229 Years Ago: New Hampshire’s Sullivan seizes Fort William and Mary

Widely considered the first military engagement of what eventually became the American Revolution, it provided the colonists with a valuable store of war materiel and sent John Sullivan on to a celebrated military and political career.
Sullivan was born in Somersworth, Strafford County, N.H., Feb. 17, 1740. His father, also named John, had emigrated from County Limerick in 1723, accompanied by his Cork-born mother, Margery Browne. Sullivan grew up to become a lawyer and leader in the local militia.
New Hampshire, like the other twelve colonies, was in 1774 a place alive with the ferment of rebellion. In the spring, the New Hampshire colonial assembly had refused to vote the funds necessary to supply the British soldiers stationed at Fort William and Mary. Then in July, the town of Portsmouth became aroused when word got out that 27 chests of tea had — in defiance of the colonial boycott against British tea — arrived secretly at a local merchant’s warehouse. Public pressure forced the merchant to send the tea to Canada. Tensions continued to rise through the summer and fall with more tea sent away and frequent meetings of the Sons of Liberty and Committee of Correspondence (the latter for the purposes of communicating with like-minded groups in other colonies). By mid-November the British governor was reporting to London a mood of rising discontent throughout New Hampshire and growing support for the Continental Congress.
Discontent turned to action on Dec. 13 when Paul Revere arrived with a message from Boston’s Committee of Correspondence. It warned Portsmouth’s committee of word that British troops were on the way to reinforce Fort William and Mary.
Immediately the patriots of Portsmouth swung into action. The Sons of Liberty were summoned and placed under the leadership of Major Sullivan. At midday on Dec. 14, he led several hundred men to the fort and demanded entry. Inside were only a handful of British regulars under the command of one Captain Cochran (likely, given his name, an Irishman himself). They refused and fired warning shots but everyone knew it was a token gesture of resistance against overwhelming odds. Sullivan ordered an assault and his men broke through the main gate and took the fort with no loss of life.
Aware that British reinforcements might arrive at any moment, Sullivan and his men moved quickly to secure their prize: the fort’s five tons of gunpowder. Within an hour the booty was on its way up river to Sullivan’s farm in Durham where it was carefully hidden. Sullivan returned to the fort on the 15th and with his men removed all the remaining cannon and small arms which were then stashed in Durham. What they might need this materiel for they did not know, but keeping it out of British military hands was seen as a victory in itself.
Events moved quickly in the coming months as relations between the British government and the American colonies rapidly deteriorated. April 1775 brought the famed fight at Lexington and Concord. Two months later came the clash at Bunker Hill, a battle in which the colonial cause was greatly helped by five tons of gunpowder brought from Sullivan’s farm. One year later, as the violence escalated, representatives to the Continental Congress issued the Declaration of Independence, announcing the end of the union between England and the colonies. Now all they had to do was win that independence on the field of battle against the world’s most formidable army and navy.
John Sullivan did his part in that struggle. He received a commission from the Continental Congress as a brigadier general and served under Washington in the siege of Boston and the disastrous campaign in New York. In the latter, Sullivan was captured along with thousands of Continental Army soldiers during the Battle of Long Island. Exchanged soon thereafter for a British general, he rejoined Washington in time to play a crucial role in the victory at Trenton, N.J., in December 1776. Sullivan remained with the army for three more years, during which time he endured the hard winter at Valley Forge and led a harsh campaign against the Iroquois (allies of the British) in upstate New York. Ill health forced him to resign his commission in 1779.
After leaving the army, Sullivan again served in the Continental Congress. He returned to New Hampshire in 1782 and began an active life in state politics, serving twice as governor. In 1789 he was named a federal district judge, but declining health forced him to retire from public life later that year. Sullivan died in 1795 at the age of 54.