In lieu of an abstract, here is a brief excerpt of the content:

19 Oo Personal and National Turmoil in 1941 Belle and Barbara Donohoe worked tirelessly to complete the grounds at Bellefield Plantation. Landscape architects Umberto Innocenti and Richard E. Webel of Long Island’s Studio Roblyn designed the entrances to the stables , the house, the forecourt, gates, and terraces of Bellefield. All bricks in the courtyards and exterior walls were ballast bricks from the old Charleston Conservatory of Music. The gates were cypress with handwrought iron fixtures and working parts made of bronze. Barbara planted Lady Banksia yellow climbing roses that still bloom today against the mellow brick walls of the Belle- field courtyard. “They are like sunshine when they bloom,” said Ella Severin. In late 1940 Barbara Donohoe’s father fell ill, and she was called home to California, never to return. Leaving her horse, Malicorn, her saddle, boots, and belongings behind, Barbara rushed to her father’s side. A few months later Barbara married Fred Jostes and never saw Belle again. Asked about it many years later, Barbara said quietly, “That part of my life was over. . . . One couldn’t go on riding in horse shows forever.” Barbara was Roman Catholic, devoted to her family. There is no question but that reminders of familial and religious duty and other pressures were exerted to keep Barbara in California. Belle was heartbroken and devastated when she learned of Barbara’s unexpected marriage. She could not believe that Barbara would leave her for a man, ignoring the two times that she had betrayed Barbara’s love through her alliances with Chita Davila and Munro Cuthbertson. Baroness of Hobcaw 114 Malicorn remained at the Bellefield stables, pampered and cared for until his death from old age. Barbara’s sidesaddle remained in Bellefield’s tack room, regularly oiled and polished, until it was donated to the Davis Institute in 1988, long after Belle’s death. Photographs of Barbara abound at Bellefield, but Barbara admitted that she had not a single photo of her days in Europe and America with Belle. Clearly, she had decided to end their long relationship and did not look back. Putting aside her grief for Barbara, Belle joined her sister, Renee, in plans for a memorial to their mother and in January 1941 attended the formal dedication of the new x-ray department at Knickerbocker Hospital in New York, given by Belle and Renee in honor of Annie Griffen Baruch. Belle stayed in New York for a time, seeing old friends, attending the theater, and visiting her father and Edith Wilson in Washington, D.C. Bernard Baruch was deeply involved in his efforts to influence Franklin Delano Roosevelt to institute price controls and prepare to defend the country. Baruch and the president had a somewhat tenuous relationship. Both were men of enormous ego, each wanting to be the focal point of any gathering. Their relationship was exacerbated by the jealousy of the White House inner circle, who declined to share power or prestige with an outsider. As Jim Bishop noted in FDR’s Last Year: “A few in the Roosevelt circle tried to drive a wedge between the men. The male gossips wove their webs of innuendo, but Roosevelt made a point of defending ‘Barney’ while, as counterpoint, he kept Baruch from becoming too close a friend.”1 Roosevelt knew well that he could not afford to offend a man of Baruch’s power and prestige and, further, a man who donated enormous sums of money to the Democratic cause. Few Wall Street millionaires were numbered among the Democrats. There were times in the Wilsonian era when it was Baruch’s money that kept the Democratic party afloat. As Jordan Schwarz noted: “He [Baruch] had an understanding with Roosevelt, even if they did not always see eye to eye. Roosevelt knew his value, both in public relations and in political contributions. . . . They needed each other, they used each other, they were comfortable with each other.”2 Baruch, in the meantime, had developed his own conduit to the White House: a strong friendship with Eleanor Roosevelt. Oddly enough, the supposedly liberal Eleanor originally harbored prejudices against Jews and blacks. She had been furious when pushed to attend a party that was given in honor of Bernard Baruch. Baruch, however, charmed her with his courtly, attentive manner and his willingness to dispense both valued advice and dollars in support of her many causes. “From what we heard at the White House,” Lillian [18.216.190...

Share