Description
Over the Threshold is the first in-depth work to explore the topic of intimate violence in the American colonies and the early Republic. The essays examine domestic violence in both urban and frontier environments, between husbands and wives, parents and children, and masters and slaves. This compelling collection puts commonly held notions about intimate violence under strict historical scrutiny, often producing surprising results.
Table of Contents
OVERVIEWS 1. Christine Daniels--Intimate Violence, Now and Then 2. G. S. Rowe and Jack D. Marietta--Personal Violence in a Peaceable Kingdom: Pennsylvania, 1682-1801 3. Jacquelyn C. Miller--Governing the Passions: The Eighteenth-Century Quest for Domestic Harmony in Philadelphia's Middle-Class Households HUSBANDS, WIVES, AND LOVERS 4. Randolph A. Roth--Spousal Murder in Northern New England, 1776-1865 5. Edward E. Baptist--My Mind is to Drown You and Leave You Behind: 'Omie Wise', Intimate Violence, and Masculinity 6. Ed Hatton--He Murdered Her Because He Loved Her: Passion, Masculinity and Intimate Homicide in Antebellum America 7. Jenifer Banks--A New Home for Whom? Caroline Kirkland and Domestic Abuse on the Michigan Frontier 8. Stephanie Cole--Keeping the Peace: Domestic Assault and Private Prosecution in Antebellum Baltimore PARENTS AND CHILDREN 9. Merril D. Smith--Unnatural Mothers: Infanticide, Motherhood, and Class in the Mid-Atlantic, 1730-1830 10. James D. Rice--Laying Claim to Elizabeth Shoemaker: Family Violence on Baltimore's Waterfront, 1808-1812 11. Jeffrey H. Richards--Decorous Violence: Manners, Class, and Abuse in Rebecca Rush's Kelroy MASTERS, SERVANTS, AND SLAVES 12. Terri L. Snyder--As If There Were Not Master or Woman in the Land: Gender, Dependency, and Household Violence in Virginia, 1646-1720 13. Trevor Burnard--A Theater of Terror: Domestic Violence in Thomas Thistlewood's Jamaica, 1750-1786 14. T. Stephen Whitman--I Have Got the Gun and Will Do As I Please with Her: African-Americans and Violence in Maryland, 1782-1830 15. Christopher Morris--Within the Slave Cabin: Violence in Mississippi Slave Families Contributors' Biographies Index
