Ethan Allen, Part 1

Ethan Allen was a huge personality, a founder of Vermont, and an important figure in the Revolutionary War. His story also includes some fascinating side-notes, and some missteps which may account for his hazy spot in historical lore. Read the show notes here.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome to Stuff You Missed in History Class from how
Stuff Works dot com. Hello, and welcome to the podcast.
I'm Holly Fry Tracy Wilson, and this is actually going
to be a two parter, and it is a listener request,
and it is a subject that has been requested by

(00:22):
several people throughout the years. And then recently, when I
was at Dragon Con, I met a listener of ours
named Terry and he asked for it too, and he
was really really excited about it. Uh, and it got
me thinking about it some more again. Even though it's
been on the list, you know, sometimes you get reminders.
And then I was thinking about whether or not it
was a good topic. And in addition to listener interest,

(00:46):
I did some very non scientific polling and I mentioned
the name of this person around the office and with
my friends and family, and boy was I shocked because
none of them really knew much about the person that
we're talking about today. Even his name is a household
name that everyone knows and recognizes. Uh. If you have
spent any time in Vermont, you probably know a good

(01:07):
bit about Ethan Allen because he's very central to Vermont's story.
But sadly too many his name is only associated with
the Huge Furniture Company, which is no disparity to the um.
Not to disparage the Huge Furniture Company, but that's sort
of eclipsed any actual historical record for a lot of people,
and some people even think he was a carpenter as

(01:28):
a consequence, he was not like the furniture guy, and
I'm like, not really the furniture name appropriation. Yeah, but
he was a huge personality. He was a founder of Vermont,
and he was a very important figure in the Revolutionary War.
His story also includes some fascinating and sort of wacky
side notes and some missteps, which may account for sort

(01:51):
of why he is not a more prominent figure in
American historical lore. So we are going to cover Ethan
Allen in his really very fascinating life. Ethan was born
on January twenty one, thirty eight in Litchfield, Connecticut. He
was the oldest of eight children born to Joseph and
Mary Allen, and shortly after Ethan was born, their family

(02:14):
moved to Cardwall, Connecticut. So Ethan was the only one
of the Allen children's who have been born in Lichfield.
His five brothers were Hem and heber Levi, Zimri and Ira,
and his two sisters were Lydia and Lucy. All of
the children lived to adulthood, which, as we often comment
on with surprise, is surprising. Yeah, but apparently that that

(02:38):
Alan blood was healthy. Ethan was very into philosophy and
learning as a kid, and he was eventually sent to
study under Reverend Jonathan Lee and Salisbury, Connecticut to prepare
for studies at Yale. He was really, by his father's plan,
on track to become an educated man. However, um the

(03:00):
world kind of put a spanner in the works. His
father died shortly after this plan began, and that meant
that Ethan had to care for the family farm at
the age of seventeen, and his plans for higher education
were pretty much cut short at that point. In seventeen
fifty seven, just two years after Ethan became the head
of the household, he felt the pull of duty and
enlisted to fight in the French and Indian War. He

(03:22):
wasn't called to combat, though, and he returned home unscathed.
Ethan married Mary Brownson in seventeen sixty two, and he
was just twenty four, and Mary was actually six years
older than him, and he had met Mary because he
hauled grain for her father. Uh. And this match uh
does not sound like it was especially happy. So whereas

(03:43):
Ethan was fascinated by learning, uh, he was also a
bit impulsive, you know, kind of as you said, a
big figure, a big personality, and he liked to drink
and party a little bit. Mary is usually characterized as
being very prim and quite reserved and even stern. Uh
So in terms of their personalities. Of times, those kinds
of things will balance out, but it seems like it
really made for some conflict there. Uh. But the couple

(04:06):
settled in Salisbury, where Ethan had partial ownership and an
iron works. Despite their differences, the two had five children
together over the course of their twenty year marriage. Their daughter, Lorraine,
was born the year after the wedding in seventeen sixty three.
They had a son, Joseph, who was born in seventeen
sixty five, and then another daughter, Lucy Caroline, who was

(04:27):
born in seventeen sixty eight. Daughter number three was Mary
Anne and was born in seventeen seventy two. Their fourth daughter, Pamela,
was born in seventeen seventy nine. Uh. And we're jumping
ahead in time a bit, but four years after Pamela
was born, So in seventeen eighty three, Mary actually died
of consumption, and then their eldest daughter, Lorraine, also died

(04:51):
of consumption just a few months later. But that is,
as we said, we're jumping forward, but we'll circle back
to kind of that part of his life. While living
in Salisbury, connectic It, Ethan became friends with Thomas Young
m D. So Young was educated and was really happy
to discuss politics and philosophy with Ethan, and the two
of them had a lot of talks about the writing
of Thomas Hobbes and John Locke, and it was locks

(05:14):
work really that exposed Ethan Ellen to the concepts of
the three unalienable rights of life, liberty, and property that
we're at the center of revolutionary Republican ideology. So locks
writing and Hobbs's writing were really inspiring to many of
the American revolutionaries. The two of them also talked about
medicine in the course of their friendship. One of the

(05:36):
things they discussed touches on our Edward Jenner episode it
was smallpox vaccination. The idea of introducing infective material into
a healthy body is a way to ward off or
cure disease, as we talked about in that episode, was
basically viewed as heresy at the time. Uh not everywhere,
but particularly in their community. It was really frowned upon

(05:57):
as some suspicious business to try to cure thing with
a thing. But allan believing the logic of in grafting,
which is what this was called. This introduction to be sound,
insisted that doctor Young publicly administer a controlled dose of
the smallpox virus to him through vary elation so that
they could prove once and for all that this process worked.

(06:19):
And Dr Young was willing, and the procedure was performed
on the steps of the Salisbury Meeting House on a
Sunday in seventeen sixty four. The two men were both
really known as free thinkers, which just didn't sit well
at all with the many members of the community. Additionally,
the procedure that the two of them had publicly displayed
was not just considered to be the devil's work, it

(06:41):
was illegal because it had not been approved by the
town selectman. And there was some pretty significant fallout for
the two of them from this little demonstration of science
and medicine. Young, who up to that point had really
had a very successful medical practice. Uh and you know,
was a well respected doctor. Found that after they did

(07:03):
this little variolation display, his patient load pretty quickly dwindled. Um.
He eventually had to move his practice to another town.
Although you may recognize his name because he did make
history uh later on, not as a doctor, but as
a revolutionary. He went on to become one of the
pivotal participants in the Boston Tea Party, and he was

(07:25):
significant in that and that he was one of the
few men who refused to wear a disguise during that protest.
Ethan's reputation really suffered while he successfully talked his way
out of this blasphemy charged that he faced. He had
a really cantanker his personality that had already alienated a
lot of people in the community, and the stunt with
young in the very elation did not help. Yeah. He uh,

(07:50):
you know he actually there's I read one account that
suggested that he was actually charged with a lesser thing.
He was charged with blasphemy because when they came to
get him on the steps, he kind of cursed out
the town leaders and they arrested him for that rather
than for performing this medical procedure without permission, but I

(08:12):
was not able to confirm that um and as though
just to cement his identity as sort of town troublemaker.
After this whole varilation incident happened. The following year, Ethan
was selling his part of the iron Works to a
man named George Caldwell, and the terms of sale became

(08:33):
a little bit contentious, and this disagreement escalated at the
point where there was a skirmish in public in which
Ethan Allen stripped naked and physically attacked Caldwell, and he
ended up find for this behavior. I'm not sure why
he stripped naked, but that is part of the story.

(08:54):
It seems like if you're gonna fight a guy, you
might want to have the protection of clothing, you would think.
The only thing I can think of is if he
just wanted to prove like he had nothing. There was
no you know, sort of weaponry. He just wanted a
bare knuckle fair fight. It's still a little bit odd.
But before we get to sort of where he goes
after this, after he's really kind of become this town troublemaker,

(09:18):
do you want to have a word from a sponsor
sure to return to Ethan Allen. As the seventeen seventies began,
Ethan found himself with no ill income, and he was
grieving the loss of his recently deceased sister, Lydia and
caring for his ailing mother, who had suffered a stroke
right after Lydia's death. Yeah, and keep in mind he
had also made himself possibly the most unpopular man in town,

(09:40):
and so in search of new opportunities, he decided to
strike out for the Green Mountains of the New Hampshire Grants.
This is the territory that is present day Vermont. Many
families were moving to the grants in an effort to
secure land for their families and thus sort of have
a um a secure future for them. But there was
a little bit of a problem in that this land

(10:02):
was tied up in a debate over who actually had
rights to it. The Governor of New Hampshire, Benning Wentworth,
had been selling land parcels for a low price to speculators,
although King George had ruled in seventeen sixty four that
New York had the rights to the land. As the
fighting went on, there were threats the landowners were going
to have to pay the Yorkers for the rights to

(10:24):
the land that they already thought they owned, and tensions
over this were incredibly high. Yeah, we've done other episodes
on sort of uh land grabs and people trying to
place claims on land and how contentious it can be,
and this was really really like a hot bed of argument.
And so when Ethan Allen arrived on the scene, he

(10:44):
was pretty passionate and open about his disdain for the
Yorkers and his ideology that the prospectors who had gone
to the grants really deserved the opportunity to ensure their
family security through land ownership. Uh. He was a natural leader.
I cannot say those two words together without thinking about
Han Solo because princessly it calls him that, having nothing

(11:05):
to do with Ethan Allen. But so Ethan Allen was
a natural leader, and he really excelled at convincing people
to see his point of view as the correct one.
So he was really gaining ground with people that have
been on the fence. So we're saying, like, no, these
New Hampshire grants need to be given to people that
are striking out and starting their families and trying to
secure a family legacy, and so not long after he

(11:26):
had arrived he was actually chosen as the agent for
the settlers that were holding these Wentworth titles, and this
leadership role Allen often found himself and just really all
kinds of conflicts. Probably the most famous involved loyalists Samuel Adams.
When Adams turned up ready for a fight, telling the

(11:47):
title holders that they would have to purchase official New
York Land needs from him, Ethan Allen disarmed him and
hauled him to the Catamount Tavern. Allan and his fellow
settlers held a trial for Adams, found him guilty, tied
him to a chair, and set him on the taverns
signpost for several hours. Mr Adams was apparently not much

(12:07):
trouble to the settlers after that. Ethan Allen also there's
a story that he took to Albany sheriffs into custody
at one point when they had come to try to
assertain New York's ownership of this land. And he held
these two sheriffs in separate cells, away from one another.
They couldn't see you or interact with each other at all.
And then during the night Ethan Allen went outside and

(12:30):
he hung an effigy outside the jail, but at a
distance so it wasn't close up where you could clearly
see it. And in the morning he allegedly told each
of these men that the other one had been hanged
in the night, and he convinced both of them, using
this little ruse, that it was really far too dangerous
to seek out payment to New York among the went

(12:51):
Worth grant holders. And then once they were good and
convinced that this was a scary place and they should
not try to pursue any legal or fiscal action here,
he let them go at different times so they did
not see one another, and apparently there was some time
before either of the men realized that they had been
completely duped and that no one had been killed. So

(13:12):
to to cut over to another frequently requested podcast subject.
In the summer of seventeen seventy one, Ethan Allen was
instrumental in the organization of the Green Mountain Boys at
the Catamount Tavern. This was a militia that was focused
on keeping Yorkers out of New Hampshire. Ethan was elected
colonel commandant of the group and uh also during seventeen

(13:35):
seventy one, there were two conventions that Allen was instrumental
in arranging, and he set up public safety committees in
one of them in almost a dozen grant townships. And
he was also a major player in one of the
conventions in drafting a decree that outlawed New York Land
titles on the New Hampshire Grants. Alan also oversaw the

(13:56):
production of political pamphlets explaining the settlers edition and currying
favor by making the case the settlers were bullied and
pushed around and their dealings with the Yorkers. Yeah, he
really laid it on thick like it was. He you know,
invoked images of like crying widows and you know, children
that were frightened for their future, and he painted a

(14:18):
picture of of real um. It was sort of the
colonial version of those ads you see on television late
at night that tell you about damaged animals or starving children. Like.
It was that great of sort of almost propagandist writing.
And the Green Mountain Boys, for their part, really made

(14:39):
sure that Yorkers knew they were not welcome in the
New Hampshire Grants. Their resistance was so effective and they
were such a strong force that New York actually begged
British forces in Canada to help them enforce the law
and assert their ownership over this land. And the response
that they got was not at all what they wanted.

(15:00):
It kind of went along the lines of like, Hey,
if your forces can be run off by this ragtag
group of quote militiamen, then maybe you shouldn't be in
power because you clearly can't handle it. So it did
not go as New York had hoped. And before we
get to sort of a transition that happens where the
Green Mountain Boys go from being militia protecting their land

(15:21):
to fighting for the colonies, do you want to have
a quick word from a sponsor. So getting back to
Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys. Uh. While all
of this discord that was going on around land ownership
that was sort of at this constant bubbling brew for
several years, the American Revolution was also building. And as

(15:41):
this was all happening, the Grant settlers and their Green
Mountain Boys had come to believe, for the most part,
not everyone was in agreement, but most of them that
if they really wanted to protect this property that they
were laying claim to, they were going to have to
become an independent province and sort of outside anyone's uh
governance except their own. Ethan Allen and many of the

(16:04):
other settlers thought that if they could just prove themselves
in battle against the British, surely their claimed the statehood
would be seen favorably by the Continental Congress. And we're
telegraphing because almost anytime we say surely this will happen,
it almost always does it. Uh So, on May tenth,
the Green Mountain Boys were instrumental in the capture of

(16:25):
the British fort at Ticonderoga, New York. Although the fort
was not especially well fortified and was also in a
bit of disrepair, it was important because it sat on
the southern edge of Lake Champlain, which was strategically pretty
beneficial for geographical reference. The lake straddles the state line
between New York on the west and Vermont on the east,

(16:47):
and it pokes up into Quebec on the north end.
This is a really major waterway, and it was used
for travel between the St. Lawrence River Valley and the
Hudson River Valley. The British had held this position since
seventeen sixty three, and uh the Green Mountain Boys, led
by Ethan Allen mobilized to hit the fort as a

(17:08):
target after a request from Connecticut Governor Jonathan Trumbull. But
Alan and Trumbull were not the only ones who recognized
that the Ticonderoga Fort was important. Benedict Donald was also
making a move to attack Ticonderoga, and he had a
military commission from the Revolutionary Councils of Massachusetts and Connecticut.

(17:29):
So Benedict Donald and his forces showed up kind of
alongside Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys, and then
they were going to proceed upon the fort. At that point,
Ethan Allen's crew was really adamant that they were not
going to take orders from anyone other than him. As
a consequence, Alan took command of all the forces, and
you can imagine how that really delighted Benedict Arnold, who,

(17:52):
like Allen, had all kinds of confidence of his own.
The two men are said to have bickered over who
was in charge without were settling things definitively, but their
mission did continue in spite of their confusion over the leadership. Yeah,
I mean, Benedict Donald was showing up with like an
organized force, and Ethan Allen had his militia and then

(18:17):
he just wanted to take over everything I can see
where there would be some fights. However, the group made
their move on the morning of the tenth, but they
really met with like no resistance. There had only been
about fifty men defending the four un Britain's behalf uh,
and they were super easily taken. They weren't expecting anybody.
They just they were actually um engravings that you will

(18:39):
see of Ethan Allen just kind of standing outside the
room and being like come out, we have you uh,
and sort of just demanding the the surrender, which he got.
Building on a success at Ticonderoga, the Green Mountain Boys
and the troops that had traveled with Arnold moved north
to take Crown Point a day later on May eleven.

(18:59):
Similar to the first fort, Crown Point offered no resistance
in the colonial army now now held two vital forts.
Holding these positions on behalf of the colonies served to
prevent a British attack from the north. Yeah. And it's
one of those things that when you read about these uh,
and sometimes in Ethan Allen biographies that kind of like

(19:21):
quick ones that will be like he you know, masterfully
handled these two pivotal fort takeovers, and it's like, well,
he was leading forces, but it wasn't like these were
like really big battles that required a lot of thinking
on your feet. I mean, they kind of just went
in and knocked on the door and said, we have you.
This is ours now. Thanks guys. Yeah, there are some

(19:41):
modern historians who are like, hey, wait, let's back up
a little bit. This is not like a big skirmish.
It was just sort of in some ways a lucky turn. However,
despite this great success having taken these two forts, in
July of seventy, Ethan was actually voted out of his
leadership role with the Green Mountain Boys and replaced with
a man named Seth Warner, who had really emerged as

(20:03):
a leader during the taking of the Crown Point Fort.
So it probably sounds a little weird for a military
unit to be electing its owned officers, and it was so.
At this point. The Green Mountain Boys were acting under
the auspices of the State of New York, but they
were authorized by the Continental Congress. And additionally, they weren't
really into the whole structure of military power as it

(20:26):
existed beyond them. As is probably clear from their refusal
to take orders for Benedict Arnold. Yeah, so remember if
it sounds weird that they were uh serving under the
auspices of the State of New York that legally, at
this point on paper, New York was recognized as the
owner of the New Hampshire grants, even though that was
a disputed area. And they were kind of throwing in

(20:47):
their lot with this revolutionary war effort in the hope
when all the dust had settled they could say, hey,
we really helped you. Can we have our state now?
And of course, having been ousted from his position, Ethan
Allen was a little bit chagrined, but he did still
want to contribute to the war effort, so he volunteered
to move into Canada as the next step. But before

(21:09):
we get there, we're gonna break uh. And this will
be the end of the first part, because we kind
of want to end on a triumphant note. Even though
he has lost his leadership position, he has still had
two you know, great fork takeovers, even if they were
pretty easy. So I also have some listener mail, please
read it well, and I have a couple and this

(21:31):
one is good since we're ending as we kind of
shift into Canada, which is from Canada. Uh. It is
about our biggest Land podcast and it is from our listener, Sophie.
And she says, your begins Land podcast had all of
my favorite things, the yukon, the mounteas and oatmeal. I
have a constable with the Royal Canadian Mounted Police and
I was listening to your show during a slow night

(21:52):
shift when the episode came on. I haven't closed the
book The Cremation of Sam McGhee, which, as the sticker
on the front indicates, is concern it or to children's book.
I've always found this funny is the book is about
cremating an American prospector after he freezes to death. Despite
the grim talk topic, the poetry and illustrations are stunning.
I agree the color work on this is really really beautiful.

(22:14):
So I recommend anybody who has the opportunity to see
this book to do so. Uh And she said I
had this book as a child and I can still
recite it from memory. Further, she also sent us um
to shoulder flashes from old uniform shirts, which is so cool.
She said. Although it's commonly believed that the RCMP slogan
is we always get our man on the crest. It
is mental le noir, which translates as maintained the right. Uh. So,

(22:39):
thank you so much, Sovie. This is such an awesome
little parcel to receive. This book is seriously beautiful and
I super appreciate it. Uh. And I love to look
at art all the time. So hooray, thank you Sophie.
And it's cool to have your patches. I feel so honored. Uh.
If you would like to write to us, you can
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(23:00):
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(23:22):
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You can go to our parents site House to Works,

(23:44):
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(24:06):
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