Literacy among New England's transient poor, 1750-1800

Journal of Social History, Summer, 1996 by Ruth Wallis Herndon

A number of historians have investigated the rate of literacy of New Englanders before 1800, using as their sources various legal documents connected with the disposition of estates. Kenneth Lockridge used wills from towns in Massachusetts, Connecticut, and Maine; Linda Auwers used real estate deeds and wills from one Connecticut town; William Gilmore used a combination of real estate deeds, township petitions, account book customers, and wills from towns in Vermont and New Hampshire; Ross Beales used probate records from one Massachusetts town; and Gloria L. Main used letters of guardianship and administration from Massachusetts towns. In addition, two other historians, Joel Perlmann and Dennis Shirley, used the 1850 and 1870 census records from towns in all six New England states to discover (retroactively) the literacy of women born in the late 1700s and still alive in the mid-nineteenth century.(1)

These historians discovered a nearly universal literacy among New England men and varying levels of literacy among New England women in the latter part of the eighteenth century. Beales found female literacy to be about 53% for the entire period 1731-1800.(2) More time-specific studies produced similar results: Lockridge estimated female literacy at about 45% on the eve of the Revolution; Gilmore found it to be about 67% at that time; and Main found 56% literacy among women widowed during the Revolutionary Era.(3) But other studies produced significantly higher rates: Auwers found female literacy to be 90% by the Revolutionary period, and Perlmann and Shirley found nearly 100% literacy among women who had been born before the Revolution and were still alive in the mid-1800s.(4)

Using estate documents causes a sampling bias that these historians have recognized: it over-represents older adults, males, and wealthy people. Literacy rates that accurately describe prosperous older men do not necessarily apply to people who did not have enough property to leave any estate documents. Gilmore estimated that his sources, which went beyond wills and deeds, still left out about 20 percent of the population.(5) We need a source of signatures left by people in that 20 percent, whose literacy rates might or might not support the statistics these historians have produced.

Happily, the Rhode Island town records contain a source of signatures that gives equal time to women, younger adults, and poor people: the official interrogations of transient poor people. Literacy rates based on name-signing ability of this population are as follows:

21.7% All females (n=258)

28.5% White females (females not designated as non-white, n=179)

6.3% Non-white females (Indian, black, Negro, mulatto, mustee, n=79)

66.8% All males (n=262)

77.1% White males (males not designated as non-white, n=214)

20.8% Non-white males (Indian, black, Negro, mulatto, mustee, n=48)

About half of these transient people originated in Rhode Island, and most of the other half came from Connecticut and Massachusetts towns. But wherever they originated, they tried to settle in Rhode Island towns, and Rhode Island town officials transcribed their "examinations" in the town council records. Not all of the examinations bear a mark or signature; the above literacy rates are derived from 520 signed or marked examinations recorded in the official books of 14 Rhode Island towns between 1750 and 1800.(6)

Rhode Island town officials interrogated these people because they were living as "transients" within the town. "Transient" did not indicate a person's brief residence in a town; rather, this legal term indicated that a resident had not acquired a legal settlement in the town by purchasing enough real estate to qualify as a "freeholder." Since most poor people could not afford to buy land, they were considered "transients" by the authorities in any town other than their home town. These transient people were not bound servants or slaves; they were free, laboring persons who maintained their own households or paid board in one place while they went out to work elsewhere.

Councilmen "examined" these transient people to determine where they were legal inhabitants, so that they could be sent back to their home towns in time of need. English law made each town responsible for the support of its poor inhabitants; but the poor had to be living within their home towns to receive that support. Since many poor people moved to other towns in search of work or a more congenial community, town leaders stayed busy sending those in desperate need back to their home towns. The councilmen "warned out" the transient poor who were capable of leaving on their own; the town sergeant "removed" those who were too ill or too stubborn to leave on their own. The object was to get the transient poor to their home towns, where they would receive welfare.

Councilmen directed their questions to the head of the transient household - a woman in about 50 percent of the cases. This prevalence of female-headed households allows an unprecedented opportunity to compare literacy rates between men and women of the poorer sort. Further, the people questioned were significantly younger than those who signed wills: female examinants averaged 28 years old and male examinants averaged 40 years old. Finally, the details supplied in the transient examinations allow a comparison of literacy in different racial groups: people of color (described as Indian, mustee, black, Negro, or mulatto) account for about one-quarter of the examinants - 18 percent of the male examinants were described as non-white and 31 percent of the female examinants were so described.