Photograph, circa 1871, of suffrage-leaders Susan B. Anthony and white-haired Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Letters between Susan B. Anthony and popular public speaker Anna Dickinson echo the, even flirtatious, relationship Anthony had with suffragists she mentored. With Dickinson she desires “to snuggle . . . closer than ever” with her “Chicky Dicky Darlint.”[1] Her bed is “big enough and good enough to take” Anna in.[2] In turn, Dickinson reveals to Anthony a longing “to hold your hand in mine, to hear your voice, in a word, I want you.”[3]

Anthony declared she “never found the man who was necessary to my happiness.”[4] In later life, she companioned with Emily Gross, a wealthy Chicago businessman’s wife. Anthony wrote of her intention to “call in Chicago–at my new lover’s–Mrs. Gross–48 Lake Shore Drive.”[5] After Anthony’s death, a mutual friend revealed, “Times are very hard with dear Mrs. Gross I fear.”[6]

Sources

1. Lillian Faderman, To Believe in Women: What Lesbians Have Done for America—A History (Boston: Mariner, 2000), 26.

2. Faderman, 26.

3. Faderman, 26.

4. Faderman, 29.

5. Faderman, 28.

6. Faderman, 30.