July 23, 2024
Introduction: In this article, Melissa Davenport Berry continues her series about the founders of Nantucket, Massachusetts, and their descendants, showing photos of the Coffin-Carlisle family and including two more oral histories. Melissa is a genealogist who has a website, americana-archives.com, and a Facebook group, New England Family Genealogy and History.
Today I continue with stories of the Coffin-Carlisle and allied families of Nantucket, including more of the oral histories recorded by Henry Coffin Carlisle (1886-1964) as well as other relics in the collections of the Nantucket Historical Association (NHA).
Henry, a 7th generational descendant of the Tristram and Dionis Coffin line, preserved some of the most significant and endearing oral histories of Nantucket island via audio recordings.
To recap: My last two parts covered Henry’s ancestral lines (Part 1) and an interview with Marcus Litchfield Ramsdell which included some details on the Essex whaleship (Part 2).
In 1958 Henry interviewed Margaret Georgia (Fawcett) Barnes (1898-1980), who summered on the island section known as Siasconset, or Sconset for short.
Margaret’s first husband, Robert Wilson, was a New York playwright and founder of the Straight Wharf Theatre in Nantucket. She later married Landon Davis Barnes.
In her interview with Henry, Margaret shared the history of her parents, George and Percy (Haswell) Fawcett, stage actors who established the “Sconset Actors Colony,” an annual summer gathering of mainland actors.
George Fawcett transitioned from theater to films in 1914 and worked with well-known figures such as D.W. Griffith, Joan Crawford, and Greta Garbo.
Below is a group photo from the Margaret Fawcett Barnes Photographic Collection at NHA, taken by her father George of members of the “Lambs Club” on Sconset Beach 1914, along with some well-known New York actors.
Topics in Margaret’s oral account include famous visitors, colony rituals, and the early days of the Sconset Casino and Nantucket Railroad.
Listen to Margaret’s oral history interview: Oral History Interview Call # T-13.
Here is a newspaper clip from 1904 on the Actors Colony.
What pops out most in this article is the description of the primitive spirit of the colony that has no boundaries or restrictions, almost Utopian.
This article reports:
’Sconset is, indeed, a little world in itself. It is a wildflower in the ocean; it loves liberty, and smiles at its semi-barbaric beauty. It has free life and it has fresh air. It has not the prejudices, conventionalities, or the formality of the great world ’round about it. In the one little chapel on the green, people of all religions meet at different hours of the Sabbath to worship God in their own way, and above the head of the priest and minister is this simple legend: “Behold how good and how pleasant it is for brethren to dwell together in unity.”
And in unity do all the inhabitants dwell; both in summer and winter, and, believing in government resting on the consent of the governed, and that every man has a right to life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness, they dwell on in contentment with the sand, sun and sea, and who shall be so rude as to disturb fair ’Sconset?
Below is a photo of actors staying at the Harry Woodruff cottage “Aloha” in 1903.
Also in 1958, Henry interviewed Grace Brown Gardner (1888-1973), daughter of Arthur Hinton and Mary Macy (Brown) Gardner.
Grace’s father served as NHA president, and she oversaw a scrapbook collection of Nantucket historical clippings. Read more about Grace in my “Scions of Nantucket Founders” series: Part 3 and Part 4.
Henry’s interview with Grace was conducted at 33 Milk Street in Nantucket, known as the Coffin-Gardner house, built by Grace’s great grandfather George Gardner in 1830.
Listen to Grace’s oral history interview: Oral Interview CT-27.
Graces’ grandfather George Coffin married Sarah “Sally” Calder, daughter of Samuel and Ruth (Coffin) Calder. Another daughter, Charlotte Calder, married Captain William Bunker Coffin.
Here is a photo of Grace sitting in a chair in the parlor of the George Coffin House in Nantucket, holding the logbook of her grandfather Captain William Bunker Gardner (1811-1856), a Nantucket whaler and shipmaster whose portrait hangs above her. William is the son of Samuel and Elizabeth (Morin) Gardner.
One gift presented to the NHA from Grace was this portrait of her gr. great uncle, Captain Andrew Calder (1768-1813), painted by Nicholas Joseph Delin
Captain Calder married Lydia Coffin, daughter of Major Elijah and Abigail (Folger) Coffin. They had one daughter, Betsey Calder, who married Thomas Hallett.
I found Capt. Calder’s death notice.
This obituary reports:
On the 7th inst. [i.e., this month] at Richmond, Virg., after a short, but a severe illness, Capt. Andrew Calder, of this city. His death is deservedly regretted by all who knew him.
Another relic of the Calder family is a sampler made by Grace’s great aunt Love Calder (1785-1870) at the age of fifteen. (View at NHA.) Love Calder was a devout Quaker who lived at 4 Mill Street in Nantucket, known as the 1800 House.
Here is another gift presented to the NHA by Grace: a watercolor family record painted by Phebe Folger for Zaccheus Coffin (1751-1788), son of Zaccheus and Mary (Pinkham) Coffin, and his wife Thankful (Joy) Coffin (1749-1810), daughter of Ebenezer and Elizabeth (Covill) Joy.
The painting celebrates the union of marriage between Zaccheus and Thankful on 22 March 1770, and a memorial for Zaccheus, who died 2 December 1788 “in captivity at Algiers.”
Also recorded in the watercolor are their two children: Zaccheus Coffin, born 8 May 1780; and Bethiah Coffin, born 3 July 1771, who married Jeremiah Gardner, son of Jeremiah and Apphia (Sherman) Gadner, and left many descendants.
Stay tuned for more…
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Note on the header image: flag of Nantucket, Massachusetts. Credit: NuclearVacuum; Wikimedia Commons.
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