Lucy Hayes was born to be a mother.
Lucy: Girl to Woman
Lucy Ware Webb (1831-1889) was born and raised in Chillicothe OH, when the state was becoming a major industrial force in the country. In-home manufacturing was declining and large factories were beginning. The population was exploding, and towns and cities were growing.
Perhaps the most remarkable thing about Lucy’s childhood is that she was raised by a single mother. Her father, a doctor, had died while treating friends and patients during a cholera epidemic. Lucy was two, and had no memory of him. Her mother, a devout Methodist, Maria Cook Webb never remarried, and raised Lucy and her two older brothers alone.
Education was first and foremost on the agenda during Lucy’s early years. Higher learning was a given for her older brothers. In the 1830s, well-born girls were expected to read and write and do sums, but serious academic knowledge was not a common part of the picture. Except to Mrs. Webb. She had become a great admirer of Lucy Stone, an early advocate of higher education for women. As a particularly good student, Lucy Webb was permitted to audit classes at Ohio Wesleyan University (where her brothers attended); when she was fifteen or sixteen, she attended Cincinnati Wesleyan Female College, one of the few institutions of higher learning available to women. She graduated in 1850.
She first met Rutherford Birchard Hayes a few years earlier. He was ten years her senior, and had graduated Kenyon College, and Harvard Law School. Like Lucy, he had been raised by a single mother. His father had died two months before he was born. Interesting enough, Mrs. Hayes and Mrs. Webb had become acquainted, and subsequently good friends. When Lucy was 19, her acquaintance with “Rud” was renewed on a different level. She was now a pretty young woman, with soft manners that belied a strong sense of moral fiber and purpose. He was enchanted.
Marriage and Motherhood
Lucy married Rutherford B. Hayes in 1852. He had been fast-tracked as an attorney from the start. His bachelor uncle Sardis Birchard, who had been a father-figure to him from infancy, was a prominent and well-to-do Ohio businessman, happy to turn over his legal matters to his capable nephew. While the Hayeses were never wealthy, they would always be comfortably fixed throughout their lives.
Lucy and Rud had eight children, five of whom lived to maturity. Her “higher learning” notwithstanding, she was content being Mrs. Hayes. Her obvious education and scholarly interests made her an asset to her husband, and an adept hostess for their growing social set.
As a couple, they were both ardently opposed to slavery and just as ardently opposed to secession. And they both supported the growing temperance movement. As an aside, Rutherford Hayes was known to bend a convivial elbow with his fellows while he was a student, but it was occasional – and when he met Lucy, it was not hard for him to renounce spirits altogether.
But first and foremost, Lucy was a caring mother, who enhanced and mentored her children’s education. It was a happy situation all the way around.
The Civil War Years
When the Civil War began in 1861, Rutherford Hayes was 40, a successful attorney, and father of three sons – with another on the way. He was certainly eligible to be deferred from military service. Nevertheless, he wanted to enlist, eagerly supported by his wife, and especially since Lucy and the children were well looked after by Uncle Sardis. He signed on as a major, adapted to military life quickly and ably, promoted to Colonel, and then to Brigadier General of the Ohio 23rd Regiment.
Wives encamping (whether long or short term) with their husbands during the Civil War was not uncommon, particularly among the officers. Lucy visited her husband on several occasions when active fighting was at a lull.
There is one story that Lucy was visiting his encampment, sitting outside his tent mending his shirt or sewing his buttons on. A young private passed by and was advised by one of his fellow enlistees (perhaps as a joke), that the motherly-looking woman he saw would be happy to sew on his missing buttons. The private returned with a few shirts needing repair. Mrs. Hayes was happy to oblige. When the private returned to pay her later in the day, she said there was no charge. It was not until later that he was astounded to learn that the “General’s wife” was the seamstress.
The Injured Part
General Hayes was a somewhat rarity among Civil War Generals: amateur soldiers (no military training) who proved to be brave and capable officers. He saw active duty, and was injured four separate times – once seriously. When he was injured, Lucy came immediately to personally care for him, and more importantly, free others for more pressing duties.
In September, 1862, not far from Antietam, Hayes was hit in the arm by a musket ball, and despite insisting he would remain with his army, he was carried by his men to a surgical tent for immediate treatment. To delay would likely have required amputation. Lucy was notified at once, but due to confusion (she believed he was in Washington), it took her several days before she located him – in Maryland. She took over his nursing care, and continued making frequent visits to his army camps for the rest of the war, which invariably included numerous inspections of the field hospitals.
Her devotion to the Ohio 23rd won her the lifelong affection of its members, who remembered her sitting with the wounded soldiers, re-settling their blankets and pillows, mopping feverish brows, or coaxing them to a spoonful of soup.
Demonstrating Affection
Once the Civil War ended, army reunions became a tradition for decades. For the rest of her life, Lucy and her husband never missed an occasion whenever the Ohio 23rd got together. Both of them were generous supporters of veterans’ groups, and war widows and orphans organizations.
And when President and Mrs. Hayes celebrated their 25th (Silver) Wedding Anniversary in the White House, a huge, specially engraved silver serving tray was presented to them – from the members of the Ohio 23rd.
Sources:
Anthony, Carl Sferrazza – First Ladies 1789-1961, William Morrow,1990
Geer, Emily Apt – First Lady: The Life of Lucy Webb Hayes – Kent State University Press, 1984
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