New Hampshire Individuals of Note

John Stark, like his father, was a farmer in Londonderry, New Hampshire, the frontier at the time.  Relations with the Native Americans were deteriorating as the French and English clashed for control of the land.  At age 24 John Stark was captured by an Abenaki raiding party and, the story is, was forced to run a gauntlet between hatchet swinging braves.  He grabbed a stick and began swinging.  His courage so impressed the Abenakis they adopted him, and he lived with them for a period learning the language and skills.  In the French and Indian War (1755-1763) Stark served as Lieutenant of Rogers Rangers formed to protect the borders from raids of Indians and French coming down from Canada.  The Rangers were led by Stark's friend, Robert Rogers of Dunbarton, whose farm had been burned.  They used guerrilla warfare, incorporating the Indian skills of scouting, tracking, destruction of property, and scalping to keep the enemy away from the settled areas.  These were skills Stark had learned well, but which the British never appreciated. 

After the Battles of Lexington and Concord, New Hampshire men and women marched south.  John Stark was made colonel of a New Hampshire Brigade and fought at Bunker Hill (Breeds Hill).  Stark later fought at the Battles of Trenton and Princeton.  Angry at being passed over for promotion by the Continental Congress, Stark resigned and returned to Londonderry in 1777.  When General Burgoyne’s attack in the Hudson River Valley and capture of Fort Ticonderoga threatened to split New England from the other colonies, Stark was made a brigadier general and, with money supplied by John Langdon, raised over 1300 recruits and marched to Vermont.  He stopped the English advance into Vermont at Bennington.  Over 150 prisoners were taken including the British commander, Lt. Col Baum. 

After the battle he held several important posts including commander of the northern border.  He served on the court martial of John Andre, the British soldier who worked with Benedict Arnold to plan the surrender of West Point.  In 1783 John Stark resigned his commission as Major General in the United States Army and returned to farming in New Hampshire.

John Stark was of Scotch descent.  He was born in Londonderry, New Hampshire, and received limited formal schooling.  He learned by doing as his experience as an Indian captive indicates.  In 1758 John Stark married Elizabeth Page who was born in 1737.  Her father was a captain in the New Hampshire militia.  He had built a fort on his property in Dunbarton as a defense against Indian attack. "Betsy" helped guard the fort and met John Stark there while he was serving in Rogers Rangers.  John Stark always called his wife Molly and she has gone down in history as Molly Stark.  After marrying, the Starks built a house in Derryfield (Manchester) near Molly’s father’s and farmed.  They had five boys and six girls one of whom died in infancy.  His oldest son, Caleb, lived with his grandpartents.  After John Stark led forces to Massachusetts in 1775, he wrote describing conditions and inviting Molly to join him.  She did.  Molly and their son, Caleb, age fifteen, fought at Bunker Hill.  Molly was noted for her spirit of adventure and courage.  When not accompanying John with the troops, Molly ran the farm.  After the revolution, they farmed and ran a tavern in Derryfield.  He did not take as active a part in political life as did other leaders of the Revolution.  Molly Stark died of typhoid fever in 1814.  John Stark died in Derryfield at age 94.

It is often difficult to get a sense of what people from the past actually were like.  John Stark appears to have been typical of the many frontiersmen of the 18th and 19th centuries.  An acquaintance, Luther Roby, writing in 1831 described Stark as "about middle size, extremely well proportioned and in his youth remarkable for vigor, activity and (endurance). . . a man of kindness and hospitality which throughout his life he extended to all his broken down companions in arms . . . His manners were frank and open, though tinged with an eccentricity, peculiar to himself and useful to society.  (He had) the reputation of a man of honor and integrity, friendly to the industrious, and enterprising -- severe to the idle and unworthy. . ." Seventy years after Stark's death, US Senator Dr. Jacob Gallinger (NH) described him as "Plain in appearance, awkward in manner, untrained in the arts of social life, uneducated and brusque" and went on to say, "Stark’s features were bold and prominent, his nose well formed, the eyes light blue, keen and piercing . . . under projecting brows.  His lips were tightly compressed." We believe one portrait was done of Stark while he was alive (1816 by Samuel F. B. Morse).  It shows an older man with some of these facial characteristics.

WOK

Roby, Luther.  Memoir of John Stark 1831 (reprinted in Reminiscences of the French War).  Freedom, NH: Freedom Historical Society, 1988.

Stark, Caleb.  Memoirs and Official Correspondence of General John Stark.  Bowie, MD: Heritage Press, 1999 (reprint of 1877 edition).

"Stark Papers."  Manuscripts.  Concord, NH: New Hampshire Historical Society.