PREPARATIONS TO CAPTURE TICONDEROGA.--DIARY OF EDWARD
MOTT.--EXPEDITIONS PLANNED.--BENEDICT ARNOLD.--GERSHOM BEACH.
On March 29, 1775, John Brown, a Massachusetts lawyer, wrote from
Montreal to Boston:
The people on the New Hampshire Grants have engaged to seize the
fort at Ticonderoga as soon as possible, should hostilities be
committed by the king's troops.
The most minute account of the preparations to capture Ticonderoga is
furnished by the diary for April, 1775, of Edward Mott, of Preston,
Conn., a captain in Colonel S. H. Parson's regiment. He had been
at the camp of the American army beleaguering Boston; took charge
of the expedition to seize Ticonderoga; reported its success to
Governor Trumbull at Hartford; was sent by Trumbull to Congress at
Philadelphia with the news; resumed the command of his company at
Ticonderoga in May; was with the Northern army during the campaign;
was at the taking of Chambly and St. Johns; and became a major in
Colonel Gray's regiment next year.
PRESTON, Friday, April 28, 1775.
Set out for Hartford, where I arrived the same day. Saw
Christopher Leffingwell, who inquired of me about the situation
of the people at Boston. When I had given him an account, he
asked me how they could be relieved and where I thought we could
get artillery and stores. I told him I knew not unless we went
and took possession of Ticonderoga and Crown Point, which I
thought might be done by surprise with a small number of men.
Mr. Leffingwell left me and in a short time came to me again,
and brought with him Samuel H. Parsons and Silas Deane, Esqrs.
When he asked me if I would undertake in such an expedition as
we had talked of before, I told him I would. They told me they
wished I had been there one day sooner; that they had been on
such a plan; and that they had sent off Messrs. Noah Phelps and
Bernard Romans, whom they had supplied with £300 in cash from the
treasury, and ordered them to draw for more if they should need;
that said Phelps and Romans had gone by the way of Salisbury,
where they would make a stop. They expected a small number of men
would join them, and if I would go after them they would give
me an order or letter to them to join with them and to have my
voice with them in conducting the affair and in laying out the
money; and also that I might take five or six men with me. On
which I took with me Mr. Jeremiah Halsey, Mr. Epaphras Bull, Mr.
Wm. Nichols, Mr. Elijah Babcock, and John Bigelow joined me;
and Saturday, the 29th of April, in the afternoon, we set out
on said expedition. Mr. Babcock tired his horse. We got another
horse of Esq. Humphrey in Norfolk, and that day arrived at
Salisbury; tarried all night, and the next day, having augmented
our company to the number of sixteen in the whole, we concluded
it was not best to add any more, as we meant to keep our business
a secret and ride through the country unarmed till we came to
the New Settlements on the Grants. We arrived at Mr. Dewey's in
Sheffield, and there we sent off Mr. Jer. Halsey and Capt. John
Stevens to go to Albany, in order to discover the temper of the
people in that place, and to return and inform us as soon as
possible.
That night (Monday the 1st of May) we arrived at Col. Easton's
in Pittsfield, where we fell in company with John Brown, Esq.,
who had been at Canada and Ticonderoga about a month before; on
which we concluded to make known our business to Col. Easton and
said Brown and to take their advice on the same. I was advised by
Messrs. Deane, Leffingwell, and Parsons not to raise our men till
we came to the New Hampshire Grants, lest we should be discovered
by having too long a march through the country. But when we
advised with the said Easton and Brown they advised us that, as
there was a great scarcity of provisions in the Grants, and as
the people were generally poor, it would be difficult to get a
sufficient number of men there; therefore we had better raise a
number of men sooner. Said Easton and Brown concluded to go with
us, and Easton said he would assist me in raising some men in
his regiment. We then concluded for me to go with Col. Easton to
Jericho and Williamstown to raise men, and the rest of us to go
forward to Bennington and see if they could purchase provisions
there.
We raised twenty-four men in Jericho and fifteen in Williamstown;
got them equipped ready to march. Then Col. Easton and I set
out for Bennington. That evening we met with an express for
our people informing us that they had seen a man directly from
Ticonderoga and he informed them that they were re-enforced at
Ticonderoga, and were repairing the garrison, and were every way
on their guard; therefore it was best for us to dismiss the men
we had raised and proceed no further, as we should not succeed.
I asked who the man was, where he belonged, and where he was
going, but could get no account; on which I ordered that the men
should not be dismissed, but that we should proceed. The next day
I arrived at Bennington. There overtook our people, all but Mr.
Noah Phelps and Mr. Heacock, who were gone forward to reconnoitre
the fort: and Mr. Halsey and Mr. Stevens had not got back from
Albany.
The following account of expenses incurred on this expedition
is amusing, pitiful, and interesting, as evidence of the small
beginnings of the Revolution, and as compared with the machinery of
transportation and the wealth of the nation in its Civil War:
Account of Captain Edward Mott for his expenses going to
Ticonderoga and afterwards against the Colony of Connecticut:
£ s. d.
April 26th.--To expenses from Preston
to Hartford 0 5 0
Expenses at Hartford while consulting
what plan to take, or where it
would be best to raise the men 0 15 0
April 30th.--To expenses of six men at
New Hartford on our way to New
Hampshire Grants to raise men
($3) 0 18 0
May 1st.--To expenses at Norfolk
($2.50) 0 15 0
To expenses at Shaftsbury 0 7 8
To expenses in Jericho while raising
men 1 0 5
To expenses of marching men from
Jericho to Williamstown 1 4 0
May 1st.--To expenses at Allentown 0 6 8
To expenses at Massachusetts 2 4 6
" " " Newport 0 16 0
" " " Pawlet 1 3 3
" " " Castleton 1 6 0
To cash to a teamster for carting
provisions 0 6 0
To cash to Captain Noah Phelps £1
and to Elijah Babcock £6 7 0 0
To cash to Colonel Ethan Allen's
wife 3 0 0
To a horse cost me £20 in cash
($66.66), which I wore out in
riding to raise the men and going
to Ticonderoga, so that I was
obliged to leave her and get another
horse to ride back to Hartford 20 0 0
To my expenses from Ticonderoga
back to Hartford after we had
taken the fort 2 0 0
To my time or wages while going on
said service, and going from Hartford
to Philadelphia to report to
Congress by Governor Trumbull's
orders, being between thirty and
forty days, much of the time day
and night 20 0 0
The 3d of May, 1775, is an eventful day. Four scenes interest
us. At Albany there is hesitation. Halsey and Stevens have been
there to obtain permission for the Ticonderoga expedition. The
Albany committee-men are alarmed, for the proposition seems to be
hazardous. What will the New York Congress think of it? Will the next
Continental Congress, to meet seven days hence, approve of it? The
committee write to the New York Congress for instructions, suggesting
that if New York goes in for the invasion it will plunge northern New
York into all the horrors of war.
A second scene is at Cambridge. The Committee of Safety, without
waiting for permission from New York, decided to act. They issue a
commission to Arnold without consulting the Massachusetts Congress,
and authorize him to raise four hundred men in western Massachusetts
and near colonies for the capture of Ticonderoga and Crown Point;
they give him money and authority to seize and send military stores
to Massachusetts. We can imagine Arnold quickly in the saddle, for
the enterprise suits his genius.
Benedict Arnold was now thirty-five years old; educated in the
common schools, apprenticed as a druggist, fond of mischief, cruel,
irritable, reckless of his reputation, ambitious and uncontrollable.
As a boy he loved to maim young birds, placed broken glass where
school-children would cut their feet, and enticed them with presents
and then rushed out and horsewhipped them. He would cling to the arms
of a large water-wheel at the grist-mill and thus pass beneath and
above the water. When sixteen years of age he enlisted as a soldier,
was released; enlisted again, was at Ticonderoga and other frontier
forts; deserted; served out his apprenticeship, became a druggist and
general merchant in New Haven; shipped horses, cattle, and provisions
to the West Indies, commanded his own vessels, fought a duel with a
Frenchman in the West Indies, became a bankrupt, and was suspected of
dishonesty. Fertile in resource, he resumed business with energy but
with the same obliquity of moral purpose.
With sixty volunteers, a few of them Yale students, marching from
New Haven to Cambridge, he had an interview with Colonel Samuel H.
Parsons near Hartford the 27th of April, and told him about the
cannon and ammunition at Ticonderoga and the defenceless condition
of that fort. Such was the man who endeavored to wrest the command of
the expedition from Allen.
But the grandest scene of all on that 3d of May is the assemblage
in Bennington, perhaps in the old Catamount Tavern of Stephen Fay.
Allen, Warner, Robinson, Dr. Jonas Fay, Joseph Fay, Breakenridge are
there with fifteen Connecticut men and thirty-nine Massachusetts men.
Easton's Massachusetts men outnumber Warner's recruits, and Warner
ranks third instead of second. No one dreams of any one but Allen for
the leader. Easton is also complimented by being made chairman of the
council. Allen with his usual energy takes the initiative and leaves
the party to raise more men. He has been gone but a short time when
Benedict Arnold arrives on horseback with one attendant at the hamlet
and camp of Castleton. He sees Nott and other officers. They frankly
communicate to him all their plans, and are in turn astounded by
Arnold's claiming the right to take command of their whole force. He
shows them his commission from the Committee of Safety in Cambridge,
Mass. This paper gave authority to enlist men, but no more power
over these men than any other American volunteers. Arnold's temper
brooked no opposition. There is almost a mutiny among the men. They
would go home, abandon the whole expedition which had so enkindled
their enthusiasm, rather than be subject to Arnold. Whether this
was owing to his domineering temper as exhibited before them, to
his reputation in Connecticut as an unprincipled man, or entirely
to their regard for their own officers and aversion to others, we
can only conjecture. Tuesday morning this wrangling is resumed.
Again the soldiers threaten to club their guns and go home. When
told that they should be paid the same, although Arnold did command
them, they would "damn" their pay. But Arnold suddenly started to
leave this company and overtake Allen. The soldiers, knowing Allen's
good-nature, as suddenly leave Castleton and follow Arnold to prevent
his overpersuading Allen to yield to his arrogance.
When this stampede occurred, Nott and Phelps with Herrick were with
the thirty men on the march to Skenesborough. They left the Remington
camp at Castleton, and had gone nearly to Hydeville. The stampede
left all the provisions at Castleton, so that Nott and Phelps were
obliged to return to Castleton, gather up the provisions, and follow
the main party to Ticonderoga. They arrived in Shoreham too late to
take part in the capture, but crossed the lake with Warner. This
incident deprives us of the benefit of Nott's journal account of the
capture itself, a loss to be deplored. Some time Tuesday, somewhere
between Castleton and the lake, Allen and Arnold met, and the scene
occurred which has been so often and so well told in romance and
history.
Within three weeks after the world-renowned 19th of April, 1775,
Ethan stood in Castleton with an old friend by his side, Gershom
Beach, of Rutland, a whig blacksmith, intelligent, capable, and true.
Besides some sixty Massachusetts and Connecticut allies, Allen is
surrounded by from one to two hundred Green Mountain Boys. More men
were wanted, and Beach was selected from the willing and eager crowd
to go, like Roderick Dhu's messenger with the Cross of Fire, o'er
hill and dale, across brook and swamp, from Castleton to Rutland,
Pittsford, Brandon, Middlebury, and Shoreham. The distance was sixty
miles, the time allowed twenty-four hours, the rallying-point a
ravine at Hand's Point, Shoreham. Paul Revere rode on a good steed,
over good roads, on a moonlight night, in a few hours. Gershom Beach
went on foot, crossed Otter Creek twice, forded West Creek, East
Creek, Furnace Brook, Neshobe River, Leicester River, Middlebury
River, and walked through forests choked with underbrush, but at the
end of the day allotted the men were warned and were hastening to the
rendezvous. Then and not till then Beach threw himself on the ground
and gave himself up to well-earned sleep. Let us give this hero his
full meed of praise. After a few hours' rest he followed the men whom
he had aroused and joined Allen.