Ira Allen, the secretary and youngest member of the Vermont Council, strongly advocated the raising of a regiment for the defense of the State, while the majority could not see the way clear to raise more than two companies of sixty men each; nor could they, in the unorganized condition of the new State, a third of whose inhabitants were in the confusion of an exodus, see how more than this meagre force could be maintained, and the day was spent in fruitless discussion of the vexed question. At last a member moved that Allen be requested to devise means for paying the bounties and wages of his proposed regiment, and to report at sunrise on the morrow. The astute young secretary was equal to the occasion, and when the Council met next morning, at an hour that finds modern legislators in their first sleep, he was ready with his plan of support. This was, that Commissioners of Sequestration should be appointed, with authority to seize the goods and chattels of all persons who had joined or should join the common enemy; and that all property so seized should be sold at public vendue, and the proceeds be paid to the treasurer of the Council of Safety, for the purpose of paying the bounties and wages of a regiment forthwith to be raised for the defense of the State. "This was the first instance in America of seizing and selling the property of the enemies of American independence," says its originator, in his "History of Vermont."[72] These "turbulent sons of freedom," as Stark afterward termed them, were indeed foremost in many aggressive measures. The Council at once adopted the plan, and appointed a Commissioner of Sequestration. Samuel Herrick was appointed to the command of the regiment, his commission being signed on the 15th of July by Thomas Chittenden, president. The men were enlisted and their bounties paid within fifteen days. The colonels of the state militia were ordered to march half their regiments to Bennington, "without a moment's Loss of Time," and the fugitives, who since the invasion had been removing their families to the southward, were exhorted to return and assist in the defense of the State.[73] Stark was collecting his men at Charlestown, and sending them forward to Warner at Manchester as rapidly as they could be supplied with kettles, rum, and bullets. There was great lack of all three of these essentials of a campaign, especially of the last, for there was but one pair of bullet-moulds in the town, and there were frequent and urgent calls for lead. When the lead was forthcoming, the one pair of moulds was kept hot and busy. But at last, on the 7th of August, Stark was at the mountain-walled hamlet of Manchester with 1,400 New Hampshire men and Green Mountain Boys, ready to follow wherever the brave old ranger should lead.