Among them was a family of the name of Greene, from which the subject of this memoir was a lineal descendant. Not many years after their settlement there, religious controversies began to wear a serious aspect, and John Greene becoming involved in them, determined to remove with his family to the settlement formed a year before, by Roger Williams, on the banks of the Providence river. We find the name of John Greene recorded among the twenty-four original colonists, who obtained a permanent organization by the charter of Charles the Second. From that period, members of this family are frequently mentioned as holding offices of dignity and trust; one of them was Governor of Rhode Island during several years of the revolutionary war.
Nathaniel Greene, a brother of Governor Greene, and direct in descent from the original emigrant, had established himself as an anchor-smith near the head waters of a small stream, which still retains its Indian name of Potowhommett.
On the settlement of this town it was named Warwick, where the subject of this sketch, and son of the above Nathaniel Greene, was born, on the 27th of May, 1742.
The first years of his life were almost exclusively passed in the labors of the farm, for which he was well adapted by a strong and vigorous constitution. Losing his mother when he was only ten years of age, his domestic education more immediately devolved upon his father, who was a rigid disciplinarian, confining his son very closely to agricultural pursuits, and a stand at the anvil. This was continued through the spring and summer, but at the approach of winter a teacher was sought to reside in the family to teach the elements of an English education.
The Bible was the only book allowed to be used in the family of the Quaker preacher, for such was the rank his father held. But to Nathaniel such an education was too limited, and therefore unsatisfactory; he accordingly, as fast as his small savings would permit, purchased himself a small, but well selected library, and often spent the whole night, after the family supposed he had retired to bed, in regular study. An acquaintance casually formed, at the age of fourteen, with a young man who happened to be spending his college vacation at Warwick, first directed his attention to higher and more absorbing pursuits. It is not for us to conjecture what passed between Greene and his newly found friend. But whatever it was, the spark in his coarse clad bosom soon became ignited, and kindled into a flame that was never to be quenched.
The next winter another teacher was engaged, better qualified to direct the first efforts of a mind awakening to a consciousness of its powers, and with him he studied mathematics and the classics.
He had now reached his twentieth year, and by patient industry and unwavering perseverance he had acquired a certain amount of knowledge, which was a matter of surprise to his neighbors, having so little leisure between the mill and the forge. Every penny of his hard-earned savings was devoted to his library, and he now possessed many valuable and standard works which he considered gems of invaluable worth. His life was regular but methodical, one cup of coffee in the morning, and one substantial meal in the afternoon sufficed for each day. His father, as has been before observed, was a strict disciplinarian, and every morning strictly laid out the duty which Nathaniel had to perform before night; this task he was never known to neglect, but always carried in his pocket some favorite volume, as a relaxation during the few intervals of leisure through the day.
It might easily be supposed, that with such strict habits he would have lost all his original buoyancy of spirits and love of frolic, but it was the reverse; it appeared to give a stronger zest to his sports, and no sooner was his mind relaxed from study or toil, than he entered at once into some feat of agility or mimic, in which art he so frequently displayed his skill. In notes written by his grandson, while consul at Rome, we find the following amusing anecdote: he says—“His chief passion was dancing, and that pleasure was often purchased at the risk of a fall from the window through which, when the watchful eyes of his father were closed in sleep, he would steal away to the scenes that he loved. It happened once, however, that something had excited his father’s suspicion, and set him upon the watch. There was a ball in the neighborhood to which young Greene was invited. The dance continued until late in the night, and he was cautiously making his way homeward, when whom should he see but his father, with horse-whip in hand, patiently pacing to and fro beneath the window. Retreat would have been useless, for the door was locked, and there was no other way of getting into the house. He knew the inflexible severity of his father too well to dream of escape, for dancing, of all misdemeanors, was most heinous in the eyes of a Quaker, and there was nothing to be done but to submit to his punishment with the best grace he could.
“But, while he made up his mind to take his flogging patiently, he was resolved to suffer as little from it as possible; and accordingly, before he presented himself to the lash, he cautiously thrust under his clothes three or four shingles, from a pile that chanced to be lying near him, and then coolly advanced to meet his father. The reception was just such as he was prepared for, and the blows fell quick and heavy upon his corselet of shingles.”
Some of his biographers have said that this love of frolic yielded at last to the rigorous discipline of his parent, but this is a mistake. Many years after this, when on a visit to Block Island, to the family of the lady who subsequently became his wife, dancing and riding were his chief amusements, and many persons remember to have seen him in his house at Newport, after the close of the war, amusing himself by playing with his wife the old game of poor puss wants a corner. About this time there was a considerable change in domestic affairs, his father purchased a new mill at Coventry, a few miles distant from his home, and made him the director. For the first time in his life he felt that he was his own master, and possessing a small share in the concern, his resources were enlarged, together with the means of employing them. His library, which had been but scantily supplied, now felt the benefit of this change, for it soon reached to between two and three hundred volumes, which at that period was considered an extensive affair. He now began to feel of some importance in the neighborhood in which he had made his new home. He began also to take an active part in public affairs, and was soon the means of establishing the first public school at Coventry, the result of the interest he took in all that related to the cultivation of mind. In 1770 he was elected to the General Assembly of the Colony, and from his zeal in the general cause, he continued to be returned for the town of Coventry until sometime after his appointment to the command of the Southern army. As a member of the Assembly he was distinguished for his dispassionate and patient investigation.