USA > Massachusetts > Worcester County > Oakham > Soldiers of Oakham, Massachusetts, in the revolutionary war, the war of 1812 and the Civil war > Part 1
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M. L.
GENEALOGY COLLECTION
ALLEN COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY 3 1833 01072 6039
SOLDIERS OF OAKHAM
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PLAN OF OAKHAM
showing the Original Lots and the Public Roads laid out before the year 1800.
What is now Oakham was the West Wing of Rutland from 1722 to 1759, and the Precinct of Rutland West Wing from 1759 to 1762 when it was incorporated as a district by the name of Oakham.
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SOLDIERS OF OAKHAM
MASSACHUSETTS
IN
THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR
THE WAR OF 1812
AND
THE CIVIL WAR
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1762
SACH
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BY
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HENRY PARKS WRIGHT,
RARY
1 NEW HAVEN, CONN. THE TUTTLE, MOREHOUSE & TAYLOR PRESS
1914
COPYRIGHTED, 1914, BY THE TUTTLE, MOREHOUSE & TAYLOR CO.
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED
PUBLISHED AUGUST, 1914
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TO THE MEMORY OF CAPTAIN JOHN CRAWFORD [1739-1824]
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SOME OAKHAM DATES
First settlements within the limits of the town, not later than 1750. Established as Precinct of Rutland West Wing, 1759.
First meeting-house erected, 1761.
Oakham incorporated as a district, June 7, 1762.
Rev. John Strickland ordained and installed over Presbyterian church, April I, 1767.
Church reorganized after Congregational form, June 23, 1773.
Oakham District made a town by general act, August 23, 1775.
Rev. Daniel Tomlinson ordained and settled, June 22, 1786.
Sixth Massachusetts Turnpike incorporated, 1799.
Oakham Post Office established, April 1, 1813.
New meeting-house dedicated, 1815.
First stage line through the town, 1818. ,
The north village first called Coldbrook, 1832.
Rev. James Kimball ordained and installed, December 26, 1832.
Methodist meeting-house dedicated, October 1, 1843.
Congregational meeting-house remodeled; dedicated, February 12, 1846. Rev. Francis N. Peloubet installed, December 26, 1860.
Ware River Railroad opened, October, 1873.
Memorial Hall dedicated, January I, 1875.
Central Massachusetts Railroad opened, December, 1887.
Town Clock, presented by Mr. Henry E. Dean, dedicated, August 30, 1905.
Fobes Memorial Library, presented by Charles A. Fobes, Mrs. Celia E. Fobes, and Mrs. Harriet F. Gifford, dedicated, August 27, 1908.
Mail service by automobile established, October, 191I.
PREFACE
The town of Oakham was fortunate in having during the most important periods of its early history clerks who kept full and clear records. It is not probable that those who made the records had any thought of their future value as historical docu- ments. They made them complete that there might be no doubt about the responsibility of those who were chosen to public office; but in their effort to make everything plain, they left us very detailed information about the early history of the town. The records of the first forty-four years fill two large volumes, containing together seven hundred and ninety-one pages. The eight years of the Revolutionary War cover two hundred and four pages. Fortunately, also, during the one hundred and fifty years when the town documents were not safeguarded as they are to-day, not a page of any of the record books was lost or destroyed.
By the wise action of the State authorities, there are kept, in the libraries of the town officers and in the Free Public Libraries of all Massachusetts towns, many works of great value that are too little appreciated. In these libraries may be found printed copies of many important early colonial and state documents ; the military record of the soldiers from the State in the Revolu- tionary War and in the War of 1812; the Adjutant General's reports during the period of the Civil War; and also vital records of Massachusetts towns and cities. With such material at hand to supplement the records of the town clerks, it is pos- sible to prepare a history of the men from any Massachusetts town who have served the country as soldiers.
When in 1866 the Oakham Soldiers' Union proposed to keep in permanent form brief biographies of the soldiers from the town in the Civil War, it was not expected that these sketches would be printed, much less that they would form part of a printed volume. But during the half-century that has since elapsed, the soldiers who survived the war have lived as private citizens engaged in their several occupations, have filled out their
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SOLDIERS OF OAKHAM
family history, and have taken an active part in the public life of the communities in which their work has been done. No sketches of their lives could be thought of now which did not include what they have accomplished since the war, and what they have stood for as citizens and as men.
The men that constituted the Union Army were the best that the country produced. An army in time of war is no place for men weak physically or morally. The Union soldiers were not only men of strength and courage, but also men of character. In no war ever waged were the soldiers of better quality. The enormous debt incurred on account of the war was repaid, but the loss to the nation of hundreds of thousands of such young men can never be made up.
If there are any men who deserve to be remembered for what they have sacrificed for the sake of others, it is those who have served in the army in time of war. Only those who have seen actual service can fully realize what it means for a young man to give up home and friends, and to endure the hardships and the undermining influences of army life, and to face the dangers of a protracted war. If he returns uninjured, no soldier who has been long in the service can ever be repaid for what he has lost, physically, mentally, and morally. And what a multitude of young men in the Civil War either did not return, or came back crippled for life !
When I remember how much life has brought to me since the close of the war; in my home life; in the opportunity for service; in the joy of interest in the world's progress for half a century ; and in the privilege of having even a little share in the work that has been done; and remember also that every one of our soldiers who were killed in battle or died by disease lost all this, I begin to appreciate what the sacrifice of so many young lives meant.
In the preparation of this book I have not only been living again among old friends, but have sometimes seemed to myself to be renewing an acquaintance with men brought back upon the stage from former generations. I knew personally the greater part of the soldiers from Oakham in the Civil War.
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PREFACE
One-fourth of them had been my pupils, and a large proportion had been my playmates and friends. I had seen the greater part of the men from the town who were in the War of 1812. From early childhood I had heard much about the soldiers in the Revolutionary War from my grandmother, by whom I was brought up, who was the widow of a Revolutionary soldier and the daughter of John Crawford, Captain of the Oakham company from 1775 to 1783.
It has been a pleasure to gather, from the records of the town and the state, the history of the Oakham men who served in the War for Independence, but it has been especially gratifying to bring to light in a neighboring town a Revolutionary document supposed to have been irrecoverably lost. The fortunate dis- covery of a pay roll of Captain How's company for service on the Hudson in the latter part of 1776 gives encouragement to hope that copies of other such supposedly lost muster or pay rolls will yet be found.
Miss Mary A. French, of North Brookfield, into whose keep- ing a package of manuscript regarding the French family had come by inheritance, was greatly surprised to find that among these papers there was this list of Revolutionary soldiers made more than one hundred and thirty years before by her ancestor, Lieutenant French. The roll seems to have been either unnoticed or thought of no importance by those who had previously pos- sessed these documents after the death of Lieutenant French in 1832. Though a portion of it was once thrown into the waste- basket, it was fortunately recovered, and the roll is preserved entire, with every name legible.
The possession by one of his descendants of this copy of a pay roll made by Lieutenant French, and also the discovery among the papers of Captain William Crawford of a copy of the roll of his Company in the War of 1812, shows that an officer may have kept the first draft of his report, having made a better written copy to send in.
Great care has been taken to make the statements in this book correct, and the authorities are cited for most facts to which the writer himself cannot testify. But there must still be errors and
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SOLDIERS OF OAKHAM
omissions. Sometime a fuller history of the town will probably be written, and a more complete genealogy of Oakham families. With this in view, I earnestly request those who read any part of this book to send me corrections of errors found in it, and to give any additional information which they possess regarding the Oakham families to which they belong, or from which they are descended.
Many have helped to gather material for the biographical sketches, to all of whom the author acknowledges his obligations. He is especially indebted to Miss Emily K. Fobes of Worcester, for searching the Worcester County Records; to Mr. Ernest L. Hayward of Taunton, for the preparation of the Index; and to Professor Henry Burt Wright of New Haven, who has verified the authorities for the Soldiers of the Revolutionary War, and given valuable assistance in every part of the work.
HENRY P. WRIGHT.
New Haven, Conn., January 5, 1914.
Soldiers of Oakham, Massachusetts
By HENRY PARKS WRIGHT Formerly Dean of Yale College
This book gives the military record of all soldiers from Oakham who served in the Revolutionary War. in the War of 1812, and in the Civil War, with the family history of each, and the authorities on which the histories are based. Among the families represented are the following :
Allen, Adams, Bassett, Bell, Berry, Black, Blair, Bolton, Bothwell, Boyd, Brown, Bullard, Butler, Caldwell, Chaddock, Conant, Crawford, Dean, Dunbar, Edson, Fairbank, Field, Forbes, Foster, French, Gould, Green, Harper, Haskell, Hayden, Henderson, Howell, Hudson, Johnson, Joslyn, Kimball, Knight, Lincoln, Lovell, Macomber, McFarland, Maynard, Nye, Packard, Parker, Parmenter, Partridge, Perkins, Rawson, Reed, Robinson, Sargeant, Shaw, Spooner, Stone, Wl'alker, Ware, Warren, Washburn, Waterman, White, Wilbur, Wilson, Wood. W'oodis, Wright.
The newly discovered Pay Roll of Captain How's company, which was in service in New York in September and November, 1776, containing ten new names of Massachusetts soldiers in the Revolutionary War, is here printed for the first time.
An account is also given of William O'Brien, George Perkins, and George Walls, three British soldiers who escaped from General Burgoyne's captured troops while prisoners at Rutland, lived for a time in Oakham, and later enlisted in the Continental Army.
Three hundred and twenty-five pages, octavo, with Index, bound in full cloth. Price $2.50, sent by mail, postage prepaid. on receipt of the price, by the Publishers
THE TUTTLE, MOREHOUSE & TAYLOR COMPANY
123 TEMPLE STREET, NEW HAVEN, CONN.
CONTENTS
The Soldiers' Union, 3-14
Organization, 3. Memorial Hall, 5. Building Committee, 6. Dedication, 7. Address of Henry P. Wright, 8. Ad- dress of Rev. F. N. Peloubet, II. Presidents of Soldiers' Union, 14.
The Revolution,
17-33
Minutemen, 18. Eight Months' Regiments, 19. Oakham Militia Company, 21. Ticonderoga Campaign, 22. Cam- paigns to New York in 1776, 22. Captain How's Company, 23. Continental Army (1777), 24. Casualties among the Continental Soldiers, 25. Josiah Whitney's Regiment, 26, 30. Rhode Island Alarm, 26. Danforth Keyes's Regiment, 27. Bennington Alarm, 28. Stillwater Campaign, 28. Guards, 29. March to Enfield, 30. Campaign to Rhode Island, 30. Claverack, 31. Continental Army (1780), 31. West Point, 31, 32. Town Officers during the Revolution, 32.
Soldiers in the Revolutionary War, . 34-156
Authorities and Abbreviations, 34. Biographical Sketches, 35
The War of 1812, I57-17I
Authorities, 158. Washington Grenadiers, 160. Bio- graphical Sketches of Soldiers in the War of 1812, 163. Town Officers during the years 1812-14, 171.
Seminole and Mexican Wars, . 172
The Civil War, 173-267
Authorities, 174. Three Months' Regiments, 175. Bio- graphical Sketches-Massachusetts Regiments: Second Infantry, 176; Tenth Infantry, 176; Eleventh Infantry, 177; Thirteenth Infantry, 178; Fifteenth Infantry, 179; Twenty-first Infantry, 181; Twenty-fifth Infantry, 183; Thirty-first Infantry, 205; Thirty fourth Infantry, 206; Thirty-sixth Infantry, 210; Thirty-ninth Infantry, 225;
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SOLDIERS OF OAKHAM
Fortieth Infantry, 226; Forty-second Infantry, 226; Forty- fourth Infantry, 231; Forty-sixth Infantry, 232; Fifty- first Infantry, 234; Fifty-second Infantry, 245; Fourth Cavalry, 246; Second Heavy Artillery, 250; Fourth Heavy Artillery, 252; Eleventh Battery, 253; Sixtieth Infantry, 254; Sixth Unattached Volunteer Militia, 255. Enlistments in Other States: One Hundred and Sixteenth Pennsylvania Infantry, 256; Second Michigan Cavalry, 256; Thirty-sixth Iowa Infantry, 259; Sixth Vermont Infantry, 260; First Vermont Cavalry, 261; Contract Service, 261; Second Ohio Heavy Artillery, 262. Summary, 264. Town Officers during the Civil War, 266.
Addenda, 269-279
Authorities, 270. Captain How's Company, 271. Cap- tain How's Pay Roll, 274. John French, 2d, 278. Captain William Crawford's Pay Roll, 280. John Rice Crawford, 282.
Index, 285-325
General Index, 287. Companies in the Revolutionary War, 293. Regiments in the Revolutionary War, 313. Town Lots, 319. Index of Towns, 322.
THE SOLDIERS' UNION
THE SOLDIERS' UNION
The Oakham Soldiers' Union grew out of a meeting of a few returned soldiers, in the vestry of the Congregational Church, on the evening of August 17, 1866. Major Fairbank, Andrew Spooner, and Sergeant Temple were requested to prepare a constitution, and, a week later, the Union was organized. Any resident of the town who had served in the Army or Navy of the United States and had been honorably discharged, and any person who had enlisted from the town and had been honorably discharged, was eligible for membership.
The annual meetings of the Soldiers' Union became at once the important social event of the year for the town, and were continued regularly for nearly a quarter of a century. A part of each meeting was given to addresses on war subjects and to other suitable exercises, and a part to social entertainment, which included a supper served by the ladies of Oakham. The proceeds of the annual meetings were deposited in the North Brookfield Savings Bank, and the deposits were increased by various entertainments planned by joint committees of the citizens and soldiers.
The association from the beginning had before it two plans : (I) the erection of some form of a monument to the soldiers who lost their lives in the Civil War; (2) the preservation of a brief biography of all the men who enlisted from the town in that war.
When the Union had reached its sixth year, it had accumulated funds which justified it in beginning to make plans for a soldiers' memorial. At the annual meeting in 1872, two proposi- tions were presented by a committee which had been appointed at the previous annual meeting :
(I) A hall for town and public uses, with memorial tablets.
(2) A monument erected on the Village Green.
The attendance at this meeting was large, and the majority of those present expressed their preference for a hall.
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SOLDIERS OF OAKHAM
On January I, 1873, the Treasurer's report showed a balance of $1,232.48 in the treasury. At this meeting the Union appointed a committee, consisting of two soldiers and five citi- zens, "to see what can be done by the citizens and by the town toward building a hall, and to present plans of a building suit- able for memorial purposes, and an estimate of the cost of building." The committee were instructed to make their report within three months. No report was ever received from this committee.
On the part of several prominent citizens there was strong opposition to an appropriation toward the erection of a memorial hall. The town was already heavily burdened by the expenses of the war, and by the railroad debt. In order to get a definite decision from the town and the citizens, the following resolu- tion was presented by Andrew Spooner, at a meeting of the Union on December 31, 1873 :
"Whereas, a committee was chosen at the last annual meeting of this association, on January Ist, 1873, to consider and report upon plans, specifications, and cost of building a suitable memorial hall, with instructions to report within three months, and no report from said committee has been received, and whereas it is desirable that the matter of a soldiers' memorial be finally disposed of, therefore
Resolved, that a committee be chosen at this time whose duty it shall be to proceed to the erection of a suitable soldiers' memorial, and that if no feasible plan for building a suitable hall be presented to them previous to the first day of January, 1875, they be instructed to erect a suitable monument, to be completed before September Ist, 1875, the cost of which shall not exceed twelve hundred dollars, and that they be empowered to draw on the treasury for the payment of the same."
After much discussion, action on this resolution was post- poned, that those in favor of a memorial hall might have oppor- tunity to ascertain what contributions of money, building material, and labor would be made by citizens, and what the town would vote to do. A canvass of the town showed that
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THE SOLDIERS' UNION
twelve hundred dollars could be raised from the citizens. The question was then presented to the town, at a meeting held March 17, 1874. At this meeting the town
"Voted to appropriate two thousand dollars, when the soldiers and the voluntary contributors shall guarantee the balance of the four thousand and four hundred dollars required to build the proposed hall."
Upon further consideration it seemed best for the interests of the town to erect a building which should contain both a hall for town and memorial purposes, and two or more rooms for a center school. Another town meeting was called, to be held March 31, to see whether the town would appropriate five hundred dollars more. At the beginning of this meeting it was voted that no one be allowed to speak on the question more than three times, or more than five minutes at a time. After a lengthy and exciting debate the town by a large majority
"Voted, that the town raise and appropriate the sum of twenty- five hundred dollars, including the two thousand dollars already appropriated by the town on the 17th of March current, for the purpose of erecting a town hall and two school rooms in one building."
The Soldiers' Union held a meeting on April II, and passed the following resolution :
"Resolved, that the Soldiers' Union will give to the town for the purpose of erecting a schoolhouse and town hall the sum of Twelve Hundred Dollars ($1,200), upon the following conditions, namely :
(I) That the town and citizens furnish a sum sufficient to complete the building proposed.
(2) That suitable tablets shall be placed therein for a soldiers' memorial by the Soldiers' Union, and maintained for all time by the town.
(3) That the Soldiers' Union have the free use of said Hall for all such meetings as they may desire to hold from year to year."
The Soldiers' Union appropriated $260 in addition, for memorial tablets.
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A Building Committee was appointed consisting of nine mem- bers, three to represent the town, three the Soldiers' Union, and three the citizens:
For the town: Alanson Prouty, Avery C. Bullard, Alonzo Lincoln.
For the Soldiers' Union: Dr. J. G. Shannon, George W. Stone, Stephen Boyden.
For the citizens: Page Austin, Deacon James Packard, Leonard P. Lovell.
Page Austin was elected Chairman.
Memorial Hall was completed before the close of the year and was dedicated on Friday evening, January 1, 1875.
The building contains two school rooms and a Selectmen's room on the first floor, and a hall, called Memorial Hall, on the second floor. The hall is used for town meetings, for public lectures, and for entertainments of all kinds. The school rooms are for the use of the Center School District, and also for pupils in the higher grades from any part of the town.
Few of the soldiers who organized the Union or were mem- bers of it are now living, but their work for the town abides in this building, which has been for nearly forty years of incal- culable value to the citizens of the town and to their children. May it long remain a monument to the soldiers of Oakham in the Civil War.
The second purpose of the Soldiers' Union-the preservation of brief biographies of the soldiers from Oakham in the Civil War-is fulfilled by the publication of this book. The plan has been enlarged so as to include also the soldiers from the town in the Revolutionary War and in the War of 1812.
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THE SOLDIERS' UNION
EXERCISES
AT THE
DEDICATION OF MEMORIAL HALL
FRIDAY EVENING, JANUARY 1, 1875
Presiding Officer, Mark Haskell
Prayer, . Rev. Alpha Morton
Report of the Building Committee and Presentation of the Keys,
Page Austin, Chairman of the Building Committee
Acceptance on behalf of the Town,
Moses O. Ayres, Chairman of the Selectmen
Presentation of the Memorial Tablets, .
Henry P. Wright
. Mark Haskell Response,
Poem,
Ella M. Spooner, Mt. Holyoke Seminary
Address, .
Rev. F. N. Peloubet of Natick, Mass.
Music by Crawford's Cornet Band and by Conant and Macomber's Orchestra
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SOLDIERS OF OAKHAM
ADDRESS OF HENRY P. WRIGHT
It has been thought appropriate that a few words be said concerning the part taken in the erection of this building by the Soldiers' Union.
During the year following the close of the war, the returned soldiers of the Union Army residing in this town formed them- selves into an association called the Oakham Soldiers' Union, Its object, as set forth in the constitution, was "to cherish the memory of our fallen comrades, to preserve the friendships of camp and field, and to cultivate a sentiment of love and devotion to our country." At the beginning, the organization was designed to be of a social character. Its first meetings were attended only by soldiers, who passed the time chiefly in relating incidents of the war of which they themselves had personal knowledge. It was soon proposed to collect materials for a historical sketch of each soldier who enlisted from Oakham, and thus to preserve in permanent and accessible form a history of the town in the war. This has been partly done and will be completed. Another design was the erection, at some future time, of a suitable memorial to perpetuate the memory of those who fell in their country's service.
Annual reunions were established, to be held on the first day of January of each year, to which all friends of the soldiers were invited. Their purpose was to keep alive the friendships formed in the war and to interest the people in our organiza- tion and its objects. These meetings, always well attended, have constantly increased in public favor, and it is to this, our ninth annual reunion, that you are welcomed for these dedicatory exercises.
But something more was thought of than social entertainment. It seemed desirable to begin some movement, as early as pos- sible, to perpetuate the memory of the sacrifices of this people in the war. The returned soldiers were few in number, and when a memorial was first suggested we saw no way of raising
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THE SOLDIERS' UNION
money sufficient even for a humble monument. A little was saved from the annual meetings, a little added now and then from a social gathering; yet the sum of these littles was still small. The most timely aid rendered to our cause was by Mr. John B. Gough, who on so many occasions has placed the people of this town under lasting obligations to him, and whom we must ever hold in grateful remembrance. The proceeds of his lectures were added to our little fund, and it at once began to be respectable. The citizens of the town made our object their own, and by fairs and social entertainments the cause was helped on. By these means and by judicious investment, our accumulations became such that, two years ago, we began seriously to consider how they could best be used. After a very careful consideration of different plans, it was agreed to give the greater part of our fund to the town for the purpose of erecting a memorial building, providing the town and citizens would furnish enough to complete it. The town and citi- zens accepted the offer, and we united with them in the erection of this Hall, for which we were able to contribute one-fourth of the amount expended upon it. In itself, perhaps, the sum may seem small, but our gift was of great value for this reason, at least, that, without it, the building would not have been erected.
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