10/07/2026
Charity Bryant & Sylvia Drake — 1807
In 1807, in Weybridge, Vermont, Charity Bryant and Sylvia Drake began a lifelong relationship that historians consider one of the earliest and best-documented same-sex marriages or partnerships in the United States.
Charity Bryant, born in 1777, met Sylvia Drake, born in 1784, after Charity came to Weybridge in February 1807. Within months, they decided to build a life together. On July 3, 1807, Charity later wrote that Sylvia had “consented to be my help-meet” and become her companion in life and work—a description historians interpret as their commitment to marriage.
The couple lived together for 44 years, ran a successful tailoring business, shared their finances and home, participated in their local church and charitable activities, and became accepted by much of the Weybridge community as a married couple.
Their relationship is unusually well documented through diaries, letters, poems, business records and other papers preserved by the Henry Sheldon Museum. They were also buried together under the same headstone.
Important wording for your LGBTQ+ history timeline: I would say “one of the earliest documented same-sex marriages in the United States” rather than simply “the first le***an marriage.” There wasn't a modern legal same-sex marriage system in 1807, so “marriage” describes how Charity and Sylvia understood and lived their relationship, and how their community came to recognize them.
