Hope Chests

 We all need something to hold our greatest moments. Something that stores our life histories. It is often said, that a man shall leave his mother and a woman leave her home. There they travel on to where the two shall be as one. A new life with memories of both families are thus combined. In order to accomplish such things need to be preserved to hand down from one generation to the next. Thus, the Hope Chest or Marriage Box was born.

Cedar chest - Hope Chests - Marriage Boxes were usually passed down from Mother to Daughter. It was a way to preserve family history for the next generation. A woman often began assembling 'her things' as soon as she learned sewing techniques like embroidery, quilting, knitting, crocheting, and sewing. Items she fashioned would be folded and stored away in the chests for her new life.

Once engaged, items given at parties found their way into these sturdy structures. Silverware, china, linens, jewelry and even money. Remember in the Quiet Man - Maureen O'Hara didn't consider herself fully married to John Wayne until she had her things and her dowry.

 

From the Quiet Man Film staring John Wayne and Maureen O'Hara

But, chest for such things  were nothing new. More than 3000 years ago the Egyptians were doing the same. Chest contained items that were essential to the here and now as well as at death items that might help in the afterlife.

Trunks and chests became popular pieces for the every man in the middle ages. They provided ways for the families to store items in case of siege. For this reason, handles were added to the boxes of oak, popular, cedar, walnut, or pine, so the families could pick up and flee if the moment arrived.

As society lust for items continued, little drawers were added to the bottom of the chests. These drawers led to the furniture item today we called a Chest of Drawers. In our family the chest of drawers often was the Man's piece of the bedroom furniture. The ladies had a dressing table with a stool and a plain mirrored chest that held her most intimate things.

In America, as brides traveled west, these boxes might be fastened by fathers for their daughters. It was often a most cherished  piece of furniture. It would be placed at the foot of the bed to hold blankets once the house was set up. A mail order bride might carry,  a quilt pieced by family and friends, linens, china, silverware, photos, books, letters from her sweetheart, her wedding dress, veil, and fine gowns for that romantic first encounter. One important piece would be a new bible. There she would place her wedding date, dates of her children's births, and deaths. All things that would explain to the next generation who they were, where they came from, and their hopes for the future. In a sense, it was your time capsule.

I have two.

My mother's sits up on legs and she referred to it as a "high boy". Inside she kept things she was given at her marriage. She had a silk quilt she said always fell off the bed. Her grandmother crochet her a bedspread. She never used it. Down in the bottom, she had the green suit she wore on the day she and my father eloped to South Mills, North Carolina.

When I graduated high school, she took the things out of my grandmother's cedar chest and placed them in there with hers. My Grandmothers china doll with the corn silk hair and one toe that is square where she drug it across the floor loving it. A book written in 1913 about the Titanic. Her hair pins, and crochet blankets.

Once the cedar chest was emptied, it was given to me. Inside it, I have my wedding veil. I borrowed my dress from my aunt so I had to give it back, my wedding photos, blankets my mom got when I was born and she never used.Yes, I did use one for my daughter. She has that now in hers.

Perhaps its still just a southern tradition, but I hope it will always continue. We women keep the family stories going. We are the ones who pass on the traditions, the hopes, the dreams for the future. We live to tell who lives, who dies, and sing the stories.....

Until next time, 

Nan

Hope chests

I'm doing research for new series of stories based on a familiar item in my home. I'm not sure how familiar this item is in the present, but growing up it was a link to my past and a hope for my future.

This piece of furniture, is wonderfully handcrafted. As a child, I would take my blankets and books and crawl up to read or to gaze into the yard. The wooden box was created to hold such items as clothing, linens, blankets, and other items created for married life. Some called this wooden chest, dowry chests, cedar chest for the wood that lined the inside, trousseau chests, glory boxes, or, as in my case - the hope chest.

The crafting of these boxes are really quite old. Ancient Egyptians used such boxes to hold jewels or scrolls of value. In the 15th and 16th centuries, Europeans carved such boxes as a show of wealth. But, as families began to journey to the new world, these chest contained all the important items for their survival.

In my part of the south, you received your hope chest at the coming of age, usually sixteen. From there until the age of twenty-one, you would sit at your mother's knee and learn skills such as embroidery, quilting, crochet, or knit and carefully stow your items inside in preparation for your next stage of life as a married woman.

I had always grown up with my grandmother's cedar chest in my bedroom. At the age of sixteen, it was given to me entrust to keep the legacy from the past and to create new hope for my future. My grandmother was given her chest before 1900 by her father and mother. She brought it to Norfolk in 1922 when my grandfather moved the family here to gain employment in the shipyards.

It was always wonderful to open and gaze upon the legacy pieces inside. My grandmother's china doll she'd had since childhood. Complete with the original clothing, corn husk hair, and bonnet. One foot has a flat toe where she drug it across the floor. Beneath that, was her father's Confederate uniform carefully folded. It lay in state until 1970 when we opened it and found it finally was reduced to tatters. A satin blanket covered all the items. It was the blanket that my grandmother had across her bed until her death two months before my birth. My mother placed my baby sweaters and one white blanket with embroidered pink flowers that she used for me, that I used for my daughter, that I passed to my granddaughter. I placed my wedding veil inside on top of my box of horse ribbons and trophies won when I showed professionally.

The giving of the hope chests waned in the 1960's due to the feminist movements. I admit, I did not give my daughter one at sixteen, but when I die, she will receive the chest and the items inside. I hope that my granddaughter will open and explore with wonder the treasures that lie inside.

Be looking for the Hope Chest Series in 2019. It will be a collection of sweet romances that follow the generations of one family highlighting their hopes, dreams, and disappointments.

Until next time, happy reading,

Nan O'Berry