Women, Dissent and Anti-Slavery in Britain and America, 1790-1865

225 Pages·2011·1.17 MB·English

by  Elizabeth J. Clapp

WOMEN, DISSENT, AND ANTI-SLAVERY
–
IN BRITAIN AND AMERICA, 1790 1865
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Women, Dissent, and
Anti-Slavery in Britain
–
and America, 1790 1865
Edited by
ELIZABETH J. CLAPP AND JULIE ROY JEFFREY
1
3
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Foreword
This study of Women, Dissent, and Anti-Slavery in Britain and America is
the third volume to result from the work of the Dr Williams’s Centre for
Dissenting Studies. Established in September 2004, the Centre is a collabo-
rationbetweentheSchoolofEnglishandDrama,QueenMary,Universityof
London, and Dr Williams’s Library, Gordon Square, London. Its objectives
are to promote the use of the Library’s unique holdings of Puritan, Pro-
testant nonconformist and dissenting books and manuscripts; to encourage
research into and dissemination of these resources; and to increase know-
ledge and understanding of the importance of Puritanism and Protestant
dissent to English society and literature from the sixteenth century to the
present.
To further these aims the Centre has developed an extensive programme
of conferences, seminars, workshops, and publications. The annual one-day
conferences have led to five volumes of essays: Joseph Priestley, Scientist,
Philosopher, and Theologian (2008), and Dissenting Praise: Religious Dissent
and the Hymn in England and Wales (2011), both edited by Isabel Rivers
and David L. Wykes, and published by Oxford University Press; and
now Women, Dissent, and Anti-Slavery, edited by Elizabeth J. Clapp and
Julie Roy Jeffrey. Dissent and the Bible in Britain, 1650–1950, edited by
Scott Mandelbrote and Michael Ledger-Lomas, is also forthcoming from
the Press; Religious Dissent and the Aikin-Barbauld Circle, 1740–1830, edited
byFelicityJamesandIanInkster,isforthcomingfromCambridgeUniversity
Press. In addition the Centre’s postgraduates have published the following
electronic editions online: The Letters of Joseph Priestley to Theophilus
Lindsey 1769–1794, edited by Simon Mills (2007); and A Bibliography of
theWritingsofWilliamHazlitt1737–1820(2009),andNewCollege,Hackney
(1786–96): A Selection of Printed and Archival Sources (2010), both by
Stephen Burley.
The Centre’s Dissenting Academies Project, in association with the Sussex
Centre for Intellectual History, is funded by the Leverhulme Trust and the
Arts and Humanities Research Council. It will produce both print and
online publications: A History of the Dissenting Academies in the British
Isles, 1660–1860, edited by Rivers and Wykes, with Knud Haakonssen
and Richard Whatmore as associate editors, to be published by Cambridge
University Press, and two relational databases to be published online on the
Centre’s website. The Centre is also supporting the publication of a new
vi Foreword
editionofReliquiaeBaxterianaebyNeilKeeble,JohnCoffey,andTimCooper,
tobepublishedbyOxfordUniversityPress,aswellasanumberofothermajor
initiatives such as an edition of Henry Crabb Robinson’s diary and
correspondence.
IsabelRivers
DavidL.Wykes
TheDrWilliams’sCentreforDissentingStudies,London
Contents
Foreword v
ListofContributors ix
Introduction 1
ElizabethJ.Clapp
1. ComplicatingtheStory:ReligionandGenderinHistorical
WritingonBritishandAmericanAnti-Slavery 20
DavidTurley
2. MarthaGurneyandtheAnti-SlaveTradeMovement,1788–94 44
TimothyWhelan
3. ‘WeOughttoObeyGodratherthanMan’:Women,Anti-Slavery,
andNonconformistReligiousCultures 66
AlisonTwells
4. TheDissentingVoiceofElizabethHeyrick:AnExploration
oftheLinksBetweenGender,ReligiousDissent,andAnti-Slavery
Radicalism 88
ClareMidgley
5. Immediatism,Dissent,andGender:Womenandthe
SentimentalizationofTransatlanticAnti-SlaveryAppeals 111
CarolLasser
6. WomenAbolitionistsandtheDissentingTradition 132
JulieRoyJeffrey
7. ‘OntheSideofRighteousness’:Women,theChurch,
andAbolition 155
StaceyRobertson
8. WritingAgainstSlavery:HarrietBeecherStowe 175
JudieNewman
Bibliography 197
Index 209
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List of Contributors
ElizabethJ.ClappisSeniorLecturerinAmericanHistoryattheUniversityof
Leicester.HerpublicationsincludeMothersofAllChildren:WomenReformers
andtheRiseoftheJuvenileCourtsinProgressiveEraAmerica(1998),together
withseveralarticlesonwomen’sactivismwhichhaveappearedinsuch
journalsastheJournalofAmericanStudies,JournaloftheEarlyRepublicand
AmericanNineteenthCenturyHistory.Shehasrecentlycompletedastudyof
MrsAnneRoyallandthepoliticalcultureoftheearlyAmericanrepublic.
JulieRoyJeffreyisProfessorofHistoryatGoucherCollege,Baltimore.
ShewasrecentlytheJohnAdamsChairinAmericanHistoryattheUniversity
ofUtrecht(FulbrightDistinguishedChair)andhasalsoreceivedaNational
EndowmentfortheHumanitiesfellowship.HerpublicationsincludeThe
GreatSilentArmyofAbolitionism:OrdinaryWomenintheAntislavery
Movement(1998)—awardedtheChoiceAwardforAcademicBookof
ExcellenceandhonourablementionfortheFrederickDouglassprize—and
AbolitionistsRemember:AntislaveryAutobiographiesandtheUnfinished
WorkofEmancipation(2008),aswellasnumerousarticlesandessays.She
isalsotheco-authorofTheAmericanPeople:TheHistoryofaNationand
aSociety.
CarolLasserisProfessorofAmericanHistoryatOberlinCollege,Ohio,and
DirectorofOCEAN:theOberlinCollegeEducationalAllianceNetwork.She
haswrittenwidelyonwomenandgenderinnineteenth-centuryAmerica.Her
publicationsincludeEducatingMenandWomenTogether:Coeducationina
ChangingWorld(1987);FriendsandSisters:LettersbetweenLucyStoneand
AntoinetteBrownBlackwell,1846–1893(co-editor,withMarleneD.Merrill,
1987),aswellasnumerousarticlesandessaysinsuchjournalsasGender&
History,Signs,andtheJournaloftheEarlyRepublic.
ClareMidgleyisResearchProfessoratSheffieldHallamUniversity.Sheis
theauthorofFeminismandEmpire:WomenActivistsinImperialBritain,
1790–1865(2007);GenderandImperialism(1998);andWomenAgainst
Slavery:TheBritishCampaigns,1780–1870(1992),aswellasnumerous
articlesandessays.ShehasalsoservedasaneditorforGender&Historyand
Women’sHistoryReview.ShehasrecentlybecomePresidentofthe
InternationalFederationforResearchinWomen’sHistory.
JudieNewmanisaFellowoftheEnglishAssociation,andProfessorof
AmericanStudiesattheUniversityofNottingham.Shehaspublishedwidely
onAmericanandotherliteratures.Sheeditedthefirstmoderneditionof