Men of Vermont : an illustrated biographical history of Vermonters and sons of Vermont, Part 5

Author: Ullery, Jacob G., comp; Davenport, Charles H; Huse, Hiram Augustus, 1843-1902; Fuller, Levi Knight, 1841-1896
Publication date: 1894
Publisher: Brattleboro, Vt. : Transcript Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 842

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wild, rollicking and romantic work is very much the same as to Warner's part as any of the other leaders. He was prompt and eager to go with his comrades into the revo- lution, and to join the expedition to Ticon- deroga. He was left with the rear guard, the bulk of the party, on the east shore of the lake unable to get across, at the time of the capture of that fortress, but he was sent the next day with a detachment of men to take Crown Point, which he accomplished successfully, the fortress surrendering at the first summons, with two men and sixty-one good cannon, besides a lot unfit for service. He earnestly seconded Allen's efforts for an invasion of Canada, going with him to Philadelphia and Albany, to urge it on the Continental and provincial congresses. It looked for a time as if the controversy be- tween New York and the people on the grants was to disappear in the enthusiasm over the capture of Ticonderoga, for not only were Allen and Warner cordially re- ceived when they appeared before the Pro- vincial Congress, but they were both willing and eager to lead troops raised under New York authority, and the Congress passed a resolution authorizing the raising of a regi- ment among the lately rebellious people to be commanded by officers chosen by them- selves. Allen in his impulsive generosity wrote to the Provincial Congress : "When I reflect on the unhappy controversy which has many years subsisted between the gov- ernment of New York, and the settlements of New Hampshire grants, and also con- template on the friendship and union that hath lately taken place between the govern- ment and these its former discontented sub- jects, in making a united resistance against ministerial vengeance and slavery, I cannot but indulge fond hopes of reconciliation. To promote this salutatory end, I shall con- tribute my influence, assuring your honors, that your respectful treatment, not only to Mr. Warner (Seth Warner) and myself, but to the Green Mountain Boys in general, in forming them into a battalion, are by them duly regarded, and I will be responsible that they will retaliate this favor by wholly haz- ardizing their lives, if need be, in the com- mon cause of America. I hope no gentle- man in Congress will retain any precon- ceived prejudice against me, as on my part I shall not against any of them ; but as soon as opportunity may permit, and the public cause not suffer thereby, shall hold myself in readiness to settle all former disputes and grievances on honorable terms." But the land jobbers evidently got in their work soon to check this flood of good feeling. For when the regiment had been raised and Warner elected its colonel-much to the mortification of Allen-the New York gov-

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ermment neglected to give him his commis- sion, for it appears by General Montgom- ery's note book that after the regiment had reached Canada and joined in the operations the General appointed him colonel, and re- quested him to be obeyed as such. The New York Congress had not only withheld commissions from the regiment, but had asked the Continental Congress to do the same, and the demand was several times afterward repeated. January 20, 1777, the New York Congress adopted a report declar- ing that "The said Seth Warner hath been principally concerned in riots, outrages and cruelties against the former government of this state, and is otherwise utterly unfit to command a regiment in the Continental ser- vice," and insisting that it is absolutely neces- sary to disband the regiment and "recall the commissions given to Colonel Warner and the officers under him ; as nothing else will do justice to us and convince these deluded people that Congress have not been prevailed on to assist in dismembering a state." But no attention was paid to the demand, although New York was profuse in promises to raise extra troops enough beyond her quota to make up for the disbandment of this regi- ment, and yet it was but little more than a year after this that New York was relying on Warner and this regiment mainly for the protection of her own frontiers-an arduous and exhausting service which Warner cheer- fully rendered, and in which really he lost his life.

When the invasion of Canada was finally begun in the fall of 1775, Warner and his Green Mountain Boys joined it within three days. Montgomery promptly sent him with a part of his men to the St. Lawrence and vicinity of Montreal to watch the motions of the enemy. With three hundred men he repulsed Carlton when the latter attempted with eight hundred men to join McLean and raise the siege. Warner watched the British as they embarked from Montreal, permitted them to approach very near the south shore and then poured a hot fire into them, throw- ing them into disorder and compelling a retreat. It was well and gallantly done.

After repulsing Carlton and maneuvering McLean back to Quebec, he erected a battery at the mouth of the Sorel to com- mand the passage of the St. Lawrence and block up Carlton in Montreal. Carlton managed to escape down the river to Que- bec, and Montgomery took possession of Montreal Nov. 13. But General Prescott attempting to escape with a number of armed vessels loaded with provisions and military stores, was captured at the mouth of the Sorel with one hundred and twenty men. Warner also commanded at an action

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at Longueil in which Montgomery com- mended his bravery and prudence.

November 20, as the reginent had served only as volunteers and was too miserably clad to endure a winter's campaign, Mont- gomery discharged it with peculiar marks of respect. But the gallant boys had hardly got home when General Wooster wrote Warner, telling of the desperate straits the invading army was in after the repulse at Quebec, and the sickness and desertions from which it was suffering and urging him to raise a body of men and hasten to their support until relief could come from the colonies. " Let them come," General Woos- ter wrote, " by tens, twenties, thirties, forties or fifties, as fast as they can be prepared to march." Eleven days afterward the valiant and energetic Warner was again marching a regiment northward. The men had become habituated to turn out at his call, they had unbounded confidence in his vigilance, pru- dence and courage, and they loved him as few officers are loved by their soldiers. He was affable and familiar with the humblest private without sacrificing any of the dignity necessary to command.

The campaign was an extremely distress- ing one. The troops, even the freshly-armed Green Mountain Boys, lacked comfortable clothing, barracks and provisions. When the retreat was made, Warner was placed in command of the rear guard and did good and skillful service in covering the retreat, picking up the wounded and distressed, and keeping generally only a few miles ahead of the British advance, who pursued closely from post to post. He brought off most of the invalids, and with this corps of diseased and infirm, arrived at Ticonderoga a few days after the main column.

July 5, 1776, shortly after the final aban- donment of Canada, Congress resolved, on a report of the board of war, to organize a regiment of regular troops for permanent service, to be under command of officers who had served in Canada. Warner was appointed colonel of this regiment, which was raised chiefly in Vermont, and Samuel Safford lieutenant-colonel. Warner was at Ticonderoga with his regiment through the whole of the remainder of the campaign of 1776, and did some efficient service in pro- tecting that post.

In the 1777 campaign, with its invasion by Burgoyne, Warner went to work with his accustomed activity to meet it. He issued a stirring appeal to all Vermonters and wrote, July 2, from Rutland to the convention at Windsor, that an attack was expected at Ti- conderoga, and urging that all men who could possibly be raised be forwarded at once. "I should be glad," he said, "if a few hills of corn unhoed should not be a mo-

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tive sufficient to detain men at home." He reached Ticonderoga with 900 men, mainly Vermont militia, July 5, in season to assist in its defense, but St. Clair and his council of war resolved to abandon the post that night, before Burgoyne's investment was com- pleted. Warner was again placed in com- mand of the rear guard. He was overtaken by Fraser, in command of the British ad- vance, on the morning of July 7, and the re- sult was the well-planned and splendidly fought, but most unlucky, battle of Hubbards- ton. Warner had about 1,000 men, consist- ing of his own and Colonel Francis, and Colonel Hale's New Hampshire and Massa- chusetts regiments. The British for cenum- bered rather more, besides Riedesel's in- fantry and reserve corps following three miles behind. Hale got detached and was captured, and Francis fell while charging for the third time at the head of his regiment. Still Warner fought on with the utmost gal- lantry and with skillful dispositions and had the battle nearly won when Reidesel's rein- forcements arrived. Warner himself was surrounded with a small party at one time, but fought his way out. Only when defeat was evidently overwhelming did he give up. There is a story, not supported by incontes- table proof, however, that he then gave an order not found in any tactics, for every man to take to the woods and meet him at Man- chester. He himself safely conducted a re- treat with a small remnant to Fort Edward.

The historian, Bancroft, is even more unjust than in his strictures on Allen at Montreal, when he says that Warner had en- camped at Hubbardston contrary to St. Clair's instructions, and calls the fight a rash one. St. Clair had ordered him to keep the British in check while the main army made its escape. Besides, it was a good opportunity for St. Clair, who was only six miles distant, at Castleton, to turn upon the pursuing column and crush it. Burgoyne, with the rest of his army, was on the ships in the lake and beyond supporting distance. War- ner would have made the day victorious but for the arrival of Riedesel's reinforcements, and successfully resisted them for a time. And yet Riedesel had three miles to march while St. Clair would have had only six. When Riedesel arrived with his three Ger- man batallions, Fraser took him by the hand and thanked him for the timely rescue. If Warner had run for Fort Edward without fighting, as Bancroft seems to think he ought, it would have reversed the conditions and given the British a chance to beat the Americans in detail, and very possibly St. Clair would have been unable to reach Schuyler with a single soldier.

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Warner arrived at Manchester a few days after with about one hundred and fifty effect- ives, where he maintained a bold front until the New Hampshire men had time to rally, and it very likely saved the stores at Ben- nington from a descent by Riedesel from Castleton. He adopted, in agreement with Stark, the plan of arresting Burgoyne's ad- vance, harassing his flanks. Schuyler con- sented to it most reluctantly and only after he found that Stark would not obey his orders to join him in Burgoyne's front. Washington approved these tactics which Warner had inaugurated, and it was ob- viously the only thing to do in the pres- ent junction, because it would compel Burgoyne to weaken his column to guard points in the rear, while time was the one thing necessary to gather and organize a sufficient force to arrest his progress in the front. Schuyler, after he had assented to the plan, did his best to make it effective, send- ing Warner $4,000 and an order for whatever clothing he could procure at Albany. The result was not only a gain of over a month of precious time, but to make the Benning- ton expedition for supplies a necessity for Burgoyne.

Warner was with Stark two days before the battle of Bennington, August 16, 1777, aided in planning the attack on Raum's in- trenchments, and rode about the field with the General early in the fight. The battle was planned and fought with a degree of military talent that would have done no dis- credit to any service in Europe, and Stark in his official report expressed his particular obligations to Warner, "whose superior skill was of great service." Warner himself had hurried on at the first tidings brought by his admirable scouting service of the approach of the British to capture the stores which had been accumulated at Bennington to be for- warded to Ticonderoga. But his regiment had so large a number off scouting that it couldn't start on the 14th, but had to wait for the parties to come in. The next day they started under command of Major Stafford, but owing to a heavy rain it was midnight before they arrived within a mile of Benning- ton. Their ammunition was wet, and a considerable part of the next day was ex- hausted before they could get to the scene of the battle. They arrived, however, most opportunely, just as Breyman had come with reinforcements for the British, after the day had once been won by the Americans, who were now scattered about gathering up plunder. It was by Warner's earnest advice, and against Stark's first impression, that the fresh troops were at once thrown against Breyman, instead of retreating to rally the

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whole army on a new line. Warner pat hi- sell at the head of his regiment and pushed the fight with a fire and dash that made the Americans irresistible as soon as the other troops could be formed in line and brought into action, and swept Breyman and his bat- talion off the field in complete ront. War- ner's brother, Jesse, was killed in the battle.

Warner was with Gates throughout the rest of the campaign, and after the surrender of Burgoyne he was in constant service along the Hudson and elsewhere. He commanded an expedition to Lake George Landing, by which the vessels in which Burgoyne might have escaped, were captured. In April, 1778, he was ordered to Albany, leaving the state without protection. Schuyler sent him on a particular command into Yessop's Patent, which he executed with skill and address. It was not a field for brilliant achievements, but for vigilance, energy and cool judgment in guarding against Indian incursions, watch- ing the Tories, gathering information, and protecting communications. His bravery and military capacity came to be highly re- garded by the officers of the Continental army. He was wounded from an ambush of Indians in September, 1780, when the only two officers with him fell dead by his side, and with his constitution undermined by his constant exertions and exposures, he returned to Bennington toward the close of the war a dying man, with poverty to crown his mis- fortunes. Never a business man or thought- ful for money matters, he had taken no in- terest or part in the land speculations that made most of the Vermont leaders wealthy. The proprietors of several towns had voted him land as a reward for his services, but most of it was sold for taxes and he never got any benefit. The neglect of his affairs and other tax sales while he was fighting for his country had nearly used up what little possessions he had, so that before his death his wife was forced to appeal for charity to the helpless Congress. In 1777 the Legisla- ture had granted him 2,000 acres in the northwest part of Essex county, supposing it would be valuable, but he never realized much from it.

Colonel Warner was not at any time in the secret of the Haldimand negotiation, but like most people believed that something wrong was going on between the British and the Vermont authorities and was very indig- nant about it, becoming estranged from his old associates on account of it. He went with a Bennington committee to Arlington, in 1782, to protest to Governor Chittenden against the sending of prisoners that had been taken in war to Canada and threatening to raise a regiment to overtake and bring them back. There was quite an altercation, and a reply from the Governor, substantially telling

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him to mind his own business, that Colonel Allen's regiment which had taken the prison- ers was able to protect them, and that there would soon be seen a generous return of prisoners from Canada-which proved to be the fact.

Colonel Warner returned to Roxbury, C't., in the summer of 17844 and died there Dec. 26, of that year, at the age of forty-one. He was long sick abed ; mortification began at his feet and continued by slow progress up his body. His last few months were clouded by fits of insanity. The burial was with all the honors of war. There was in the old. days a pleasant story that Washington re lieved the homestead of a mortgage for the widow ; but it was a fiction.

The record is insufficient in the words of the inscription on his tombstone, to

" 'T'ell future ages what a hero's done."

For Seth Warner's career was one of deeds done, not words written, and his modesty made his reports few and short and free from any recounting of his own achieve- ments. He always appeared to be satisfied with being useful and manifested little solici- tude that his services should be known or appreciated. So it came about, as he was never much of a pen and ink man, anyway, that in the latter part of his service, while he was on detailed commands, we have very few particulars about him ; but he was about. the ideal soldier, with cool courage and perfect self-possession, at all times resolute, energetic and sound of judgment, inspiring his associates and his command with entire confidence, courteous and frank in bearing and with a character that was given a strong and steady fibre by the high and patriotic purposes that animated him.

Hon. S. D. Boardman of Connecticut, who as a youth often saw him, describes Warner as of "noble personal appearance, very tall, not less than six feet two ; large-boned, but rather thin in flesh, and apparently of great bodily strength ; features regular, strongly marked, and indicative of mental strength, fixedness of purpose, and yet of much benevolent good nature, and in all respects both commanding and pleasing. His man- ners were simple, natural and free from any kind of affectation, at once both pleasing and dignified." Additional descriptions tell of his sparkling and beaming blue eyes, his beautifully arched eyebrows below nut- brown hair, and a forehead broad and intel- lectual, indicative of a sound and reflecting mind and a strong and well-balanced man- hood. He bestrode a horse with rare grace and dignity.

The state of Connecticut has caused a neat and substantial monument, a granite obelisk, about twenty-one feet high, to be erected over his grave.

CHITTENDEN.

CHITTENDEN, THOMAS .- The "Washington of Vermont," her firstgovernor,for nineteen years, shaping her ad- ministration, shares with the Allens the honor of the successful birth of the new state, and in him was the indis- pensable com- pletement of their talents to carry it through the multiplied perils of its youth. John L. Heaton in his "Story of Vermont," does not exaggerate when he says that Chittenden should "rank with Adams, Hancock, and Morris among the great men of the Revolutionary period ; for he was one of the wisest and purest," and it cannot now be seen that he made or sanc- tioned more than one serious blunder, though his task was one of the most difficult that ever confronted a leader of the people.

This plain, hard-working farmer, equipped by God as a statesman, came to Vermont and assumed his work at the age of over forty and in the full maturity of his mind and powers. He was born at East Guilford, Conn., Jan. 6, 1730, the son of Ebenezer Chittenden, and descended from a family that came from Cranbrook, England, in 1639, and of whom one, Moses, was an officer in Cromwell's own regiment. The Chittendens were of Welsh origin and the name comes from the words Chy-tune-den or din, signify- ing a castle in a valley between mountains. Crittenden is another form of the name and the great Senator John J. Crittenden, of Ken- tucky, was closely related to the Connecticut and Vermont family. A brother of the Gov- ernor, Bethuel Chittenden, was the first Epis- copal minister of Vermont. His mother was a Johnson, and cousin of President Johnson of Columbia College.

Thomas Chittenden's father was a farmer of only moderate circumstances, and there- fore the boy had only the meagre common school education of those days. He worked on the farm until he was eighteen, becoming quite noted as an athlete, and then shipped as a sailor on a voyage to the West Indies. England and France then being at war, the ship was captured by a cruiser ; he landed on one of the islands moneyless and friendless, and he reached home only after much suf- fering and fully satiated with sea life.

At the age of twenty he married Elizabeth Meigs and removed to Salisbury, where by his industry and frugality he soon acquired a

CHITTENDEN.

competence and became a leading man of the place, representing it in the colonial As- sembly six years, and being colonel of a regiment of militia. His large business judgment saw the opportunities of the virgin land in Vermont, to which the spirit of emi- gration and adventure was then directed, and in 1774 he came to Williston, on the Onion river, where he purchased a considerable tract of land, settling with his family and a few others when there was scarcely a family or road in that part of the land. He was pushing improvements on the place when the retreat of the American army from Can- ada forced him, in the spring of 1776, to abandon it, first taking his family to Massa- chusetts. But he soon bought a farm in Arlington, to which he removed, and re- mained there, with short stays at Pownal and Danby, until after the war, when he returned to Williston, which was his home until his death. One of his reasons for locating in Arlington was to quell the Tory power which had then become seriously troublesome there, and this, in conjunction with the Allens and Matthew Lyon, he did vigorously, but, as Hon. David Read says, with "sagacity, humanity, and sound discre- tion," until nearly every royalist was driven out of town or persuaded to remain in sub- mission. From the beginning he had entered zealously into the struggle of the settlers with New York and the mother country. He was appointed first president of the committee of safety at Bennington, was a member of the first convention of delegates that met at Dorset, Sept. 25, 1776, to consider the inde- pendence of the state, and at the Westmin- ster session was one of the committee that drafted the declaration, and assisted at the Windsor convention in framing the constitu- tion. He went to Philadelphia with Allen, at the opening of the Revolution, to learn the disposition and intentions of Congress, and generally to procure intelligence and advice. He was chosen one of the council of safety by the Constitutional Convention, and at once became president of that body, and was unremitting in his attention to its duties, which combined the legislative, judicial, and executive powers of government, throughout that summer.

Perhaps he cannot be said to have been the first to see the opportunity to end the New York controversy by erecting a new state ; but he was one of the foremost in ad- vocacy of the idea, and indeed, by this time, this sagacious, cool-headed, thoroughly prac- tical and dignified gentleman had come to be universally recognized as the representative man of the settlers ; the one to mould and weld into practical shape the results of the tremendous power, as a popular leader of agitation, of Ethan Allen ; the brilliant fertil-

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CHITTENDEN.

ity and financial resourcefulness of Ira Al len, and the shrewd and patriotic endeavors of Carpenter and Warner, the Fays and Rob- insons and the rest. So, naturally, he was elected the first Governor, taking the office March 1, 1778, and being regularly re- elected until March, 1797, except in the one year of '80, when, owing to issues which will be later explained, Moses Robinson defeated him for a single term. He was undoubtedly best fit- ted of any man in the state for the position and its duties.

He steadily pursued the policy of inde- pendence, and he made the Haldimand negotiations (more fully treated in the sketch of Ira Allen) a chief club with which to maintain it. He wrote a spirited protest against the proposal, on which New York and New Hampshire were figuring in 1780, to divide the state upon the mountain line between them. He likened it to the iniquit- ous division of Poland, told about the new state's maintenance of posts in the northern frontier, and that she was at liberty "if necessitated to it," to offer or accept terms of cessation of hostilities with Great Britain ; and " if neither Congress nor the other states will support her in independence, but devote her to the usurped government of any other power, she has not the most distant motive to continue hostilities and maintain an im- portant frontier for the benefit of the United States, and for no other reward than the un- grateful one of being enslaved by them." He acted in December of the next year with General Enos, Ira Allen and William Page, as commissioners to New Hampshire, to ac- commodate matters with that state and save the effusion of blood in a conflict of author- ity in the East Union.

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Men of Vermont : an illustrated biographical history of Vermonters and sons of Vermont, Part 5

Author: Ullery, Jacob G., comp; Davenport, Charles H; Huse, Hiram Augustus, 1843-1902; Fuller, Levi Knight, 1841-1896 Publication date: 1894 Publisher: Brattleboro, Vt. : Transcript Pub. Co. Number of Pages: 842

Author: Ullery, Jacob G., comp; Davenport, Charles H; Huse, Hiram Augustus, 1843-1902; Fuller, Levi Knight, 1841-1896
Publication date: 1894
Publisher: Brattleboro, Vt. : Transcript Pub. Co.
Number of Pages: 842