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"Considering the sickness of my children, my heart was exceedingly sunk": fatherhood and children's health in colonial New England, 1660–1785

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dc.contributor.authorLeDoux, Libby, author
dc.contributor.authorLittle, Ann, advisor
dc.contributor.authorOrsi, Jared, committee member
dc.contributor.authorHutchins, Zach, committee member
dc.date.accessioned2023-08-28T10:27:53Z
dc.date.available2023-08-28T10:27:53Z
dc.date.issued2023
dc.description.abstractA reading of Puritan fathers' personal writings from 1660–1785 indicates a larger ethic of loving, hands-on fatherhood. When fathers wrote about their children in their personal writings, it was most often related to their children's spiritual and physical health. By providing for their children in times of physical distress, Puritan fathers participated in the private life of their families and formed intimate bonds with their children. This thesis challenges the narratives that present the distribution of household labor as divided between the public and private. It rejects the assumption that caring for children was women's work and sickrooms were women's spaces. The fathers examined in this thesis were mentally, emotionally, and physically present throughout their children's illnesses. Fathers' detailed descriptions of their children's physical health and the medicine given to them to ease their suffering makes it clear that the sickroom was not strictly a place for women. In addition to physical remedies, fathers also employed spiritual methods to cure their children in hopes of earning God's favor. Fathers had to reckon with the religious aspects of physical disease. They ruminated on the possible causes for disease, sought for religious meaning in their children's illnesses, and worried for the sanctification of their children's souls. At its core, this thesis tells the story of fathers who loved their children. It does not paint these fathers as men who cared for their children because of an internalized goal of living up to an abstract concept of ideal Puritan manhood or paternal power. A reading of these diaries does not unveil a series of emotionally distant patriarchal authoritarians. These men were hands-on fathers who deeply loved their families and wanted to protect their children at all costs.
dc.format.mediumborn digital
dc.format.mediummasters theses
dc.identifierLeDoux_colostate_0053N_17907.pdf
dc.identifier.urihttps://hdl.handle.net/10217/236826
dc.languageEnglish
dc.language.isoeng
dc.publisherColorado State University. Libraries
dc.relation.ispartof2020-
dc.rightsCopyright and other restrictions may apply. User is responsible for compliance with all applicable laws. For information about copyright law, please see https://libguides.colostate.edu/copyright.
dc.subjectfamily history
dc.subjecthealth
dc.subjectPuritan
dc.subjectfatherhood
dc.subjectchildhood
dc.subjectmedicine
dc.title"Considering the sickness of my children, my heart was exceedingly sunk": fatherhood and children's health in colonial New England, 1660–1785
dc.title.alternativeConsidering the sickness of my children, my heart was exceedingly sunk: fatherhood and children's health in colonial New England, 1660–1785
dc.typeText
dcterms.rights.dplaThis Item is protected by copyright and/or related rights (https://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/). You are free to use this Item in any way that is permitted by the copyright and related rights legislation that applies to your use. For other uses you need to obtain permission from the rights-holder(s).
thesis.degree.disciplineHistory
thesis.degree.grantorColorado State University
thesis.degree.levelMasters
thesis.degree.nameMaster of Arts (M.A.)

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