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Sarah Louisa Forten Purvis (1814–1883) was an American poet and abolitionist from Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. She co-founded The Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society and contributed many poems to the anti-slavery newspaper The Liberator.[1] She was an important figure for the history of abolitionism and feminism.

Biography

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Purvis née Forten was born in 1814 in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania.[2][3] She was one of the "Forten Sisters."[4] Her mother was Charlotte Vandine Forten and her father was the well known African American Abolitionist, James Forten. Sarah Louisa Forten Purvis's sisters were Harriet Forten Purvis (1810–1875), and Margaretta Forten (1808–1875). The three sisters, along with their mother, were founders of the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society in 1833.[5] This society was not the first female Anti-Slavery society. However, this society was particularly important because of the role it played in the origins on American Feminism.[6]

Sarah Louisa Forten Purvis was a poet. She is cited in some scholarship as using the pen names, "Ada" and "Magawisca", as well as her own name.[7] There is some conflict surrounding the poetry under the pen names of "Ada" as it has been argued that certain poems with this pen name may have been inaccurately attributed to Forten Purvis.[8] She is credited with writing many poems about the experience of slavery and womanhood. Some of Forten Purvis's most well known works include "An Appeal to Woman" and "The Grave of the Slave." Both of which were published in the abolitionist newspaper The Liberator. The poem "The Grave of the Slave" was subsequently set to music by Frank Johnson.[4] This song was often used as an anthem at antislavery gatherings.[8] While the poem "An Appeal to Woman" was utilized in the pamphlets for the Anti-Slavery Convention of New York in 1837[9].

In 1838 Sarah married Joseph Purvis with whom she had eight children, including William B. Purvis.[5] Joseph Purvis was the brother of Robert Purvis, who was the husband of Sarah's sister Harriet.[2]

She is said to have died in 1883.[4][10] Though some works that speak about her life and poetry state she died in 1857.[11] This discrepancy may be related to the misattribution of some of her works.

Education

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Sarah Louisa Forten Purvis and her sisters received private educations and were members of the Female Literary Association, a sisterhood of Black women founded by Sarah Mapps Douglass, another woman of a prominent abolitionist family in Philadelphia. Sarah began her literary legacy through this organization where she anonymously developed essays and poems.[12]

Written Work

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Motherhood and Daughterhood within the context of slavery are made example of within Forten Purvis's poetry.[13][14][15] These perspectives come from a personal place according to Julie Winch (a writer of History at the University of Massachusetts) and are informed by Forten Purvis's ancestry, status and intellectual background.[7] Though Forten Purvis was never herself oppressed through the chattel slavery system, her poetry extensively made example of the anguish of the experience of being enslaved as a woman of African decent. The notion of cultural kinship was present within much of her poetry.[16] Additionally, the marginalization and oppression exemplified within her poetry is shown to be compounded in many cases by the gendered nature of the poetry. These poems, though primarily about the lived experiences of those within the slavery system, also work to show the lived experience of women as intersecting with their race[17]. Examples of the experience of racism as informed by the experience of womanhood can be seen within "An Appeal to Women"[9], "The Slave Girl's Address to her Mother"[13], "A Mother's Grief"[14], and "The Slave Girl's Farewell."[15]

A list of Sarah Louisa Forten Purvis's Published Poetry
Poem Title Year Published In Author
"An Appeal to Women" of the Nominally Free States [18] 1837 Anti Slavery Convention of American Women Sarah Louise Forten
"The Farewell"[19] 1832 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten
"The Grave of the Slave" [20] 1831 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten
"A Mother's Grief" [14] 1832 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten
"Prayer"[21] 1831 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten
"The Seperation"[22] 1833 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten
"To the Hibernia"[23] 1833 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten
"The Slave Girl's Address to her Mother"[13] 1831 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten
"The Abuse of Liberty"[24] 1831 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten
"Hours of Childhood"[25] 1834 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten
"A Slave Girl's Farewell"[15] 1835 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louisa Forten
"Past Joys"[26] 1831 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten
"My Country"[11] 1834 The Liberator (Newspaper) Sarah Louise Forten

Feminist Contributions

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One of Forten Purvis's contributions to feminist activism has been discussed within the academic world as an equally considerable contribution to intersectionality. For example, Forten Purvis's Poem "An Appeal to Women" is identified through the lens of race and womanhood within Janet Gray's book "Race and Time" (2004).[16] Similarly, Julie Winch discusses Forten Purvis’s relationship to both Womanhood and Race.[7] It is identified that this poem, which was distributed and read allowed to the attendees of the antislavery convention for women in 1873, spoke primarily to the white women of this period.[16][18] In particular, it urged them to join in solidarity with their African American female counterparts as a sisterhood in the fight against slavery. Gray states that what makes this poem inherently intersectional in its feminism is Forten Purvis's identification of the plurality of being Black and being female in comparison to the lived experience of being a white woman.[16] Additionally, this poem makes mention of the self-objectification of white women's "fairness" as synonymous with their social value as apposed to the agency of black women as something more than merely "fairness" (Fairness in this case as related to complexion).[16] Forten Purvis's poem conversely plays on white women's "fairness" as a "virtue" or more contemporarily put, a mark of privilege and further calls for white women to use their "virtue" for activism in the defense of their Black sisters.[16] It is suggested that Forten Purvis's poetry, transforms the female listener into an agent of change. [16]

Poetry

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As can be noted in additional poetry from Forten Purvis, the dualistic nature of blackness in relation to womanhood is a common theme.[7] This intersectional dissemination of feminist ideals and the perspective and experiences of black women through poetry cannot be investigated separately.[16] Ira V. Brown additionally specifies that the women who acted within the Philadelphia Female Anti Slavery society, through whatever those actions were (in Forten Purvis's case, creative poetry) were contributors to what she called "The cradle of Feminism" - or in other words the development of it.[6]

Correspondence

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On the topic of Prejudice, Forten Purvis believed that all people regardless of gender had a responsibility to act as political catalysts in the Abolition of slavery[27]. This is evidenced by her letter to Angelina Grimke, written on April 15th of 1837[27]. It specified that man or woman were to be equal contributors to the cause and that women, regardless of their politically oppressions condition at the time must consider their "sisters" and act upon this consideration.

Sketches

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Forten Purvis also made contributions to the imagery of the emblem of the female supplicant. Adapting this emblem according to their own devices, many women within American drew renditions of the emblem. Forten Purvis being one of them. As specified by Jean Fagan Yellin, Forten Purvis privately added her rendition of the emblem as a sketch, into Elizabeth Smith's album[17].

Misattribution of Works

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As identified, some of Forten Purvis's works may have been under the pen names of "Ada" or "Magawisca." According to some scholars, an abolitionist by the name of Eliza Earle Hacker had been the author of what many thought to be some of Forten Purvis's work.[8] Though there is little evidence as to which poems are not in fact Forten Purvis's. There are some possible distinctions. The fact that Forten Purvis's "Ada" signature always comes with a specifier as to the place with which the poetry was written, while Hackers "Ada" does not, indicates the potential for separation of the authors work. Regardless, many Anti-Slavery and Abolition Authors used pen names to protect their identity and as a result, it has become difficult to attribute certain works to certain individuals.[8] For this reason the chart only includes works in which the place of original is specified as being Philadelphia (Forten Purvis's home state).

The pen name "Ada" was taken up by another poet, Eliza Earle Hacker (1807–1846), a Quaker abolitionist from Rhode Island. A case has been made that the two poets have been confused on occasion because, although of different races, both women were ardent abolitionists writing during the same era, on the same topic. Specifically, Ada's poem "Lines: Suggested on Reading 'An Appeal to Christian Women of the South' by Angelina Grimké," was most likely written by Hacker but often attributed to Forten and included in African-American writing anthologies.[28]

References

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  1. ^ Smith, Jessie Carney (2009). Freedom facts and firsts: 400 years of the African American civil rights experience. Linda T. Wynn. Canton, MI: Visible Ink Press. ISBN 978-1-57859-243-2. OCLC 608623382.
  2. ^ a b "Sarah Louisa Forten Purvis (1814–1883)". FineAncestry. Retrieved February 21, 2019.
  3. ^ James, Alfreda S. (2013). "Purvis, Sarah Louisa Forten". African American Studies Center. doi:10.1093/acref/9780195301731.013.35895. ISBN 978-0-19-530173-1.
  4. ^ a b c "The Forten Sisters". History of American Women. January 25, 2017. Retrieved February 21, 2019.
  5. ^ a b "Purvis, Sarah Forten (c. 1811–c. 1898)". Women in World History: A Biographical Encyclopedia. Encyclopedia.com. Retrieved February 21, 2019.
  6. ^ a b Brown, Ira V. (1978). "Cradle of Feminism: The Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society, 1833-1840". The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography. 102 (2): 143–166. ISSN 0031-4587.
  7. ^ a b c d Sklar, Kathryn Kish; Stewart, James Brewer (2007-05-22), "Introduction", Women's Rights and Transatlantic Antislavery in the Era of Emancipation, Yale University Press, pp. xi–xxiii, retrieved 2021-11-09
  8. ^ a b c d Gernes, Todd S. (June 1998). "Poetic Justice: Sarah Forten, Eliza Earle, and the Paradox of Intellectual Property". The New England Quarterly. 71 (2): 229–265. doi:10.2307/366504. JSTOR 366504.
  9. ^ a b Child, L. M. F., & Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women, 1st New York, 1837. (1837). An Appeal to the Women of the Nominally Free States. W. S. Dorr. https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/AMWAUJ018995649/NCCO?u=edmo69826&sid=bookmark-NCCO&xid=19a8bef6&pg=1.
  10. ^ "Africans in America/Part 3/The Forten Women". pbs.org. Retrieved February 21, 2019.
  11. ^ a b These truly are the brave : an anthology of African American writings on war and citizenship. A. Yemisi Jimoh, Françoise N. Hamlin. Gainesville. 2015. ISBN 978-0-8130-6022-4. OCLC 889175249.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: location missing publisher (link) CS1 maint: others (link)
  12. ^ American poets and poetry : from the colonial era to the present. Gray, Jeffrey, 1944-, Balkun, Mary McAleer, McCorkle, James. Santa Barbara, California. ISBN 978-1-61069-831-3. OCLC 890912391.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: others (link)
  13. ^ a b c Forten, Sarah Louise. (1814-1883) The Slave Girl's Address to her Mother. In The Liberator, Vol. 1, no. 5, 29 January 1831, p. 18, 1 page(s) https://search.alexanderstreet.com/view/work/bibliographic_entity%7Cbibliographic_details%7C2656357.
  14. ^ a b c Forten, Sarah Louise. (1814-1883) A Mother's Grief. In The Liberator, Vol. 2, no. 27, 7 July 1832, p. 106, 1 page(s) https://search.alexanderstreet.com/view/work/bibliographic_entity%7Cdocument%7C2662587.
  15. ^ a b c Forten, Sarah Louise. (1814-1883) The Slave Girl's Farewell. In The Liberator, Vol. 5, no. 26, 27 June 1835, p. 104, 1 page(s) https://search.alexanderstreet.com/view/work/bibliographic_entity%7Cbibliographic_details%7C2656355.
  16. ^ a b c d e f g h Gray, Janet (2004). Race and Time: American Women's Poetics from Antislavery to Racial Modernity. University of Iowa Press. ISBN 978-1-58729-480-8.
  17. ^ a b Fagan., Yellin, Jean (1989). Women & sisters : the antislavery feminists in American culture. Yale Univ. Pr. ISBN 0-300-04515-8. OCLC 246848792.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
  18. ^ a b Child, L. M. F. Anti-Slavery Convention of American Women, 1st New York, 1837. (1837). An Appeal to the Women of the Nominally Free States. W. S. Dorr. https://link.gale.com/apps/doc/AMWAUJ018995649/NCCO?u=edmo69826&sid=bookmark-NCCO&xid=19a8bef6&pg=1.
  19. ^ Forten, Sarah Louise. The Farewell. 1832. Women and Social Movements in the United States,1600-2000 Database. Web.
  20. ^ Forten, Sarah Louise. The Grave of the Slave. 1831. Women and Social Movements in the United States,1600-2000 Database. Web.
  21. ^ Forten, Sarah Louise. Prayer. 1831. Women and Social Movements in the United States,1600-2000 Database. Web.
  22. ^ Forten, Sarah Louise. The Separation. 1833. Women and Social Movements in the United States,1600-2000 Database. Web.
  23. ^ Forten, Sarah Louise. To the Hibernia. 1833. Women and Social Movements in the United States,1600-2000 Database. Web.
  24. ^ Forten, Sarah Louise. The Abuse of Liberty. 1831. Women and Social Movements in the United States,1600-2000 Database. Web.
  25. ^ Forten, Sarah Louise. Hours of Childhood. 1834. Women and Social Movements in the United States,1600-2000 Database. Web.
  26. ^ Forten, Sarah Louise. Past Joys. 1831. Women and Social Movements in the United States,1600-2000 Database. Web.
  27. ^ a b Sklar, Kathryn Kish (2000). "Women's Rights Emerges within the Antislavery Movement, 1830–1870". doi:10.1007/978-1-137-04527-0. {{cite journal}}: Cite journal requires |journal= (help)
  28. ^ Gernes, Todd S. (June 1998). "Poetic Justice: Sarah Forten, Eliza Earle, and the Paradox of Intellectual Property". The New England Quarterly. 71 (2): 229–265. doi:10.2307/366504. JSTOR 366504.
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