Alexander Scammel sometimes Scammell was an American Revolutionary soldier during the American Revolutionary War.
Background
Alexander was born on March 27, 1747 in that part of the town of Mendon which is now Milford, Massachussets, United States. He was baptized there on March 22, 1747. His parents were Samuel Leslie and Jane (Libbey) Scammell, both of whom emigrated from Portsmouth, England, to Mendon probably in 1737.
His father, a physician of standing and affluence, died in 1753 and in his will provided for the care of his two sons by the Rev. Amariah Frost, pastor of the Congregational Church.
Education
Alexander was prepared for Harvard College and graduated there in 1769.
Career
With such experience in teaching district school as Scammell had already gained during his college course, he taught first in Kingston and then at Plymouth, Massachussets In 1772 he went to Portsmouth, New Hampshire, where, with the help of a cousin in government service, he was employed in surveying and exploring for lands and for royal navy timber. He worked with Samuel Holland in surveying and making maps of the region.
The outbreak of the Revolution found him a tall, attractive young man reading law in the office of John Sullivan at Durham, New Hampshire. He became a brigade major in Sullivan's brigade, served in the siege of Boston and in the expedition to Canada the next year, and as aide-de-camp to Sullivan he participated in the Long Island campaign, during which, on the retreat to New York, he was responsible for a blunder that might have been fatal but for the timely arrival of Washington.
In October 1776 he became brigade major in the division of Gen. Charles Lee and on December 10, 1776, colonel of the third continental battalion to be raised by the state. In 1777 he was with St. Clair at Ticonderoga and was slightly wounded at Saratoga. On January 5, 1778, he was chosen by Congress to succeed Timothy Pickering as adjutant general of the Continental Army and served until January 1, 1781. In that office it became his duty to arrest his old general, Charles Lee, after the battle of Monmouth and in 1780 to take charge of the execution of Major John Andre.
He resigned to take command of the 16t New Hampshire Regiment, and he led a party of Continental light horse until on September 30, 1781, he was captured at Yorktown, while reconnoitering as officer of the day. The circumstances of his death at Williamsburg sixteen days later have occasioned some controversy. It has been charged that after his capture he received the wounds from which he died; but the evidence is unconvincing. Contemporary reports of his death are not agreed in making such a charge, and it is not clear by what channels the report of any eye-witness could have found its way back to the American lines.
Achievements
Alexander Scammell successfully commanded the regiment at Trenton, Princeton, Saratoga, the Sullivan Expedition and Monmouth. In the result, he was appointed adjutant general of the Continental Army by Gen. George Washington.
Fort Scammel in Casco Bay, Maine is named after him. Also in 1933, the Alexander Scammell Bridge over the Bellamy River near Durham, New Hampshire, was named after him and a street was named in his honor.