Occasionally, we all learn something that makes us wonder if the authors of the American History books we all read ever did any research at all. Due to his impeachment, and a profound misunderstanding of the dynamic between him and his congress, this man, President Andrew Johnson has suffered a rather ignominious reputation, but it wasn't quite that simple.
This is a replica of the small house in Raleigh, North Carolina in which he was born. His widowed mother, saddled with poverty, apprenticed him to a tailor at age nine. He didn't make it to the end of his twelve year apprenticeship. Harassed by the father of a girl he was interested in, he and his brother left when Andrew was fifteen.
He traveled as far as Alabama, finding work with other tailors. He returned to Raleigh at his mother and stepfather's request to help them emigrate west. Along the way, they passed through Greeneville, Tennessee. Andrew fell in love with the city and decided to stay. He opened a successful tailor shop in this building. It is now housed inside the Andrew Johnson museum, but was not moved there. Instead, the museum was built around it.
Johnson was always proud of his skill as a tailor. He often claimed that not one of his seams ever ripped. This wedding jacket is an example of his work.
He lived in this house across the street from his tailor shop.
He met and married Eliza McCardle, daughter of the local shoemaker. The ceremony was performed by Justice of the Peace Mordecai Lincoln, first cousin of Thomas Lincoln, Abraham's father. Eliza taught him math, and helped him improve his writing skills. Andrew was a voracious reader, particularly favoring books about and by famous orators. He developed an interest in politics, and before long, his tailor shop also became a center for political debate.
During his years as a tailor, he prospered, enabling him to make several astute real estate investments. This house, constructed by Valentine Sevier in 1795, is the oldest house still standing in Greeneville. It was one of those investments. Andrew Jackson lived here while he was practicing law in Greeneville.
Johnson quickly rose through the political ranks from Alderman, to first the Tennessee, then the United States legislature. In June of 1861, he met here, in the Greene County courthouse, with a group of prominent politicians in a failed effort to keep Eastern Tennessee in the Union. He became a compromise candidate to replace Hannibal Hamlin as Lincoln's vice-president in the 1860 election, then assumed the Presidency upon Lincoln's assassination. Johnson was a strict constitutionalist. This quickly ran him afoul of Congress. He vetoed several bills proposed by radical Republicans that would have led to military despotism in the defeated southern states. Many were passed over his veto, but he failed to implement them, thus incurring the ire of Congress. He was eventually impeached for violating another, clearly unconstitutional bill, that prohibited the dismissal of any member of the cabinet he inherited from Lincoln. He escaped conviction by a single vote.
He returned to this house in Greeneville after failing to get his (Democratic) party nomination in 1868.
This sewing machine is in his wife's bedroom. We wondered if he had ever tried it.
This is Eliza's bed. She and Johnson could not sleep together at this stage in her life because her long, now advanced, struggle with tuberculosis made it difficult for her to tolerate his presence in her bed.
In 1875, Johnson was elected to the Senate, the only former President ever to achieve that distinction. He did not serve long before dying of a stroke. He is buried here, a copy of the Constitution placed beneath his head and wrapped in the American flag, at his request. Eliza lost her battle with tuberculosis less than a year later, and is buried beside him.
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