Mistress Bradstreet (20 page)

As much as she loved her husband, there was nothing Anne would have wanted more than the gentle, knowing ministrations of her women friends. During the early stages, the gathering had the feel of a party as everyone ate, sipped her ale, and told old war stories about her own childbirths or other travails she had witnessed. There was one tradition that during these early stages of labor the mother-to-be should start making bread, as some midwives believed the act of kneading the dough would calm the woman and move the contractions along at a brisker rate. Whether or not Anne actually began the process of feeding the yeast and mixing the sponge, it was important for her to stay relaxed and to eat in order to build her strength for what lay ahead. Her mother would have known to try to tempt her with food that was high in protein but easy to digest, such as broth or poached eggs.
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Conversation would have quieted, however, and jests and gaiety would have gradually subsided when it became clear that Anne’s contractions were becoming hard to endure. This was the time for coaching the suffering woman through her pain, and everyone would have had her own techniques—calm words, cool damp cloths, sips of water, a back rub. Probably the most important assistance anyone could provide was the reassurance that her pain was normal and there was as yet no evidence that she was dying or that the baby was in danger. If a crisis did occur, however, no one would have thought to minimize the danger of the situation, as everyone knew of some friend or relative who had died in childbirth or had lost a baby in delivery or soon after.

When at last it was time to push the baby out, many arms were there to help Anne onto the birthing stool, which was low and open seated. During this, the most dangerous phase of delivery, the more experienced women stepped to the fore. A perfectly healthy baby could be lost if the women in charge missed the telltale signs of a cord wrapped around an infant’s neck or if a shoulder got stuck in the birth canal. One of Anne’s neighbors was probably a more skilled midwife than the others and used her experience and judgment to determine if the baby was beginning to struggle and had to come out sooner rather than later.

If Simon was still in the house, he could hear the cries of his wife, the murmurs of the women, and mysterious patches of silence. As the hours passed, he would have been forced to endure an unaccustomed helplessness.
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As one anxious husband described this waiting time:

After the Women had been some time assembled I went out to get a little Briony Water—upon my return my wife’s mother came to me with tears in her eyes, O, says she, I don’t know how it will fare with your poor wife, hinting withal her extreme danger.
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Despite his anxiety, Simon would have known better than to interrupt the crucial process in the other room; still it was hard to wait until the women came to him and reported on his wife’s progress. Good Puritan that he was, and joined, no doubt, by Anne’s devoted father and her younger sisters (although it is possible that they were allowed in the birthing room even though they were still unmarried), Simon would have used his time to say prayers and declare his willingness to submit to God’s will.

For Anne it was reassuring to know that her family and friends were entreating God for her and her baby’s safety. But she had been taught to believe that, like the illnesses she had endured, this pain was God’s “corrective” tool. According to Puritan theology, each woman’s suffering was her personal retribution for Eve’s original trespass and was a kind of purification process meant to combat the dark lusts that were lodged in her heart. Someone like Anne might also have seen her agony in the redemptive terms of the New Testament. Christ, after all, had compared His crucifixion and miraculous return to a mother whose “time had come.”
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This meant that the anguish during labor was not only punishment for original sin but also an opportunity to join Christ and take up His cross. As one devout New England mother wrote after the birth of each of her children, “[T]he Lord apeard for me and maid me the living mother of another living Child.”
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For Anne, therefore, her labor was a passage far more important than her illnesses or her voyage to America.

When at last one of the women could see the baby’s head, Anne must have hoped that her misery would soon be at an end. One traditional midwife’s strategy was to have the mother touch the top of the baby’s head, feel the damp tuft of hair and the warm miracle of the little being itself, so that the tired woman could get ready for the final push. When the baby finally spilled out between her legs and into the welcoming hands of one of the other women, she knew she had won an astonishing victory against her own physical weakness and against death itself. Or, more accurately, God had allowed her to triumph.

Anne’s new baby was a healthy little boy. Nothing could have pleased this community of Puritans better than the arrival of a male child. If properly educated, he would be able to step into a leadership position in New England when he came of age. Despite the importance of women’s contributions to the colony, men were still considered a more valuable asset to the future of Massachusetts than their wives and daughters. When Anne heard the pleased murmurs that her son was healthy and strong, she knew it was a wondrous event. Only two years before, she had almost died. Now she had a son.

After delivery, the other women flew into action, cleaning the infant and making sure the placenta and umbilical cord were not mishandled, as there was a host of traditions surrounding the ritual of cutting this emblematic connection to the mother’s womb. If the cord fell on the floor, then the boy would not be able “to hold water.” If it was cut too short, his penis would be too small and he would be “insufficient in encounters with Venus.”
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While her attendants worried, cleaned, and prepared food for her, Anne could give herself up to the ecstasy of having borne a child. She had proved that she was not a spiritual outcast, she had pleased her father by helping swell the ranks of pious Puritans in America, and she had undoubtedly thrilled Simon by giving him an heir.

It was probably clear to everyone that she would name her baby Samuel. She had waited five long years for this child, and so it was only natural that she compare herself to the Old Testament Hannah, who had had to endure years of infertility before she gave birth to the famous prophet Samuel. Of course, it is also likely that Anne admired her older brother, Samuel, and wanted to link her little boy to his uncle. But above all, she had been taught to view her life on a biblical scale and so believed that the birth of her son connected her to a larger story.

There were many examples of this kind of exalted thinking among the Massachusetts Puritans. One prominent citizen, Judge Sewall, explained that he had named his son, Joseph, “in hopes of the accomplishment of the Prophecy of Ezekiel xxxvii.” When his wife bore a little girl, he wrote, “I was struggling whether to call her Mehetable or Sarah. But when I saw Sarah’s standing in the Scripture . . . I resolv’d on that suddenly.”

Although traditional names such as Hannah, meaning “grace,” and Abigail, meaning “father’s joy,” were frequently selected by Anne’s friends and family because “the history of these two Hebrew women made their names honored,” the length or oddity of a name was no impediment to such a single-minded people. Choices such as Zurishaddai, which meant “the Almighty is my rock,” were not uncommon, and there were many instances of names that Puritan parents adopted to express their devotion to God or to declare their own earthly suffering, such as “Hoped For,” “Return,” “Believe,” “Wait,” “Thanks,” “Unite,” “Supply,” or “Tremble.” One recently widowed mother even saw fit to name her newborn “Fathergone.”
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Although she had just undergone the most wearing experience of her life, Anne was now catapulted into the rigors of a new mother’s schedule. She had been influenced by the Countess of Lincolnshire’s opinions on this subject and breast-fed Samuel, nursing through the long night hours and attempting to soothe him when he wailed. It was a grueling regimen, and many years later she would write a poem from the perspective of an infant:

With tears into the world I did arrive,

My mother still did waste as I did thrive,

Who yet with love and all alacrity,

Spending, was willing to be spent for me.

With wayward cryes I did disturb her rest,

Who sought still to appease me with the breast.
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Anne could take comfort in the fact that since this boy had been born on the purer shores of New England, he would surely prove to be a finer man and a truer Puritan than those born in the corruption of the Old World. As one enthusiastic settler wrote:

The Christian children born here are generally well-favored and beautiful to behold. I never knew any to come into the world with the least blemish on any part of the body; being in the general observed to be better-natured, milder, and more tender-hearted than those born in England.
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To Anne her long-awaited baby must have seemed perfect in every way. But now that he was safely delivered, she could not help but grapple with a flood of new fears. Could she keep him safe, fight off his illnesses, tend him, keep him alive?

Infants in a pioneer settlement such as New Towne faced many obstacles to their survival, from diseases such as rickets, measles, whooping cough, diphtheria, and intestinal worms to hazards such as the canal that flowed past Samuel’s grandparents’ house, the gape of gigantic fireplaces, cauldrons of boiling water, unfenced and marauding livestock, and severe spells of both cold and hot weather. Babies were frequently referred to as “it,” not because of any lack of maternal devotion, but because mothers were responsible for running an entire household and did not show their love through the sort of focused attention we now associate with maternity. In addition, childbirth was such a regular phenomenon in most families that the identity of the youngest changed from year to year.
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Sadly, there were often dire results to the many responsibilities a woman had to juggle, since it was impossible to keep an eye on the children at all times. One Puritan child “narrowly escaped drowning being fallen into a Kettle of Suds” and was only saved when he was “Seasonly Spyd and pulled out by the heels.” Another little girl was scalded to death in a similar accident when her mother was still “lying in” from delivering a new baby. Since women often had to be out of the house to complete their chores, weeding their extensive vegetable gardens, gathering eggs, or fetching water, they often left their infants and toddlers under the care of servants or older children and had to count on their limited ability to supervise a curious small child. Often this simply did not work. One poor mother came home from hiking out to a distant field to deliver her husband his midday meal only to discover her baby had vanished. “It was here just now presently,” an older daughter declared. But after a frantic search, the body of the toddler was found floating in an “unfenced water hole.”
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Though Samuel was Anne’s first and her house was not yet overrun with children, it was still hard to keep track of the baby, especially when he began to crawl and take his first steps. Nothing about life was safe. Anne had to be enough of an herbalist to know how to treat everything from bee stings and stomachaches to teething pains and head wounds. She had to be doctor enough to set broken bones or sprains and to stanch swelling and bring down virulent fevers. The other women in the village shared their lore and their extensive knowledge of healing plants and other practical remedies. But in a crisis, Anne would have to respond independently, quickly, and appropriately, or she might lose her child.

Miraculously, little Samuel managed to survive and even thrive. With each month that he grew stronger and bigger, Anne gained confidence in her skills as a mother and in her sense that God was now with her more than ever before. She knew that if she could raise her child to become a healthy Puritan adult, she would be giving an invaluable gift to New England. To many Puritan women motherhood assumed an overall weight that sometimes seemed unbearable. If her children flourished and devoted themselves to the true path of Reformed religion, a Puritan mother would have achieved the pinnacle of success and even fame in her community. One woman’s gravestone in Newbury was twice as large as that of her husband’s so that it could contain the lengthy epitaph written by her children:

To the memory of Mrs. Judith late virtuous wife of Deac[on] Tristram Coffin, Esqr. Who having lived to see 177 of her children and children’s children to the 3d generation died Dec. 15, 1705 aged 80.

Grave, sober, faithful, fruitfull vine was she,

A rare example of true piety.

Widow’d awhile she wayted wisht for rest

With her dear husband in her Savior’s breast.
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Anne aspired to this sort of glory, although she knew that parenthood on this scale entailed hard work, suffering, and then more hard work. Later in life she would reflect that a woman’s tasks were both wearying and never ending, and she recalled her years of motherhood as ones of self-sacrifice:

I nursed them up with pain and care,

Nor cost, nor labour did I spare,

Till at the last they felt their wing,

Mounted the trees, and learned to sing.
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But to Anne and to most Puritan women, motherhood was the most important way to serve God. If she could help raise a new flock of the faithful, Anne would help ensure the future of the New England Puritan dream.

Chapter Eleven

Enemies Within

Abstract yourselfe with a holy violence from the Dung heape of this Earth.

—
ROGER WILLIAMS

T
HE YEAR
1634
USHERED
in a new set of problems for the colony, ones that came from inside the towns rather than from outside. Dissension, conflict, and arguments about the true path to take pitted old friends against each other and forced many prominent people into exile. It was dangerous in Massachusetts to stray too far from the accepted beliefs of the authorities. With both her husband and father serving on the governing board of the colony, Anne knew this all too well.