Julia Ward Howe

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Julia Ward Howe

Julia Ward Howe (May 27, 1819–October 17, 1910) was a prominent writer, poet, lecturer, & women's rights activist.

As an American abolitionist,  most famous as the author of "The Battle Hymn of the Republic which she wrote in 1862.

In 1868, she helped establish the New England Woman Suffrage Association . During a speaking tour in the late 1870's, J.W.Howe called for a peace movement & convened a Woman's Peace Conference in London, as a response to the Franco-Prussian War.


Family

Born Julia Ward in New York City, she was the fourth of seven children born to Samuel Ward (1786 - 1839) and Julia Rush Cutler. Her father was a well-to-do banker.

Her paternal grandparents were Lieutenant Colonel Samuel Ward (May 1, 1756 - November 27, 1839) of the Continental Army and Phoebe Green. Her maternal grandparents were Benjamin Clarke and Sarah Mitchell Cutler.

Lieutenant Colonel Samuel Ward was a son of Samuel Ward, a colonial Governor of Rhode Island and later as a delegate to the Continental Congress, and his wife Anna Ray. Phoebe Green was a daughter of William Greene, Governor of Rhode Island and his wife Catharine Ray.

Marriage and later life

In 1843 she married a hero Abolitionist, physician Dr. Samuel Gridley Howe who founded the Perkins Institute for the Blind.Together they raised six children. He was very active in the lead anti-slavery cause. Dr.Howe, along with their minister Theodore Parker, were a part of the Secret Six, six men who agreed to bankroll John Brown & his valiant efforts to end slavery.

The couple made their home in South Boston, had six children (five of whom lived to adulthood), and were active in the Free Soil Party. 

Howe's "Battle Hymn of the Republic", set to William Steffe's already-existing music, was first published in the Atlantic Monthly in 1862 and quickly became one of the most popular songs for the Union during the American Civil War.

After the war she focused her activities on the causes of Pacifism and women's suffrage. She was a member of the Unitarian church.

In 1870 she was the first to proclaim Mother's Day, with her Mother's Day Proclamation.

On January 28, 1908 Julia Ward Howe became the first woman elected to the American Academy of Arts and Letters.

Julia Ward Howe is buried in the Mount Auburn Cemetery in Cambridge, Massachusetts.

Julia Ward Howe was inducted into the Songwriters' Hall of Fame in 1970.

Quotes

Mother Mind

I never made a poem, dear friend.. I never sat me down, & said, This cunning brain & patient hand Shall fashion something to be read.

Men often came to me, & prayed I should indite a fitting verse For fast, or festival, or in Some stately pageant to rehearse. (As if, than Balaam more endowed, I of myself could bless or curse.)

Reluctantly I bade them go, Ungladdened by my poet-mite; My heart is not so churlish but Its loves to minister delight.

But not a word I breathe is mine To sing, in praise of man or God; My Master calls, at noon or night, I know his whisper & his nod.

Yet all my thoughts to rhythms run, To rhyme, my wisdom & my wit? True, I consume my life in verse, But wouldst thou know how that is writ?

T'is thus..through weary length of days, I bear a thought within my breast That greaten from my growth of soul, And waits, & will not be expressed.

It greatens, till its hour has come, Not without pain, it sees the light; "Twixt smiles & tears I view it o'er, And dare not deem it perfect, quite.

These children of my soul I keep Where scarce a mortal man may see, Yet not unconsecrate, dear friend, Baptismal rites they claim of thee.


Great Quotes:


"Every life has its actual blanks, which the ideal must fill up, or which else remain bare & profitless forever."


"I am confirmed in my division of human energies. Ambitious people climb, but faithful people build."


"I am confirmed in my division of human energies. Ambitious people climb, but faithful people build."


" Every life has its actual blanks, which the ideal must fill up, or which else remain bare & profitless forever."


"When I see the elaborate study & ingenuity displayed by woem in pursuit of trifles, I feel no doub of their capacity for the most hercluean undertakings."

"The strokes of the pen need deliberation as much as the sword needs swiftness."

Publications

  • The Hermaphrodite. Incomplete, but probably composed between 1846 and 1847. Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2004.
  • Passion-Flowers. Poetry of Julia Ward Howe. Boston: Ticknor, Reed, and Fields, 1854.
  • Words for the Hour. Poetry of Julia Ward Howe. Boston: Ticknor and Fields, 1857.
  • From Sunset Ridge; Poems Old and New]]. Poetry of Julia Ward Howe. Boston, New York: Houghton Mufflin & Co. 1898
  • Later Lyrics. Poetry of Julia Ward Howe. Boston: J. E. Tilton & company, 1866.
  • At Sunset. Poetry of Julia Ward Howe. Boston and New York: Houghton Mifflin Co., 1910.
  • Sex and education: a reply to Dr. E.H. Clarke's "Sex in education." Boston: Roberts Bros., 1874.
  • Woman's work in America. New York: N. Holt and Co., 1891
  • Reminiscences: 1819-1899. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1899.
  • Representative women of New England. Boston: New England Historical Pub. Co., 1904.
  • Julia Ward Howe and the woman suffrage movement: a selection from her speeches and essays. Boston. D. Estes, 1913.
  • Richards, Laura Elizabeth. Julia Ward Howe, 1819-1910. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1916. 2v.

References
ISBN links support NWE through referral fees

http://ocp.hul.harvard.edu/ww/people_howe.html

http://womenshistory.about.com/library/weekly/aa013100b.htm

http://womenshistory.about.com/od/quotes/a/julia_ward_howe.htm

http://womenshistory.about.com/od/howejwriting/a/mothers_day.htm


External links

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