Ichabod Crane's Neighbor: Henry Christian Vought (1760-1842) (52 Ancestors 2020 Week 44) Theme: "Scary Stuff"

The Headless Horseman chasing Ichabod Crane through Sleepy Hollow is scary stuff indeed!

"The Headless Horseman Pursuing Ichabod Crane"
John Quidor, oil painting 1858, Smithsonian American Art Museum
Public Domain image https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/Template:PD-US

In the story, superstitious school-teacher Ichabod Crane is vying for the hand of Katrina Van Tassel, but rival Brom Bones has his own agenda. After a night of ghost stories (many told by Brom), Ichabod is chased home through the spooky countryside and disappears after the "head" is tossed at him. All that is to be found the next day is his trampled saddle and a shattered pumpkin.  

Ichabod Crane was a fictional creation by Washington Irving in his 1820 gothic tale "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow".  My 5X great grandfather Henry Christian Vought was a flesh and blood man who lived in the place and time of Ichabod's scary ride. 

Irving's Headless Horseman was believed to have been based upon a real Hessian soldier who was decapitated by a canonball during the Battle of White Plains in the American Revolution around the time of Hallowe'en in 1776. Sleepy Hollow was inspired by North Tarrytown (now renamed "Sleepy Hollow"), a Dutch settlement where Irving had fled as a teenager to escape a yellow fever outbreak in nearby New York City. 

About a dozen miles from Sleepy Hollow is another Dutch settlement where my 5X great grandfather Henry Christian Vought was born, lived his life, fought in the American Revolution, died and was buried. This is the area around Peekskill and Courtlandt. If there is something homogeneous in the nature of the Dutch settlers and of the brutality of American Revolutionary War battles in Westchester County, Henry Vought is notionally Ichabod's neighbor.

Google Earth - Henry Christian Vought and Sleepy Hollow locations Westchester, N.Y.

Although Ichabod is an almost unknown name today, it comes from the Hebrew meaning "without glory" and appears in the first Book of Samuel in the Bible.  Certainly Ichabod Crane was aptly named for his ignominious disappearance from Sleepy Hollow.

Henry Christian Vought, on the other hand, did achieve glory for one particular event during the Revolutionary War.

 According to an Affidavit sworn by Henry in his application for a pension for his Revolutionary War service: 

I was born in the year 1760 according to the best information I have on the subject, in the village of Peeks Kill Town of Courtlandt County of West Chester and State of New York. My age is recorded in the Church Books of the Dutch Reformed Church in the town of Courtlandt to which Church my parents belonged.

The full US Revolutionary War Pension and Bounty - Land Warrant Application Files, 1800-1900 is available for Henry C Vought of New York, West Chester. From it we learn that Henry was a private in the Company of Captain Slows commanded by Colonel Van Duyck for 2 years. He was paid his pension at the rate of $80 per year commencing 4 March 1831. His pension application was made when he was 72 years old (actually indicated he would be 72 on 16 February 1833). In his affidavit, he described his service as follows: 

I first entered the service of the United States by enlisting in the service for the period of one year under Capt Slow in Col. Hughes Regiment in the regular line of the State troops of New York and served out the period of my enlistment at Kings Ferry in the County of West Chester and Rockland being constantly employed in ferrying across back and forth, the Army Cattle and Provisions for the army and such like services. This enlistment was in the year 1778. - I again enlisted in the year 1780 in the same service for 12 months (twelve months) in the Company of Capt. Bond in the same Regiment and served out the time at Kings Ferry aforesaid in the same services as before detailed. - My next enlistment was in the same year Cornwallis was taken into a Company of Rangers commanded by Capt. Jacket in the Regiment of Col Van Duyck in the State troops of New York for the period of nine months during this enlistment some part of my time I was stationed with the standing Army at Pines Bridge in the County of West Chester; at other times we ranged from the North to the East River in different parts of the County of West Chester. - During this enlistment I was in the skirmish at Mile Square near the town of Bedford in the County of West Chester where Col Holmes with a Party of Tories surrounded us and we cut our way thro' killing one man and wounding fourteen. - I served my time out and was regularly discharged with the rest of my company. - Besides these services while regularly enlisted I was frequently called out in the Militia in Alarms and Scouting Parties. 

His service would seem to range from the mundane ferrying of provisions to taking part in what must have been a very scary skirmish. In addition to the possibility of death or serious injury, if taken prisoner of war, a soldier's fate would have been possible death by starvation or disease aboard the notorious prisoner of war ships anchored in New York Harbor. The skirmish is described further in his October 1842 obituary in the Peekskill Highland Democrat newspaper.

Highland Democrat October 1842

Unfortunately (as can be seen in the above image) some crucial wording cannot be read in this version of the obituary. However, piecing this together with another transcription located in the Wadsworth history leads to the following description: 

Mr. Vought belonged to a corps of men sent out on a scouting party, commanded by one Lieut. Mosher, with a heart of oak. While the Lieut. was at breakfast with his men somewhere in the vicinity of  Whiteplains, he heard the alarm of the approach of a Squadron of British dragoons. In haste he formed his little band of about twenty men, into a hollow square, the soldiers dropping down with one knee on the ground, elevating their pieces with fixed bayonets to a angle of forty five degrees. The Tory Col. Holmes commanded the Squadron, determined with his horsemen to surround and take these wanderers with him to the British. He offered Lieut. Mosher the most honourable terms of capitulation, which were cordially reciprocated by the Americans, but promptly declined on both sides. Col. Holmes, sure of success, made a violent assault upon this more than spartan band, but the phalanx after repeated assaults still remained unbroken. The assaulters were at last drawn back with disgrace and loss, while the brave Lieut. brought off his men in safety and in triumph.

Gen. Washington gave an account of this gallant and unparalleled affair in his communication and Congress passed a voice of thanks to this distinguished Corps for their valorous achievement.

Henry Christian Vought married Rebecca Nelson in about 1781. They had several children, including daughter Margaret Vought, my 4X great grandmother (whose quilts feature in another story).

He lived out his life in the same vicinity as shown on the map above, dying in Cortlandt 7 October 1842. His obituary in the Highland Democrat begins:

DIED At Annsville, Cortlandt Town, on the morning of Friday the 7th inst., Mr. Henry Christian Vought, aged about 84 years. Mr. Vought belonged to a Revolutionary - Whig family! He was himself a soldier in the Revolution, throughout the war; and lived long and respectably for better than half a century in the full possession and enjoyment of the peace and prosperity won by his valour and that of his companions in arms, and died at last full of years and full of honour. Mr. Vought bore a most conspicuous part in one of the remarkable skirmishes that tried American skill and bravery in the whole war.

He was buried at the Old Episcopal Church of St. Peter's at Cortland. Certainly his was a  much happier and dignified ending than that met by his "neighbor" Ichabod Crane!

Photo Courtesy Gene Baumwoll CSW on www.findagrave.com
Plaque indicates that 44 known Soldiers of the American Revolution are buried here -
Henry is in good company

 

Some Resources:

• Borkow, Richard, Westchester County, New York's Role in the Revolutionary War, Westchester Magazine 2013, accessed online 12 October 2020 at https://westchestermagazine.com/uncategorized/westchester-county-new-yorks-role-in-the-revolutionary-war/
• History.com website accessed 6 October 2020 at https://www.history.com/news/legend-sleepy-hollow-headless-horseman
• Lee, Francis Bazley, Genealogical and Memorial History of the State of New Jersey, New York: Lewis Historical Publishing Company, 1910.
• Wadsworth, John Ogden, Walcott, New York, Old and New, photocopy of pages 510-511 in possession of the author.