Fairlee preacher penned patriot soldiers’ song

Today is the 250th anniversary of the Battle of Bunker Hill. 

The Journal-Opinion reports some Vermont and New Hampshire angles:

Over 1,500 soldiers from New Hampshire fought in the battle. Several Haverhill men, including John Rine, George Moors, and Joseph Springer, served in Col. Stark’s regiment. 

John Smith, of Hampstead, New Hampshire, survived this early American Revolution battle and later moved to Newbury Vermont where he set up a tavern. More than 35 years after Bunker Hill, Smith answered the call during the War of 1812 to serve in the militia and went to Lake Champlain for the British invasion. Upon his death, he left a tract of land in West Newbury for the village cemetery and the West Newbury Church. 

Another Newbury man, Peter Johnson, who was the brother of famed Newbury Revolutionary War Col. Thomas Johnson, fought and was wounded at Bunker Hill. 

Prior to his arrival in Fairlee and then West Fairlee, Nathaniel Niles was a preacher in Norwich, Connecticut. He was also an accomplished poet and, later in 1775, wrote an ode called “The American Hero” inspired by Bunker Hill. 

“The poem was set to music and almost universally sung in the churches of the eastern states and became the war song of the New England soldiers,” according to the West Fairlee Center Church history.

You can listen to it here.

Feature photo – “The Death of General Warren.”