My aunt Dottie asked if there were any Revolutionary War soldiers in the Lord line of our family tree. Possibly (they were certainly in the right place at the right time). So I did some digging and found that my 7th great grandfather, Thomas Hamilton, was indeed a Revolutionary War soldier.
I only stumbled across that last night, which is odd, because I only just found Dottie’s email in my spam folder this afternoon. I haven’t a clue why it ended up there, as there’s not anything remotely spammy about it.
Anyway!
The Thomas Hamilton in question is buried in the White Settlement Cemetery in Tomkins County, New York. His (modern) headstone identifies him as a private in the 10th Pennsylvania Regiment. That seems to be incorrect, though. There was an interesting a discussion on one of the Hamilton surname listserves that details why the Thomas Hamilton who was a private in the 10th PA can’t be “our” Thomas. And, as well, a good reason to think that our Thomas was actually in the Northampton County Militia.
What we do know about our Thomas is that he was a surveyor. He married a woman named Sarah Westfall. They had five children. In 1875 the family, along with Joseph Brearley and his wife, Lydia Colborn, moved to Muncy, Pennsylvania. While crossing Sweet Arrow Creek, their wagon was overcome with water and Sarah and Joseph both drowned. Thomas later married Joseph’s wife, Lydia. (Since it ends in a wedding, I guess that makes it a comedy, right?)
red paper boat 
