Cato Tufts

Quick Facts

Significance:

Patriot of Color at the Battle of Bunker Hill

Place of Birth:

Medford, Massachusetts(?)

The following is from the 2004 National Park Service study Patriots of Color researched and prepared by George Quintal:

Nothing is known of the early life of Cato Tufts.¹

He joined the eight month’s service on 15 May 1775 in the company of Capt. Oliver Parker, in Col. William Prescott’s regiment.² He ‘served at Bunker Hill’³ in the redoubt.

Capt. Ephraim Corey submitted his order for a bounty coat on 31 October 1775. Next he was engaged as a matross in Capt. James Swan’s 1^st company, in Col. Thomas Craft’s Massachusetts Artillery, during August to November 1776. The roll, dated Boston, reports him as being ‘drummed out’ of the service.⁴

Footnotes:

1. Soldier description unavailable – soldier placed in database based on given (first) name alone.
2. Secretary of Commonwealth. Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War (1896-1908), 16:151. Also 2-CD Family Tree Maker^TM set “Military Records: Revolutionary War.” Listed under ‘Turfts.’ After the Battle of Bunker Hill, Capt. Parker left the service and command of the company fell to Lt. Nathaniel Sartwell. Capt. Ephraim Corey then took over for Sartwell.
3. Wild, Helen Tilden. Medford [MA] in the Revolution … (1903), 50.
4. Secretary of Commonwealth. Massachusetts Soldiers and Sailors of the Revolutionary War (1896-1908), 16:132. Also 2-CD Family Tree Maker^TM set “Military Records: Revolutionary War.”

Learn more about Quintal's study.