Charles Carleton Coffin | Page 3

wooden and pewter plates. She was
just the kind of a woman to be the mother of patriots and to make the
Revolution a success. The couple had been married nine years, when
the news of the marching of the British upon Lexington reached
Boscawen, on the afternoon of the 20th of April, 1775. Captain Coffin
mounted his horse and rode to Exeter, to take part in the Provincial
Assembly, which gathered the next day. Two years later, he served in
the campaign against Burgoyne. When the militia was called to march
to Bennington, in July, 1777, one soldier could not go because he had
no shirt. Mrs. Coffin had a web of tow cloth in the loom. She at once
cut out the woven part, sat up all night, and made the required garment,
so that he could take his place in the ranks the next morning. One
month after the making of this shirt, the father of Charles Carleton
Coffin was born, July 15.
When the news of Stark's victory at Bennington came, the call was for
every able-bodied man to turn out, in order to defeat Burgoyne. Every
well man went, including Carleton's two grandfathers, Captain Peter
Coffin, who had been out in June, though not in Stark's command, and
Eliphalet Kilborn. The women and children were left to gather in the
crops. The wheat was ripe for the sickle, but there was not a man or boy
to cut it. With her baby, one month old, in her arms, Mrs. Peter Coffin
mounted the horse, leaving her other children in care of the oldest, who
was but seven years old. The heroine made her way six miles through
the woods, fording Black Water River to the log cabin of Enoch Little,
on Little Hill, in the present town of Webster. Here were several sons,
but the two eldest had gone to Bennington. Enoch, Jr., fourteen years
old, could be spared to reap the ripened grain, but he was without shoes,
coat, or hat, and his trousers of tow cloth were out at the knee.
"Enoch can go and help you, but he has no coat," said Mrs. Little.
"I can make him a coat," said Mrs. Coffin.
The boy sprang on the horse behind the heroic woman, who, between
the baby and the boy, rode upon the horse back to the farm. Enoch took
the sickle and went to the wheat field, while Mrs. Coffin made him a

coat. She had no cloth, but taking a meal-bag, she cut a hole in the
bottom for his head, and two other holes for his arms. Then cutting off
the legs of a pair of her stockings, she sewed them on for sleeves, thus
completing the garment. Going into the wheat field, she laid her baby,
the father of Charles Carleton Coffin, in the shade of a tree, and bound
up the cut grain into sheaves.
In 1789, when the youngest child of this Revolutionary heroine was
four months old, she was left a widow, with five children. Three were
daughters, the eldest being sixteen; and two were sons, the elder being
twelve. With rigid economy, thrift, and hard work, she reared her
family. In working out the road tax she was allowed four pence
halfpenny for every cart-load of stones dumped into miry places on the
highway. She helped the boys fill the cart with stones. While the boy
who became Carleton's father managed the steers, hauled and dumped
the load, she went on with her knitting.
Of such a daughter of the Revolution and of a Revolutionary sire was
Carleton's father born. When he grew to manhood he was "tall in
stature, kind-hearted, genial, public-spirited, benevolent, ever ready to
relieve suffering and to help on every good cause. He was an intense
lover of liberty and was always true to his convictions." He fell in love
with Hannah, the daughter of Deacon Eliphalet Kilborn, of Boscawen,
and the couple lived in the old house built by his father. There, after
other children had been born, Charles Carleton Coffin, her youngest
child, entered this world at 9 A. M., July 26, 1823. From this time
forward, the mother never had a well day. After ten years of ill health
and suffering, she died from too much calomel and from slow
starvation, being able to take but little food on account of canker in her
mouth and throat. Carleton, her pet, was very much with her during his
child-life, so that his recollections of his mother were ever very clear,
very tender, and profoundly influential for good.
The first event whose isolation grew defined in the mind of "the baby
new to earth and sky," was an incident of 1825, when he was
twenty-three months old. His maternal grandfather