Fort at Number 4
The Fort at Number 4 was the northern most English settelment along the Connecticut River in New Hampshire untill after the French and Indian War more than 30 miles from the nearest English settlements. The town is now known as Charlestown, New Hampshire. Building was started in 1740 by brothers Stephen, Samual and David Farnsworth. By 1743 there were 10 families settled in a square of interconected houses with a stockage and guard tower.
King George's War
In 1744 with the start of King George's War many of the outlying farms and buildings were burned by the French and there Indian Allies. The settler families abandoned the fort and it was occupied by Capt. Stevens and 30 militia troops in the spring of 1747. 11 days after Capt. Stevens and his men arrived the fort was besieged by a large force of French militia and Abenaki warriors. The siege lasted 3 days untill the French and Indians decieded that it was better to head back to Canada than assult the fort with a direct attack.
French and Indian War
During the last of the French and Indian Wars, the Fort at Number 4 saw many soldiers stationed at the fort to protect the frontier including Colonel Nathan Whiting's Regiment of Connecticut with 500 men and Colonel John Goffe’s New Hampshire Regiment with 400. In 1759 Robert Rogers sought help for his hungery rangers in the return from there raid on St. Francis Quebec. Also at the time General Jeffrey Amherst ordered a road to be built between the Fort at Number 4 and the newly captured fort at Crown Point on the shores of Lake Champlain in New York in witch Capt. John Stark and a company of Rangers along with Col. Goffe's Regiment built. The Crown Point Road as it was known is 77 1/2 miles long with many block houses along its route to protect the supplies and travelers trought the wilderness that would later become Vermont. With the defeat of the French in 1761 and the Treaty of Paris in 1763 the need for the fort was ended.
American Revolution
Thought the fort was no longer there, General John Stark gathered the New Hampshire Militia Regiments here on there way to the Battle of Bennington in 1777.