Prudence Punderson (see previous post), age twenty-four, wrote to her sister Hannah about a serious medical problem she was having.

Dec: Saturday 30th A[nno] 1780Next monday it will be 5 weeks since I was taken with a severe fever, which ocation’d much pain in my right arm during the whole Night & in 2 or 3 days I perceived a sweeling just above my right Breast, Doctr: Mitchel endeavoured to scatter it but to no purpose; in the 2d week of my sickness for a while I was in great agony with the Cholick, but applycation of medicine soon gave me releif, my fever which has occasioned the Doctr: to look upon me dangerously Ill; has been broke for several days & the Gathering on my breast has been launced twice, the Cavity of matter lay so deep in my stomack that he was obliged to cut 3 times down with his launcet before he could reach it, he has thought that also rendered my recovery unsertain, but now is much better & gitting well, tho Doctr: Mitchel & Doctr: Mott both of them says the Bone is defected & by what I can gather of their judgments must Content my self to be as long disabled for the use of my Nedle as I have allready been, & now trespass in the limits allowd me by the Doctrs: in using my arm so much as to write you this letter about my Illness. Since my fever has been broke I have gather’d strength & health beyond expression.

One wonders what ailment Prudence complained of. A cyst? Or could it have breast cancer?

The letter can be found on page 170 of In the Words of Women, from the Prudence Punderson Papers, Connecticut Historical Society.

Prudence Punderson (1758-1784) was born in Preston, Connecticut. Her father was a Loyalist and fled with his family to Long Island during the Revolution. Prudence was a gifted artist with her needle and embroidered this picture, sewn on silk with silk thread, when she was a young woman. It is a “momento mori,” entitled “The First, Second and Last Scenes of Mortality.” Intended to remind one of the shortness of life, it depicts the three stages in the life of a woman—in this case Prudence’s: infancy, womanhood, and death. Prudence is the baby in a cradle tended by a black servant; she is the young woman at the table in the prime of life; and she is in a coffin marked with the initials PP. Sadly, Prudence’s life was short. She married Dr. Timothy Rossiter in 1783 and died in 1784 after giving birth to a daughter.

Punderson’s needlework picture is at the Connecticut Historical Society.

The Battle of White Plains, New York, occurred on October 28, 1776. General Washington was moving his troops northward from New York City into Westchester County after having suffered a major defeat by the British. It proved impossible to defend his position in the village of White Plains and so he retreated further north, eventually crossing the Hudson River, marching through New Jersey and into Pennsylvania. Phoebe Oakley, fleeing her home, had stored her valuables at her brother-in-law’s house for safekeeping. Unfortunately the house was in White Plains near the site of the battle. it was plundered by American soldiers. Her complaint listed the items stolen:

a trunk filled with Linen & cloaths . . . five feather beads [beds] & bedding, one looking glass, one Copper Coffey-Kettle, with lamp and stand, two muffs in cases, a long blue cloth cloak, one pair of brass knobbed hand irons, one painted and one woolen floor-cloth, one copper Tea Kettle, two Pewter dishes & one dozen of plates, a whole set of Tea China, and a small red trunk . . . a pair of boots almost new, a pair of brass Candle-sticks and some books.

Some items were returned to her, but the rest disappeared.

Phoebe Oakley’s list can be found on page 62 of In the Words of Women.