The Female Paul Revere

“Listen, my children, and you shall hear of the midnight ride of Sybil Ludington”… So, okay, it doesn’t rhyme, but it was still one heck of a daring deed. It would have been daring even for a man, but Sybil was a teenage girl when she made her not-so-famous ride—and why she’s not as famous as Paul Revere, one can only guess. Maybe it’s due to the sexual prejudice of past historians, or maybe it’s simply that no one ever wrote a poem about her (it being so difficult to find a decent rhyme for Ludington, and all). Regardless, her story is an inspiring one and especially appropriate for this time of year. When we think of America’s founding fathers on July 4th, it’s nice to remember that there were a few mothers among them.

Sybil Ludington was born April 5, 1761, in Fredericksburg (now called Ludingtonville), New York. She was the eldest of twelve children (which makes her mother a heroine, too, come to think of it), and the daughter of Colonel Henry Ludington. Colonel Ludington was a veteran of the French and Indian War and the commander of the 7th Regiment of the Dutchess County Militia, a volunteer regiment of locals during the Revolutionary War. He later became an aide to General George Washington.

On the night of April 26, 1777--only a few weeks past Sybil’s sixteenth birthday--just as the family was getting ready for bed, a dust-caked messenger on a lathered horse arrived at the Ludington farm with extremely distressing news: Two thousand British troops under the command of General William Tyron, who was also the governor of New York, had attacked Danbury, Connecticut, about fifteen miles southeast. Danbury was where the munitions and supplies for the militia of the entire area were stored. And the British were torching the town!

Obviously, quick action was needed, but getting the militia together presented a problem. Colonel Ludington’s men were scattered throughout the area on their farms, preparing for spring planting. Even in times of war, life goes on. The messenger and his horse were both exhausted. The poor man was also unfamiliar with the surrounding country; he probably wouldn’t have been able to find half the regiment even if he had been able to ride further. Colonel Ludington himself couldn’t rally his men and organize them for attack at the same time, so sixteen-year-old Sybil convinced her father to let her sound the alarm. Brave girl.

She left about 9:00 PM, traveling alone and with no weapons save a stick--and the stick was just for prodding her bay horse, Star. Some sources say her ride that night was forty miles, some say it was only twenty, but all agree it was raining hard. To make matters worse, Sybil had to avoid not only British troops in the area, but also British Loyalists and “Skinners” (outlaws with allegiance to neither side). She rode through Putnam and Dutchess counties, south to Mahopec and north to Stormville, shouting at the farmhouses of the militiamen, “The British are burning Danbury! Muster at Ludington’s!”

Along the way, she could see a hellish red glow in the night sky from the flames of the burning town. One can only imagine what she felt, so young and alone and vulnerable--battling wet, cold, fear and fatigue, risking capture or worse--but Sybil stuck to her horse and stuck to her mission. She made it back home just before dawn, soaked to the skin and bone-weary, and was heartened to find almost four hundred men ready to march.

The militia arrived too late to save Danbury or their munitions and supplies, but they were able to attack the British troops as they left the area, and drive them back to their ships in the Long Island Sound. The encounter was later dubbed “The Battle of Ridgefield.” And the young lady who braved possible death to sound the alarm was congratulated for her heroism by General George Washington himself. Colonel Ludington must have been very proud of his daughter.

After the war, in October 1784, Sybil married a lawyer from the Catskills, Edward Ogden, and lived in Unadilla, New York until her death on February 26, 1839. The couple had one son, whom they named Henry (after Sybil’s father, one would assume). She was buried near her father in the Maple Avenue Cemetery.

Today, visitors can trace the route she took on her midnight ride by following markers laid out through Putnam County. Moreover, in 1961 a sculpture of “The Female Paul Revere,” by artist Anna Huntingon, was erected beside Gleneida Lake in Carmel on Route 52. A smaller copy of the sculpture is said to reside in Washington D.C. in Constitution Memorial Hall in the DAR headquarters. If anyone deserves the title of “Daughter of the Revolution,” it’s Sybil Ludington.