Commander of the Fifteenth Regiment of the Massachusetts Line in
the Continental Army, during
THE WAR OF THE REVOLUTION.
WORCESTER:
PRINTED BY HENRY J. HOWLAND,
212 Main Street.
1860.
Transcriber's Note:
Minor spelling andtypographical errors have been corrected without note.A table of contents, though not present in the original publication,has been provided below:
TO
COL. T. BIGELOW LAWRENCE,
A GREAT GRANDSON OF THE HERO OF THESE PAGES,
I Dedicate this feeble effort.
It is written to perpetuate the memory of one of
WORCESTER'S MOST ILLUSTRIOUS SONS,
and also of
HIS COMPANIONS IN ARMS,
WHO FOR EIGHT YEARS STRUGGLED SO HARD TO GAIN
THE INDEPENDENCE OF THE COLONIES.
The writer of the following pages was dandled upon the knee of aworthy sire, who had spent eight years of his life in the struggle forIndependence, and taught me the name of Col. Bigelow, long before Iwas able to articulate his name. Many have been the times, while sittingon my father's lap around the old hearthstone, now more than fifty yearssince, that I listened to affecting reminiscences of Col. Bigelow andothers, until his voice would falter, and tears would flow down his agedand careworn face, and then my mother and elder members of the familywould laugh, and inquire, "what is there in all of that, that shouldmake you weep?" but I always rejoiced with him, and wept when Isaw him weep. After the death of my father, having engaged in theactive scenes of life, those childish memories in some degree wore away,but the happiest moments of my life have been spent in company withsome old Revolutionary Patriot, while I listened to the recital of theirsufferings and their final conquest. The first history of the AmericanRevolution I ever read, is found in Morse's Geography, published in1814. This I read until I had committed the whole to memory. Thenext was what may be found in Lincoln's History of Worcester, publishedin 1836, and from which I have taken liberal extracts. The nextis the History of the War of Independence of the United States ofAmerica, written by Charles Botta, translated from the Italian byGeorge Alexander Otis, in 1821; from this also, I have taken extracts.I have also consulted Lossing's Pictorial Field Book of the Revolution.In neither of these histories (except Lincoln's