New Hampshire Line
New Hampshire Line
NEW HAMPSHIRE LINE. New Hampshire mobilized volunteers to participate in the siege of Boston as soon as news arrived of the fighting at Lexington and Concord, but did not take formal action until the Provincial Congress met on 17 May 1775. Three days later it voted to form 2,000 men into a brigade of three infantry regiments, using most of the volunteers at Boston for the first and completing the two others by new recruiting. The colonels of the regiments were John Stark (for the First New Hampshire Regiment), Enoch Poor (for the Second), and James Reed (for the Third). Nathaniel Folsom was the brigadier general. In 1776 they reenlisted respectively as the Fifth, Eighth, and Second Continental Regiments, respectively, reverting to their old state numerical designations in 1777. The Third Regiment disbanded on 1 January 1781. On 1 March 1783 the First became the New Hampshire Regiment, while the Second was reduced to the New Hampshire Battalion. Those two units were merged on 22 June 1783 as a five-company battalion and disbanded on 1 January 1784 at New Windsor, New York. In addition to the formal New Hampshire Line, the state also furnished three other infantry units to the Continental army. These were employed primarily on the northern frontier: Bedel's Regiment (which operated as rangers) in 1775–1776; Long's Regiment (1776–1777); and Whitcomb's Rangers (1776–1780).
SEE ALSO Lexington and Concord.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Dearborn, Henry. Revolutionary War Journals of Henry Dearborn 1775–1783. Edited by Lloyd A. Brown and Howard H. Peckham. Chicago: Caxton Club, 1939.
Kidder, Frederick. History of the First New Hampshire Regiment in the War of the Revolution. Albany, N.Y.: Joel Munsell, 1868.
Potter, Chandler Eastman. Military History of New Hampshire, from Its Settlement, in 1623, to the Year 1861. 2 vols. Concord, N.H.: Adjutant General's Office, 1866–1868.
Resch, John. Suffering Soldiers: Revolutionary War Veterans, Moral Sentiment, and Political Culture in the Early Republic. Amherst, Mass.: University of Massachusetts Press, 1999.