Samuel Larrabee

(October 8, 1753 – November 21, 1844)  

Very little is known about Samuel Larrabee prior to arriving in Boston, Massachusetts with a load of wood and subsequently joining in the destruction of the tea on December 16, 1773.  

Larrabee, a coastal trader from Cumberland Country, Maine, provided considerable detail about his brief but dramatic term of military service in his application for his Revolutionary War pension. According to his pension, he enlisted in June 1775 with Captain Benjamin Parker, serving on Maine’s Chebeague Island through about December 1, 1775. As part of Colonel Whitcomb’s regiment, the company built a fort overnight at the foot of King Street in what is now Portland, Maine, causing the British ships in the harbor to sail away.  

Larrabee re-enlisted in February 1776 with Captain Cranston’s company, again under Colonel Whitcomb, and served on Dorchester Heights just prior to General Howe’s evacuation of Boston. He declared that he was part of the rush of troops to the State House to assist in removing the British from Boston. A short time after the evacuation, Larrabee’s regiment assisted in rebuilding Fort William on Castle Island, which was destroyed by the fleeing British fleet. Additionally, Larrabee helped to build forts on Governor’s Island and Fort Hill in Boston. He marched with his regiment to hear the reading of the Declaration of Independence from the State House in Boston on July 18, 1776. 

On the eve of being ordered to Fort Ticonderoga in New York, Larrabee was stricken with smallpox, and was subsequently declared unfit for duty and returned home to Maine. It was also in his pension materials that he claimed to have been in Boston with a load of wood on the eve of the Boston Tea Party and assisted in throwing the tea into the harbor. He was awarded his pension in the sum of $40.00 per year on May 3, 1837, retroactive to 4 March 1831. Samuel Larrabee served as quartermaster in the local North Yarmouth regiment during the War of 1812, from September 10th through 24th 1814. 

Samuel Larrabee died in North Yarmouth, Massachusetts on November 21, 1844. He is buried in the Old Baptist Cemetery in North Yarmouth, Massachusetts.