CHAPTER II.WOMEN OF AFFAIRS.

The early history of Maryland seems singularly peaceful when contrasted with that of other colonies. There were few Indian horrors, few bitter quarrels, comparatively few petty offences. In spite of the influx of convicts, there was a notable absence of the shocking crimes and equally shocking punishments which appear on the court records of other provinces; it is also true that there were few schools and churches, and but scanty intellectual activity. Against that comparatively peaceful background stands out one of the most remarkable figures of early colonial life in America—Margaret Brent; a woman who seemed more fitted for our day than her own. She was the first woman in America to demand suffrage, a vote, and representation.

She came to the province in 1638 with her sister Mary (another shrewd and capablewoman), her two brothers, and nine other colonists. The sisters at once took up land, built manorhouses, and shortly brought over more colonists; soon the court-baron and court-leet were held at Mary Brent’s home, St. Gabriel’s Manor, on old Kent Island. We at once hear of the sisters as active in business affairs, registering cattle marks, buying and selling property, attending with success to important matters for their brothers; and Margaret soon signed herself “Attorney for my brother, &c., &c.,” and was allowed the right so to act. The Brents were friends and probably kinsfolk of Lord Baltimore, and intimate friends, also, of the governor of Maryland, Leonard Calvert. When the latter died in 1647, he appointed by nuncupation one Thomas Greene as his successor as governor, and Margaret Brent as his sole executrix, with the laconic instruction to “Take all and Pay all,” and to give one Mistress Temperance Pypott a mare colt. His estate was small, and if he had made Greene executor, and Mistress Margaret governor, he would have done a much more sensible thing; for Greene was vacillating and weak, and when an emergencyarose, he had to come to Margaret Brent for help. The soldiers, who had assisted the government in recent troubles, were still unpaid, and Governor Calvert had pledged his official word and the property of Lord Baltimore that they should be paid in full. After his death an insurrection in the army seemed rising, when Mistress Brent calmly stepped in, sold cattle belonging to the Proprietary, and paid off the small but angry army. This was not the only time she quelled an incipient mutiny. Her kinsman, Lord Baltimore, was inclined to find bitter fault, and wrote “tartly” when the news of her prompt action and attendant expenditure reached his ears; but the Assembly sent him a letter, gallantly upholding Mistress Brent in her “meddling,” saying with inadvertent humour, that his estate fared better in her hands than “any man elses.”

Her astonishing stand for woman’s rights was made on January 21, 1647-48, two centuries and a half ago, and was thus recorded:—

Came Mrs Margaret Brent and requested to have vote in the House for herself and voyce allsoe, for that on the last Court 3rd January itwas ordered that the said Mrs Brent was to be looked upon and received as his Ldp’s Attorney. The Governor deny’d that the s’d Mrs Brent should have any vote in the house. And the s’d Mrs Brent protested against all proceedings in this present Assembly unlesse she may be present and have vote as afores’d.

With this protest for representation, and demand for her full rights, this remarkable woman does not disappear from our ken. We hear of her in 1651 as an offender, having been accused of killing wild cattle and selling the beef. She asserted with vigor and dignity that the cattle were her own, and demanded a trial by jury.

And in 1658 she makes her last curtsey before the Assembly and ourselves, a living proof of the fallacy of the statement that men do not like strong-minded women. For at that date, at the fully ripened age of fifty-seven, she appeared as heir of an estate bequeathed to her by a Maryland gentleman as a token of his love and affection, and of his constant wish to marry her. She thus vanishes out of history, in a thoroughly feminine rôle, that of a mourning sweetheart; yet standing signally out of colonial days as themost clear-cut, unusual, and forceful figure of the seventeenth century in Maryland.

Another Maryland woman of force and fearlessness was Verlinda Stone. A letter from her to Lord Baltimore is still in the Maryland archives, demanding an investigation of a fight in Anne Arundel County, in which her husband was wounded. The letter is businesslike enough, but ends in a fiery postscript in which she uses some pretty strong terms. Such women as these were not to be trifled with; as Alsop wrote:—

All Complemental Courtships drest up in critical Rarities are meer Strangers to them. Plain wit comes nearest to their Genius, so that he that intends to Court a Maryland girle, must have something more than the tautologies of a long-winded speech to carry on his design.

Elizabeth Haddon was another remarkable woman; she founded Haddonfield, New Jersey. Her father had become possessed of a tract of land in the New World, and she volunteered to come alone to the colony, and settle upon the land. She did so in 1701 when she was butnineteen years old, and conducted herself and her business withjudgment, discretion, and success, and so continued throughout her long life. She married a young Quaker named Esthaugh, who may have been one of the attractions of the New World. Her idealized story has been told by L. Maria Child in her bookThe Youthful Emigrant.

John Clayton, writing as early as 1688 of “Observables” in Virginia, tells of several “acute ingenious gentlewomen” who carried on thriving tobacco-plantations, draining swamps and raising cattle and buying slaves. One near Jamestown was a fig-raiser.

In all the Southern colonies we find these acute gentlewomen taking up tracts of land, clearing them, and cultivating their holdings. In the settlement of Pennsylvania, Mary Tewee took two thousand five hundred acres in what is now Lancaster County. She was the widow of a French Huguenot gentleman, the friend of William Penn, and had been presented at the court of Queen Anne.

New England magistrates did not encourage such independence. In the early days of Salem, “maid-lotts” were granted to single women, but stern Endicott wrote that it was best to abandon the custom, and “avoidall presedents & evil events of granting lotts vnto single maidens not disposed of.” The town of Taunton, Mass., had an “ancient maid” of forty-eight years for its founder, one Elizabeth Poole; and Winthrop says she endured much hardship. Her gravestone says she was a “native of old England of good family, friends and prospects, all of which she left in the prime of her life to enjoy the religion of her conscience in this distant wilderness. A great proprietor of the township of Taunton, a chief promoter of its settlement in 1639. Having employed the opportunity of her virgin state in piety, liberality and sanctity of manners, she died aged 65.”

Lady Deborah Moody did not receive from the Massachusetts magistrates an over-cordial or very long-lived welcome. She is described as a “harassed and lonely widow voluntarily exiling herself for conscience’ sake.” Perhaps her running in debt for her Swampscott land and her cattle had quite as much to do with her unpopularity as her “error of denying infant baptism.” But as she paid nine hundred or some say eleven hundred pounds for that wild land, it is no wonder she was“almost undone.” She was dealt with by the elders, and admonished by the church, but she “persisted” and finally removed to the Dutch, against the advice of all her friends. Endicott called her a dangerous woman, but Winthrop termed her a “wise and anciently religious woman.” Among the Dutch she found a congenial home, and, unmolested, she planned on her Gravesend farm a well-laid-out city, but did not live to carry out her project. A descendant of one of her Dutch neighbors writes of her:—

Tradition says she was buried in the north-west corner of the Gravesend church yard. Upon the headstone of those who sleep beside her we read the inscriptionIn der Heere entslapen—they sleep in the Lord. We may say the same of this brave true woman, she sleeps in the Lord. Her rest has been undisturbed in this quiet spot which she hoped to make a great city.

It seems to be plain that the charge of the affairs of Governor John Winthrop, Jr., in New Haven was wholly in the hands of Mrs. Davenport, the wife of the minister, Rev. John Davenport. Many sentences in her husband’s letters show her cares for her friends’ welfare, the variety of her businessduties, and her performance of them. He wrote thus to the Governor in 1658:—

For your ground; my wife speedily, even the same day she received your letter, spake with sundry about it, and received this answer, that there is no Indian corne to be planted in that quarter this yeare. Brother Boykin was willing to have taken it, but saith it is overrun with wild sorrell and it will require time to subdue it, and put it into tillage, being at present unfit to be improved. Goodman Finch was in our harbour when your letter came, & my wife went promptly downe, and met with yong Mr Lamberton to whom she delivered your letter. He offered some so bad beaver that my wife would not take it. My wife spake twise to him herself. My wife desireth to add that she received for you of Mr Goodenhouse 30s worth of beaver & 4s in wampum. She purposeth to send your beaver to the Baye when the best time is, to sell it for your advantage and afterwards to give you an account what it comes to. Your letter to Sarjiunt Baldwin my wife purposeth to carry to him by the 1st opportunity. Sister Hobbadge has paid my wife in part of her debt to you a bushel of winter wheate.

The letters also reveal much loving-kindness, much eagerness to be of assistance,equal readiness to welcome new-comers, and to smooth the rough difficulties in pioneer housekeeping. Rev. Mr. Davenport wrote in August, 1655, from New Haven to Gov. Winthrop at Pequot:—

Hon’ᵈ Sir,—We did earnestly expect your coming hither with Mrs. Winthrop and your familie, the last light moone, having intelligence that a vessel wayted upon you at Pequot for that end, and were thereby encouraged to provide your house, that it might be fitted in some measure, for your comfortable dwelling in it, this winter.My wife was not wanting in her endeavors to set all wheeles in going, all hands that she could procure on worke, that you might find all things to your satisfaction. Though she could not accomplish her desires to the full, yet she proceeded as farr as she could; whereby many things are done viz. the house made warme, the well cleansed, the pumpe fitted for your use, some provision of wood layed in, and 20 loades will be ready, whensoever you come; and sundry, by my wife’s instigation, prepared 30 bush. of wheate for the present and sister Glover hath 12 lb of candles ready for you. My wife hath also procured a maid servant for you, who is reported to be cleanly and saving, her mother is of the church,and she is kept from a place in Connectacot where she was much desired, to serve you....If Mrs. Winthrop knew how wellcome she will be to us she would I believe neglect whatsoever others doe or may be forward to suggest for her discouragement. Salute her, with due respect, in my name and my wife’s, most affectionately.

My wife was not wanting in her endeavors to set all wheeles in going, all hands that she could procure on worke, that you might find all things to your satisfaction. Though she could not accomplish her desires to the full, yet she proceeded as farr as she could; whereby many things are done viz. the house made warme, the well cleansed, the pumpe fitted for your use, some provision of wood layed in, and 20 loades will be ready, whensoever you come; and sundry, by my wife’s instigation, prepared 30 bush. of wheate for the present and sister Glover hath 12 lb of candles ready for you. My wife hath also procured a maid servant for you, who is reported to be cleanly and saving, her mother is of the church,and she is kept from a place in Connectacot where she was much desired, to serve you....

If Mrs. Winthrop knew how wellcome she will be to us she would I believe neglect whatsoever others doe or may be forward to suggest for her discouragement. Salute her, with due respect, in my name and my wife’s, most affectionately.

Madam Davenport also furnished the rooms with tables and “chayres,” and “took care of yor apples that they may be kept safe from the frost that Mrs. Winthrop may have the benefit of them,” and arranged to send horses to meet them; so it is not strange to learn in a postscript that the hospitable kindly soul, who thus cheerfully worked to “redd the house,” had a “paine in the soles of her feet, especially in the evening;” and a little later on to know she was “valetudinarious, faint, thirsty, of little appetiteyet cheerful.”

All these examples, and many others help to correct one very popular mistake. It seems to be universally believed that the “business woman” is wholly a product of the nineteenth century. Most emphatically may it be affirmed that such is not the case. Ihave seen advertisements dating from 1720 to 1800, chiefly in New England newspapers, of women teachers, embroiderers, jelly-makers, cooks, wax-workers, japanners, mantua-makers,—all truly feminine employments; and also of women dealers in crockery, musical instruments, hardware, farm products, groceries, drugs, wines, and spirits, while Hawthorne noted one colonial dame who carried on a blacksmith-shop. Peter Faneuil’s account books show that he had accounts in small English wares with many Boston tradeswomen, some of whom bought many thousand pounds’ worth of imported goods in a year. Alice Quick had fifteen hundred pounds in three months; and I am glad to say that the women were very prompt in payment, as well as active in business. By Stamp Act times, the names of five women merchants appear on the Salem list of traders who banded together to oppose taxation.

It is claimed by many that the “newspaper-woman” is a growth of modern times. I give examples to prove the fallacy of this statement. Newspapers of colonial times can scarcely be said to have been edited, they were simply printed or published, and all thatmen did as newspaper-publishers, women did also, and did well. It cannot be asserted that these women often voluntarily or primarily started a newspaper; they usually assumed the care after the death of an editor husband, or brother, or son, or sometimes to assist while a male relative, through sickness or multiplicity of affairs, could not attend to his editorial or publishing work.

Perhaps the most remarkable examples of women-publishers may be found in the Goddard family of Rhode Island. Mrs. Sarah Goddard was the daughter of Ludowick Updike, of one of the oldest and most respected families in that State. She received an excellent education “in both useful and polite learning,” and married Dr. Giles Goddard, a prominent physician and postmaster of New London. After becoming a widow, she went into the printing business in Providence about the year 1765, with her son, who was postmaster of that town. They published theProvidence Gazette and Country Journal, the only newspaper printed in Providence before 1775. William Goddard was dissatisfied with his pecuniary profit, and he went to New York, leaving the business wholly withhis mother; she conducted it with much ability and success under the name Sarah Goddard & Company. I wish to note that she carried on this business not under her son’s name, but openly in her own behalf; and when she assumed the charge of the paper, she printed it with her own motto as the heading,Vox Populi Vox Dei.

William Goddard drifted to Philadelphia, where he published thePennsylvania Chroniclefor a short season, and in 1773 he removed to Baltimore and established himself in the newspaper business anew, with only, he relates, “the small capital of a single solitary guinea.” He found another energetic business woman, the widow Mrs. Nicholas Hasselbaugh, carrying on the printing-business bequeathed to her by her husband; and he bought her stock in trade and establishedThe Maryland Journal and Baltimore Advertiser. It was the third newspaper published in Maryland, was issued weekly at ten shillings per annum, and was a well-printed sheet. But William Goddard had another bee in his bonnet. A plan was formed just before the Revolutionary War to abolish the general public post-office and to establish inits place a complete private system of post-riders from Georgia to New Hampshire. This system was to be supported by private subscription; a large sum was already subscribed, and the scheme well under way, when the war ended all the plans. Goddard had this much to heart, and had travelled extensively through the colonies exploiting it. While he was away on these trips he left the newspaper and printing-house solely under the charge of his sister Mary Katharine Goddard, the worthy daughter of her energetic mother. From 1775 to 1784, through the trying times of the Revolution, and in a most active scene of military and political troubles, this really brilliant woman continued to print successfully and continuously her newspaper. TheJournaland every other work issued from her printing-presses were printed and published in her name, and it is believed chiefly on her own account. She was a woman of much intelligence and was also practical, being an expert compositor of types, and fully conversant with every detail of the mechanical work of a printing-office. During this busy time she was also postmistress of Baltimore,and kept a bookshop. Her brother William, through his futile services in this postal scheme, had been led to believe he would receive under Benjamin Franklin and the new government of the United States, the appointment of Secretary and Comptroller of the Post Office; but Franklin gave it to his own son-in-law, Richard Bache. Goddard, sorely disappointed but pressed in money matters, felt forced to accept the position of Surveyor of Post Roads. When Franklin went to France in 1776, and Bache became Postmaster-General, and Goddard again was not appointed Comptroller, his chagrin caused him to resign his office, and naturally to change his political principles.

He retired to Baltimore, and soon there appeared in theJournalan ironical piece (written by a member of Congress) signed Tom Tell Truth. From this arose a vast political storm. The Whig Club of Baltimore, a powerful body, came to Miss Goddard and demanded the name of the author; she referred them to her brother. On his refusal to give the author’s name, he was seized, carried to the clubhouse, bullied, and finally warned out of town and county. Heat once went to the Assembly at Annapolis and demanded protection, which was given him. He ventilated his wrongs in a pamphlet, and was again mobbed and insulted. In 1779, Anna Goddard printed anonymously in her paperQueries Political and Military, written really by General Charles Lee, the enemy and at one time presumptive rival of Washington. This paper also raised a tremendous storm through which the Goddards passed triumphantly. Lee remained always a close friend of William Goddard, and bequeathed to him his valuable and interesting papers, with the intent of posthumous publication; but, unfortunately, they were sent to England to be printed in handsome style, and were instead imperfectly and incompletely issued, and William Goddard received no benefit or profit from their sale. But Lee left him also, by will, a large and valuable estate in Berkeley County, Virginia, so he retired from public life and ended his days on a Rhode Island farm. Anna Katharine Goddard lived to great old age. The story of this acquaintance with General Lee, and of Miss Goddard’s connection therewith, formsone of the interesting minor episodes of the War.

Just previous to the Revolution, it was nothing very novel or unusual to Baltimoreans to see a woman edit a newspaper. TheMaryland Gazettesuspended on account of the Stamp Act in 1765, and the printer issued a paper calledThe Apparition of the Maryland Gazette which is not Dead but Sleepeth; and instead of a Stamp it bore a death’s head with the motto, “The Times are Dismal, Doleful, Dolorous, Dollarless.” Almost immediately after it resumed publication, the publisher died, and from 1767 to 1775 it was carried on by his widow, Anne Katharine Green, sometimes assisted by her son, but for five years alone. The firm name was Anne Katharine Green & Son: and she also did the printing for the Colony. She was about thirty-six years old when she assumed the business, and was then the mother of six sons and eight daughters. Her husband was the fourth generation from Samuel Green, the first printer in New England, from whom descended about thirty ante-Revolutionary printers. Until the Revolution there was always a PrinterGreen in Boston. Mr. Green’s partner, William Rind, removed to Williamsburg and printed there theVirginia Gazette. At his death, widow Clementina Rind, not to be outdone by Widow Green and Mother and Sister Goddard, proved that what woman has done woman can do, by carrying on the business and printing theGazettetill her own death in 1775.

It is indeed a curious circumstance that, on the eve of the Revolution, so many southern newspapers should be conducted by women. Long ere that, from 1738 to 1740, Elizabeth Timothy, a Charleston woman, widow of Louis Timothy, the first librarian of the Philadelphia Library company, and publisher of theSouth Carolina Gazette, carried on that paper after her husband’s death; and her son, Peter Timothy, succeeded her. In 1780 his paper was suspended, through his capture by the British. He was exchanged, and was lost at sea with two daughters and a grandchild, while on his way to Antigua to obtain funds. He had a varied and interesting life, was a friend of Parson Whitefield, and was tried with him on a charge of libel against the SouthCarolina ministers. In 1782 his widow, Anne Timothy, revived theGazette, as had her mother-in-law before her, and published it successfully twice a week for ten years till her death in 1792. She had a large printing-house, corner of Broad and King Streets, Charleston, and was printer to the State; truly a remarkable woman.

Peter Timothy’s sister Mary married Charles Crouch, who also was drowned when on a vessel bound to New York. He was a sound Whig and set up a paper in opposition to the Stamp Act, calledThe South Carolina Gazette and Country Journal. This was one of the four papers which were all entitled Gazettes in order to secure certain advertisements that were all directed by law “to be inserted in the South Carolina Gazette.” Mary Timothy Crouch continued the paper for a short time after her husband’s death; and in 1780 shortly before the surrender of the city to the British, went with her printing-press and types to Salem, where for a few months she printedThe Salem Gazette and General Advertiser. I have dwelt at some length on the activity and enterprise of these Southern women,because it is another popular but unstable notion that the women of the North were far more energetic and capable than their Southern sisters; which is certainly not the case in this line of business affairs.

Benjamin and James Franklin were not the only members of the Franklin family who were capable newspaper-folk. James Franklin died in Newport in 1735, and his widow Anne successfully carried on the business for many years. She had efficient aid in her two daughters, who were quick and capable practical workers at the compositor’s case, having been taught by their father, whom they assisted in his lifetime. Isaiah Thomas says of them:—

A gentleman who was acquainted with Anne Franklin and her family, informed me that he had often seen her daughters at work in the printing house, and that they were sensible and amiable women.

We can well believe that, since they had Franklin and Anne Franklin blood in them. This competent and industrious trio of women not only published theNewport Mercury, but were printers for the colony, supplyingblanks for public offices, publishing pamphlets, etc. In 1745 they printed for the Government an edition of the laws of the colony of 340 pages, folio. Still further, they carried on a business of “printing linens, calicoes, silks, &c., in figures, very lively and durable colors, and without the offensive smell which commonly attends linen-printing.” Surely there was no lack of business ability on the distaff side of the Franklin house.

Boston women gave much assistance to their printer-husbands. Ezekiel Russel, the editor of that purely political publication,The Censor, was in addition a printer of chap-books and ballads which were sold from his stand near the Liberty Tree on Boston Common. His wife not only helped him in printing these, but she and another young woman of his household, having ready pens and a biddable muse, wrote with celerity popular and seasonable ballads on passing events, especially of tragic or funereal cast; and when these ballads were printed with a nice border of woodcuts of coffins and death’s heads, they often had a long and profitable run of popularity. After his death, WidowRussel still continued ballad making and monging.

It was given to a woman, Widow Margaret Draper, to publish the only newspaper which was issued in Boston during the siege, theMassachusetts Gazette and Boston News Letter. And a miserable little sheet it was, vari-colored, vari-typed, vari-sized; of such poor print that it is scarcely readable. When the British left Boston, Margaret Draper left also, and resided in England, where she received a pension from the British government.

The first newspaper in Pennsylvania was entitledThe American Weekly Mercury. It was “imprinted by Andrew Bradford” in 1719. He was a son of the first newspaper printer in New York, William Bradford, Franklin’s “cunning old fox,” who lived to be ninety-two years old, and whose quaint tombstone may be seen in Trinity Churchyard. At Andrew’s death in 1742, the paper appeared in mourning, and it was announced that it would be published by “the widow Bradford.” She took in a partner, but speedily dropped him, and carried it on in her own name till 1746. During the time that CorneliaBradford printed this paper it was remarkable for its good type and neatness.

The Connecticut CourantandThe Centinelwere both of them published for some years by the widows of former proprietors.

The story of John Peter Zenger, the publisher ofThe New York Weekly Journal, is one of the most interesting episodes in our progress to free speech and liberty, but cannot be dwelt on here. The feminine portion of his family was of assistance to him. His daughter was mistress of a famous New York tavern that saw many remarkable visitors, and heard much of the remarkable talk of Zenger’s friends. After his death in 1746, his newspaper was carried on by his widow for two years. Her imprint was, “New York; Printed by the Widow Cathrine Zenger at the Printing-Office in Stone Street; Where Advertisements are taken in, and all Persons may be supplied with this Paper.”

The whole number of newspapers printed before the Revolution was not very large; and when we see how readily and successfully this considerable number of women assumed the cares of publishing, we knowthat the “newspaper woman” of that day was no rare or presumptuous creature, any more than is the “newspaper-woman” of our own day, albeit she was of very different ilk; but the spirit of independent self-reliance, when it became necessary to exhibit self-reliance, was as prompt and as stable in the feminine breast a century and a half ago as now. Then, as to-day, there were doubtless scores of good wives and daughters who materially assisted their husbands in their printing-shops, and whose work will never be known.

There is no doubt that our great-grandmothers possessed wonderful ability to manage their own affairs, when it became necessary to do so, even in extended commercial operations. It is easy to trace in the New England coast towns one influence which tended to interest them, and make them capable of business transactions. They constantly heard on all sides the discussion of foreign trade, and were even encouraged to enter into the discussion and the traffic. They heard the Windward Islands, the Isle of France, and Amsterdam, and Canton, and the coast of Africa described by old travelledmariners, by active young shipmasters, in a way that put them far more in touch with these far-away foreign shores, gave them more knowledge of details of life in those lands, than women of to-day have. And women were encouraged, even urged, to take an active share in foreign trade, in commercial speculation, by sending out a “venture” whenever a vessel put out to sea, and whenever the small accumulation of money earned by braiding straw, knitting stockings, selling eggs or butter, or by spinning and weaving, was large enough to be worth thus investing; and it needed not to be a very large sum to be deemed proper for investment. When a ship sailed out to China with cargo of ginseng, the ship’s owner did not own all the solid specie in the hold—the specie that was to be invested in the rich and luxurious products of far Cathay. Complicated must have been the accounts of these transactions, for many were the parties in the speculation. There were no giant monopolies in those days. The kindly ship-owner permitted even his humblest neighbor to share his profits. And the profits often were large. The stories of some of the voyages, the adventuresof the business contracts, read like a fairy tale of commerce. In old letters may be found reference to many of the ventures sent by women. One young woman wrote in 1759:—

Inclos’d is a pair of Earrings. Pleas ask Captin Oliver to carry them a Ventur fer me if he Thinks they will fetch anything to the Vally of them; tell him he may bring the effects in anything he thinks will answer best.

One of the “effects” brought to this young woman, and to hundreds of others, was a certain acquaintance with business transactions, a familiarity with the methods of trade. When the father or husband died, the woman could, if necessary, carry on his business to a successful winding-up, or continue it in the future. Of the latter enterprise many illustrations might be given. In the autumn of 1744 a large number of prominent business men in Newport went into a storehouse on a wharf to examine the outfit of a large privateer. A terrible explosion of gunpowder took place, which killed nine of them. One of the wounded was Sueton Grant, a Scotchman, who had come to Americain 1725. His wife, on hearing of the accident, ran at once to the dock, took in at a glance the shocking scene and its demands for assistance, and cutting into strips her linen apron with the housewife’s scissors she wore at her side, calmly bound up the wounds of her dying husband. Mr. Grant was at this time engaged in active business; he had agencies in Europe, and many privateers afloat. Mrs. Grant took upon her shoulders these great responsibilities, and successfully carried them on for many years, while she educated her children, and cared for her home.

A good example of her force of character was once shown in a court of law. She had an important litigation on hand and large interests at stake, when she discovered the duplicity of her counsel, and her consequent danger. She went at once to the court-room where the case was being tried; when her lawyer promptly but vainly urged her to retire. The judge, disturbed by the interruption, asked for an explanation, and Mrs. Grant at once unfolded the knavery of her counsel and asked permission to argue her own case. Her dignity, force, and lucidity so moved the judge that he permitted her toaddress the jury, which she did in so convincing a manner as to cause them to promptly render a verdict favorable to her. She passed through some trying scenes at the time of the Revolution with wonderful decision and ability, and received from every one the respect and deference due to a thorough business man, though she was a woman.

In New York the feminine Dutch blood showed equal capacity in business matters; and it is said that the management of considerable estates and affairs often was assumed by widows in New Amsterdam. Two noted examples are Widow De Vries and Widow Provoost. The former was married in 1659, to Rudolphus De Vries, and after his death she carried on his Dutch trade—not only buying and selling foreign goods, but going repeatedly to Holland in the position of supercargo on her own ships. She married Frederick Phillipse, and it was through her keenness and thrift and her profitable business, as well as through his own success, that Phillipse became the richest man in the colony and acquired the largest West Indian trade.

Widow Maria Provoost was equally successful at the beginning of the eighteenth century, and had a vast Dutch business correspondence. Scarce a ship from Spain, the Mediterranean, or the West Indies, but brought her large consignments of goods. She too married a second time, and as Madam James Alexander filled a most dignified position in New York, being the only person besides the Governor to own a two-horse coach. Her house was the finest in town, and such descriptions of its various apartments as “the great drawing-room, the lesser drawing-room, the blue and gold leather room, the green and gold leather room, the chintz room, the great tapestry room, the little front parlour, the back parlour,” show its size and pretensions.

Madam Martha Smith, widow of Colonel William Smith of St. George’s Manor, Long Island, was a woman of affairs in another field. In an interesting memorandum left by her we read:—

Jan ye 16, 1707. My company killed a yearling whale made 27 barrels. Feb ye 4, Indian Harry with his boat struck a whale and called for my boat to help him. I had but a third whichwas 4 barrels. Feb 22, my two boats & my sons and Floyds boats killed a yearling whale of which I had half—made 36 barrels, my share 18 barrels. Feb 24 my company killed a school whale which made 35 barrels. March 13, my company killed a small yearling made 30 barrels. March 17, my company killed two yearlings in one day; one made 27, the other 14 barrels.

We find her paying to Lord Cornbury fifteen pounds, a duty on “ye 20th part of her eyle.” And she apparently succeeded in her enterprises.

In early Philadelphia directories may be found the name of “Margaret Duncan, Merchant, No. 1 S. Water St.” This capable woman had been shipwrecked on her way to the new world. In the direst hour of that extremity, when forced to draw lots for the scant supply of food, she vowed to build a church in her new home if her life should be spared. The “Vow Church” in Philadelphia, on Thirteenth Street near Market Street, for many years proved her fulfilment of this vow, and also bore tribute to the prosperity of this pious Scotch Presbyterian in her adopted home.

Southern women were not outstripped bythe business women of the north. No more practical woman ever lived in America than Eliza Lucas Pinckney. When a young girl she resided on a plantation at Wappoo, South Carolina, owned by her father, George Lucas. He was Governor of Antigua, and observing her fondness for and knowledge of botany, and her intelligent power of application of her knowledge, he sent to her many tropical seeds and plants for her amusement and experiment in her garden. Among the seeds were some of indigo, which she became convinced could be profitably grown in South Carolina. She at once determined to experiment, and planted indigo seed in March, 1741. The young plants started finely, but were cut down by an unusual frost. She planted seed a second time, in April, and these young indigo-plants were destroyed by worms. Notwithstanding these discouragements, she tried a third time, and with success. Her father was delighted with her enterprise and persistence, and when he learned that the indigo had seeded and ripened, sent an Englishman named Cromwell—an experienced indigo-worker—from Montserrat to teach hisdaughter Eliza the whole process of extracting the dye from the weed. Vats were built on Wappoo Creek, in which was made the first indigo formed in Carolina. It was of indifferent quality, for Cromwell feared the successful establishment of the industry in America would injure the indigo trade in his own colony, so he made a mystery of the process, and put too much lime in the vats, doubtless thinking he could impose upon a woman. But Miss Lucas watched him carefully, and in spite of his duplicity, and doubtless with considerable womanly power of guessing, finally obtained a successful knowledge and application of the complex and annoying methods of extracting indigo,—methods which required the untiring attention of sleepless nights, and more “judgment” than intricate culinary triumphs. After the indigo was thoroughly formed by steeping, beating, and washing, and taken from the vats, the trials of the maker were not over. It must be exposed to the sun, but if exposed too much it would be burnt, if too little it would rot. Myriads of flies collected around it and if unmolested would quickly ruin it. If packed too soon it wouldsweat and disintegrate. So, from the first moment the tender plant appeared above ground, when the vast clouds of destroying grasshoppers had to be annihilated by flocks of hungry chickens, or carefully dislodged by watchful human care, indigo culture and manufacture was a distressing worry, and was made still more unalluring to a feminine experimenter by the fact that during the weary weeks it laid in the “steepers” and “beaters” it gave forth a most villainously offensive smell.

Soon after Eliza Lucas’ hard-earned success she married Charles Pinckney, and it is pleasant to know that her father gave her, as part of her wedding gift, all the indigo on the plantation. She saved the whole crop for seed,—and it takes about a bushel of indigo seed to plant four acres,—and she planted the Pinckney plantation at Ashepoo, and gave to her friends and neighbors small quantities of seed for individual experiment; all of which proved successful. The culture of indigo at once became universal, the newspapers were full of instructions upon the subject, and the dye was exported to England by 1747, in such quantity that merchantstrading in Carolina petitioned Parliament for a bounty on Carolina indigo. An act of Parliament was passed allowing a bounty of sixpence a pound on indigo raised in the British-American plantations and imported directly to Great Britain. Spurred on by this wise act, the planters applied with redoubled vigor to the production of the article, and soon received vast profits as the rewards of their labor and care. It is said that just previous to the Revolution more children were sent from South Carolina to England to receive educations, than from all the other colonies,—and this through the profits of indigo and rice. Many indigo planters doubled their capital every three or four years, and at last not only England was supplied with indigo from South Carolina, but the Americans undersold the French in many European markets. It exceeded all other southern industries in importance, and became a general medium of exchange. When General Marion’s young nephew was sent to school at Philadelphia, he started off with a wagon-load of indigo to pay his expenses. The annual dues of the Winyah Indigo Society of Georgetown were paid inthe dye, and the society had grown so wealthy in 1753, that it established a large charity school and valuable library.

Ramsay, the historian of South Carolina, wrote in 1808, that the indigo trade proved more beneficial to Carolina than the mines of Mexico or Peru to old or new Spain. By the year of his writing, however, indigo (without waiting for extermination through its modern though less reliable rivals, the aniline dyes) had been driven out of Southern plantations by its more useful and profitable field neighbor, King Cotton, that had been set on a throne by the invention of a Yankee schoolmaster. The time of greatest production and export of indigo was just previous to the Revolution, and at one time it was worth four or five dollars a pound. And to-day only the scanty records of the indigo trade, a few rotting cypress boards of the steeping-vats, and the blue-green leaves of the wild wayside indigo, remain of all this prosperity to show the great industry founded by this remarkable and intelligent woman.

The rearing of indigo was not this young girl’s only industry. I will quote from variousletters written by her in 1741 and 1742 before her marriage, to show her many duties, her intelligence, her versatility:—

Wrote my father on the pains I had taken to bring the Indigo, Ginger, Cotton, Lucern, and Casada to perfection and had greater hopes from the Indigo, if I could have the seed earlier, than any of ye rest of ye things I had tried.I have the burthen of 3 Plantations to transact which requires much writing and more business and fatigue of other sorts than you can imagine. But lest you should imagine it too burthensome to a girl in my early time of life, give me leave to assure you I think myself happy that I can be useful to so good a father.Wont you laugh at me if I tell you I am so busy in providing for Posterity I hardly allow myself time to eat or sleep, and can but just snatch a moment to write to you and a friend or two more. I am making a large plantation of oaks which I look upon as my own property whether my father gives me the land or not, and therefore I design many yeer hence when oaks are more valuable than they are now, which you know they will be when we come to build fleets. I intend I say two thirds of the produce of my oaks for a charity (Ill tell you my scheme another time) and the other third forthose that shall have the trouble to put my design in execution.I have a sister to instruct, and a parcel of little negroes whom I have undertaken to teach to read.The Cotton, Guinea Corn, and Ginger planted was cutt off by a frost. I wrote you in a former letter we had a good crop of Indigo upon the ground. I make no doubt this will prove a valuable commodity in time. Sent Gov. Thomas daughter a tea chest of my own doing.I am engaged with the Rudiments of Law to which I am but a stranger. If you will not laugh too immoderately at me I’ll trust you with a Secrett. I have made two Wills already. I know I have done no harm for I conn’d my Lesson perfect. A widow hereabouts with a pretty little fortune teazed me intolerably to draw a marriage settlement, but it was out of my depth and I absolutely refused it—so she got an able hand to do it—indeed she could afford it—but I could not get off being one of the Trustees to her settlement, and an old Gentⁿ the other. I shall begin to think myself an old woman before I am a young one, having such mighty affairs on my hands.

I have the burthen of 3 Plantations to transact which requires much writing and more business and fatigue of other sorts than you can imagine. But lest you should imagine it too burthensome to a girl in my early time of life, give me leave to assure you I think myself happy that I can be useful to so good a father.

Wont you laugh at me if I tell you I am so busy in providing for Posterity I hardly allow myself time to eat or sleep, and can but just snatch a moment to write to you and a friend or two more. I am making a large plantation of oaks which I look upon as my own property whether my father gives me the land or not, and therefore I design many yeer hence when oaks are more valuable than they are now, which you know they will be when we come to build fleets. I intend I say two thirds of the produce of my oaks for a charity (Ill tell you my scheme another time) and the other third forthose that shall have the trouble to put my design in execution.

I have a sister to instruct, and a parcel of little negroes whom I have undertaken to teach to read.

The Cotton, Guinea Corn, and Ginger planted was cutt off by a frost. I wrote you in a former letter we had a good crop of Indigo upon the ground. I make no doubt this will prove a valuable commodity in time. Sent Gov. Thomas daughter a tea chest of my own doing.

I am engaged with the Rudiments of Law to which I am but a stranger. If you will not laugh too immoderately at me I’ll trust you with a Secrett. I have made two Wills already. I know I have done no harm for I conn’d my Lesson perfect. A widow hereabouts with a pretty little fortune teazed me intolerably to draw a marriage settlement, but it was out of my depth and I absolutely refused it—so she got an able hand to do it—indeed she could afford it—but I could not get off being one of the Trustees to her settlement, and an old Gentⁿ the other. I shall begin to think myself an old woman before I am a young one, having such mighty affairs on my hands.

I think this record of important work could scarce be equalled by any young girl in acomparative station of life nowadays. And when we consider the trying circumstances, the difficult conditions, in which these varied enterprises were carried on, we can well be amazed at the story.

Indigo was not the only important staple which attracted Mrs. Pinckney’s attention, and the manufacture of which she made a success. In 1755 she carried with her to England enough rich silk fabric, which she had raised and spun and woven herself in the vicinity of Charleston, to make three fine silk gowns, one of which was presented to the Princess Dowager of Wales, and another to Lord Chesterfield. This silk was said to be equal in beauty to any silk ever imported.

This was not the first American silk that had graced the person of English royalty. In 1734 the first windings of Georgia silk had been taken from the filature to England, and the queen wore a dress made thereof at the king’s next birthday. Still earlier in the field Virginia had sent its silken tribute to royalty. In the college library at Williamsburg, Va., may be seen a letter signed “Charles R.”—his most Gracious Majesty Charles the Second. It was written by hisMajesty’s private secretary, and addressed to Governor Berkeley for the king’s loyal subjects in Virginia. It reads thus:—

Trusty and Well beloved, We Greet you Well. Wee have received wᵗʰ much content ye dutifull respects of Our Colony in ye present lately made us by you & ye councill there, of ye first product of ye new Manufacture of Silke, which as a marke of Our Princely acceptation of yoʳ duteys & for yoʳ particular encouragement, etc. Wee have been commanded to be wrought up for ye use of Our Owne Person.

And earliest of all is the tradition, dear to the hearts of Virginians, that Charles I. was crowned in 1625 in a robe woven of Virginia silk. The Queen of George III. was the last English royalty to be similarly honored, for the next attack of the silk fever produced a suit for an American ruler, George Washington.

The culture of silk in America was an industry calculated to attract the attention of women, and indeed was suited to them, but men were not exempt from the fever; and the history of the manifold and undaunted efforts of governor’s councils, parliaments, noblemen, philosophers, and kings to forcesilk culture in America forms one of the most curious examples extant of persistent and futile efforts to run counter to positive economic conditions, for certainly physical conditions are fairly favorable.

South Carolina women devoted themselves with much success to agricultural experiments. Henry Laurens brought from Italy and naturalized the olive-tree, and his daughter, Martha Laurens Ramsay, experimented with the preservation of the fruit until her productions equalled the imported olives. Catharine Laurens Ramsay manufactured opium of the first quality. In 1755 Henry Laurens’ garden in Ansonborough was enriched with every curious vegetable product from remote quarters of the world that his extensive mercantile connections enabled him to procure, and the soil and climate of South Carolina to cherish. He introduced besides olives, capers, limes, ginger, guinea grass, Alpine strawberries (bearing nine months in the year), and many choice varieties of fruits. This garden was superintended by his wife, Mrs. Elinor Laurens.

Mrs. Martha Logan was a famous botanist and florist. She was born in 1702, and wasthe daughter of Robert Daniel, one of the last proprietary governors of South Carolina. When fourteen years old, she married George Logan, and all her life treasured a beautiful and remarkable garden. When seventy years old, she compiled from her knowledge and experience a regular treatise on gardening, which was published after her death, with the titleThe Garden’s Kalendar. It was for many years the standard work on gardening in that locality.

Mrs. Hopton and Mrs. Lamboll were early and assiduous flower-raisers and experimenters in the eighteenth century, and Miss Maria Drayton, of Drayton Hall, a skilled botanist.

The most distinguished female botanist of colonial days was Jane Colden, the daughter of Governor Cadwallader Colden, of New York. Her love of the science was inherited from her father, the friend and correspondent of Linnæus, Collinson, and other botanists. She learned a method of taking leaf-impressions in printers’ ink, and sent careful impressions of American plants and leaves to the European collectors. John Ellis wrote of her to Linnæus in April, 1758:—

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