A Revolutionary Nonbinary Prophet: Public Universal Friend

After nearly dying of typhus in 1776, they returned with a message.

“The heavens were open’d And She saw too Archangels descending from the east, with golden crowns upon there [sic] heads, clothed in long white Robes, down to the feet; Bringing a sealed Pardon from the living God.” In a note found in the Friend’s Bible titled “A Memorandum of the Introduction of the Fatal Fever,” Public Universal Friend described the vision they experienced that altered their life. 

The Public Universal Friend was a Quaker born as Jemima Wilkinson in 1752 in Cumberland, Rhode Island. In 1776, after suffering a fever, the Jemima Wilkinson claimed to have “died” and been reborn as the Public Universal Friend (the Friend). Through this vision, the Friend believed they were called to preach as God’s mouthpiece. The Friend immediately began spreading the word of their rebirth in their hometown and throughout towns in New England. Their powerful oration and stances on women’s equality and the prohibition of slavery created a small following, known as the Society of Universal Friends. 

While their beliefs were primarily standard Quaker doctrine, many onlookers were more focused on their androgynous appearance. After their rebirth, the Friend refused to respond to their old name, dressed themselves in androgynous preachers’ clothes, and forbade their followers from referring to them using gendered pronouns. One description of their clothing in 1787 describes them wearing:

“…light cloth Cloke with a Cape like a Man’s–Purple Gown, long sleeves to Wristbands–Mans shirt down to the Hands with Neckband–purple handkerchief or Neckcloth tied around the neck like a man’s–No Cap–Hair combed turned over & not long–wear a Watch–Man’s Hat.”

In addition, their tone and confidence were also considered “masculine.” Their manner of speech deeply compelled and sometimes confused their audience, who often speculated as to whether the Friend was truly a man or a woman. One onlooker wrote: “What she said, or of the subject matter, nothing is remembered; but her person, dress and manner is as palpable… as though she thus looked and spake but yesterday.”

Of the detractors of their following, the Friend said:

“They hate us without a cause, and thus evilly entreat us in the darkness of their minds, and in the ignorance and hardness of their hearts, for which my soul doth pity them, and even entreat thee for them, that if possible their eyes may be yet opened.“

The Society of Universal Friends grew in Rhode Island and slowly spread throughout New England, as the Friend traveled constantly. Eventually the Friend expanded their reach to Pennsylvania, shifting the group’s headquarters to Worcester, Pennsylvania, in 1787 and permanently leaving New England in 1789. During their short time in Pennsylvania, the Friend was planning to establish a settlement in rural New York, which they founded in 1790. They named it Jerusalem. With frequent land disputes and attempts to arrest the Friend for blasphemy–both stemming from the Friend’s former followers– the Friend persisted in Jerusalem but struggled to bring in new recruits. The Friend eventually passed away in 1819 at the age of 66.

The legacy of the Friend is complex, with some portraying them as a manipulative con artist, and others praising their progressive stances. While the language of non-binary gender identity did not exist then in the same way it does today, the Public Universal Friend is often pointed to as one of the first self-described non-binary people in colonial America.

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