When little Kate was nearly four years old Mrs. Saxton, mother of Mrs. McKinley, died. The blow was a peculiarly severe one, for within a month her second child, also a girl, was born—but to close her eyes on the earth almost as soon as she had opened them. They named her Ida, the father hoping in the brief days of the delicate little life that the child would bring back vigor and interest in existence to the depressed wife, whose grief at the death of her own mother was scarcely assuaged.
But in this gentle hope he was doomed to disappointment, for little Ida faded from among them. And then the third great blow fell, for a few weeks after the baby’s death little Kate sickened and died.
Ida Saxton had been a strong, healthy girl. She was not delicate of physique; and while she was in no sense buxom or amazonian, she was far from frail. Yet the accumulated shocks and sorrows of those sad days completely unstrung her. And the woman who deserved and might have had a world of happiness, a heaven of domestic joy on earth, never again was blest with health.
No more children came to them, but their home has always catered to the rippling laughter and the joyous songs of young life. Even to the end, even on that last day at Buffalo, when horror leaped from the heart of happiness, there were young people with them. But in that hour of his wife’s great trial, when he could not share her suffering, nor take an iota from the black pall of grief which enveloped her, William McKinley began a life of devotion a thousand times more gentle and kind than the intensest courtship of a lover. And through all the long years that have followed—for twenty-four long years—he has never wavered night nor day in the most assiduous care a husband can possibly bestow. No time has been so hurried, no demand of politics so exacting, no weariness so heavy that he has failed to remember her. If near her, he has gone to her, and expressed by his presence the thoughtful love which he felt. If she were absent he has always sent her a message. And, however brief, however little he might have to say that would interest her, he has kept strong and true that faith in her wifely heart that he would “love, cherish and protect” her in an infinitely more tender way than any vow could bind him.
For a while after the death of the little girls Mrs. McKinley concluded she wanted to live near “Mother McKinley,” and they two took a couple of rooms in the house of the elders. Her own mother was dead, and the grief-stricken woman sorely needed the strong, steadfast hand and hearty comfort of that fine old matron who had done so much in building the character of a grand American.
But presently Major McKinley found a new interest with which he hoped to distract his wife’s mind from the cloud of sorrows that would not lift. He was building a house. He was establishing a home of their very own. And in the occupation of watching the workmen her spirits came back again. She could not regain her physical health, and never has. But the clouds were dispelled, and the old cheerful, happy look came back to the blue eyes, and the fair face again resumed its wonted roundness of outline and sweetness of expression. And these have never again departed.
Of course no man deserves praise or credit for kindness to his wife; and when her illness renders attention the more necessary, there is still less reason for indulging in adulatory phrases. But in the case of William McKinley there is, even with the most undemonstrative, warrant for expressing the admiration which every good man and true woman must certainly feel.
In spite of a physical weakness which stubbornly clung to the little woman, the home life of Major and Mrs. McKinley has always been singularly happy. She loved children, as has been said, and always had them around her. She loved music; and there has always been singing and the best of instrumentalists at her home. She loved roses; and the house has always been a bower of floral beauty and of perfume.
In time a larger house was builded, and into it the family removed. It was really but an extending of the dwelling which had been their home in the old days. And it is the house to which unnumbered thousands made pilgrimages in 1896. It will be understood that Mrs. McKinley possessed a fortune in her own right. Her father died late in the seventies, following his wife’s demise; and the Saxton estate was divided between three heirs—a sister, a brother, and Mrs. McKinley. But the man who could attend her with all the solicitude of a mother was not the man to use a dollar he had not earned. When financial disaster came upon him, in 1893, his wife—for once opposing his will—turned over all her property for the benefit of those creditors whom a security debt had created. The good home went too. And the man who had done so much for his country, who was so nearly a model of American manhood, began paying rent as at the beginning. The debts were all wiped out, absolutely; and Mrs. McKinley’s estate was released to her, and the old home became again the property of the man who had earned it, and who so richly deserved it. But even in that hour of a new tribulation, he never faltered in his loving care for his wife, or the filial considerateness he had always paid his mother.
When that mother fell ill and died, her son had reached the highest honor the greatest nation can bestow. But he hurried from the presidential mansion to her bedside at Canton, and sorrowfully followed her to the grave.