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Lynn in the Revolution Chapter XI. The End of the Story

A Very Special Thanks To The Lynn Public Library For The Use Of This Important Resource. Transcribed by Shaun Cook To help transcribe or submit information, please e-mail Shaun Cook

     THERE is little more to record regarding the movements of the soldiers of Lynn. Only once after this are we able to discover that recruits were sent to the army. This was in response to a patriotic appeal to the people for long-term enlistments, embodied in a resolve in the council of Massachusetts on the second of December, 1780. It was at a time when the army was in the greatest desti­tution, and enlistments were hard to obtain. Washington expressed the need in a private letter, in which he said: -

     "We are without money; without provision and forage except what is taken by impress; without clothing; and shall shortly be, in a manner, without men. In a word we have lived by expedients till we can live no longer."

     General Glover wrote to the council of Massachusetts on the eleventh of December: -

     "It is now four days since your line of the army has eaten one mouthful of bread. We have no money, nor will anybody trust us. The best of wheat is at this moment selling in the state of New York for three fourths of a dollar per bushel and your army is starving for want. On the first of January something will turn up, if not speedily prevented, which your officers cannot be accountable for."

     The prospect of three years in the army under such conditions was not bright, to say the least, and drafts had to be made in order to comply with the request. We find
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that it was not until the fourth of the following January that a vote was taken in Lynn, at a town meeting held at Jacob Newhall's tavern, to raise twenty-seven men for the Continental Army. At the same time it was voted to grant as much money as would purchase twenty-seven hundred silver dollars, or the value thereof in gold, to pay the men. The committee chosen to have the whole matter in charge consisted of Jacob Newhall, Joseph Ballard, and John Upton. Some days later there were added to the committee the captains of each company and Nathan Hawkes, Captain Thomas Cox, Benjamin John­son, Lieutenant Thomas Townsend, and Colonel John Mansfield. Even with such effort it was months before the full number was obtained, yet, when it is seen that some of the men engaged dated back their enlistments to the year 1777, it is realized how great was their contri­bution to the cause of independence.
     The, twenty-seven men finally sent were recruited for various regiments, and were as follows: -
 
Samuel Vial  
James Ramsdell  
Samuel Brown  
John Jacobs  
Jacob Hart, Sergt.  
Ebenezer Hart, Corporal  
Richard Hill, Corporal  
Aaron Nourse  
William Paul  
Calvin Newhall  
Charles Watts  
Nathan Hitchings  
John Mead  
Jos. Adams
Charles Hopkins
John Rhodes
Nathaniel Cushing
Noah Parker
Benj. -ridge
John Flinn
Jos. Williams
John Brown
John Marden
James Welman
Michael Fleming
John Swain
Cuff Gott (Ceasar)
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     From a careful study of the individual records of the Lynn soldiers it will be seen that little, if any, part was taken by them in the remaining hostilities of the war. These being from this time on confined to the South, the duties of most of the New England men were the no less important ones of holding the posts at the North already belonging to the Americans. Even after the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown, Washington considered it of the utmost importance to keep the ranks of the army supplied and the posts defended until an actual declara­tion of peace should remove the possibility of some new hostile movement. Consequently, the series of canton­ments established in the region of the Hudson, forming a wide half-circle around the British base at New York City, were kept fully manned, and in these our men were quartered until furlough or discharge enabled them to turn homeward. No doubt they shared to the full the discontent and discouragement which prevailed in the Northern Army during the later years of the war, yet, although desertions were frequent, examples are scarcely to be found of our own men thus leaving the army.
     When, to the great joy of all, formal announcement of the cessation of hostilities was made on the nineteenth of April, 1783, the anniversary of their beginning at Lexington, many men, including some from Lynn, were allowed to go home on furlough, taking their weapons with them. These will be noted in the biographical sketches which follow. They were, of course, never called upon to rejoin the army, and the remainder of the soldiers whose three years' term was not over when the final peace was declared were honorably discharged. We may well imagine that the journey home on foot was
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joyfully undertaken, and that at the farm-houses, where the soldiers were kindly entertained, the rehearsal of their experiences was eagerly listened to.
     On their arrival home, work on the farm and at the shoemaker's bench was again taken up, and their part as citizens once more assumed. Again they were heard in the deliberations of the town meeting, and very soon they began to share in the interests and anxieties which resulted from the newly gained independence.
     Many of these men spent the rest of their lives in the little town from whence they had marched away to the war; and in the old-time burial-places they lie surrounded by their families and neighbors. Many of their long­forgotten resting-places are now suitably marked by the bronze marker of the Sons of the American Revolution, and where for years no stone was raised in their mem­ory a recent provision of the government of the United
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States has made it possible to place at the head of every known grave of a Revolutionary soldier, the marble stone which records his name and the fact of his honorable service.
     It may be well in this connection to refer to the com­memorative services which were held on the seventeenth of June, 1904, in honor of the Revolutionary soldiers of Lynn.
     In the year 1903 and the spring of 1904 stones and markers had been placed at the graves of all the known Revolutionary soldiers in the various burial-grounds of what constituted the old town of Lynn. The seven­teenth of June of the latter year was chosen as a day of dedication of such of these memorials as had been placed within the precincts of the present city. On the morn­ing of that day, flags were placed in the bronze markers at the graves, and in the afternoon, on the invitation of the Old Essex Chapter, Sons of the American Revolu­tion, and the Lynn Historical Society, there gathered at the old Western Burial Ground, and later at the First Congregational Church, children, grandchildren, and great-grandchildren of Revolutionary sires. These were not necessarily members of patriotic societies, although many, no doubt, were such, but they came together simply as those who would do honor to the memory of men whom the world had forgotten, but who had been identified with the best and noblest work that Lynn had ever helped to accomplish. It was a unique gathering, com­posed as it was, to so large an extent, of representatives of old Lynn families, and it was marked by a dignity and absence of noise and parade which would have well suited the simple taste and manner of the earlier day
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which the meeting recalled. It seemed fitting, too, that such memorial services should be held in the church whose traditions were those of the old "Meeting-House," where our men of the Revolution had so often gathered.

     The exercises, which served to review something of the history of the Lynn soldiers, were also the occasion of formally dedicating and turning over to the city the care and preservation of the memorials which had been erected in their honor. And it was felt to be a matter of some pride and satisfaction that the patient work of years had resulted in the placing of more flags in markers of the Sons of the American Revolution than could be found in any other city of the United States. One hun­dred and ninety-six graves had thus been marked, - one hundred and four in the old Western Ground, twelve in the Eastern Ground, eleven in Pine Grove Cemetery, thirty-five in Saugus, and thirty-four in Lynnfield. In
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the second part of this volume will be found the record of the burial-places of as many of the Revolutionary soldiers of Lynn as are to-day known. In many cases where the men died in service, it has been only possible to give that fact, the exact place of burial being unknown.
     In the following chapter will be given the journal of Henry Hallowell, a Revolutionary soldier of Lynn, who thought it worth while to write out his experiences for the benefit of those who should come after him. His inter­esting account gives many side-lights upon what has been here related, and its addition will finish the story of Lynn's part in the great Revolution. It was not a brilliant part, not full of striking incident and distinguished valor, per­haps, but it was the part of a simple, true-hearted, patriotic community which gave of its best and remained steadfast through "the times which tried men's souls."
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