Life Prior To The Civil War
Rose Greenhow was born in 1817 in Port Tobacco, Maryland, as Maria Rosetta O'Neal. Her father, John O'Neal, was murdered by his slaves in 1817. His widow, Eliza O'Neal, was left with four daughters and a cash-poor farm to manage. Orphaned as a child, Greenhow was invited to live with her aunt in Washington, D.C. as a teenager. Her aunt, Maria Ann Hill, ran a stylish boarding house at the Old Capitol building, and Greenhow was introduced to important figures in the Washington area. When she was a young woman, Greenhow was considered beautiful, educated, loyal, compassionate, and refined. Her olive skin and rosy complexion earned her the nickname "Wild Rose."
In the 1830s, she met Dr. Robert Greenhow. Their courtship was well received by the society of Washington, especially by famed society matron Dolley Madison. In 1833, Rose's sister Ellen married Dolley's nephew James Madison Cutts, and their daughter Adele would later marry Stephen A. Douglas. In 1835, Rose married Dr. Greenhow, with Dolley's blessing. Greenhow's husband taught her history and gave her access to government documents through his work in the U.S. Department of State.
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Famous quotes containing the words civil war, life, prior, civil and/or war:
“He was high and mighty. But the kindest creature to his slaves—and the unfortunate results of his bad ways were not sold, had not to jump over ice blocks. They were kept in full view and provided for handsomely in his will. His wife and daughters in the might of their purity and innocence are supposed never to dream of what is as plain before their eyes as the sunlight, and they play their parts of unsuspecting angels to the letter.”
—Anonymous Antebellum Confederate Women. Previously quoted by Mary Boykin Chesnut in Mary Chesnut’s Civil War, edited by C. Vann Woodward (1981)
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