Robin (Robert) Currier

Quick Facts

Significance:

Patriot of Color at the Battle of Bunker Hill

Place of Birth:

Amesbury, Massachusetts(?)

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

Robert was the ‘negro’ slave of Eliphalet Currier of Amesbury (MA).^I

Enlistment papers (probably dated May 1775) place him in Capt. John Currier’s company in Col. James Frye’s regiment.^II It is probably the same man, listed as ‘Robin Currier,’ who marched from Salisbury (MA) on the Lexington Alarm, in Capt. Henry Morrill’s company in Col. Caleb Cushing’s regiment.^III It is also probably the same man, also named ‘Robin Currier,’ who was listed on a receipt for pouches dated Cambridge on 19 June 1775, on a 1 July 1775 receipt for advance pay, and on an October 1775 company return, all in Capt. Currier’s company.^IV Another man by the same name is also listed on the 6 October 1775 roll of Capt. Jonathan Evans’ company, in Col. James Frye’s company.^V It would seem that he transferred from Capt. Currier’s to Capt. Evans’ company in early October. Two orders for ‘bounty coat or its equivalent in money’ also exist: one, on 13 November 1775, for ‘Robert Curer’ in Capt. Evans’ company;^VI the other, on 16 November 1775, for ‘Robin Kier’ in Capt. Currier's company.^VII

Once again it is probably the same man who enlisted on 17 June 1776, in Capt. William Hudson Ballard’s company in Col. Asa Whitcomb’s regiment, for reinforcement of the Northern Army. His name still appears on a 27 November 1776 ‘muster roll dated Camp at Ticonderoga’ under Capt. Ballard though he re-enlisted in Capt. John Drew’s company in Col. Thomas Poor’s New Hampshire regiment on 13 November 1776.^VIII

Footnotes:

1. Merrill, Joseph. History of Amesbury and Merrimac Massachusetts (1880), 255.
2. Ibid, 254, listed as ‘Robert negro man – servant to Eliphalet Currier.’
3. Secretary of the Commonwealth. Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War (1896-1908) 4:243, second instance of ‘Robin Currier.’ Also 2-CD Family Tree Maker^TM set “Military Records: Revolutionary War.”
4. Ibid, first instance of ‘Robin Currier.’
5. Ibid, second instance.
6. Ibid 4:235, referring to same man as in second instance.
7. Ibid 9:176, referring to same man as in first instance.
8. Ibid 4:243, third instance of ‘Robin Currier.’

Learn more about Quintal's study.