Dr. Irvine also was one of the first patriots to respond to the cause of the colonists, and January 9, 1776, was commissioned Colonel of the Sixth Pennsylvania Regiment. He became Brigadier General May 2, 1779. Previous to that time, however, on June 6, 1776, he was captured at Three Rivers, and remained a prisoner on parole until his exchange, April 21, 1778, when he assumed command of the Seventh Pennsylvania Regiment, in which John Casper Hays was a private soldier.
After young Hays left Carlisle with his regiment, his wife remained employed at Colonel Irvine’s. Some time thereafter her parents, who still resided in New Jersey, sent a message with courier for her to visit them, and the same horseman carried a letter from her husband, begging her to go, as he might then get an opportunity to see her, as his regiment was then nearby. With Mrs. Irvine’s consent Mary set out on her long journey, traveling on horseback. At the time Molly Hays was a young woman of twenty-five years.
To prevent the movement of the British on New York, General Washington marched his troops again into New Jersey, and the Battle of Monmouth was fought June 28, 1778.
The battle continued from 11 o’clock in the morning until dark, and the day was one of the hottest of the year. Fifty soldiers are said to have died of thirst, and the tongues of many said to have been so greatly swollen as to protrude from the mouth.
While the battle was in progress Molly carried water for the thirsting soldiers from a neighboring spring, which is still pointed out on the historic battlefield. Back and forth she went under shelter or under fire, supplying the much-needed water. Possibly, as is stated by some, it was carried in the cannoneer’s bucket. In whatever way it was carried the sight of Molly with her “pitcher” was a welcome sight to the weary and thirsty Continentals.
Molly’s husband, having served a year in Proctor’s Artillery, and though now an infantryman, had been detailed as a gunner in a battery that was engaged. Doubtless Molly was never out of sight of that battery. As she approached with water she saw a soldier lying at the gun, whom she thought to be her husband, and hurrying on she found her husband wounded, but the dead man was one of his comrades. Her husband recovered, but lived only a few years after the close of the war.
It is stated that the cannon was ordered to the rear and would have been taken off the field had not Molly bravely sprung to her husband’s place, and so kept the gun in action.
For her wonderful patriotism and self-sacrificing devotion to the soldiers she was dubbed “Sergeant” and by some called “Major Molly.”
“Moll Pitcher she stood by her gun,
And rammed the charges home, sir.