USA > New York > Orange County > Goshen > A few biographical sketches of Goshen people and a few reminiscences of doings in Goshen > Part 3
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ried a Miss Van Gieson, of New York city, and had several children, of whom only Caroline, now Mrs. Swain, is living, as are also several of her children. Caroline became first Mrs. Tut- hill and later Mrs. Brewster, and her descend- ants living are her son, the Rev. Charles A. Brewster and his children. While Frances became Mrs. Thompson and her only descendant is the Rev. John J. Thompson.
Mrs. Wilkin was small in stature and in gen- eral appearance was very like my wife, her granddaughter (of whom later) as she was told by Miss Moffatt, an old lady relative, who knew them both. Of Mrs. Wilkin, Judge Westcott Wilkin, who was proud of her, said he had no doubt his grand-father's refined and well-bred bride had had a very helpful influence in making him, with his plain and homely early associ- ations, the distinguished man he was in attract- ive and cultivated manners.
Mrs. Wilkin died at the age of sixty-six, fifteen years before her husband, and was buried in the family burial plot, back of her father's house, and later with those of her husband, her remains were removed to the Slate Hill Ceme- tery.
SARAII GALE WESTCOTT was the daugh- ter of Col. David Mandeville Westcott and Keziah Gale of Goshen. She was born May 29, 1796. Her father was a printer who came to
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Goshen when a young man, from New York or Philadelphia, with his uncle Henry Mandeville, also a printer, and soon they established a news- paper there. Later he became one of Goshen's most respected and distinguished citizens. He became Judge of the Court of Common Pleas, County Clerk and State Senator. Able opinions written by him as one of the Judges of the Court of Appeals, when Senator, appear in the Reports of that court. Her mother was the daughter of Benjamin Gale, a reputable citizen of Goshen who lived opposite the Court House on Main Street; and there his daughter lived until her marriage. Whether she had any other educational advantages than were to be had at Goshen, which were then very creditable. I am not able to state. With her natural ability and the influences of her home. she became an ac- complished and very interesting woman.
She was married, at the age of twenty, to Samuel J. Wilkin, as we know, and became the mother of eight children, Mary, Alexander, Charles, Westcott, William, Samuel, Hannah and Sarah. The first death was of Samuel in infancy. William died ten years later. almost thirteen years old. Hannah died a few months later, nearly ten, and Charles, a bright lad, was killed only a few months later, by his own gun while out hunting, in his eighteenth year, being the third death within the year. His grand-
COLONEL DAVID M. WESTCOTT Father of Mrs. Samuel J. Wilkin. From a Miniature.
1
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fathers had obtained for him an appointment at the U. S. Naval Academy but he died before going there. Her sons Alexander and Westcott survived her and had already made for them- selves honorable names and positions. Sarah, the youngest, born nearly ten years after the others, was nearly sixteen years old when her mother died and for several years was the only one of the children living home.
By her very nature, as I believe, Mrs. Wilkin was a deeply religions woman notwithstanding the doctrine of original sin in which I have no doubt she fully believed, otherwise during the year 1839, when not only three of her children died, but her husband's health failed and that of her daughter Mary became the cause of great anxiety, except for implicit faith in the justice and mercy of her God, she must have herself broken down under her trials. But through it all and all the rest of her life her religious faith was her erowning glory. She was a woman of superior intelligence and her company was much sought for, not only by her relatives, but by her acquaintances, men as well as women, believers and unbelievers, for advice and the pleasures of her conversation and companionship, altho confined much of the time at home by feeble health. Her letters show that she was a clear thinker and ready writer, Indeed she had quite a reputation as a writer of poetry, but I do
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not know of any of her poems having been pub- lished or preserved. Some lines written and published in connection with the notice of her death, with which I will close this sketch, refer to this accomplishment. Her father-in-law, when some one spoke to him in praise of some of her poetry, smilingly replied, "Well, I had hoped my family would be spared that trial."
Cheerfulness and a well controlled temper were the habits of her life. Mr. Wilkin had little faculty for looking after his financial interests beyond his present needs. His tastes were simple and his wants were few. He was generous and thought more about helping a client who needed his services than he did of collecting his fee for the service. In this respect he sadly needed a guardian to look after his affairs in the interest of his family, who by their pride of position, with, at times, an almost want of the common necessaries were in quite straits to keep up appearances. Once, when he com- plained to his wife at the table of the quality of the tea, evidently his wife concluded to give him a reminder on this line, for she caught up the tea-pot and tossed it out of the open window by her side and told him, "you should provide better." Seeing that it had fallen upright on the ground he went out and brought it in and with much politeness returned it to its place on the table. He caught her point.
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MR. AND MRS. SAMUEL J. WILKIN IN 1844
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Her children almost adored her and her hus- band found in her not only a faithful wife, but a loving companion. She and her daughter Sarah spent many precious hours together, in a com- panionship ever gratefully remembered by the daughter, during the last years of the mother's life. She died March 23rd, 1854, from lung troubles, having passed her fifty-eighth birth- day. Her funeral was on a Sunday, at the same time and place, as that of a friend, Mrs. J. C. Wallace, and the occasion was long remembered by the citizens of Goshen as one of peculiar solemnity. The other churches were closed and their members came to the funeral to testify their respect for the deceased. The following, the authorship of which is not indicated, was published in the Goshen Democrat.
ELEGIAC
In memory of Mrs. Samuel J. Wilkin
Why should we mourn thee! See the captive bird
Hath burst its prison bar, and wanders free, Through the clear ether, till no more is heard Its minstrelsy.
Should we deplore its flight
As up the blue expanse with quivering wings Exultingly it springs,
Spreading its pinions towards the throne of light, And leaving far behind the land of chains and Why should we mourn thee! [night!
.
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When the exile lone,
Homeward returning from far espies, His cot's low roof with verdure overgrown, Mid the green foliage where embowered it lies, And pressing forward, with a bounding heart And quickened footstep, gains the distant spot; From its loved shelter could we say depart? And seek again the pilgrim's weary lot Each hardship o'er, each peril now forgot. Why should we mourn thee
Gifted one, thy lyre
Gave the sweet echoes of thy soul's warm lay; Strings such as angels sweep, the golden wire That vibrates to seraph's touch of fire;
The holy, holy song
Immortal lips prolong [clay, These were thy high aspirings, and thy robe of Bound but thy spirit's wings which longed to Why should we mourn thee! [soar away In thy bright abode Pain is unknown and sorrow hath no place, The heritage alone of those who trace, Life's stormy road,
'Tis for ourselves we weep Poor earthborn prisoners still
On our toilsome way and steep,
With our load and care and ill; But for thee. sweet songstress, thee!
Be our purest praises given: Like the captive bird made free, Like the exile joyously Thou hast gained thy throne in heaven, And thine earthly lyre Though quenched in fire
Will echo again mid the angel choir.
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SARAH WESTCOTT WILKIN was born January 2nd, 1838, at No. 173 Spring Street, New York city, during the short period her father resided away from Goshen. She was the daughter of Samuel J. Wilkin and Sarah G. Westcott, both of Goshen. In the fall of 1841 her parents returned to their former home in Goshen and lived there until after the death of Gen. Wilkin when they moved to the Wilkin house. After the death of her mother she and her father remained there until about 1860 when they went to live with her uncle Nathan West- cott in the old Gale-Westcott house. From there she was married in the church, April 12th, 1865, to Roswell C. Coleman, then again she re- turned, with her husband and father, to the Wilkin house. Her father only lived to the following March, but as he said to her when brought to her bedside after the birth of her first child, "I am glad to have lived to become a grandfather."
She was the child of parents well advanced in years, the youngest of eight children, but from her earliest recollection the others had either died or left home, so that she grew up almost as an only child and was the object of her parents most solicitous care and devoted love. Beside her home training, with cultivated parents, and her attendance at the Goshen schools, she had a final course in the home and at the school of
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the Misses Graham at No. 1 Fifth Avenue, New York. Accustomed as she was to the compan- ionship of elderly people and to the daily inter- course with the friends of her parents, rather than with children of her own age, she acquired quiet, self-possessed manners, but was always bright and cheerful, with the happy faculty of pleasing and making friends. Even as a child she was a great favorite with the students in her father's office, which connected with the house. Years after one of them told her about an occasion when she was not pleased with the condition of the office floor and of her going for a broom and in her efforts to sweep raising a great dust, at which the young men "shewed" her out, calling her an apparition; soon she re- turned and told them, "My mamma says I am not an appernition, I am perstantial flesh and blood."
She was very fond of music and in her early days played well upon the piano, and accom- panied herself in singing upon a guitar. Her voice was clear but not strong and she had a very correct ear for the tune and for harmony. Hers was a genuinely mother's voice and she had abundant opportunities for using it in quiet- ing and soothing her children's childish and real troubles. And, too, most ungrudgingly her voice was given in reading, in which she excelled, both to the young and to the grown ups. When other means failed, she would entertain her
SARAH W. COLEMAN At About The Age of Thirty-five
ALICHIOD .W HAHAC
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children by the hour reading, and often re-read- ing, to them childhood's tales, and often, too, with their little friends as listeners. Sometimes they would have her vary the program by asking her to tell the stories in her own way. Loving these stories, fairy, historical and biblical, her- self, she fully entered into the spirit of them in her telling. For her own pleasure she read much of the best literature. It is wonderful how, with the few minutes at a time at her command she was able to read so many of both the older and later writers. She loved the very companionship of books, and to be in the library surrounded by them. She possessed in no small degree literary powers of her own, but after her marriage the pressing duties of her daily life precluded any exercising of these powers. She had on several occasions, to sup- ply local needs, written A Carrier's Address, words to be sung to the tune of Dixie, at a public war-meeting, and The Wounded Soldier, patriotic verses, which were published in Harper's Weekly. Many other compositions, humorous, descriptive and pathetic, only came to the knowledge of her friends.
In personal appearance she was five feet high with a compact, well rounded figure, her eyes were grey and she had a great abundance of hair, "sandy" and naturally very waivy and curly. She was very light on her feet, quick in
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her motions and when young fond of dancing; even after her children were grown her sons would eateh her up and she would waltz about the room with her old time ease, grace and jollity.
Altho unaccustomed, in childhood, to much companionship with children she had the great- est patience with and sympathy for their trials and troubles, real or imaginary, and loved to be with them. She had a marvelous faculty for treating and caring for their ailments. While naturally of a very sensitive and emotional nature she would, when necessary, in emergen- cies do heroie acts, with good judgment, which were highly approved and commended by the doctor when he arrived. An instance of nerve in an emergency : she heard the children scream - ing in the back yard; hastening out she found one of the neighbor's boys hopping about on one bare foot with an iron toothed garden rake hanging from the other. No one was around to call upon for help and something must be done at once. So, putting him on the ground, the little woman put her foot on his body, taking the head of the rake in both her hands, quiver- ing herself in every fibre, pulled her best and drew the iron tooth from his foot. After bind- ing it up she sent him home for treatment and went in and laid down herself. One more instance of courage of another sort: she was on
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the train on her way to the city. She had oc- casion to move to a seat on the opposite side of the car. Soon she remembered having left a fine umbrella in the first seat. In the meantime a man had taken the seat: she asked him about it and not finding it she asked the brakeman to assist her, who asked the man to step out while he looked under the seat, but without finding it. Thinking possibly she might have left it in the station she gave up looking, but was quite an- noved about it as it belonged to a friend to whom she was taking it. As the train was ap- proaching the next station the man arose to leave. As he passed her she noticed the corner of the handle of the umbrella inside his over- coat. She meant to have that umbrella what- ever happened, so, saying "I will take my um- brella, Sir," reached up and took hold of it: he, in some confusion, muttered, "Oh, Oh, some mistake, I suppose," and hastened from the car amid the laughter of the other passengers. It is quite evident she possessed the family traits of a cool head and absence of fear. It is told of her brother, Col. Alexander Wilkin, who was a man only five feet and an inch high, that on his way home from the Mexican war he stopped at the home of an army friend, in the suburbs of New Orleans, to execute some commission en- trusted to him. He arrived there after night fall but before it was fairly dark and had to
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walk some distance back from the highway. He was attended by a colored servant and shortly after they entered the grounds they were fiercely set upon by two blood hounds, trained for hunt- ing negroes; keeping the servant behind him he held the hounds at bay by command and stern demeanor, backing them before him until he reached the dwelling. Arriving there in safety his friends declared they would not have be- lieved it possible for them to have escaped alive.
The saddest trials of her life, naturally, were the deaths, first of her youngest son, Charles, a bright, handsome, chubby little chap of seven, quickly swept away by scarlet fever; and next, only a few months after, of Mary, a most sprightly, talented and lovable girl of eighteen, also taken most unexpectedly after only a very short illness. "Oh," she said, "I have heard of heart ache, but I never felt it before; it seems as though mine would break." But the times of her greatest pride and happiness were when surrounded by all her ten children in the old Goshen home. particularly at the Holiday seasons, when seemingly she could not do enough for them or sufficiently rejoice with them in their frolics and games. My, but the rows of filled stockings on Christmas morning and how the old house would resound with all their merry voices and shook under their romp- ing feet. At one time the rule was no one
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could have their stockings until dressed, but it was found some of them had smuggled them- selves off to bed dressed, so the rule was changed and none could come down stairs for their stocking until it was light enough for them to distinguish the different colors of pieces of worsted taken to bed with them. No party even for little folks was complete without her presence.
All her childish associations and most of her adult life's experiences were in Goshen and about the old home there. There all her child- ren were born and two of them were buried there. Singularly her life began about three years before living there and ended about the same length of time after she left there. There were her most treasured memories, there she was married and there many of her ancestors had lived and were buried; and yet in the course of time, so many changes had occurred, she left there willingly when the requirements of her husband's business made a change of residence desirable, and, in 1896, the family moved to Newburgh. She hoped by the change and with new surroundings and larger privileges to awaken new interests, and in the absence of so many reminders of past griefs to be less con- scious of them. And in a measure so it was.
Never of robust health and yet without serious illness, except in a single instance when she had
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a most alarming attack of pneumonia, she was able almost unceasingly and most efficiently to attend to her many duties to within a short time of the end.
It must not be supposed that her life was spent in one long round of family duties and cares. Somehow time and a way was found to make a pleasant trip to Saint Paul (for the sec- ond time) to visit her brother, the Judge; at another time to the Saint Lawrence and Can- adas: many happy seasons were spent in the Adirondaek camp; and, chief of them all, to go with her two oldest daughters to Europe for twelve weeks. And between times many lesser excursions and no end of social doings. She had the happy faculty when once she got away from home to leave it and its responsibilities behind and enjoy herself without worrying about what she could not help.
One of the things she hoped for was the privi- leges which come with old age of living with her children and being with her grandchildren. During the last year of her life she got about less than usual, particularly the last six months, but, her manner was so cheerful and hopeful, the family, while anxious hoped with pleasant weather of the coming summer to see her around as usual and did not realize the danger. Probab- ly she did, however, more than, they. Sud- denly, without any acute attack, she began
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rapidly to fail and after less than a week of alarming symptoms, the flame of life began to flicker, then went out and she was gone. That bright, always hopeful, cheerful and helpful dear little wife and mother was taken from the objects of her devoted love and from the wider circle of dear friends to other worlds forever.
To undertake to write the many interesting matters concerning her life, of the duties well done, of her children and the providing for them, of their education and training, and how some- times, with little to do with she did for so many and always kept them tidy and presentable, would not only make a book but a mighty big one. She died at Newburgh on the 29th day of May, 1899.
She was one of a line of women of marked religious character and Christian faith and with wide influences. They were all Presbyterians. She was the last of a family of large mental ability and fine culture, but in speaking of her it seems natural rather to speak of those con- nected with her than of herself, for with womanly loyalty and modesty she did not seek attention for herself, but rather desired appre- ciation for those she loved. Always a loving and devoted wife she was, however, above all a true mother. Her constant thoughts were of her duties to her Maker and to her family, not so particularly desiring for her children worldly
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position and success as to have them deeply impressed with sound, broad and Christian principles and to have high ideals. For years it was her earnest hope and prayer to be per- mitted to live until her children were grown, yet she considered no sacrifice of her strength so great as not to be cheerfully made for their welfare: and cheerfulness and hopefulness were her ever present habit.
THE OLD WILKIN HOUSE
For nearly or quite one hundred and twenty years this house has sheltered the descendants of the young man that built it for his home. Three generations of children have lived there and have either passed to the beyond, or are now out in the world in their later homes, while a fourth generation of them are now its inmates.
For nearly thirty years I lived in it. There with my bride I first established a home. There, with one exception, my children were born, and there the best of my life was spent. What won. der then my thoughts should thither turn when in reminiscent mood.
In 1865 the house extended much farther back from the street in a succession of additions each a little lower than its predecessor and ended in a small story and a half wing, which had former- ly been the slave quarters. The next forward covered the cistern and was used chiefly as a
-
LHE OFD MITKI HOARE
OTZI trodA
1
THE OLD WILKIN HOUSE About 1870
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laundry and had a small room off. Next came the kitchen and then three rooms. The one farthest south was an entry which opened on a side porch, the one farthest north also had an outside door, toward the street, and had been used by Gen. Wilkin in his later years as an office. while the middle room, with a window looking west, had served for various purposes. All these rambling wings, which had become more or less out of repair, were torn down about 1870, and the present kitchen wing built. Later on, about 1890, the new dining room addition was built. But the large main building with its hall, eleven feet wide and thirty-two long, and its rooms, except for very slight changes, remain the same. The same hewn timbers sustain it, the same siding covers it and the same walls en- close its rooms. These walls have witnessed what has transpired there all these years: the happiness, the comforts and the sorrows of their inmates; the comings by birth and the goings by deaths; the anxieties caused by childish ailments and the patient nursings of those passing from life; the romping of the feet of many merry children and the timorous step of the feeble and aged; the weddings and the funerals; the smiles and the tears; the entertainments of friends and the feastings of guests. All the doings of and happenings to kindred. The importance too of those rock-bottomed cellars must not be over-
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looked. There the fresh milk and delicious cream and butter were always in abundance; and huge meat barrels well filled; and goodly stores of fruits, preserves and vegetables; and barrels of cider, yes, and the well stocked closets of wines and liquors, for, while the good deacon- general would not permit a playing card about the house, his side-board offered a generous supply of good old madeiras and ports with brandies for those that preferred. Times and customs as well as inmates have changed with the passing years.
Oh, the interesting tales this old house could tell. But it is better as it is. Our imaginings can sufficiently picture the happenings and thus we can omit much that was sad and disappoint- ing for such there must have been. Rather let us bring to mind the many useful and well rounded lives spent there. History only repeats itself with the necessary variations to suit the different individuals. Hosts of memories will serve us elders without the aid of such unsymp- athizing prompters.
In the nature of things the old house stands for more in the lives of its women and children inmates, for the men have more to do with out- side affairs, so the mind will conjure up possible visitations of friendly ghosts of departed mothers witnessing the pleasures and the trials of their children and their children's children
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and we wonder what the thoughts of the visitant would be. But it is quite as well we have not the power to see the invisible, that may be left to the hereafter. Let us be content with feelings of gratitude for what those that have gone before have been to us and have faith in those that are to follow us. Undoubtedly some of the parents that have lived in the old house have been sadly disappointed in some of their children, but so also have they had occasion for great thankfulness in others.
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