Warner, Seth
Warner, Seth
WARNER, SETH. (1743–1784). Militia officer. Vermont. Born in Woodbury (later Roxbury), Connecticut, on 6 May 1743, Warner moved with his family to Bennington, Vermont, in 1763 and became a leader of the Green Mountain Boys. On 9 March 1774 he was outlawed by New York, and a reward was offered for his arrest. He took part in the capture of Ticonderoga on 10 May 1775 and occupied Crown Point two days later. At a council held at the latter the next month, he and Ethan Allen were named to ask Congress to create a Green Mountain regiment in the Continental army. Their mission was successful, and on 26 July, Warner was elected commander with the rank of lieutenant colonel.
Returning to Lake Champlain, he joined Montgomery's wing of the Canada invasion and fought at Longueuil on 31 October 1775, defeating a far superior British force. In the retreat from Canada he commanded rear guard actions and also raised reinforcements in Vermont. At Hubbardton on 7 July 1777, his rear guard was surprised and defeated. Rallying his forces, Warner arrived for the final and decisive phase of the Battle of Bennington on 16 August 1777. In October the Green Mountain Regiment joined the forces of General Horatio Gates at Stillwater. On 20 March 1778 he was promoted to brigadier general of Vermont militia, having been given the grade of colonel of one of the Additional Continental Regiments on 5 July 1776. Warner and his regiment spent the rest of the war at various northern outposts. In 1780 he was wounded during a skirmish with Indians on Lake George.
Warner's constant hard service left him in declining health. He and his regiment were retired on 1 January 1783. He died at his home in Woodbury on 26 December 1784.
SEE ALSO Additional Continental Regiments; Bennington Raid; Crown Point, New York; Gates, Horatio; Green Mountain Boys; Hubbardton, Vermont; Longueuil, Canada; Ticonderoga, New York, American Capture of.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Bellesiles, Michael. Revolutionary Outlaws: Ethan Allen and the Struggle for Independence on the Early American Frontier. Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1993.
Chipman, Daniel. The Life of Colonel Seth Warner. Burlington, Vt.: C. Goodrich, 1858.
revised by Michael Bellesiles