Village Cemetery Tour

Jebez Elwell
Interred in Village Cemetery - Shaftsbury, Vermont: Section C / Lot 205 / Grave 7
For information regarding his family, children, and siblings, visit Find-A-Grave or the Town’s Cemify website.
www.findagrave.com Cemify Link

Jabez Elwell 1747-1813, served in the Revolutionary War under Washington.

Jabez and his wife resided in Hadley, Hampshire County, Province of Massachusetts Bay, where he served in Captain Jonathan Warner's Company of Minute Men. Immediately upon receiving the news of the Battle at Lexington (April 19, 1775), he marched, with his Company, from Hadley to the vicinity of Boston. While at Roxbury, outside of Boston, he enlisted for 9 months and served there in a Massachusetts Regiment for the term of his enlistment. During this enlistment, his wife Thankful returned to Hardwick, Worcester County, Massachusetts, and lived there with her father.

In May 1776, Jabez enlisted, as a Private, for 5 months, in Captain Timothy Page's Hardwick Company, Colonel James Converse's 4th Worcester County, Massachusetts Regiment of that went to New York City. During this enlistment Jabez was in the Battle of Long Island (Battle of Brooklyn Heights), August 27, 1776. After serving out this term of enlistment, he returned home to Hardwick. This battle was lead by Gen. George Washington.

In April or May 1777, Jabez was enlisted for a term of 3 years by a Sergeant John Cobb and initially served in Captain Benjamin Warren's Company, Colonel Ichabod Alden's Regiment serving with the Continental Army. On June 1, 1777, he was promoted to Corporal and began serving in the 3rd Company of Colonel Brook's Regiment. In September and October, 1777, he was in one or both of the Battles at or near Stillwater, New York (The Battle of Saratoga). There, he was at the taking of British General Burgoyne and his Army. He was one of the guards to the prisoners when they were marched to Massachusetts. Sometime in the latter part of 1777, he was granted a furlough and returned home to Hardwick where he come down with the smallpox. Both his wife and 3 children had the disease from him by inoculation. On January 12, 1778, he was reported on furlough from Captain Warren's Company . After recovering from the smallpox, he rejoined the Army. Continental Army pay accounts record him as serving during this enlistment from June 1, 1777 to March 10, 1778 when he was discharged.

In 1781, Jabez and his family moved to Westhampton, Hampshire County, Massachusetts. There, on August 10, 1781, he enlisted and substituted for a person who had been drafted and served in his stead, in Captain Ebenezer Strong's Company, Colonel Sear's Hampshire County Regiment. On August 17, 1781, they initially marched to the Hudson River near Albany, New York. There at Saratoga, where he served 3 months and 10 days, he was engaged in building barracks. He was discharged from this service, November 20, 1781.
(1) US Federal Military Pension File number W.17,754.
(2) US Federal Military Pension File number W.23,006.
(3) Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors in the Revolutionary War, Vol. V, by the Secretary of the Commonwealth, 1896, page 331.

His headstone states he served under General George Washington. Jacbez was not a GMB, but was a Revolutionary War Patriot having served in MA.