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FEMALE HUSBANDS

Long before people identified as transgender or lesbian, there were female


husbands and the women who loved them. Female husbands – people assigned
female who transed gender, lived as men, and married women – were true queer
pioneers. Moving deftly from the colonial era to just before World War I, Jen
Manion uncovers the riveting and very personal stories of ordinary people who
lived as men despite tremendous risk, danger, and threat of violence. Female
Husbands weaves the story of their lives in relation to broader social, economic,
and political developments in the United States and the United Kingdom while
also exploring how attitudes toward female husbands shifted in relation to
transformations in gender politics and women’s rights, ultimately leading to the
demise of the category of “female husband” in the early twentieth century.
Groundbreaking and influential, Female Husbands offers a dynamic, varied, and
complex history of the LGBTQ past.

Jen Manion is Associate Professor of History at Amherst College, the author of


Liberty's Prisoners: Carceral Culture in Early America (2015), and a lifelong LGBTQ
rights advocate.
FEMALE HUSBANDS

A Trans History

Jen Manion
Amherst College, Massachusetts
University Printing House, Cambridge CB2 8BS, United Kingdom
One Liberty Plaza, 20th Floor, New York, NY 10006, USA
477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia
314–321, 3rd Floor, Plot 3, Splendor Forum, Jasola District Centre,
New Delhi – 110025, India
79 Anson Road, #06–04/06, Singapore 079906

Cambridge University Press is part of the University of Cambridge.


It furthers the University’s mission by disseminating knowledge in the pursuit of
education, learning, and research at the highest international levels of excellence.

www.cambridge.org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781108483803
DOI: 10.1017/9781108652834
© Jen Manion 2020
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception
and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,
no reproduction of any part may take place without the written
permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published 2020
Printed in the United Kingdom by TJ International Ltd, Padstow Cornwall
A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Manion, Jen, 1974– author.
Title: Female husbands : a trans history / Jen Manion.
Description: Cambridge, United Kingdom ; New York, NY : Cambridge University
Press, 2020. | Includes index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2019038186 (print) | LCCN 2019038187 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781108483803 (hardback) | ISBN 9781108718271 (paperback) |
ISBN 9781108652834 (epub)
Subjects: LCSH: Female-to-male transsexuals–History. | Transgender men–History. |
Husbands–History. | Gender nonconformity–History.
Classification: LCC HQ77.9 .M26 2020 (print) | LCC HQ77.9 (ebook) |
DDC 306.76/809–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019038186
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2019038187
ISBN 978-1-108-48380-3 Hardback
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy
of URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication
and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain,
accurate or appropriate.
For Leslie Feinberg
(1949 – 2014)
Contents

Acknowledgments . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . page ix
Introduction: Extraordinary Lives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 1

PART ONE: UK HUSBANDS, 1740–1840


1 The First Female Husband . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 17
2 The Pillar of the Community . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 44
3 The Sailors and Soldiers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 68
4 The Wives . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 104

PART TWO: US HUSBANDS,1830–1910


5 The Workers . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 139
6 The Activists . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 165
7 The Criminalized Poor . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 198
8 The End of a Category . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 231
Conclusion: Sex Trumps Gender . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 258
Epilogue: The First Female-to-Male Transsexual . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 267

Notes . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 279
Index . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . . 337

vii
Acknowledgments

am so grateful to those friends and colleagues


I who have been excited about this project from the beginning.
A generous grant from the National Endowment for the Humanities
allowed me to spend a semester at the American Antiquarian Society
(AAS). AAS staff and curators went above and beyond in helping me
identify a usable archive of newspapers, books, magazines, and children’s
literature including Ashley Cataldo, Vincent Golden, Lauren Hewes,
Elizabeth Watts Pope, Kimberly Tony, and Laura Wasowicz. Then Dir-
ector of Academic Programs Paul Erickson ensured every scholarly
gathering was both generative and fun with his humor, smarts, and savvy.
An Andrew Mellon Foundation Fellowship from the Massachusetts His-
torical Society enabled early research on women’s rights, education, and
abolition with great support from then Director of Research Conrad
Wright.
Several Research Matters Grants from Connecticut College funded
exploratory research trips to New York Public Library, San Francisco
State University Archives, and the Library Company of Philadelphia
(LCP). I am continually grateful to Connie King from LCP for her
thoughtful engagement with the project and ongoing support for bring-
ing LGBTQ history to life. A New England Regional Fellowship Consor-
tium Research Grant gave me the opportunity to travel to numerous state
archives including Maine Historical Society, Rhode Island Historical
Society, and Vermont Historical Society, allowing me to survey a variety

ix
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

of nineteenth-century organizational and carceral records from these


wonderful places. Andrew Lott at London Metropolitan Archives helped
me find sources I never would have found on my own.
An Amherst College Trustee Faculty Fellowship supported a sabbat-
ical year in which I completed most of the research and some of the
writing. Jane Kamensky generously invited me to be a Research Associate
in the Department of History at Harvard University during my sabbatical
year to facilitate my research. The Research Grant at the Schlesinger
Library on the History of Women in America allowed me to examine
writings by key feminist writers on a variety of subjects including
medicine, education, labor, and women’s rights activism. The Slavery,
Abolition, and Resistance Fellowship from the Gilder Lehrman Center at
Yale University helped me think through connections between slavery,
abolition, carceral practices, and transing gender.
I am still amazed and grateful that these organizations have funded
this unconventional project in transgender, queer, and feminist history.
Many people who have done important dissertations in LGBTQ history
have not gotten the institutional support (in the form of fellowships or
jobs) needed to finish their books.
This project benefited from generous engagement by colleagues
across the country from the earliest stages until the bitter end. I am
grateful for the opportunity to present the findings at the Nineteenth
Century US History Workshop at Brown, the McNeil Center for Early
American Studies at Penn, the Yale Research Initiative on the History of
Sexualities, the Humanities Action Lab and Department of History at the
New School, the Alice Paul Center for Research on Gender, Sexuality,
and Women at Penn, the Department of African American Studies at
Wesleyan University, the Francis A. Countway Library of Medicine at
Harvard, the Stanford Humanities Center, the Rothermere American
Institute at Oxford, and the Five Colleges History Seminar. Each of these
talks gave me a chance to test arguments and receive so much amazing,
thoughtful feedback.
It has been an honor to join the history department at Amherst
College, especially during Biddy Martin’s presidency. Amherst has gen-
erously supported my work in countless ways, including funding research
trips to nearly a dozen archives. Thank you to Dean Catherine Epstein

x
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS

and Austin Sarat for often saying “yes.” Amherst students Daniel Lee,
Sydney Tate, Isabel Tessier, and Elliot Van provided research assistance
and important insights. Thank you to Amrita Basu, Nellie Boucher,
Nicola Courtright, Frank Couvares, Judy Frank, Tariq Jaffer, Sheila
Jaswal, Rick Lopez, Ted Melilo, Monica Ringer, Sean Redding, Karen
Sanchez-Eppler, Adam Sitze, and Martha Umphery for being friends and
colleagues in all the best ways.
Several colleagues read parts of the book at various stages. This is the
invisible labor of academic life and friendship which makes all of our
scholarship better. Thanks to Kathy Brown, Brian Connolly, Bruce
Dorsey, Richard Godbeer, Nancy Hewitt, Sarah Knott, Joanne Meyerowitz,
Claire Potter, Lizzie Reis, Dan Richter, and Nick Syrett. I have learned so
much in talking this project through with Jessica Halem, Kathy Brown, and
Ann Fabian. I still can’t believe that Jan Lewis is no longer with us but
I thought of her often as I debated whether I needed to keep doing
research for this book. Jan once told me if the new findings affirm what
you already know and don’t change your argument, then are you done.
She said it much more eloquently than that.
I can’t thank Cecelia Cancellaro of Word Literary enough for helping
me get the book into shape, clarifying its argument, and finding it a great
home at Cambridge University Press. It has already been a pleasure
getting to know the team at Cambridge who will bring this book into
the world. Debbie Gershenowitz gave this manuscript the best read an
author could ask for in balancing critique, curiosity, and encourage-
ment. It has meant the world to me throughout this process that Cecelia
and Debbie get that this is a work of love for and about the LGBTQ
community as much as it is a conventional history book.
One day, Jessica Halem declared that I was her female husband. Why
hadn’t we thought of that sooner? It was the perfect category for me as
someone assigned female who happily took on many of the responsi-
bilities typically expected of husbands. Being her female husband is my
greatest joy, as I aspire to be worthy of all the love and laughter she has
brought into my life.

xi
Introduction: Extraordinary Lives

n 1746, charles hamilton of glastonbury, England


I found what they were looking for – Mary, a curious young woman
who was taken by their charms. With the approval of the girl’s aunt, the
pair were joined in marriage and set off on a honeymoon. Hamilton had
little money and no family. But they were resourceful, determined, and
charismatic. They offered Mary companionship and adventure. As some-
one who was assigned female at birth, Hamilton became known as a
female husband. Nearly one hundred years later and across the Atlantic,
the Journal of Commerce ran a story called, “Extraordinary Case of a Female
Husband.” Scottish immigrant George Wilson was found passed out on
the streets of New York’s Lower East Side. A policeman took them into
the station. Wilson was just another poor laborer who drank too much
after a long day of work. But as someone who was raised as a girl and now
lived as a man, they were incredibly vulnerable to harassment, violence,
and punishment at the hands of the authorities.
Hamilton, Wilson, and dozens of others like them were designated
“female husbands” – a term that persistently circulated throughout
Anglo-American culture for nearly 200 years to describe people who
defied categorization. Though assigned female at birth, female husbands
assumed a legal, social, and economic position reserved for men: that of
husband. Female husbands were presented as shocking and controver-
sial figures, often with headlines featuring the word “extraordinary.” By
their very existence, they challenged essentialist understandings of
sexual difference. They demonstrated by their actions every day that
gender was malleable and not a result of one’s sex. In their ability to
flirt, charm, and attract female wives, they threatened the stability of the

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