By February 1778, the Continental Army had already endured several months of a harsh, cold winter at Valley Forge.
Though not the coldest conditions the Americans would suffer – that would come during the Morristown encampment several years later – the stakes were no less severe. After a series of crushing defeats, the British Army had decisively driven Gen. George Washington and his ragged army from New York across the Hudson River. The port city would remain Loyalist for the war’s duration until November 1783.
Morale was low. Men lacked shoes and proper attire to withstand the elements. Hunger gripped the soldiers. Dissolution rumbled through the ranks. Desertion had become more commonplace. And enlistment expirations constantly plagued Washington's mind.
To subdue tempers and coalesce the fledgling army, Washington needed urgent supplies from the Continental Congress and the colonies. One of the dignitaries he turned for assistance then – and throughout the war – was Connecticut’s governor: Jonathan Trumbull.
Trumbull was a reliable figure. As the only colonial governor who supported the American cause, he had procured and provided the necessary provisions since the war’s inception. A devout Christian, Trumbull – who assumed the governorship in October 1769 – viewed the conflict, and independence, as divine providence “with that of the realization of God’s plan for the salvation of mankind,” according to Connecticut’s War Governor: Jonathan Trumbull by David M. Roth.
As such, Trumbull and Washington developed a close friendship. The two leaders consistently corresponded – not only about supplies and recruitment, but military intelligence and even personal matters.
Indicative of their rapport, in a letter dated Feb. 6, 1778, Washington expressed his distress over the need for cattle and other “articles” to the man whose “zeal which has so eminently distinguished your character in the present arduous struggle.” The general closed the letter, as per usual with Trumbull, “Your most obedient servant.”
In response, Trumbull sent fish and “all the beef we can provide” hundreds of miles, as well as new recruits to bolster the Continental Army. Reportedly, all the cattle – numbering 300 – were eaten in five days.
This episode is merely a microcosm of Connecticut’s consequential compliance with Washington’s numerous appeals and Trumbull’s “zeal” for independence. For their efforts, the state earned the nickname “The Provision State,” while Trumbull was known as “Brother Jonathan” and “the first of patriots” by Washington.
This is the story of Trumbull, Connecticut’s revolutionary governor.
‘Men Who Have Tasted Freedom’
Born on October 12, 1710, the future governor spent his youth imbibed in his family’s mercantile shipping business and Puritanism. Both would shape his outlook and eventual public service during the American Revolution. The latter especially convinced him that the war was “nothing less than the salvation of his eternal soul and the Christianization of the world,” as Roth notes.
Still, Trumbull was not poised to inherit the business; that responsibility would fall to his older brother, Joseph. Instead, Trumbull’s father intended for him to become a minister, which he obliged. By 1727, Trumbull had attended and graduated from Harvard, which, at the time, primarily schooled clergymen. Several years later, in 1731, the young man was poised to be a preacher in Colchester. However, as would happen throughout his life, tragedy struck the family: while on business, Joseph died at sea in the Caribbean. His body was never recovered.
Trumbull, at 21 years old, quickly pivoted his career to assume the family business. In his duties, he shipped “cattle and other goods to ports such as Boston” and “traded them for consumer goods that had been imported from Europe,” according to the Museum of Connecticut History. In turn, he sold the traded goods back in Connecticut.
Within the next several years, however, Trumbull’s life would evolve beyond his familial trade. He studied law, and then took an interest in local politics. He was elected to the General Assembly in 1733, and by the end of the decade he was chosen to serve as Speaker of the House at just 29 years old. According to Roth, Trumbull’s rapid rise rested on his “absolute reliability,” “fiscal soundness” (despite his own personal debt), and a “remarkably temperate or judicious approach to controversy.”
Trumbull undoubtedly impressed his colleagues with his work ethic and leadership. He had a penchant for organization, which rose to the fore during the conflicts that engulfed the New England colonies prior to the American Revolution, including King George’s War (1744-1748) and the Seven Years’ War (1754-1763).
In February 1745, he took part in a conference in Boston focusing on the “intercolonial strategy against the French,” Roth states, and in the Seven Years’ War, he “furnished provisions for the Connecticut expedition to Lake George,” as well as recruited troops. For his valiant efforts, Trumbull was appointed colonel of the 12th Connecticut Regiment despite never serving in the field.
By the late 1760s, Trumbull was one of the most prominent officials in the Connecticut colony, elected as the deputy governor under William Pitkin. When Pitkin died on Oct. 1, 1769, Trumbull assumed the governorship.
Prior to the end of the Seven Years’ War, Trumbull had been a proud British subject; but the war’s effects – and ensuing taxation by Parliament, such as the Stamp Act – roused an ire toward the ancestral homeland and King George III. As Roth emphasizes:
“Trumbull viewed the Stamp Act as but the first step in what ultimately would be the corruption and demoralization of pristine American society...”
With these evolving sensibilities, he consequently supported the Sons of Liberty’s cause; and when the ‘shot heard around the world’ was fired at Lexington and Concord on April 19, 1775, Trumbull was “sensibly affected.”
In the immediate aftermath, the governor personally packaged supplies – from food to gunpowder – for the local militia at his Lebanon store, which would be converted into his war office and then later lodgings for the Comte de Rochambeau’s French army between November 1780 and June 1781.
Additionally, the General Assembly quickly acted, creating six regiments and establishing the Council of Safety to “lend the governor assistance for the war effort.” It met more than a thousand times throughout the revolution, according to Connecticut History.
Trumbull wasted no time rallying troops, securing provisions, arranging the construction of ships, and developing key relationships with soliders like Washington. In a letter dated July 13, 1775, the Connecticut governor congratulated the new Commander in Chief of the army “raised for the Defence [sic] of American Liberty”; but he also reminded the general of the stakes:
“Men who have tasted of Freedom, and who have felt their personal Rights, are not easily taught to bear with encroachments on either, or brought to submit to oppression. Virtue ought always to be made the Object of Government: Justice is firm and permanent. His Majesty’s Ministers have artfully induced the Parliament to join in their Measures, to prosecute the dangerous and increasing Difference between Great Britain and these Colonies with Rigour and Military Force: whereby the latter are driven to an absolute necessity to defend their Rights and Properties by raising Forces for their Security.”
Never one to mince words, he then wished God’s blessings on Washington for the forthcoming struggle and to “convince our Enemies of their mistaken measures.” For the next eight years, the American Revolution would consume both their lives.
‘An Unnatural King Has Risen Up’
Throughout the war, Connecticut enjoyed “relative political stability” and largely avoided “internal friction and disharmonies” between Loyalists and Patriots, as Roth emphasizes. This was attributable to Trumbull, whose “thoughtful administration” and subdued temperament kept the colony’s “internal difficulties to a minimum.”
As governor, he controlled inflation, embargoed goods, fortified coastal towns, and had an ability to rally Connecticut residents to fight in the American cause. Nevertheless, to procure food and supplies, Trumbull was forced to raise taxes – something that would become a liability after the war.
Unlike other colonies, who endured British occupation and large-scale conflicts, Connecticut mostly evaded such predicaments, aside from the razing of Danbury and subsequent Battle of Ridgefield in 1777, and other attacks along the coast.
Otherwise, Connecticut possessed a plethora of natural resources and farms not under British control, so, as Roth explains, the colony “was able throughout the war to conduct its agricultural enterprises without interference from the enemy.” Trumbull took advantage by amply supplying the Continental Army.
Under Trumbull’s leadership, Connecticut was also secure enough for Washington and other prominent military leaders to hold strategic meetings. In early 1776, the governor and general met in Norwich to discuss the colony’s assistance in “Washington’s upcoming campaign in the summer of 1776 down in New York City with both militia and military provisions,” according to the Journal of the American Revolution.
Indeed, other consequential military conferences were held in Connecticut, such as talks between Washington and Rochambeau in September 1780 and May 1781. These meetings helped the allies plan strategies that would eventually lead to the end of the war.
Though the Continental Army suffered various disasters, particularly the Battle of Long Island (1776), Trumbull remained steadfast; his faith in God often strengthened his resolve, as he often alluded to in his various letters to Washington and ‘Day of Fasting and Prayer’ proclamations. To him, the British government had been grossly unjust, as he said in June 1776:
“The Race of Mankind was made in a State of Innocence and Freedom, subjected only to the laws of God. …But through Pride and Ambition, the Kings and Princes of the World, appointed by the People the Guardrails of their Lives and Liberties…denegrated [sic] into Tyrants. …An unnatural King has risen up – violated his sacred Obligations, and by the Advice of evil Counsellors, attempted to wrest from us, their Children, the sacred Rights we justly claim…”
The cause was worthy enough for Trumbull Trumbull and his family to pledge their lives and reputations to the cause.
Trumbull’s daughter, Faith, committed suicide at 31 years old; his son, Joseph, who served as commissary general in the Continental Army, died from an illness in 1778; and his wife, also named Faith, died at 61 in 1780. His son, Jonathan Jr., was Washington’s secretary (1781-1783) and survived the war, eventually becoming a Connecticut governor (1797-1809); meanwhile, John – who also served as Washington’ aide-de-camp – became a renown American painter, whose works are prominently displayed in the U.S. Capitol Rotunda.
Politically, Trumbull faced several setbacks – and a near reputational disaster. Rumors swirled that he had profited from illegal trading with the British; the accusations were unfounded and disproved after an investigation. He also “became increasingly unpopular as time went on” – particularly from overburdened farmers – due to taxation and other economic wartime policies, notes the Museum of Connecticut History. In the war’s latter years, he even failed to win majorities in several elections.
Nevertheless, Trumbull remained at the “center” of the war effort, “almost alone [bearing] the responsibility of the mobilization of Connecticut’s physical and economic resources,” as Roth highlights.
After a decisive victory forced the British surrender at Yorktown on October 19, 1781, Trumbull penned a letter to Washington, extolling him for the “honorable and glorious” event “so interesting and happy to the United States,” adding:
“....[The success at Yorktown] cannot fail to strengthen the impressions of the European powers in favor of the great and good cause in which you have so long and so successfully contended, and go far to convince the haughty King of Great Britain that it is in vain to persevere in his cruel and infamous purpose of enslaving a people who can boast of Generals and armies that neither fear to meet his veterans in the high places of the field, or pursue them to their strong holds of security...”
Then, as was his modus operandi, Trumbull informed Washington of various military developments, including the burning of New London and Groton by the “infamous traitor whose name and memory should rot.”
The First of Patriots
The war years took their toll on Trumbull; his personal funds and political capital had been spent. By May 1784, he announced his retirement from the governorship, and lived the rest of his life in Lebanon studying theology.
On August 17, 1785, at 74 years old, he passed away from a stroke.
Washington received the news from Trumbull’s son, Jonathan Jr., which affected him deeply. In a touching tribute, the general – who had considerably relied on the Connecticut governor through the throes of war – offered his condolences:
“A long, & well spent life in the Service of his Country, placed Govr Trumbull amongst the first of Patriots. In the social duties he yielded to none—and his Lamp, from the common course of Nature, being nearly extinguished—worn down with age & cares, but retaining his mental faculties in perfection, are blessings which rarely attend advanced life. All these combining, have secured to his memory universal respect & love here, and no doubt immeasurable happiness hereafter.”
Indeed, as Roth emphasizes, Trumbull’s “herculean labors and logistical skills” proved instrumental and vital in the cause for independence, “without which the emerging American nation could not have long survived.”
The Connecticut governor risked everything: his life, fortune, and honor for the cause of liberty and limited government. Without Trumbull’s energetic zeal, perseverance, and steadfast belief, the United States of America – and the principles we hold dear – may not have existed. An army needs supplies and provisions to carry on; and Trumbull’s logistical acumen and tact allowed Washington and the Continental Army to persevere through their darkest days.
As the nation celebrates the 250th anniversary of America, we must look upon forefathers like Trumbull with gratitude for their immeasurable fortitude, grit, and passion in securing our inherited and cherished liberties.
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