Part 54

The next year, 1777, was the turning point, or critical period of the war. It was checkered by good and evil fortune. It was a period of much financial difficulty and great suffering both by the army and the people; but towards its close, the unexpected and great success of the American arms at the north really decided the fate of the contest, and showed that the attempt of Great Britain to reduce the Colonies by force to their former allegiance was a hopeless undertaking. About the end of May, the American army, now much strengthened by recruits, left its winter quarters, and took a strong position at Middlefield. Howe manœuvred for some time, in the hope of inducing or compelling it to fight a battle on equal ground. But finding that Washington was too cautious to run this hazard, he suddenly embarked his army on board the fleet, and carried it round to the head of Chesapeake Bay, where he landed and began his march for Philadelphia. He was obliged to take this route, as the American fortifications on the Delaware made it too hazardous for the fleet to ascend that river. Anxious to save the city which was the seat of Congress and was regarded in some measure as the capital of the country, Washington marched hurriedly south to intercept him. After passing through Philadelphia, he first attempted to check the progress of the enemy at Brandywine, where a creek, everywhere fordable, guarded the front of the American position. The British passed this stream in two divisions, September 11, at considerable distance from each other; and Washington’s army being thus attacked in front and on the flank, some regiments broke and fled, and the rest were forced to retreat in some disorder. The Americans again offered battle five days afterwards, but a violent storm interrupted the engagement almost as soon as it began. The hope of saving Philadelphia was then abandoned; Congress adjourned to Lancaster, the magazines and public stores were removed, and Howe entered the city on the 25th, leaving the bulk of his army ten miles off, at Germantown. It was a barren conquest; experience was now teaching the British that they could hold no more ground in America than what they actually occupied with their troops; and these were not to be too much scattered, or they were liable to be cut off in detail.

To raise the sinking spirits of his men, Washington planned a surprise of the British army in Germantown. The enterprise seemed successful at first; but the troops got separated from each other, in the darkness of the morning, by the inequalities of the ground, a panic seized upon some, and the whole were then driven to make a disorderly retreat. Rightly deeming that Washington could not soon make another attack after this repulse, Howe resolved to attack the forts on the Delaware, in order to establish communication with his fleet, which had not yet been able to pass up the river. Count Donop, with 1,200 Hessians, assaulted the post at Red Bank, on the Jersey shore, but fell in the attempt, and his men were driven off with great slaughter; and of the ships which assailed Fort Mifflen, on an island in the Delaware, a sixty four was blown up, a frigate was burned, and the others were much injured and compelled to retire. The enemy then erected land-batteries, which kept up so heavy a fire that the fortifications were ruined, and the garrison was withdrawn. Red Bank was also evacuated, and the Delaware was thus opened to the British fleet.

But the most important military operations of this year took place at the North. Gen. Burgoyne received the command in Canada, with a finely appointed army of 10,000 men, and was instructed to force his way down Lake Champlain, and then cross to Albany, and descend the Hudson, to join the British forces in New York. This plan, if executed, would have cut off New England from the other Colonies, and have rendered the subjugatian of the Americans extremely probable. And there was great danger for a time that it would be executed. Burgoyne summoned the Indians to his standard, and easily drove the feeble and disorganized army of St. Clair before him, captured Ticonderoga and Skenesborough, July 6, and prepared to force his way through the wilderness, from the head of the lake to the Hudson. St. Clair had brought a poor remnant of his army to join Schuyler at Fort Edward, on the Hudson; but their united forces did not number 5,000, most of them were militia, and both ammunition and provisions were wanting. The news of the loss of Ticonderoga and the rapid progress of Burgoyne created great consternation; the militia of New England came forward readily, and in considerable numbers, to strengthen the northern army, which also received some detachments from the posts in the Highlands. Schuyler was superseded by Gen. Gates, and under him were placed Arnold, Morgan, Lincoln, and others, who were among the best officers in the army. Burgoyne had succeeded in reaching the Hudson after immense labor and fatigue, but he found that difficulties were now beginning to thicken around him. He sent out a strong detachment of regular troops, Tories, and Indians, to his right, to turn the alarm to the western frontier of New York, and lay siege to Fort Schuyler at the head of the Mohawk. Arnold was sent against him, and the fear of his approach caused so many of the Indians to desert, that St. Leger was compelled to raise the siege and retire so precipitately that most of his stores and baggage fell into the hands of the Americans. Another and stronger detachment was sent out to the left, under Col. Baum, to try the temper of the people and to obtain horses and provisions; this was encountered, at Bennington, by some New Hampshire militia and Green Mountain Boys, under Col. Stark, and totally defeated, most of the German soldiers being taken prisoners. Col. Breyman, who had been sent with 500 men to aid Baum, came up two hours after the battle was fought, was himself attacked by the victorious party, and obliged to make the best retreat he could, with the loss of all his baggage and artillery. Thus both of Burgoyne’s wings were clipped, and he found himself at Saratoga, on the west side of the Hudson, in the heart of a difficult country, short of provisions, and with an enemy constantly increasing in numbers on all sides of him. He first tried an attack upon Gates’ camp, upon Behmus’s Heights, in his front Sept. 19; and the result was a drawn battle, in which he lost 500 men, and gained not a single advantage. A party of Lincoln’s militia had got into his rear, surprised the posts around Lake George, and besieged Ticonderoga, so that his communications were cut off. But he was encouraged to hold out, as a letter reached him from Clinton in New York, saying that the latter was about to make an expedition up the Hudson, which could operate as a diversion, and might reach Albany, so as to place Gates between two fires. The promise was kept, the passes of the Highlands were forced, and the British had proceeded as far north as Esopus, when they learned that they were too late, and found it prudent to return. Burgoyne offered battle again on the 7th of October, and his troops were defeated and driven back into his camp, his entrenchments in one quarter were forced, and a part of his artillery and ammunition were captured. His position was thus rendered untenable, and he secretly drew back in the night to a rising ground in the rear. Thence he retreated, two days afterwards, to Saratoga, and found that the difficulties of the country and the position of the American parties were such that he could go no further. He held out a week longer; and then, his provisions being exhausted and his camp surrounded and hard pressed, he was obliged to capitulate. He had already lost about 4,000 men, and 5,642 others were now surrendered as prisoners of war, all his arms, baggage, and camp equipage also passing into the hands of the victors. The garrison of Ticonderoga, when they heard of this calamity, hastily retreated into Canada, and the Americans again took possession of this renowned fortress.

Two days after the news arrived at Paris of the capture of Burgoyne and the battle of Germantown, the French ministry intimated to Dr. Franklin that they were willing to consider the project of a treaty of alliance with the American States. Two treaties were accordingly framed, Feb. 6, 1778, in one of which France acknowledged the independence of the States, and formed relations of amity and commerce with them; in the other, which was to go into effect if Great Britain should make war upon France, the two contracting parties bound themselves to aid each other as good friends and allies, to maintain the sovereignty and independence of the American States, and not to make a truce or peace except by mutual consent. About the same time, the British ministry caused two laws to be enacted, declaring that no tax should hereafter be imposed by parliament on the Colonies, and appointing commissioners to treat with them on almost any terms short of absolute independence. The concession was ample, but it came too late; Congress refused even to hold a conference with the commissioners before the British armies were withdrawn and the independence of the country acknowledged. England therefore declared war against France, and prepared to keep up in America some years longer a useless, expensive, and murderous conflict, in which she had hardly a hope of ultimate success. The Colonists were indeed compelled to pay a heavy price for their freedom. The public finances were in a deplorable state; recruits could not be obtained except by enormous bounties, and the troops were but half fed and half clothed; and the people generally were suffering from the interruption of trade and agriculture, and the scarcity of breadstuffs. There was hardly a family in the land to which the war had not already brought privation and bereavement. And yet the spirit of the people continued high; they expected much from the French alliance, and, except among the Tories, hardly a wish was breathed for peace on any terms short of independence. For the army, which had passed the winter in miserable huts at Valley Forge, suffering from cold and disease, and to some extent also from hunger and nakedness, Washington set apart a day for rejoicing when the news of the treaty with France were received. Losses and hardships were then forgotten in the general exultation; ‘every heart was filled with gratitude to the French king, and every mouth spoke his praise.’

The quarters of the British army were now found to be too much extended; and it was resolved to evacuate Philadelphia and to retreat to New York. The American army, which had been reinforced in the spring of 1778, and somewhat trained and disciplined through the great efforts of Baron Steuben, a brave and skillful Prussian officer, hung upon their rear and gave them much trouble. A battle was fought at Monmouth, June 28, with indecisive results, though the British loss considerably exceeded that of the Americans. Many of the German soldiers, also, took the opportunity to desert. Count D’Estaing soon arrived with a powerful fleet, having 4,000 French soldiers on board, and a scheme for a combined attack on New York having failed because the pilots would not conduct the heavier ships over the bar, an expedition against Newport was agreed upon, that place being held by Gen. Pigot, at the head of 6,000 men. The fleet blockaded the harbor, and forced the English to sink some of their frigates; but the Continental troops and New England militia did not arrive soon enough to coöperate with the ships, which were compelled to put to sea by Lord Howe’s fleet, and were also crippled by a storm. The undertaking was abandoned, and Gen. Sullivan had much difficulty in bringing off the American troops, as the British had received a large reinforcement. These were the only military operations on a large scale during the year; though as the war was now prosecuted both by the British and the Tories in a less hopeful and more revengeful spirit, several predatory expeditions were sent out that did much wanton injury, and in some skirmishes no quarter was given, and acts of sickening barbarity were committed. Wyoming, a flourishing settlement in Pennsylvania, was desolated by an incursion of Indians and Tories, the male inhabitants were massacred, the houses burned, and the cattle killed or driven off. Some towns on the coast of Massachusetts were burned, and a heavy contribution was levied on a defenseless island. In New York, Baylor’s troop of dragoons were surprised, and the men bayonetted, under Gen. Gray’s orders to give no quarter; and the same fate befell the infantry of Pulaski’s legion. There was some excuse for the Tories in these proceedings; their property had been very generally confiscated, they often had rough personal treatment, and on slight pretexts, some of them had been hanged.

During the next two years, the war was chiefly carried on by the British in the southern States, where the population was more scattered and divided in opinion, and the country offered fewer means of defense. At the close of 1778, Savannah was taken by an expedition from New York, and another body of royal troops coming up from Florida, nearly completed the conquest of Georgia. Gen. Lincoln was sent to take the command in this department, and by great exertions he protected Charleston and South Carolina from the enemy till September 1779, when D’Estaing, with a French fleet and 6,000 men, arrived on the coast, and the two armies in concert laid siege to Savannah. But as the French could remain but a short time, the attack was made prematurely, and the besiegers were beaten off with great loss, the gallant Count Pulaski being among the slain. Gen. Mathews was sent from New York, with 2,500 men, on a plundering expedition to Virginia. He took possession of Portsmouth and Norfolk, burned some ships of war and many private vessels, and brought off a large quantity of tobacco, after destroying private property to the amount of two millions of dollars. At the north, Congress took measures to punish the Indians for the atrocities they had committed at Wyoming, and other places. Gen. Sullivan led an expedition of 4,000 men into the heart of their country, in the western part of the State of New York, destroyed their villages, cut down their fruit trees, and so devastated the region, that the miserable savages could attempt nothing more till the close of the war. Some British troops under Gen. Tryon paid a marauding visit to the Connecticut shore, plundered and burned several towns, and destroyed a large amount of property. About the only legitimate military exploits of the year, at the north, were the capture by the British of Stony Point and Verplanck’s Point on the Hudson, thus rendering the communication between New England and the Middle States more circuitous and difficult, and the recapture of Stony Point in a very gallant manner by the Americans under Gen. Wayne.

Spain had now joined the alliance against England, June, 1779, though with no very definite purpose, except the hope that, while the attention of the British ministry was occupied by so many enemies, she might regain possession of Gibraltar. For a short time, the united French and Spanish fleet swept the British seas; but it was soon compelled to go into harbor. The next year, 1780, added another European power to the list of England’s enemies, and brought her assumed empire of the seas into great danger. To check the maritime superiority of the British, who, during the war, had greatly disturbed the neutral trade at sea, and molested the ships of every country by an oppressive search for contraband goods, Catherine II of Russia concluded an alliance with the several neutral powers, which should maintain the principle of ‘free ships, free goods,’ and thus secure the trade of the neutral states on the coasts and in the harbors of either of the belligerent powers. The confederacy also declared that no blockade of any port should be deemed effectual, so as to exclude neutral vessels from entering it, if there were not an adequate naval force present to maintain the blockade and render it dangerous for any ship to attempt to enter. This neutral alliance was constituted successively by Russia, Denmark, Sweden, Prussia, Austria, Naples, and Portugal. But Holland, whose adherence was very important from her situation and maritime strength, hesitated so long that England got information of the project, and declared war against the Dutch before they could give in their adhesion at St. Petersburg. Holland thus disappeared from the list of the neutral powers, and the alliance was deprived of her aid towards accomplishing their great purpose.

A powerful British armament, under Clinton and Arbuthnot, appeared before Charleston in February, 1780, and laid siege to it, with a view to the ultimate conquest of the whole State. Gen. Lincoln’s means of defense were very inadequate, and though he made every effort, he was compelled, after a resistance of 42 days, to surrender the city and give up his whole army as prisoners of war. The enemy then easily overran South Carolina; and many of the inhabitants, to avoid the extremities of war, took ‘protections’ from them, and thereby avowed themselves to be British subjects. Lord Cornwallis was then left to command at the South, while Clinton returned to New York. Congress appointed Gen. Gates to oppose the former, and by great exertions an army of 4,000 men was collected for this purpose, mostly militia, who were ill fed and ill armed, and not at all disciplined. With the rash confidence inspired by his success against Burgoyne, Gates advanced hastily and with little precaution, was attacked under unfavorable circumstances by Cornwallis, near Camden, and his army so completely routed that not a fourth part of them could be again brought together. The southern States were thus rendered almost entirely defenseless, though the British for the present were not able to invade North Carolina from the want of supplies. Sumter and Marion, also, noted partisan officers, gave them great annoyance by collecting bands of irregular troops, and waging a kind of guerrilla warfare against their outposts and detachments. One motley collection of such troops, chiefly mounted backwoodsmen with their rifles, under Shelby and Sevier, intercepted Ferguson, an active Loyalist, at the head of about 1,000 Tories, at King’s Mountain, and totally defeated him, taking most of his men prisoners, and hanging some of them as traitors. At the end of the year, Gen. Greene was sent to take Gates’ place, and a small regular army was collected for him, which he led with consummate ability. At the north, a French fleet and army, the latter under Rochambeau, arrived at Newport, but were blockaded there by a superior British fleet, so that they accomplished nothing.

Another remarkable incident of the year was the treason of Gen. Arnold, a very brave officer, but dissolute, wayward, and extravagant, who sold himself to the British for £10,000 and a general’s commission, covenanting to give into their power, also, West Point and the other American fortresses in the Highlands. The conspiracy was detected just before the time fixed for its execution. Arnold succeeded in making his escape; but Major Andrè, a gallant English officer whom Clinton had sent to negotiate with him, was seized when in disguise within the American lines, and was tried and executed as a spy. The want of pay and the impossibility of complying with the just demands of the soldiers, caused some Pennsylvania regiments, who were encamped near Morristown, to break out into open revolt. They were invited to join the British, as Arnold had done; but they refused, and after the matter had been compromised by Congress some of their grievances being redressed, they gave up the emissaries of the enemy, who were hanged as spies. Some New Jersey troops quickly followed this example of insubordination; but their revolt was crushed with a strong hand, and a few of the ringleaders were executed.

The comparative ease with which Georgia and South Carolina had been subdued caused great efforts to be made, in 1781, for the conquest of North Carolina and Virginia. In January of this year the traitor Arnold was sent with 1,600 men, chiefly Tories, to plunder and devastate the country on the Chesapeake and the James river, in order to cripple the resources of the state; and after he had accomplished this service, he was joined by Gen. Phillips, with 2,000 troops from New York. But these marauding expeditions did not help the British cause much; they caused great misery, but they incensed the people so much that they lost all thoughts of acquiescence and submission, and made desperate efforts to repulse the destroyers. The plan was, that Cornwallis should march north, to join Phillips and Arnold, their united forces being deemed sufficient to crush all opposition at the South. But Cornwallis had now an able and determined opponent in Greene, who gave him enough to do in the Carolinas. Half of Greene’s force, under Morgan, who had been sent to put down the Tories in the west, encountered the British light troops under Tarleton, at the Cowpens, and gave them a signal defeat, killing or taking prisoners over 600 of them. Cornwallis instantly started of in great haste, to overtake and punish Morgan before he could rejoin his commander. But the activity of the Americans baffled him. Still the British general pushed on; and Greene’s whole force being much inferior, he was obliged to make a rapid retreat into Virginia. He soon returned, however, with some reinforcements, and offered battle at Guilford Court House, where Cornwallis indeed defeated him, but the victory was equivalent to a defeat. The British loss was greater than the American, and Cornwallis was obliged to retire to Wilmington, near the sea. Greene pursued him for a while, and then took the bold step of marching directly into South Carolina, which had been left in charge of Lord Rawdon with a small force. Finding it impossible to overtake him, Cornwallis imitated his bold policy by marching north, to join the king’s troops in Virginia. Greene and Rawdon came in conflict with each other at Hobkirk’s Hill, April 25, and the former was again defeated, though his loss was no greater than the enemy’s and the advantages of the encounter were all on his side. Lee and Marion, with other partisan officers, encouraged by his presence, roused the inhabitants to arms; nearly all the British posts in the upper country were captured or abandoned, and the larger part of South Carolina was restored to the Americans. Their irritated opponents shot as deserters all whom they captured in arms that had once accepted British protection; among these victims was Colonel Hayne, an eminent citizen of Charleston, whose fate caused much sorrow and indignation. The conflict on both sides had all the aggravated features of a civil war.