Lydia Maria Child

From Philosopedia

Child, Lydia Maria Francis (11 February 1802 - 7 July 1880)

Considered one of the "first women of letters" in the United States, Child became a famous abolitionist, author, novelist and journalist. Americans continue singing her lyrics in the song, "Over the river and through the woods to grandfather's house we go."

The daughter of a Calvinist, she originally was baptized an orthodox Congregationalist, but she supported the Free Religious movement and for a time was a convert to Swedenborgianism. She usually attended Unitarian services, however, and among her friends were William Lloyd Garrison, Maria Weston Chapman, William Ellery Channing, Margaret Fuller, Theodore Parker, and Anne Whitney. She joined the Unitarians in 1820 but was unchurched most of her life.

She ran a school, started the first journal for children, wrote several novels, then supported herself (and her husband) by writing such popular how-to books as The Frugal Housewife, The Mother's Book and The Little Girl's Own Book. Her history, The First Settlers of New England, blamed Calvinist-based racism for the treatment of Native Americans.

An Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans recruited many to the anti-slavery movement but made Child a pariah in Boston society. However, it influenced William Ellery Channing's Slavery (1835). Her 2-volume The History of the Condition of Women, in Various Ages and Nations was published in 1835.

She continued abolition work, supporting herself through popular writings and newspaper columns. The Progress of Religious Ideas (1855) rejected theology, dogma, doctrines, and talked of "Providence" as the inward voice of conscience. She later defined religion as simply working for the welfare of the human race.

“It is right noble to fight with wickedness and wrong,” she wrote in Over the River and Through the Woods (1842); “the mistake is in supposing that spiritual evil can be overcome by physical means.” She also wrote,

• It is impossible to exaggerate the evil work theology has done in the world.

In a biography, Carolyn L. Karcher notes that as early as the 1830s Child was vindicating the rights of women, Indians and, particularly, African-American slaves. She was a “household name” during her lifetime, but her works and influence have been all but “erased from history.” Karcher found Child’s writings had an anti-Catholic, anti-French, and anti-Irish bias.

She died from heart disease, and her funeral was presided over by the well-known orator Wendell Phillips, John Greenleaf Whittier recited a memorial poem in her honor, and The Truth Seeker memorialized her.

{BDF; CE; FFRF; JM; PUT; RAT; U&U; WWS}