TO HAVE AND TO HOLD: THE MARY JOHNSTON STORY
by Paul Simpkins


A Virginia woman who rocked the system a century ago is still shaking up readers and bringing attention to her native Virginia town of Buchanan on the James River. Mary Johnston (1870-1936) grew up a stone’s-throw from the famous old river, gained international attention as a woman novelist in an early 1900’s man’s world, then used her popularity as a forum for women’s rights.
 
The tiny woman, who was deemed too frail to attend local schools, was educated at home by her grandmother, aunt, and tutors and indulged her love of writing and reading in her father’s ample library. She developed into a prolific writer. Her first published novel was PRISONER OF HOPE published in 1898 Her most publicly recognized work today is her second and wildly popular novel TO HAVE AND TO HOLD. Published in 1899, this flagship book created a sales sensation that once made her name as well-known as most Pulitzer prize winners.
 
Since then, presses have cranked out over a million copies—no mean deal today but a barn-buster a century ago. The book was made into a silent film in 1918 and again in 1921. AUDREY, her third book, was also made into a film; however, a tiny black-and-white pamphlet is the only known record of this filming. One-of-a-kind mementos from this period are in the Mary Johnston Collection at Fireside Books and Prints in Buchanan.
 
Mary Johnston was a 1990’s woman living in the 1890’s. Legend declares she was the first woman to speak before the Virginia General Assembly on giving women the right to vote. She carried her message to her neighboring state of Tennessee, then took the very unpopular fight to Alabama, where it almost cost her life when men hurled bricks and rocks at the speakers. The dedicated suffragette told anyone who would listen that women should finds jobs, become independent, and then—and only then—could they enjoy men! She also supported “mixed marriages” between Jews and gentiles. She never married, casually remarking that she never had the time.
 
Mary was born of southern aristocracy. Her mother, Elizabeth Alexander, hailed from a prominent West Virginia family. She died in 1889 and never knew of Mary’s literary success and fame, which had to be greatly disappointing to Mary. During the Civil War her father, Major John William Johnston, served as a captain in the Botetourt Artillery and saw action at First Manassas (Bull Run) with “Stonewall” Jackson. His campfire diaries of the Virginia Campaign formed the backbones for Mary’s books CEASE FIRING and THE LONG ROLL, which is dedicated to both her father and her uncle, Confederate General Joseph E. Johnston. Both books were illustrated by famed artist N.C. Wyeth. When they were published in 1911 and 1912, friend and fellow writer Margaret Mitchell said, “I hesitate to write about the South after having read Mary Johnston.” Thankfully, she overcame this case of the vapors. In 1936 the world was introduced to Mitchell’s novel GONE WITH THE WIND. 
 
After the Civil War and during Mary’s early years, her father was a successful lawyer and served as president of the James River and Kanawha Canal, which linked Buchanan to Lynchburg and the ports of Richmond. This enterprise died with the coming of the railroad, but John Johnston later served as president for railroads in Virginia, Alabama, and Georgia. Although the family was not exceptionally wealthy, her father’s wise investments provided Mary sufficient income that—not needing to marry for financial support—she was free to begin writing full-time before she was 21. For several productive years in New York City, she held no other job and said she spent most of her days sitting on a bench in Central Park penning chapter after chapter of her first two books.
 
This virtually carefree life is supported by 21 cases of her letters held in the library of the University of Virginia. These beautifully written notes contain numerous references to expensive trips abroad, some lasting an entire season. Cash, though, was apparently short at times. Publisher Houghton Mifflin’s book BUILDING THE HOUSE contains several references to loaning or advancing money to Mary between books.
 
In 1913 Mary Johnston wrote a book that killed the successful momentum of her writing career. HAGAR said, flat out, that she was for the women’s movement. Men stopped buying her books and taking them home, causing her sales to plunge to painful levels, never again to rise above token purchases. Lack of sales resulted in limited print-runs, making some of her later works quite rare. In her day, she was considered insane by some and a trouble-maker by most men; today, she would fit right in. She found something in which she believed and she never let go, even when it probably cost her fame and fortune.
 
Mary Johnston was unique in that almost everything she wrote was published on both sides of the Atlantic. Canadian and London publishers scattered her works around the globe. Today, prices paid for a copy of her work published in London for markets in Australia, New Zealand and New Guinea can rise to several hundred dollars. The Fireside Books Collection even boasts one leather bound Johnston novel written in Swedish!
 
In her four-decade career, Mary wrote 23 American novels, one drama, at least two long narrative poems, and many short stories. All were also published in Canada and England, though several underwent title changes. PRISONER OF HOPE became THE OLD DOMINION, and TO HAVE AND TO HOLD became BY ORDER OF THE COMPANY. The common United States title 1942 became the now very rare U.S. title COMMANDER OF THE OCEAN SEA, and the U.S. title FOES became the almost impossible-to-find LAIRD OF GLENFERNIE. Possibly no more than four copies of LAIRD have been found worldwide. For several years the only known copy resided in the Fireside Books Collection in Buchanan. The bookshop also has a substantial inventory of letters, post cards, pamphlets, autographs, a college thesis, a faded copy of her 1936 obituary, even a stately magnolia in the bookstore’s backyard which came from the Johnston’s trees next door. 
 
In 1912 Mary used proceeds from the sales of TO HAVE AND TO HOLD and THE LONG ROLL to build a mansion near Warm Springs overlooking her beautiful blue Virginia mountains. There, she briefly found the peace and solitude she sought for her writing and for herself, often arising at dawn and hiking through the hills before beginning to write. However, this was short-lived, as mooching family members came to visit the giant stone house named Three Hills and never left. Dependent relatives and friends, declining book revenues, and The Depression forced her to turn it into a boarding house run by her sister Eloise.
 
Mary’s reputation slept peacefully for almost three-quarters of a century until the late 1990’s when the University of Virginia re-printed her book HAGAR, a story that almost duplicated her life’s struggles. The University of North Carolina then re-issued TO HAVE AND TO HOLD. Following closely on the heels of the UVA re-prints, Johns Hopkins in Baltimore, MD, re-issued her two Civil War novels THE LONG ROLL and CEASE FIRING, making them available for the first time in decades. The originals are the books of which Gen. Dwight D. Eisenhower said during the stormy days of World War II, "If I want to read military tactics for pleasure, I choose to read Mary Johnston."
 
The primary importance of the re-issues is that when colleges publish old works, these titles are soon woven into required reading lists, resulting in more people becoming familiar with the author. That results in increased demand. Today, finding a reissue of one of her most popular books could be as easy as a trip to any bookstore or flea market. 
 
Her fine birthplace home in Buchanan is gone now, torn down—like the Sixties song says—to build a parking lot. But mementos of her 15 years there abound in the little town of about 1500 contented souls and a half-dozen old crabs. Mary’s own priceless collection of her writings was willed to the town upon her death in 1936 but was lost in the flood of 1985 that devastated the town. Her work has been re-born in the local bookstore as the most extensive collection of Mary Johnston books and memorabilia in the world. Among the collection is the only known copy of SWEET ROCKET with a dust jacket. 
 
Buchanan’s Mary Johnston Collection would never have flowered without the help and support of Charlottesville collector Joe Thompson. Thompson once had the premier collection but has shared many of his “finds” with Fireside Books and has given other batches to The University of Virginia and the Buchanan Library. He has offered his full collection to the latter if they would provide locked cases to display it.
 
The town’s history buffs are looking toward a museum with a Mary Johnston theme. There is already a room in her name at the local library. Every week brings visitors to Buchanan, people who want to see pictures of her home, walk down to where it was, leaf through her books, hold the movie things in their hands just to get a feel for the tiny but powerful lady whose presence remains so strong in the town. They want to have and to hold and, thus, to know Mary Johnston.
 
Even ghosts have gotten into the act. In the last years before her death, Mary Johnston often came to tea in the 14-room Victorian house that now houses Fireside Books downstairs and, upstairs, owners Bobbie and Paul Simpkins’ residence. Several times, Bobbie reported seeing in their home a “tiny, frail little lady with white hair” who would vanish if approached. Shown a picture of Mary Johnston, Bobbie readily identified her visitor as the famed writer. This makes sense to some people because there are more of her things there than in any other place in the world. For unknown reasons, Mary Johnston’s vaporish 20th Century visits stopped after a half-dozen sightings. 
 
The Buchanan Welcome Center has two Mary Johnston artifacts. One is a mirror from her home that was used by Victorian ladies to see if their petticoats were showing. The other is an original portrait of Mary Johnston that somehow escaped the flood and now rests on a high shelf.
 
Mary herself rests next to her father in Richmond’s Hollywood Cemetery. Like the town of Buchanan since the spirit of revitalization made her a destination of choice, Mary Johnston’s spirit lives on as today’s readers newly discover her life and her work. 

Paul Simpkins is a former journalist turned Buchanan, Virginia, antiques dealer, estate appraiser, and book dealer who keeps company at Fireside Books with some 100,000 books, magazines, postcards, prints, and sheet music. “It’s a hobby out of control!” he admits. He can be reached at (540) 254-3200 or at fireside@rbnet.com