The 1777 March of the Saratoga Convention Army

How many connections are there between Lexington, Concord, and the 1777 march of the Convention Army?  On the American side, countless Massachusetts militiamen who answered the call on April 19th, 1775, did so again in the summer and fall of 1777.   During the Saratoga campaign, twenty militiamen from Lexington served in Captain Samuel Farrar's company with Colonel Jonathan Reed's Middlesex County militia regiment and escorted the German column of the Convention Army to Winter Hill.  The  pay receipt they signed   is now in the collection of the Lexington Historical Society.  Benjamin Lock, one of those men, kept a  journal of his march to Saratoga and back .  Another , Benjamin Wellington , is said to be the first armed man taken by the British in the Revolutionary War .  Militiamen from Concord and neighboring Acton also served in Reed's Middlesex County regiment during the Saratoga campaign.  According to Lemuel Shattuck, i...

How many connections are there between Concord and Lexington, and the 1777 march of the Convention Army?  On the American side, countless Massachusetts militiamen who answered the call on April 19th, 1775, did so again in the summer and fall of 1777.  Benjamin Lock of Lexington appears to be one of them, as evidenced by a deposition he signed on April 25, 1775,  the journal he kept in 1777  documenting his  journey to Saratoga and his return home after the surrender as a guard with the German column of the Convention Army, and a   pay receipt for service during the Saratoga campaign   that is now in the collection of the Lexington Historical Society.  Was Benjamin Lock among the men on Lexington Green who were fired upon by British troops on the morning of April 19th, 1775, as pictured here in an engraving by Ralph Earl and Amos Dolittle? [1]   When Lock submitted his claim for a pension in 1833, he did not mention that he was on Lexingt...

How many connections are there between Concord and Lexington, and the 1777 march of the Convention Army?  On the American side, countless Massachusetts militiamen who answered the call on April 19th, 1775, did so again in the summer and fall of 1777.  Benjamin Lock of Lexington is said to be one of them, as evidenced by  the journal he kept in 1777  documenting his  journey to Saratoga, and his return home after the surrender as a guard with the German column of the Convention Army, as well as the pay receipt he signed in Lincoln in 1778 seven months later.    Benjamin Wellington, eighth on the Lexington list , has an interesting story of his own.  A bronze plaque (pictured here) at the corner of Follen Road and Pleasant Street in Lexington, on the lawn of Scared Heart Church, notes his capture with the words:  "Near this spot at early dawn on the 19th of April 1775, Benjamin Wellington, a minute man, was surprised by British scouts and...

How many connections are there between Lexington and Concord, and the 1777 march of the Convention Army?  On the American side, countless Massachusetts militiamen who answered the call on April 19, 1775, did so again in the summer and fall of 1777.  Benjamin Lock of Lexington is said to be one of them.  Several documents confirm he served with the Massachusetts militia late during the Saratoga campaign.  One is the journal he kept in 1777  documenting his  to march to Saratoga and return home after the surrender.   Another is a document in the collection of the Lexington Historical Society , created in Lincoln, Massachusetts in June of 1778.  It reads:  "These may certify whom it may concern that we the subscribers have Rec'd of Sam'l Farrar Jr. our Continental Pay in the thirty Day Service in his company in Col'l Reeds Regiment to Reinforce the Northern army under Gen'l Gates" .  Twenty names follow, the signature of each man (or h...

How many connections are there between Concord and Lexington, and the 1777 march of the Convention Army?  One British unit, the 47th Regiment of Foot , fought both on April 19, 1775, and two years later in 1777 as part of Lieutenant-General John Burgoyne’s army, in a campaign which culminated in the surrender at Saratoga.   On the American side, countless Massachusetts militiamen who answered the call on April 19th, 1775, did so again in the summer and fall of 1777.  Benjamin Lock of Lexington is said to be one of them.  Several primary sources place him with the Convention Army, including two in his own hand.  One is the journal he kept in 1777 on his way to Saratoga, and his return home after the surrender, which he submitted with his claim for a pension in 1833.  The second is a receipt in the collection of the Lexington Historical Society that he and others from Lexington who served in Captain Samuel Farrar's company with Colonel Jonathan Reed's Mi...

If you reenact the Revolutionary War period, and have enjoyed a cup of coffee in camp, you may have had a visitor ask:  "Did they drink coffee back then?" .  The answer can always be  "It depends" ,   but in many cases the answer is  "yes" .  Some time ago I suggested the acronym "SALT" as an assessment tool for determining who ate what during the Revolutionary War period.  Each of the letters, "S" for status, "A" for activity, "L" for location and "T" for time of year, is a factor to consider for understanding what "they" ate or drank based on who they were, what they were doing, and when they were doing it.  Taken together, it is also a good reminder that much of the meat eaten in an age before refrigeration and canning was preserved by being salted. [1]   This approach is helpful when answering the coffee question.   Ads for coffee appear regularly in Revolutionary War era newspapers.  The exam...