Women’s Benevolent Societies in Antebellum America

One of the earliest women’s charitable associations appeared in 1795, when Quaker philanthropist Anne Parrish (1760-1800) organized the Female Society of Philadelphia for the Relief and Employment of the Poor, also known as the “Friendly Circle.” The group came together to confront the rising poverty caused by the Yellow Fever epidemic of 1793, especially among the widows and children of men who had died from the disease. The organization subsequently founded a House of Industry to create employment opportunities for women and opened a daycare center.

In 1797, Scottish-born educator Isabella Graham (1742-1814) established the Society for the Relief of Poor Widows with Small Children in New York. In its first year, these women reformers provided food and financial assistance to nearly 100 widows and over 200 children. Several other women’s societies emerged in the Northeast around this time. Notable among these was the Boston Female Asylum, formed in 1800 to help orphaned girls, which attracted the patronage of First Lady Abigail Adams (1744-1818) and several other prominent Bostonian women. The Female Humane Society in Baltimore, dedicated to supporting widows, appeared two years later. In 1813, the Ladies Benevolent Society of Charleston began providing health care and other services to residents impacted by the War of 1812.

The Second Great Awakening – an evangelical Protestant revival that arose during the first decades of the 19th century – inspired a number of women-led movements dedicated to both social and spiritual reform. Founded in New York City in1834, the Female Moral Reform Society was dedicated to combating prostitution. Among the nation’s first organizations to be operated and administered entirely by women, the society directly challenged the sexual double standards of the era, striving to liberate women from the sex trade while exposing men’s roles in perpetuating it. Known for its confrontational style, the society even printed the names of prominent men who frequented brothels in the Advocate of Moral Reform, a journal that reached tens of thousands of readers.

While women’s benevolent societies were eventually eclipsed by the rise of abolitionist groups in the 1830s and 1840s, their work on behalf of marginalized women and children helped lay the groundwork for organized social reform in the United States. Equally significant, their commitment to female empowerment helped legitimize gender equality as a political issue, blazing a trail for the women’s movements of the late-19th and early-20th centuries.

Contributor: Stephen Meyer