Hope Brown

Although mostly forgotten by history, Hope Brown was, in a way, the Mother of Providence. She is significant to the history of Rhode Island because her family, especially her sons, played such an important role in building the city of Providence and fostering American political and economic independence.

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Hope Power was born on January 4, 1702 in Providence, RI and died almost 90 years later on June 8, 1792, also in Providence. She was born into the wealthy Power family and was the daughter of Nicholas Power III (1673-1734) and Mercy Tillinghast (1679-1769). Nicholas Power was a colonel in the colonial militia and has been described as carrying a silver-hilted sword and an ivory-topped cane. Along with these accessories, Nicholas Power could boast the first Providence home with a dining room. Nicholas was Providence’s leading merchant in the early 18th century and was also proprietor of the town’s first rum distillery. His first marriage was to Mary Hale (1679-1700), who bore a daughter, Mary (1696-1741). Around 1701 Nicholas married Mercy Tillinghast, who shortly afterwards gave birth to their first daughter, Hope. Nicholas and Mercy had five other children: Joseph, Anne, John, Nicholas, and Mary Mercy Power. It was a large family, consisting of the six children of Mercy Tillinghast and one of Mary Hale. Since Nicholas Power possessed substantial wealth, Hope and her siblings lived in better conditions than most other people during this period, which perhaps explains her longevity.

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James Brown, Jr.’s (1698-1739) decision to marry Hope Power signified his lack of interest in his father’s ministry as he instead followed Nicholas Power into trade. On December 21, 1722 at Providence, RI, twenty year old Hope married James Brown. The couple was married by Justice Thomas Olney, whose father Thomas Olney, Sr. had been deeded land by Roger Williams. In 1723 Hope’s father underwrote James Brown’s first sea voyage to the West Indies. The ship was a forty-five foot sloop called the Four Bachelors, which was a large ship. Over the years James became a successful merchant, trading rum, molasses, slaves, and other goods. James Brown became the first Providence-based owner of a slave ship, the Mary, which in 1736 became the first ship that sailed from Providence specifically to procure slaves.

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Brown’s house has been described as very busy but comfortable. Hope maintained it with the help of at least one of the four family slaves. James and Hope had a very large family that consisted of five sons and one daughter. Their eldest son James, a sea captain lived from 1724 to 1750, Nicholas lived from 1729-91, their daughter Mary lived from 1731-1795, Joseph lived 1733-1785, John lived from 1736 to 1803, and lastly Moses was born in 1738 and died in 1836. In 1739, shortly after the birth of her youngest son, Hope’s husband James died. According to his will, Hope and her brother-in-law Joseph Brown became the administrators of his estate and any and all debts. The death of her husband meant her last two children, John and Moses, had no memory of their father.

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Hope’s sons were educated mostly by James’s brother Obadiah, who introduced them to the world of business. Her sons became patriots and business leaders, overseeing business ventures spanning from their iron ore foundry (called Hope’s Furnace) to the China Trade, the Slave Trade, and other enterprises. John and Moses became the best known of the five Brown brothers, and they are profiled most extensively in Charles Rappleye’s Sons of Providence. According to Rappleye, when Moses and his family moved into their Elmgrove estate overlooking the Seekonk River in 1772, his mother, aunt, sister, and sister-in-law moved in with them. Hope and the rest of the women provided support and an inner sanctum for Moses during a period in which his own developing moral code was being tested, particularly in the debates about slavery and Quaker pacifism in a time of war. The first United States census in 1790 listed Hope in a household consisting of three family members and three free white persons. This illustrates the fact that while she lived with the anti-slavery Moses at least, Hope lived without slaves. Hope may have adopted the Quaker views of her son and daughter-in-law regarding slavery’s immorality or else freed her slaves to appease them.

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Hope’s progeny helped secure American independence, created Brown University and other important institutions in Rhode Island, and publicly struggled with the problem that would divide many American families: slavery. It was this issue that first split her sons John and Moses. Perhaps the most telling story of this matriarch is the fact she outlived most of her family. She outlived her husband and all of her siblings excluding her brother Joseph, and outlived all of her children except Mary Vanderlight, John Brown, and Moses Brown. She died at the age of ninety on June 8, 1792 and was buried in the North Burial Ground alongside her husband James. Visitors will undoubtedly notice that James Brown’s gravestone is much different from his wife’s. His grave is marked by finely chiseled drawings of what appears to be a cherub face surrounded by angel’s wings, as well as a floral pattern engraved on the sides. Conversely, Hope’s grave marker of four decades later is plainly crafted; it simply displays her name and date of death along with her vital family information. Hope and James may have been husband and wife, but their gravestones are different because the styles and tastes had changed after the Revolutionary War. The colonial designs, which were more elaborate (and interesting), were replaced by a much simpler, classical style. The differences between the gravestones illustrate how much things had changed by the time of her death. Born a colonial subject of English King William III, several months before the formation of the United Kingdom, she died an American citizen. She ended her life in a much larger and more influential version of the town in which she was born, and her maternal love and guidance helped lay the foundations of the Providence we know today.

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Joshua Choiniere, Student at Rhode Island College

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Further Reading

Arnold, Samuel Greene. History of the State of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations: 1701-1790. Volume 2. D. Appleton & Co., 1889.

Hedges, James. The Browns of Providence Plantation: The Colonial Years. Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 1952.

Rappleye, Charles. Sons of Providence: The Brown Brothers, the Slave Trade, and the American Revolution. New York: Simon & Schuster, 2006.

The James Brown II (1698-1739) Papers are at the Rhode Island Historical Society (http://www.rihs.org/mssinv/Mss309.htm)