Colonel Fisher Gay and Other Freedom Fighters

“Feby. 2, 1776. Set off for headquarters to join the Army under the command of General Washington before Boston, and arrived at Roxbury 6th of said month. Stationed at Roxbury with the Regiment I belonged and quartered at Mr. Wyman’s with Colonel Wolcott, and Mr. Perry. Was sent for by General Washington to wait on his excellency 13th of said month, and was ordered by the General to go to Connecticut to purchase all the gunpowder I could….”

-Diary of Colonel Fisher Gay

Col. Fisher Gay went on to fight in Massachusetts and New York in the Second Connecticut Regiment. He died in New York in 1776. Others from Farmington who joined the fight included Deacon Porter, who marched off to the war in his wedding suit; Deacon Samuel Richards, who witnessed with the Third Regiment the execution of British spy John Andre at Gen. George Washington’s headquarters in Tappan, N.Y., in 1780; and Timothy Hosmer, the doctor who pronounced Andre dead.