Sources of Early Knowledge
When European colonists arrived in America, they brought with them knowledge about the means for inducing abortion that had circulated among women and men since antiquity. While the primary source of information for most women about how to effect an abortion remained other women, literate women also drew on the knowledge contained in herbals such as John Gerard’s Herball and Nicholas Culpeper’s The English Physician, or early sex manuals like the anonymous Aristotle’s Masterpiece, all of which were widely reprinted and extremely popular. In addition, women likely learned about techniques to abort through midwives, a profession that was composed almost exclusively of women until the 19th century. Finally, some women may have gained this knowledge from enslaved or Native American women—the former having adapted the knowledge they brought with them from Africa, the latter having acquired it from long familiarity with the properties of native plants.
The Herball, or, General Historie of Plants
John Gerard
London: Printed by Adam Islip, 1636
One of the standard reference works of its day and one that remained influential throughout the 18th century, John Gerard’s Herball would have been one of several sources that literate women might have consulted for information about herbal abortifacients. Among the most popular of the many plants with such properties was pennyroyal. On the reverse of this page, Gerard lists as the chief of this plant’s virtues that it “provoketh the monthly terms.” Since pregnancy was the most common cause of “obstruction”—the term most often used during the period for the suspension of a woman’s menstrual cycle—readers likely understood Gerard to be commending pennyroyal’s use as a natural method of reproductive control.
The English Physician Enlarged
Nicholas Culpeper
Exeter [New Hampshire]: Printed by James Scammon, 1824
Even more popular than Gerard’s Herball was Nicholas Culpeper’s The English Physician Enlarged, a work that was reprinted more than forty times between 1656 and 1800. Printed in small formats that were designed to be affordable, Culpeper’s Physician aimed to democratize knowledge of the medicinal properties of many commonly available plants, including those, like tansy, with abortifacient properties. American editions such as this one made it a point to assure readers that the recipes contained within were "made of American herbs." Like other herbalists of his time, Culpeper often attributed seemingly contrary properties to certain plants, as he does here where he both commends tansy to women “that desire children” and stresses its usefulness for “procur[ing] women’s courses.”
The Midwife’s Guide, Being the Complete Works of Aristotle
[Anonymous]
New York: Printed for the Trade, 1845
Another source of knowledge about abortion available to women came from midwives, many of whom would have used the herbs recommended by Gerard and Culpeper in the ordinary course of their work, whether in helping a woman to deliver a child that had died in the womb or in assisting with the expulsion of the placenta following childbirth. Gerard, for example, notes pennyroyal’s effectiveness for both of these processes. While this manual for midwives makes clear that a midwife is “by no means [to prescribe] such medicines as will cause abortion,” its anonymous author nevertheless provides readers with knowledge of the very herbs—dittany, juniper berries, betony, pennyroyal—commonly used to induce abortion.