{"id":1209,"date":"2012-07-20T18:05:25","date_gmt":"2012-07-20T18:05:25","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/blog.genealogybank.com\/?p=1209"},"modified":"2012-07-20T18:05:25","modified_gmt":"2012-07-20T18:05:25","slug":"portuguese-american-revolutionary-war-heros-obituary-discovered","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/portuguese-american-revolutionary-war-heros-obituary-discovered.html","title":{"rendered":"Portuguese American Revolutionary War Hero\u2019s Obituary Discovered"},"content":{"rendered":"

You can learn a lot about the Americans who fought in our country\u2019s wars\u2014from the Colonial Indian Wars down to the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq\u2014from GenealogyBank\u2019s online newspaper archives<\/a>.<\/p>\n

Revolutionary War Hero Lives to Be a Centenarian<\/strong><\/p>\n

This old obituary gives us many details of the life of John Peters, a Portuguese American who fought in the Revolutionary War and lived to be over 100 years old. It was published in the Alexandria Gazette<\/em><\/a> (Alexandria, Virginia), 1 May 1832, page 2.<\/p>\n

\"John<\/a><\/p>\n

Peters was there from the beginning of the troubles with Great Britain.<\/p>\n

He was at the Boston Tea Party on 16 December 1773. He then joined the army.<\/p>\n

\"John<\/a><\/p>\n

During the American Revolutionary War he fought in the Battle of Lexington and the Battle of Bunker Hill.<\/p>\n

Although Peters \u201clost one of his fingers\u201d in that latter battle, he continued to fight for his new country.<\/p>\n

\"John<\/a><\/p>\n

He was \u201cin the battles of Monmouth and Princeton, and assisted in capturing the Hessians at Trenton.\u201d<\/p>\n

The historical obituary of this old Revolutionary war soldier goes on to say \u201cHe was engaged in the capturing of Burgoyne and also of Cornwallis; he fought under Washington and Lafayette at Valley Forge, where he was again wounded.\u201d<\/p>\n

It tells us he was \u201caged 100 years 5 months and 23 days\u201d when he died on 23 April 1832. That calculates out to give us his birth date:\u00a0 31 October 1731.<\/p>\n

And just where was this centenarian veteran born? The old newspaper obituary tells us that he was born \u201cin Portugal near Lisbon.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"John<\/a>\u00a0Earthquakes That Shook the World in 1755 Remembered<\/strong><\/p>\n

The veteran\u2019s obituary adds the extra detail that he \u201cemigrated [sic] to this country shortly after the earthquake in 1755.\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Wikipedia that was the 1755 Lisbon earthquake<\/a>, \u201cone of the deadliest earthquakes in history\u201d with tens of thousands killed.<\/p>\n

There were several powerful earthquakes in 1755. Another one was the Cape Ann earthquake<\/a> that hit the U.S. 18 days after the Lisbon earthquake, on the northeast coast of Massachusetts.<\/p>\n

Young Hannah Clark [Hannah (Clark) Lyman (1743-1842)], then a child of 12, was terrified by the Cape Ann earthquake. Her obituary clearly recorded her terror at living through that earthquake.<\/p>\n

\"Hannah<\/a><\/p>\n

It was published in the Hampshire Gazette<\/em><\/a> (Northampton, Massachusetts), 21 March 1832, page 3.<\/p>\n

\u201cShe remembered distinctly the great earthquake of Nov. 18, 1755\u2026It was between 4 and 5 in the morning, and the moon shone brightly. She and the rest of the family were suddenly awaked from sleep by a noise like that of the trampling of many horses; the house trembled and the pewter rattled on the shelves. They all sprang out of bed, and the affrighted children clung to their parents. \u2018I cannot help you dear children,\u2019 said the good mother [Martha Phelps Clark, 1717-1803], \u2018we must look to God for help.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n

According to Wikipedia this was \u201cthe largest earthquake in the history of Massachusetts.\u201d Cape Ann and Boston felt the brunt of the earthquake\u2019s aftermath; however hundreds of homes and buildings throughout the state of Massachusetts were also damaged. Northampton, Massachusetts, is 142 miles from Cape Ann, Massachusetts.<\/p>\n

These two powerful earthquakes were so memorable that 77 years later they were mentioned in these 1832 obituaries.<\/p>\n

Don\u2019t let the stories of your ancestors\u2019 lives be lost. Use GenealogyBank to find them and document their lives.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

You can learn a lot about the Americans who fought in our country\u2019s wars\u2014from the Colonial Indian Wars down to the conflicts in Afghanistan and Iraq\u2014from GenealogyBank\u2019s online newspaper archives. Revolutionary War Hero Lives to Be a Centenarian This old obituary gives us many details of the life of John Peters, a Portuguese American who […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[12713],"tags":[2150,2916,4,5281,2147,5294,1129,3207,2191,5325,5354,1067,1761,2151,5371,441,5460],"class_list":["post-1209","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-genealogy-research-tips","tag-afghanistan","tag-battle-of-bunker-hill","tag-birth","tag-britain","tag-cape-ann","tag-clark","tag-family","tag-hill","tag-history","tag-indian","tag-life","tag-massachusetts","tag-mother","tag-portugal","tag-portuguese","tag-revolutionary-war","tag-young"],"acf":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1209","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1209"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1209\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1209"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1209"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.genealogybank.com\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1209"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}