Benjamin Carpenter ★

Born May 17, 1725, in Swansea3/Rehoboth, Massachusetts. He married October 2/3, 1745, in Providence, Rhode Island and worked as farmer. He died March 29, 1804 in Guildford, Vermont.

A Vermont Founder

Benjamin Carpenter was born May 17, 1725, in Swansea (or Rehoboth), Massachusetts, and had no formal education, but by 1764 was serving as a magistrate in Rhode Island. He moved to Guilford, in what would become Vermont, around 1770, and when revolutionary tensions escalated became chairman of Cumberland County's committee of safety in 1776, nominated as lieutenant colonel of its militia. That year Guilford sent him as its representative to the Westminster Convention, and Benjamin attended Vermont's first constitutional convention and spoke publicly at a Dorset meeting in favor of Vermont's independence — a cause his own son Asaph opposed. In 1777 he walked to the Bennington legislature carrying three days' provisions to help plan the fledgling republic's defense, and helped draft Vermont's first constitution.

Lieutenant Governor of an Independent Republic

Benjamin served as Vermont's lieutenant governor from 1779 to 1781 during its years as a fully independent republic, and continued serving the new state on councils overseeing confiscated property, militia payroll, and grievances through the early 1780s. His advocacy made him a target: in December 1783, opponents who wanted Vermont annexed to New York seized him as a prisoner, and on another occasion around seventy armed New Yorkers attempted to kidnap Benjamin and a state supreme court member to trade for a captured ally, though the plot failed. He turned down land grants the Vermont legislature wanted to award him and his fellow officials, believing public service should be given freely. Around 1792 Benjamin joined the Baptist church — known locally as the “New Lights” for their support of Vermont's statehood — and served as a deacon who occasionally preached, remaining a member for fifty years until his death in Guilford on March 29, 1804.