On Thursday, May 6, 1852, Lew Wallace married Susan Elston in the Elston Homestead in Crawfordsville. As he wrote in his Autobiography, “On May 6, 1852, I was able to go to Crawfordsville and be married. If my great happiness over the event so long in expectancy was tinctured ever so slightly with exultation, I plead the weakness of human nature in extenuation. The wedding was without objection. I took my wife to my father’s house in Indianapolis, and introduced her there. She delighted my people—none more than the old gentleman himself [Lew’s father, David]. I returned then to Covington, the birthplace of our only child, Henry Lane Wallace.” Lew may have been a bit polite about the comment “without objection.” By the time of the wedding there may not have been any objection, but he failed to note that the engagement lasted almost three years until Susan’s parents seem to have grown used to the idea that Lew and Susan were destined for each other.
Their only child, Henry Lane Wallace was born on February 17, 1853, just nine months and a few days after the wedding! Lew wrote a series of letters to his brother, William, in Indianapolis. In the first, he informed his brother of his marriage to Susan. It appears that no members of Lew’s immediate family made the trip to Crawfordsville for the nuptials. In a subsequent letter, Lew tells William that Susan is expecting and he is planning on a very large family. A few months later, Lew tells William that Susan is doing well and that they will have several children, but maybe not as large a family as he had hoped for.
On February 17, 1853, Lew actually wrote William two letters. The first early in the day, “And first, Bill, the baby hasn’t come yet, though we’re both in nightly expectation. We’ve had great trouble over it, indeed, our only difficulty. I insisted that there should be two: she insisted on one. The strife waxed higher, and was warmly waged night after night, until the result we at length grew tremulous about. Finally, the angel of peace on dark night, about the hour of Tristam’s birth, (which you’ll recollect no critic has ever yet precisely ascertained), flew to our relief. He suggested a mode of settlement. I immediately proposed it, and we compromised. I consented to one, in consideration of a solemn promise on her part that that one should be a boy.”
From these letters it appears that Susan did not wish to have several children and she made her wishes clear to Lew. Susan was one of the older of the nine Elston children and had helped in the rearing of her younger siblings. Perhaps seeing the effect on her mother that having nine children had and her early responsibilities colored Susan’s thoughts on motherhood. Susan did as she had promised and a baby boy was born later in the day on February 17. Lew wrote a second letter to his brother announcing the birth and claiming he needed to find a name for the new baby.
In this second letter, Lew explained what the child should not be named. Lew parodied the names of his father and brothers when he wrote, “I think I had better right here quietly observe, that the fellow’s name shant be David, that’s too plebian – nor William, that’s very pretty for a child, but unfit for a man, nor Edward, that’s too pretty for either man or baby. I have determined that the most aristocratic and democratic, the most semantic and unpedantic the most noble, manly, appropriate and significant of all that ‘best becomes a man’ is – ‘Lew”
However, Lew failed to convince Susan of the name ‘that best becomes a man.’ The baby was named after his uncle and Susan’s favorite brother-in-law, Henry Lane. In addition to the family relationship, another factor figuring into naming the boy and one that Lew would have probably appreciated is that it was a nineteenth century practice to name a child after a military commander. Henry Lane had served as Lew’s commander during the Mexican War and, in addition, Lew and Susan first met in Henry and Johanna Lane’s home.
Shortly after the birth of their son, Susan and Lew Wallace relocated from Covington to Crawfordsville to begin their next 50 years together in her hometown. As their 50th wedding anniversary approached, Lew wrote: “When May 6, 1902 comes round, and repeats itself in budding roses, it will be golden-wedding day with us. The advent may freshen recollection of the glad time, and I bid it welcome in advance, but I will not for that delay the record I have for her as my wife. I have been subject to her; and her gentle soul has controlled me, and bent me to her wishes, but unselfishly, and always for my good, and always so deftly that I was as one blind to the domination. My temper has never been so hot she could not lay it. She has decided me in doubt, defended me against interruptions, saved me my time at the sacrifice of her own, cheered me when down at heart, lured me back to my tasks when the tempter would have whisked me away, held my hand in defeat, and rejoiced with me in my triumphs. In my work she has helped me to the word, and been my one honest critic. Often in the long journey when, at the parting of the ways, I have stopped bewildered, afraid to go on, unwilling to go back, she has set me in the right way, and even gone before to assure me. Her faith in me began with the beginning, when I was unknown and uncertain of myself, and the world all too ready to laugh at my attempts. Hers is a high nature, a composite of genius, common-sense, and all best womanly qualities. The marvel, her memory, has always been at my service. . .What success has come to me, all that I am, in fact is owing to her.” In one of his most charming comments on Susan, Lew set a high bar for us husbands when he wrote: “Fifty years and more! I can blow the time aside lightly as smoke from a cigar, and have return to that evening with Miss Elston, and her blue eyes, and wavy hair, fair face, girlish manner, delicate person, and witty flashes to vivify it.” Lew and Susan were a remarkable team for 53 years.
Sources: Lighty, Chandler S. “Henry Lane Wallace Part I.” Montgomery Magazine, (Crawfordsville, IN) Oct. 2, 2001.
Lew Wallace: An Autobiography, Lew Wallace, Harper & Brothers, 1906.
