Colonel William Ledyard, merchant of Groton Bank, was not the master of his own destiny.

Ledyard may have been free to decide whether to refuse surrender and lose his life in the 1781 Battle of Groton Heights on Fort Griswold in Groton, but one could reasonably conclude that Ledyard’s life was written the day he was born, his fate almost pre-determined by five circumstances that inexorably led him from birth to the tip of an angry British sword forty-two years later.

The first factor out of his control was Privilege. Ledyard was born into a well-off family of high social status, part of what some historians call the “commercial gentry” of his town. As such, he was naturally looked to by his community and state for leadership. His family’s prominence led to his high military rank, which, in turn, led to his death.

The second factor was Paternal Influence. He was raised by a father with a strong personality and political connections, a shrewd businessman, and an early proponent of the revolutionary cause. John Ledyard served many years in the Connecticut Assembly. He was also a judge and Auditor of the Supreme Court. It was said that he may well have been appointed Governor had he not been an Englishman.

Like many sons, William was a product of his father’s influence. Imbued with his father’s commitment to public service, he recognized the responsibility of prominent men to serve their community. Emulating his father, he served in the Connecticut Assembly, including our tumultuous year of 1776, when Connecticut treasonously voted to remove all references to King George III from state documents.

The third guiding circumstance was Geography. Ledyard was born in the shoreline town of Groton Bank, situated between the revolutionary hotbeds of Boston, Massachusetts, and New York City. Plus, he lived across the river from New London, a town whose privateering successes brought the brutal British army to the Thames River and Groton, where British officers would decide when the Colonel would die.

The fourth factor to consider was Occupation. Ledyard’s life as a merchant obviously steered his revolutionary life. He had come of age among ships, and with his family already established in the trading business, the stage had long been set for Ledyard to become part of the New England merchant class that instigated the initial protests leading to the American Revolution, and ultimately luring him to a violent end.

And, as a merchant, Ledyard traded in sugar, molasses, rum, and tea, the high-demand and profitable products at the core of those years of social upheaval and protest in America that led to the war, and the battle that killed him.

The fifth element that steered Colonel Ledyard toward his fate was, of course, the confluence of international events of his time, as Great Britain struggled to control world trade and especially the American colonies, with Parliament targeting merchants like Ledyard to pay for Britain’s growing national debt from several wars, including the French and Indian War on American and Canadian soil.

Explosive national events unfolding around him throughout his adult life, propelled by the politically volatile products he shipped, caused Ledyard to join the protests of his fellow American merchants, instigating a rebellion that inescapably pulled him into the Revolution.

National events were the catalyst that exploited the paternal influence, geography, and occupational factors in guiding William Ledyard’s life.

For over seventeen years throughout his adult life, from the Sugar Act of 1764 when he was twenty-five years old, to his death in battle at age forty-two in 1781, he would be forced to respond to his politically charged world — personally as a merchant, legislatively as a representative to the Connecticut Assembly, and militarily as a militiaman.

The solemn stone marker inside the fort indicating where Ledyard the soldier fell, tells visitors only the military conclusion of this revolutionary merchant’s life. Yet, it was far more than his role as a military officer that delivered him to that angry British officer who ran him through with a sword.

The full history of Colonel William Ledyard would include the revolutionary road he was destined to follow, his fate almost preordained through privilege, paternal influence, geography, his occupation as a merchant, and the local ramifications of the world events of his time.

John Steward lives in Waterford. He now lectures on the life of Colonel William Ledyard. He can be reached at tossinglines@gmail.com