Bennington semi-weekly banner. (Bennington, Vt.) 1894-1902, 1895-05-21
THE FIRST MARTYR OF THE REV.
oLUTIoN.
HE WAS WILLIAM FRENCH OF BRATTLE-
BoRo, SHOT AT WEsTMINIsTER-THE
b GROUNDS ON WHICH THE CLAIM FAIR
LY RESTS, THOUGH HISTORY HAS NOT
GENERALLY RECOGNIZED IT.

| NhOUNDS ON WHICH THE CLAlM FAIR
LY RESTS, THOUGH HISTORY HAS NOT
GENERALLY RECOGNIZED IT.
From Burlington Free Press.I
The Revolutionary War may very prop
erly be considered to date from the first
conflict of bodies of soldiers. This took
place at Lexington. But the Revolution
had broken out before this, and was in
active progress, although it had not be-
| come open war.
The resistance to the opening of the
court at Westminster, vt, on the 18th
of March, 1775, was plainly resistance
to the British government, and it was
part and parcel of the incipient resist
ance to the royal authority, ON the part
of the American colonies.
The first Continental Congress had
met and among other things had agreed
to suspend all commercial intercourse
with the mother country until the. OBJ
| nOXious acts of parliament should be re-
pealed, and had recommended to the
| colonies to have no trade. dealings or in
tercourse with any colony that refused
to accede to the measures of opposition
to the government of England, which
had been recommended by the congress.
All the colonies approved and adopted
these measures, except New York. A
tory majority controlled the New York
assembly at that time and refused to ac-
cede to the measures of the continental
congress or to send delegates to the con-
gresS that was to meet in the following
May. New York as a province and King
George III, were making common cause.
The patriots of the New Hampshire
Grants resisted them both. The men of
Cumberland county which comprised
the territory now occupied by Windham
| and Windsor counties, met in a county
meeting and declared their adhesion to
the measures recommended by the con-
tinental congress and their purpose to
resist all authority opposed to that con-
gress. In furtherance of this
purpose they undertook to
prevent the holding of term of the
county court, which was the instru-
ment of the British ministry to collect
revenue for the crown, by taxation of
the colonists. In this they followed eX-
amples set by the men of some of the
other colonies, who had made violent re-
sistance to the holding of the county
courts. A party of thirty men occupied
the court house at Westminster, to pre-
vent the tory Sheriff from opening it for
the court. The Sheriff came with an
armed posse, read "the Kings proclama-
tom against riots, ordered the party
out of the building, and when they re-
| fused to obey fired into the court house,
wounding ten men, two of them mortal
| ly, one of the latter being William
| French. This could not be called war,
for the patriots who occupied the court
house were not armed with any weapons
of war; but it was revolution, and Will
liam French appears to have been the
first man who yielded his life for the
cause of American Independence.
The stone erected over French's grave
"a slab of slate, brought from Dummers-
ton, erected at the time, and still stand
ing, we believe, though much dilapidat
eds a witness to the fact that the cause
in which he died was resistance to royal
oppression, rather than opposition to the
New York land jobbers." 1t reads
thus:
In memory of William French, son to Mr.. Ma
| thanel French, who was shot at Westminster,
March ye 18th 1915, by the hands of Cruel Minis
terial tools of George, We 3d, in the Court House
at II O'Clock at Night in the 22d year of his age.
Here William French his Body lies
For murder his blood for Vengeance cries.
King George the third his Tory crew
that with baw his head shot threw
For Liberty and his Country Good
He lost his life his Dearest blood.
1t seems to us to be established be-
yOnd controversy that while opposition
to the Workers" contributed to the ex.
citement of the time, and probably en-
tered into the motives which led the men
of Cumberland county to resist the open
ing of the court, their action was mainly
a resistance to the royal authority, which
they in common with the patriots of the
other colonies were preparing to throw
off; and that being such William French
may properly be called the first martyr
of the American Revolution.
1t may be noted in this connection that
the citizens of Salem, Mass, claim first
blood, for their town, in the Revolution.
On the 26th of February, 1915, a squad
of British soldiers sent from Boston to
Salem, finding draw bridge over which
| they must pass, open, undertook to use
couple of scows to take them past the
draw, and were resisted by the Salem
| bOatmen, on one of whom, it is claimed,
a soldier used his bayonet in the scuffle !;
and it is asserted that this was the first
| blood shed of the Revolutionary conflict.
| But Justin Winsor, who is Boston man,
in his critical History of America, makes
light of this affair, calling it "a little al
| legged pricking of bayonets," while he
cites the massacre at Westminster as an
undoubted instance of resistance to the
British arms, resulting in blOodshod,
previous to the affair at Lexington.