USA > Vermont > History of eastern Vermont, from its earliest settlement to the close of the eighteeth century with a biographical chapter and appendixes > Part 65
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645
CONDUCT AT THE "WESTMINSTER MASSACRE."
of Crean Brush. In a description of the General Assembly of New York, given in the Connecticut Courant, under the date of April 10th, 1775, it is said of Brush that he "sold the clerk- ship of the county to Judge Wells's son-in-law." Of the truth of this statement, there are now no means of judging, but it is safe to conclude that it is greatly exaggerated, if not wholly false. On the 5th of May, 1774, Mr. Gale was honored with another mark of favor, in receiving a commission, authorizing him to administer the prescribed oaths to all persons appointed to office in the county.
Notice has already been taken of his conduct on the memo- rable evening of the 13th of March, 1775. Warmly attached to the royal cause, and deeming those who should rebel against constituted authority as worthy of the direst punishment, his indignation knew no bounds when he saw the yeomanry whom he had been accustomed to regard only in the light of obedient subjects, demanding redress for wrongs, which, doubtless, ap- peared to him more imaginary than real, and enforcing the demand with manifestations whose import could not be mis- taken. Actions performed in a moment of excitement cannot, however, be regarded as criteria of character. The few lines which are devoted to Mr. Gale in the account of the " West- minster Massacre" prepared by Reuben Jones, are, so far as they are intended to represent the actual disposition of the in- dividual, entirely at variance with truth, and unworthy of the page of history. "Jones's sketch," a gentleman* of high respectability has observed, " conveys as false an impression of Mr. Gale as the daguerreotype would convey of the ele- phant which should represent that noble animal while his mouth is wide open to receive fruits." On the day following the out- break, Mr. Gale was imprisoned in the jail at Westminster, and there remained until the 19th of March, when he was taken to Northampton, Massachusetts, where he was kept in confine- ment from March 23d to April 6th, when he obtained his re- lease, and repaired to New York.
Here he continued to reside, his family having joined him, until February, 1776, when he was seized at night in his own house, and conveyed to a guard-house at the upper barracks in the city, where the troops from Connecticut were quartered. Thence he was soon after removed to Fairfield jail, in Connecti-
* Rev. Canon Micajah Townsend, of Clarenceville, Lower Canada.
646
HISTORY OF EASTERN VERMONT.
cut, where he was placed in close confinement. Hoping to obtain his release, he wrote to John Mckesson, secretary of the Provincial Congress of New York, requesting him to interfere in his behalf. His letter, dated the 29th of February, evinced by its style and expressions the honorable character of the writer. "You well know," he remarked, " that my sentiments have been uniform and steady, even if erroneous ; and, there- fore, I conceive myself entitled, at the least, to the privileges and protection which, by the laws of all Christian nations, are granted to prisoners of war. I call it prisoner of war, not as being an enemy in heart to any man breathing, but as being by birth and education one of that country between which and this country a war subsists. Let me request that I may either be allowed the privilege granted by all Christians to a prisoner of war; or else the birthright of a British subject-the writ of habeas corpus." He declared his belief that a design against his person had been formed by some of the inhabitants of Cum- berland county, and referred to a document which had been drawn up in vindication of his own conduct, and that of the sheriff and posse, during the affray at Westminster. He de- scribed his place of confinement as. " a common jail, where the cold wind through the bars (for the windows are not glazed) far exceeds the warmth of all the fire that is obtained," and asked to be accommodated with " a genteeler apartment."
This letter was considered by the New York Provincial Con- gress on the 5th of March, and the seizure of Mr. Gale was declared to be "a wanton act of military power, inconsistent with that liberty for which the colonists are contending." On the following day, Congress wrote to Maj .- Gen. Charles Lee, notifying to him the facts as they had been presented, and re- questing from him a statement of the nature of the charge brought against Mr. Gale, in order that proper steps might be taken either for his discharge or punishment. In his reply, written the same day, Lee acknowledged that the arrest of Mr. Gale should have been made by the Provincial Congress, but gave as a reason for his conduct the assurances he had received from many respectable men, that Mr. Gale was "a most dan- gerous man, and ought not to be suffered to remain on Long Island," where, as Lee observed, "an enemy is more dangerous than in any other spot of America."
Information of the views of Congress in the matter, was sent to Mr. Gale by Secretary Mckesson. In his answer, dated the
647
LETTER TO SECRETARY MC KESSON.
12th of March, Mr. Gale referred to a letter which he had writ- ten to Col. Benjamin Bellows (in which he had claimed a right to the records pertaining to his office as clerk of Cumberland county), as being the probable cause of his arrest. His remarks on this point were in these words : "Whoever construes the dis- liked expressions in my letter to Colonel Bellows to relate to others than those of the county of Cumberland, gives it a con- struction which was not thought of by me when I wrote it. I am not of opinion that you or many of your body hold their pro- ceedings in a much better light than myself ; nor can I suppose that any one can think me blameable in forbidding a delivery of the records to any but myself or deputy." He then stated
at length what his conduct had been ; that he had scrupulously abstained from disobeying the orders of those opposed to Great Britain ; that he had never been engaged in any "Tory plots ;" that the treatment he had received was far from being recon- cilable with the principles of liberty ; and closed with this im- passioned peroration : " Whether I return to New York or not, may the Almighty's will be done! I flatter myself that, that nobleness of heart which characterizes the free-born Briton, that spirit in which malice or revenge hath never reigned, add- ed to a conscience serene and clear, will enable me to pass through the various mazes and labyrinths of persecution, torture, or death, with all the patience and resignation of a martyr; and should the apprehensions which I have mentioned grow into realities, I shall say with Balaam, 'Let me die the death of the righteous ; let my last end be like his !' "
Meantime, the committee of the Provincial Congress to whom the subject had been referred, reported on the 8th of March, that " the sole occasion for apprehending Samuel Gale, and sending him into confinement" had arisen from certain let- ters in the possession of Col. William Williams, a member of the said Congress, and that they knew of no other evidence against him. This report was taken up on the 16th of March, and, in view of its statements, a resolution was passed, declaring the opinion of Congress, that Mr. Gale ought to be forthwith released, inasmuch as he had been carried away and imprisoned "without any hearing, trial, or adjudication whatever." Notice of this decision was communicated to the chairman of the com- mittee of Fairfield county, accompanied by a request for the immediate discharge of the prisoner. Mr. Gale was informed privately, of the resolve, but the committee concluding that
648
IHISTORY OF EASTERN VERMONT.
they had no jurisdiction in the case, refused to comply with the request. In a third letter to Secretary Mckesson, dated at Fair- field, on the 12th of April, Mr. Gale repeated his application for a release, and detailed the reasons why it should be granted; described the misery of his situation ; and expressed his views upon the merits of the struggle between the colonies and the mother country, in terms which bore evidence to the sincerity, ability, and honesty of the man.
"In this intolerable place," he wrote, referring to the prison, "the wind, when cold, fairly chills every vein in my body. The smoke, when there is fire, not only blinds but nearly suffocates me ; and the continual smell of the room has, I fear, tended to rot my very vitals. In the morning, I have perpetually a sick- ness at the stomach ; about noon comes on a fever, which in about three hours is succeeded by an ague, sometimes more and sometimes less violent. Every one of these intolerable tortures were so inexpressibly increased by the excessive weather of Saturday the 30th ult., that they introduced thoughts and ex- torted expressions too wild to mention in cooler moments." Turning then to a consideration of the death whose " slow ap- proaches, inch by inch," he could not fail to perceive, he re- marked : "Though I conceive it a duty incumbent on every man, to use his endeavors for the preservation of his life, yet I never viewed death through so horrible a medium as some men do. I have lately learned to consider it as a matter of relief, rather than as a punishment. To leave the wife of my bosom a disconsolate widow, and the babes of my loins without a helper, is doubtless an unhappy reflection. But I am of opinion that a single stroke, however violent, would in the end be less grief to those I leave behind me, than a continuation of that suspense and anxiety of mind with which they are now totally overwhelmed." Do " some of my persecutors," he exclaimed, " want to dip their hands in the blood of a martyr? If so, it would in my opinion be far less criminal, both in the sight of God and man, for them to let it flow in decent streams than thus, with dastardly meanness, to drag it from me drop by drop."
A few days after this letter was written, Thaddeus Burr, the sheriff of Fairfield county, received the resolve of the Provin- cial Congress and released his prisoner on parole of honor. In a letter to General Washington, dated the 19th of April, Burr notified the course he had pursued, and asked for directions. Of Mr. Gale, he remarked : " He is an Englishman, a gentle-
649
ATTACHMENT TO BRITISH RULE.
man of good education, and possessed of high notions in favor of his native country ; is frank and open in declaring his senti- ments, but says he never has been,, or will be active against the colonies.". From an entry in the Journal of the New York Provin- cial Convention, under date of September 16th, 1776, it seems that Mr. Gale was then in the city of New York, and that he had been brought thither, by order of the New York Committee of Safety. In behalf of the Convention, James Duane and Ro- bert Yates were appointed to examine him. To this committee Robert Harper was added on the 17th of September, and Col. William Allison on the following day. On the 21st, a commit- tee was constituted for the express purpose of detecting and defeating conspiracies, and to them the examination of Mr. Gale, was finally referred. The immediate result of their in- vestigations is not known. Ultimately, Mr. Gale was released from his parole of honor, and restored to liberty.
His sufferings, while in confinement, had not tended to lessen his hatred of the "rebel" cause, but on the contrary had strengthened his attachment to the government in whose behalf he had endured so many privations. Experience had also taught him, that he was ill-prepared to engage in civil commo- tions. Desirous of avoiding a repetition of scenes which, to him, had been fraught with sorrow and distress, he prudently removed with his family to Quebec, where he received the ap- pointment of Provincial Secretary, under the administration of Governor Prescott. He subsequently accompanied his Excel- lency to England, to defend him with his powerful pen, in the difficulties which had arisen in connection with the Council in Canada. He had written and published an elaborate work en- titled, " An Essay on Public Credit," involving many abstruse and extensive mathematical calculations on finance, having for its object the gradual extinguishment of the national debt of England. This work he presented for adoption to Pitt, then Chancellor of the Exchequer, by whom its correctness was ad- mitted and its principles highly approved ; but who found it easier to put off the learned author with a pension for life, than to meet the public creditors with this book of financial reform in his hand, which might have cost him his place. In 1803 or 1804, Mr. Gale rejoined his family in Canada, where he lived in retirement, and died at his country residence in Farnham, on the 27th of June, 1826. He left a daughter, since deceased, and a son who has been an eminent lawyer and a judge of
1
650
HISTORY OF EASTERN VERMONT.
King's Bench, at Montreal, where he now lives retired and re- spected.
Mr. Gale possessed an intellect of more than ordinary strength, and his writings were always pregnant with thought, and lucid in expression. In disposition, he was amiable and forgiving ; in manners, polished and gentlemanly ; in character, ingenuous, honorable, and conscientious .*
JOHN GROUT
John paul THE second son and third child of John Grout, who was the father of fourteen children, was born at Lu- nenburgh, Massachusetts, on the 13th of June, 1731. There he probably resided until he was thirty-five or thirty-six years old. The first intimation relative to any intention on the part of Grout to remove from Lunenburgh, is found in a letter signed by one James Putnam, dated at Worcester, Mass., September 3d, 1766, and written, as would appear from its contents, to some person resident on the New Hampshire Grants. In this letter Putnam says :- "Grout is desirous of settling in that part of the world where you live," and, in reference to his qualifications, adds, " he seems to have a peculiar natural talent for doing business at law and in courts." Grout did not change his abcde immediately, for by a receipt dated April 22d, 1768, it appears that he was at that time, at Lunenburgh. It is probable that he soon after remov- ed to the " Grants," and this opinion is strengthened by the fact, that he was at Charlestown, New Hampshire, in the fol- lowing August. Before leaving the home of his nativity, he had married, and in the rapid increase of his family, had already shown a laudable desire to emulate his father. His advent was not hailed at Windsor, the place he had chosen for his new
* Journal of N. Y. Prov. Cong., i. 339, 340, 343, 347, 365, 627, 629, 630, 639 : ii. 119, 120, 178, 179, 183, 184. Am. Arch., Fourth Series, vol. v. cols. 341, 355, 390, 865-867, 991. Letter from the Rev. Canon Micajah Townsend, dated Clarence- ville, C. E, July 1st, 1856.
651
REDUCED CIRCUMSTANCES OF JOHN GROUT.
abode, with that enthusiasm which is so grateful to the volun- tary exile. On the contrary, the inhabitants of the little town regarded his coming as an unfortunate occurrence. Scarcely was he settled, when Nathan Stone, the justice of the peace, received a notice from Zedekiah Stone and Joseph Wait, the overseers of the poor, in which they stated that complaint had been made to them " by the principal inhabitants" of Windsor, that "John Grout and his wife, and family of five or six chil- dren" who had lately arrived, were " likely to become charge- able to the town." On this account, and to gratify the pauper- hating people of Windsor, the overseers prayed that a warrant might be issued for the removal of said Grout and his family.
Their prayer was granted, and Benjamin Wait and Ezra Gil- bert were authorized to command the immediate exodus of the penniless lawyer and his dependents. Information of the course which the town authorities intended to pursue having been given to Grout, he, on the 22d of April, 1769, endeavored to obtain a stay of proceedings from the officers who had been sent to remove him. To this end, he gave a written promise, that if permitted to remain a few days longer, he would, at the end of the specified time, be ready with his family, " at nine of the clock in the forenoon" at his " dwelling-house in Windsor," " to be carried out of town." In case this request should be granted, he declared "on honor, and as a lawyer," that no harm should come of it, either to the town or its officers. It is probable that the days of grace were given, and it would also appear that when these had passed, he had made some arrangements for re- maining in Windsor. He was there on the 27th of May follow- ing, and from a deposition made on the 31st of the same month, by Simeon Olcott, an officer of that town, it seemed that there was at that time, "not any copy of a warrant of any kind" in his hands against Grout, issued at the instance of Windsor people. On the 5th of June following, Elijah Grout, a younger brother, testified to a similar statement. Grout next appeared at Chester, of which place he was a resident in February, 1770. The events previously recorded, in which he had acted so prominent a part, happened during the summer of that year, and proba- bly afforded sufficient exercise for the restless disposition of the unfortunate Grout .* About this period his son, " a lad of thirteen years of age," ran away from the paternal roof, and the
* See ante, pp. 161-168.
652
HISTORY OF EASTERN VERMONT.
notice of this event which Grout published in the papers, and requested " all printers on the continent" to copy, was headed in staring capitals "Stop Thief ! Stop Thief !" Notwithstand- ing the disrepute in which he was held by many, he obtained some business, and it appears on the 8th of March, 1771, he supplanted Thomas Chandler, one of the most influential men in Chester, as the attorney and land agent of Cornelius Vanden- bergh, of the city of New York.
Grout endeavored to obtain an impartial execution of the laws relative to the cutting of ship-timber, and was diligent in informing John Wentworth, the surveyor-general, of the short- comings of his deputies. His zeal does not appear to have met with the reward it deserved. In a bond dated the 17th of April, 1773, given to Daniel Whipple, the sheriff of Cumberland county, Grout, in answer to a citation, agreed to appear in the city of New York on the third Tuesday of that month, to " answer to Richard Morris in a plea of trespass." From ac- companying circumstances, it would seem that the trespass with which he was charged was the destruction of his Majesty's masting trees. He was not unfrequently sent with dispatches to distant places, and was always careful to execute his com- missions with fidelity. On the occasion of a riot in Putney, early in the year 1772, he bore the intelligence of the disturb- ance to the city of New York. In the letter which he carried on this occasion to Governor Tryon, dated the 29th of January, Judge Lord, the writer, after detailing a narrative of the tumult, referred to Grout in these words :- "I have yet to crave your Excellency's patience and leave to recommend to your Excellency's favour Mr. John Grout, attorney-at-law, who hath suffered much by persons enemical to this government, and to him, on account of his firm attachment to it, and endea- vours to maintain good order and justice therein. Truth itself obliges me to say, that his practice as an attorney in this county, has always entitled him to the good opinion of the court and the best gentlemen in the county, as I apprehend, although riot- ous persons and parties, friends to New Hampshire and ene- mies to good order, have given him much trouble, which he has borne with great magnanimity, and strove in a legal and dispassionate way to overcome. Your Excellency, being per- fectly humane, will delight in protecting him." This extract represents Grout in a different aspect from that in which he has previously appeared. He was, it would seem, a warm sup-
653
UNSTEADY SENTIMENTS OF GROUT.
porter of the claims of New York to the " Grants," and on this account was shabbily treated by those who adhered to the New Hampshire faction. An unhappy disposition, and a turn for pettifogging, were not the best equipments with which to meet this opposition, and yet these were the weapons which Grout appears to have brought to the combat.
Previous to the commencement of the Revolution, Grout ex- pressed sentiments in opposition to the acts of the British mi- nistry, and at a meeting held in Chester on the 10th of October, 1774, was chosen by the patriotic citizens of that town a mem- ber of a committee, who were directed to join with the general committee of Cumberland county, in preparing a report con- demnatory of the late acts of Parliament, to be sent to the New York committee of correspondence. His patriotism appears, however, to have been of short duration. A letter attributed to him, written from the "South-east part of Cheshire county, March 10th, 1775," contains the most violent and obscene ex- pressions relative to the " damned Whigs." Still, his views cannot be determined by this production, for, although the first impression which one would derive from its perusal, is that the writer, whoever he might have been, was a vile blackguard, destitute of principle, and unscrupulous in the expression of his opinions, yet a more careful examination suggests the idea that the communication might have been intended as an allegorical declaration of sentiments in favor of a revolutionary movement. This notion is supported by the closing paragraphs of the letter, which are in these words :-
"Be assured, Sir, that our Honored Master Beelzebub waited upon me yesterday, and Commanded me to write to you and Inform you, that it is his Royal will and pleasure, that you play Hell with the Court that shall set at Westminster next week.
" From your Friend and Brother,
" Apollyon.
"To the Faithful and Dearly beloved "Dr. Jones
. "P.S. Please to read this Epistle to all the Faithful Bre- thren and salute them, Charles Phelps and Doctor Harvey in particular, with a kiss of love."
Three days after the date of this letter, the courts were broken up at Westminster, and on that occasion, Dr. Reuben Jones, of Rockingham, and Dr. Solomon Harvey, of Dummerston, were prominent leaders among the Whigs.
654
HISTORY OF EASTERN VERMONT.
On the 12th of April, 1775, Grout, who had been imprisoned for debt, received "his liberty" from Benjamin Archer, under- keeper of the jail at Westminster. Previous to this, he had satisfied certain judgments which had been obtained against him. His escape from this Scylla of confinement did not enable him to avoid the Charybdis of the people's late. Having been de- nounced by John Chandler, and Thomas Chandler Jr., of Ches- ter, as an enemy to his country, he, according to his own state- ments, was threatened by some with death, and by others with tortures " at the hands of the Green Mountain Boys." In this emergency, he declared his innocence of the crime charged against him, and wrote to Col. John Hazeltine, the chairman of the Cumberland county committee of correspondence, and to the chairman of the Walpole committee of inspection, for protection. He also made known his situation to the Rev. Samuel Whiting, of Chester, and begged him to use his influence " with these mad people," and thus save the county from be- coming " an Aceldama or field of blood." In the latter part of the month of May, while confined to his bed by a fever, a party of men entered his dwelling, headed by Thomas Chand- ler Jr., and endeavored to drag him out of doors, but were prevented by the efforts and entreaties of his wife and his " good neighbours." On the following morning they renewed the attempt, and, having taken him about half a mile from his house, threatened to strangle him, but were induced to desist from executing this design. Having, through the efforts of his friends, regained his liberty, he claimed protection from the county committee. The chairman of that body thereupon or- dered Chandler to desist from all attempts to injure Grout, which order Chandler promised to obey.
Though freed in this manner, from the annoyances to which his suspicious conduct had subjected him, he could not resist the temptation of disturbing the peace of the county. To effect this end, he commenced an epistolary attack upon the chairman of the committee of correspondence, Col. John Hazeltine. In a letter to this gentleman written from the " County of Hampshire, Province of Masstts. July 10th, 1775," Grout accused him of presiding over the deliberations of a body of men whose acts were tyrannical, and whose conduct was contrary to every principle of right. He further declared, that it was for this cause " that a great many of the best peo- ple in the county of Cumberland who are substantial friends to
655
"MEMORIAL AND PETITION."
the Liberties of the people and the Sacred Rights of Mankind, and who are even willing to seal their Love of their Country with their Blood in Defence of it, Groan under the weight of the Oppressions of that Lawless Banditti of men, who having first put a stop to the Course of Civil Justice under the assumed name of sons of Liberty, are destroying not only the Semblance, but even the substance and shadow of Liberty itself." In this style he continued through a long communication, to abuse the officers of Cumberland county, who in this time of emergency were directing their best efforts to secure to the people their rights, and to defend them from the machinations of Loyalists and Tories.
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