USA > Maine > Lincoln County > Waldoboro > History of old Broad Bay and Waldoboro, Volume 1 > Part 51
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From the beginning of the struggle, military stores had been scarce in the Province of Maine. William Loud of Bristol, speak- ing of conditions in this area, observed: "I do not think one tenth part of the inhabitants have any [ammunition]." To meet this condition the Massachusetts Council on April 20, 1776, appointed Colonel William Jones as a committee to distribute £1200 to the inhabitants of the eastern part of Lincoln County to relieve cur- rent distress. The Commissary General was also empowered to deliver to Captain Samuel Nichols of Newcastle "for the use of the inhabitants of said county of Lincoln 10,000 weight of gun- powder, 20,000 weight of balls, 3000 flints, and that payment be made for the same inside of twelve months."15 These supplies were welcome, but the suggestion of payment led Mr. William Loud to offer on behalf of the district a brief comment on its condition.
I doubt not Sir but that you remember Mr. Waterman Thomas of Waldoborough, who was up to the Congress for the year past [1775] on Acct of Supply for many settlements but could not obtain it. As the inhabitants have been Drove to great Straits on acct of not having mar- ket for their Lumber for the year past, and the supports of life having been so dear to them, I cannot see how it is possible at present for them to raise cash for ammunition.16
The early raids by the British on coast towns had made the Province immediately conscious of its need for defense in this area. Accordingly, on January 4th the House of Representatives resolved that "sea coast establishments" be raised. They were sta- tioned in companies of fifty men, including officers, at the mouth
14Edward K. Gould, British and Tory Marauders of the Penobscot (Rockland, 1932). 13 American Archives IV, Ser. 4, 1776.
16Wm. Loud to John Taylor, Esq., Colls. Me. Hist. Soc., Doc. Ser., XIV, 360-361.
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of the Sheepscot, at Pemaquid, at Medumcook, St. Georges and on the Penobscot. Such companies were stationed to prevent landing forces from British ships raiding the settlements. Waldo- borough was defended from any such surprise attacks by the forces at Pemaquid and Medumcook. The company on the Georges was under Captain Benjamin Plummer and was in service from March 5th to September 6th, 1776. It included the following Waldoborough men: William Farnsworth, Jr., sergeant, Isaac Farnsworth, fifer, and privates Abel Cole, Ezra Pitcher, George Ulmer, Nathaniel Pitcher, Peter Hilt and James Sweetland.
Apart from these minor phases of the war, there were also Waldoborough men engaged in the major theater. In camp before the beleaguered city of Boston were among others, as we have said, Conrad Heyer, Isaiah Cole, and George Ulmer, Jr. John Stahl, who had joined a company raised to the west in Cumberland County, and young Philip Reiser were also there. A little insight into army life around Boston is afforded in a simple letter of this youthful soldier to his father, Major Reiser, in Waldobor- ough. Since it is the only thing of its kind from this period preserved in our annals it is reproduced here in full:
Camp Prospect Hill. February 28, 1776
Honoured father and mother. I take this opportunity to write to you to inform you that I am now in Good health hoping these few lines may find you the Same. I hope you will not think hard of my not writing to you before for I have been with Lieutenant Smith to take care of him for he has been almost at Deaths Door but he is now well and I have been sick but am now hearty and like the Army Very well and like my officers well, all that I dislike is that everything is exceeding Dear and clothes in a particular manner. I expect to Go to battle every minute and if my life is Spared me I hope to be with you to pay you A visit next Spring with Sergt. Ulmer. Give my love to my Brothers all En- quiring friends. I should be glad if you would write to me every op- portunity and if you send any letters you must Direct them to Prospect Hill in Col. Bond's Regiment and in Capt. fuller's Company which is the Company I Belong to. Sergt. Ulmer Remembers his love to you all and all his Uncles and aunts family No more at present. But I remain Your Dutiful Son,
Philip Razor
Address: Mr Martin Razor in Waldoborough, By favour Mr. Acorn.17
This lad later died in Camp at Prospect Hill, years before the cause to which he so cheerfully devoted himself had reached its attainment. His naïvely charming letter is an interesting reflection of the extent to which some of the second generation of young Germans in the better-to-do families in Waldoborough had adopted and were using the language of their new country. The Puritan influence was here proving its potency.
17Letter loaned by Emily Hazlewood of Boston, a descendant of John Martin Reiser.
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After the unfortunate hiatus in the town records, the narra- tive is again resumed in a sketchy way with the meeting of March 4, 1776, "at the new meeting house on the easterly side of the river." These minutes are not particularly revealing. Of the de- tails worthy of note, the following are listed: To the town war- rant the third selectman affixed his signature as Johan Adam Löwen Zölner, thus settling himself the long dispute over the original form of the name of Levensaler; the town voted to send "Mr. Waterman Thomas up to the Concrese [Province Congress]"; at the April meeting a new Committee of "Corespontents and In- spection" was elected, made up of Bernhard Shuman, Jacob Eichorn (Achorn), Captain Solomon Hewet, Jacob Unbehinde (Umberhine), Bernhard Uckley (Eugley), Callab Howert (How- ard), and John Weaver; the warrant for the meeting of May 7, 1776, was issued in the name of the Government of Massachusetts Bay in place of that of His Majesty, the King. From the minutes of this year it is clear that a strong Tory and neutral minority was not disposed to dispute the control of the patriot element in town affairs.
The Declaration of Independence was promulgated on July 4th of this year. It was printed in Massachusetts, and copies were sent to all ministers in the Province to be read publicly by them in the pulpit "on the first Lord's day after its reception," and to be recorded by the town clerks in their respective town books. No record of this document was ever made in the Waldoborough minutes, and the preacher, "Doctor" John Martin Schaeffer, a gentleman of strong and outspoken Tory sympathies, stoutly re- fused to read it from the pulpit. The pastor's attitude clearly reveals the strength of the loyalist sentiment in the town, and the general tolerance with which it was regarded, for the Reverend Schaeffer was never compelled to comply, nor was he dismissed from the church, but continued against all suasion to refuse to pray for the success of the American arms, cynically averring that in England prayers were offered four hours earlier for the success of British arms, thereby implying that those who were there first would be served first. But the Declaration was read. The stubborn clergyman was circumvented by two of his parish- ioners, Jacob Ludwig and Andrew Schenck, who translated the document into German and read it before their mustered militia companies, thereby insuring its being circulated throughout the community by word of mouth. One of these companies com- manded by Captain Ludwig marched to Megunticook (Camden) on November 3rd, embarked there for Machias and did a six months' period of duty guarding the town against raids from British war vessels.
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In early days all connections with the west had been by water, the intervening forest being an untracked wilderness. Bridle and foot trails from town to town had gradually come into use and were then followed by roads of a sort. This year the first recorded overland trip on horseback to Boston was made by Benjamin Burton from the Georges River. He bore with him the petition for the incorporation of the town of Thomaston. He crossed the Medomak at Waterman's Ferry, which was the first of eight to be crossed to reach Boston. This journey required six days. The total expense to the town was £1 7s. 5d., equal to about $4.56 current value. One shilling was the normal amount paid for a meal, and 4s. 8d. for crossing a ferry.
Through the early winter months of this year, Washington had tightened his grip on Boston. On the night of March 4th Dorchester Heights were occupied and fortified. A fierce two- day storm gave the Americans the opportunity to make their position so strong that assault seemed futile to Lord Howe. With both his fleet and army under the fire of American guns he was compelled to evacuate the town in order to save his forces. This movement was carried out gradually and was completed by the 19th. The next day the town was occupied by the patriots. From this time on to the end of the war, the main military operations took place outside of New England. This fact limits the role of Waldoborough in the war to smaller local campaigns, to the struggle with Tory marauders, and to the role played by her citizen soldiers at Valley Forge, Saratoga, and Yorktown.
The year 1777 was one of considerable activity on the part of the Tories in Lincoln County. In many of the towns surrounding Waldoborough, they had received harsh treatment at the hands of local patriots, and in consequence local feuds and grudges long smouldering had burst into open flame; and from this time until the end of the war, the Tories adopted and continued retaliatory tactics. The nearness of the eastern coast to enemy territory served to embolden them. In their raids and marauding excursions, they were joined by the disaffected, by those with private grudges, and by men who were not above using unsettled conditions to their own advantage.
Such developments were slow in coming to a head in Waldo- borough, and where they did occur, events enacted came largely from marauders from other towns. Waldoborough was probably the strongest Tory center in the district, but there is no evidence that this sentiment brought neighbors to the point of committing outrages against one another. Feelings by and large remained cool and strained. Where differences in viewpoint were known to exist they were usually accompanied by commendable restraint. This condition probably arose largely from the fact that the local
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Tories were neither active nor militant, but were willing to live and let live. Here again families were large, seven or eight brothers and sisters being the usual family pattern in this second genera- tion. This fact, combined with intermarriage, set up values of blood kinship and family loyalty as a counterbalance to the differ- ences of opinion which developed over the issues of the day. The Germans, too, were rather turgid in their interest in public affairs and were in the main unwilling to allow their domestic peace and well-being to be strained unduly by political differences.
The size of the Tory faction in the town undoubtedly was another factor which led their other-minded neighbors to ob- serve a judicious restraint. Had this issue been pushed, as in other towns, to the point of persecution and outrage, a condition akin to civil war would have prevailed in the community. Of the number or percentage of Waldoborough Tories, we cannot be certain, although all contemporary observers agree it was large. Mrs. Mero, a contemporary in the Georges Valley, is quoted by Sibley to the effect that "in Waldoborough ... were many tories. The old country people were almost all for the King."18 Her testimony is supported by that of the Reverend Jacob Bailey, the Episcopal rector and Tory of Pownalborough, who was compelled in 1779 to take refuge in Halifax. From this town he wrote to the British General McLean in command on the Penobscot concern- ing dependable loyalists in Lincoln County. Under the heading "at Bristol and Broad Bay," he lists Cornelius Rhodes (Rothe) and son, George, John Martin, Dr. Martin Shepherd (Schaeffer), Michael Sprague, and two sons, Captain David Vinal, Peter Cre- mor (Cramer or Creamer) and two sons, George Cremor, George Young (Jung), George Light, Mr. Cyder (Seider), Mr. Umber- hind, "and in general all the Dutch families in Broad Bay except ten or twelve families."
A passing glimpse of the milder activity of some of the local Tories is furnished by the account of this same Reverend Bailey on his expulsion to Halifax in June 1779. While the little sloop in which he was taking passage lay off Woolwich, he wrote: "Mr. Palmer19 brought me several letters from my good friends at Broad Bay and presents for the journey." Sailing that day from the Kennebec they spent the night at Cape Newagen. The next day the sloop rounded Pemaquid Point and beat its way up the sound to Mr. Palmer's. It anchored near Loud's Island and filled its water casks. The following morning leave was taken of the "zealous friend," Mr. Palmer, and the sloop headed for St. Georges, but an east wind drove them back to Broad Cove where they could see "the Dutch Plantation at Broad Bay." Mr. Bailey con-
18 John L. Sibley, History of the Town of Union (Boston, 1851).
19 Probably Nathaniel Palmer, a restless Bristol Tory.
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tinues: "I spent the night with Mr. Rhoads [Cornelius Rothe], a generous farmer born in Germany, who had amassed a good for- tune, but whom the war had ruined.20 Such a characterization is on the whole typical of the passive attitude of most Waldo- borough Tories, and while we may deplore the lukewarmness of many of our German forebears, we can commend the poise and restraint they exercised in maintaining their community life in- tact and ready for the more cooperative days of peace.
Throughout the year 1777, the patriot faction in the town maintained a firm grip on its internal administration. Elected as its board of selectmen were Waterman Thomas, Nathan Soule, and Nathaniel Simmons, all of the recent Puritan migration and all staunch friends of freedom. On the Committee of Correspond- ence, Inspection and Safety, it placed only two Germans, Peter Pracht (Prock) and Andrew Schenck, the latter a well-known patriot. The other seven members of this group were from the Puritan faction and all fervent in the cause of liberty. They were Captain Waterman, Captain Samson, John Hunt, Zebedee Sim- mons, Esquire Thomas, Captain Soule, and Captain Farnsworth. With such a lineup, the town was overwhelmingly in a position to give the fullest support to the patriot cause.
This year a determined effort was made to secure soldiers for a longer enlistment, and this meant to secure them for the Con- tinental Army. The usual enlistments for short periods, with the soldier leaving service promptly on their expiration, or even before, made it extremely difficult for the commanders in the field to maintain an efficient military force. To overcome this fatal weak- ness and under pressure from the General Court, longer terms of service were sought. The town accordingly made the effort to raise its quota of one man out of every seven for a long-term enlistment by offering a bounty "to each seventh man above six- teen years of age if he would enlist in the continental army for three years or during the war." In fact, enlistments were so slow that a bounty was offered of £10 lawful money for each man "listing in town for three years or during the warre"; and for enlisting its quota of one man in seven for a long term, it offered the inducement of a £100 lawful money bounty. The fact that this inducement failed is significant of the temper of the town. It became necessary in the meeting of June 12th to up the bounty to £200.21 In evaluating this monetary test of local patriotism, the fact must not be overlooked that this sum of $666.67, calculated on a sound money basis, was actually very much less in terms of the much depreciated currency of that period. It did prove,
20 Cited by Charles H. Allen, History of Dresden, Maine, p. 400. 21Waldoborough Town Records, 1777.
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however, an inducement, and a number in excess of the quota for the year enlisted for service with the Continental Army.
The legislative appeal of the General Court for troops was read throughout the county by the ministers of the Gospel; and along with it, certain enactments which made it a highly penal matter to discourage enlistments in the Continental Army or Navy, to depreciate the bills of currency, or to disparage in any way the support of independence on the part of the people. Under these statutes any person suspected with good reason of being inimical to the colonial cause could be arrested on a justice warrant and banished to the enemy, unless willing to take an oath of alle- giance; the return of a person so banished was punished by for- feiture of life. The effect of these legislative acts in the towns of the county was to provide the zealots with new instruments for persecuting their Tory neighbors and brought closer the day when the Tory outlaws, ranging at large through the towns, would take their toll of vengeance on the innocent as well as the guilty.
This year brought to the town of Waldoborough two mili- tary developments of more than passing moment. The first of these was the British plan to isolate New England from the rest of the confederation by having Burgoyne occupy the line of Lake Champlain and the Hudson River, and to effect contact with the smaller British force under Clinton in New York. Burgoyne, moving southward, encountered little opposition until he reached the portage between Lakes Champlain and George and the Hud- son River. General Schuyler, in command of small American forces, did everything in his power to delay this advance by felling trees across the route and filling up the creeks to flood the land. So effective were these tactics that it took the British force fifty days to move seventy-five miles.
In the meantime the call went out through all New England to the men on the hills, rivers, and shores to assemble to check this new danger. Colonel Dummer Sewall of Georgetown brought the call to Waldoborough. Proceeding eastward through the coast towns, he crossed the Medomak at Light's Ferry and conferred with the two captains of the local militia, Schenck and Ludwig. Captain Schenck mustered his company immediately. It was ad- dressed by Colonel Sewall in English and by Captain Schenck in German.
The same procedure was followed with Captain Ludwig's company, and volunteers were called for. Among those respond- ing were Isaiah Cole, Barnabas Freeman, John Fitzgerald, Charles Heavener, Frederick Schwartz, Peter Light, George Seitenberger, Charles Walsh, and George Leissner. These men proceeded over- land to Georgetown (Bath) where they were fitted out and then
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joined that stream of men coursing toward the Hudson Valley from many districts of New England. Here they formed a part of that "rabble in arms" across the line of Burgoyne's advance. It is presumed that they all engaged in the battle of Saratoga. Charles Heavener fought under Benedict Arnold in the initial battle of this campaign which arrested the advance of the British at Freeman's Farm. Shortly after, he was in the battle of Saratoga and later at Valley Forge, Monmouth, Stillwater, and Rhode Island.
By October 17, 1777, the rabble in arms had achieved its objective, and the threat of Burgoyne came to an end with the capitulation of the entire British force. These prisoners were marched to Boston, there to embark on British transports and proceed to England on parole. The terms of this Saratoga Con- vention, however, were never carried out, and the whole body of prisoners was held in Boston awaiting final disposition. It was at this time that the German population of Waldoborough received fresh accessions from the Hessian contingent, a few being released on parole under the sponsorship of Americans. On October 25, 1777, John M. Schaeffer petitioned for three Hessian prisoners, one each for himself, Waterman Thomas, and Andrew Schenck.22
The first of such additions was Heinrich Isence, born at Hanover, Germany, who had been captured by General Stark at' Bennington. He was brought to Waldoborough by Andrew Schenck and after a brief residence in the town joined a fellow countryman in Union. This fellow countryman was Andreas Such- fort (Sukeforth) who was brought from Boston by Philip Rob- bins of Union. This Suchfort, who was a very powerful man, at one time lugged two bushels of salt on his back from Waldo- borough to Union.23 He later moved to Waldoborough where for a short period he owned the present Merle Castner farm. Ultimately he settled in Washington, where he died, leaving a very considerable posterity. Among the other Hessians who be- came residents at this time, or a little later, were John Peter Walther, paroled to General McCobb, Doctor Theobald, surgeon and chaplain, and Doctor John G. Bornemann.
The second major military event of the year in Waldobor- ough was the campaign in the Machias area of a local militia company under the command of Captain Jacob Ludwig. This year the coast had been infested by British ships which had maintained a virtual blockade that had had the effect of reducing the local stores of materials and markedly raising prices. Corn sold at $2.50 a bushel, and all other foods were in proportion. To prevent
22Colls. Me. Hist. Soc., Doc. Ser., XV, 266. 23Sibley, History of the Town of Union.
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landing parties from making assaults on the settlements and seiz- ing or destroying stores, two hundred men were enrolled to de- fend the coast from Camden to Machias. Captain Ludwig's com- pany was raised along the Medomak and the Georges. Its Waldo- borough contingent was made up of Jacob Ludwig, captain, Jacob Winchenbach, first lieutenant, and privates Gottfried Born- heimer, William Farnsworth, Peter Hilt, Godfrey Hoffses, Caleb Howard, William Miller, Valentine Mink, Henry Oberloch, Isaac Sargus, John Werner, and John Winchenbach. John Gross and John Hilt were in Captain Benjamin Lamont's company, Colonel John Allen's regiment. On November 3rd the company left Cam- den for Machias, where it arrived November 10th. The little we know of its activities at Machias is derived from the Diary of the commanding officer of the district, Colonel John Allen. Among its items are found the following:
Machias, Monday, Nov. 10, 1777, Captain Ludwig arrived with his company of twenty-four officers and soldiers. In the evening the Indians danced according to their usual manner. ... 11th. The articles of war and a Resolve of the General Court was read to Capt. Ludwig's Company, who have orders to be ready to go to the Rhym to-morrow, the two Hessian prisoners who came with Capt. Ludwig enlisted. Wed. the 12th. In the morning Capt. Ludwig's men were supplied with what arms and other things they were in want of, and then set off for the Rhym. Dec. 6. Gave orders for Crosby's company to come up to the falls; Capt. Lud- wig to command at the Rhym. Dec. 22. Capt. Ludwig disbanded his company. 23d. Capt. Ludwig made up his pay roll,24 preparing to set off; his men went down to the Rhym to go in a shallop to Gouldsboro.25
No enemy attacks occurred in this sector, and Captain Lud- wig and his men were back in Waldoborough by the New Year. The details of this insignificant military episode have been set forth here because they are typical of the colorless character of so much of the service of the local militia in this war.
The surrender of Burgoyne had in part relieved the gloom occasioned by the checks received by Washington at German- town and on the Brandywine and his failure to prevent the British occupation of Philadelphia. At the close of the campaign around the latter city, Washington's army withdrew up the Schuylkill and settled down to a winter of the most acute misery at Valley Forge. Among the Waldoborough men in the Continental Army undergoing this tragic ordeal were: Daniel Beckler, Isaiah Cole, Charles Heavener, Conrad Heyer, George Leissner, George Ul- mer, Jr., Lieutenant Philip Ulmer, and Ezekiel Winslow. The sufferings of the colonial troops during this winter are a theme
24Filed in the Secretary's office, State House, Boston, Mass.
25Frederick Kidder, Military Operations in Maine and Nova Scotia During the Revolution (Albany, 1867).
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in every school history, but it is from Washington's own pen that an adequate idea of their miseries can best be gathered. He writes: "To see men without clothes to cover their nakedness, without blankets to lie on, without shoes (for the want of which their marches might be traced by the blood from their feet) ... is a proof of patience and obedience, which in my opinion can scarce be parallelled." And again: "For some days there has been little less than a famine in camp. A part of the army has been a week without any kind of flesh ... Naked and starving as they are, we cannot enough admire the incomparable patience and fidelity of the soldiery."26
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