A South Carolina Journal (1890 – 1946) – Howell Morrell and Mamie Boozer – A Christmas Love Story

By Kathy Morrell Newman

HOWELL MORRELL AND MAMIE BOOZER – A CHRISTMAS LOVE STORY

My name is Kathy Morrell Newman.  I live on top of Horrell Hill in a two-story Victorian-style home my Grandfather built for my Grandmother.  Howell Morrell bought a tract of heart pine in the Congaree Swamp and sent it to Mr. Corley’s lumber mill in Lexington.  He built the outbuildings out of the unfinished wood and the house from the finished wood.  It was his wedding present to Mamie Boozer.

Mary (Mamie) Boozer and Howell Morrell were married December 26, 1906, six years after Mamie’s parents refused Howell’s request to court her and 2 months after Grandfather’s election to the SC Legislature. 

In the fall of 1899 Howell had asked Mamie’s parents, Albert M. and Amanda Boozer, permission to court Mamie and been refused. Courtship is defined as a relationship that could lead to marriage.  In that era, courting was usually approved by the parents and done at the lady’s home under supervision.

Their love story began in the fall of 1898 at the new Horrell Hill Elementary and High School when Mamie Boozer was named  Assistant Principal and Teacher to Howell Morrell, principal. It was her first job since graduating from Columbia Female College(Columbia College).  She grew up in downtown Columbia.

At the end of the  school year, Howell asked Mamie if he could court her.  She said yes, but her parents said “No!” and  instructed Mamie to quit her job and move back home.

 According to family legend, Mamie’s parents said she was a city girl, that she couldn’t live in the country and she couldn’t even cook.  Grandfather’s famous reply:  “I don’t want a cook, I want a wife.”

Albert Boozer was half right.  Howell  Morrell  got a wife, never a cook.  But she loved living on top of Horrell Hill in the country. 

On December 11, 1933, 27 years later, Grandmother wrote: 

“Heartsick and weary over the never-ending work in the kitchen, shutting my eyes and fleeing from it to sink into the depths of the big easy chair by the dining room fire.  For a while, too tired to open my eyes or even think.  Gradually the music of the radio soothing me and soon laughing heartily with the boys and their jokes and songs.”  She was also known to call the stove the “black monster” and threatened to hid the pots and pans behind it.  She usually had kitchen help, but this was 1933, often considered the worst year of the Great Depression.

But factors other than where Mamie would live and not being able to cook impacted her parent’s decision.  First was the their family background and second  their age difference.  Howell was fourteen years older than Mamie.  At that time, he as 39 and she was 25.

Grandmother grew up in Columbia on Plain Street -now Hampton St.  Her father was a  lawyer and clerk of the SC Supreme Court most of his career.  Both he and his wife could trace their ancestors back to the early days of America.  Grandmother and her two sisters  attended Columbia Female College and her brother attended  Yale and became a dentist. She was a pianist with a degree in music and was a favorite performer in Columbia musical events and concerts.  Attending professional and local musical programs, theatre and lectures was part of the family’s daily life.  Very importantly, Grandmother was very close to her parents.  She would not  marry without their consent.

Grandfather was raised on a farm in Dentsville (Blythewood),  an area known for its poor soil and where farming was hard.  When he was seven years old his father was killed in the Civil War. He was an only child and suddenly he was the man of the house, helping his mother eke out a living from their small farm. Sometimes farm chores  took precedent over school attendance.  It wasn’t until he was 19 and his mother remarried that he was free to pursue his dream  of attending South Carolina College (USC) and becoming an educator.  He was unprepared for the entrance exam and  convinced a rural schoolmaster to let him sit in on classes in return for serving as caretaker for the schoolhouse.  After a year, he took and passed the college’s entrance exam.  He taught at several schools in SC before being recruited to oversee the building of Horrell Hill’s first community school and become its first principal.

AN UNDER-THE-WIRE COURTSHIP

Even though permission to court was denied, there was a courtship, perhaps best described as under-the-wire.

Letters were Howell and Mamie’s  primary means of communication and social events or other community activities were their primary ways of seeing each other. And then there were the times they conspired for him to visit her home on the sly.

On January 12, 1895, Mamie wrote Howell:

            Dear, I’m so afraid you misunderstood me to-night.  When  I shook my head, you looked so sad that it cut me to the heart, and I can’t get over it.  I only meant that  I could not arrange for you to visit me at my home tomorrow.  Mama is not going away as she expected, and my sisters may come home tomorrow; so you see that it will not be possible.  I shook my head , because I promised to let you know to-night whether you could come or not, and that was the only way I could  do it.  I intended writing you a note this afternoon, but had to rush my work to get out tonight and did not have time.

            I know you will agree with me that it would not be prudent to come here to-morrow, under the circumstances.  I want Cousin Henry to talk to Mamma first.  I can’t imagine why he hasn’t written or done something, as he promised.  I have watched for a letter every day, and am so disappointed.  I have no right to ask you to wait any longer, but  was depending on Cousin Henry’s help in setting things straight so much.

            It breaks my heart to see you so miserable.  When I think of what a hard time you have had all your life, and of how I am adding to your suffering every day, it seems as if it must kill me.  God knows I would like to make you happy, and would rather die than send you away.  Oh, indulge me a little longer!

 Your Miserable,

                             M

Howell Morrell waited on his “Miserable M”.

It was a long and happy marriage.  Within 9 years they had four children.  Grandfather later retired from teaching and became a successful farmer. He terraced the “Hill” and grew different crops on each of the 6 terraces.  He owned the cotton gin at the bottom of the hill and opened a community store on the corner of Horrrell Hill-Harmon Rd and Garners Ferry Rd.

On December 26, 1932, my grandparents celebrated their Silver Anniversary.  He was 72 and she was 58. On December 26, 1933, Grandmother  pasted two intertwined hearts in her diary and wrote: “Our Wedding Anniversary, hence the hearts. Wonderful memories of last year’s Silver Wedding Anniversary.”

CHRISTMAS AT THE BOOZER AND MORRELL HOMES

Grandmother was a lifetime diarist and all seven that have survived – her 1890-95 journal, her 1933 diary and five diaries from the 1940’s – reflect her love of Christmas.  On September 12, 1942 she pasted a Henry Van Dyke prose poem entitled Keeping Christmas in her diary.  She said she found it in the Progressive Farmer magazine and just had to keep it.   A few lines: 

It is  a good thing to observe Christmas Day.

But there is a better thing than the observance of Christmas Day.  It is keeping Christmas.

Are you willing to forget what you have done for other people and to remember what other people have done for you; …to stoop down and consider the needs and the desires of little children;… to remember the weakness and loneliness of people who are growing old; …to look round  you for a place where you can sow a few seeds of happiness?  Are  you  willing to do these things for even a day?  Then you can keep Christmas.  And if you can keep it a day, why not always?

No matter her age, Grandmother loved Christmas.

November 25, 1890, age 16

“One month until Christmas!  How glorious! But I heard today  that we would not have but three days  holiday.   I think that’s the meanest thing I ever heard of.  I never have had less than a week.  I earnestly hope that the report is a mistake.”

December 5, 1890

“Only three weeks until Christmas!  How time flies.  I am going to make this the very happiest Christmas I have ever spent.  If it would only turn cold!  I have some hopes for it; for the weather is very warm now, and if it will just turn cold again in time for Christmas.”

December 8, 1890

“Just now  happened to glance out of the window and saw a boy pass with a bunch of mistletoe in his hand.  How good it made me fell to think that Christmas is so near!  Yesterday, as we were out walking, a carriage passed us loaded with holly boughs; and it looked so jolly that we just had to stand and stare.”

December 17, 1890

“Everything is lovely!  Everything is pure white outside.  Last night it sleeted a little and then froze hard; then when we awoke this morning, we found everything covered and it has continued to snow all day.  It is simply beautiful.  We have been nearly wild with delight all day.  It has been intensely cold for about a week and we have been expecting this all the time.  How glorious for it to come during the holidays!  I have seen several sleighs pass and the air has been ringing with laughter and snowballs.” 

November 25, 1890, age 16

“One month until Christmas!  How glorious! But I heard today  that we would not have but three days  holiday.   I think that’s the meanest thing I ever heard of.  I never have had less than a week.  I earnestly hope that the report is a mistake.”

December 5, 1890

“Only three weeks until Christmas!  How time flies.  I am going to make this the very happiest Christmas I have ever spent.  If it would only turn cold!  I have some hopes for it; for the weather is very warm now, and if it will just turn cold again in time for Christmas.”

December 8, 1890

“Just now  happened to glance out of the window and saw a boy pass with a bunch of mistletoe in his hand.  How good it made me fell to think that Christmas is so near!  Yesterday, as we were out walking, a carriage passed us loaded with holly boughs; and it looked so jolly that we just had to stand and stare.”

December 17, 1890

“Everything is lovely!  Everything is pure white outside.  Last night it sleeted a little and then froze hard; then when we awoke this morning, we found everything covered and it has continued to snow all day.  It is simply beautiful.  We have been nearly wild with delight all day.  It has been intensely cold for about a week and we have been expecting this all the time.  How glorious for it to come during the holidays!  I have seen several sleighs pass and the air has been ringing with laughter and snowballs.” 

“This morning two girls and myself went out to see about gathering a Christmas present for our Sunday school teacher.  We had to walk some distance to see some of the other girls and I don’t know when I have had more fun.  We laughed, sliding along, ran, fell down and had fun in general.”

December 25, 1895, age 21

“Such a beautiful, balmy Christmas day! We have just returned from church and  am sitting at my open window.  The services were appropriate and interesting, led by our new pastor. Mr. W.W. Daniel, with whom we are charmed.  We couldn’t feel solemn, though, with the sound of firecrackers out in the street and the many merry, smiling faces of some of our “boy” friends sitting near.  After the service we had a merry little chant with “the boys”.  We hung up our stockings as usual last night and received some very pretty and useful presents.  I m trying my best to get hungry, but I m actually tired of good things already.  I see Lena out in the yard busy with firecrackers and Papa helping.  I must go too.”

December 14, 1933, age 58

“A day in town.  Annual  custom-we three sisters doing Christmas shopping together and such a happy time! They treating me to a “turkey lunch”-delicious.  Wandered from one gaily decorated store to another, imbibing the Christmas spirit.  The varicolored lights coming on at dusk, making a veritable fairyland.  The Salvation Army with their Christmas music a fitting climax.”

December 25, 1933

“Shall I try to write about this blessed day, or should I just hold it against my heart ” the memory?  Our darlings, little children again, untying their stockings.  Ruth having bulging ones – mysteriously left at the door for us.  Lavish gifts for each other and us on the lovely tree.  Dinner-the boys almost unable to walk afterwards.  Carols over the radio.  My heart full tonight for my many blessings.”

December 25, 1944, age, age 70

“Wondrous Christmas Day!  Up until long after midnight stuffing stockings and wrapping gifts.  After breakfast this morning unloading our stockings as eagerly as children, but waiting until after dinner to open our regular gifts.  And such a dinner!  Getting full so quick and looking at the loaded table in despair.  This afternoon a roomful of Ruth’s girlfriends with two soldiers from Congaree Air Base. ”

December 25, 1946, age 72 

“How can I  tell of this blessed day! One of the most glorious of my life! First of all, everybody half dressed examining their stockings, filled with sweets and jokes.  Later, upstairs and down joining forces on dinner.  Our table almost breaking down under the weight of good things.  Later Santa Claus himself in full costume(whisper this as Toni had come in with Hanley.”(granddaughter and son) ” In common life known as Mr. Rawle, who handed out gifts that had been placed under the Christmas tree.  At night, all around big bonfire shooting off fireworks with me in the car looking on.  I’ve been dissolving into happy tears often during the day.”

Grandmother’s 1947 diary ended on June 15, 1947, 23 days after I was born in Greensboro, NC. We never met, but through her journals, I have listened to her say what she wants in whatever words she chose. And I have learned to love her.

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I am not a historian.  My writings are one woman’s thoughts, opinions and historical facts as I know and understand them.  Any omissions or errors are mine alone.  I welcome your comments at kmorrellnewman@