USA > Vermont > Chittenden County > History of Chittenden County, Vermont, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers > Part 10
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HISTORY OF CHITTENDEN COUNTY.
assistance, and coolly advised him to surrender on the best terms he could procure. The letter was intercepted by Montcalm, who sent it in to Monroe with further proposals for a surrender. Articles of capitulation were there- upon subscribed by Montcalm and Monroe, by the terms of which the garri- son were to march out with their arms and baggage, and to be escorted to Fort Edward by a detachment of the French troops ; and were not to serve against the French for a period of eighteen months; the works and all the warlike stores were to be delivered to the French; and the sick and wounded of the garrison were to remain under the protection of Montcalm, and to be permit- ted to return as soon as they were recovered. Not apprehending any further trouble, the garrison marched out of the fort. It has been stated that the In- dians served in this expedition on the promise of plunder, and were enraged at the terms of capitulation. However that may be, their victims had no sooner left the fort, than they began the perpetration of a massacre more barbarous and sanguinary than it is possible to describe. They fell upon the defenseless soldiers, and, without resistance from the French, who stood idle spectators of the terrible scene, plundered and murdered all who came in their way. Not sat- isfied with depriving their victims of life, they mangled their dead bodies with scalping-knives and tomahawks, in all the wantonness of Indian fierceness. On the following day, when Major Putnam arrived upon the scene, he found the fort entirely demolished, the barracks, out-houses, and buildings a heap of ruins, while more than one hundred women, butchered and shockingly mangled, lay upon the ground, still weltering in their gore.
The French were apparently satisfied with this victory, and retired to their works at Ticonderoga and Crown Point; and owing to the inefficiency and want of energy on the part of the English generals nothing more of importance was effected by either party during the remainder of the year. A change of the English ministry now brought William Pitt into the position for which he was by nature and education peculiarly adapted. Henceforth the British affairs in America assumed a more favorable aspect. The English forces had been so unfortunate as to win the contempt of their enemies; they soon came to be respected and feared.
According to the plan of 1758 the French settlements were to be attacked at several points at once. General Amherst took command of 12,000 troops, which were to attempt the reduction of Louisburg, in the island of Cape Bre- ton ; General Forbes commanded 8,000 against Fort Duquesne, while the com- mand of a force of 16,000 troops against Ticonderoga and Crown Point devolved upon General Abercrombie.
On the 28th of May the forces under Amherst embarked in a fleet consist- ing of 157 sail, from Halifax, in Nova Scotia, and on the 2d day of June anchored about seven miles west of Louisburg. On the 8th of June General Wolfe, who, with Whitemore and Lawrence and Admiral Boscawen, assisted
87
LAKE CHAMPLAIN BEFORE THE REVOLUTION.
Amherst in this expedition, effected a landing, and in a few days had the place completely invested. Amherst proceeded with such care and vigor that the six ships of the line and five frigates with which Chevalier Drucour defended the harbor were destroyed, and on the 26th of July the garrison of 3,000 men, chiefly regulars, surrendered themselves prisoners of war.
At the same time General Forbes was advancing on Fort Duquesne, and on the 25th of November, the French having abandoned it and retreated down the Ohio River, he took possession of the place and changed its name to Pitts- burgh, in honor of William Pitt.
General Abercrombie was not, however, equally successful in his expedi- tion against the French posts on Lake Champlain. On the 5th of July he embarked his army, of 7,000 regular and 9,000 provincial troops, at Fort Will- iam Henry, on board 900 bateaux and 135 whale-boats, and landed the next morning, without opposition, near the north end of Lake George. He formed his men into three columns and moved forward toward the enemy, whose advanced party of one battalion lay encamped behind a breastwork of logs. They retreated with precipitation before the English, after setting fire to the breastwork and tents, and the English, in their attempts to advance, became embarrassed and somewhat disordered by the thickness of the wood. Lord Howe and Major Putnam were in the front of the center column. A skirmish occurring on the left with the enemy, these officers filed off at the head of a hundred men and soon became engaged with the enemy. The first fire was fatal to Lord Howe. Putnam and his party were warmly attached to the English lord, and were animated by his fall to such a degree that they cut their way through the enemy and, with another party of the English, killed about 300 of the French and took 148 prisoners. The English troops then marched back to the place where they had landed in the morning, and on the following day Colonel Bradstreet with a detachment of the army took possession of the saw-mills. The fort at Ticonderoga, washed on three sides by the lake and protected on the other side, in part, by a deep swamp, was situated in a place of easy defense. The remaining passage on the land side, not protected by the swamp, had been fortified by a breastwork nine feet high, before which the ground had been covered with felled trees and bushes to render the approach of the enemy more difficult. The fort was garrisoned with 6,000 French troops, and a reinforcement of 3,000 men under M. de Levy was expected soon to join them. Abercrombie's wish was to take the fort before the reinforce- ment should arrive, and he sent forward his engineer to reconnoiter the works, who reported that the breastwork was assailable and that he believed the fort could be taken by an assault with musketry. Confiding in this report the gen- eral immediately ordered an attack. Notwithstanding the well-directed fire of the enemy the troops marched forward without wavering, until they became entangled in the trees and bushes which had been thrown before the breast-
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HISTORY OF CHITTENDEN COUNTY.
work to retard their assault. They attempted to cut their way through with the sword to the breastwork, and withstood the relentless fire of the enemy during four hours while engaged in this attack, and were at last compelled, only by their rapidly diminishing numbers, to retreat in order to their encamp- ment.
The loss of the English in this encounter was 1,800 men killed and wounded and 2,500 stand of arms. The severity of the loss determined Abercrombie to withdraw to his encampment at Lake George, whence all the wounded who could be removed were sent to Fort Edward or Albany.
Notwithstanding the unfortunate event of this battle, Abercrombie contin- ued the prosecution of affairs with commendable vigor. He dispatched Gen- eral Stanwix to the carrying place between the Mohawk and Onondaga Rivers, where he erected a fort. Colonel Bradstreet was ordered to proceed with 3,000 men, mostly provincial troops, against Fort Frontenac, at the outlet of Lake Ontario. This expedition was attended with success. Bradstreet landed his troops within a mile of the fort before the enemy was apprised of his approach, and the little garrison of 110 Frenchmen and a few Indians sur- rendered at discretion. The fort contained sixty cannon, sixteen mortars, and small arms, military stores, merchandise, and provisions in large quantities. After capturing, further, all the armed vessels of the enemy on the lake, num- bering nine, Bradstreet destroyed them and the fort, and returned to Oswego.
The favorable termination of the campaign of 1758 determined the British secretary of state to prosecute the following campaign with such vigor as to complete, if possible, the conquest of Canada. He therefore projected three expeditions against the enemy, believing that by the simultaneous attacks of these troops at different points the forces of the enemy would be divided and their councils effectually embarrassed. General Wolfe was to command the expedition against Quebec ; General Prideaux and Sir William Johnson were to conduct their forces against the French fort at Niagara; while General Am- herst, commander-in-chief of the British forces in America, was to attempt the reduction of Ticonderoga and Crown Point.
At the same time important events were transacting on Lake Champlain. On the 27th of July the French, after making a feeble effort to withstand the siege of General Amherst, who had begun the reduction of Fort Ticonderoga, dismantled that fortress and repaired to Crown Point. The English general thereupon took possession of Ticonderoga and proceeded to repair it, at the same time employing scouting parties to watch the movements of the enemy at Crown Point. Having received intelligence on the Ist of August that the French had also abandoned Crown Point and gone down the lake without de- stroying the works, he dispatched a body of rangers to take possession, and on the 4th moved forward with his whole army and commenced the construction there of a new and strong fortress.
89
LAKE CHAMPLAIN BEFORE THE REVOLUTION.
The French troops retired to the Isle aux Noix, which commands the com- munication between the lake and Canada, and having collected their forces to the amount of 3,500 men and supplied themselves with sufficient artillery and four vessels mounted with cannon, determined to make a stand against the English. Amherst thought it best to provide a superior naval force before ven- turing an attack at this point. The Indians had been making cruel and de- structive depredations on the English colonies, and Amherst took this opportu- nity to make them feel his resentment. He therefore selected Major Rogers, a brave and capable officer from New Hampshire, to conduct an expedition against the village of the St. Francis Indians, on the south side of the St. Law- rence not far from Three Rivers. On the 12th of September Rogers em- barked at Crown Point with 200 men and proceeded down the lake in bateaux. On the fifth day after his departure, while encamped on the east side of the lake, a captain and several of his men were wounded by the explosion of a keg of gunpowder, and were attended to Crown Point by a party, which reduced Rog- ers's force to 142 men. He pushed on, however, to Missisco Bay, where he left the boats in charge of two rangers, with provisions sufficient to carry them back to Crown Point, and advanced in the direction of the Indian settlement on the St. Lawrence. On the second evening after he left the lake he was over- taken by the rangers and informed that a party of 400 French and Indians had captured the boats and sent them away in charge of fifty men, while the rest were in pursuit of the English. Rogers immediately dispatched a lieutenant, with eighteen men and the two rangers, to Crown Point with a request to Am- herst to send provisions to Coos on the Connecticut River, by which route he had determined to return. He then pushed rapidly towards St. Francis, with the design of accomplishing the object of his errand before being overtaken by his pursuers. He reached the village on the evening of October 4, and went forward in Indian garb to reconnoiter the place while his men were resting He found the Indians wholly unaware of their danger, engaged in a grand dance. He returned to his men about one o'clock and led them forward to within 500 yards of the town. The dance ended about four o'clock and the Indians, thoroughly fatigued, retired to rest. The assault commenced at day- break and was conducted on the Indian method of indiscriminate slaughter. The ferocity of the assailants was stimulated by the discovery of several hun- dred scalps which had been torn from the heads of their countrymen, and sus- pended on poles as trophies of Indian cruelty. The place was completely sur- prised. Of the 300 souls which the village had contained at sundown on the previous day, 200 were slain and twenty taken prisoners. The English loss was one killed and six slightly wounded. Rogers reduced the village to ashes and refreshed his men, after which he set out on his return, at eight o'clock in the morning. He proceeded up the St. Francis River with the intention of avoid- ing his pursuers, and directed his course toward Coos, on the Connecticut River.
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HISTORY OF CHITTENDEN COUNTY.
He was soon overtaken, however, and several times attacked in the rear, with a loss of seven men. He therefore formed an ambuscade on his own track and routed the enemy.
In answer to Rogers's request for provisions, Amherst sent Samuel Stevens and three others up the Connecticut River from Charlestown with two canoe- loads of provisions. They encamped the first night on Round Island at the mouth of the Passumpsic River; but in the morning were so terrified by the report of what they supposed the guns of the Indians, that they hastily re- loaded the provisions and went back to Charlestown. About noon of the same day Rogers and his party arrived at the mouth of the Passumpsic, and seeing a fire on the island, constructed a raft and went over to it. The disappointment of his men on discovering that no provisions had been left, so disheartened them that a number of them died within twenty-four hours. They were all reduced to a state of starvation. Rogers therefore relinquished his command and told his men to take care of themselves. A few of them perished in the woods, but most of them, after suffering intensely from cold and hunger, succeeded in reaching Charlestown. Here Rogers resumed command and proceeded with his band to Crown Point, which they reached on the Ist of December, having suffered a diminution, since leaving St. Francis, of three commissioned officers and forty-six non-commissioned officers and privates.
In the mean time General Amherst was preparing a naval force to expel the enemy from the Isle aux Noix, and early in October proceeded down the lake with that object. But owing to the lateness of the season and the tempestuous state of the weather, he abandoned the enterprise and returned to Crown Point, after having taken or destroyed most of the enemy's shipping. Here he passed the remainder of the season in getting everything in readiness for another cam- paign.
The only place of much strength or consequence now in the possession of the French was Montreal. Consequently, at the opening of the campaign of 1760 the English concentrated all their forces towards this point. General Murray was to conduct the English forces at Quebec up the St. Lawrence ; Colonel Haviland was to make the approach from Lake Champlain, while Gen- eral Amherst was to lead his troops to Montreal by the way of Lake Ontario. In pursuance of this determination the armies moved forward, and by a singu- lar coincidence, without any knowledge of one another's progress all arrived at Montreal on the 6th and 7th of September. While Amherst was preparing to lay siege to the city he received a flag of truce from the French commander, Vaudreuil, demanding terms of capitulation. The French finally submitted to the terms offered, and the whole province of Canada was surrendered to the British on the 8th of September, 1760. By the treaty of peace signed at Paris on the Ioth of February, 1763, this province was formally ceded to the king of Great Britain.
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THE CONTROVERSY WITH NEW YORK.
CHAPTER IV.
THE CONTROVERSY WITH NEW YORK.
Settlement Retarded by the French Wars - The Impending Strife - Proclamations and Counter-Proclamations - Interpretations of the Royal Decree- Organized Opposition to New York - Ethan Allen at Albany - First Military Company - Rewards Offered for the Capture of the " Rioters " - The Beech Seal - Governor Tryon's Attempted Reconciliation-Difficulties with Colonel Reed-The Durhamites-Despotic Legislation of New York-Reply of the Green Mountain Boys-Disturbance at Westminster-Vermont Declared Independent-Allen's Address. to the People - Controversy with New Hampshire and with Congress - Territory of Vermont Extended - Negotiations with the British - New York Become Lenient - Disturbances by Malcontents - The Controversy Settled - Vermont Admitted into the Union.
1 HE territory comprised within the present limits of Vermont being the- principal theatre of action in the war between the English and French, and regarded as dangerous ground on which to attempt the establishment of communities, remained under the sovereignty of nature until after the conquest of Canada was completed by the English, in 1760. The previous occupation of the country by the French, though undertaken in the hope that their right to remain would not be successfully disputed, was yet continued with so pre- carious a tenure as to deserve no other title than that which the uncertain supremacy of arms could give. They all retired with the French garrison at Crown Point before the advance of General Amherst, in 1759. The English colonists, in the same expeditions against the French, had made themselves acquainted with the fertility of the lands west of the Green Mountains and the advantages of situation and elevation. As soon, therefore, as the perils of the French and Indian depredations were abated, the more adventurous of the colonists from the older settlements began to select suitable tracts of territory along the lake for the purpose of cultivation and settlement.
But the discovery of the value of the land led not to good alone. The avarice of two powerful colonies was awakened, and it soon became evident that a conflict was imminent. A long and tedious controversy between New Hampshire and Massachusetts had been settled in favor of the former in 1740, by the decree of King George II, establishing the boundaries of the contend- ing colonies and declaring, in effect, that the disputed territory, Fort Dummer,. lay within the province of New Hampshire. The northern line of Massachu- setts was described as a " similar curve line" pursuing the course of the Mer- rimac River, and three miles to the north of it, extending from the Atlantic Ocean to a point due north of Patucket Falls ; thence due west until it meets. his majesty's other governments. The line was surveyed in 1741 by Richard Hazen. As Fort Dummer was found to lie beyond the jurisdiction of Massa- chusetts to the north, and as his majesty repeatedly called upon the Assembly of New Hampshire to provide for its support, it was generally supposed to rest
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HISTORY OF CHITTENDEN COUNTY.
under the jurisdiction of that province; and as it was situated on the west side of the Connecticut River, the west line of New Hampshire was supposed to have been extended as far west as that of Massachusetts, to wit, to a line twenty miles east of the Hudson River. In pursuance of this supposition, Gov- ernor Benning Wentworth, who was commissioned governor of New Hamp- shire in the year 1741, conceived the plan of granting out townships to those who applied in apparent good faith for a charter. The first grant drew on the conflict. On the 3d of January, 1749, Governor Wentworth granted a town- ship six miles square on what he held to be the western border of New Hamp- shire, being twenty miles east of the Hudson and six miles north of Massachu- setts. This township, in honor of himself, he denominated Bennington. The governor of the province of New York opened a correspondence with Gov- ernor Wentworth concerning the title of that province to the lands west of the Connecticut River ; notwithstanding which claim, Wentworth proceeded to extend settlement under New Hampshire jurisdiction by the making of further grants. By the year 1754 these grants numbered fifteen, but the commence- ment of hostilities between the French and English caused a suspension of further application for grants until the completion of the conquest of Canada, in 1760. But the New England troops, upon the close of the war, eagerly sought the means of acquiring title to those portions which best suited their tastes.
So urgent were the applications for grants that Wentworth, with the advice of his council, ordered a survey to be made of Connecticut River for sixty miles, and three tiers of townships to be laid out on either side. As the appli- cations multiplied, further surveys were ordered ; so that in the year 1761 no fewer than sixty townships, each six miles square, were granted on the west side of the Connecticut River. Within the two following years the number increased to one hundred and thirty-eight. Their extent was from the Con- necticut River westward to within twenty miles of the Hudson, and northward as far as that stream extended, and then as far west as Lake Champlain. It may well be presumed that Governor Wentworth was the more willing to maintain the title of New Hampshire to this territory because of the fat emolu- ments proceeding from the grants and the right of reserving five hundred acres in each township for himself. The same motive, however, stimulated the gov- ernment of New York into a determined resistance to the legality of these grants and the titles of the grantees. Accordingly, on the 28th of December, 1763, Lieutenant-Governor Colden, of New York, issued a pronunciamento, in which he recited the grants made in 1664 and 1674 by King Charles II to the Duke of York, which included " all the lands from west side of Connecticut River to the east side of Delaware Bay." He therefore ordered the sheriff of the county of Albany to make returns of the names of all persons then pos- sessed of lands on the west side of the Connecticut under titles derived from the government of New Hampshire.
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THE CONTROVERSY WITH NEW YORK.
Thereupon Governor Wentworth, on the 13th of March, 1764, issued a counter-proclamation, intended to inspire confidence in the grants of New Hampshire, in which he alleged that the grant to the Duke of York was obso- lete, and that the grants made by New Hampshire would be confirmed by the crown if the jurisdiction should be altered. The settlers were exhorted to be industrious and diligent in the cultivation of their lands, and not to be intimi- dated by the menaces of New York. The civil officers were required to exer- cise jurisdiction as far west as grants had been made and to administer punish- ment to all disturbers of the peace. This proclamation had the desired effect of quieting the fears of the settlers, who had no idea that a controversy be- tween the two provinces respecting the extent of their jurisdiction would ever affect the validity of titles derived under a charter from a royal governor.
Fearing to rely further upon so precarious a tenure as the grant to the Duke of York, the government of New York now made application to the crown, by a petition which fraudulently claimed to contain the signatures of many of the settlers on the New Hampshire grants, praying that the western bank of the Connecticut might be established as the eastern boundary of New York, for a confirmation of her claims. His majesty thereupon, on the 20th of July, 1764, decreed that " the western bank of Connecticut River, from where it enters Massachusetts Bay, as far north as the 45th degree of north latitude, be the boundary line between the said provinces of New Hampshire and New York." It appears that this determination was not founded upon any previous grant, but was made on the supposition that the desires and conven- ience of the people demanded it.
The settlers under the New Hampshire grants were more surprised than alarmed at this order, for they apprehended that the only manner in which it could affect their interests would be to extend the jurisdiction of New York over their territory, without in any way attacking their titles to the lands which they occupied. They did not imagine that the same power which had created their titles could interfere with the vested rights which it had encouraged. Governor Wentworth at first remonstrated against the change, but was at last induced to withdraw from the contest, and issued a proclamation recommend- ing obedience to the authority and laws of the colony of New York. This was the starting-point of the real controversy between the government of New York and the settlers under New Hampshire. The latter regarded the decision of the crown as merely prospective, and that while they were called upon to submit to a different provincial authority, they would remain on their lands un- molested. But the same motives which impelled the authorities in New York to obtain this jurisdiction, impelled them to place a very different construction upon the decree of the crown. They held that the order was confirmatory of the grant to the Duke of York; that it was therefore endowed with retrospect- ive energy, and that the titles of the settlers under the grants from Benning
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