Mary Upton Ferrin: Earliest Massachusetts Pioneer in Woman Suffrage  by S.M. Smoller
My Hero | Memorial of the Female Signers | Address to the Judiciary Committee | Charitable Benevolent Association | A Woman's Defence | Women's Rights | Later Life & Obituary Sketches | There's a Good Time Coming Girls | Notes

Early Days

She was born in South Danvers, now West Peabody, Massachusetts, in 1810 into the Upton family, and was a direct descendant of John Upton of Scotland who was captured by Oliver Cromwell in 1651.  Upton was sent to Salem to work in the Iron Works as an indentured servant.  Eventually, he became a landowner and passed on a home to Mary's grandfather, Ezra, who turned the home into a tavern. Her father, Jesse Upton, continued the tavern business at the family's farm on Lowell Street.

Her mother, Eliza Wyman Wood Upton, a widow from Woburn, was the second wife of Jesse Upton.  They married in 1798 and had six children.  Their fifth child and fourth daughter was named Polly after an older sister who died young.  Polly was later called Mary.

Eliza and Jesse both attended the First Baptist Church of Danvers.  All five of their children were baptized in this church.  When Mary was 12 years old, the question of woman suffrage agitated the church, and in March 1822, the rule was adopted that "the sisters be allowed to vote on admission and exclusion of members, but only the brethren voted on other business, after prudent and reasonable consultation with the sisters and showing due respect to their opinions and feelings."

It appears that Mary investigated the Universalist Society, one of five churches that sprang up in the town after the turn of the century.  She is also listed as a member of the Ladies Unitarian Society in 1832.

On December 2, 1845, 35-year-old Mary Upton married Jesse Ferrin, a 31-year-old grocer, in a ceremony performed by Rev. J. W. Eaton at the Danvers Baptist Church.  Two years later the church burned to the ground and at the same time Mary found herself in a bad marriage.  She said "intemperance degraded her husband's character" and he abused her.

The sails on the Salem schooners slapped in the gusty spring wind as she made her way to the office of Samuel Merritt, "the honest lawyer of Salem." She introduced herself and inquired in regard to the property rights of married women and the divorce laws.

Merritt's advice was not encouraging.  She learned that in 1848 "the whole of the wife's personal property belonged to the husband, as also the improvements upon her real estate; and that she could only retain her silver and other small valuables by secreting them, or proving them to have been loaned to her."

The weight of his words was devastating.  Mary sat quietly and listened as Merritt explained the laws of Massachusetts, which like the laws of most states, were based on the old Common Law idea of a wife's subjection to the husband and that interpretation would likely be applied to any married woman compelled to retain any portion of her own property.

She took the omnibus back to the square in South Danvers and walked to her Aunt Phebe's home in the area off Lowell Street known as "The Kingdom".  Betsey Upton King was in the parlor with Phebe when Mary presented a straight forward report of the substance of the conversation she had had with Merritt.

Phebe at once became deeply interested saying, "If such are the laws by which woman are governed, every woman in the state should sign a petition to have them altered.

"Will you sign one if drawn up?", queried Mary.

"Yes," replied Phebe, "and I should think every woman would sign such a petition."

Mary's strength had returned quickly, despite the wretched condition she was in when she fled from Jesse.  There was no question of her resolve to separate her life from him, no matter the cost.  The women decided to start with the family and approached Daniel P. King, and then Judge John Heartley, for aid in developing the proper form of the petition.  To the women's surprise, both men refused.

Betsy then suggested that Judge Benjamin C. Pitkin, a state senator from Salem, possessed sufficient influence to have the laws amended without the trouble of petitioning the Legislature.  The women "were strong in their faith that the enactment of just laws was the business of legislative bodies," and they believed all they had to do was "bring the injustices to the notice of a lawmaker in order to have it done away."

Filled with courage and hope, Mary immediately wrote to Judge Pitkin, approaching him respectfully with her cause.  To their infinite astonishment, he replied:  "The law is very well as it is regarding the property of married women.  Women are not capable of taking care of their own property; they never ought to have control of it.  There is already a law by which a woman can have her property secured to her...But, not one in fifty knows of the existence of such a law.  They ought to know it; it is no fault of the law if they don't.  I do not think the Legislature will alter the law regarding divorce.  If they do, they will make it more stringent than it now is."

The response repulsed Mary.  If anything, it strengthened her resolve.  It did not dishearten her or prevent her from drawing up the petitions herself and circulating them. She became a sort of town crank, somewhat of a joke, but filled with a dedication and intensity of purpose that gave her a certain charm.  She roamed the streets gathering "many hundred signatures of old and young....Many persons laughed at her, but known it to be a righteous work, and deeming laughter healthful to those indulging in it", Mary continued circulating her petitions.

Rev. John M. Usher, a Universalist minister of Lynn, and a member of the lower House of Representatives, presented Mary's petitions to the Legislature, but too late in the 1848 sessions for action.  Even thought they were not acted upon, her petitions formed "the initiative step for Woman Suffrage in Massachusetts."

 Mary was determined to "attack the Legislature in such good season, that lateness of time would again be brought up as an excuse for non-attendance to the prayers of women."

Phebe's interest continued unabated and she advised Mary to prepare an address to accompany the petitions and introduced her to Hon. Charles W. Upham, minister of the First Unitarian Church of Salem and a State Senator.  He too encouraged Mary.

"I concur with you in every statement," he said.  "But, please re-write your address, making two of it; one in the form of a memorial to the Legislature and the other, an address to the Judiciary Committee, to whom your petitions will be referred."

The document Upton Ferrin produced suggests important demands for a change of laws relating to woman, and presents an argument on the fallacy or "sacredness" for restrictive laws.  She champions the rights of humanity as superior to any outside authority and makes the cause of justice the basis for the needed reformation of the laws.  The right of woman to trial by a jury of her peers is claimed, followed by the suggestion that woman is capable of making the laws by which she is governed.

Upham told her that the presentation caused great excitement at the State House.  He said, "A great many of the members told me they didn't believe a woman wrote it."