Yours respectfully, WILLIAM HOUSE, Secretary, per D. S. BRUNER.
To refuse such an opportunity was not to be thought of, so she accepted, and then wrote Mrs. Stanton, who answered: "Come on and we will grind out the speech. I shall expect to get the inspiration, thoughts and facts from you, and will agree to dress all the children you bring."
She found a cordial welcome when she reached Dundee, October 17. It rained so hard her address was deferred till the next day, as it had to be delivered out of doors, so she visited the "art" and "culinary" departments of the fair, and records in her diary: "I have just put an extra paragraph in my speech on bedquilts and bad cooking." Her stage was a big lumber wagon, and her desk the melodeon of James G. Clark, the noted singer and Abolitionist, who held an umbrella over her head to keep off the rain. The diary says: "More than 2,000 feet were planted in the mud, but I had a grand listening to the very end." The speech was a great success and was published in full in the Dundee Record, occupying the entire front page. It was a fine exposition of modern methods of farming and a strong plea for beautifying the home, giving the children books and music and making life so pleasant they would not want to leave the country for the city. These ideas at that time were new and attracted much attention and favorable comment. This was the first instance of a woman's making an address on such an occasion.
At the close of 1860 an incident occurred which attracted wide attention and strikingly illustrated Miss Anthony's unflinching courage and firm persistence when she felt she was right. One evening in December she was in Albany at the depository with Lydia Mott when a lady, heavily veiled, entered and in a long, confidential talk told her story, which in brief was as follows: She was the sister of a United States senator and of a prominent lawyer, and in her younger days was principal of the academy and had written several books. She married a distinguished member of the Massachusetts Senate and they had three children. Having discovered that her husband was unfaithful to her and confronted him with the proofs, he was furious and threw her down stairs, and thereafter was very abusive. When she threatened to expose him, he had her shut up in an insane asylum, a very easy thing for husbands to do in those days. She was there a year and a half, but at length, through a writ of habeas corpus, was released and taken to the home of her brother. Naturally she longed to see her children and the husband permitted the son to visit her a few weeks. When she had to give him up she begged for the thirteen-year-old daughter, who was allowed to remain for two weeks, and then the father demanded her return. The mother pleaded for longer time but was refused. She prayed her brother to interfere but he answered: "It is of no use for you to say another word. The child belongs by law to the father and it is your place to submit. If you make any more trouble about it we'll send you back to the asylum."
Then in her desperation she took the child and fled from the house, finding refuge with a Quaker family, where she stayed until she learned that her hiding-place was discovered, and now as a last resort she came to these women. They assured the unhappy mother that they would help her and, upon making careful inquiry among her friends, found that, while all believed her sane, no one was willing to take her part because of the prominence of her brothers and husband. Finally it was decided that Miss Anthony should go with the mother and child to New York and put them in a safe place, so they were directed to disguise themselves and be at the train on Christmas afternoon. Miss Anthony went on board and soon saw a woman in an old shawl, dilapidated bonnet and green goggles, accompanied by a poorly dressed child, and she knew that so far all was well, but she found the woman in a terrible state of nervousness. She had met her brother coming out of another car where he had just placed his young son to return to boarding-school, after a happy vacation at home, while his sister with her child was fleeing like a criminal; but fortunately he had not recognized her.
Miss Anthony and her charges reached New York at 10 o'clock at night and went through snow and slush to a hotel but were refused admittance because it did not take women "unaccompanied by a gentleman." They made their weary way to another, only to be met with a similar refusal. Finally she thought of an acquaintance who had had a wretched experience with a bad husband and was now divorced, and she felt that sympathy would certainly impel this woman to give them shelter. When they reached the house they found her keeping boarders and she said all would leave if they learned she was "harboring a runaway wife." It was then midnight. They went in the cold arid darkness to a hotel on Broadway, but here the excuse was made that the house was full. Miss Anthony's patience had reached its limit and she declared: "I know that is not so. You can give us a place to sleep or we will sit in this office all night." The clerk threatened to call the police. "Very well," was the reply, "we will sit here till they come and take us to the station." At last he gave them a room without a fire, and there, cold, wet and exhausted, they remained till morning. Then they started out again on foot, as they had not enough money left to hire a carriage.
They went to Mrs. Rose but she could not accommodate them; then to Abby Hopper Gibbons, who sent them to Elizabeth F. Ellet, saying if they could not find quarters to come back and she would care for them. Mrs. Ellet was not at home. All day they went from place to place but no one was willing to accept the responsibility of sheltering them, and at night, utterly worn out, they returned to Mrs. Gibbons. She promised to keep the mother and child until other arrangements could be effected, and Miss Anthony left them there and took the 10 o'clock train back to Albany. She arrived toward morning, tired out in mind and body, but soon was made comfortable by the ministrations of her faithful friend Lydia.
It was not long before the family became convinced that Miss Anthony knew the whereabouts of mother and child and then began a siege of persecution. She had at this time commenced that never-to-be-forgotten series of anti-slavery conventions which were mobbed in every town from Buffalo to Albany. In the midst of all this excitement and danger, she was constantly receiving threats from the brothers that they would have her arrested on the platform. They said she had broken the laws and they would make her pay the penalty; that their sister was an "ugly" woman and nobody could live with her. To this she replied: "I have heard there was Indian blood in your family; perhaps your sister has got a little of it as well as yourselves. I think you would not allow your children to be taken away from you, law or no law. There is no reason or justice in a woman's submitting to such outrages, and I propose to defy the law and you also."
If she had been harassed only by these men, it would have caused her no especial worry, but letters and telegrams from friends poured in urging her to reveal the hiding-place and, most surprising of all, both Garrison and Phillips wrote that she had abducted a man's child and must surrender it! Mr. Phillips remonstrated: "Let us urge you, therefore, at once to advise and insist upon this woman's returning to her relatives. Garrison concurs with me fully and earnestly in this opinion, thinking that our movement's repute for good sense should not be compromised by any such mistake." In a letter from Mr. Garrison covering six pages of foolscap, he argued: "Our identification with the woman's rights movement and the anti-slavery cause is such that we ought not unnecessarily involve them in any hasty and ill-judged, no matter how well-meant, efforts of our own. We, at least, owe to them this—that if for any act of ours we are dragged before courts we ought to be able to show that we acted discreetly as well as with good intentions." Both men spoke kindly and affectionately but they were unable to view the question from a mother's or even from a woman's standpoint. Miss Anthony replied to them:
I can not give you a satisfactory statement on paper, but I feel the strongest assurance that all I have done is wholly right. Had I turned my back upon her I should have scorned myself. In all those hours of aid and sympathy for that outraged woman I remembered only that I was a human being. That I should stop to ask if my act would injure the reputation of any movement never crossed my mind, nor will I now allow such a fear to stifle my sympathies or tempt me to expose her to the cruel, inhuman treatment of her own household. Trust me that as I ignore all law to help the slave, so will I ignore it all to protect an enslaved woman.
At the anti-slavery convention in Albany Mr. Garrison pleaded with her to give up the child and insisted that she was entirely in the wrong. He said: "Don't you know the law of Massachusetts gives the father the entire guardianship and control of the children?" "Yes, I know it," she replied, "and does not the law of the United States give the slaveholder the ownership of the slave? And don't you break it every