Good luck and magic

Elizabeth Parker’s cross-stitched account circa 1830 of her emotional trauma and suicide attempt after her employer pushed her down the stairs when she resisted his sexual advance. Elizabeth begins, “As I cannot write I put this down simply and freely as I might speak to a person whose intimacy and tenderness I can fully intrust myself…”

In some ways things have changed so much for women, but in others, not that much. The specter of assault by employers, violence from men when their attentions are rebuffed, the feelings of guilt and pain after the assault, the concealment of the event and her feelings.