Marriage and Family
On May 25, 1840, Eleanor married the Virginia planter William Henry Lee, cousin of Robert E. Lee. Her father settled the couple with a large dowry from Eleanor's mother's legacy: "a large plantation in Hinds County, Mississippi, with about 85 slaves, assessed in 1838 at the value of $122,000." They frequently stayed in Natchez for its society.
According to her sister Catherine, Eleanor never wrote another poem. In 1844 their half-sister Mary Jane Ellis LaRoche died, followed by their half-brother Thomas. Eleanor gave Catherine the editing lead for their joint volumes, and had never been as prolific. In the summer of 1849 while at the resort of Mississippi Springs, she complained of melancholy. She died of yellow fever during an epidemic that summer, at the age of 30.
Read more about this topic: Eleanor Percy Lee
Famous quotes containing the words marriage and, marriage and/or family:
“Marriage and deathless friendship, both should be inviolable and sacred: two great creative passions, separate, apart, but complementary: the one pivotal, the other adventurous: the one, marriage, the centre of human life; and the other, the leap ahead.”
—D.H. (David Herbert)
“Yes, marriage is hateful, detestable. A kind of ineffable, sickening disgust seizes my mind when I think of this most despotic, most unrequited fetter which prejudice has forged to confine its energies.”
—Percy Bysshe Shelley (1792–1822)
“With all the attention paid to your new baby, it’s easy for your own feelings and needs to get lost in the shuffle. Although all parents engage in some self-sacrifice for their children, keep in mind that your goal isn’t just to raise a happy, healthy child. You want that child to be part of a happy, healthy family as well.”
—Lawrence Kutner (20th century)