On this day 250 years ago, the Third New Hampshire Provincial Congress passed a resolution to raise troops“to join in the common cause of defending our just rights and liberties.”
On this day 250 years ago on the northern end of Lake Champlain in the Quebec province of Canada, Col. Benedict Arnold and Capt. Eleazar Oswald (an immigrant from England) commanding about 50 men onboard the schooner Liberty raided the British garrison at St. Johns. On May 9, Connecticut militia had seized Loyalist Philip Skene’s trading schooner Katherine at Skenesborough, at the southern end of Lake Champlain in New York. After the capture of Fort Ticonderoga Arnold renamed Katherine the Liberty and then sailed her up the lake into Canada. Arnold’s force surprised the small British garrison (less than 20 soldiers), destroyed British bateaux, rescued American prisoners, and captured supplies and the sloop George III, which they renamed Enterprise. This ship was the first U.S.S. Enterprise in American history.
Learning that British reinforcements were on their way to St. Johns, Arnold departed before the end of the day sailing his two-ship fleet of Enterprise and Liberty south. Col. Ethan Allen leading 100 Green Mountain Boys then arrived as Arnold was leaving and occupied the fort at St. Johns.
Sources: https://daybydayamerica.com/day-by-day/year-1775/may-18-1775/; https://whitehall.bloatedtoe.com/whhistory.html
On this day 250 years ago, the inhabitants of Gloucester County, New Jersey issued Instructions to their delegates to the New Jersey Provincial Congress that warned the delegates when “legislative representatives hold . . . not during the will of their constituents; . . . but during the Governor’s pleasure — A deadly enemy to Liberty lurks here!”
Source: https://www.gloucestercityhistoricalsociety.org/revolution/1765
On This Day In The Revolution 