At the courthouse Alice Frost Blower Tilley (1594-??)

In 1648 my 11x great grandmother, Alice Tilly, was accused of medical malpractice in her role as a midwife in Boston, and sparked American women's first collective political action. Alice was quite a character. Married to a man ten years her junior, she was summoned to court multiple times for civil offences. Even her supporters admitted that she was arrogant. But supporters she had. When Alice was arrested and accused of causing the deaths of women and children she had attended as a midwife the women of Boston and Dorchester rallied to her support. They submitted six petitions, seemingly composed by the women themselves, with 217 signatures representing over a third of the female population of Boston and almost half of the women of Dorchester. They claimed that she was "The Ablest Midwife That Wee Knowe in the Land", and that they feared the consequences if they were deprived of her services. Court records are missing for those years so it is not clear whether Alice was convicted or not, but records do indicate that the women of Boston got what they wanted. Alice seems to have continued practicing midwifery in the following years.