EARLY DAYS.—­LEAVING HOME.—­BOUND OUT.—­FARMING.—­CARPENTER.—­SOLDIER.—­ CLOCK MAKING.

I was born in the town of Canaan, Litchfield County, in the State of Connecticut, on the 10th day of June, 1793.  My parents were poor but respectable and industrious.  My father was a blacksmith and wrought-nail maker by trade, and the father of six children—­four sons and two daughters.  I was the fourth child.

In January, 1797, he moved from Canaan to the town of Plymouth, in the same County, and in the following spring built a blacksmith shop, which was large enough for three or four men to work at the nail making business, besides carrying on the blacksmithing.  At that time all the nails used in the country were hammered by hand out of iron rods, which practice has almost entirely been done away by the introduction of cut nails.

My advantages for education were very poor.  When large enough to handle a hoe, or a bundle of rye, I was kept at work on the farm.  The only opportunity I had for attending school was in the winter season, and then only about three months in the year, and at a very poor school.  When I was nine years old, my father took me into the shop to work, where I soon learned to make nails, and worked with him in this way until his death, which occurred on the fifth of October, 1804.  For two or three days before he died, he suffered the most excruciating pains from the disease known as the black colic.  The day of his death was a sad one to me, for I knew that I should lose my happy home, and be obliged to leave it to seek work for my support.  There being no manufacturing of any account in the country, the poor boys were obliged to let themselves to the farmers, and it was extremely difficult to find a place to live where they would treat a poor boy like a human being.  Never shall I forget the Monday morning that I took my little bundle of clothes, and with a bursting heart bid my poor mother good bye.

I knew that the rest of the family had got to leave soon, and I perhaps never to see any of them again.  Being but a boy and naturally very sympathizing, it really seemed as if my heart would break to think of leaving my dear old home for good, but stern necessity compelled me, and I was forced to obey.

The first year after leaving home I was at work on a farm, and almost every day when alone in the fields would burst into tears—­not because I had to work, but because my father was dead whom I loved, and our happy family separated and broken up never to live together again.  In my new place I was kept at work very hard, and at the age of fourteen did almost the work of a man.  It was a very lonely place where we lived, and nothing to interest a child of my age.  The people I lived with seemed to me as very old, though they were probably not more than thirty-six years of age, and felt no particular interest in me, more than to keep me constantly at work, early and late, in all kinds of weather, of which I never complained.  I have many times worked all day in the woods, chopping down trees, with my shoes filled with snow; never had a pair of boots till I was more than twenty years old.  Once in two weeks I was allowed to go to church, which opportunity I always improved.