REMOVAL TO VERMONT.--THE NEW HAMPSHIRE GRANTS.
Allen came to Vermont, probably, in 1769, a year memorable for the
founding of Dartmouth College and for the birth of four of earth's
renowned men: two soldiers, Wellington and Napoleon; two scholars,
Cuvier and Humboldt.
In the early history of Vermont, one of its prominent judges
speculated extensively in Green Mountain wild lands. The aggregate
result of these speculations was disastrous. Attending a session of
the legislature, the judge was called upon by a committee for his
advice in reference to suitable penalties for some crime. He replied,
advising for the first offence a fine; for the second, imprisonment;
and if the criminal should prove such a hardened offender, such a
veteran in vice as to be guilty the third time, he recommended that
the scoundrel should be compelled to receive a deed of a mile square
of wild Vermont lands. Speculation in wild lands is a feature of
pioneer society. Vermont was once the agricultural Eldorado of New
England. Emigration first rolled northward. Since that time a certain
star, erroneously supposed to belong to Bishop Berkeley, has been
travelling westward.
In 1749 Benning Wentworth, Governor of New Hampshire, issued a
patent of a township, six miles square, near the northwest angle of
Massachusetts and corresponding with its line northward, and in this
township of Bennington the Allens bought lands and made their home.
This grant caused a remonstrance from the governor and council of New
York. Similar remonstrances had been made in the cases of Connecticut
and Massachusetts, each of whom claimed that their territory extended
to the Connecticut River. But that question had been settled in
the former cases between New York and New England by agreeing upon
a line from the southwest corner of Connecticut northerly to Lake
Champlain as the boundary between the provinces. Wentworth urged in
justification of his course that the boundary line was well known,
and that New Hampshire had the same right as the other colonies of
New England, and he persevered in his own course. In 1754 fourteen
new townships had been granted, when the French war broke out and the
settlers were deterred from occupying their lands by the incursions
of the French and Indians on the frontier and the uncertainty of
the termination of the contest; but when Canada was reduced by the
English and peace concluded, there was a new rush for the possession
of the fertile lands by the hardy and adventurous sons of the old
New England colonies. In four years Governor Wentworth granted one
hundred and thirty-eight townships, and the territory included was
called the New Hampshire Grants. Then began in bitter earnest the
long controversy between New York and New Hampshire for the ownership
of all the territory now known as Vermont.
In order to make clear the circumstances of the time when Ethan
Allen came to the front, it is necessary to explain something of the
origin of the strife. The New York claim was founded on a charter
given by Charles II. to his brother, the Duke of York, in 1664, for
the country lying between the Connecticut and Delaware rivers. But
that charter had long been considered as practically a nullity, for
when the Duke of York succeeded to the throne of England, it all
became public property subject to the king's divisions; and there
are strong reasons for believing that the mention of the Connecticut
was merely a formality, not intended as a definite boundary, and
that the design was to take in the whole of the New Netherlands. The
geography of the country was little known, and the wording of the
charter was ambiguous and vague. Allen at once espoused the cause of
the settlers. But for him the State of Vermont would probably have
never existed. But for Allen, Albany, not Montpelier, might have been
the capital of Vermont. Allen's most illustrious achievement for the
benefit of the nation was the capture of Ticonderoga. His great work
for Vermont was successful resistance to the Yorkers.
Before entering upon this period of litigation, one of the stories of
Allen, illustrating his honesty, may fitly find a place. Having given
a note which he was unable to pay when it became due, he was sued.
Allen employed a lawyer to attend to his case and postpone payment.
But the lawyer could not prevent the rendering a judgment against
Allen at the first term of court, unless he filed a plea alleging
some real or fictitious ground of defence. Accordingly, quite
innocently he put in the usual plea denying that Allen signed the
note. The effect of this was to continue the case to the next term
of court, exactly what Allen wanted; but Allen was present and was
indignant that he should be made to appear to sanction a falsehood.
He rose in court and vehemently denounced his lawyer, telling him
that he did not employ him to tell a lie; he did sign that note; he
wanted to pay it; he only wanted time!
It was in June, 1770, that Allen first became prominent in Vermont
public affairs. Then it was that the lawsuits brought by Yorkers
for Vermont lands were tried before the Supreme Court at Albany.
Robert R. Livingston was the presiding judge; Kempe and Duane,
attorneys for plaintiffs; Silvester, of Albany, and Jared Ingersoll,
of New Haven, attorneys for defendants. Ethan Allen was active in
preparing the defence. But of what avail was defence when the court
was virtually an adverse party to the suit? Not only did Duane claim
50,000 acres of Vermont lands, but, to the disgrace of English
jurisprudence, Livingston, the presiding judge, was interested
directly or indirectly in 30,000 acres. The farce was soon played
out; the court refused to hear the New Hampshire charter read; one
trial was sufficient; the plaintiffs won all the cases. Duane and
others called on Allen and reminded him that "might makes right,"
advising him to go home and counsel compromise. Allen observed: "The
gods of the valleys are not the gods of the hills!" Duane asked for
an explanation, and Allen replied: "If you will come to Bennington
the meaning shall be made clear to you."
Allen went home and no compromise was thought of. The great seal
of New Hampshire being disregarded, the "Beech Seal" was invented
as a substitute. A military organization was formed with several
companies, Seth Warner, Remember Baker, and others as captains, and
Ethan Allen as colonel.
In July, 1771, on the farm of James Breakenridge, in Bennington,
the State of Vermont was born. Ten Eyck, the sheriff, with 300 men,
including mayor, aldermen, lawyers, and others, issued forth from
Albany, as did De Soto to capture Florida, as Don Quixote essayed
to conquer the windmills. Breakenridge's family were wisely absent.
In his house were eighteen armed men provided with a red flag to run
up the chimney as a signal for aid. The house was barricaded and
provided with loop-holes. On the woody ridge north were 100 armed
men, their heads and the muzzles of their guns barely visible amid
the foliage. To the southeast, in plain sight, was a smaller body
of men within gunshot of the house. Six or seven guarded the bridge
half a mile to the west. Mayor Cuyler and a few others were allowed
to cross the bridge and a parley ensued. The mayor returned to the
bridge, and in half an hour the sheriff was notified that possession
would be kept at all hazards. He ordered the posse to advance, and a
small portion reluctantly complied. Another parley followed, while
lawyer Yates expounded New York law and the Vermonters justified
their position. The sheriff seized an axe, and going toward the door,
threatened to break it open. In an instant an array of guns was aimed
at him; he stopped, retired to the bridge, and ordered the posse to
advance five miles into Bennington. But the Yorkers stampeded for
home, and the bubble burst. The "star that never sets" had begun to
glimmer upon the horizon.
In the winter of 1771-72 Governor Tryon, of New York, issued
proclamations heavy with ponderous logic and shotted with offers of
money for the arrest of Allen and others. To the arguments Allen
replied through a newspaper, the Connecticut _Courant_, of Hartford.
To the premium for his arrest he returned a Roland for an Oliver in
the following placard:
£25 Reward.--Whereas James Duane and John Kempe, of New York,
have by their menaces and threats greatly disturbed the public
peace and repose of the honest peasants of Bennington and the
settlements to the northward, which are now and ever have been
in the peace of God and the King, and are patriotic and liege
subjects of Geo. the 3d. Any person that will apprehend those
common disturbers, viz: James Duane and John Kempe, and bring
them to Landlord Fay's, at Bennington, shall have £15 reward for
James Duane and £10 reward for John Kempe, paid by
ETHAN ALLEN.
REMEMBER BAKER.
ROBERT COCHRAN.
Dated Poultney,
Feb. 5, 1772.
Duane and Kempe were prominent lawyers of New York, and also
prominent as advocates of New York's claim to Vermont lands.
Duane was the son-in-law of Robert Livingston and Kempe was
attorney-general. The idea of their being kidnapped for exhibition
at a log tavern in the wilderness was slightly grotesque. But this
did not satisfy Allen. He would fain visit the enemy in one of his
strongholds.
Albany was emphatically a Dutch city, for it was two centuries old
before it had 10,000 inhabitants. In 1772 it might have had half
that number. While the country was flooded with proclamations for
his arrest, Allen rode alone into the city. Slowly passing through
the streets to the principal hotel he dismounted, entered the
bar-room, and called for a bowl of punch. The news circulated; the
Dutch rallied; the crowd centred at the hotel; the officers of the
court, the valiant sheriff, Ten Eyck, and the attorney-general were
present. Allen raised the punch-bowl, bowed courteously to the crowd,
swallowed the beverage, returned to the street, remounted his horse,
rose in his stirrups and shouted "Hurrah for the Green Mountains!"
and then leisurely rode away unharmed and unmolested. The incident
illustrates Allen's shrewd courage, and sustains Governor Hall's
theory that the people of New York sympathized more with the Green
Mountain Boys than with their own land-gambling officers.
At the Green Mountain tavern in Bennington was a sign-post, with a
sign twenty-five feet from the ground. Over the sign was the stuffed
skin of a catamount with large teeth grinning toward New York. A
Dutchman of Arlington who had been active against the Green Mountain
Boys was punished by being tied in an arm-chair, hoisted to this
sign, and there suspended for two hours, to the amusement of the
juvenile population and the quiet gratification of their seniors.