Customer Reviews

Queen of the Confederacy: The Innocent Deceits of Lucy Holcombe Pickens

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When I first learned a few months ago that a biography of Lucy Holcombe Pickens was going to be published I anxiously awaited its publication. I was not disappointed. This is a first class biography of a significant person in the history of the Confederacy that has been overlooked too long. Several years ago I wanted to learn more about this interesting lady; but I found the sources about her few and far between. She does not have her own separate entry in the Encyclopedia of the Confederacy. She is only passingly mentioned in John B. Edmonds, Jr.'s book "Francis W. Pickens and the Politics of Destruction" published in 1986 and this is only because she was Picken's third wife. I could not find much information about her life after Pickens death. He died in 1869 and Lucy lived until 1899. So what happended to Lucy from 1869-1899? This beautiful biography fills in the blanks and Elizabeth Wittenmyer Lewis deserves our thanks for writing it. It is carefully researched and well written. The photographs show Lucy in her later years as well as her younger years when she enjoyed the reputation as the most beautiful woman in the Confederacy. This book is a true treasure and one that I would put on the same level with Elizabeth Muhlenfeld's biography of Mary Boykin Chesnut first published in 1981. A superb work and a significant contribution to the history of Confederate women.

Lucy Holcomb(e) was born into a Southern Family of means. This book covers her life as a spoiled but spirited debutante to a woman who spent years with her husband as America's representatives to the Czar of Russia. But this fantasy life quickly changed as her husband returned to his native South to fight in the Civil War. This book does a good job of delving in to her work for the South that along with her beauty... led to her place on Confederate $100 bills. I found this a very interesting side view into life in the South before, during and after the Civil War. I recommend it to anyone interested in the Civil War... and also to anyone wanting to discover another strong woman in a time when women were not expected to be active in marriage and definetly not in war.

Queen of the Confederacy: The Innocent Deceits of Lucy Holcombe Pickens is the aptly researched and enthrallingly presented biography of Lucy Holcombe Pickens (1832-1899), wife of Francis Wilkinson Pickens, the man who became the secessionist governor of South Carolina as America hurtled toward the Civil War. Lucy possessed a strong will, and the determination to aspire to greater heights than those of a typical Southern belle. She urged Pickens to undertake a diplomatic mission to the court of Tsar Alexander II of Russia, and hers was the only female face to appear upon Confederate paper currency. After the Civil War, she struggled with hard times as did many Southerners, yet her regal charm remained of great renown. The saga of a truly extraordinary woman, Queen of the Confederacy is especially recommended for American History and biography collections.