Tristen WillhelmDr. Nichols2/18/2013

1. Why is a Midwife’s Tale considered to be a primary document? Why are

primary documents important to the study of history? What are some of the

problems associated with primary documents and the study of history?

A Midwife’s Tale is a primary document due to the fact that it gives the accounts

and experiences of Martha Ballard, a woman living first hand in the eighteenth to

early nineteenth century. The journal itself is a primary document as well as the

novel, in accordance with definition by Yale University “…primary sources can

also include autobiographies, memoirs, and oral histories recorded later.” Primary

documents are important for the study of history because they provide first-hand

accounts of what day to day life was like in the period being researched. They take

a large amount of speculation and guess work out of the process, while at the same

time opening more avenues for historians to ponder the more complex workings of

times since passed. Though immensely useful, the use of primary documents can

still leave something to be desired. Most will only give a small glimpse of a society

compared to the bigger picture of the time period as a whole, providing personal

insights and observations but leaving gaps in the workings of society outside the

sphere the author of the primary document lived in. Changes in writing and

language between the time of the document and present day also put forth another

hurdle. Even in just the few hundred years between Martha’s diary and modern day

English can leave you wondering even the basic meanings of words and phrases,

let alone the subtle complexities that certain language can present in context of the

times, that is to say if the person writing the document was even educated enough

to give a good insight into the true happenings of the time.

2. Who was Martha Ballard, when and where did she live?

Martha Ballard was a midwife in eighteenth to nineteenth century New England.

Born in 1735 in Oxford, Massachusetts, she was the wife to Ephraim Ballard and

the mother of their nine children, though three of them died in 1769 due to a

diphtheria epidemic. In 1785 after their family moved to Hallowell, Maine she

began keeping her diary of day to day life, accounts and midwifery until her death

in 1812.

3. Explain the numerous roles of a midwife in colonial/early American society.

The midwife in colonial/early American society was in ways similar to those who

still practice midwifery today, but in many ways much more than that. They were

not just practitioners of medicine, or in the case of early society healing. These

women were also wives, tradeswoman, they tended gardens and handled accounts

of their own in the household and were generally a major part of the community

around them. It was upon the midwife to run back and forth delivering the

staggering amount of children birthed at the time, while still upholding wifely and

community duties. Martha Ballard kept her house, entertained guests, healed the

sick and comforted the downtrodden, she kept her house and raised her children as

well as dealing with the business of collecting debts from those she serviced.

4. What was the status of the midwife and their relationship with other

women and men?

The midwife was often treated much as a doctor would be today, though in

comparison to physicians of the period they may have been looked down upon by

some as being inferior in medicinal practices. They were called upon to heal the

sick and birth children, and thus it feels as if they had a great sense of honor in the

community. They were often the first people sought after, rather than the more

expensive and sometimes experimental physicians. Though their interactions with

men did indeed go beyond idle conversation and healing into the world of

economic and occasionally legal dealings, their relationship with the women of the

town was much more developed. The birthing process for Early American times

involved a lot of support not just from midwives and nurses, but from neighbors

and families. A gathering of women would occur once true labor began and would

sometimes last through the night or in the case of some helpers through the next

week. For the midwife to be there for as many gatherings as she delivered babies it

would seem to me that they would be much more deeply ingrained in more circles

of women than your average housewife.

5. How did the “scientific doctors” interact with the midwives?

Most of the scientific doctors saw themselves as more educated and of a superior

status to the midwives. Though not all that held this belief were necessarily hostile

against the women, many were. Many called them ritual healers and too traditional,

that their practices were outdated in comparison to the medicine they knew, though

many still used the same herbs as the housewives on top of the more sophisticated

chemical medicines. Often medical authors of the century would shoot down the

practices of midwives calling them unnecessary and simply the gathering of

woman in order to spread gossip and rumor in a disgusting fashion. Some on the

other hand, while not admitting the need for them, simply embraced their help

whenever needed or available. Spreading their workload of minor illnesses to the

midwives and concerning themselves with worse off cases, or politics.

External references:

http://www.yale.edu/collections_collaborative/primarysources/

primarysources.html

http://dohistory.org/martha/index.html