A Lady in Defiance
Apr 8, 20143 min
By Heather Frey Blanton
Dorothy Hancock
The biggest, baddest, most bold signature on the Declaration of Independence belongs to John Hancock. Said signature is the icon for fearless rebellion and raw treason. Did you know that when Hancock put his name to that paper, he was a newlywed?
No wonder he was feeling froggy.
So who was the lady who stoked the fires of revolution and made John think he was ten feet tall and bulletproof?
Dorothy “Dolly” Quincy was the youngest daughter of Judge Edmund Quincy. Born to a life of privilege and wealth, she was blessed with brains and beauty. She seems to have had numerous pretty sisters and cousins, too. Like flowers for bees, the Quincy home attracted many young men, including Samuel and John Adams, and the wealthy John Hancock. John had recently inherited his uncle’s holdings and was using his newly acquired fortune to establish a path in politics.
An ardent patriot, he found that the Quincy family shared his love of liberty. Dorothy eagerly desired to see the British head back across the pond and leave the colonists alone. It didn’t help that in 1775 an arrest order was issued for her new beau John. The British thought to take him into custody while they commandeered the ammunition supplies at Lexington. Dorothy was in Lexington visiting Lydia Hancock, John’s aunt, and actually witnessed the Battle of Lexington.
Fearing for her safety, John forbade his fiancée to return to Boston. Supposedly her response was something meek and acquiescent, like, “Recollect, Mr. Hancock, I am not under your authority yet. I shall go to my father’s to-morrow.” The fact that this story survives speaks, I think, volumes about the woman. It is rather apropos she heard” the shot heard round the world.”
In any event, Aunt Lydia talked her out of going. The writing was on the wall. Revolution had exploded and America was at war with the largest military power on the planet. John sent Dorothy and his Aunt to stay with the Rev. Thaddeus Burr in Fairfield while he and the other founding fathers decided how to respond to the battles of Lexington and Concord. That summer, in the midst of such deeply important strategizing, he made time to marry Dorothy. The two rebels headed off immediately to Philadelphia.
A year later, as president of the Continental Congress, John Hancock signed the Declaration of Independence and officially made himself an enemy of the Crown. Dorothy never second-guessed him. She never asked him to back off. She never asked him to value his fortune or family over the cause of liberty. This country had to be free and they had pledged their lives to it.
Married nearly twenty years, the couple had two children. One died in infancy, the other by the age of eight. Dorothy was by John’s side when he passed away in 1793. She re-married several years later to a friend of the family.
Perhaps she never carried secret intelligence or manned a cannon, but Dorothy Hancock was a loyal wife and valued confidante to her husband. She supported the cause of liberty with boundless passion, and carried herself with admirable dignity, even in in the face of tragedy. Sometimes, keeping your head up and your fist raised is a matter of slow, defiant slogging.
Here’s to another Lady in Defiance.
Copyright 2014 Heather Blanton
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