Obituary/Biography of General John Stark
The last surviving General of the Revolution



Known as the "Hero of Bennington"
for his service at the Battle of Bennington in 1777

Taken From the Gettysburg Compiler (Gettysburg, Pennsylvania)
May 29, 1822 Page 4

Death of General Stark
From the New Hampshire Patriot, May 13 [1822]

The immortal Stark is no more! He surrendered his mighty soul to the God who gave it, on Wednesday, May 8, 1822, aged 93 years, 8 months and 24 days; his last illness was short by extremely distressing – fourteen days previous to his death, he sustained, as was supposed, a paralytic shock, which discovered itself in choking and inability to swallow while eating; after this he ate no more; and during his remaining time, he was speechless, although it was apparent to his watchful friends and relations who stood around him, that he retained his senses to the last. – Until the last attack, he had ever been able to walk about the house, and in pleasant weather out of doors.

His funeral obsequies were attended by a large concourse of people at his late residence in Manchester, on the bank of the Merrimack, on Friday last. Rev. Dr. Dana, on Londonderry, addressed the Throne of Grave in a fervent and excellent prayer. His remains were interred with military honors in the cemetery which without a few years had been enclosed at his own request; it is situated on a mound being the second rise from the river, and can be seen for a distance of four or five miles up and down the Merrimack.

John Stark was born at Londonderry, N. H., Aug. 18, 1728, old style, corresponding with Aug. 17, N. S. His father was a native of Scotland, and was educated at the University of Edinburgh; married in Ireland and emigrated to America at the beginning of the last century. He made his first settlement at Londonderry, but soon after removed to Derryfield (now Manchester,) and settled on the east bank of the Merimack, near Amoskeag Falls. On the breaking out of the seven years war, John Stark, then 21 years of age, his brother William, Amos Eastman of this town, and John Stinson, of Londonderry, while out on a hunting excursion on the upper branches of this river, were surprised by the Indians. Stinson was killed on the spot; Eastman and John Stark were taken prisoners, and William Stark escaped. Stark was conducted by the Indians to St. Francois, and from thence to Montreal, where, after remaining four months in captivity, he was purchased by Mr. Wheelright, of Boston, and returned home by way of Albany. Soon after he engaged a company of Rangers, of whom he was first commissioned lieutenant, and afterwards Captain. Here he found a field suited to his daring and adventurous spirit – he remained in this service until the close of that war, during which he retained the confidence and friendship of the British General, Lord Howe, until the death of that nobleman, who was killed while storming the French lines.

In that sanguinary and doubtful contest Stark was always found cautious on a march, vigilant in camp, and undaunted in battle – and it was probably owing to the experience he here acquired, that invariable success attended, so far as he was concerned, his battles of the subsequent revolution, which separated these States from Britain.

At the close of the French war he returned to his father’s house, was soon after married, and remained in the enjoyment of domestic life, until the report of the battle of Lexington spread, like an electric shock, through the country. When this report reached Stark, he was at work in his saw mill at Amoskrag Falls: he stopped his mill, went immediately to his house, took his musket, and with a band of heroes proceeded to Cambridge. The morning after his arrival, he received a colonel’s commission, and in less than two hours he enlisted eight hundred men!

On the memorable 17th of June, at Breed’s Hill, the British soldiers first felt the destructive hand of the backwoodsmen of New Hampshire. Stark, during the whole of this engagement, evinced the most consummate bravery and intrepid zeal for his county, and his name and heroism will live forever in the annals of that eventful period. The night after this battle, the works on Winter Hill were commenced, and so zealous were the soldiery, that on the morrow they presented a bold and commanding front, that kept the British in awe, and prevented further depredations.

After the British evacuation of Boston, Stark went to the northern posts to assist the retreating army from Quebec. On the arrival of the army at Ticonderoga, the important pair of Mount Independence assigned to his command, and the arduous task of fortifying that peninsula. After the British quit the lakes, he joined General Washington in Pennsylvania, preparatory to the battle of Trenton. And here it may be important to notice an event which was related on the day of his funeral by a venerable companion in arms then present, and in whose veracify the most implicit reliance may be place.

It is well known that, just previous to this important action, the American army was on the point of being broken up by suffering, desertion and the expiration of the term of enlistment of a great portion of the troops. A few days previous, the term of the New Hampshire troops expired: Stark was the first to propose a re-engagement for six weeks – he, for the moment, left his station as commander, and engaged as recruiting officer; and it is added that not a man failed to re-engage. He led the van of that attack – and the event is well known. Seven days after he was with Gen. Washington at Trenton, when Lord Cornwallis with 12,000 men nearly hemmed them in: by consummate address the impending fate of the Americans was avoided. Washington fell on the enemy’s rear at Princeton, and so broke up the British plans, that the enfeebled American army was enabled to turn to hem up the British in the environs of New York.

In 1777, the overwhelming force of Burgoyne drove the Americans from their strong post at Ticonderoga – universal alarm prevailed in the North at the rapid approach of the British. Stark was found ready to meet and conquer them. He voluntarily marched to Vermont, and at the head of undisciplined, but ardent troops, he immortalized his name by planning and consummating the attack at Bennington – the most extraordinary and least expected event of the whole revolution, in which two different corps of British, Hessian and Indian “invincibles” were attacked and beaten in rapid succession, the first in their redoubts, and the second while coming up to the relief of the other. This victory, from a state of the lowest depression, inspired Americans with the highest confidence; Stark, with myriads of other volunteers, joined Gen. Gates at Saratoga, and by his exertions aided in the overthrow of Burgoyne. He was of the convention which negotiated the British surrender, but was decidedly averse to any other treaty than a surrender at discretion.

The following year the northern frontier was assigned to his command with a feeble force; still, his old friends, the militia, prompt at his call, presented such an attitude as secured the frontier from assault. In ’79 he was at Rhode Island, and principally employed with Gen. Gates in surveying the country from Riverton to Point Judith to guard against attack. Late in the season, however, he joined Washington with the northern army, who was enabled to make good his winter quarters. In the year ’80 he was with Washington at Morristown and in the battle of Springfield; that season terminated with Gen. Lincoln’s disaster at Charleston and the treason of Arnold. In ’81 he again had charge of the northern department, and kept the enemy in close quarters with a small body of militia; the surrender of Cornwallis this year closed the war.

For the materials of this hasty sketch, our obligations are due to Major Caleb Stark, his eldest son, who participated with his illustrious father in many of the perils of the revolution.

At the conclusion of the war, Gen. Stark, like the Roman Cincinnatus, retired to the pursuits of domestic life, mingling with the industrious and hardy ycomanry of New England, and aspiring to none of the honors or emoluments of public office, but reaping, in common with his countrymen, the fruits of that immortal struggle, which made us a free people. For the last few years of his life he enjoyed a pecuniary bounty from government – a few will offering of the nation to one of its most distinguished defenders.

Such was Gen. Stark – the last surviving general officer of the revolution – the first and most intrepid hero of our State, of whom she may justly boast as unsurpassed in cool and determined bravery. He has gone the way of all the living. His character in private life was unblemished – His manners were frank and artless, though tinged with an eccentricity peculiar to his family alone. To sum up all, he was that humblest work of God’s – an Honest Man.” [Submitted by Nancy Piper]

Note: In 1809, a group of Bennington veterans gathered to commemorate the battle. General Stark, then aged 81, was not well enough to travel, but he sent a letter to his comrades, which closed "Live free or die. Death is not the worst of evils." The motto Live Free or Die became the New Hampshire state motto in 1945. Stark and the Battle of Bennington were later commemorated with the 306-foot tall Bennington Battle Monument in Bennington, Vermont.

©2007 Kim Torp