Faith Trumbull Huntington (1743-1775): A Nod to Her Short But Well-Lived Life

Did Faith actually witness this famous battle? Visiting the area on June 17, 1775 exposed her to war.

I have enjoyed watching Ken Burns' documentary, The American Revolution, and appreciate all the hard work that has gone into it. However, I was more than a bit disturbed by the lack of screen time for colonial Connecticut merchants and politicians that did so much for the war during the first few years. Connecticut merchants and their associates (i.e. ship captains) fed and clothed the soldiers every.single.time when the Continental Congress could not because of their dysfunction and lack of funds. George Washington relied HEAVILY on Connecticut for gunpowder, provisions, men, arms, and more!

The Governor Jonathan Trumbull and Huntington family circle worked so hard for the war effort that they would lose family members, not on the battle field but at home--the stress ground them down. It started with the premature death of their beloved Faithy.

Also, I cannot believe the producers did not mention Benedict Arnold's burning and terrorizing the people of New London on September 6, 1781 and his subsequent annihilation "take no prisoners" of outnumbered patriot militia troops during the Battle of Groton Heights. Shameless Benedict Arnold. I kept waiting to hear about September 6, 1781 and they just bypassed it. It is so much a part of the complicated Arnold story....

Two-Hundred and Fifty Years Ago This Week, Bad Things Were Happening

Around two-hundred and fifty years ago this week, Connecticut's own Faith Trumbull Huntington (1743-1775) died in Dedham, Massachusetts. She took her own life after enduring a terminal bout of depression. We know this because she documented her own failing health in letters to her beloved husband, Jedediah Huntington (1743-1818) during the latter part of 1775--the first year of war.

But, before ALL OF THAT, she was a fully functioning, intelligent woman who was well loved by ALL the people around her. Affectionately called Faithy, her death was the first of quite a few premature deaths, in her family circle, during the war-era (brother, sister-in-law, mother, father-in-law, and her father, the governor, Jonathan Trumbull). They were a family utterly and completely immersed in the war and all the drama that came with it. It was an anxious time for them.

Governor Trumbull and Mrs. Faith Robinson Trumbull, 1774-5 by their young son John Trumbull. Source: Connecticut Museum of Culture and History (CMCH)

I spent over a year, in 2018, writing a long-article for Connecticut History Review on Faith's life which was published in 2019.

There certainly has been a resurgence of interest in her life and dramatic death because of the excitement around America250. Also the realization, for historians, that there is quite a cache of surviving letters by and about Faith and that of her family circle trying to cure her illness. Those letters are located at Yale's Beinicke Library, the Connecticut State Library, the Connecticut Museum of Culture and History, and items in private hands.

Also, her exceptional needlework pictures survive, in good condition, at the Lyman Allyn Museum and the Connecticut Museum of Culture and History (all in storage but they are happy to show you the work).

"Death of Absalom" by Faith Trumble, Age 10 1/2. Done on black silk. Notice the original spelling of the Trumbull name and that this was Faith's first needlework picture completed during her first terms with Mrs. Elizabeth Murray. Other students included: Sarah Henshaw (18) and Lois Breck (17). Source: The Lyman Allyn Art Museum, New London.

Faith Trumbull Huntington circa 1761 second overmantel when she was eighteen or so. Done in Boston probably with Mrs. Murray or one of her successors like Jane Day. Notice that every inch of this blue silk canvas is covered in stitches. This was the fourth needlework project she would complete before marriage. Source: CMCH

A Young Faith Is Educated in Boston

Faith's parents invested money into Faith's education in order to increase her chances of an advantageous marriage. Her education included needlework practice, dancing, attending social funcitons in Boston, maybe learning book-keeping and handwriting with Mrs. Murray who was also a successful merchant. To see more on Faith's first term in 1753 please see https://www.maggiemeahl.com/post/another-a-ha-moment-mid-1750s-schoolgirl-needlework-pictures-done-at-elizabeth-murray-s-boston-sc

Faith spent at least three "terms" up in Boston between 1753-1761. As a young ten-year-old, she experienced homesickness and tears when her parents dropped her off. The Trumbulls were a close family.

In 1761, age 18, she also had to pass a Latin examination in order to study at the Boston Latin School, "I must be diligent as a bee." She still was a bit homesick as an eighteen-year-old missing the country life in Lebanon and being conscious that she was in fact, a country girl amongst the sophisticated and good looking! Bostonians. But, Faith wanted MORE education or her father wanted her to marry a rich merchant. Or both.

Circa 1761 letter by "Faith Trumble Junior" to her parents "Honored Father and Mother." Source: McClellan Family Papers, CMCH

Marriage and Motherhood

Faith was a popular girl in the higher ranking circles of Lebanon and Norwich. First a local man, considerably older than she vied for her hand in marriage: William Williams. She rejected him for the ambitious and wealthier Jed Huntington from nearby Norwich.

There is evidence in a surviving letter where Williams admits that he has been bested by Huntington. He would later marry her only sister Mary.

Signer of the Declaration of Independence and tough guy, William Williams (1731-18??). After being rejected by Faith in the 1760s, he eventually married her sister Mary in 1771ish. They lived in Lebanon. Williams attended Faith's funeral in Dedham in November 1775 and his father, Solomon Williams, eulogized Faithy in the First Church Lebanon the week after her death.

Based on the evidence in 1-2 letters from this time period, Faith did not bounce back very well from childbirth and little Jabez had "spots" meaning he had some type of childhood disease (but probably not small pox as in 1777, Jed wanted the young Jabez to get inoculated in Dedham--it did not happen).

At age, say, five, the bright "Master" Jabez Huntington, named for his esteemed paternal grandfather, started attending Master Tisdale's private school in Lebanon, the one that his uncles and mother went to. Leaving home young, called "sending out," was not unheard of in the early modern era--children were regulary farmed out when it was smart and convenient to do so.

Master Jabez Huntington, age 10 by his Uncle John Trumbull in 1777. Trumbull painted a lot of family portraits that year. This was Faithy's only child.

Little Jabez lived with his paternal grandparents in the big Georgian mansion just off the green during the Revolutionary War-era until he entered Yale. When Faithy was still alive she would visit her young son frequently.

Another later image of Faith Robinson Trumbull c1779 (1793), Faith's mother. Source: Yale Art Museum.

Faith's older brother Jonathan Trumbull Jr., his wife Eunice Backus Trumbull, and daughter Faith Trumbull (Wadsworth). Faith would visit Roxbury in 1775 with her brother pictured here and his wife. Circa 1777. Source: Yale Art Museum

Mary Trumbull Williams (1745-18??) by John Trumbull in 1777. Mary tended to her sickly older sister Faith as she recovered from childbirth in late 1767. Source: Private

War, Death, and Funeral

By 1775, Jed and Faith had been married almost ten years and would not have more children. Jed, very militarily ambitious, had already been preparing for war as had all the men in Faith's orbit, including her father, Governor Jonathan Trumbull.

The eastern Connecticut merchant families were solidly patriot and would throw their lives, and wealth, into the war effort, starting with the aftermath of Lexington and Concord. It was their duty. The Trumbulls and the Huntingtons all of them experienced terror, random British false alarms, concern about kidnapping, torched powder houses, stolen goods, etc. They were the provisioning leaders of Connecticut and would make things happen for George Washington.

Jed went off to war in April/May 1775 with brothers, brother-in-laws, friends, and even some Black enslaved soldiers from Connecticut. The tumult, stress, and real fear of what the British would do to her male family members serving in Boston was very real to Faith. She documented her feelings in about 10-11 letters from May-October, that survive.

In those long letters she cites Biblical phrases, her insomnia, "up with the birds," home news, and packages she would deliver to Jed and others. From May-October she suffered but kept a brave face. Meanwhile there was an inner turmoil that would not let up perhaps intensified by the dark New England fall and cold temperatures.

Jed, trying to prove himself worthy as a colonel of a Connecticut regiment, up in Roxbury, was trying to help his wife during the middle of the Siege of Boston. Everyone in the family knew that Faith had melancholy and that she could not "shake it" as she described. Faith was sent up north to be near Jed and a doctor but to no avail. She finally took her own life with "a small cord" in the early morning hours after Thanksgiving, November 24, 1775 at the Samuel Dexter house in Dedham, MA where she had been staying.

Faith Trumbull Huntington (1743-1775) took her own life in this house. Her funeral happened here a few days later in one of those front rooms with Chinese wallpaper and "turkey carpet." George Washington would stay in the house, in early April 1776, on his way to New York City.

Her funeral occured at the Dexter house complete with many officers from Jedediah's regiment. All of it was documented by one of his lieutenants, Jabez Fitch, including the placement of her casket in the Ames' family tomb, in the Dedham Village Graveyard. Fitch went down into the vault and horsed around with a friend before Faith's body was placed in there. There is no evidence that her remains were ever moved to Connecticut.

The Ames' tomb at Dedham's Old Village Graveyard. Faith was interred here.

If you want to hear more about Faith's life, and her world, please sign up to watch me on January 27th, at 12 noon, via Connecticut Museum of Culture and History's "Lunch and Learn" series. https://www.connecticutmuseum.org/event/lunch-and-learn-faith-trumbull-huntington/