Newport native, Sophia Robbins Little, was a writer and reformer active in the antislavery, women’s suffrage, and temperance movements. She wrote two abolitionists tracts, The Branded Hand (1845), a tribute to abolitionist Jonathan Walker and Thrice Through the Furnace: A Tale of Times of the Iron Hoof (1852), a response to the Fugitive Slave Act. Her poetry and novels celebrated women as strong characters. Sophia was also an advocate for recently released female prisoners, helping them to find employment, and for unwed teenage mothers, establishing the Sophia Little Home in Providence in the 1870s.
Biography provided by Heidi Benedict, Roger Williams University
Image courtesy of Rhode Island Historical Society
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