Chapter 13: Revolution! 400 Years in America

The Stamp Act, Coxsackie Declaration, Siege of Boston, Smallpox!

To pay for the French and Indian War, the British imposed a series of taxes on their American colonies, including the Stamp Act, the Townshend Acts, and the Tea Act.  The Tea Tax led to the Tea Party in 1770, in which the Sons of Liberty, a radical group of colonists bent on freedom, destroyed more than 92,000 pounds of tea by dumping it into Boston Harbor.  The British decided it must punish the rebellious colonists, and closed Boston Harbor.  Then it passed the Quartering Act, which allowed the British to demand accommodation of their troops in vacant houses and taxed the colonists for the costs of the food and lodging of the troops.

The colonists began to stockpile weapons and gun powder following the Stamp Act (1765), Quartering Act (1765) and other punitive measures imposed by the British Crown.

The Boston Massacre, known in Great Britain as the “Incident on King Street,”, involved a group of nine British soldiers who shot and killed five people and injured six in a crowd of three or four hundred who had been verbally abusing them.  Future president John Adams of Quincy defended the soldiers at trial.  The incident, publicized by the above engraving which was widely circulated in the Thirteen Colonies, increased tensions in the Colonies.

A second Quartering Act was passed in 1774.  On the morning of April 19, 1775, the British army garrisoned in Boston marched to Concord to seize military stores of the Massachusetts Colony.   At the Lexington Common they came upon a hastily summoned group of provincials, who stood their ground and opposed the British.  The skirmish was the “shot heard round the world;” the spark that triggered the Revolutionary War.

Word of Concord and Lexington reached the Dutch in the Hudson Valley.  The result was the drafting and signing of the “Coxsackie Declaration,” one of the earliest statements for independence from the British Crown:

Persuaded that the Salvation of the Rights and Liberties of America, depends, under God, on the firm union of its Inhabitants, in a vigorous prosecution of the Measures necessary for its Safety, and convinced of the Necessity of preventing the Anarchy and confusion which attend the Dissolution of the Powers of Government:

THAT the Freeholders and Inhabitants of Coxsackie District, in the County of Albany, being greatly alarmed at the avowed Design of the Ministry to raise a Revenue in America, are shocked by the bloody Scene acting in the Massachusetts Bay; Do in the most solemn manner, resolve never to become Slaves; and do also associate under the Ties of Religion, Honor and Love of our Country to adopt and endeavor to carry into Execution whatever Measures may be rendered by our Continental Congress, or resolved upon by our Provincial Convention for the purpose of preserving our Constitution and apposing the Execution of several arbitrary and oppressive Acts of the British Parliament, until a reconciliation between Great Britain and America or constitutional principles (which we most ardently desire) can be obtained; and that we will, in all Things, follow the advice of our general Committee, respecting the purpose aforesaid, the preservation of Peace and good Order, and the Safety of Individuals and private property.

Dated at Coxsackie the Seventeenth of May in the Year of our Lord, One Thousand seven hundred and seventy five. (signed by 225 citizens of Coxsackie)

Seven members of our Hallenbeek family and eight members of our Van Loon family signed this declaration of loyalty in support of the newly formed Continental Congress and Committee for Safety, more than a year before the national Declaration of Independence was signed in July, 1776.

It is not surprising that these Dutch, and even the English among them, were quick to rally in favor of independence.  The English Crown had been a longtime enemy of the Dutch.  The Pilgrims had found protection from the overreaching English Crown in Holland, then in North America.  And the English authorities had persecuted both the Pilgrims and the Puritans, pushing them to cross the ocean for freedom.  Now the hated Crown was infringing on their liberties again.

In response some 10,000 provincial militia from throughout New England swarmed and laid siege to Boston, effectively stopping the British from leaving the town by land.  One of the soldiers who answered the call to arms was our ancestor Ebenezer Sumner, from Middletown, Connecticut.  He was commissioned as Lieutenant two weeks after hostilities began, on May 1, 1775, in the Fourth Company of Gen. Spencer’s 2nd Continental Regiment 1775.

Captain Ebenezer Sumner was the great great grandson of William Sumner and Mary West, who came to Dorchester, Massachusetts Colony, with the Winthrop Fleet in 1630.  Like the Fuller family, the Sumner family eventually moved to more fertile land on the Connecticut River.

Captain Sumner marched his company from Connecticut to Roxbury Camp, near Boston, and joined in the siege of Boston.  On 14 June 1775 the Regiment was merged into the Main Continental Army.  Soon thereafter, on July 1, 1775, Ebenezer Sumner was promoted to Captain.   

On Sunday, July 2, 1775, General George Washington rode into Cambridge, Massachusetts to take command of the Continental Army.  Captain Ebenezer Sumner lined up his men on the parade ground where they were inspected by General Washington. (Chernow, 2010, p. 288)

The summer of 1775 saw an outbreak of smallpox in Boston.  Soon after taking command of the Continental army, Washington wrote to the Continental Congress in Philadelphia that he had been “particularly attentive to the least Symptoms of the Small Pox.”  He stated that he was quarantining anyone suspected of having the disease in a special hospital, and promised that he would “continue to utmost Vigilance against this most dangerous enemy.”  In 1777 Washington described smallpox as potentially a greater threat “than … the Sword of the Enemy.”

Captain Sumner, as we shall call him, participated with his men in the blockade of the British in Boston.  He fought in the battles of Breed’s Hill, Bunker Hill, and of course the blockade of Boston, which kept the British bottled up in Boston.

As winter approached, many of the soldiers headed for home, their terms of enlistment having expired.  Washington was desperate to keep men in his little army.

On the 9^th of November, 1775, at Roxbury Camp, near Boston, Ebenezer Sumner was appointed a Captain in the 22^nd Regiment under Colonel Wyllys, also called the 22d Continental.  This was a reorganization of the army for the upcoming campaigns of 1776.   He had been promoted to Captain earlier in July.  His regiment, under Col. Wyllys, served under Brig. General Joseph Spencer.

Two weeks later Captain Sumner was given a message from Brig. Gen. Spencer for General Washington.  Our ancestor Captain Sumner  personally took this message to General George Washington:

To George Washington from Brigadier General Joseph Spencer, 25 Nov 1775
May it please your Excellency:
The Bearer hereof, Capt. Sumner in Col. Wyllys’s Regiment, has a Lieut. on Command with Colo. Arnold - whereby the Birth is at present vacant: Roger Hooker an Ensign belonging to the same Regiment a likely young Officer - and the only one who is willing to serve another Campaign, of the Company he at present belongs to - is desirous to serve in the Birth of the absent Lieut. - as likewise Capt. Sumner and the officers of his Company to have him; till the Lieut. should return: provided he can have the pay of a Lieut. and then resign, if there could not be a Birth for him. I beg Leave to inform your Excellency - that if he can be permitted to remain in the Service, agreeable to the above proposal-as he is the only officer of the Company in the present Establishment, who remain in the Service, he will probably be able to get a considerable part of the Company he at present belongs to-to engage for another Campaign. 
I am sir with great Respect & Esteem, your Excellency’s most obedt hum. servt
Joseph Spencer

Translation:  In the above message, Brigadier General Spencer is requesting General Washington to approve the promotion of an ensign to the rank of Lieutenant, with the promise that if he is so promoted, he and many of his men will reenlist for another year.  General Washington approved the promotion and Captain Sumner and his unit extended their service for another year.  Washington was greatly in need of men.

By the end of November, 1775, only 3500 men, including Captain Ebenezer Sumner, had agreed to stay with the dwindling Continental Army. (Chernow, 2010, p. 313)  At the end of the year of 1775, the Continental Army stood at 9,650 men, half the number that Congress had hoped for.  Yet on New Year’s Day, General Washington told his new Continental Army: “This day giving commencement to the new army, which in every point of view is entirely continental… His Excellency hopes that the importance of the great cause we are engaged in will be deeply impressed upon every man’s mind.” (Chernow, 2010, p. 316)

On May 22, 1775, Ethan Allen and his Green Mountain Boys, and others including Benedict Arnold and a militia from Berkshire County, Massachusetts, had surprised the British and captured Fort Ticonderoga, located 200 miles northwest of Boston.  General Washington eventually sent Henry Knox to bring the captured guns to assist in the siege of Boston

.

The captured British guns from Ticonderoga were put in place on Dorchester Heights, overlooking Boston, on the night of March, 1, 1776.   The guns made the British position untenable. The British quickly evacuated Boston on March 17, 1776. 

Washington sent a force of 1,000 smallpox-immune American troops to occupy Boston in order to prevent further spread of the disease, which had ravaged Boston during the British occupation.  Eventually Washington instituted a system of inoculation of new recruits immediately upon enlistment.  They would get a milder form of the disease, and when recovered, would be ready to fight.

After the British evacuated Boston, Washington and his troops, including Capt. Sumner and the 22^nd Continental, marched south to defend the important port of New York from the British.  Washington understood that New York would provide an excellent base for the Royal Navy, so he established defenses there and waited for the British to attack.   Captain Sumner and his men assisted in fortifying New York.  All that summer was spent digging fortifications for the defense of both New York on Manhattan and Brooklyn on Long Island.

“Our affairs are hastening fast to a crisis; and the approaching campaign will, in all probability, determine forever the fate of America." So wrote John Hancock, President of Congress, on June 4th, 1776, from Boston to the governors and conventions of the Eastern and Middle colonies.   

Sources and Notes for this Chapter:

1. The Record of Connecticut Men in the Revolution in the Military and Naval Service during the War of the Revolution, 1775-1783, Henry P. Johnston, 1889 (herein “Conn. Men in the Rev.”)

2. Washington: A Life, Ron Chernow, 2010, Penguin Press.

3. Smallpox! Digital Encyclopedia of George Washington. www.MountVernon.org; accessed March 12, 2024. Smallpox! https://www.mountvernon.org/library/digitalhistory/digital-encyclopedia/article/smallpox/#:~:text=Smallpox.%20In%20response%2C%20Washington%20forbade%20refugees%20from%20Boston,order%20to%20avoid%20further%20spread%20of%20the%20disease

4. ALS, MH: Jared Sparks Collection

5. The 22nd Continental Regiment was officially formed on 1 January 1776 when the 2nd Connecticut Regt (1775) of Spencer's Brigade in the Main Continental Army was re-designated. On 12 August 1776 Spencer's Brigade was re-designated as Parson's Brigade and on 12 November 1776 the brigade was reassigned to the Highland's Department. The regiment was reassigned to Mercer's Brigade of the Main Continental Army on the same date. The regiment was disbanded on 31 December 1776 at Peekskill, New York.

6. Roger Hooker, who joined Spencer’s Connecticut regiment as a sergeant in May 1775, served as a 2d lieutenant in Wyllys’s 22d Continental Infantry during 1776. In 1781 Hooker was a brigade major in the Connecticut militia. Ebenezer Sumner was commissioned a 1st lieutenant in Spencer’s regiment in May 1775 and was promoted to captain in July. Sumner served as a captain in the 22d Continental Infantry during 1776 and subsequently as a captain in the Connecticut militia. Samuel Wyllys (c.1738-1823), lieutenant colonel of Spencer’s regiment, commanded the regiment while Spencer performed his duties as a Continental general. Wyllys served as colonel of a Continental regiment from 1 Jan. 1776 to 1 Jan. 1781 when he retired from the army.

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