Random History Bytes 146: John Woolman 2
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John H. Yates
Last Update: Wed Jul 26 08:24 EDT 2023
Random History Bytes 146: John Woolman 2
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As a young Quaker in 1742,
John Woolman
1
(1720-1772) was a clerk for a Mount Holly, New Jersey shopkeeper and was asked to write up
a bill of sale for a woman that the shopkeeper sold as a slave. He considered it wrong, and
spoke his mind both to the buyer and seller, but reluctantly complied.
2
This was perhaps the earliest expression of his lifelong crusade against slavery.
He was at various times
"a shopkeeper; notary; tailor; surveyor; executor of wills, estates, and deeds;
minister; church leader; and schoolteacher."
3
He was a very devout Quaker in many ways, some perhaps extreme, and in addition to preaching
his beliefs as an itinerant minister, he wrote essays, pamphlets, and a
Journal
4
(published posthumously in 1774 and never out of print since).
John Woolman and the Affairs of Truth: The Journalist's Essays, Epistles, and Ephemera
5,
edited by James Proud, is a collection of many of them.
His tireless work for abolition as a reformer influenced changes in thought about it
within the Quaker leadership, as well as its members.
From the beginning of
Quakerism,
its founder,
George Fox,
expressed uneasiness with slavery. Some Quakers were against it, some owned slaves.
There was not a uniform position on it.
Pennsylvania became the center of Quaker abolitionism, and renowned abolitionists
John Woolman and
Anthony Benezet
demanded an end to the slave trade, and to slavery itself.
In 1754, Philadelphia Yearly Meeting published a statement against slavery,
and in 1776 agreed to prohibit slave owners in its membership.
Then they promoted abolitionism for the public at large.
6
Nash and Soderlund
7
discuss Woolman and Benezet efforts in more detail.
Woolman journeyed to England in 1772 and traveled in
steerage
8
rather than accept
better accomodations. He attended the British London Yearly Meeting,
9
and then traveled
to York, where he died of smallpox, and was buried there.
10
A memorial
honoring John Woolman was constructed posthumously in Mount Holly, New Jersey in 1783
and serves as a house museum.
11
John Woolman references are also scattered throughout Robert Thompson's book
Burlington Biographies
12
in the biographies of historically important Burlington County, New Jersey people.
Endnotes:
1
Full Disclosure: The author is John Woolman's 1st cousin, 8x removed.
2
Geoffrey Plank, John Woolman's Path to the Peaceable Kingdom: A Quaker in the British Empire
(Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 2012), 1.
3
Thomas P. Slaughter, The Beautiful Soul of John Woolman, Apostle of Abolition
(New York: Hill and Wang, 2008), 3.
4
Frederick B. Tolles, Introduction, The Journal of John Woolman and A Plea for the Poor:
The Spiritual Autobiography of the Great Colonial Quaker
(New York: Citadel Press, 1961).
5
James Proud, Editor, John Woolman and the Affairs of Truth
(San Francisco: Inner Light Books, 2010).
6
Jean R. Soderlund, Quakers and Slavery: A Divided Spirit
(Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 1985), 3-4.
7
Gary B. Nash and Jean R. Soderlund, Freedom by Degrees: Emancipation in Pennsylvania and its Aftermath
(New York: Oxford University Press, 1991), 51-56.
8
Slaughter, The Beautiful Soul of John Woolman, Apostle of Abolition, 328-329.
9
Slaughter, The Beautiful Soul of John Woolman, Apostle of Abolition, 341-347.
10
Plank, John Woolman's Path to the Peaceable Kingdom, 216-221.
11
Heidi J. Winzinger and Mary L. Smith, Images of America: Mount Holly
(Charleston, South Carolina: Arcadia Publishing, 2001), 82.
12
Robert L. Thompson, Burlington Biographies: A History of Burlington, New Jersey
Told Through the Lives and Times of Its People
(Galloway, New Jersey: South Jersey Culture & History Center, 2016).