Lucy Terry

Lucy Terry Prince, often credited as simply Lucy Terry (1733–1821), was an American settler and poet.

Early life

Terry was born in 1733 in Africa. She was abducted from there and sold into slavery in Rhode Island as an infant in about 1733.^[1][2][3][4] She lived in Rhode Island until the age of five, when she was sold to Ebenezer Wells of Deerfield, Massachusetts, who allowed the five-year-old Terry to be baptized into the Christian faith during the Great Awakening.

In 1756, Lucy married Aijah Prince, a successful

Terry's work "Bars Fight",^[1] composed in 1746,^[5][6] is a ballad about an attack upon two white families by Native Americans on August 25, 1746. This poem is part of the American captivity narrative genre.^[7] The attack occurred in an area of Deerfield called "The Bars", which was a colonial term for a meadow.^[8] The poem was preserved orally until 1855, when it was published in Josiah Gilbert Holland's History of Western Massachusetts.^[1][9] This poem is the only surviving work by Terry. However, she was famous in her own time for her "rhymes and stories".^[10]

Terry's work is considered the oldest known work of

In 1803, Lucy, now destitute, returned to the Vermont Supreme Court to argue on behalf of her sons against false land claims made against them by Colonel Eli Brownson. She was awarded a sum of $200.^[12]: 184 She was the first woman to argue before the high court,^[13] holding her own against two of the leading lawyers in the state, one of whom later became Chief Justice.^[14]

In 1806, after months of petitioning, Lucy convinced the town selectmen of Sunderland, Vermont to purchase an additional $200 (~$3,896 in 2023) of land from Brownson for her use, to provide for her family.^[12]: 188

Lucy reportedly delivered a three-hour address to the board of trustees of Williams College while trying to gain admittance for her son Festus. She was unsuccessful, and Festus was reportedly denied entry on account of the school's racist admission policies.^[15][2] This oral history was recorded at the time of Lucy's death by a resident, who also reported that Lucy remained popular in her hometown until her old age and that young boys would often come to her home to hear her talk.^[12]: 205

Death

Prince's husband died in 1794. By 1803, Prince had moved to nearby Sunderland. She rode on horseback annually to visit her husband's grave until she died in 1821.

The following obituary was published for Prince on Tuesday, August 21, 1821, in the Greenfield, Massachusetts, paper The Frankylin Herald:

At Sunderland, Vt., July 11th, Mrs. Lucy Prince, a woman of colour. From the church and town records where she formerly resided, we learn that she was brought from Bristol, Rhode Island, to Deerfield, Mass. when she was four years old, by Mr. Ebenezer Wells: that she was 97 years of age—that she was early devoted to God in Baptism: that she united with the church in Deerfield in 1744—Was married to Abijah Prince, May 17th, 1756, by Elijah Williams, Esq. and that she had been the mother of six children. In this remarkable woman there was an assemblage of qualities rarely to be found among her sex. Her volubility was exceeded by none, and in general, the fluency of her speech was not destitute of instruction and education. She was much respected among her acquaintances, who treated her with deference.^[16]

The Prince family was remembered in Guilford for many decades after their death. John Noyes' daughter was once startled off a horse by the sight of their ghosts, and ghost sightings on their farm have been reported even into the 21st century.^[12]: 166

Historical record

Only a single letter in Abijah's handwriting and none in Lucy's has survived. Because the shopkeeper's records show that the household sometimes purchased paper, it is suspected that Lucy wrote other literary works, which were eventually lost during the attacks on her household and declining fortune.^[12]: 80

References