All Our Relations

This study moves beyond the patriarchal household to investigate the complex, meaningful connections among siblings in early America. Taking South Carolina as a case study, Lorri Glover challenges deeply held assumptions about family, gender and cultural values in the 18th century. Siblings and kin formed the foundation on which South Carolina gentry built their emotional and social worlds. Adopting a co-operative, interdependent attitude and paying little attention to gendered notions of power, siblings and kin sered one another as surrogate parents, mentors, friends, confidants and life-long allies. Elite men and women simultaneously used those family connections to advance their interests at the expense of unrelated rivals.