Israel Putnam

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Gene. Maj. Israel Putnam

Israel Putnam (born January 7, 1718 in Salem Village (today: Danvers ), Province of Massachusetts Bay , † May 29, 1790 in Brooklyn , Connecticut ) was an American general in the American Revolutionary War .

Life

Israel Putnam's birthplace in Danvers, Massachusetts

In 1740 Putnam moved northeast to Connecticut from Massachusetts. During the French and Indian War (1754–1763) he served in the British Crown with Rogers' Rangers . He was captured and saved from being burned on the torture stake by being exchanged for a French prisoner. He led a regiment in the attack on Fort Ticonderoga in 1759 and on Montreal in 1760.

In 1762 he was one of the few survivors of a shipwreck during the conquest of Havana from the Spanish. On the return trip from Cuba, he probably brought the first cigars back to his home in Connecticut, where pipes were only smoked up to now. In 1766 he was elected to the Connecticut Provincial Assembly in the context of the Stamp Act dispute and was one of the founders of the Connecticut Sons of Liberty Society .

At the beginning of the American Revolutionary War (1775–1783) Putnam led a regiment of the Connecticut militia. After the skirmishes in Lexington and Concord , he led the militia to Boston as a brigadier and was promoted with Ward , Lee and Schuyler to the first major generals of the insurgent army, which was their highest rank at the time. He fought in the battles of Bunker Hill (1775) and Long Island (1776). After his defeat on Long Island, he was used by Commander-in-Chief George Washington for recruitment purposes. In 1777 he was again given a command during the Saratoga campaign . At the end of 1779 he was paralyzed in a stroke , which ended his military career.

Putnam died in Brooklyn / Connecticut in 1790, where he was buried. In 1888 his remains were immured in a sarcophagus in the foundation of a newly erected monument in Brooklyn. His headstone is now in the State Capitol in Hartfort, Connecticut, USA, which was built in 1879.

About ten places and counties in the USA are named after Israel Putnam. Christian Friedrich Daniel Schubart erected a memorial to him in his “Freedom Song of a Colonist” in 1775 with the lines: Ha, Father Putnam directs the storm / And shares danger with us; / We shine like a pharus tower / His silver hair! .

literature

Web links

Commons : Israel Putnam  - album with pictures, videos and audio files