US Welles, Mary Jane Hale

Mary Jane Hale Welles

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Mary Jane Hale Welles.jpg


Born: June 12, 1817

Birthplace: Glastonbury, Connecticut

Father: Elias W. Hale 1775 – 1832
(Buried: Saint Marks Cemetery, Lewiston, Pennsylvania)​

Mother: Jane Mulhollan 1785 – 1853
(Buried: Saint Marks Cemetery, Lewiston, Pennsylvania)​

Husband: Secretary of Navy Gideon Welles 1802 – 1878
(Buried: Cedar Hill Cemetery Hartford Connecticut)​

Married: June 16, 1835 in Lewiston, Pennsylvania

Children:

Anna Jane Welles 1836 – 1854​
(Buried: Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford, Connecticut)​
Samuel Welles 1838 – 1839​
(Buried: Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford, Connecticut)​
Edward Gideon Welles 1840 – 1843​
(Buried: Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford, Connecticut)​
Edgar Thaddeus Welles 1843 – 1914​
(Buried: Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford, Connecticut)​
Thomas Gideon Welles 1846 – 1892​
(Buried: Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford, Connecticut)​
John Arthur Welles 1849 – 1885​
(Buried: Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford, Connecticut)​
Herbert Welles 1852 – 1853​
(Buried: Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford, Connecticut)​
Hubert Welles 1853 – 1862​
(Buried: Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford, Connecticut)​
Mary Juanita Welles 1854 – 1858​
(Buried: Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford, Connecticut)​

Life Events before War:

1819: Birth of her sister Caroline Amelia Hale Morgan​
1824: Birth of her brother Elias White Hale​
1832: Death of her father Attorney Elias W. Hale.​
1835: Married her husband Gideon Welles​
1835 – 1836: Her husband served as Connecticut State Comptroller​
1836: Birth of her daughter Anna Jane Welles​
1838: Birth of her son Samuel Welles​
1839: Death of her son Samuel Welles​
1840: Birth of her son Edward Gideon Welles​
1843: Birth of her son Edgar Thaddeus Welles​
1843: Death of her son Edward Gideon Welles​
1846: Birth of her son Thomas Gideon Welles​
1849: Birth of her son John Arthur Welles​
1852: Birth of her son Herbert Welles​
1853: Birth of her son Hubert Welles​
1853: Death of her son Herbert Welles​
1853: Death of her mother Jane Mulhollan Hale​
1854: Death of her daughter Anna Jane Welles​

1854: Birth of her daughter Mary Juanita Welles​
1858: Death of her daughter Mary Juanita Welles​

Civil War Life Events:

1861 – 1869: Her husband served as United States Secretary of Navy.​
1862: Death of her son Hubert Welles​
1863: Death of her older brother Reuben Charles Hale​
1865: Her husband’s boss President Abraham Lincoln Assassinated.​

Life Events after War:

1861 – 1869: Her husband served as United States Secretary of Navy.​
1869 – 1878: Her husband wrote and edited Journals
Death.jpg

1878: Death of her husband U.S. Secretary of Navy, Gideon Welles.​
1878 – 1886: Widow of United States Secretary of Navy, Gideon Welles​
1885: Death of her son John Arthur Welles​

Died: February 28, 1886

Place of Death: Hartford, Connecticut

Age at time of Death: 69 years old

Burial Place: Cedar Hill Cemetery, Hartford, Connecticut
 
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On a side-note Mary Jane Hale Welles was acquainted with tragedy:

“Mary Jane birthed 9 children. 2 sons died within a year of birth and one of those sons, Herbert born August, 1852 died August 20, 1853 from diphtheria. Sadly for the Welles his 18 year old sister Anna died April 10, 1854 at 17, only 8 months after her brother.” {*}

Through this tragedy she became a good friend to Mary Lincoln after the death of Willie in February of 1862. She was just one a few that were able to console the distraught First Lady.

"Mrs. Lincoln turned to her friend Mary Jane Welles, although, there were times that she never understood Mary Jane’s comforting words to her that she would see her children again in heaven. As Doris Kearns Goodwin writes a in her book “Team of Rivals” - - -

'Nor could she (Mrs. Lincoln) fully accept the comfort Mary Janes Welles found in the belief that her children awaited her in heaven. If only she had faith that Willie was ‘far happier’ in an afterlife than he had been ‘when on earth,’ Mary suggested to Mary Jane, she might accept his loss'." {*}

Mary Welles wasn’t aware that by the end of the year she would say a final good-bye to another son:

“But the Mary’s did what they could to comfort each other through the pain. For the Welles, before the end of the year, they would say good bye to another child, Hubert born May 29th, 1853 died from an unknown illness (today some say diphtheria) on November 18th, 1862 at 9 years of age.” {*}

And her friendship with Mrs. Lincoln continued when the President assassinated:

“Mary Jane Welles was the only cabinet wife that Mary Lincoln requested to be at her side at the Peterson House for the death watch over President Lincoln. Mary Jane was actually in her sick bed, but went to her friend to give comfort. The Welles were helpful to Mary in the days following the president’s death as the former First Lady leaned on them for help in the transition that needed to be made during those difficult months.” {*}

{*} https://civilwartalk.com/threads/a-friendship-blooms-through-depths-of-gloom.158238/#post-2058260
 
Did her husband keep an actual diary or is that just the title of his book? "Diary of Gideon Welles, Secretary of the Navy Under Lincoln and Johnson."
Check this out:
https://www.loc.gov/search/?fa=partof:gideon+welles+papers:+diaries,+1824-1869

And at Amazon - The Civil War Diary of Gideon Welles, Lincoln's Secretary of the Navy: The Original Manuscript Edition (The Knox College Lincoln Studies Center) Kindle Edition - a bargain at $9.99

And part of the description:

“Perhaps the hardest-working member of the cabinet, Welles still found time to keep a detailed diary that has become one of the key documents for understanding the inner workings of the Lincoln administration. In this new edition, William E. and Erica L. Gienapp have restored Welles’s original observations, gleaned from the manuscript diaries at the Library of Congress and freed from his many later revisions, so that the reader can experience what he wrote in the moment. With his vitriolic pen, Welles captures the bitter disputes over strategy and war aims, lacerates colleagues from Secretary of State William H. Seward to General-in-Chief Henry Halleck, and condemns the actions of the self-serving southern elite he sees as responsible for the war. He can just as easily wax eloquent about the Navy's wartime achievements, extoll the virtues of Lincoln, or drop in a tidbit of Washington gossip.”
 
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