ENOCH POOR.
Enoch Poor, born in Andover, Massachusetts, on the 21st of June, 1736, was educated in the common schools of his native place. Removing to Exeter, New Hampshire, he engaged in commercial pursuits until summoned by his country to take up arms in her defence. Immediately after the battle of Lexington, three regiments of militia were raised and equipped in New Hampshire, and the command of one intrusted to Poor. Serving first in New England, then in New York, and afterward joining in the ill-starred Canadian expedition, he used all his influence to dissuade General Schuyler from abandoning Crown Point, and when that measure was decided upon, joined with several other officers in sending him a written protest. Considering this a breach of discipline, Schuyler appealed to the commander-in-chief, who, while declining to reverse the general’s decision, wrote him a private letter, approving Colonel Poor’s judgment, and regretting the abandonment of Crown Point, which he considered the key of the lakes. On the 21st of February, 1777, Poor was commissioned brigadier-general and attached to the army under Washington. In 1779, he joined the expedition against the Six Nations and subsequently was attached to Lee’s command, remaining with him until after the defeat at Monmouth, when Poor was ordered to join the division under Lafayette. The following year he fell a victim to fever, dying, after a short illness, at Hackensack, New Jersey, on the 8th of September, 1780. Washington, in acquainting Congress with the sad intelligence, said of him, “He was an officer of distinguished merit, who as a citizen and a soldier had every claim to the esteem of his country;” and Lafayette, on revisiting this country many years after, testified his loving remembrance by paying a tribute to the memory of Poor when called upon for a toast.