John Stark probate document signed ("John Stark"). One partially printed page, 7.25" x 12", [Amherst, New Hampshire]; March 17, 1792. Docketed. Former Major General John Stark is appointed executor of his late son's estate. A legal appeal documenting that "John Stark of Derryfield. Esquire, and William W Questin of Litchfield. Esquire, both in the County of Hillsborough are holden and stand firmly bound and obliged unto Samuel Dana Esq – Judge of the probate of Wills, and for granting Administrations within said County of Hillsborough in the full sum of four hundred pounds...the above bounded John Stark, who is appointed Executor to the last Will of Archibald Stark, gentlemen, deceased do make, or cause to be made, a true and perfect Inventory of all the Goods, Chattles, Rights, and Credits of the said Deceased..." Signed, "John Stark". Countersigned by William W. Questin. Witnessed by George Reid Jr. and William Gordon. After the war, Stark returned home to Derryfield where he worked as a lawyer and farmer. The former occupation was undoubtedly what authorized John to serve as an executor to his son, Archibald Stark's (1761- 1791) estate. This event is recorded in A Life of General John Stark of New Hampshire, where the author writes, "When Archibald died it was one of the hard shocks of the General's life. As a lad of 17 he had been with his father at Albany and later went with General Sullivan...Archibald made his will...Gen. John, the father, was Executor...The General made the usual meticulous account, in March 1792, to the Probate Court at Amherst, taking all the fees as Executor in characteristic fashion..." The document is accompanied by an engraving of Stark in uniform published by Johnson, Fry & Co. John Stark (1728-1822) fought in the French and Indian Wars as a lieutenant in Roger's Rangers. He was appointed a colonel in the New Hampshire Militia on April 23, 1775, and participated in the Battle of Bunker Hill. He then served under General George Washington (the militia temporarily attached itself to the Continental Army) during the battles of Princeton and Trenton. Stark returned to New Hampshire at the behest of Washington to recruit more men. When he arrived, he learned that Enoch Poor, a fellow New Hampshire colonel with no combat experience, had been made a brigadier general in the Continental Army, while he, a veteran of the French and Indian War and several battles in the current conflict, had been passed over. Furious, Stark resigned from military service. The state offered him a brigadier general's commission in the militia four months later, which Stark accepted with one condition - he would not be under the authority of the Continental Army. As a general, he commanded the "Green Mountain Boys," whose defeat of a part of Burgoyne's army under Colonel Friedrich Baum at Bennington, Vermont aided in Burgoyne's later surrender at Saratoga. Stark served with distinction for the remainder of the war and was promoted to major general by Congress on September 30, 1783. When he died in 1822, he was the last living general of the Revolution. Reference: A Life of General John Stark of New Hampshire. Howard Parker Moore. New York: Published by the author, 1949, page 490. Condition: A few closed tears at old folds repaired on verso with archival tape. Light toning along edges. Pencil notation to verso. Minor offsetting at bottom of document from storage while folded. HID03101062020 © 2022 Heritage Auctions | All Rights Reserved

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