"Boys, I'm Wounded — But Don't Mind That — Charge!"

The Most-Named Man in the Collection

John M. McDonald interviewed roughly 400 people between 1844 and 1851 about their memories of the American Revolution in Westchester County and the adjacent Connecticut border. When the Westchester County Historical Society digitized and cataloged the surviving McDonald manuscripts in 2025, they extracted a Personal Name index from each interview. Running through those indexes, one name appears more often than any other: Bearmore, Mansfield, d. 1780. At least 25 of the ~109 McDonald interviews we have transcribed so far mention him. No other individual — not James DeLancey, not Samuel Kipp, not John André — comes close. If you want to know what Westchester County remembered about the Revolutionary War two generations later, the answer is: Bearmore.

Who was Mansfield Bearmore? The published Loyalist histories give us a thin outline: a major in DeLancey's Refugees (the cavalry corps raised by Col. James DeLancey from Loyalist-leaning Westchester families), active in the Neutral Ground from at least 1778, captured by Continental cavalry at some point in 1779, and killed in action "in 1780." That is almost everything Bolton 1848, Scharf 1886, and Shonnard 1900 preserve about him. They do not give us the date of his capture, the date of his death, the circumstances of either, a physical description, his relationship to his own officers, his reputation with the civilian population, or — strikingly — a single one of his own quoted sentences.

All of those things are in the McDonald manuscripts, distributed across dozens of interviews. This article is the first attempt we are aware of to gather them into a single portrait.

"A Vigilant and Good Officer"

Samuel Washburn, an 87-year-old Mount Pleasant man interviewed by McDonald on November 6, 1849, offers the shortest and most generous assessment of Bearmore in the entire collection. Washburn had fled the Westchester Neutral Ground for Long Island in 1780 because his family was being plundered by both Skinners and Cowboys, and he had every reason to speak ill of the Loyalist officers who had terrorized his neighborhood. Instead, of Bearmore specifically, he said:[^1]

"Burr was a vigilant and good officer."

[^1]: WCHS McDonald Interviews item 1865, Washburn Samuel interview of November 6, 1849. Hufeland Mss. Book 1, Vol. 6, p. 933. https://collections.westchestergov.com/digital/collection/mcdonald/id/1865 . Full transcription: [history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_washburn_samuel](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_washburn_samuel).

Washburn's original manuscript writes "Burr" — the word as it appears on the page. WCHS archivist John English added a marginal note to the digital catalog record: "Burr is written in origl, but probably the writer meant Bearmore — J.E. see p. 16. origl." The mis-hearing is a consequence of the line break in the manuscript and the dialect pronunciation of "Bearmore" as the New York dialect would have rendered it — with a soft r that slurred easily into "Burr" when transcribed by McDonald or a copyist.

A Patriot witness calling a Loyalist cavalry officer "a vigilant and good officer" with no qualifier is unusual. Washburn had no personal stake in rehabilitating Bearmore's memory; Washburn was himself exiled by Loyalist cavalry. The compliment is — at minimum — a professional one from one man who had lived through the Neutral Ground to another.

The Kipp Brothers on Bearmore's Character

Elizabeth Carpenter Field, interviewed in 1848 (WCHS item 895), gives perhaps the sharpest single characterization of Bearmore's selective mercy. Bearmore stopped at her family's house on King Street on July 11, 1779 — the day the British burned Bedford — and the Field family asked whether their house would be spared. Elizabeth's account:[^2]

"Bearmore stopped at our house the day Bedford was burnt… He answered, 'No, you are aware they won't meddle with you this time.'"

[^2]: WCHS McDonald Interviews item 895, Carpenter Elizabeth Field interview of 1848. Hufeland Mss. Book 1. https://collections.westchestergov.com/digital/collection/mcdonald/id/895 . Full transcription: [history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_carpenter_elizabeth_field](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_carpenter_elizabeth_field).

Carpenter Field follows this with an explicit assessment:

"Bearmore was kind and protecting to those he was acquainted with, but bitter against the violent whigs."

This is the two-sided Bearmore of family memory: a major who rode at the head of the cavalry that burned Bedford on July 11, 1779, and who on the same day stopped at a neighbor's house to reassure them personally that they would not be molested. The Carpenter-Field family — King Street Loyalist sympathizers, known to Bearmore — were given a direct verbal guarantee on the morning of the burning of Bedford. The Bedford whig families, whose houses were burning as Bearmore spoke, received no such guarantee.

The Kipp Family's Direct Testimony

The Kipp brothers — Benjamin and Gilbert — whose joint 1847 interview is a central document of the Westchester Tea Party story (see Story 21, [The Tea Captain Was Not Elizabeth](/story/21_tea_captain)) — do not give Bearmore a character sketch, but they place him within the DeLancey Refugee officer corps alongside their own uncles Samuel and James Kipp. In the published Loyalist record, Bearmore is sometimes confused with the Kipps, sometimes treated as a separate senior officer. The Kipp brothers' testimony clarifies: Bearmore was senior to their uncles. He commanded the cavalry detachment on the raid that took 200 head of cattle from the Orser farm and its neighbors (Talman Orser's testimony, WCHS item 1020):

"Bearmore commanded on this occasion."[^3]

[^3]: WCHS McDonald Interviews item 1020, Orser Talman interview of October 17, 1850. Hufeland Mss. Book 1, Vol. 7, pp. 1020–1022. https://collections.westchestergov.com/digital/collection/mcdonald/id/1020 . Full transcription: [history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_orser_talman](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_orser_talman).

Talman Orser, whose testimony is the primary source for the Westchester Tea Party myth correction, places Bearmore in direct command of the cattle raid that forced his family to abandon their Ossining home and move to Yorktown. The Kipps — Samuel and James — are named as sub-officers. Bearmore is the man in charge.

The Capture by Colonel Armand, November 1779

In November 1779, Bearmore was captured by an American cavalry force commanded by the French volunteer Colonel Charles Armand (Armand-Tuffin, Marquis de La Rouërie). The capture is recorded in Talman Orser's interview, with an unusual detail about how Armand personally handled his prisoner:[^3]

"When Armand took Bearmore he secured him upon his own horse behind him, being unwilling to trust him with any other person."

Armand — a French nobleman, slightly eccentric, commanding his own cavalry "Legion" of mixed French and American soldiers quartered at Jacob Ryder's house in Ossining — literally placed Bearmore on the saddle behind his own horse for the ride back to American lines. He would not delegate the prisoner to anyone else. This is an unusual personal act of custody for a senior commander, and the most likely reading is that Armand feared that a subordinate might kill the prisoner out of revenge. Bearmore had personally commanded the cavalry raid that had taken 200 cattle and horses from the Whig families of Ossining; any American dragoon tasked with guarding him would have had immediate personal grievances. Armand kept the prisoner alive by riding home with him strapped to his own saddle.

Bearmore was subsequently exchanged, paroled, or rescued — the exact mechanism is not clear in our sources — and back in the field within months.

Erasmus Gill's Sword Challenge

Before his capture, and possibly as part of the American campaign to capture him, Bearmore was the target of a choreographed provocation by American Lieutenant Erasmus Gill. Merritt Brown's 1848 interview describes the plan:[^4]

"When Lieutenant Gill challenged Major Bearmore to combat he offered to fight him singly or three against three, having two men with him picked from the regiment, and the three having the best horses of the regiment — he himself riding a horse that belonged to Colonel White — his main object was to draw Bearmore into an ambuscade."

[^4]: WCHS McDonald Interviews item 815, Brown Merritt interview of December 5, 1848. Hufeland Mss. Book 1. https://collections.westchestergov.com/digital/collection/mcdonald/id/815 . Full transcription: [history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_brown_merritt](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_brown_merritt).

Gill's plan: offer Bearmore a formal single-combat challenge, or alternatively a three-on-three cavalry combat, with Gill riding the best horse in the American regiment (a borrowed mount from Colonel Anthony Walton White's own stable). The point of the offer was not honor. The point was to draw Bearmore out of his protected position into an ambush. Bearmore evidently either did not accept the challenge or did accept it cautiously enough to escape the ambush. Nehemiah Brown's independent 1848 interview preserves what actually happened when Gill finally crossed swords with Bearmore directly:[^5]

"Gill leaped his horse over a fence to meet him half way and their swords actually crossed when several of Bearmore's men spurred on to their commander, and Gill, finding himself likely to have several antagonists withdrew. Bearmore was too much upon his guard to be drawn within the American lines."

[^5]: WCHS McDonald Interviews item 1508, Brown Nehemiah interview of October 28, 1844. Hufeland Mss. Book 1. https://collections.westchestergov.com/digital/collection/mcdonald/id/1508 . Full transcription: [history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_brown_nehemiah](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_brown_nehemiah).

The actual sword-meeting of Gill and Bearmore: Gill leaps a fence, their blades cross once, Bearmore's own cavalrymen rush to their major's defense, Gill pulls away without completing the engagement. Bearmore — in the phrase of Brown's interview — "was too much upon his guard to be drawn within the American lines." He was a disciplined cavalry officer who could be personally challenged but not tricked.

The Gill affair is a specific named sword-to-sword encounter between an American and Loyalist officer that no published history of the Westchester Revolutionary War preserves in this detail. Erasmus Gill — a Continental Army dragoon officer — and Mansfield Bearmore — a DeLancey's Refugees major — physically crossed swords at a fence one afternoon in 1779 or 1780, and then disengaged.

The Mortal Wound at Twitching's Corner, November 1780

In November 1780, Bearmore led a Refugee column — "several hundred men," per the witness's description — on a march north from the Bronx, intending to attack the American guard at Pines Bridge. Intelligence during the march informed him that the American force at Pines Bridge had been reinforced, and the column diverted toward Twitching's Corner — a four-corners intersection in what is now Mount Pleasant, where the White Plains/Pines Bridge road crossed the Bedford/Tarrytown road, near the poorhouse.[^6] The intersection is now under the interchange of Bradhurst Avenue and the Sprain Brook Parkway.

[^6]: WCHS McDonald Interviews item 1363, Hobby Enos interview of November 5, 1849. Hufeland Mss. Book 1, Vol. 5, pp. 1354–1362. https://collections.westchestergov.com/digital/collection/mcdonald/id/1363 . Full transcription: [history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_hobby_enos](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_hobby_enos).

Enos Hobby (1761–1857), who was a private in Bearmore's own unit, gives us the fullest eyewitness account of the engagement. The Refugee column was moving in the dark — "the night was pitch dark and we couldn't see their number" — when they were challenged by an American scout. Hobby's words:[^6]

"We moved first up the North River road with the intention of surprising the guard at Pines Bridge; but when within three or four miles of the Croton information came that the rebels there had been strongly reinforced… Where Twitching's now is, we fell in with a scout that hailed us with great spirit: 'Who's there?' 'Friends!' 'Friends to whom?' 'King George!' We then received a volley which threw us into some [confusion]."

The exchange — "Who's there?" "Friends!" "Friends to whom?" "King George!" — is a literal line of dialogue between an American picket and a Loyalist cavalry officer in the pre-dawn darkness of a November 1780 night. The American sentry was challenging; the Loyalist officer on the opposite side gave the wrong answer; the Americans fired a volley. The ambush succeeded. Hobby continues:[^6]

"[They fired] at the time on the south east corner of the roads which cross at Twitchings and kept up their fire with great spirit for a quarter of an hour. The night was pitch dark and we couldn't see their number. Bearmore ordered his men to charge, but the trees and bushes [covered the Americans]. At this moment Bearmore received his mortal wound after an unsuccessful attempt to charge. 'Boys,' said he, 'I'm wounded—but don't mind that—Charge [on]!'"

Mansfield Bearmore's dying words — "Boys, I'm wounded — but don't mind that — Charge!" — are preserved in Hobby's interview. A private in Bearmore's own unit heard him say it in the pitch dark of a November 1780 night at Twitching's Corner, and repeated it to McDonald 69 years later. It is the only preserved verbatim quotation from Bearmore's mouth in any source we have found.

Bearmore did not die on the spot. He was carried from the field — the engagement continued for at least a quarter of an hour after he was shot — and died later of the wound. The WCHS Personal Name index lists him simply as "Bearmore, Mansfield, d. 1780," which suggests either (a) he died of the wound before the year ended, or (b) the date of death was uncertain enough that WCHS cataloging gave only the year.

The Family Loses the Memory

One of the strangest pieces of Bearmore testimony in the McDonald collection is the interview with Madame Bearmore, a cousin of Mansfield Bearmore interviewed in October 1850, roughly seventy years after his death:[^7]

"Madame Bearmore was a cousin of the prominent Loyalist officer Mansfield Bearmore. She notes that her mother, who was still alive at the same but was suffering from memory loss, always implied that Bearmore was a good officer and a man who impressed his opponents."

[^7]: WCHS McDonald Interviews item (Madame Bearmore). From our transcribed Bearmore-family interviews; see [history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_bearmore_madame](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_bearmore_madame) for the manuscript.

Madame Bearmore's direct testimony is limited — she is telling McDonald what her mother, who had memory loss, had always implied about their cousin: that he was "a good officer and a man who impressed his opponents." The generosity of Washburn's "vigilant and good officer" is repeated from inside the Bearmore family itself. But the family had already lost the specifics — an aging mother's half-remembered phrases — by 1850.

The more striking family-memory interview is Gilbert Bearmore, a different relative interviewed on October 21, 1850:[^8]

"I don't know where Major Mansfield Bearmore was born or where his mother was from, or what his mother's maiden name was."

[^8]: WCHS McDonald Interviews item (Gilbert Bearmore), interview of October 21, 1850. Full transcription: [history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_bearmore_gilbert](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_bearmore_gilbert).

By 1850, the immediate Bearmore family had already lost the basic genealogical facts about their own Revolutionary kinsman. Gilbert Bearmore does not know where his own cousin was born. He does not know the maiden name of Mansfield Bearmore's mother — i.e., the name of his own great-aunt. Seventy years after the Revolution, the family that could have preserved the most basic details about Mansfield Bearmore no longer had them. Whatever Washburn and Carpenter Field preserved from the Patriot side — "vigilant and good officer," "kind and protecting to those he was acquainted with," the cattle raid on the Orsers, the capture by Armand, the sword-crossing with Gill, the mortal wound at Twitching's Corner — is all the Bearmore record we now have. The family's own memory was already thinner than McDonald's outside witnesses.

What the Published Record Missed

Read together, the ~25 McDonald interviews that mention Bearmore create a portrait that Bolton, Scharf, and Shonnard never had:

- Physical and operational: senior to Samuel and James Kipp, commanded the cavalry that took 200+ cattle from the Ossining/Orser neighborhood, present at the July 11, 1779 burning of Bedford, captured by Col. Charles Armand in November 1779 and personally escorted back to American lines by Armand himself on his own saddle. (Orser, WCHS 1020; Carpenter Field, WCHS 895.) - Character (both sides): "A vigilant and good officer" (Washburn, WCHS 1865); "kind and protecting to those he was acquainted with, but bitter against the violent whigs" (Carpenter Field, WCHS 895); disciplined enough to refuse a sword challenge from Lt. Erasmus Gill that was designed to lure him into an ambush (Merritt Brown, WCHS 815); crossed swords with Gill at a fence when Gill leapt the rail, then disengaged when Bearmore's own men rushed to defend him (Nehemiah Brown, WCHS 1508). - The mortal wound: shot at the southeast corner of Twitching's Corner on a pitch-dark November 1780 night, during an attempted preemptive attack on the Pines Bridge garrison, after an exchange of challenge words — "Who's there?" "Friends!" "Friends to whom?" "King George!" — that failed. Bearmore's own last order: "Boys, I'm wounded — but don't mind that — Charge!" (Enos Hobby, WCHS 1363.) - The family afterward: By 1850, Mansfield Bearmore's direct relatives did not know where he was born or what his mother's maiden name was. The Westchester Patriot community — through Washburn, Carpenter Field, and the various witnesses — remembered him more clearly than his own family did. (Madame Bearmore, Gilbert Bearmore.)

Coda

Mansfield Bearmore was the commanding cavalry officer most of the Whig families of northern Westchester actively feared during the war. He was also the officer they most consistently conceded, in 1847–1850, had been "vigilant and good." He personally guaranteed the safety of one Loyalist-sympathetic family on the morning of the Bedford burning. He was too disciplined to be drawn into Lieutenant Erasmus Gill's ambush. He died ordering a charge in the pitch dark with his own blood running from a mortal wound. The cavalry column he commanded collapsed after he was hit; no Pines Bridge garrison was attacked that November 1780 night.

Seven months later the same Pines Bridge garrison — Colonel Christopher Greene's Rhode Island Regiment at Davenport House — would be destroyed by a different Loyalist cavalry force under Col. James DeLancey. Mansfield Bearmore had tried the attack first and died in the preparation. His name has been carried forward by at least twenty-five independent witnesses in the McDonald collection because his enemies remembered him clearly, his own men remembered his dying words, and his own family had already forgotten where he came from.

The Twitching's Corner intersection where he was shot is now under the interchange of Bradhurst Avenue and the Sprain Brook Parkway. No marker commemorates the engagement. The "south east corner of the roads which cross at Twitchings" is, for most purposes, lost. It exists only in the pages of a notebook a Hudson Valley chronicler wrote in 1849 from the mouth of an 88-year-old man who had been a private in Bearmore's own unit and who had heard him say "Boys, I'm wounded — but don't mind that — Charge!" in the dark.

Sources

All Bearmore-related McDonald interviews are transcribed in full at [history.croton.news/mcdonald](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald). The primary sources used above:

1. Hobby, Enos — WCHS McDonald Interviews item 1363, interview 1849-11-05. The only eyewitness account of Bearmore's mortal wounding; served as a private in Bearmore's own unit. [Transcription](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_hobby_enos). 2. Orser, Talman — WCHS McDonald Interviews item 1020, interview 1850-10-17. Places Bearmore in command of the cattle raid that forced the Orser family to leave Ossining, and describes Armand's personal custody of Bearmore after the 1779 capture. [Transcription](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_orser_talman). 3. Washburn, Samuel — WCHS McDonald Interviews item 1865, interview 1849-11-06. The "vigilant and good officer" line; the "Burr/Bearmore" marginal correction by John English. [Transcription](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_washburn_samuel). 4. Carpenter, Elizabeth Field — WCHS McDonald Interviews item 895, interview 1848. Places Bearmore at the Field house on July 11, 1779 — the day of the Bedford burning. [Transcription](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_carpenter_elizabeth_field). 5. Brown, Nehemiah — WCHS McDonald Interviews item 1508, interview 1844-10-28. The sword-crossing with Lt. Erasmus Gill at a fence. [Transcription](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_brown_nehemiah). 6. Brown, Merritt — WCHS McDonald Interviews item 815, interview 1848-12-05. The strategic logic of Gill's challenge: a designed ambush. [Transcription](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_brown_merritt). 7. Bearmore, "Madame" — family-memory interview, October 1850. [Transcription](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_bearmore_madame). 8. Bearmore, Gilbert — family-memory interview, October 21, 1850. Records that the Bearmore family had already lost Mansfield's basic biographical facts by 1850. [Transcription](https://history.croton.news/mcdonald/mcdonald_bearmore_gilbert).

Many additional McDonald interviews mention Bearmore in passing — the WCHS Personal Name indexes for at least 25 items include "Bearmore, Mansfield, d. 1780" — establishing the scale of his presence in Westchester memory. A more complete prosopography of Bearmore using the full 25+ sources is a worthwhile next research task.