See also
1 Meigs BAILEY1 ( - ) [9047].
2 Return Jonathan Meigs BAILEY1 (1779- ) [9044]. Born 19 Jul 1779.1 Marr Hannah ? 22 Mar 1804.1
4 Jacob BAILEY , Jr.1,2 (1747-1779) [9027]. Born 8 May 1747.1 Marr ? ? c. 1773.1 Marr Sarah ? 13 Feb 1776.1 Died 15 Jul 1779.1,2
From Crook; An American Family, 1698-1955 compiled by Charles Henry Leavitt, 1956.
13. i. JACOB BAILEY JR. (Elizabeth Crook, Thomas) was born May 8, 1747 in Haddam, Connecticut. He spent his youth in his native town and married about 1773. The name of his wife is unknown, but it is known that there was one son, Jacob III, born March 19, 1775. This son married Temperance Bates May 7,1800. Jacob III died June 14,1813 in Haddam.
Jacob Bailey Jr. married his second wife, Sarah ____, February 13, 1776. Four months later in June, 1776 with his brothers Thomas and Timothy and several cousins, he became a soldier in the War for Independence. They enlisted as privates in Captain Cornelius Higgin's Eighth Company from Haddam, Fifth Connecticut Militia Battalion—Colonel James Wadsworth's Brigade. It was this Fifth Connecticut Battalion that reinforced General George Washington's army at New York and was at the right of the line of works during the Battle of White Plains. Jacob was discharged December 25, 1776 when the term of service expired for the Haddam Company.
Jacob Bailey re-enlisted for three years as a private, April 12, 1777 in Captain Charles Pond's Company—also known as Captain Eleazer Claghorn's Company, Sixth Connecticut Regiment—commanded by Colonel Return Jonathan Meigs. He re-entered the army in time to be in the expedition under Colonel Meigs in the attack upon a British foraging party at Sag Harbor, at the east end of Long Island. Colonel Meigs and his detachment of 170 men embarked in a number of whaleboats from Guilford (at that tune a small town five miles east of New Haven) in the evening of May 23, 1777. They crossed the Sound and attacked the British troop at Sag Harbor about two o'clock the following morning. The Loyalists were completely surprised and all the members of the party were taken prisoners, without the loss of a single American. Forage, brigs, sloops and large quantities of supplies were destroyed. In going to Sag Harbor and returning to Guilford, a distance of nearly one hundred miles was covered in less than eighteen hours and this brilliant exploit became a reality. Such a surprise was known by the British as an "alert." The members of Congress were so grateful they voted Colonel Meigs their thanks for the achievement and presented him with a silver hilted sword.
The Sixth Regiment went into winter quarters for 1777 and 1778 at West Point, where the soldiers assisted in the construction of permanent fortifications on the Hudson River. Jacob Bailey was promoted to Corporal June 17,1778. That summer Colonel Meigs' regiment was encamped with the main army under General Washington at White Plains. The Connecticut Division received orders October 22 to leave White Plains for New Melford, Connecticut, where they went into camp at a place called "Camp Second Hill". On November 19 they were again on the march to their winter quarters at Camp Redding in the town of Danbury, Connecticut, where most of them were to remain during the winter of 1778 and 1779. Their camp was in a sheltered valley framed by the Saugautuck River and its tributaries and protected by tree-covered hills.
About December, General Israel Putnam took command of Camp Redding. From time to time during the winter small detachments were sent out from Redding to watch the enemy and relieve soldiers in out-posts kept up on Long Island Sound. No doubt Corporal Jacob Bailey was often in charge of such units. He was taken prisoner January 10, 1779. The roll on which his capture is recorded is dated February 2, of that year. Later be was exchanged and returned to his company, but this last date has not been found. In May the Connecticut Division left Camp Redding, their destination being the Highlands across the river from West Point on the east side of the Hudson River.
General Washington decided that summer that it was necessary to recapture Fort Stony Point, a post on the west bank of the Hudson River, which the British had captured and held since early in the spring. This fort commanded King's Ferry river crossing between the New England colonies and the strategic Middle Atlantic country. It was strongly fortified and at high tide entirely surrounded by water. General Washington organized a corps of 1300 light Infantry troops under Brigadier-General Anthony Wayne. They were picked men from all the regiments under Washington's command. Each regiment contributed companies of from 40 to 60 men and all were organized into regiments. The Connecticut Division furnished one of the regiments, numbering 400 officers and men, commanded by Colonel Return Jonathan Meigs of Middletown, Connecticut. Corporal Jacob Bailey was among those selected for this difficult task. His part in the storming and taking of Fort Stony Point July 16,1779 was his final service to his country.
Extensive and far reaching military preparations were made for weeks in advance of the attack, for it was known to be almost an impregnable fortress. All dogs within a radius of three miles of the fort were destroyed so that no riotous bark might give an alarm to the garrison. Not a gun was to be loaded and the men were warned that if by chance a musket was fired, an outcry or other signals made, betraying the approaching columns, the offender would be immediately shot by the nearest officer. The onset was to be made with bayonets alone, and as the soldiers said, "For once to be put to more warring use than roasting meat before a camp fire
At eight o'clock in the evening of July 15, 1779, a hot summer day, General Wayne halted his troops a mile and a half from the fort and gave orders for the assault which was to be made a little after midnight. The Connecticut regiment formed part of General Wayne's right column. A Negro, who had learned the countersign, went with the advance and through him the enemy pickets were deceived, caught and silenced.* Everything was done in silence. With empty muskets and bayonets fixed the two divisions crossed the stony causeway at low tide, attacked from opposite sides, swarmed upon the outposts before the garrison could open fire from their batteries. As they gained positions a watchword had been given to each detachment to shout: "The fort is ours." The struggle was short and over in a few minutes when the garrison surrendered. The Americans lost 15 killed, among them Corporal Bailey and four other Corporals, the British 63 killed and 553 taken prisoners.
This commendable exploit had an inspiring effect upon the morale of the American army. General Charles Lee (a troublemaker in the army and far from being a friend of General Washington) called this, "Not only the most brilliant assault in the whole war on either side, but the most brilliant in history." General Wayne, who was wounded in the battle, wrote to General Washington, "Our officers and men behaved like men determined to be free."
Corporal Jacob Bailey was killed in the early morning of July 16, and three days later, on July 19, 1779 his son was born in Haddam, Connecticut. This boy was named Return Jonathan Meigs after his father's regimental commander, under whom his father had served more than two years. Meigs was the name by which the son was known throughout his life.
March 22, 1804 Meigs married Hannah ______. Six years later they were still living in Haddam with their two sons and one daughter. The widowed mother was also a member of their household. She had raised her son and always lived with him. Before 1820 the family had moved to Henrietta, Monroe County, New York, where Sarah Bailey died suddenly July 8, 1836, having outlived her husband 57 years. Meigs Bailey was allowed a pension due his mother on an application executed October 27, 1846. His two sons were Marving and Meigs. In a letter dated Henrietta, New York, October 27, 1844 Meigs wrote that he recalled an incident in Haddam, Connecticut, when he was a small boy. Colonel Meigs called at his mother's home and gave him a crown— telling him if he would call at the Colonel's house in Middletown he would give him a hat. At that time he signed his name Jonathan R. M. Bailey.
JACOB BAILEY JR'S SONS:
i. Jacob III born March 19, 1775; died June 13,1813.
ii. Return Jonathan Meigs, born July 19.1779.
*John Hope Franklin, in his "From Slavery to Freedom," page 136, makes this statement: "The victory of Anthony Wayne at Stony Point in 1779 was made possible by the spying of a Negro soldier by the name of Pompey."
8 Jacob BAILEY3,4,5 (1720-bef1784) [3568]. Born 21 Oct 1720, Haddam, Middlesex, CT.3,5 Marr Elizabeth CROOK 6 Aug 1746, Haddam, Middlesex, CT.1,3,5 Died bef 1784.3
From Crook; An American Family, 1698-1955 compiled by Charles Henry Leavitt, 1956.
JACOB BAILEY (Ephraim, John,2 John1) was born October 21, 1720 in Haddam, Connecticut—the second son in a family of ten sons and one daughter. The emigrant ancestor was John Bailey or Bayley, as the name was then spelled. This first member of the Bailey family in America came from England in 1648 and lived in Hartford, Connecticut, where he was made a Freeman In 1657. "While in Hartford he held one or two offices including that of constable. This great-grandfather of Jacob Bailey was among Ae first settlers of Haddam
About one month after Charles II signed the Charter of Connecticut in April, 1662, a committee of the Connecticut Colonial Legislature bought a large tract of land from the Wangunt Indians foe a trifling sum (about $100.00). The town of Haddam is today a part of that tract. The same summer John Bailey was one of twenty-eight young men, of Hartford and near by towns, who tools up the purchase and started a plantation on the lower Connecticut River. This region was called "Thirty Mile Island Plantation." It was opposite a small island in the river, which was about thirty miles from Long Island Sound- Six years later that location became the town of Haddam, named after Great Haddam, England. John Bailey established himself on land at Higganum in the northern part of Haddam where he died in 1696. This founder of the Bailey family in America is of special interest since the Crook and Bailey families intermarried.
Jacob Bailey, like his father Ephraim, was a farmer in Haddam. He and one of his sons (name not given) were employed in the Continental Service in 1775 and on account of this service they were exempt from certain taxes in Haddam. At least five of Jacob's sons and one son-in-law served as soldiers in the Revolutionary War. His name does not appear in the United States Census of 1790, but an Elizabeth Bailey, residing in Haddam, is listed as head of a family. However this was probably another Elizabeth Bailey. According to the distribution of the estate of their son, Gurdon, both of his parents had passed on before December 28, 1784.
9 Elizabeth CROOK1,3 (1721-bef1784) [3569]. Born 30 Apr 1721, Nantucket, MA.3 Died bef 1784.3
From Crook; An American Family, 1698-1955 compiled by Charles Henry Leavitt, 1956.
ELIZABETH2 CROOK (Thomas1) was born April 30, 1721 in Nantucket, Massachusetts, where she lived until she went with her parents to Haddam, Connecticut She was the oldest of their children. In that early day a daughter's history consisted largely in birth and marriage, so one reads of Elizabeth's marriage to Jacob Bailey August 6, 1746. It was the second marriage in the Crook family. Jacob was the son of Ephraim and Deborah (Brainerd) Bailey. The Crook and Bailey families were near neighbors in Higganum and later two of Elizabeth's younger sisters also married Bailey men.
5 Sarah ?1 ( -1836) [9043]. Died 8 Jul 1836.1
| 1 | "From Crook; An American Family, 1698-1955 compiled by Charles Henry Leavitt, 1956.". |
| 2 | "Record of Service of Connecticut Men in the War of the Revolution, 1889". |
| 3 | "Ancestry.com, Snow/Lyman Ancestors". |
| 4 | "A History of the Towns of Haddam and East-Haddam by David D. Field, A.M., Pastor of the Church of Haddam, 1814". |
| 5 | "Genealogy of the Brainerd-Brainard Family in America 1549-1908 by Lucy Abigail Brainard, 1908". |