Territorial Women Influence National Opinions

Through popular books and letters to New England newspapers, Kansas women settlers, including Clarina Nichols and Sara Robinson, helped shape national opinions about the turmoil during Bleeding Kansas, the struggle from 1854-1861 over the extension of slavery. These early Kansans found ways to influence politics and public opinion without challenging the social conventions of 19th century America.

Nichols and Robinson came to the Kansas Territory as members of the small but influential group of New Englanders whose interest in Kansas was fueled by the political question that racked the nation in the 1850s. They responded to the call to save Kansas from the pro-slavery Missourians who were committed to making Kansas a slave state.

Before coming to Kansas in 1854, Clarina Nichols edited the Windham County Democrat in Brattleboro, Vermont. Nichols was a leader in the early women's civil rights movement as well as an abolitionist. During Kansas' territorial period, she sent articles to like-minded newspapers including the New York Tribune, the Chicago Tribune, the Boston Evening Telegraph, and the Milwaukee Daily Press Gazette. As a newspaper editor and a leader in the reform movements, she had credibility and a following with people in the East, said Diane Eickhoff, who will portray Nichols in Kansas Chautauqua, June 2004.

Sara Robinson, wife of future Kansas Governor Charles Robinson, came to the Kansas Territory in 1855. Her journal of pioneer life was published in 1856 as Kansas: Its Interior and Exterior Life. Robinson’s popular book went through several printings in a very short time.

"In the Robinson papers, there is a letter from Charles to Sara in which he jokingly refers to the fact that he's known to people in the East as 'Mrs. Robinson’s husband,' a testament to how well-know her work was, despite the fact that he is the one with the leading role in the free-state movement," said Nicole Etcheson, professor of history at the University of Texas-El Paso and the author of a book on Bleeding Kansas that will be published by the University of Kansas Press in 2004.

"Both [of these women] paint dramatic pictures of both the home scene and the perils and heroism of the free-state settlers that won enormous sympathy for the cause outside the Kansas Territory," said Eickhoff, author of Frontier Freedom Fighter: The Story of Clarina I. H. Nichols, which will be published in 2004.

In addition to promoting the cause of the free-state movement, these books and letters helped reassure women who were reluctant to move away from the comforts of the East.

"Reports from other women already in the Kansas Territory helped convince pioneer women that it was all right to come here, that other women were there, and that this was not a desert or a wilderness but had the potential to be home and to provide new business contacts," Eickhoff said.

Robinson and Nichols were committed to the free-state movement. They used their talents and passion to stir up sympathy to support for the settlers working against slavery while still acting like "ladies."

"The bottom line is that women were much more politically active than we’ve thought. They found new ways to influence politics that were still considered to be appropriate for women, but they exercised power nonetheless," Etcheson said.

In June 2004 the Kansas Humanities Council sponsors a statewide, month-long event, Bleeding Kansas: Where the Civil War Began, a Kansas Chautauqua. Through evening programs featuring portrayals including Clarina Nichols, Abraham Lincoln, and John Brown, workshops, historic tours, and reenactments, participants learn about Bleeding Kansas and Kansas’ rich history. Kansas Chautauqua will be in Junction City (June 4-8), Colby (June 11-15), Fort Scott (June 18-22), and Lawrence (June 25-29). For more information, contact info@kansashumanities.org or call 785/357-0359.

TOP