by Mary Virginia Goodman
Edited by Joe Lantiere
After the Battle of Groton Heights on September 6, 1781, the wounded American soldiers were placed in a cart to be dragged down the steep hill to the shore of the river to be taken as prisoners in a British ship to New York. The wagon increased in speed as it descended the hill; the men pulling were obliged to let it roll. It got away from them and collided with a tree, causing much agony to the wounded occupants. They were taken into Ebenezer Avery’s house and laid on the floor. And for many years, the blood stains were plainly seen on the wide floor boards.
The venerable house that stood for over two hundred years and more at the corner of Latham Street and Thames Street in Groton, CT, known to everyone on Groton Bank as the Ebenezer Avery House, the house where the wounded soldiers were taken after the Battle of Groton Heights, was purchased by Stanton Avery of California, and given to the Avery Memorial Association in 1971.
This generous gift, deeply appreciated by the members, became the most exciting thing to happen to the Avery Memorial Association since the forming of the society and the dedication of the Avery Memorial Monument on the site of the original Hive of the Averys.
The location and surroundings of the Ebenezer Avery House on Thames and Latham Streets were so far different from the time in which it was built, that with the interest and cooperation of the Park and Forest Commission it became possible to have the house dismantled, board by board, and re-erected in its present position on the grounds of Fort Griswold, accessible from Fort Street in Groton, CT.
