With all her appreciation of admiration, she was not extravagant; her house, during the time of Mr. Jefferson’s term, was very plainly furnished, and in no way elegant. Like most Virginians, she delighted in company, and her home was the most hospitable abode in Washington. Her table was her pride; and the multiplicity of dishes, and their size, was a subject of ridicule to a foreign minister, who observed “that it was more like a harvest-home supper, than the entertainment of a Secretary of State.” She heard of this and similar remarks, and only observed with a smile, “that she thought abundance was preferable to elegance; that circumstances formed customs, and customs formed taste; and as the profusion so repugnant to foreign customs arose from the happy circumstance of the superabundance and prosperity of our country, she did not hesitate to sacrifice the delicacy of European taste for the less elegant, but more liberal fashion of Virginia.” But this time of prosperity was doomed, and war insatiate was already treading upon the shores of the Atlantic. Mr. Madison, the peace-loving, humane Executive, was compelled to declare war with Great Britain; and after a time its actual presence was felt at the National Capital. June, 1812, is memorable as the second appeal of the United States to arms, to assert once more the rights of its freemen; and for three years its fierceness was felt from Canada to New Orleans, and over the blue waters of the oceans of the world.
“Generous British sentiments revolted at the destruction of the American Capital: which might not have been branded with universal infamy if confined to navy yards, warlike implements, vessels of war, and even private rope-walks, if the enormity had stopped there. But no warfare can satisfy its abominable lust with impunity on libraries, public and private, halls of legislation, residences of magistrates, buildings of civil government, objects of art, seats of peace, and embodiments of rational patriotic pride. The day before the fall of Washington was one of extreme alarm: the Secretary of State wrote to the President: ‘The enemy are advanced six miles on the road to the wood-yard, and our troops are retreating, you had better remove the records.’ Then commenced the panic which was destined to grow more general the coming day. Tuesday night every clerk was busy packing and aiding in the removal of valuables. Coarse linen bags were provided, and late in the evening, after all the work was over, and the bags were hanging round the room, ready at a moment’s warning to be moved, Mr. Pleasanton, one of the clerks, procured conveyances, and crossing the Potomac, deposited them in a mill three miles off. But fearing for their safety, he determined to go farther into the interior, and the next night slept at Leesburg, a small town thirty-five miles from Washington. The light that shone against the cloudless sky revealed the fate of the city, and the doom of his charge had they delayed. Amongst the documents were the original Declaration of Independence, the Federal Constitution, and General Washington’s commission as Commander-in-chief of the Army of the Revolution, which he relinquished when he resigned it at Annapolis (found among the rubbish of a garret). Scarcely had the wagon that bore the papers crossed the wooden bridge of the Potomac, than crowds of flying fugitives, men, women and children, pressed upon it in such numbers as to render the threatened danger almost imminent. The frightened multitude swayed to and fro, seeking means of escape till night closed the horrible drama; then upon Capitol Hill appeared the red-coated soldiery of the British army. The sun sank beneath the golden sheen of fleecy clouds that floated softly over the southern horizon, but the going down of the king of day in nowise relieved the atmosphere. Dust and heat were intolerable, and a rumor that the water was poisoned rendered the sufferings of the weary soldiers painful in the extreme. For the seventh time that day a retreat was commanded, and the city troops, mortified and enraged, refused to obey. Back from the city to the heights of Georgetown was the order; but how could they leave their families, their homes and property, and march by those they were sworn to protect! Down the long, broad, and solitary avenue, past the President’s now deserted house, through Georgetown, and some as far as Tenlytown, the disorganized, demoralized remnant of the army strayed, and slept on the ground, lighted up by the fiery red glare from the burning buildings in Washington. All night they lay alarmed and distressed, while but few could steal a moment’s repose. The bursting shells in the navy yard were heard for miles, and each boom was a knell to the agonizing hearts, who knew not where their helpless ones were in this hour of horrors. When the British marched slowly into the wilderness city, by the lurid light that shot up from the blazing capitol, the population had dwindled down to a few stragglers and the slaves of the absent residents. The houses, scattered over a large space, were shut, and no sign of life was visible. The President had crossed the Potomac early in the afternoon, and Mrs. Madison had followed in another direction. The bayonets of the British guard gleamed as they filed down the avenue, and the fulminations from the navy yard saluted them as they passed. Nothing but the prayers and entreaties of the ladies, and the expostulations of the nearest residents, deterred the British General Ross from blowing up the Capitol; but he ordered it to be fired at every point, and many houses near it were consumed. A house hard by, owned by General Washington, was destroyed, which, in justice to human nature be it said, the General regretted. Not so the Admiral, who ordered the troops to fire a volley in the windows of the Capitol, and then entered to plunder. I have, indeed, to this hour (said Mr. Richard Rush, in 1855), the vivid impression upon my eye of columns of flame and smoke ascending throughout the night of the 24th of August from the Capitol, President’s house, and other public edifices, as the whole were on fire, some burning slowly, others with bursts of flame and sparks mounting high up in the dark horizon. This never can be forgotten by me, as I accompanied out of the city, on that memorable night, in 1814, President Madison, Mr. Jones, then Secretary of the Navy, General Mason, of Anacostia Island, Mr. Charles Carroll, of Bellevue, and Mr. Tench Ringgold. If at intervals the dismal sight was lost to our view, we got it again from some hill-top or eminence where we paused to look at it.”
It was among the stories when Congress met near the ruins three weeks afterward, that the Admiral in a strain of coarse levity, mounting the Speaker’s chair, put the question, “Shall this harbor of Yankee democracy be burned?” and when the mock resolution was declared unanimous, it was carried into effect by heaping combustibles under the furniture. The temporary wooden structure, connecting the two wings, readily kindled. Doors, chairs, the library and its contents, in an upper room of the Senate-wing, everything that would take fire, soon disappeared in sheets of flame, illuminating and consternating the environs for thirty miles around, whence the conflagration was visible. Through “the eternal Pennsylvania Avenue,” the Admiral and General led their elated troops, where but a few hours before the flying, scattered Americans, dismayed, ashamed, and disgusted, had wended their sorrowing way. The Capitol behind them was wrapt in its winding robes of flame, and on through the darkness they passed to that other house of the nation.
An aged lady lived in the nearest residence to the Presidential Mansion, and here the ruffianly Cockburn and the quiet, sad General Ross halted and ordered supper, which they ate by the light of the burning buildings. A letter written by Mrs. Madison to her sister at Mount Vernon, gives us an insight into her feelings, at this time of trial and danger.
“Tuesday, August 23d, 1814.
“Dear Sister:—My husband left me yesterday morning to join General Winder. He inquired anxiously whether I had courage or firmness to remain in the President’s House until his return, on the morrow or succeeding day, and on my assurance that I had no fear but for him and the success of our army, he left me, beseeching me to take care of myself, and of the Cabinet papers, public and private. I have since received two dispatches from him written with a pencil; the last is alarming, because he desires that I should be ready at a moment’s warning to enter my carriage and leave the city; that the enemy seemed stronger than had been reported, and that it might happen that they would reach the city with intention to destroy it. * * * I am accordingly ready; I have pressed as many Cabinet papers into trunks as to fill one carriage; our private property must be sacrificed, as it is impossible to procure wagons for its transportation. I am determined not to go myself, until I see Mr. Madison safe and he can accompany me—as I hear of much hostility toward him. * * * Disaffection stalks around us. * * My friends and acquaintances are all gone, even Colonel C., with his hundred men, who were stationed as a guard in this enclosure. * * French John (a faithful domestic) with his usual activity and resolution, offers to spike the cannon at the gate, and lay a train of powder which would blow up the British, should they enter the house. To the last proposition I positively object, without being able, however, to make him understand why all advantages in war may not be taken.
“Wednesday morning, twelve o’clock.—Since sunrise I have been turning my spy-glass in every direction and watching with unwearied anxiety, hoping to discover the approach of my dear husband and his friends; but, alas! I can descry only groups of military wandering in all directions, as if there was a lack of arms, or of spirit, to fight for their own firesides!
“Three o’clock.—Will you believe it, my sister? we have had a battle or skirmish near Bladensburg, and I am still here within sound of the cannon! Mr. Madison comes not; may God protect him! Two messengers covered with dust come to bid me fly; but I wait for him. * * * At this late hour a wagon has been procured; I have had it filled with the plate and most valuable portable articles belonging to the house; whether it will reach its destination, the Bank of Maryland, or fall into the hands of British soldiery, events must determine. Our kind friend, Mr. Carroll, has come to hasten my departure, and is in a very bad humor with me because I insist on waiting until the large picture of General Washington is secured, and it requires to be unscrewed from the wall. This process was found too tedious for these perilous moments; I have ordered the frame to be broken and the canvas taken out; it is done—and the precious portrait placed in the hands of two gentlemen of New York for safekeeping. And now, my dear sister, I must leave this house, or the retreating army will make me a prisoner in it, by filling up the road I am directed to take. When I shall again write to you, or where I shall be to-morrow, I cannot tell!”
On the removal of the seat of government to Washington, in 1800, a magnificent portrait of General Washington, painted by Stuart partly, and completed by Winstanley, to whom President John Adams’ son-in-law, Colonel Smith, stood for the unfinished limbs and body, hung in the state dining-room. Colonel Washington Parke Custis, of Arlington, a grandson of Mrs. Washington, called at the President’s to save this picture of his illustrious grandfather, in whose house he was reared. Then, as now, it was one of the very few ornaments which adorned the White House, and at the risk of capture Mrs. Madison determined to save it. The servants of the house broke with an axe the heavy gilt frame which protected the inner one of wood, upon which the canvas was stretched, and removed, uninjured, the painting, leaving the broken fragments screwed to the wall, which had held in place the valued relic. Mrs. Madison then left the house, and the portrait was taken by Mr. Baker beyond Georgetown and placed in a secure position.
Half a century later, when the White House was undergoing a renovation, this portrait was sent, with many others subsequently added to this solitary painting, to be cleaned and the frame burnished. The artist found on examination that the canvas had never been cut, since the rusted tacks, time-worn frame, and the size compared with the original picture, was the most conclusive evidence that Mrs. Madison did not cut it out with a carving-knife, as many traditions have industriously circulated.