Azariah Comstock, Jr.

Quick Facts

Date of Birth:

1753

Place of Death:

Stillwater, NY

Date of Death:

September 19, 1777

Azariah Comstock, Jr. (born 1753) of Richmond, New Hampshire, was a relatively new transplant to the colony. Originally from Rhode Island, his parents and siblings moved to Richmond in 1762 at the tail end of the French and Indian War. Azariah Jr. was the youngest of eight children.

The Comstocks were no royalists, and Azariah, Sr., Azariah, Jr., and Moses (Azariah, Jr.’s older brother) demonstrated the point when they signed the Association Test - an oath of loyalty to the American Cause - in August 1776. Azariah, Jr. and Moses also enlisted in Colonel Wingate’s militia regiment for six-month terms that summer. The regiment was deployed to Ticonderoga where it remained until discharged.

When the new New Hampshire Continental regiments were being recruited in earnest in winter and spring 1777, officers were looking for people like Azariah, Jr.: twentysomethings who had some prior military experience under their belts. But Azariah wasn’t interested in joining the struggle for American independence again. Did his 1776 militia service ruin his appetite for the fight?

Regardless, Azariah was drafted in May 1777. Unable to get out of it, he signed up to serve for the shortest duration possible: 8 months. He was enrolled as a private soldier in Captain Ellis’s company of the 3^rd New Hampshire Regiment and was advanced to the rank of corporal that July.

1777 was a challenging year for the 3^rd New Hampshire Regiment, and elements of the corps fought in the July 7 Battle of Hubbardton, the July 8 Battle of Fort Anne, and in other skirmishes with the British Army from Canada. Beaten, threadbare, hungry, wet, and suffering from cold nighttime temperatures, soldiers of the American Northern Army retreated in the face of British domination. Finally, by mid-September, the Northern Army was ready to defend United States sovereignty at Bemus Heights, located just north of Stillwater, New York.

The British advanced toward Bemus Heights on September 19 and the subsequent Battle of Freeman’s Farm was fought. The 3^rd New Hampshire Regiment was hotly engaged and received a high number of casualties that day. Azariah, Jr. was killed in the fighting; he was 23-years-old.

Azariah, Jr. was probably buried by the victorious British in an unmarked trench-grave near where he was killed.