Carpenter learned to pack, transport, issue, auction, then repack and re-transport many wagons several times each week.

"[1] The same book refers to Mary Tonkin Carpenter as "a little below medium height, with dark hazel eyes, brown hair, and a fine clear brunette complexion.

[2] Carpenter was a member of the Society of Friends, or Quakers which influenced, and distinguishes, his non-combat service in the Revolutionary War.

[4] Some Quakers chose to support the wartime effort, resulting in rifts within the Friends religion; some enlisted for military service, and were expelled from the Society.

[1] Carpenter served as an Ensign and Adjutant in Colonel Samuel Dick's Regiment, 1776–1778, and Paymaster for the New Jersey Militia.

[3][6][7] During the American retreat from the banks of the Assunpink Creek on January 3, 1777, in the Second Battle of Trenton, Carpenter withdrew all of his supplies and assisted another unit to do likewise and then, exhausted, camped with them.

His actions helped General George Washington continue the fight threatening the rear area of the British forces.

[1] After the fighting at the Battle of Princeton, Carpenter and Colonel Dick, who was a physician, went to the aid of their friend Brigadier General Hugh Mercer who had been beaten and bayoneted seven times then left for dead.

[1][8] An example of a surviving document mentioning Carpenter is a dispatch dated at Burlington, January 17, 1780, from Light-horse Harry Lee to "Thomas Carpenter, purchasing commissioner" reading in part, "I have written to the Magistrates of Salem County begging them to aid you …" and ends with, "For God's sake perform this business with all possible dispatch.

While it is in private hands, the timber framed, two and one half story house is considered a historical site by Gloucester County, New Jersey and the Library of Congress.