Their alacrity in
assembling at the common rendezvous has been a matter of wonder ever
since, for nearly all marched on foot, without the assistance of horses
or steam. The writer of these lines had an ancestor who was foremost
among those minutemen hurrying to the defense of liberty, and who, it is
a tradition in his family, ran nearly all the way from Beverly, twenty
miles distant, with his flint-lock on his shoulder. Hence, as all were
equally prompt in leaping at the enemy's throat, Putnam's remarkable
feat was not at the time considered extraordinary.
In a few days our hero was at home again, having been called to Hartford
by the legislators, who were desirous of consulting with their most
experienced warrior, and bestowed upon him the rank and title of
brigadier-general. All these events took place within the space of a
week's time, and before another week had passed Brigadier-General Putnam
was in headquarters at Cambridge, occupying a house which stood within
the present grounds of Harvard University. General Artemus Ward, of
Massachusetts, was commander-in-chief of the forces, having been
commissioned by the Provincial Congress; but Putnam was the greater
favorite with the soldiers, in whose vocabulary (to paraphrase a saying
common at the time) "the British were the Philistines, and Putnam, the
American Samson, a chosen instrument to defeat the foe.
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