Joshua Porter

Not the son of Nathaniel B Porter and Eunice Porter

Joshua Porter

• Birth: about 1728 - England
• Death: 4-26-1777 - Danbury, Fairfield County, Connecticut
• Cause of death: killed in the raid on Danbury, American Revolutionary War
• DAR Ancestor # A091166, private for Connecticut
• Service Source: JOHNSTON, CT MEN IN THE REV, PP 64, 68
• Service Description: 1) CAPT NOBLE BENEDICT, COL DAVID WATERBURY, 6TH CO, 5TH REGT, 1775
• Parents: unknown
• Spouse: 1) ELIZABETH X

Betty was the wife of Joshua Porter who was killed in the British Raid of Danbury, CT, April 26, 1777. She is buried next to her daughter Betty Gregory and son-in-law Nathaniel Gregory.

Children

1. Betty Gregory (born Porter)
2. John Porter
3. James Porter
4. Rebecka Porter
5. Mary Abbott (born Porter)
6. Ezra Porter

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Biography

From: Freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com Streeter/Porter site about Joshua Porter:

Joshua Porter was born not later than 1740 and married not later than 1759. The first record of his presence in America is May 18, 1772 when he bought for the sum of fifteen pounds a parcel of land 13½ acres in size "east of the Round Mountain" near Ridgefield, a village about ten miles from Danbury, Connecticut. A year and half later, Dec. 20 1773, he bought for six pounds "six acres and one rood of land" lying west of his first purchase. From this humble farm he endeavored to make a living for his family during the troublous years preceding the revolution.

Recent discovery of the gravestone of Betty, his widow, in the upper cemetery at Danbury, indicates that she was born 1732 or 1733.

In April 1775, resentment against the oppression of England crystallized in the battles of Lexington and Concord. When the news reached Danbury there was great excitement. A company of soldiers was raised and among the ninety-eight names on the company roster we find Joshua Porter, - the sixth company of the fifth regiment, commanded by Col. Waterbury. By request of the New York provincial regiment and the Continental Congress they marched to New York inJune 1775 and encamped at Harlem. In September, under orders from Congress, the Company marched to the northern department and took part in operations along Lakes George and Champlain, assisting in the reduction of St. Johns in October.

After his service as a soldier, Joshua returned home. Nationally the times were momentous. In July came the Declaration of Independence and the die was cast for complete separation from the mother country. Slowly the war progressed. There were no major engagements in Connecticut, but depots were established for storage of arms, ammunition and supplies, one being located at Danbury. It became of increasing importance for the British to discover and destroy the sources of supplies for the Continental Army. General Wm. Tryon, Governor of the colony of New York, was given the task of destroying the depot of supplies at Danbury. Tryon approached Danbury from the southeast and reached his objective on Saturday, April 26, 1777. No one knew what direction his march would take from that point on, and it was important for the farmers in his path to find out. One of them was Joshua Porter. Perhaps mindful of his former army service and needing supplies (it is said that he came to town for a jug of molasses), he set out to gain first hand information and was in Danbury when the enemy came. In town he met Captain Eleazar Starr and they took refuge in the house of Captain Starr's cousin, Major Daniel Starr (one of the most valuable dwellings in Danbury) with three other persons, one a negro, in Major Daniel Starr's house; all four were killed and the house burned in the afternoon of April 26, 1777.

GEDCOM Note

Died during the Raid of Danbury by the British at the start of the American Revolution. Joshua Porter, Eleazar Starr, and a black slave named Ned. Major Daniel Starr died on the day of the raid, either from British attack or from falling off his horse. Some accounts say another slave was killed along with Ned.

Notes

Joshua Porter, Died a Patriot

As recorded in our family pedigree by Betty Marie Johnson 12/01/1983. She loved to tell me I was a daughter of the Revolutionary War and was proud of our heritage and his patriotism to our nation. -Jessica Marie Tolley

Disambiguation

There were multiple men named Joshua Porter. The origins of Joshua Porter (ca. 1728-1777) of Fairfield County, Connecticut are unknown and he should not be confused with the better known Col. Joshua Porter, lastly of Salisbury, Litchfield County, Connecticut.

If you are a fellow descendant of Joshua and Betty [%E2%80%94?%E2%80%94] Porter, please:

1) Take an Autosomal DNA test with Ancestry, Family Tree DNA, etc.
2) Download your raw data results.
3) Upload your raw data results to the free site, GEDmatch.com,
4) Share your GEDmatch Kit number with Perry Streeter (perry@streeter.com).

DNA comparisons may enable us to confirm theories regarding their origins and/or enable others to confirm their lines of descent.

Comments

No original records have been found to substantiate the following claim:

"Porter, Joshua, Pvt., CT, b c. 1763 [sic, 1733?], prob CT d 4-26-1777, Danbury, CT, m c. 1759, Elizabeth Elwell (1763---2-23-1818). Desc. Reineman, Patricia Arnold." ("Historical and Genealogical Record of the Michigan Daughters of the American Revolution, 1976-1988. Volume VII. [1990], p. 212)

References

1. https://www.familysearch.org/tree/person/details/LT7B-833
2. https://www.findagrave.com/memorial/31964505/betty-porter
3. "The Burning of Danbury" < link > When General George Washington ordered that Danbury serve as a supply depot for the Continental army in early 1777, he based his decision on the town’s importance as a regional trading and manufacturing center, served by several major roads. Protecting the army’s supplies was a militia regiment of 100 men under Colonel Jedediah Huntington and a militia company of 50 men under the command of Colonel Joseph P. Cooke. Located some 25 miles inland from Long Island Sound, Danbury was considered beyond easy reach of the British, who, in August 1776, captured and occupied Long Island and New York City. Yet, on April 26, 1777, Danbury was attacked by roughly 1,850 men under the leadership of Major General William Tryon.
4. "Battle of Ridgefield" < Wikipedia > Tryon was given one of the early operations of the season, a raid against a Continental Army depot at Danbury, Connecticut.[4] Howe had learned of the depot's existence through a spy working for British Indian agent Guy Johnson,[5] and he had also met with some success in an earlier raid against the Continental Army outpost at Peekskill, New York.[6]
5. "The Danbury Raid, April 1777" < link >. Connecticut was a Patriot stronghold during the American Revolution and its shoreline was strategic both in terms of military engagement and espionage—particularly relating to Long Island, just across the Sound which was occupied by British forces. Early in the conflict, outright battle came to Westport when, in the spring of 1777, the British landed a force of 2,000 men on Compo Beach. The goal was to proceed to Danbury to confiscate or destroy the Patriot’s supply of tents and other provisions stashed there. As the British marched to Danbury the Patriots mustered their forces but were too late to stop them from plundering and burning that town.