Queer questions and ready replies

by Samuel Grant Oliphant

266. What President married the same lady twice?

In the summer of 1791, Andrew Jackson married Mrs. Rachel Robards, a daughter of Col. John Donelson, of Virginia, one of the founders of Tennessee. Her first husband was Mr. Lewis Robards, of Kentucky. Robards and his wife were boarding with Mrs. Donelson, then a widow, when Jackson arrived at Nashville, and took up his residence in the same family. In 1790–1791, Robards applied to the Legislature of Virginia for an act preliminary to a divorce, stating that his wife was living in adultery with Andrew Jackson. The act was passed, under it a jury was summoned late in 1793, and the court of Mercer County, Ky., declared the marriage between Lewis Robards and Rachael Robards dissolved. Jackson and Mrs. Robards believed the act passed by the Legislature was itself a divorce, and they were married at Natchez two years before the action of the court. At the suggestion of their friend Judge Overton, who also was surprised to learn that the act of the Legislature had not divorced Robards, they procured a license in January, 1794, and had the ceremony performed again. When Gen. Jackson had become the chief of a great party, the circumstances of this marriage led to very serious misrepresentations. Robards was prone to jealousy without cause, and Jackson was not the first man of whom he was jealous. His statement to the Legislature of Virginia is believed to have been wholly unfounded. His relatives all sided with his wife, and never supposed her to be guilty of even an act of impropriety.

267. Why is Alaska so called?

In the dialect of the natives first encountered by the Russian explorers, the land was called Al-ay-es-ka, “the great land.” From this the present name has become changed through Aliaska and Alaksa to its present form.

268. Who was the nearest common ancestor of nearly all the reigning monarchs of Europe?

John of Gaunt (1339–1399), fourth son of Edward III. of England, although he himself was never a king, nor were any of his brothers or sisters even sovereigns, was the common ancestor of nearly all the crowned heads of Christendom. The monarchs descended from him are Victoria, Queen of England, who is of the sixteenth generation; Louis I., King of Portugal, of the fifteenth generation; Alphonzo XII., the late King of Spain, of the sixteenth generation; Francis Joseph I., Emperor of Austria, of the fifteenth generation; Leopold II., King of Belgium, of the seventeenth generation; Christian IX., King of Denmark, of the sixteenth generation; Humbert, King of Italy, of the sixteenth generation; George I., King of Greece, of the seventeenth generation; Alexander III., Emperor of Russia, of the eighteenth generation; William I., Emperor of Germany, of the sixteenth generation; Dom Pedro II., Emperor of Brazil, is of the fourteenth generation, the nearest of kin to the English progenitor; the late Chambord (Henry V.), claimant of the French throne, was of the sixteenth generation; and Louis Philippe Albert, Prince d’Orleans, the Orleanist claimant of the French throne, is of the seventeenth generation.

269. Who was the “Red Prince”?

Prince Frederick Charles Nicholas, of Germany (1828–1885), a nephew of Emperor William I., was so called from his favorite attire,—the scarlet uniform of his Brandenburg Hussars, which he loved far more than the full glitter of his highest honors.

270. Why is New Jersey called a foreign country?

In the early days of railways the New Jersey Legislature chartered the Camden and Amboy Railroad, but neglected to impose a tax upon its earnings or plant. A few years later, when it became a valuable property, the State, unable to modify the charter, levied a State tax upon each passenger carried. This tax fell upon travellers who lived outside the State as well as Jerseymen, and the former, because they were taxed to pass through it, facetiously termed New Jersey a foreign country.