1780, Revolutionary War Muster Roll, Captain Lemuel Clapp, Dorchester Heights
Item History & Price
| Reference Number: Avaluer:61336 |
This item is a wonderful, original document dated 1780, being a muster roll for Capt. Lemuel Clapp's Company detached to Major Nathaniel Heaths guard (which patrolled South Boston and Dorchester Heights). A fine muster showing names of soldiers, time of enlistment and pay owed. Back of muster depicts a table detailing mens ranks...Captain Clapp's retained copy, ironic in that the paper used has a huge watermark of King George III......Some great names from the Seige of Boston, the Wisw...ells, Withingtons, Clapps and Birds just to name a few. Document is 12x18, larger than my scanner, photo shows the entire document which I scanned in two sections for better reading.The Lemuel Clapp house still exists today, housing the Dorchester Historical Society... The gambrel-roofed house was built about 1710 by descendants of Roger Clapp, one of Dorchester 's original settlers. The Clapp family settled on the rich farm lands of Dorchester Neck, a district soon noted for its fine orchards. In 1767, the simple two-room homestead was purchased by a cousin, Lemuel Clapp. Lemuel, who later served in the Revolution, remodeled the house as a country mansion. In 1957, the house was moved 200 yards from its location on nearby Willow Court to its present site and restored to its conjectured original appearance by the Dorchester Historical Society.Lemuel Clapp, a Dorchester Patriot who invited George Washington's troops to encamp on his estate during the Siege of Boston, was, like the site's first English owner, Roger Clap, a man of pronounced Puritan tenets. One of those tenets was self-sufficiency, and from the time that Roger Clap erected his house, in winter of 1633, to the enlargements to the Clapp in 1767 and 1768 by Lemuel Clapp, the family ran a working farm.Captain Clapp was a commander in the war of the Revolution. Some of the officers and soldiers were quartered at his house." Showing little respect for their barracks, the soldiers "attempted, it is said, to tear off the paper from the walls to adorn their hats." Ziphion Thayer's imported London wallpaper proved stronger even than the troops' blades, which tore at the "choice paper...but without success, it [the paper] being so adhesive." Historian Trask notes: "The bayonet marks made by the soldiers are, or were, to be seen in the ceiling of the chamber above."Please view the other historical and Civil War related documents I'll be listing this week.SEE SCAN.I now accept PAYPAL but PREFER other forms of traditional paper payment. Buyer pays shipping(usually FREE within the US and $12 for International), payment must be received within 5 days.
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