Daddy said that I was awful young [age 13] to be thinking about getting married. Doo [Doolittle Lynn] said he knew that, but he'd take real good care of me . . .
We were taking our honeymoon at Chandler's Cabins, about seventeen miles from Paintsville . . .
. . . Doo was the first boy I ever went with, and I didn't go with him long enough to know what was going on. My parents never told me nothing . . . My Daddy used to tell me they got me by turning over a cabbage leaf — and I believed it . . .
I said, "I'm freezing to death!" But I know it was nerves. His mother had bought me a nightgown. I had never worn any kind of gown because we always used to sleep in our underclothes. So he said, "Go ahead, get your gown and go in the bathroom."
I took out this gown; it was white with raised white flowers and leaves on it, thinner than flannel, and to me it was beautiful because I never saw anything like it. It was long and straight and I thought you wore it over everything. I was in bad shape — scared to death, I suppose. So I put the gown over my clothes and came back out.
Doo said, "Hey, you ain't supposed to wear clothes under your nightgown."
Well, I went back and took off my dress and left all my underclothes on. He sent me back again. By this time it was three o'clock in the morning. It was getting late, I guess you'd say. So I took off my slip and went back. I guess he didn't think that was too smart. He really had a time with this little girl he married. He finally more or less had to rip off my panties. The rest of it was kind of a blur. I guess I went into a fit and didn't know what he was doing. He didn't tell me nothing, so I just lay there. (Paintsville, KY, 1948)
from Coal Miner's Daughter by Loretta Lynn, with George Vecsey (Da Capo Press, © 1996)
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