Well-behaved women make history when they do the unexpected, when they create and preserve records and when later generations care. - Laurel Thatcher Ulrich

Without the diary we would know nothing of her life after the last of her children was born, nothing of the 816 deliveries she performed between 1785 and 1812. We would not even be certain she had been a midwife. In the spring of 1789, Martha faced a flooding river and a rising tide of births. She attended seven deliveries in March and another seven before the end of April, twice her monthly average. On April 23 she went down the Kennebec to visit several families on the west side of the river opposite Bumberhook. This is how she told

How long God will preserve my strength to perform as I have done of late he only knows. May I trust in him at all times and do good and hee will fullfill his promis according to my Day. May he giv me strength and may I Conduct accordingly.

In a signed affidavit, William Law affirmed that Hyrum Smith had read to him a revelation “so called” that authorized certain men to have more than one wife. Jane Law added her own statement, explaining that the purported revelation “set forth that those women who would not allow their husbands to have more wives than one should be under condemnation before God.” Their statements were powerful because they were simple, straightforward, and true.