Helen Dortch Longstreet (1863-1962) was born on April 20, 1863 in Franklin County, Georgia, to James Speed Dortch (?-1891) and Mary Pulliam (?-1927). She was an editor for local newspapers, including the Carnesville Tribune and the Milledgeville Chronicle. She attended the Notre Dame Convent in Baltimore, Maryland. In 1884, she earned a Bachelor of Arts at Brenau University in Gainesville, Georgia, where she befriended Maria Louisa Longstreet (1872-1957), the daughter of American Confederate General James Longstreet. On September 8, 1897, she and James Longstreet (1821-1904) were married at the Governor’s Mansion in Atlanta, Georgia.

In 1894, Governor William Yates Atkinson appointed Helen Longstreet as Assistant State Librarian, the first woman to serve in that capacity. In 1904, she was appointed postmaster in Gainesville, a position she held until 1913. She founded the Longstreet Memorial Association in 1938, the purpose of which was to restore General Longstreet's reputation after he had been held responsible for Confederate losses during the Civil War. The association also raised funds for a statue of General Longstreet on the Gettysburg Battlefield. Her other activities included spearheading an effort to regain Tallulah Falls from the Georgia Power Company and lobbying for the establishment of Georgia Woman’s College in Milledgeville, Georgia.

Before World War II, Longstreet advocated non-intervention, but once the United States entered the war, she joined the war effort, working at the Bell Aircraft Plant in Marietta, Georgia. She launched an unsuccessful gubernatorial campaign against Herman Talmadge in 1950. In 1957, her family admitted her to Milledgeville State Hospital, where she remained until her death in May 1962. She is buried in Westview Cemetery.