Elizabeth Kortright Monroe
| Elizabeth Monroe | |
|---|---|
 |
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| First Lady of the United States | |
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In role March 4, 1817 – March 4, 1825 |
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| President | James Monroe |
| Preceded by | Dolley Madison |
| Succeeded by | Louisa Adams |
| Personal details | |
| Born |
Elizabeth Jane Kortright June 30, 1768 New York City, New York, British America |
| Died | September 23, 1830 (aged 62) Oak Hill, Virginia, U.S. |
| Spouse(s) | James Monroe (m. 1786) |
| Children | Eliza James Maria |
| Signature |  |
 First Lady Elizabeth Monroe, C‑SPAN
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Elizabeth Kortright Monroe (June 30, 1768 – September 23, 1830) was First Lady of the United States from 1817 to 1825, as the wife of James Monroe, fifth President. Due to the fragile condition of Elizabeth's health, many of the duties of official hostess were assumed by her eldest daughter, Eliza Monroe Hay.
Born in New York City on June 30, 1768, Elizabeth was the youngest daughter of Lawrence Kortright, a wealthy merchant, and Hannah (Aspinwall) Kortright. Her father was one of the founders of the New York Chamber of Commerce. During the Revolutionary War, he was part owner of several privateers fitted out at New York, and it has also been documented that he owned at least four slaves. He purchased land tracts in what is now Delaware county, New York, and from the sale of this land the town of Kortright, New York, was formed.
Elizabeth acquired social graces and elegance at an early age. She grew up in a household with four older siblings: Sarah, Hester, John and Mary. According to the parish records of Trinity Church, New York, Elizabeth's mother, Hannah, died on September 6 or 7, 1777, at the age of 39. The cause of death was recorded as resulting from Child Bed. An unidentified sibling of Elizabeth, age 13 months, succumbed to flux and fever a few days later. Mother and infant were both buried at St. George's Chapel in New York. At the time of their deaths, Elizabeth was nine years old. Her father never remarried.
On August 3, 1778, almost a year after the death of Elizabeth's mother, the home of the Lawrence Kortright family was nearly destroyed by fire during a blaze which caused damage and destruction to fifty homes near Cruger's Wharf in lower Manhattan. A historian later wrote that this blaze was due to the mismanagement of British troops while directing the firefighters. Elizabeth, age 10, with her father and siblings, survived the fire unscathed.
Elizabeth first caught the attention of James Monroe in 1785 while he was in New York City serving as a member of the Continental Congress. William Grayson, James Monroe's cousin and fellow Congressman from Virginia, described Elizabeth and her sisters as having "made so brilliant and lovely an appearance" at a theater one evening, "as to depopulate all the other boxes of all the genteel male people therein." James, age twenty-seven, married Elizabeth, age seventeen, on February 16, 1786, at her father's home in New York City. The marriage was performed by Reverend Benjamin Moore, and recorded in the parish records of Trinity Church, New York. After a brief honeymoon on Long Island, the newlyweds returned to New York to live with her father until Congress adjourned. Their first child, whom they named Eliza Kortright Monroe, was born in December, 1786, in Virginia.
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