1st Lt. Benjamin Hopkins, Warner’s Additional Continental Regiment
Benjamin Hopkins was born in 1745 in Dutchess County, New York. He was the son of Stephen and Jemima (Bronson) Hopkins. Benjamin married Zaresh Rudd on April 10, 1766.
Benjamin was commissioned as a Second Lieutenant in Colonel Seth Warner’s Additional Continental Regiment on September 16, 1776. He was promoted to First Lieutenant on May 2, 1778.
All of the Additional Continental Regiments were having trouble enlisting recruits during 1778, as many of the States were paying additional enlistment bounties to new recruits for their own State Lines. This problem was made worse when General Washington ordered a draft of new recruits for Warner’s Regiment to Rhode Island instead of joining the Regiment. Political interference from New York with Vermont’s attempts to fill the Regiment was also a problem.
The Regiment was involved in several skirmishes during 1778 & 1779. The only significant one occurred at 14 Mile Island on Lake George where the Regiment lost 7 killed and 7 captured. Major Wait Hopkins (brother of Benjamin) & two Company Commanders were lost in this action.
First Lieutenant Benjamin Hopkins was Killed in Action near Lake George on September 6, 1780.
Sources: Francis B. Heitman, Historical Register of Officers of the Continental Army, (Baltimore, 1914), 300; William Richard Cutter, New England Families, Genealogical and Memorial, Volume IV (New York, NY, 1914), 2004; Gavin K. Watt, The Burning of the Valleys, Dundurn Press (1997), 103–05; Elizabeth Cometti, editor. The American Journals of Lt John Enys, Syracuse University Press (1976), 51; Selected Wartime Service Records of First Lieutenant Benjamin Hopkins.
