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Rebecca Faulkner Foster
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REBECCA FAULKNER FOSTER
(1761-1834), c.
1830
Eliza Goodridge (1798-1882)
watercolor on ivory
3 5/8 x 2 1/4 (9.2075 x 5.7150)
Bequest of Harriet E. Clarke, 1944
Weis #59
Hewes #51
More Information
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Rebecca Faulkner was born in Acton, Massachusetts, and in 1783,
at the
age of twenty-one, married Dwight Foster (1757-1823). Foster, who
had
graduated from Brown in 1774, was admitted to the bar in 1778 and
established
his law practice in Brookfield, Massachusetts. Rebecca Foster was
the
mother of four children, Pamela (1784-1807), Algernon Sidney
(1785-1823),
Sophia Dwight (1787-1871), and Alfred Dwight (1800-52). By the
time of
their marriage, Dwight Foster was already serving as a justice of
the
peace. During his long career, Foster held many elected offices in
Worcester
County, serving as sheriff, a justice of the Court of Common
Pleas. He
served two terms in the Massachusetts House of Representatives,
1791-92
and 1808-9. Between these terms in Boston, he was elected to the
United
States House of Representatives (1793-1800) and the Senate
(1800-1803).(1)
During her husband's absence in Washington, D. C., Rebecca
Faulkner Foster
maintained an extensive correspondence with him in which she told
him
of the health of their children, social events in Worcester, and
details
of her household management and expenses.(2) A letter written in
1803,
near the end of her husband's term in the United States Senate,
Rebecca
Faulkner Foster, who had remained in Brookfield with four small
children,
expressed her anticipation of his return home. 'I rejoice the time
draws
nigh you have fixed upon to quit the Public walks of life and
retire to
your little family circle - ten long winters have rolled away in
dull
repetition. I hope we shall be permitted to have the remainder of
our
winters together in peaceful and happy retirement.'(3)
Dwight Foster returned to Brookfield and continued to be
actively involved
in public service on a local level until around 1820. After her
husband's
death in 1828, Rebecca Faulkner Foster lived in Worcester with her
youngest
daughter Sarah Dwight Foster Burnside.(4) This miniature was
probably
painted toward the end of her life when she was living with the
Burnsides.
When Rebecca Faulkner Foster died in 1834, at the age of
seventy-two,
her son-in-law wrote in his diary, 'This day, at 15 minutes past
11 Mrs.
Foster, our dear and venerable Mother breathed her last,
surrounded by
her children. Her struggle with nature was long and distressing in
the
extreme, but she has gone to her eternal rest.'(5)
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1) For additional biographical information on Dwight Foster
see Frederick
Clifton Pierce, Foster Genealogy (Chicago: W. B. Conkley, Co.,
1899),
222.
2) These letters, along with Dwight Foster's political
correspondence featuring
discussions of national trade issues, foreign affairs, and aspects
of
the events surrounding the Louisiana Purchase, are all preserved
in the
manuscript collection of the American Antiquarian Society. In 1813
he
became a member of the American Antiquarian Society, and his
descendants
later donated important pamphlets from his personal library,
including
Samuel Hopkins's Dialogue Concerning the Slavery of the Africans
(1776)
and Fisher Ames's An Oration on the Sublime Virtues of General
George
Washington (1800). Dwight Foster Correspondence, Rebecca Faulkner
Foster
Correspondence, Foster Family Papers, 1740-1884, American
Antiquarian
Society Manuscript Collection.
3) Rebecca Faulkner Foster to Dwight Foster, January 30,
1803, Foster Family
Papers.
4) Before 1821, Sophia Dwight Foster Burnside maintained a
weekly correspondence
with her mother, which is preserved in the American Antiquarian
Society's
Foster Family Papers.
5) Samuel M'Gregore Burnside Diary, May 9, 1834, Samuel
M'Gregore Burnside
Papers, 1783-1850. American Antiquarian Society Manuscript
Collection.
Burnside describes Foster's funeral in his entry for May 12,
1834.
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This site and all contents © 2004 American Antiquarian
Society
Last updated December 10, 2004
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