Maj. Lemuel Clift (1755-1821)
of Southeast, Putnam Co., New York
He was born in Connecticut and was recruited as a Private at the Lexington Alarm in 1775. He steadily rose through the ranks so that he retired as a Major by the end of the war. His obituary in the New York Spectator read: "Maj. Clift was one of the few remaining officers of the revolution. He entered into the service in the first year of the war and continuing in it, until the closing scene at Yorktown; and throughout the whole, sustained the character of an active and brave officer. For many years previous to his death, Maj. Clift was a zealous professor of the Christian Religion, and his surviving friends have the consolation to hope and believe that he has closed a well spent life in the attainment of a blessed immortality."