But the culmination of all the secret machinations and open preparations was at hand. April 20, at a town-meeting, votes were passed to pay wages to the minute-men for what they had done; “to encourage them in perfecting themselves in the Military Art,” provision was made for “practicing one half-day in each week.”
The voters could hardly have left the meeting-house, when the sound of a galloping horse was heard, and the hoarse call, “To arms! To arms!” broke upon the air. The horse bloody with spurring and the rider covered with dust brought the news of Concord and Lexington. The half-day drills had done their work. Before the clock in the meeting-house steeple struck the midnight hour, fifty minute-men, under Captain Jonas Locke, Lieutenant Thomas Bardwell and Lieutenant Joseph Stebbins, were on the march to Cambridge. This company was soon broken up; Captain Locke entered the Commissary Department, while Lieutenant Stebbins enlisted a new company, with which he assisted General Putnam in constructing the redoubt on Bunker Hill, and in its defense the next day, the ever-glorious 17th of June. One Deerfield man was killed and several were wounded.
Independence Day should be celebrated, in Deerfield, June 26, for on that day in 1776 the town
“Voted that this Town will (if ye Honorable Congress shall for ye safety of ye United Colonies declare them INDEPENDENT of ye Kingdom of Great Britain) Solemnly Engage with their LIVES and FORTUNES to Support them in yt Measure, and that ye Clerk be directed to make an attested copy of this Vote and forward ye same to Mr. Saxton, Representative for this town, to be laid before the General Court for their Information.”
Here was treason proclaimed and recorded, and every voter was exposed to its penalty. Ten days later the Continental Congress issued the world-stirring Declaration of Independence.
On Burgoyne’s invasion in 1777 a company under Captain Joseph Stebbins and Lieutenant John Bardwell marched for Bennington. They were too late for the battle at Walloomsack, and found the meeting-house filled with Stark’s Hessian prisoners. But they had their share in the work and glory of rounding up and capturing the proud soldiers of Burgoyne.
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