Militia Fortifications on Rhode Island

At the beginning of the War for Independence, Rhode Island’s active military force consisted of companies of “Train Bands” and independent militias.  According to Edward Field in his book “Revolutionary Defenses in Rhode Island”, they were well equipped and well disciplined.  The members elected their own officers and these were approved by the Rhode Island General Assembly.  Training days were more like a holiday.  Rhode Island Colony law in 1774 stated that each enlisted soldier was required to furnish his own gun and bayonet.  After Lexington and Concord the General Assembly ordered an “Army of Observation” of fifteen hundred men to be raised and they were to drill a half day once every two weeks.  This was the beginning of Rhode Island’s forces in the Continental Army.

The response of the Portsmouth Militia provides an example of how the militias went into action at the start of the war.  From its start Portsmouth and other communities traditionally had a militia.  As war threatened in 1774, the General Assembly ordered monthly drills of all militia companies with full preparations for war.  Portsmouth Militia man David Gifford was a local ferry man and tavern owner.  Since 1772 David Gifford had already been transporting town records and other items to and from Providence with his ferry boat. As the threat of war increased, the town records show that on August 29, 1775 the town voted “that David Gifford Draw the sum of Eighteen shillings out of this Town Treasury . . . for bringing . . . this Town’s Proportion of Powder & Balls from Providence.”

In the opening stages of war in 1775, Portsmouth raised a company of around sixty men to march to the support of Boston with a regiment raised in Newport County.  A group of militia remained on guard at the town while the others were gone. Portsmouth created the fourteen-member volunteer “Artillery Company” and provided it with 115 pounds of powder, 184 pounds of lead and 739 flints (for flintlock muskets). These local minutemen were to “March out to Action” when needed.  When they became part of the 1st Rhode Island Regiment in 1776, the Colony of Rhode Island provided cannons on carriages. In August of 1775, the leaders were Captain John Earl, Lieutenant James Peckham, and Ensign Cook Wilcox. Later artillery company leaders were David Gifford and Burrington Anthony.  By the end of the Revolution almost all Portsmouth men from ages sixteen to sixty except the Quakers had served in the military.

The assembly in Providence called for additional troops and David Gifford was appointed to dole out the bounty of forty shillings to be paid to those who enlisted. Portsmouth was receptive to the calls for additional troops. Town records show that on September 17, 1776 the freemen voted that “seventeen able bodyed men be Enlisted into the servis of this State being the Town’s proportion, and that forty shillings Lawful Money be paid for every such person so Inlisted if they provide themselves with Arms &; Accoutrements and that Capt. David Gifford provide the Money for said use that he be Repayed out of this Town’s Treasury as soon as possible.”

By February 1776 the town meeting ordered their town council to draw up a list of people in town who could not provide their own firearms. The freemen voted 75 pounds lawful money to purchase firearms. A committee of four men was assigned to get the money and purchase twenty small arms. David Gifford, one of the committee, was selected to receive the weapons.

When the British arrived in December of 1776, there were citizens who fled to Tiverton or Bristol. It is likely that David Gifford and his ferry boat left the island. In December of 1776 Rhode Island Records state “It is voted and resolved that Capt. David Gifford be permitted to proceed with a flag of truce to Rhode Island, under the direction of His Honor the Governor, upon his procuring three prisoners of war to exchange for three soldiers lately belonging to his company, and now detained as prisoners on said island.” It would be interesting to know which three of his Portsmouth militia company were part of the exchange.