Julia Evelina Smith

Julia Evelina Smith was born in Glastonbury, Connecticut, on 27 May 1792. She was the daughter of Hannah Hadassah Hickok (or Hickock) Smith (1767-1850) and Zephaniah H. Smith (1758-1836). Her sisters were Hancy Zephina (1787-1871); Cyrinthia Sacretia (1788-1864); Laurilla Aleroyla (1789-1857); and Abby Hadassah (1797-1878). Her father was a Congregationalist minister, but later turned to the law. He was a firm abolitionist. Her mother was well educated, having studied Latin, Italian, mathematics, and astronomy, as well as writing poetry.

Julia Smith knew Latin, Greek, and Hebrew. Her translation of the Bible was published in Hartford in 1876. For a time, Julia Smith taught at the Emma Willard school in Troy, New York, but spent most of her life in Glastonbury. After the death of her parents and three of her sisters, Julia Smith lived with her sister Abby on the family homestead in Glastonbury. Abby managed the farm, allowing Julia, who was more retiring and dependent, to pursue her academic interests.

Abby and Julia Smith took an interest in women's suffrage in about 1869, after having to pay the same highway tax twice. They began attending suffrage meetings in Hartford and speaking publicly against taxing women, who were not yet allowed to vote. From 1873 until her death in 1878, Abby Smith refused to pay taxes without a vote in the town meeting, and her sister Julia joined in this resistance. A tract of the sisters' land was disposed of at public auction to pay their taxes, and their cows were repeatedly sold to pay delinquent taxes. Abby and Julia Smith supported the women's suffrage movement by writing letters to the press, speaking at local meetings and suffrage conventions, and annually petitioning the Connecticut legislature for a woman's right to vote. In January 1878, the sisters attended a hearing on the equal suffrage amendment before a committee of the United States Senate, where Julia Smith spoke. The Smith sisters and their cows became known throughout the United States and abroad and added impetus to the movement to allow women the right to vote.

Abby Hadassah Smith died 23 July 1878. Julia Smith, who was dependent on Abby, struck up a friendship with Amos A. Parker of Fitzwilliam, New Hampshire, after he sent her a condolence letter. She married him 9 April 1879, at the age of 86. Julia Smith moved to Hartford with her husband. She died 6 March 1886.