The Stormy Present: Conservatism and the Problem of Slavery in Northern Politics, 1846–1865

Abstract

largesse of the Rochester Ladies’ Antislavery Society collection at the Clements Library but also Julia Wilbur’s papers at Haverford College. The latter contains two series of diaries that Wilbur kept in tandem, one a series of pocket diaries and the other a longer and more extensive set of personal reflections. With the assistance of the Friends of Alexandria Archaeology, Whitacre turned the latter into part of a digital project and the years 1860–66 are accessible and searchable online. Whitacre’s work with that agency makes those sections of her volume particularly rich in detail and context. Academic historians may wish for more grounding in historiography and intersectional gender interpretation. Certainly, A Civil Life in an Uncivil Time is replete with intriguing opportunities for discussion surrounding single women, choices not to marry, and the different perceptions that Jacobs and Wilbur may have had of their relationship or of the conditions that they observed, such as freedpeople living in one of the most notorious former slave pens in the city. Still, Whitacre tells a compelling and recognizably human story that will contribute well to the ongoing study of the long view of antislavery women’s lives and careers.