Page:The part taken by women in American history.djvu/139

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Part Taken by Women in American History


is presented as declaiming against the Stamp Act. When the test came their mother's sympathy went with the cause for which her boys were fighting, naturally making their country her country. And she never regretted her choice. She was rewarded for her brave life by living to see America free and at peace, and her sons most highly respected citizens. And so her old age was happy — happier indeed she declared than her youth had been, for she writes, "I regret no pleasures that I can enjoy, and I enjoy some that I could not have had at an earlier season. I now see my children grown up and, blessed be God, I see them such as I hoped." What is there in youthful enjoyment preferable to this?

CATHERINE GREENE.

Catherine Littlefield, the eldest daughter of John Littlefield and Phebe Ray, was born in New Shoreham, on Block Island, in 1753. When very young she came with her sister to reside in the family of Governor Greene, of Warwick, a lineal descendant of the family, whose wife was her aunt. It was here that Miss Littlefield's very happy girlhood was passed; and it was here also that she first knew Nathaniel Greene. Their marriage took place July 20, 1774, and the. young couple removed to Coventry. Looking at that bright, volatile, coquettish girl of this time, no one could dream of her future destiny as a soldier's wife and comrade; nor that the broad-brimmed hat of her young husband covered brows that should one day be wreathed with the living laurels won by genius and patriotism.

But when Nathaniel Greene's decision was made, and he stood forth a determined patriot, separating himself from the community in which he had been born and reared, by embracing a military profession, his spirited wife did her part with