Tennessee Celeste Claflin - End of Life

End of Life

“The two once-inseparable sisters had been estranged for years. Tennessee’s marriage to Francis Cook had been an unhappy one. Early on, Victoria recognized Cook as ‘an old man libertine’ who, she said, ‘openly insulted’ Tennessee and boasted about it. Under John Martin ’s guidance, Victoria had distanced herself from her sister’s domestic troubles and had remained distant even after Cook died in 1901. Tennie appeared to grieve neither the loss of her husband nor the separation from her sister. She died on January 18, 1923, in England at the home of her grandniece Lady Utica Celeste Beecham at the age of seventy-seven. She left no will. “Lady Cook… best known to the elder generation of Americans as the radical, beautiful Tennessee Claflin. In the early days of the suffrage movement, as Tennie Claflin, with Susan B. Anthony and Lucretia Mott, she led a delegation of women before the United States Senate, and demanded the right to vote. She also nominated Lucretia Mott for President of the United States. She once held the unique position of colonel of a regiment of negroes.” “Many New Yorkers have almost forgotten that Lady Cook was Miss Tennessee Claflin, women’s rights champion, writer, banker, broker, successful Wall Street speculator, and all-around new woman, who with her sister, Victoria Woodhull, startled two continents with their daring.”