Reviews of Books and Films
1572
of duplicitous behavior on both personal and political
levels. What rescues the story is the author's insightful
applications of theoretical concepts. Companionate
marriage, patriarchy, and the cult of domesticity form
a compelling intellectual framework for the personal
saga and allow the author to authenticate claims as
well as transcend the particular to a general consideration of gender and political topics.
One especially intriguing episode is the report of the
wedding and reception of Chase and Sprague, held in
Salmon Chase's Washington, D.C. home in 1863. It
was an amazing display of material and political consumption in view of required wartime sacrifices. This
event marked the beginning of seventeen tumultuous
years of marriage, followed by a contentious divorce.
The author appends the divorce petitions of both
parties, and what is conspicuous is Chase's request to
resume her birth name. There is no explanation of the
significance of that development. Perhaps the most
audacious interlude of Chase's search for fulfillment
was her relationship with Republican politico Roscoe
Conkling; this brief companionship epitomized the
vast internal party conflicts and rivalries with which she
was continually involved.
There are so many strengths in this book, among
them the clarity of its vision and tone, that any
objections may appear as quibbles, but there are a few
weaknesses that must be pointed out. The sources are
somewhat limited, and Lamphier might have discovered a more imaginative approach to her material. The
central complaint is the minimal annotation provided
in the references. In the absence of a bibliography,
thorough documentation would improve the quality of
the citations. The index is not exhaustive and would
benefit from more inclusive listings.
In spite of her avowed sympathies for Chase, the
author has created a textured tapestry from the flawed
characters in this highly charged drama. The result is
an exceptional contribution to a variety of fields,
including biography, women's history, and social and
cultural studies as well as political history.
BETTY BRANDON
University of South Alabama
R. VARON. Southern Lady, Yankee Spy: The
True Story of Elizabeth Van Lew, A Union Agent in the
Heart of the Confederacy. New York: Oxford University
Press. 2003. Pp. xi, 317. $30.00.
ELIZABETH
The topic of female espionage captivated attention
during and after the Civil War, giving rise to contemporary stories as well as historical accounts. Typically
those female spies who have received the most attention have shared an element of theatricality, whether
Pauline Cushman, who acted on stage, or Belle Boyd
and Rose O'Neal Greenhow, who tended toward selfdramatization. In some ways the view of Elizabeth Van
Lew, a prominent Richmond native who provided
information to the Union army, has been a variant: for
years the popular depiction of Van Lew cast her as a
AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW
woman who affected an eccentric, slightly daft demeanor as "Crazy Bet" to cover her tracks as a spy. In
this rendition, Van Lew outfoxed Richmonders
through her performances.
In a fast-paced, lively account based on extensive
research, Elizabeth R. Varon challenges this popular
image of Van Lew. In its place she substitutes a
nuanced biography of a southern lady whose heart lay
with the Union and a war against slavery. In Varon's
account, Van Lew was less the daring spy, so beloved
of popular fiction, and more the careful leader of a
ring of northern sympathizers who aided the Union in
various ways.
Varon introduces Van Lew's Civil War activities
with a detailed discussion of the latter's background
and upbringing. Her father, John Van Lew, while
hailing from Long Island, New York, was a successful
hardware merchant in Richmond. Her mother, Eliza
Baker Van Lew, was the daughter of a Philadelphia
mayor who was a prominent supporter of antislavery
there. Despite northern origins, the Van Lews blended
well into Richmond society and owned slaves as well as
a luxurious mansion in the elite Church Hill neighborhood.
Yet in Varon's account, Eliza Baker Van Lew
apparently became more critical of slavery after her
husband's death in 1843. Varon argues convincingly
that the fragmentary evidence shows the Van Lew
women sympathized with the colonizationist cause and
probably allowed many of their slaves to hire their own
time and live independently. Not only did their tax
return show fewer slaves over time, but Eliza Baker
Van Lew also arranged for the baptism of a young
woman of color, Mary Jane Richards, and educated
her in the North.
Varon intently seeks the reasons for Elizabeth Van
Lew's continued allegiance to the Union and her slow
entrance over time into purveying information to
Union officials. Forty-two years old in 1861, Elizabeth
Van Lew early in the war ministered to prisoners of
war, especially sick or wounded ones. The Van Lew
women even accepted some ill Unionists and Union
soldiers into their home. Varon here argues that
Elizabeth took a bolder Unionist course than her
mother, who defused some of their neighbors' criticism
by aiding Confederate soldiers and contributing to
Confederate causes.
In Varon's account, Van Lew almost seamlessly
moved from nursing Union prisoners to aiding their
escape. At least by 1862, her house was a station for
escaping prisoners. Varon believes that Confederate
crackdowns on Unionists, increasingly severe after
1862, ironically enough served another purpose: that
of revealing the identities of northern sympathizers
and bringing them together. This allows Varon to
explain how Van Lew came to collaborate with German immigrants and plain farmers who otherwise
would never have formed part of her social world.
Crucial to Van Lew's success were her identity as a
southern lady and her wealth. These allowed her slaves
DECEMBER
2004
Canada and the United States
to take food and supplies to the jails and messages to
prearranged stops. That she disliked slavery and
sought a better life for her bondspeople helped to
secure the willing assistance of at least some of them in
her illicit activities. Varon also argues Van Lew's class
and gender identity as fragile southern lady rather than
any eccentricity actually disarmed Confederate authorities and dispelled their suspicions about her loyalty.
After the Civil War, Van Lew, on account of her
wartime service, secured the postmastership of Richmond. Not only did she modernize and enlarge the
office, but she also hired African American as well as
white postal workers. Elite white Richmond residents
did not forgive her wartime espionage, especially when
she combined it with postwar Republican politics and
egalitarian racial beliefs. Varon posits that this period
began Van Lew's social ostracism and produced the
notion of her as "Crazy Bet."
Any educated reader can profit from Varon's engagingly written biography. Sure-handed in its evocation
of nineteenth-century Richmond life, this book persuasively details Van Lew's beliefs and chronicles her
service to the northern cause. At the same time as
Varon builds a suspenseful story of clandestine activities, she also explores the content and meaning of a
nineteenth-century woman's patriotism and political
allegiances.
JANE TURNER CENSER
George Mason University
LA COVA. Cuban Confederate
Colonel: The Life of Ambrosio Jose Gonzales. Columbia: University of South Carolina Press. 2003. Pp.
xxviii, 537. $59.95.
ANTONIO RAFAEL DE
This volume describes thoroughly the career of a
relatively minor figure in dramatic events on an extensive historical stage. Ambrosio Jose Gonzales (18181893), born in Matanzas, Cuba, received his secondary
education in New York, and served as an organizer of
three filibuster expeditions from the United States
between 1849 and 1851 against Spanish rule in Cuba.
In these preparations, Gonzales served primarily as
interpreter and political intermediary for Narciso
Lopez (1797-1851), a former Spanish general who
traveled extensively in the United States seeking funds,
troops, and equipment. The conspiracy's goal was
Cuba's independence, probably to be followed quickly
by annexation to the United States as a slave state. As
Antonio Rafael de la Cova notes, many affluent Cuban
backers of Lopez "favored annexation because it
would guarantee their chattel property" (p. 6). Gonzales, a U.S. citizen since 1849 and styled as adjutant
general to Lopez, took part in a May 1850 landing in
the town of Cardenas on Cuba's north coast. The
invading troops, largely from the U.S. South, were able
to remain ashore less than twenty-four hours, as
Spanish troops approached and no local recruits
flocked to the invaders' banner. Following the failure
of these insurgent efforts, Gonzales fruitlessly pursued
AMERICAN HISTORICAL REVIEW
1573
federal diplomatic appointments in Latin America,
and in 1856 married into an affluent South Carolina
family, the Elliotts of Oak Lawn.
Within the politics of antebellum South Carolina,
Gonzales is described by de la Cova as a Unionist who
viewed slavery as economically necessary. Maintaining
both these views became untenable as secessionist
enthusiasm prevailed in the state in 1860, and Gonzales immediately volunteered his talents to the Confederacy as a military organizer. Appointed colonel of
artillery, he energetically arranged (and worked to
procure) the ordnance that helped to prevent Union
conquest of Charleston for nearly four years, despite
northern desires to punish the rebellious city in exemplary fashion. Paroled a few weeks after Appomattox,
Gonzales sought to provide for his wife Hattie and for
the six children they had together. Reconstruction
visited unfamiliar privation on the Gonzales and Elliott families. Their efforts at farming and lumber
production never yielded appreciable returns, and (in
a turn of fate perhaps tinged with poetic justice)
several branches of the family lived for years in former
slave quarters, the only plantation structures to survive
wartime destruction. Ambrosio, Hattie, and the children tried life in Cuba in 1869, but Hattie died of
yellow fever within a year. Returning to the United
States, Gonzales was separated from his children as he
again took up his never successful search for government patronage. He shuttled among Washington, Baltimore, New York, and North Carolina, relying on
brief assignments as interpreter, teacher, stock trader,
and translator. He was reconciled with his children in
his last years, which also witnessed a laudatory 1892
meeting in Key West with Jose Marti and the leaders
of Cuba's 1868 rebellion against Spain. Gonzales died
in relative obscurity in New York less than a year later.
De la Cova's account displays a number of strengths.
By meticulous research in correspondence and published hotel registers, he reconstructs Gonzales's travels with Lopez within the United States, and their
contacts with other filibuster conspirators. These chapters demonstrate the broad appeal of Cuban annexationism in the South around 1850 and the importance
of Masonic ties among the plotters. The reader also
gains insights into Gonzales's personality and character. The Cuban-born colonel could be an energetic
organizer and military subordinate, but at times he
also showed vanity and poor judgment. He alienated
Confederate President Jefferson Davis with an impolitic letter in 1861, although his long acquaintance with
Davis might have warned him of the dangers in
adopting such a tone. Turned down (six times!) for
military promotion, in later years Gonzales awarded
himself a courtesy title of "general," referring to his
briefly held rank as a filibuster. Gonzales was a devoted husband, however, and after the Civil War he
also reconciled with Davis and with many northerners.
Logically, the author emphasizes Gonzales's private
life during the Reconstruction years, and this vivid and
distressing account emphasizes how cultural prejudice
DECEMBER
2004