The Colonel's Lady on the Western Frontier: The Correspondence of Alice Kirk Grierson

by Shirley A. Leckie, Alice Kirk Grierson

The modern woman who tries to juggle private and public roles with equilibrium will discover a spiritual ancestor in Alice Kirk Grierson. The colonel's lady spent most of her life at army outposts on the nineteenth-century western frontier, where she faced the problems of raising a large family while fulfilling the duties of a commanding officer's wife. Fortunately for history, she left a large and extraordinarily candid correspondence, which has now been edited by Shirley Anne Leckie. Alice was the wife of Benjamin B. Grierson, a major general in the Civil War who won fame for a raid that contributed to the fall of Vicksburg. Her letters begin in 1866, when her husband reentered the army as colonel of the legendary "buffalo soldiers" of the Tenth Cavalry, and end with her death in 1888. During these years she chronicles the criticism experienced by her husband in commanding one of the army's two black mounted regiments and the frustration when he is repeatedly passed over for promotion, in part because he advocated a more humane Indian policy. All the while her position requires her to assume heavy responsibilities as a hostess. Her letters are just as unflinching in describing the daily hard-ships of raising a family at frontier posts like Forts Riley, Gibson, Sill, Concho, Davis, and Grant, where two of her seven children died young and two suffered from manic-depressive psychosis. They are extraordinary for their insight into nineteenth-century attitudes toward birth control, childbearing, marital roles, race relations, and mental illness.

Genres: Nonfiction

256 pages, Paperback

First published August 1, 1989

Reviews

[Bob · Rating 3 out of 5]

These are family letters, not written for the public. They are interesting for what they reveal about the lives of the men and women who fought the final Indian wars in the southwest. Col. Grierson commanded the 10th Cavalry regiment, a unit of ¨Buffalo Soldiers¨ operating in present-day Texas, New Mexico, and Arizona. These people performed a thankless task with little material or social assistance, and did so without much complaint.
Shirley Anne Leckie, who edits the volume, supplies very useful context for the letters, a biographical register of entries drawn from an official historical register, and a really excellent index which allows the reader a way to keep track of (to me) very complicated family relations.

[Lindsey · Rating 4 out of 5]

While reading someone else's correspondence can of course be tedious at points, I loved the way this book gave a window into the life of a woman vastly different - and yet incredibly similar - to many women of today. Alice's life was oriented around hardships of all sorts, relationships that were often painful but mattered intensely to her, and constant, unceasing transition. She experienced the deaths of numerous children, both her own and of the women around her; she tended to two sons and multiple family members with mental illnesses. She almost never got to have all her family in one place, and was essentially an expat. Yet she bore it all with courage and a willingness to use her voice to speak about her experience. She is an inspiration.

[Adrienne Morris · Rating 4 out of 5]

Just because you’re nice doesn’t mean you’re going to be popular. This is what General Ben Grierson must have said to console himself. A hero of the Civil War, Grierson commanded the Buffalo Soldiers out West against Victorio and his Apache warriors after the war, but do you think that would have gotten him some respect and a few honors? No.

His wife Alice was pretty pissed about it and said so in letters. She said a lot in letters that might make a Victorian pretend to blush. At one point she left poor Ben to spend time in Chicago admitting after he begged her to come back to him that she knew they would have sex again (which she greatly enjoyed), and didn’t want to have any more children (I think they had 7 at that point). She felt contraception was a sin against God, loved her husband, but was afraid with her depressive tendencies that she’d end like her mother did–a used up mental case.

General Ben was such a decent guy and openly affectionate, devoted and supportive when Alice spoke about women’s rights and the stuff she’d read in The Revolution (I must admit, though I’d hate to be judged by my private letters and emails, that I found Alice’s constant complaining a bit annoying–I don’t think Ben deserved that. He just wanted her by his side. Sigh).

Ben was no slouch in the warrior department, but . . . and this is my opinion–one shared by General Sherman at the time–he was a bit too lenient with the Indians who used his kindness to screw him over (we don’t like to admit that being a doormat you get walked on but it’s true). He had kind words for his black soldiers though most people thought black recruits were less capable of the mental tasks of military life at the time, but again he may have in his easy-going way not pushed them quite hard enough–so says one of my characters in The House on Tenafly Road.

Anyway there’s much to think about–sex, war, mental health, relationships, Indians, military politics in these two companion volumes. You get the historian’s version and then the wife’s version and that’s fun.

[Randall · Rating 2 out of 5]

Some interesting tidbits, but mostly tiresome. In the author's defense, she probably didn't expect her letters to be shared with the general public. She probably would have been horrified.