Night
and day patrols, with regular officers of the day, were organized, and
about a hundred men formed into a company and drilled daily on the
green. A large proportion of them having served in the revolution,
they made a very creditable appearance after a little practice. In
their hats they wore jauntily hemlock plumes, and old Continental
uniforms being still quite plentiful, with a little swapping and
borrowing, enough army coats were picked up to clothe pretty much the
entire force.
One afternoon, as the drill was going on, a traveling carriage turned
in from the Boston road, drove across the green in front of the
embattled line, and turning down toward the Housatonic, stopped before
the Sedgwick house, and Theodore Sedgwick descended. The next day, as
Perez was walking along the street, he saw Dr. Partridge, Squire
Edwards, and a gentleman to him unknown, conversing. As he approached
them, the doctor said, in the good-humored, yet half-mocking tone
characteristic of him:
"Squire Sedgwick, let me introduce to you the Duke of Stockbridge,
Captain Perez Hamlin, to whose gracious protection we of the court
party, owe our lives and liberties at present."
Sedgwick scanned Perez with evident curiosity, but merely bowed
without speaking, and the other passed on.
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