Four Women in a Violent Time

by Deborah Crawford

Anne Hutchinson (1591-1643), Mary Dyer (1591?-1660), Lady Deborah Moody (1600-1659), Penelope Stout (1622-1732)

Traces the lives of four women who struggled for civil rights and justice in seventeenth-century America.

Genres: Biography, Adult, Religion

191 pages, Hardcover

First published June 1, 1970

Reviews

[Nelleke Plouffe · Rating 4 out of 5]

Four stars because I enjoyed the writing style and appreciated thinking about the lives of these women. On the other hand, I found the author didn’t really seem to understand the deeply held religious beliefs of the women themselves or of the Puritans, Quakers, or Baptists in general. I felt that the author’s air of amused tolerance, while entertaining, did not give me a lot of confidence in her interpretation of how people may have been thinking or of what the issues were. But now I want to read more about it.

[Julie · Rating 5 out of 5]

This book chronicles the lives of four women in the early 1600s. Penelope Stout is my ancestor, and although I had heard her story since I was a little girl, I learned so many more details about her struggle for freedom in this new land. Penelope was scalped disemboweled and hacked with a "tomohawk" to her shoulder,and left for dead with her new husband. She survived in the woods for a week before she was saved by the old brave. It's been too many years since I read it. I need to go read it again.

[Ann Foust · Rating 4 out of 5]

I was weeding old books from my school library when I ran across this book. With a copyright of 1970, it seemed a prime candidate to be weeded. I found the title and the cover intriguing, however, so I brought it home to read. The book tells about four remarkable and courageous women--Anne Hutchinson, Mary Dyer, Penelope Stout, and Lady Deborah Moody. Hutchinson and Dyer were martyrs for religious freedom. Stout was a survivor; she was scalped and left for dead not long after she came to the New World. Moody was an aristocrat who had a vision of building a town where everyone could worship as he or she saw fit.

The book is dated, but I found the historical backdrop with women playing the major roles to be fascinating

[Valerie]

I have to admit that I've only read one part of this, the part that deals with Penelope Stout. She's supposed to be kin to most anybody who has Stouts in the family (she had literally dozens of children). What's in the book more or less accords with the legends in my part of the family. I didn't check the bibliography (don't remember if there was one), to see if it also agrees with the primary sources.

True or not, it's a gripping story, and worth a read, especially if you've Stout kin!

[Amy · Rating 4 out of 5]

I have read one part of it, very good so far, and true!