Thomas Robinson Hazard
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Thomas Robinson "Shepherd Tom" Hazard (January 3, 1797 – March 26, 1886) was an American author,
social reformer Reformism is a type of social movement that aims to bring a social or also a political system closer to the community's ideal. A reform movement is distinguished from more radical social movements such as revolutionary movements which reject t ...
, and advocate of Modern Spiritualism.


Early life

Hazard was born on January 3, 1797, in the village of South Kingstown, Rhode Island, the second-eldest son of textile industrialist Rowland Hazard and Mary (
née The birth name is the name of the person given upon their birth. The term may be applied to the surname, the given name or to the entire name. Where births are required to be officially registered, the entire name entered onto a births registe ...
Peace) Hazard. His mother was raised in
Charleston, South Carolina Charleston is the List of municipalities in South Carolina, most populous city in the U.S. state of South Carolina. The city lies just south of the geographical midpoint of South Carolina's coastline on Charleston Harbor, an inlet of the Atla ...
and spent a year studying in London as a girl. His father founded the Peace Dale Manufacturing Company in Peace Dale, Rhode Island in 1802. Among his siblings was older brother Isaac Peace Hazard and younger brother Rowland G. Hazard. A descendant of an old New England
Quaker Quakers are people who belong to the Religious Society of Friends, a historically Protestant Christian set of denominations. Members refer to each other as Friends after in the Bible, and originally, others referred to them as Quakers ...
family, Hazard was a fifth-great-grandson of Thomas Hazard, one of the nine founding settlers of Newport on
Aquidneck Island Aquidneck Island ( ), officially known as Rhode Island, is an island in Narragansett Bay in the state of Rhode Island. The total land area is , which makes it the largest island in the bay. The 2020 United States Census reported its population as ...
in the
Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations The Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations was an English colony on the eastern coast of America, founded in 1636 by Puritan minister Roger Williams after his exile from the Massachusetts Bay Colony. It became a haven for religious d ...
. His paternal grandparents were Thomas Hazard and Elizabeth (née Robinson) Hazard, herself a daughter of William Robinson, the Deputy Governor of the Colony of Rhode Island and Providence Plantations. At twelve, Thomas enrolled in the Friends’ School at West Town, Pennsylvania but left to assist in the operation of the family's wool carding manufactures at Peace Dale. After a gift of two ewes sparked his interest in agriculture and livestock, Hazard acquired the nickname “Shepherd Tom.”


Career

In 1844, Hazard became one of the original twenty three incorporators of the Rhode Island Hospital for the Insane, later
Butler Hospital Butler Hospital is a private, non-profit, psychiatric and substance abuse hospital for adolescents, adults, and seniors, located at 345 Blackstone Boulevard in Providence, Rhode Island. The hospital is affiliated with the Warren Alpert Medical S ...
. The facility was the first of its kind in the state; responsibility for the care of destitute and mentally handicapped citizens at the time fell largely upon local governments. Owing to his extensive record as an outspoken champion of the rights of the “insane poor,” Hazard was appointed by the state to conduct a survey of Rhode Island's poor houses and insane asylums. ''The Report on the Poor and Insane in Rhode Island: Made to the General Assembly at its January Session, 1851'' provided a detailed census of “insane paupers” at thirty-three local facilities. The abuse of disabled Rhode Islanders in rural localities exposed in the report helped abolish state policies which treated mental illness as a crime. Hazard was also a committed antislavery activist and published dozens of tracts in support of the
American Colonization Society The American Colonization Society (ACS), initially the Society for the Colonization of Free People of Color of America, was an American organization founded in 1816 by Robert Finley to encourage and support the repatriation of freeborn peop ...
and the Republic of Liberia. From 1840 to 1841 he served as a Vice President of the ACS. Other causes for which he labored included the abolition of the death penalty in Rhode Island and public education.


Spiritualism

Following the death of his wife in 1854, Hazard became interested in spiritual communication and began visiting mediums in Providence and Boston. The author Maud Howe Elliott, a neighbor and childhood friend of the Hazard children, recalls Shepherd Tom's grief and subsequent obsession with “materialization, spirit life, mediums, psychic photographs.” Hazard penned numerous firsthand accounts of spirit materializations and séances held in a dedicated room at his Portsmouth estate, Vaucluse. After two of his daughters died of tuberculosis and a third drowned herself in a river on the family's property, he dedicated himself exclusively to the defense of mediumship. Hazard authored two books of local folklore, the latter of which became the subject of controversy when Dr. Leroy Vaughn used the work as evidence of Thomas Jefferson's African Heritage, which the
Thomas Jefferson Foundation The Thomas Jefferson Foundation, originally known as the Thomas Jefferson Memorial Foundation, is a private, nonprofit 501(c)(3) corporation founded in 1923 to purchase and maintain Monticello, the primary plantation of Thomas Jefferson, the third ...
has since dismissed.


Personal life

On October 12, 1838, he married Frances Minturn (1813–1854), daughter of New York merchant Jonas Minturn and Esther (née Robinson) Minturn. She was also a niece of Robert Bowne Minturn (who later went into business with Henry Grinnell as
Grinnell, Minturn & Co Grinnell, Minturn & Co. was one of the leading transatlantic shipping companies in the middle 19th century. It is probably best known today as being the owner and operator of the '' Flying Cloud'', arguably the greatest of the clipper ships. His ...
). Together, the couple had five daughter and one son: * Mary Robinson Hazard (1840–1842), who died in childhood. * Frances Minturn Hazard (1842–1877), who died unmarried. * Gertrude Minturn Hazard (1843–1877), who died unmarried. * Anna Peace Hazard (1846–1868), who died unmarried. * Esther Robinson Hazard (1848–1880), who married Edwin James Dunning (1821–1901), the son of Uriah Dunning. * Barclay Hazard (1852–1938), who married Alida Blake, a daughter of Professor Eli Whitney Blake Jr. Hazard died in
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on March 26, 1886.


Published works

*''Eleven Days at Moravia'' (1873) *''Blasphemy; Who Are the Blasphemers? The "orthodox" Christians, or "spiritualists"?'' (1872) *''Modern Spiritualism Scientifically Explained .'' (1875) * ''Recollections of Olden Times: Rowland Robinson of Narragansett and his Unfortunate Daughter: With Genealogies of the Robinson, Hazard, and Sweet families of Rhode Island (1879)'' * ''The Jonnycake Papers of “Shepherd Tom”,: Together with Reminiscences of Narragansett Schools of Former Days (1880)''


References


External links


Thomas Robinson Hazard
at the Rhode Island Heritage Hall of Fame * {{DEFAULTSORT:Hazard, Thomas Robinson 1797 births 1886 deaths American abolitionists American spiritualists Hazard family (Rhode Island)