Life in the Iron-Mills; Or, The Korl Woman

Synopsis

Life in the Iron-Mills is a short story written by Rebecca Blaine Harding Davis who was one of the prominent writers of realism genre. Her works had been praised by most important literary figures like Emily Dickinson and Nathaniel Hawthorne, however forgotten by the literary world after her death.

Life in the iron mills is a feminism based work which narrates the story of working class people and based on the incidents during world war time in the industrial revolution era.  Hugh Wolfe works in an iron mill as puddler. Deborah Wolfe, his cousin brings lunch to him by walking for a long distance. Hugh is not in love with her; however he has sympathy for her. Though he has born into poverty, he has the skill for making sculpture and one of the sculptures created by him found by some of the elite people of Iron mill including the mill owner and a Doctor. During their chat, Deborah steals the wallet of the Doctor and justifies her action as they deserve to keep the money.  However they have been convicted for this crime and Hugh has been sentenced for jail term. His terrible situation leads him to committing suicide in the prison. 

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