Gold Selleck Silliman

Gold Selleck Silliman (1732–1790) was a Connecticut militia General during the

Biography

Silliman was born in

One night in May 1779, nine Tories crossed the sound in a whale boat from Lloyd's Neck. One of the Tories had been previously employed by Silliman as a carpenter, so he knew the house well. Eight of the men forced their way into the house at midnight and took the general and his adult son. They were taken to Oyster Bay, New York, and finally to Flatbush.

The Americans had no prisoner of equal rank to exchange for Silliman, so they captured one. Thomas Jones, a highly reputed loyalist, was captured in November 1779 by Continental Navy Captain David Hawley and brought back to Connecticut. Silliman and Jones were exchanged in May 1780, with Silliman's son being exchanged as well. These events were accurately^{[citation needed]} depicted in the 1994 TV film Mary Silliman's War by Heritage Films, based on the 1984 biography of Silliman's second wife by Joy and Richard Buel. Silliman died on July 21, 1790.

Family

Silliman was the son of Abigail Selleck (the daughter of Abigail Gold and Jonathan Selleck) and Ebenezer Silliman (the son of Sara Hull and Robert Silliman).^[1] His son Benjamin Silliman was born in a tavern, originally the home of Ebenezer Hawley in Trumbull, Connecticut, after Benjamin's mother, Mary Silliman, fled Fairfield ahead of a British and Loyalist raiding party. Benjamin was the first professor of science at Yale University and the first American to distill petroleum.

See also

• Silliman Memorial Lectures

References

• Baker, Mark Allen, "Connecticut Families of the Revolution, American Forebears from Burr to Wolcott," The History Press, Charleston, SC, 2014
• Lossing, Pictorial Field-Book of The Revolution, New York, 1860
• Who Was Who in the American Revolution, 1993
• Herbert Thoms, Yale Men and Landmarks in Old Connecticut, Yale University Press, New Haven, 1967