John Strong (1738 - 1816)

Born 16 Aug 1738 in Salisbury, Litchfield, Connecticut

Ancestors

Husband of Agnes (McClure) Strong — married 2 Sep 1759 in Litchfield, Connecticut

Descendants

Died 16 Jun 1816 at age 77 in Addison, Vermont, United States

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Biography

John is the son of Noah and Deborah (Gleason) Strong. On 2 Sept 1759, John married Agnes McClure, only daughter of John McClure of Edinburgh, Scotland^[1]. John McClure was implicated in the "1715 Jacobite Rebellion" and fled Scotland.

In 1766, John Strong, his wife, and 3 young children removed to Addison, Vermont, becoming one of the first families to settle there. On 14 Jun 1766, just 4 months after the family arrived, John, Jr. became the first English child born in Addison. Among the children of John and Agnes are:

• Asa, b. 01 Aug 1760 in Litchfield, Conn.; d. 26 Jan 1833
• Gen. Samuel, b. 19 Jul 1762 in Litchfield, Conn; d. 5 Dec 1832
• Mary, "Polly", b. 28 Jul 1764 in Litchfield, Conn.; m. Ezekiel Payne of Franklin, NY; d. Feb 1830
• John, b. 14 Jun 1766 in Addison, Vt; d. 30 Apr 1807
• Luke, b. 16 Aug 1768; d. 5 Apr 1807;
• Electa, b. 16 Nov 1770; m. Seth Storrs; d. 15 Mar 1842
• Moses, b. 1772; m. 1) Lucy Maria Smith and 2) Harriet Woodbridge Hopkins, daughter of Enoch Woodbridge; d. 29 Sept 1842
• Chloe, b. 08 Jul 1774; m. John Herriman;
• Cyrus, b. 16 May 1777; d. Apr 1844
• Mabel, b. 1782 in Dorset, Vt.;
• Noah, b. 8 Mar 1785 in Addison, Vt.; d. 28 Mar 1785
• Sidney, (adopted) b. 26 May 1793; d. 25 Nov 1855

On August 6, 1776 John, enlisted in the Army to fight the Revolutionary War. He served as private and commissary. On October 10, 1776 he received a commission as Captain in Colonel Ira Allen’s Regiment, "Companies of the Range".^[2]

During the American Revolution, John was captured by a party of the British and loyalist Indians and imprisoned. Sometime later, he was paroled by General Frazer but, since his farm had been taken by the British, the Strong family moved to Dorset where they took over the farm of Asa Baldwin who had recently been imprisoned for being a British loyalist. While in Dorset, John Strong represented the town in the Vermont House of Representatives from 1779 to 1782. From 1781 to 1782 he served as Assistant Judge of Bennington County.

In 1783 he returned to Addison where he represented the town in the Vermont House from 1784 to 1787 and serving as Speaker in 1786. He was elected Judge of the Addison County Court in 1785 and, from 1786 to 1801, he served as Judge of Probate and member of the Governor's Council. In October of 1791, John resigned as Brigadier General of the 4th (6th) Brigade of the Militia of Vermont to take a vacancy in the House.^[3] Strong was also a member of the convention that ratified the U.S. Constitution and resulted in statehood for Vermont.

The John Strong House

In the 1790s, Strong built a home in Addison to replace his original home, which had been destroyed by the British during John Burgoyne's advance from Canada during the Revolution. The " General John Strong Mansion" was home to 5 generations of the Strong family. Today, the house is a museum operated by the Vermont chapter of Daughters of the American Revolution.

Sources

1. ↑ Vermont Vital Records, 1760-1954
2. ↑ United States Rosters of Revolutionary War Soldiers and Sailors, 1775-1783
3. ↑ Vermont: Records of the Governor and Council of the State of Vermont , Page 15

• "John Strong's Wikipedia Page"
• "John Strong Family Papers"
• Benjamin Woodbridge Dwight, The History of the Descendants of Elder John Strong, of ..., Volume 2. Pages 1015-1017
• "General John Strong's Story"
• Vanderpoel, Emily Noyes. Chronicles of A Pioneer School, from 1792 to 1833 (University Press, Cambridge, Mass., 1903) Page 294.
• United States Rosters of Revolutionary War Soldiers and Sailors, 1775-1783
• United States Revolutionary War Rolls, 1775-1783
• United States Census, 1790
• Vermont Vital Records, 1760-1954
• Find A Grave Memorial # 48059955