Women’s Christian Temperance Union Hatchet
Women’s Christian Temperance Union Hatchet
Protesters used prayers, hymns—and sometimes axes—to call attention to alcoholism
In the 19th century, alcoholism wreaked havoc on families and communities. The Women’s Christian Temperance Union strove to abolish the liquor trade, reduce consumption of alcohol, and secure pledges of abstinence. In 1873, at the courthouse in Washington, Ohio, women celebrated the closing of two saloons with songs and prayers, but then, according to contemporary accounts, “axes were placed in the hands of the women who had suffered most, and swinging through the air, they came down with ringing blows, bursting in the heads of the casks, and flooding the gutters of the street.”
