Fragments

On this day in 1619, Elizabeth Stuart, Electress Palatine (through marriage), eldest daughter of King James VI of Scotland and I of England and Anne of Denmark, and granddaughter of Mary Queen of Scots, was crowned Queen of Bohemia, just a few days after her husband Frederick had been crowned King. 

Elizabeth Stuart

Frederick’s reign was unfortunately short, and two were driven into exile at the Hague.  Because of her brief reign, Elizabeth was nicknamed the “Winter Queen.”  After Frederick died in 1632, Elizabeth remained in Holland; but after the English monarchy was restored in 1660, Elizabeth returned there and remained in England until her death in 1662. 

Sophia of Hanover

Elizabeth’s youngest daughter, Sophia of Hanover, ultimately became, through a series of developments too convoluted to detail in a “fragment,” heiress presumptive to her cousin Queen Anne of England and Ireland.  Sophia never became Queen because she died a few weeks before Anne, but her eldest son became King George I. All British monarchs since then have been descendents of Elizabeth Stuart.

On this date in 1916, Jeannette Rankin (1880 – 1973) became the first woman to be elected to the United States House of Representatives. Rankin is the only woman to have ever been elected to Congress from Montana.

A social worker by training, Rankin was also suffragist and devout pacifist.  She voted against United States entry into both World Wars; her extremely unpopular vote against World War II ultimately resulted in her retirement from Congress.

Both as Congresswoman and later as a lobbyist, Rankin was a champion of legislation to provide government funding for health clinics, midwife education and visiting nurse programs, with the goal of reducing infant mortality.  Rankin was a founding officer of the American Civil Liberties Union, and later became a leader in the anti-Vietnam-War movement.  The foundation created in her name still provides scholarships for low income women.

Poetry Cupboard ~ Ella Wheeler Wilcox

Love lights more fires
Than hate extinguishes.

On this date in 1850, American author and poet Ella Wheeler Wilcox was born on a farm in my home state.

I’m interested in Wheeler Wilcox for a couple of reasons, the first one being the local connection. Another reason is that she was one of three American Nineteenth Century poets who were the subject of a doctoral dissertation written by my daughter’s aunt several years ago.

Wheeler Wilcox was considered something of a sentimentalist, and a popular poet, rather than a literary one, who made substantial amounts of money from her poetry. I happen to own an ornately embossed volume of Wheeler Wilcox’s poetry, published in 1901, that I found years ago at a used book store. These lines from the poem “Maurine,” which is also the name of the book, certainly display a sentimental turn of mind:

The moon went down, slow sailing from my sight,
And left the stars to watch away the night.
O stars, sweet stars, so changeless and serene!
What depths of woe your pitying eyes have seen!
The proud sun sets, and leaves us with our sorrow,
To grope alone in darkness till the morrow.
The languid moon, e’en if she deigns to rise,
Soon seeks her couch, grown weary of our sighs;
But from the early gloaming till the day
Sends golden-liveried heralds forth to say
He comes in might; the patient stars shine on,
Steadfast and faithful, from twilight to dawn.

Wheeler Wilcox came from an impoverished background. Her mother sought solace in literature, with the result that Wheeler Wilcox began writing both prose and poetry at an early age. She wrote a multi-chapter novel at the age of eleven and earned her first commission for writing when she was fourteen. Following high school, she spent one miserable year in college and then began writing both prose and poetry for a living.

One source that I looked at described Wheeler Wilcox’s writing as follows:

Ella wrote about love, optimism, marriage, temperance, the labor movement, classless society, history, life crises, and more. Much of her prose consists of moral platitudes, little sketches of about 500 words. She often wrote about letters she had received from readers: she was the Dear Abby and Ann Landers of her day. Those of us who have been criticized for using platitudes can certainly appreciate her platitudinous statement about platitudes in 'Women Who Want to Succeed': that all successful people know the important platitudes ….

Isn’t that the truth?

When Wheeler Wilcox was 28, she married Robert Wilcox; together they explored various schools of thinking, including “Theosophy,” “New Thought,” and “Spiritualism.” The couple had a very interesting pact that whoever died first would come back and communicate with the other. When Robert Wilcox died in 1916 and did not return as Ella expected him to do, she traveled to California, seeking counsel from the leader of the Rosicrucian Philosophy, Max Heindel. These words from her description of this meeting reminds me eerily of my own thoughts whenever I hear a story about how Jesus has appeared to someone on a piece of toast, or the Virgin Mary has appeared as a stain on a wall:

I replied that it seemed strange to me that an omnipotent God could not send a flash of his light into a suffering world to bring its conviction when most needed.

Heindel’s response essentially was that Robert Wilcox would only reappear when Ella’s tumultous grief had quieted. Ella took this advice to heart, even composing a mantra in which she repeated over and over:

I am ready, God: I am ready, Christ: I am ready, Robert.

Despite these careful preparations, however, I have never heard that Robert Wilcox ever reappeared to comfort his widow.

Wilcox was very popular within the “New Thought” movement, and as mentioned above, her writings demonstrate a blending of various schools of thought, including a belief in reincarnation. She is perhaps best known for the lines that begin her poem “Solitude,” which was composed after a chance encounter with a grieving widow while traveling to the Governor’s inaugural ball in 1883:

Laugh and the world laughs with you,
Weep, and you weep alone;
The good old earth must borrow its mirth,
But has trouble enough of its own.

Ella Wheeler Wilcox died of cancer in 1919. Although Wheeler Wilcox is now considered an obscure minor poet, her words quoted at the top of this post are preserved for posterity as an inscription on a paving slab in Jack Kerouac Alley, next to the City Lights Bookstore, in San Francisco.

Fragments ~ Mary of Orange

On this day in 1631, Mary Henrietta Stuart, Princess Royal, Princess of Orange and Countess of Nassau -- more commonly called Mary of Orange -- was born at St. James's Palace in London.

Never a queen herself, Mary was nevertheless both daughter of a king (Charles I of England and Ireland) and mother of a king (William III of England and Ireland, and II of Scotland).

While Mary was still quite young, she was highly sought after on the royal marriage market. In 1641, at the age of ten, she married Willem, son and heir to the Prince of Orange. However, Mary's husband then returned to Europe, and it is thought that the marriage was not consummated for some time after that.

In 1642, Mary's father Charles I gave her the title of "Princess Royal," a title that is now traditionally bestowed on the eldest daughter of a monarch, especially when there are male heirs (Mary had two brothers). Charles created the title to imitate the French tradition of calling the eldest daughter of a king "Madame Royale." That same year, Mary and her mother Queen Henrietta Maria crossed over to the Dutch republic, where Mary joined her father-in-law's household and began her active public life.

In 1647 Mary's husband Willem succeeded his father to his various titles (including Prince of Orange). In 1650, just after trying to take over Amsterdam, Willem died of smallpox; their only child (Willem, later William III) was born a few days later. Without her husband's protection, Mary became quite unpopular, owing primarily to her Stuart loyalties and the welcome she gave to her brothers in exile, Charles II and the Duke of York (later James II). Mary was forced for some time to share the guardianship of her son with his grandmother; but in 1657 she became regent, on his behalf, of the principality of Orange. Mary then sought assistance from Louis XIV of France to deal with her difficult Dutch relations; ironically, however, Louis seized the opportunity to grab control of Orange.

Mary's brother (Charles II) was ultimately restored as King, and she and Willem returned to England in 1660; unfortunately, however, she died of smallpox the same year. Politics being what they were in those days, Willem ultimately ascended to the British throne (as William III) in 1689, but only after his uncle James II was deposed.

William III reigned jointly with his second wife, Mary II (pictured above). They are the "William and Mary" after whom counties and colleges have been named in this country ....

.... including the College of William and Mary, which they chartered in 1693 as the second college in the American colonies.