Mrs. Jackson

Having separated from her first husband, Rachel Donelson met and married Andrew Jackson, who would go on to be the President of the United States. Her divorce from her first husband, however, was not finalized before she married Jackson, and thus Donelson and Jackson were forced to marry a second time. The murky circumstances surrounding their marriage became fodder for political attacks against Jackson. Rachel Jackson's sudden death due to heart attack, shortly before her husband assumed office, prompted him to resent his political enemies for, as he saw it, driving her to an early grave. Faulkner's characterization of Jackson's obsession with his wife's honor is supported by the epitaph on Rachel Jackson's grave: "A being so gentle and so virtuous slander might wound, but could not dishonor."