Diary of an affluent woman living in Richmond, Virginia in the mid-19th century. Her writings include passages about her children, John and Charles, the books she was reading, and her interest in learning to play the piano and speaking French. Roughly half of the pages are filled with writings. Calculations and records for household expenses are written in the back of the diary. A newspaper clipping of "A Song of Affection" is placed between the pages. This diary provides the rare but sheltered perspective of a wealthy, educated white woman in the antebellum south in the years leading up to and after the American Civil War.
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Collection consists of a single diary.
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Abigail Brown Shaw Cole diary, Special Collections Research Center, William & Mary Libraries.
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Abigail "Abbie" Brown Shaw Cole was born in 1823 in Providence, Rhode Island to Oliver and Sarah Shaw (née Jenckes). Her father was a musician and composer known for his hymns. Abigail married Hanun Wilbur Cole (1816-1885), a merchant and scholar, in 1846 and had three children, John Hanun Cole (b. 1848), Caroline Minna Cole Chapin (b. 1850), Charles D'Urban Morris Cole (b. 1861). Charles would go on to graduate from Harvard in 1883 and receive a law degree from Columbia Law School. He later became an organizer of the Morristown Civic Association. John also received a law degree as well from Harvard University and established a private practice in New York in 1880. The Cole family lived in Providence, Rhode Island, Richmond, Virginia, Cambridge, Massachusetts, and New York City, New York over the years. Abigail passed away in 1906 in Springfield, Massachusetts. She is buried at Swan Point Cemetery in Providence, Rhode Island.