Person:Phineas Porter (1)

Colonel Phineas Porter in the American Revolution

"Phineas Porter was one of the first to enlist from Waterbury in the service of the patriots; he went forth on June 1, 1775, as captain of the first Waterbury company that served in the war, being with his company on the march toward New York one whole month before General Washington took formal command of the American armv. Captain Porter's company remained three weeks at Fairfield, and on June 27, joined its regiment (commanded by General Wooster) 'below Rye,' where they met Washington and his suite, who 'passed in a genteel manner and there followed him a band of music.'

Captain Porter's Company served at Harlem, Plumb Island, Shelter Island, and at East Hampton. Later it was ordered to Canada, going via Lake Champlain. The troops rowed up the lake by day, and slept in the woods by night, and finally reached Montreal after much suffering from the fatigues of the march and from cold. On the return march, because of the ice in the lake, the men were forced to leave their boats and carry their baggage on their backs, in which condition they reached Ticonderoga. The Waterbury company on their return from Ticonderoga were on the march fourteen days before they reached Norfolk, Conn., where they arrived on December 9, 1775.

Soon after the Canada campaign, Captain Porter served as Major on the staff of Colonel Douglas' regiment in General Wadsworth's brigade of state troops which had been raised in 1776 to reinforce Washington's army at New York. In the retreat from Long Island, Major Porter, who was not then the husband of Melicent Baldwin, was taken prisoner and confined in the noted Sugar House, where he witnessed the barbarity of Cunningham, and only escaped starvation 'by pawning all the silver on his person.' At Stillwater and at Saratoga, Lieutenant Colonel Baldwin, Melicent's father, and Major Porter, her husband, were in active service with their regiment, which was commanded by Col. Thaddeus Cook. Major Porter later was commissioned Colonel of the Twenty-eighth Militia Regiment of Connecticut, which under the old organization had been known as the Tenth Regiment. Col. Baldwin's military career seems to have been entirely confined to this regiment."^[2]

1. ↑ ^{1.0 1.1 1.2} Thomas Porter; Phinehas Porter, in Ward, Anna L. (Anna Lydia); Joseph Anderson; and Sarah J. (Sarah Johnson) Prichard. The Town and City of Waterbury, Connecticut, from the Aboriginal Period to the Year Eighteen Hundred and Ninety-Five. (New Haven, CT: The Price & Lee Company, 1896)
   106Ap.

   "Phineas (Porter), b. Dec. 1, 1739."
   "Phinehas Porter, s. of Capt. Thomas, m. Esther Clark, d. of Thomas, dec'd, July 12, 1770. … Esther d. Mch. 18, 1772, and Major Phineas m. Milliscent Lewis, wid. [of Isaac Booth and d. of Jonathan Baldwin], Dec. 23, 1778. He d. Mch. 9, 1804."

2. ↑ Phineas Porter, in Root, Mary Philotheta. Chapter Sketches, Connecticut Daughters of the American Revolution: Patron Saints. (New Haven, Conn.: Connecticut Chapters, Daughters of the American Revolution, 1901)
   294-95.
3. ↑ ^3.0 3.1 Waterbury Vital Records [NEHGS], in Connecticut, United States. The Barbour Collection of Connecticut Town Vital Records
   236.

   "Porter, … Phineas, s. [Thomas & Mary], b. Dec. 1, 1739 [1:45]"
   "Porter, … Phinehas, d. Mar. 9, 1804 [2:144]"

4. ↑ Col Phinehas Porter, in Find A Grave.