Child, Lydia Maria Francis. Letter to Harriet Brent Jacobs.

Title

Child, Lydia Maria Francis. Letter to Harriet Brent Jacobs.

Creator

Child, Lydia Maria Francis

Contributor

Harriet Brent Jacobs

Date

1860-08-13

Description

Handwritten letter from Lydia Maria Francis Child to Harriet Brent Jacobs. Child writes her assessment of Jacobs‚Äôs slave narrative manuscript.

Subject

Child, Lydia Maria, 1802-1880

Is Part Of

Isaac and Amy Post Family Papers

Rights

The organization that has made the Item available believes that the Item is in the Public Domain under the laws of the United States, but a determination was not made as to its copyright status under the copyright laws of other countries. The Item may not be in the Public Domain under the laws of other countries. Please refer to the organization that has made the Item available for more information. http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/NoC-US/1.0/

Identifier

1330

Location

Rare Books, Special Collections, and Preservation, River Campus Libraries, University of Rochester

Transcription

(Page 1)

              Wayland, Aug. 13^th 1860
Dear Mrs. Jacobs,

                               I have been busy with
your M.S. ever since I saw you; and
have only done one third of it. I have
very little occasion to alter the language,
which is wonderfully good, for one
whose opportunities for education have
been so limited. The events are in-
-teresting, and well told; the remarks
are also good, and to the purpose.
But I am copying a great deal of it,
for the purpose of transposing sentences
and pages, so as to bring the story into
continuous order, and the remarks into
appropriate places. I think you will
see that this renders the story much
more clear and entertaining.
I should not take so much pains, if
I did not consider the book unusually

(Page 2)

interesting, and likely to do much
service to the Anti-Slavery cause.
So you need not feel under great
personal obligations. You know I would
go through fire and water to help give
a blow to Slavery.     I suppose you
will want to see the M.S after I
have exercised my bump of mental
order upon it; and I will send it
wherever you direct, a fortnight hence.
                        My object in writing at
this time is to ask you to write what
you can recollect of the outrages com-
-mitted on the colored people, in Nat
Turner’s time. You say the reader
would not believe what you saw
“inflicted on men, women, and children,
without the slightest ground of suspicion
against them.” What were those inflic-
-tions? Were any tortured to make them
confess? and how? Where [sic] any killed?
Please write down some of the most
striking particulars, and let me have

(Page 3)

them to insert.
       I think the last Chapter, about
   John Brown, had better be omitted.
It does not naturally come into your
story, and the M.S. is already too long.
Nothing can be so appropriate to end
with, as the death of your grand mother [sic].
               Mr. Child desires to be respectfully
remembered to you.
        Very cordially you friend,

                   L. Maria Child

Annotations

Lydia Maria Child, an author, abolitionist and woman's rights activist, is writing from Wayland, Massachusetts to Harriet Brent Jacobs. Child refers to Jacobs's slave narrative. Nat Turner was a slave, who led a violent insurrection against slave owners in Southampton, Virginia in 1831 and was later hanged for his actions. Many slaves, who were uninvolved in the uprising were mistreated and mistrusted as a result. John Brown was a radical abolitionist, who tried to raise an army to free slaves by raiding a federal arsenal in Harper's Ferry, Virginia in 1859. Brown was caught and executed.

Tags

Abolitionism

Collection

D.93 Isaac and Amy Post Family Papers

Citation

Child, Lydia Maria Francis, “Child, Lydia Maria Francis. Letter to Harriet Brent Jacobs.,” RBSCP Exhibits, accessed November 21, 2024, https://rbscpexhibits.lib.rochester.edu/items/show/3618.

Transcribe This Item