There are many colorful clergymen who have passed through the pages of Sullivan County’s history over the years, but none more noteworthy than Reverend Benjamin Montanye, who presided over the Baptist congregation at New Vernon in the town of Mamakating from 1794 until his death in 1825.

Montanye was a blacksmith when the Revolutionary War began, and he joined the Continental Army, eventually becoming the personal courier for General George Washington, and creating a legacy that is still discussed to this day.

The legend of Benjamin Montanye begins in March of 1781, when he was captured by the British while carrying Washington’s personal mail from New Windsor to Philadelphia.

Several historians, including Sullivan County’s James Eldridge Quinlan, have recounted the story that Montanye’s capture by the British was planned by Washington, who had planted letters in his correspondence that were intended to convince the enemy that the Continental Army was about to attack New York City, when in reality they were preparing to march south where they would engage General Cornwallis at Yorktown.

In his “History of Sullivan County,” published in 1873, Quinlan wrote that in 1781, Montanye was “a trusted confidential agent of General Washington, and was employed to deliver dispatches to the commanders of forces in different sections of the country. When the commander-in-chief of our armies resolved to capture or destroy the army of General Cornwallis, he deceived the British General Clinton as to his own plans, by writing deceptive letters to General Green [sic], and forwarding them in such a way that they would be taken by the enemy. These letters were carried by Benjamin Montanye. While traveling on horseback across Bergen County, New Jersey, he was intercepted by a company of British Rangers under Captain Moody, his horse shot through one of its knees and turned loose, and his dispatches taken from him. He was then hurried to New York, and thrust into the infamous sugar-house prison. The British considered the taking of these papers so important that they illuminated their houses, while Washington was making the well-known movement which terminated in the surrender of Cornwallis. Montanye was a prisoner about two months, when he was exchanged. Three common soldiers were considered a fair equivalent for the daring young courier.”

Other historians have expressed doubts about the story, despite the fact that it was often repeated by Montanye, even after he became pastor in New Vernon.

In a series of articles he wrote for the Orange County Historical Society between 1990 and 1994, Richard J. Koke painstakingly dissects the Montanye capture, and concludes that although “Montanye’s story combines fact and fiction to his advantage, the incident of his capture is well documented and, aside from the Yorktown connection, is an interesting episode…”

In an article entitled “Benjamin Montanye and General George Washington’s Mail,” written for the blog, “Washington’s Papers,” Jeffrey L. Zvengrowski debunks most of the story.

“Benjamin J. Lossing erroneously wrote in his celebrated mid-nineteenth-century ‘Pictorial Field-Book of the Revolution’ that before Washington moved with his army from New Windsor to meet French forces marching from Rhode Island, ‘Washington had caused deceptive letters to be written and put in the way of being intercepted, all of which deceived Sir Henry Clinton into the belief that an attack upon New York city was the grand object of the Americans.’” Zvengrowski wrote. “Lossing seems to have arrived at this conclusion thanks to Montanye’s words as posthumously communicated to him by Jeremiah H. Pierson, a prominent resident of Ramapo, N.Y.”

Furthermore, Zvengrowski wrote that “if Washington did indeed attempt to trick the British at New York City in 1781 with ‘fictitious’ letters that he wanted to be intercepted, the letters he sent were certainly not those taken by Moody from Montanye.”

Despite the evidence presented by these and other historians that dispute the details of Montanye’s capture, there are still some who cling to the original version, citing the recollections of George Washington himself, who wrote to Noah Webster from Mount Vernon in 1788 that “much trouble was taken and finesse used to misguide & bewilder Sir Henry Clinton in regard to the real object, by fictitious communications, as well as by making a deceptive provision of Ovens, Forage & Boats in his Neighborhood, is certain. Nor were less pains taken to deceive our own Army; for I had always conceived, when the imposition did not completely take place at home, it could never sufficiently succeed abroad.”

Quinlan writes that following his death, Montanye’s family petitioned the federal government for a financial reward for his role in the victory at Yorktown, but the petition was denied, which may or may not have been a commentary on the accuracy of his version of events.

Regardless of whether Montanye’s story is truthful or embellished, he remains one of the most esteemed—and colorful-- pastors in his church’s long history.

John Conway is the Sullivan County Historian and a founder and president of The Delaware Company. Email him at jconway52@hotmail.com.