Caresse Crosby - Marriage and Divorce

Marriage and Divorce

In 1915, Polly Jacob and Richard ("Dick") Peabody were married by his grandfather, Endicott Peabody, the founder of the Groton School, and whose family had been one of the wealthiest in America during the 19th century. By the early 20th century a case could be made that the Peabodies had supplanted the Cabots and the Lodges as the most distinguished name in the region. They had a son, William Jacob, born on February 4, 1916. Polly found that Dick was a well-educated but undirected man and a reluctant father. Less than a year later Dick Peabody enlisted at the Mexican border and joined the Boston militia engaged in stopping Pancho Villa's cross-border raids. Less than a year after he returned home, he enlisted to fight in World War I. Their second child, a daughter, Poleen Wheatland ("Polly"), was born on August 12, 1917 but Dick was already in Officers Training Camp at Plattsburgh, New York, where he was commissioned a Second Lieutenant in the Artillery. He became a Captain in the United States Army's 15th Field Artillery, 2nd Division, American Expeditionary Force. While she had been largely cared for by his parents, he had been enjoying life at the front as a bachelor.

Dick Peabody returned home in early 1921 and was assigned to Columbia, South Carolina. Polly and the children soon joined him, but when the war ended, Dick found himself left with nothing but a family allowance. He suffered from his war experiences and returned to drinking heavily. Polly found he had only three real interests, all acquired at Harvard: to play, to drink, and to turn out, at any hour, to chase after fire engines and watch buildings burn. Polly's life was difficult during the war years and when her husband returned home, significantly changed, her life soon changed abruptly too.