Catharine Maria Sedgwick’s early letters document the intellectual development of a prolific woman writer from her childhood in the early national period through the 1813 death of her father Theodore Sedgwick, a Federalist member of Congress and Massachusetts supreme court judge. The youngest daughter in a family of seven siblings, Sedgwick practiced epistolary conventions in her early letters while introducing her lifelong theme of balancing personal and family expectations with the obligation to write. As Sedgwick reported in her later autobiography, she felt that she lacked a satisfactory formal education, but “these great deficiencies” were offset by the quality of her homelife. Her adolescent years were marked by her mother’s chronic ill health and death in 1807, her father’s remarriage in 1808, and her engagement with her siblings’ growing families throughout the period. By 1812, as a 22-year old republican woman reflecting on her social position, CMS felt the call of a “life dignified by usefulness” and compared her father’s contributions to her own potential: “You may benefit a Nation my dear Papa, & I may improve the condition of a fellow being” (1 Mar. 1812).
Letters from Sedgwick’s pre-publication adulthood demonstrate her intellectual and religious development as she grappled with events both personal and national. Her siblings became the central focus of her domestic life, and the Sedgwicks’ experiences with “the market of matrimony” (15 Aug. 1813) provide intriguing fodder for epistolary debate. Sedgwick rejected at least two marriage proposals in her twenties, one in 1812 and another in 1819. In the summer of 1821, she traveled to Niagara Falls and Montreal and began keeping a journal. As Sedgwick developed her authorial persona and worked on her first novel, her full-throated dedication to family, female relationships, and personal usefulness emerged as primary concerns. Sedgwick’s letters also become more philosophical, and her lifelong dedication to republican service and intellectual Unitarianism come into focus. Sedgwick explains her sense of vocation to her lifelong friend Eliza Cabot Follen: “my ministry must be one of watchfulness and steady devotion, and all those cares that love teaches, and can pay without being asked” (15 Nov 1822).
With her first novel A New-England Tale (1822), Sedgwick established herself as a professional writer, and she published four additional literary novels and more than 30 stories during this period. As a dedicated family woman, who also chose to be single and an author, she constructed domestic arrangements that complemented her writing career. She lived in the homes of her brothers and sisters-in-law in Stockbridge, Lenox, and New York City, deepening her relationships with her siblings as well as caring for the children and contributing to their education. Redwood, her second novel, received “much more praise and celebrity than [she] expected” (18 Oct. 1824). As her fame grew, she continued to find her spiritual home in Unitarianism, while her range of acquaintances expanded to include artists, politicians, reformers, educators, and intellectuals. Sedgwick began to travel more widely, visiting friends in Boston, Newport, and Philadelphia, and making extended trips to Washington DC and the South. As a measure of her celebrity, she was selected for inclusion in the National Portrait Gallery of Distinguished Americans (1834), the only woman included other than Martha Washington. The period was also punctuated by “the real and bitter sorrows that cloud our life” (13 Mar. 1830), including the deaths of her sister Eliza, her childhood nurse Elizabeth Freeman, and her brother Harry.
As a member of the American literati, Sedgwick navigated transatlantic fame while experiencing personal loss at home. She pursued new avenues of benevolent activism in her life and writings. Letters from this period will be available soon.
Sedgwick’s engagement with mid-nineteenth-century reform movements informed her writings during this period. Her primary residences continued to be New York City and the Berkshires. She deepened her relationships with her niece Kate Minot and other members of the next generation of Sedgwicks. Letters from this era will be available at a future date.
During the Civil War period, Sedgwick grappled with issues of national importance alongside personal losses at home. She published her last book and final story and, after a medical crisis, resigned as Director of the New York Women’s Prison Association. In her final years, she resided with Kate Minot and her family near Boston. Letters from this era will be available at a future date.
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For the first time in six weeks dear Jane we have winter & cold weather today -- I have been foggy & dull as the weather -- -- but I mean to beleive it was all the weather & to catch some energy from this northern blast -- -- -- What a dreadful thing this illness of Judge Howe's is -- It seems as if our own peculiar circle was again invaded -- & if his loss will be a serious diminution of our best possessions what must it be to his family! -- --
I had a very kind message from Eliza Robbins -- not long since & my heart moved me to go & see her -- I dont obey all its best suggestions but I did this -- -- -- I found her quite overwhelmed crushed"r Howe -- -- she is certainly the most respectable Magdalen 2 among our acquaintance -- --
When I am not writing to you I think of a hundred things to communicate -- that if I were with you would be poured into your attentive ear -- but pen & ink are a terrible 2 touch stone -- --
Mr Bleecker is here on his return from Washington -- He left the Halls 3 there going through their usual reciprocation -- hospitalities received & superciliousness returned -- How could the Bostonians so long endure their airs? If they have been rightly reported to us they deserved to have put in Coventry -- -- Wallenstein -- B says, is deeply smitten with the Spanish Ambassador's daughter -- and 'loves like a German' -- I don't know how that is -- -- does Eliza? --
I do not see much of Lucy -- she
Do you know that Thatcher wrote the review of the Talisman 5 in the NA 6 -- -- Rather high-seasoned praise of a mediocre production -- but very well prepared -- Is it not? -- -- Mrs Osborne is as serene as ever -- as great an adept this winter at dressing hair 'en rs Dr Revere & Mrs Johnson & Mrs rs Wheaton's places -- -- I didnot mean to 3 have joined them at present -- but Elizth would not go -- and they made so much talk about our both being absent that I
The Wares appear very happy this winter -- William has improved extremely -- He has abandoned the impersonal style -- & I really think the average of his sermons fully equal to his Brother's --
The new church are still in their widowed or rather maiden condition -- They are a good deal displeased, & I fear not without reason with Dewey -- -- He has disappointed them & not
I meant yesterday to have written to Louisa & Eliza & sundry others but Mary Cabot came home with me and we spent the whole day téte á tété in my room -- & this Evening I have recd a note from her saying she goes tomorrow -- I am very sorry for that as I have many things left undone -- & I am afraid I shall not see her again -- -- --
Many & constant are the enquiries dear Jane about you & Harry -- and even in this great & busy City your loss has created a sensation -- I trust Harry will again be reestablished here -- for this seems to be the point towards which all his desires converge -- --
I leave all about fashion -- soirées &c for Maria's folios to Mary -- -- Do give my best love to your brother & to Louisa & Mary -- and
Dr Revere is giving some charming lectures at the Athenaeum -- Who would ever have dreamt of Mr Farrar's being one of fortune's minions? -- -- Cupid should take him up now 9 -- I am sure he deserves the favor of the whole Pantheon -- --
You say nothing of Margt my love to her -- old Mrs Coles is a perfect wreck in mind She enquired after you but could not remember your name or whether you had any children! 4
I am not writing -- & do not feel as if I ever should again -- -- I wrote a little story for Willis -- but it was not fit to send & I have yet a promise to him -- to redeem -- Oh dear Jane if I could see you for half an hour even half an hour! --
Miss Roches I know claims the gift of the spirit -- and her illuminations may be perfectly satisfactory to herself & to the beleiving -- -- but there are those in the habit of beleiving only what they understand, & who rely more on facts than on the inward testimony
Letter
Massachusetts Historical Society
Catharine Maria Sedgwick Papers III.
Wax blot and tear. The closing paragraph is written in the left and top margins of page 1; the PS is written in the left margin of page 2.
Mrs H D Sedgwick/Boston/Miss Cabot
1828 is written in the upper right corner of page 1.
From William Shakespeare's Romeo and Juliet (c1597).
A Magdalen is "a repentant female sinner, esp. a reformed prostitute" (OED).
Probably a reference to Scottish travel writer Basil Hall and his wife, Margaret, who spent 1827 and 1828 in the United States.
Possibly a reference to Sedgwick's lifelong friend Susan Livingston Ledyard, about whose attachment to Thatcher Payne Sedgwick comments with some regularity. Ledyard was a wealthy widow, while Payne was several years younger and from a poor family of teachers.
Sir Walter Scott's 1825 novel, The Talisman.
Possibly a reference to the North American Review.
French terms for contemporary hairstyles.
Probably a reference to Jane Minot Sedgwick's older, unmarried cousin Susanna Speakman, who often lived with her family.
John Farrar did remarry in 1828.