Jane Turell Explained

Jane Colman Turell (1708–1735) was an 18th-century American colonial poet. A gifted young scholar, her father provided an unusually good education for a young woman of this period.^[1] She was the first of a number of prolific women poets whose works were published in the colonies.^[2] Born in Boston, she was the only daughter of Dr. Benjamin Colman, a clergyman and writer. Encouraged by her father to follow literary pursuits, she started writing poetry at the age of 11.^[3] At the age of 19, she married Rev. Ebenezer Turell of Medford, Massachusetts. A writer of "classic" poetry focused primarily on religion and family life, she modeled her life and writings after Elizabeth Singer Rowe.^[4] Turrell's contemporaries were Francis Knapp, Benjamin Colman, Roger Wolcott, Mather Byles, and Rev. John Adams.^[5]

Turell died at the age of 27. She wrote about her experience with childbirth, which included stillbirth, early death of her infants, and painful occurrences. Her letters, diary extracts, short religious essays and pious verse were collected in a pamphlet and published by her husband immediately after her death in 1735,^[6] as Reliquiate Turellae et Lachrymae Paternal,^[7] and reprinted in 1741 as Memoirs of the Life and Death of the Pious and Ingenious Mrs. Jane Turell.^[8]

Notes and References

1. Book: Lepore, Jill . Book of Ages: The Life and Opinions of Jane Franklin . Vintage; Illustrated edition . 2014 . 978-0307948830.
2. Book: Tierney, Helen. Women's Studies Encyclopedia. 1 January 1999. Greenwood Publishing Group. 978-0-313-31072-0. 1092–.
3. Book: Sears. Edward Isidore. Gorton. David Allyn. Woodman. Charles H.. The National Quarterly Review. Public domain. 1871. Pudney & Russell. 335–.
4. Book: Bigold, Melanie. Women of Letters, Manuscript Circulation, and Print Afterlives in the Eighteenth Century: Elizabeth Rowe, Catharine Cockburn and Elizabeth Carter. 12 January 2013. Palgrave Macmillan. 978-1-137-03357-4. 89–.
5. Book: Bronson, Walter Cochrane. A short history of American literature. Public domain. 1919. Heath. 37–.
6. Book: May, Caroline. The American Female Poets: With Biographical and Critical Notices. Public domain. 1854. Lindsay & Blakiston. 171–.
7. Book: Colman, Benjamin . Reliquiae Turellae, et lachrymae paternae. The father's tears over his daughter's remains. Two sermons preach'd at Medford, April 6. 1735. / By Benjamin Colman, D.D. ; The Lord's Day after the funeral of his beloved daughter Mrs. Jane Turell. ; To which are added, some large memoirs of her life and death, by her consort, the Reverend Mr. Ebenezer Turell, M.A. Pastor of the church in Medford. ; [Four lines from Psalms] ]. 1735-04-06 . S. Kneeland & T. Green, for J. Edwards and H. Foster in Cornhill . Boston.
8. Book: Davis . Cynthia J.. West. Kathryn. Women Writers in the United States. registration . 28 March 1996. Oxford University Press. 978-0-19-535812-4. 18–.