REVIEW: The Washerwomen’s War by Piper Huguley
1881: Mamie Harper, a new teacher at Atlanta Female Baptist Seminary, hears of mistreatment from her washerwomen students and tells them to strike. She re-encounters summer pastor Gabriel Harmon, who has other ideas to help the washerwomen. Will these combatants be able to win in the war of love?
Dear Ms. Huguley,
For some years I’ve meant to read the “Daughters of the Nation” anthology only to discover that the four novellas are now being sold separately. Okay, I can get started on them that way. “The Washerwomen’s War” is loosely tied to the Milford College stories as the heroine is in school there when she’s called on to help educate older women of the race in Atlanta in the summer of 1881.
Mamie Harper (who sings but never plays the violin in this story despite what is shown in the lovely cover) is a nineteen year old young woman with decided ideas of what she wants in life. One thing she doesn’t want is to marry a preacher as so much is demanded of their wives. The ones Mamie has encountered so far are either put upon sweet women or vipers spewing venomous judgement on people. When she meets Gabriel Harmon, she’s interested in him until she learns his planned vocation. No siree, he’s handsome and compelling but she’ll look elsewhere for a husband.
Then Mamie is “volunteered” by Mother Manda of Milford College to help two Boston White women who are starting a school in Atlanta for Black women. It’s only for the summer and Mamie feels strongly about Black women having a chance for an education. It’s only after she arrives in Atlanta that she realizes she’ll be in close contact with Gabriel who is a substitute minister there.
During their rides home in the evening, when Gabriel urges Mamie to share dinners with him at the homes of parishioners, Gabriel also presses his suit. He’s restrained about it but Mamie intends to stand firm. That is until the two of them get involved with the battle of one of Mamie’s students – and all the underpaid washerwomen of Atlanta – in a strike for fair wages. Will their efforts help the women and their courtship?
Mamie is a strong woman (and based on a real person). Her mother, a famous poet and speaker, has had to leave Mamie at Milford for most of Mamie’s life as she goes out on the speaking circuit. It doesn’t take Mamie long to feel the drive to help the older women she teaches and rail against the fact that their children don’t have a school or chance to learn. She knows that Gabriel is subtly wooing her and slowly succumbs to his persuasion and interest in her. He knows what she thinks and where she stands and in the end, he’s the one who is willing to sacrifice in order to be what she wants. I enjoyed following them as they fell in love and discovering how the school where Mamie helps teach ultimately became Spelman College. B
~Jayne
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