On a late Winter morning in 1775, William French woke up for the last time. The lively 22-year-old lived in the Town of Bennington—itself scarcely older than he was.
Self-named by Benning Wentworth, Governor of New Hampshire, Bennington became—in 1741—the first township granted west of the Connecticut River. It was a fact that would soon matter far more than anyone expected.
French headed to Westminster, a small hamlet on the west side of the Connecticut River, nestled in the broad curve of the oxbowing waterway, in the fertile eastern valley beneath the Green Mountains.
That afternoon, French walked along King’s Highway to the farmhouse of Capt. Axariah Wright, an eccentric old patriot. There he met Daniel Houghton and nearly 100 other men. They were there to confront a problem they believed could no longer be avoided.Continue Reading “William French and the Westminster Massacre”
The Shot Not Heard ’Round the World: Vermont’s First Taste of Independence
The land lies dormant. But enticing. Open. Exposed. Its potential untapped.
Beyond the mountains, out of sight, Albany holds court, too distant to exercise its authority over the outer reaches of its boundary. Closer, on the opposite shore of the river, New Hampshire saw it as an avenue of expansion.
Both colonies claimed it. Neither controlled it.
Yet, into that void, settlers arrived.
The first colonists to settle what would become Westminster, Vermont, came from Continue Reading “The Shot Not Heard ’Round the World: Vermont’s First Taste of Independence”