Soldiers in King Philip's war. Containing lists of the soldiers of ...

NO. XX.
CAPT. JOSEPH SILL AND HIS MEN.
JOSEPH SILL (or as it is variously spelled, Syll, Scill and
Scyll) was the son of John and his wife Joanna, of Cambridge,
1637-8, and was born there about 1639. He married, December
5, 1660, Jemima, daughter of Andrew and Elizabeth (Danforth)
Belcher, of Cambridge, and had children—Andrew, born February
5, 1665-6, died June 12, 1666; Jemima, born September 21,
1667, who married December 21, 1687, John Hall, of Medford,
and inherited for him her father's Narragansett claim ; Elizabeth,
born September 12, married November 12, 1685, Samuel Green,
Jr. ; Andrew and Thomas, of whose births no record is found.
Capt. Sill was called into military life early in the war, and served
almost continually, in important times and places, till its close.
When Capt. Richard Beers marched with his company up to relieve
the garrison at Brookfield, Aug. 5th, 1675, Sill was his lieutenant,
and shared the fortunes of the company in that campaign ; was probably
in the fight at " Sugar-Loaf Hill " on August 25th ; but was
probably left at Hadley in command of the rest of the company
when Capt. Beers, and his twenty-six men, marched to the relief
of Northfield on September 3d, and were ambushed and nearly all
slain on the 4th, on what is since known as " Beers's Plain." After
that disaster he remained in command of the remnant of the company
for the rest of the campaign, and up to October 5th, when he is
mentioned in Capt. Mosely's letter as having gone with Captain
Appleton and a company of one hundred and ninety men to protect
Springfield. On October 4th a letter from the Council to Major
Pynchon directs that "Lieut. Scill be dismisse dhome to his fami-
ly," and his soldiers to make up some of the other companies as the
Major thinks best.
In a letter from Capt. Appleton at Hadley, October 17th, Capt.
Sill is mentioned as being still in command of a company of sixty
men ; but he had evidently returned home before November 1st, as