2006 Peabody women who are builders of community and dreams are the
Peabody Chamber of Commerce's
Mary Upton Ferrin Award Winners

Builders of Community and Dreams Project

Mary Upton Ferrin
1810-1881

Peabody Chamber of Commerce

Peabody, Massachusetts

Women's History Month in Peabody: A Retrospective

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MARY UPTON FERRIN
by D. Votto

Years before women got the right to vote, woman suffrage had a place in the history of South Danvers (now Peabody).  In fact, the first pioneer in Massachusetts women's suffrage was Mary Upton Ferrin.  She lived from 1810 to 1881 and was a member of the First Baptist Church of Danvers.

Upton Ferrin was the fifth child of Jesse Upton and Elizabeth (Wyman) Wood Upton and a direct descendant of John Upton of Scotland.  John Upton came to this country as an indentured servant and after a long time of servitude at the Saugus Iron Works, he earned wages, bought land and started a family.  He built a house which the Upton family lived in for many centuries.  It became a tavern during the American Revolution.  Following in her grandmother Mehitable Upton's steps as an extraordinary woman and with the help of her aunts, Upton Ferrin became the first Massachusetts' suffragist, but certainly not the last.

On December 2, 1845, when she was thirty-five, she married a thirty-one year old grocer named Jesse Ferrin.  After three years, Upton Ferrin evidently had an unhappy marriage because records show she she went to consult a divorce lawyer in Salem, Mass. about the laws pertaining to the property rights of married women.

Jesse Ferrin was an alcoholic and abusive towards Upton Ferrin, but she was helpless.  When she learned she was not entitled to anything if she divorced her husband, she discussed this with her aunts, Phebe King, Betsey King and Mary Upton.  Together the foursome petitioned for an amendment to the law.  Upton Ferrin traveled 600 miles, of which 400 miles were on foot, collecting signatures for the petition.

On March 2, 1849, Upton Ferrin's first petition regarding the issue of amending the law governing married women's property rights was brought to the Senate and House of Representatives.  She read it aloud, and many could not believe that a woman had written the memorial.  Her initial effort was discarded but she was not deterred.

The following year, she petitioned the Judiciary Branch to amend the law.  Her petition was withdrawn.  She continued to submit her petition to the legislature each year until 1855.

 Mary Upton Ferrin petitioned the Constitutional Convention of 1853 on behalf of married women's property rights. Two years later, a law was passed in Massachusetts that allowed women to keep their property after marriage.
 

There are no official records on whether or not Mary Upton Ferrin succeeded in divorcing Jesse Ferrin. Upton Ferrin moved in with her Aunt Mary and Uncle Eben Upton and resided off Lowell Street at the time of the census of 1850. Because two Mary Uptons were living in the same house, it is difficult to prove which Mary Upton worked with Eliza Sutton to create the Sutton Home for Aged Women; however, since Sutton and Upton Ferrin were about the same age and she was living in the same house as the other Mary Upton, we can assume that she had at least a part in or an idea about it.

As well as being one of the first women to call for the right of women to serve on juries, she wrote and published In Defense in 1869.  It was a response to an anti-suffrage article written by Horace Greeley

In 1878, Upton Ferrin collected 116 signatures in Essex County for the National Women Suffrage Association's (NWSA) amendment petition.  In 1880, NWSA collected signatures in support of the 16th amendment.  Again, 70-year-old Upton Ferrin came through with 45 signatures from Essex County. She was known as a Universal Suffragist as she was in favor of the equal rights of black people as well. 

She was loyal to her cause until she died of pneumonia in Marblehead, Mass. at the age of 71.  Unfortunately, she died 39 years before her cause would win entirely.  Thanks to faithful friends who did not mind giving her due credit, we know about Upton Ferrin - despite the fact that she is not mentioned in any records or the Journal of the House of Representatives.  She did not care about the glory she deserved but rather about the issues. She was one of the early and silent workers of women's suffrage.
 

Women Heroes

Mary Upton Ferrin