Role Playing Activity:
ELIZA LUCAS PINCKNEY
Diane Grau, Ordean School, Duluth, MN
Objectives:
- The student will gain a broader understanding of the colonial
period of U.S. history.
- The student will become aware of the role of Eliza Lucas Pinckney
in colonial history as an example of a woman who had influence
in that time period.
- The student will become aware of the importance of indigo cultivation
in colonial South Carolina and how the Revolutionary War changed
that role.
Time Frame: approximately 15-20 minutes
Context: Integrate into a science unit on plants
and/or a social studies unit on colonial America preceding and through
the Revoultionary War.
Rationale: Science (as well as Social Studies)
is more meaningful to students when it is "brought to life" through
information about real people. Girls, especially, may be encouraged
to consider entering some field of scientific study as they learn
of women who have been successful and respected for their efforts.
Eliza Lucas Pinckney was such as woman.
Materials: a hat and an outfit with a floor-length
skirt as accurate a representation of colonial dress as possible.
Script: The following notes are given to be developed
into a presentation according to one's personal style.
Notes on the life of Eliza Lucas Pinckney:
- born Elizabeth "Eliza" Lucas to an officer in the British
army and his wife on the British-ruled island of Antigua in the
West Indies in 1722
- returned to England for education...few children, boys or girls,
wre as well educated
- fifteen when moved to South Carolina with family for mother's
health
- lived on plantation called Wappoo, near Charleston
- father owned three plantations
- father recalled to Antigua to be royal governor
- at sixteen was placed in charge of father's plantations and business
dealings as he recognized Eliza was more mature and capable than
others twice her age
- began each day at 5 A.M. to manage the business affairs
- elderly woman friend worried, according to Eiza, getting up so
early would "'spoil my marriage, for she says it will make
me look old long before I am so.'"(Jaher)
- Eliza advised, however: Avoid "'Sloth and Idleness....and
be neither luxurious or extravagant.'"(Jaher)
- hobbies: music lessons, gardening, reading
- she advised herself and her kin, "'Use all your diligence
to improve yourself.'"(Jaher)
- elderly woman friend also worried, according to Eliza, I would "'read
myself mad'"(Jaher)
- ran school for family's young slaves while many colonists felt
it wrong to educate slaves as it would encourage them to run away
- two of closest friends were Charles Pinckney, whose father had
moved to SC in 1692, and Elizabeth Lamb Pinckney....Eliza visited
with them, borrowed books....Charles supported the cause of "Negro" education
and gave money towards building a school for "Negro" children
to be taught reading and religion
- loved experimenting to see if a crop would grow well in SC
- experimented with flax, hemp, and silk culture
- about 1740 began to try to grow indigo with seeds sent by her
father from the West Indies; indigo is a shrubby legume, growing
five feet high, with dainty compound leaves and typical legume
pods which is used to make indigo dye...use goes back to Sanskrit
records 4000 years old...failed at first...crops hurt by storms
and frost
- encouraged by friend, Dr. Alexander Garden, whose hobby was collecting
samples of plants and animals native to SC but unknown to European
scientists....who discovered the mud iguana and who visited fishermen's
homes and would snatch fish dinners right off their tables if the
fish were interesting specimens....who was one of first to describe
use of pinkroot as medicine for killing intestinal worms in humans
- successful in growing indigo by 1744
- encouraged others to grow indigo and it became leading money
maker for SC
- friend and neighbor Andrew De Veaux als experimented with and
was successful with indigo....others then followed their successful
examples
- Elizabeth Lamb Pinckney died in 1744 and 4 months later at age
22 Eliza married Charles Pinckney
- she and husband had three children: Charles éotesworth born in
1745, Harriott, and Thomas
- felt children could learn at young age....made set of carved
blocks for letters of alphabet....Charles C. knew letters before
age of two and began to spell....had children find sermon text
in Bible as soon as returned home from church
- religion was important to family...Eliza told Charles C., "you
must know the welfair of a whole family depends in a great measure
on the progress you make in morral Virtue, Religion and Learning...'" You
must fortify yourself "'against those Errors into which you
are most easily led...What I most fear for you is heat of temper....'"(Zahnister)
- other planters grew indigo
- angered when Charels not confirmed by England as interim Chief
Justice of SC Supreme Court after appointment by colonial governor
- by 1750 two of three Carolinians were slaves and not all were
brought from Africa...South arolinians forced Native Americans
to give up lands, conquered them in bloody battles, enslaved them
more than any other colony..to have enough free labor to grow crops
cheaply (Charleston main entry point for slaves...when no farm
work, slaves hired out to work as fishermen, carpenters, garbage
collectors...money given to masters...little spent on needs of
slaves ...mostly lived in small huts a distance from home of masters...often
fed meat fat, skimmed milk, moldy bacon...some not even given clothes
until age 13)
- by 1754 colony was exporting over 216,000 pounds of processed
indigo per year (was used for color of uniforms of British sailors
and later American sailors as well as other clothes and cloth)
- returned to England for 5 years (17531758) to educate the children,
husband served as colonial agent
- husband died in 1758 shortly after return to SC to manage business
affairs...Eliza, age 36, stayed on in SC....sons stayed in England
for education
- friend Dr. Alexander Garden in 1760 had gardenia named after
him though he had not discovered it...discovered by British sea
captain, grown in England by his friend Richard Warner...flower
given name by Carolus Linnaeus to honor Garden
- 1760s Charleston richest town in 13 colonies...3/4s of SC white
population lived there....social center with theater, America's
first music club, horse races....and ethnic clubs (Scottish, English,
German) to help immigrants
- son Charles C., while still in England, had picture painted showing
himself objecting to the Stamp Acti in 1765
- sons stayed in England until 1769 but colonials were snubbed
or teased by sons of England's elite, even friends, in public schools
and sons always thought of selves as Americans, maybe because of
this
- promoted independence for colonies (SC was successful under British
rule yet thousands fought for independence, including the "Swamp
Fox"...was where over 100 battles fought)
- studied law on own and wrote wills for others
- son Charles C. joined Charles-Town Militia Regiment in June 1772
to protect against Indian attacks, slave uprisings, coastal raids
by Spanish
- son Thomas joined a group of Americans in military drills conducted
by a sergeant of the Royal Guards...called "the little rebel" by
friends
- She was the mother of one signer of the Constitution, Charles
Cotesworth Pinckney, and the
aunt of another signer Charles Pinckney.
- both sons
fought with the continental army
- continued to manage plantations and helped raise grandchildren
- need for food during Revolution so people grew rice instead of
indigo
- after war, competition from Inida ended indigo growth in SC...cotton
took over....Thomas Jefferson and Dolly Madison and others tried
to encourage farmers to raise dye plants, such as indigo, madder,
and woad on a commercial scale but failed...dyers improved their
chemical practices, though, over trial and error methods and advanced
- son Charles C. delegate to 1787 convention in Philadelphia that
drafted U.S. Constitution to replace Articles of Confederation....also
Federalist candidate for vice president in 1800...ran for president
against Thomas Jefferson in 1804 and James Madison in 1808
- died at age 71 in Philadelphia...had gone there for cancer treatment..President
George Washington requested to be and served as one of her pallbearers
- statue as memorial to her in the Colonial National Historic Park
in Virginia
Sources:
- Adrosko, Rita J. Natural Dyes and Home Dyeing. NY: Dover,
1971.
- "Elizabeth Lucas Pinckney." World Book Encyclopedia.
1977 ed.
- "Charles Cotesworth Pinckney." World Book Encyclopedia.
1977 ed. Fradin, Dennis Brindell. The South Carolina Colony.
Chicago: Children's P, 1992.
- Jaher, Frederic Cople. The Urban Establishment. Urbana:
U of IL P, 1982.
- Leckie, Shirley. "Elizabeth Lucas Pinckney (1722-1793)." Women's
History. 1995:16.
- Zahniser, Marvin R. Charles Cotesworth Pinckney. Chapel
Hill: U of NC P, 1967.
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