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Amenia Historical Society

While Amenia and the countryside around were spared the bloody battlefields of the Revolutionary War, this area, which has been called "the 14th colony", played an important role in the fledgling nation's fight for independence.

      Amenia was one of some score of neighboring villages in the tri-state region of New York, Connecticut and Massachusetts that served the colonies as the 'Arsenal of the Revolution'.   The rich lodes of ore - both iron and lead - provided the cannon, muskets and shot that armed much of the Continental Army and militia.

      About a mile south of the early settlement of Richard Sackett and the Palatine refugees from Germany in South Amenia, the furnace and foundry of the Steel Works were established. Before the outbreak of war, Capt. James Reed and a Mr. Ellis had begun the manufacture of steel there.   Subsequently, arms were manufactured for the colonial forces there.

      According to Phillip H. Smith who wrote a history of Dutchess County 1608-1876, Cornelius Atherton, an early resident of Amenia, petitioned the colonial council of New York to exempt his workmen at the Steel Works from military duty so his enterprise could fulfill his contract with Congress to manufacture fire arms.

      There are conflicting versions of the Steel Works' role in producing the first chain across the Hudson at Fort Montgomery.    Some claim that iron pigs from the Steel Works' furnaces were sent to Ancram and Salisbury forges for making the links to block the British ships sailing up the river.     Whatever, the Steel Works seemed to have had a part in the historic event.

      In April 1777, the lead mines in the northern reaches of Amenia were explored at the direction of the Colonial Provincial Congress and excavation was started.    An experienced miner from Scotland, John McDonald was brought over to supervise the operation of the mine that provided lead bullets for the army throughout the war.

      Besides its service in providing arms for the colonial forces, Amenia and the Harlem Valley could be termed the "breadbasket of the revolution".   Agriculture had been the chief business of the early settlers.   Rich farmland in the valleys of the Webutuck River, Wassaic Creek and the West Brook gave the impression of "one great wheat field".    The production of wheat had been greatly bolstered by the wars in Europe and then by the need for Colonial military provisions.   The streams provided waterpower for the numerous gristmills that ground the grain and flour.   Mills were operating at Leedsville, the Steel Works and on run by Lewis DeLavergne.   Ox-drawn carts carried the farm products to the Poughkeepsie wharves for river sloops and schooners to ship to the army posts north and south.

      Beef cattle drives by drovers down the valley and across to the Hudson ports also helped feed the cities and military forces.   The demands of the war and pressure on prices brought a period of prosperity to the farms of Eastern Dutchess.     According to Newton Reed's Early History of Amenia, the price of wheat in 1776 was five shillings a bushel, equal to a day's wage in harvest time.

      A divisive line was drawn between the colonial patriots and loyalists to the British king by the signing of the New York Colony's Pledge of Association.    While Amenia was overwhelmingly on the side of the adherents of liberty,   in various parts of Dutchess County there were many aligned with the Tory cause.    Nonetheless, the support of independence was growing.    For instance in the summer of 1775, colonial leaders    in Dutchess County directed each town "to go to the persons called Tories and in a friendly manner, request them to part with their firelocks for the use of the Continental Forces at a reasonable price."    If refused, the order went on, "Take such firelock forcibly."  There was a certain niceness in the directness of the rhetoric of the time.

      A Committee of Safety organized in local communities to monitor activities of British loyalists arrested three Tories and confined them to jail for attempting to enlist Dutchess County men for the King's army.  

      Newton Reed in his "Early History of Amenia" tells of a primitive prison  built in the eastern part of the county for confinement of Tories.    Made of logs,  the remains of the jail were still around nearly a hundred years after the revolution.

      In 1775, while Burgoyne's British troops were threatening the upper Hudson region, a body of Dutchess Tories collected in Washington Hollow to demonstrate their support for the King.      Hearing of the plan, a company of 50 or so patriots from Sharon, Connecticut, moving westward through Amenia and grew to a party of several hundred.    After spending the night a little north of the Hollow, they swept down in an attack on the Tories the next morning.   A number of prisoners were taken in the Tory rout and sent to Exeter, New Hampshire where they were kept in confinement for two years.    "No more trouble was made by the Tories here during the war" according to Newton Reed.

      From the early days of the independence movement, the colonies marshaled local manpower in militia units of minutemen.    Intended for local defense, there was no occasion for using the Amenia militia except in December 1776 when the local regiment and other units from Dutchess, Westchester and part of Albany were mobilized on the east side of the Hudson to meet the threat of the English forces under General Henry Clinton.     

      The activation order called for the local minutemen to be furnished with muskets and ammunition in the then rare case of not having their own firearms.   They were also given six-days provisions and blankets and a "pot or camp kettle for every six men."

      Local militia leaders were charged with settling appeals for exemption due to hardship and troops engaged in the manufacture of gunpowder, army shoes or clothing were also excused.

      While the militia had no other opportunity to join the battle for independence a number of Amenia citizens played a part in the Revolution as individuals.

      There was Thomas Young, a local physician who, early on, felt the colonists weren't doing enough to oppose the British oppression and went to Boston for the "Tea Party", reputedly one of the few participants not disguised as an Indian.

      Col. Roswell Hopkins of the leading Amenia family fought at Saratoga where General Burgoyne was defeated,  pretty much ending the British campaign north of the Hudson.    Dr. Reuben Allerton who had joined Hopkin's regiment as a surgeon  after medical school became known for his compassionate care "dressing the wounds of friend and foe."

      Captain William Chamberlain, who owned an Amenia tavern, was a zealous patriot and fought in the battles of Bennington and Saratoga. His brothers, Colbe, James and John were also active in the War of Independence.

©2007 Amenia Historical Society