LOCAL HEROS
A new book delves into Lincoln’s
roster of celebrated revolutionaries,
and finds both more and less than the legends might have us believe
By Kathleen
Pierce
The Boston Globe, April 11, 2013
Jim Hollister, a Minute Man park ranger,
inspected gear at a recent drill by Lincoln Minutemen, including author
Richard Wiggin (right).
Joshua Child, Scipio Brister, and Levi Brooks.
These soldiers, honored every Patriots Day with a fife
solo and musket salute, defended Lincoln at the dawn of the
Revolutionary War.
Or did they?
Richard Wiggin had his doubts.
As captain of the Lincoln Minute Men, historical
reenactors, Wiggin inherited a roster of Revolutionary War soldiers
buried in town, and wondered, beyond their antiquated names, who they
were.
“We were celebrating the men on this list, but what was
their provenance? No one had verified it,’’ the 64-year-old Lincoln
resident said.
Intrigued, he spent months poring over treasury
statements in the town library, checking names against service records.
It didn’t take long to determine that not only was the list flawed,
little was known about these patriots. He dug deeper.
“I wanted to bring these men to life and show them as
people,” said Wiggin.
Seven years later, he has done just that.
His book, “Embattled Farmers: Campaigns and Profiles of
Revolutionary Soldiers from Lincoln, Massachusetts, 1775-1783,” comes
out on Monday, this year’s Patriots Day holiday. A launch party will
take place from 5 to 7:30 p.m. at the Lincoln Public Library, 3 Bedford
Road.
|
Published by the Lincoln Historical Society, it is filled with
profiles of Lincoln’s 252 militia members and four loyalist
soldiers, battles they fought, and snapshots of the 1700s
agricultural community. In his research, Wiggin uncovered 55 new war heroes. He also outed some long-heralded “soldiers,” such as Levi Brooks, who was 12 when the war broke out, and never set foot on Battle Road the fighting on April 19, 1775. “There is a myth of the Minutemen and then there is the reality of the Minutemen,” said Wiggin. “The reality is sometimes more interesting .” Tracing stories like that of Jonathan Gage, a Lincoln soldier held prisoner on a British ship, drew him in, Wiggin said. |
 |
In his pension records, Gage describes his role in a skirmish, known as
Young’s House, in 1780 outside New York City, and states he was never
paid for service. Wounded by a sword to the head and a “bayonet to my
body,” he nearly died. Such nuggets kept the project rolling.
“It brings it out. Now Jonathan Gage is a real person,”
said Wiggin, a retired life sciences executive with a fascination for
the Revolutionary War.
Local historian Jack MacLean, who edited the book,
considers “Embattled Farmers” a new take on a well-told story.
“Typically material on the Revolution deals with
different battles. This looks at where people that took part in it came
from,” said MacLean, whose 1987 book, “A Rich Harvest,” is considered
the definitive word on Lincoln’s history. “It makes for a more personal
orientation than what you usually get.”
Beyond shedding light on the farmers who took on the
redcoats 238 years ago, the book refocuses attention on Lincoln’s role
in the Revolution.
Paul Revere was captured here, and Lincoln was also the
site of the Bloody Angle battle, where the Minutemen ambushed the
British on their return march to Boston.
Long overshadowed by Lexington and Concord, Lincoln
seems to have “just missed the headlines,” said MacLean.
LINCOLN JOINS THE REVOLUTION
256
soldiers 252
fought for the Colonies 4
for the British crown
62
were Minutemen 120
of the fighting men were related
SOURCE: “Embattled Farmers” by Richard Wiggin
To bring the era’s townspeople to life, Wiggin created kinship charts
showing the soldiers’ lineage. The family tree of Mary Stearns and John
Cutler, for example, finds both patriots and loyalists among their
children and grandchildren, showing anew that the war divided more than
the Colonies and the British crown.
Wiggin discovered most in town were related to one
another. About half the soldiers who fought in the war were brothers,
cousins, or uncles. Many shared the same last name.
“No one’s looked at this thoroughly before. In Colonial
times these were small towns, and everyone was related,” he said.
While truly a Lincoln-centric book, “Embattled Farmers”
resonates beyond the community.
“It’s dealing with one town, but the interest is
broader in nature. People interested in the American Revolution” will
like the book, said MacLean.
It is surprising more than historians. Lincoln resident
Ephraim Flint, reached by telephone last week, learned he was named
after a Revolutionary War militiaman said to have captured a British
solider and served at Dorchester Heights. Wiggin covers this in his
book.
“I had always heard that most of the Flints were
sleeping that day,” said Flint. “We were not really an activist family.”
While not enthralled by his family’s history, Flint
said, he finds the broader trends of American independence interesting,
and plans to read the book. “If you think what those farmers started, if
you think of what George Washington did with some unruly farmers that he
couldn’t stand, it’s pretty amazing. It’s always fun to see where our
forefathers started, and the sacrifices that they were willing to make.”
The sacrifices he made in writing the book — including
seven years of research, trips to the National Archives and a
Revolutionary War library in Pennsylvania, and out-of-pocket expenses
without an advance — didn’t faze him, Wiggin said. Like the Minutemen on
Battle Road, he plunged ahead.
“I never set out to write this. It was an accident,” he
said.
But the more he learned, the more he wanted to share.
“It’s important history for people to know. I thought
the wrong thing would be to let it disappear.”
Kathleen Pierce can be reached at kmdpierce@gmail.com.