Samuel Bailey, Jr.,
a patriot who died at Bunker Hill
A Biographical Statement
By Hollis R. Bailey
[The following information was part of an address delivered by Hollis R. Bailey, Esq., to the annual meeting of the Bailey-Bayley Association in 1894. Bailey served as President of the Day of the Association. The address is recorded in The Account of the Gathering, published by the Bailey-Bayley Association and preserved in the New York Public Library genealogy collection. In the same volume J.A. Bailey stated that “Records of Old Andover refer to Andover as the Bailey District ‘which was almost entirely owned by members of our family.’”]
Samuel Bailey, Jr., married Hannah Kittridge on January 23, 1753. They had eight children, seven of whom grew up and were married and left numerous descendants. Some of the present residents of Andover [in 1894] are in this branch of the family.
At the opening of the Revolutionary War, Samuel Bailey Jr., was a member of one of the Andover companies of Minute Men, and when the news came on the early morning of April 19, 1975, that the British were marching to Lexington, he hurried, with his company, to assist in driving back the enemy. The thought of his aged parents, and his wife and eight children—the oldest a boy of 17—did not serve to keep him for risking his life in his country’s service.
His service at the Lexington Alarm, as the records show, was with Capt. Joseph Holt’s company from Andover, and was as a private and lasted only a day and a half. But as soon as he had had time to return home and do a considerable part of his spring planting, he enlisted again on May 27, 1775, with Captain Tyler’s (afterwards, Capt. Furbush’s) company from Andover and joined the Continental forces at Cambridge under Colonel Bridges.
He was killed in the battle of Bunker Hill, and his name appears upon the bronze tablets recently erected by the city of Boston.
It has always been understood among the descendants of Samuel Bailey, Jr., that at the time of his death he held the rank of Lieutenant, and his daughter, Hannah Bailey Needham, frequently stated that to her grand children.
It is reported that when he received his death wound in the battle his last words were, “Take my powder horn, I am a dead man!” It is a matter of history that the Continental forces were compelled to retreat because their ammunition gave out, so we find that even in death, the last thought of Samuel Bailey Jr., was to render his utmost service to his country.