Born in Wiltshire County, England in 1586, Deborah Moody came from a wealthy family with both political and religious connections, but also one that believed strongly in civil liberties and religious non-conformity. After her husband died, she sailed for Massachusetts in 1639. Lady Moore, as she was called in America, first settled in the later town of Lynn and was granted four hundred acres of land by the Massachusetts General Court which was very rare considering she was a woman with no husband or any man. She was a member of the church in neighboring Salem, where she later built a house but her church failed to give her freedom of conscience. Attracted to Anabaptism, as were others in her community, she clung to her unorthodox views.
As a believer in Anabaptism, a sect of Christianity that rebelled against baptism of infants because a child cannot commit to any religious faith, she was admonished by the Puritan leaders for failing to conform to their beliefs. In 1643, she led a group of religious dissenters fleeing Puritan persecution to the Dutch colony of New Netherland. The Dutch directed her to Gravesend, located on Long Island, where she brought her followers. Today the area is part of Brooklyn in New York City, with the original town square still evident in the street layout. The people from Gravesend were granted religious freedom, unusual for that period. Lady Moody’s establishment was the first English settlement in what is now Brooklyn and the first colonial enterprise to be headed by a woman.
Under Lady Moody’s guidance the colonists made a notable beginning: a plan for a growing town was drawn; town meetings were instituted; the Indians were paid for their lands; liquor was not to be sold to the Indians; habitable dwellings were required of all settlers. In the years that followed, Lady Moody, the only woman of rank to settle in New Netherland, enjoyed the respect of Dutch director generals including the infamous Peter Stuyvesant. She even housed the meeting that helped mediate the disputes that arose due to Stuyvesant’s intolerance. She also allowed Quakers to practice their religion and even encouraged Quaker missionaries. Her home contained what was probably the largest library in the Dutch province, and she had undoubtedly studied a variety of religious writings. In any event, Quakers visiting Gravesend in 1658 found that their message had taken root and the settlement soon became a center of Quakerism on Long Island.
By: Jordan Bellis, Anna Tao, and Jamie Fung
Quaker Meeting House and John Bowne House
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