More On Benjamin Lock - "We Do Testify And Declare"

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 Lexington Common the morning of April 19th, 1775 - or at the surrender at Saratoga on October 17, 1777.  Did he miss seeing two of the most significant events of the Revolutionary War? [2] 

According to Charles Hudson's History of the Town of Lexington, Benjamin Lock, age eighteen at the time of the battle, was “... one of Capt. Parker’s company on the morning of April 19, 1775…”. [3]  There are six entries under the name "Benjamin Lock" in Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War.  Fifth on the list is an entry for "our" Benjamin Lock, for one month and ten days service in 1777, with Captain Farrar's company, Colonel Reed's regiment, "... to reinforce army under Gen. Gates at the Northward.".  None of the six entries indicate that a Benjamin Lock served on April 19, 1775. [4] 

A brief biography of Lock (who the author Bill Poole refers to as Benjamin "Locke"), on the Lexington Minutemen website indicates: "Benjamin Locke was one of four members of the Locke family who responded to the alarm of April 19, 1775. ... Benjamin Locke along with his brother, Reuben, and his two first cousins, Amos and Ebenezer, hastened to Lexington Common when the belfry bell sounded the alarm on the evening of April 18, 1775.  After waiting for quite some time, Amos and Ebenezer... decide to return to their homes in Woburn.  It is presumed that Reuben and Benjamin had remained, either in Buckman's Tavern or in a nearby home, and at the sound of William Diamon[d]'s drum hastened to face off against the Regulars." [5]

Does Hudson's statement that Lock was “one of Capt. Parker’s company on the morning of April 19, 1775”, and Poole's that he was "one of four members of the Locke family who responded to the alarm" mean that Lock was there on the common when the first shots were fired?  

The events of that morning are fairly well documented, so it would seem this should be easy to determine.  Provincial officials took depositions from a number of participants and witnesses, which were then published in a pamphlet printed by Isaiah Thomas in Worcester "by order of the Provincial Congress".  Among the depositions included is one signed by Benjamin Lock and thirty-three others on April 25, 1775, indicating: “We ... do testify and declare... [that after being alarmed, then dismissed] that about five o'clock in the morning, hearing our drum beat, we proceeded towards the parade, and soon found that a large body of troops were marching towards us, some of our company were coming up to the parade and others had reached it, at which time the company began to disperse, whilst our backs were turned on the troops, we were fired on by them, and a number of our men were killed instantly …”. [6]

There are several others on the Saratoga payroll receipt who were deposed in addition to Lock.  Isaac Hastings (tenth on the payroll), John Chandler Jr. (twelfth), Phineas Stearns (nineteenth), signed the same deposition as Lock.  Thomas Fessenden, second on the payroll, testified in a separate deposition that he was in a pasture near the meetinghouse when he saw one British officer fire his pistol at the militia, and another waive his sword then point it at the militia right before the British troops fired. Levi Harrington, thirteenth on the payroll, signed a deposition stating he and another "were on Lexington Common as spectators" when they saw a British officer fire his pistol at the militia. [7]

In light of Lock's statement in his 1775 deposition, it appears he was in Lexington on the morning of April 19th, even if he didn't mention it in his pension application in 1833.  Lock, along with Benjamin Wellington, John Chandler Jr., Isaac Hastings, and Phineas Stearns who signed the Saratoga payroll, as well as "William Monroe 3rd", "John Monroe Jr." and "Ebenezer Monroe Jr.", who may also have signed (the number of Munroes in town make it hard to determine who is who), are listed on the monument erected in Lexington in 1948 which reads: "Memorial to the Lexington Minute Men who were on the Green in the early morning engagement April 19, 1775...". [8]

Isaac Durant is also listed on the Lexington monument, and served during the Saratoga campaign, but he didn't sign the Lexington payroll, as he served with a company comprised of men from Concord and Acton, a story for another post.   

Next Time: A Concord-Saratoga Connection - "Fire - For God's Sake Fire"

Last Time: Benjamin Wellington of Lexington - "The First Armed Man Taken In The Revolution" 

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 

   General Whipple's Journal         Burgoyne in Albany                    Annotated Bibliography 

[1] Image courtesy of the Miriam and Ira D. Wallach Division of Art, Prints and Photographs: Print Collection, The New York Public Library. "The battle of Lexington, April 19th. 1775. Plate I" The New York Public Library Digital Collections. 1775. https://digitalcollections.nypl.org/items/510d47d9-7e71-a3d9-e040-e00a18064a99.

[2] Pension file of Benjamin Lock (SI8492), 8 p., Oct. 2-Nov. 7, 1777 (roll 1575, frames 117-122), available online at: https://catalog.archives.gov/id/196193964?objectPage=35, images 113, 115 and 117.  Lock's pension application indicates that he served from July to November of 1776 in the Champlain Valley; during the Saratoga campaign where "... he was in no battle..", but "... was one of the guards of the Hessians from Stillwater, New York, to Winter Hill, Charlestown, Mass."; and in 1778, where "... he does not recollect the month when he commenced or when he left, but he was one of the guards of the British Prisoners taken with Gen Burgoyne...".

[3] Charles Hudson, History of the Town of Lexington (Boston, MA: Houghton Mifflin Company, 1913), 2:370.
[4] MSSRW, 9:896.  As indicated previously, there appear to be no entries in MSSRW for those who were on Lexington Green the morning of April 19th, including the eight who were killed.  Two of the six entries under "Benjamin Lock" are for service after 1777.  The first is a Captain Benjamin Lock of Cambridge, aged thirty-seven in 1775.  An entry for Benjamin Lock of Concord pertains to service in the winter of 1776-1777 at Fort Ticonderoga, versus that of Benjamin Lock of Lexington, who indicated in his pension application he served there from July through November of 1776.  The third period of service Lock lists in his pension application, as a substitute for thirty days in 1778 in Captain Pierce's company of Colonel Brooks regiment, guarding the Convention Army, is not listed either.  An entry for five days service at Roxbury in March of 1776 in Captain Bridge's company, Colonel Brook regiment, may relate to Benjamin Lock of Lexington, though he does not list it in his pension application.  MSSRW, 9:895-896.

[5] Bill Poole, "Benjamin Locke A Brief Biography", 1 and 3, accessed online at: https://lexingtonminutemen.com/biographies/g-to-l/benjamin-locke/.  There is no entry in MSSRW for a Benjamin "Locke".

[6] A Narrative of the Excursion and Ravages of the King's Troops Under the Command of General Gage, On the nineteenth of April, 1775 (Worcester, MA: Isaiah Thomas, 1775), no page numbers.  Poole describes the deposition Lock signed as his "testifying with regard to what had transpired on Lexington Common on the morning of April 19, 1775."a description that also falls short of saying Lock and the others were actually on the common.

[7] A Narrative of the Excursion and Ravages of the King's Troops Under the Command of General Gage, On the nineteenth of April, 1775.

[8] For a list of names and an images of the back of the monument, see: https://lifefromtheroots.blogspot.com/2014/10/lexington-massachusetts-one-monument.html .