On this day 250 years ago in Cambridge, Massachusetts, Gen. George Washington wrote to John Hancock, President of the Continental Congress in Philadelphia:
It is not in the pages of History perhaps, to furnish a case like ours; to maintain a post within Musket Shot of the Enemy for Six months together, without—and at the same time to disband one Army and recruit another, within that distance, of Twenty odd British regiments, is more probably than ever was attempted; But if we succeed as well in the last, as we have heretofore in the first, I shall think it the most fortunate event of my whole life.
. . .
As It is possible your may not yet have received his majesties most gracious speech, I do myself the honour to Inclose one, of many, which were sent out of Boston yesterday. It is full of rancour & resentment, and explicitly holds forth his Royal will to be, that vigorous measures must be pursued to deprive us of our constitutional rights & liberties
Source: “George Washington to John Hancock, 4 January 1776,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-03-02-0013. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 3, 1 January 1776 – 31 March 1776, ed. Philander D. Chase. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1988, pp. 18–21.]
On this day 250 years ago in Quebec, the British buried Major General Richard Montgomery of the Continental Army, after retrieving his body from the snow covered street where he had fallen and confirming with American prisoners his identity. Word of Montgomery’s promotion to major general arrived after he was dead. In 1818, General Montgomery’s remains were reinterred to St. Paul’s Chapel of Trinity Church in New York City. You can visit Montgomery’s grave there in Manhattan today.
On this day 250 years ago in Albany, New York, Col. Henry Knox was waiting for the arrival of the artillery being hauled from Lake George on sleighs pulled by horses on snow covered roads southward toward Albany. The ice on the Mohawk River at Lansing’s Ferry was not thick enough to allow the sleds to cross on the ice so Knox had his men try to thicken the ice by pouring buckets of river water over the surface to freeze. The next day January 4th the first of the guns would cross the river at Lansing’s Ferry and arrive in Albany.
Today January 3, 2026 there will be a commemoration of Knox’s Noble Train crossing the Hudson River at Crailo State Historic Site, although it has a few days before the actual 250th anniversary of the crossing of the Hudson.
On this day 250 years ago in Philadelphia, Thomas Drummond, Lord Drummond and Andrew Elliot, the Royal Collector of New York to meet with certain members of the Continental Congress in a last ditch attempt at reconciliation between the Colonies and Britain. The Pennsylvania Committee of Safety was suspicious of their activities in Philadelphia and asked the Congress if they should be arrested. The Congress recorded in its Journal on this day that:
Application was made from the Committee of Philadelphia asking Advice Whether to secure Lord Drummond and Andrew Elliot now in Philadelphia. Some Members gave them good political Characters & they remained unhurt.
Also on this day in Philadelphia the Continental Congress adopted a resolution to disarm Tories in Queens County (now the Borough of Queens in New York City) on Long Island in New York:
Whereas a majority of the inhabitants of Queen’s County, in the colony of New York, being incapable of resolving to live and die freemen, and being more disposed to quit their liberties than part with the little proportion of their property necessary to defend them, have deserted the American cause, by refusing to send deputies as usual to the convention of that colony; and avowing by a public declaration, an unmanly design of remaining inactive spectators of the present contest, vainly flattering themselves, perhaps, that should Providence declare for our enemies, they may purchase their mercy and favor at an easy rate; and, on the other hand, if the war should terminate to the advantage of America, that then they may enjoy, without expense of blood or treasure, all the blessings resulting from that liberty, which they, in the day of trial, had abandoned, and in defense of which, many of their more virtuous neighbors and countrymen had nobly died:
And although the want of public spirit, observable in these men, rather excites pity than alarm, there being little danger to apprehend either from their prowess or example, yet it being reasonable, that those who refuse to defend their country, should be excluded from its protection, and be prevented from doing it injury:
Resolved, That all such persons in Queen’s county, aforesaid, as voted against sending deputies to the present convention of New York, and named in a list of delinquents in Queen’s county, published by the convention of New York, be put out of the protection of the United Colonies, and that all trade and intercourse with them cease; that none of the inhabitants of that county be permitted to travel or abide in any part of these United Colonies, out of their said county, without a certificate from the convention or committee of safety of the colony of New York, setting forth, that such inhabitant is a friend to the American cause, and not of the number of those who voted against sending deputies to the said convention; and that such of the said inhabitants as shall be found out of the said county, without such certificate, be apprehended and imprisoned for three months.
. . .
Resolved, That Colonel Nathaniel Heard, of Woodbridge, in New Jersey, taking with him six hundred minute men, under discreet officers, march to the western part of Queen’s county, and that Colonel Waterbury, of Stanford, Connecticut, with the like number of minute men, march to the eastern side of said county; that they confer together, and endeavor to enter Queen’s county on the same day; that they proceed to disarm every person, who voted against sending deputies to the said convention, and cause them to deliver up their arms and ammunition on oath, and that they take and confine in safe custody, till further orders, all such as shall refuse compliance.
On this day 250 years ago at his headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts, General George Washington reversed his policy that prohibited the enlistment of Blacks in the Continental Army because almost all of the initial enlistments ended with the new year, new enlistments were very slow and few soldiers were reenlisting. Washington wrote to John Hancock, president of Congress that
it has been represented to me that the free negroes who have Served in this Army, are very much disatisfied at being discarded—as it is to be apprehended, that they may Seek employ in the ministerial Army—I have presumed to depart from the Resolution respecting them, & have given Licence for their being enlisted, if this is disapproved of by Congress, I will put a Stop to it.
“George Washington to John Hancock, 31 December 1775,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-02-02-0579. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 2, 16 September 1775 – 31 December 1775, ed. Philander D. Chase. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1987, pp. 622–626.]
In the early morning hours on this day 250 years ago the American Army suffered a disastrous defeat in the Battle of Quebec. The Americans lost 60 men killed, 34 wounded and 431 captured while the British had only 5 men killed and 14 wounded. I can find the names of the American officers who gave their lives or were wounded in the battle. General Richard Montgomery, Maj. John Macpherson, Capt. Jacob Cheesman, Capt. William Hendricks, Lt. John Humphries, Lt. Samuel Cooper, and Lt. Joseph Thomas were killed, and Col. Benedict Arnold, Brigade-Major Matthias Ogden, Captain Jonas Hubbard, Capt. John Lamb, Captain John Topham, Lieutenant Archibald Steele, Lieutenant Tisdale, Commissary Taylor and Chief Sabattis of the Abenakis were wounded. Captain Hubbard would die of his wounds in British captivity the next day. One source names “Desmarais the Canadian guide” as killed with Montgomery, but “the orderly sergeant . . . and eight other brave fellows [who] lay dead and dying” in the snow next to Montgomery are unnamed. Another source gives the name of John Harris for one of the enlisted men in Arnold’s command who was killed. But that leaves more than 50 men who died in the assault on Quebec unidentified.
The Patriots of Massachusetts did an admirable service recording the names of every Massachusetts man who was killed on April 19 at Lexington or on the road from Concord back to Boston. Similarly, I have found compilations of names of the Americans killed at Bunker Hill preserved so that they would be remembered by future generations. But starting with the Battle of Quebec, all too often the enlisted Americans who gave their lives fighting for American Liberty are recorded as simply numbers rather than as names. If anyone can identify others who were killed or wounded at Quebec, please share those names with me and I will be happy to help honor and remember them on this blog.
On this day 250 years ago at the Holland House on St. Foy Road on the edge of Quebec City, Major John Macpherson Jr. wrote to his father John Macpherson:
If you recieve this letter it will be the last this hand will ever write you Orders are given for a general storm of quebeck this night and heaven only knows what will be my fate. But whatever it may I cannot resist the inclination I feel to assure you that in this cause I feel no reluctance to venture a Life which I confess is lent only to be used when my Country demans it in moments like these such an assertion will not be thought a boast by any one – by my father I am sure it cannot –
It is needless to tell you that my prayers are for the happiness of our family and their preservation in this general Confusion – But their is one thing I must mention. Should providence in its wisdom call me from rendering the little Assistance I can to my country I could wish my Brother would not continue in the service of her enemies –
That night as a blizzard struck Quebec, Maj. Macpherson prepared to take his position beside Gen. Richard Montgomery at the head of the column of some 300 men as they assaulted the Lower Town of Quebec from the south. Also that night a larger column of 600 men — Continentals plus Canadien militia and Indians — led by Col. Benedict Arnold assembled at Mr. Devine’s house on the outskirts of Quebec to assault the Lower Town from the north. Canadian militia numbering less than 200 led by Col. James Livingston and fewer than 100 American militia led by Capt. Jacob Brown assembled for diversionary attacks of the gates of the fortress surrounding the Upper Town of Quebec.
The next morning Maj. Macpherson lay dead next to Montgomery in front of a barricade in the Lower Town. Soon thereafter William Macpherson resigned his commission as a Lieutenant in the British Army and was commissioned as a Major in the Continental Army to take his brother’s place.
On this day 250 years ago in Newport, Rhode Island, Samuel Hopkins wrote to Thomas Cushing who was then a member of the Massachusetts delegation in the Continental Congress:
They have indeed manifested much wisdom and benevolence in advising to a total stop of the slave trade, and leading the united American Colonies to resolve not to buy any more slaves, imported from Africa. This has rejoiced the hearts of many benevolent, pious persons, who have been long convinced of the unrighteousness and cruelty of that trade, by which so many Hundreds of thousands are enslaved. And have we not reason to think this has been one means of obtaining the remarkable, and almost miraculous protection and success, which heaven has hitherto granted to the united Colonies, in their opposition to unrighteousness and tyranny, and struggle for liberty?
But if the slave trade be altogether unjust, is it not equally unjust to hold those in slavery, who by this trade have been reduced to this unhappy state? Have they not a right to their liberty, which has been thus violently, and altogether without right, taken from them? Have they not reason to complain of any one who withholds it from them? Do not the cries of these oppressed poor reach to the heavens? Will not God require it at the hands of those who refuse to let them go out free? If practising or promoting the slave trade be inconsistent with what takes place among us, in our struggle for liberty, is not retaining the slaves in bondage, whom by this trade we have in our power, equally inconsistent? And is there not, consequently, an inconsistence in resolving against the former, and yet continuing the latter?
And if the righteous and infinitely good Governor of the world, has given testimony of his approbation of our resolving to put a stop to the slave trade, by doing such wonders in our favor; have we not reason to fear he will take his protection from us, and give us up to the power of oppression and tyranny, when he sees we stop short of what might be reasonably expected; and continue the practice of that which we ourselves have, implicitly at least, condemned, by refusing to let the oppressed go free, and to break every yoke?
Does not the conduct of Lord Dunmore, and the ministerialists, in taking the advantage of the slavery practised among us, and encouraging all slaves to join them, by promising them liberty, point out the best, if not the only way to defeat them in this, viz. granting freedom to them ourselves, so as no longer to use our neighbour’s service without wages, but give them for their labours what is equal and just?
Source: “Samuel Hopkins to Thomas Cushing, 29 December 1775,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Adams/06-03-02-0196. [Original source: The Adams Papers, Papers of John Adams, vol. 3, May 1775 – January 1776, ed. Robert J. Taylor. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1979, pp. 388–390.]
Hopkins must have at that time been writing his pamphlet entitled A Dialogue Concerning the Slavery of the Africans which was addressed “To the Honorable Members of the Continental Congress, Representatives of the Thirteen United American Colonies”. In that pamphlet, Hopkins referred to slaves as “our brethren and children” and stated that it was the duty of America to free them.
On this day 250 years ago in Philadelphia, Julien-Alexandre Achard de Bonvouloir wrote to the French ambassador to Britain Comte de Guines a report to pass along to the French foreign minister Comte de Vergennes regarding his second meeting on December 27 with Benjamin Franklin and John Jay of the Committee of Secret Correspondence of the Continental Congress, and their translator Francis Daymon:
I have found this country in an inconceivable agitation … They besieged Montreal, which has capitulated and are actually before Quebec which I think will soon fall also. They have seized several of the King’s vessels filled with provisions or war and food. They are perfectly entrenched before Boston; they have built a small Navy; they have unbelievable spirit and good will … I made no offer to them, absolutely none, promising only to give them all the service I can without compromising myself, and without vouching for events in any fashion … I told them I thought France wished them well; if she would aid them that that might well be; on what terms I did not know … that I promise to present their requests without anything more … They asked me whether it would be prudent for them to send an empowered deputy to France. I told them I imagined this would be precipitous, even hazardous; that everything is known about London in France and about France in London, and that the step would singe the English beard …
Their affairs are in good state … I have just this instance learned that the savages of five nations have sent their chiefs to the general assembly, in order to assure them they wished to be neutral … They are convinced that they cannot sustain themselves without a nation that protects them by sea; … Everyone here is a soldier. The troops are well clothes, well paid and well commanded. They have about 50,000 men hired and a greater number of volunteers who do not wish to be paid … They have said they are fighting to become free and that they will succeed at no matter what price, that they are linked bu oath and … know well that they cannot maintain themselves at sea and that only France is in a condition to protect their commerce without which their country cannot flourish …”
Bonvouloir‘s overly optimistic report reached Vergennes in Paris on February 27, 1776.
On this day 250 years ago at Cambridge, Massachusetts, Captain Reuben Dow of Hollis, New Hampshire was discharged from service because his right ankle had been shattered by a musket ball at Bunker Hill. Captain Dow was placed on half-pay through December 31, 1776 and then received one-fourth pay until 1783 when he was granted a lifetime pension by New Hampshire. After his discharge, Captain Dow served as Chairman of the Committee of Safety of Hollis and a Representative to the General Court.
On this day 250 years ago General Richard Montgomery met with Colonel Benedict Arnold and the other key officers in his army besieging Quebec City including Lieutenant Colonel Christopher Greene, Major Timothy Bigelow, Major Return Jonathan Meigs, Captain Daniel Morgan, Captain Aaron Burr, Captain William Hendricks, Captain John Lamb, Captain John MacPherson, and Captain Jacob Cheesman to discuss their next steps. The previous day, Christmas, Montgomery had addressed the troops to encourage them for the coming assault of the city before the enlistments of most of the men would expire at the end of the year.
Although some of the officers were pessimistic that the assault would succeed but Benedict Arnold convinced the other officers that an assault on the city must be tried, regardless of the chances of it succeeding. Because a frontal attack against the city’s granite walls was impossible they agreed to assault Quebec’s Lower Town. Colonel Arnold would lead his men to attack along the river from the north while General Montgomery would lead his troops against the Lower Town from the south. Capturing the Lower Town would cut off the Upper Town from resupply from ships on the St. Lawrence River. They also agreed to wait until the next snowstorm to launch the attack in order in the hope that the snowstorm would hide the assault until they breached the Lower Town’s outermost defenses.
On this day 250 years ago in New York, Col. Henry Knox was on foot alone scouting out the route for his train of artillery as the snow began falling. At the ruins of Fort Miller (on the south edge of the modern town of Fort Edward), Judge William Duer, an immigrant from England who was then a member of the New York Provincial Congress and would become a member of the Continental Congress, provided Knox “a sleigh to go to Stillwater” where Knox crossed the ferry across the Hudson River. He then proceeded to the village of Saratoga (today’s Schuylerville) where he recorded in his diary that he
dined & set off about three OClock it still snowing exceeding fast… after the utmost efforts (of the) horses we reach’d Ensign’s tavern 8 miles beyond Saratoga – we lodg’d.
The next morning there would be two feet of snow on the ground. That was actually a good thing because the ground and rivers needed to freeze and snow had to cover the ground to haul the artillery to Boston. You can visit the monuments for Knox’s Noble Train of Artillery in Fort Edward, Stillwater and Schuylerville along with monuments for perhaps the most pivotal battle of the Revolution.
On this day 250 years ago at his headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts, General Washington replied to a letter from General Philip Schuyler:
I am very sorry to find by several paragraphs, that both you and General Montgomery incline to quit the Service—Let me ask you Sir, when is the Time for brave Men to exert themselves in the Cause of Liberty and their Country, if this is not?
Neither General Schuyler nor General Montgomery would quit the Service. Schuyler would continue in the Continental Army until 1779 when he was elected to the Continental Congress, and General Montgomery would be killed one week later in the unsuccessful assault on Quebec.
Source: “George Washington to Major General Philip Schuyler, 24 December 1775,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-02-02-0557. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 2, 16 September 1775 – 31 December 1775, ed. Philander D. Chase. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1987, pp. 599–600.]
On that same day at his headquarters in Cambridge, General Washington ordered the “following Rations to be delivered” by “the Commissary General to all the Troops of the United Colonies”:
Corn’d Beef and Pork, four days in a week.
Salt Fish one day, and fresh Beef two days.
As Milk cannot be procured during the Winter Season, the Men are to have one pound and a half of Beef, or eighteen Ounces of Pork Pr day.
Half pint of Rice, or a pint of Indian Meal Pr Week.
One Quart of Spruce Beer Pr day, or nine Gallons of Molasses to one hundred Men [per] week. Six pounds of Candles to one hundred Men Pr week, for guards.
Six Ounces of Butter, or nine Ounces of Hogs-Lard Pr week.
Three pints of Pease, or Beans Pr Man Pr Week, or Vegetables equivalent, allowing Six Shillings Pr Bushel for Beans, or Pease—two and eight pence Pr Bushel for Onions—One and four pence Pr Bushel for Potatoes and Turnips.
One pound of Flour Pr Man each day—Hard Bread to be dealt out one day in a week, in lieu of Flour.
Unfortunately, the troops of the United States would all too often not receive the full rations ordered by General Washington and the Continental Congress as the War continued for the next eight years.
Source: “General Orders, 24 December 1775,” Founders Online, National Archives, https://founders.archives.gov/documents/Washington/03-02-02-0555. [Original source: The Papers of George Washington, Revolutionary War Series, vol. 2, 16 September 1775 – 31 December 1775, ed. Philander D. Chase. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1987, pp. 597–599.]
On this day 250 years ago at his headquarters in Cambridge, Massachusetts, General George Washington’s aide Robert Hanson Harrison wrote letters dictated and signed by General Washington to James Warren, President of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress (and Paymaster General of the Continental Army), Governor Jonathan Trumbull, Sr. of Connecticut, Governor Nicholas Cooke of Rhode Island, and Matthew Thornton, President of the New Hampshire Provincial Congress:
Notwithstanding the great pains taken by the Quarter Master General, to procure Blanketts for the Army, he finds it impossible to procure a Number Sufficient—he has tryed the different places to the Southward without Success, as what were there are engaged to Supply the wants of the Troops in each place.
Our Soldiers are in great distress & I know of no way to remedy the evil than applying to you, cannot some be got from the different Towns? Most Houses could spare One, some of them many—If your Honorable House will please to take this affair under your Immediate consideration & by some means or other, procure as many as can be spared from the Housekeepers, you will do Infinite Service to this Army
You can visit Washington’s headquarters in Cambridge to see where these letters were written, and where Washington molded the Continental Army and led the successful siege of Boston .
On this day 250 years ago in Philadelphia, “Captain John the Tuscarora Chief and his Companions” met in conference with a committee of the Continental Congress. The Congress agreed to provide the Tuscarora “with a friendly answer, and make them a small present [and] to provide them with Food and Raiment for their Return Home.” The Tuscarora along with the Oneida Nation would remain allied with America throughout the Revolution while the other four nations of the Iroquois would fight for the British.
On this day 250 years on the Delaware River at Philadelphia the Gadsden Flag was flown for the first time aboard the USS Alfred.
The flag was designed by Christopher Gadsden, a member of the Continental Congress from South Carolina Gadsden gave the flag to Commodore Esek Hopkins to fly on the main mast of Hopkins’s flagship, the USS Alfred.
The Gadsden flag features a coiled rattlesnake against a yellow background, above the slogan “Don’t Tread on Me.” The rattlesnake had a long history as a symbol of the unity of the Thirteen Colonies and Benjamin Franklin had used it for his “Join or Die” woodcut in 1754.
[On a personal and political note, the Gadsden Flag has been one of my favorite symbols of the ideals of the Revolution since the Bicentennial in my youth. So it has disheartened me in recent years to see it appropriated by Tea Party and MAGA adherents whose understanding of the lessons of the Revolution differ completely from my own. But I was heartened to see protesters at the recent “No Kings” rally here in D.C. carrying signs with the rattlesnake symbol and slogans warning our current President not to tread on our rights. I applauded them for helping to reclaim the Gadsden Flag.]
On This Day In The Revolution 