USA > New Hampshire > History of New Hampshire, from its first discovery to the year 1830; with dissertations upon the rise of opinions and institutions, the growth of agriculture and manufactures, and the influence of leading families and distinguished men, to the year 1874; > Part 19
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Committees from both sides of the river conferred together, and reported that a union of all the towns granted by New Hampshire was desirable and necessary, and they recommended the calling of a convention, in which every town interested should be represented, to meet at Charlestown, N. H., on the third Tues- day of January, 1781. Three parties were now in the field : Ver- mont, her recreant sons who preferred some other jurisdic- tion to that of the state, and the citizens of New Hampshire living in the towns upon the river. They were all intensely ex- cited, and eager for victory. The delegates from the disturbed towns met at Charlestown according to notice. Forty-three towns were represented from the two states. No journal of the convention exists. The result of their deliberations was favora- ble to the government of Vermont. Twelve delegates from New Hampshire protested and withdrew. A committee was appointed to confer with the legislature of Vermont which was to meet at Windsor during the next month, and the convention adjourned to meet at Cornish while the legislature of Vermont should be in session.
A petition came to the legislature of Vermont, at the same session, from the settlers west of the Green Mountains, desiring union with Vermont and protection from that state. Both peti- tions received a favorable response. They voted to receive all towns east of the Connecticut to the distance of about twenty miles, if two thirds of said towns approved the union. The leg- islature then adjourned till the following April. At their ad- journed meeting the following towns in New Hampshire sent in their allegiance, to wit: Hinsdale, Walpole, Surry, Gilsum, Al- stead, Charlestown, Acworth, Lempster, Saville, Claremont, New- port, Cornish, Croydon, Plainfield, Grantham, Marlow, Lebanon, Grafton, Dresden, Hanover, Cardigan, Lyme, Dorchester, Ha- verhill, Landaff, Gunthwaite, Lancaster, Piermont, Richmond, Chesterfield, Westmoreland, Bath, Lyman, Morristown and Lincoln.
Thirty-six towns in Vermont approved of the union, eight voted against it, and six made no returns. Thus the union was con- summated. Twenty-eight towns in New Hampshire sent rep- resentatives to the legislature of Vermont, then sitting at Wind-
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sor. Provision was then made for the union of these towns with the counties opposite to them in Vermont, except the southern tier of towns, which were made into a new county to be called Washington. Provision was also made for the trial of suits already commenced in the New Hampshire courts, and for pro- bate jurisdiction for the newly united towns. They then adjourn- ed to meet at Bennington in the following June. At this session eleven towns from the western portion of Vermont were admit- ted to the union against the wishes of many of the towns in New Hampshire. The next legislature of this new state met at Charlestown in October, 1781. Mr. Hiland Hall, in his History of Vermont, reports as present at Charlestown one hundred and thirty-seven members, representing one hundred and two towns in Vermont and New Hampshire. Of these, sixty represented forty-five towns in New Hampshire. Two councilors and the lieutenant-governor were from the same side of the river. Other authorities affirm that fifteen towns east of the river sent no del- egates ; eighteen were certainly represented. The most distin- guished citizens of those towns were elected. Charlestown ex- erted an important influence in favor of union with Vermont. The town was not originally chartered by New Hampshire. Massachusetts had been the protector of this and other frontier towns on the Connecticut. New Hampshire had neglected them. They therefore sought to live under another government. These citizens acted from high and pure motives, as they viewed their relations to surrounding states. They honestly believed that New Hampshire had no claim to their allegiance, and that they were free to choose their own rulers. So they acted ; not from mere selfish motives, as some have affirmed, to secure power and bring the capitol to their side of the river, but to establish a firm and stable government for the people on both sides.
In August, 1781, congress again resumed the consideration of affairs in Vermont. They began to hold out inducements of her ultimate reception into the Federal Union; but they dis- suaded the citizens of that state from annexing towns in New Hampshire or New York to their original territory. They ap- pointed a committee to confer with a committee from Vermont respecting the admission of the state into the Union. Agents had been already appointed at Charlestown, to present the peti- tion of the new state, with all its accessions, to congress for ad- mission. At first the congressional committee declined to meet them, because they represented the enlarged territory. The matter was referred to congress and the conference was granted. The result of the conference was the reaffirming of the first pro- position of congress to receive Vermont as an equal member of the confederacy, whenever she should relinquish her claim to
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towns in New Hampshire and New York. Of course Vermont was, by this resolution, required to retrace her steps and aban- don her allies. At that time she was not prepared to yield so much to congress to secure her independence. When the legis- lature of Vermont met at Charlestown, Oct. 11, 1781, as above recorded, Thomas Chittenden had been reëlected governor ; but of lieutenant-governor there was no choice. The house elected Elisha Paine of Lebanon, formerly of Cardigan. Bezaleel Woodward of Dresden was one of the councilors. Thus the officers were selected, in part, from New Hampshire towns.
When the commissioners returned from Washington the legis- lature of Vermont convened, Oct. 16, 1781, to consider the terms proposed by congress in committee of the whole. They resolved not to recede from their previous plan of union, and positively refused to abandon their new allies. They also ap- pointed nine commissioners to meet an equal number from each of the states of New Hampshire and New York for the mutual adjustment of their jurisdictional claims.
While the session of the Vermont legislature lasted at Charles- town, there was much fear that New Hampshire might attempt their dispersion. There was a state of feverish excitement in both states. During that session a regiment of New Hamp- shire troops arrived in Charlestown, as was supposed, to over- awe the legislators. Colonel Reynolds, who was in command, was advised that his force was too small for conquest ; too large, if it was only sent to intimidate the legislature. He gave no ac- count of his plans or those of his superior officers. No attempt was made by him to disturb the session of the legislature. On receiving the news of the capture of Cornwallis at Yorktown, the legislature adjourned to meet at Bennington, Jan. 31, 1782. Meantime party spirit was very violent, and a civil war was im- minent. Courts and judicial officers were duplicated in all coun- ties that contained towns originally belonging to New Hamp- shire. The new county of Washington, which was formerly a part of Cheshire, had courts in the same place, though not at the same time, under the jurisdiction of two states. The sheriff appointed by Vermont was Nathaniel S. Prentiss. The sheriff from New Hampshire was Colonel Enoch Hale. Both were men of mark and had held high offices in the previous history of the country. The war for a while centered in these two men. Sheriff Prentiss, in attempting to serve a writ in Chesterfield, Nov. 14, 1781, was interrupted and driven from his purpose by two men who protected the defendant against whom the writ was issued. Prentiss procured a warrant for these disturbers of his peace, arrested them, and confined them in the jail at Charlestown. These citizens appealed to the assembly of New
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Hampshire, and the assembly, on the twenty-eighth of November, 178I, empowered Colonel Hale to release the prisoners. They also authorized the arrest of all persons attempting to exercise judicial authority in towns east of the Connecticut river. Col- onel Hale proceeded to Charlestown to execute the decrees of the New Hampshire legislature, but Sheriff Prentiss, being a bold man, and not having the fear of the New Hampshire legis- lators before his eyes, proceeded to arrest and imprison Colonel Hale ! Armed, as he supposed, with plenary power to call for a posse, he made a requisition on General Bellows of Walpole to call out the militia for his liberation. This requisition being ap- proved by the committee of safety in New Hampshire, they or- dered General Bellows, in concert with General Nichols of Am- herst, to march, with the troops under their command, to Char- lestown and release Colonel Hale. They also ordered Francis Blood of Temple to furnish provisions for the troops. Governor Chittenden immediately ordered Lieutenant-Governor Elisha Paine of Lebanon to call out all the militia of Vermont east of the Green Mountains, if necessary, to prevent the liberation of Colonel Hale. He also sent a committee to Exeter to secure, if possible, a peaceful settlement of the quarrel. Mr. Prentiss was one of this delegation. The New Hampshire committee of safety, on the seventh day of January, 1782, made the following entry on their records : "Nathaniel S. Prentiss of Alstead, in the county of Cheshire, was apprehended and brought before
the committee. Upon examination, it appearing that he had acted within this state as an officer under the pretended and usurped authority of the state of Vermont, so called, he was com- mitted to gaol !" This act added new fuel to the fires of con- tention, and they blazed with ten-fold fury. New Hampshire also made a proclamation, ordering all the people of the revolt- ed towns, within forty days, to present themselves before some magistrate of New Hampshire and subscribe a declaration ac- knowledging the jurisdiction of that state to extend to the Con- necticut river. They also ordered the militia of all the counties to hold themselves in readiness to march against the rebels ! At this crisis congress again interposed. They prevailed on General Washington, then in Philadelphia, to write a letter, dated January 1, 1782, to Governor Chittenden, advising a re- linquishment of their late extensions of territory as an indis- pensable preliminary to their admission into the union. He in- timated that a failure to comply with this reasonable request would cause the United States to regard them as enemies to be coerced by military power ! The letter produced the desired result. The statesmen of Vermont saw that their true interests lay in union with the confederacy, and with their original terri- 1
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tory only. The assembly met at Bennington, according to pre- vious notice, on the thirty-first of January, 1782. Taking ad- vantage of the absence of the members from New Hampshire, they proceeded to define the limits of Vermont by the western bank of the Connecticut river, thus leaving the New Hampshire towns that had acted with them to provide for their own welfare.
Thus was the inauspicious union severed, which only a few months previous they had pronounced inviolate, and pledged their sacred honor in its defence. When the members from New Hampshire towns arrived they were not permitted to take their seats in the assembly; they accordingly left their alienated friends with expressions of great bitterness. This action of the Vermont legislature virtually ended the controversy, though the excitement still continued. The towns thus rejected very soon quietly returned to their old allegiance ; and the State of New Hampshire, acting with great lenity, received back her er- ring children with joy, and, in subsequent years, appointed some of the actors in this drama of secession to places of power and honor. They could hardly fail to do so, for the leading men in the revolt were among the most distinguished citizens of the towns they represented. The town of Dresden, as the seat of Dartmouth College was then called, was represented in the leg- islature of Vermont that sat at Charlestown in October, 1781, by Professor Bezaleel Woodward, brother-in-law of the presi- dent of the college, and General Ebenezer Brewster, then, per- haps, the most influential citizen of that little town. Hanover proper was represented by Jonathan Wright and Jonathan Freeman, who was afterwards trustee of the college and mem- ber of congress. This rebellion ended so suddenly and subsid- ed so rapidly that few men of this age know of its existence .*
* The author is indebted to Rev. H. H. Saunderson for many facts and dates in the above chapter.
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CHAPTER L.
--
MILITARY OPERATIONS OF 1777. BATTLE OF BENNINGTON.
Short enlistments and temporary recruits had been proved to be very inconvenient in the previous service ; accordingly New Hampshire raised three regiments for three years, or during the war. The commanders were Joseph Cilley, Nathan Hale and Alexander Scammell. The men were furnished with new French arms and ordered to rendezvous at Ticonderoga, under the im- mediate command of Brigadier-General Poor. He was younger in the service than Colonel Stark, and this irregular promotion by congress gave offence to Stark, and he retired from the army in disgust. Ticonderoga was regarded as the Gibraltar of Amer- ica. It was therefore made a special object of assault by the British under Burgoyne, and was taken. On the retreat, Colo- nel Hale's regiment was detailed to cover the rear of the in- valids, and was thus left far behind the main army. An ad- vanced party of the enemy attacked him at Hubbardton, in Rutland county, Vt., seventeen miles southeast of Ticonderoga. A severe skirmish ensued in which several officers and one hun- dred men were taken prisoners. The remainder of the army fell back to Saratoga. There was, on the way, a second engage- ment, at Fort Anne, in which Captain Weare, son of the presi- dent of the state, was mortally wounded. He soon after died at Albany.
After the evacuation of Ticonderoga, the people of the New Hampshire Grants implored aid of the committee of safety at Exeter, to protect them from the advancing enemy. The legis- lature being summoned, they divided the entire militia into two brigades, giving command of the first to William Whipple ; of the second to John Stark. They ordered one fourth of Stark's brigade and one fourth of three regiments of Whipple's brigade to march immediately under Stark, "to stop the progress of the enemy on our western frontiers." The state could vote to raise troops but could not pay them. The treasury was empty. In this emergency, the patriotism of Mr. Langdon, speaker of the house, became conspicuous. He offered to loan the country three thousand dollars in coin and the avails of his plate and some West India goods on hand, remarking that if the Ameri- can cause should triumph, he should be repaid ; but in case of defeat the property would be of no use to him. He also vol-
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unteered, with other distinguished citizens, to serve as privates under General Stark.
Among the distinguished patriots of that crisis was Captain Ebenezer Webster. The state authorized him to enlist soldiers for the common defence. He, on learning the danger from the in- vasion of Colonel Baum, enlisted a company of sixty men, chiefly from the towns of Salisbury and Andover. His personal popu- larity as an officer influenced many of these men, his neighbors and friends, to join the army. They rendezvoused at Charles- town, and thence marched to Bennington and joined the brigade of Stark. Captain Webster and his company performed signal service in the events that followed.
The appointment of Stark was received with enthusiasm throughout the state. The people confided in him ; they knew his dauntless courage and keen sagacity, and, with one voice, bade him "God speed," and prophesied his success. Volun- teers, in great numbers, flocked to his standard. All classes were eager "to take the woods " for "a Hessian hunt." Their confidence was not disappointed. Stark made his headquarters at Charlestown. As his men arrived, he sent them to Manches- ter, twenty miles north of Bennington, to join the forces of Ver- mont under Colonel Warner. Here Stark joined him. Gen- eral Schuyler, commander of the northern department, sent to them General Lincoln to conduct the militia under their com- mand to the west side of Hudson's river. Stark declined to obey, alleging that he was in the service of New Hampshire, and her interests required his presence at Bennington. He was reported to congress and they passed a vote of censure upon Stark, which in a few days they were obliged to change to a vote of thanks. He knew his business and duty better than they. Following out his own plan, Stark collected his forces at Ben- nington, and left Warner with his regiment at Manchester. Stark's object was to meet and resist Colonel Baum, who had been sent from Fort Edward by Burgoyne to rob and plunder the people of Vermont, and thus secure horses, clothes and pro- visions for the British army. He had under him about fifteen hundred men, Germans, tories and Indians. Stark sent Colonel Gregg, with two hundred men, to stay the advance of the Ind- ians who preceded the main army. Gregg retreated before the red men ; but on the next day, the fourteenth of August, Stark came to his relief, and a skirmish followed in which thirty of the enemy were killed ; among them two chiefs. The Indians then began to desert saying that "the woods were full of Yankees." The next day a heavy storm of rain delayed the contest. On the sixteenth of August reinforcements from Berkshire, led by Colonel Symonds, and from Pittsfield, led by Rev. Thomas Al-
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len, joined the army of Stark which now amounted to sixteen hundred men. Bryant, in his song entitled "Green Mountain Boys," thus describes their condition before the battle :
" Here we halt our march and pitch our tent On the rugged forest ground, And light our fire with the branches rent By winds from the beeches round. Wild storms have torn this ancient wood, But a wilder is at hand, With hail of iron and rain of blood, To sweep and waste the land."
The enemy selected a favorable position, and constructed breastworks of logs and timber brought from the houses in the vicinity, which they tore down for that purpose. They were also defended by heavy artillery ; and a reinforcement under Colonel Breyman, with two heavier cannon, was approaching to aid them. General Stark* assigned a position to every subaltern. Colonels Hubbard and Stickney, with two hundred men, were posted on the right to attack the tory breastwork. The flanking parties, which took a circuitous route to reach their posts, were supposed by the British to be deserting. General Stark took his position with the reserve. The battle was opened at three o'clock, P. M., by Colonel Nichols on the left, and was immedi- ately responded to by Colonel Herrick on the right. Colonel Stickney's regiment from New Hampshire was divided; a de- tachment from it was ordered to the rear. Captain Webster's station was in front of the log fort. After the signal for action from General Stark, the assault was general. "It thundered all round the heavens." The Americans in front fought in the woods. The shot from the fort flew too high, often cutting off the limbs of trees which fell upon their heads. Otherwise, little injury was done. Captain Webster, who, as General Stark after- wards affirmed, was so begrimed with powder that he could hardly be distinguished from an Indian, became impatient of delay and shouted to his men: "Boys, we must get nearer to them." They then rushed to the breastwork, which Captain Webster was among the first to scale. Thus the fort was taken after two hours of hard fighting. Two pieces of cannon and a large number of prisoners were also captured.
Just at the moment of victory, it was announced that Brey- man with his reinforcement was marching to the rescue. Hap- pily, Warner's regiment came in at the same time. Stark rallied his men and renewed the fight. They fought "till the going down of the sun," and completely routed the enemy, taking from them two other pieces of artillery, all their baggage wagons
* There is a tradition that General Stark, just before entering the engagement, made one of his eccentric speeches to his men. It was well known to most of his troops that he called his wife "Molly." He made this laconic address: "There's the enemy, boys. We must flog them, or Molly Stark sleeps a widow to-night."
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and horses. "The fruits of this victory," says the biographer of Stark, "obtained by raw militia over European veterans, tories and savages, were four pieces of brass artillery, eight brass-bar- reled drums, eight loads of baggage, one thousand stand of arms, many Hessian dragoon swords, and seven hundred and fifty prisoners. Two hundred and seventy fell on the field of battle. The loss of the Americans was about thirty, and forty were wounded. But the most important result of this victory was the restoration of confidence to the desponding armies of America, while it gave a death-blow to the hopes of the in- vader." The traditional speech of General Stark has been em- bodied in a patriotic ballad by Fitz-Greene Halleck. Here is a stanza :
"When on that field, his band the Hessians fought, Briefly he spoke before the fight began : Soldiers, those German gentlemen were bought For four pounds eight and seven pence, per man, By England's king : a bargain, it is thought. Are we worth more? let's prove it, while we can ; For we must beat them, boys, ere set of sun, Or my wife sleeps a widow. It was done !"
The battle of Bennington may be called the decisive battle of the Revolution ; for there can scarcely be a doubt that a con- trary result would have exposed all New England to devasta- tion ; and the boast of Colonel Baum, that he would march through Vermont to Boston, might have been literally fulfilled. But a kind Providence had otherwise ordered. "One more such strike," said Washington, "and we shall have no great cause for anxiety as to the future designs of Britain. The entire ex- pense of the whole campaign was £16,492, 12S. Iod., which, be- ing paid in depreciated currency, yielded to the creditors less than two thousand dollars. One dollar of hard money paid for thirty-three in continental bills! After this battle, Burgoyne wrote to Lord George Germaine : "The Hampshire Grants, un- peopled and almost unknown in the last war, now abound with the most active and rebellious race on the continent, and hang like a gathering storm upon my left." This indicates the whole- some fear which Stark's soldiers had inspired in the commander- in-chief of the invading army. On the eighteenth of Septem- ber following this memorable victory, Stark and his volunteers joined the main army under General Gates. They were ad- dressed by him and requested to remain, but they replied that " their time had expired, they had performed their part, and must return to their farms, as their harvests now awaited them." General Stark returned to New Hampshire to report progress. He held no communication with congress, alleging as a reason, that they had failed to reply to his former letters. " His return was a triumphal march ;" he had conquered the public enemy
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and humbled his private foes. Congress not only joined in the public gratitude, but, by a tardy act of justice, promoted him to the rank of brigadier-general.
CHAPTER LI.
CAPTURE OF BURGOYNE.
Burgoyne, flushed with victory at Ticonderoga, and the retreat of the American forces, advanced with sounding proclamations, declaring that " Britons never retrograde." But his condition grew more critical the farther he advanced. The northern army was reinforced by the militia of all the neighboring states. General Whipple marched to the field of danger with a large part of his brigade. The fame of Stark drew around him nearly three thousand volunteers. He led his soldiers to Fort Ed- ward and conquered the garrison left there by the British com- mander, then descended the Hudson and so stationed his troops as to prevent the retreat of Burgoyne. The two armies first met at Stillwater, on the Hudson, about twenty-five miles north of Albany, on the nineteenth of September, 1777, where a bloody battle was fought, in which Lieutenant-Colonels Adams of Dur- ham and Colburn of New Marlborough and Lieutenant Thomas were slain upon the field ; other brave officers were wounded ; Captain Bell died in the hospital.
The second battle, which was decisive, occurred on the seventh of October, at Saratoga. The New Hampshire troops deserve a large share of the honor of this great victory. In this engage- ment Lieutenant-Colonel Connor and Lieutenant McClary were killed, with a great number of their men. Colonel Scammell was also wounded. General Poor, on that eventful day, led the attack on the left front of the British; General Morgan assaulted their right. Both parties fought with desperation. In less than one hour the enemy yielded ; the Americans pursued them to their entrenchments. Arnold, then true to his country, fought like a tiger and marked all his pathway with the blood of the enemy. Night separated the combatants. The next day revealed the helpless and hopeless condition of Burgoyne. He was surrounded ; his supplies were cut off ; no aid from Clinton could reach him. He summoned a council of war, and with one
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