By David McCullough

Stories that he had been slow to learn , that by age eleven he still could not read , were unfounded. The strange behavior – the so – called “madness” of King George III – for which he would be long remembered , did not come until much later, more than twenty years later, and rather than mental illness, it appears to have been porphyria, a hereditary disease not diagnosed until the twentieth century.

Still youthful at thirty–seven, and still hardworking after fifteen years on the throne, he could be notably willful and often shortsighted, but he was sincerely patriotic and everlastingly duty bound. “George, be King,” his mother had told him. As the crisis in America grew worse, and the opposition in Parliament more strident, he saw clearly that he must play the part of the patriot-king.

He had never been a soldier. He had never been to America, any more than he had set foot in Scotland or Ireland. But with absolute certainty he knew what must be done. He would trust Providence and his high sense of duty. America must be made to obey.

“I have no doubt but the nation at large sees the conduct in America in its true light,” he had written to his Prime Minister, Lord North, “and I am certain any other conduct but compelling obedience would be ruinous and … therefore no consideration could bring me to swerve from the present path which I think myself in duty-bound to follow.”

In the House of Lords in March of 1775, when challenged on the chances of Britain ever winning a war in America, Lord Sandwich, First Lord of the Admiralty, had looked incredulous. “Suppose the colonies do abound in men, what does that signify?” he asked. “They are raw, undisciplined, cowardly men.” And Lord Sandwich was by no means alone in that opinion. General James Grant, a member of the House of Commons, had boasted that with 5,000 British regulars he could march from one end of the American continent to the other, a claim that was widely quoted.

(McCullough 2006, 5-6)

Since, clearly, it was the better part of wisdom “to put a speedy end” to such disorders, he was increasing both his naval and land forces . Further, he was pleased to form the Parliament, he had received “friendly offers of foreign assistance.”

“When the unhappy and deluded multitude, against whom this force will be directed, shall become sensible of their error, I shall be ready to receive the misled with tenderness and mercy,” he pledged, and as evidence of his good intentions, he would give authority to “certain persons” to grant pardons “upon the spot” in America, though beyond this he said no more.

In sum, he, George 111, Sovereign of the Empire, had declared America in rebellion. He had confirmed that he was committing land and sen forces as well as unnamed foreign mercenaries – sufficient to put an end to that rebellion, and he had denounced the leaders of the photo having American independence as their true objective, something those leaders themselves had not as yet openly declared.

“Among the many unavoidable consequences of this rebellion,” he said at the last, “none affects me more sensibly than the extraordinary burden which it must create to my faithful subjects.”

(McCullough 2006, 11-12)

In the House of Lords, expressions of support were spitted though comparatively brief. The King was praised for his resolution to uphold the interests and honor of the Kingdom , praised for his decisiveness. “We will support your majesty with our lives and fortunes,” vowed Viscount Townsend.

Those in opposition had more to say, and spoke at times with pronounced emotion. The measures recommended from the throne, warned the Marquis of Rockingham, were “big with the most portentous and ruinous consequences.” The hiring of foreign troops was an “alarming and dangerous expedient.” Even more deplorable was the prospect of “shedding British blood by British hands.” Any notion of America was “wild and extravagant,” said the Earl of Coventry. The administration was “no longer to be trusted,” said Lord Lyttleton bitterly.

“How comes it that the colonies are charged with planning independency?” the Earl of Shelburne demanded to know. “Who is it that presumes to put an assertion (what shall I call it, my Lords?) contrary to fact, contrary to evidence? … Is it their intention, by thus perpetually sounding independence in the ears of the Americans, to lead them to it?”

(McCullough 2006, 12-13)

The one surprise, as the debate continued, was a vehement speech by the Duke of Grafton, Augustus Henry Fitzroy, former Prime Minister, who had not previously opposed the administration. Until now, he said, he had concurred in the belief that the more forceful the government in dealing with the Americans, the more likely matters could be “amicably adjusted.” But he had been misled, deceived. Admitting to his ignorance of the real state of things in America – and inferring that this was no uncommon handicap in Parliament – he boldly proposed the repeal of every act concerning America since the incendiary Stamp Act of 1765.

(McCullough 2006, 13)

At about the time the chandeliers were being lighted in the House, John Wilkes, Lord Mayor of London , champion of the people and the homeliest man in Parliament, stood to be heard, and to let there be no doubt that he was John Wilkes.

“I speak, Sir, as a firm friend to England and America , but still more to universal liberty and the rights of all mankind. I trust no part of the subjects of this vast empire will ever submit to be slaves.” Never had England been engaged in a contest of such import to her own best interests and possessions, Wilkes said.

We are fighting for the subjection, the unconditional submission of a country infinitely more extended than our own, of which every day increases the wealth, the natural strength, the population. Should we not succeed … we shall be considered as their most implacable enemies, an eternal separation will follow, and the grandeur of the British empire will pass away.

The war with ”our brethren ”in America was “unjust … fatal and ruinous to our country,” he declared.

(McCullough 2006, 14-15)

In response, George Johnstone, a dashing figure who had once served as governor of West Florida, delivered one of the longest, most vehement declamations of the night, exclaiming, “Every Machiavellian policy is now to be vindicated towards the people of America.” Men are to be brought to this black business hood – winked. They are to be drawn in by degrees, until they cannot retreat …. we are breaking through all those sacred maxims of our forefathers, and giving the alarm to every wise man on the continent of America, that all his rights depend on the will of men whose corruptions are notorious, who regard him as an enemy, and who have no interest in his prosperity.

Johnstone praised the people of New England for their courage and fortitude. There was a wide difference, he said, between the English officer or soldier who merely did his duty, and those of the New England army, where every man was thinking of what further service he could perform. No one who loved “the glorious spirit of freedom” could not be moved by the spectacle of Bunker Hill, where “an irregular peasantry” had so bravely faced “the gallant Howe” leading the finest troops in the world. “Who is there that can dismiss all doubts on the justice of a cause which can inspire such conscious rectitude?”

(McCullough 2006, 15-16)

 AT THE START of the siege there had been no American army. It had no flag or uniforms. Though in some official documents it had been referred to as the Continental Army, there was no clear agreement on what it should be called in actual practice. At first it was referred to as the New England army, or the army at Boston. The Continental Congress had appointed George Washington to lead “the army of the United Colonies.” but in correspondence with the general, the President of Congress, John Hancock, referred to it only as “the troops under your command.” Washington, in his formal orders, called them the “Troops of the United Provinces of North America.” Privately he described them as the “raw materials” for an army.

To the British and those Loyalists who had taken refuge in Boston, they were simply “the rebels,” or “the country people,” undeserving of the words “American” or “army.” General John Burgoyne disdainfully dubbed them “a preposterous parade,” a “rabble in arms.”

(McCullough 2006, 24-25)

The arms they bore were “as various as their costumes,” mainly muskets and fowling pieces (in effect, shotguns), and the more ancient the gun, it seemed, the greater the owner’s pride in it. The most common and by far the most important was the flintlock musket, a single-shot, smooth-bore, muzzle-loading weapon that threw a lead ball weighing about an ounce and which could inflict terrible damage. The average musket measured 5 feet and weighed about 10 pounds. Though not especially accurate, it could be primed, loaded, fired, and rapidly reloaded and fired again. A good musket man could get off three to four rounds per minute, or a shot every fifteen seconds.

The trouble now was that so many of the men, accustomed to firearms since childhood, used them any way they saw fit, almost any time they pleased to start fires, for example, or blast away at wild geese.

In order that officers could be distinguished from those in the ranks, Washington directed that major generals wear purple ribbons across their chests, brigadiers, pink ribbons. Field officers were to be identified by different-colored cockades in their hats. Sergeants were to tie a red cloth to their right shoulders. Washington himself chose to wear a light blue ribbon across his chest, between coat and waistcoat. But then there was never any mistaking the impeccably uniformed, commanding figure of Washington, who looked always as if on parade.

(McCullough 2006, 34)

In response to concerns in Congress over how much of the army was in fact made up of old men and boys, as well as Negroes and Indians, General William Heath reported:

There are in the Massachusetts regiments some few lads and old men , and in several regiments, some Negroes. Such is also the case with the regiments from the other colonies. Rhode Island has a number of Negroes and Indians. The New Hampshire regiments have less of both.

General John Thomas, who commanded the Massachusetts troops at Roxbury, also responded:

The regiments at Roxbury, the privates, are equal to any I served with [in the] last war, very few old men, and in the ranks very few boys. Our fifers are many of them boys. We have some Negroes, but I look them in general equally serviceable with other men, for fatigue and in action; many of them have proved themselves brave.

Like most southerners, Washington did not want blacks in the army and would soon issue orders saying that neither “Negroes, boys unable to bear arms, nor old men” were to be enlisted. By year’s end, however, with new recruits urgently needed and numbers of free blacks wanting to serve , he would change his mind and in a landmark general order authorize their enlistment.

While no contemporary drawings or paintings of individual soldiers have survived, a fair idea of how they looked emerges from the descriptions in notices posted of deserters. One George Reynolds of Rhode Island , as an example , was five feet nine and a half inches tall, age seventeen, and “carried his head something on his right shoulder.” Thomas Williams was an immigrant- “an old country man” -who spoke “good English” and had “a film in his left eye.” David Relph, a “saucy fellow,” was wearing a white coat, jacket and breeches, and ruffled shirt when last seen.

(McCullough 2006, 36-37)

For every full-fledged deserter there were a half-dozen others inclined to stroll off on almost any pretext , to do a little clam digging perhaps, or who might vanish for several weeks to see wives and children, help with the harvest at home , or ply their trades for some much-needed “hard money.” Sometimes they requested a furlough; as often they just up and left, only to come straggling back into camp when it suited. It was not that they had no heart for soldiering, or were wanting in spirit. They simply had had little experience with other people telling them what to do every hour of the day. Having volunteered to fight, they failed to see the sense in a lot of fuss over rules and regulations.

(McCullough 2006, 37-38)

There were still too few tents, still a shortage of blankets and clothing, and no one had forgotten that winter was on the way. Farmers and soldiers knew about weather. Weather could be a great determiner between failure and success, the great test of one’s staying power.

In truth, the situation was worse than they realized, and no one perceived this as clearly as Washington. Seeing things as they were, and not as he would wish them to be, was one of his salient strengths.

He knew how little money was at hand, and he understood as did no one else the difficulties of dealing with Congress. He knew how essential it was to the future effectiveness of the army to break down regional differences and biases among the troops. But at the same time he struggled with his own mounting contempt for New Englanders. Writing to Lund Washington, a cousin and his business manager at home at Mount Ver he railed against the Yankees as “exceedingly dirty and nasty,” nothing like what he had expected. He had only contempt for “these people,” he confided in a letter to Congressman Richard Henry Lee, another fellow Virginian. The heart of the problem was an “unaccountable kind of stupidity in the lower class of these people, which believe me prevails but too generally among the officers … who are ne[ar]ly of the same kidney with the privates.” All such officers desired was to “curry favor with the men” and thereby get reelected.

Still, he allowed, if properly led, the army would undoubtedly fight. And in a letter to General Philip Schuyler, who was in command at Albany, Washington insisted – possibly to rally his own resolve – that they must never lose sight of “the goodness of our cause.” Difficulties were not insurmountable. “Perseverance and spirit have done wonders in all ages.”

(McCullough 2006, 40-41)

Of these New Englanders, all citizen – soldiers, Washington quickly surmised that Thomas , Sullivan , and Greene were the best he had. Thomas was the most commanding in appearance and had served in the French and Indian War . Earlier , his pride hurt that the less experienced Heath was to outrank him , Thomas had talked of resigning , until Washington sent an urgent plea in which, paraphrasing a line from his favorite play Cato, he said that in such a cause as they were engaged, “surely every post ought to be deemed honorable in which a man can serve his country.”

(McCullough 2006, 53)

ASKED WHAT THEY WERE FIGHTING FOR, most of the army officers and men in the ranks – would until now have said it was in defense of their country and of their rightful liberties as freeborn Englishmen. It was to “defend our common rights” that he went to war, Nathanael Greene had told his wife. The British regulars, the hated red coats, were the “invaders” and must be repelled. “We are soldiers who devote ourselves to arms not for the invasion of other countries but for the defense of our own, not for the gratification of our own private interest, but for the public security,” Greene had written in another letter to Samuel Ward. Writing to General Thomas, Washington had said the object was “neither glory nor extent of territory, but a defense of all that is dear and valuable in life.”

Independence was not mentioned. Nor had independence been on the minds of those who fought at Bunker Hill or in Washington’s thoughts when he took command of the army. En route to Cambridge from Philadelphia, he had been quite specific in assuring the New York Provincial Congress that “every exertion of my worthy colleagues and myself will be equally extended to the reestablishment of peace and harmony between the mother country and the colonies.”

But more and more of late there was talk of independence . The Reverend Belknap, from his visits to the camps, concluded that independence had “become a favorite point in the army.” A “declaration of independence” was heartily wished for, wrote Nathanael Greene, who was one of the first to say it in writing. “We had as good to begin in earnest first as last.”

(McCullough 2006, 54-55)

A stirring summons to renewed devotion to the cause of liberty, as strong and eloquent an appeal to the men in the ranks, “the guardians of America,” as had yet been seen in print, appeared in the New England Chronicle, signed simply “A Freeman.” Not only did it celebrate the Glorious Cause, but it spoke of a break with Britain soon to come and a future “big with everything good and great,” when Americans would decide their own salvation.

Your exertions in the cause of freedom, guided by wisdom and animated by zeal and courage, have gained you the love and confidence of your grateful countrymen; and they look to you, who are experienced veterans, and trust that you will still be the guardians of America. As I have the honor to be an American, and one among the free millions, who are defended by your valor, I would the tribute of pay thanks, and express my gratitude, while I solicit you to continue in your present honorable and important station. I doubt not America will always find enough of her sons ready to flock to her standard, and support her freedom; but experience proves that experienced soldiers are more capable of performing the duties of the camp, and better qualified to face the enemy, than others; and therefore every friend of America will be desirous that most of the gentlemen who compose the present army may continue in the service of their country until “Liberty, Peace, and Safety” are established. Although your private concerns may call for your assistance at home, yet the voice of country is still louder, and it is painful to heroic minds to quit the field when liberty calls, and the voice of injured millions cries “To arms! to arms!” Never was a cause more important or glorious than that which you are engaged in; not only your wives , your children , and distant posterity, but humanity at large , the world of mankind, are interested in it; for if tyranny should prevail in this great country, we may expect liberty will expire throughout the world. Therefore, more human glory and happiness may depend upon your exertions than ever yet depended upon any of the sons of men. He that is a soldier in defense of such a cause, needs no title; his post is a post of honor, and although not an emperor, yet he shall wear a crown – of glory – and blessed will be his memory!

The savage and brutal barbarity of our enemies in burning Falmouth, is a full demonstration that there is not the least remains of virtue, wisdom, or humanity, in the British court; and that they are fully determined with fire and sword, to butcher and destroy, beggar and enslave the whole American people. Therefore we expect soon to break off all kind of connection with Britain, and form into a Grand Republic of the American United Colonies, which will, by the blessing of heaven, soon work out our salvation, and perpetuate the liberties, increase the wealth, the power and the glory of this Western world.

Notwithstanding the many difficulties we have to encounter, and the rage of our merciless enemies, we have a glorious prospect before us, big with everything good and great. The further we enter into the field of independence, our prospects will expand and brighten, and a complete Republic will soon complete our happiness.

(McCullough 2006, 62-63)

At the Cambridge headquarters, Washington declared in his general orders for New Year’s Day the commencement of a “new army, which in every point of view is entirely continental.” And thus the army, though still a percent a New England army, had a name, the Continental Army.

He stressed the hope that “the importance of the great Cause we are engaged in will be deeply impressed upon every man’s mind.” Everything “dear and valuable to freemen” was at stake, he said, calling on their patriotism to rally morale and commitment, but also expressing exactly what he felt.

With the crash of a 13-gun salute, he raised a new flag in honor of the birthday of the new army – a flag of thirteen red and white stripes, with the British colors (the crosses of St. George and St. Andrew) represented in the upper corner. When the British in Boston saw it flying from Prospect Hill, they at first mistook it for a flag of surrender.

(McCullough 2006, 69)

Among those of lesser rank , an outstanding example was John Montresor, an officer of engineers whose years of service and experience would seem to make a mockery of the very idea that someone like Nathanael Greene could be a major general. Montresor, too, had served in the French and Indian War, in the Braddock campaign and at Wolfe’s siege of Quebec. In 1760, at age twenty-four, he had led a winter expedition overland from Quebec to New England, and at the war’s end worked on fortifications from Boston to Detroit to New York City, where he bought an island, Montresor’s Island, in the East River. He was resourceful, energetic, probably the best engineer in the British a with experience in America to equal any.

But it was also true that Howe and Clinton disliked one another and did not work well together, and that John Montresor, who was not an aristocrat, was still, at nearly forty, only a captain. If the desperate American need for leaders had thrust young men like Nathanael Greene into positions beyond their experience, the British military system, wherein commissions were bought and aristocrats given preference, denied many men of ability roles they should have played. Had Captain John Montresor been a major general, the outcome of the struggle might have been quite different.

(McCullough 2006, 77-78)

Dr. Thacher, setting events down in his journal as they unfolded that “anxious” day on the Heights, wrote of the swarms of spectators covering the nearby hills, waiting to see a bloody battle.

Sometime in the course of the day ( the exact hour is not known ), Washington arrived to survey the defenses and the panorama below. “His Excellency General Washington is present animating and encouraging the soldiers,” recorded Thacher, “and they in return manifest their joy, and express a warm desire for the approach of the enemy.”

Each man knows his place, and is resolute to execute his duty [he continued]. Our breastworks are strengthened, and among the means of defense are a great number of barrels, filled with stone and sand, arranged in front of our works, which are to be put in motion and made to roll down the hill, to break the ranks and legs of assailants as they advance. These are the preparations for blood and slaughter! Gracious God! If it be determined in thy Providence that thousands of our fellow creatures shall this day be slain, let thy wrath be appeased, and in mercy grant that victory be on the side of our suffering, bleeding country.

(McCullough 2006, 95)

A Boston merchant named Theophilus Lillie, who owned a store on Middle Street specializing in English dry goods and groceries, had expressed his views in print in the aftermath of the mob assault on British soldiers that erupted into the Boston Massacre.

Upon the whole, I cannot help saying – although I have never entered into the mysteries of government, having applied myself to my shop and my business – that it always seemed strange to me that people who contend so much for civil and religious liberty should be so ready to deprive others of their natural liberty ….

If one set of private subjects may at any time take upon themselves to punish another set of private subjects just when they please , it’s such a sort of government as I never heard of before ; and according to my poor notion of government, this is one of the principle things which government is designed to prevent.

(McCullough 2006, 101)

At the headquarters in Cambridge, the Boston selectmen and a delegation from the legislature of Massachusetts came to offer their gratitude to Washington for saving the town “with so little effusion of human blood,” and to shower him with praise. Harvard, in the spirit of the moment, conferred an honorary degree on the man who had had almost no formal schooling.

Responding to such tributes, Washington was duly modest and gracious, and in truth they meant more than he showed. He was happy to “hear from different quarters that my reputation stands fair,” he wrote privately to his brother. He hoped it would be remembered also that none of what happened had come easily or predictably.

We have maintained our ground against the enemy under [ a ] … want of powder, and we have disbanded one army and recruited another within musket shot of two and twenty regiments, the flower of the army, when our strength has been little if any superior to theirs, and at last have beat them in a shameful and precipitate manner, out of a place the strongest by nature on this continent, strengthened and fortified in the best manner and at an enormous expense.

He was proud of the part he had played and wanted to say something about that , at least to his brother, and about the misconceptions he had been obliged to maintain.

I believe I may, with great truth, affirm that no man perhaps since the first institution of armies ever commanded one under more difficult circumstances than I have done …. Many of my difficulties and distress were of so peculiar a cast that in order to conceal them from the enemy, I was obliged to conceal them from my friends, indeed from my own army, thereby subjecting my conduct to interpretations unfavorable to my character.

(McCullough 2006, 109-110)

THE SIEGE had been the stunning success it was proclaimed, and Washington’s performance had been truly exceptional. He had indeed bested Howe and his regulars, and despite insufficient arms and ammunition, insufficient shelter, sickness, inexperienced officers, lack of discipline, clothing, and money. His patience with Congress had been exemplary, and while he had been saved repeatedly by his council of war from his headlong determination to attack, and thus from almost certain catastrophe, he had accepted the judgment of the council with no ill-self – serving histrionics.

He had kept his head, kept his health and his strength, bearing up under a weight of work and worry that only a few could have carried.

Having struggled with his festering dislike of New Englanders, he had proven a keen judge of character and ability and pinned his hopes on such untried born – and – bred Yankees as Greene and Knox. Without Knox, there would have been no triumph at Dorchester Heights. Henry Knox, in sum, had saved the day. And while Nathanael Greene had not played so spectacular a part as Knox, the troops under his command were distinguished as the best disciplined in the army, and he himself had emerged as Washington’s ideal lieutenant. In Greene and Knox, Washington had found the best men possible, men of ability and energy who, like Washington, would never lose sight of what the war was about, no matter what was to come. All important, too, was the devotion and loyalty these two young officers felt for Washington.

After the ”miracle” of Dorchester Heights, Washington was never again to speak ill of New Englanders because they were New Englanders.

He had no illusions about the gravity of what lay ahead. Nor did many of the wisest heads in Congress. The humiliation the British had been subjected to, John Hancock warned Washington, could well make them an even more formidable foe.

(McCullough 2006, 111)

Lieutenant Isaac Bangs of Massachusetts, who in his journal would provide one of the fullest accounts of unfolding events that spring and summer, wrote of his walking tours about town and such sights to be seen as the waterworks and the larger – than – life equestrian statue of King George III, which dominated Bowling Green in front of Washington’s headquarters. “The design was in imitation of one of the Roman emperors,” Bangs wrote. The King was represented “about a third larger than a natural man,” and both horse and rider were “neatly constructed of lead [and] gilt with gold,” and “raised on a pedestal of white marble” fifteen feet high.

With twenty or more churches of differing denominations to choose from (something unknown in Massachusetts), the lieutenant attended as many as possible – an ”English” church (most likely Trinity Church on Broadway, which was Church of England), a Congregational meeting, a high Dutch church (probably Old Dutch Church on Garden Street), where only Dutch was spoken, and the city’s one synagogue, Shearith Israel, on Mill Street . He liked the Dutch church best, he decided, preferring the priest’s manifest piety to the ”pomp” of the English church, though he understood not a word of the Dutch sermon. On a later Sunday he and a friend attended a Quaker meeting , but after sitting through two hours during which not a word was said, they happily repaired to a nearby tavern.

(McCullough 2006, 123-124)

SUDDENLY, with the impact of an explosion, news of a Loyalist plot to assassinate the commander – in – chief burst upon the city. A dozen men were arrested, including the mayor of New York, David Matthews, and two soldiers from Washington’s own Life Guard. The plot reportedly was to kill Washington and his officers the moment the British fleet appeared.

Patriot mobs took to the streets to hunt down Loyalists. Those they seized were beaten, tarred and feathered, burned with candles, or made “to ride the rail,” the cruel punishment whereby a man was forced to straddle a sharp fence rail held on the shoulders of two men, with other men on either side taking a grip on his legs to keep him straight, and thus the victim was paraded through the streets.

(McCullough 2006, 132-133)

By renouncing their allegiance to the King , the delegates at Philadelphia had committed treason and embarked on a course from which there could be no turning back.

“We are in the very midst of a revolution,” wrote John Adams, “the most complete, unexpected and remarkable of any in the history of nations.” In a ringing preamble , drafted by Thomas Jefferson , the document declared it “self – evident” that “all men are created equal,” and were endowed with the “unalienable” rights of “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.” And to this noble end the delegates had pledged their lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor.

Such courage and high ideals were of little consequence, of course, the Declaration itself being no more than a declaration without military success against the most formidable force on earth. John Dickinson of Pennsylvania, an eminent member of Congress who opposed the Declaration , had called it a “skiff made of paper.” And as Nathanael Greene had warned, there were never any certainties about the fate of war.

But from this point on, the citizens – soldiers of Washington’s army were no longer to be fighting only for the defense of their country, or for their rightful liberties as freeborn Englishmen , as they had at Lexington and Concord, Bunker Hill and through the long siege at Boston. It was now proudly proclaimed, all-out war for an independent America, a new America, and thus a new day of freedom and equality.

(McCullough 2006, 136-137)

On Tuesday, July 9, at six in the evening, on his orders, the several brigades in the city were marched onto the Commons and other parade grounds to hear the Declaration read aloud.

The general hopes this important event will serve as a fresh incentive to every officer and soldier to act with fidelity and courage, [the orders read] as knowing that now the peace and safety of his country depends (under God) solely on the success of our arms: And that he is now in the service of a state possessed of sufficient power to reward his merit , and advance him to the highest honors of a free country.

The formal readings concluded, a great mob of cheering , shouting soldiers and townspeople stormed down Broadway to Bowling Green, where, with ropes and bars, they pulled down the gilded lead statue of George III on his colossal horse. In their fury the crowd hacked off the sovereign’s head, severed the nose, clipped the laurels that wreathed the head, and mounted what remained of the head on a spike outside a tavern.

Much of the lead from the rest of the statue would later be, as reported, melted down for bullets “to assimilate with the brains of our infatuated adversaries.”

(McCullough 2006, 137-138)

Lord Rawdon, a veteran of Bunker Hill and of the siege of Boston who had taken delight in the hatred his men felt for Yankees, was cheered now by the number of soldiers being court-martialed for this being perfect proof, he wrote, of their improved diet and of what a “spirited” lot they were.

The fair nymphs of this isle are in wonderful tribulation, as the fresh meat our men have got here has made them as riotous as satyrs. A girl cannot step into the bushes to pluck a rose without running the most imminent risk of being ravished, and they are so little accustomed to these vigorous methods that they don’t bear them with the proper resignation, and of consequence we have most entertaining courts martial every day.

Yet the courts-martial were themselves proof that such conduct was no laughing matter to the British command, and in fact those convicted faced punishment far more severe than what was customarily dispensed in the American army.

(McCullough 2006, 142)

ON SATURDAY, JULY 13, General Howe and his staff, joined by Royal Governor Tryon, dined with the admiral in his cabin on board the Eagle. The discussion ”turned upon military affairs, upon the country, and upon the rebels,” and lasted well into the evening.

The next day came another surprise move when Lord Howe sent a picked officer from the Eagle, Lieutenant Philip Brown, across the bay to New York under a flag of truce carrying a letter addressed to “George Washington, Esq.” Brown was met by Joseph Reed, who on Washing ton’s orders had hurried to the waterfront accompanied by Henry Knox and Samuel Webb.

”I have a letter, sir, from Lord Howe to Mr. Washington,” Lieutenant Brown began.

”Sir,” replied Reed, ”we have no person in our army with that address.”

When Brown asked by what title Mr. Washington chose to be addressed, Reed replied, ”You are sensible, sir, of the rank of General Washington in our army.”

”Yes, sir, we are,” answered Brown. ”I am sure Lord Howe will lament exceedingly this affair, as the letter is quite of a civil nature and not a military one.”

Lord Howe also lamented ”exceedingly that he was not here sooner,” Brown added, implying that the admiral regretted not arriving in New York before the Declaration of Independence.

Brown returned to the Eagle to report the response of the Americans. (”So high is the vanity and the insolence of these men!” huffed Ambrose Serle in his journal.) But the admiral persisted. Three days later, Brown departed again under a white flag, the letter now addressed to ”George Washington, Esq., etc., etc.” But again it was declined .

The day after the admiral made a third try, this time sending a different messenger, a captain named Nisbet Balfour, to inquire whether General Washington would receive the adjutant general to General Howe, Colonel James Paterson. This time the answer was yes.

Thus exactly at noon, Saturday, July 20, Colonel Paterson arrived at New York and was escorted directly to No. 1 Broadway, where he met Washington with all due formality, with Reed, Knox, and others in attendance.

Washington’s guard stood at attention at the entrance. Washington, as Knox wrote, was ”very handsomely dressed and made a most elegant appearance,” while Paterson conducted himself with what Reed considered “the greatest politeness and attention.”

Seated across a table from Washington, Paterson assured him that Lord Howe did not mean to ”derogate from the respect or rank of General Washington.” Both Lord and General Howe held the ”person and character” of General Washington ”in highest esteem,” Paterson said. But when he took from his pocket the same letter – addressed still to ”George Washington, Esq., etc., etc.” – and placed it on the table between them, Washington let it lie, pointedly refusing to touch it.

The use of ”etc., etc.” implied everything that ought to follow, Paterson offered by way of explanation. ”It so does,” said Washington,” and anything.” A letter addressed to a person in a position of public responsibility ought to indicate that station, Washington said, otherwise it would appear mere private correspondence. He would not accept such a letter.

Paterson talked of the ”goodness” and ”benevolence” of the King, who had appointed Lord and General Howe as commissioners to ”accommodate this unhappy dispute.” As Reed would write in a report to Congress – a report soon published in the Pennsylvania Journal Washington replied simply that he was ”not vested with any powers on this subject by those from whom he derived his authority and power.” It was his understanding, Washington continued, that Lord Howe had come out from London with authority only to grant pardons. If that was so , he had come to the wrong place.

”Those who have committed no fault want no pardon,” Washington said plainly. “We are only defending what we deem our indisputable rights.”

According to Henry Knox, the English officer appeared as ”awestruck as if before something super – natural.”

Paterson said he lamented that an ”adherence to forms” might ”obstruct business of the greatest moment and concern.”

The meeting over, as Paterson himself would write, the general ”with a great deal of marked attention and civility permitted me to take my leave.”

It had been a scene that those in the room would long remember. Washington had performed his role to perfection. It was not enough that a leader looked the part; by Washington’s rules, he must know how to act it with self–command and precision. John Adams would later describe Washington approvingly as one of the great actors of the age.

To Washington it had been an obligatory farce. He had no faith, no trust whatever in any peace overtures by the British, however properly rendered. He had agreed to take part in such an interview,” one senses , partly to show the British – and his own staff – that he could through the motions quite as well as any officer and gentleman, but more importantly to send a message to the British command absent any ambiguity. And in this he was unmistakably successful.

As Lord Howe would report to Lord Germain on the prospect of an accommodation acceptable to the King, the ” interview … induced me to change my subscription for the attainment of an end so desirable.”

(McCullough 2006, 144-146)

On August 12 the sea beyond the Narrows was filled with yet another one hundred ships or more bearing down on New York , a fleet so large that it took all day for them to come up the harbor under full canvas , colors flying , guns saluting , sailors and soldiers on the ships and on shore cheering themselves hoarse.

In addition, another 3,000 British troops and more than 8,000 Hessians had arrived after an arduous three months at sea.

Nothing like it had ever been seen in New York. Housetops were covered with ”gazers”; all wharves that offered a view were jammed with people. The total British armada now at anchor in a “long, thick cluster” off Staten Island numbered nearly four hundred ships large and small , seventy-three warships, including eight ships of the line, each mounting 50 guns or more. As British officers happily reminded one another, it was the largest fleet ever seen in American waters. In fact, it was the largest expeditionary force of the eighteenth century, the largest, most powerful force ever sent forth from Britain or any nation.

But it was also true that as big as the biggest ships were and to Americans who had never seen anything like them, they were colossal they could have been bigger still. Even the Asia and Eagle were small compared to other ships in the British fleet. HMS Victory, for example, mounted fully 98 guns. Concerned about the difficulties of clearing the shallows of Sandy Hook and negotiating the East River and the Hudson, Admiral Lord Howe had wisely chosen speed and maneuverability over size and more massive firepower.

Still , by the scale of things in the American colonies of 1776 , it was a display of military might past imagining. All told , 32,000 troops landed on Staten Island, a well – armed, well – equipped, trained force more had numerous than the entire population of New York or even Philadelphia, which, with a population of about 30,000, was the largest city in America.

Joseph Reed, writing to his wife, expressed what many felt:

When I look down and see the prodigious fleet they have collected, the preparations they have made, and consider the vast expenses incurred, I cannot help being astonished that a people should come 3,000 miles at such risk, trouble and expense to rob, plunder and destroy another people because they will not lay their lives and fortunes at their feet.

(McCullough 2006, 148-149)

Washington’s quandary over where the British would strike, and how to apportion the strength he had, was no less extreme now than it had been at the start. Greene and Reed, whose judgment he valued most, were certain the enemy would attack Long Island, both because of the numbers of Loyalists there and the broad accessible beaches where troops could readily land under the protection of British ships.

But Washington worried that a landing on Long Island might be a diversion in advance of a full assault on New York. And with no way of knowing, he felt compelled now to violate one of the oldest, most fundamental rules of battle, never to divide your strength when faced by a superior force. He split his army in roughly equal parts on the theory that he could move men one way or the other over the East River according to how events unfolded.

In a long report to Washington dated August 15 , Greene stressed a further cause for concern. The new troops coming over to Long Island, besides being undisciplined, inexperienced, poorly armed , and poorly equipped, were ”strangers to the ground.” They had no familiarity with the lay of the land, a subject Greene considered of greatest importance. ”They will not be so apt to support each other in time of action as those who have long been acquainted, and who are not only attached to each other but to the place.”

He confirmed that the troops were in ”exceeding good spirits,” and that, like Washington, he took heart from this. Only at the conclusion did he acknowledge with regret that he was confined to his bed with a raging fever. Greene, the officer who had been the most concerned of all about the health of the troops , was himself stricken at the crucial hour.

(McCullough 2006, 152)

The Hessian and British troops alike were astonished to find Americans blessed with such abundance – substantial farmhouses and fine furnishings. ”In all the fields the finest fruit is to be found,” Lieutenant von Bardeleben wrote after taking a walk on his own, away from the path of destruction. ”The peach and apple trees are especially numerous …. The houses, in part, are made only of wood and the furnishing in them are excellent. Comfort, beauty, and cleanliness are readily apparent.”

To many of the English, such affluence as they saw on Long Island was proof that America had indeed grown rich at the expense of Great Britain.

In fact, the Americans of 1776 enjoyed a higher standard of living than any people in the world. Their material wealth was considerably less than it would become in time, still it was a great deal more than others had elsewhere. How people with so much, living on their own land, would ever choose to rebel against the ruler God had put over them and thereby bring down such devastation upon themselves was for the invaders incomprehensible.

Arriving at Brooklyn , Washington was outraged by what he saw, and in a letter written later in the day, he lectured Old Put as he might the greenest lieutenant. All “irregularities” must cease at once. ”The distinction between a well regulated army and a mob is the good order and discipline of the first, and the licentious and disorderly behavior of the latter.”

Seeing things as they were, not as he would wish they were, was known to be one of Washington’s salient strengths, and having witnessed firsthand the “loose, disorderly, and unsoldierlike” state of things among the troops at Brooklyn , and knowing how outnumbered they were by the enemy, he might have ordered an immediate withdrawal back to New York while there was still time. But he did not, nor is there any evidence that such a move was even considered.

(McCullough 2006, 161)

Of the war he wrote that a few more days would likely ”bring matters to an issue one way or other.” If he did not think the struggle just, nothing on earth could “compensate [for] the loss of all my domestic happiness and requite me for the load of business which constantly presses upon and deprives me of every enjoyment.”

What he may have written to his wife Martha that night, or at any point in the course of events to come, is unknown, since she later destroyed all but three of his letters to her, and these survived only by accident. His sleep that night was to be abbreviated, yet the most he would have for days.

(McCullough 2006, 164)

In an effort to explain why the ”provincials” would, in their own climate, be so afflicted with ”putrid disorders,” while his Majesty’s troops, who were foreign to the climate, would enjoy near perfect health, the London Chronicle said the difference was the great cleanliness of the regulars.

Among the regular troops every private soldier is obliged to put on a clean shirt twice , perhaps three times a week, according to the season and climate; and there are a certain number of officers appointed every day to see that each man washes his own linen, if he had not a woman to do it for him.

While the dregs of society did indeed count among the great majority were young countrymen from rural England, Scotland, and Ireland. They were farmers, unskilled laborers, and tradesmen – blacksmiths, cordwainers, carpenters, bakers, hatters, locksmiths, and weavers – who had been recruited, not pressed into service, drawn by the promise of clothing, food, and steady, if meager, pay, along with a chance at adventure, perhaps even a touch of glory. In their rural or small – town origins they were not greatly different from their American counterparts.

The average British regular was in his late twenties, or about five years older than the average American soldier, but the average regular had served five or six years in the army, or five or six times longer than the average volunteer under Washington. To the British rank – and – file there way of was nothing novel about being a soldier. The harsh life was their life. They carried themselves like soldiers. They had rules , regulations, and traditions down pat. They were proud to serve in His Majesty’s army, proud of the uniform, and fiercely proud of and loyal to their regiments.

(McCullough 2006, 167)

Accounts of British, Scottish, and Hessian soldiers bayoneting Americans after they had surrendered were to become commonplace. There were repeated stories of Hessians pinning Americans to trees with their bayonets. A letter said to have been written by an unnamed British officer appeared in the Massachusetts Spy describing how readily surrendered Americans were ”dispatched.”

The Hessians and our Highlanders gave no quarters [the letter read], and it was a fine thing to see with what alacrity they dispatched the rebels with their bayonets after we had surrendered them so that they could not resist …. You know all stratagems are lawful in war, especially against such vile enemies to their King and country.

Numbers of individual Americans were indeed severely beaten after surrendering, or, like Captain Jewett, run through with bayonets, as reliable accounts attest, but no mass atrocities were committed. The letter in the Massachusetts Spy – a letter quoted repeatedly – was very likely a fake, fabricated as propaganda. Nor was there truth to an account in a London paper of Hessians burying five hundred American bodies in a single pit.

Some American prisoners , including Jabez Fitch , recorded acts of genuine civility and kindness on the part of their captors . Even the infamous General Grant, wrote Fitch, ”was so good as to make us a present of a side of mutton.”

For their British and Hessian captors, and particularly for the Hessians, the prisoners were great curiosities , a first chance to see close up what the rebel foe looked like.” They could not have been taken as soldiers as they had no uniforms , but only torn blouses of all colors, ”wrote one astonished Hessian. Lieutenant von Bardeleben, too, was surprised to see how badly clothed the Americans were. Most, he wrote, ”have nothing but a wretched farmer’s costume and a weapon. Most of their officers are no better dressed and until recently were only ordinary manual laborers.“

(McCullough 2006, 181)

The Americans had wanted another Bunker Hill. Howe, remembering Bunker Hill, had no desire to squander lives with another bloody frontal attack on an army dug in on a hill, if, with a little patience, that same hill could be taken by less costly means. ”It was apparent the lines must have been ours at a very cheap rate by regular approaches,” he would say in explanation. ”I could not risk the loss that might have been sustained in the assault.”

Had Howe pressed on the afternoon of the 27th, the British victory could have been total. Or had the wind turned earlier, and the British navy moved into the East River, the war and the chances of an independent United States of America could have been long delayed, or even ended there and then.

(McCullough 2006, 195)

The Hessians were professionals hired to perform a duty, and this was to be their day to show themselves superior in a profession they took extreme pride in. (During the time he had been held prisoner, Lord Stir ling had heard Hessian officers remark that they had never considered it their duty to inquire which of the two sides in the American controversy was right.)

(McCullough 2006, 241)

Only one American hero was to emerge from what happened at Fort Washington. She was Margaret (”Molly”) Corbin, the wife of a Pennsylvania soldier, John Corbin, who had gone into battle at her husband’s side, and when he was killed, stepped into his place, to load and fire a cannon, until she fell wounded, nearly losing one arm. After the surrender, she was allowed by her captors to return home to Pennsylvania.

(McCullough 2006, 245)

In less than two weeks, on December 1, the enlistments of 2,000 of his troops would be up, the men free to go. It was the same nightmare prospect he had faced at Boston exactly a year before, and with the misery of the men greater now than ever, and morale suffering, there seemed every chance that his army would evaporate before his eyes.

Privately, Washington talked with Reed about the possibility of retreating to western Pennsylvania if necessary. Reed thought that if eastern Pennsylvania were to give up, the rest of the state would follow. Washington is said to have passed his hand over his throat and remarked,” My neck does not feel as though it was made for a halter.” He talked of retreating to the mountains of Augusta County , in western Virginia. From there they could carry on a ”predatory war,” Washington said. ”And if over – powered, we must cross the Allegheny Mountains.” He knew, as the enemy had little idea, just how big a country it was.

The problem was not that there were too few American soldiers in the thirteen states. There were plenty, but the states were reluctant to send the troops they had to help fight the war, preferring to keep them close to home, and especially as the war was not going well. In August, Washington had had an army of 20,000 . In the three months since, he had lost four battles – at Brooklyn, Kips Bay, White Plains, and Fort Washington – then gave up Fort Lee without a fight. His army now was divided as it had not been in August and, just as young Lieutenant Monroe had speculated, he had only about 3,500 troops under his personal command – that was all.

Desperate for help, he sent Reed off to Burlington, New Jersey, on the eastern bank of the Delaware River, upstream from Philadelphia, to impress upon the governor of New Jersey, William Livingston, the urgent need for reinforcements. As it was, New Jersey militia were not turning out in any numbers that could make a difference.

General Mifflin was dispatched on a similar mission to Philadelphia, to alert Congress to the ”critical state of our affairs,” and do everything possible to round up Pennsylvania troops and send them on with all speed.

These were two critical undertakings , and in the choice of Reed, his closest confidant, and the very able Mifflin, the Philadelphian who had shown such valor in command of the rear guard at Brooklyn, Washington felt confident he was sending two of the best men he had, and that this would not be lost on any who listened to what they had to say.

The first report from Mifflin was bitterly disappointing. His fellow Pennsylvanians were ”divided and lethargic,” Mifflin wrote, ”slumbering under the shade of peace and in the full enjoyment of the sweets of commerce.” From Reed, Washington heard nothing.

(McCullough 2006, 249-250)

It was a critical moment in the management of the war, with Clinton and William Howe once more opposed on how best to proceed. Clinton continued to see Washington’s army as the heart of the rebellion , and the envelopment of the army, therefore, as the most expeditious strategy. Howe wanted to keep the Americans on the run, and continue to clear the board, so to speak – to clear New Jersey and Rhode Island of the rebel forces just as he had cleared New York , and by such conquests of vital territory bring the deluded American people and their political leaders to their senses and end their demonstrably futile rebellion.

Clinton was overruled, and though unconvinced, he departed dutifully for Rhode Island, where his expedition seized Newport without opposition and the predominantly Quaker inhabitants seemed quite happy to live in peace under his protection. But it was a conquest of little importance. As would be said, its effect on the course of the war was about what it would have been had Clinton’s forces occupied the town of Newport on the Isle of Wight.

Difficulties between Clinton and William Howe , the friction of the two contrasting personalities, had grown steadily worse. At White Plains, in an outburst of frustration and anger, Clinton had told General Cornwallis he could not bear to serve under Howe, and this Cornwallis had chosen to tell Howe. Thus it was with considerable relief that Howe saw Clinton sail off from New York, just as when Clinton had departed Boston for South Carolina.

In Clinton’s place, Howe put Cornwallis, knowing he had a far more reasonable man to deal with and a highly energetic and effective field commander.

Like Howe – indeed , like Clinton – Charles Cornwallis was a true eighteenth – century English aristocrat, a shining representative of Britain’s ruling class, born to wealth, position, and influence. Schooled at Eton, he had decided in his youth on a military career, in which he had distinguished himself ever since. At age thirty – seven, he was at his professional prime but, unlike Howe, a man with no bad habits or inclinations to self – indulgence, and if not as intellectually gifted as Clinton, he had no peevish or contrary side.

Tall and somewhat overweight, as was the fashion, he carried himself well and was considered handsome, except for a cast in one eye. (In fact, he had lost sight in one eye as a result of a boyhood accident.) He was devoted to his ailing wife, whom he missed dreadfully , and devoted to his men- ” I love that army,” he had once declared – and their devotion to him was notable. He was the most popular British general serving in America, known to be strict but fair, and genuinely concerned for the well – being of his troops. Repeatedly in the year’s campaign – at Brooklyn, Kips Bay, Fort Washington, and in his stunning surprise capture of Fort Lee – he had shown himself to be enterprising and aggressive. Thus far, he had done everything right.

(McCullough 2006, 252-253)

The British blamed the Hessians. (”The Hessians are more infamous and cruel than any,” wrote Ambrose Serle, after hearing reports of British plundering.) The Hessians blamed the British. The Americans blamed both the British and the Hessians, as well as the New Jersey Loyalists, and the British and Hessian commanders seemed no more able to put a stop to such excesses than Washington had been. The stories, as many may have been, were a searing part of a war that amplified and seemed only to grow more brutal and destructive.

Accounts of houses sacked, of families robbed of all they had, became commonplace. American reports of atrocities were often propaganda, but many were also quite accurate. The Pennsylvania Journal , the Pennsylvania Evening Post, and the Freeman’s Journal carried reports of the sick and elderly being abused, of rape and murder. No one was safe, according to the British officer Charles Stedman.” The friend and the foe from the hand of rapine shared alike.”

The New Jersey Loyalists were the most villainous of all, Nathanael Greene reported to his wife Caty.

They lead the relentless foreigners to the houses of their neighbors and strip poor women and children of everything they have to eat or wear; and after plundering them in this sort, the brutes often ravish the mothers and daughters and compel the fathers and sons to behold their brutality.

”The enemy’s ravages in New Jersey exceed all description,” Greene would report to Governor Nicholas Cooke of Rhode Island.” Many hundred women ravished.”

At Newark, according to the report of a congressional committee, three women, one of whom was in her seventies, another pregnant, were ”most horribly ravished.”

Fear and outrage spread across New Jersey and beyond. ”Their footsteps are marked with destruction wherever they go,” Greene said of the enemy.

What remained of Washington’s army, the ”shadow army,” as Greene called it, was pitiful to behold.” But give me leave to tell you, Sir,” Greene would write to John Adams,” that our difficulties were inconceivable to those who were not eye witnesses to them.”

(McCullough 2006, 260-261)

WITH THE NEW YEAR, news arrived from England that on October 31 in London, His Majesty King George III had once again ridden in splendor from St. James’s Palace to Westminster to address the opening of Parliament on the still – distressing war in America.

Nothing could have afforded me so much satisfaction [said the King] as to have been able to inform you … that my unhappy people [in America], recovered from their delusion, had delivered themselves from the oppression of their leaders and returned to their duty. But so daring and desperate is the spirit of those leaders, whose object has always been dominion and power, that they have now openly renounced all allegiance to the Crown, and all political connection with this country. … and have presumed to set up their rebellious confederacies for independent states. If their treason is to take root, much mischief must grow from it.

Another military campaign would be undertaken in America.

(McCullough 2006, 292)

The war was a longer, far more arduous, and more painful struggle than later generations would understand or sufficiently appreciate. By the time it ended, it had taken the lives of an estimated 25,000 Americans, or roughly 1 percent of the population. In percentage of lives lost, it was the most costly war in American history, except for the Civil War.

The year 1776, celebrated as the birth year of the nation and for the signing of the Declaration of Independence, was for those who carried the fight for independence forward a year of all-too-few victories, of sustained suffering, disease, hunger, desertion, cowardice, disillusionment, defeat, terrible discouragement, and fear, as they would never forget, but also of phenomenal courage and bedrock devotion to country, and that, too, they would never forget.

Especially for those who had been with Washington and who knew what a close call it was at the beginning – how often circumstance, storms, contrary winds, the oddities or strengths of individual character had made the difference – the outcome seemed little short of a miracle.

(McCullough 2006, 294)

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References

McCullough, David. 2006. 1776. N.p.: Simon & Schuster.

ISBN 978-0-7432-2672-1