“The Memorialist should apply to that source for relief”

In 1787, the Confederation Congress was meeting in New York, at City Hall and the Fraunces Tavern (shown here).

When Henry Howell Williams asked for more than £3,600 in compensation for losses from Noddle’s Island twelve years earlier, the Congress referred his request to its Board of Treasury. (This must have happened after 10 Apr 1787, when Williams wrote to Secretary of War Henry Knox asking for his help with this petition.)

That treasury board consisted of three men, all recent Congress delegates:

• Samuel Osgood, a merchant from Andover and Continental Army veteran who had moved to New York. He would later be the first Postmaster General under the new Constitution.
• Walter Livingston of New York, like Osgood a former army commissary.
• Arthur Lee of Virginia, who had studied both medicine and law in Britain, helped John Dickinson to write “The Liberty Song,” and spent the 1770s in Europe as an American lobbyist and diplomat annoying other American lobbyists and diplomats.

These were the same three men who considered Richard Gridley’s request for payment for a horse killed in the Battle of Bunker Hill (fought 250 years ago today).

On 1 Aug 1788 that board told the Congress:

the damage done to the property of the Memorialist, and the articles stated to have been applied to the benefit of the United States, was previous to the formation of an Army, under the authority of the Union.

The Board are therefore of opinion, that if the evidence adduced in proof of the value and quantity of the articles stated to have been applied to the public use was more satisfactory than in fact it is, it would be improper to establish a Precedent, in the present instance, for an admission of numerous Claims, on the merits of which it would be impossible for the Officers of the Treasury to form any competent judgement.

The general fact, of a very valuable property belonging to the Memoralist, having been either destroyed or used for the benefit of the Army assembled at Boston in the month of May 1775, by order of a Board of General Officers, appears by the Certificate of the late Commissioner of Accounts for the State of Massachusets, marked A, to have been well established:

Inasmuch however as the aforesaid property appears to have been applied for the immediate benefit of the State, and as the merits of the Claim can be best ascertained under their authority, The Board are of opinion, that the Memorialist should apply to that source for relief; and should Claims of a similar description be hereafter allowed by the general Board of Commissioners, the State will obtain reimbursement for such sums as shall appear an equitable compensation for the real damage sustained by the Memorialist.

In short, the Congress sent Williams back to Massachusetts since the Battle of Chelsea Creek happened before any Continental Army legally existed.

It’s probably also significant that the Confederation Congress was on its last legs. It didn’t have enough money to pay all its bills. So few delegates were coming to New York that the body often lacked a quorum—hence the use of commissioners for day-to-day administration, and the long delay in actions. By the time this board submitted its report, a new Constitution was being publicly debated.

TOMORROW: Back to Massachusetts.

“I am (as we say) a daughter of liberty”

For a presentation this week that didn’t come off, I picked out three extracts from the letters of young teenager Anna Green Winslow to her mother in Nova Scotia, showing her political awakening. She wrote between November 1771 and May 1773.

Richard Gridley, retired artillery colonel, explained the political factions to Anna.

As a girl, and an upper-class girl at that, Anna wasn’t supposed to demonstrate in the streets. But the Whig movement encouraged girls to participate in other ways, such as learning to spin so that local weavers could make more cloth so that local merchants didn’t have to import so much from Britain.

But Anna didn’t know how to spin.

So she contented herself by visiting the Manufactory where her cousin Sally’s yarn had been woven into cloth, and doing a little dance there.

Anna could also participate in the movement as a consumer, choosing to buy more locally produced goods. In one letter she proudly described herself to her mother as a “daughter of liberty.”

I’m not sure how Anna’s family felt about the politics she was learning in Boston. Her father, Joshua Winslow, was more closely allied with royal officials. Later in 1773 he lucked out (he thought) in being named one of the East India Company’s tea consignees in Boston. But when the town mobilized against allowing that tea to be landed, he had to lie low in Marshfield. Eventually, he left Massachusetts as a Loyalist.

Anna Green Winslow remained in the state, living in Hingham, but she died in 1780. Alas, outside of those letters to her mother in 1771–1773 we have almost no sources about Anna’s life, so we don’t know how her political outlook changed after the Whigs made her father an enemy for agreeing to sell tea, and after the war began.

“A respectable and well-known Officer”

For Thomas Seward, his military service in the Continental artillery, rising from lieutenant to brevet major over eight years, remained an important part of his identity after the war.

Seward was an original member of the Massachusetts Society of the Cincinnati and served on its standing committee in the 1790s.

Like a lot of networked Continental Army officers, he eventually accepted a job in the federal government, becoming an officer of the United States Customs in Boston in 1796.

When Alexander Hamilton was vetting officers for the “Quasi-War” with France in 1798, Henry Knox apparently told him that Seward was “advanced in years & corpulent,” and would be best as a “Garrison Capt” rather than in the field, but there were “few better Officers.”

Thomas Seward’s namesake son, a merchant captain, married in 1799. The following year, the major’s wife, Sarah, died in March.

On 28 Nov 1800 the Massachusetts Mercury reported in its Deaths section:

Yesterday, Major Thomas Steward, aged 60. A respectable and well-known Officer in the revolutionary army of the United States. His funeral will be from his late dwelling at the bottom of Middle-street, near Winnisimet-Ferry, this afternoon, which his relations and friends are requested to attended, without further invitation.

[pointing hand] The Members of the Cincinnati are respectfully requested to attend the funeral.

The next day’s Jeffersonian Constitutional Telegraph repeated the sentence describing Seward as a “respectable and well-known Officer” and added a new line: “A firm and determined Republican.” The major had taken sides in the nation’s political divide.

Seward died without a will, so probate judge George R. Minot appointed his late wife’s sister Abigail Brett to work out the estate. The inventory she filed shows that Seward owned many artifacts of gentility: a silver watch, a Bible and seventeen other books, an angling rod, two canaries in a cage, a $35 desk, $100 worth of wearing apparel. The house contained twenty pictures of various sizes, including two of “Bounaparte & Lady”—reflecting early Republican admiration for France.

That inventory also confirms that Seward owned a pew in the Rev. John Murray’s Universalist meetinghouse. At some point he had moved from an orthodox Congregationalist meeting to this liberal new sect. Among other converts to Universalism was Col. Richard Gridley, the artillery officer Seward had served under back in 1775.

TOMORROW: Why we remember Thomas Seward.

Thomas Seward, Continental Artillery Officer

Thomas Seward (1740-1800) was born in Boston and grew up to be a hatter. He married Sarah Colter at the Rev. Andrew Eliot’s New North Meeting-House in October 1763, and they had five children between 1764 and 1773.

Seward also joined the Boston militia artillery company, or train, founded in the early 1760s and commanded for most of that time by Maj. Adino Paddock. As I described in The Road to Concord, Paddock remained a Loyalist while most of the company were Patriots. In September 1774 the train fell apart, and its four brass cannon disappeared from the militia armories under redcoat guard.

By May 1775, Seward was outside Boston. He joined Col. Richard Gridley’s new artillery regiment as a lieutenant and rose to the rank of captain-lieutenant at the end of the year. On 15 July 1776 Henry Knox wrote back from New York to his brother William in Boston:

Pay Mrs Sarah Seward wife of Capt Lt Seward 20 Dollars, and inform her that Cap Seward is well and gone up to the Highland Forts about 50 miles from this City up the river—he lives near [??] ferry—don’t neglect this

That summer Seward signed a petition to Col. Knox seeking better pay for artillery captain-lieutenants. At the start of 1777, Seward became a captain in charge of his own company in Col. John Crane’s Continental artillery regiment.

Seward shows up in the documents on Founders Online only once during the war, as Gen. George Washington considered ordering him to move from one spot of the lines around New York to another. There are some letters from, to, and about Seward in the papers of Gen. Knox. The Massachusetts Historical Society holds an orderly book he kept in late 1782 with some company returns. 

Seward remained in the army until June 1783, and he was given the brevet rank of major that September as a retirement gift, along with a warrant for land.

Seward returned to Boston, his family, and his business. On 7 June 1788 he advertised in the Massachusetts Centinel:

THOMAS SEWARD
INFORMS the publick, and particularly his friends, that he has REMOVED from the Shop he lately occupied in Dock Square, to STATE STREET, adjoining Mr. Elliot’s Snuff-Store—where he continues to carry on the
HATTER’s BUSINESS—
Where any commands will be punctually executed—and every favour gratefully acknowledged.

This is the only advertisement I’ve found for Seward’s shop. Obviously he was able to keep customers without newspaper promotion. That orderly book also includes some of his personal accounts from the 1790s.

TOMORROW: Drawing on military connections.

“At the time the said Horse and Sulky was furnished”

The challenges of managing Lt. Col. Abijah Brown drew me away from the episode that initially drew my attention to him—Col. Richard Gridley’s 1786 request to the Continental Congress to reimburse him for the cost of a horse killed at Bunker Hill.

Brown had provided Gridley with that horse while they were both working for the Massachusetts Provincial Congress’s army in the spring of 1775. It’s unclear whether it was his horse or one he borrowed from someone else with a promise of compensation.

At the end of the war, Brown asked the Massachusetts government to give him the price of the dead horse. When the state declined, he sued Gridley for that sum, recovering damages in court. Gridley then petitioned the Confederation Congress.

Back on 14 June 1775, the Continental Congress had started the process of taking command of that army besieging Boston. That change became official at the highest level on 2 July when Gen. George Washington arrived in Cambridge and presented his commission to Gen. Artemas Ward.

British artillery fire killed Col. Gridley’s horse on 17 June—after the Congress had voted to assume responsibility for the New England army but before it could actually do so. So what did that mean for reimbursing the colonel?

The Confederation Congress appointed a committee to consider the details. Those officials were:

• Samuel Osgood, a merchant from Andover who had just relocated to New York to work as one of the Congress’s commissioners of the treasury.
• Walter Livingston of New York, another commissioner of the treasury.
• Arthur Lee, a Congress delegate from Virginia and former diplomat.

Those gentlemen reported:

On the above Memorial the Board observe that Colonel Gridley was not an Officer in the Service of the United States, at the time the said Horse and Sulky was furnished by Major Brown.

That by the Application made to the State for payment, it appears that the Person who furnished the said Horse and Sulky did not conceive it a proper charge against the United States.

The Board are therefore of Opinion, that the Claim of the Memorialist cannot be allowed, without establishing a precedent which would subject the General Treasury to a multitude of Claims, with which the Union are not chargeable, and submit to the Judgment of Congress the following Resolve:

That the Claim stated in the Memorial of Colonel Richard Gridley, cannot be admitted as a proper charge against the United States.

I can’t help but think that both levels of government—Massachusetts and the Continental Congress—would have been more generous toward Gridley if they had had any actual funds to spend. Because unquestionably Brown had supplied the horse for military use, and Gridley had lost it in an important battle.

But the mid-1780s was just the wrong time to ask American governments for money.

How Maj. Abijah Brown Went to War

Abijah Brown was born in Watertown in 1736, and on 24 May 1758, at the age of twenty-one, he married Sarah Stearns of Waltham.

Their first child, Abijah, Jr., was born in Watertown the following March. By the next year they had moved to Waltham, where Sarah gave birth to:

• Edward (1760)
• Anna (1763)
• Elizabeth (1765)
• Jonathan (1767)
• Abner (1769)

Abijah Brown became involved in town politics as a selectman and meeting moderator. He served on committees to respond to the Boston committee of correspondence, draft instructions for the town’s legislators, and attend the Middlesex Convention of late August 1774.

Brown was also active in the town militia company, rising to captain in 1773 and major at the start of the war. According to Henry Bond’s Family Memorials (1855), he was “one of the first to ascertain the proposed march of the British upon Concord and was active in giving the alarm.” I’m not sure what that means because most histories say that Waltham never got word about the British march on 19 April and had to catch up to its neighbors.

Contemporaneous evidence leaves no doubt that Brown was militarily active in the first weeks of the war. On 28 April the Massachusetts committee of safety declared “Major Brown appointed to give such repairs to the cannon at Waltham, as may be judged proper.” Three days before the committee had ordered that “three Cannon now at Marlborough, be brought to the Town of Waltham, and mounted on carriages prepared for them, till further orders.” 

In this period Maj. Brown probably supplied Col. Richard Gridley, the commander of the artillery regiment, with a horse and sulky so he could move around the siege lines as quickly as possible, overseeing fortifications and gun emplacements.

On 17 May the committee of safety issued new orders:

That the three pieces of cannon, with the stores, now at Waltham, be immediately removed to Watertown, near the bridge, by the advice of the general [Artemas Ward], and that Mr. Elbridge Gerry, one of the Committee of Supplies, be desired and empowered to remove the same.

Where did that leave Maj. Brown? On 19 May he wrote back to the committee:

Agreeable to your order I have removed the cannon under my care at Waltham, to the Town of Watertown, and have delivered them to the Committee of Correspondence for the same Town; and shall have my company in readiness to march to Cambridge to-morrow morning.

I am, gentlemen, with much respect, your most obedient and most humble servant…

TOMORROW: But was he? Was he really?

“The Horse so furnished was Killed at the Battle”

Yesterday I discussed Richard Gridley’s petitions to the post-war Continental Congress to keep compensating him for the loss of his Crown pension from the previous wars.

Both Gridley and the Congress were caught in the 1780s economy, when there was a postwar depression and both Continental and state notes had lost value.

Here’s an extract from the Congress’s records on 24 July 1786, shedding light not only on the retired colonel’s financial straits but also the Battle of Bunker Hill, where he was wounded.

Samuel Osgood, Walter Livingston, and Arthur Lee were tasked with assessing a “Memorial of Richard Gridley of the State of Massachusets” asking to be paid for a very particular reason:

the Memorialist states, that in the month of May, 1775, being then acting under a Commission of the State of Massachusets, as Colonel of a Regiment of Artillery, he was furnished with a Horse and Sulky, for the purpose of conveying himself and his Surveying Instruments, to such Places as the Public Service should require, by Major Brown who was employed to provide the Army with such Articles as they might want.

That the Horse so furnished was Killed at the Battle of Bunker’s Hill, and the Sulky (being kept in the Public Service ’till the Year 1780) rendered altogether useless.

That Major Browne having applied to the State of Massachusets for the payment of the said Horse and Sulky, was refused payment, and that in consequence he commenced a Suit against the Memorialist and has recovered Judgment for Fifty Pounds Lawful Money of Massachusets, which Sum he has been obliged to Pay.

I knew identifying “Major Brown” would be a challenge because that surname was so common and men’s ranks changed quickly between 1774 and 1776. Plus, Gridley’s 1986 petition might have referred to the man by a rank he attained later than the moment he discussed.

In the end, I’m guessing that “Major Brown” was Abijah Brown (1736-1818) of Waltham, who did have the rank of major in early 1775 before becoming a lieutenant colonel that fall.

I have two reasons for pointing to that Abijah Brown out of the crowd of Browns (and indeed the smaller crowd of Abijah Browns) in Massachusetts in 1775. First, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress did ask Maj. Brown of Waltham to work on supplies for Gridley’s artillery regiment. Second, Abijah Brown was a cranky, pushy man who seems like just the sort to sue a septuagenarian over a horse killed in battle eleven years earlier.

TOMORROW: Meeting Maj. Brown.

Col. Gridley’s Half-Pay

Last year I wrote two postings about Maj. Scarborough Gridley’s attempt to wring some money from the Continental government after he was cashiered from his own father’s regiment in September 1775.

In the same period Scar Gridley’s father, Col. Richard Gridley, was also seeking more pay.

Though promoted to the post of the Continental Army’s Chief Engineer in fall 1775, Col. Gridley had stayed behind in New England at the end of the siege of Boston. And Gen. George Washington was fine with that. He had lost respect for the colonel and preferred his new artillery commander, Henry Knox. Gridley finally retired at the end of 1780.

Back in April 1775, when Col. Gridley agreed to come out of retirement to work for the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, he asked that rebellious legislature to make up for the likely loss of his half-pay pension from the Crown. Once he retired again, the colonel expected that the Continental Congress would start paying the equivalent of that pension since it had taken charge of the army raised in Massachusetts.

In February 1781 the Congress “recommended to the State of Massachusetts to make up to Richard Gridley the depreciation of his pay as engineer at sixty dollars per month…and charge the same to the United States.” It promised to pay the colonel “four hundred and forty-four dollars and two-fifths of a dollar per annum” as a pension. Samuel Huntington transmitted that news to Massachusetts governor John Hancock.

Two years later, however, Gridley reported to Robert Morris “that upon his application to the said State they granted and paid the depreciation by giving their notes, and also made him a grant for the sum of £182 10/ Massachusetts currency, being for eighteen months half pay; and that he had received a warrant on the Treasurer of the State for the said sum, but that he had not received any money upon it.” Gridley had received only government notes, which were rapidly losing their value.

At that time, lots of other retired officers were complaining about their pay as well. Legislators had made more explicit promises to Col. Gridley than the rest, “as he abandoned his British half pay on an agreement made by Congress to indemnify him therefor.” The Congress recognized that difference. But basically they couldn’t do much about it.

TOMORROW: Beating a dead horse.

“No such order as Mr Gridley alludes to”

Scarborough Gridley didn’t just write to Elbridge Gerry seeking back pay in February 1784, as I quoted yesterday.

Gridley first went to the president of the Massachusetts Senate to ask for his help. That man was Samuel Adams (shown here). This is why Gridley’s letter to Gerry is in the Samuel Adams Papers at the New York Public Library, of all places.

Adams’s political estrangement from John Hancock was at its height, so he was probably quite open to Gridley’s complaint that the governor had failed to carry out his duty to send an inquiry to Gen. George Washington about Gridley’s military role. (In 1789 Hancock and Adams reconciled and ran as a ticket, so Adams was Hancock’s lieutenant governor and successor.)

Adams had been in Philadelphia in 1775, when Gridley was cashiered out of his father’s artillery regiment, and 1776, when Gridley claimed his father brought him back on as an assistant while fortifying Boston harbor. So the senate president wasn’t up on the details of the younger man’s career.

On 25 February, Adams wrote from Boston to Gerry, then representing Massachusetts in the Congress, which was convened at Annapolis.

Inclosd is a Letter to your Self from Colo. Scar Gridley. It seems he applied to this G[eneral] C[ourt] some time ago for Depretion of his pay while in the Service, upon which the Govr. was requested to write to G W to make known to him the Rank held by Mr. Gridley & [missing text] but the Letter has never been written.

I advisd him to write you on the Subject, & hope you will excuse my giving you the Trouble. As you are now near the Place of Residence of General Washington, perhaps it may not be inconvenient to you to write to him, in doing which you will gratify & oblige Mr. Gridley.

On 18 March, Gerry wrote to Washington, then retired:

By the last Post I received from the president of the Senate of Massachusetts a Letter, inclosing the papers herewith transmitted, & requesting me to write to your Excellency on the Subject. As I have no other Knowledge of the Matter, than what is derived from Colo Gridley’s Letter & the Resolve accompanying it, I can only say, that when your Excellency is at Leisure, if You think it expedient to make any Observations on the Subject or Answer to the Resolve, & should inclose them to me, I will direct them to Colo Gridley.

I flatter myself with the Hopes, that since your Retirement from publick Life, You have not only enjoyed, Health, peace & Competence, but likewise the pleasure of seeing all your Friends in the same happy Circumstances.

On 31 March, Washington wrote back from Mount Vernon:

I have examined my Letter and orderly Books but find no such order as Mr Gridley alludes to, in his letter of the 21st of Feby, to you.

If his Father, or himself ever received such orders they are no doubt to be produced, and will speak for themselves. Mr Gridley never reported himself to the Chief Engineer (Genl [Louis Lebègue] Duportail) nor has he ever been returned to me by him, or any Senior Officer in that department that I remember as one of the Corps—in the Service of the United States—It is not in my power therefore, from any recollection I have of the circumstance he speaks of—or of his Services—to certifie anything on which his claim can be founded.

According to Gridley, his father had told Washington about his appointment in 1776 and the commander-in-chief had approved it. But there’s no mention of that in the published correspondence of the two men.

The nearest hint of a new army job for Scar Gridley was his court-martial panel’s statement that “they do not consider him incapable of a Continental Commission, should the General Officers recommend him to his Excellency”—which the general officers never did.

Gerry returned Gridley’s letter with Washington’s response in a note to Adams dated 2 April. Adams replied simply: “Your Letter of the 2d relating to Colo. Gridleys Affair came to hand. I am obligd to you for the Care you have taken.” And that was the end of that.

One detail that stood out to me in this exchange is that Adams, and then Gerry, referred to Scarborough Gridley with the title “Colonel.” Gridley was a major when he was removed from the Continental Army in 1775. Some paperwork hints that in the summer of 1775 he and his father tried to get him the rank of lieutenant colonel, but that didn’t go through.

So when and how did Scar Gridley start introducing himself to people as a colonel? Then again, if he really had managed to collect a few years of pay and rations as an assistant engineer in the Continental Army without any commander knowing it, he had a lot of audacity to call on.

Scarborough Gridley died in 1787 at the age of forty-eight at his parents’ home in Stoughton.

“Less fortunate in my Military reputation than some others”

As I recounted yesterday, Gen. George Washington dismissed Maj. Scarborough Gridley from the Continental Army on 24 Sept 1775.

Dealing with the major’s father, Col. Richard Gridley, was harder. It took a lot of maneuvering by the commander-in-chief, Continental Congress delegates, and the young man Washington wanted in Gridley’s place, Henry Knox.

In November, Col. Gridley was kicked upstairs to the post of Chief Engineer of the Continental Army. When Washington moved south to New York in April 1776, he left the colonel behind in the “Eastern Department,” fortifying Boston harbor.

What happened to Scarborough Gridley? In 1781, he petitioned the Massachusetts General Court for back pay, evidently for service in Gen. John Sullivan’s push against the British in Newport in 1778. That April, the state legislature resolved to pay Gridley “forty five Pounds New England” and asked Gov. John Hancock to write to Gen. Washington asking what rank Gridley had held in the Continental Army and “from whence he is to receive his pay.”

Nothing happened. On 21 Feb 1784 Gridley penned a letter to Elbridge Gerry, one of Massachusetts’s delegates to the Confederation Congress. In it he stated:

At the evacuation of the Town of Boston by the British troops my Father was stationed here by his Excellency General Washington for the purpose of Fortifying the Town and Harbour; the Extension of the Works made it necessary that he should have an Assistant; he appointed me and reported the appointment to His Excellency who confirmed it and order’d me pay accordingly—

I continued in service and received pay as long as any General Officer remained to grant me Warrants—My last warrant for June & July 1779 for 40 dollrs. pay and three rations subsistance was given by General [Horatio] Gates a[t] Providence: since which I have received neither pay nor Subsistance excepting one ration of Provisions to January 1781—

When Military opperations commenced at Rhode Island I repaired to General Sullivans Camp, and on my return to the works in Boston, received the Public thanks of the General for my services on that Expedition. . . .

Notwithstanding my repeated and assiduous application Governor Hancock has not written on the subject. At some times he informed me that he had written at others that it had escaped his memory. . . . that I should be kept from the reward given in common to others by the Neglect of an individual (however high in Office) is humiliating—

If in the early days of the War I have been less fortunate in my Military reputation than some others, I hope it will not be esteemed presumption in me to believe that my subsequent services and the Assiduity with which I have executed every order I have received have entirely effaced every disadvantageous impression on my Character.

That last paragraph was clearly a reference to how Gridley had been cashiered from the army for his behavior during Bunker Hill.

Scar Gridley closed by asking Gerry to request a certificate of his service from Gen. Washington so he could “settle my accounts with the publick and the State.”

TOMORROW: Oh, this will go well.

“Major Scarborough Gridley guilty of a breach of orders”

On 24 Sept 1775, Maj. Scarborough Gridley’s career in the Continental Army came to an end.

Gridley was the fourth-ranking officer in the artillery regiment. More important, he was the son of the regimental commander, Col. Richard Gridley.

When the Massachusetts Provincial Congress summoned Richard Gridley in April 1775 and asked him to come out of retirement to lead its artillery and engineering force, one of his conditions was a high rank for his youngest son.

On 17 June, Maj. Gridley was ordered to take his artillery company onto the Charlestown peninsula and help defend the provincials’ new redoubt on Breed’s Hill. He found something else to do.

Three months later, that led to a court-martial. And on 24 September Gen. George Washington’s orders stated:

Major Scarborough Gridley, try’d at a late Genl Court Martial, whereof Brigd. Genl [Nathanael] Green was president, for “being deficient in his duty upon the 17th June last, the day of the Action upon Bunkers-hill”—

The Court find Major Scarborough Gridley guilty of a breach of orders; They do therefore dismiss him from the Massachusetts service; But on Account of his inexperience and Youth, and the great confusion which attended that days transaction in general, they do not consider him incapable of a Continental Commission, should the General Officers recommend him to his Excellency—

The General confirms the dismission of Major Scarborough Gridley, and orders it to take place accordingly.

Scar Gridley was born on 9 Oct 1739, so “inexperience and Youth” referred to his age of…thirty-five. Clearly that line was a sop to his father, as was the idea that he might become an officer in the army Washington was organizing for the new year. The commander pointedly took no notice of anything but this “young” man being dismissed.

Other Americans noticed the dismissal as well. The artist Bernard Romans produced a print titled “An Exact View of the late Battle at Charlestown, June 17, 1775.” The Philadelphia printer Robert Aitken copied that to make “A Correct View of The Late Battle at Charlestown: June 17th, 1775.”

Romans’s image included a detail, shown above, of Maj. Scar Gridley staying in the foreground, out of the battle, trading cannon shot with a Royal Navy ship in the Charles River. He helpfully labeled that figure “Broken Officer.” (Aitken appears to have left out Romans’s labels, which would have been of most interest to New Englanders.)

Thus, Maj. Gridley’s contemporaries viewed his deficiency as crucial to the American defeat at Bunker Hill and were willing to pay to see why he was thrown out of the army. His five months of military service were not a success.

TOMORROW: Whatever happened to Maj. Gridley?

“Remissness and backwardness” at Bunker Hill

On 13 Aug 1775, Gen. George Washington issued orders for a court-martial to take place the following day with Gen. Nathanael Greene presiding.

The defendant was Col. John Mansfield (1721-1809) of Lynn. Three junior officers in his regiment had accused him “of high Crimes and Misdemeanors”—namely “remissness and backwardness in the execution of his duty, at the late engagement on Bunkers-hill.”

But there was a delay. On 17 August, Washington told Greene and the other officers to try Col. Samuel Gerrish instead. There were also hearings on officers of lesser rank in that month. As I discussed last month, Gen. Washington was happy to remove a bunch of officers from the Continental ranks.

On 20 August the commander-in-chief told his cousin and overseer Lund Washington, “there is two more Colos. now under arrest, & to be tried for the same Offences.” One was Mansfield.

Why the delay? The charge against Mansfield also involved Maj. Scarborough Gridley of the artillery regiment, who was a protégé of his father, Col. Richard Gridley. The colonel was highly respected in Massachusetts because of his service in the last two wars, particularly the 1745 siege of Louisbourg. With a half-pay pension from the Crown, he was seen as the equivalent of a British army artillerist. The Massachusetts government had even moved to promote Col. Gridley to major general on 23 June.

Gen. Washington and particularly Gen. Charles Lee were not at all impressed with Col. Gridley’s fortifications and other work when they arrived in Cambridge in July. Washington informed the Continental Congress of Gridley’s new Massachusetts rank but pointedly didn’t endorse it. The Congress commissioned him as a Continental colonel instead. But people still didn’t want to totally alienate Col. Gridley.

What’s more, for a significant time that summer the colonel was home in Stoughton recovering a wound he’d suffered at Bunker Hill. His son Scar was the only liaison between him and the army. So both politically and practically, Maj. Scar Gridley was almost untouchable for a while.

That’s where the incident with Col. Mansfield came in. Mansfield’s failing at the Battle of Bunker Hill was to listen to Maj. Scar Gridley. As Richard Frothingham explained the situation in his History of the Siege of Boston, both officers had been ordered onto the battlefield on the Charlestown peninsula but stopped before crossing the neck:

Major Gridley, of the artillery, inadequate to his position, with part of the battalion, marched a short distance on Cambridge road, then halted, and resolved to cover the retreat, which he thought to be inevitable. Col. [Joseph] Frye, fresh from the battle, urged him forward; but Gridley, appalled by the horrors of the scene, ordered his men to fire at the [Royal Navy ship] Glasgow, and batteries from Cobble Hill. He also ordered Colonel Mansfield to support him with his regiment, who, violating his orders, obeyed.

To convict Mansfield of disobeying higher orders, cowardice, or incompetence would imply that Scar Gridley was guilty of the same charges. And how would his father respond? That might have been why Mansfield’s court martial took so long to get started.

In early September 1775, however, the court-martial proceedings started again. The logjam might have been broken from below as officers in the artillery regiment fired accusations at each other.

TOMORROW: Two trials in two weeks.

“A young Gentleman, Mr. John Gridley”

As I quoted yesterday, the earliest newspaper reports on the British Coffee-House brawl between James Otis, Jr., and John Robinson said that “A young Gentleman, Mr. John Gridley,” waded into the fight on Otis’s side.

Who was John Gridley? Having researched Boston’s Gridley families because of their connection to the Continental artillery, I can say this isn’t a simple question. They were an old New England clan with the annoying habit of having lots of children and few given names. At any one time there were multiple John, Richard, and Samuel Gridleys.

Period sources provide a couple of clues about this John Gridley. First, the fact that the newspapers consistently call him a “young Gentleman” gives a hint about his class. Second, in a letter to John Wilkes in London, Dr. Thomas Young stated that he was “a nephew to the famous attorney of that name”—Jeremy Gridley (1702-1767), who had trained Otis in the law.

In a footnote to an article about Dr. Young published by the Colonial Society of Massachusetts, Henry H. Edes wrote, “The only John Gridley of whom any record is found in Boston who may have been the person mentioned in the text was John, son of Isaac and Sarah (Porter) Gridley, who was baptized 16 October, 1737,” in the New South Meetinghouse.

Isaac Gridley, born in 1703, was indeed a younger brother of the attorney and older brother of the artillery officer. He became a ropemaker. Among his many real-estate transactions catalogued by Annie Haven Thwing, he sold John Gray property in the center of Boston that probably became part of the ropewalk where fights broke out before the Boston Massacre. After 1748 Isaac was legally referred to as “Isaac Gridley, Esq.,” indicating that society saw him as a gentleman.

John Gridley thus inherited a certain status. He married Mercy Bartlett of Newton on 18 Mar 1761. Four years later his name appeared on advertising for fishing nets and other cordage, so he had probably started to help run his father’s business. Isaac died in April 1767.

The Boston town meeting elected a John Gridley as a Clerk of the Market in March 1768. This was a low-level position that showed the respect of the town. Some men chosen for it moved up in government and others, like Gridley, simply served out the year.

When Gridley barged into the British Coffee-House on 5 Sept 1769, he was thirty-one years old—not exceptionally “young” but still part of the rising generation. He wasn’t out of place in a genteel establishment or in Boston’s business center.

A few months later, Gridley got involved with another milestone event in Boston’s pre-Revolutionary turmoil. On the evening of 5 Mar 1770, he was in the Bunch of Grapes tavern (shown above) with three other men when they heard the fire alarm. Gridley offered to go find out what was happening. Outside the Customs house he saw Pvt. Hugh White facing off against a crowd comprised mostly of “Little trifling boys.”

Gridley walked on, then came back when he saw a squad of British soldiers arrive. He even “walked betwixt the two ranks” as the men loaded their muskets. By this time, Gridley thought the crowd was full of “Mother Tapley’s boys,…boys as big as I am.” (No one can find that expression anywhere else in the entire corpus of English literature, and it needed to be explained at the trial.)

The soldiers’ attorneys called “John Gridley Merchant” to testify for their defense. He described hearing locals speak of attacking the main guard. He said the crowd doubled to about fifty people, some at the back throwing snowballs. And:

As I stood on the steps of the Bunch of Grapes tavern; the general noise and cry was why do you not fire, damn you, you dare not fire, fire and be damned. These words were spoke very loud, they might be heard to the Long wharff.

That sort of testimony was helpful to the defense and the royal cause in general, but Whig commentators don’t seem to have singled out Gridley’s testimony for criticism.

Nonetheless, in the next couple of years Gridley left Boston on some sort of business in the Caribbean. He never returned. The Boston Gazette and Evening-Post of 12 Apr 1773 reported that “Mr. John Gridley, Merchant,” had died in the West Indies.

TOMORROW: Gridley’s testimony about the brawl.

Refighting Bunker Hill with the Angry Staff Officer

This is the anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill. For an overview of the action this year, I’m pointing to the Angry Staff Officer’s article “Warfighter: Bunker Hill.”

It sets aside the mysteries, ambiguities, and evidence that historians focus on, and also applies modern military terms to the situation in 1775. Here’s a taste:

On the night of June 16, Col. [William] Prescott with chief engineer Richard Gridley and about 500 men crossed Charlestown Neck and occupied Breed’s Hill. Equipped with survivability equipment, they began construction of a fighting position on the height of the crest. During the night, ISR assets on the Royal Navy ships in the harbor spotted the movement and called for fire on the hill. Rounds began to impact, but the guns soon fell silent: Admiral Richard [sic—Samuel] Graves had been awoken by the firing and ordered the men to cease fire. Working all night, the Patriots dug a substantial fortification on Breed’s Hill with earthworks and firing platforms. When the sun rose, the British found that the height had been seized and fortified.

During the morning hours, more men arrived on the neck and began improving the fighting positions. An earthen trench was constructed down the left side of the redoubt. Just behind it, the New Hampshire and Connecticut troops constructed additional defenses extending to the left using log fences and stone walls to erect a position that ran down the slope towards the Mystic River. Between the fence and the trench, pioneers dug three v-shaped trenches to tie in the trench and the fence. This still left the extreme left vulnerable to flanking parties moving along the coast, so Col. [John] Stark led a detachment down the bluff to the river and emplaced a series of rock walls in depth. He then placed detachments of marksmen behind each wall, with strict fire control measures. He drove a stake forty yards in front of this position, with instructions for his men to aim at the enemy’s feet; this compensated for the natural rise of the musket and would place their fire center mass.

Arrayed across the dominant heights, the Patriot forces overlooked the key terrain where the British would have conduct an amphibious landing. Between this beach and the heights lay a series of swamps and rail fences that served as natural obstacles that would disrupt British movement and maneuver.

Secondary fighting positions were constructed on Bunker Hill to the rear of Breed’s Hill to serve as a fallback position for Patriot forces should they be forced to retrograde.

Fires

With their navy, the British brought significant fires dominance to the battlefield. Naval gunfire began again in the early morning hours of June 17 to suppress the Patriot lines. Over 100 guns were brought to bear on the enemy lines. This sustained fire was also meant to disrupt Patriot movement, but the natural lay of the land allowed Patriots to maneuver their forces in relative safety. In the afternoon, the British landed 12 pound and 6 pound batteries on the beach to provide additional suppressive fire.

The Patriots had four guns in position between the Connecticut and Massachusetts troops, but their gunners abandoned the field prior to the battle and so negated the majority of effects of the guns.

Sustainment

The British were forced to move all supplies via boat across the river, slowing their rate of supply and reinforcement significantly. The 6 pounder battery commander neglected to conduct a precombat inspection prior to deployment and found to their chagrin that their caissons were filled with 12 pound shot rather than 6 pound shot. This denied General [William] Howe his mobile fire support that he was counting on for close in fires.

On the Patriot side, they were already dangerously short of gunpowder. Each soldier had only about 30-40 rounds of ammunition. Lack of an overall field commander meant that there was no one individual tasked with overseeing logistics from the assembly area to the forward line of troops. This oversight would play an outsized role in the coming fight.

Now that we’ve reviewed the big picture, I’ll get into the smaller stories and questions.

“Throw up such works on the two commanding Eminences”

I’ve often wondered how Gen. Artemas Ward reacted to the letters he received from the headquarters of his commander, Gen. George Washington, on 2-3 Mar 1776.

Those letters were full of details about how to manage the Continental Army’s move onto the Dorchester peninsula, down to what sort of barrels to fill with rocks and make ready to roll down onto approaching redcoats. (“Perhaps single Barrels would be better than linking of them together, being less liable to accidents—the Hoops should be well Naild or else they will soon fly, & the Casks fall to Pieces.”)

If I were in Ward’s boots, I’d be thinking, “I’ve been advising you to take this position for months now! You did nothing but come up with foolhardy plans for frontal attacks, and I kept telling you about Dorchester Heights! And now you’re telling me we have to act fast?! You’re telling me what to do in case of wind?!”

But we don’t know what Ward would have said to Washington because he didn’t put that in writing. Perhaps he was even gratified that his commander had become so enthusiastic about his suggestion.

On 4 March, Ward issued these orders to his part of the army:

That 2100 Men viz 1 Brigadier Genl. 3 Coll. 3 Lieut Coll. 3 Majors 23 Capts 71 Subs. 100 Sergts. 3 Drums 1916 Rank. & file 3 Surgeons 3 Mates are to be Paraded this Eveng at Six oclock precisely, at Dorchester, completely Armd & accoutred, with one days Provision ready cook’d.

Before the men are marchd from the regimental Parades, they are to be handsomely drawn up two deep. Their arms, Amunition & Accoutraments strictly examin’d, the commission’d & non-commission’d Officers properly posted. The Officers will give particular Attention to their own Divisions, whether they are employ’d in the work, or as a covering Party, & not shift from one part of the Battallion to another. This will give an Opportunity for ye free Circulation to the Orders of the Commanding Officer, & enable him to conduct any movement with less Danger of Confusion, & greater Probability of Success.

The Officers will mark well the Behavior of their men; that ye Bravery & Resolution of the good Soldier may not pass unrewarded; & Meanness & Cowardice meet with just Contempt.

At 3 Oclock Tomorrow morn’g, will be paraded for the Relief of the above Party, at ye same Place, 3000 Men viz 1 Brigadier Genl. 5 Coll 5 Lieut. Coll 5 Majors 30 Capts 92 Subs 118 Sergts 5 Drums 2342 Rank & File 5 Surgeons 5 Mates, Accoutred & posted as above with one Days Provision ready cook’d. The 5 Companies of Rifle men equipt as above are to parade at the same Place & time.

At which time the Remainder of all ye Regts are to be turn’d out & take their respective Alarm Posts. The Party that is reliev’d from Dorchester is not to be dismiss’d as soon as reliev’d; but to join their respective Regts at their Alarm posts, & wait for further Orders.

The Genl. expects that in case of an attack, the Officers exert themselves to prevent their men from throwing away their Fire before the Enemy are within Reach, & recommends that no Soldier fire at any time without a particular Object in View; single Guns well aim’d and briskly fir’d, have a greater Tendency to disconcert & do more Damage to an Enemy, than firing by Plattoons.

The Surgeons and Mates are to be equip’d with every thing necessary for their department. It is ordered that the whole Camp keep by them one Days Provision ready cook’d; & that no Officer or Soldier strole from their Quarters. 2500 Men Are to parade every Morng equip’d, at ye same hour & Place.

Ward’s aide de camp, Joseph Ward, wrote out the general’s instructions to the man who would command the move onto the peninsula, Gen. John Thomas:

Brigadier General Thomas is to take the Command of 2100 Men which are to be paraded at Dorchester at six o’Clock this Evening, with which he is to proceed to Dorchester Point, and there throw up such works on the two commanding Eminences, as with the advice of the Engineer [probably Col. Richard Gridley] shall think most proper for the defence of the ground & annoyance of the Enemy and defend the same.

And there were also instructions to the head of the rifle companies:

Capt. Hugh Stevenson is to take the command of the three Companies of Rifle men in this Incampment, & also the two Companies which are ordered here from Cambridge; & at three Oclock tomorrow Morning proceed to Dorchester Point, there to obey such orders as he shall receive from Brigadier Genl. Thomas, or the Commanding Officer on that Point. 

The length and detail of all those orders on 2-4 March make a sharp contrast to what Ward had told his officers back on 15 June 1775, when the provincials had decided to fortify Bunker’s Hill. Moving onto Dorchester Heights was a more challenging operation, but this time the army had been preparing for weeks.

The 2,100 soldiers Ward sent out first were equipped not just with entrenching tools and their muskets. There were also 300 wagons loaded with bundles of hay to create a shield along the causeway and prefab pieces of fortification to assemble on the heights. There were the riflemen to guard the shoreline. There was the cover of an ongoing cannonade. And Ward had 3,000 more men ready to relieve the soldiers who would build the works—that hadn’t worked well back in June.

And of course there were barrels.

TOMORROW: The men with the bright ideas.

“Dangerous to delay taking Post on Dorchester Hills”

On 3 Mar 1776, Gen. George Washington followed up his short note to Gen. Artemas Ward (quoted yesterday) with a full set of orders for moving onto the Dorchester peninsula on the evening of the 4th.

My Letter of last Night would inform you that the Genl Officers at this place thought it dangerous to delay taking Post on Dorchester Hills, least they should be possess’d before us by the Enemy, and therefore Involve us in difficulties which we should not know how to extricate ourselves from—this opinion they were Inclind to adopt from a belief, indeed almost a certain knowledge, of the Enemys being apprisd of our designs that way.

You should make choice of some good Regiments to go on the Morning after the Post is taken, under the Command of General [John] Thomas, the number of Men you shall judge necessary for this Relief may be orderd—I should think from two to three thousand, as circumstances may require, would be enough. I shall send you from hence two Regiments, to be at Roxbury early on Tuesday Morning to strengthen your Lines, and I shall send you to morrow Evening two Companies of Rifflemen, which with the three now there may be part of the Relief to go on with Genl Thomas. these Five Companies may be placed under the care of Captn Hugh Stephenson, subject to the Command of the Officer Commanding at the Post (Dorchester). they will I think be able to gall the Enemy sorely in their March from their Boats & in Landg.

A Blind along the Causey should be thrown up, if possible, while the other work is about; especially on the Dorchester side, as that is nearest the Enemy’s Guns, & most exposed. We calculated I think, that 800 Men would do the whole Causey with great ease in a Night, if the Marsh has not got bad to Work again, & the tide gives no great Interruption—250 Axe men I should think would soon Fell the Trees for the Abettes, but what number it may take to get them, the Fascines, Chandeliers &ca in place I know not—750 Men (the Working Party carrying their arms) will I should think be sufficient for a Covering Party. these to be Posted on Nuke-Hill. on the little hill in front of the 2d hill, looking in to Boston Bay—and near the point opposite the Castle. Sentries to be kept between the Parties, & some on the backside, looking towards Squantum.

As I have a very high opinion of the defence which may be made with Barrels from either of the Hills, I could wish you to have a number [sent] over—Perhaps single Barrels would be better than linking of them together, being less liable to accidents—the Hoops should be well Naild or else they will soon fly, & the Casks fall to Pieces.

You must take care that the Necessary notice is given to the Militia agreeable to the plan settld with General Thomas. I shall desire Colo. [Richard] Gridley & Colo. [Henry] Knox to be over tomorrow to lay out the Work—I recollect nothing more at present to mention to you; you will settle matters with the Officers with you, as what I have hear said is intended rather to convey my Ideas generally, than wishing them to be adhered to strictly.

And just in case that wasn’t enough detail, Washington’s military secretary, Robert Hanson Harrison, followed that up in the evening with another letter:

I am commanded by his Excellency to Inform you that If the wind which is from the Eastward this Evening shou’d Occasion the Tide to be rather high to morrow, and there shou’d be a probability of Its continuing so for any Time, that he wou’d not have you to call in the Militia ’till you hear further from him—as the propriety of calling them in, depends upon the circumstances of the Tide you will be enabled to form a proper Judgement from appearances To morrow—

His Excellency desires that you will be particularly attentive to the motions of the Enemy, and use every precaution in your power to discover whither they have any designs of Taking possession of Dorchester Heights, as he would by no means have them accomplish It.

Now that’s a lot of detail—Washington really seems to have been micromanaging here, even as he assured Ward that he “intended rather to convey my Ideas generally, than wishing them to be adhered to strictly.”

TOMORROW: What did Ward think of that?

Reconnoitering the Dorchester Peninsula with the Generals

As I discussed yesterday, in early February 1776 Gen. George Washington and his engineers were discussing whether it was feasible to move onto the Dorchester peninsula and mount cannon there to threaten British shipping.

On 12 February, the commander-in-chief took some of his top advisors to look at the ground themselves. We know that from a letter written the next day by Capt. John Chester of Connecticut:

Yesterday the Generals went on to Dorchester Hill & point to view & plan out the works to be done there, Knox and Gridley were with them.—Their plan I cannot as yet find out.—

Col. Richard Gridley was the Continental Army’s Chief Engineer, in charge of planning and building fortifications. Until the fall he had also been in charge of the artillery. But after being wounded at Bunker Hill, he had gone home to recuperate, lost operational control of that regiment, and lost the confidence of the new commander.

In October, Washington had convinced the Continental Congress to kick Gridley upstairs with his new title. The new artillery colonel was Henry Knox, a full forty years younger than the veteran he replaced.

Since he was stationed in Cambridge, Chester didn’t see what happened in Dorchester, but he got some word about the planning from a man who had gone onto the peninsula, Gen. Israel Putnam:

Gen. Putnam says Gridley laid out works enough for our whole army [to build] for two years if the frost was to continue in that time & in short thinks we cannot do much to purpose there while the frost is in ye ground.

The ground on the heights was still so winter hard that it would take days or weeks of digging to construct fortifications there. And of course the British military would strike back as soon as they saw what their enemy was up to. The Royal Artillery had cannon and mortars mounted on Boston Neck easily able to hit the low ground that led on to the Dorchester peninsula. Plus, there were thousands of soldiers in town.

Chester continued:

Something droll Happen’d as they were on the Point & within call of the Enemy. They observed two [British] officers on full speed on Horses from the Old to the New lines & concluded they were about to order the Artillery levelled at them. Just that instant they observed a fellow Deserting from us to them. This set em all a running & Scampering for life except the lame Col. Gridley & Putnam who never runs & tarried to wait on Gridley. They had left their Horses 1/2 a mile back & feard the Enemy might attempt to encompass them.

Fortunately for the Continental cause, this scouting mission didn’t end with the commander-in-chief, third-in-command in the theater, chief engineer, artillery commander, and perhaps other generals being captured or torn apart by artillery fire.

“In daily expectation of Colonel Knox’s arrivall”

Yesterday I quoted the Boston businessman and court official Ezekiel Price about Col. Henry Knox and the artillery he brought from Lake Champlain in January 1776.

At that time Price was a war refugee living at Thomas Doty’s tavern in what was then Stoughton (shown here). That was also the home town of Col. Richard Gridley, Chief Engineer of the Continental Army and, until the previous fall, the commander of its artillery regiment. Price socialized with the Gridley family. He also gathered up rumors from other sources.

Price’s diary entries make clear that people like him knew about Knox’s mission to retrieve cannon and were eagerly awaiting the result.

Thursday, Jan. 11. — Went down to Milton. Could hear nothing remarkable from the American Army. It is reported that Colonel Henry Knox is on his return from Crown Point; got back as far as Worcester, and has with him a number of brass cannon and other ordnance-stores, and was expected at Cambridge last night with his artillery. Mr. William Bant [a business associate of John Hancock] called here on his way to the army, &c. Son Zek spent the day with us. Mrs. Price, Polly, &c, went home with Zek in the chaise. The weather threatens snow or rain soon.

Friday, Jan. 12.— A light snow fell in the night. The weather is moderate, and the morning agreeable for the season. Towards noon, it began to grow cold. Mrs. Gridley and daughter Beckey stopt here, in their way to Cambridge to visit Scar Gridley, who, they hear, is dangerously ill. A soldier from the army below says that nothing material has happened there within a day or two past, except that he heard Colonel Knox was on his return to Cambridge, and that a number of cannon had reached there, which Colonel Knox sent before him. It is cloudy, and has the appearance of more foul weather soon.

I’m skeptical about that “number of cannon” reaching Cambridge; no other sources confirm that secondhand information, and it looks to me like Knox went ahead of the guns instead of the other way around.

On 13 January, Gen. George Washington was still awaiting his artillery commander. He told Col. Alexander McDougall of New York, “I am in daily expectation of Colonel Knox’s arrivall.”

That same day, Price wrote, “By advices from Canada, I think Governor [Guy] Carlton’s head is pretty near the noose: so that we may hope to see him soon at headquarters.” He was expecting news of American triumph at Québec City.

In the evening Thomas Crane, representative from Stoughton to the Massachusetts General Court, told Price “that Knox, with the cannon, was at Springfield.” Which of course contradicted the earlier reports that the colonel was much closer. But Price was still optimistic.

Meanwhile, Washington kept waiting. On 16 January, he received a progress report from Gen. Philip Schuyler in Albany and wrote back: “I am much pleased, that the artillery was like to be got over the River, and am in Hopes, that Colonel Knox will arrive with it in a few Days—It is much wanted.”

Late the next day, Gen. Washington received bad news: Gen. Richard Montgomery had died in an unsuccessful assault on Québec. Washington called his generals together for a council of war the next morning to decide how many soldiers they could spare to bolster that effort against Canada. Knox, according to Gen. William Heath, finally arrived later on the 18th.

Sometime that same day, Ezekiel Price also heard about Montgomery’s death. He held out hope that that “melancholy and unfortunate” report was false. But on the 19th everyone connected with the army told Price the same bad news, and he had more detail by the 20th. For the next two days he described troops preparing to head north. Despite all his anticipation of Knox’s arrival, Price never actually recorded that event or mentioned the new artillery until late February. The disastrous news from Québec completely overshadowed it.

Cannon to Reappear at Grotonfest, 24 Sept.

One of the events of this Saturday’s Grotonfest will be the Groton Historical Society’s unveiling of a Revolutionary-era cannon.

The Groton Herald and Nashoba Valley Voice have both run stories about local curator Earl Carter’s work restoring that iron cannon and building a (naval) carriage for it. The Herald’s online story includes a photograph of the markings on the gun, including the royal monogram.

However, in relaying Carter’s understanding of the cannon’s history, the Herald story raises questions:

The cannon was captured when the British gunboat H.M.S. Diana, fitted with four cannon and swivel guns, sailed up Chelsea Creek from Boston Harbor to engage Colonial forces. Exposed to heavy gunfire, the British were forced to abandon Diana at about 10 pm. When British Lieutenant [Thomas] Graves abandoned Diana, he transferred his men to HMS Britannia, which was successfully towed to deeper water. Unmanned, Diana drifted and ran aground on the Mystic River side of the Chelsea coast, tipping onto one side.

American forces, including the eight Groton Minutemen, commanded by Asa Lawrence, boarded the Diana and removed four cannon, one of which is pictured on the front page of the paper. Other American forces rapidly removed everything of value, including other guns, rigging, sails, clothing, and money. They laid hay under the stern to serve as kindling, and the vessel was set on fire at about 3 a.m. to prevent it from falling back into British hands.

Twenty days later, these same four captured cannon were deployed at the Battle of Bunker Hill. Three of the four cannon were lost in the battle, with this one cannon remaining in American hands. Immediately following the battle, a great amount of the armament and gunpowder, including this cannon, were taken to Col. [James] Barrett’s farm in Concord for safe hiding from the British. But, soon, the British learned of this hiding place and sent a large contingent to confiscate these military stores.

The same narrative appears in the video accompanying the Valley Voice article.

However, the “large contingent” of British soldiers sent to confiscate weapons at Barrett’s farm arrived on 19 Apr 1775, one month before the fight over the Diana and two months before the Battle of Bunker Hill.

In addition, the Massachusetts artillery regiment got six cannon onto the Charlestown peninsula during Bunker Hill and lost five—all “4 pounders,” according to Lt. Richard Williams of His Majesty’s 23rd Regiment.

Neither newspaper story lays out the historical documentation for that narrative—which, of course, is not what newspaper stories usually do. But I hope there are clear answers to these questions:

• What size is this iron cannon? What other physical evidence does the gun itself carry? 
• What paper trail traces the cannon from the Diana into the New England army and through the war? In researching The Road to Concord I found that Col. Richard Gridley’s Massachusetts artillery regiment did a lousy job with paperwork, and the Continental Army not much better when it came to tracking individual guns.
• When does this particular cannon surface in Groton records? The town had an unusually active, document-loving local historian in Samuel Abbott Green (1830-1919). I found no mention of a local Revolutionary cannon in his books, even in the section of his Groton during the Revolution that discusses how the Massachusetts Committee of Safety assigned “four six-pounders” to the town on 15 Apr 1775. (It’s not clear the committee had time to ship those guns to Groton before the war began.)

There were cannon in Groton as early as 1808 because the town had its own militia artillery company. In that year (according to Green in his Natural History and the Topography of Groton) the Federalist Columbian Centinel reported that the town’s Independence Day celebration had been spoiled by partisan feuding within the company:

Capt. [James] Lewis [1761-1828], of the Groton Artillery, (a demo[crat].) tho’ courteously invited to appear with his company to celebrate the day, which gave our country birth, not only meanly denied Lieut. [Solomon] Carleton [1773-1856] and his company the use of the cannon on the occasion, but unsuccessfully endeavored to dissuade many from the celebration.

That gathering toasted the “Concord Artillery” instead. Even more specific, at a Lawrence Academy ceremony in 1854, Abbott Lawrence (1792-1855) shared a youthful memory of “the Groton artillery, with their two enormous guns—three pounders.”

According to the Valley Voice, “In 1972, the Groton Historical Society re-discovered [the cannon] behind a building near Lawrence Academy. Someone had built a miniature outdoor display…[but] the barrel was covered in vines ‘30 to 40 years old’.” So the cannon’s provenance seems clear for the last fifty years, at least.