Joshua Coffin

This article is about the abolitionist. For the whaler and discoverer, see Coffin (whaling family).

Joshua Coffin
Born	October 12, 1792 Newbury, Massachusetts
Died	June 24, 1864 (aged 71) Newbury, Massachusetts
Nationality	American
Occupation	Teacher
Known for	American antiquary and abolitionist

Joshua Coffin (October 12, 1792 – June 24, 1864) was an American antiquary and abolitionist.

Coffin was born in Newbury, Massachusetts. He graduated at Dartmouth in 1817, and taught school for many years, numbering among his pupils the poet John Greenleaf Whittier, who addressed to him a poem entitled "To My Old School-Master".

Coffin was ardent in the cause of emancipation, and was one of the co-founders of the New England Anti-Slavery Society in 1832, being its first recording secretary.

He published The History of Ancient Newbury (Boston, 1845), genealogies of the Woodman, Little, and Toppan families, and magazine articles. As an adult, Coffin lived for a time in the downstairs southwest room of the Coffin House, his ancestral home; in a tiny study housed within an ell of the house, Joshua wrote his History of Ancient Newbury.

References

• Coffin, Joshua (1845). A Sketch of the History of Newbury, Newburyport, and West Newbury from 1635 to 1845. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)
• Coffin, Joshua (1860). An Account of Some of the Principal Slave Insurrections. {{cite book}}: Invalid |ref=harv (help)

Attribution:

•  This article incorporates text from a publication now in the public domain: Wilson, J. G.; Fiske, J., eds. (1891). Appletons' Cyclopædia of American Biography. New York: D. Appleton. {{cite encyclopedia}}: Missing or empty |title= (help)

External links

• Works by Joshua Coffin at Project Gutenberg
• Works by or about Joshua Coffin at the Internet Archive
• Transcription of a letter by Coffin to Lydia Maria Child