Elizabeth Smith Miller known as 'Libby' was an advocate and financial supporter of the women’s rights movement and the daughter of antislavery philanthropist Gerrit Smith

Gerrit Smith

Gerrit Smith was a leading United States social reformer, abolitionist, politician, and philanthropist...

 and spouse, the abolitionist Ann Carroll Fitzhugh

Ann Carroll Fitzhugh

Ann Carroll Fitzhugh was an American abolitionist, mother of Elizabeth Smith Miller, and the spouse to Gerrit Smith. Her older brother was Henry Fitzhugh. Ann Fitzhugh and Gerrit Smith’s Peterboro, New York home was a station on the Underground Railroad...

. Elizabeth Miller was born September 20, 1822. In 1843, Elizabeth married Charles Dudley Miller. and moved to Geneva, New York

Geneva, New York

Geneva is a city in Ontario and Seneca counties in the U.S. state of New York. The population was 13,617 at the 2000 census. Some claim it is named after the city and canton of Geneva in Switzerland. Others believe the name came from confusion over the letters in the word "Seneca" written in cursive...

. Elizabeth and Charles Dudley Miller occupied the “Cottage Across the Brook,” on her father’s estate at Peterboro, New York

Peterboro, New York

Peterboro, located about twenty-five miles southeast of Syracuse, New York, is a historic hamlet situated in the Town of Smithfield, Madison County, New York.-Founding:...

. It was later the home of their son, Gerrit Smith Miller. The family later moved to Geneva, New York

Geneva, New York

Geneva is a city in Ontario and Seneca counties in the U.S. state of New York. The population was 13,617 at the 2000 census. Some claim it is named after the city and canton of Geneva in Switzerland. Others believe the name came from confusion over the letters in the word "Seneca" written in cursive...

 where Elizabeth lived until 1911.

National Women's Right Convention

At the third National Women's Rights Convention

National Women's Rights Convention

The National Women's Rights Convention was an annual series of meetings that increased the visibility of the early women's rights movement in the United States. First held in 1850 in Worcester, Massachusetts, the National Women's Rights Convention combined both male and female leadership, and...

 gavelled in Syracuse, New York

Syracuse, New York

Syracuse is a city in and the county seat of Onondaga County, New York, United States, the largest U.S. city with the name "Syracuse", and the fifth most populous city in the state. At the 2010 census, the city population was 145,170, and its metropolitan area had a population of 742,603...

, Smith Miller was the author of a motion to create State-based women's rights organizations when the motion to create a national organization failed. She was with Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Elizabeth Cady Stanton

Elizabeth Cady Stanton was an American social activist, abolitionist, and leading figure of the early woman's movement...

 and Susan B. Anthony

Susan B. Anthony

Susan Brownell Anthony was a prominent American civil rights leader who played a pivotal role in the 19th century women's rights movement to introduce women's suffrage into the United States. She was co-founder of the first Women's Temperance Movement with Elizabeth Cady Stanton as President...

 in the founding of the National Woman Suffrage Association.

Literary Activity

Following Gerritt Smith’s death in 1874, Elizabeth Smith Miller worked with biographer Octavius Brooks Frothingham on the story of Gerritt Smith’s life. When Frothingham went so far as to alleged that Smith had prior knowledge of John Brown

John Brown

John Brown may refer to:* John Brown , American who led an anti-slavery revolt in Harpers Ferry, Virginia in 1859* John Brown , Scottish physician who taught that disease was caused by either excessive or inadequate stimulationJohn Brown may also refer to:- American :* John Y. Brown, Sr. , U.S...

’s raid on Harper’s Ferry, Elizabeth ordered the publisher to recall the tomes, break their bindings, and remove the information. In her later years, Smith Miller penned a home economics treatise.

Dress Code Reform

An advocate of Victorian dress reform

Victorian dress reform

During the middle and late Victorian period, various reformers proposed, designed, and wore clothing supposedly more rational and comfortable than the fashions of the time. This was known as the dress reform or rational dress movement...

, Elizabeth Smith Miller first wore the Turkish pantaloons and knee length skirt later popularized by Amelia Bloomer

Amelia Bloomer

Amelia Jenks Bloomer was an American women's rights and temperance advocate. Even though she did not create the women's clothing reform style known as bloomers, her name became associated with it because of her early and strong advocacy.-Early life:Bloomer came from a family of modest means and...

 in The Lily. The apparel and its undergarment

Undergarment

Undergarments or underwear are clothes worn under other clothes, often next to the skin. They keep outer garments from being soiled by bodily secretions and discharges, shape the body, and provide support for parts of it. In cold weather, long underwear is sometimes worn to provide additional...

was similar to utilitarian outfits also worn by women of the utopian Oneida Community and the Oneida Nation’s women. Dress reform was seen as essential in liberating women from the functional constraints imposed on their activities by conventions reinforcing a male dominated society. “Bloomers” were worn by leaders of the women’s rights movement as an act of rebellion until the amount of attention the protest received in the popular press became a distraction from the movement.