The Battle of Bunker Hill
The second episode of The American Revolution, “An Asylum for Mankind,” covered the year following the battles of Lexington and Concord, from May 1775 to July 1776, much of which focused on the Siege of Boston.
But first let me back up. . . . While researching my post yesterday I went down a rabbit hole around the family of (Royal) Massachusetts Governor Thomas Hutchinson. We have Hutchinsons on the Woodard/Hobson branch of the family tree, including Anne (Marbury) Hutchinson, the champion of religious liberty who was driven out of Boston in 1637—more on her in a future post. She is our 4th cousin 12x removed, and as it turns out, Gov. Hutchinson’s 2nd great-grandmother. That makes him our 8th cousin 8x removed—the man whose hardline stance against the colonists led to the Boston Tea Party. Booooooo!
Massachusetts Governor Thomas Hutchinson, Loyalist twerp.
On May 3, 1775, King George III replaced Gov. Hutchinson with the British commander at Lexington and Concord, Gen. Thomas Gage—no relation, and I’m not looking into it!—who found himself surrounded in Boston by Washington’s forces. As detailed in last night’s episode, Gage decided to drive the patriots from Bunker Hill in June.
I discussed the naming of Bunker Hill after our 11th great-grandfather, George Bunker, in this earlier post, as well as the possible participation in the battle by our 6th great-grandfather, Benoni Cutler. Since writing that blog entry, I’ve learned of another relative, Timothy Fox (husband of our 6th great-grandaunt Abigail Dudley) who fought that day. He joined the New Ipswich (New Hampshire) Militia under the command of Thomas Heald. According to one source, ““Men of this company formed the nucleus of the regiments of Stark and Reed of which saw service at Bunker Hill.” As described in Gen. Stark’s wiki page on Bunker Hill:
Stark and Reed with the New Hampshire minutemen arrived at the scene soon after [William] Prescott’s request. The [HMS] Lively [a British 20-gun post ship] had begun a rain of accurate artillery fire directed at Charlestown Neck, the narrow strip of land connecting Charlestown to the rebel positions. On the Charlestown side, several companies from other regiments were milling around in disarray, afraid to march into range of the artillery fire. Stark ordered the men to stand aside and calmly marched his men to Prescott’s positions without taking any casualties.
When the New Hampshire militia arrived, the grateful Colonel Prescott allowed Stark to deploy his men where he saw fit. Stark surveyed the ground and immediately saw that the British would probably try to flank the rebels by landing on the beach of the Mystic River, below and to the left of Bunker Hill. Stark led his men to the low ground between Mystic Beach and the hill and ordered them to “fortify” a two-rail fence by stuffing straw and grass between the rails. Stark also noticed an additional gap in the defense line and ordered Lieutenant Nathaniel Hutchins from his brother William’s company and others to follow him down a 9-foot-high bank to the edge of the Mystic River. They piled rocks across the 12-foot-wide beach to form a crude defense line. After this fortification was hastily constructed, Stark deployed his men three-deep behind the wall.
A large contingent of British with the Royal Welch Fusiliers in the lead advanced towards the fortifications. The Minutemen crouched and waited until the advancing British were almost on top of them, and then stood up and fired as one. They unleashed a fierce and unexpected volley directly into the faces of the fusiliers, killing 90 in the blink of an eye and breaking their advance. The fusiliers retreated in panic.
A charge of British infantry was next, climbing over their dead comrades to test Stark’s line. This charge too was decimated by a withering fusillade by the Minutemen. A third charge was repulsed in a similar fashion, again with heavy losses to the British. The British officers wisely withdrew their men from that landing point and decided to land elsewhere, with the support of artillery.
Later in the battle, as the rebels were forced from the hill, Stark directed the New Hampshire regiment's fire to provide cover for Colonel Prescott’s retreating troops.
Location of Reed’s and Stark’s forces, and Timothy Fox.
After the war, in 1825, a cornerstone was laid for the current Bunker Hill Monument. As a Mason who at fought at Lexington Green, William Munroe, our 2nd cousin 8x removed, was part of the crew that laid the cornerstone.
Burns’s documentary then went into the ill-fated raid into Canada by the Continental Army, but as of today, I have no stories of relatives who were part of that expedition. However, in the winter of 1775–76, patriot forces led by Col. Henry Knox dragged 59 cannons from Fort Ticonderoga, New York, to Boston, where George Washington waited. On the night of March 4, 1776, Washington ordered the cannons to be brought to the top of the hill at Dorchester Heights. British General William Howe finally decided it was time to leave, and within weeks the city was taken back by the patriots without a shot.
Gen. Washington at Dorchester Heights. How do you like deez cannons?
This remarkable military victory was achieved in part by the 17th Continental Regiment, led by Col. Jedediah Huntington, which established the fortifications at Dorchester Heights. Earlier, in January, Jehiel Niles, our 5th great-grandfather on the Cross/Niles branch, had enlisted as a private in the company of Capt. Abraham Tyler at Chatham, Connecticut, for 12-month service. Tyler’s company served under Huntington in the 17th Continental Regiment. Niles would later move to Randolph, New York, where in 2016 we visited his grave at Sample Hill Cemetery. Jehiel was Lucy (Cross) Baer’s great-grandfather.
Next episode: The Declaration of Independence!
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