“It was a plot to deprive her of his society and shorten his life by unnecessary care and responsibility.” This was indeed about to happen, and in the agony of that hour she prostrated herself at her husband’s bedside, while her children clung around her.
The sun, on the morning of the 9th of July, 1850 rose gloriously over the White House. The President’s family and Colonel Bliss had remained by his bedside all night, refusing the indulgence of necessary repose. Each hour it was evident that the catastrophe was nearer. Mrs. Taylor would not believe that death was possible. He had escaped so many dangers, had been through so much exposure, he could not die surrounded with so many comforts and loved so intensely by his family and friends. The emotions of apprehension were so oppressive, that overtaxed nature with Mrs. Taylor found relief in fits of insensibility.
At thirty-five minutes past ten P. M., the President called his family about him, to give them his last earthly advice and bid them his last good-by. No conventional education could restrain the natural expressions of grief of the members of this afflicted household, and their heart-rending cries of agony reached the surrounding street. “I am about to die,” said the President, firmly, “I expect the summons soon. I have endeavored to discharge all my official duties faithfully. I regret nothing, but that I am about to leave my friends.”
Mrs. Taylor and family occupied the White House until the sad ceremonies of the funeral ended with the removal of the late President’s remains. The bustle and the pomp was now painful to her sight and ears, and she realized, in the fearful interval of time, how truly he was dead, who, though the nation’s successful General and a President, was to her only a cherished husband. It can easily be imagined that, as the glittering, heartless display of the Executive Mansion commenced fading away from her sight, that she must have regretfully turned to the peaceful era of her last home at Baton Rouge, and the unpretentious cottage, the neglected garden; and the simple life connected with these associations, must have appeared as a dream of happiness when contrasted with the fearful year and a half of sad experiences in Washington. From the time Mrs. Taylor left the White House, she never alluded to her residence there, except as connected with the death of her husband.
Accompanied by her daughter, Mrs. Bliss, after leaving Washington, she first sought a home among her relations in Kentucky, but finding herself oppressed by personal utterances of sympathy, she retired to the residence of her only son, near Pascagoula, Louisiana, where, in August, 1852, she died, possessed of the same Christian spirit that marked her conduct throughout her life. The sudden and lamented death of Major Bliss soon followed, and without children by her marriage “Miss Betty Taylor,” as she must ever be known in history, studiously sought the retirement of private life, and found it in the accomplished circles of the “old families of Virginia,” with so many of whom she was connected by ties of blood. By a second marriage, her historical name passed away. But when the traditions and histories of the White House have the romance of time thrown around them, Miss Betty Taylor will be recalled to mind, and for her will there be a sympathy that is associated with youth, for she was the youngest of the few women of America who have a right to the title of Hostess of the President’s House.
MRS. ABIGAIL FILLMORE.
XVII.
ABIGAIL FILLMORE.
Abigail Powers, the youngest child of Lemuel Powers, a prominent Baptist clergyman of that day, was born in Stillwater, Saratoga county, New York, March, 1798.
Dr. Powers was of Massachusetts descent, being one of the nine thousand six hundred and twenty-four descendants of Henry Leland, of Sherburne, and a cousin and life-long friend of the eccentric and talented John Leland. Though not a wealthy man, he yet possessed a competence, and his profession was the most honored and respected of all pursuits.