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There are no portraits of Margaret Brent, but this 1976 conjectural painting by Louis Glanzman depicts the attorney
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THE VOICES of more than 600 Stafford children will fill the halls of the county's newest elementary school when it opens next month.
The voices of an estimated 60 million women will be heard at the polls two months later when America elects a president.
Both groups share in the legacy of a woman who raised her voice more than 350 years ago in advocating women's rights, the practice of law and religious tolerance.
Her name was Margaret Brent.
She lived from 1601 to 1671 and is recognized as both the nation's first female attorney and the first woman in America to demand the right to vote. She also was the first woman to own enormous tracts of land in both Maryland and Virginia, and lived the last two decades of her life in present-day Stafford County.
Brent also is believed to be buried in Stafford. And that's partly why Margaret Brent Elementary School, which will welcome its first students this fall near the intersection of Mountain View and Choptank roads, was named in her honor.
How far was Margaret Brent ahead of her time?
Her demand for voting rights came 272 years before the passage of the 19th Amendment granted women's suffrage in 1920. Her first appearances before the provincial court came 220 years before a handful of pioneering American women began legal careers in the 1860s. And her family's acceptance of religious diversity on the Virginia frontier came more than 100 years before Thomas Jefferson penned the Virginia Statute for Religious Freedom.
"For a woman to accomplish so much at a time when women had so few rightswell, it's just amazing," said Jane Conner, president of the Stafford County Historical Society.
"She's a great role model. The lesson the kids can learn from Margaret Brent is that if you set your mind to it, you can do anything."
During his tenure as a member of the Stafford County School Board, David Kerr of Aquia Harbour was a motivating force in having an elementary school named for Brent.
He said he first became interested because of Brent's connection to Stafford and because she thrived as a single woman living a frontier existence. Then, the more he learned, the more impressed he became.
"She just really stands out," Kerr said. "She pushed back against the norms of the era, challenged the established order and, in my view, was a person of will, tenacity, gall and courage.
"She didn't bow to the established order, and pushed the envelope in terms of a woman's role in society like it had never been pushed before."
Margaret Brent was 37 years old when she arrived in Maryland in 1638 with her sister, Mary, and two brothers, Giles and Foulke.
Little is known about her early life or her educational background. Margaret was one of 13 children born to Richard and Elizabeth Brent, who were Catholic gentry living in Gloucestershire, England. Her father was a sheriff and there was a family history of barristers, so the law probably was a frequent topic of discussion in the household.
Young women in those days usually were dominated by their fathers until they married, at which time their husbands took control of both their lives and property.
It is likely that her brothers came to America for religious freedom and to seek economic opportunities that weren't available to them in England as younger sons. There is no record as to why Margaret came to the Maryland colony, but it seems that she was the head of the household from the time of the family's arrival at St. Mary's City.
Margaret Brent was the cousin of Anne Arundel, the wife of Maryland's proprietor, Cecil Calvert, Lord Baltimore, who lived in England. It was his letter of instruction to Maryland officials that gave Brent the same rights as free male colonists and granted her thousands of acres of land.
According to a biography on the Maryland State Archives Web site, Margaret Brent soon was engaged in a variety of business ventures, including land transactions and the trading of indentured servants, tobacco and livestock. She also profited from lending capital to new immigrants. She frequently appeared in court to protect her interests, and occasionally acted as an agent for her brothers, as well.
She became the largest landowner and perhaps the most influential resident in Maryland. But being a member of the fairer sex still caused enough confusion that she was listed in deed books as "Margaret Brent, gentleman."
Although men outnumbered woman six to one in the Maryland colony, Brent never married.
"You have to remember, this was a time when most women couldn't read," Stafford historian Jerrilynn Eby said of America in the mid-1600s.
"In most cases, women would find a husband, raise children and manage a household. If they were single or widowed and owned property, they would have someone act for then as an agent."
Historian Aleck Loker, writing for the Chronicles of St. Mary's magazine in 1998, said that Margaret Brent's name appears in Maryland court records 134 times between 1642 and 1650.
"That level of legal activity clearly establishes Margaret Brent as a singularly independent woman with a penchant for public discourse," wrote Loker. "Her opponents in these cases were men, often of very high standing in the community, including the governor."
Eby said that Brent was far ahead of her time in understanding legal matters and managing property.
"She apparently was a very good speaker," Eby said. "She was persuasive and could get people to go along with her line of thinking. In all my research, I can't think of another woman at that time who recorded land patents in her own name--not a single one."
Said Kerr: "The very notion of a woman making a case before a Colonial magistrate in that era is absolutely amazing.What kind of force of character, intellect and just plain guile that took must have been something else."
Since 1991, the American Bar Association has presented the Margaret Brent Women Lawyers of Achievement Awards on an annual basis.
Previous winners range from small-firm practitioners in Alabama and Alaska to U.S. Supreme Court Associate Justices Sandra Day O'Connor and Ruth Bader Ginsburg.
According to the ABA, the Margaret Brent Award winners "are selected on the basis of their professional accomplishments and their role in opening doors for other women lawyers."
Unfortunately, there is no known portrait of Margaret Brent.
The best conjectural images of her--a 1976 painting by Louis Glanzman and a 1934 drawing by Edwin Tunis--offer two interpretations of an appearance by Brent before Maryland assemblymen.
In Glanzman's painting, a matronly Brent shakes her hand at the assemblymen during an impassioned speech, while the men huddle in a corner of the darkened room.
In the drawing by Tunis, a younger and more feminine Brent stands reverently in the glow of sunshine from a large window while a gentleman--perhaps the governor--seems to be chastising her from his seat of power.
Which image best depicts Brent's true personality is something we may never know.
We do know that she was about 47 years old on Jan. 21, 1648, when she appeared before the assembly and demanded "voice and vote"--in other words, full participation in the legislative process.
She wanted one vote because of her status as a freewoman and landowner, and a second vote as Lord Baltimore's attorney.
Maryland Gov. Leonard Calvert, Lord Baltimore's brother, had died the previous year, in 1647. And from his deathbed he had appointed Margaret Brent as his executor. The Maryland colony faced a severe crisis at that point. A rebellion in 1645 had forced Gov. Calvert to flee to Virginia, where he gathered a group of armed volunteers. He returned to Maryland in 1646 and regained control. But at the time of his death, the soldiers had not been paid and were on the verge of mutiny. Nothing less than the fate of the young colony hung in the balance.
Before his death, Calvert's simple instructions to Brent were to "take all and pay all." One of Brent's first actions was to have Calvert's power of attorney for his brother in England transferred to her. This request was granted and was the basis for her demand for a second vote in the assembly.
"The fact that [Gov. Calvert] chose Margaret Brent to handle his affairs, when he could have had anyone, shows the respect he had for her ability," said Eby.
Brent's request for voting rights was summarily denied--a decision she protested to no avail.
Some historians point out that Brent's motivation for a vote was, in part, to preserve her family's wealth and influence. And they question whether Brent should be considered America's first suffragist, because she acted only on her own behalf and did not specifically advocate expanding all women's rights.
But Loker wrote that it would be wrong to apply "suffragette standards" from the 19th and 20th centuries to Brent's act of courage before the assemblymen.
"On that day, she said by her actions that she believed her sex was irrelevant when it came to the right to be heard and participate in the legislature," Loker stated. "We will never know whether she took action on behalf of all women.
"However, Margaret Brent was an intelligent and perceptive woman who could clearly see the future consequences of her action. She would have understood the principle of setting precedents."
As for the crisis involving the unpaid Virginia militiamen, Brent managed to raise the necessary funds from the estate of the late Gov. Calvert and by selling some of Lord Baltimore's cattle. Thus she ensured the survival of the colony.
Her actions, however, prompted a scathing letter from Lord Baltimore that accused Brent of overstepping her authority.
The Maryland Assembly came to Brent's defense, however, sending a response to England that stated: "As for Mistress Brent's undertaking and meddling with your Lordship's estate here, we do verily believe and in conscience report that it was better for the colony's safety at that time in her hands than in any man's in the whole province after your brother's death. For the soldiers would never have treated any other with that civility and respect."
Another resolution by the Maryland Assembly is worth noting here. It was passed on March 25, 1984--that's 336 years after Brent's demand for a vote--and reads as follows:
"Be it hereby known to all that the Maryland General Assembly on this 350th anniversary of the founding of Maryland extends to Mistress Margaret Brent belatedly but appropriately, the right to vote and fully participate in the public affairs of this great state of Maryland."
Having lost favor with Lord Baltimore, the Brents left Maryland in search of new frontiers to conquer. They found what they were looking for in the Widewater peninsula of present-day Stafford County.
Giles Brent arrived first in 1648, along with his 20-year-old wife, Mary Kittamaquad, an Indian princess who had married Brent when she was only 12.
Margaret Brent and her sister, Mary, arrived in Virginia two years later and joined Giles at his Aquia Creek plantation called Peace. Margaret, who had maintained her vast holdings in Maryland, immediately began to acquire property in Virginia.
The headright system in place at the time allowed wealthy colonists to acquire land grants in exchange for paying the transportation fees for new settlers.
Eby can document that the Brents patented almost 13,000 acres of land in Virginia. But she knows that figure is low because some land records have been lost. The Brent family holdings were not contiguous, but stretched from the Rappahannock near present-day Fredericksburg to the Potomac and the site of present-day Alexandria.
The Brents are recognized as the first Catholic settlers in Virginia and are known for their acceptance of religious diversity on the northern frontier of a Virginia colony that was primarily Anglican at the time.
Today, a bronze crucifix honoring the Brent family faces motorists heading north on U.S. 1 near the intersection of Telegraph Road in North Stafford. Standing 20 feet tall, the crucifix was erected by the Richmond Catholic Women's Club in 1930.
"Even if she were not America's first woman attorney and first suffragist, Margaret Brent would be a significant figure just because her family allowed people of all religions to settle here," said Conner of the Stafford Historical Society. "It's the first instance of religious toleration in Virginia."
Margaret Brent died in 1671 at the age of 70. Historians have found no grave marker, but it is believed she is buried either in the Brent family cemetery near the crucifix or in some other long-lost burial plot in the Widewater area.
So, how would Margaret Brent fit into modern society?
"Oh, I think she would be a lawyer--and a successful one," said Eby. "I think she really loved the law and was good at it. And she was ambitious--just as ambitious as any of the male landowners at that time."
Mary Ann Jung agrees. She has a background in both history and acting and has performed a one-woman show about Margaret Brent for 14 years.
"I suspect she would fare very well," Jung said. "Considering how flexible she was, how adaptable she was and how forward-thinking she was, I think she would appreciate all the things we have today."
Kerr said that a modern-day Margaret Brent probably would be challenging convention just as she did in the 1600s, regardless of her career path.
"She had high moral principles," he said. "She stood up for them. And I think if she were transported to the 21st century, she would still be doing just that."
Kerr speculated that Brent might be a businesswoman or a lawyer today--or perhaps an elected official.
"Those were her talents over 300 years ago," he said. "And in the more open society of our day, I think she would flourish."
Kerr said he is proud that Margaret Brent Elementary School became a reality.
The new school's motto, "Working Together, Anything is Possible," is based on Brent's life and accomplishments.
"Personally, I like the notion of having a school named after someone you can write an essay about, give a talk about, or do a project on," Kerr said. "Someone, though in some cases long gone, who can give a school a little extra touch of character.
"Margaret Brent is certainly someone who had character."
LEE WOOLF, a longtime reporter and editor with The Free Lance-Star, is bureau manager at the newspaper's North Stafford office. Contact him at 540/720-5470, or lwoolf@freelancestar.com.
