The Sewing Girl's Tale by John Wood Sweet

 

In 1793, Lanah Sawyer went out walking with a gentleman.  She was excited, thinking that this might lead to a proposal.  He had told her they would be accompanied by another couple but when they met, he told her the other couple would meet them later and instead he took her to a brothel where he gained entrance, locked her in a room and raped her.  

Lanah was seventeen and living in a Colonial America that prized women's virtue above all.  If they were raped, they were spoiled and their chances of marriage were considered unlikely.  Fathers attempted to make the man marry their daughter, another horrid outcome.  If unsuccessful, the family attempted to hide the crime so that their daughter would not be ruined.

But Lanah Sawyer went another route.  Her stepfather was a boat captain and he and his friends were not fond of gentlemen who often tried to cheat them of wages and tips.  He and Lanah went to a magistrate and filed rape charges against the man, the first rape trial to take place in New York or the country.  Some of the most famous lawyers of the time got involved, including Alexander Hamilton.  Although it took many months, Lanah eventually got retribution but her reputation was stained throughout the new country.

John Wood Sweet is an American author who is also a history professor at the University of North Carolina.  His books have been on early American history and have gained literary prizes.  This book is extensively researched and told in great detail.  The reader will learn about the history of rape charges but also much about New York City and its citizens at the end of the seventeenth century. I listened to this book and the narrator did an excellent job.   This book is recommended for nonfiction history readers.