Description:

Revolutionary War

New York Provincial Revolutionary War Council of Safety Encourages Raising of Troops in 1777

 

ROBERT BENSON, Autograph Document Signed, Copy of Resolutions, July 16, 19, 1777, [Albany, New York. 1 p., 8.25" x 12.5." Expected folds; some browning; fire damage to center affecting eight lines of text; reinforced. From the Library of Charles I. Forbes, off the market for 60 years!

 

Complete Transcript:

State of New York.                                          In Council of Safety July 16th 1777   

Resolved that Captain Fredrick Schoonmaker be and he is hereby appointed to raise of Company of Men, similar to the Company, he lately raised and commanded, pursuant to the Resolutions of the late Convention passed the 29th of April last to be under the like Regulations as to Service Pay and Subsistence & to continue in service untill the first Day of Decem[ber] next unless sooner discharged

July 19th

Resolved That Captain [Schoon]maker do enlist the Company [(which were direc]ted to be raised, by the Resolu[tion of the] 16th Instant, to serve till the first Da[y of] December) to serve till the first Day of October next unless sooner discharged.

extract from the Minutes

                                                                                   Robt Benson Secry

Bracketed text missing; supplied from another source.

 

On April 29, 1777, the New York Provincial Congress adopted a set of resolutions for raising two hundred men in Ulster County to serve in the county until July 15. Captains would not be paid until they had enlisted at least twenty-nine men, each armed with a good musket and a sword or tomahawk. The three companies were to be one corps, and the Congress appointed as captains Evert Bogardus, Isaac Belknap, and Frederick Schoonmaker.

 

On July 19, Schoonmaker attended the meeting of the New York Committee of Safety and reported that he had enlisted twenty-three men for two months before becoming aware of the resolution of July 16 that enlistments should be until December 1. He did not know whether the men would consent to serve so long, or whether he could enlist many for that term. The Committee passed the second resolution, reducing the enlistment period, so that it would expire on October 1. The Committee also ordered that Schoonmaker assemble the men he had raised at the courthouse in Kingston to relieve the militia there guarding prisoners.

 

 

Robert Benson (1739-1823) inherited his father’s brewery in 1762 and continued as a brewer for a few years before selling the business. He served as secretary of the New York Provincial Congress in 1775 and 1776, as secretary of the New York Senate from 1777 to 1784, and as aide-de-camp to New York Governor George Clinton. After the war, Benson bought farmland in Brooklyn and settled there. He was the older brother of Founding Father Egbert Benson (1746-1833).

 

Fredrick Schoonmaker (1738-1819) was born in Kingston, New York. He served as a captain in Colonel Johannes Snyder’s New York Regiment (Ulster County Militia) during the Revolutionary War.

 

 

This item comes with a Certificate from John Reznikoff, a premier authenticator for both major 3rd party authentication services, PSA and JSA (James Spence Authentications), as well as numerous auction houses.

 

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