Mercy Otis Warren

Mercy Otis Warren
Warren c. 1763
Born	Mercy Otis September 28, 1728 (1728-09-28) Barnstable, Massachusetts Bay, British America
Died	October 19, 1814(1814-10-19) (aged 86) Massachusetts, U.S.
Resting place	Burial Hill, Plymouth, U.S. 41°57′22″N 70°39′58″W / 41.956°N 70.666°W / 41.956; -70.666
Pen name	A Columbian Patriot
Occupation	Poet and political writer
Language	English
Education	Writer
Notable works	History of the Rise, Progress, and Termination of the American Revolution
Spouse	James Warren (m. 1754)
Children	5 [Charles Warren,James Warren,George Warren,Winslow Warren and Henry Warren.]

Bronze sculpture of Mercy Otis Warren stands in front of the Barnstable County Courthouse

Mercy Otis Warren (September 14, [September 25, New Style]^[1] 1728 – October 19, 1814) was a poet, playwright and pamphleteer during the American Revolution. During the years before the American Revolution, Warren published poems and plays that attacked royal authority in Massachusetts and urged colonists to resist British infringements on colonial rights and liberties. She was married to James Warren, who was likewise heavily active in the independence movement.

During the debate over the United States Constitution in 1788, she issued a pamphlet, Observations on the new Constitution, and on the Federal and State Conventions written under the pseudonym "A Columbian Patriot", that opposed ratification of the document and advocated the inclusion of a Bill of Rights. Observations was long thought to be the work of other writers, most notably Elbridge Gerry. It was not until her descendant, Charles Warren, found a reference to it in a 1787 letter to British historian Catharine Macaulay that Warren was accredited authorship.^[2] In 1790, she published a collection of poems and plays under her own name, a highly unusual occurrence for a woman at the time. In 1805, she published one of the earliest histories of the American Revolution, a three-volume History of the Rise, Progress, and Termination of the American Revolution.

Early life[]

Warren was born on September 7, 1728 (old style), the third of thirteen children and first daughter of Colonel James Otis (1702–1778) and Mary Allyne Otis (1702–1774). Only six of her siblings survived to adulthood. The family lived in West Barnstable, Massachusetts. Her mother was a descendant of Mayflower passenger Edward Doty. Her father was a farmer and attorney, who served as a judge for the Barnstable County . He won election to the Massachusetts House of Representatives in 1745.^[3] He was an outspoken opponent and leader against British rule and against the appointed colonial governor, Thomas Hutchinson.

The Otis children were "raised in the midst of revolutionary ideals". Although Mercy had no formal education, she studied with the Reverend Jonathan Russell while he tutored her brothers Joseph and James in preparation for college. Unlike most girls of the time who were simply literate, Warren most likely paved the way for her to break the traditional gender roles of her time. Her father also had unconventional views of his daughter's education, as he fully supported her endeavors, which was extremely unusual for the 18th century.^[4] He brother James attended Harvard College and became a noted patriot and lawyer. What little of his correspondence with Mercy survives suggests that James encouraged Mercy's academic and literary efforts, treating her as an intellectual equal and confidante.^[5]

She married James Warren on November 14, 1754. After settling in Plymouth, James inherited his father's position as sheriff. His previous occupations included farming and merchanting.^[6] Throughout their lives, they wrote letters of respect and admiration to each other. These exchanges of adoration showed both a mutual respect and an enduring bond between the two. James would write from Boston, "I have read one Excellent Sermon this day & heard two others. What next can I do better than write to a Saint," and Mercy would then respond, "Your spirit I admire- were a few thousands on the Continent of a similar disposition we might defy the power of Britain."^[7] They had five sons, James (1757–1821), Winslow (1759–1791), Charles (1762–1784), Henry (1764–1828), and George (1766–1800).^[8]

Her husband James had a distinguished political career. In 1765, he was elected to the Massachusetts House of Representatives. He became speaker of the House and president of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress. He also served as paymaster to George Washington's army for a time during the American Revolutionary War. Mercy Warren actively participated in the political life of her husband. The Warrens became increasingly involved in the conflict between the American colonies and the British Government. Their Plymouth home was often a meeting place for local politics and revolutionaries including the Sons of Liberty. Warren became increasingly drawn to political activism, and she hosted protest meetings in her home. With the assistance of her friend Samuel Adams, these meetings laid the foundation for the Committees of correspondence. Warren wrote, "no single step contributed so much to cement the union of the colonies."

Like Mercy's father and brothers, the first patriots disliked the colonial governor. Mercy accordingly became a strong political voice with views on liberty, republican government and independence for the American colonies. She wrote: "Every domestic enjoyment depends on the unimpaired possession of civil and religious liberty." Mercy's husband James encouraged her to write, fondly referring to her as the "scribbler"^[9] and she became his chief correspondent and sounding board.^[10] She wrote poems and stories about people fighting for freedom.

Revolutionary writings and politics[]

Warren formed a strong circle of friends with whom she regularly corresponded, including Abigail Adams, John Adams, Martha Washington and Hannah Winthrop, wife of John Winthrop. In a letter to Catharine Macaulay she writes: "America stands armed with resolution and virtue; but she still recoils at the idea of drawing the sword against the nation from whom she derived her origin. Yet Britain, like an unnatural parent, is ready to plunge her dagger into the bosom of her affectionate offspring."^[11] Through their correspondence they increased the awareness of women's issues, were supportive, and influenced the course of events to further America's cause.^[10]

She became a correspondent and advisor to many political leaders, including Samuel Adams, John Hancock, Patrick Henry, Thomas Jefferson, George Washington and especially John Adams, who became her literary mentor in the years leading to the Revolution. In a letter to James Warren, Adams writes, "Tell your wife that God Almighty has entrusted her with the Powers for the good of the World, which, in the cause of his Providence, he bestows on few of the human race. That instead of being a fault to use them, it would be criminal to neglect them."^[12] Since Warren knew most of the leaders of the Revolution personally, she was continually at or near the center of events from 1765 to 1789.

She wrote several plays, including the satiric The Adulateur (1772). Directed against Governor Thomas Hutchinson of Massachusetts, The Adulateur foretold the War of Revolution. It was published as a part of a longer play by an unknown author without Warren's consent in 1773. One of the main characters in Warren's part of the play is Rapatio, who represented Hutchinson. Because Warren was a Whig and Hutchinson was a Tory, Warren disagreed with Hutchinson's views. Therefore, Rapatio is the antagonist in The Adulateur. The protagonist is Brutus, a character that Warren created to represent her brother, James Otis. In the play, the characters that are Whigs are brave, independent people. The characters that are Tories are selfish and rude. The play includes a happy ending for the Whigs. After the play was published, Hutchinson actually become known as Rapatio to citizens of Massachusetts who identified with the Whigs. Because her first play was so successful and she thoroughly enjoyed writing about politics, Warren did not stop there.^[13]

In 1773, she wrote The Defeat, also featuring a character based on Hutchinson. Hutchinson had no idea the accuracy of her plot nor completely comprehended the impact she made on his political fate. Warren's assistance in the movement to remove Governor Hutchinson from his position through The Defeat was one of her greatest accomplishments, and she allowed the piece a rare happy ending.^[14] Warren began to doubt as she wrote the third installment in her trilogy, feeling the power of her satire compromised her divine purpose to be a "member of the gentler sex," but she found encouragement from Abigail Adams, who told her, "God Almighty has entrusted [you] with Powers for the good of the World".^[15] With this affirmation, Warren then provided her sharpest political commentary yet: in 1775 Warren published The Group, a satire conjecturing what would happen if the British king abrogated the Massachusetts charter of rights. The anonymously published The Blockheads (1776) and The Motley Assembly (1779) are also attributed to her. In 1788, she published Observations on the New Constitution, whose ratification she opposed as an Anti-Federalist.

Warren was one of the most convincing Patriots in the Revolution and her works inspired others to become Patriots. Her work earned the congratulations of numerous prominent men of the age, including George Washington and Alexander Hamilton, who remarked, "In the career of dramatic composition at least, female genius in the United States has outstripped the male".^[16]

Post-Revolutionary writings[]

History of the Rise, Progress and Termination of the American Revolution (1805)

All of Warren's works were published anonymously until 1790, when she published Poems, Dramatic and Miscellaneous, the first work bearing her name. The book contains eighteen political poems and two plays. The two plays, called "The Sack of Rome" and "The Ladies of Castille," deal with liberty, social and moral values that were necessary to the success of the new republic.^[10]

In 1805, she completed her literary career with a three-volume History of the Rise, Progress, and Termination of the American Revolution. President Thomas Jefferson ordered subscriptions for himself and his cabinet and noted his "anticipation of her truthful account of the last thirty years that will furnish a more instructive lesson to mankind than any equal period known in history."^[17] The book's sharp comments on John Adams led to a heated correspondence and a breach in her friendship with Adams, which lasted until 1812.

Mercy Otis Warren's gravestone located directly behind James Warren's plaque. She is buried alongside her husband at Burial Hill.

Death and legacy[]

Warren died on October 19, 1814, at the age of 86, six years after her husband died in 1808.^[18] She is buried at Burial Hill, Plymouth, Massachusetts. According to historian Mary Benson, Warren was able, vigorous, and much better read than her contemporaries. Her family connections gave her access to the leadership of the American Revolution, including her brother James Otis and her husband James Warren. New England's patriot leadership welcomed her revolutionary fervor and deployed her plays as valuable propaganda for the cause.

Although at first dubious about the proper role of women as propagandists, she succumbed to the urgings of her friends and accepted her duty to use her talents for the patriot cause. Her interest in current events blossomed into the skills of a self-taught historian, with a romanticized style of the sort readers of contemporary literature expected. Like the fiction of the day, her historiography pointed toward moral lessons, and a plays and histories reflected her partisanship against the faction around Governor Hutchinson, or around the Hamiltonian Federalists in the national capital. Historians no longer read her for factual details, but they do find her a valuable source on the mood among intellectuals in the Revolutionary era and the early nation. Feminists debate whether she could be considered one of them, for her expressed approach was traditional, with some impatience shown at the restraints. She did strongly encourage women writers while stressing the cheerful performance of household duties.^[19]

Warren proved her ability to resonate to her colonial audience, men and women alike. Furthermore, she proved courageous in being willing to put forth work calling out the authoritative power while raising a family, yet she was humble and practical in how she presented the commentary through quieter presentations. Her success was never above her personal dignity. She said to her son, "The thorns, the thistles, and the briers, in the field of politics seldom permit the soil to produce anything… but ruin to the adventurer," yet the public would not let her retire from commentating on the political conflicts of her later days.^[20] She concentrated her writing on strict political matters wrote many more short dramas, poems, and essays throughout wartime and post-Revolution with a commentating and critical voice.

The SS Mercy Warren, a World War II Liberty ship launched in 1943, was named in her honor. In 2002, she was inducted into the National Women's Hall of Fame in Seneca Falls, New York. She is remembered on the Boston Women's Heritage Trail.^[21] Her great-great-grandson, Charles Warren, became a distinguished lawyer and historian.

References[]

Further reading[]

• Botting, Eileen Hunt. "Women Writing War: Mercy Otis Warren and Hannah Mather Crocker on the American Revolution." Massachusetts Historical Review 18 (2016): 88-118. in JSTOR
• Cohen, Lester H. "Mercy Otis Warren: the Politics of Language and the Aesthetics of Self." American Quarterly 1983 35(5): 481–98. ISSN 0003-0678 Fulltext in Jstor
• Davies, Kate. Catharine Macaulay and Mercy Otis Warren: The Revolutionary Atlantic and the Politics of Gender. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005.
• Davies, Kate, "Revolutionary Correspondence: Reading Catharine Macaulay and Mercy Otis Warren," Women's Writing: the Elizabethan to Victorian Period. 2006 13:1, 73–97.
• Ellis, Joseph J. The Passionate Sage: The Character and Legacy of John Adams. Norton, 1993. ISBN 0-393-31133-3
• Franklin, Benjamin V. and Warren, Mercy Otis. The Plays and Poems of Mercy Otis Warren. Delmar, New York: Scholars' Facsimiles & Reprints, 1980. Print.
• Friedman, Lawrence J. and Shaffer, Arthur H. "Mercy Otis Warren and the Politics of Historical Nationalism." New England Quarterly 1975 48(2): 194–215. in JSTOR
• Gelles, Edith B. "Bonds of Friendship: the Correspondence of Abigail Adams and Mercy Otis Warren" Proceedings of the Massachusetts Historical Society 1996 108: 35–71. ISSN 0076-4981
• King, Martha J. "The “pen of the historian”: Mercy Otis Warren's History of the American Revolution." Princeton University Library Chronicle 72.2 (2011): 513-532. online
• Lane, Larry M. and Lane, Judith J. "The Columbian Patriot: Mercy Otis Warren and the Constitution." Women & Politics 1990 10(2): 17–32. ISSN 0195-7732
• Oreovicz, Cheryl Z. "Mercy Otis Warren (1728–1814)" Legacy 1996 13(1): 54–64. ISSN 0748-4321 Fulltext online at Swetswise
• Richards, Jeffrey H. Mercy Otis Warren. (Twayne's United States Authors Series, no. 618.) Twayne, 1995. 195 pp.; reviewed in William and Mary Quarterly 1996 54(3): 659–61. Fulltext of review in Jstor
• Shalev, Eran. "Mercy Otis Warren, the American Revolution and the Classical Imagination." Transatlantica. Revue d’études américaines. American Studies Journal 2 (2015). online
• Stuart, Rubin, Nancy. The Muse of the Revolution: The Secret Pen of Mercy Otis Warren and the Founding of a Nation. Beacon Press, 2008.
• Tarantello, Patricia F. "Insisting on Femininity: Mercy Otis Warren, Susanna Rowson, and Literary Self-Promotion." Women's Studies 46.3 (2017): 181–199.
• Wood, Gordon S. "The Authorship of the Letters from the Federal Farmer" (in Notes and Documents). William and Mary Quarterly. 3rd Ser., Vol. 31, No. 2. (Apr., 1974), pp. 299–308.
• Zagarri, Rosemarie. A Woman's Dilemma: Mercy Otis Warren and the American Revolution. Harlan Davidson, 1995.
• Zagarri, Rosemarie. A Woman's Dilemma: Mercy Otis Warren and the American Revolution. Wiley-Blackwell, 2015.

Primary sources[]

• Warren, Mercy Otis. The Rise, Progress and Termination of the American Revolution, Interspersed with Biographical, Political and Moral Observations. Ed. and Ann. by Lester H. Cohen (2 vols.) Liberty Classics, 1988 (modern reprint of orig. 1804 edition).
• Warren, Mercy Otis. Mercy Otis Warren: Selected Letters (University of Georgia Press, 2010).
• Works by Mercy Otis Warren at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Mercy Otis Warren at Internet Archive
• Works by Mercy Otis Warren at LibriVox (public domain audiobooks)

External links[]

• Michals, Debra. "Mercy Otis Warren". National Women's History Museum. 2015.