Worcester State University - Oak Leaf Yearbook (Worcester, MA)

Page 15 text:

In the Spanish campaign of 1740, Ruggles organized a company of 100 men at his own expense and marched them from Cape Cod to Boston, whereupon he received a commission as Captain. In 1753, he moved his family to Hardwich, which at that time was on the frontier. He was elected the town’s representative to the General Court. He established the Hardwich Agriculture Fair, an annual affair which continues to be held at the present time. The Brigadier was heard frequently to remark that the time would come when the colonies would “fall off from the parent state, as ripe fruit from the tree.” However, he believed the Whigs (the rebels’ political representatives) were shaking the tree for selfish economic reasons and the result eventually would prove disasterous for the colonies and the old country alike. His influence upon his professional colleagues was strong — so much ' so that it was said that “every Worcester County lawyer but one became a Loyalist refugee.’’ However, his own family itself was deeply divided. His wife refused to leave Hardwick when the war erupted. His favorite brother, his eldest son and many of his nephews were active Whigs. His brother-in-law was sent to the House of Representatives in his place. Word was received at Hardwick during August 1774 that Ruggles had been appointed to the Maudamus Council, a body loyal to the Crown. The Brigadier set out along the road from Hardwick to Boston. His neighbors gathered, under arms, to prevent his journey to take the oath. Timothy made it to Boston. After Ruggles’ departure from the town, the mansion in which he lived was plundered of its guns, and the Brigadier’s best English stallion poisoned. Timothy Jr. was placed under house arrest and the others were placed in the town pound to be fed bread and water. He never saw his home or wife again, but he regretted even more the abandonment of the sword which he had carried through the French and Indian War. He died at age 63 and was buried in Nova Scotia. n

Page 17 text:

The essence of this story can be found today inscribed on Joshua Spooner’s gravestone in the Brookfield Town Cemetery — “He was murdered by three soldiers ... at the instigation of his wife Bathesheba.” The Bathesheba in this case is Bathesheba Ruggles Spooner, the daughter of Brigadier Timothy Ruggles. Before reaching first twenty years of her life, she was married at her father’s insistence to a prosperous citizen of Brookfield, named Joshua Spooner. The marriage was hastily put through, possibly because her father, realizing his own precarious position at the time, sought to assure Bathesheba’s security. The misfortune was that Spooner, although comparatively wealthy, was a much older man and of unpleasant character and disposition. At the time of his death, they had lived together nearly 14 years, many of them years of corroding embitterment. Bathesheba was 33 years old in the year 1775. She was a person who had strong feelings and passions and ’eventually she came to have an utter aversion to her husband. About a year before the murder, a young 18 year old soldier, Ezra Ross, recently discharged from the Continental Army due to illness passed through the town. Bathesheba noticed his weakened condition, took him into the home and nursed him back to health. Since she was starved for love and affection, and of a passionate nature, she fell in love with Ross, who was a person of respectable parentage and had some education. Although there is some evidence of resistence to the relationship, Ross submitted. The relationship had an ironic twist in that Ross was a former soldier in Washington’s army and Bathesheba was extremely Loyalist in her sympathies. Nevertheless, the relationship remained intact, while it lasted. During the war, Brookfield was overwhelmingly pro-Revolutionary and she was intensely disliked by her neighbors because she was so honest about her political affiliation. y In late winter 1778, realizing she was pregnant, Bathesheba began thinking of ways to dispose of her husband. On an early February morning, James Buchanan and William Brooks came along the road and passed the Spooner homestead. They were British soldiers who had surrendered with Burgoyne at Saratoga and had successfully drifted away from the prison camp at nearby Rutland. The day was cold and Alexander Cummings, a servant in the Spooner household, suggested that they come inside the house. He told them that his mistress had a great regard for members of the British army, as her father and brother were in the army. 13