Thomas Wentworth Higginson

Unitarian clergyman Thomas Wentworth Higginson was both an early advocate for women’s rights and a radical abolitionist. He helped to finance John Brown’s failed insurrection at Harpers Ferry and later commanded an African American regiment during the Civil War. Higginson emerged as a prolific author in the postwar years and is best known for his mentorship of Emily Dickinson, whose poetry he aided in publishing after her death. During his sister-in-law’s estrangement (1853–55) from her irresponsible husband (the poet William Ellery Channing II), Higginson sheltered her and her young children—three of whom appear with him in this portrait.