“Money to pay said Company for said service”

Yesterday we reached the moment in Westborough’s town meeting on 30 Dec 1774 when the town voted not to pay its minute men anything extra.

Someone at the meeting then asked “if the Town expected any thing more of the Minit men than they did of other men.” The clerk’s notes don’t say who, but I can’t help but imagine it was Edmund Brigham or some other officer of the minute company, possibly working hard to keep his temper. After all, those men had already been training for months. Other towns had chosen to pay for extra training.

But that question, too, “past in ye negative.” Westborough officially decided to make no distinction between the minute company and its other militia companies aside from the name that the minute men had apparently taken for themselves.

Another town meeting stretched over 7 and 8 Feb 1775. Some citizens again brought up the question of special duties or pay for Westborough’s minute men. Ultimately the town “Voted at that all the Soldiers both minit men and others Train once a Fortnit four hours in a Day without pay.” This was a significant increase from the usual pace of four militia training days a year, but the majority of the town still wouldn’t expend any extra money or grant the minute company special status.

Someone—again we don’t know who—asked the town to reconsider that vote. The attendees agreed and went home for the night. Perhaps they agreed in order to go home for the night.

Official town records don’t describe any other meeting until March. However, on 20 Feb the Rev. Ebenezer Parkman wrote in his diary about an imminent “Town Meeting on many Accounts, viz. whether they shall pay Minute Men; Contribution to Relief of Boston etc.” Charity for Boston’s poor was another financial question.

Parkman attended what he called a “Town Meeting and Training” the following afternoon. He spoke in favor of charity. He also told his congregants “exerting themselves to obtain Military skill, Arms, Ammunition etc., to improve their Time Well when they have T[own]. Meetings and Trainings — to endeavour after Unity and Harmony (for I perceived there were Jarrs).” One of Samuel Johnson’s definitions for the word “jar” was “Clash; discord; debate.”

That public discussion never went on the records as an official town meeting. There’s still no record of Westborough deciding to treat the minute company differently. People appear to have tried to get along.

On 6 March the town had its traditional big meeting of the year, electing officials and handling other annual business. That long gathering decided to make the men training on the town’s cannon part of the minute company.

Then war broke out on 19 April. Three Westborough militia companies mobilized, as David A. Nourse’s thorough research has shown. Some of those men signed on to serve for the rest of the year as part of the Massachusetts army, then the Continental Army. Others turned out for later militia duty on behalf of the state.

On 27 November, Capt. Brigham tried one more time. He submitted a document to the Westborough selectmen that said:

Gentlemen

The following is an Exact Acct. [of] what Service the Minute company performd in the training field according to the vote of the Town pass’d sometime in the last winter, and desire you wd. give me an order on the treasurer for the money to pay said Company for said service.

The document then listed forty-six men. Most were labeled as having served seven days, a couple six or five.

Notably, Westborough had just convened another town meeting on 13 November to discuss town bills, including extra pay for the Rev. Mr. Parkman, but pay for militia training didn’t come up.

At the big town meeting on 4 Mar 1776, the town elected Edmund Brigham as a constable. One of his new duties was to collect taxes. There was still no official mention of pay for his company.

However, if we look on the back of Brigham’s request for training pay, there’s a date of 16 Mar 1776 and the signatures of all the men named on the front, attesting that they had indeed received pay. Somehow, fourteen months after the issue was first raised, despite two town meetings voting to the contrary and no recorded vote in favor, Westborough officials came up with money for the minute men.