In other litigation involving Ethan, two years after receiving the Long Island loans, his first documented foray into the legal world as a named litigant occurred in Bennington in December 1779. There, he and Ira joined together to bring suit against their brother Levi, in the matter of General Ethan Allen & Ira Allen versus Levi Allen. The claim concerned Levi’s failure to convey certain rights to land in St. Albans to his brothers in breach of a pre-existing agreement to do so. After receiving evidence, the court found for the plaintiffs, ordering that Levi convey the land as he had promised.
To assure their survival in these times, Ethan and Ira became masters at manipulating the legal system. Ethan’s boldness in challenging Levi in court reflects a certain comfort level with the legal system. Earlier, in 1767, he counseled brother Heman in a lawsuit giving him specific instructions in the preparation of a legal document, an effort he repeated in 1787 when providing legal advice to Levi (after their reconciliation) in the preparation of another document.[13] It is ironic that Levi received such Janus-like treatment from Ethan as it was he his brother relied on to pay off debts out of his own pocket, for which he never received reimbursement. This later required Levi to make several claims against Ethan’s estate for sums owed which, as in virtually every matter involving the finances of Ethan and Ira Allen, he never received.
The drumbeat of Ethan’s neglect to pay his creditors dogged him after 1777. Failure to repay several other debts and notes he signed (Sam Hand, John Armstrong, Jr., Joab Stafford), his refusal to settle book accounts with a another (Alexander Frazier), his several breaches of contract (William Blodgett, Wolcott Hubbell, Chauncey Ensign), and, just six days before he died, his refusal to convey land to an attorney (Timothy Hollibert) demonstrate the diverse ways he escaped accountability for his obligations. But for his life ending when it did, there is little reason to believe that Ethan, even in the face of approaching financial collapse, would have changed the course of his questionable dealings. Only a short time after his death, Ira stepped out from under his shadow to shoulder even larger financial losses extending out over the next two decades, ones that neither of them could have ever imagined.