Religious Deviance and Psychological Medicine in the Second Great Awakening: The Asylum Narratives of Elizabeth T. Stone (b. 1811)

In 1842, after her release from McLean Asylum in Boston, Elizabeth T. Stone (b. 1811) published an exposé detailing her experience as a patient confined for religious insanity.1 Documenting a prison-like environment in which patients endured the hostility of attendants, the humiliation of invasive physical examinations, and the ravages of seizure-inducing drugs, the book warned the public of the threat that asylums posed. This was merely the first of four books Stone would write about the “Bastiles” [sic] of New England over the next two decades.2 Her fourth book, published in 1861, was the most politically charged and philosophically ambitious of the series. Entitled The American Godhead, it adduced a trinity of powers in American society—“[t]he ordained ministry, legal or law power, and the medical faculty”—which worked in concert to undermine natural liberties. Religious freedoms in particular were the principal punitive target of this “Devil’s Godhead.”3 And so Stone, as a woman who had been confined chiefly for her religious behaviors, had been one of its banner victims. One might be tempted to dismiss Stone’s critique of American society as the paranoid effusion of a traumatized mind. Yet, beneath the tidy certainties of her political philosophy, we discern important insights about the nature of religious life and its perils in nineteenth-century Massachusetts. Her writings point to a fraught political and social atmosphere—a society that had only recently undergone religious disestablishment, and whose institutions faced upward pressures to implement a greater degree of social stability.4 The interpretation of insane asylums as institutions that supported the development of a bourgeois social order is now well established and finds general agreement in this article.5 Our interest, however, is not in reiterating old arguments, but in exploring the nuanced tensions between the religious self and society in nineteenth-century Massachusetts—tensions that are uniquely exhibited in Elizabeth Stone’s narratives. This article analyzes Stone’s writings with a view to highlighting the distinct challenges to the free exercise of religion that certain people faced in antebellum America. Our article draws upon various archival sources—including Stone’s own works, the annual reports of asylums, medical publications, and religious periodicals—many of which, to our knowledge, have not been examined in depth. For historians and scholars of church and state, we hope that this article makes a modest contribution to their respective fields, shedding light upon a largely unknown figure while further illuminating the societal challenges that she and others faced. We structure the present article as follows. First, we sketch Stone’s journey to the asylum, emphasizing the gradual formation of her “mad” spiritual identity as well as the complex set of social, theological, and therapeutic reasons for which she was institutionalized. Next, we explore ideological and social considerations which led evangelical leaders to support the confinement of deviant members of their own flocks. From there, we investigate Stone’s experience as a patient at McLean, highlighting the ways in which asylum medicine imposed upon patients a particular notion of how the religious self should relate to American society. We then conclude by considering Stone’s legacy as it pertains to long-standing debates about religious liberty. As was typical among nineteenth-century American asylum patients, it was Elizabeth Stone’s own family members who took the decision to confine her; and she claimed that they had done so “because she differed with them in their religious sentiments.”6 Yet the evidence of her own accounts indicates that their reasons for doing so were more complex than a mere bias against her religious stance. There was a range of both social and religious ways in which her identity was a source of family embarrassment. Moreover, there is good reason to believe that her family members had sincere concerns about her health, for which the asylum seemed to them a suitable solution. Nevertheless, the common thread across these issues was Stone’s religious identity, the spiritual outlook that had been shaped over many years through her engagement with various communities associated with the Second Great Awakening. Indeed, in a broad sense, the institutionalization of religious deviants such as Stone resulted when religious tensions in the wider society penetrated individual homes. We elaborate upon this claim by tracing Stone’s portrayal of her religious formation, and then by investigating the reasons for which Stone’s family confined her. In her autobiographical writings, Elizabeth Stone recounted an unpleasant childhood. She was born in Westford, Massachusetts in 1811 to an intemperate mechanic named Samuel Stone, and a sickly and neglectful mother. As their seventh child (and the youngest of three daughters), Elizabeth was the particular victim of her parents’ abuse. She was ridiculed by her mother for her sensitive disposition, and “disowned” by her father “as his lawful child.”7 It was therefore a matter of self-preservation when she chose to leave home at the age of fifteen to work in the textile factories in the nearby industrial town of Lowell. Through eight years of employment as a weaver, Stone saved enough money to enroll at a female seminary in New Hampton, New Hampshire in May 1834. It was there that she experienced an evangelical conversion. In her writings, she recounted from this point feeling a distinct calling to become a missionary in distant lands; yet financial necessity forced her to withdraw from her studies in the fall of her second year. She spent the bulk of the next five years in the factories of Lowell, resolved to save what she would need to eventually embrace her evangelistic calling. Throughout this time, her engagement with evangelical communities continued and, between 1837 and 1840, she became a Millerite. A Baptist preacher based in Vermont, William Miller (1782–1849) had attracted thousands of followers with his predictions that Christ’s second coming would occur in 1843 or 1844. Many of these so-called Millerites were institutionalized in the late 1830s and early 1840s for the excesses to which their apocalyptic hopes drove them.8 Stone’s conviction that she should “run as to obtain the prize in six years” likewise induced a spiritual fervency which her own journey to the Yet her spiritual identity was further shaped by two of evangelical that were across New England in this In the of 1840, Stone the of the born of in at the of the and for its that of should set their to as mere evangelical Stone’s of this was to the that led to her In 1840, she with the of the Baptist church she had been a to that she to his had that of the of the Baptist were a by the and she had therefore Stone was two Nevertheless, she at the church of the and that she a the of in There she a and of evangelical that her “mad” spiritual this Stone that she had the of the and The notion that as a second work of was by the and was by William to the the and with by the Baptist in the of In New the was by the and it to the in New in the Stone her spiritual as a First, she had been by from the Baptist church in Lowell. at the in she had been by the and had been tensions between Stone and her family members and the wider religious communities of which she was a they relate to her her own accounts this Stone’s book, the a and of that led to her of her and by their from the Baptist church which was a and by her with the confined her for three to her and their and from that a from a to his and then his three to to to in that and after the next his to a with The of was McLean, the of and would the next are with the in her first two In she her decision to confine her to their religious Yet the autobiographical in her first book a more complex set of her A important that is a the Stone which a greater of The two she most Stone and Stone, had from the modest to become in the a published two books law and and, in was of In the as a to the Massachusetts and as a in about life are but Elizabeth makes of his and that the in It was this in particular whose are most in first She that had a when to her; and, to his home in Boston, had not to one that worked in a Stone’s first book indicates a between Stone and her which their Her religious with the of her from the Baptist church in social tensions the and the degree of her identity to her these tensions were the for her confinement at McLean, the a we a second reason her a sincere therapeutic the of her From her first it is that Stone had of in the the confinement in her The of this are For she recounted in her first book feeling a between her and her spiritual calling. She to her employment at the to for the but this should for a Moreover, she the of financial support to her youngest who had been and at of This for Stone, Stone in would in Yet it at a to a spiritual about the of her work or physical she to Her own of the its spiritual She that at the of the she from her spiritual from the of the church of the and then from at her to she her that she would be to for the The first from there with her confinement at yet her to have been a state, by of and not a by her as her book And first of her her to home to She the in her she would the her had her religious The next her became when she to to Stone to over the She the and of her and not of In this at there is of an of as well as a bias against Stone’s religious and she to associated with the her and a when the who Stone’s her these that her of the for her her religious yet the for their to have been a than a Moreover, Stone’s own of a over these three and of an experience of spiritual which had are of a to which her as they in Stone’s autobiographical writings, we are faced with about the nature of her own her confinement at McLean, and, about the reasons for which her confined her. This was not a of religious the it is that the of Stone’s against her religious were not to their of her we that Stone’s religious outlook was and the an identity that was in various ways a source of her and which was in the that her The religious communities of New England were by the social and religious tensions as were New England such as the in her fourth book upon her by two who supported her Stone a that the against her in her first three she in a of societal medical and legal of religious in America. Our of this claim a complex The of a of American institutions that to of Yet there is a in which religious communities evangelical and medical institutions in were in their to the social pressures at by religious and As was the for New England to the asylum both as a of pressures the and as an that therapeutic to it In this we these and medical and the reasons for which Stone’s own spiritual identity from the of evangelical a suitable for asylum We by Stone’s by We then various that evangelical of religious we Stone’s identity, her as a female to explore the concerns and which led evangelical to certain members of their Stone’s first as she at the of we In her first book, Stone claimed that had her with a second her The second was by a who was one of at had the in her first book about the experienced by patients at the Stone was at of the fervency of his Indeed, had been enough for the to it to as a missionary in 1842, and to a book in the of to the and of to about the apocalyptic that were to Nevertheless, took the of McLean Asylum against his in what became a public the of which Stone in her second book The in a at the home of which when that the was against that had work than to to a and with the of and their followers from these nineteenth-century evangelical leaders the in Stone’s A to this of the and social of evangelical leaders the one and of Stone’s spiritual identity, the We first to the The notion that a religious deviant such as Stone in an asylum upon a between religion as an of and as a of religious and medical were among when as This was established in many nineteenth-century evangelical Yet its to debates about which are for their to and medical the such as the and the and the established political order through to these such as these to to a in a or physical that one was a of This of religious became a of political the the was now associated with the of the Great and, in with the and that evangelical Yet than to that was a evangelical leaders their The New England and that many of the and that people experienced evangelical be in and evidence of spiritual experience to the and evangelical religion against the that it the Second Great medical of deviant religious experience were for by many New and the political threat of had been Nevertheless, the of that across the American and challenges to the and its among these was the of and which were by of American Indeed, as a of American religious were from and their were to the the of nineteenth-century their they were to to the and of the they social among nineteenth-century that to the development of a more American in this to in Stone’s is further as we religious religious had been in Massachusetts Stone’s through two first its of and the second to through money For the Baptist these an from the religious by Yet had among were the and of religious identity that had been an Elizabeth Stone’s religious identity the of religious about which In upon the of the she both religious and social We have for her of Baptist and the public of her of this upon the communities that seemed to be for and it well have been this that decision to support her Stone’s were the more her to in them the more light of her Many of the that the Second Great the and the had female and As in the 1830s and of these this in their to their and public Yet the was the to not after Stone’s with This is of the ways in which Stone’s identity was by her the of female As female had been by evangelical for a range of and ideological of which had been by a were to as than as and they were not Stone’s own as a are in about which that his about McLean had greater than Stone’s by of his to Stone’s writings further her general for the social and of after her with Stone and woman were in the The for the of a of with their to the of light to that from the of For the the interpretation and of the of the than the of Stone’s at these was the of Her public in which excesses were and Stone the between her by evangelical and their own with In her second book, for she that the church had a public against her her release from McLean of a upon The of Stone’s writings, to the of the individual to the of the and for the of Stone had such in her and in her by had Stone’s and so had the for the of at McLean had his spiritual to support an Stone the of these individual our more the concerns of the evangelical that the Second Great Awakening. In in pressures upon these to a Stone’s about In the of whose religious bourgeois of and the of individual evangelical leaders upon the between religion and The the to confine one of their own in a medical As insane asylums in and public in in the first of the and religious communities to them as a of tensions by the or of such as how these institutions to such how Stone view their of these we investigate Stone’s of her own as it with the and of the and who her. As we Stone’s critique of asylum was both Her was that asylum had the of and she the to the identity of Yet our of asylum annual reports that Stone’s would have been the had been an Her at McLean, was not in a the to her spiritual identity was a of the between her own the of the Second Great the bourgeois at the of asylum Stone’s critique of McLean her identity as both a woman and a which, for were had been the of Stone’s spiritual life her at the female seminary in New In the her it was from her female that she had to spiritual and, after her it was a of that she spiritual and Stone this of spiritual with the of the medical of in which is further by her the of female with the asylum she had by her in her to not believe that a female be to such a And the asylum, she had been by the of one of the female attendants, as well as by the among the of the This of in common with the challenges to in the writings of the asylum patients that the Yet the of Stone’s books is about the perils that the asylum for than about its threat to the Her books in this not asylum as in but as Stone had been by these of and their had her of Her writings were at the of not Stone’s was to McLean as a of religious she this to the religious identity of the In their first Stone had had a of an evangelical to which that had not what the a This is with what we about religious life from such as the by his the as a yet who of but who was by the and the of further published an from writings which this of and only in to after many and and as to what of This was from Stone’s evangelical for Stone, it was religious that led to her spiritual that Stone [sic] she had done for to that and her of her to the of the that to that of This therapeutic claim is in light of the of her four medicine they and and the of For Stone, to her religious with was a of his Nevertheless, Stone’s own conviction this her experience at McLean well have been the had been an The between religion and after was for by of religious religious were to of the particular religious of the A of this is by the of the for the In an annual for his asylum, was to and have been an evangelical the of religious the that the evangelical Yet his own as a was with of religious the patient the evidence of their own spiritual they were to to one of his patients, that her good was a her spiritual be a of an physical to of and and to of The patient but not a in her from to medical Stone’s own was to the of a religious As we have had an established for between religion and its This the range of to from which the patient they are or by to which the patient they are not such Stone’s of have been as a of by an evangelical In this asylum was The religious of the well be to the nature of the a This is further by Stone’s of two at McLean who were members of church in and both had to with Stone in her religious Stone’s as and The of these two is one of of the of in Stone’s As an to which social and to and American medicine in the first of the From the therapeutic these to the patient for a life the Yet, as and others have the that it to were by bourgeois were with that had shaped Elizabeth Stone her evangelical and it is in the between these two that we McLean to have been a of for her. of the at McLean are the asylum and the religious the in an 1837 annual that of and patients in such as are in were to patients to social and them from their Yet Stone such as as to asylum life only be a of to in the of this In to the there was the of the religious a for the patients and attendants, which, to his annual for Stone was in a of the writings, religious a with the of two or the medical of his these as of calling the and of the they were as a not to be the threat of was a of good the Religious the asylum was a of than an in was to only and of that was of a The therapeutic of however, was not these to be to than the of in was to a of that was with the social and of life that were likewise the asylum For Stone, the of these was as an to her religious identity as was the that her when her therapeutic was a particular of how the religious self should relate to a society by religious and It is not to the asylum as a of spiritual for a such as Stone whose and with this Yet in to her spiritual Stone the medical of her the she had been forced to than the The drugs, she had and a of we evidence the nature of the at McLean, we of in which with in Stone that were to patients and that the of these [sic] was the as that of the asylum the to the of their In about the in which these had her spiritual Stone the of religion and which, as we have the for the confinement of religious The asylum Stone had to of of the of the for the of Her for had been she and of The were She had her and was now for This a of and Her to the of at the of her was a from which to physical of the and which such as and with the of the Stone to have these from the and she after her release from Yet, for Stone, this was to that of her had the religious which, to were the of of to in own the and of their she be one of the as it in Stone’s own experience as an asylum the spiritual nature of of asylum from its social to its be in from the to their that or this Stone so at the of the was this point more than in the Stone between her at McLean and the of the As with Stone, and had been as of Stone, had been by and power, the of the medical to be The of Christ’s was As the had been from the at or the of the she was from through to her in one of Our of Stone’s life and writings two of the trinity about which she in The American and the We have that Stone’s as a religious and her confinement at McLean not to a of medical and then to a fraught social and religious environment which and religious communities to insane asylums for In such institutions as of tensions that from the and of American religious Moreover, they evangelical with a of the of their own In to these we have how Stone the social, and medical of her Her writings asylum for a critique of of which the of conclude this we Stone’s of the of the “Devil’s the or law in Stone’s A at Stone’s this matter her legacy in wider debates about law and of religious Stone’s the or of religious development after the between her second and In her she the of nineteenth-century American a that asylums the of the that her fourth had to his when had from England to Massachusetts as a religious In her fourth book, at the of the of the American she the of as a for the of in the American A second she might be to This political in Stone’s was not only by the but by Stone had recently in a legal a whose had her with asylum confinement of her with the threat the the of who to them a of the that a public with a of six was to confine an This the that not confine her as would have been in in this Nevertheless, for Stone, these of the of religious by the when her the legal with Stone’s own she had been by her at the individual had been their legal were Stone was only when one of her who had had with her confinement her and the of her that she had been a victim of religious in a that had been a religious for her Stone’s by the was as and as was her by the and medical she had not been by to and the of legal were of The law had to Stone from the of her family and from the of asylum confinement and her had to for her as their and had to for her as their Yet, her Stone not been to she the public debates of her about of religious and the of asylum It was at a that upon her first book, and the that took the to its that her was not Stone was one of many female asylum patients in this to in this of as the of among their and who were in of to political Stone’s writings were of a of critique that the in law in her own and that the of the Stone’s to these have been by the of more such as Elizabeth her own in the of The American a (and

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