Cato Wood

Quick Facts

Significance:

Patriot of Color at Battle Road and the Battle of Bunker Hill

Place of Birth:

Charlestown, Massachusetts(?)

The following is from the 2004 National Park Service study Patriots of Color researched and prepared by George Quintal:

Nothing is known of the early life of Cato Wood. He is described as ‘a negro.’^I

His name is present on every known list of soldiers of color who fought at Battle Road. He was indeed listed on the roll of Capt. Benjamin Locke in Col. Thomas Gardner’s regiment, a company known to have been at Battle Road, but his name is crossed out.^II

He enlisted on 18 May 1775 in the company of Capt. Edward Blake, in Col. Jonathan Brewer’s regiment. By October, Capt. Joseph Stebbins had taken over the company. On 26 October 1775, he was listed on an ‘order for bounty coat dated Camp at Prospect Hill.’^III

Footnotes:

1. Cutter, Benjamin and William R. History of the Town of Arlington, Massachusetts formerly the Second Precinct in Cambridge or District of Menotomy, afterward the Town of West Cambridge 1635-1879 … (1880), 58.
2. Secretary of Commonwealth. Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War (1896-1908), 17:721. Also 2-CD Family Tree Maker^TM set “Military Records: Revolutionary War.”
3. Ibid.

Learn more about Quintal's study.