Ethan Allen: the Green Mountain Boy at the State House door
Photo: Farragutful, CC BY-SA 4.0, via Wikimedia Commons.
The marble figure at the entrance of the Vermont State House in Montpelier is Ethan Allen, and he has a fair claim to being the state’s founding character.
Allen was born in Litchfield, Conn., in 1738. In the 1760s he joined settlers who held land grants from New Hampshire’s colonial governor in the territory between the Connecticut River and Lake Champlain, known then as the New Hampshire Grants. New York claimed the same land and its courts ruled against the settlers.
The Green Mountain Boys
Allen became the leader of the Green Mountain Boys, a militia that used intimidation to drive off New York surveyors and officials. New York put a price on his head.
When the Revolution began, Allen and Benedict Arnold led a small force that captured Fort Ticonderoga from the British on May 10, 1775, without a fight. The fort’s cannons were later hauled to Boston. Months later, Allen was captured during a failed attack on Montreal and spent more than two years as a prisoner.
Vermont independence
After his release he returned to the Grants, which had declared themselves the independent Republic of Vermont in 1777. Allen pushed Vermont’s case with the Continental Congress and, controversially, held talks with the British about Vermont rejoining the empire. Historians still debate whether that was a bluff to pressure Congress.
Allen died in Burlington in 1789, two years before Vermont became the 14th state. He is buried in Burlington’s Green Mount Cemetery, and the Ethan Allen Homestead on the Winooski River is open to visitors.
