Declaration in order to obtain the benefit of the Act of Congress June 7th A. D. 1832.

State of Tennessee
Robertson County

This the tenth day of November in the year of our Lord one thousand eight hundred and thirty two 
Captain Stephen Cole personally appeared before the County Court for the County of Robertson in 
said State now in session aged seventy three (73) and being duly sworn according to law, doth upon 
his oath make the following declaration for the purpose of obtaining the benefit of the Act of Congress 
passed the 7th day of June 1832 for the benefit of the officers and soldiers of the Revolution. He 
declared that he was born in Anson County, in the State of North Carolina and that in the year of 1776 
he thinks in the month of August, he entered the services of the United States as a substitute for his 
father who was a crafted militiaman, in the company commanded by Capt. Hay and Lieutenant Edward Davidson 
in a Regiment commanded by Col. David Love and Maj. Davidson, that they marched in the summer of 1775 
from Anson County against the Cherokee Indians under the command of Gen'l Rutherford that he believes 
they were called and for a tour of three months, but not the Regiment to which he belonged, was actually 
in service about four months, when upon our return to Anson County we were discharged, that he does not 
recollect whether he received a discharge or not, but that he never received any compensation therefore, 
that after this time the Tories became very troublesome in that part of North Carolina. He was engaged 
as a volunteer in a great many scouting parties against them and without any definite time being specified 
for serving, and performed such services very frequently as occasion required, until he received the 
commission of Captain signed by Governor Caswell, authorizing him to raise and command a company of 
volunteers that in pursuance thereof he raised a company of volunteers and took the command of them as 
captain and Israel Medlock was appointed his lieutenant and John Bern the ensign, that he is unable to 
specify the time when he received his commission, but immediately upon his receiving the commission he 
was actively employed in ranging and scouting in four or six counties around Anson where he resided, 
that whilst engaged in the performance of such services, he was under the command of the various superior 
officers in whose district he happened to be employed. He recollects to have been under the command of 
Col. Wade who commanded in Anson and also of Col. Medlock who commanded in Richmond County, which had 
been a part of Anson, and also of Col. Williams and also of Col. Donaldson in that section of North 
Carolina and also in the upper part of South [Carolina], the times were very troublesome and dangerous 
and that in the discharge of the various duties assigned him after he was commissioned as a captain, 
he sometimes had the command of a whole company and at other times of the smaller number of men, depending 
upon the services to be discharged and that in his whole time was given to the services of his country, 
that he recollects he had been at one time advised together with nine others to take charge of a drove 
of cattle and drive them to the army of Gen'l Gates and that after crossing the River Pedee with the 
cattle he met the troops of Gen'l Gates  who had been defeated at Camden (SC) on their retreat and then 
returned to the opposite side of the Pedee; that he was well acquainted with Gen'l Caswell [illegible]  
under Gen'l Gates in that battle and was slightly acquainted with the Baron De Kalb and Gen'l Smallwood 
who were in the battle; that he had joined with his troop of Cavalry the army commanded by Gen'l Gates, 
at a plantation of Montgomery on Deep River in Chatham County, near Wilcox's Ironwork, on his march to 
South Carolina and he was then ordered to pilot Col. Armeng a French officer who commanded a regiment of 
dragoons, to some part of South Carolina, which is not now recollected and after the performance of this 
service, he was returning to join the army of Gen'l Gates with the drove of beeves when he met the troops 
of Gen'l Gates fleeing from Camden, that after the battle of Camden his company as well as most of the 
militia scattered and were dispersed in various parts of the country, where they could be most secure, 
that he and his brother James Cole who had served under him as one of his soldiers retreated to the 
neighborhood of Raleigh when James was taken sick and remained confined to his bed for some months at the 
house of Mr. Bledsoe a true Whig and an honest benevolent man. After his brother had so much recovered as 
to be out of danger, he returned to Pedee for the purpose of collecting if possible his scattered company, 
that he succeeded in collecting a few men and as early as practicable again marched with them into South 
Carolina and took his station on the Pedee River at a place then known by the name of Culps Ferry, his 
command then amounting to about thirty men, of the Whig refugees and took possession of a large brick 
dwelling house of Col. Culp and occupied it as a fort and guarded that bank of the River, the British 
being about three hundred strong on the opposite side of the River, at, what was then called the Long 
Bluff Court House about three miles from the ferry; that he and his company remained in the occupation 
of Culp's house until the arrival of Gen'l Greene when I met him at the mouth of Rocky River. That he 
and his company was then ordered East toward Fayetteville district where there was a great abundance 
of Tories for the purpose of making discoveries ….information of the situation of the country - that he 
continued after that time in the command of his company ranging and scouting and acting as spies until 
the close of the war -  that recollects in one of the scouting parties to have met Gen'l Marion at Cole's 
Bridge on Drowning Creek in Richmond County where he had but two men with him and I had but two or three - 
I was personally acquainted with Gen'l Greene having been repeatedly sent for by him to his tent, for 
the purpose of giving him information as to the situation of the country and the parties -  that he was 
constantly employed in that section of the country in the performance of such duties until the taking 
of Cornwallis at York-town and until peace was finally made.

After the Battle of Camden, when the country seemed to be lost and the Whig cause almost desperate 
I became apprehensive that I should fall into the hands of the Tories from the part I had taken against 
them I did not expect any humanity or mercy from them and thought the best way to secure myself in such 
an event would be to keep them in ignorance of my name, therefore destroyed all the papers I had and suppose 
that the commission I had received was destroyed at that time, and he further declared, that he has no 
written evidence of his commission or services, further than a letter addressed to him after the peace was 
made by Charles Brooks, who was one of his soldiers, requesting him to hand a certificate of his services to 
John Hunt, who was a cousin of said Brooks and who was the ensign in my company - the said letter bears 
date in 1784 and is addressed to me as Captain and is enclosed in these papers for the satisfaction of 
the department - he does not know of any person now living by whom he can prove his services except the 
following - One man by the name of Lot Stricklin , who I am informed now lives in Richmond County, North 
Carolina, who served under me as one of my soldiers, and my brother James Cole who now resides in  Carroll 
County in the State of Tennessee. He is informed that a few others are probably living who might prove 
some incidents in the revolution which would tend to shew that he had been an officer in service but none 
so fully as his brother James and said Lot Stricklin - that after peace was made he settled himself in 
Richmond County, North Carolina and remained there some years and removed himself to the State of Tennessee 
in Robertson County where he now resides - that he is not upon the pension list of any state or that of 
the United States, and that he hereby relinquishes all claim for any pension except that under the Act 
of 1832 for which this declaration is filed.

I have procured the deposition of Lot Stricklin spoken of in the foregoing declaration which I hereby 
transmit in support of my declaration. I have endeavored by the same service to obtain the deposition of 
James Cole, but have failed to obtain it from what cause I am unable to state whether he is dead (being
seventy seven years of age) or what is the cause is unknown. Sworn to and subscribed the day and year 
aforesaid in open Court Stephen Cole. Test W. Seal, Clk.

We, Thomas Gunn, a Clergyman residing in the County of Robertson and James Seal residing in the same 
county certify that we are well acquainted with Stephen Cole who has subscribed and sworn to the above 
declaration that we believed him to be seventy three years of age that he is reputed and believed in the 
neighborhood where he resides to have been a soldier and officer of the revolution and that we concur in 
that opinion. Sworn to and subscribed the day and year aforesaid in open court. Thomas Gunn, MG and W. 
Seal, Clk. 

State of Tennessee
Carroll County
Court of Pleas & Quarter Sessions. December Term 1832

On the 10th day of December A. D. 1832 personally appeared in open Court before the Justices of the 
Court of Pleas & Quarter Sessions for the County of Carroll, James Cole, a resident of said County aged 
77 years, who being first duly sworn according to Law; deposeth and saith, that his brother Stephen Cole,
now residing in the County of Robertson, State of Tennessee, but at the period mentioned below residing 
in the County of Anson, State of North Carolina, in that part of said County which has since become 
Richmond, went a s substitute for his Father, John Cole, Sen'r., in 1776 under command of Captain Hay, 
David Love, Colonel, in an expedition against the Cherokee Indians, and was thus engaged about the term 
of six months. After his return deponent does not recollect particularly of his being engaged in the 
service until the year 1780 when he volunteered, deponent thinks, under Colonel Crawford, or Colonel Wade 
and some time after, time not particularly recollected, he, Stephen Cole aforesaid obtained the appointment 
of Captain, and deponent well recollects serving under him as such -  but how long said Stephen Cole acted 
as Captain, or whether deponent ever say his commission or what has become or it, he is unable to say - 
yet well recollects having heard his brother Stephen frequently say that being in some close place and 
fearing that he might fall into the hands of the Tories and British, he collected his papers and burnt 
them - Deponent further states, on his oath aforesaid that his Brother Stephen Cole, from this time was 
constantly in the service of the United States, until the surrender of Cornwallis and for several months 
afterwards, the Tories acting as tho' they were sensible that theirs was a desperate case after the news 
of Cornwallis' surrender.

This Deponent further says that the time of service of his said Brother Stephen Cole, from first to last 
exceeded two years, but cannot say that he acted as Captain as long as two years and wishes not to be 
understood as saying that he did not. James Cole

Sworn to and subscribed in open court the day and year first above mentioned by and before Edward Gwin, Clk

State of Tennessee
Carroll County

I, Edward Gwin Clerk of the Court of Pleas and Quarter Sessions for the County of Carroll, hereby certify 
that James Cole who has sworn to and subscribed the foregoing affidavit is a credible person, and that his 
statements are entitled to credit

In witness whereof I have hereunto set my hand and seal of office the 10th day of December A.D. 1832 and 
the 57th year of Independence of the United States. Done at Huntingdon. Edward Gwin, Clerk

Cole Family Data Discovered in Ancient Book of Sermons
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