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Article published Dec 18, 2003
Thurmond's daughter says she's at peace

JACOB JORDAN
Associated Press

COLUMBIA -- The 78-year-old daughter of the late Sen. Strom Thurmond and a black maid who worked in his family home said Wednesday that she is finally at peace."I am not bitter. I am not angry ... in fact there is a great sense of peace that has come over me in the past year," she said during a news conference before dozens of reporters and supporters at a downtown hotel, just blocks from the Statehouse where a monument of Thurmond sits."I feel as though a great weight has been lifted. I am Essie Mae Washington-Williams, and at last I feel completely free," she said, visibly moved by the sheer words and the ensuing applause.Williams announced last weekend she is the illegitimate daughter of Thurmond, a former segregationist, and a black teenage maid, Carrie Butler."I knew him beyond his public image," an emotional Williams said, sometimes pausing. "I certainly never did like the idea that he was a segregationist, but there was nothing I could do about it.""I did my part as far as trying to convince him, of course that was his life and I did not try to change him," she added.Thurmond was 22 and Butler was 16 when Williams was born in Aiken in 1925. She was raised in Pennsylvania by an aunt and uncle, seeing her mother sporadically and not meeting Thurmond until she was 16."My husband and I were blessed with four wonderful children -- all of whom are tremendously successful. I have 13 grandchildren and four great-grandchildren. Their lives are meaningful and important in American history."There are many stories like Sally Hemings' and mine. The unfortunate measure is that not everyone knows about these stories that helped to make America what it is today," Williams said, referring to Thomas Jefferson's relationship with one of his black slaves.She said she did not come forward earlier because she didn't want to jeopardize Thurmond's political career. "Throughout his life and mine we respected each other. ... I was sensitive about his well-being and his career and his family here in South Carolina."However, Williams said Thurmond never denied she was his daughter and gave her money throughout her life. She also said there were others who knew. "All of them on his staff knew exactly who I was," she said.Thurmond's family said Monday they acknowledge Williams' claim, and the former senator's oldest son, U.S. Attorney Strom Thurmond Jr., said he would like to meet his half-sister and start a relationship."The extended Thurmond family wants to arrange a meeting with Ms. Williams and her children as soon as practicable in a quiet setting," the relatives said in a statement through their lawyer Wednesday afternoon.Williams, a retired teacher living in Los Angeles, said Wednesday that she, too, would like to meet Thurmond's other children.Walter Thurmond Bishop, the chief federal bankruptcy court judge for South Carolina and Thurmond's nephew, told The Washington Post on Tuesday that he served as a "pass-through" for payments sent by cashier's check to Williams.Bishop, who is the son of Thurmond's late sister Martha, said he sent money at the senator's request whenever Williams indicated she needed financial assistance. He said he began communicating with Williams on the senator's behalf in the late 1960s and continued to send money, along with warm personal letters, until recent years."He never told me she was his daughter," Bishop said. "I could surmise, but he never did point-blank say it."After Thurmond died in June at age 100, Williams said she began to think about ending "all the speculation and questions" about the long-rumored relationship.Williams said her mother didn't tell her much about Thurmond and the relationship the two had. During an interview set to air on "60 Minutes II" on Wednesday night, Williams called it an "affair" and said her mother remembered Thurmond as "very nice person."The nation's oldest and longest-serving senator apparently never disputed Williams was his daughter, first meeting her in his Edgefield office when she was 16."Well, you look like one of my sisters," Williams recalled Thurmond saying. "You've got those cheekbones like our family."""So that was like almost an admission," Williams said.She said Wednesday that she didn't know her father was white until her mother "introduced me. Then obviously, I knew."In seven decades of politics, the former governor and Republican senator gained fame and infamy as an arch-segregationist, but he later came to support a holiday for slain civil rights leader Martin Luther King.Many blacks have said the news of Thurmond's biracial daughter is hardly surprising.Outspoken black state Sen. Kay Patterson, D-Columbia, said there's nothing new about the announcement."It was known in our community all along," said Patterson, who said his grandfather is white.Patterson said the relationship was hypocritical of Thurmond, who during his 1948 campaign for president on the Dixiecrat ticket vowed never to be forced to "admit the Negro race into our theaters, into our swimming pools, into our homes, and into our churches."But, Patterson added, "man is hypocritical -- white men and black men."Patterson, who eulogized Thurmond during his funeral six months ago, has been a state legislator since 1975 and supported Thurmond after he abandoned his segregationist ways.A handful of South Carolina State University alumni were at the hotel to support Williams, who graduated from the school. Some of the supporters even had presents for her.Marianna White Davis said she attended college with Williams. Davis brought three gifts for Williams, including a wooden wine case and a glass angel.The 1949 graduate said she wants Williams to write a book about her story."You have a case here where the person who is telling the story is the story," Davis said. "I think it's important for historical reasons."Williams said she has started a book on the subject, and her attorney said he has been fielding calls from publishers.