Flora Adams Darling

Background

Flora Adams Darling was born on July 25, 1840 in Lancaster, New Hampshire, United States. Descendant in the seventh generation of Henry Adams who settled in Braintree, Massachusetts, in 1636, the daughter of Harvey and Nancy (Rowell) Adams. Her father, to whom she was devoted, was a Democrat and she shared his views of history and politics, subjects in which she was interested from childhood.

Career

In 1860, together with her husband, she went to his Louisiana home just before the outbreak of the Civil War. Throughout that struggle her sympathies were divided between North and South, and as a Yankee Protestant her life was not altogether easy in a family of Southern Catholics. Going to England with her husband in January 1861, she tried to keep him there when the Civil War began, but he hastened home and joined the Confederate army.

Before the birth of her son, she returned to her father’s New England home, intending to remain there until the war was over, but her husband’s serious illness from a wound caused her to join him at Richmond in February 1863, after much difficulty in securing permission to cross the lines.

Her husband, wounded at Franklin, Tennessee, died December 2, 1863.

Under suspicion because she had taken the oath of allegiance to the Confederacy, she was arrested in New Orleans by Union officials and on her release found that her securities and jewelry had been stolen from her trunks. This loss occasioned a prolonged claim case before Congress. Illnesses from malarial and typhoid fever in the South injured her health, and a recurrence of malaria in 1876 resulted in the loss of her hearing and the impairment of her sight.

After the war, she was for a time employed in a government department in Washington, where most of her remaining life was passed. In September 1890, Mrs. Darling asked Mrs. Mary S. Lockwood to join her in organizing a patriotic society which became the Daughters of the American Revolution, formally founded October 11, 1890.

She was the second signer, was elected vice-president in charge of the organization of chapters, and became editor of the official organ, the Adams Magazine.

Friction shortly arose between her and the National Board of the D. A. R. because she opposed eligibility to membership through the maternal side and because of her alleged refusal to recognize the authority of the Board.

By a resolution of the Board, July 1, 1891, she was removed from office and on August 7, 1891, she resigned her life membership and severed all connection with the organization.

The Darling Chapter of New York, named for her, also withdrew and became the parent of the Daughters of the Revolution, founded by Mrs. Darling August 20, 1891, on the basis of lineal descent only.

Mrs. Darling was the author of several books, most of them autobiographical. Late in life she organized the Edward Irving Darling Musical Society in memory of her son, a composer.

Achievements

• Flora Adams Darling founded the Daughters of the United States of the War of 1812, of which she became the first president-general.

Works

More photos

• book

  • Founding and organization of the Daughters of the American revolution and Daughters of the revolution

    ( About the Book By the 1770s, 13 British colonies held 2...)

  • Mrs. Darling's Letters, or Memories of the Civil War
  • A winning, wayward woman: Chapters in the heart-history of Amélie Warden, (Judge's novels)

Connections

On March 12, 1860 she married Colonel Edward Irving Darling, twenty-two years older than herself.

Father:

Harvey Adams

Mother:

Nancy (Rowell) Adams

Brother:

John Quincy Adams

Son:

Edward Irving Darling

husband:

Edward Irving Darling