Passion and Principle: John and Jessie Fremont, the Couple Whose Power, Politics, and Love Shaped Nineteenth-Century Americ
by By Denton, Sally
Category: History , United States , General

John Charles Fremont was the illegitimate child of a Virginia aristocrat and a working class French immigrant; Jessie Benton was the daughter of the most powerful pre-Civil War U.S. senator, Thomas Hart Benton of Missouri. John was twenty-seven when they first met, tanned and handsome, just back from an expedition exploring the American West. Jessie was sixteen, a schoolgirl who had been raised at her father's knee in Washington, D.C., groomed as much as any young man to be president, if not for her gender. From the moment they locked eyes, John and Jessie's lifelong love affair began.The man who unknowingly brought them together, Senator Benton, had been courting Fremont to fulfill the national destiny he envisioned of an expanded United States. But he never imagined his daughter would fall in love with Fremont, who was widely known to be of dubious background and breeding and was certainly not an appropriate mate for Jessie. None of Senator Benton's considerable efforts, however, could keep the young couple apart.Jessie and John made a formidable couple. Both together and apart they contributed significantly to shaping our country: He was a key figure in western expansion, and the first presidential candidate for the Republican Party. She was a savvy political operator who played confidante and adviser to the highest political powers in the country. Despite their great efforts on behalf of their country, their reputations could not survive a Washington smear campaign led by none other than Jessie's father. As a result, John and Jessie were eclipsed and opposed by some of the most mythic characters of their era, not least Abraham Lincoln.As much as Passion and Principle is about the dynamics of this family triangle, it is also about the tumultuous period that forms the backdrop for John and Jessie's lives together, from the abolition of slavery to the building of the railroad. Written with an investigative journalist's eye for detail and a novelist's flair, Passion and Principle restores the reputations of John and Jessie and places them at the center of our country's history.