While I’m not sure who this couple is (I Googled her; nada). But the idea of investigating whether these types of couplings were really a thing (of course they were), which led me to stumble upon a love story published in The New York Times about William Ramey and his wife, Kittie Simkins.

Ramey met Simkins when he was 20 and she was 14 in Edgefield, South Carolina. She was a slave, and he was the son of a wealthy business man who owned a few slaves of his own. While there was an attraction, the two didn’t begin an affair until he came back from fighting the Civil War AS A CONFEDERATE!!! with an injury. He reenlisted and Simpkins gave birth to their first child. He was captured by Union soldiers until the war ended, and when he returned, he resumed his relationship with Simpkins. He went on to become an attorney and then a judge, and was even engaged to a white woman, but he ended it when Simpkins gave birth to their second child, a son. He married Simpkins, and they went on to have nine (!) other children, and they stayed married for 38 years until he died. His evil sister threatened to take his wife and children’s inheritance once he died, but Ramkey cleverly transferred all his holdings to his wife and sent her off to New York so she would be safe. Simpkins and her children lived comfortably until her death in 1929.

This has got to be one of the most remarkable slave-era love stories I’ve read. A confederate soldier from a rich family, gives up marrying a white woman to marry a former slave. This should be a movie.

Here’s my take on it all:

https://youtu.be/BwBUG3zGH1s