Middlebury register. (Middlebury, Vt.) 1886-1937, 1902-01-24
! THE BATTLE OF
! LAKE CHAMPLAlN.

A recent number of The Outlook
contains an exceedingly interesting arti-
Gle by j. E. Tuttle, describing an inter-
view with the venerable Benajah Phelps,
who as Mr.. Tuttle believes and as is
probable, is the only surviving eyewit-
ness of the Battle of Pittsburgh. The
article is headed by striking likeness OF
Mr.. Phelps taken on his last birthday,
March "a, 1901, when he reached the age
of 1Ol years, still retaining his hearing,
his eyesight, and his mental powers. He
ia, as we suppose, son OF Benajah
! Phelps, who was one of the early settlers
/ on the island of Grand Isle, and who
died at the age of 92, having raised
family of Is sons and daughters who
grew to be men and women and good
citizens. He, the present Benaiah, is
residing in the state of Colorado. He
voted for president in the last national
election, and we hope we will survive to
vote again. His account of the battle of
September IL, 1914, slightly condensed
from the columns Of The Outlook, is
as follows:
"Remember the battle of Lake Cham
plain? Well, guess do. just the same
as if it was yesterday. 1t was the
eleventh of Sept, 1914. You see, was
raised right there. Yes, | was quite
boy then. Let's see-I was about thir-
teen or fourteen years old. Yes, yes,
that was good while ago; but, some
how, it don't seem so very long ago,
either. was born March 81, 1900, on
South Island. That's one of the islands
in Lake Champlain. Father was a
farmer. He had farm of one hundred
and sixty acres on South Island. 1t was
the old Jerry Green Sawyer place. Colo
mel Tim Allen was our next neighbor,
and Tim Porter was another. That was
a nice farm, too, slopin' from the hills to
the water. We were all home on the
farm that fall. OF course we knew
there was goin' to be a battle. Father
was orderly sergeant in the miishy, and
used to hear him talkin' 1t over with
mother. Well. we knew the British was
comm that day, and, of course, father
had to be with his company. He was
stationed at Plattsburgh, right across
from South Island. | wanted to 90 with
him the worst kind when | knew there
was gon' to be a fight, but father
wouldn't let me. He said that | must
stay at home and look after the women
folks and other things. There was all
the chores to do, and | was the only one
to do it. OF course there was lot of
cows and such. SO | had to stay. 1t
made me feel pretty bad, too. We knew
the battle would be up in the bay, be-
cause they wanted to take Pittsburgh.
You know General Provost started from
Montreal with 10000 soldiers. He cal
c'lated to 90 straight to Washington and
burn every town and city he came TO
That's what he was Gale latin; but
here Mr.. Phelps INDUCED In a chuckle OF
intense satisfaction-"he didn't even gil
through the first county. No, sir! He
didn't. Lost five hundred men, too, and
all his shippin'.
swell, we was watchin', and father
had gone. when, about sunrise, we saw
the masts of the British ships down al
the outlet. | tell yer, it didn't take mt
long to git the team to the door, | hat
had the horses all hitched up long before
sunrise. There wasn't any need for the
women to say, Hurry up, Binajah.'
got mother and my two sisters in the
team and put for Sawyer's Hill, two
> miles away, as fast as could make the
horses 90. That was right opposite
Plattsburgh, and the fight was in TIT
bay, right close down opposite the hill
The hill was called after Uncle Jerry
Sawyer. When we got there, hitche(
the horses to a tree, and we went wher'
we could see everything. There was no
4 much wind, and the Brit h was comm
y up very slowly. There was one biz
sailin' ship. Cap'n Downe was tn
cap'n of the British. Then they had tw'
I sloops more than one hundred feet long
: built in St. Johns. The Eagle and tn
Grower was the two sloops. They ha,
+ been Yankee sloops, but they had BEEF
captured from us while before.
G guess it was about year before. The,
- looked very fine comm up the river
e They had about a dozen row galley
with cannon in each end, and twelv
men to each, six on side. They wer
e town the ships, which had the sails up
because there was so little wind. The
o didn't hurry any, for they calc'lated tn
: land army to reach Pittsburgh abou
v the time they got into the bay, and t
u begin the battle over the town at tn
3, same time they begun the fight on tn
n water. There was about one thousan
d of our soldiers in Plattsburgh, and Ger
eral Provost thought it wouldn't be any
Is thing for his big army to take 'en
Is That's where he made pooty big mis-
take forgot to say the British brough
is their boats up the night before, opposit
'e North Island, in the gut between Mort
and South Island. It's about half a mil
}" wide there and very deep water. Gu
folks stepped around pooty lively whe
d they see the British comm. Our bigges
1t ship was the Saratoga, Cap'n McDonoug
Is was the cap'n. He wasn't exactly cap'I
y though, just then. He was leftenan
D. leftenant commander. He was prt
l. NOTED to cap'n after he beat the British