From December 1780 to June 1781, a mounted
detachment of about 250 French soldiers from the Duc de Lauzan's
legion (who would subsequently form the left column on Rochambeau's
march from Rhode Island to join George Washington's Continental
troops on the Hudson River) camped in the fields on the west side
of the common. They baked their bread in an open-air oven on the
Lebanon Green.
|
|
he strong
sense of history and timelessness in Lebanon is here enhanced by
the quiet presence of the 1804 brick Congregational church (its
third on the green) and Lebanon's well-known associations with
Revolutionary War activities.
Among the town's patriot citizens were William
Williams (1731-1811), member of the Continental Congress and a
signer of the Declaration of Independence, and Governor Jonathan
Trumbull, Sr. (1710-85), whose term in office between 1769 and 1784
made him the last governor of the Colony of the Connecticut and the
first governor of the State of Connecticut. Trumbull was the only
colonial governor to side with the patriots during the war for
American independence. Many important meetings concerning
Connecticut's contribution to the fight for American liberty, --
some attended by such luminaries as George Washington, the Marquis
de Lafayette, and the Comte de Rochambeau (1725-1807), commander of
the French allied troops Ñ occurred in the War Office, a
small building (1727) fronting the Lebanon Green that Trumbull had
previously used as a store.
|