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Stranger stop and cast an eye
As you are now, so once was I,
As I am now, so will you be,
Prepare for death and follow me.¹
Through an
enduring tribute at Westford’s Fairview Cemetery, Mrs. Molly ensured that
generations of Americans would remember her husband; a man who sacrificed
his comfort, love and life in the hopes that some day his family and
fellow Americans would live in freedom.
But the hardships that Mrs. Molly endured are also
evident at the Rogers’ family plot. Alongside the Rogers’ monument, are
two small stones that mark the resting place of two other Molly’s in the
young couple’s lives; those of their infant daughters. Their first was
born in 1774. She only lived to the age of 15 months and died amidst the
turmoil and start of the Revolution.
It was customary for colonial Americans to carry
their namesake into each generation. In a time of high infant mortality,
it wasn’t uncommon for Puritan parents to continue with the name’s use for
siblings born after a child’s death. Benedict Arnold, himself, was the
second Benedict of his generation.²
Mrs. Molly was pregnant when her husband volunteered
to reinforce Arnold’s fleet. He would die during the Battle of Valcour
Island, 3 months before the child’s birth. Tragically, this second Molly
born to Mrs. Rogers would also die as an infant. She lived to the age of
20 months, dying September 11, 1778.
Westford, Massachusetts was a short distance away
from where the American Revolution was to begin. Its citizens were among
the first to respond to the British advance on Lexington and Concord.
During a walk through Fairview Cemetery, it’s readily apparent how
precious life and liberty were to those early-American families. Despite
her loss and her grief, Mrs. Molly would make sure that the love for her
husband and his contribution to American independence would not be lost to
those who would stop and cast an eye.
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Click
on the thumbnails to see a full-size image |
Fairview Cemetery,
Westford Massachusetts
Here Lieutenant Rogers' pregnant widow erected a monument to her
husband who died "in the Serves of his country and in the caus of
Liberty..." |
Continued here:
Daniel McCay's Military
Record
by Myron C. Smith, MD
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