Monday, July 2, 2012

The Heroine Of Monmouth, MOLL PITCHER

July 16, 1899.  "THE HEROINE OF MONMOUTH.  Figurette of MOLL PITCHER, The Brave Sergeant of the Revolution.  It Will Stand Alone If Cut Out According To Directions.  The war of the Revolution produced no more picturesque character than Moll Pitcher, who has been described by Mrs. Alexander Hamilton as a "stout, red-haired, freckled-faced young Irish woman, with a handsome, piercing eye."  Her husband, a cannoneer in the Continental army, was killed at the battle of Monmouth, June 28, 1778.  During the battle Moll had busied herself by carrying water from a neighboring spring to the men at the guns, and when a British shot killed her husband she seized the rampart and took his place at the gun.  After the victorious battle, although covered with dirt and blood, she was presented by General Nathaniel Greene to Washington, who commended her bravery and appointed her a sergeant.  Capt. Molly, as she was generally known, was also at Fort Clinton when the British captured it in October, 1777, and when her husband dropped the portfire just as the British appeared over the parapets, Molly picked it up and fired it, the shot being the last one fired by the Americans on that occasion.  She died near West Point in 1789, aged about 43 years."

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