Maj. General Seth Pomeroy (Massachusetts Militia)

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A Patriot of the American Revolution for MASSACHUSETTS with the rank of MAJOR GENERAL. DAR Ancestor #: A090416

Also thought to be buried in Bridge Street Cemetery, Northampton, Hampshire County, Massachusetts, United States (unsupported).

Seth Pomeroy (May 20, 1706 – February 9, 1777) was an American gunsmith and soldier from Northampton, Massachusetts. His military service included the French and Indian War and the early stages of the American Revolutionary War. He fought as a private soldier in the Battle of Bunker Hill but was later appointed a major general in the Massachusetts militia.

Private life

Seth was born in Northampton, Massachusetts to Ebeneezer and Sarah (King) Pomeroy. His father was a prominent local citizen and had been a Major in the militia. Seth became a mechanic and gunsmith, as well as joining the local militia in Hampshire County. He earned a reputation as one of the best gunsmiths in the colony.

Pomeroy married Mary Hunt (1705–1777) on December 14, 1732. They would have one son, Dr. Medad Pomeroy (1735–1819). Mary would survive her husband by only seven months.

King George's War

When Massachusetts undertook an expedition against the French in Nova Scotia, Major Pomeroy answered Governor William Shirley's call for volunteers. He was part of the expedition led by William Pepperrell that captured Fortress Louisbourg in Nova Scotia in 1745. He used his professional skills in support of Richard Gridley, the expedition's chief engineering officer. He reconditioned the guns captured from an outlying position after the French had spiked them and supported 46 days of heavy bombardment.

Seth and Mary (Hunt) Pomeroy had more than one child. Children: Seth b.1733, Quartus b.1735, Medad b.1736, Lemuel b.1738, Martha b.1740, Mary b. 1742, Sarah b. 1744, A child b.1747, Asahel b.1749.

French and Indian War

In 1755 Lt. Colonel Pomeroy was second in command of the regiment led by Colonel Ephraim Williams. They marched to New York to support a move to capture Crown Pont.

While on the march, they were ambushed by a force of 800 French and Canadian troops, supported by 600 Iroquois warriors, and led by Baron Dieskau at the Battle of Lake George. Of all the commanding officers, Pomeroy was the only one to survive the battle, and instead of Williams' death assumed the rank of Colonel. Although suffering significant losses, they withdrew to the English camp at the south end of Lake George. There they built a hasty wall of wood and carts and made their stand, supported by cannon and additional forces under General William Johnson. The Indians and Canadians would not attack in the open. When Baron Dieskau was wounded, the entire French force withdrew from Fort Carillon (later called Fort Ticonderoga).

Dieskau was captured, and Johnson built a more permanent Fort William Henry to protect the site.

Revolutionary War

Although a senior officer in the Massachusetts militia at the start of the war, Pomeroy had a limited role. He was, after all, nearly seventy years old. But when the Siege of Boston began in 1775, he was among the volunteers who went in support of it. On June 17 a British naval bombardment marked the start of the Battle of Bunker Hill. He borrowed a horse from General Artemas Ward and set out for Charlestown. When he reached the neck of the peninsula, he found troops piled up because the narrow strip was under fire from British warships. Giving the horse to a soldier to return, he shouldered his musket and marched through the barrage. He declined any command, but took a post at the rail fence, fighting with John Stark's 1st New Hampshire Regiment.

The next week, the Continental Congress named him a brigadier general in the Continental Army. Since his health was not the best, when difficulties arose about seniority, he declined this commission and served instead as a major general in the Massachusetts militia.

When General George Washington asked for support in New Jersey the following year, Pomeroy marched with his militia unit. He didn't complete the trip, but fell ill and died in Peekskill, New York. He was buried in St. Peter's Churchyard there. The churchyard is now part of Hillside Cemetery.

See also

   * Seth Pomeroy's Ride (poem)

Further reading

   * The Journals and Papers of Seth Pomeroy, edited by Louis DeForest. New Haven, Ct, 1926.

   * The Taking of Louisburg 1745 by Samuel Adams Drake, Lee, and Shepard Publishers Boston Mass. USA 1891 (reprinted by Kessinger Publishing ISBN 9780548622346)

Source: Downloaded March 26, 2011, from http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Seth_Pomeroy

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Monument erected in the memory of General Seth Pomeroy in Hillside Cemetery, Peekskill, NY June 17, 1898. By the Society of the Sons of the Revolution.

Letter to Seth's Wife

Major Seth Pomeroy, a Massachusetts blacksmith, who afterward became a useful officer in the French and Indian War. "It looks as if our campaign would last long," the gallant Pomeroy wrote to his wife, "but I am willing to stay till God's time comes to deliver the city into our hands." "Suffer no anxious thought to rest on your mind about me," answered that patriotic New England woman. "The whole town is much engaged with concern for the expedition, how Providence will order the affair, for which religious meetings every week are maintained. I leave you in the hand of God." Such was the spirit of the descendants of the Puritans. http://www.colonialwarsct.org/1745.htm

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General Seth Pomeroy, was one of many Pomeroy gunsmiths and blacksmiths in Northampton. A patriot and father of nine, Seth served in the Massachusetts militia and saw action as a Major at Louisbourg in 1745 and as Lt. Col. at the Battle of Lake George, NY in 1755. In that battle, which started as the Bloody Morning Scout, his brother Lt. Daniel Pomeroy and many other sons of Northampton were lost.

At age 69 in 1775, Seth fought at Bunker Hill. George Washington then offered him the commission of Brigadier-General which he declined due to his age. He died of pleurisy in Peekskill, NY in 1777 while on a march with his militia unit to join General Washington in Morristown, NJ.

http://www.americanpomeroys.org/Northampton.html