Harriet Beecher Stowe - Infinite Women

Born: 14 June 1811, United States
Died: 1 July 1896
Country most active: United States
Also known as: NA

This biography is reprinted in full with permission from the National Women’s History Museum (United States of America). It was written by Debra Michals, PhD (2017). NWHM biographies are generously supported by Susan D. Whiting. All rights reserved.

Abolitionist author, Harriet Beecher Stowe rose to fame in 1851 with the publication of her best-selling book, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, which highlighted the evils of slavery, angered the slaveholding South, and inspired pro-slavery copy-cat works in defense of the institution of slavery.
Stowe was born on June 14, 1811 in Litchfield, Connecticut, the seventh child of famed Congregational minister Lyman Beecher and Roxana Foote Beecher. Her famous siblings include elder sister Catherine (11 years her senior), and Henry Ward Beecher, the famous preacher and reformer. Stowe’s mother died when she was five years old and while her father remarried, her sister Catherine became the most pronounced influence on young Harriet’s life. At age eight, she began her education at the Litchfield Female Academy. Later, in 1824, she attended Catherine Beecher’s Hartford Female Seminary, which exposed young women to many of the same courses available in men’s academies. Stowe’s proclivity for writing was evident in the essays she produced for school. Stowe became a teacher, working from 1829 to 1832 at the Hartford Female Seminary.
In 1832, when Stowe’s father Lyman accepted the position of president of the esteemed Lane Seminary in Cincinnati, Ohio, she went with him. There, she met some of the great minds and reformers of the day, including noted abolitionists. Smitten with the landscape of the West, she published her first book, Primary Geography, in 1833, which celebrated the diverse cultures and vistas she encountered. In 1836, she met and married Calvin Stowe, a professor at the Lane Seminary. He encouraged her writing, they had seven children, and weathered financial and other problems during their decades-long union. Stowe would write countless articles, some were published in the renowned women’s magazine of the times, Godey’s Lady’s Book. She also wrote 30 books, covering a wide range of topics from homemaking to religion in nonfiction, as well as several novels.
The turning point in Stowe’s personal and literary life came in 1849, when her son died in a cholera epidemic that claimed nearly 3000 lives in her region. She later said that the loss of her child inspired great empathy for enslaved mothers who had their children sold away from them. The passage of the Fugitive Slave Act of 1850, which legally compelled Northerners to return runaway slaves, infuriated Stowe and many in the North. This was when Stowe penned what would become her most famous work, the novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin. Originally serialized in the National Era, Stowe saw her tale as a call to arms for Northerners to defy the Fugitive Slave Act. The vivid characters and great empathy inspired by the book was further aided by Stowe’s strong Christianity.
Uncle Tom’s Cabin was released as a book in March 1852, selling 300,000 copies in the US in the first year. It was later performed on stage and translated into dozens of languages. When some claimed her portrait of slavery was inaccurate, Stowe published Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin, a book of primary source historical documents that backed up her account, including the narratives of notable former slaves Frederick Douglass and Josiah Henderson. Southern pro-slavery advocates countered with books of their own, such as Mary Henderson Eastman’s Aunt Phillis’s Cabin; Or, Southern Life as It Is. This work and others like it attempted to portray slavery as a benevolent institution, but never received the acclaim or widespread readership of Stowe’s.
Stowe used her fame to petition to end slavery. She toured nationally and internationally, speaking about her book and donating some of what she earned to help the antislavery cause. She also wrote extensively on behalf of abolition, most notably her “Appeal to Women of the Free States of America, on the Present Crisis on Our Country,” which she hoped would help raise public outcry to defeat the 1854 Kansas-Nebraska Act.
During the Civil War, Stowe became one of the most visible professional writers. For years, popular folklore claimed that President Abraham Lincoln, upon meeting Stowe in 1862, said, “So you’re the woman who wrote the book that started this great war.” That quote, published in a 1911 biography of Stowe by her son Charles, has been called into question, as Stowe herself and two others present at the meeting make no reference to it in their accounts (and Charles was only a boy at the time of the meeting).
In 1873, Stowe and her family moved to Hartford, Connecticut, where she remained until her death in 1896, summering in Florida. She helped breathe new life into the Wadsworth Atheneum Museum of Art, and was involved with efforts to launch the Hartford Art School, later part of the University of Hartford.

The following is excerpted from A Short Biographical Dictionary of English Literature, written by John W. Cousins and published in 1929 by J. M. Dent & Sons, Ltd.

STOWE, MRS. HARRIET BEECHER (1811?-1896). —Novelist and miscellaneous writer, dau. of Dr. Lyman Beecher, a well-known American clergyman, and sister of Henry Ward B., one of the most popular preachers whom America has produced, was b. at Litchfield, Connecticut, in 1811 or 1812. After spending some years as a teacher, she m. the Rev. Calvin E. Stowe. Up till 1852 all she had written was a little vol. of stories which failed to attract attention. In that year, at the suggestion of a sister-in-law, she decided to write something against slavery, and produced Uncle Tom’s Cabin, which originally appeared in serial form in a magazine, The National Era. It did not at the time receive much attention, but on its appearance in a separate form it took the world by storm. Its sale soon reached 400,000 copies, and the reprints have probably reached a far greater number. It was translated into numerous foreign languages, and had a powerful effect in hurrying on the events which ultimately resulted in emancipation. Her later works include Dred, The Minister’s Wooing, Agnes of Sorrento, The Pearl of Orr’s Island, and Old Town Folks. Some of these, especially the last, are in a literary sense much superior to Uncle Tom’s Cabin, but none of them had more than an ordinary success. In 1869 an article on Lord Byron involved her in a somewhat unfortunate controversy.

The following is excerpted from A Woman of the Century, edited by Frances E. Willard and Mary A Livermore, published in 1893 by Charles Wells Moulton.

STOWE, Mrs. Harriet Beecher, author, horn in Litchfield, Conn., 14th June, 1812. She is the sixth child and the third daughter of Rev. Lyman Beecher. When she was four years old, her mother died, and Harriet was sent to the home of her grandmother in Guilford, Conn. She displayed remarkable precocity in childhood, learning easily, remembering well, and judging and weighing what she learned. She was fond of Scott’s ballads and the “Arabian Nights,” and her vivid imagination ran wild in those entertaining stories. After her father’s second marriage she entered the academy in Litchfield, then in the charge of John Brace and Sarah Pierce. She was an earnest student in school, not fond of play, and known as rather quiet and absent-minded. Slit-showed peculiar talent in her compositions, and at twelve years of age she wrote a remarkable essay on ” Can the Immortality of the Soul be Proved by the Light of Nature?” That essay won the approbation of her father, although she took the negative side of the question. After her school-days were finished, she became a teacher in the seminary founded in Hartford by her older sister, Catherine Beecher. When her father was called to the presidency of Lane Theological Seminary, in Cincinnati. Ohio, in 1832, Catherine and Harriet went with him and established another school. There, in 1836, Harriet became the wife of Prof.C. E. Stowe, one of the instructors in the seminary. Soon after arose the agitation of the slavery question, which culminated in the rebellion. The “underground railroad ” was doing a large business, and many a trembling fugitive was passed along from one “station’ to another. Prof. Stowe’s house was one of those “stations,” and Mrs. Stowe’s pity and indignation were thoroughly awakened by the evils of slavery and the apathy of a public which made such conditions possible. The slavery question became at last a source of such bitter dissension among the students of the seminary that the trustees forbade its discussion, in hope of promoting more peaceful studies, but that course was quite as fatal. Students left by the score, and when Dr. Beecher returned from the East, where he had gone to raise funds for the conduct of the school, lie found its class-rooms deserted. The family remained for a time, teaching all who would be taught, regardless of color, but shortly after the passage of the Fugitive Slave Law, in 1850, Prof. Stowe accepted an appointment in Bowdoin College, in Brunswick, Me., and there “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” was written. The story is told that once, while Mrs. Stowe was walking in her garden in Hartford, a stranger approached and offered his hand, with a few words expressive of the pleasure it gave him to meet the woman who had written the book which had so strongly impressed him years before. “I did not write it,” replied Mrs. Stowe, as she placed her hand in his. “You didn’t!” exclaimed her caller. “Who did, then?” “God did,” was the quiet answer. “I merely wrote as He dictated.” That celebrated book was first published as a serial in the “National Era,” an anti-slavery paper of which Dr. Bailey, then of Washington, w;is editor When it had nearly run its course, Mrs. Stowe set about to find a publisher to issue it in book form, and encountered the usual difficulties experienced by the unknown author treating an unpopular subject. At last she found a publisher, Mr Jewett, of Boston, w ho was rewarded by the demand which arose at once, and with which the presses, though worked day and night, failed to keen pace. Mrs. Stowe sent the first copies issued to those most in sympathy with her purpose. Copies were sent to Prince Albert, the Earl of Shaftsbury. Macaulay, the historian. Dickens and Charles Kingsley, all of whom returned her letters full of the kindest sympathy, praise and appreciation. The following year she went to Europe, and enjoyed a flattering reception from all classes of people. A “penny-offering” was made her, which amounted to a thousand sovereigns, and the signatures of 562,448 women were appended to a memorial address to her. Returning to the United States, she began to produce the long series of books that have added to the fame she won by her “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” In 1840 she had collected a number of articles, which she had contributed to periodicals, and published them under the title, ‘The Mayflower, or Short Sketches of the Descendants of the Pilgrims. A second edition was published in Boston in 1855. She had no conception of the coming popularity of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” Her preceding works had been fairly popular, but not until her serial was published in a book did her name go around the world. In the five years from 1852101857, over 500,000 copies of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” were sold in the United States, and it has since been translated into Armenian. Bohemian, Danish, Dutch, Finnish, French. German, Hungarian, Illyrian. Polish, Portuguese, modern Greek, Russian, Servian, Spanish, Swedish, Wallachian, Welsh and other languages. All these versions are in the British Museum, in London, England, together with the very extensive collection of literature called out by the book. In 1853, in answer to the abuse showered on her she published “A Key to Uncle Tom’s Cabin, Presenting the Original Facts and Documents Upon Which the Story is Founded, Together with Corroborative Statements Verifying the Truth of the Work.” In the same year she published “A Peep Into Uncle Tom’s Cabin for Children.” The story has been dramatized and played in many countries, and the famous book is still in demand. After her trip to Europe, in 1853, with her husband and brother Charles, she published “Sunny Memories of Foreign Lands,” a collection of letters in two volumes, which appeared in 1854 In 1856 she published “Dred, a Tale of the Dismal Swamp, which was republished in 1866 under the title “Nina Gordon.” and has been recently published under the original title. In 1859 she published her famous book, “The Minister’s Wooing.” which added to her reputation. In 1864 her husband resigned his Andover professorship, to which he had been called Some years previous, and removed to Hartford, Conn., where he died 22nd August, 1886. Mrs. Stowe has made her home in that city, and for some years passed her winters in Mandarin, Fla., where they bought a plantation. She was treated rather coldly by the southern people, who could not forget the influence of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin” in abolishing slavery. In 1869 she published “Old Town Folks,” and in the same year she published “The True Story of Lady Byron’s Life.” A tempest of criticism followed, and in 1869 she published “Lady Byron Vindicated, a History of the Byron Controversy.” Her other published books are: “Geography for My Children” (1855), “Our Charley, and What To Do with Him” (1858). ” The Pearl of Orr’s Island, a Story of the Coast of Maine” (1862); ” Reply on Behalf of the Women of America to the Christian Address of Many Thousand Women of Great Britain” (1863); “The Ravages of a Carpet” (1864); “House and Home Papers, by Christopher Crowfield” (1864); “Religious Poems” (1865); “Stories About Our Dogs” (1865); “Little Foxes” (1865); “Queer Little People” (1867); “Daisy’s First Winter, and Other Stories” (1867); “The Chimney Corner, by Christopher Crowfield ” (1868); “Men of Our Times” (1868); “The American Woman’s Home,” with her sister Catherine (1869); “Little Pussy Willow” (18701; “Pink and White Tyranny” (1871); “Sam Lawson’s Fireside Stories” (1871); “My Wife and I” (1S72); “Pal- metto Leaves ” (1873); “Betty’s Bright Idea, and Other Tales” (1875); “We and Our Neighbors” (1875); “Footsteps of the Master ” (1876); “Bible Heroines ” (1878); “Poganuc People” (18781, and “A Dog’s Mission” (1881). Nearly all of those books have been republished abroad, and many of them have been translated into foreign languages. In 1859 a London, Eng., publisher brought out selections from her earlier works under the title “Golden Fruit in Silver Baskets.” In 1868 she served as associate editor, with Donald G. Mitchell, of “Hearth and Home,” published in New York City. Four of her children are still living. During the past few years she has lived in retirement in Hartford with her daughters. She is in delicate health, and her mental vigor has been impaired by age and sickness. She is a woman of slight figure, with gray eyes and white hair, originally black. In spite of the sale of about 2,000,000 copies of “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” she has not averaged over four-hundred dollars a year in royalties from the sales. In her library she has fifty copies of that work, no two of which are alike. Next to her brother, Henry Ward Beecher, she is the most remarkable member of the most remarkable family ever produced by any country.

Works cited by NWHM
Barbara M. Cross, “Harriet Beecher Stowe,” in Edward T. James, Janet Wilson James, and Paul Boyer, editors, Notable American Women, 1607-1950: A Biographical Dictionary (Cambridge: Belknap Press of Harvard University, 1971), p. 393-402.
The Harriet Beecher Stowe Center, “Harriet Beecher Stowe’s Life.” Accessed 7July 2017, https://www.harrietbeecherstowecenter.org/hbs/
“Harriet Beecher Stowe” in Lauter, Paul, editor, Heath Anthology of American Literature. Accessed 7 June 2017. https://college.cengage.com/english/lauter/heath/4e/students/author_pages/early_nineteenth/stowe_ha.html
“Harriet Elizabeth Beecher Stowe.” Encyclopedia of World Biography, Gale, 1998. Biography in Context, link.galegroup.com/apps/doc/K1631006289/BIC1?u=deschutes&xid=016ee01c. Accessed 2 Aug. 2017.
Hedrick, Joan D. Harriet Beecher Stowe: A Life. (Oxford University Press, 1995).
Hedrick, Joan D. “Stowe’s Life and Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” Accessed 2 August 2017. http://utc.iath.virginia.edu/interpret/exhibits/hedrick/hedrick.html
Vollaro, Daniel. “Lincoln, Stowe, and the ‘Little Woman/Great War’ Story: The Making, and Breaking, of a Great American Anecdote.” Journal of the Abraham Lincoln Association. Volume 30, Issue 1, Winter 2009, pp. 18-34. Accessed 2 August 2017 https://quod.lib.umich.edu/j/jala/2629860.0030.104/–lincoln-stowe-and-the-little-womangreat-war-story-the- making?rgn=main;view=fulltext