USA > Vermont > Early history of Vermont, Vol. II > Part 22
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His services were such that he was not brought into quite as prominent notice as his two brothers, Ethan and Ira, but in character and ca- pacity was fully equal to either, and was em- ployed on the most important committees. He attended upon Congress in 1776, and by his tact saved the State from an adverse decision by that body which at that time would have been greatly injurious, if not fatal to the interests of Vermont. A high degree of confidence was reposed in his judgement and ability.
HEMAN ALLEN of Milton and afterwards of Burlington was of another line of the Allen family and a son of Enoch Allen, born at Ashfield, Massa- chusetts, June 14, 1777; he was a member of Congress eight years and died at Burlington December 11, 1844.
HEMAN ALLEN of Colchester, known as Chili
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Allen, was the son of Heber Allen and nephew of Colonel Ira Allen, and was adopted by Ira on the death of Heman Allen's father; he was born in Poultney February 23, 1779, and was a member of Congress in 1817 and 1818, and resigned in the latter year to accept the office of United States Marshall for the District of Vermont, and ap- pointed Minister to Chili by President Monroe in 1823; he resigned that office in 1829, and died at Highgate April 9, 1852.
BENJAMIN CARPENTER of Guilford was the first delegate of that town in a Vermont Convention of April 11, 1775, at which Convention the gov- ernment of New York and the massacre at West- minster were condemned; he also was a delegate in the Dorset and Westminster Conventions of 1776, and a committee sent to Windsor in June 1777, to hear the report of the agent sent to Con- gress concerning the new State. From 1778 to 1791, Guilford was ruled by sympathizers with New York or Tories, but Carpenter steadily adhered to Vermont disregarding personal danger. In De- cember 1783, he was taken prisoner by the York- ers and carried away, to his great damage. The following inscription on his tombstone gives a de- scription of his person and a history of his services and character, viz :
" Sacred to the Memory of the Hon. Benj. Carpenter, Esq.
Born in Rehoboth, Mass., A. D. 1726. A magistrate in Rhode Island in A. D. 1764. A public teacher of righteousness,
An able advocate to his last for Democracy, 24
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And the equal rights of man.
Removed to this town (Guilford) A. D. 1770,
Was a field officer in the Revolutionary War,
And founder of the first Constitution and government of Vermont, A Council of Censors in A. D. 1783,
A member of the Council and Lieutenant-Governor of the State in A. D. 1779.
A firm professor of Christianity in the Baptist Church 50 years.
Left this world and 146 persons of lineal posterity, March 29th, IS04,
Aged 7S years 10 months and 12 days, with a strong mind and full of faith of a more glorious state hereafter.
Stature about six feet-weight 200 Death had no terrors."
JEREMIAH CLARK was born in Preston. Connec- ticut, in 1733, and came to Bennington 1767, and soon thereafter made his pitch in Shaftsbury where he dwelt about fifty years. He served as Major and took part in the Battle of Bennington with a son sixteen years of age: he was one of the committee who warned the Dorset Convention of January 1776, and was a delegate in several other conventions, served as a member of the Council of Safety in 1777-S, and as Councellor in 1778, to 1780, inclusive; he was Chief Judge of Bennington County Court in 1778, and while serving in that capacity passed sentence of death on David Red- ding who was the first man executed in Vermont : he died in 1817.
NATHAN CLARK came to Bennington from Con- necticut in 1762, and took a prominent stand as a Green Mountain Boy in the controversy with New York, and said to be the author of many of the published papers of the times; he also was chair-
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man of the Bennington Committee of Safety and a member of the State Council of Safety and Speaker of the first General Assembly. He lost one son, Nathan Clark Jr., in the Battle of Ben- nington. Isaac Clark, known as "Old Rifle," was also in that battle and was Colonel in the War of 1812, and distinguished as a partisan leader-he was also the son of said Nathan Clark; he after- wards arose to the position of General; he mar- ried Hannah, the third daughter of Governor Thomas Chittenden; he was a good fighter and a very zealous Republican of theschool of Jefferson.
He represented Castleton in the General Assem- bly from 1796, to 1799, inclusive, and was a vic- tim of the so called "Vergennes Slaughter House" in 1798-he having been expelled from the House for an alleged misdemeanor as a member of the committee to canvass votes for State officers. A new election was ordered and he was re-elected by a majority of all the votes in his town, but the Federalists refused to admit him at that session, which, it is supposed, led to the writing of the fol- lowing lines, viz :
"Nature has left this tincture in the blood, That all men would be tyrants if they could. If they forbear their neighbors to devour, 'Tis not for want of will, but want of power."
On the expulsion of General Clark there was published in a Republican magazine (a piece writ- ten by Matthew Lyon, ) the following, viz: "The last political death reported, is that of General Clark-he departed this life the 25th instant, aged 14 days; he died in the defense of that Country
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which, through his aid, had given birth to his as- sassins-his last moments were marked with as much serenity as the celebrated John Rogers' were, and in some degree similar; only the one died for religion, the other for political sentiments, both under the reign of party terror. His parting soul breathed forth a strong and manly hope of a speedy and glorious resurrection of Republicanism."
"When party zeal in public good shall end, And show the world who is his country's friend ; When Democrats shall rise and reign,
And freedom bless the earth again ; When Tories shall sink down to hell, Where pandemonium harpies dwell ; Millennial love shall then prevail ;
Aristocrats lament and wail ; Republicans rejoice to see The blest return of liberty ; Vergennes ever will harmless prove, Or rage a stimulous to love."
The above was written by Lyon when he was in jail at Vergennes suffering the penalty of the alien and sedition act. General Clark was Col- onel of the 11th U. S. Infantry March 12, 1812. He also commanded a successful expedition against St. Armand, Lower Canada, October 12. 1813.
MATTHEW LYON was one of Vermont's remark- able men ; he was born in Wicklow County, Ire- land, in 1746, and came to America at the age of thirteen and was so poor he had to indenture his person in Litchfield, Connecticut, to pay his pas- sage-this indenture was sold to Jesse Leaven-
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worth (one of the founders of Danville, Vermont,) for a pair of steers. His favorite oath used to be "by the bulls that redeemed me." He was a dele- gate for North Wallingford in the Dorset Conven- tion of July 24, 1776, being then thirty years of age, and during that year he was Lieutenant in Captain John Fassett, Jr's. company and was stationed at the block-house in Jericho which was abandoned by the men of the company, on the re- treat of the Continental Army from Canada.
Lyon reported this fact to General Gates and charged the responsibility mainly on Captain John Fassett Jr., when the officers were arrested, including Lyon. They were tried by court mar- tial for cowardice, convicted and cashiered. This charge was claimed to be unjust on the ground that for forty men to stay at Jericho when our army was retreating before the British up the lake, when every man, woman and child had quit that part of the State, would be sheer fool-hardi- ness. It appeared afterwards that Lyon opposed the evacuation of the block-house on Onion River and was acquitted of blame.
In Congress, Roger Griswold taunted Lyon for "wearing a wooden sword," and Lyon resented it by spitting in Griswold's face. There was an at- tempt to expell him from the House for this act, but it failed for want of a two thirds vote. The, cashiering of Lyon was not injurious to him in Vermont, however annoying for a time, for he af- terwards was made Commissary-General and Col- onel and elected twice to Congress. Arlington was a stronghold of the Tories and Lyon with
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Thomas Chittenden and John Fassett Jr. tempo- rarily became citizens of that town on that ac- count, and took possession and confiscated prop- erty of Tories. Ira Allen was only three miles dis- nant and these four men erected a judgement seat and sat as Council to pronounce woe upon every rebellious Tory.
Here Lyon married, for his second wife, Beulah, widow of Elijah Galusha and the fourth daughter of Thomas Chittenden. For several years he was Clerk of the Court of Confiscation and in 1785, for refusing to produce its records, was impeached by the General Assembly, tried and convicted and sentenced to reprimand and to a fine of 500 pounds, but an application was made for a re- hearing which was ordered, and nothing more was done with the affair. General Schuyler re- stored him to his military rank and appointed him paymaster in Warner's regiment July 15, 1777. In April 1778, he was appointed Deputy Secretary of the Governor and Council; he was also Clerk of the Assembly and Secretary of the Board of War in 1779.
He represented Arlington in the General Assem- bly from 1779, to 1782, inclusive, and Fairhaven ten years, in 1783-4, and 1787, to 1796. He was elected to Congress in 1796, and re-elected in 1798. He was said to be a terse and vigorous writer and able debater. On July 31, 1798, the Vermont Journal published a letter written by Lyon June 20, of that year and mailed at Phila- delphia on July 7, 1798, three days after the se- dition act of Congress went into effect. A portion
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of this letter was deemed seditious, and Lyon was indicted, tried and convicted in October following. The penalties imposed were a fine of $1000 and imprisonment for four months.
While he was imprisoned he was re-elected to Congress, and when the prison doors were opened in February 1799, he announced that he was on his way to attend Congress at Philadelphia, and thus escaped a re-arrest which his opponents had prepared for him. He took his seat in Congress on February 20, 1799, when Mr. Bayard of Dela- ware moved to expell him from the House, and urged the matter with a good deal of bitterness. The cause of urging the passage of the resolution of expulsion was that on its passage might de- pend the fact whether the Federalist should or should not have the vote of the State if the elec- tion of president should be thrown into the House in the next Congress, it being known that Lyon was a Republican and the other Congressman from Vermont, Lewis R. Morris, a Federalist. If Lyon could be expelled the Federalists would have a chance to secure the seat on a special elec- tion. Bayard's resolution failed for want of a two-thirds vote.
In 1801, the election fell into the House and Thomas Jefferson received the vote of Lyon, and Aaron Burr that of Morris. On the 36th ballot Morris withheld his vote and Lyon yoted, for Jef- ferson, thus giving the vote of Vermont to Jeffer- son, which was sufficient to elect him. Lyon on one occasion said on a disagreement with Jeffer- son, "I made him and I can unmake him." At the
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end of his term in Congress he removed to Ken- tucky and was a member of the Legislature of that State, and their member of Congress for eight years, from 1803 to 1811. He petitioned Con- gress to refund said fine and cost, $1060.90, im- posed on him under the sedition act; and after a delay of thirty years an act was passed July 4, 1840, refunding the amount to his heirs with interest.
He was a man of great business capacity. At Fairhaven he built the Lyon Tavern House prior to 1787, and the first store there, in 1791; he built the Lyon Iron Works in 1785, Lyon's Paper Mills in 1791, manufacturing paper from bass wood, and built the first grist mill prior to 1795, and a saw mill in 1797; he established a printing office and started the third newspaper in Vermont, "The Farmer's Library," in 1793. He continued his business enterprises in Kentucky.
COLONEL JOSEPH FAY, who was the brother of Jonas, was born in Hardwick, Massachusetts, about 1752, and came to Bennington in 1766. He was Secretary of the Council of Safety from September 1777, to March 12, 1778, and of the State Council from March 1778, to 1794, and Sec- retary of State from about November 1778, to 1781, and member of the Board of War. He was associated with Ira Allen in the famous negotia- tions with General Haldimand. He removed to New York City in 1794, and died there of yellow fever in October 1803.
MOSES ROBINSON was son of Samuel Robinson, Senior, the pioneer settler of Bennington, who
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went in December 1765, as agent of the New Hampshire grantees to petition the King for relief against the government of New York, and died in London, October 27, 1767. Samuel, the father of Moses, was born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1605; the name of the grandfather of Moses was also Samuel Robinson, who was born in Bristol, England, in 1668, and he claimed descent from Rev. John Robinson, "the father of the Indepen- dents," who was pastor of the Pilgrims before they sailed from Holland in the Mayflower in Au- gust of 1620.
Moses Robinson was born in Hardwick, Mass- achusetts, March 26, 1744, and came to Benning- ton with his father in 1761. He was the first Town Clerk of Bennington, chosen in March 1762, and held the office nineteen years; as Colonel of militia, he was with his regiment at the evacua- tion of Ticonderoga and Mount Independence in July 1777; he was a member of the Council of Safety in 1777-8, and Councillor eight years to October 1785, and served as a member of the Su- preme Court, in all, ten years and elected Governor in 1789, by the Joint Assembly, there having been no election by the people. He was elected one of the United States Senators in 1791, and held the office till 1796, when he resigned.
He was said to be a man of piety. On one oc- casion there being a delay in business, he proposed spending the time in prayer-meeting, which was agreed to; and in one prayer-meeting he invited the two deacons to offer prayer, but he was unsuc- cessful and performed the duty himself, commenc-
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"ing with an open confession: ""O, Lord! Thou knowest we have come up here this afternoon to worship Thee, and we are cold and luke-warm as it were,-I fear at least some of us are!" He united with the church June 20, 1765, and was elected deacon May 22, 1789, which office he held until his death, May 26, 1813.
DOCTOR JONAS FAY was son of Stephen Fay, and was born at Hardwick, Massachusetts, Janu- ary 17, 1737, and removed to Bennington with his father in 1766. He was prominent and an in- fluential man in the contest with New York and the mother country, and could wield the pen as well as the sword; he was Clerk of the Conven- tion of settlers in March 1774, and of many other Conventions subsequently `held in the interest of the New Hampshire Grants and Vermont. On the declaration of Vermont's independence in 1777, he was one of the committee to prepare and present to Congress the declaration and petition of the State, and was an agent of the State on several occasions to manage the affairs of the State in Congress.
At the age of nineteen he served in the French War during the campaign of 1756. He was with Ethan Allen as surgeon in the capture of Ticon- deroga in May 1775, and served in the same ca- pacity in Warner's regiment. In July 1775, he was appointed by the Massachusetts committee at Ticonderoga to muster the troops as they ar- rived; he was a member of the Council of Safety in 1777-S, and then of the State Council for the first seven years, and was Judge of the Supreme
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Court; he was Judge of the Probate Court for five years from 1782 to 1786. He resided for a while after 1818, in Charlotte and Pawlet, and died in Bennington, March 6, 1818.
LIEUTENANT JAMES BREAKENRIDGE of Benning- ton has a conspicuous place in the history of the controversy with New York. At first he seemed to stand firm against the encroachments of the New York authorities. On his farm the first at- tempt was made to enforce the authority of New York October 19, 1769, but the New York author- ities were overawed by the hostile appearance of many of Breakenridge's neighbors who with Breakenridge were indicted as rioters in the court at Albany. In July 1771, another attempt was made at the Breakenridge farm to enforce the New York authority, but it failed.
Governor Hall says, "in fact, on the farm of James Breakenridge was born the future State of Vermont." Breakenridge was appointed one of the agents to represent to the King the grievances of the claimants under the New Hampshire Grants; ou January 17, 1776, he was one of the agents appointed to represent the case of the Grants to the Continental Congress; he was fre- quently denounced by the Yorkers as a rioter and was proscribed with others in the New York riot act of 1774.
He was of Scotch-Irish descent, and it was said he was scrupulous about bearing arms against the King; as Burgoyne with his splendidly equip- ped army swept along the western border of Ver- mont Breakenridge thought it would be vain to
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make further resistence, and fled to the protection of Burgoyne as many other residents of Vermont did in 1777. He was sentenced to banishment within the enemies' lines by Vermont. He applied for relief, which was granted. He finally re-ac- quired citizenship in Vermont, and it is said adorned it by an honorable life.
LIEUTENANT LEONARD SPAULDING was a resi- dent of Putney in 1768, and from the outset was a sturdy enemy of Loyalists and Yorkers, and consequently a favorite with the Whigs and Green Mountain Boys. In 1771, when his property was seized by an officer to satisfy a judgement recov- ered against him in a New York court, a large party from New Hampshire crossed the river into Putney, broke open the enclosure and rescued his property. In 1774, he had become a citizen of Dummerston and he was so free with his Whig sentiments that he got special attention from the royal authorities.
He threw out words unfavorable to the British tyrant and was imprisoned therefor for high treason, but his friends opened the prison-door and let him go. The imprisonment in no way dampened his patriotic zeal and he was conspicu- ous among those who resented the Westminster massacre by arresting the royal officers; he was a delegate in all the Conventions beginning with that of September 25, 1776, and represented Dumi- merston in the General Assembly of March 1778, and for the years 1781, 1784, 1786, and 1787.
BENJAMIN WAIT, though not recognized as a leader, left a record remarkable for military and
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OF VERMONT. 365
civil services. He was born in Sudbury. Massa- chusetts, February, 13, 1737; and at the age of eighteen entered the military service under the British General Amherst and performed important military service in the English-French War. At twenty-five years of age he had been engaged in forty battles and skirmishes and had his clothing perforated many times, but received no wound. He settled in Windsor in 1767; in 1769, was em- ployed to arrest depredators upon the King's timber.
In 1770, identified himself decidedly with the Green Mountain Boys. In February 7, 1775, he was the sole delegate from Windsor in the Whig Convention of the County of Cumberland. Al- though an avowed opponent of New York in the controversy about jurisdiction and land titles he with some others offered to aid New York in rais- ing of a regiment of good, active, enterprising sol- diers "to keep under proper subjection regulars, Roman Catholics and the savages at the north- ward," and to defend their own rights and privi- leges against ministerial tyranny and oppression ; he was commissioned by New York as Captain in a battallion of rangers, and on September 3, 1777, was appointed Major, by Vermont, in Her- rick's regiment of rangers, and he commanded that part of it which in connection with Colonel John Brown swept the British from the north end of Lake George and from Ticonderoga, and he was complimented for this spirited conduct by the Council of Safety.
On November following he was ordered to take
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possession of Mount Independence. On February 10, 1778, he was authorized to co-operate with Colonel Herrick in raising 300 men for an in- tended expedition to Canada under General La- fayette; he was appointed Sheriff of Windsor County, which office he held for about seven years. The General Assembly resolved, on Novem- ber 27, 1779, that North and South Hero in Grand Isle County should be granted to him and his company, which grant was voted by the Gov- ernor and Council November 11, 1779.
He performed various services for good order in the State and was wounded in quelling an in- surrection in Windsor County. When "the piping times of peace" came the General Assembly com- plimented him in electing him to the office of Brig- adier-General. The township of Waitsfield was chartered to him and Roger Enos and others Feb- ruary 25, 1782, and Wait was the first settler in 1789, and the first representative and held that position by successive elections from 1795, to 1802, inclusive. He was truly the father of the town, and it bears his name. General Benjamin Wait died in 1822, aged 86 years.
SAMUEL HERRICK came to Bennington about the year 176S, but left the town and State soon after the close of the Revolutionary War. While in Vermont the record of his life was honorable. In May 1775, he was one of the Captains who joined the expedition for the capture of Ticonder- oga and Crown Point. He was appointed Col- onel of Vermont rangers in July 1777, and in Au- gust of the same year led the attack on the rear of
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Brown's right in the Battle of Bennington, and in September following his regiment with Colonel Brown's troops gained the command of Lake George, dispossessed the enemy of Mount Indepen- dence, Defiance, and Hope, and forced their retreat from Ticonderoga. Subsequently Herrick was Colonel of the south-western regiment of Vermont militia.
REV. SAMUEL WILLIAMS, L. L. D., was born in Waltham, Massachusetts, about 1740; grad- uated at Harvard in 1761; was ordained minister of Bradford, Massachusetts, November 20, 1765; he afterwards was professor of mathematics and natural philosophy in Harvard. He removed to Rutland, Vermont, about 1788, and was elected to the General Assembly in 1783, and was 14. years a member of the House; he was a member of the Governor's Council in 1795 to 1798, inclu- sive; he was a Judge of the County Court from 1790 to 1797, inclusive, and in 1794, he preached the election sermon.
At one time he was editor of the Rutland Her- ald that was established in 1792, and published in 1794, a one volume History of Vermont and ex- tended it into two volumes in 1808; in 1795-6, he published the Rural Magazine. He was one of the founders of the University of Vermont. John Wheeler, the President of the University, said in an historical discourse August 1, 1854, that "the creative mind of Dr. Samuel Williams had worked for the University of Vermont and in it." He was the most learded man of Vermont in his day. He died in January 1817.
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COLONEL JOSEPH BOWKER was a prominent man in public affairs in Vermont during the few years he lived. E. P. Walton states in a notice of him that, "with two exceptions he was President of every General Convention" while he was in the State. He was the first representative elected from Rutland and was elected Speaker of the House. The same year when the votes for Coun- cillor were canvassed it was found he had been elected to a seat in the Council. To that body he was elected seven times and till his death. He was the first Judge of Rutland County Court, which office he held till December 1783; he was the first Judge of Probate and held that office till his death in 1784. He was patriotic and popular. It is said he left no heir and no stone to mark his grave.
CAPTAIN JUSTUS SHERWOOD of New Haven. John Munro named him as one of the party who rescued Remember Baker in 1772. He was pro- prietor's clerk of that town from their first meet- ing in 1774, until 1776, when he removed to Shaftsbury on account of the War. At that time he was an avowed Loyalist and was punished as such at Bennington. He was so exasperated at this that he raised a company of Loyalists and joined the British army in Canada. He was em- ployed by General Haldimand in the negotiations with Vermont in 1780, and 1783.
JOHN MUNRO, EsQ., of Shaftsbury held a magis- trate's commission under New York. The Green Mountain Boys were in the habit of chastising Yorkers who interfered offensively with the affairs of the Grants. Munro's house had been visited by
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