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Elizabeth Kortright Monroe
1768-1830
[James Monroe]
Biography: Romance glints from the little that is known about
Elizabeth Kortright's early life. She was born in New York City in 1768, daughter of an old
New York family. Her father, Lawrence, had served the Crown by
privateering during the French and Indian War and made a fortune. He
took no active part in the War of Independence; and James Monroe wrote to
his friend Thomas Jefferson in Paris in 1786 that he had married the
daughter of a gentleman, "injured in his fortunes" by the Revolution.
Strange choice, perhaps, for a patriot veteran with political ambitions
and little money of his own; but Elizabeth was beautiful, and love was
decisive. They were married in February 1786, when the bride was not yet 18.
The young couple planned to live in Fredericksburg, Virginia, where
Monroe began his practice of law. His political career, however, kept
them on the move as the family increased by two daughters and a son who
died in infancy.
In 1794, Elizabeth Monroe accompanied her husband to France when
President Washington appointed him United States Minister. Arriving in
Paris in the midst of the French Revolution, she took a dramatic part in
saving Lafayette's wife, imprisoned and expecting death on the
guillotine. With only her servants in her carriage, the American
Minister's wife went to the prison and asked to see Madame Lafayette.
Soon after this hint of American interest, the prisoner was set free.
The Monroes became very popular in France, where the diplomat's lady
received the affectionate name of la belle Americaine.
For 17 years Monroe, his wife at his side, alternated between foreign
missions and service as governor or legislator of Virginia. They made
the plantation of Oak Hill their home after he inherited it from an
uncle, and appeared on the Washington scene in 1811 when he became
Madison's Secretary of State.
Elizabeth Monroe was an accomplished hostess when her husband took the
Presidential oath in 1817. Through much of the administration, however,
she was in poor health and curtailed her activities. Wives of the
diplomatic corps and other dignitaries took it amiss when she decided to
pay no calls--an arduous social duty in a city of widely scattered
dwellings and unpaved streets.
Moreover, she and her daughter Eliza changed White House customs to
create the formal atmosphere of European courts. Even the White House
wedding of her daughter Maria was private, in "the New York style" rather
than the expansive Virginia social style made popular by Dolley Madison.
A guest at the Monroes' last levee, on New Year's Day in 1825, described
the First Lady as "regal-looking" and noted details of interest: "Her
dress was superb black velvet; neck and arms bare and beautifully formed;
her hair in puffs and dressed high on the head and ornamented with white
ostrich plumes; around her neck an elegant pearl necklace. Though no
longer young, she is still a very handsome woman."
In retirement at Oak Hill, Elizabeth Monroe died on September 23, 1830;
and family tradition says that her husband burned the letters of their
life together.
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