Reed, Rebecca Theresa. Six Months In a Convent.

Boston: Russell, Odiorne & Metcalf, 1835. The full title is: Six Months in a Convent, or the narrative of Rebecca Theresa Reed, who was under the Influence of the Roman Catholics about Two Years, and an Inmate of the Ursuline Convent on Mount Benedict, Charlestown, Mass. Written by a young Episcopalian postulant in the convent, the book purports to be an account of the woman’s mistreatment at the hands of the nuns. Although it was published after the burning of the convent by a mob in 1834, copies of the manuscript were said to have been in circulation before the event. The book sells some 200,000 copies within a month of its release and becomes the best-selling book in the U.S. until publication of Uncle Tom’s Cabin.