Abigail Hopper Gibbons

American abolitionist (1801–1893)

Abigail Hopper Gibbons, née Abigail Hopper (December 7, 1801 – January 16, 1893) was an American abolitionist, schoolteacher, and social welfare activist. She assisted in founding and led several nationally known societies for social reform during and following the American Civil War. She grew up in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, in a Quaker family. Her father, Isaac Hopper, opposed slavery (as did many among Quakers by then) and aided fugitive slaves. She grew to share her father's beliefs and spent much of her life working for social reform in several fields. In 1841, the New York Monthly Meeting disowned Gibbons' father and husband for their anti slavery writing. Abigail Gibbons resigned the following year, also removing her minor children. Gibbons was prominent during and after the American Civil War. Her work in Philadelphia, Washington, D. C., and New York City was for civil rights and education for Black Americans, prison reform for women, medical care for Union officers during the war, aid to veterans returning from the war, to help them find work; and welfare. Because Gibbons was a known abolitionist, her house was among those attacked and destroyed during the New York City draft riots of July 1863.

Abigail Hopper was born in Philadelphia in 1801, the third of ten children. She was informally called Abby. Both her parents were proud abolitionists. Her father, Isaac Tatem Hopper, was of the Hicksite branch of Quakers. Her mother, Sarah Tatum Hopper, became a recommended minister for the Society of Friends and oversaw schools for black children, along with a committee. Pennsylvania had abolished slavery and many free people of color lived in Philadelphia. Her father became an active and leading member of The Pennsylvania Abolition Society. He often directly confronted slave kidnappers, who frequented Philadelphia and sometimes kidnapped free blacks for sale into slavery, as well as capturing fugitive slaves to return to their masters for bounties. Called upon to protect the rights of African Americans, Isaac Hopper and his wife garnered a reputation as friends and advisers of the "oppressed race" in all emergencies. The Hoppers also sheltered many poor Quakers in their house, despite their own family's large size and the father's unstable financial status. From their early years, their children were called to aid others. Both of Hopper's parents came from historically Quaker families and raised their children in that religion. Hopper and her siblings attended Friends' schools while growing up, and lived with these beliefs. In 1821, she also founded a school that practiced Quaker beliefs. On June 26 1827, Abigail, along with her siblings and parents transferred their membership to the Darby Friends Meeting. In 1830, Hopper moved to New York and became a teacher at a Quaker school. Abigail grew up to share her parents' abolitionist sentiments. She worked with well known abolitionists of her time, including Lydia Maria Child, Sarah Moore Grimké, William Lloyd Garrison, and Theodore Dwight Weld.

Some Quaker yearly meetings divided due to influences from deism, as well as differences between urban and rural members. In 1841, the New York Monthly Meeting, which was dominated by Hicksites, disowned Abigail's father Isaac Hopper and her husband James Sloan Gibbons for their writing and other activities against slavery. The following year Abigail Hopper Gibbons resigned from the Meeting in protest, also removing her and James' four minor children. She and her family maintained Quaker practices and faith but did not rejoin the Meeting.

With the outbreak of the American Civil War, Gibbons knew that nurses would be needed to care for the wounded. The United States Sanitary Commission was established in 1861, shortly after the Civil War began, to recruit nurses and to provide adequate medical care to the Union wounded. It would undertake numerous fundraising efforts to raise money for these purposes. When the Commission set up a training base at Davids Island Hospital in New York, Gibbons was among the trainees. In the South, she worked closely with contrabands, escaped slaves who often sought refuge behind Union lines. Hopper helped them with childbirth and other familial issues. She also collected donations from those in the North and gave them to the contraband slaves. Additionally, she used her wages to help pay for medical expenses encountered by patients who resided in a contraband camp.) The rioters also attacked residences of known white abolitionists and prominent Republicans. On Tuesday, July 14, 1863, the Gibbons' Manhattan home at 19 Lamartine Place (now 339 West 29th Street) was burned and destroyed by rioters.

Following the war, Gibbons founded the Labor and Aid Society in New York, which aided returning veterans find work. To further her mission with women prisoners, she co founded The Isaac T. Hopper Home, named for her father. It assisted former women prisoners to integrate into society after their release.

Gibbons died of pneumonia in New York in 1893, aged 91. She was eulogized in her obituary as "one of the most remarkable women of the century" for her work in noted reform movements. She is interred at Green Wood Cemetery in Brooklyn, New York.

Her daughter Sarah Emerson Gibbons edited and wrote a biography of Abigail Hopper Gibbons, published in 1896, which was based in part on her letters. The WPA has continued, providing programs through which women can acquire the life skills needed to gain and keep employment, manage finances, and to make good choices for themselves and their families. It is the nation's oldest advocacy organization working exclusively with women prisoners.