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JULIA WARD HOWE

© Mary M. Alward

Julia Ward was born in New York City in 1819. Her mother died when she was young. Her aunt, who was a strict disciplinarian, raised Julia. When her father died, Julia's guardianship reverted to a more lenient uncle. Julia became more liberal on social and religious issues.

When Julia was twenty-one, she married Samuel Gridley Howe. He was a veteran of the Greek War of Independence and had written of his experiences. He was a radical Unitarian and was the director of the Perkins Institute in Boston. Samuel carried his strict religious beliefs into his work with the blind and mentally ill. He opposed slavery.

Julia became a Unitarian Christian. She believed in a loving God who cared about humanity. She believed Christ set a pattern for behavior and that it should be followed. She became a religious radical.

Samuel had been attracted to Julia's wit and quick mind. However, he believed that a woman's place was in the home and that she should have no life outside of her domicile.

Julia wrote poetry and attended church. She found her life frustrating - her marriage stifling. She did not adjust to being subsumed in the professional life of her husband. She became impatient with the violent and controlling Samuel. He mismanaged the inheritance her father had left her and was a womanizer. Julia stayed with him because he threatened to keep her children from her if she divorced him.

In lieu of divorce, Julia taught herself several languages and studied philosophy. She also educated her children. She supported her husband and worked beside him for a short time in the publication of an abolitionist paper.

When Samuel led anti-slavery settlers to Kansas in 1856, Julia published her poems and plays. This angered Samuel. When American President Millard Fillmore signed the Fugitive Slave Act, it drew people in the Northern states into the slavery issue. They were now legally responsible to return runaway slaves to their Southern owners. The nation divided over the slavery issue. John Brown led his men to capture arms that were stored at Harper's Ferry. He planned to give the guns to fugitive slaves. Brown was defeated and hung for his act of treason.

Samuel is believed to have been one of the Secret Six. These men bankrolled Brown's efforts at Harper's Ferry.

Samuel and Julia became a part of the US Sanitary Commission that tried to assure sanitary conditions in the Prisoner of War Camps during the Civil War. Though their efforts saved lives near the end of the war, many men died from infection early on.

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