On March 27, 1856, Henry Augustus Coit and Mary Bowman, daughter of Charles Wheeler, Esq., were married in the Church of the Epiphany, Philadelphia, by her uncle, the Rev. Dr. Bowman. One of the Trustees, Bishop Chase, after visiting the School in June 1856, wrote to Dr. Shattuck about Mrs. Coit: “The lady, I judge, is in no way behind the Rector in qualifications.” August Heckscher in his history of St. Paul’s writes: “The young bride took to this life as one born to it. She became quickly the manager of a growing household, the confidante of boys, and hostess to a stream of visitors....When illness cast its shadow over the boys, she watched with her husband at the bedside…She talked to everyone in a most motherly way….Certainly, the opening years show modest means—essentially a Christian household: a farmhouse, a family group, and the intense soul of the doctor…”