Benjamin Bussey Thatcher
Published: 2013-09
Total Pages: 46
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This historic book may have numerous typos and missing text. Purchasers can usually download a free scanned copy of the original book (without typos) from the publisher. Not indexed. Not illustrated. 1835 edition. Excerpt: ... decisive blow. Washington, unquestionably, conceived the plan of making an attack, as the only means of liberating the suffering inhabitants. "It should not be lost to history, that while all these rigorous exactions were enforced, countrymen were allowed to convey vegetables over the lines, occasionally, for the tables of those who could indulge in such luxuries. Carts being less common then than now, it was customary to carry this kind of marketing in panniers, on horseback, through the streets and lanes. As an evidence of the shrewdness and determined spirit which animated the people of that day, the following anecdote cannot be unacceptable: "George Minot, a Dorchester farmer, and son of John Minot, one of the Selectmen, went so frequently on these excursions, that the guard at the Green Store became quite remiss in the examination of the returning panniers, in which he was in the constant habit of bringing out powder for the powderless patriots who constituted Washington's army of observation. In that humble capacity, he rendered invaluable service to his country. There being little or nothing in the town treasury, from which to draw purchase money in support of this singular but well-timed traffic, the father advanced it to the persons of whom it was thus clandestinely procured, trusting to the justness of the claim on the government he clearly foresaw must rise on the ruins of the colonial wreck. His confidence was not misplaced. It became a funded debt, and with it he purchased a part of Thompson's Island, now the location of the Farm School, of the Rev. Dr. William Walter, then rector of Trinity Church. "On another occasion, the same individual being permitted to enter the town with an ox-team for offals, driven by a colored...