The flattering hope of being able to do some little service to my distressed and devoted country

From 1776 by David McCulough. Page 59.

To further complicate life, Knox had taken up the patriot cause and fallen in love with the daughter of a prominent Tory. She, too, was a patron of the bookstore, a correspondingly plump, gregarious young woman named Lucy Flucker, whose father, Thomas Flucker, was the royal secretary of the province. “My charmer,” he called her, and neither his maimed hand nor his politics deterred her ardor. Despite the objections of her family, they were married. When Lucy’s father, in an effort to give his new son-in-law added respectability, arranged for Knox to be offered a commission in the British army, Knox declined.

In the tense days following the bloodshed at Lexington and Concord, the young couple packed what little they could carry and slipped out of Boston in disguise. Lucy was never again to see her mother and father, who would eventually sail for England.

Having settled Lucy safely in Worcester, Knox reported for service with General Artemus Ward, who assigned him to planning and building fortifications. “Long to see you, which nothing would prevent but the flattering hope of being able to do some little service to my distressed and devoted country,” he wrote to her.

Feminist historians try and fill the void and end up over-egging the pudding.  But there is a wonderful story to be written at some point of the critical and necessary role of women among the leaders in the Revolution.  The marriages of Washington, Adams, Greene, Knox all come to mind, married to strong women who were confidents, advisors and supporters.