The Establishment of the Association for Retaliation

In spring 1780, Loyalist raiding parties ungoverned by military officers emerged as a dangerous, new enemy for Monmouth Countians. They kidnapped a dozen militia officers and several other Monmouth leaders. Inside Monmouth County, rage and desperation reached a new level; meanwhile, the expected return of the French fleet put county leaders in motion—traveling from Freehold to shore to create stores of provisions. This enabled Freehold Township leaders, particularly a clique of Machiavellian leaders who attended the Tennent Church together, to promote a bold idea—establishing a vigilante society to inflict eye-for-an-eye retaliation whenever a member of the society was attacked.

Continental Leaders Worry about Vigilantism

Throughout the war, Continental leaders worried about Whigs (supporters of the Revolution) engaging in lawless violence. Dr. Benjamin Rush, serving in the Continental Congress, for example, discussed "furious Whigs" who “injure the cause of liberty… by their violence." George Washington worried about New Jersey militia officers from “the lowest class of people… leading men into every kind of mischief; one species of which is plundering the inhabitants under pretense of being Tories."

Worries about local leaders behaving lawlessly pushed Governor William Livingston to issue a proclamation on February 5, 1777. He scolded local officials who have “forcibly carried away and seized the goods of their fellow inhabitants on pretense that the owners thereof were inimical to the Liberties of America." Livingston warned that retribution would "inflame the minds of the sufferers... and abolish all discipline." Livingston ordered militia officers and other civil officials to "desist for the future from all depredations and violence" without legal due process.

Monmouth Countians Petition for Tougher Laws Against Enemies

In Monmouth County, scars from the Loyalist insurrections and the disastrous Battle of the Navesink trumped the Governor’s warning. Over the next three years, they repeatedly petitioned the Legislature for stronger laws to punish Loyalists and their kin at home. The petitions are summarized below:

In March 1777, petitioners argued against leniency for disloyal citizens who “have nothing to fear from violation of the laws of this state.” They called for stricter laws to punish the at-home disaffected.

In June 1777, petitioners (in two petitions) plundered of property during the Loyalist insurrections sought a law that would compensate them from the estates of Loyalists. When the Legislature did not act, Nathaniel Scudder, the County’s leading political figure, wrote Governor Livingston in April 1778:

The Tory race, who have increased under our nurture, that is to say our lenient measures, are now much more dangerous than the British troops. Alas, my dear sir, instead of rearing our heads as heretofore like the stout oak, we flag like the parcel of bull rushes.

Other petitions called for the State to prevent Loyalists from returning home, and re-punishing Loyalists formerly jailed but now “suffered to go at large." At least three more petitions went forward in 1779 calling for more vigorous actions against the at-home disaffected.

In May and September 1779, petitioners (in three petitions) argued that county residents were “deprived of their property by some of the fugitives that have joined the enemy from this county.” They wanted victims “compensated by [the estates of] such fugitives as have left their estates."

Extra-Legal Acts Against Loyalists in Monmouth County

Even while Monmouth Countians were seeking stronger laws against Loyalists and at-home disaffected, some were taking matters into their own hands. Perhaps most notably, in October 1777, David Forman, a Colonel in the Continental Army (who would soon have his troops taken away from him) hanged the Loyalist Stephen Edwards without a civil trial. Other events would follow.

In January 1778, the New Jersey Supreme Court heard a trespass case against William Wikoff. The state charged Wikoff “with diverse other persons, with force and arms… unlawfully did assemble and close the stable of a certain Denice Holmes.” There, he “unlawfully did break and enter, and a horse belonging to Daniel Van Mater, did maliciously and unlawfully take from said stable to the evil example of all others." Van Mater was a Loyalist whose horse was apparently being boarded by Holmes. Wikoff had served as a captain under David Forman and his family had opposed the Loyalist insurrections.

In 1782, the Supreme Court heard a case in which the State charged three leading Monmouth Whigs--John Burrowes, David Forman and Elisha Walton—with illegally detaining a Loyalist. 

Prosecutors charged that on April 1, 1778, "James O'Hara had then and there committed a felony & was flying from justice and was on his way to New York.”  O’Hara was taken by the men who “falsely and unlawfully did conceal and keep secret the wicked intentions of the said James O'Hara... whereby O'Hara was not then & there brought to justice." O’Hara was detained without arrest; he re-emerged as a Pine Robber in 1781.

After the destructive raid against Middletown Point in May 1778, a Monmouth County Whig published a threat to retaliate against civilians in Brooklyn in the New Jersey Gazette on June 6:

O, ye butchering British monster!  We are not obliged to delay retaliating any longer! - Therefore, as you value the safety of your friends on the Island, do not send another example as that of Middletown [Point], for the consequence may prove fatal to the Tories on the Island.

Concurrently, William Marriner and John Schenck launched their surprise counter-raid against Brooklyn, and the Monmouth County Court of Oyer and Terminer issued a dozen capital convictions—more than any county court would issue during the war. Later that year, the captured Loyalist, James Pew, was murdered in the Monmouth County jail by the prison guard, James Tilley.

Word of vigilante activity in Monmouth County reached Philadelphia. Conrad Alexandre Gerard, the French diplomat at Philadelphia, wrote with concern on February 10, 1779:

The impunity with which the Tories who lived in New Jersey have exercised all kinds of exhortation in the proximity of the English [has] embitters the Whigs, who have themselves re-assembled throughout all parts of the County of Monmouth, which is very fertile in Tories. They [Tories] infest the roads with robbery, the Whigs give their hunt; they seize property all over where they find [Tories]; they kill in great numbers [and] they accuse throughout. They [Whigs] drag them [Tories] before the juries of their choice and assume the right of the [entire] body of people; they pronounce the guilty and enforce their sentences immediately without due processes, and confiscate their goods. People hope this rage will calm down through public vengeance and the particular exercises of the Whigs. If such exercises are the good fruits of Democratic Liberty, this is a good fruit people cannot wish on their enemies.

Extra-legal retaliation also had its moments in the Continental Congress; a few times, it threatened eye-for-an-eye retaliation. For example, on May 24, 1779, Congress stated that the British ”have perpetrated the most unnecessary, wanton and outrageous barbarities… deliberately putting many to death in cool blood after they had surrendered, abusing women and desolating the country." So, Congress resolved: “Congress will retaliate for cruelties and violations of the laws of nations committed in these states against the subjects of His Most Christian Majesty, in like manner and measure.”

Establishing the Association for Retaliation

A year later, in June 1780, the New Jersey Legislature’s Upper House, the Legislative Council, recorded receiving a petition from Monmouth County praying "that retaliation may be made on the disaffected to induce the enemy to treat our citizens more humanely." The Council minutes do not record a response to the petition, but the petition was sent to the Assembly (the Lower House).

The Assembly’s minutes record receiving two petitions from Monmouth County about retaliation. The first one: "praying that a law may be enacted to enable them to retaliate upon the disaffected in the said County, under proper regulations and restrictions" was referred to the Committee. The second one prayed for a law that would allow petitioners “to apprehend a number of the most notoriously disaffected who are related to the most considerable among the Refugees, and to keep them in close custody until the loyal subjects of the State, in the hands of the refugees are liberated.”

The petitioners well knew that many families split apart during the war. Punishing the kin of a Loyalist based on the (alleged) sins of that Loyalist is impossible to ethically defend. If the kin of the Loyalist was “notoriously disaffected,” those individuals could stand trial for their own actions.

One of these petitions has survived. The petitioners complained of:

The enemy amongst us, who not only conceal the plunderers, but we believe, give information as to most of our movements, and are so crafty that we are not able to bring lawful accusations against them, although there is great reason to think they are active aforesaid, by which means they take off any persons they please, plunder our houses, take our property.

The petitioners worried about the militia and state troops “not being up to the task.” They then requested:

As no means appears to us to be so effective as that of retaliation, we therefore earnestly pray that your honourable body will form such a law as may enable us to make such retaliation, as person for person and property for property, under such restrictions & regulations as to your honours will seem most adequate to the suppression of aforesaid.

Importantly, the petitioners requested a law to enable “person for person and property for property” retaliation—a tacit acknowledgement that such actions were not legal under existing law.

On June 23, David Forman (who was assisting the Continental Army with preparations for the arrival of the French fleet) wrote George Washington regarding a raid against Middletown that took ten captives (seven were liberated). Forman interrogated a Loyalist captured during the raid:

On his examination, he confesses he is not a soldier - neither was he to receive any pay - that their sole business was to take a number of inhabitants from their houses and to plunder, & that the plunder was to be divided amongst them. The fact is they were probably a marauding gang.

Forman called on Washington to clarify that he could execute such a man for “marauding”—a power granted to British officers. Forman referred to a standing British order:

Declaring that all persons not uniformed & acting without a commissioned officer, if taken, should be hanged immediately as marauders - some such example, I am sure, is necessary in this part of the country to deter that class of people; we can no longer be secure at night. My next dispatch shall cover, for your Excellency's opinion and if agreeable to the rules of war, that prisoners taken in that way may be executed.

At this same time, articles that would establish the Association for Retaliation were being drafted. Forman and others were traveling between Freehold and the shore, making it easier to promote the Association for Retaliation’s first meeting—to be held at Freehold on July 1. The articles were circulated; signatures were collected.

On July 1, the Association for Retaliation held its first public meeting at the county courthouse to elect a nine-man Board of Directors. According to antiquarian sources, Retaliators were sworn to secrecy under threat of the "direst penalty." 436 Monmouth Countians signed the articles—more signatures than any Monmouth County document from the Revolutionary Era. A number of David Forman’s political rivals—including Colonel Asher Holmes—chose to sign, though they probably regretted doing so later on.

The articles of the Association for Retaliation stated the worldview of the Retaliators:

Whereas from the frequent incursions and depredations of the enemy (and more particularly of the refugees) in this county, whereby not only the lives but the liberty and property of every determined Whig are endangered, they, upon every such incursion, either burning or destroying houses, making prisoners of, and most inhumanly treating aged and peaceable inhabitants, and plundering them of all portable property, it has become essentially necessary to take some different and more effectual measures to check said practices.

They further complained about local disaffected who “in general have been suffered to reside unmolested among us, numbers of which, we have full reason to believe, are aiding and accessory to those detestable practices.” The Retaliators, therefore, “actuated solely by the principles of self-preservation… solemnly associate for the purpose of retaliation” and “obligate ourselves” to:

Warrant and defend such persons as may be appointed for the purpose of making restitution to such friends to their country as may hereafter have their houses burned or broke to pieces, their property wantonly destroyed or plundered, their persons made prisoners.

The eye-for-an-eye credo of the Retaliators was then laid out in three provisions:

First, for every good subject of this state residing within the county that shall become an associator, that shall be taken… on the errand of plundering and man-stealing, there shall be taken an equal number of the most disaffected and influential residing and having property within the county, and them confine within the Provost jail and treat them with British rigor, until the good subjects of this state taken as aforesaid shall be fully liberated.

Second, for every house that shall be burned or destroyed, the property of a good subject that enters with this association, there shall be made full retaliation upon or out of the property of the disaffected as aforesaid.

Third, for every article of property taken as aforesaid from any of the associators, being good subjects, the value thereof shall be replaced out of the property of the disaffected as aforesaid.

Finally, the Retaliators pledged to support the militia (“We will turn out at all times when the country is invaded, and at other times do our proportionate part towards the defence thereof.”) and advertise themselves in the New Jersey Gazette. These provisions may have been included to assuage fears that the Retaliators would work in opposition to Whig institutions such as the militia. (The full Articles for Retaliation are in Appendix 1 of this article.)

The Retaliators knew that their existence was controversial; Nathaniel Scudder, a member of the Retaliator Board, wrote letters on July 12 and 17 to Philadelphia seeking to legitimize the group in the nation’s capital (see Appendix 2). In one of his letters, Scudder was too frank, writing (and underlining): “We are well aware of the objections this distressing mode is liable to cause, as being not agreeable to law, liable to abuse and likely sometimes to injure the innocent - but alas my dear friend, necessity has no law.” With this statement, Scudder crystalized the problem posed by the Retaliators—they judged themselves so righteously aggrieved that they could commit unlawful and brutal acts, including against people whose only “crime” was having Loyalist kin.

The Loyalist New York Gazette also printed the Articles for Retaliation. The writer noted that two members of the Retaliator Board had been prisoners in New York “whereupon, instead of the pains of imprisonment, were through the grace & benignity of Government, they were genteelly lodged and protected from every kind of insult.” While Loyalists, “merely for conscientious adherence to principle” are “condemned at mock tribunals, tortured and ignominiously put to death." The writer concluded that the Retaliators should be "most exemplarily and emphatically retaliated upon."

Indeed, the vigilante Associated Loyalists in New York would emphatically retaliate upon the Retaliators, and they would retaliate in kind. As this author has previously written, retaliation propelled the local war Monmouth County for the next two years toward climactic retaliation in April 1782.

Caption: Conrad Alexandre Gerard, the French diplomat, wrote with concern about rising vigilantism in Monmouth County in 1779; he could not stop formation of the Retaliators, a vigilante society, in 1780.

Related Historic Site: Old Tennent Church

Appendix 1: Articles of Association for Retaliation

Whereas from the frequent incursions and depredations of the enemy (and more particularly of the refugees) in this county, whereby not only the lives but the liberty and property of every determined Whig are endangered, they, upon every such incursion, either burning or destroying houses, making prisoners of, and most inhumanly treating aged and peaceable inhabitants, and plundering them of all portable property, it has become essentially necessary to take some different and more effectual measures to check said practices, than have ever yet been taken; and as it is a fact, notorious to every one, that these depredations have always been committed by the refugees (either black or white) that have left this country, or by their influence or procurement, many of whom have near relations and friends, that in general have been suffered to reside unmolested among us, numbers of which, we have full reason to believe, are aiding and accessory to those detestable practices.

We, the subscribers, inhabitants of the county of Monmouth, actuated solely by the principles of self-preservation, being of opinion that the measure will be strictly justifiable on the common principles of war, and being encouraged thereto by an unanimous resolve of the honorable the congress, passed the 30th of Oct., 1778, wherein they in the most solemn manner declare that through every possible change of fortune they will retaliate, do hereby solemnly associate for the purpose of retaliation, and do obligate ourselves, our heirs, executors and administrators, and every of them jointly and severally, to all and every of the subscribers and their heirs, to warrant and defend such persons as may be appointed to assist this association in the execution thereof; and that we will abide by and adhere to such rules and regulations for the purpose of making restitution to such friends to their country as may hereafter have their houses burned or broke to pieces, their property wantonly destroyed or plundered, their persons made prisoners of whilst peaceably at their own habitations about their lawful business not under arms, as shall hereafter be determined on by a committee of nine men duly elected by the associates at large out of their number; which rules and regulations shall be founded on the following principles,

FIRST - For every good subject of this state residing within the county, that shall become an associator, and shall be taken or admitted to parole by any party or parties of refugees as aforesaid, that shall come on the errand of plundering and man-stealing, the good subject not actually under or taken in arms, there shall be taken an equal number of the most disaffected and influential residing and having property within the county, and them confine within the Provost jail and treat them with British rigor, until the good subjects of this state taken as aforesaid shall be fully liberated.

SECOND - For every house that shall be burned or destroyed, the property of a good subject that enters with this association, there shall be made full retaliation upon or out of the property of the disaffected as aforesaid.

THIRD - That for every article of property taken as aforesaid from any of the associators, being good subjects, the value thereof shall be replaced out of the property of the disaffected as aforesaid. We do also further associate for the purpose of defending the frontiers of this county, and engage each man for himself that is a subject of the militia that we will turn out at all times when the county is invaded, and at other times do our proportionate part towards the defence thereof. We the associators do hereby direct that a copy of this association be, as soon as the signing is completed, transmitted to the printer of the New Jersey Gazette, for publication, and that the original be lodged in the clerk's office.

Also we do request, that the associators will meet at the courthouse on Saturday, the 1st of July, at 1 o'clock in the afternoon for the purpose of electing a committee of nine men, as before mentioned, to carry the said association into effect.

Appendix 2: Nathaniel Scudder’s July 1780 Letters on Retaliation

Nathaniel Scudder letters to Philadelphia on July 12 and July 17. Excerpts on Retaliation:

July 12:

“After petitioning the Legislature without success for a law of retaliation or other remedy for depredations of the Refugees, and now despairing any other effectual mode of redress, the inhabitants of the County have entered into a solemn association (near 500 have signed it) to retaliate in kind upon the disaffected among us for all the damages, burnings, kidnappings, etc., done or perpetrated by the Refugees - and the Association has chosen a committee to execute the general purposes of the said association & General Forman is our chairman & that the association have jointly pledged themselves and their fortunes to support & defend us, you will not doubt that the execution will be rigidly punctual & delivered.”

July 17:

“We suffer greatly in this part of the country from the murder, depredation, and kidnappings of the refugees and disaffected... we have from the necessity of the case on the sole ground of self-preservation been compelled to enter into a general association for the purpose of retaliation on the persons and property of the notoriously disaffected yet residing amongst us, for all damages depredations, burnings, kidnappings & c. done or committed by any of the refugees on the associators in this neighborhood; [we] amount to near or quite 500, & the number is daily increasing - they have chosen a committee of execution and have solemnly pledged themselves to defend them in the prosecution of the business - an eye for an eye & a tooth for a tooth [underlined], we are well aware of the objections this distressing mode is liable to, as being not agreeable to law, liable to abuse and likely sometimes to injure the innocent - but alas my dear friend, necessity has no law [underlined], we could no longer consent to be murdered and plundered by rule while from the laxness and timidity & indecision of our own magistrates the law was rather a screen for the Tories, while they [laws] afforded but little security to the well-affected citizens."

Sources: Washington’s quote is in Ruth M. Keesey, "New Jersey Legislation Concerning Loyalists," Proceedings of the New Jersey Historical Society, vol. 79 (1961), p 81; Governor Livingston's Proclamation, American Revolution Digital Learning Project, www.amrevonline.org; Petition contained in: National Archives, Revolutionary War Veterans' Pension Application, James Wall of NJ, www.fold3.com/image/# 20366031; The Library Company, New Jersey Votes of the Assembly, February 18-19, 1778, p 55, 58; The Library Company, New Jersey Votes of the Assembly, May 29, 1778, p 123 and June 3, 1778, p 129; Minutes of the Provincial Congress and the Council of Safety of the State of New Jersey 1775-1776 (Ithaca: Cornell University Library, 2009) p 245; The Library Company, New Jersey Votes of the Assembly, September 28, 1779, p 178-180; New Jersey State Archives, Supreme Court Records, #39523; Nathaniel Scudder to William Livingston, Massachusetts Historical Society, William Livingston Papers; New Jersey State Archives, Supreme Court Records, #34123; Archives of the State of New Jersey, Extracts from American Newspapers Relating to New Jersey (Paterson, NJ: Call Printing, 1903) vol. 2, pp. 246-7; Conrad Alexandre Gerard, Despatches and Instructions of Conrad Alexandre Gerard, 1778-1780, (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins Press, 1939) pp. 510-1; Journals of the Continental Congress, (Philadelphia: David Claypool, 1782) vol. 5, p220; the articles establishing the Association of Retaliation are printed in Franklin Ellis, The History of Monmouth County (R.T. Peck: Philadelphia, 1885), p206; Journals of the Legislative Council of New Jersey (Isaac Collins: State of New Jersey, 1780) p95-6; The Library Company, New Jersey Votes of the Assembly, June 9, 1780, p 229; David Forman to George Washington, Library of Congress, George Washington Papers, series 4, reel 67, June 23, 1780; New Jersey Historical Society, MG-14 (Ely Collection), Petition, Monmouth County; William Horner, This Old Monmouth of Ours (Freehold: Moreau Brothers, 1932) p 219-20; Nathaniel Scudder to John Scudder, New Jersey Historical Society, Letters: Nathaniel Scudder; Nathaniel Scudder to Henry Laurens, Pennsylvania History Society, Dreer Collection, Nathaniel Scudder, August 17, 1780; Library of Congress, Rivington's New York Gazette, reel 2906; Tilton, LeRoy W. "New Jersey Petition of 1780, Concerning Retaliation," National Genealogical Society Quarterly, vol. 34, Spring 1946, pp. 75-76; “’A Combination to Trample All Law Underfoot’”: The Association for Retaliation and the American Revolution in Monmouth County, New Jersey,” New Jersey History, 1997; Michael Adelberg, Biographical File, unpublished compendium at the Monmouth Historical Association.