Embedded Files
Likely photograph of a young Cordelia Green at Clay County Archives, undated. Image was not labeled, but in the collection of letters.
Cordelia Green’s experiences as a student at Clay Seminary impacted her entire life. In her youth, she was often called Corda, Cordia, or Cordie; and much of what is known about Cordelia’s Clay Seminary experiences comes from two articles printed in 1936 describing a collection of items that Cordelia had kept in storage for forty seven years after she left Liberty. A year before her death, she sold her entire Liberty collection to Harry Antique shop for $50 which was far less than what she had paid in storage over the years. Unfortunately, most of the items reported in the article that were part of her collection are now in unknown locations.
Items lost that were part of her Liberty collection were text books from Clay Seminary, hoop skirts and capes of Civil War days, assorted trinkets and essays written in her own handwriting. The oration she gave at her graduation from Clay Seminary, “Droppings From Wisdom’s Fount” was among the essays which have not been found.
Other items reported in the collection sold in 1936 that show how important her years at Clay Seminary were to her included a hand bill dated August 15, 1865 advertising, “A First Class Female School for Sale, Clay Seminary." According to “Out of Storage after 47 Years,” Cordelia had written on the side, “How much of joy, how little sorrow hath I passed, within they walls, this dear old school.” (Liberty Advance, March 30, 1936) This shows how fondly she felt about her experiences at Clay Seminary. The hand bill stated, “The school has existed for ten years; a good portion of the time under adverse circumstances, yet its prosperity has exceeded the most sanguine anticipations of its founder and friends, and the future under the auspices of peace and returning prosperity, is even more hopeful.” And, “It is confidently stated that no better situation can be found in the West for an enterprise of the kind, and any one wishing to open and conduct a permanent first class female school in a community with intelligence to appreciate it, and public spirit and pecuniary ability to sustain it, will do well to obtain further particulars by addressing the principal.”
All six students in Cordelia Green’s graduating class participated in the commencement program which took place over the span of two days, July 10 and 11, 1862. On July 10, Cordelia was one of three debators of the affirmative regarding the debate question – "Is one out of the world when out of the fashion?" She also performed an untitled musical composition. On July 11, she gave her speech, “Droppings from Wisdom’s Fount.”
Eunomian society program at Clay County Archives. Notice the Annual Address was given by William Brining whom Cordelia Green had invited to speak.
Cordelia Green Drumm was clearly interested in the social life and education community in Liberty. Her Liberty collection also included a copy of the inaugural address of Reverend Thomas Taimbaut when he became president of William Jewell College when it was reopened after the Civil War.
It appears the Eunomian society at Clay Seminary held a special place in Cordelia Green’s Clay Seminary experiences. The 1936 article, “Out of Storage after 47 years,” reported Eunomian society programs were included in her storage collection and an acceptance letter from Willing Brining to speak at the annual address for the Eunomian society in 1862. The article stated he wrote the following to Cordelia Green,
“Liberty, June 21, 1862
Dear Cordia Green:
Assure the officers and members of the Eunomian Literary Society of Clay Seminary, that I highly appreciate the unmerited distinction they have conferred upon me, by unanimously electing me to deliver the annual address before them, on the evening of the 19th prosimo.
I trust that my health, which has of late been very feeble and precarious, will afford me the privilege of rendering some little service to the great cause your society seeks to promote – the mental and moral improvement of youth.
Wit muc respect, yours truly, W. Brining”
Also, in Cordelia Green Drumm’s collection sold to Harry Antique shop was a record sheet of several of her pupils in a class book with a handwritten note by Cordelia which said, “Began teaching music in Dr. Hughes school October 5, 1868.
A final item of note reported to have been in Cordelia’s Liberty collection was a clipping from the Liberty Tribune with a copy of General Sterling Price asking for 50,000 men. This shows that the Civil War which raged while Cordelia was at Clay Seminary had a great impact (even though James Love claimed it hadn't in the circular advertisement in 1862) and was viewed with great importance by Cordelia and many of her classmates. This is made even more clear by analyzing the valedictory address of Cordelia’s classmate, Henrietta Clay George.
Circular advertisement from 1862 noting the "excitement and violence of the times" and that Clay Seminary had "little interruption."
On July 25, 1862, the Liberty Weekly Tribune printed the only existing valedictory speech of a student at Clay Seminary, at the request of those in the audience that had not heard the speech in its entirety claiming the venue was too full for all to hear her speak. Henrietta Clay George, often called Henri or Clay, submitted the manuscript. Her speech was full of war rhetoric showing her knowledge of the sectional struggles locally and nationally showing a depth of knowledge of current events. Key quotes include:
Her and her classmates have “peacefully and without interruption gathered around the shrine of wisdom.”
Describes the current war, “…like a vivid flash through the gathering storm, it darted its forked tongues on the sky of astounded Europe, and excited an interest among foreign powers, most absorbing and intense, and these now gaze with eagle eye, upon the rising storm, which heaves to the very centre, the grand ‘Old Ship of State,’ which has safely braved the storms and tempests of external opposition, but to be buffeted by the waves of internal dissensions.”
She calls on her classmates, including Cordelia Green, “go boldly forth clad in the armor of truth, thoroughly prepared for the struggles of life; and to give battle to the opposers of right.”
Cordelia Green’s time at Clay Seminary was marked by turmoil in the nation and Liberty. On April 20, 1861, pro-Confederate men attacked the Liberty Arsenal where only one man was stationed. The guard quickly surrendered and some 1,500 arms were distributed to citizens of Clay County for their protection. By August of 1861, General McCulloch declared Union people in Missouri would be protected, but that they had to choose a side. In September of 1861, Missouri State Guardsman had attacked Union forces near the Missouri River, forcing them to retreat to Liberty. Henrietta Clay George referenced this in her valedictory address. She stated, “But a few months ago, the dread tocsin of war pealed aloud its thunder.” The people of Missouri were split over sympathies and allegiance.
Article found at Clay County Archives, by Henrietta Clay George, “Valedictory Address,” Liberty Weekly Tribune, July 25, 1862.
The war had to be terrifying for everyone at this time, but perhaps had a particular impact on the young women at Clay Seminary. Catherine Clinton writes in Divided Houses: Gender and the Civil War that, “Confederate women found that the war might support a newly independent stature on their part.” (page 17) Perhaps, there were subtle challenges to the notion that women should play no public role in political life beyond deferring to male judgements. Women were no longer seeing themselves as passive victims. It is quite possible Cordelia Green was one of these women.
While Cordelia Green was most likely protected from the worst of the guerrilla fighting in the war, skirmishes and fighting frequently happened near Liberty. 1862, the year of Cordelia’s graduation from Clay Seminary, was particularly frantic. An example of this was on March 18, 1862, when one recruit of the state militia was shot and eight others were taken prisoner. General Prentiss, of pro-Confederate forces, tore down the American flag and raised a secession one. Later, Colonel Catherwood of Union forces, tore down the secession one and raised the Stars and Stripes again, and had President Thompson of the Baptist College of Liberty taken prisoner.
There could not have been a true sense of safety and security even within the protected walls of Clay Seminary. According to Michael Fellman’s chapter Divided Houses in “Women and Guerrilla Warfare,” “In Missouri, which saw the most intense guerrilla fighting of the war, where pro-Confederate guerrillas roamed far beyond Union lines, and where Union guerrilla hunters behaved just as abysmally as their enemies, women from both camps often became both victims and participants in the heart of the conflict.” (page 147)
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