Amos Farnsworth (April 28, 1754-Oct 29, 1847) was a corporal in the Massachusetts Militia during the Revolutionary War. Immediately after the Battle of Bunker Hill, June 17, 1775, he entered in his diary:
<We within the entrenchment...having fired away all ammunition and having no reinforcements...were overpowered by numbers and obliged to leave....I did not leave the entrenchment until the enemy got in. I then retreated ten or fifteen rods.
Then I received a wound in my right arm, the ball going through a little below my elbow, breaking the little shellbone. Another ball struck my back, taking a piece of skin about as big as a penny.
But I got to Cambridge that night....Oh the goodness of God in preserving my life, although they fell on my right and on my left! O may this act of deliverance of thine, O God, lead me never to distrust thee; but may I ever trust in thee and put confidence in no arm of flesh!> 1754AF001
Following a battle fought on one of the islands in Boston Harbor, Amos Farnsworth entered in his diary:
<About fifteen of us squatted down in a ditch in the marsh and stood our ground. And there came a company of regulars on the other side of the river...and we had hot fire, until the regulars retreated.
But notwithstanding the bullets flew very thick, there was not a man of us killed. Surely God has a favor toward us....Thanks be unto God that so little hurt was done us, when the balls sang like bees round our heads.> 1754AF002
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American Quotations by William J. Federer, 2024, All Rights Reserved, Permission granted to use with acknowledgement.
Endnotes:
1754AF001. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). Amos Farnsworth, after the Battle of Bunker Hill, June 17, 1775, corporal in the Massachusetts Militia. Amos Farnsworth, "Diary," Dr. Samuel A, Greene, ed., Massachusetts Historical Society Proceedings, 2nd Series, Vol. XII (1899), p. 84. Henry Steele Commager and Richard B. Morris, eds., The Spirit of 'Seventy- Six (NY: Bobbs-Merrill Co., Inc., 1958, reprinted, NY: Harper & Row, Publishers, 1967), p. 122. Peter Marshall & David Manuel, The Glory of America (Bloomington, MN: Garborg's Heart 'N Home, 1991), 6.17.
1754AF002. William J. Federer, American Quotations (2014). Amos Farnsworth, 1775, diary entry following a battle fought on one of the islands in Boston Harbor. Page A. Smith, A New Age Now Begins (NY: McGraw Hill, 1776), p. 508. Peter Marshall and David Manuel, The Light and the Glory (Old Tappan, New Jersey: Fleming H. Revell Co., 1977), p. 277.