Writing Home: A Quaker Immigrant on the Ohio Frontier; the Letters of Emma Botham Alderson [Hardcover]

Writing Homeoffers readers a firsthand account of the life of Emma Alderson, an otherwise unexceptional English immigrant on the Ohio frontier in mid-nineteenth-century America, who documented the five years preceding her death with astonishing detail and insight. Her convictions as a Quaker offer unique perspectives on racism, slavery, and abolition; the impending war with Mexico; presidential elections; various religious and utopian movements; and the practices of everyday life in a young country.

Introductions and notes situate the letters in relation to their critical, biographical, literary, and historical contexts. Editor Donald Ulin discusses the relationship between Alderson’s letters and her sister Mary Howitt’sOur Cousins in Ohio(1849), a remarkable instance of transatlantic literary collaboration.

Writing Homeoffers an unparalleled opportunity for studying immigrant correspondence due to Alderson’s unusually well-documented literary and religious affiliations. The notes and introductions provide background on nearly all the places, individuals, and events mentioned in the letters.

Published by Bucknell University Press. Distributed worldwide by Rutgers University Press.Writing Homeis the critically annotated correspondence of Emma Alderson, an 1840s immigrant from England to Ohio, mingling details of daily life with observations on slavery, American customs, religious communities, the impending war with Mexico, and more. Ending with Alderson’s death in 1847, the letters formed the basis for Mary Howitt’s popular children’s bookOur Cousins in Ohio(1849).EMMA BOTHAM ALDERSON(1806-1847) was a Quaker woman who immigrated to Ohio from Liverpool, England, in 1842, with her husband and other family members. She was the sister of Mary Howitt, popular poet, translator, and author of books for children and young adults.

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