I represent William Greer. I was a sergeant in Captain Thomas Colden‘s Company in the Provincial Corps of Pennsylvania Loyalists. Raised in Philadelphia in 1777, the corps arrived in Pensacola at the very end of 1778 and remained until the surrender of Pensacola to the Spanish on May 10, 1781. I first appear on the muster rolls on February 1, 1779 – which was the first time since our arrival we had enough men fit to muster. By the April 25 muster, I was a Corporal. A comrade of mine, Sgt. Field, was stationed at the Queen’s Redoubt at Fort George on May 8, 1781. From Robert Farmar‘s journal of the siege of Pensacola for that day: “About 9 o’clock a.m. a shell from the enemy’s front battery was thrown in at the door of the Magazine at the Advanced Redoubt (as the men were receiving powder) which blew it up and killed 40 seamen belonging to H.M. Ships the Mentor and the Port Royal and 45 men of the Pennsylvania Loyalists were killed by the same explosion.” This disaster was the final nail in the coffin of Pensacola’s defenses against the Spanish, and Gen. Campbell raised the white flag that very day. Unfortunately, Sgt. Field was one of the Pennsylvania Loyalists that was killed that day. His wife was left a widow, and she quickly remarried – to me. This was the only way for her to continue her and her childrens’ rations. I went to Long Island, New York with the rest of the prisoners of war after the capitulation of Pensacola on May 10, 1781. In muster rolls from that time, my last name is spelled “Grier” and “Guerrier.”
Sources: 28, 30, 56, 130