Worcester Men Who Gave Their Lives in Quebec
- Caroline Bigelow
- Dec 28, 2025
- 4 min read
250 years ago Gen. Benedict Arnold led an expedition north from Massachusetts to Quebec in an attampt to capture the town. They left from Newburyport, MA at the end of September 1775 and arrived in Canada in the middle of November. Having very little in the way of supplies and amunition left, and knowing he was outnumbered until his reinforcements arrived, General Arnold attempted to convince the inhabitants to surrender. They called his bluff, and he and his men were forced to wait for General Montgomery to join. Arnold's men were ill prepared for the weather, and were starving and near frozen when Montgomerty arrived at the beginning of December. They waited outside the city walls for a month before finally deciding to attack in the dead of night. The battle, which took place in the middle of a snowstorm on December 31, was a disaster for Arnold's forces; every member either was either killed, wounded, taken prisoner, and/or deserted. Worcester lost three men: Captain Jonas Hubbard, Sergeant Silas/Samuel Wesson, and Private Timothy Rice.
Captain Jonas Hubbard
Capt. Hubbard was born in Worcester, MA on May 21, 1739 to Daniel and Dorothy Hubbard. He was the youngest of their eleven children. On March 7, 1759 he married Mary Stevens. They had seven children, the youngest of whom was born only a few months before his father's death.
Jonas was a farmer, and his farm was successful enough for him to be a Worcester voter. He was an organizing member of the American Political Society, Worcester's version of the Sons of Liberty, which was founded in late December 1773 after the events of the Boston Tea Party.
In the summer of 1774 the men of Worcester began drilling in militia companies to defend their homes should the need arise. Worcester has enough able-bodied men to supply two companies, and Jonas was elected Lieutenant in Captain Timothy Bigelow's company. He marched on the Lexington and Concord Alarm of April 19, 1775. When Bigelow was promoted to Major the following week, Hubbard took over the Captaincy.
In late summer 1775 General Benedict Arnold (yes, that Benedict Arnold) and General Montgomery convinced General Washington to allow them to send a contingent of men north in an attempt to take Quebec City. Fifteen men from Worcester went to Newburyport, MA to join Arnold's expedition in early September. In a letter sent to his wife from the encampment in Kennebec just before the march north, Capt. Hubbard wrote: "I know not if I shall ever see you again. The weather grows severe cold, and the woods, they say, are terrible to pass. But I do not value life or property, if I can secure liberty for my children."
Captain Hubbard was no fan of Arnold, and he and the other Worcester men were very vocal about their dislike of both his plans and leadership. But they did their duty. Hubbard led his men in the first attack in the lower town and was felled by an injury to his ankle and either refused or was unable to leave the battlefield. He was found the next morning and brought into a field hospital where he died a few days later.
After the war Mary and the children moved to Paris, ME.
Sergeant Silas Wesson
Sgt. Wesson was born around 1750 to John and Ruth (Death) Wesson. Their last name is also spelled Wisson, Wyson, and Weston. Around the time of his birth the family was living in "Grafton Gore", an area south of Lake Quinsigamond claimed by both Worcester and Grafton. His birth, and those for majority of his siblings were not recorded in either town, so tracking him through vital records has been tricky.
There is no record of a Silas Wesson in the Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors compendium, but a Samuel Wesson does, and his service matches exactly for Silas Wesson. I'm thinking Silas and Samuel are in fact the same person. If they are, then he was born in Sherborn, MA in 1741. The name only appears as "Serg't. S. Weston" in the journal entries about the expedition.
Private Wesson marched on the Lexington and Concord Alarm of April 19, 1775 in Capt. Timothy Bigelow's Company. A week later he was promoted to Corporal in Capt. Hubbard's Company. He joined the Quebec Expedition in Capt. Hubbard's Company and was promoted to Sergeant before they set off. Sgt. Wesson was good friends with both Capt. Hubbard and Sgt. Josiah Pierce, the surveyor of the expedition who was also from Worcester. The three of them shared a tent with a few of the other officers and staff in Capt. Hubbard's Company.
Sergeant Wesson was shot in the back during the assault on the lower town during the battle on the night of December 31/January 1. He was brought to the field hospital but died of his wounds.
If he was Samuel Wesson, he was married to widow Rebeckah Davis, who remarried in 1777.
Private Timothy Rice
Private Rice wis another person whose vital records have eluded me. Rice is an extremely common surname in central Massachusetts, and Timothy is a very common first name.
The name Timothy Rice does not appear in Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors. The only record of him that I have is from the list of men in Capt. Hubbard's Company for the Quebec expedition, and from the British list of prisoners taken during the Battle of Quebec. He was listed as being from "Worcester in Massachusetts Bay". Private Rice was mortally wounded during the battle in the lower town, and died in the field hospital in early January 1776, as did his quad mate Simon Fobes.
The lives of these three men echo the lives of so many others during that time period, and the struggle that researchers and genealogists have in finding not just what they were and what they did, but who they were. Sometimes, as in the case of Capt. Jonas Hubbard, there is a lot of information and documentation left behind. Most of the time however, as in the case of Sgt. Wesson and Pvt. Rice, there is very little and we are left to fill in the details as best we can.
One wonderful resource for the Quebec Expedition is Kenneth Robert's 1938 book March to Quebec. It is mostly out of print, but you can borrow it for free from the Internet Archive.
Very informative and sad! So many sacrificed for our freedom which we take for granted today.