Rhode Island's famous Hoydens and Firebrands

Anne Hutchinson's statue at Boston's State House

Hoydens and Firebrands is a superb blog devoted to "Roaring Ladies who write about the 17th Century." That would be me, and this week Hoydens and Firebrands are hosting me in a tale about Anne Hutchinson, Mary Dyer, and of course, Herodias Long. All three are noted 17th century Rhode Island firebrands, but Herodias is also notorious for her hoyden-esque life too! Please click on over to my post, and huzzah for Roaring Ladies!
 
http://hoydensandfirebrands.blogspot.com/2013/07/guest-post-jo-ann-butler.html

"17th Century Celebrity Trial" guest post and "The Reputed Wife" giveaway on Ginger Myrick's Blog:

Ginger Myrick

The lovely and talented Ginger Myrick is hosting me on her blog this week for a tale from Herodias Long's scandalous life, "A Celebrity Trial 17th Century Style."  She is also hosting a giveaway of 2 print copies of The Reputed Wife or Rebel Puritan (your choice) and 2 ebook copies. I hope you'll click right on over to Ginger's blog and leave your name for a chance to win.

Oh, and read the story while you are at it! Cheers, Jo Ann

http://gingermyrick.com/jo-ann-butler-guest-post-and-giveaway/?fb_source=pubv1

The Hanging of Mary Dyer

Mary Dyer on her way to the gallows

On May 31, 2013, Christy English hosted me on her blog for this post commemorating the martyrdom of Mary Dyer on June 1, 1660. http://www.christyenglish.com/2013/05/31/the-hanging-of-mary-dyer-by-joann-butler/

Here is my post:

June 1 is a sad anniversary in New England history. On that day in 1660 Mary Dyer was hanged in Boston for defying the Puritan government’s order of banishment on pain of death. What events led to the execution of that highly respected woman, and what does Mary Dyer have to do with my favorite Rhode Island obsession, Herodias Long?

 

Some quick background on what the Puritans were thinking when they hanged Mary. Decades earlier they had watched political, financial, and religious harassment by King Charles I and the Church of England escalate. Then the Pilgrims, a Puritan sect who had fled first to Holland, settled at Plymouth, Massachusetts in 1620.

Governor John Winthrop

Backed by the Massachusetts Bay Company, Governor John Winthrop led over 700 men, women, and children in search of a place where they could worship freely. They settled on a peninsula in Massachusetts Bay in 1630. The Puritans’ stated purpose was to be a “city upon a hill.” The world would marvel as a Godly community prospered and the Wampanoag Indians flocked to convert to Christianity. The Puritans would also trade for furs with said Wampanoags, scout for gold and minerals, and repay their backers. 

The Puritans briefly lost the governor’s seat to Sir Henry Vane in 1637. Their response was to purge their community of a liberal, perhaps heretical faction of voters.

Sir Henry Vane

The men who voted Harry Vane into power sought a more liberal flavor in their Puritanism. Anne Hutchinson held meetings in her home to critique Puritan sermons. Soon 80 people were crowding to hear her, and even more were noted to be discontent. Anne was banished as a heretic, but not before 142 men were ordered to turn in their arms, and then to recant or to leave. 84 men took their families and departed, most of them to Rhode Island in winter-spring, 1638. 

William and Mary Dyer and their young son were among the families who began farming on the north end of Rhode Island (then called Aquidneck). A year later, discontent over leadership led the Dyers to follow William Coddington southward to establish Newport.

The trial of Anne Hutchinson

Herodias Long, then Hicks, her husband, and their children arrived in Newport in the same year. John Hicks was not accused of supporting Anne Hutchinson, yet perhaps the Hickses were sympathetic enough to leave Puritan Massachusetts for Newport in summer, 1639.

With Anne and her malcontents gone, the Puritans continued to purge their colony of undesirables. Criminals and suspected heretics were banished. Catholics and free-thinkers like Roger Williams were told to leave. Baptists were jailed and flogged. Quakers began to arrive in Boston in 1656. The first two women were stripped and searched for witches’ marks, then jailed. Then more Quakers arrived. Mary Dyer, who had become a Quaker in England, was jailed in Boston for over two months as the Puritans wrote even harsher laws. Soon Quaker missionaries were being severely flogged.

The Puritans were defensive about their laws. Aren’t they the same as locks on a man’s door to keep intruders out? Besides, the Quakers had plenty of warning, and were guilty of their own deaths. Their ministers concurred, saying that the Quakers were under Satan’s influence, and little more than witches.

You are thinking, “What has this got to do with Herodias Long?” Well, Mary Dyer brought her Quaker faith to Newport in June, 1657. Quaker literature tells us that in May, 1658 ‘Horred’ Gardner shouldered her nursing infant. With a girl to assist her, they walked 50 through the wilderness to Weymouth, Massachusetts to protest Puritan cruelties done to Quakers.

Whipping a Quaker 'out of town'

Herod and her maid were arrested, marched to Boston, where they were both stripped to the waist in public, and then whipped. Herod sheltered her baby in her arms, and afterward prayed that God would forgive the Puritans.

It seems that Herodias Long and Mary Dyer must have been close friends. After all, Herod walked 60 miles to defend the Quakers a year after Mary brought that faith to Newport. I can’t prove from contemporary writings that the two were friends, but the two young mothers brought their families to the very small, very new town of Newport at the same time. They attended the same church, and their husbands served in the same government. Of course Herod and Mary knew each other, and well.

Herod’s conversion to Quakerism, if it happened at all, was brief. She never appears in Quaker writings after her whipping, as other Quaker martyrs did. Her name is not seen in the records of Quaker meetings which became established near Herod’s homes. I believe that Herod was a woman of conscience who spoke out against Puritan abuse, but I don’t believe she was a Quaker.

Quakers walking to the gallows

What of Mary? She was jailed several times in Boston, but was not whipped, probably because she once lived in Boston, and perhaps because she was a woman of some means. Rumors abound that Mary was of noble birth, but no researcher has turned up her roots.

In 1659 Mary was led to the gallows. She watched two male Quakers hang, and then stepped willingly onto the ladder herself. The executioner snugged the noose around her neck and hooded her face, but then she was reprieved and sent back to Rhode Island. Once more the court’s sentence was ‘banishment on pain of death’ should she return to Boston.

Mary Dyer did exactly that in May, 1660. She never preached a word against Puritan ministers or government, as other Quakers did. She disturbed no meetings, nor the peace of the marketplace. Mary came to Boston to visit jailed Quakers, and to defy that order of banishment. If the Puritans hanged her – and they did – maybe witnesses would speak out too, and eventually those bloody laws would be rescinded.

King Charles II of England

In 1661 King Charles II was horrified when he read of Mary’s death, and ordered the hangings to end. Charles also read of Herod’s flogging. The friends’ sacrifices of blood and life were not in vain, for they helped to stir a monarch’s heart, and to end the killing.

What did Herod do when she heard that her friend faced the Puritans’ gallows? The record is mute, but I drew on the friendship and sacrifices of Mary Dyer and Herodias Long for my historical novel The Reputed Wife. I hope you’re curious enough to find out what happened next …

Puritans: From Concord and Lexington to the Boston Marathon

On Sunday evening, April 14, I finished Paul Revere’s Ride by David Hackett Fischer. I can’t remember when I relished a book more. I even devoured all the appendices and notes, and was sorry to see the book end. Mr. Fischer’s 1995 riveting history is about Paul Revere, but also the disastrous British attack on Concord and Lexington, Massachusetts, about twenty-four road miles from Boston.

Twenty-four miles, and the British army covered that distance in about

Battle of Lexington April 19, 1775

six hours as they retreated from the American militia. The men who defeated professional British soldiers and marines may have been farmers, lawyers, and tradesmen, but they knew how to fight. All able bodied men between sixteen and sixty were required to train with the militia, and New England's militias had been fighting Indians and French for generations. They were well-prepared to turn out against the British that day.

Now, I could spiral off into saying “that’s why we need guns.” All I’m going to say is I don’t have one. I don’t say that the law-abiding and capable shouldn’t have one. But I don’t think that all of the armaments available now should be on the market.

My thoughts turn more to those twenty-four miles. Runners traveled twenty-six for the Boston Marathon yesterday. I’m tempted to search out some cosmic conjunction in those distances. However, I’ll focus on why those miles were traveled. 

Boston Tea Party Dec. 16, 1773

The British went to Lexington because they heard that John Hancock and Samuel Adams were there. They would arrest those Sons of Liberty for raising opposition to Parliamentary acts and taxes. The Boston Tea Party was the most famous of many acts of resistance.

Then the 700-man army would hasten to a few miles down the road to Concord to seize gunpowder the colonials were storing there. They didn’t expect much resistance, but some 250 colonials drove them out of Concord. Alerted by word of mouth and messengers on horseback – Paul Revere wasn’t the only one – militias streamed in from as far as Connecticut (though the Nutmeggers didn’t arrive until the battle was long over). A British brigade reinforced the embattled army by another thousand men. Nearly two thousand militiamen harried the British to the outskirts of Boston. I won’t discuss how many casualties there were, but there were hundreds, and they were horrific.

The British were defeated. They wanted to nab Hancock and Adams, but they failed, and they didn’t get that colonial gunpowder.

We all know what happened yesterday. One or more cruel, destructive people created bombs, and while I’m not speculating on their motives, they wreaked death, destruction, and fear at the Boston Marathon - a race where people challenge themselves to triumph over fatigue and pain.

Minuteman statue at Lexington

Yesterday was Patriot’s Day, celebrating the April 19 anniversary of Concord and Lexington. The bomber(s) chose that day. The bomber chose a race dedicated to the dead at Newtown, Connecticut. And that twenty-six mile race is a distance honoring a runner who died bringing news of a Greek victory at Marathon. The day and the month are rich with symbolism.

There will be all sorts of calls for more security, and there may be proposals which put our hard-won liberties to the test. I don’t think I’ll change how I look at the world, any more than I did after 9/11. But I do have to remember a couple of things.

I’ve had a lot to say about Puritans in my two historical novels and in blogposts, especially the Puritans who settled in Massachusetts. However, Mary Dyer and Anne Hutchinson were Puritans before they were cast out by their own for radical views. Even Herodias Long, whom I revere, may once have been a Puritan. The Minutemen and other militia members who defeated the finest army in the world were only a generation or two removed from Puritans.

I am proud to say that I’m a descendant of Puritans, even though I deplore some of their acts. The Puritans who crossed the Atlantic to build homes in the American wilderness were tough people. They risked everything for their beliefs and they were stalwart, even when they thought they faced Satan during the witchcraft trials.

The 17^th century Puritans were doing their best in a new world. They believed in hard work, but they shared it. They loved their families (though they didn’t spare the rod to prevent spoiling the child). The Puritans believed they were a 'city upon a hill' with the world's eyes upon it, and they strove to provide the world with an example of a Godly society.

Now Boston is once more the ‘city upon a hill,’ and they will triumph over those who would make us all despair. Yesterday Bostonians ran to help the wounded and opened their homes and hearts. Humanity is capable of harsh acts, but I must remember that it is also capable of greatness.

Images:

Wikipedia

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2013/04/15/help-boston-marathon-victims_n_3087183.html?utm_hp_ref=mostpopular

The Sunshine Award

Sunshine Award

 A few days ago Christy English gave me the Sunshine Award for those “who positively and creatively inspire others in the blogosphere.” As I write on this gloomy and sunless day in upstate NY, I thank Christy for this dose of Sunshine. My good friend lights up my life with her unwavering joy, and with her blog, A Writer's Life: Working with the Muse at: http://www.christyenglish.com/

And now, to paraphrase Monty Python, She who receives the Sunshine Award must answer me these questions three, ere the other side she see.  OK, it's nine questions, but Sir Galahad had trouble counting too:

Ride 'em, Jo Ann!

Favorite Color: Sky blue. It's a color I crave even more than chocolate, especially between November and May.

Favorite Animal: I love them all, but I don't remember an age when I wasn't in love with horses.

Favorite Number: 5. I can't tell you why, but the answer is probably at my fingertips.

Favorite Non-alcoholic Drink: Tea - hot, cold, or any other temperature.

Facebook or Twitter?: Facebook. I love birds and birdsong, but Twitter hasn't grabbed me.

Rebel Puritan and The Reputed Wife

Your Passion: Herodias Long. I've spent ten years writing about that woman's bravery and persistence, and hope that she has passed those traits down to me, her 8th great-granddaughter.

Giving or getting presents: There is nothing like a present to brighten the day!

Favorite Day: Monday, believe it or not. Nothing on my schedule and all things are possible.

Favorite Flowers: Hyacinths. Winter really is over when they appear, and they smell divine!

 And now, to announce the next winners of the Sunshine Award:

Ginger Myrick, author of the amazing historical fiction novels WELSH HEALER and EL REY

http://gingermyrick.com/

Deborah Swift, author of THE GILDED LILY and THE LADY'S SLIPPER, and her wonderful blog:

http://www.deborahswift.blogspot.com/ 

Francine Howarth, author of numerous historical romances, including
BY LOYALTY DIVIDED

http://francinehowarth.blogspot.co.uk/

Doing Pushups for the Army

Arm wrestling, anyone?

I wrote this story back in 2006, peddled it unsuccessfully to a few magazines, and then shoved it in a folder and forgot about it. Offering my story to you seems a good way to blow the dust off my blog. Without further ado:

 

 

Doing Pushups for the Army

Ten minutes ago, I was a fifty-one-year-old woman enjoying New York’s State Fair. Now, I was preparing to do pushups for the Army. That was the plan, but inwardly I feared disgracing myself before a jeering mob. As I hit the dirt – this is the Army, ladies, so it was toesies, not kneesies – I wondered, “How did a nice girl like me get in a position like this?”


In retrospect, my plight was predictable. As a born tomboy, dolls rarely interested me. I ran and climbed trees with the boys. Anything I was allowed to do, and many things that adults considered too dangerous were within my ability.


On to junior high school, where I was the smallest girl in gym class. Volleyball and gymnastics were a snap, but one sport was beyond my ability – basketball. I could steal a ball and move it down the court, but lacked strength to throw it into the basket. It was embarrassing to wait for someone else to get there, then pass the ball to her. For the first time in my life, I felt weak.


In college I followed a life-long ambition - archeology. My first dig was at a New England field school. There, I learned to dig a proper square, removing dirt inch by inch to study how soil layers and artifacts were deposited. I happily burrowed into an eighteenth-century cellar hole, though the “hole” was now a depression covered with trees and crawling with poison ivy. Decades ago, someone had filled in the cellar with a bulldozer.


The cellar’s walls were lined with rock slabs, stacked by some long-ago Connecticut Yankee farmer. When the bulldozer filled the cellar, the wall’s top tiers were shoved into the hole. No way could I lift the biggest stones. When I freed one, I’d call a coworker to help get it out of my square. Asking for his aid wasn’t too distressing, since he looked like Michelangelo’s “David.”


As the days passed, the rocks I could move got bigger, and soon I was lifting well over my own weight. The next summer, I shoveled sand at a South Carolina fort. My senior year saw me hoisting rock again at a Declaration of Independence signer’s home. I had a body like Serena Williams, and loved to “make a muscle” and watch people’s eyes pop.

A knee injury ended my archeology career, but I’ve stayed active. Hiking, yoga, canoeing and gardening have maintained my muscle, though it’s somewhat obscured by middle age.


Back to the Army recruiters’ booth. A sign invited men and women between eighteen and forty to do pushups for two minutes. A man who could perform fifty, or a woman who did twenty-five would get a T-shirt. Six recruiters challenged a few onlookers to give it a try, but weren’t getting any takers. I asked the lone female recruiter, “What’s with the forty-year age limit?”

“Think you can do it?”


“Maybe,” was my answer. “Do I get a shirt?”


T-shirts were meant for potential recruits, and at fifty-one, I was too old for the military. She said I’d get a CD case if I did twenty-five, or bottled water just for trying. Then she dared me to put my money where my mouth was. My fifty-eight-year-old partner, Richard, wasn’t about to miss the fun. As we filled out releases absolving the Army of blame if one of us popped a gasket, we drew a skeptical crowd. Even better for the Army, several potential recruits signed up, itching to outdo us geezers.


A twenty-something guy went first, but surrendered after only fifteen pushups. Doubt gnawed at me. I figured I was good for ten, but could I really do twenty-five toesies? After all, a lot of years have passed since I’d done that many pushups. As my silver-haired partner and I assumed the position, I tried not to picture my rear end, swathed in comfortable khakis, facing the spectators. “Go,” I heard, and began my ordeal.

It was easier than I’d feared, and I did ten rock-hard pushups as the female recruiter cheered me on. At four, she said, “Remember to breathe.” Great advice, since I was so pumped-up that I’d forgotten. At seven, she commented respectfully, “You’re doing really good.” I thought so, too.


I took a break at ten. When I continued, my shoulders and arms groaned, 'Hey lady, what the heck are you doing?'  I wasn’t ready to surrender. At thirteen, my back began to sag, my wrists were screaming, and the shoulder-ache was turning into little blowtorch flames.

After fifteen, I announced, “That’s enough for me.” Richard, a Vietnam-era Army veteran, quit at twenty. That sounds like a piddly number, but if you haven’t been doing them on a regular basis and you are over forty, try it and see how far you get. 'My' recruiter gave us bottles of water, saying, “You did good.” We strolled off to enjoy the rest of the fair, and nursed creaky shoulders for a few days.

It was later reported that some younger female dynamo was able to do ninety-five pushups. I wish I’d been able to do the full twenty-five, but I’m still proud to have struck a blow for middle-aged grrrrl power. Not even the Army can declare me too old to test myself! It’s still fun surprising people who don’t believe that a woman my age can haul furniture, sacks of compost, or do perfect toesies pushups. And, now that I’m not sore any more, you wanna arm wrestle?

My Favorite Character, Time and Place, and Tea or Coffee?

On January 3, 2013 I appeared in a Pittsburgh Examiner interview by Kayla Posney.  Thanks, Kayla!

Jo Ann Butler, author of "Rebel Puritan" answers 10 questions about her favorite time period in history, her favorite figures from history, and the age old question of coffee or tea.

1. If you could go back in time and be any figure from history, who would it be?
I’m not the first historical fiction author to say that I want to be my character, Herodias (Long) Hicks Gardner Porter in 17th century Newport, Rhode Island. Not only would I learn who she really was, I would be my own 8th-great grandmother.

2. What year in history would you have liked to live in?
1622 as part of the migration from England to Plymouth, Massachusetts. The Mayflower crossing two years before was extremely difficult for all involved. Disease, exposure, and starvation killed half of the Mayflower’s passengers and crew within 6 months of their landing. By 1622 the colony had stabilized, wives and young children were coming over, and being part of that new beginning would have been very exciting.

3. You're having a dinner party and you can invite 5 people from history, who would they be?
I’m going back to my “Rebel Puritan” protagonist. I’ll invite Herodias Long and her three husbands, though I’d better seat two of them at opposite ends of the table. Her first husband, John Hicks was abusive and abandoned her. He accused the second, George Gardner, of stealing her away, though it seems that she shouldn’t have had a difficult choice to make. The third, John Porter, was one of Rhode Island’s more affluent denizens, and would be an interesting dinner companion. My final guest is Benjamin Franklin because I love him!

4. What castle from the past or present would you like to live in?
Here’s one you probably haven’t heard of: Smith’s Castle, on the western shore of Rhode Island’s Narragansett Bay. Richard Smith used his home as a trading post with the Narragansett Indians in the 17th century. I’ve studied that period as an archeologist and genealogist, and wrote about it in “Rebel Puritan.” I would love to experience it, but I’m taking comfortable shoes.

5. Two fellow historical fiction authors you'd like to go on a history themed tour of the world with?
Ginger Myrick and Christy English. We write in different periods, but our central themes are how strong-willed women make their own way in a man’s world. And we all love Mel Brooks and Monty Python, so we’ll have a blast!

6. Who was more dashing and interesting, King Henry VIII of England or King Louis XIV of France?
Henry VIII for his messy marital life. Louis had his many dalliances and a pair of wives, but Henry never fails to fascinate. Would I dare to swap marital vows with Henry? That’s a tricky and potentially fatal proposition, but how could I pass up the opportunity?

7. Which of the six wives of King Henry VIII is your favorite?
Anne Boleyn as a spirited and independent woman, though the qualities contributed to her downfall.

8. English monarchy or French monarchy?
Definitely English, though there’s a chance to lose one’s head either way.

9. What three novels could you read over and over?
"To Kill A Mockingbird", "The Lord of the Rings" trilogy, and "Gone With the Wind".

10. Tea or coffee when writing?
Tea by the gallon, hot or cold, green or black, I love them all!

Jo Ann Butler's official website:
http://rebelpuritan.com/

Jo Ann Butler's blog:
www.rebelpuritan.blogspot.com/

Link to original article:
http://www.examiner.com/article/10-questions-with-historical-fiction-author-jo-ann-butler?cid=rss