II. UNVEILING TABLET AT THE ENGLISH FORT.
Upon reaching Crown Point Forts, a tablet was unveiled on the walls of the old Barracks at the English fort, built by General Amherst and occasionally called “Fort Amherst,” by members of the Society of Colonial Wars, which was witnessed by the Champlain Commissioners and the large assemblage of people. The following report of the Tablet Committee is of historical interest:
REPORT OF THE TABLET COMMITTEE
To the members of the Society of Colonial Wars, in the State of New York, your committee beg to report that the tablet has been designed, cast and erected on the walls of the old Barracks at Fort Amherst in the State Reservation at Crown Point, New York.
The design was drawn and the details of modeling were carried out under the supervision of Mr. Walter B. Chambers, of the committee. The sculptor who made the Tablet was Mr. Herman Wurth.
The tablet was unveiled with appropriate ceremony on Friday, July 5, 1912, on the occasion of the dedication of the Champlain Memorial Lighthouse, erected by the states of New York and Vermont, at Crown Point, N. Y.
The members of the Society were guests of the Tercentenary Commissions on the steamboat “Ticonderoga,” leaving Port Henry, New York. At 11:30 A. M. on the day mentioned, and on landing at Crown Point, a procession was formed and led by the Port Henry Band, and an escort of Company “I,” 2d Regiment, N. G., N. Y., and Company “M,” N. G., Vt., Governor Dix and staff, Adjutant-General Tillotson and staff, representing Governor John A. Mead, of Vermont.
Major-General John F. O’Ryan, N. G., N. Y., Count and Countess de Peretti de la Rocca, and Mr. Maugras, representing the French Embassy.
Members of the New York and Vermont Champlain Tercentenary Commission, Colonel William Cary Sanger, Governor of our Society, Frederick B. Richards, Dr. Reynolds Webb Wilcox, George G. Reynolds, Stephen H. P. Pell, and other members of the Society, and about one hundred invited guests marched from the wharf to the English Fort built under Amherst, where the tablet was handsomely decorated with American flags guarded by a soldier of the 2d Regiment.
Hon. Howland Pell, your chairman, called the meeting to order, and stated that the committee had finished its task, and asked Miss Evelyn Witherbee to unveil the tablet. As this was done the band played the National air, the troops came to attention, and the audience of several thousand applauded. Its inscription showed that the tablet was erected by the Society of Colonial Wars in commemoration of the erection of the Fortress by Amherst and capture of Fort St. Frédéric.
Unveiling Tablet at Fort Amherst, July 5, 1912
The chairman then introduced Col. William Cary Sanger, who in a few well chosen words presented the tablet to the State of New York. Governor Dix then made a brief address, accepting the Tablet and placed it in the custody of the New York Historical Association in charge of the Reservation. Mr. James A. Holden, Treasurer, and Mr. Frederick B. Richards, Secretary, of the Association, accepted the charge and made short addresses. Judge Pyrke, of Port Henry, chairman of the local committee, promised to see that the tablet would be well cared for. The tablet bears the following inscription:
| 1759 | 1912. |
THIS TABLET IS ERECTED BY THE SOCIETY OF COLONIAL WARS IN THE STATE OF NEW-YORK A. D. 1912 TO COMMEMORATE THE CAPTURE OF FORT ST. FRÉDÉRIC AND THE ERECTION OF THIS FORTRESS A. D. 1759 BY THE BRITISH AND PROVINCIAL ARMY COMMANDED BY GENERAL SIR JEFFREY AMHERST | |
| BRITISH REGIMENTS | PROVINCIAL REGIMENTS |
| 1st or the Royal Regiment of Foot | Col. Lyman’s—Connecticut |
| 17th Regiment of Foot “Forbé’s” | Col. Whiting’s—Connecticut |
| 27th (Inniskilling) Regiment of Foot | Col. Worcester’s—Connecticut |
| 42d Royal Highlanders—Black Watch | Col. Fitch’s—Connecticut |
| 55th Regiment of Foot, “Prideaux’s” | Col. Willard’s—Massachusetts |
| 77th Regiment Montgomery’s Highlanders | Col. Ruggle’s—Massachusetts |
| 80th (Light Armed)—Regiment of Foot “Gage’s” | Col. Lovell’s—New Hampshire |
| Royal Artillery | Col. Schuyler’s—New Jersey |
| Detachment of Sailors | Col. Babcock’s—Rhode Island Rangers and Indians. |
The tablet is of the finest bronze, 30 by 24 inches in size, and represents a soldier of the Black Watch, and a provincial soldier holding a scroll of inscription. General Sir Jeffrey Amherst’s head is in the upper center, and the insignia of the Society in the lower, the background shows the English forts, and a list of the English and American regiments in the campaign is given.
Howland Pell,
Chairman.
Address of Acceptance of Tablet by James Austin Holden, State Historian and Treasurer, New York State Historical Association
The tablet was formally accepted for the New York State Historical Association by State Historian James A. Holden of Glens Falls, who is ex-officio a member of the committee in charge of the Crown Point Reservation, as well as Treasurer of the New York State Historical Association. He spoke briefly as follows:
Your Excellency, Tercentenary Commissioners, Representatives of New York and of Vermont, of France, of Patriotic and Historical Societies, Ladies and Gentlemen: It is with great pleasure that I accept on behalf of the New York Historical Association, the official custodians of the Crown Point Reservation, this beautiful and distinctive tablet which has just been presented by the Society of Colonial Wars to the State of New York, through you, its Governor.
It is especially gratifying to the Association to receive it from your hands, for it is to you, and your broad and patriotic conception of the duties of the chief executive of the State, that our hearty thanks are due for the generous and welcome local appropriations which you lately have approved, making so largely for the preservation, the maintenance and popularity of the reservation.
On this torrid July day whose sun’s rays reflected from these crumbling walls are full as deadly as any of the bullets which blazed forth at them in days of old, my words of acceptance must be brief indeed.
This expressive addition, then, to these historic walls, whose story is rife with actions of emprise and derring-do, around which still hover the historic spirits of the olden wars, connected with which are the inspiring deeds of the knightly souls of Montcalm and Amherst, of Warner and Burgoyne, yes, even of Arnold the patriot, not yet the traitor, full of the memories of the now shadowy hosts of white coated Bourbons, the red attired British, and the buff and blue covered Revolutionists, we accept and assure your Excellency that it shall be our earnest endeavor to prove worthy in every way of the confidence reposed in us in making this Association the State’s representative for this reservation.
On behalf of the Association I now turn over to the Secretary of the Association the formal care of the tablet, thanking once more your Excellency and all who have been concerned in the presentation of this memorial, for giving to the Association this further opportunity to prove its historical usefulness, and to justify its being, and for providing this occasion to exemplify practically the purposes for which it was founded.
Tablet Unveiled at Fort Amherst, July 5, 1912
Frederick B. Richards, Secretary of the New York State Historical Association, at the unveiling of the tablet at Crown Point Forts, N. Y., July 5, 1912, said:
I supplement State Historian Holden because I feel that it will take at least two to make up for the absence of our esteemed President, Ex-Comptroller Roberts, who was to have represented the New York State Historical Association this morning.
We feel deeply honored that the State has designated our Association as custodians of this reservation. We are still further honored by being entrusted with this beautiful tablet, erected by the Society of Colonial Wars, which, linking as it does the past with the present, adds to the interest of these old ruins.
I will not detain you longer this morning except to call your attention to one feature of the tablet in which I am particularly interested. You will notice that the list of the regiments is supported on the left by a Highlander, a private of the Royal Highlanders as they were known in this campaign, otherwise called the 42d, “Old Forty-Twa,” or the Black Watch.
The Black Watch, the oldest Highland regiment in the British Army and one of the regiments under Amherst who helped to build this old fort, was selected for this place of honor because of its unparalleled gallantry in the assault on Fort Ticonderoga under General Abercromby the year before, in which engagement it lost 646, killed and wounded, out of a total strength of a thousand men who went into action, or a mortality of twice that of the Light Brigade at Balaklava, immortalized by Tennyson.
Col. Sanger, Gov. Dix and Staff approaching Memorial at Crown Point, July 5, 1912