Previous Challenge Entry (Level 1 – Beginner)
Topic: Sewing (02/22/07)
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TITLE: Legacy | Previous Challenge Entry
By Diana Richardson
02/27/07 -
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When I married into a family who took great pride in their ancestral roots I was afraid I’d never fit in. The connection they felt with those gone to dust was strange.
My husband and I soon found ourselves the guardians of the family treasures. You know, things others might call old trash. It wasn’t long before I discovered that connection also. There were two treasures in particular that made me feel connected to the Carmack’s favorite ancestor.
The first was an old tattered book handed to me with care by my John. He was convinced that I was the perfect person to keep that treasure. It was a book which had belonged to Ma, his great-great grandmother. THE LADY’S MANUAL OF FANCY WORK was embossed in gold on its cover.
Ma had been born into Southern Aristocracy in Virginia. She grew up in a time when women of that status had servants to do all the work while they spent their time in fancy work. When I turned the pages I could see a vision of a pretty young girl learning all the right things from tutors at home. This lady had studied Latin, great literature, religion & fancy work by oil lamp light. She sat on plush furnishings with a stand holding a frame for embroideries or spindle lace.
As I turned the pages I marveled at the beautiful language used to teach each handcraft. Definitely not cut and dried method taught in books today. It almost sounded like poetry. As I turned pages I found papers with hand-written instructions. Next was a paper pattern for a quilt piece, then a detailed cut rose for cutwork. The delicate cursive writing from Ma’s own hand was as beautiful as any artistic endeavor those hands might have made.
As I looked through that book, autograph books and letters from the treasury we’d inherited I began to feel I knew this woman. She had grown up in riches, went to college when very few women could do such a thing and knew the highest in society of her day. She was a spunky creative woman who was probably rather spoiled.
Then the Civil War came into view. Her friends wrote poetry in her autograph book about the present “unpleasantness” looming on the horizon. When war came, Ma didn’t cower in some corner and shake with fear. In deed she became a spy for the Confederate Army. Wisely she didn’t put much of that in writing, but passed down stories verbally.
During the war she met Captain Carmack. By the end of that war the life of the southern aristocrat was gone. The scorched earth was just that, scorched. Most of the lovely plantation homes were burned. Her beloved, Selma had survived, but it would never be the same. The economy was destroyed. What was a delicate flower of the south to do? Could she spend her days occupied as before with fancy work?
Emma spent a few more hours sewing. She had to make her own clothes. No Bernina for her ladies. She made every stitch by hand. Working by lamp light until the eyes could no longer stay open. These were special dresses, one of which we have carefully wrapped in acid free paper.
Emma married the handsome Captain Carmack in the parlor of her aunt in 1867. The Captain had no plantation or even land. He wasn’t high in politics or religion like Emma’s family. I’m sure her aunt thought she was definitely marrying beneath her. After the wedding she wore a blue checked taffeta suit as her going away outfit. That’s the one we now have.
Captain Carmack packed up his new bride and headed west. They went to Tennessee and became sharecroppers. Ma worked along side her husband in the fields, living in harsh wilderness conditions. In 1869 she bore my husband’s great grandfather. Sometime later they came to Texas and got a land grant. That land became was passed on for several generations and a town sprung up around it.
When she died in Handly, TX at the age of 103 years she was still sewing quilts by hand. We have her last unfinished quilt top also. Emma Carmack left quite a legacy. Her things have helped me be connected to her, but her story is the true legacy. We all leave a legacy, so be sure that all those stitches are beautiful, tight and neat in your story.
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