Hadley Abolitionist Quilt (Ohio USA 1842)

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Clinton County Historical Society
Wilmington Ohio USA

72 x 72 inches / 182.9 x 182.9 centimeters

The quilt was made in 1842 by Quaker (Society of Friends) women of Clinton County, Ohio and Wayne County, Indiana. These women had been disowned by the mainstream Quaker meetings due to their anti-slavery activities. The Quakers were opposed to slavery, but did not want their members to take an active role in the emancipation movement.

The women who made the quilt were all members of the Indiana Yearly Meeting of Anti-Slavery Friends, which was comprised of twelve Monthly Meetings in Indiana and Ohio. Rebecca Harvey Hadley of Clinton County, who along with her daughters signed the quilt, was related to several of the signers from Indiana.

By the late 1850s, the anti-slavery Quaker groups disbanded and rejoined the mainstream Quaker movement.

Slavery ended in the USA with the Union (Northern states) victory of the Civil War / War Between the States (1861 - 1865).