The Wyoming Military Establishment. A History of the Twenty-fourth Regiment of Connecticut Militia An Address Before the Tioga Point Historical Society, Delivered — Key Ideas to Explore

From Legal Argument to Battle Narrative

The address begins as a territorial dispute, citing King James I's 1620 charter and the Connecticut Colony's grant. Tubbs builds a case that the Wyoming Valley was legally part of Connecticut, using phrases like “an integral part of the State of Connecticut” and listing institutions—town, county, judge, sheriff, representatives. This section is dense with proper nouns and dates, establishing a foundation of legitimacy. Then, abruptly, the tone shifts. The narrative moves to the battle itself, describing the “massed in columns of four” approach of Major John Butler's Rangers and the Seneca chiefs “streaked with paint, adorned with feathers.” The language becomes sensory: “screech of fife,” “roll of drums,” “picturesque barbaric ornaments.” This transition from dry legalism to visceral detail mirrors the regiment's own sudden plunge from administrative existence into violent conflict.

Voice and the Weight of Family Memory

Tubbs explicitly invokes oral tradition: “This scene as it came down to me when a child, from the reported words of a great grandmother who witnessed it, most profoundly impressed my youthful imagination.” This single sentence reveals the address's dual nature—it is both a public historical lecture and a private family story. The grandmother's eyewitness account is not quoted directly, but its emotional residue shapes the narrative. Tubbs does not claim omniscience; he presents the surrender and subsequent flight through a blend of documentary evidence (Articles of Capitulation, muster rolls, pay rolls) and inherited testimony. The phrase “most profoundly impressed my youthful imagination” acknowledges the subjective lens through which this history is filtered. This personal stake gives the account a particular urgency, especially in describing the “hurried, hasty, precipitate flight” of the valley's inhabitants.

Pacing and the Structure of Catastrophe

The address's pacing is carefully calibrated. After the battle's climax, the narrative slows to detail the terms of surrender and the regiment's dissolution: “The Twenty-fourth regiment was never reorganized. It was overwhelmed on the field of battle; it was surrendered in sections, by the terms of four military conventions.” The repetition of “it was” creates a rhythmic finality. Then, a counterpoint: “On the other hand many of the men considered themselves absolved.” Tubbs lists those who continued fighting—Lieutenant Colonel Zebulon Butler, Captain John Franklin—and points to an “original pay roll” in the building where he speaks. This juxtaposition of defeat and persistence mirrors the historical reality: the regiment ended, but its men did not. The final image of the dead lying unburied for nearly four months, until a detail of thirty men performed “that solemn duty,” closes the narrative on a note of grim, understated dignity.

Tubbs's address is best read as a layered document: a legal brief, a battle narrative, a family memoir, and a commemorative speech. Pay attention to how he weaves together charter language, casualty figures, and personal recollection. The shifts in pace—from measured exposition to rapid, almost breathless description—reflect the regiment's own trajectory from administrative routine to catastrophic violence. The address does not claim to be a complete regimental history; it is a selective, impassioned account shaped by the speaker's ancestry and his audience's expectations. Readers interested in the intersection of local history and personal memory will find this a revealing example of early twentieth-century historical practice.

Reading Tubbs’s careful shift from legal record to the roar of battle, I remembered my grandfather’s voice telling the same story twice—once dry, once trembling. That same ache came back with A Sketch of the 29th Regiment of Connecticut Colored Troops — Background and Themes, where documentation yields to quiet pride. Both feel like holding a letter someone never mailed.