Laurel Thatcher Ulrich - A Midwifes Tale: The Life of Martha Ballard, Based on Her Diary, 1785-1812

ALSO BY LAUREL THATCHER ULRICH

The Age of Homespun: Objects and Stories in the Creation of an American Myth

Good Wives: Image and Reality in the Lives of Women in Northern New England, 16501750

All Gods Critters Got a Place in the Choir (with Emma Lou Thayne)

FIRST VINTAGE BOOKS EDITION, JUNE 1991

Copyright 1990 by Laurel Thatcher Ulrich
Maps copyright1990 by Karen Hansen

All rights reserved under International and Pan-American Copyright Conventions. Published in the United States by Vintage Books, a division of Random House, Inc., New York, and simultaneously in Canada by Random House of Canada Limited, Toronto. Originally published in hardcover by Alfred A. Knopf, Inc., New York, in 1990.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Ulrich, Laurel.
A midwifes tale : the life of Martha Ballard, based on her diary, 17851812 / Laurel Thatcher Ulrich.1st Vintage Books ed. p. cm.
eISBN: 978-0-307-77298-5
1. Ballard, Martha, 17351812. 2. Hallowell (Me.)Biography. 3. Augusta (Me.)Biography. 4. Kennebec River Valley (Me.)Social life and customs. 5. MidwivesMaineHallowellBiography. 6. MidwivesMaineAugustaBiography. I. Title.
[F29.H15U47 1991]
974. 16dc20
[B] 90-55674

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for Gael

Eight months of the year Hallowell, Maine, was a seaport. From early April to late November, ocean-going vessels sailed up the Kennebec, forty-six miles from the open Atlantic, bringing Pennsylvania flour, West Indian sugar, and English cloth and hardware, returning with shingles, clapboards, hogshead and barrel staves, white ash capstan bars, and pine boards destined for Boston or Bristol or Jamaica.

Hallowell folks remembered openings and closings of the river the way people in other towns remembered earthquakes or drought. In 1785, the year of the long winter, the ice was still firm enough on April 22 to hold a sleigh bearing the body of Samuel Howard, one of the original settlers of the town, to his burying place at Fort Western. Not until May 3 did the first vessels arrive from the westward, bringing corn and pork to the straitened town.

In 1789, the river opened on April 7 in a heavy rain that took away the bridge over Ballards brook, made a breach in the mill dam, and washed out the underpinning of the north side of the house. But we are yet alive & well for which we ought to be thankful, Martha Ballard told her diary. She was fifty-four years old, a midwife. She and her family had lived at the mills since 1778, seven years after the incorporation of the town. Though she knew little of the sea, she had traveled much on the Kennebec, by water, by ice, and, during those treacherous seasons when the river was neither one nor the other, by faith.

The year Old Lady Cony had her stroke, Martha Ballard crossed the river in a canoe on December 2, pushing through ice in several places. On December 30 of another year, summoned by a woman in labor, she walked across, almost reaching shore before breaking through to her waist at Sewalls Eddy. She dragged herself out, mounted a neighbors horse, and rode dripping to the delivery. Necessity and a fickle river cultivated a kind of bravado among Hallowell folks. People Crost the river on a Cake of ice which swong round from the Eddy East side & stopt at the point below Mr Westons, Martha wrote on December 15 of one year. On April 1 of another she reported walking across on the ice after breakfast, adding drily in the margin of the days entry, the river opened at 4 hour pm

Martha Moore was born in 1735 in the small town of Oxford, near the Connecticut border in Worcester County, Massachusetts, but the real story of her life begins in Maine with the Without the diary we would know nothing of her life after the last of her children was born, nothing of the 816 deliveries she performed between 1785 and 1812. We would not even be certain she had been a midwife.

In the spring of 1789, Martha faced a flooding river and a rising tide of births. She attended seven deliveries in March and another seven before the end of April, twice her monthly average. On April 23 she went down the Kennebec to visit several families on the west side of the river opposite Bumberhook. This is how she told her story:

[April 23] Clear & very Pleasant. I sett out to go to Mr Bullins. Stept out of the Canue & sunk in the mire. Came back & Changd my Cloaths. Maid another attempt & got safe there. Sett out for home. Calld at Capt Coxes & Mr Goodins. Was Calld in at Mrs Husseys. Tarried all night. A sever storm before morn.

[April 24] A sever Storm of rain. I was Calld at 1 hour pm from Mrs Husseys by Ebenzer Hewin. Crosst the river in their Boat. A great sea A going. We got safe over then sett out for Mr Hewins. I Crost a stream on the way on fleeting Loggs & got safe over. Wonder full is the Goodness of providence. I then proseeded on my journey. Went beyond Mr Hainses & a Larg tree blew up by the roots before me which Caused my hors to spring back & my life was spared. Great & marvillous are thy sparing mercies O God. I was assisted over the fallen tree by Mr Hains. Went on. Soon Came to a stream. The Bridg was gone. Mr Hewin took the rains waded thro & led the horse. Asisted by the same allmighty power I got safe thro & arivd unhurt. Mrs Hewins safe delivd at 10 h Evn of a Daughter.

After great deliverances came small annoyances. In the margin of that days narrative, she wrote, My Cloak was burnt while there so that it is not wareable. In all the excitement, someone had apparently allowed the midwifes sodden wrap to hang too near the fire. The story continued:

[April 25] Rainy. I came from Mr Hewins to Mr Pollards. My hors mired & I fell off in the mud but blessed be God I receivd no hurt. Mr Hewins attended me to Mrs Husseys. We arivd at 11 hour morning. Mrs Norcross was in Travill. Her women were immediately Calld & Shee was Safe Delivrd at 5 hour 30 minutes Evening of a fine son. Her Husband & Mrs Delino & her Childn went on board bound for Nantucket Early this morn.

[April 26] A very Cold morn. Snowd. I took my leav of Mrs Hussey & family. Came to Mr Herseys. He & William Howard brot me from fort Western by water. I left my patients Cleverly & found my famely well. It is the greatest freshet in this river that has been this many years.