Women's History is Every Month: Carol Berkin - Colonial Women; Women in the American Revolution; Here are 7 of history’s gre
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| xena | Did they get in trouble for having sex before marriage? |
| Berkin | No, as long as there was marriage. The concern was to make sure there were no dependent mothers and children in the community. And, Puritans believed that once you published your banns (announced your engagement), then you could have sex. |
| Jayne | But they still had to live in their family homes until they were married, right? Where did they find privacy? |
| Berkin | Colonists didn't have the same sense of privacy that we do. In the 17th century, the entire family and the servants all slept in one room. Often, the parents and the children slept in one bed. There was no such thing as a teenager having privacy. So, sex was more public, in a sense, than today. |
| Jayne | But if you were engaged, would your boyfriend sleep over? |
| Berkin | When a boy came to court or visit his sweetheart, it was after dark when field work was done. Even in New England, there was still wild animals roaming about. So, he rarely went home. He slept over and families sometimes put a "bundling board" between the boy and the girl. The "bundling board" was just a piece of wood that divided the family from the visitor. |
| tinky | Did women have access to the legal system? Could they sue people or divorce their husband? |
| Berkin | Good question. Divorce was very rare in Colonial America. It was hard for both men and women. In Puritan New England, you could get a divorce if someone couldn't have children. Most colonies granted what we would call "permanent separations" but neither party could remarry. Many men and some women "divorced" their spouse by leaving town or the colony. Bigamy was a big social problem. Single women could sue in courts, but married women could only sue in court with their husband's permission. |
"The Revolutionary War divided families. In 1774, eighteen-year-old Lucy Flucker married twenty-four-year-old Henry Knox. Lucy’s parents were powerful, wealthy Tories, and they were not happy with the match. Henry Knox was the son of an Irish immigrant. At the age of nine, he quit school to go to work when his father abandoned the family. Henry was also rumored to be a patriot.
Lucy and Henry left Boston in 1775. Henry joined Washington’s army, and Lucy was left on her own for the first time in her life. When the British evacuated Boston after the siege in 1776, many loyalists left with them including Lucy Knox’s family. After returning to Boston, Lucy felt her family’s absence. In this letter, Lucy attempts to reconnect with her sister, Hannah Urquhart, whose husband, James, was a captain in the British 14th Regiment. The heavy editing visible in the image shows how hard it was for Lucy to be caught between her husband and her family:
oh my Sister, how horrid is this war, Brother against Brother – and the parent against the child – who were the first promoters of it I know not but god knows – and I fear they will feel the weight of his vengence – tis pity the little time we have to spend in this world – we cannot injoy ourselves and our friends – but must be devising means to destroy each other – the art of killing has become a perfect science
