Ethan Allen: His Life and Times

Randall wrote a wonderful and telling biography of Ethan Allen of Vermont. I bought it used from Amazon after reading a review in the WSJ. Some take-aways:Ethan Allen was fundamentally a Libertarian—socially liberal, economically conservative, and fiercely independent. He was skilled politically, a shrewd businessman, and at times skillfully played British overtures for Vermont to join their side against the Congressional Congress dragging their feet to admit Vermont to Statehood.I had not realized that both before and after the Revolutionary war that there were almost civil wars between Vermont and New York. We learned that granting land rights was a profit-making activity for political leaders at the time, and both New Hampshire and New York were making conflicting land grants in the same area of Vermont. Understandably, farmers did not want to pay twice for the same land, and Ethan Allen was their champion fighting off New York claims to pay again for land grants already issued by New Hampshire (New Hampshire Grants). After his life and as a condition of Vermont joining the union, these disputes were eventually settled with NY for small amount of money.Ethan Allen probably hated New Yorkers (“Yorkers”) more than he hated the Loyalists.Few other learnings:* Ethan Allen helped establish the standard for the exchange and treatment of wartime prisoners that exists to this day. Allen was a British captive for three years and at times faced execution.* Confiscating and selling off the assets of Loyalists, legal or not, was the main source of income for Vermont for many years, and why Vermont ended the war without meaningful war debt.* After the war and after Ethan Allen’s death, then-Secretary of State Thomas Jefferson and Speaker of the House James Madison toured Vermont on vacation. They were struck by how much more prosperous Vermont was compared with NY. It seems that Vermont land owner invested in the land they owned, whereas in contrast, New York had many tenant farmers who were reluctant to invest in land owned by someone else. Vermont farms were the most productive in the nation. A lesson for today.And coincidently, Ethan Allen died, age 51, exactly 20 years to the day of Abraham Lincoln’s birth.In my view, I think this story of Ethan Allen also helps explain the individualist character of Vermont today versus New York’s more collectivist mentality that still exists today.

I found the information in this biography extremely enlightening about pre-Revolutionary Connecticut, Vermont and New York. I live near where Ethan Allen was born, and my sister near where he died in Vermont, and I never knew how hard it was for those first emmigrants from Connecticut who went North searching for land. Even by mid-18th Century, the population had run out of room in the newly settled Litchfield County. I also had no idea how the Royal Govenor of New York & New Hampshire tried to make ordinary farmer pay twice (or become sharecroppers) to build homesteads in Vermont. I always had an impression of Ethan Allen as a bit of a braggart, but he was very well-read (self-educated). He was ambitious, but also a hard worker as pioneer, statesman and soldier. He really was a "common" man who earned his revolutionary status without wealth or patronage. He single-handedly made Vermont the first truly independent state -- not just ex-colony -- in America.I see other reviewers mention details that are wrong about Bennington, VT, but I have to say everything I read about this part of CT was accurate, informative. The book is truly original for its broader portrait of how Americans became citizens rather than just British subjects. This is a perspective I have not read elsewhere before -- and I read a lot of New England history.

Ethan Allen and his gang of merry men better known as the Green Mountain Boys made the residents of New England proud of their dedication to the Revolutionary cause. He had the reputation of supporting the down trodden settlers against the English interests that settled the Mohawk and Hudson Valley lands, He was an early proponent of small pox vaccination and separation of church from state. He was a major influence in Vermont statehood. A grand military man having fought under the leadership of Benedict Arnold during the aborted invasion of Canada. He suffered through British imprisonment and lived to fight another battle.Whether his exploits turned out to be myth or facts. Randall makes a good case as to what actually happened during his life time. I recommend this book because not only is it a very good story but it expands our knowledge of early revolutionary times.

This was an exceptional book. I plan to read this many times. Will Randall did an outstanding job of researching and compiling the information. I have recommended this book to many people hoping they will read about "The Green Mountain Boys". Many people, I am sure, do not know that Vermont probably would not belong to the USA if not for Ethan Allen, his brother Ira and his cousins. They rode in freezing weather, leaving family behind, enduring great hardships, to travel on horseback from Vermont to Montreal, to D.C., to Philadelphia and Ohio. Just think how long it takes us to travel to these places by car in good weather! They fought across Lake Champlain in freezing weather and still more hardships and they won their fight under extreme conditions to have Vermont brought into the States and not made part of Canada. This is an outstanding book written by a great historical author. Willard Randall Stern, I applaud you! Keep writing!