REVOLUTIONARY PENSION APPLICATION - SILAS FORE
Contributed by:  James F. Sellars III

Silas Fore Pension (rejected)
Henry County, Kentucky R3650

On this 2d day of September 1844 personally appeared before the Henry County
Court in open Court Silas Foree of the said County of Henry and State of 
Kentucky aged 78 years, who being first duly sworn according to law doth on 
his oath make the following declaration in order to obtain the benefit of the 
act of Congress passed June 7th 1832. That he entered the service of the 
United States and served as herein stated that is to say he was born in the 
County of Prince Edward in the State of Virginia on or about the 1st day of 
January 1766 according to the best information which he has on the subject. 
That soon after his birth his mother died leaving 13 children to wit: 
Hezekiah and John Foree and Judith, Polly, Keziah and Martha Foree and this 
declarent besides six others that after her death and he thinks in the early 
part of the winter 1777/8 his father Peter Foree together with the said 7 
children left Virginia and came to the State of Kentucky to the present 
County of Bourbon and located at the fort at Martin's Station about 3 or 4 
miles below Paris. He states that in March 1778 he thinks was the month and 
year the Indians made an attack on the fort and young as he was being only 12 
years of age or thereabouts at that time he volunteered and aided in the 
defence of it and the Indians were repelled. He further states that in the 
month of June following (1778) as well as he remembered his father died 
leaving him and his brothers and sisters orphans and two or three days 
afterward an attack was made by the British and Indians upon Riddles Station 
situated about seven or eight miles from the fort at Martins Station and that 
post was captured by them. He states that they heard the firing at Martin's 
Station and being satisfied that an attack was there made they prepared 
themselves at the fort at Martin's Station for defence apprehending that an 
attempt would be also there made and this declarent again was mustered 
amongst the men for its defence and they dispatched two men for 
reinforcements one of whom was captured by the enemy (his name McGuire) and 
the other escaped. On the day after the man who had been captured came to the 
fort in company with some British officers and they demanded a surrender and 
the prisoner advised that the demand should be complied with which was 
accordingly done and the whole number at that place became prisoners of war 
including men, women and children. The fort was commanded by Charles Gatliffe 
and the prisoners there taken including those taken at Riddles Station (in 
the former was included this declarent)were all taken by the British and 
Indians to Detroit where many of them including declarent was kept until in 
the summer of the year 1782. He states that one of his sisters died or was 
killed on the way to Detroit that his other sisters and his brother Hezekiah 
together with himself were kept at Detroit and his brother John was sent to 
some other place. In the summer of 1782 declarent understood that an exchange 
of prisoners was agreed upon and he together with the other prisoners were 
taken to Ticonderoga and as he understood were there exchanged and were taken 
charge of by some American officers. He states that at that time there were 3 
or 4 ship loads of prisoners to be exchanged and after the exchange they were 
including this declarent taken into the charge and under the care of some 
American officers who conducted them some distance into the interior and this 
declarent and his brother John reached the County of Prince Edward in the 
State of Virginia about 1st September 1782 it having been upwards of four 
years from the time he was taken prisoner at the fort at Martins Station 
until he reached his old home in the State of Virginia. He further states 
that Capt. Gatliffe was absent when the fort was surrendered having gone to 
the salt works as declarent understood. This declarent recollects well the 
names of various persons who lived about said fort when it was surrendered a 
portion of whom were among the prisoners nearly or quite all of whom he 
supposes are now dead. He recollects David White, Joel Hill, - Vanhook, 
William Whitesides, Solomon Litton, William McGuire, Capt. Duncan, Charles 
Gatliffe, - Lovelace, Samuel Poter, William Foster, Thomas Foster, Thomas 
Berry, William Leforce, - Mahan, William Mahan, and Thomas Mahan and his own 
brothers and sisters. He supposes however that all of them are dead. His 
brother Jesse lives now in Trimble County, Kentucky but he was not at the 
fort. He knows however of this declarents abscense and of his return and of 
it being said that he was a prisoner and was exchanged. He has a niece also 
in the State of Missouri daughter of Hezekiah who was six or seven years old 
at the time the fort was surrendered and if she is alive she can testify to 
the facts herein detailed she being also taken and kept as a prisoner. This 
declarent states that after he returned to Virginia when he was exchanged as 
before stated he remained in Prince Edward County four or five years then 
married and moved to Nottoway County, Virginia where he continued to live 
until about 1803 or '4 when he moved to Shelby County, Kentucky where he 
remained one year and then moved to the neighborhood of where he now lives in 
Henry County, Kentucky. He states that his original family record is lost. He 
also states that he knows of no one now living by whom he can certainly prove 
his services and his detention as a prisoner except as before stated. He 
hereby relinquishes every claim whatever to a pension or amount except the 
present and declares that his name is not on the pension roll of the Agency 
of any State. Sworn to and Subscribed the day and year aforesaid.


Silas (his X mark) Foree