Featured image: Civil War veterans at the Choate Bridge

The Civil War memorial on the North Green

James Appleton Post, reunion of Civil War Veterans, circa 1900.

Some American wars in which Ipswich citizens have fought

• 1634: Settlement and the early military annals
• 1636-1638 Pequot War
• 1675 -1676 King Philip’s War
• 1689-1697 War of William and Mary (King William’s War)
• 1690 Battle of Quebec
• 1702-1713 Queen Anne’s War (War of Spanish Succession)
• 1744-1748 King George’s War (War of Austrian Succession)
• 1756-1763 French and Indian War (Seven Years War)  List of Ipswich soldiers
• 1775-1783 American Revolutionary War
• 1787 Shay’s Rebellion
• 1798-1800 Franco-American Naval War
• 1801-1805 First Barbary War
• 1815 Second Barbary War
• 1812-1815 War of 1812
• 1846-1848 Mexican-American War
• 1861-1865 U.S. Civil War
• 1898 Spanish-American War
• List of Ipswich Soldiers and Sailors in the Civil War, the Spanish War, 1898, and on the Mexican Frontier, 1916
• 1914-1918 World War I View Military Records of the Men and Women in Service, 1918
• 1939-1945 World War II
• 1950-1953 Korean War
• 1960-1975 Vietnam War

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The Ipswich Convention and the Essex Result - Delegates from 67 towns arrived in Ipswich on Tuesday, Sept. 6, 1774 and began deliberations regarding a Constitution for Massachusetts. "Surely a state of nature is more excellent than that in which men are meanly submissive to the haughty will of an imperious tyrant."

The Great Ipswich Fright, April 21, 1775 - A rumor spread that two British ships were in the river, and were going to burn the town. The news spread as far as New Hampshire, and in every place the report was that the regulars were but a few miles behind them, slashing everyone in sight.

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The Newburyport Tea Party - When Parliament laid a tax on tea, the British locked all the tea that had arrived in Newburyport into the powder house. Eleazer Johnson led a group of men who shattered the door and burned the tea in Market Square.

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The Massachusetts Circular Letter, February 11, 1768 - Dr. John Calef represented Ipswich in the Massachusetts Assembly and was one of only 17 members who voted to retract the Circular Letter opposing the Townshend Acts. An engraving by Paul Revere portrays Calef being pushed into Hell.

Paul Revere’s not so famous ride through Ipswich, December 13, 1774 - On the cold icy morning of December 13, 1774, Paul Revere headed out on a 60 mile gallop from Boston along the Old Bay Road through Ipswich to warn the citizens of Portsmouth that British troops may be landing.

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General Michael Farley - In 1774, the Town of Ipswich chose Michael Farley, a tanner, as a delegate to the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts. Farley fought for the Continental Army and was appointed major-general of the Militia of Massachusetts in 1777. He is buried at the Old North Burying Ground beside his wife Elizabeth. His house was demolished in the 20th Century, replaced by a service station that is now the Richdale store.

The Arnold Expedition arrives in Ipswich, September 15, 1775 - A memorial sits in the intersection between the South Green and the site of the former South Congregational Church in Ipswich. It reads, “The expedition against Quebec, Benedict Arnold in command, Aaron Burr in the ranks, marched by this spot, September 15, 1775."

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5-7 Poplar Street, the Dr. John Calef house (1671) - This house was built on South Main St. between 1671 and 1688 by Deacon Thomas Knowlton. In the mid-18th Century the house was owned by Dr. John Calef, a Loyalist. John Heard moved the house to its present location in order to build his elaborate Federalist home which now houses the Ipswich Museum.

88 County Road, the Col. Nathaniel Wade House (1727) - This house was built in 1727 by Captain Thomas Wade. On September 25, 1780, his son Nathaniel Wade received an urgent correspondence from General George Washington that General Arnold had "gone to the enemy" and to take command at West Point. The house is protected by a preservation covenant with the Ipswich Historical Commission.

The “Dungeons of Ipswich” during the War of 1812 - On October 7, 1813, the keeper of the Ipswich jail was given orders by the President "to "receive into his custody and safely keep in dungeons, in the gaol aforesaid, 16 British prisoners of war" as hostages.

April 1, 1970: The Massachusetts Legislature challenges the Vietnam War - On April 1st, 1970, both houses of the Massachusetts legislature passed a bill known as the "Shea Act," which declared that no inhabitant of Massachusetts "shall be required to serve" abroad in an armed hostility that has not been declared a war by Congress, under Article I of the U.S. Constitution.

The “Birthplace of American Independence” - Resistance by the citizens and leaders of Ipswich to a tax imposed by the Crown in 1687 is commemorated in the seal of the town of Ipswich, which bears the motto, "The Birthplace of American Independence 1687."

The Ipswich Company, Massachusetts State Guard, 1942 - The Ipswich Company of the Massachusetts State Guard during WWII

Captain Arthur H. Hardy, 1972 - Arthur Hans Hardy grew up in Ipswich, On a mission over the Ho Chi Minh Trail in Laos on March 14, 1972, Hardy's aircraft was hit and he bailed out nar enemy troops. His body is buried at Highland Cemetery in Ipswich.

Daniel Denison - Daniel Denison became Major General of the colonial forces and represented Ipswich in the general court. He was remembered with high esteem by the people of Ipswich well into the 19th Century. You can visit Denison's grave at the Old North Burial Ground.

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How Ipswich celebrated the end of the Revolutionary War - The manner in which residents of Ipswich celebrated the end of hostilities was recorded in "The Life, Journals and Correspondence of Rev. Manasseh Cutler."

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Leslie’s Retreat, or how the Revolutionary War almost began in Salem, February 26, 1775 - In our struggle for Independence, the British military received its first setback from the inhabitants of Salem in an episode that could not have been more ludicrous or entertaining if it had been written for Monty Python.

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“To the Inhabitants of the Town of Ipswich,” from Thomas Jefferson - The Embargo Act of 1807 put New England ports at a standstill and its towns into a depression. The Ipswich Town Meeting petitioned the President to relieve "the people of this once prosperous country from their present embarrassed and distressed condition." The town found Jefferson's answer "Not Satisfactory."

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In Congress, July 4, 1776 - When in the Course of human events it becomes necessary for one people to dissolve the political bands which have connected them with another and to assume among the powers of the earth, the separate and equal station to which the Laws of Nature and of Nature’s God entitle them, a decent respect to the opinions of mankind requires that they should declare the causes which impel them to the separation.

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