Free Woman (17 page)

The governor of Massachusetts objected violently. "She is no better than a thief or a common streetwalker," he insisted. "I will see that she doesn't open her vile mouth in the city which was so recently honored by Mr. Beecher's presence." He kept his promise.

Instead. Vicky spoke in Springfield, Massachusetts. "They may stop my press," she told her audience, "but never my tongue."

A few days later, she announced that her next speech would take place in New York City at Cooper Union. On January 9, she would tell the full story of the Beecher-Tilton affair, as well as an account of her arrest and imprisonment.

When Anthony Comstock read of her scheduled talk, he got out of a sickbed to pounce again. Under an assumed name, he ordered, by mail, a copy of the controversial issue in which Beecher had been exposed. Unsuspecting, the
Weekly
promptly mailed the issue. Comstock promptly obtained another warrant to arrest them for sending obscene matter through the mails.

On January 9, James was the first to be arrested. Before he was taken away, however, he managed to send a message to Vicky and Tennie, who were at home.

Seizing her cloak, Vicky ran out the back door and took the first ferry to New Jersey. She checked into a hotel in Jersey City under a false name. Tennie also evaded arrest by hiding in a large washtub in the kitchen.

January 9 was one of the coldest days on record. By evening the temperature hovered a few degrees above zero. Howling winds ripped through the streets as New Yorkers found their breath freezing. At Cooper Union, United States marshals guarded the front door.

"No lecture tonight," they told all who arrived. "Mrs. Woodhull is being arrested." About fifty policemen were stationed inside the hall.

Some people left, grumbling. Others stayed and took their seats anyway. Perhaps they remained to thaw out before venturing into the cold again. Perhaps they hoped Vicky would show up after all. Maybe they wondered why so many police were there if Mrs. Woodhull was on her way to jail.

People chatted, rubbed their numb fingers, and stamped their feet to get warm. Among them was an elderly woman in a gray cloak and an old-fashioned bonnet. She hobbled down the aisle and took a seat in the front row. When people began to clap in rhythm and chant "We want The Woodhull," the old woman clapped too.

At last a woman appeared onstage. She was not Victoria Woodhull but Laura Cuppy Smith, Vicky's closest woman friend outside of her family. Announcing that Mrs. Woodhull would not speak tonight, Laura went on to say, "She can't appear or she'll be thrown into jail. Is this a free country? Have we free speech? Have we a free press?"

As Laura was speaking, the audience noticed that the old woman in the quaint bonnet was slowly climbing the steps to the platform. She tottered across the stage and disappeared into the wings. People nudged one another, tittering and pointing.

While Laura was still apologizing for Vicky's absence, the old woman in gray suddenly ran onto the stage and threw off her bonnet and cloak. There stood Victoria Wood-hull, her clothes and hair rumpled, her blue eyes glittering with defiance.

The audience shrieked. "Comstock's been hoaxed!" somebody roared.

Holding out her arms to calm the crowd, Vicky began to speak. For ninety minutes she held the audience spellbound with her story. Not one of the fifty policemen in the hall tried to arrest her.

Then it was over. A marshal immediately mounted the platform and led Vicky away.

11

Hard Times

In 1873 things suddenly began to go wrong for America. Ever since the end of the Civil War, business had boomed, cities had grown larger, people had made money. Now a depression shook the country.

Five thousand businesses failed that year. Banks collapsed; even the great banking firm of Jay Cooke and Company could not honor its financial obligations. Out in the prairie states, farmers had to sell their grain for less than it cost to grow. Textile mills and coal mines closed down. Factories laid off workers or cut their wages.

In big cities like New York and Chicago and Pittsburgh, the hungry and the unemployed stood in long lines to get free bowls of soup and chunks of bread. Desperate people roamed the roads, wandering from city to city in the hope of finding work. By the next year, three million people would be out of a job.

The Panic of '73 hurt many people. Vicky was among them. Although her case still had not been tried, she was out of jail and prayed that the government would find no further excuse to arrest her. She felt a desperate need to put her life in order. After so many nights in jail, after months of never knowing when she might be arrested again, she longed for the comforts of home. In jail, she had looked forward to a normal life: to spending her days at the
Weekly
office like a proper editor and her nights with her family. She especially wanted to be with Zulu Maud and have long, intimate conversations like other mothers and daughters did.

But the peace and normality she craved seemed beyond her reach. She needed money badly. The
Weekly
was coming out regularly now, but its size had been reduced from sixteen to eight pages. Even so, it was costly to print. The paper ate money instead of earning it. Looking for ways to bolster her income and pay the thousands of dollars she owed in legal fees, she ran the following notice in the Weekly:

The books and speeches of Victoria C. Woodhull and Tennie C. Claflin will hereafter be furnished, postage paid, at the following liberal prices:

The Principles of Government -
$3.00 
by Victoria C. Woodhull

Constitutional Equality
- 2.50 
by Tennie C. Claflin

The Principles of Social Freedom -
.25

The Ethics of Sexual Equality
- .25

She and Tennie had their photographs taken and offered them to readers at a dollar each.

Still there was never enough money. In February and March Vicky made a whirlwind tour through Massachusetts, Connecticut, Maryland, Pennsylvania, Delaware, and West Virginia. Very often, the turnout was disappointing. People didn't have extra money to spend, not even to hear The Woodhull. Sometimes, glancing at her audiences, Vicky wished for an instant that she could trade places with one of those comfortable wives on the arm of her protective husband. But these were fleeting, guilty thoughts. No, she could never be a submissive housewife, dependent upon the goodwill of a man. She loved her liberty too dearly.

And yet she had to admit that James was less of a husband than she had hoped for. "It's curious," she thought, "but it has been my fate to have had two husbands and neither of them ever supported me." Of course, she quickly reminded herself, James was unique. He had been her teacher, lover, and companion for seven years. No matter what she had decided to do, he encouraged her. No matter what business venture she had started, he pitched in and helped to make it a success. He had even gone to prison for her sake.

But he was a follower, content to bask at the edge of her limelight. He had never initiated any project of his own. Never once had she been able to reassure herself by saying, "I can rest for a while—James will take care of the family's needs." Before it had not mattered. Now, for the first time, she began to feel resentment.

In early March 1873, alone in a hotel room in Baltimore, she read a newspaper account of President Grant's inauguration. It had been so cold and windy that his inaugural speech could hardly be heard above the icy gale. The ball that night sounded like a complete fiasco. It was so cold the food froze solid. Hundreds of canaries, brought to decorate the ballroom, had huddled in their cages; some froze to their perches. Guests danced in their wraps, and most went home before midnight.

Vicky believed that Grant had been reelected by corrupt businessmen and rich politicians who had too much to lose without him in the White House. She gazed at Grant's picture on the front page and remarked out loud, "If Jesus Christ had been running against this man, He'd have been defeated."

Yawning, she crawled between the cold sheets. She lay there a long time without sleeping, forcing herself not to think about her smashed presidential dreams. Looking back was too painful. At last, she fell asleep on her stomach, like a child.

Returning home to New York, she felt bitterly tired. Often, in the mornings, she would still be in bed at nine o'clock. Listening through her sleep to the familiar sound of Roxanna's voice coming from the kitchen, she longed to roll over and slip back into oblivion again. Getting out of bed seemed like such a great effort. But get up she always did.

"What on earth's the matter with me?" she would think.

After a cup of tea and a slice of bread, she would feel better and be able to leave for the
Weekly
.

One humid Friday night in June, she and Tennie made a trip to the offices of the New York
Sun
. They paid for an announcement asking why the government had obstructed justice in their case. Why had their trial been postponed for over six months?

Lingering for a while, they stopped to talk to several reporters, old friends of Tennie's. As they left the
Sun
, a heavy rain began to fall, turning the broiling city into a steambath. For some time now, Vicky had been unable to afford a carriage of her own. She and Tennie waited for the streetcar. Riding home, Vicky began to feel faint.

"My chest hurts," she gasped. She could hardly breathe.

"It isn't any wonder—it's stifling in here," Tennie agreed, and began to fan her with a paper. She was worried, though, because Vicky's face looked gray.

Zulu Maud greeted her at the door with a hug. "Supper's on the stove, Mama."

Vicky didn't feel like eating. "I'll go up to bed and maybe have a cup of tea later," she said. She started up the stairs, but when she reached the landing there was a leaden thump.

Tennie and James rushed up the steps to find her sprawled on the floor unconscious. There was no pulse in her wrists and drops of blood were beginning to ooze from her lips.

James stumbled down the stairs and out the front door to find a doctor.

That night and all the next day, the house lay under a deathly silence, except for an occasional piercing shriek from Roxanna. The three doctors attending Vicky concluded that she had ruptured a blood vessel in her lungs. Once she regained consciousness; then, just as quickly, she sank into a coma again. The doctors administered medicines and a mustard plaster for her chest. But they told Tennie and James there was little hope.

The news of her illness had already flashed out across the land by telegraph. Headlines shouted
Mrs. Woodhull Dying!
The press began to compose her obituaries.

"If she dies," declared the Pittsburgh
Leader,
"the world will be rid of one of the most remarkable, albeit terrible and dangerous, women who ever lived in it."

The New York
Sun
said: "If Mrs. Woodhull had been born and educated in a different sphere—if her surroundings had been refined and inspiring—she would have developed into a great and glorious character. As it was, she simply leaped from one excitement to another, wasting her life." All the newspapers speculated on the effect her death would have on the Beecher-Tilton scandal.

Five days later, Vicky rallied from her coma and began to sleep normally. The crisis had passed. Soon she was sitting up in bed, still weak and speaking in a whisper, but on her way to recovery.

As her health gradually returned, so did her worries. At last, the government had set a date for the trial. Months earlier, she had written to her old friend Congressman Butler. What, she had asked, would he recommend as a defense? Butler answered that the obscenity statute was only meant to cover books, pamphlets, and drawings. The law did not refer to newspapers.

This was the line of defense used by Vicky's attorney. On the afternoon of June 26, a wan and thin Vicky sat in the hot courtroom and listened to the jury bring in a verdict of "not guilty." There was no argument and practically no discussion of the obscenity charge. After all those months of anguish, the case was dismissed in a few hours.

Vicky felt that she had touched bottom at last. Surely there was nowhere to go but up. That summer, she spent most of her time in New York. Her younger sister Utica was living with them now. Seeing her every day, Vicky soon noticed something about Utica that had escaped her attention before. She drank—heavily—and her drinking seemed to grow worse with each passing week.

After Vicky's years with Canning, she recognized the signs of alcoholism. There was no mistaking Utica's addiction to the bottle. Sometimes, when she drank to excess, she'd erupt into violence. Once, in a rage, she attacked Margaret Ann with a chair.

At thirty-one, Utica had two unhappy marriages behind her. In her own way she was as beautiful and ambitious as Vicky, but nothing she had ever tried, including marriage, had worked out. Suddenly, one day in July, she collapsed.

The Claflins anxiously gathered around Utica's bed, but they did not realize the seriousness of her condition. Utica just lay there with her eyes closed. She felt too ill to talk.

"Oh, my darling sister," Vicky cried, kneeling beside her. "Do you know how much I love you? I would die for you!"

Utica did not reply.

At eleven o'clock that evening Vicky felt she must get out of the house for a while. She began to walk and then remembered she had left a half-written speech at the office. She boarded a streetcar going south. As they passed Trinity Church, she heard Utica's voice. "It's all right now, Vicky."

At the next corner, Vicky leaped off the streetcar and caught another heading back home. Even before she opened the front door, she heard Roxanna weeping hysterically. Utica had died at eleven-thirty.

Roxanna refused to admit that Utica was dead. She kept insisting that her daughter had not been sick. Somebody must have poisoned her. Half-crazed with grief, she could not be convinced otherwise. Vicky and Tennie arranged for an autopsy. The report revealed that Utica had died of Bright's disease, most likely brought on by excessive use of alcohol and other narcotics.