The Signature of All Things

dressing nearly like a Quaker: flannel and wool and dark colors, and with the most homely imaginable poke bonnets. She did not adorn herself with so much as a trinket or a watch chain, nor would she wear even a speck of lace.
    Prudence’s restrictions were not limited to her wardrobe, either. Her diet became as simple and restricted as her mode of dress—all cornbread and molasses, by the looks of things. She was never seen to take a glass of wine, or even tea or lemonade. As her children came along, Prudence had raised them in the same miserly manner. A pear plucked from a nearby tree constituted a treat for her boys and girls, whom she trained to turn their faces away from more alluring delicacies. Prudence dressed her children in the same manner in which she dressed herself: in humble clothing, neatly patched. It was as though she wanted her children to look poor. Or perhaps they genuinely were poor, though they had no cause to be.
    “What in the deuce has she gone and done with all her gowns?” Henry would sputter, whenever Prudence came to visit White Acre adorned in rags. “Has she stuffed her mattresses with them?”
    But Alma had seen Prudence’s mattresses, and they were stuffed with straw.
    The wags of Philadelphia had a great sport speculating about what Prudence and her husband had done with the Whittaker dowry. Was Arthur Dixon a gambler, who had squandered the riches on horse races and dog fights? Did he keep another family in another city, who lived in luxury? Or was the couple sitting on a buried treasure of unspeakable wealth, hiding it behind a facade of poverty?
    Over time, the answer emerged: all the money had gone to abolitionist causes. Prudence had quietly turned over most of her dowry to the Philadelphia Abolitionist Society shortly after her marriage. The Dixons had also used the money to purchase slaves out of captivity, which could cost upwards of $1,300 per life. They had paid for the transport of several escapedslaves to safety in Canada. They had paid for the publication of innumerable agitating pamphlets and tracts. They had even funded black debating societies, which helped train Negroes to argue their own cause.
    All these details were revealed back in 1838, in a story that the Inquirer had published about Prudence Whittaker Dixon’s peculiar living habits. Spurred by a lynch mob’s burning of a local abolitionist meeting hall, the newspaper had been looking for interesting—even diverting—stories about the antislavery movement. A reporter had been pointed in the direction of Prudence Dixon when a prominent abolitionist made mention of the quiet generosity of the Whittaker heiress. The newspaperman had been immediately intrigued; the Whittaker name, hitherto, had not exactly been associated around Philadelphia with boundless acts of generosity. What’s more, of course, Prudence was vividly beautiful—a fact that always draws attention—and the contrast between her exquisite face and her plain mode of living only made her a more fascinating subject. With her elegant white wrists and delicate neck peeking from within those dreary clothes, she had every appearance of being a goddess in captivity—Aphrodite trapped in a convent. The reporter had been unable to resist her.
    The story appeared on the front page of the paper, along with a flattering engraving of Mrs. Dixon. Most of the article was familiar abolitionist material, but what captured the imagination of Philadelphians was that Prudence—brought up in the palatial halls of White Acre—was quoted as having declared that for many years she had denied herself and her family any bit of luxury that was produced by a slave’s hands.
    “It may seem innocent to wear South Carolina cotton,” her quote continued, “but it is not innocent, for this is how evil seeps into our home. It may seem a simple pleasure to spoil our children with a treat of sugar, but that pleasure becomes a sin when the sugar was grown by human beings held in unspeakable misery. For that same reason, in our household, we take no coffee or tea. I urge all Philadelphians of good Christian conscience to do the same. If we speak out against slavery, yet continue to enjoy its plunders, we are naught but hypocrites, and how can we believe that the Lord smiles upon our hypocrisy?”
    Later in the article, Prudence went further still: “My husband and I live next door to a family of freed Negroes, consisting of a good and decent man named John