Ohrstrom Library Digital Archives

Coit House was the original Orphans’ Home. According to Arthur Stanwood Pier’s book, St. Paul’s School 1855-1934 (pg. 67-68):

 In 1865 the rector conceived the idea of establishing under the auspices of the school a house for Concord children whose fathers had died in the war and who had been left destitute. The first Orphans’ Home, opened in April, 1866, was at the crossing of the Hopkinton and Long Pond roads. Although instituted primarily for the care of the children of dead soldiers, it admitted other homeless children. In 1868 the home was established . . . on the Dunbarton road.

…Until 1874 the institution derived its support almost entirely from the school and was managed by the rector and his wife; in fact, as long as Mrs. Coit lived, she was its guiding spirit. In 1874 the Home was transferred from the school to a board of Trustees and became a diocesan institution. Funds contributed from outside sources provided a new and large brick building.

This photograph shows Coit House, some time after 1874, in its Dunbarton Road location across from the intersection with Silk Farm Road.  An undated note on the back of the photograph identifies the buildings on the right of the picture as having been designed by the architect Henry Vaughan, and the house on the left as the old Flanders farm.

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