More Details from Capt. Samuel Leighton’s Papers

As I looked over the document dealer Seth Kaller’s offerings from the papers of Capt. Samuel Leighton of Kittery, Maine, a few things jumped out at me.

Records of the Massachusetts Committee of Safety say that a total of 91 guns were delivered to Col. James Scamman’s regiment on 30 June and 7 July 1775. The papers for sale include a receipt for four guns dated 4 July. The most expensive of those guns, worth a third of the total, is connected with Henry Foss, who was the Leighton company’s drummer.

Foss also had one of the best signatures in the company, as shown by this document. A few men signed with their marks only, including one, Stephen Nason, who is listed as a corporal. Normally I expect the non-commissioned officers to be able to write, but this man might have been exceptional.

At a council of war on 3 Aug 1775, Gen. George Washington learned that his army’s stock of gunpowder was considerably smaller than he’d understood. I suspect that led to Capt. Leighton’s inventory of “Aminitson” held by men on 12 August. It looks like most of the company had over twenty rounds.

At the end of the year, Col. Scamman didn’t receive a new Continental Army commission. Despite being acquitted in a court-martial, he apparently hadn’t escaped the cloud hanging over him since Bunker Hill. In fact, he continued to argue against those charges in the newspaper in 1776.

Capt. Leighton and many of his men chose not to reenlist. They accepted money in lieu of winter coats and collected their October pay on 29 December. Leighton turned in some ammunition and other supplies and got a receipt on 1 Jan 1776.

And then Capt. Leighton and many of his men went back home to Maine. Leighton was in Kittery on 8 March when he paid Sgt. Josiah Paul. Meanwhile, back in Massachusetts Gen. Washington was overseeing the endgame of the siege from Dorchester Heights.

A family genealogy includes his Samuel Leighton’s commission in the Massachusetts militia dated 16 May 1776. He led a company back to Boston later that year for guard duty and eventually was promoted to major in the state militia, but never again served in the Continental Army.

Among the other Leighton documents is what Seth Kaller calls a list of instructions for infantry formations. It’s actually the section headings of chapter five of Gen. Steuben’s drill manual, titled “Miscellaneous Evolutions.” That was published in 1779, so I assume Leighton or a relative copied it out later in the war, maybe for militia training.

Capt. Samuel Leighton and His Regiment

Will Steere at the Seth Kaller Inc. dealer in historic documents alerted me to some recent offerings that shed a little light on the siege of Boston. They are more of the papers of Capt. Samuel Leighton (1740-1802) of Kittery, Maine. His men came from that area and Portsmouth, New Hampshire. One can find them all at the Seth Kaller site by searching for the keyword “Leighton.”

This company was part of the regiment of Col. James Scamman (1742-1804). Documents in the Massachusetts archives indicate that some officers and men in that regiment wanted their colonel to be Johnson Moulton, a veteran of the French & Indian War who had mustered a minute company on 21 Apr 1775 and marched south. By the time Moulton returned home four days later, however, Scamman was evidently recruiting.

Moulton signed on to Scamman’s regiment as lieutenant colonel on 2 May but brought Gen. Artemas Ward a letter from prominent neighbors dated three days later recommending that he be made colonel. “There is a considerable number of good men enlisted already, with a view of said Moulton being their Colonel,” the letter closed. Scamman could be lieutenant colonel, they suggested.

The Massachusetts Committee of Safety was convinced enough to ask Scamman to step aside in a 7 May letter. But he didn’t. Instead, he marched his regiment to Cambridge and mustered them there on 23 May.

The committee decided that they couldn’t remove Scamman without his cooperation. They certified his regiment as “nearly full” and recommended commissions for his officers. On 29 May, Moulton was officially made the regiment’s lieutenant colonel. Later the Continental Congress issued the equivalent commissions. Leighton’s commission as a Continental captain, dated 1 July, is quoted here.

By then, Leighton’s company had been involved in the fight for Hog Island but not in the Battle of Bunker Hill for reasons explained here. According to a muster roll Leighton prepared, three of his men had deserted, two reportedly on 1 July.

TOMORROW: More of Capt. Leighton’s documents.

Records from Col. Scamman’s Regiment

A Boston 1775 reader has alerted me to Seth Kaller’s offering of documents from Capt. Samuel Leighton’s provincial company during the siege of Boston. The document dealer’s description says:

The present papers primarily illustrate the administration and supply of Captain Samuel Leighton's Company in the 30th Regiment of Foot commanded by Colonel James Scamman. They include a 44 page Book of Accounts kept by Leighton, recording pay receipts and meetings with soldiers, 3 “Returns,” 4 muster rolls for the company in July–September 1775, 15 receipts for guns, and 12 pay receipts for the company.

Leighton’s company was involved in the fight for Hog Island.

Col. Scamman (also spelled Scammon) interests me because of what he did during the Battle of Bunker Hill—or rather what he didn’t do. He was ordered to take his regiment into action on the hill. Instead, he stopped on Lechmere Point in east Cambridge, where Maj. Scarborough Gridley of the artillery was trading ineffectual shots with a British warship in the Charles River and Col. John Mansfield was also holding his regiment.

On 12 July 1775, Gen. George Washington’s general orders included this item:

A General Court Martial of the Line to sit at Head Quarters, in Cambridge, to morrow morning at Nine OClock, to try Col. Scammons of the Massachusetts Forces accused of “Backwardness in the execution of his duty in the late Action upon Bunkers-hill”. The Adjutant of Col. Scammon’s regiment, to warn all Evidences [i.e., witnesses], and persons concern’d to attend the court.

Scamman argued that he had thought his orders to march “to the hill” meant Cobble Hill on Lechmere Point, not Bunker Hill, and he had sent a message to Gen. Israel Putnam asking if his men were needed in Charlestown.

On 18 July, Washington announced that Scamman had been acquitted. The colonel then accused Ens. Joshua Trafton of “abusive Language, to the said Colonel Scammons while under Arrest,” but Trafton was also acquitted. Gridley, Mansfield, and other American officers weren’t so fortunate in their courts-martial. However, Washington and his command didn’t bring Scamman into the Continental Army when they reorganized at the end of 1775.

In February 1776, Scamman had the record of his trial published in the New-England Chronicle, apparently to uphold his reputation. That November, he petitioned the Massachusetts Council this way:

whereas his conduct has been called in question respecting the Battle of Charlestown in June 1775 wherein the Disposition made was such as could render but Little prospect of success and he being willing to shew his Country that he is ready at all Times to risque his Fortune and Life in defence of it would readily engage again in the service thereof and begs leave to inform your Honours that he has no doubt that he can raise a Regiment immediately for the service of the Continent and therefore prays to be indulged with a Commission for that purpose...

It doesn’t look like Scamman’s request was ever granted.