Born in Woburn, Mass., James Reed was a veteran captain of the French and Indian War who settled here about 1765 as an original proprietor of Monadnock No. 4, now Fitzwilliam. After the Battle of Lexington, he recruited several companies to form the Third New Hampshire Regiment, which aided General Stark at the Battle of Bunker Hill in the Revolutionary War. He was commissioned a Brigadier General following the siege of Boston and his engagement at the Battle of Ticonderoga.