VTDigger · Charles Calley · September 3, 2026
Kyle Neece’s recent story in VTDigger about “three Vermonters whose histories are lesser known” was very interesting. However, the writer could have chosen a Native American who was even less well known than “Indian Joe” and far more important.
When the American Revolution began, an Abenaki leader in Vermont and New Hampshire raised a company of Abenaki soldiers who fought alongside the Yankee militia commanded by Gen. Jacob Bayley. The Yankees knew the Abenaki leader as Captain John Vincent or, more commonly, as Captain John.
Bayley’s war records reveal he had 50 Abenaki soldiers on his payroll. In 1777, when Bayley led his Yankee militia column out of Newbury to battle the British army at Saratoga, Captain John and his Abenaki soldiers marched with them. Some of those Abenaki soldiers gave their lives for Vermont, New Hampshire and the United States.
Opinion contributor from Newbury. More by Charles Calley
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