Ethan Allen

For other uses, see Ethan Allen (disambiguation).

File:Ticondsurrender.jpg

An engraving depicting Ethan Allen demanding the surrender of Fort Ticonderoga

Ethan Allen ([[January 10 ]] 1738 – February 12 1789) was an early American revolutionary and guerrilla leader during the era of the Vermont Republic and the New Hampshire Grants. He fought against the settlement of Vermont by the Province of New York, and then for its independence in the American Revolutionary War.

Early Years

Ethan Allen was born in Litchfield, Connecticut, the first born child of Joseph and Mary Baker Allen. Ethan was the oldest of the eight children. He was the only one to be born in Litchfield, since the family moved to Cornwall shortly after his birth. His brother, Ira, was also prominent in the early history of Vermont.

Joseph Allen was the leader of a rebellious group of land owners and speculators who held New Hampshire title to land grants in Bennington, Vermont, which at that time was disputed territory, known as the New Hampshire Grants. New York, which held substantial claim to the area, refused to honor the New Hampshire titles and sold competing titles to different people, who generally did not live in Vermont. This led to open rebellion among the population in much of Vermont. In April 1755, Joseph Allen died, leaving Ethan to take care of the family farm and title claims.

Profile

Allen had bright red hair and was well over six feet (about 1.80 m) tall. He was outspoken and apparently quite articulate, although he enjoyed using profane language. At the age of 24, he served in the colonial military in the French and Indian War. He was married and had five children. In the early 1770s, he emerged as the military leader of Anti-New York dissidents, known as the Green Mountain Boys, who were fighting New York over the New Hampshire grants. He and The Green Mountain Boys successfully carved out the Republic (1777-1791) and later the State of Vermont. A warrant was issued for his arrest by the government of New York, for what was a substantial reward of 100 pounds.

Capture of Fort Ticonderoga

In the spring of 1775, following the beginning of the American Revolutionary War, Allen and Benedict Arnold led a raid to capture Fort Ticonderoga. The relative roles of Allen and Arnold are not entirely clear. Nor is it clear to what extent the campaign was formulated by the strongly anti-British faction in Connecticut, to what extent it was the idea of the Green Mountain Boys headquartered at the Catamount Tavern in Bennington. What is clear is that the rebels moved north, managed to get a few dozen men across Lake Champlain (they had considerable trouble finding a boat and the one they found was quite small). In a dawn attack, Ticonderoga was taken from the small British garrison that held it and who were apparently not aware that the war had started. Allen/Arnold's rebels also quickly captured forts at Crown Point, Fort Ann on Isle La Motte near the present Canadian border, and (temporarily) the town of St John (now Saint-Jean-sur-Richelieu, Quebec). The huge stores of cannon and powder seized at Ticonderoga allowed the American rebels to break the stalemate at the siege of Boston, which caused the British to evacuate the city in March 1776.

Imprisonment

The Green Mountain Boys elected Allen's cousin, Seth Warner, as leader;

however, Allen commanded small militia in the American rebels' campaign in Quebec in 1775. As a result of miscommunication or misjudgment, he attacked Montreal with a handful of men and was captured by the British. He was shipped to England where he was imprisoned in Pendennis Castle, Cornwall, and suffered considerable mistreatment. On May 3, 1778, Ethan Allen was marched to a sloop in the harbor at New York, in which he was taken to Staten Island. There, he was admitted to General Campbell’s quarters. Allen was invited to eat and drink with the general and several other British field officers, and treated for two days in a polite manner. On the third day Allen was exchanged for Colonel Archibald Campbell, who was conducted to the exchange by Colonel Elias Boudinot, the American commissary general of prisoners appointed by General George Washington. On the fourth day, the general took him prinsoner again, and charged him with treason to the Patriots.

Charges of treason

Allen then moved back to Vermont, which had become a hotbed of malcontent, harboring little affection for either England or for the nascent United States. Vermont was also harboring a significant number of deserters from the armies of both. Allen settled a homestead in the delta of the Winooski River in what became the modern city of Burlington. Allen remained active in Vermont politics and was appointed general in the Army of Vermont. In 1778, Allen appeared before the Continental Congress on behalf of a claim by Vermont for recognition as an independent state. Due to the New York (and New Hampshire) claim on Vermont, Congress was reluctant to grant independent statehood to Vermont. Allen then negotiated with the governor of Canada between 1780 and 1783, in order to establish Vermont as a British province, in order to gain military protection for Vermonters. Because of this, the US charged him with treason; however, because the negotiations were demonstrably intended to force action on the Vermont case by the Continental Congress, the charge was never substantiated.

Family

Ethan had five children with his first wife, Mary Brownson (1732 - 1783):

• Loraine (1763 - 1783)
• Joseph (1765 - 1777)
• Lucy Caroline (1768 - 1842)
• Mary Ann (1772 - 1790)
• Permelia (1779 - 1809)

Ethan's marriage to Mary, who was six years older, does not seem to have been particularly happy. Mary died of tuberculosis in 1783, a few months before her eldest daughter.

Frances Montresor Brush Buchanan

Ethan met his second wife, a widow, Frances Montresor Brush Buchanan, in 1784. They married within a few months on February 16, 1784. They had three children:

• Fanny (1784-1819)
• Hannibal (1786-1813)
• Ethan (1787-1855)

Memorials

Sculpture of Ethan Allen at the Vermont State House after Larkin Goldsmith Mead.

Two ships of the United States Navy have been named Ethan Allen in his honor, as well as Fort Ethan Allen, a cavalry outpost, in Colchester and Essex, Vermont. The Spirit of Ethan Allen is the name of a tour boat line in Lake Champlain. The Ethan Allen Express, the Amtrak train line running from New York City to Rutland, Vermont, is also named after him.

A statue of Allen represents Vermont in Statuary Hall in the U.S. Capitol.

Publications

Allen is known to have written the following publications:

• Narrative of Colonel Ethan Allen's Captivity (1779)
• Vindication of the Opposition of Vermont to the Government of New York (1779)
• Reason the Only Oracle of Man, or A Compendious System of Natural Religion (1784) (co-authored with Dr. Thomas Young)

Other Associates

• Dr. Thomas Young, a radical who advocated for independence from Britain, was a mentor for Allen.
• Thomas Rowley was known as his spokesman, the "Bard of the Green Mountains" who "Set the Hills on Fire" for Ethan Allen.

External references

• Allen, Ira, "The Natural and Political History of the State of Vermont." 1798, Charles E. Tuttle Co.: Publishers
• Bellesiles, Michael A. Revolutionary Outlaws: Ethan Allen and the Struggle for Independence on the Early American Frontier. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1993.
• Hall, Henry. Ethan Allen. New York, 1893.
• Holbrook, Stewart H. "Ethan Allen", New York: The MacMillan Company, 1940
• Hoyt, Edwin P. "The Damndest Yankee: Ethan Allen & his Clan". Brattleboro, Vermont: The Stephen Greene Press, 1976.
• Jellison, Charles A. Ethan Allen: Frontier Rebel. Syracuse, NY: Syracuse University Press, 1969.
• Pell, John. Ethan Allen. Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1929.

External links

• Essay on natural religion by Allen: Reason: The Only Oracle of Man, published 1784
• Ethan Allen Homestead and Historical Site
• Statue of Ethan Allen in the United States Capitol