page_title: Harriet Forten Purvis
section_title: Marriage and children
hierarchical_section_title: Harriet Forten Purvis / Personal life / Marriage and children
caption_attribution_description: English: Daguerreotype photograph of Robert Purvis. Dimensions (in case): 11 × 8.5 cm (4.3 × 3.3 in). Original description by Boston Public Library: BPLDC no.: 07_05_000013 Call no.: Cab.G.3.115 Title: Robert Purvis Creator: Date: 1840-1849 (approximate) Publisher: Extent: 1 photograph&#160;: quarter plate daguerreotype&#160;; in case 11 x 8.5 cm. Genre: Daguerreotypes; Portraits Notes: Subjects: Abolitionists Purvis, Robert, 1810-1898 BPL Department: Rare Books Department
context_page_description: Harriet Forten Purvis was an African-American abolitionist and first generation suffragist. With her mother and sisters, she formed the first biracial women's abolitionist group, the Philadelphia Female Anti-Slavery Society. She hosted anti-slavery events at her home and with her husband Robert Purvis ran an Underground Railroad station. Robert and Harriet also founded the Gilbert Lyceum. She fought against segregation and for the right for blacks to vote after the Civil War.
context_section_description: She was married in her family's home on September 13, 1831 to a light-skinned African-American, Robert Purvis from South Carolina. Like her father, Purvis was a wealthy man. They were married by an Episcopal bishop in an "elegant ceremony". Some people gossiped about the variation in their skin tone. Purvis, an abolitionist and anti-slavery lecturer, was very open about his family history. Harriet and Robert worked together on their shared interests, activism, and reform efforts.
  The Purvises' egalitarian marriage and activist partnership presented a unique phenomenon. Few such relationships existed during the Victorian era. Their marriage demonstrated one man's commitment to the concepts of equality and freedom of expression. Further, it revealed one woman's ability to transcend contemporary mores to share in both the private and public spheres of her husband's life and work.
  —Joe Trotter and Eric Ledell Smith
  They employed servants, including an English governess, which made it possible for Harriet to actively work on the causes important to her. Harriet's elegant English-style house and grounds, called Saint's Rest by abolitionist Sallie Holley, had a calming and restful effect on its visitors. It was where: "the wicked cease from troubling and the weary are at rest." She was often hostess to visiting fellow activists and abolitionists, including William Lloyd Garrison, George Benson, and George Thompson. They had deep and long-term friendships with notable black and white reformers, under the belief that we are all "but one race". Others in the city rallied against blacks and people who aided refugee slaves, which erupted in race riots and violence in the 1830s. In 1834, 44 churches and buildings owned by blacks were set on fire.
  Harriet's sister Sarah, who married Robert's brother Joseph Purvis, wrote articles and poems for the Liberator under pseudonyms.  Frank Johnson, a black band leader, wrote music for her poem The Grave of the Slave, which was often played at anti-slavery events. They lived near Robert and Harriet's family in Byberry. Harriet's brother Robert was left a widower about 1840 and his daughter, Charlotte, lived with the Purvis's and received her education from a private tutor. Due to segregation in Philadelphia, Robert did not think that she would get a good education in the city. Charlotte "drew personal comfort and intellectual delight" from her aunt. Charlotte then lived in Salem, Massachusetts with another prominent black family in 1853.
  Harriet's eight children were one to eighteen years of age in 1850. Charles Burleigh Purvis was a physician, medical school educator, and the first African American to run a civilian hospital. He attended Oberlin College and Wooster Medical College (Western Reserve). During the Civil War, he served as both a physician and nurse for the Union Army.
caption: Robert Purvis (1810-1898), circa 1840-1849
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