Watertown, Massachusetts - "The Day On Which They Were To Pass Through"

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What was it like to have the Convention Army pass through your town after the surrender at Saratoga?  It probably depended on who you were.  Officers and soldiers with the Northern Army wrote home and noted in their journals the immense pride they felt as they watched Lieutenant-General John Burgoyne's defeated British and German troops march by them at Saratoga on October 17, 1777.  One of these was Massachusetts Militia Colonel Ralph Cross, who noted it was: “... a Grand Sight as ever was Beheld by Eye of man in America ... Their March was Supposed to bee Seven miles in Length with Baggage etc. Grand in Deed.” [1]

Local residents from Schaghticoke, New York, to Cambridge, Massachusetts, turned out in droves along the 1777 route of march of the Convention Army.  Some wrote about what they saw.  Hannah Winthrop watched the Germans arrive in Cambridge on November 7, 1777, and noted: "... I never had the least Idea, that the Creation producd such a Sordid Set of Creatures in human Figure..." [2]  Ten year old Nathaniel Goddard, who was out the same day, saw what he later described as "the greatest sight we had ever witnessed." [3]

Pictured here is the Browne House, a two story wooden structure dating from the 17th century.

The last town the Convention Army passed through before reaching Cambridge was Watertown.  They began arriving on November 5th.  Massachusetts Militia Lieutenant Israel Bartlett, who appears to have been traveling with leading elements of the British column, wrote in his diary: “[Nov.] 5 Wedny.  Marched to Watertown [from Sudbury], 5 miles from Cambridge.”  [4]  New Hampshire Militia Brigadier-General William Whipple, one of those assigned to escort British Lieutenant-General John Burgoyne, reached Watertown that day as well, noting: “[Nov.] 5th ... at Westtown ate dinner after dinner set out for Watertown where arrived before night  6th hard Rain ...” [5]

Those British prisoners and their guards who stopped in Waltham, Massachusetts, on November 5th passed through the following day.  It would be the last day of their march, Massachusetts Militia Private David How noting: “[Nov.] 6  Day we march’d through Watertown [from Waltham] and Cambridge  And march’d To Prospeck Hill and Left all the prisoner  And ware all Dismised  And we march’d to Menotomy, Staid at Night  Its ben Very Rainney all Day.”  [6]  

The Germans passed through a day later, one recording: “Nov. 7  Our march went through Watertown, a very respectable town where many artisans live.” [7]  Brunswick Grenadier Johann Bense likewise noted: “[Nov.] 7 through Watertown onto Winter Hill.” [8]  

Young Nathaniel Goddard had hoped to see the German column as it passed through Watertown.  After being told by his father that he and his brothers could take a break from digging potatoes: “We learned the day on which they were to pass through Watertown to Cambridge...  We started at the moment with all expedition for Watertown, and certainly we lost no time, but on arriving there we were informed that they had passed. We started again, running much of the way... We followed the road down towards Cambridge and soon came up with the troops. They were sitting by the side of the road on the wall, the officers on horseback, and all guarded by American soldiers, some on the flanks, some in the rear, and, I believe, a few in front. Here was the greatest sight we had ever witnessed. When we came up with them they were eating their dinner, after which they again moved on and we followed them, passing through the lines and then waiting again for them to come up. ... The next day to our potatoes again.” [9]

According to British Ensign Thomas Anburey, after the Convention Army arrived in Cambridge, “... the officers have the towns of Cambridge, Mystic and Watertown, to quarter themselves…” [10]  Watertown's residents were reluctant to receive them.  In less than a month, the town's selectmen decided its citizens should take up the issue in that most democratic of institutions, a town meeting, “... to manifest their minds Relating to the Quartering Some of the officers of the Army lately Commanded by Gen': Burgoyne in Watertown, and to act thereon as they think proper."  Despite Nathaniel Goddard's fascination with their passing, Watertown's residents were less welcoming and on December 15th:  "... the Article Relating to Quartering Burgoynes officers was Read & after a fair and Candid Debate thereon the following passed unanimously (Viz) That it is the Opinion of this town that the Quartering the British officers among the inhabitants thereof, at this time, is Very Dangerous to the peace & Safety of the town as Well as the publick, and therefore we Cannot give our consent thereto.  Then they Chose the Selectmen to be a Committee to Inform the D. Q. Master, and Such of the Inhabitants of the town as were Inclined to Receive Sd: officers into their families or houses of this Vote.” [11]  A history of Watertown indicates their efforts were unsuccessful, as several officers were quartered there. [12]

Watertown European settlers arrived in 1630. [13]  Several buildings from the time of the march still exist in Watertown.  The Browne House (pictured above), built between 1694 and 1701, is now a house museum.  Historic New England's website describes the home as being: "... a modest “one-over-one” dwelling with eighteenth- and nineteenth-century additions. Prominent features include a steeply pitched roof, diamond-patterned casement windows, and early door and window placements and styles. ... There is one large room on the first floor, which incorporated living, cooking, and sleeping space."  Tours happen once a month from May through October.  We visited last fall, and had a chance to see it for ourselves.  We also took some time to explore a bit of Watertown, a diverse and dynamic community today, whose roots date back to the earliest days of our country.


For more on the Convention Army's 1777 march from Saratoga to Boston, see:

1777 March Blog Home          Overnight Stopping Points          Towns and Villages Along the Way 

                                Burgoyne in Albany                    Annotated Bibliography 


[1] Cross, "The Journal of Ralph Cross, of Newburyport, Who Commanded the Essex Regiment, At The Surrender of Burgoyne in 1777",  10-11.
[2] Hannah Winthrop to Mercy Otis, Nov. 11, 1777, accessed through the Massachusetts Historical Society website: https://www.masshist.org/database/viewer.php?item_id=3349&mode=dual&img_step=1&noalt=1&br=1#page1.
[3] Henry Goddard Pickering, Nathaniel Goddard: A Boston Merchant, 1767-1853 (Riverside Press, 1906) 63.  My thanks to Steve Raynor of Northern Department of the Continental Line, for his Facebook Post on April 8, 2024, describing Goddard's adventure. 
[4] Bartlett, "Journal", 402.
[5] Whipple, "Whipple Journal", Annotated Transcription, 9.
[6] How, Diary of David How,  50-51.
[7] Specht Journal, 109.
[8] Bense, p. 80.
[9] Pickering, Nathaniel Goddard: A Boston Merchant, 1767-1853, 62-64.
[10] Anburey, Travels Through the Interior Parts of America, 2:61.
[11] Isaac B. Patten Post 81, Grand Army of the Republic, Watertown's Military History (Boston, MA: David Clapp & Son, Printers, 1907), 31.
[12] D. Hamilton Hurd, History of Middlesex County (Philadelphia, PA: J.W. Lewis & Co., 1890) 3:389.
[13] Hurd, History of Middlesex County, 3:344.

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