Jonathan Chase and Saratoga

In the Spring of 1777, political battles within the upper echelons of George Washington's military commanders had left Fort Ticonderoga in New York State vulnerable to attack by the British. Colonel Jonathan Chase and his soldiers from Cornish, New Hampshire marched all the way from Cornish to Fort Ti, only to be told that their services were no longer needed because the danger from British forces had passed. The arrived home only to be sent back to New York, but on their return trip they met soldiers headed for home with the news that Fort Ticonderoga had fallen to the British. In response to this fiasco, General Horatio Gates was reinstated as the commander of the northern forces.

During the Revolutionary War, Committees of Safety in each state organized and managed the troops from their areas and districts. The Upper Valley's Committee of Safety consisted of delegates from Cornish, Lebanon, Plainfield and Hanover. In a letter dated September 17, General Gates wrote to the Committees of Safety asking them to send troops, as British General Burgoyne was headed toward Saratoga. The Committee of Safety met on September 21 to plan a response to this request. It's impressive that in the space of four days, the letter traveled safely from the war zone in the Lake George region, to the Upper valley and the Committee was able to meet and take action.

During the Revolution, troops couldn't travel long distances because of inadequate roads and primitive modes of transportation. When General Gates needed more troops in New York than that area could provide, he sent missives requesting reinforcements to committees of safety within a couple of days travel. Troops were not sent across the country to fight in other regions. I think that partially explains why the Patriot troops were more likely to win battles fought in rural areas. The men that fought in those battles were more familiar with guns and could use them more effectively than soldiers from the city who may have had less experience with firearms.

The Upper Valley Committee of Safety sent Jonathan Chase and his troops back to New York one more time, along with troops from Lebanon and Hanover. Originally, the term “regiment” referred to the geographic area a commander drew his troops from. The minutes of the Committee of Safety, quoted in “A History of Dartmouth College and Hanover New Hampshire” by Frederick Chase, say, “whatever number of men shall turn out for the purpose aforementioned from the towns of Colonel Chase's regiment shall have the liberty to chuse (sic) proper officers for their company from amongst themselves.” This quote refers to the towns of the regiment and not to the members, men, or soldiers of the regiment. There were seventeen regiments in New Hampshire and Chase's regiment was the 17^th. Each regiment had to fill a quota, providing a certain number of soldiers. These men left Cornish on September 26, 1777, and traveled to Fort Number 4, crossed the river, and headed toward New York, probably via the Crown Point Road.

General Burgoyne's plan was to invade New York, and by controlling the Hudson River he would cut New England off from the rest of the colonies. He believed that if he could isolate New England the rest of the states would abandon the rebellion, because New England was the heart of the rebellion. After the British captured Fort Ticonderoga, Burgoyne sent a force of Hessian troops to Bennington,

Vermont looking for food and supplies. These men were defeated in the Battle of Bennington and never rejoined the main army in New York. Just as importantly, they never brought the much needed food and supplies they were sent to find.

While Burgoyne was on the march from Ticonderoga to Saratoga, Horatio Gates was busy building defenses on a ridge of bluffs near Stillwater, New York overlooking the Hudson River. If the Patriots controlled the river and the road coming into Saratoga, a natural bottleneck in the river valley would funnel the invading British right into a trap. On September 19, 1777, the two armies collided in a field on a farm near the bluffs. In a day of fierce fighting, the field changed hands several times but at the end of the day, the British prevailed and controlled the field. They could not manage to advance any further. On September 22, Burgoyne got word that General Clinton, the British officer who was in charge of the forces occupying New York City, was getting ready to send reinforcements to Saratoga. Burgoyne's forces had carried the day on that first day of fighting, but could not gain any further ground without reinforcements, so he decided to dig in and wait for the arrival of Clinton's men.

Clinton's men did start north, capturing a few forts a long the way. A few troops made it as far as Albany, but Clinton decided he needed them more to maintain the occupation of New York City and Philadelphia. Meanwhile, Horatio Gates' army was becoming increasingly stronger as more and more reinforcements arrived every day. One of the new arrivals was Jonathan Chase's regiment of 142 men from Cornish. Along the way, he had gathered even more recruits so that by the time he arrived in Saratoga on September 26^th, he had 235 men. On October 1, 30 more men to joined the Patriot forces.

These additions, combined with significant reinforcements from northern New England, gave Gates confidence that he could meet the British in battle and beat them. On October 7^th, the two armies battled again, and this time the outcome was much different. Although Burgoyne managed to hold the field on September 19^th, he lost a large number of troops in the effort. On October 7^th, his depleted troops faced an enemy that was substantially increased in number. The Patriots soundly defeated the

British in that battle. Burgoyne lost so many men he was outnumbered 3-1. With nightfall, he and his remaining troops retreated under cover of darkness to the town of Saratoga. In Saratoga, starving, miserable and surrounded by the Patriot army, there was no other option for General Burgoyne but to surrender. The first thing the Patriot army did after the surrender was feed the starving British troops.

There is some mention online that Jonathan Chase may have “drawn up” the Articles of Convention” that outlined the terms of Burgoyne's surrender. The Wikipedia entry for Jonathan Chase makes that claim, and so do several ancestry websites. I have spent hours looking for other, more legitimate sources that mention this, but I could not find any. The other question, not that it really matters, is what does “drawn up” mean? Did Jonathan write the Articles of Convention, supposedly, as dictated by someone else because he had good handwriting? Or did he compose and write them? Reproductions of the Articles of Convention are available for purchase, and if it could be verified that Jonathan wrote them, it would be possible to buy a document that you know is a copy of something written by him.

Sources: Chase, Frederick "A History of Dartmouth College and Hanover New Hampshire" 1891 Hanover, NH: J Wilson and son http://books.google.com/books/about/A_History_of_Dartmouth_College_and_the_T.html?id=gfEKAAAAIAAJ

Child, William Henry "History of the Town of Cornish New Hampshire" 1911 Concord NH: Rumford Press https://archive.org/details/historyoftownofc01chil

Heald, Bruce "New Hampshire and the Revolutionary War" 2013 Charleston: The History Press