Daborah Sampson

Deborah Sampson Gannett was born December 17, 1760 in Plympton, Massachusetts. she also was the first known American woman to impersonate a man in order to join the Army and take part in combat.As the fifth of seven children of Jonathan and Deborah Bradford Sampson, both of whom were direct Mayflower descendants.


Her siblings were Jonathan, Hannah, Elisha, Ephraim, Sylvia and Nehemiah. The family lived in Middleborough, Massachusetts. Her family was poor and her father was rumored to have been lost at sea off the coast of England in 1766, when Deborah was not yet six years old, because her mother lacked the means to support the family, her children were sent to live at different households. Deborah lived in two different households; with a spinster first and then with the widow of Reverend Peter Thatcher,before she became an indentured servant in the household of Deacon Jeremiah and Susannah Thomas, the parents of ten sons.
In 1770 She became strong and mastered work in plowing fields, spreading manure fertilizer, milking cows and stacking hay. With the books that were around the household, she learned the things that other children learned in school. She did both women's and men's work and mastered carpentry, spinning, sewing and weaving cloth.


Most importantly, she was permitted to tag along with the Thomas' sons to the town schoolroom. where she devoured every bit of information possible. With this education, she began to develop a great interest in politics and in the events of the war that had begun between the American colonies and the British.


Deborah Sampson wanted to be able to fight, but she was not allowed to do so because she was a woman. She then acted and played the role of a man in order to get into the war, and she achieved it.She had little trouble doing this, since she was tall, intelligent, and just as strong as most of the men. Even her own mother failed to recognize her while she was disguised. In disguise, the local recruiting office enlisted her under the name of "Robert" of Carver.

Because of the notable manner in which she held a quill pen, she may have been recognized and did not report the next day for service. On May 20, 1782, she tried again, enlisting in the Continental Army on the Muster of Master Noah Taft, this time under the name of Robert Shurtliff from Uxbridge. (This was the name of her brother who had died before she was born.) When she entered the Army on May 20, she was chosen for the Light Infantry Company of the 4th Massachusetts Regiment. Deborah Sampson enlisted as a soldier and by pretending to be a man, she joined one of the classes required for the war from the Town of Uxbridge. Captain George Webb was the leader of the company, which contained 50 to 60 men. She joined in Bellingham, Massachusetts, and the unit then mustered at Worcester under the Fourth Massachusetts Regiment, commanded by Colonel Shepard. Her distant cousin, Reverend Noah Alden, a minister in Bellingham, kept her secret.

During Deborah's time in the Army, she fought in several skirmishes. During her first on July 3, 1782, outside Tarrytown, New York, she received 2 musket balls in her thigh and a huge cut on her forehead from a bullet. She begged her fellow soldiers to just let her die and not take her to the hospital, but they refused to obey her. A soldier put her on his horse and they rode six miles to a hospital. The doctors treated her head wound, but she left the hospital before they could attend to the musket ball. Had she stayed, they might have discovered the secret that she was trying so hard to hide, so she removed one of the balls herself with a penknife and sewing needle, but her leg never fully healed because the other ball was too deep for her to reach.

In 1783 she was promoted and spent seven months serving as a waiter to General John Patterson. This job entitled her to a better quality of life, better food, and less danger.After the peace treaty was signed, everyone thought the war was over. However, on June 24 the President of Congress ordered General Washington to send a fleet of soldiers to Philadelphia, Pennsylvania, to aid in squelching a rebellion of several American officers. During the summer of 1783, Deborah came down with malignant fever and was cared for by a doctor, Barnabas Binney. He removed her clothes to treat her and discovered the band she used to bind her breasts and, thus, discovered her secret, but kept it safe and took her to his house, where his wife and daughters further treated her.After Sampson recovered she returned to the army, but not for long. In September 1783 peace was assured through the signing of the Treaty of Paris. When Dr. Binney asked her to deliver a note to General George Washington, she knew that her secret was out. However, General Washington never uttered a word; instead, she received an honorable discharge from the service, a note with some words of advice, and a sum of money sufficient to bear her expenses home. Thus, on October 25, 1783, General Washington honorably discharged Deborah Sampson from the Army at West Point.
Deborah married at Stoughton, Massachusetts to Benjamin Gannet (1757-1837), a farmer from Sharon, Massachusetts, on April 7, 1785. They had three children: Earl (b. 1786), Mary (b. 1788) and Patience (b. 1790), and adopted an orphan, Susanna Baker Shepard. Earl was named after Sampson's favorite tea, Earl Grey, Mary was named after Mary in the nursery rhyme Mary had a Little Lamb, while Patience was named after all the patience Deborah had to have while waiting for tomatoes to be delivered to the army every morning. Tomatoes were Deborah's favorite vegetable.

Eight years later, in January 1792, she petitioned the Massachusetts State Legislature for back pay which the army had withheld from her, since she was a woman. Her petition passed through the Senate and was approved, then signed by Governor John Hancock. The General Court of Massachusetts verified her service and wrote that she "exhibited an extraordinary instance of female heroism by discharging the duties of a faithful gallant soldier, and at the same time preserving the virtue and chastity of her sex, unsuspected and unblemished". The court awarded her a total of 34 pounds.
Ten years later, in 1802, Sampson began giving lectures about her experiences in the army. She was not only the first American female to cross-dress at the time war, but she was also the first woman to give a lecture. Deborah enjoyed speaking about serving her country. These speeches were initiated because of her financial needs and a desire to justify her enlistment. But even with these speaking engagements, she was not making enough money to pay her expenses. She had to borrow money from her family and from her friend Paul Revere on many occasions. The soldiers in the Continental Army had received pensions for their services, but Sampson did not because she was female.