DEBORAH SAMPSON 1760-1827
Casting off her humble origins, Sampson disguised herself as a man to fight in the American Revolution
A Massachusetts native, Sampson came from a poor family and was destined for a life in service. But this wasn’t to be her fate. In the early 1780s she made her first attempt to enlist in the army. She was rebuffed, but in 1782 her second attempt was a success. Under the alias Robert Shurtliff, she joined the 4th Massachusetts Regiment under Captain George Webb during the Revolutionary War. Sampson spent 18 months as a combat soldier, participating in several skirmishes and sustaining multiple injuries. During the conflict she became an accomplished soldier, scouting for neutral territory, leading expeditions, conducting house raids and storming British redoubts. She was reportedly hit by musket fire in the summer of 1782 but refused medical treatment in fear of her identity being discovered, and she extracted a bullet herself.
Her identity was finally discovered in 1783 when she contracted a fever while on duty in Philadelphia. Sampson was honourably discharged and returned to Massachusetts, and in around 1802 she began a year-long lecture tour about her experiences. Sampson was the only woman to receive a military pension (albeit minimal) but she had to petition for it. Her cause was taken up by Paul Revere, who noted in 1804 that while he expected her to be a “tall, masculine female” she was in fact a “small, effeminate, and conversable woman.”