Page:The Granite Monthly Volume 7.djvu/33

 IN THE FOOIPRINTS OF THE PIONEERS.

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��1 am informed that expresses have been •<:irculated through the neighboring towns to collect a number of people to-morrow, or as soon as possible, to carry away all the cannon and arms belonging to the castle, which they will undoubtedly effect unless some assist- ance should arrive from Boston in time to prevent it.

J. WENTWORTH."

But as is well known the " timely assistance " did not arrive, and the cannon and about sixty muskets were taken away by the determined " sons of liberty."

This was the first open revolt of the people against the British government, ■and it took place, as will be seen, full four months before the battle of Lex- ington, and the same arms and ammu- nition, so opportunely seized by the sturdy yeomanry of New Hampshire, did effective service at the battle of Bunker Hill in the same brawny hands that borrowed them from the king's castle.

Capt. Cochran, the commander of the fortress, was like most or many of those who held royal commissions, a true servitor of the king, and we may suppose that this partial grant of a wild township was, in some degree, a recognition of loyalty ; but the gift like the service proved of little value to him, for he became obnoxious to the '•'sons of liberty" and was forced to flee the country. His name is seventh from the governor on the proscribed list, and he was one of the twenty-two from this state whose estates were con- fiscated. His title in Whitefield lands passed by public sale into the posses- sion of Samuel Minot, and now num- bers two and three in the twenty-second range, form the wild eastern boimdary ■of the Col. Colby farm, a part of the -confiscated estate of John Cochran.

One of the ninety petitioners for a grant of the original township of VVhite- iield, in 1774, was one Peter Green, Esq. He was number sixteen in the .list, and drew share seventy-three in the first allotment by the Gerrish plan.

This Peter was originally from Lan-

��caster, Mass., where he was bom. He removed to the newly or- ganized town of Concord, N. H., during the stirring times just previous to the declaration of independence of the colonies. He was an ardent sup- porter of the cause of the king, and never yielded allegiance thereto until forced by the tide of public sentiment to adapt himself, apparently, at least, to the growing change in the political world around him.

It was a recorded fiict of those times that those holding commissions under the king, either civil or military, were generally the last to come to the open support of the colonists ; and of Peter Green, Esq., it is recorded, that although having subscribed to the "test oath" in 1776, before the com- mittee of safety of Concord, he made himself so openly obnoxious to the friends of liberty that the parish voted to "break off" all dealings with him, and that he be advertized in the public prints as an enemy to the United States of America, and that he be disarmed by the committee of safety, and that the court of judicature be applied to to dis- miss Peter Green, Esq., from all business henceforth and forever. Also, that if any persons have any dealings v.ith the same he shall be looked upon as an enemy to his country. All this unless the said Peter Green, Esq., give satis- faction to this parish within thirty days."

But we may conclude that the re- quired satisfaction was not made, for soon thereafter a party of zealous lib- erty men assembled in high excite- ment for the purpose of pulling down the house of this royalist, and they only desisted from their purpose by the advice of some of the cooler order loving and influential men of the town.

Green's outspoken sentiments and royalist sympathies at last caused his arrest, and along with Capt. Jeremiah Clough, also one of Whitefield's grant- ees, he was taken to Exeter and there confined in jail. They were afterward released, upon taking the oath of alle- giance and agreeing to comply with the regiilations of the committee ot

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