Bristol County, Massachusetts - Chapter 3: Fall River in the Revolution, 1924

Our approximately true appreciation of the values of any age in Bristol County is not to be satisfactorily found in the superficial comparison of our own times with those of another; we shall best judge of former peoples and conditions as we learn more of the story of their day and that of their contemporaries. For we are prone to overlook the fact that many of those customs and manners that seem futile and unnecessary to us were part of the circumstances of an age as vital and serious to its inhabitants as our customs are to our own day. Devoted inquiry is able to make us possessors of much more knowledge of eras that we sometimes mistakenly name the "childhood of the race."

Revolutionary times in the Fall River-to-be - small village though it then was - completely engrossed the plans and energies of contending factions. They were a living, resourceful, enterprising group of men and women who were just getting ready for their first conflict for nationality, and are not to be treated as mere channels leading to the present greatness of the nation. The War for Independence, as its purposes became more fully known and appreciated, lighted with its red glare the way to the end of an age, past former colonial and provincial times to another and a self-reliant régime. Let us share, if we may, and not as mere sight-seers, the recollections meagre as they are, of the Revolt in this section.

The Freetown-Fall River Revolutionary patriots were of the order of "embattled farmers," as were those at Concord and at Lexington, when it came to actual fighting and sacrificing much for the Independence that at first was mentioned, but not aloud. Before the actual summons to war, however, and just before the critical situation and the proximity of revolt was well comprehended, the town's general inclination was Tory-ward. Almost to the last minute, there existed as weighty a dread of majesty as hatred of the taxation hardship; and the Loyalists up to the limit of patience were loyalists indeed, as all New England had been, only a little while before. It was to no small extent an indignant Freetown to whom came the news of the "tea party" of Boston harbor. The town was a long distance from that effervescing centre of a rebellious population that within a short period had lost all fears of a tyrannical king, overseas. The delayed and not thoroughly understood reports of uprising against authority were distasteful and repellent here. So loyal was the section to the already passing state of offensive rulership that a meeting was called January 17, 1774, for the purpose of uttering denunciation of such occurrences as were taking place in the coastwise towns.

From today, as we look back upon the scene, we find ourselves able to excuse the town fathers and a large proportion of the townsfolk, indeed, for their action, simply because they were somewhat isolated from the forefront of the fearless forward movement of the older and the shore communities. The loyalist element, the stubborn holders-out for the absolute right of the king, were in all the towns, as in Taunton and Middleboro; but as in the cases of these towns the patriot party in Freetown was pro tempore unequal to the task of quieting or exiling the Tories. Thus it was that some of the townsmen got others of the townsmen together at the protest meeting of which Captain George S. Chase was the moderator, and as one of the results of the assemblage, deprecatory resolutions were adopted January 26, 1774, which went so far as adversely to criticise Boston for the part that it had been stated that town had taken in mob rule and riot. The committee who had charge of such resolutions and their presentation consisted of Thomas Gilbert, Abiel Terry, James Winslow, Jael Hathaway, and Jesse Bullock. They were a much disturbed group, for they feared the "vengeance of an affronted majesty," they being incapable of appreci- ating the highly advanced grade of what they believed to be the rebelry of the men of Boston, who were even then closer than they to approaching combat with a despot and a despot's soldiery. It was the last local stand of "loyalism."

Presently the radical change did take place, so that all were involved in the event of the hour. The fires of still greater patriotic ardor swept in full tide across New England, and no town or village escaped the flame - a flame destructive only to the tares and the chaff of an absolute monarchism as they choked the slowly growing gardens of colonial freedom. And, far removed as we are from that hour, neither we nor presentday Britons have been able to discover mitigating circumstances for the loyalists or their claims during the latter part of the struggle against the omnipresent tax-gatherer. Those loyalists and their descendants have acknowledged the serf-like conditions under which the king had gradually placed his colonial subjects, by means of his unjust measures; but the loyalists then as a body were willing to bear and forbear all, that majesty might still remain enthroned. Democracy was to them an incredible principle anywhere to be maintained. 'Long live the king" was a slogan never to be changed for another. But most of those who had exhibited signs of holding out against rising popular opinion in Fall River, soon heeded the admonitions of their neighbors and of their own common sense, and now, having news of the general and stubborn trend towards Independence, stood forth as one for the patriotic purpose and intent of the town.

"What measures should be taken in our deplorable circumstances?" was the universal query that was raised, and forthwith steps were initiated to confer with other towns concerning probabilities for any next move. It was too country-wide a query to be discussed in Fall River alone, so that preparations were set on foot for a union of discussion of the towns. And it thereupon came about that a committee from this town went up to attend that first unforgetable county convention at the court house in Taunton, in confessed protest against tyranny. Zephaniah Leonard, many of whose descendants live throughout the county, was the presiding officer of the gathering - Zephaniah Leonard, a justice of the Court of Common Pleas. 'There and then they determined to oppose "to their utmost all illegal and unconstitutional measures which have been or hereafter may be adopted by the British Parliament or the British ministry." That declaration, in accord with the specific expression of all colonial townsmen, voiced the revulsion of feeling in Fall River against oppression. And the men who had the honor of thus uttering the appeal of the town at the courthouse on September 28, 1774, were Dr. John Turner, Thomas Durfee, Captain Ambrose Barnaby, Nathaniel Morton and John Hathaway. These represented the spirit of the town, and they came home bringing with them the great resolve of their county courthouse congress to maintain the jeopardized rights of the colonists.

In its turn, then, came the Lexington Alarm, and the response on April 19, 1775, was unanimous here. The names of the thirty-one men who, under Captain Levi Rounseville, answered the call, are always worth repeating - a brave company, who in the face of unknown perils sanctioned what the loyalists naturally had called rebellion. These were the Revolutionary men of Fall River: Lieutenants Samuel Taber and Nathaniel Mor- ton; Sergeants John White and Consider Crapo; Corporals Joshua Lawrence and Seth Hillman; Privates Philip Taber, Uriel Pierce, Benjamin Lawrence, Abiel Cole, Consider White, Jesse Keen, Jacob Benson, John | Clark, John Braley, Percival Ashley, Ichabod Johnson, Michael Ashley, Seth Morton, Jeff Sachems, Israel Haskell, Louis De Moranville, Abram Ashley, Charles De Moranville, Aaron Seekel, Abner Haskins, Benjamin Runnells, Thomas Rounseville, Peter Crapo, Joseph Hacket. And with these well on their way, there were soon afterwards others joining the county regiments here for service in the field, and especially at Rhode Island. And the town did not forget these or their families, for at one of the enthusiastic town meetings of the time (that of May 10, 1775), a vote was taken in which it was declared that the town would take care of the families of the men enlisted in the service. Our Civil War and World War resolves to similar effect were not innovations.

It was a popular thing, then, and a general precautionary measure, too, to form committees of correspondence, inspection and safety; and such a committee was the ruling civic body of the time in this township. The Declaration of Independence was signed July 4, 1776, and the town was stirred to new patriotic action when, at a town meeting of July 15, that year, Fall River declared itself in favor of the paper that severed our relations with the mother country, expressed in a set of resolutions as intrepid of spirit as that shown in any of the towns to the north. The resolutions, as drawn up by Major Joshua Hathaway, Colonel James Winslow and John Hathaway, declared that "We are ready with our lives and our fortunes to support the General Congress in declaring the United American colonies free and independent of Great Britain"; and finally, with the appeai "to ye Supreme Governor of the world for our sincerity in the declaration." Many who now had been signers of approval of the Fall River document had been Tories up to the last minute - they had been reluctant to relinquish a life-long adherence to the "old régime." But Loyalists and their friends must up and away, and times and manners must change, as in all the history of the universe. So we of these times are witnesses to the passing of a régime that the colonists themselves might never foresee, and the coming of an era that many now are reluctant to accept. Captains Ambrose Barnaby and Levi Rounseville had been Tories up to the final call, but presently they had become Americans, and they and their descendants have remained Americans true and tried.

Outside of the personal enlistment of the Revolutionary soldiers, the nearest that the battles of the war approached Fall River was an actual fight that took place within the town limits itself, of which Colonel Joseph Durfee, graphic writer of the event, has told in full, and that is frequently quoted from as being the only extant authentic Revolutionary story and diary of this immediate territory. It appears that the British were continually threatening the Bay towns, even Freetown itself, so that Colonel Durfee found it necessary to form a guard for the safety of the townspeople, and the store of the ironworks company wharf was made use of as a guardhouse. Thence, on May 25, 1778, Samuel Reed, a member of the town guard, saw the boats of the enemy approaching. Hailing them, and receiving no reply, he fired a shot in their direction. That aroused the town, and everyone was soon under arms. Advancing, the enemy began firing with large guns, resulting ina retreat of the townsfolk. On the way the guard removed some planks that had been placed across the stream, and here Freetown turned and gave battle to the pursuers. The small guard it is stated, handled the enemy roughly, so that the latter decided to make a retreat, though they left behind them a wounded and a dead soldier. We quote from a portion of Colonel Durfee's statement:

The wounded soldier left by the enemy, before he expired, informed me that the number of the enemy who attacked us was about 150, commanded by Major Ayres. When they landed, they set fire to the house of Thomas Borden, then nearly new; they next set fire to a grist mill and saw mill belonging to Mr. Borden, standing at the mouth of Fall River. These buildings I saw, when set on fire. When the British troops retreated, as they were compelled to do, from the shots of our little band of volunteers, they set fire to the house and other buildings of Richard Borden, then an aged man, and they took him prisoner. We pursued them so closely in their retreat that we were enabled to save the building that they had last fired.. The British were frequently fired upon, and not a little annoyed by the musketry of our soldiers, as they passed down the bay in their boats on their retreat.

Mr. Richard Borden, whom they took prisoner, was in one of their boats. Finding themselves closely pursued by a few American soldiers, who from the shore poured in their shot and balls upon them as fast as they could load and fire, and finding themselves in danger from the musketry of these few brave whigs who pursued them, they ordered Mr. Borden, their prisoner, to stand up in the boat, hoping that his comrades on the shore would recognize him and desist from firing upon them. But this he refused to do, and threw himself flat in the bottom of the boat. Mr. Borden was obstinately silent to all the questions which were asked him; so that, not being able to make any profitable use of him, they dismissed him in a few days, on parole.

The site of this event was marked by a bronze tablet erected by the Quequechan chapter, Daughters of the American Revolution, May 25, 1899, on the southwest corner of City Hall. The Sons of the American Revolution have marked the graves of a number of the Revolutionary soldiers, thus: In the North Steep Brook burying-ground, Captain James Simmonds and Benjamin Weaver; in the North burying ground, Colonel Joseph Durfee, Thomas Durfee and Robert Irving; in the Oak Grove cemetery, Ephraim Boomer, Elisha Caswell and Benjamin Peck.

The toryism of a Gilbert or a Valentine of Assonet and Freetown disappeared, its former place of prominence lost in the new political rulings; while the town swung into line with all New England and former colonial townships, to become a vigorous industrial community that not many years later should lengthen its lines and borders to welcome the polyglot modern city as we know it today.