'Cotton' to Cotten
This article describes William Stephenson's research regarding Sallie Southall Cotten. This and other articles may be found in the University Archives.
Citation for this article is: Rees, Franceine. "'Cotton' to Cotten," ECU Magazine Winter, 1988, Volume 2, No. 1.
The life of one of North Carolina's most distinguished women is documented in a new book by an ECU English professor.
The biography, Sallie Southall Cotten:A Woman's Life in North Carolina by William Stephenson, is the result of 10 years of research and "piecing together" scattered bits of Cotten's writings.
Within days of it's official publication, the biography was named winner of the first annual Marguerite Schumann Award for Literary Achievement, an honor given by the North Carolina Chapter of the Victorian Society in America.
Dr. Stephenson's book, the only full-length biography of Cotten, was based on interviews with her surviving relatives and associates, contemporary newspapers and several collections of unpublished papers in East Carolina Manuscript Collection, the Southern Historical Collection at UNC-Chapel Hill and the Virginia State Library.
A particulary rich source of material was her correspondence. "Her letters were of immerse help because she told her story to so many people in so many ways," Stephenson says. "She was a wonderful correstpondent, and people tended to save her letters."
In the course of his research, Stephenson discovered a treasure trove of material in Minnesota; one of his subject's correspondents was former Union Army General and U.S. Agriculture Commissioner William G. LeDuc, whom she met on a train trip in 1894.
The two exchanged letters until the general died 23 years later at the age of 94. Encouraged by LeDuc, Cotten wrote a long romantic poem about the legendary transformation of "Lost Colony" maiden Virginia Dare into a white doe.
Cotten (1846-1929) is best known as a tireless advocate of educational opportunities for women and founder of the N.C. Federation of Women's Clubs. She was also a plantation wife and mother of a large family who "lived a successful double life," according to Stephenson.
Born into a distinguished, but impoverished southside Virginia family, young Sallie Southall was sent to the Murfreesboro, N.C., home of properous Southall cousins, so she could attend Wesleyan Female College.When the Civil War began and federal gunboats menaced the Chowan River region, she was sent to Greensboro Female College.
A brief teaching career in private, home-based schools in Concord and Edgecombe County ended when she met and married Confederate cavalryman Robert Randolph Cotten. Six eventful decades as wife, mother and helpmeet followed.
During the first 10 years, Cotten's energies were focused on caring for her husband and their family at homes in Tarboro, Wilson, and Falkland. The book traces the lives and fluctuating fortunes of the Cotten family throughout this period until their eventual settlement at Cottendale, a comfortable, though isolated, plantation home in northern Pitt County.
Living in such a remote area made Cotten a prolific letter and journal writer, Stephenson says. "The nearest sizable town was Greenville, a 16-mile round trip on unpaved roads," he points out. "Trips to Greenville had to be rescheduled when a farm horse was available."
Some of her most poignant writing records her grief when the Cottens' eldest son, Robbie Jr., drowned in the Tar River on his 15th birthday. This loss, Stephenson believes, "remained always the great personal tragedy of her life."
Cotten's involvement in public affairs began in 1890 when a family friend, political leader Elias Carr, arranged to have her appointed "alternate lady manager" on the committee to plan North Carolina's part in the Chicago World's Fair.This experience brought opportunities for travel and development of the public speaking, fund raising and leadership skills which she would later put to use on behalf of women.
Stephenson became intrigued with Cotten while doing research for an women's club, The End of the Century Club, founded and led by Cotten. This dynamic personality, affectionately known as "Mother Cotten," was evidently the club's "moving spirit," according to the club minutes, Stephenson says.
Futher research revealed more about Cotten and her dedicated work for the betterment of women."I grew interested in tracing her life story in all its details," he says.
His biography goes beyond a chronicle of Cotten's life and work; it delves into her failures and disappointments as well, and offers reasons for why this particular gifted and persuasive woman failed to achieve what other women of her era were able to accomplish.
Her ambition was hampered by the sheer weight of her responsibilites as a plantation wife and mother, Stephenson acknowledges, although she probably came as close to "having it all" (public career and family) as any other rural North Carolina woman could have in those days.
"Prevailing attitudes among even progressive North Carolininas of the late 19th and early 20th centuries effectively curtailed women's function in public life," he explains.
The notion that women could form a book club and meet regularly to exchange ideas was a radical concept, Stephenson points out. Even Cotten's successful campaign for women to be granted the right to serve on public school boards met bitter opposition in 1913.
A tendency toward social and political conservatism is one of several character traits of North Carolinians Stephenson discusses in the Cotten biography, making a not entirely flattering picture of our forebears.The nickname "Tar Heels" may imply that North Carolinians of former times were known to be "slow, stubborn and averse to any change from their habitual ways," the author suggests.
As a bright schoolgirl, Cotten met this conservatism when she became aware of what was regarded as woman's proper place. "The marriage and motherhood were likely, suitable destinies for young girls had been a general presumption in Virginia," Stephenson says."In North Carolina it was more like a holy law, with no exceptions allowed."
Other strong "Tar Heel" traits noticed by Stephenson are frugality, dislike of urban life, preference for modest, unostentatious living -- even among the wealthy -- dependence upon strong family ties, a strong sense of nature's beauties, unquestioning acceptance of innate class differences and integrity and devotion to duty.Most of these qualities are apparent today, espcecially to a non-native observer, Stephenson maintains.
As an adopted North Carolinian, Cotten shared some of these qualities; she recognized all of them in people she sought to persuade.Since many women, as well as men, needed coercion to accept the role of women as voting citizens, Cotten's speeches for suffrage coaxed, rather than exhorted.She compared going to the polls with going to church, promising that women would be able to vote "without any compromise of dignity or principles."
Largely because of her circumstances, Cotten did not become "a full-time public figure with a long list of personal achievements," Stephenson notes.Her influence was chiefly felt through her letter, attendance at public meetings and encouragement of others.
"Sallie was famous for what she was, more than for what she did," Stephenson says."She did not repeatedly make headlines herself, but she was the reason others went on to all sorts of public accomplishments."
Sallie Southall Cotten:A Woman's Life in North Carolina was published under Stephenson's own imprint, Pamlico Press."There are two more books in preparation now," he says. "I anticipate others to follow.Our focus will be North Carolina culture, folklore, history and interesting people. The emphasis will not be scholarly treatments, but on books for the intelligent general reader."
Stephenson has begun preliminary work on another biography, but not for Pamlico Press. His subject will be Broadway theatrical producer Charles Frohman, victim of the 1915 Lusitania disaster. This project is "way in the future," Stephenson says, and will require research at Texas and Harvard universities.
