9781929175048. New condition. Trade paperback. Language: English. Pages: 480. Trade paperback (US). Glued binding. 480 p. Contains: Illustrations. Born to affluence and opportunity in the South s Golden Age Mary Motte Alston Pringle (1803-1884) represented the epitome of Southern white womanhood. Her husband was a wealthy rice planter who owned four plantations and 337 slaves. Her thirteen children included two Harvard scholars seven world travelers a U.S. Navy war hero six Confederate soldiers one possible Union collaborator a Confederate firebrand trapped in the North an expatriate gourmet bon vivant and two California pioneers. How Mary Pringle her family and slaves lived before the Civil War clung desperately to life in the eye of the maelstrom and coped -- or failed to cope -- with its bewildering aftermath is the story of this book.