Thomas Hamilton
MSA SC 3520-17284
Biography:
Thomas Hamilton enlisted as a private in Captain Thomas Ewing's Fourth Company, part of the First Maryland Regiment, on January 24, 1776. During this time, the Fourth Company was stationed in Baltimore, training until they departed for New York. [1]
The First Maryland Regiment were the first troops Maryland raised at the beginning of the Revolutionary War. Maryland was more than willing to do its part to recruit the men needed to fill the Continental Army's depleted ranks. A few days after independence was declared, the First Maryland Regiment was ordered to New York so it could join the forces of General George Washington. The regiment arrived there in early August, with the Battle of Brooklyn set between the Continental Army and the British Army, joined by their Hessian allies. [2]
Four days before the Maryland troops departed for New York, Daniel Bowie was promoted to captain of the Fourth Company after Captain Thomas Ewing became a colonel in the Maryland Flying Camp. Hamilton served with Bowie's company at the Battle of Brooklyn in late August 1776. The company was placed at the front of the lines, but was attacked by advancing British soldiers and was unable to "escape in the best manner we possibly could" by crossing the swampy Gowanus Creek. A sergeant of the company, William McMillan, vividly described what happened:
"...On the evening of the 26 August we left New York and landed on Longe Ilsland and the next day we [was] August 27 battle...My captain was killed, first lieutenant was killed, second lieutenant shot through the hand, two sergeants was killed; one in front of me [and] sometime my bayonet was shot off my gunn two corporals killed all belonged to our Company[.] [Our] Captain['s] name was Daniel Bowie from Annapolis...That afternoon my brother and I [and] 50 or 60 of us was taken...[when] we were surrounded by Healanders [Highlanders] on one side, Hessians on the other and the Hessians broke the butts of our guns over their cannon and robbed us of everything we had...and gave us nothing to eat for five days, and then [only] moldy biscuits…blue, mindey [moldy], full [of] bug[s] and rotten." [3]
Eighty one percent of the men in Bowie's company were either killed or captured, even more than the companies of Edward Veazey, Benjamin Ford, Peter Adams, and Barton Lucas, which also suffered heavy losses. This confirmed the assessment of the British Parliament's Annual Register which described how "almost a whole regiment from Maryland…of young men from the best families in the country was cut to pieces" even as the battle brought the men of the Maryland 400 together. [4]
By September, only one sergeant, one drummer, and twelve privates remained, half of whom were sick. At this point, 52 privates and 4 sergeants were needed to complete the regiment, while Bowie and Joseph Butler died in captivity not long after the battle. Numerous soldiers were killed or captured during the battle, meaning that the Fourth Company was nearly wiped out in the battle and never regained its full strength, even by late fall 1776. [5]
One person named Thomas Hamilton enlisted in the First Maryland Regiment in December 1776. He participated in the Battles of Trenton (1777), Princeton (1777), Brandywine (1777), Germantown (1777), Staten Island (1777), and then deserted in March 1778, while the regiment was camped in Wilmington. Although he is the strongest possible candidate for being the Thomas Hamilton from the Fourth Company, nothing can be proven conclusively. [6]
Hamilton's life after the Revolutionary War is unclear. Ultimately, Hamilton's fate is not known.
- Burkely Hermann, Maryland Society of the Sons of American Revolution Research Fellow, 2016.
Notes
[1] Muster Rolls and Other Records of Service of Maryland Troops in the American Revolution, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 18, 11.
[2] Arthur Alexander, "How Maryland Tried to Raise Her Continential Quotas." Maryland Historical Magazine 42, no. 3 (1947), 187-188, 196.
[3] Pension of William McMillan, Revolutionary War Pension and Bounty-Land Warrant Application Files, National Archives, NARA M804, Record Group 15, pension number S. 2806, roll 1697, from Fold3.com
[4] Proceedings of the Conventions of the Province of Maryland, 1774-1776, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 78, 198; Francis B. Heitman, Historical Register and Dictionary of the U.S. Army Vol 1 (Washington: Government Printing Office, 1903), 220; Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 18, 30, 54; Mark Andrew Tacyn, “'To the End:’ The First Maryland Regiment and the American Revolution” (PhD diss., University of Maryland College Park, 1999), 21, 247; Pension of William McMillan.
[5] Tacyn, 4.
[6] Return of the six Independent Companies and First Regiment of Maryland Regulars, in the service of the United Colonies, commanded by Colonel Smallwood, Sept. 13, 1776, National Archives, NARA M804, Record Group 93, Roll 0034, from Fold3.com; Heitman, 112; Tacyn, 17, 83, 161; Roster of Smallwood's Battalion, January 1777, Maryland State Papers, Red Books, MdHR 4573, Red Book 12, p. 66 [MSA S989-17, 1/6/4/5]; Return of the First Regiment of Maryland Regulars in the sevice of the United Colonies Commanded by William Smallwood, Oct. 11, 1776, p. 92-93, National Archives, NARA M804, Record Group 93, Roll 0034, folder 35, from Fold3.com.
[7] Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 18, 117.
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