It is unfortunate that so little is known about the actual leaders and those who joined with them in the attacks upon the fort. The newspapers of the time were silent upon the question, and even the official reports contain scarcely a reference, simply saying that the leaders were well known. The act was one of open treason to the king, and, as it was the almost unanimous act of the community, but little was written or published that might injure the participants. A few names only are preserved to us. Governor Wentworth says that the first attack was carried out by citizens of Portsmouth, Rye, and Newcastle. No individual is named. General Sullivan says the powder was sent to him by a messenger from Colonel Long, and, if he remembered correctly, signed also by John Langdon. John Sullivan was the unquestioned leader of the second attack. Jeremy Belknap, who wrote during the lives of both Langdon and Sullivan and was a close friend of the latter, credits the leadership to these two prominent New Harmpshire men. Judge Ebenezer Thompson, in the New Hampshire Spy, says: "Hon. John Langdon and others took the powder." John M. Whitton,1 is the first to claim Thomas Pickering as a leader. No previous mention of his name in this connection has come to light, and Whitton does not give his authority. The History of Manchester, 1856,2 Report of the Adjutant General for New Hampshire, 1866,3 and Brewster's Rambles about Portsmouth speak of Thomas Pickering as being the leader in the first attack. All three take their authority from Daniel P. Drown, a nephew of Pickering, who had received his version of the affair from his father, Samuel Drown, whom he stated as a participant. Brewster, obtaining his information from the same source, states also that Sullivan, Langdon, George Ffrost of Durham, and Dr. Bartlett of Kingston, were present. The account by Drown is so inaccurate in many particulars that it is doubtful if his memory of his father's story was correct in regard to the others. Brewster4 also states that Pierse Long assisted in the removal of the powder which General Sullivan's article, before quoted, confirms. From the New Hampshire Spy we learn that Judge Ebenezer Thompson went with the party as far as Portsmouth, but was not present at the fort, and that the Rev. Mr. Adams, Deacon Norton, Lieutenant Durgin, Capt. Jonathan Woodman, Mr. Aaron Davis, and, probably, Mr. Footman of Dover, were actively engaged in the second attack.

Mr. Eleazer Bennett of Durham, who was probably the last survivor of those who took part in the affair, gave a full description to the Rev. Mr. Tobey of Durham, who published it in an obituary notice of Mr. Bennet, in the Congregational Journal of Feb. 18, 1852. It is unfortunate for our purpose that Mr. Bennet was one hundred years old at the time Mr. Tobey took down his statement, for his account is very inaccurate, and with the exception of adding several names of those present contains nothing of value. He enumerated John Sullivan, Winborn Adams, Ebenezer Thompson, Joln Demerit of Madbury, Alpheus Chesley, Jonathan Chesley, Peter French a law student in Sullivan's office), John Spencer, Micah Davis, Edward Sullivan, Isaac Small, Benjamin Small, and himself, as members of the party. It is worthy of note that he makes no mention of Alexander Scammell, although in the narrative as quoted in Amory's Life of Sullivan as coming from the same source his name is included. It is probable that Amory copied this account from the highly imaginary article in Harper's Monthly of July, 1886, rather than from the original publication. However, in a letter to the senate of New Hampshire of Feb. 14, 1785,5 General Sullivan says that he was assisted by his three clerks in bringing the stores up the river, and this leaves but little doubt that Alexander Scammell, Peter French, and James Underwood, who were at that time in his office, were with him at the second attack. Another account by a survivor of the Exeter party, and published by Governor Bell in his History of Exeter, also differs so much from the known facts that little credence can be given to any part of it. It does not seem wise to further quote either of these accounts.