Behind The Scenes: Formerly A Slave, But More Recently Modiste, And Friend To Mrs.Abraham Lincoln Or, Thirty Years A Slave, And Four Years In The White House - Softcover
Synopsis
In the recent blockbuster and award-winning movie Lincoln, viewers saw in the White House a mullatto woman who was employed by the Lincoln's as Mrs. Lincoln's housemaid and attendant. This woman was no film-fiction – she was Elizabeth Keckley, who had spent thirty years of her life as a slave before ultimately working for the White House. She was in many ways closer to Mary Todd Lincoln than any other person, during the four years of the Civil War; her story is a part of American history seldom offered, seldom understood. This book, out of print for many decades but again available, tells the personal side of living and working in Washington, but also the struggles of a black woman, both as slave and as free woman, in the turbulent times of the Civil War
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Review
"Invaluable...Elizabeth Keckley's memoir of her life as a White House dressmaker for Mary Todd Lincoln...[is a] curious gem"--Eric J. Sundquist in The New York Times Book Review "A remarkable vantage point on the Civil War"--Chicago Sun Times
From the Back Cover
Only a few years later, however, that relationship was in ruins, when this 1868 book created a scandal. Intended by Keckley to rehabilitate the reputation of the former First Lady--who had run up extensive debts on clothing and other luxuries while in the White House, and found herself unable to repay them after the President's assassination--the book was perceived instead as a betrayal of friendship.
Perhaps one of the first examples of celebrity gossip publishing gone awry, Behind the Scenes does, nevertheless, offer an insider perspective on the Lincoln White House that will intrigue armchair historians and fans of biography alike.
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Behind The Scenes: Formerly A Slave, But More Recently Modiste, And Friend To Mrs.Abraham Lincoln Or, Thirty Years A Slave, And Four Years In The White House
Published by
CreateSpace Independent Publishing Platform, 2014
ISBN 10: 1499356536
ISBN 13: 9781499356533
Used
Paperback
Seller: ThriftBooks-Atlanta, AUSTELL, GA, U.S.A.
Seller rating 5 out of 5 stars
Paperback. Condition: Very Good. No Jacket. May have limited writing in cover pages. Pages are unmarked. ~ ThriftBooks: Read More, Spend Less. Seller Inventory # G1499356536I4N00