Margaret Junkin Preston

Margaret Junkin Preston
Born Margaret Junkin
(1820-05-19)May 19, 1820
Milton, Pennsylvania, U.S.
Died March 28, 1897(1897-03-28) (aged 76)
Baltimore, Maryland, U.S.
Resting place Stonewall Jackson Memorial Cemetery, Lexington, Virginia
Residence Lexington, Virginia
Occupation Poet, author
Spouse(s) John Thomas Lewis Preston (1857-1890; his death)
Children 2
Parent(s) George Junkin
Julia Rush (Miller) Junkin
Relatives Elinor Jackson (sister)

Margaret Junkin Preston (May 19, 1820 – March 28, 1897)[1] was an American poet and author.[2]

Biography

She was born in Milton, Pennsylvania, in 1820.[3][4] Her father was George Junkin, a Presbyterian minister and college president.[2][3][4][5][6] She learned Latin and Ancient Greek at the age of twelve.[3] She married Major John Thomas Lewis Preston in 1857,[7] a professor of Latin at Virginia Military Institute.[2][3][4][5][6] Her sister, Elinor (Ellie), had in 1853 married Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson, a colleague of Preston's at VMI.[8] Major Preston served on the staff of Stonewall Jackson during the Civil War.[9]

She wrote many volumes of prose and poetry, and published some of her writing in the Southern Literary Messenger and Graham's Magazine.[10] She also published a few articles in Harper's Magazine.[11]Preston's 1856 novel Silverwood is a subtle exploration of the clash between traditional values of honor and family and the new market economy that was sweeping through the United States and the Shenandoah Valley.[12] She is remembered for espousing the Confederacy in her poems.[6]

She became blind in the late 1880s, and died in Baltimore in 1897.[3][5]

Bibliography

References

  1. ↑ "Pr - New General Catalog of Old Books & Authors". Retrieved 14 December 2016.
  2. 1 2 3 "Margaret Junkin Preston Papers, 1812-1892, 1938, 1997". Retrieved 14 December 2016.
  3. 1 2 3 4 5 Southern Writers: A Biographical Dictionary (Southern Literary Studies), Robert Bain (ed.), Jr. Louis D. Rubin (ed.), Joseph M. Flora (ed.), Louisiana State University Press, 1979, pp.365-366
  4. 1 2 3 Southern Life in Southern Literature, Maurice Garland Fulton (ed.), Kessinger Publishing, 2003, p. 268
  5. 1 2 3 Charles William Hubner, Representative Southern Poets, BiblioLife, 2008, p. 147
  6. 1 2 3 "Margaret Junkin Preston, Poet of the Confederacy". Retrieved 14 December 2016.
  7. ↑ "Margaret Junkin Preston (1820-1897) - Poetess Laureate of the South". Retrieved 14 December 2016.
  8. ↑ "Eleanor Junkin (1825-1854) - first wife of Confederate General Thomas "Stonewall" Jackson". Retrieved 14 December 2016.
  9. ↑ http://www.lib.unc.edu/mss/inv/p/Preston,Margaret_Junkin.html
  10. ↑ "History Cooperative - A Short History of Nearly Everything!". Archived from the original on 30 June 2008. Retrieved 14 December 2016.
  11. ↑ "Margaret Junkin Preston - Harper's Magazine". Retrieved 14 December 2016.
  12. ↑ Alfred L. Brophy & Douglas Thie, Land, Slaves, and Bonds: Probate in the Pre-Civil War Shenandoah Valley, West Virginia Law Review 116 (2016): 345, 348-50 (beginning exploration of trust law in the Shenandoah Valley with the central conflict in Silverwood -- a trustee's stealing of the inheritance of the Irvine family).
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