All the Presidents Wives 9

ANNA TUTHILL SYMMES HARRISON

Born:

Solitude Farm, near Morristown, Sussex County, New Jersey 25 July, 1775

Father: John Cleves Symmes, born 21 July, 1742, Colonel of the Continental Army during American Revolution, associate justice on the New Jersey Superior Court (1778-1785), delegate from Delaware to the Continental Congress (1785-1786), Chief Justice of the New Jersey Supreme Court (1787), died 26 February, 1814 in Cincinnati, Ohio.

*In 1787 John Symmes was appointed judge of the Northwest Territory. In 1788 he obtained from the government a grant; of 1,000,000 acres, bounded south by the Ohio, and west by the Miami, and was the founder of the settlements of North Bend, and Cincinnati thereon.
*After the death of his first wife, Anna Tuthill, Judge John Symmes married secondly to a Mrs. Halsey, and thirdly to Susan Livingston, daughter of New York Governor William Livingston.

Mother: Anna Tuthill Symmes, born 17 June, 1749; married 30 October, 1760 in Southhold, Long Island, New York; died 25 July, 1776

Ancestry:

English; the last of Anna Harrison's ancestors to emigrate from England was one of her paternal great-great grandparents Anthony Collamore, who died at sea on 16 December, 1693.

Birth Order and Siblings:

Second of two; one sister; Maria Symmes Short (1762-?)

Physical Appearance:

small in height, dark brown hair, dark brown eyes

Religious Affiliation:

Presbyterian

Education:

Clinton Academy, 1781-?, East Hampton, New York: taught the classics and English;

Boarding School of Isabella Marshall Graham, 1787-1791, New York City, New York, Anna Harrison was a classmate of incumbent First Lady Martha Washington's granddaughter Nellie Custis for one year, from 1789 to 1790.
*Anna Harrison was the first First Lady to receive a formal education

Occupation before Marriage:

For the first three years after the death of her mother, Anna Symmes was raised by her father but as an officer in the Continental Army, he was unable to fully care for her. He put on the uniform of a British soldier and rode by horseback from New Jersey through British-occupied New York to take the four year old to her maternal grandparents Henry and Phoebe Tuthill in Southhold, Suffolk County, on Long Island. They supervised her excellent education and raised her through late adolescence. In 1794, she rejoined her father and her second stepmother Susan Livingston Symmes at a temporary home on his extensive land holdings in the Northwest Territory along the Ohio River near Cincinnati. While the home of Judge Symmes was being built in North Bend, Ohio, she and her stepmother lived with Anna Harrison's elder sister Maria and her husband Peyton Short in Lexington, Kentucky. There she met and fell in love with the young Army officer, Acting Captain William Henry Harrison, who had fought in Indian wars in the Northwest Territory.

Marriage:

20 years old, to William Henry Harrison (born 09 Feb 1773, Berkeley Plantation, Charles City County, Virginia), on 22 November 1795, at North Bend, Hamilton County, Ohio;

it is not clear whether Anna Symmes and William Henry Harrison eloped or married in her father's home. It is known that Judge Symmes initially opposed the marriage on the basis that a military career was not stable enough to support a wife and family but relented once he came to know and admire the character and strength of his new son-in-law.

Children:

Elizabeth Bassett Harrison Short (1796-1846); John Cleves Symmes Harrison (1819 – 1830); Lucy Singleton Harrison Estes (1800 – 1826); William Henry Harrison II (1802 – 1838); John Scott Harrison (1804-1878); Benjamin Harrison (1806 – 1840); Mary Symmes Harrison Thornton (1809 – 1842); Carter Bassett Harrison (1811 – 1839); Anna Tuthill Harrison Taylor (1813 – 1845); James Findlay Harrison (1814 –1817)
*Anna Harrison bore the largest number of children by a First Lady, and she outlived all but one.

*Anna Harrison outlived all but one of her ten children.

Occupation after Marriage:

Anna Harrison had no ambitions socially or politically; rather she derived her satisfaction in the traditional role of wife and mother and as a devoted member of her church community. Through Harrison's early military career, she remained at the small log home that they built on 169 acres in North Bend. In 1799, when Harrison was elected to Congress as Territorial Representative, Anna Harrison joined him in the capital city of Philadelphia and made an extensive visit to his relatives in Richmond, Virginia. It would be her only trip back to the eastern seaboard for the rest of her life. When Harrison was named Territorial Governor of Indiana in 1801, Anna Harrison moved with her children to the former French trading post of Vincennes, Indiana where her husband built the family a sturdy brick mansion they called Grouselands; it included a fortress-like wall to protect it from raids by Native American Indians. Anna Harrison managed her various roles; a mother responsible for the education and religious training of her growing family that would eventually number ten children; hostess at the governor's house to the likes of prominent figures ranging from a visiting Vice President Aaron Burr to Indian leaders Tecumseh and Tenskwatawa; financial management of her and her husband's property, other assets and debts. She confessed to doing poorly at the last responsibility. With the War of 1812, Anna Harrison took her children back to North Bend, Ohio where there was less chance of danger. Upon her father's death in 1814, she and her husband inherited Judge Symmes' substantial land holdings - but also his great debts. They enlarged their cabin into a 22-room house. Despite Harrison's subsequent election to the U.S. House and then Senate, and his appointment as Minister to Columbia, Anna Harrison remained in Ohio while he was away in Washington and then Bogotá. Despite her remaining in Ohio, Anna Harrison was well-read and actively interested in the political world in which her husband now moved, avidly consuming all the political journals and newspapers she was able to obtain on the frontier. What most engaged her outside of her family, however, were her Presbyterian Church activities. So involved was she with her religious community that she even was known to invite her entire congregation back to the Harrison home after Sunday service for an open house supper. There is little in the way of documentation regarding any influence she may have exercised over her husband's decisions except for the fact that she demanded that he never bring political guests nor conduct any business on Sunday; this was evidently the context in which the often-quoted remark of one observer that Anna Harrison "rules the General" was made.

Presidential Campaign and Inauguration:

Anna Harrison voiced her opposition to the drafting of her husband as the Whig candidate for President in both 1836 and 1840. Although she opposed his candidacy, Anna Harrison was a visible presence at the Harrison home during the colorful "Tippecanoe and Tyler Too" campaign of 1840 where supporters, Whig organizers and reporters came to see the candidate. Harrison was 68 years old when he became President. Until the 1980 election of Ronald Reagan, Harrison was the oldest man to assume the office. In the winter of 1841, as an entourage consisting of her husband and family members were leaving Ohio by a caravan of horse-drawn carriages to Virginia to visit one of her daughters and then to Washington, D.C. to attend President-elect Harrison's Inauguration, Anna Harrison was ill and too weak to join them. Considering that she would live another 22 years in often robust health suggests that whatever illness she was suffering from in 1841 was temporary. She was still mourning the 12 August, 1839 death of her son Carter, and the 9 June, 1840 death of her son Benjamin.

First Lady:

4 March, 1841 - 4 April, 1841

65 years old
In sending her daughter-in-law Jane Harrison in her stead, it is not clear whether Anna Harrison did so to at least ensure that there would be a female presence and companion for the new President at the Inauguration as they anticipated his greeting thousands of well-wishers for him - the first chief executive elected from the Whig Party - or to serve at all White House functions. By education and experience, Anna Harrison was well-qualified to serve as hostess herself. No primary sources indicate her intentions. She was in good health and preparing to leave by stagecoach from Ohio to Washington when a courier arrived at the Harrison farm with the shocking news that the President had died. Anna Harrison remained in Ohio since she would not have arrived in time for the funeral services and burial of her late husband in Washington, D.C. had she attempted the arduous and lengthy trip there.
*Anna Harrison is the only incumbent First Lady who never entered the White House.

White House Hostess:

Jane Irwin Harrison

Jane Irwin Findlay

During the brief four weeks of the Harrison Administration, Jane Irwin Harrison (1804-1846) served as hostess. Her father Archibald Irwin inherited the homestead and mill that his own father and namesake had built in Mercersburg, Pennsylvania. He married for his first wife Mary Ramsey, daughter of Major James Ramsey, who also built and ran a mill, near Mercersburg. Archibald and Mary Ramsey Irwin had two daughters, Jane and Elizabeth, both of whom were born in the family's limestone mansion. Mary Ramsey Irwin's sister, Nancy married an Englishman John Sutherland, and moved with him to his home in North Bend, Ohio, near the home of William Henry and Anna Harrison. Jane and Elizabeth Irwin were visiting their aunt Nancy Sutherland when they met two of the Harrison sons, William Henry and John Scott. Jane Irwin married the future President's son and namesake, then twenty-two year old William Henry Harrison, Jr. on 18 February, 1824 in her hometown. He was a struggling lawyer at the time of their marriage and also suffered from alcoholism. He died on 6 February, 1838 in North Bend, Ohio.

In 1832, eight years after her sister Jane married William Henry Harrison, Jr., Elizabeth Irwin married his brother, John Scott Harrison. It was one of their sons, Benjamin Harrison, who would go on to be elected the 23rd President of the United States. Another Harrison brother, Carter Bassett Harrison, married Mary Anne Sutherland, the first cousin of Jane and Nancy Irwin. A thirty-six year old widow of three years at the time she served as White House hostess, Jane Irwin Harrison brought her two young sons, James and William along with her to live in the mansion with their grandfather and other relatives. She also asked her father's elderly sister, Jane Irwin Findlay to accompany her. Although her aunt has often been mistakenly identified as the official hostess of the brief Harrison Administration, or confused with her namesake niece, it was the younger Mrs. Harrison who presided at the President's table, while the older Mrs. Findlay acted as her social guide and supported and occupied a seat of honor at the few recorded family gatherings. Jane Irwin Harrison died just four years later, in 1845, at age 41 years old.

Like her husband, General James Findlay (also from Mercersburg, Franklin County, Pennsylvania) Jane Irwin Findlay was the youngest in her family. She was born about 1770, married in 1792 and a year later joined her husband in helping to establish the small Ohio River settlement of Cincinnati. They were among the early entrepreneurs and land speculators who both fueled and profited from young Cincinnati's rapid growth from a population of 1,000 in 1802 when it was incorporated to a population of more than 46,000 in 1840. Jane Findlay was a widow for six years when she came with General Harrison to Washington for his March 4, 1841 Inauguration. Her late husband had made substantial land investments in southern Ohio with Harrison and had also fought during the War of 1812. As Major General of the Ohio Militia's First Division, he commanded a regiment near Detroit, built a fort near what later became Findlay, Ohio, and was taken prisoner by British troops. An enormously successful retail businessman and two non-consecutive terms as mayor of Cincinnati, he and Jane Findlay had no children and put their time and resources into their burgeoning city, helping found its first library. Jane Findlay was familiar with the social world of Washington, living there as a Congressional wife throughout the John Quincy Adams Administration and the first term of Andrew Jackson. After her brief return to the capital city to live with her niece in the Harrison White House for one month, she returned to Cincinnati where she died in 1851. She is buried with her husband in Spring Grove Cemetery.

Post-Presidential Life:

Anna Harrison was the first presidential widow to be awarded a pension by Congress– a lump sum of $25,000. They also granted her right to free postage on all her outgoing correspondence. After a state funeral in Washington, her late husband was interred in Congressional Cemetery in the capital. However, Anna Harrison selected a site on a knoll near Congress Green Cemetery in North Bend, where her father was buried, and began construction of a final burial place there for her late husband. A few years later, the late President's remains were re-interred there, following a service in a nearby chapel, where he laid in state for the family's viewing. Within four years of her husband's death, Anna Harrison also lost her three remaining daughters - Mary Thornton died in 1842, Anna Taylor in 1845, and Betsy Short in 1846. She remained close to, and relied upon the financial assistance of her widowed son-in-law John Cleves Short - who was also her nephew, the son of her sister Maria. Anna Harrison kept abreast of political intricacies and had strong objections to policies of both the Administrations of Tyler and Polk. She nevertheless made good use of her status as a presidential widow to press both Presidents into awarding her numerous nephews and grandsons either commissions to federal or military positions. Although she had initially supported the Jacksonian Democratic Party, she became a rabid supporter of the emerging Republican Party because of its pro-abolition stand. Through her extensive correspondence, Anna Harrison also maintained close ties to her relatives in New York and New Jersey. Her primary focus, however, remained her local Presbyterian Church. Despite having to subsist on a small income, she was generous with the poor members of her church and community. As the Civil War began, Anna Harrison encouraged her grandsons to fight for the Union. After her 22-room home burned in 1858, Anna Harrison went to live at the home of her only living child, John Scott, thus living in the same household as her grandson Benjamin Harrison, the future 23rd President.
*Anna Harrison is the only woman who was the wife of a president and grandmother to another, Benjamin Harrison.

Death:

88 years old 25 February, 1864 North Bend, Ohio

Burial:

Congress Green Cemetery North Bend, Ohio

http://www.firstladies.org/biographies/