Judith Sargent Murray Society

Judith Sargent Murray SocietyJudith Sargent Murray SocietyJudith Sargent Murray Society
Home
Chronology
Her Letters
Her home
On Equality
On female education

Judith Sargent Murray Society

Judith Sargent Murray SocietyJudith Sargent Murray SocietyJudith Sargent Murray Society
Home
Chronology
Her Letters
Her home
On Equality
On female education
More
  • Home
  • Chronology
  • Her Letters
  • Her home
  • On Equality
  • On female education
  • Home
  • Chronology
  • Her Letters
  • Her home
  • On Equality
  • On female education

America's first public feminist

America's first public feministAmerica's first public feministAmerica's first public feminist

Essayist, poet, playwright, letter writer

Buy my latest book!
Judith Sargent Stevens (later, Murray) by John Singleton Copley, c. 1770-72

About the Society

Gloucester Harbor -- the oldest known image -- 1817

Expertise and Experience

Founded in 1996 by Bonnie Hurd Smith to promote Judith Sargent Murray (1751-1820) of Gloucester and Boston, Massachusetts through research, writing, speaking, consulting, collaborating, publishing, and promoting. 


Bonnie Hurd Smith has been recognized by the Oxford Online Bibliography of American Literature as the leading scholar on Judith Sargent Murray. She is the author of four books on Murray, and is currently transcribing her letter books for publication. Ms. Smith is the former board president of the Sargent House Museum in Gloucester (Murray's former home).

My Blog

The Letter Books

Starting in 1774, Judith Sargent Stevens decided to start a life-long project of copying her outgoing correspondence into blank volumes that would be come her letter books. By the time she copied her last letter, in 1818, she had filled 20 ledgers.

Murray was living at a pivotal time in American history. She was literate and had access to people and information at the highest levels of military, politics, and culture. Keeping letter books was not a normal activity for 18th-century women. Prominent men did so because they knew their words would be important for history. Judith Sargent Murray broke this glass ceiling! 

Adding her voice to the American story

The letter books were discovered in 1984, preserved and published on microfilm in the early 1990s, but they have not been fully transcribed and made available to all. That is our work, and I ask for your support!

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I will do my best to get back to you soon!  --Bonnie Hurd Smith

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