Coffin (surname)
The House of Coffin is an ancient English family which originated in Devonshire. The Coffins have held a number of manors, the most notable of which is Portledge in Devon, England, which they held for over nine centuries. The progenitor of the American Coffins was Tristram Coffin, a Royalist, who came to Massachusetts from Devonshire in 1642. He was the original proprietor of Nantucket. The American branch is one of the Boston Brahmin, a group of elite families based in and around Boston. Many American Coffins are or were Quakers.
| Coffin | |
|---|---|
 Arms of Coffin of Portledge, Alwington, Devon: Azure, three bezants between eight crosses crosslet or | |
| Current region | South West England New England Eastern Canada |
| Earlier spellings | Coffyn |
| Place of origin | Devon, England |
| Estate(s) | Portledge |
Pine-Coffin quartered arms
List of persons with the surname Coffin
- Alexander J. Coffin (1794–1868), New York politician
- Bill Coffin, writer of novels and role-playing games
- Charles Coffin (writer), French writer, educator and Jansenist
- Charles A. Coffin, cofounder and first President of General Electric corporation
- Charles Edward Coffin, politician from U.S. state of Maryland
- C. L. Coffin, American engineer and inventor of the arc welding process using a metal electrode
- Clifford Coffin, English recipient of the Victoria Cross
- Clifford Coffin (photographer), British photographer
- David Coffin, folk musician
- Edmund Coffin, saddle maker and equestrian
- Edward Coffin, English Jesuit
- Frank M. Coffin, politician and jurist from the U.S. state of Maine
- Frank Trenholm Coffyn, aviation pioneer
- Frederick D. Coffin, American film actor, singer, songwriter, and musician.
- George Coffin (1903-1994), American bridge player
- Howard A. Coffin, politician from the U.S. state of Michigan
- Howard E. Coffin, automobile engineer and founder of Hudson Motors
- C. Hayden Coffin, English actor
- Henry Sloane Coffin, American theologian
- Isaac Coffin, East India Company Army officer
- Sir Isaac Coffin, 1st Baronet, Royal Navy officer
- James Henry Coffin, American mathematician and meteorologist
- Jeff Coffin, American saxophonist
- John Coffin (c. 1751–1838), army officer, judge and politician in New Brunswick
- John Coffin, U.S. virologist
- Joshua Coffin, American abolitionist
- Levi Coffin, American educator and abolitionist
- Lucretia Mott, née Coffin, American antislavery and women's rights advocate
- Marian Cruger Coffin, American landscape architect
- Micajah Coffin, American mariner, trader in the whaling industry and politician
- Nathaniel Coffin, loyalist and Canadian politician
- Owen Coffin, a teenager on the whaler Essex who was cannibalized
- Peleg Coffin (fl. ca. 1790s), proponent of Gay Head lighthouse on Nantucket
- Peleg Coffin, Jr., financier and politician from the U.S. state of Massachusetts
- Peter Coffin, U.S. artist
- Peter Coffin, Canadian bishop
- Pierre Coffin, film director
- Richard Coffin (1456-1523), sheriff of Devon in 1511
- Richard Geoffrey Pine-Coffin, World War II parachute officer in the British Army
- Robert Aston Coffin, English priest
- Robert P. T. Coffin, writer and poet
- Shannen W. Coffin, U.S. lawyer
- Thomas Coffin (disambiguation), list of people with the name
- Tris Coffin, actor
- Tristram Coffin (settler), notable settler of Nantucket, Massachusetts, from whom most American Coffin families are descended
- Tristram P. Coffin, American folklorist and ballad scholar
- Walter Coffin, Welsh Member of Parliament and coal owner
- William Coffin (courtier), English courtier, favourite of Henry VIII
- William Henry Coffin (1878–1941), U.S. painter and commercial artist
- William Sloane Coffin, American clergyman and peace activist
- Zenas Coffin, one of the most successful of Nantucket's eighteenth century whaling merchants
In Fiction
- Benjamin Coffin III, landlord in Jonathan Larson's musical Rent
- Coffin Family, cursed family in the novel Coffins by Rodman Philbrick
- Frank Coffin, detective in the mystery novel series series by Jon Loomis
- Frank Trenholm Coffyn, a real-life aviator trained by the Wright Brothers, he appears as a character in Jack Finney's novel From Time to Time
- Ghost of Dr. Coffin, villain in the Scooby-Doo/Dynomutt Hour episode The Harum Scarum Sanitarium. The "ghost" is revealed to be Officer Oldfield.
- John Coffin, detective in the mystery novel series by Gwendoline Butler
- Jonathan Coffin, "Nonno" in Tennessee Williams' play Night of the Iguana
- Mistress Coffin, murder victim in the novel The Strange Death of Mistress Coffin by Robert Begiebing. Set in New England in 1648, it is apparently based on an actual unsolved murder from that period.
- Peter Coffin, proprietor of "The Spouter Inn" in Herman Melville's novel Moby-Dick
- Ray and Steve Coffin, father and son characters in Marvel's Micronauts comic book series. Both men assume the persona of Captain Universe.
- Robert Coffin, adventurer and ship captain in the novel Maori by Alan Dean Foster
References
- Begiebing, R. J. (1996). The strange death of mistress coffin. Chapel Hill, NC: Algonquin Books.
- Butler, G. (1956-2002) John coffin series. Various publishers.
- Finney, J. (1995). From time to time. New York, NY: Simon & Schuster.
- Foster, A. D. (1988). Maori. New York, NY: Ace Books.
- Larson, J., McDonnell, E., & Silberger, K. (1997). Rent. New York, NY: HarperEntertainment / HarperCollins.
- Loomis, J. (2007-2012). Frank coffin mysteries. New York, NY: Minotaur Books.
- Mantlo, B. (1979-1984). Micronauts [Comic Book Series]. New York, NY: Marvel Comics.
- Melville, H. (1851). Moby-Dick; or, the whale. New York, NY: Harper & Brothers.
- Nichols. C.A. (Director). (1976, October 23). The harum scarum sanitarium [Television series episode]. In A. Lovy, (Producer), The Scooby-Doo/Dynomutt Hour. Los Angeles, CA: Hanna-Barbera Productions.
- Philbrick, R. (2002). Coffins. New York, NY: Tom Doherty Associates, LLC.
- Williams, T. (2000). Plays 1957-1980 (Mel Gussow and Kenneth Holditch). New York, NY: Library of America.
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