Child, Lydia Maria

orig. Lydia Maria Francis

born Feb. 11, 1802, Medford, Mass., U.S.

died Oct. 20, 1880, Wayland

U.S. abolitionist and author.

She was raised in an abolitionist family and was greatly influenced by her brother, a Unitarian clergyman. She wrote historical novels and published a popular manual, The Frugal Housewife (1829). After meeting William Lloyd Garrison in 1831, she became active in abolitionist work. Her Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans (1833) was widely read and induced many to join the abolitionist cause. From 1841 to 1843 she edited the National Anti-Slavery Standard. Her home was a stage on the Underground Railroad.

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▪ American author

née  Lydia Maria Francis 

born February 11, 1802, Medford, Massachusetts, U.S.

died October 20, 1880, Wayland, Massachusetts

 American author of antislavery works that had great influence in her time.

      Born into an abolitionist family, Lydia Francis was primarily influenced in her education by her brother, a Unitarian clergyman and later a professor at the Harvard Divinity School. In the 1820s she taught, wrote historical novels, and founded a periodical for children, Juvenile Miscellany (1826). In 1828 she married David L. Child, an editor. After meeting the abolitionist William Lloyd Garrison (Garrison, William Lloyd) in 1831, she devoted her life to abolitionism.

      Child's best-known work, An Appeal in Favor of That Class of Americans Called Africans (1833), related the history of slavery and denounced the inequality of education and employment for blacks; it was the first such work published in book form. As a result, Child was ostracized socially and her magazine failed in 1834. The book succeeded, however, in inducing many people to join the abolition movement. Child's further abolitionist efforts included editing the National Anti-Slavery Standard (1841–43) and later transcribing the recollections of slaves who had been freed.

      In 1852 the Childs settled permanently on a farm in Wayland, Massachusetts. They continued to contribute liberally, from a small income, to the abolition movement. Child's other work included once-popular volumes of advice for women, such as The Frugal Housewife (1829), and books on behalf of the American Indian. Among her later books were three volumes of Flowers for Children (1844–47), Fact and Fiction (1846), The Freedmen's Book (1865), and An Appeal for the Indians (1868). Her letters have been compiled in Lydia Maria Child, Selected Letters, 1817–1880 (1982).

Additional Reading

Biographies about Child include Deborah Pickman Clifford, Crusader for Freedom: A Life of Lydia Maria Child (1992); and Carolyn L. Karcher, The First Woman in the Republic: A Cultural Biography of Lydia Maria Child (1994).

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