Pennsylvania Militia
The Conestoga Area Historical Society
The Pennsylvania Militia
The best place to find information on Revolutionary War soldiers is the printed Pennsylvania Archives. The Fifth series lists both soldiers who served in the militia as well as those who served in the Pennsylvania Line (regular army), most of what follows will concern the militia. Vol. 7 of the fifth series includes those who served in the militia from Lancaster County. The last two volumes of the sixth series (Vol. 15 #1 and 2) are the index to the 5th. If your local genealogical or historical society doesn't have the printed Pa. Archives then check with a local university library, they may have it as part of their history collection. It is also available on microfilm from the Mormon Family History Library and I understand someone is preparing to release parts of it on CD ROM.
Doing research on revolutionary War soldiers is very difficult. Unfortunately, many records no longer exist if they ever existed at all. This was not a culture given to documentation and a leaving a paper trail. One has to keep in mind that many of the soldiers couldn't read or write and certainly were not schooled in how to preserve documents. More than one Revolutionary War soldier lost his discharge papers to "vermin". One has to make do with what records that exist.
Few historical works mention soldiers who served in any given battle, the most you can hope for is to trace your soldier by finding his colonel or general and then follow references to him. If you are lucky enough to find pension papers this will also list battles the soldier served in but in order to collect a pension the soldier who escaped the war unscathed had to live until 1832. It was only after they began dying that people began to give high regard to Revolutionary War soldiers. We see the same thing today with our quickly disappearing veterans of World War II.
In March 1777 Pennsylvania began a draft because of a difficulty finding volunteers to serve in the militia. Prior to that date, those who served in the Flying Camp or went to the "Camp in the Jersey's", were strictly volunteers.
The draft covered males between the ages of 18 and 53. Exceptions were allowed for delegates to Congress, members of the state government, judges of the Supreme Executive Council, judges of the Supreme Court, college teachers, ministers, and indentured servants. Those who chose not to serve, often for religious reasons, could pay a fine or provide a substitute. If they paid the fine the money would then be used by the County Lieutenant to hire a substitute.
The organization of the militia was established by the state along county and then municipal lines. County Lieutenants were appointed to organize the county militia. They established Battalion districts, expected to raise between 440 to 680 men. These Battalion districts were further subdivided into 8 company districts which would roughly cover one township and were expected to raise between 80 and 100 men. The troops that served in the same company would be from the same neighborhood, giving the unit some cohesion. The men in each battalion elected their own field officers and those from each company chose their company officers.
The class list that appears in the printed Pennsylvania Archives doesn't really constitute evidence of revolutionary war service, these might be better understood as a census of the various townships of those people who were subject to militia service, males between the ages of 18 and 53. What class someone served in was a result of a lottery, the intent of the classes was to ensure that an area wouldn't be drained of able bodied men. When the state needed troops it would call out the 1st Class of the Lancaster County militia, if not enough troops appeared then they would call for the second class, this continued until all eight classes were called up and then the process would begin again with the first class. In 1777 all eight classes of the Lancaster County Militia were called up, they would serve two months active service. One might conclude that anyone who showed up in the class list for 1777 and doesn't appear on the Non-associators list probably served active duty in the militia.
Those who chose not to serve could pay a fine, their names appears on many of the Lancaster County tax lists for the year 1777, at the end of the list, titled "Non-Associators". Generally non-associators were people from churches opposed to war, Quakers, Mennonites and Church of the Brethren. While Quakers were generally disowned for Revolutionary War service, I don't think the other churches were as rigid and the decision was left to the individual. The Non-Associators list for Martic Township appears in the article on these pages from Ellis and Evans "History of Lancaster County" for Martic Township.
Occasionally an "old man's list" will appear in the tax lists, these are those over 53 who are too old for militia service. The printed Pennsylvania Archives also includes lists of those who served in the militia before and after the Revolutionary War period as well as a tax list for the period from 1770 to 1780 for the whole state. This is a good way to search all of Pennsylvania for a surname, put then in a township and then find a nearby church. The tax list is in the 3rd series, the last four volume of this series are the index. The Third Series also includes warentees, those who bought land from the Penns.
For further details see "The Pennsylvania Militia in 1777" by Hanna Benner Roach, the Genealogical Magazine of Pennsylvania, Vol. 23, #3,1964. The Genealogical Society of Pennsylvania sells a reprint of this article for $5.00, its about 80 pages.
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