Col. Timothy Bigelow: An Introduction

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Col. Timothy Bigelow (1739-1790) is one of the most fascinating and utterly admirable people I have come across in my exploration of our ancestors.

Timothy Bigelow

  • In his youth, he was tutored by John Adams, the future patriot and U.S. president.
  • In his twenties, he eloped with his heiress fiancee, riding with her on horseback to a clandestine ceremony more than a hundred miles away in Hampton, New Hampshire.
  • In his early civilian life, he was a blacksmith, but his passions ran to the political issues of the day, and from the political to the military.
  • He was a member – in the run up to the revolutionary period –  of the Committee of Correspondence.
  • He was an early member of the Sons of Liberty, a clandestine loose affiliation of colonists dedicated to resisting British rule.
  • He was a delegate to the Massachusetts Provincial Congress for its first two sessions.
  • He was the first, unanimously chosen, commander of the Minute Men of Worcester, and marched with them following the call to the Battle of Lexington and Concord.
  • In the Continental Army, he served under, among others, Arnold, Gates, and Lafayette.
  • He fought – seemingly – everywhere: at Quebec, Monmouth, Saratoga, Verplanck’s Point, Peekskill, Valley Forge, and Yorktown, and was present at the surrender of Burgoyne.
  • He was captured and held as a prisoner of war, by the British in Canada, before being exchanged back.
  • He retired a full Colonel.
  • Following the war, Congress granted him 23,040 acres of land in Vermont, in lieu of money, on which was founded the town of Montpelier, VT; he never saw the grant, however.
  • He returned to civilian life almost certainly suffering from what is today called PTSD. The description of his symptoms, written in the vernacular of the 18th century, is both absorbing and heart wrenching.
  • Following the death of his teenaged son, he developed a severe depression, and, financially destitute, died in debtor’s prison at the age of 5o.

In the next several posts, I’m going to reproduce a number of the materials I have found on this man: admittedly, some of it is a little dry, some of it repeats what has appeared elsewhere, but…each item offers something unique as well: some new anecdote, a letter from his wife, the entry of his jailer on his death, etc.; together they present multiple perspectives on an individual whom – I believe – history needs to acknowledge once again.

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The Old Burying Ground and the Groton Cemetery

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Our earliest Groton ancestors, i.e. Lawrences, Tarbells, Parkers, and others who preceded Samuel and Susanna Lawrence, are interred in the Old Burying Ground in the center of town. (Many of the graves are worn and illegible, but  Samuel Abbott Green compiled an interesting book of the headstone inscriptions there, Epitaphs from the Old Burying Ground in Groton, Massachusetts.) The Old Burying Ground is located here.

 

 

Our more “recent” kin, recent by New England standards, starting with Samuel and Susanna Lawrence, are buried in the Groton Cemetery, a little further towards the outskirts of town.

 

Both of these places are well worth the trip.

William Lawrence on His Grandmother, Susanna Lawrence

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This next passage, which closes out the material on Samuel and Susanna Lawrence, is devoted exclusively to Susanna. I have always thought she would have to have been an amazing woman. She managed a household with a husband away at war; was herself a currier for secret correspondence; delivered and raised 9 children in a pre-vaccination/ pre-antibiotic era with one child dying in his teen years and the other eight surviving to adulthood; and lived to the somewhat extraordinary age of 89.

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from Extracts From The Diary And Correspondence of Amos Lawrence, by William R. Lawrence, M.D., Boston, 1855

Of his mother Mr. Lawrence [Amos–LSL] always spoke in the strongest terms of veneration and love, and in many of his letters are found messages of affection, such as could have emanated only from a heart overflowing with filial gratitude. Her form bending over their bed in silent prayer, at the hour of twilight, when she was about leaving them for the night, is still among the earliest recollections of her children.

She was a woman well fitted to train a family for the troubled times in which she lived. To the kindest affections and sympathies she united energy and decision, and in her household enforced that strict and unhesitating obedience, which she considered as the foundation of all success in the education of children. Her hands were never idle, as may be supposed, when it is remembered that in those days, throughout New England, in addition to the cares of a farming establishment, much of the material for clothing was manufactured by the inmates of the family. Many hours each day she passed at the hand‑loom, and the hum of the almost obsolete spinning‑wheel even now comes across the memory like the remembrance of a pleasant but half‑forgotten melody.

Amos Lawrence on His Father, Samuel Lawrence

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The following passage relates some more of the stories and memories Amos Lawrence told specifically  regarding his father, Samuel. You may notice a few of the sentences describing Samuel’s military service, and his early days with Susanna, are almost verbatim duplicates of previously posted material. In point of fact, the paragraphs here below were written first, by about thirty years.  Despite the repetition, I thought they were still worth including. The flavor of this piece is just a bit different, and Samuel’s exhortation to his sons, that they should use the talents entrusted to them, is advice every child should take to heart, in any age.

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from Extracts From The Diary And Correspondence of Amos Lawrence, by William R. Lawrence, M.D., Boston, 1855

 

My father belonged to a company of minute‑men in Groton, at the commencement of the Revolution. On the morning of the 19th of April, 1775, when the news reached town that the British troops were on the road from Boston, General Prescott, who was neighbor, came towards the house on horseback, at rapid speed, and cried out, “Samuel, notify your men: the British are coming.” My father mounted the general’s horse, rode a distance of seven miles, notified the men of his circuit, and was back again at his father’s house in forty minutes. In three hours the company was ready to march, and on the next day (the 20th) reached Cambridge. My father was in the battle of Bunker Hill; received a bullet through his cap, which cut his hair from front to rear; received a spent grape‑shot upon his arm, without breaking the bone; and lost a large number of men. His veteran captain Farwell was shot through the body, was taken up for dead, and was so reported by the man who was directed to carry him off. This report brought back the captain’s voice, and he exclaimed, with his utmost power, “It aint true; don’t let my poor wife hear of this; I shall live to see my country free.” And so it turned out. This good man, who had served at the capture of Cape Breton in 1745, again in 1755, and now on Bunker Hill in 1775, is connected with everything interesting in my early days. The bullet was extracted, and remains, as a memento, with his descendants.

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William Lawrence on the War, His Grandparents’ Wedding, and the Family They Raised

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In the Introduction to this project, I wrote about having the realization…

…that people whose names have almost been forgotten, or have been forgotten, were as real as I am in all respects…

If there’s one line, one phrase, that sums up my entire motivation to do this work, to gather in all this information, and take so much time and effort and life energy to make it available to others, so that these stories can live and be passed on, it is this idea. “People whose names have almost been forgotten, or have been forgotten, were as real as I am in all respects…”

As real as I am.

I’ve often wondered if, as our lives unfold, we don’t go through a very early period of more or less secretly believing that all of those around us – mother, father, siblings, neighbors, cousins –  exist as actors in some sort of play for our benefit and our benefit alone. Then, as we add neurons and synaptic connections and gain experience, we move on to a stage where we somewhat grudgingly acknowledge that while others might be real, the time period in which we find our young selves is in fact the only time that has ever existed, that there is just the present, this present, and all pieces of evidence to the contrary, i.e. history, art, culture, language, are more or less elaborate fictions that have been thought up as embellishments to our current period. (A mentality not dissimilar to the way creationists explain away the fossil record as being placed in the ground by God, but I digress.) And then, in this “unfolding” of our consciousnesses, if we’re lucky, we enter a phase in our development, where we connect with the truth, not intellectually but viscerally, that we and every other person we know, have ever known, will ever know, are only the latest chapter of humanity’s broad narrative arc; the last few ticks of a clock whose hands have been circling for eons.

As I said, this is just  something I’ve wondered. Perhaps a child psychologist, or a pediatric neurologist, would say all the above is hogwash. I have no idea. But when I think back on my own earliest days, it feels true.

As for the last phase, connecting with the reality of other people in other times, for me there was no one single  “Aha!” moment; there were several.

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Family Memories of Samuel and Susanna Lawrence

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The following is the complete text of A Minute Man, by Mary Fosdick. Fosdick, was the daughter of Sarah Lawrence (Woodbury) Fosdick, daughter of Mary (Lawrence) Woodbury, daughter of Samuel and Susanna (Parker) Lawrence. I have included this in its entirety because, in spite of its children’s-book-like tone, and obvious license where dialogue is concerned, it as close as we will ever get to an actual oral history of our family during the Revolutionary War and the earliest days of the new United States.

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A MINUTE-MAN[1]

By Mary Fosdick

CHAPTER I

Captain Amos Lawrence was an estimable farmer in New England, who was born in the first quarter of the eighteenth century, and at a suitable age married Miss Abigail Abbott. She brought him as part of her dowry various handsome pewter articles, among them several large plates, or platters, on which her initials were stamped or cut, as was the fashion in her day, a handsome hall clock with mahogany case and brass face, and other articles of household furniture; though, as her father was also a farmer, it is not probable that she brought Captain Lawrence very much else beside the bedding which every bride [was] expected to provide. As to her personal attractions I have no means of knowing. Though born in Boston’s neighborhood, Captain Amos Lawrence made his way to Groton, a thriving village farther inland, and there our minute-man was born in the spring of 1754. He was a bright boy, and “did well,” as people said, both as a son and brother at home and as a scholar in school; and when he had exhausted the best educational advantages the place then afforded, he went to work on a small farm, which he took on a mortgage, hoping probably to make it profitable enough to enable him to support a wife. Whether he had in mind the lady whom he afterward married, I am unable to state, but in his twenty-first year he became engaged to a handsome girl, a year younger than himself, whose acquaintance he probably made while visiting his grandparents Lawrence, as her stepfather lived in a town (Concord) adjoining the one in which his mother, Miss Abbott, had been born (Lexington); so we may naturally suppose that he desired to make the farm as successful as possible. His parents had other children, and having given him the benefit of the best educational facilities in Groton, could not afford to do more, though they must have realized that such a boy as he would have been glad to go through college, as at least two of his contemporaries did, and would be an honor to any profession, for he was beloved and respected by his fellow townsmen as few young men of his age were, and was as fond of books as if he had been a rich Tory’s son.

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An Account of Samuel Lawrence’s Military Career, and a Brief Sketch of His Subsequent Civilian Life

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The following brief biography is, almost verbatim, taken from Historical Sketches of the Lawrence Family, by Robert Means Lawrence, 1888. I have made only a few edits for the sake of clarity.

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from Robert Means Lawrence, Historical Sketches of the Lawrence Family, 1888

MAJOR SAMUEL LAWRENCE

The third and youngest son of Amos and Abigail Lawrence, and grandson of John of Lexington, was born in Groton, April 24, 1754. His early life was passed on his father’s farm.

Military Career

He was a corporal in one of the Groton companies of minute-men. Late in the afternoon of Tuesday, April 18, 1775, several brass cannon arrived in Groton, having been sent there by a vote of the Committee of Safety of the Provincial Congress.

Tradition says that the minute-men held a meeting that same evening; and that nine of them set out after dark, carrying lighted torches, and, marching during the night, reached Concord very early on Wednesday morning. Having breakfasted, they joined the minute­men of Concord and the adjoining towns, and were participants in the fight at the North Bridge, and in the pursuit of the British troops as far as Lexington or beyond.

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The Lawrence Homestead at Groton

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In his book, Historical Sketches of Some Members of the Lawrence Family, Boston, 1888,  Robert Means Lawrence describes the location of the three Lawrence homesteads that were home to our family from the 17th century through to the mid-20th century. Keep in mind his references to “current” landmarks are well over a hundred years old, but I have added some notes from Uncle Johnny, John Endicott Lawrence Sr., to make locations a little more researchable.

The first homestead:

The original Homestead at Groton, built by John Lawrence when he came up from Watertown, stood “southwest of Gibbet Hill, a short distance east of the First Parish Meeting House, and near where Love Lane joins the present road to Lowell. This farm has been for many years the property and residence of Joseph F. Hall.” [And, according to John Endicott Lawrence, Sr., was more recently owned by Marion Daniels. —LSL] See Historical Sketches, p.9.

The second homestead:

John’s second son Nathaniel started out married life living in Sudbury with his wife, then moved back to Groton where he lived with his father for about twenty years, before moving in 1683 into his own Homestead, “on the ‘Mill Highway,’ so called, now the road to Ayer, about three-quarters of a mile south of the center of town and near the Indian Hills…. This estate is now the residence of William Peabody.” [According to John Endicott Lawrence, Sr., this land recently belonged to Mrs. Orick Bales. —LSL] In 1694, after a long series of Indian wars, with promise of more to come, Nathaniel moved his family out to Concord, and from there to Charlestown. The farm passed through several hands, until it was purchased again by Amos Lawrence in 1748. Amos’ children, including Samuel were born here, and when Amos died it went to his oldest son, Amos Jr. See Historical Sketches, pp.11-15, 93-94.

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The Abduction of the Tarbell Children: Part 3

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The account below is taken from Butler’s History of Groton, Pepperell, and Shirley, published in 1848.

It is the last of the historical accounts which I could find relating to the abduction of the Tarbell children, and it is both the oldest, and the least accurate.

For example, note that the author believed the mother of the boys was Elizabeth Blood. He was mistaken in this.  (It was Elizabeth Woods.) Also, note their abduction is said to have taken place on a Mr. Sanderson’s property. This may or may not conflict with the other stories, which place the event squarely on Tarbell property.

A brief note on language: The following is a historical account dating from the mid-19th century. There are instances here of the kind of language that typifies the ethnocentrism and rank prejudice of that period. These sentences are included – have been allowed to remain –  because they are integral to the meaning and substance of the document, and not because I as an individual in any way agree with or endorse these characterizations.

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from Caleb Butler, History of Groton, Pepperell, and Shirley, Boston, 1848. pp.96-7

 

…Besides these instances of alarm, attack and suffering from a savage foe, others are known to have occured, of which there is more or less authentic evidence. One, of which the tradition is undoubtedly nearly correct, is that of the two lads, John Tarbell and Zachariah Tarbell, brothers, and sons of Thomas Tarbell, who were taken and carried to Canada. The story runs thus. One evening, a little after sunsetting, the Indians came suddenly upon the inmates of a garrisoned house, which stood where the Rev. Mr. Sanderson’s house now stands, or near that spot. They all escaped and got safely into the garrison except these two boys, who being on a cherry tree had not time to descend and save themselves from captivity. The precise time of this event is not known, but it is said that Zachariah was so young, that he entirely lost his native language, and the records of Groton show, that John was born July 6, 1695, and Zachariah January 25, 1700. So it was probably between 1704 and 1708. Some years after, they both came to Groton on a visit, but having become accustomed to savage life, no persuasion prevailed upon them to return and live with their friends and relatives. The present inhabitants of that name are their collateral kindred. Their descendants are still among the Indians in Canada.

The Abduction of the Tarbell Children: Part 2

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This article, From Groton During the Indian Wars, by Samuel A. Green, Groton, 1883, pp. 109-124, is written more from the point of view of a historian. Many of the primary records relating to the incident are included, as are alternate versions of the story as it had come to be told in 1883. Apparent misspellings, punctuation abnormalities, and other errors have been checked and simply are period usage.

A brief note on language: The following is an account from the 19th century that draws on and quotes primary material written in the 18th century. There are multiple instances here of language that ranges from racially insensitive to downright repugnant, when read from a 21st century perspective. These passages are included – have been allowed to remain –  because they are integral to the meaning and substance of the unique and irreplaceable historical documents being referenced, and not because I as an individual in any way agree with or endorse these characterizations.

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from Samuel A. Green, Groton During the Indian Wars,  Groton, 1883, pp. 109-124

II.

IN a list of prisoners held by the French and Indians in Canada, March 5, 1710-11, are the names of “Zech. Tarbal, John Tarbal, Sarah Tarbal, Matt. Farnsworth [and] Lydia Longley” (Archives, LXXI. 765), all of Groton, though no date of capture is given. Lydia Longley was taken by the Indians on July 27, 1694, and the particulars of her case have already been told. The Tarbell children were carried off on June 20, 1707; but it is unknown when Mathias Farnsworth was captured, and this entry appears to be the only record of the fact. Sarah, John, and Zechariah were children of Thomas and Elizabeth (Wood) Tarbell, who, with a large family, lived on Farmer’s Row, near where James Lawrence’s house now stands. Sarah was a girl nearly fourteen years of age, John a lad of twelve years, and Zechariah only seven, at the time when they were taken. They were near kindred of the Longley family, who had been massacred thirteen years before. The father was unquestionably the Corporal Tarbell who commanded, in the autumn of 1711, one of the eighteen garrisons in the town.

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