A Cyclopaedia of Female Biography/Lee, Anne

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LEE, ANNE,

Was born at Manchester, in 1736. She was the daughter of a blacksmith, and at an early age she became the wife of one of the same trade. She is distinguished as the person who introduced Shakerism into America, and she became the leader of the sect. Her first "testimony of salvation and eternal life," borne in 1770, was the injunction of celibacy as the perfection of human nature; and next, she claimed to be a divine person. From this time she was honoured with the title of "Mother Anne," while she styled herself "Anne the Word." Having been persecuted in England, she went to America, in 1774, with several members of the society, and formed the first community of Shakers, at Watervliet, near Albany, where she died, in 1784.