Wife’s dream foretold Tyler’s death

John Tyler, the 10th president of the United States, lived to see the collapse of the Union and the outbreak of Civil War. He stayed loyal to his native Virginia and became a Confederate congressman.

Civil War page contributor William Connery interviewed Tyler’s grandson, Harrison Ruffin Tyler, on May 22, while Mr. Tyler was overseeing this year’s re-enactment of the Battle of Fort Pocahontas. Harrison Tyler’s father, Lyon Tyler, was president of William and Mary College. Harrison Tyler is the present owner of Sherwood Forest, where President Tyler retired in 1845. The president’s first wife, Letitia, had died in 1842. He married New York socialite Julia Gardiner in 1844.

John Tyler was the first vice president to become president, upon the untimely death of William Henry Harrison just 32 days into his term. Thus, detractors called Tyler “His Accidency.” He also was the first president widowed and married in the White House. Altogether, the president fathered 15 children.

Since 1997, Harrison Tyler has allowed re-enactors, especially descendants of United States Colored Troops (USCT), to come and spend a weekend in the actual fort where their ancestors defeated dismounted Confederate cavalry under Gen. Fitzhugh Lee, nephew of Robert E. Lee.

WC: First, Harrison, tell me the situation in Sherwood Forest in 1860.

Mr. Tyler: Both my grandfather and grandmother were living at that time. My Aunt Pearl, their last child, was born that year. So they were living happily at Sherwood. Every summer they would take vacation trips, and part of the time would be in New York, with Julia’s mother, Juliana McLachlan Gardiner, who was living on Staten Island. They would visit Saratoga and take in the races and the Greenbrier in western Virginia and other hot spas and hot springs. Life was idyllic. But there were storm clouds on the horizon.

In February 1861, President Tyler was the principal organizer of a peace conference where representatives from 21 states met at the Willard Hotel in Washington to iron out the differences between the Northern and Southern states.

However, the conference was a failure because there were those die-hards from both sides, Massachusetts and South Carolina, for instance, who would not give an inch.

John Tyler counseled everybody against secession. But when the action at Fort Sumter occurred and Abraham Lincoln called for 75,000 volunteers to wipe out the Rebels of the South, Virginia had no choice but to join either one side or the other. John Tyler threw his support vigorously for secession at that point.

So Virginia seceded, and the capital of the Confederacy was moved from Montgomery, Ala., to Richmond. John Tyler was elected to the Confederate Congress, which was set to meet in Richmond in January 1862.

WC: Was the Confederate Congress like the U.S. — bicameral?

Mr. Tyler: Yes, the Confederate Legislature was similar to the U.S., with a Senate and House. Tyler was elected to the House to represent this area. He took a packet steamer to Richmond. There were several of these that traveled up and down the river between Richmond and Norfolk. He went to the Exchange Hotel, where most of the legislators were staying. He was expecting to take his seat when the Legislature convened a few days later.

My grandmother had a dream that night. She was in a room she had never seen before and saw a bed she had never seen before. The bed had a carved eagle on it. And in the bed was her husband, John Tyler, deathly pale, propped up on pillows, reaching out and calling her name.

WC: So John Tyler was the only former president to throw in with the Confederacy.

Mr. Tyler: I believe so. So Julia had this dream. And she was so alarmed, she gathered up her children and servants and came to the landing here and caught the packet to Richmond. She arrived late in the afternoon, was taken by carriage to the Exchange Hotel, and asked where Mr. ex-President was. She saw him across the room, in animated conversation with people. She caught his eye and then went up to her room.

Story Continues →