Genealogy Story – Revolutionary War Service

As a follow-up to my story on my ancestors who served this country in the military (http://ramblinrussells.blogspot.com/2017/11/genealogy-story-serving-their-country.html), I’ve been doing some further research into some of my ancestors who served their country during the Revolutionary War and have found that two of my great*5 grandfathers had service that connected.

My great*5 grandfather, John Russell, was born in Bedford, NY in 1756, but twenty years later had moved a few miles north to Carmel, NY. Although the Declaration of Independence, first signed on July 4, 1776, is typically used to mark the start of the war, it really began in April of 1775 with the encounter in Lexington and Concord. John Russell enlisted on May 1, 1776 in a New York regiment.

The next five months he was engaged in construction activities at Fort Constitution – located right across the Hudson River from West Point. Following this, he served for six months at Peekskill, NY, three months at Red Mills, NY and then his final three months back in Peekskill. During the latter part of his service (August-October 1777) he was under the command of General Israel Putnam (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Israel_Putnam). Although John served for 17 months, he had never been more than 20 miles from his home. [Information taken from John’s pension application submitted in 1833.]

Meanwhile, one of my great*5 grandfathers on my mother’s side, Reuben Frisbie, had enlisted with a Connecticut company. His service lasted from August 1776 until the war ended in 1783. The first three months of Reuben’s service was also under General Putnam and he was located near Fort Montgomery, across the Hudson from where John Russell was located. Reuben’s service took him up and down the Hudson for the next several years, including one winter spent at West Point and another right across the Hudson at “Connecticut Village”. While it is unlikely that John and Reuben ever met, since they were in units from different states, the fact that they were both serving in the same area and under the same general for three months is interesting.

Finally, I should also note that in reading through John’s pension application that he also “signed” with an “X”, indicating that he was illiterate. With that being true for both John and his grandson Silas who signed a Civil War pension application in the same manner (see http://ramblinrussells.blogspot.com/2017/10/genealogy-story-illiterate-ancestors.html), it is also most likely that the other generations of my Russell ancestors before/after John would also have been illiterate, although there are no documents which prove this.