Upcoming Book on Keckly

[Laurie Verge]

Just received word that there will be another book on Elizabeth Keckly coming this winter. Entitled Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker, it is being authored by Jennifer Chiaverini and will be in novel form. It will be interesting to see what can be factually added to the story beyong what Mrs. Keckly herself wrote and the excellent work that Jennifer Fleischner did about 6-7 years ago.

[BettyO]

(09-11-2012 11:15 AM)Laurie Verge Wrote:  Just received word that there will be another book on Elizabeth Keckly coming this winter. Entitled Mrs. Lincoln's Dressmaker, it is being authored by Jennifer Chiaverini and will be in novel form. It will be interesting to see what can be factually added to the story beyong what Mrs. Keckly herself wrote and the excellent work that Jennifer Fleischner did about 6-7 years ago.

Sounds good, Laurie!

[Rsmyth]

Maybe she will include your undertaking in marking her grave.

[L Verge]

Let's hope Rich - and please say OUR undertaking in marking the grave since you were the one who located the reinterment site for us.

[RJNorton]

[Laurie Verge]

Thanks for posting this. It is the program for the tombstone dedication at Mrs. Keckly's grave. Her remains were moved from their original grave back in the 1950s when Colombian Harmony Cemetery went backrupt and was sold to developers. The developers agreed to move the graves, but not the monuments for each.

Mrs. Keckly was moved to New Harmony Cemetery in Landover, Maryland, but for years researchers thought she was either in a mass grave or at least an unmarked grave. Former cemetery officials were not helpful in trying to locate her site. Rich was doing his prolific gravesite research and stumbled upon a cooperative person at New Harmony who found the records for him.

He contacted the Surratt House, and we began a campaign to mark her grave. With the cooperation of The Lincoln Forum, Black Women of Fairfax County, our Surratt Society, and a multitude of donors, we were able to raise $6000 to provide a bronze marker. Visit http://www.surratt.org and click on the Keckly link to see the result.

Because of the publicity that the Washington Post gave us, Surratt House was contacted by the National Park Service with a request to nominate Mrs. Keckly to their Underground Railroad Network to Freedom Initiative for the tremendous amount of work that she did in assisting contraband that swarmed into D.C. during the Civil War. Our research librarian, Sandra Walia, prepared the paperwork, and we were informed this past March that Mrs. Keckly has now been added to the Initiative. We were recently contacted by staff from the proposed Smithsonian African American History Museum for assistance because Mrs. Keckly will be part of an exhibit on African American designers.

We're getting a reputation as a provider of tombstones. We first marked the grave of Edman Spangler in the old St. Peter's Cemetery near the Dr. Mudd House; then came Mrs. Keckly's project. This past June we successfully finished a campaign to mark the grave of Frederick Aiken in Oak Hill Cemetery in Washington, D.C. Frederick was Mrs. Surratt's defense lawyer.