Deborah Sampson was born on December 17, 1760, in Plympton, Massachusetts, into a modest family. Her father was Jonathan Sampson and her mother was Deborah Bradford. Her siblings were Jonathan, Elisha, Hannah, Ephraim, Nehemiah, and Sylvia. When she was ten years old, Deborah was sent to live with Jeremiah Thomas’s family in Middleborough, where she worked as a servant from 1770 to 1778. Even though she was treated well, she was not given any formal schooling like the Thomas children because Jeremiah did not believe in giving women education. Sampson was able to overcome Jeremiah's ideals by learning from his sons, who shared their school work with her. When her time as an indentured servant was over at age 18, Deborah made a living by teaching school during the summer in 1779 and 1780.
In early 1782, Sampson decided that she wanted to help fight for her country’s …show more content…
Being as women were typically not allowed to participate in the war, she wore men’s clothes and joined an Army unit in Middleborough, Massachusetts, under the name Timothy Thayer. The Baptist church to which she belonged learned of her actions and took away her fellowship. In May 1782, Sampson enlisted again in Uxbridge, Massachusetts under the name Robert Shirtliff, and joined the Light Infantry Company of the 4th Massachusetts Regiment, under the command of Captain George Webb.
During her first battle, on July 3, 1782, outside Tarrytown, New York, she was hit by two musket balls in her thigh and a cut on her forehead. She begged her fellow soldiers to let her die and not take her to a doctor, but a soldier took her to a hospital. The doctors treated her head wound, but she left the hospital before they could help her leg due to the fact that