Josselyn records that in New England in 1638, “Scolds they gag and set them at their doors for certain hours, for all comers and goers by to gaze at....”

In Virginia:  “A wife convicted of slander was to be carried to the ducking stool to be ducked unless her husband would consent to pay the fine imposed by law for the offense....  Some years after (1646) a woman residing in Northampton was punished for defamation by being condemned to stand at the door of her parish church, during the singing of the psalm, with a gag in her mouth....  Deborah Heighram ... was, in 1654, not only required to ask pardon of the person she had slandered, but was mulcted to the extent of two thousand pounds of tobacco.  Alice Spencer, for the same offence, was ordered to go to Mrs. Frances Yeardley’s house and beg forgiveness of her; whilst Edward Hall, who had also slandered Mrs. Yeardley, was compelled to pay five thousand pounds of tobacco for the county’s use, and to acknowledge in court that he had spoken falsely."[296]

The mere fact that a woman was a woman seems in no wise to have caused merciful discrimination among early colonists as to the manner of punishment.  Apparently she was treated certainly not better and perhaps sometimes worse than the man if she committed an offense.  In the matter of adultery she indeed frequently received the penalty which her partner in sin totally escaped.  In short, chivalry was not allowed to interfere in the least with old-time justice.

FOOTNOTES: 

[230] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 237, p. 396.

[231] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 237.

[232] Howard:  History of Matrimonial Institutions, p. 166.

[233] Howard:  p. 163.

[234] Howard:  p. 200.

[235] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 396.

[236] Diary, Vol.  II, p. 336.

[237] Vol.  III, pp. 144, 165.

[238] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 176.

[239] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 180.

[240a], [240b] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 232.

[241a], [241b] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 262.

[242] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 265.

[243a], [243b] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 266.

[244] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 269.

[245] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 271.

[246] Vol.  III, p. 274.

[247] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 275.

[248] Ravenel:  Eliza Pinckney, p. 55.

[249] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 491.

[250] Sewall’s:  Letter-Book, Col.  I, p. 213.

[251] Diary, Vol.  I, p. 216.

[252] Diary, Vol.  I, p. 228.

[253] Vol.  III, p. 172.

[254] Diary, Vol.  I, p. 368.

[255] Diary, Vol.  II, p. 24.

[256] Diary, Vol.  III, p. 364.

[257] Diary, Vol.  II, p. 347.