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In search of love

I told my wife she should consider this column, which deals with love and romance in Arkansas history, as her Valentine's gift. Those readers who know my wife will not be surprised to learn that I am now walking with a limp. Perhaps I should tell her that I love her as much as Mollie Williams of Searcy County loved her husband, a Civil War survivor and "dark haired lover."

Mollie Williams, whom I have written about previously, spent 42 days during the Civil War fruitlessly searching for the body of her dead husband, enduring privations that would overwhelm most modern humans, and finally returning home so distressed that she "simply existed from necessity, because it was inconvenient to die."

Recalling these awful experiences nearly 40 years later, Mollie was proud that the tragedies did not diminish her capacity for love: "Love! Who can fathom its depths; who can analyze its delicate and mysterious combinations? Its nature manifests itself in 10 thousand distinct differentiations, each one of which is an unsolved problem in itself. It knows no bounds; it mocks at impossibilities and walks with fearless steps 'where angels fear to tread.'"

Mollie was still wearing her "widow's weeds" when she discovered that a previous suitor had, contrary to rumors, survived the war and was back in the area. Disregarding the fact that handsome V.H. Williams was now courting her cousin, Mollie decided to initiate a reunion--a somewhat brazen act for 1866. She agreed to go to church in hopes of seeing her former beau: "I did not care to hear of the angels that lived in an ethereal home beyond the clouds; my mind was more interested in a raven-haired masculine angel, who proudly trod the material ground with firm and manly step, and who was a creature of flesh and blood of the very best quality." Don't forget this memoir was being penned by a middle-aged matron.

While not nearly as eloquent as Mollie Williams, early Arkansas settler Hiram A. Whittington left a charming 1834 letter describing his love for a 15-year-old lass in Little Rock: "I thought I was beyond the reach of Cupid's darts, and had bid defiance to the female world. But what a fool, what a vain, conceited arrogant fool I was." He boldly declared that "my wandering optics ceased their roaming, and appeared to have taken up their everlasting resting place upon her sweet, bewitching, lovely countenance." His devotions turned out to be a little short of everlasting, with Hiram returning to his native Boston two years later to find a wife.

Hiram Whittington's romantic interest in a 15-year-old girl was not unusual in 19th-century Arkansas. Arkansas women, like women throughout the South, often married at a young age. A letter written to the Arkansas Gazette in May 1830 addressed the issue head-on: "The evil in connecting old and young ages together in wedlock is seldom reflected upon, particularly by parents. We often find, through the influence of parental authority, young girls wedded to old miserly men, without their own consent; and it has seldom ever happened without producing the worst of consequences to the girl, by rendering her miserable during the life of her husband, if she has the good fortune to survive him, which is not very often the case."

Finding spouses was in some ways no different than it is today. Young men and women often developed romantic inclinations while attending dances. For families with religious scruples forbidding dancing, young people organized "play parties" which were basically dances without music. Religious services, especially revivals--which were called "protracted meetings"--and summer singing schools often gave couples opportunities to meet and court.

Several years ago, while doing research in the Pulaski County clerk's office, I came across the incorporation records of a large number of what were called "Matrimonial Aid Societies." I recently learned that these organizations were basically insurance plans, with premiums going into a pool for payouts at the time a policy holder got married. The idea was considered "a solution of the long vexed question of providing a start for impecunious couples," as one journalist wrote.

During a three-month period in the summer of 1882, a total of 12 matrimonial societies were formed in Pulaski County alone. The first group incorporated in Little Rock was the Western Marriage Endowment Association, followed over the next few days with the creation of the Little Rock Nuptial Association ("to promote matrimony, morality, and economy"), the Quapaw Matrimonial Aid Association, and the Eureka Daily Marriage Association.

I am still trying to fathom the name of one society, the Climax Daily Matrimonial Aid Association. The word "climax" did not have a sexual connotation in 1882, so I am puzzled.

These insurance plans were poorly conceived since most men did not buy a policy until already engaged. The societies disappeared as quickly as they arose.

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Tom Dillard is a historian and retired archivist living in Hot Spring County. Email him at Arktopia.td@gmail.com. An earlier version of this column appeared Feb. 15, 2015.

Editorial on 02/11/2017

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