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Young Theodore Roosevelt’s pocket diaries tell of
the depth of his love for his first wife, Alice Hathaway Lee, and the
depth of his grief when Alice died at age 22, two days after giving birth
to their daughter, and just hours after his mother died…on this day
in 1884.
Images of selected pages from the diaries are available at the American
Treasures online exhibit at the Library of Congress Web site. 21-year-old
Theodore and 18-year-old Alice were betrothed in January, 1880, and would
be married in October of the same year, on Roosevelt’s 22nd birthday.
Here are a few excerpts from Roosevelt’s journal, written during
the engagement period…
Tuesday, February 3, 1880 – “Snowing heavily, but I drove over
in my sleigh to Chestnut Hill, the horse plunging to his belly in the
great drifts…My sweet life was just as loveable and pretty as ever;
it seems hardly possible that I can kiss her and hold her in my arms;
she is so pure and so innocent, and so very, very pretty. I have never
done anything to deserve such good fortune.”
Friday, February 13, 1880 – “In the evening was all the time
with my darling Little Sunshine; she is so marvelously sweet, and pure
and loveable and pretty that I seem to love her more and more every time
I see her, though I love her so much now that I really can not lover her
more. I do not think ever a man loved a woman more than I love her; for
a year and a quarter now I have never (even when hunting) gone to sleep
or waked up without thinking of her; and I doubt if an hour has passed
that I have not thought of her…”
Saturday, February 14, 1880 – “Drove back to Cambridge in the
morning; announced my engagement to the club, and “set up” champagne…”
Four years later, the day his mother died of typhoid fever and his young
wife died of Bright’s disease, both at the Roosevelt home in New
York City, Theodore wrote a single sentence in his diary…
Thursday, February 14, 1884 – “The light has gone out of my
life.”
Saturday, February 16, 1884 – “Alice Hathaway Lee. Born at Chestnut
Hill, July 29th, 1861. I saw her first on Oct 1878; I wooed her for over
a year before I won her…”
Sunday, February, 17, 1884 – “…on February 14th she died
in my arms; and my mother had died in the same house, on the same day,
but a few hours previously. On Feb 16th they were buried together in Greenwood.
On Feb 17th I christened the baby Alice Lee Roosevelt. For joy or for
sorrow my life has now been lived out.”
Soon Roosevelt would place his infant daughter Alice in the care of his
sister, and leave Manhattan for his ranch near Medora. His sojourn in
North Dakota would be a time of healing a broken heart and preparation
for “living out” the rest of his remarkable life.
Sources:
http://www.loc.gov/exhibits/treasures/trm052.html
http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org/life/timeline.htm
http://www.theodoreroosevelt.org/life/familytree/AliceLongworth.htm
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prior permission from North Dakota Public Radio.
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