Elizabeth Buffum Chace
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Elizabeth Buffum Chace (1806-1899) was an influential activist in the Anti-Slavery, Women's Rights, and Prison Reform Movements of the mid to late 1800s.
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[edit] Birth and early life
Elizabeth Buffum Chace was born Elizabeth Buffum in Providence, Rhode Island on December 9, 1806, to Arnold Buffum and Rebecca Gould, the Buffum and Gould families were some of the oldest families in New England. A birthright Quaker, Elizabeth Buffum grew up in a household that was anti-slavery, her father Arnold holding strong beliefs in that regard.
[edit] Marriage and early activities
On April 4, 1828, Elizabeth married Samuel Buffington Chace, also a birthright Quaker of an ancient New England family. It was after her marriage to Samuel that Elizabeth began to become truly influential in the anti-slavery movement. Although Samuel was not as outspoken as his wife, he shared her beliefs and together, they opened their home in Valley Falls, Rhode Island as a Station on the Underground Railroad, at great personal risk, to runaway slaves helping them escape to Canada.
To Samuel and Elizabeth were born 10 children. The first five died in childhood to diseases which ravaged the families of that time.
[edit] The Civil War Years
With the outbreak of the American Civil War in 1861, the Chaces continued their striving for the outlaw of slavery and although firmly supportive of the Union cause, were disappointed that Abraham Lincoln did not move immediately to abolish slavery. Elizabeth Buffum Chace was a regular correspondent with many of the most significant Anti-Slavery personalities of that time, and she associated personally with William Lloyd Garrison, Frederick Douglass and hosted them frequently at her home.
As an illustration of just how dedicated to and involved in the anti-slavery movement the Buffum family were, while John Brown was being held in Virginia after his actions at Harpers Ferry and right prior to being hanged, Elizabeth's sister Rebecca Buffum and her son Edward journeyed to Virginia from Rhode Island specifically to visit with Brown in his cell. They requested and received special permission from the Virginia authorities to do so thinking that they could "minister" to John Brown. By their own account of the visits, John Brown welcomed them openly.
[edit] Later years
In her later life, Elizabeth continued to advocate for the political rights for women and for prison and workplace reform.
[edit] Legacy
Conscience of Rhode Island
In 2001, Rhode Island Secretary of State, Edward S. Inman III selected Elizabeth Buffum Chace out of a field of 36 nominees including Anne Hutchinson and Christiana Carteaux Bannister, to be singularly honored with a bronze bust in the Rhode Island State House as "The Conscience of Rhode Island" for her tireless championing of the rights of the less fortunate.
Influence of the family
Samuel's and Elizabeth's progeny played large roles in higher education in the twentieth century. Their son, Arnold Buffum Chace, became the Chancellor of Brown University and a renowned mathematician associated with the Rhind Papyrus. Their daughter, Lillie Buffum Chace Wyman, became an author publishing several books and writing regularly for such magazines as The Atlantic Monthly in addition to being a tireless prison reformer. And, their grandchildren Richard Chace Tolman and Edward Chace Tolman both became Professors of renown. Richard played a crucial role as Scientific Liaison for the United States Army on the Manhattan Project, and Edward, a pioneer in Behaviorism, successfully sued the University of California, Berkley for firing him for refusing to sign the infamous Loyalty Oath of the 1950s during the McCarthy Era. Samuel's and Elizabeth's grandson, Malcolm Greene Chace, was a US Collegiate Tennis Champion.
[edit] References
- Elizabeth Buffum Chace, 1806-1899, Her Life and its Environment, In Two Volumes, by Lillie Buffum Chace Wyman and Arthur Crawford Wyman, WB Clarke Co., Boston, 1914.
- Two Quaker Sisters, From the Original Diaries of Elizabeth Buffum Chace and Lucy Buffum Lovell, with an introduction by Malcolm R. Lovell, and foreword by Rufus M. Jones. New York: Liveright Publishing Corporation, 1937.
- Elizabeth Buffum Chace and Lillie Chace Wyman: A Century of Abolitionist, Suffragist and Workers' Rights Activism, by Elizabeth C. Stevens, McFarland and Company, 2003.
- Elizabeth Buffum Chace and Lillie Chace Wyman, by Elizabeth C. Stevens, Unstoppable mother and daughter activists
