Lily’s Books

The Episode

Welcome to this episode of “Now & Then at Dodona Manor.”

In this episode, you will learn about George C. Marshall’s first wife, Lily. Marshall met Elizabeth “Lily” Carter Coles while attending the Virginia Military Institute and was immediately smitten. They married on February 11, 1902, just a few days before Marshall left for an assignment in the Philippines.

Back at home, Lily was an avid reader, and we have a few of her books in our collection in the Marshalls’ library at Dodona Manor. In this episode, you can learn more about two of those books that provide some “Marshall life wisdom” on persevering despite life’s setbacks.

Join us as we journey into George’s past and discover how a desire to “prove them wrong” would shape the lives of two key figures in our story today. 

Questions for Thought and Discussion

George started classes at VMI on September 11, 1897, a full ten days late after a lingering bout of typhoid fever. He began the strict and strenuous life of a cadet, saying, “The first year was quite an ordeal,” he later reflected. Despite the hardship of those months, however, he persevered through them, and he came to appreciate that school year more than any other. Marshall undoubtedly learned some valuable lessons during that time of his life. 

As time went on, Marshall began to enjoy the rigors of cadet life at VMI. He gained a reputation as a strong and principled leader, which secured him the rank of First Captain of the Corps of Cadets his senior year. During that year, he became enamored with a local beauty named Elizabeth Carter Coles, also known as “Lily.” Little did Marshall know that she was the same Lily Coles whom George’s older brother had courted while he was a cadet.                                   

Lily was a red-haired beauty who lived with her mother near VMI’s original southern limit gates. She suffered from a heart condition that often kept her indoors away from other children. To keep herself amused during such lonely hours, she took up reading and music, both of which she enjoyed and pursued for the rest of her life. 

Lily was four years older than George and was considered by many to be something of a flirt. Popular with young men, she often drew criticism from her peers, but the older women always recalled her as gracious. Marshall is said to have found her vivacious, witty, and altogether fascinating. Before meeting Lily formally, he would walk by her house and stop to listen to her playing the romantic scores of Scott Joplin and Claude Debussy on her piano. One day, he was observed doing so by Lily’s mother, whom he persuaded to invite inside to finally meet the beauty playing the piano. Marshall was immediately smitten. He frequently “ran the block,” or sneaked off post to see her, risking demotion or even expulsion in order to see Lily. 

On February 11, 1902, Marshall finally married his sweetheart just after being commissioned as a second lieutenant. After a 10-day honeymoon, Marshall was assigned to his first post in the Philippines. Because junior officers were not permitted to take their wives out of the country with them, he had to leave Lily with her mother in Lexington. 

Remember that Lily had grown up being kept indoors. She likely longed to live some of the adventures she found in the books of her childhood. Finally, in 1907, George and Lily moved back and forth across the United States together so that George could fulfill duties in the Oklahoma Territory, Kansas and New York during the 10 years leading up to the outbreak of World War I. 

Twelve years after they were married, war began raging in Europe. In 1917, Marshall was tapped to serve as aide to Major General J. Franklin Bell, who commanded the Army’s Department of the East headquarters on Governors Island, New York. That same year, the First Infantry Division was formed, and Marshall was sent to France as the division’s head of operations and training.

During this time, Marshall wrote to Lily, “Dearest, I love you very much. …and I would give my very soul to have you close to me this afternoon. You are all I think about and long for....”  Lily replied that “… there is not a single day where I do not think of you.” Their love never faltered over distance and time, and Marshall finally returned home a year later in 1918. As a lieutenant colonel in 1924, Marshall got a new assignment, and Lily was finally able to taste the adventure she had imagined in her books by travelling with him to China for a tour with the elite 15th Infantry Regiment. 

By 1921, the Chinese Communist Party had formed a united front with the ruling Nationalist Party under Sun Yat-sen. Tensions ran high over the issue of British colonial influence and American presence in the country, and Marshall was sent with a small band of military forces to ensure the safety of American citizens living in China. During this time in China, Marshall taught himself the Mandarin language, learned how to negotiate in Chinese politics, and even grew a mustache (which Lily later made him shave off). It was during this assignment in China that Lily, an avid reader, expanded her personal library, which brings me to these two books at the center of our learning together today. These books sit on the shelves of Dodona Manor’s library and are just two examples of books purchased by or given to Lily while she was in China. We display more than 20 of Lily’s books in our collection that Marshall kept throughout his lifetime.

This first book, titled In a Shantung Garden, by Louise Jordan Miln, is a historical fiction novel about a man who goes to the eastern Chinese province of Shandong on a business trip, where he is asked to learn the culture and the language before his true purpose is revealed there. This book was first given to Lily’s mother, Elizabeth Pendleton, by a friend. The inscription from M.L.S. hopes Mrs. Coles will have “a garden as lovely as Mr. Yoo,” who is a character in the book. Lily’s mother signed her name on this page just before she sent it to her daughter as a Christmas present in 1924.

The second book I have here is O Genteel Lady written by Esther Forbes in 1926. Lily bought it that same year from an American shop in China. These words are inscribed in the book with Lily’s own handwriting: “Elizabeth C. Marshall, Tientsin China, September 26th, 1926.” O Genteel Lady is the bittersweet story of a young New England woman in the mid-nineteenth century who felt trapped by the social conventions of her day. In some sense, this parallels the life of Lily, who felt trapped by the heart condition that kept her indoors. It seems that she turned to books all her life to find escape from the monotony and loneliness of her seclusion. Her marriage to Marshall also enabled her to live in exotic places such as China, Japan, and across the United States outside the pages of her books. 

In 1927, the Marshalls returned to America. Shortly thereafter, however, Lily’s health took a turn for the worse with shortness of breath and bouts of coughing. Doctors diagnosed her with an abnormal enlargement of her thyroid gland, commonly referred to as a goiter. Lily’s surgery to remove the goiter was successful, but while writing a note to her mother on September 15, 1927 about being released from the hospital, her heart failed, and she died.

Broken-hearted, Marshall wrote to his friend General John Pershing (we’ll save that friendship story for another episode) about his loss saying, “Twenty-six years of most intimate companionship, something I have known since I was a mere boy, leaves me lost in my best effort to adjust myself to future prospects in life.”

We hope you enjoyed discovering these books and the story of George and Lily’s perseverance. The very presence of these inscribed books here in the Marshalls’ library tell us a beautiful love story. Even though Marshall eventually loved again, he clearly treasured the memories and adventures shared in his early life with Lily Marshall.

The next time you find yourself feeling cooped up, take a page from Lily’s book and enjoy an adventure from the pages of your own story. Until next time, thank you for joining us Now & Then at Dodona Manor.