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Title: The Pictorial Field-Book of The Revolution, Vol. 1 (of 2)
       or,Illustrations, by Pen And Pencil, of The History,
       Biography, Scenery, Relics, and Traditions of the War for
       Independence

Author: Benson J. Lossing

Illustrator: Benson J. Lossing
             Barritt

Release Date: July 4, 2015 [EBook #49351]

Language: English

Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1

*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK PICTORIAL FILED-BOOK ***




Produced by David Widger from page images generously provided
by the Internet Archive





THE PICTORIAL FIELD-BOOK OF THE REVOLUTION

Or,Illustrations, By Pen And Pencil, Of The History, Biography, Scenery,
Relics, And Traditions Of The War For Independence

By Benson J. Lossing

With Eleven Hundred Engravings On Wood, By Lossing And Barritt. Chiefly
From Original Sketches By The Author.

In Two Volumes.

Vol. I

New York:

Harper & Brothers, Publishers,

Franklin Square.

1860.

CONTENTS

INTRODUCTION

PICTORIAL FIELD-BOOK OF THE REVOLUTION.

CHAPTER I.

CHAPTER II.

CHAPTER III.

CHAPTER IV.

CHAPTER V.

CHAPTER VI.

CHAPTER. VII.

CHAPTER VIII.

CHAPTER IX.

CHAPTER X.

CHAPTER XI.

CHAPTER XII.

CHAPTER XIII.

CHAPTER XIV.

CHAPTER XV.

CHAPTER XVI.

CHAPTER XVII.

CHAPTER XVIII.

CHAPTER XIX

CHAPTER XX.

CHAPTER XXI.

CHAPTER XXII.

CHAPTER XXIII.

CHAPTER XXIV.

CHAPTER XXV.

CHAPTER XXVI.

CHAPTER XXVII

CHAPTER XXVIII.

CHAPTER XXIX.

CHAPTER XXX.

CHAPTER XXXI.

CHAPTER XXXII.

INDEX

INTRODUCTION

As my journey was among scenes and things hallowed to the feelings of
every American, I felt a hope that a record of the pilgrimage,
interwoven with that of the facts of past history, would attract the
attention, and win to the perusal of the chronicles of our Revolution
many who could not be otherwise decoyed into the apparently arid and
flowerless domains of mere history. I accordingly determined to make the
record of the tour to the important localities of the Revolution a
leading feature in the work. Here another difficulty was encountered. So
widely scattered are those localities, and so simultaneous were many of
the events, that a connected narrative of the journey must necessarily
break up the chronological unity of the history, and, at times, produce
some confusion. To give incidents of the journey, and sketches and
descriptions of the scenery and relics as they appear at present, in
fragmentary notes, would deny to the work the charm of a book of travel,
and thus almost wholly remove the prime object in view in giving such
narrative. The apparently less objectionable course was chosen, and the
history was broken into fragments, arranged, in the exhibition, in
accordance with the order in which each locality was visited, the
fragments individualized as much as possible, yet always maintaining a
tie of visible relationship with the whole. The apparent difficulties in
the way of the student which this plan suggests, are removed by the aid
of a complete Analytical Index at the close of the work, while the
narrative of the tour remains unbroken, except by the continually
recurring appendices of history. How far this arrangement shall
accomplish the desired result the candid judgment of the reader must
determine.

To collect the pictorial and other materials for this work, I traveled
more than eight thousand miles in the Old Thirteen States and Canada,
and visited every important place made memorable by the events of the
war; yet, in all that long and devious journey, through cities and
villages, amid mountains and vast pine forests, along rivers and over
fertile plantations, from New England to Georgia, with no passport to
the confidence, no claim to the regard of those from whom information
was sought, except such as the object of my errand afforded, and
communing with men of every social and intellectual grade, I never
experienced an unkind word or cold repulsion of manner. On the contrary,
politeness always greeted my first salutation, and, when the object of
my visit was announced, hospitality and friendly services were freely
bestowed. Every where the memorials of our Revolution are cherished with
devotional earnestness, and a feeling of reverence for these things
abounds, though kept quiescent by the progressive spirit of the age. To
those who thus aided and cheered me in my enterprise, I here proffer my
sincere thanks. I can not name them all, for they are too numerous, but
they will ever remain cherished "pictures on memory's wall."

It has been said that "diligence and accuracy are the only merits which
a historical writer may ascribe to himself." Neither labor nor care has
been spared in the collection of materials, and in endeavors to produce
a work as free from grave errors as possible. It has imperfections; it
would be foolish egotism to assert the contrary. In the various
histories of the same events many discrepancies appear; these I have
endeavored to reconcile or correct by documentary and other reliable
testimony; and if the work is not more accurate than its predecessors,
it is believed to be equally so with the most reliable. Free use has
been made of the available labors of others in the same department of
literature, always accrediting the source from whence facts were
derived. I have aimed to view men and events with an impartial eye,
censuring friends when they deserved censure, and commending enemies
when truth and justice demanded the tribute. The historical events
recorded were those of a family quarrel concerning vital principles in
jurisprudence; and wisely did a sagacious English statesman console
himself, at the close of the war, with the reflection, " We have been
subdued, it is true, but, thank Heaven, the brain and the muscle which
achieved the victory were nurtured by English blood; Old England, upon
the Island of Great Britain, has been beaten only by Young England, in
America." .

In the pictorial department, special care has been observed to make
faithful delineations of fact. If a relic of the Revolution was not
susceptible of picturesque effect in a drawing, without a departure from
truth, it has been left in its plainness, lor my chief object was to
illustrate the subject, not merely to embellish the book. I have
endeavored to present the features of things as I found them, whether
homely or charming, and have sought to delineate all that fell in my way
worthy of preservation. To do this, it was necessary to make the
engravings numerous, and no larger than perspicuity demanded, else the
work would be filled with pictures to the exclusion of essential reading
matter.

The plans of military movements have been drawn chiefly from British
sources, for very few were made by the engineers in the Continental
service. These appear to be generally pretty correct, so far as they
represent the immediate movements of the armies in actual conflict; but
the general topographical knowledge possessed by those engineers, was
quite defective. I have endeavored to detect and correct their
inaccuracies, either in the drawings or in the illustrative
descriptions.

With these general remarks respecting the origin and construction of the
work, it is submitted to the reading public. If a perusal of its pages
shall afford as much pleasure and profitable knowledge as were derived
from the journey and in the arrangement of the materials for the press,
the effort has not been unfruitful of good results. With an ardent
desire that it may prove a useful worker in the maintenance and growth
of true patriotism.

Far o'er yon azure main thy view extend,

Where seas and skies in blue confusion blend..

Lo, there a mighty realm, by Heaven design'd,

The last retreat for poor, oppress'd mankind;

Form'd with that pomp which marks the hand divine,

And clothes yon vault, where worlds unnumber'd shine.

Here spacious plains in solemn grandeur spread;

Here cloudy forests cast eternal shade;

Rich valleys wind, the sky-tall mountains brave,

And inland seas for commerce spread the wave

With nobler floods the sea-like rivers roll,

And fairer luster purples round the pole.

Timothy Dwight.

EVERY nation eminent for its refinement, displayed in the cultivation of
the arts, had its heroic age; a period when its first physical and moral
conquests were achieved, and when rude society, with all its impurities,
was fused and refined in the crucible of progress. When civilization
first set up its standard as a permanent ensign in the Western
hemisphere, northward of the Bahamas and the great Gulf, and the
contests for possession began between the wild Aborigines, who thrust no
spade into the soil, no sickle into ripe harvests, and those earnest
delvers from the Old World, who came with the light of Christianity to
plant a new empire and redeem the wilderness by cultivation, then
commenced the heroic age of America. It ended when the work of the
Revolution, in the eighteenth century, was accomplished; when the bond
of vassalage to Great Britain was severed by her colonies, and when the
thirteen confederated States ratified a federal Constitution, and upon
it laid the broad foundation of our Republic.

Those ancient civilizations, registered by the stylus of history, were
mere gloamings of morning compared with the noontide radiance which now
lights up the Western World; and even the more modern nations of Europe,
brilliant as they appear, have so many dark spots upon the disk of their
enlightenment, that their true glory is really less than that of the
waxing Star in the West. These ancient and modern civilizations, now
past or at their culminating points, were the results of the slow
progress of centuries; the heroic age {xvi}of America, meteor-like, was
brilliant and rapid in its course, occupying the space of only a century
and a half of time from the permanent implanting of a British colony,
weak and dependent, to the founding of our government, which, like
Pallas Athena, was, at its birth, full panoplied, strong, eminently
individual in its character, and full of recuperative energies. The head
of Britannia was cleft by the Vulcan of the Revolution, and from its
teeming brain leaped the full-grown daughter, sturdy and defiant.

Long anterior to the advent of Europeans in America, a native empire,
but little inferior to Old Rome in civilization, flourished in that
region of our continent which now forms the southwestern portion of the
Republic. The Aztec empire, which reached the acme of its refinement
during the reign of Montezuma, and crumbled into fragments when Cortez
dethroned and murdered that monarch, extended over the whole of Central
America: and when 1521. the Spaniards came it was gradually pushing its
conquests northward, where all was yet darkness and gloom. To human
apprehension, this people, apparently allied by various ties to the wild
nations of North America, appeared to be the most efficient instruments
in spreading the light of civilization over the whole continent; yet
they were not only denied this glorious privilege, but, by the very race
which first attempted to plant the seeds of European refinement in
Florida and among the Mobilian tribes, and to shed the illumination of
their dim Christianity over the dreary regions of the North, was their
own bright light extinguished. The Aztecs and their neighbors were
beaten into the dust of debasement by the falchion blows of avarice and
bigotry, and they form, apparently, not the most insignificant atom of
the chain of events which connects the history of the empires of the Old
World with that of our Republic.

It is believed that, two hundred years before the Aztecs subdued the
more ancient people of the Mexican valley and founded Tenochtitlan, * a
handful of rough, half-civilized adventurers from the wintery shores of
Iceland and the neighboring main, driven by adverse winds they knew not
whither, touched upon the bleak shores of Labrador, and traversed the
American continent southward as far as Rhode Island, and, it may be, the
capes of Virginia. ** These supposed first modern discoverers of America
were the children of the "mighty sea kings" of the Teutonic romances-the
Scandinavian _reguli_, who, scorning to own _Gorm the Old_ of Norway,
and _Harold Fairhair_ of Denmark, their conquerors, as masters, forsook
their country and colonized Iceland, Greenland, Shetland, and the Orkney
Islands, whence they sent forth piratical expeditions, which became a
terror to Western Europe. They traded as well as plundered, and by
commerce and conquest became potential. Every coast was visited by their
squadrons, either for war or traffic. They swept over Denmark and
Germany, and by conquest obtained possession of the best portions of
Gaul. *** They invaded the British Islands, and placed the renowned
Canute upon the throne of Alfred. Long before Christianity had shed its
genial rays over their frozen territory of the North, and banished the
barbarous rites of Pagan worship, the lamp of learning had been

* This city was founded about the year 1210, and was afterward called
Mexico, which signifies the place of Mexitli, the Aztec god of war. The
present capital of Mexico is upon the site of that ancient city. The
Aztecs, at that time, were settled in Lower California. They were
divided into six tribes. The Mexican tribe wandered off southward,
subdued the Toltecs, and founded the city around which the whole Aztec
nation subsequently gathered. The Toltecs were far more refined than
their conquerors, and from members of that dispersed nation the Aztecs
were first made acquainted with painting, sculpture, astronomy, and many
of the useful arts, such as working in metals, building bridges and
aqueducts, agriculture, &c.

** See note on page 633.

*** Charles III., called the Simple, the eighth of the Carlovingian
kings of France, ceded to Rolf or Rollo, one of the Northmen chiefs, the
large province called by them Normandy. This event occurred in the year
918. Rollo and his subjects embraced Christianity, and became the
guardians of France against further invasion from the Northmen.

HE story of the American Revolution has been well and often told, and
yet the most careless observer of the popular mind may perceive that a
large proportion of our people are but little instructed in many of the
essential details of that event, so important for every intelligent
citizen to learn. Very few are ignorant of the more conspicuous
circumstances of that period, and all who claim to be well-informed have
a correct general knowledge of the history of our war for independence.
But few even of that intelligent class are acquainted with the location
of the various scenes depicted by the historian, in their relation to
the lakes and rivers, towns and cities, whose names are familiar to the
ears of the present generation. For example: the citizen of Saratoga may
have a thorough knowledge of the memorable places in his own vicinage,
and of the incidents which have hallowed them, yet how puzzled he would
be if asked to tell the inquiring stranger, or his more inquisitive
children, upon what particular stream, or lofty height, or broad plain,
or in what mountain gorge, occurred the battles of Rocky Mount, King's
Mountain, Eutaw Springs, or the Cowpens. These are places widely known
in their respective districts, and the events connected with them form
as important links in the chain of circumstances which were developed in
the progress of the colonies toward independence, as the surrender of
Burgoyne and his army upon the plain at Saratoga. Among this class,
claiming to be generally informed, but ignorant in many particulars,
especially in relation to the character and situation of localities, the
writer places himself; and to an appreciation of the necessity of a more
thorough knowledge of these places, and of the men who are identified
with the Revolution, the reader is partially indebted for the pages
which follow this confession.

To obtain this accurate chorographical knowledge of our early history as
a confederation of states, was not the only incentive to undertake a
journey to the battlefields and other localities hallowed by the events
of the Revolution. My limited observation had perceived many remaining
physical vestiges of that struggle. Half- {viii}hidden mounds of old
redoubts; the ruined walls of some stronger fortification; dilapidated
buildings, neglected and decaying, wherein patriots met for shelter or
in council; and living men, who had borne the musket and knapsack day
after day in that conflict, occasionally passed under the eye of my
casual apprehension. For years a strong desire was felt to embalm those
precious things of our cherished household, that they might be preserved
for the admiration and reverence of remote posterity. I knew that the
genius of our people was the reverse of antiquarian reverence for the
things of the past; that the glowing future, all sunlight and eminence,
absorbed their thoughts and energies, and few looked back to the
twilight and dim valleys of the past through which they had journeyed. I
knew that the invisible fingers of decay, the plow of agriculture, and
the behests of Mammon, unrestrained in their operations by the
prevailing spirit of our people, would soon sweep away every tangible
vestige of the Revolution, and that it was time the limner was abroad.

I knew that, like stars at dawn which had beamed brightly through a long
night, the men of old were fast fading away, and that relics associated
with their trials and triumphs would soon be covered up forever. Other
men, far more competent. than myself to use the pen and pencil, appeared
indisposed to go out into the apparently shorn and unfruitful field upon
which I looked with such covetous delight, except to pick up a grain
here and there for special preservation. I knew that the vigorous
reapers who had garnered the products of that broad field, must have let
fall from their full hands many a precious ear loaded with choice grain,
and I resolved to go out as a gleaner, carefully gather up what they had
left behind, and add the winnings to their store. Like the servants of
Boaz, when Ruth followed the reapers, they seem to have "let fall also
some of the handfuls of purpose for me, that I might glean them," for I
found a far greater abundance than hope had promised. I have "gleaned in
the field until even, and beat out that I have gleaned," and here is my
"ephah of barley."

In the arrangement of a plan for presenting the result of these labors
to the public in an acceptable form many difficulties were perceptible.
Other histories of our Revolution had been written, embellished, and
read; what could be produced more attractive than they? The exciting
literature of the day, ranging in its intoxicating character from the
gross pictures of sensual life drawn by the French writers of fiction,
to the more refined, but not less intoxicating works of popular and
esteemed novelists, so cheaply published and so widely diffused, has
produced a degree of mental dissipation throughout our land,
destructive, in its tendency, to sober and rational desires for imbibing
useful knowledge. Among the young, where this dissipation is most rife,
and deleterious in its effects, it seemed most desirable to have the
story of our Revolution known and its salutary teachings pondered and
improved, for they will be the custodians of our free institutions when
the active men of the present generation shall step aside into the quiet
shadows of old age. Next to tales of love and gallantry, the young mind
is most charmed by the narratives of the traveler. The woof of our
history is too sacred to be interwoven with the tinsel filling of
fiction, and we should have too high a regard for truth to seek the
potential aid of its counterfeit in gaining audience in the ear of the
million; but to the latter taste we may consistently pay court, and in
behalf of sober history, use its {xvii}taken from the cloisters of the
South and placed within their temples, and upon dreary and desolate
Iceland and Norway civilization erected its humanizing altars. Ardent,
imaginative, and devotional, they eagerly accepted Christianity, and it
became to them really a "Star in the East," leading to where "the infant
Jesus laid." It was not to them sr much a personal treasure to he valued
for its immortal blessings, as a glorious idea full of temporal
advantage. It became an intense passion, not a sober belief, and its
warmth generated mighty events. Among them the spirit of chivalry had
its birth and early nurture, and in those unholy wars against the
possessors of the land of Palestine and of the sepulcher of Christ,
called the Crusades, which shook the nations during three consecutive
centuries, these Northmen furnished the bravest leaders.

From such a people, possessed of every attribute necessary to the
successful founding of new empires, having the ocean pathway to a broad
and fertile continent made clear before them, what great results might
not be expected? But, with the prize just within their grasp, they, too,
were denied the honor of first peopling our land; yet their mixed
descendants, the Anglo-Saxons, now possess it. It is supposed that they
attempted settlements, but failed, and in the lapse of centuries their
voyages were forgotten, or only remembered in the songs of their bards
or the sagas of their romancers. For more than five hundred years after
the voyages of those navigators, America was an unknown region; it had
no place upon maps, unless as an imaginary island without a name, nor in
the most acute geographical theories of the learned.** It was reserved
for the son of an humble wool-carder of Genoa to make it known to the
world.

During the first half of the fifteenth century, maritime discoveries
were prosecuted with untiring zeal by the people inhabiting the great
peninsula of Southwestern Europe. The incentives to make these
discoveries grew out of the political condition of Europe and the
promises of great commercial advantages. The rich commerce of the East
centered in Rome, when that empire overshadowed the known world; when it
fell into fragments, the Italian cities continued their monopoly of the
trade of the Indies. Provinces which had become independent kingdoms
became jealous of these cities, so rapidly outstripping them in power
and opulence; and Castile and Portugal, in particular, engaged in
efforts to open a direct trade with the East. The ocean was the only
highway for such commerce toward which they could look with a hope of
success. The errors of geographical science interposed their obstacles;
the belief that a belt of impassable heat girdled the earth at the
equator intimidated mariners, and none were willing to double Cape
Bojador, beyond which was the fancied region of fire.

Prince Henry of Portugal, son of John the First and Philippa of
Lancaster (sister of Henry the Fourth of England), having accompanied
his father into Africa, in an expedition against the Moors, received
much information concerning the mineral riches and fertility of Guinea
and other portions of the coast. The idea of making discoveries along
the African shores filled his mind, and on his return to Portugal he
abandoned the court, retired to a secluded spot near Cape St. Vincent,
in full view of the ocean, and drawing around him the most eminent
scientific men in the kingdom, pursued geographical and nautical
inquiries with untiring zeal. He became convinced that Africa was
circumnavigable, and that the

** "The [Atlantic] Ocean," observes Xerif al Edrisi, an eminent Arabian
writer, quoted by Irving, "encircles the ultimate bounds of tbe
inhabited earth, and all beyond is unknown. No one has been able to
verify any thing concerning it, on account of its difficult and perilous
navigation, its great obscurity, its profound depth, and frequent
tempests; through fear of its mighty fishes and its haughty winds; yet
there are many islands in it, some of which are peopled and others
uninhabited. There is no mariner who dares to enter into its deep
waters; or, if any have done so, they have merely kept along its coasts,
fearful of departing from them. The waves of this ocean, although they
roll as high as mountains, yet maintain themselves without breaking, for
if they broke, it would be impossible for a ship to plow through them."
{xviii}Indies might be leached by doubling its most southerly headlands.
Expeditions were fitted out; the Cape de Verd and the Azore Islands were
discovered; Cape Bojador was passed; the tropical region was penetrated,
and divested of its terrors; and at length the lofty promontory which
terminates Africa on the south, was descried. It was hailed as a
harbinger of the coveted passage to the Indian Seas, and on that account
King John gave it the appellation of the Cape of Good Hope.

The Spaniards were also making maritime discoveries at the same time,
but Lisbon was the point of great attraction to the learned, the
curious, and the adventurous, who were desirous to engage in the
expeditions then continually fitting out there. Among them came
Christopher Columbus, or Colombo, a native of Genoa, then in the vigor
of maturity. * Already he had made many a perilous voyage upon the
ocean, having engaged in the life of a mariner at the age of fourteen
years. The bent of his mind for such pursuits was early discovered by
his father, and in the University of Pavia he was allowed, by a short
course of study, to obtain sufficient elementary knowledge of geometry,
astronomy, geography, and navigation, and of the Latin language,.to
enable him to make those sciences afterward subservient to his genius.
From the commencement of his nautical career to his landing in Portugal,
his history ** is very obscure.

* There is some obscurity and doubt respecting the precise year in which
Columbus was born. Munoz, in his History of the New World, places it in
1446. Mr. Irving, relying upon the authority of Bernaldez, who says that
"he died in 1506, in a good old age, at the age of seventy, a little
more or less," places it in 1436, which would make him about forty-
eight years old when he landed in Portugal.

** This peculiar signature of Columbus is attached to various documents
written by him subsequent to his first voyage. It was customary, in his
time, to precede a signature with the initials (and sometimes with the
words in full) of some pious ejaculation. We accordingly find the
signature of Columbus with initial prefixes, thus:

S

S A S X M Y Xpo FERENS

The interpretation is supposed to be "Sancta! Sancta, Ave, Sancta!
Christo, Maria, Yoseph id est, Christ, Mary, Joseph. The xP° are Greek
letters; the word FERENS Roman capitals. X, or a cross, is the sign for
Christo or Christ, and xp° is an abbreviation of (Greek), anointed, and
expressed the first and chief portion of the Christian name of Columbus.
The Latin word ferens (bearing, carrying, or enduring) expressed not
only the latter portion of his name, but also his character, according
to his own lofty conceptions of his mission. He believed himself to be
Christo ferons, Christ-bearer or Gospel-bearer, to the heathen
inhabitants of an unknown world. It may be added, that Colombo
(Columbus), a dove or pigeon, was doubtless associated, in his
imagination, with the carrier-bird, and had its due weight, not only in
his conceptions of his destiny, but in forming his sign-manual. The
signature to his will is EL ALMI-RANTE (the Admiral), with the above
letters, instead of xp° FERENS.

{xix}In person, Columbus was tall and commanding; in manners,
exceedingly winning and graceful for one unaccustomed to the polish of
courts or the higher orders in society. He was a strict observer of the
rituals of his religion. His piety was not a mere form, but an elevated
and solemn enthusiasm, born of a deep conviction of the vital truths of
Christianity. While in Lisbon, he never omitted religious duties in the
sanctuary. At the chapel of the Convent of _All Saints_, where he was
accustomed to worship, he became acquainted with a young lady of rank
named Donna Felipa, the daughter of Monis de Palestrello, an Italian
cavalier, who had been one of the most distinguished navigators in the
service of Prince Henry. They loved, and were married. His wife's sister
was married to Pedro Correo, a navigator of note. In the family of his
mother-in-law he learned all the incidents of the voyages of her
husband; and the charts, journals, and other manuscripts of that
navigator she delivered to Columbus. These possessions awakened new
aspirations in his mind. He had made himself familiar, by study and
large experience, with all the nautical knowledge of the day, and, in
common with the most enlightened men of his time, he was disposed to
credit the narratives of Plato and other ancient writers respecting the
existence of a continent beyond a glorious island called Atlantis, * in
the waste of waters westward of Europe. Such a continent was necessary
to make his own geographical theory perfect. The gorgeous pictures of
Zipango or Cipangi and Cathay, on the eastern coast of Asia, drawn by
Marco Polo and Mandeville, also excited his warm imagination; and the
alleged apparitions of land seen to the westward by the people of the
Canary Isles were treasured in his mind as great realities. ** His
comprehensive genius constructed a new and magnificent theory, and his
bold spirit stood ready to act in unison with his genius. He based his
whole theory upon the fundamental principle that the earth was a
terraqueous globe, which might be traveled round from east to west, and
that men stood foot to foot at opposite points.

* Ancient writers speak of an island which existed at a very early
period in the Atlantic Ocean, and said to have been eventually sunk
beneath its waves. Plato, who gave the first account of it, says he
obtained his information from the priests of Egypt. The island was
represented to be larger than Asia and Africa, as they were then known,
and beyond it was a large continent. Nine thousand years before Plato's
time, this island was thickly inhabited and very powerful, its sway
extending over all Africa, including Egypt, and also a large portion of
Europe. A violent earthquake, which lasted for the space of a day and a
night, and was accompanied by inundations of the sea, caused the island
to sink, and, for a long period subsequent to this, the sea in this
quarter was impassable by reason of slime and shoals. Learned men of
modern times have been disposed to believe in the ancient existence of
such an island, and suppose the West India Islands to be the higher
portions of the sunken land. If this belief is correct, then the
continent beyond was America.

According to the account given to Plato, Atlantis was the most
productive region upon the earth. It produced wine, grain, and delicious
fruits in abundance. It had wide-spread forests, extensive pasture-
grounds, mines of gold and silver, hot springs, and every luxury for
human enjoyment. It was divided into ten kingdoms, governed by as many
kings, all descendants of Neptune, and living in perfect harmony with
each other. It had splendid cities, rich and populous villages, vast
fortifications, arsenals, and equipments for navies. There was a temple
in the island a stadium (six hundred and six feet nine inches) in
length, dedicated to Neptune. It was ornamented with gold, silver,
orichalcium, and ivory. It contained a golden statue of Neptune,
representing the god as standing in his chariot, and holding the reins
of his winged steeds. Such was the ancient vision.

** So confident were the people of the Canaries that land lay to the
westward of them, that they sought and obtained permission from the King
of Portugal to fit out various expeditions in search of it. A belief was
so prevalent that a Scottish priest named Brandon discovered an island
westward of the Canaries, in the sixth century, that maps, in the time
of Columbus, had the Island of St. Brandon upon them. It was placed
under the equator. {xx}This was seventy years before Copernicus
announced his theory of the form and motion of the planets,a and one
hundred and sixty years before Galileo was obliged, before the court of
the Inquisition at Home, to renounce his belief in the diurnal
revolution of the earth.

Columbus divided the circumference of the earth at the equator,
according to Ptolemy's system, into twenty-four hours of fifteen degrees
each, making three hundred and sixty degrees. Of these he imagined that
fifteen hours had been known to the ancients, extending from the
Fortunate or Canary Islands to the city of Thinoe in Asia, the western
and eastern boundaries of the known world. By the discovery of the Cape
de Verd and the Azore Islands, the Portuguese had advanced the western
frontier one hour, leaving about one eighth of the circumference of the
globe yet to be explored. The extent of the eastern region of Asia was
yet unknown, although the travels of Polo in the fourteenth century had
extended far beyond the Oriental boundary of Ptolemy's map. Columbus
imagined that the unexplored part of Asia might occupy a large portion
of the yet undefined circumference of the earth, and that its eastern
headlands might approach quite near to those of Western Europe and
Africa. He therefore concluded that a navigator, pursuing a direct
course from east to west, must arrive at the extremity of Asia by a far
easier and shorter route than following the coast of Africa around the
Cape of Good Hope. Fortunately, he adopted the opinions of Aristotle,
Pliny, and other writers, who considered the ocean as but of moderate
breadth, so that it might be crossed from Europe in the space of a few
days. A knowledge or suspicion of its actual extent would have deterred
even the bold enterprise of Columbus from attempting an exploration of
its waters in the small ships of that day. Reports of strange trees,
reeds of immense size, curiously-carved pieces of wood, and the bodies
of two men-unlike, in color and visage, any of the known races extant-
having drifted ashore upon the Canary and Azore Islands by westerly
winds, confirmed him in his belief, and a desire and determination to
undertake a demonstration of his theory by an exploring voyage absorbed
his whole attention. "He never spoke in doubt or hesitation," says
Irving, "but with as much certainty as if his eyes had beheld the
Promised Land. A deep religious sentiment mingled with his thoughts, and
gave them at times a tinge of superstition, but of a sublime and lofty
kind. He looked upon himself as standing in the hand of Heaven, chosen
from among men for the accomplishment of its high purpose. He read, as
he supposed, his contemplated discovery foretold in Holy Writ, and
shadowed forth darkly in the prophecies. The ends of the earth were to
be brought together, and all nations, and tongues, and languages united
under the banner of the Redeemer." * The prophetic passage in Pulci's
"Morgante Maggiore" was to him full of promise:

"Know that this theory is false; his bark

The daring mariner shall urge far o'er

The Western wave, a smooth and level plain,

Albeit the earth is fashion'd like a wheel.

Man was in ancient days of grosser mold,

And Hercules might blush to learn how far

Beyond the limits he had vainly set **

The dullest sea-boat soon shall wing her way.

Men shall descry another hemisphere,

Since to one common center all things tend.

So earth, by curious mystery divine

* Life and Voyages of Columbus.

** Calpe and Abila, or Gibraltar, on the Spanish, and Cape Serra, on the
African shore of the Straits of Gibraltar, were called the Pillars of
Hercules; it being said, in ancient fable, that Hercules placed them
there as monuments of his progress westward, and beyond which no mortal
could pass.

Well balanced, hangs amid the starry spheres.

At our antipodes are cities, states,

And thronged empires, ne'er divined of yore.

But see, the sun speeds on his western path

To glad the nations with expected light."

Prescott's translation of stanza 229, 230, canto xxv.

{xxi}While maturing his plans, Columbus extended the bounds of his
observation and study by a voyage to Thule, or Iceland, from which
remote point he says he advanced one hundred leagues northward,
penetrated the polar circle, and convinced himself of the fallacy of the
popular belief that the frozen zone was uninhabitable.1 Whether he saw,
in Iceland, written accounts of the voyages of the Northmen to America,
or heard of them as related by tradition or chanted in songs, we have no
means of determining. If he did, it is singular, as Prescott remarks,
that they were not cited by him in support of his hypothesis, while
earnestly pressing his suit for aid before the courts of Portugal and
Spain; and it is equally surprising that he did not, in his first voyage
to America, pursue the route traversed by those early navigators. He
probably heard little more than vague rumors of their voyages, such as
presented insufficient data even for a plausible opinion. His
magnificent idea was all his own, sustained by the opinions of a few
learned men, and confirmed by his observations while on this northern
voyage.

Filled with his noble resolutions and lofty anticipations, Columbus
submitted the theory on which rested his belief in a practicable western
route to Asia, to King John the Second of Portugal. That monarch's
sagacity perceived the promised advantages to be derived from such an
enterprise, and he eagerly sought the counsel of his ministers and wise
men. But his court and the college of scientific sages could not
comprehend the sublime project; and after a long and fruitless
negotiation, during which the Portuguese meanly attempted to avail
themselves clandestinely of his information, Columbus quitted Lisbon in
disgust, determined to submit his proposals to Ferdinand and Isabella,
the Spanish sovereigns, whose wisdom and liberal views were the
admiration of men of science and learning. His wife was dead; his
feelings had no hold upon Portugal, and he quitted it forever.

It was toward the close of 1484 when Columbus appeared at the Spanish
court. ** It was an unpropitious hour, for the whole resources of the
nation were then employed in prosecuting a war with the Moors. For a
long time he awaited the decision of the sovereigns, employing his
leisure in the alternate pursuits of science, and engagements in some of
the military campaigns. He was treated with great deference, and, after
much delay, a council of learned men were convened at Salamanca to
consider his plans and propositions. After mature deliberation, they
pronounced his scheme "vain, impracticable, and resting on grounds too
weak to merit the support of government." A minority of the council were
far from acquiescing in this decision, and, with the Cardinal Mendoza
and other officers of government, and Fray Juan Perez de Marchena,
guardian of the ancient monastery of La Rabida,

* In the age of Columbus, Greenland was laid down upon the maps as a
continuation or projection westward of Scandinavia. Columbus discovered
this error in his northern voyage, which discovery was a new fact in
support of his theory of a continent lying westward from Europe, or at
least a proximity of the eastern coast of Asia. At that time the climate
of Iceland and Greenland was far more genial than at present, and there
is reason to believe that those portions of the latter country which for
two or three hundred years have been ice-bound and uninhabitable, were
then tillable. Philosophers of our day, who have studied the phenomena
of terrestrial magnetism with care, have advanced a plausible theory
whereby to explain this fact.

** It is asserted, but without positive proof, that Columbus, before
going to Spain, made application to the authorities of his native city,
Genoa, for aid in his enterprise; but failing in this he went to Venice,
and also sent his brother Bartholomew to England, to lay his plans
before Henry the Seventh. If these statements are true, they exhibit his
perseverance in a still stronger light than truthful history presents
it. {xxii}they induced the sovereigns to soften the decisions of the
council by a promise to give the proposition a fair audience when their
pressing state engagements should be ended. Columbus, wearied by
procrastination, at length lost all hope of effecting any thing with the
Spanish court. He turned from it with disgust, and made application to
two wealthy and enlightened Southern dukes, who had ample means at
command. He was unsuccessful, and with a heavy heart he left Spain, to
carry his proposals to the King of France.

Isabella of Castile and Leon, sister of the profligate Henry the Fourth,
was the successor October 19,1469. of that monarch to the throne. She
married Ferdinand, the son of old John the Second of Aragon, and,
associating him with herself in the government, united the two
monarchies into one great kingdom, the renowned modern Spain. Isabella
was eminently virtuous, and her piety and daily goodness were the fruit
of a deep religious feeling. Ferdinand was ambitious, and, in the.midst
of his perplexity with the Moors, he felt a strong desire to advance the
interests and glory of the new kingdom, by maritime discoveries; yet he
could not comprehend the vast plans of Columbus, and he looked coldly
upon the project. To the pious sentiments of the queen, Father Perez, a
former confessor of Isabella and a friend of Columbus, appealed with
success; and before the navigator had entered the dominions of France,
he was summoned back to the court, then in the camp at Santa Fé. He
arrived in time to witness the surrender of Grenada. Joy and exultation
pervaded all classes. Columbus took advantage of this state of things,
and while he excited the acquisitiveness of the nobles by reciting
wonderful tales of the riches of Cipangi and Cathay, he eloquently
portrayed to the queen the glorious prospect of extending the influence
of the Gospel over benighted heathens, promising to devote the profits
of the enterprise to the recovery of the Holy Sepulcher at Jerusalem
from the hands of the Paynim. His eloquence was seconded by that of
Louis de St. Angel, a favorite officer of the crown. The religious zeal
of Isabella was fired, and, notwithstanding the extravagant demands of
Columbus,1 2 she resolved, in opposition to the wishes of Ferdinand, to
aid him in fitting out an ex-

* Isabella was of middle size, and well formed, with a fair complexion,
auburn hair, and clear, blue eyes. There was a mingled gravity and
sweetness in her countenance, and a singular modesty, gracing, as it
did, great firmness of purpose and earnestness of spirit. Though
strongly attached to her husband, and studious of his fame, yet she
always maintained her distinct rights as an allied prince. She exceeded
him in beauty, personal dignity, acuteness of genius, and grandeur of
soul. Combining the active and resolute qualities of man with the softer
charities of woman, she mingled in the warlike councils of her husband,
and, being inspired with a truer idea of glory, infused a more lofty and
generous temper into his subtile and calculating policy.- Washington
Irving.

** Columbus, in the demands set forth in his proposition, stipulated for
himself and heirs the title and authority of admiral and viceroy over
all lands discovered by him. This demand was inadmissible, yet the
navigator persisted in it, though it appeared an effectual bar to any
arrangement with the queen. His stipulations were finally acceded to,
and Columbus always regarded the queen with feelings of the liveliest
gratitude. "In the midst of the general incredulity," he said in a
letter, "the Almighty infused into the queen, my lady, the spirit of
intelligence and energy, and while every one else, in his ignorance, was
expatiating only on the inconvenience and cost, her highness approved
it, on the contrary, and gave it all the support in her power."

These demands almost frustrated his designs, and Columbus had again
turned his back upon the Spanish court, when, through the wise counsels
of friends, the queen's objections were overcome, and the warmest
impulses of her nature aroused. "I will assume the undertaking," she
said, when opposed by her husband and his counselors, "for my own crown
of Castile, and am ready to pawn my jewels to defray the expense of it,
if the funds in the treasury shall appear inadequate."

All preliminaries being arranged, the queen lost no time in fitting out
two vessels, * and Columbus, aided chiefly by the wealthy and
enterprising family of the Pinzons equipped a third.

With this feeble squadron, manned with timid mariners, Columbus left the
little port of Palos, upon the Tinto River, in Andalusia, on Friday, the
third of August, 1492, and, spreading his sails to an easterly breeze,
turned his prow toward the waste of Avaters in the direction of the
setting sun.

He had no reliable chart for his guidance, no director in his course but
the sun and stars, and the imperfect mariner's compass, then used only
by a few in

* The vessels furnished by Isabella were only caravels, light coasting
ships, without deeks, and furnished with oars like the ancient galleys.
The picture here given is from a low relief sculpture, on the tomb of
Fernando Columbus, a son of the navigator, in the Cathedral of Seville.
Such a vessel would be considered quite inadequate to perform a coasting
voyage at the present day. The larger vessel, with a deck, fitted out by
Columbus and his friends, was called the Santa Maria; the caravels were
named respectively Pinta and Mina. Martin Alonzo Pinzon commanded the
Pinta, and Vincent Yanez Pinzon the Mina. Garcia Fernandez, the
physician of Palos, accompanied the expedition as steward. The whole
number of persons that embarked was one hundred and twenty. The whole
expenditure of the queen in fitting out the caravels amounted to only
seventeen thousand florins, or between eight and nine thousand dollars.
*** These were small preparations for an exploring expedition of such
vast extent and importance.

The descendants of the Pinzons are still quite numerous in the vicinity
of Palos. When Mr. Irving visited that town in 1828, he saw the ruins of
a family mansion which belonged to one of the two Pinzons who sailed
with Columbus on his first voyage. Mr. Irving was accompanied in his
visit to Palos, the monastery of Ribida, and other localities in the
vicinity, by Juan Fernandez Pinzon, a descendant of one of. the
companions of Columbus.

** The pile of buildings in this view, standing upon the bluff, is the
ancient Church of St. George. For some misdemeanor, the people of Palos
were obliged to serve the crown for one year with two armed caravels.

They were under this penalty when Columbus made his arrangement with
Isabella, and they were ordered to fit out the two caravels for the
expedition. In the porch of the old Church of St. George, Columbus first
proclaimed this order to the inhabitants of Palos. Mr. Irving, who
visited Palos in 1828, says of this edifice, "It has lately been
thoroughly repaired, and, being of solid mason-work, promises to stand
for ages, a monument of the discoverers. It stands outside of the
village, on the brow of a hill, looking along a little valley to the
river. The remains of a Moorish arch prove it to have been a mosque in
former times. Just above it, on the crest of the hill, is the ruin of a
Moorish castle."

*** This is the amount given by Munoz, one of the most reliable of
Spanish authors. Others have named s much higher sum Dr. Robertson rates
the amount at £4000 sterling, or about $00,000, but docs not give his
authority.

{xxiv}navigating the pleasant seas of the Old World. After various
delays at the Canary Islands, they passed and lost sight of Ferro, the
most westerly one of the group, on Sunday, the ninth of September. Now
Europe was left behind, and the broad Atlantic, mysterious and unknown,
was before them. As the space widened between them and their homes, the
hearts September, 1492. of mariners failed; and when, on the thirteenth,
the commander and his pilots discovered the variations of the magnetic
needle, misgivings, arose in the stout hearts of the explorer and his
friends, the Pinzons. They were now six hundred miles westward of the
Canaries, in an unknown sea. It was a phenomenon unknown to the world of
science, and Columbus tried in vain to satisfy himself respecting the
cause. He could not long conceal the fact from his seamen. It filled
them with consternation and awe; for they believed they were entering
another world, subject to the influence of laws unknown and dreadful.
Columbus quieted their apprehensions by telling them that the needle did
not point to the north star, but to an invisible point around which that
star revolved daily. Thus he explained a phenomenon now well known; and
his companions, relying upon his astronomical knowledge, received his
theory as truth, and their alarm subsided.

For several days after this event they were wafted pleasantly by the
trade winds, which blow continually from east to west. The air was
balmy, and soon vast fields of sea-weeds, and an occasional petrel upon
the wing, heralded an approach to land; but head winds and days of
profound calm deferred the joyful consummation of their hopes; and the
seamen, wearied and home-sick, resolved to retrace their path, and seek
the shores of Spain. Even the little land birds that came upon the
spars, and sung merrily their welcome to the New World, and then left at
evening for their distant perches in the orange groves, failed to
inspire the mariners with confidence in the truth of their commander's
reasonings, and open mutiny manifested itself. With gentle words,
promises of rewards, and threats of punishment against the most
refractory, Columbus kept them from actual violence for several days.
One evening, just at sunset, Martin Alonzo Pinzon, mounted on September,
25. the stern of the Pinta, shouted, "Land! land! Senor, I claim the
reward!"

Along the southwestern horizon was stretched an apparent island.
Columbus, throwing himself upon his knees, with all the crews, chanted
_Gloria in Excelsis!_ In the morning the island had vanished, for it was
nothing but a cloud. For a fortnight longer they floated upon an almost
unruffled sea, when land birds came singing again, and green herbage
floated by; but days passed on, and the sun, each evening, set in the
waves. Again the seamen mutinied, and Columbus was in open defiance with
his crew; for he told them that the expedition had been sent by their
sovereigns, and, come what might, he was determined to accomplish his
purpose. They were on the point of casting him into the sea, when, just
at sunset, a coast-fish glided by; a branch of thorn, with berries upon
it, floated near; and a staff, artificially carved, came upon the waters
to tell them of human habitations not far off. The vesper hymn to the
Virgin was now sung, and Columbus, after recounting the blessings of God
thus far manifested on the voyage, assured the crews that he confidently
expected to see land in the morning. On the high poop of his vessel he
sat watching.

* Columbus agreed to give a silk waistcoat, besides the royal pension of
thirty dollars, to the person who first discovered land.-Munoz {xxv}near
midnight, when he saw the glimmer of moving lights upon the verge of the
horizon. Fearing his hopes might have deceived his vision, he called
Pedro Gutierrez, gentleman of the king's bed-chamber, and also Rodrigo
Sanchez, of Segovia, to confirm his discovery. They also saw the gleams
of a torch.

All night the overjoyed Columbus watched. At dawn, beautiful wooded
shores were in full view; the perfumes of flowers came upon the light
land breeze; and birds in gorgeous plumage hovered around the vessels,
caroling morning hymns, which seemed like the voices of angels to the
late despair-October 12, 1492 seamen. In small boats they landed, the
naked natives, who stood upon the beach in wonder, fleeing to the deep
shadows of the forest in alarm. Columbus, dressed in gold-embroidered
scarlet, bearing the royal standard, first stepped upon the shore.

He was followed by the Pinzons, each bearing the banner of the
enterprise.1 On reaching the land, they all fell upon their knees,
kissed the earth, and, with tears of joy in their eyes, chanted the _Te
Deum Laudamus._ Rising from the ground, Columbus displayed the royal
standard, drew his sword, and took possession of the land in the name of
the Spanish sovereigns, giving the island the title of San Salvador **
With the most extravagant demonstrations of joy, his followers crowded
around him. The most insolent in the mutinous displays were the most
abject in making vows of service and faithfulness. All present took an
oath of obedience to him as admiral and viceroy, and representative of
Ferdinand and Isabella. The triumph of Columbus was complete.

The natives had beheld the approaching ships at dawn with fear.

* This was a white banner, emblazoned with a green cross, having on each
side the letters F. and Y., the Spanish initials of Ferdinand and
Ysabel, surmounted by golden crowns.

** The island on which Columbus first set his foot in the New World is
one of the Lucayas or Bahama group, and was called by the natives
Guanahana. The Spaniards and others still call it San Salvador; the
English have given it the vulgar name of Cat Island. It lies between the
twenty-fourth and twenty-fifth degrees of north latitude, and the second
and third degrees of longitude east of the meridian of Washington city,
eighty or ninety miles northeast of Havana, Cuba. Munoz, a learned
Spanish writer, thinks Watling's Island, and not the one called San
Salvador on our maps, was the first landing-place.

*** This is copied, by permission of the author, from Irving's Life of
Columbus. It is a fac-simile of a sketch supposed to have been made by
Columbus, in a letter written by him to Don Raphael Xansis, treasurer of
the King of Spain {xxvi}in awe regarding them as monsters of the deep.
By degrees their alarm subsided, and they approached the Europeans. Each
party was a wonder to the other. The glittering armor, shining lace, and
many-colored dresses of the Spaniards filled the natives with admiration
and delight; while they, entirely naked, with skins of a dark copper
hue, painted with a variety of colors and devices, without beards and
with straight hair, were objects of great curiosity to the Spaniards.
They were unlike any people of whom they had knowledge. Not doubting
that he was upon an island near the coast of Farther India, Columbus
called these wild inhabitants _Indians_, a name which all the native
tribes of America still retain.

It is not within the scope of my design to relate, in detail, the
subsequent career of Columbus in the path of discovery, nor of those
navigators who succeeded him, and share with him the honor of making
known our continent to the Old World. He was the bold pioneer who led
the way to the New World, and as such, deserves the first and highest
reward; yet he was not truly the first discoverer of the _continent_ of
North America. Eager in his search for Cathay, he coasted almost every
island composing the groups now known as the West Indies, during his
several voyages, but he never saw the shores of the Northern August,
1498 Continent. He did, indeed, touch the soil of South America, near
the mouth of the Oronoco, but he supposed it to be an island, and died
in the belief that the lands he had discovered were portions of Farther
India. *

Intelligence of the great discovery of Columbus, though kept concealed
as much as possible by the Spanish court, for reasons of state policy,
nevertheless went abroad, and aroused the ambition of other maritime
powers. The story that Columbus had found vast and populous gold-
producing regions in the Western Ocean excited the cupidity of
individuals.

* Columbus returned to Europe in March, 1493. Ferdinand and Isabella
bestowed upon him every mark of honor and distinction, and the nobles
were obsequious in their attentions to the favorite of royalty. On the
25th of September, 1493, he left Cadiz, on a second voyage of discovery.
He had three large ships and fourteen caravels under his command. His
discoveries were principally among the West India Islands, where he
founded settlements. He returned to Spain in June, 1496. Misfortunes had
attended him, yet the sovereigns treated him with distinguished favor.

On the 30th of May, 1498, Columbus sailed from San Lucar de Barraraeda,
with a squadron of six vessels, on a third voyage of discovery. He found
the settlements which had been planted in great confusion, and civil war
among the Spaniards and natives was rife in Hispaniola. In the mean
while, intrigues against him were having due weight in the Spanish
court. It was alleged that Columbus designed to found an empire in the
New World, cast off all allegiance to Spain, and assume the title and
pomp of king. He had already offended the conscientious Isabella by
persisting in making slaves of the natives, and she readily gave her
consent to send out a commissioner to investigate the conduct of the
navigator. Bobadilla, a tool of Columbus's enemies, was intrusted with
that momentous duty; and, as might have been expected, he found Columbus
guilty of every charge made against him. Bobadilla seized Columbus, and
sent him in chains to Spain. His appearance excited the indignation of
the sovereigns, and they declared to the world that Bobadilla had
exceeded his instructions; yet justice was withheld, through the
influence of Ferdinand, and Columbus was not reinstated as viceroy of
Hispaniola.

While these events were occurring, Vasco de Gama, a Portuguese
navigator, had reached Calicut, in the East Indies, by doubling the Cape
of Good Hope, and traversing the Indian Ocean. But Columbus still
persevered in his determination to reach Asia by a western route. He
induced Isabella to fit out a fourth expedition for him, and on the 9th
of May, 1502, he sailed for Hispaniola. After many troubles and
hardships, he returned to Spain in 1504. His patron and best friend, the
queen, died that same year. Old age had made its deep furrows, and, in
the midst of disappointment and neglect, the great discoverer died on
the 20th of May, 1506, at the age of seventy. He never realized his
grand idea of reaching India by a western route. The honor of that
achievement was reserved for the expedition of Magellan, fourteen years
after the death of Columbus. That navigator passed through the straits
which bear his name, at the southern extremity of our continent, and
launched boldly out upon the broad Pacific. He died on the ocean, but
his vessels reached the Philippine Islands, near the coast of India, in
safety. Magellan gave the tame of Pacific to the pleasant ocean over
which he was sailing. {xxvii}many adventurers offered their services to
sovereigns and men of wealth. Almost simultaneously, Sebastian Cabot, of
Bristol, and Amerigo Vespucci, a Florentine, sailed for the lands
discovered by Columbus; the former under the auspices, of Henry the
Seventh of England, and the latter in the employment of Spanish
merchants, with the sanction of Ferdinand. Cabot's father was an
Italian, and had been long a resident of Bristol, then the chief
commercial mart of England. The Northwestern seas were often traversed
as far as Iceland by the Bristol mariners, and they had probably
extended their voyages westward to Greenland in their fishing
enterprises. Cabot seems to have been familiar with those seas, and the
English merchants had great confidence in his abilities. He obtained a
commission from Henry the Seventh, similar, in its general outline, to
that given to Columbus by Ferdinand and Isabella. It empowered him and
his three sons, their heirs or deputies, to discover and settle unknown
lands in the Eastern, Northern, or Western seas, such lands to be taken
possession of in the name of the King of England. He fitted out two
vessels at his own expense, which were freighted by merchants of London
and Bristol; and it was stipulated that, in lieu of all customs and
imposts, Cabot was to pay to the King one fifth part of all the gains.

Cabot's son, Sebastian, a talented young man of only twenty years, with
about three hundred men, sailed from harbor of Bristol in May, 1497. He
directed his course to the northwest, until he reached the fifty-eighth
degree of north latitude, when floating ice and intense cold induced him
to steer to the southwest. Fair winds produced a rapid voyage, and he
discovered land on the twenty-fourth of June, which he called Prima
Vista, because it was his _first view_ of a new region. The exact point
of this first discovery is not certainly known; some supposing it to
have been on the coast of Labrador, and others the Island of
Newfoundland or the peninsula of Nova Scotia.

He touched at other points, but did not attempt a settlement: the
climate seemed too rigorous, the people too fierce, and he returned to
Bristol.

Cabot made arrangements for a February, 1498 second voyage. He did not
go in person, but fitted out vessels for the purpose. His son,
Sebastian, was placed at the head of the expedition, and in May, 1498,
the month in which De Gama reached Calicut, in the East Indies, byway of
the Cape of Good Hope, he sailed for the New World with several ships.
He visited the region first discovered by his father and himself, and
called it Newfoundland. It was not rich in gold and spices, but its
shoals abounded with vast schools of codfish; and within a few years
after his return to England a permanent fishery was established there.
Cabot sailed along the whole coast of the present United States,
beginning at latitude fifty-six degrees, and terminating at about
thirty-six degrees, or Albemarle Sound. His provisions ailing, he
returned to England. He made another voyage in 1517, as far south as the
{xxviii}Brazils; but failing to discover a western passage to the East
Indies, he again returned to England. *

In the same month when young Cabot sailed from Bristol, Amerigo Vespucci
departed from Cadiz on his first voyage to the New World. In that voyage
he appears May, 1497 to have held a subordinate station.

The expedition under Ojeda, which Amerigo calls his _second_ voyage, was
not undertaken until 1499. Whether any vessel in that expedition was
under his command is questionable. Spanish writers assert to the
contrary, and say that he was first a captain when in the service of
Emanuel of Portugal; but it is not my province to inquire into this
disputed matter. Spanish historians, jealous of the fame of Columbus,
charge Vespucci with falsehood and fraud; but early Spanish authors were
not always scrupulous in regard to truth when national pride demanded
prevarication, or even absolute falsehood. ** It was

* After his second voyage, Sebastian Cabot was invited to Spain, and
sailed on a voyage of discovery, in the service of the Spanish monarch,
in 1525. He visited Brazil, and, coasting southward to the thirty-fifth
degree, he entered a large river, which he called Rio de la Plata. Up
this river he sailed one hundred and twenty leagues. After an absence of
six years, he returned to Spain, but seems not to have been well
received by the sovereign. He made other, but less conspicuous voyages,
and in his old age retired to. Bristol, where he died about the year
1557, at the age of eighty years. He received a pension from Edward the
Sixth, and was appointed governor of a company of merchants associated
for the purpose of making discoveries.

** The name of the Florentine is variously spelled, Amerigo Vespucci,
Americus Vespucius, Amerigo Vespuche. The latter orthography is
according to the entry in an account-book containing the expenditure of
the treasurer of the royal mercantile house of Seville, quoted by Munoz,
tome i., page xix of the Introduction. It appears by that account, that
on the 24th of February, 1512, was paid to Manuel Catano, executor of
the will of Amerigo, "10937 and a half maravedis," which was due to him
for services as chief steersman to his majesty. Amerigo was appointed to
that office in March, 1508, with a salary of 50,000 maravedis a year.

Whether he ever commanded an expedition in the Spanish service is a
disputed question. He made several voyages to the New World between 1497
and 1512, the year of his death. With an expedition under the command of
Ojeda, in 1499, he visited the Antilles and the coast of Guiana and
Venezuela. On his return, Emanuel, king of Portugal, invited him to his
capital, and gave him the command of three ships for a voyage of
discovery. He left Lisbon May 10th, 1501, visited Brazil, and traversed
the coast of South America as far as Patagonia, but failed to discover
the straits through which Magellan passed at a later day. He returned to
Lisbon in 1502. He made a fourth voyage, and returned to Portugal in
1504. Soon after this he wrote an account of his voyage. The book was
dedicated to Rene II., duke of Lorraine. He again entered the service of
the King of Spain, who appointed him to draw sea-charts, and gave him
the title and salary of chief steersman or pilot, which commission he
held until his death. According to some accounts, he died in the Island
of Terceria, one of the Azores, in 1514; others affirm that his death
occurred at Seville.

The portrait of the navigator, here given, was copied, by permission,
from the original picture by Bronzino, now in possession of C. Edwards
Lester, Esq., late United States consul at Genoa. It was committed to
his care by the Vespucci family, to be placed in the possession of our
government. No arrangement for its purchase has yet been made. I
believe.

An Italian woman named Elena Vespucci, bearing proofs of her lineal
descent from the famous navigator, came to America a few years ago, and
made application to our Congress for a grant of land, on account of her
relationship to the Florentine from whom our continent derived its name.
Subsequently, her brother and two sisters, Amerigo, Eliza, and Teresa
Vespucci, made a similar petition to Congress. They mention the fact
that Elena, "possessing a disposition somewhat indocile and
unmanageable, absented herself from her father's house, and proceeded to
London. Hence she crossed the ocean, and landed upon the shores of
Brazil, at Rio Janeiro. From that city she proceeded to Washington, the
capital of the United States." Elena Vespucci was treated with respect.
Possessed of youth and beauty, she attracted much attention at the
metropolis, but the prayer in the petition of both herself and family
was denied. She was living at Ogdensburgh, New York, when I visited that
place in 1848.

natural that they should be tender of the reputation of Columbus,
although he was not a Spaniard, for his discoveries reflected great
luster upon the Spanish crown. For this reason they have ever disputed
the claims of Vespucci, and denounced him as a liar and a charlatan.
These denunciations, however, prove nothing, and the fame of Columbus
loses none of its brightness by admitting the claims of the Florentine;
claims, it must be acknowledged, that have sound logic and fair
inferences as a basis. Amerigo seems to have been the first who
published an account of the discoveries in the New World, and for this
priority the narrow and selfish policy of the Spanish government is
responsible. His first announcement was made in a letter to Lorenzo de
Medici, 1504 and soon afterward he published a volume giving an account
of his four voyages, which he dedicated to the Duke of Lorraine.1507 In
these he claims the merit of discovering the continent, having landed
upon the coast of Paria,(1497) in Colombia, South America, and traversed
the shores, according to his own account, as far northward as the Gulf
of Mexico. If this statement is true, he visited the continent nearly a
year previous to the landing of Columbus at the mouth of the Oronoco, in
the same district of Paria. From the circumstance of Amerigo making the
first publication on the subject, and claiming to be the discoverer of
the continent, the New World was called America, and the Florentine
bears the honor of the name; but to neither Columbus nor Vespucci does
the honor of first discoverer of America properly belong, but to young
Cabot, for he and his crew first saw its soil and inhabitants. He alone,
of all those voyagers in the fifteenth century, beheld North America.
Whether to Columbus, Vespucci, or Cabot, truth should award the palm,
Italy bears the imperishable and undisputed honor of giving birth to all
three.

The expeditions of the Cabots turned attention to the regions north of
the West India Islands. Emanuel of Portugal dispatched some vessels,
under the command of Caspar Cortereal, in 1501, to follow in the track
of the English. Cortereal sailed between two and three hundred leagues
along the North American coast, but his voyage was fruitless of good
results, either to science or humanity. He made few discoveries of land,
carried on no traffic, planted no settlements, but kidnapped and carried
to Portugal several friendly natives, to be sold as slaves! Perfidy and
cruelty marked the first intercourse of the whites with the tribes of
our continent; is it to be wondered that the bitter fruits of suspicion
and hostility should have flourished among them?

Ponce de Leon, one of the companions of Columbus, and first governor of
Porto Rico, a small island sixty miles east of Haiti, sailed on a voyage
of discovery among the Bahamas, in search of the fabled Fountain of
Youth. It was generally believed in Porto Rico, and the story had great
credence in Old Spain, that the waters of a clear spring, bubbling up in
the midst of a vast forest, upon an island among the Bahamas, possessed
the singular property of restoring age and ugliness to youth and beauty,
and perpetuating the lives of those who should bathe in its stream. De
Leon was an old man, and, impressed with the truth of this legend, he
sought that wonderful fountain. After cruising for a while among the
Bahamas, he landed upon the peninsula of Florida, in the harbor of St.
Augustine. It was on Palm Sunday when he debarked. That day is called by
the Spaniards _Pasqua de Flores_, and, partly from that circumstance,
and partly on account of the great profusion of flowers which, at that
early season of the year, were blooming on every side, 1520 {xxx}Ponce
de Leon gave the country (which he supposed to be a large island like
Cuba) the name of Florida. He took formal possession in the name of the
Spanish monarch; but, feeling unauthorized to proceed to making
conquests without a royal commission, he sailed for Spain to obtain one,
after failing in his search after the Fountain of Youth.

He had plunged into every stream, however turbid, with the vain
expectation of rising from it young and blooming; but, according to
Oviedo, instead of returning to vigorous youth, he arrived at a second
childhood within a few years. He was afterward appointed Governor of
Florida, and was killed while on an expedition against the natives.

While Ponce de Leon was in Europe, where he remained several years, some
wealthy gentlemen of Haiti fitted out two vessels to explore the
Bahamas. The squadron was commanded by Lucas Vasquez d'Aillon or Allyon,
a Spanish navigator. Their vessels were driven northward by a hurricane,
and came near being stranded upon the low coasts. They finally made land
in St. Helen's Sound, near the mouth of the Combahee River, in South
Carolina, about half way between Charleston and Savannah. D'Aillon
called the river Jordan, and the country Chicora. He carried off several
natives, whom he enticed on board his ships, with the intention of
selling them as slaves in Haiti. A storm destroyed one of the vessels,
and the captured Indians in the other voluntarily starved themselves to
death, so the avaricious whites were disappointed in their expectations
of gain. D'Aillon afterward returned, with three ships, to conquer the
whole of Chicora. The natives feigned friendship, decoyed the whites on
shore, and then, with poisoned arrows, massacred nearly the whole of
them, in revenge for their former perfidy. But few returned with
D'Aillon to Haiti. This was the first discovery of the Carolina coast.

While these events were in progress, Cortez, at the head of an
expedition fitted out by Velasquez, the governor of Cuba, was destroying
the empire of Montezuma, in Mexico, then recently discovered. The
success of Cortez excited the jealousy of Velasquez, for he feared a
renunciation of his authority by that bold leader. He sent Pamphilo de
Narvaez, with a strong force, to arrest and supersede Cortez; but he was
defeated, and most of his troops joined his enemy. Narvaez afterward
obtained from the Spanish court a commission as _adelantado_ or Governor
of Florida, a territory quite indefinite in extent, reaching from the
southern capes of the peninsula to the Panuco River in Mexico. With a
force of three April 22, 1528 hundred men, eighty of whom were well
mounted, Narvaez landed in Florida, where he raised the royal standard,
and took possession of the country for the crown of Spain. With the hope
of finding some wealthy region like Mexico and Peru, he penetrated the
vast swamps and everglades in the interior of the flat country along the
northern shore of the Gulf of Mexico. His men suffered terribly from the
almost daily attacks of the natives and the nightly assaults of the
deadly malaria of the fens. They reached the fertile regions of the
Appalachians; but the capital of the tribe, instead of being a gorgeous
city like Mexico or Cuzco, was a mean village of two hundred huts and
wigwams. Disappointed, and one third of his number dead, Narvaez turned
southward, reached the Gulf near the present site of St. Mark's, on the
Appalachie Bay, constructed five frail barks, and launched upon the
waters. Nearly all his men, with himself, perished during a storm. Four
of the crew, who were saved, wandered for years through the wild regions
of Louisiana and Texas, and finally reached a Spanish settlement in
Northern Mexico. These men gave the first intelligence of the fate of
the expedition.

Two years after the return of these members of the expedition of
Narvaez, Fernando de Soto planned an expedition to explore the interior
of Florida, as all North America was then called, in search of a
populous and wealthy region supposed to exist there. By permission of
the Spanish monarch, he undertook the exploration and conquest of
Florida 1538. {xxxi}at his own risk and expense. He was commissioned
governor-general of that country and of Cuba for life. Leaving his wife
to govern Cuba during his absence, he sailed in June, 1539, and landed
at Tampa Bay with a force of six hundred men in complete June 25, 1539
armor.

There he established a small garrison, and then sent most of the vessels
of his fleet back to Cuba. He found a Spaniard, one of Narvaez's men,
who had learned the native language. Taking him with him as interpreter,
De Soto marched with his force into the interior. For five months they
wandered among the swamps and everglades, fighting their way against the
natives, when they reached the fertile region of the Flint River, in the
western part of Georgia. There they passed the winter, within a few
leagues of the Gulf, making, through exploring parties, some new
discoveries, among which was the harbor of Pensacola. Early in May they
broke up their encampment, and, marching northeasterly, readied the
head-waters of the Savannah River. After a brief tarry there, they
turned their faces westward, and, on the twenty-eighth of October, came
upon a fortified town, near the junction of the Alabama and Tombeckbee
Rivers. A severe battle of nine hours' duration ensued. Several
thousands of the half-naked Indians were slain, and their village
reduced to ashes. Several of the mailed Spaniards were killed, and the
victory availed De Soto nothing. All his baggage was consumed, and much
provision was destroyed.

The wild tribes, for many leagues around, were aroused by this event. De
Soto went into winter quarters in a deserted Indian village on the
Yazoo. There he was attacked by the swarming natives, bent on revenge.
The town was burned, all the clothing of the Spaniards, together with
many horses and nearly all the swine which they brought from Cuba, were
destroyed or carried away, and several of the whites were killed. Early
in the spring the shorn invaders pushed westward, and discovered the
Mississippi. They crossed it at the Chickasaw Bluffs, and traversed the
country on its western shore up to the thirty-seventh degree, nearly
opposite the mouth of the Ohio. They penetrated the wilderness almost
three hundred miles west of the Mississippi during the summer, and
wintered upon the Washita, in Arkansas. They passed down the Red River
to the Mississippi in the spring, where De Soto sickened and died. (May
31, 1542) He had appointed a successor, who now attempted to lead the
remnant of the expedition to Spanish settlements in Mexico.

For several months they wandered in the wilderness, but returned in
December,(1543) to winter upon the Mississippi, a short distance above
the mouth of the Red River.

There they constructed seven large boats, and in July following embarked
in them. On reaching the Gulf of Mexico, they crawled cautiously along
its sinuous coast, until the twentieth of September, when, half naked
and almost famished, they reached a white settlement near the mouth of
the Panueo River, about thirty miles north of Tampico.

While the Spaniards were making these useless discoveries of the
southern regions of our Republic along the Gulf of Mexico, the French
fitted out several expeditions to explore the coast between the
peninsula of Florida and the banks of Newfoundland. John Verrazzani, a
celebrated Florentine navigator, proceeded to America with a squadron of
four ships, under {xxxii}the auspices of Francis the First of France, in
1523. Three of his vessels were so damaged by a storm that they were
sent hack; in the fourth, he proceeded on his voyage.

Weathering a terrible tempest, he reached our coast near the mouth of
Cape Fear River, in North Carolina. He explored the whole coast, from
the Carolinas to Nova Scotia, and taking formal possession of the
country in the name of the French king, he called it New France, the
title held by Canada while it remained in possession of the French.
Verrazzani was followed, the next year, by Cartier (also in the service
of the French king), who discovered the Gulf and River St. Lawrence; and
soon afterward by the Lord of Roberval, a wealthy nobleman, who proposed
to plant a colony in the New World. Roberval failed in his undertaking,
and returned to France. He sailed on another voyage, and was never heard
of afterward. Other efforts at settlement along the southern coasts were
made by the French, but were unsuccessful. A Protestant French colony,
planted in Florida, was destroyed by the Spaniards in 1564, and over the
dead bodies of the Huguenots the murderers placed the inscription, "We
do this not as unto Frenchmen, but as unto Heretics." In 1567, De
Gourgues, a Gascon soldier, fitted out an expedition at his own expense,
to avenge this out rage. He surprised the Spanish forts erected near St.
Augustine, and hung the soldiers of the garrison upon the trees. Over
them he placed the inscription, "I do this not as unto Spaniards or
mariners, but as unto traitors, robbers, and murderers." Thus white
people were exterminated by white people, and Indians again possessed
the land.

The history of the early discoveries in North America forms a wonderful
chapter in the great chronicle of human progress and achievements, and
in its details there are narratives of adventure, prowess, love, and all
the elements of romance, more startling and attractive than the most
brilliant conceptions of the imagination ever evolved. The story of the
progress of settlements which followed is equally marvelous and
attractive. These tempt the pen on every side, but as they are connected
only incidentally with my subject, I pass them by with brevity of
notice. In the preceding pages I have taken a very brief survey of
events in the _progress of discovery_ which opened the way to
settlements in the New World; a brief survey of the _progress of
settlements_ will be found interwoven with the records upon the pages
which follow. They are all united by the often invisible threads of
God's providence; and each apparently insignificant event in the
wondrous history of our continent is a link as important in the great
chain of human deeds, directed by divine intelligence, as those which
arrest the attention and command the admiration of the world. Never was
this truth oftener and more strikingly illustrated than in our history
of the war for independence; and the student of that history, desirous
of understanding its true philosophy, should make himself familiar with
the antecedents which have a visible relation thereto.

** See page 178, vol. i.

PICTORIAL FIELD-BOOK OF THE REVOLUTION.

CHAPTER I.

"Our young wild land, the free, the proud!

Uncrush'd by power, unawed by fear,

Her knee to none but God is bow'd,

For Nature teaches freedom here:

From gloom and snow to light and flowers

Expands this heritage of ours:

Life with its myriad hopes, pursuits,

Spreads sails, rears roofs, and gathers fruits.

But pass two fleeting centuries back;

This land, a torpid giant, slept,

Wrapp'd in a mantle thick and black

That o'er its mighty frame had crept,

Since stars and angels sang, as earth

Shot, from its Maker, into birth."

Street.

HE love of country, springing up from the rich soil of the domestic
affections, is a feeling coexistent and coextensive with social n
itself. Although a dreary climate, barren lands, and unrighteous laws,
wickedly administered, may repress the luxuriant growth of this
sentiment, it will still maintain firm root in the heart, and hear with
patience the most cruel wrongs. Man loves the soil that gave him birth
as the child loves the mother, and from the same inherent impulses. When
exiled from his father-land, he yearns for it as a child yearns for
home; and though he may, by legal oath, disclaim allegiance to his own
and swear fealty to another government, the invisible links of
patriotism which hind him to his country can not be severed; his lips
and hand hear false witness against his truthful heart.

Stronger far is this sentiment in the bosom of him whose country is a
pleasant land, where nature in smiling beauty and rich beneficence woos
him on every side; where education quickens into refining activity the
intellect of society; and where just laws, righteously administered,
impress all possession, whether of property or of character, with the
broad seal of security. An honest, justified pride elevates the spirit
of the citizen of a land so favored; makes him a vigilant guardian of
its rights and honor, and inspires him with a profound reverence for the
men and deeds consecrated by the opinions of the just as the basis upon
which its glory rests.

Classic Localities.-- Departure for Saratoga.-- Voyage up the Hudson.

034It was under the influence of this sentiment, so natural to every
American, and a strong desire to make a personal visit to the classic
grounds of my country, and portray their features before every ancient
lineament should he effaced, that, during the sultriness of midsummer, I
left behind me the cares of business life within the confines of our
commercial metropolis, and commenced a pilgrimage to the most important
localities connected with the events of the war for our national
independence. For many years, as I occasionally saw some field
consecrated by revolutionary blood, or building Hallowed as a shelter of
the heroes of that war, I have felt emotions of shame, such as every
American ought to feel, on seeing the plow leveling the breast-works and
batteries where our fathers bled, and those edifices, containing the
council-chambers of men who planned the attack, the ambuscade, or the
retreat, crumbling into utter ruin. While England erects a monument in
honor of the amputated leg of a hero who fought for personal renown, we
allow these relics, sanctified by the deeds of soldiers who were more
than heroes as the world regards heroism, to pass away and be forgotten.
Acquisitiveness is pulling down walled fortresses; the careless
agriculturist, unmindful of the sacredness of the ditch and mound that
scar his fields, is sowing and reaping where marble monuments should
stand; and improvement, a very Cambyses among achievements of labor of
former times, under the fair mask of refined taste, is leveling nearly
all that remains of the architecture of the Revolution. To delineate
with pen and pencil what is left of the physical features of that
period, and thus to rescue from oblivion, before it should be too late,
the mementoes which another generation will appreciate, was my
employment for several months; and a desire to place the result of those
journeyings, with a record of past events inseparably connected with
what I have delineated, in an enduring form before my countrymen, has
given birth to these pages.

I resolved to visit the scenes of the northern campaigns during the
summer and early autumn. With the exception of the historic grounds
lying around New York and among the Hudson Highlands, the fields of
Saratoga, in point of importance and distance, invited the initial
visit.

1848 I left New York on the evening of the 24th of July for
Poughkeepsie, on the banks of the Hudson, there to be joined by a young
lady, my traveling companion for the summer. For many days the hot sun
had been unclouded, and neither shower nor dew imparted grateful
moisture to town or country.

"The whispering waves were half asleep,

The clouds were gone to play,

And on the woods and on the deep

The smiles of Heaven lay."

Shelley.

During the afternoon the barometer indicated a change, and portents of a
gathering storm arose in the west. At twilight we entered the great
amphitheater of the Highlands, and darkness came down suddenly upon us
as a tempest of wind, thunder, and rain burst over the Dunderberg and
the neighboring heights. A thunder-storm at night in the Hudson
Highlands! It is a scene of grandeur and sublimity vouchsafed to few,
and never to be forgotten. The darkness became intense, and echo
confused the thunder-peals into one continuous roar. The outlines of the
hills disappeared in the gloom, and our vessel seemed the only object
wrapped in the bosom of the tempest, except when, at every flash of
lightning, high wooded cones, or lofty ranges, or rocky cliffs burst
into view like a sudden creation of the Omnipotent fiat, and then melted
into chaos again. The storm continued until we passed West Point. The
clouds then broke, and as we emerged from the upper gate of the
Highlands into the beautiful expanse of Newburgh Bay, the moon came
forth, like a queen from her pavilion, in beauty and majesty, the winds
were quiet, the waters placid, and the starry sky serene, for

"The thunder, tramping deep and loud

Had left no foot-marks there."

Returning Volunteers.-- Albany.-- Troy.-- Fulton's Steam-boat

035The next morning the air was clear and cool as in September. At noon
we took passage in one of those floating palaces which are the pride of
the Hudson River. What a contrast to the awkward contrivance-the mere
germ of the steam-boat of the present day--that gave such glory to
Fulton, and astonished the world. * Her saloon, like a ducal drawing-
room; her table, spread as with a royal banquet; her speed, like that of
the swift bird, are all the creations of one generation, and seem like
works of magic. Among the passengers there were a few-plain and few
indeed-who attracted general attention. They were a remnant of a
regiment of Volunteers returning home, weary and spirit-broken, from the
battle-fields of Mexico. Of the scores who went with them, these alone
returned to tell of havoc in battle and slaughter by the deadly
_vomito_. They were young, but the lesson of sad experience might be
read on each brow, and the natural joy of the homeward-bound beamed not
in their eyes. To them military, glory was a bubble burst; and the
recollections of the recent past brought not to them that joy which the
soldier feels who has battled in defense of country and home. At Albany
preparations had been made to receive them, and for half a mile the
wharves, bridges, vessels, and houses were thickly covered with people
anxious to see the returning heroes. We landed with difficulty in the
midst of the excitement and noise, for cannon-peals, and drum and fife,
and the rattle of military accouterments, and wild huzzas of the crowd,
and the coaxing and swearing of porters and coachmen, were enough to
confound confusion itself. How changed was the scene when we returned, a
few weeks later. Wharves, bridges, and houses had been swept by
conflagration, and acres of the dense city were strewn with smoking
ruins.

Early on the morning of the 26th we left Albany for Bemis's Heights,
near the village of Stillwater. An omnibus ride of an hour, over a fine
McAdam road, placed us in Troy, where we took stage for the Waterford
ferry at Lansingburgh, four miles above. The day was excessively warm,
and eleven passengers occupied "seats for nine." Not a zephyr stirred
the waters or the leaves. A funny little water-man; full of wine and
wit, or something stronger and coarser, offered to row us across in his
rickety skiff. I demanded the price for ferriage.

* For the gratification of the curious, I here present a drawing of the
"Clermont," Fulton's experiment boat, with some notices of her earlier
voyages.

It was constructed under the personal supervision of Fulton, in 1807. It
was one hundred feet long, twelve feet wide, and seven feet deep. In
1808 it was lengthened to one hundred and fifty feet, widened to
eighteen, and its name changed to North River. The engine was
constructed by Watt & Bolton, England, and the hull by David Brown, of
New York. In August, 1807, the boat was propelled from the East River to
the Jersey shore; and about the first of September it was started on its
first trip to Albany.

The following advertisement appeared in the Albany Gazette, September
1st, 1807:

"The North River steam-boat will leave Paulus's Hook [Jersey City] on
Friday, the 4th of September, at 9 in the morning, and arrive at Albany
on Saturday, at 9 in the afternoon. Provisions, good berths, and
accommodations are provided. The charge to each passenger is as follows:

To  Newburgh, dolls. 3, time 14 hours.

"   Poughkeepsie, "  4,   "  17  "

"   Esopus,       "  5,   "  20  "

"   Hudson.       "  6    "  30  "

"   Albany,       "  7,   "  36  "

It is noticed in the same paper, of October 5th, 1807, that "Mr.
Fulton's new steam-boat left New York on the 2d, at 10 o'clock A.M.,
against a strong tide, very rough water, and a violent gale from the
north. She made a headway against the most sanguine expectations, and
without being rocked by the waves." What a change in about forty years!
Forty years ago a steam-boat voyage from Albany to New York, one hundred
and sixty miles, was accomplished in thirty-six hours, at an expense of
seven dollars, exclusive of cost of meals. Now the passage is easily and
often made in nine and a half hours, at a cost of one dollar, and
frequently for less. Now our first class steam-boats are nearly four
hundred feet long, and of proportionate depth and breadth of beam.

Crossing the Hudson.-- Cohoes' Falls.-- Van Schaick's Island.-- State of
Affairs in 1777.

036"Five thousand dollars," hiccoughed the Charon. I did not object to
the price, but valuing safety at a higher figure, sought the owner of a
pretty craft near by, while the little votary of Bacchus was tugging
manfully, but unsuccessfully, at a huge trunk, to lift it into his boat.
Before he was fairly conscious that he was not yet toiling at our
luggage, we were out upon the stream in the "Lady of the Lake." I
compensated the tipsy boatman for his labor of love by a brief
temperance lecture; but the seed doubtless fell upon "stony ground," for
he had the hard-heartedness to consign me to the safe keeping of him
whom

"The old painters limned with a hoof and a horn,

A beak and a scorpion tail."

We pushed across the Hudson to the upper mouth or "sprout" of the
Mohawk, anu, gliding under the rail-road bridge and along a sluice of
the Champlain Canal, clambered up a high bank, and reached the packet
office at Waterford * toward noon. The suppressed roar of Cohoes' Falls,
two miles distant, wooed us to the pleasures of that fashionable resort,
to while away the three hours before the arrival of the canal packet.

These falls, though not so grand as many others either in volume or
altitude of cataract, or in the natural scenery around, nevertheless
present many points of beauty and sublimity exceedingly attractive to
the tourist. The Mohawk is here more than one hundred yards wide, and
perfectly rock-ribbed on both sides. The fall is nearly seventy feet
perpendicular, in addition to the turbulent rapids above and below. A
bridge, eight hundred feet long, spans the river half a mile below the
falls, from which a fine view may be obtained of the whole scene.

Before entering the Hudson, the river is divided into four mouths or
_sprouts_, as they are called, by three rocky islands, Haver's, Van
Schaick's or Cohoes', and Green's or Tibbetts's Islands, which form a
scene that is singularly picturesque. It is generally supposed that
Henry Hudson, the discoverer of the river bearing his name, ascended as
far as this point in 1609, and that he and his boat's crew were the
first white men who beheld the cataract of Cohoes.

The mouth of the Mohawk was a point of much interest toward the close of
the summer of 1777, when Van Schaick's Island was fortified by General
Schuyler, then in command of the northern division of the Continental
army. Properly to understand the position of affairs at that period, it
is necessary to take a brief view of events immediately antecedent to,
and intimately connected with, the military operations at this point,
and at Stillwater a few weeks later.

Incensed at the audacity of the American Congress in declaring the
colonies free and independent states; piqued at the consummate
statesmanship displayed by the members of that Congress, and foiled in
every attempt to cajole the Americans by delusive promises, or to crush
the spirit of resistance by force of arms, the British ministry, backed
by the stubborn king and a strong majority in both Houses of Parliament,
determined to open the campaign of 1777 with such vigor, and to give to
the service in America such material, as should not fail to put down the
rebellion by midsummer, and thus vindicate British valor, which seemed
to be losing its invincibility. So long as the Americans were tolerably
united; so long as there remained a free communication between
Massachusetts and Virginia, or, in other words, between the Eastern and
the Middle and Southern States, permanent success of the British arms in
America was very questionable. The rebellion was hydra-headed, springing
into new life and vigor suddenly and powerfully, from the inherent
energies of union, in places where it seemed to be subdued and
destroyed. To sever that union, and to paralyze the vitality dependent
thereon, was a matter of great importance, and to effect this was a
paramount object of the British government.

General Howe was then in the quiet possession of the city of New York
and its vicinity.

* Waterford is on the west bank of the Hudson, at the head of sloop
navigation.

English Preparations tor the Campaign of 1777.-- Instructions of Lord
George Germain.-- Biographical Sketch of Burgoyne

037A strong British force occupied Rhode Island and overawed the eastern
coast; the patriot insurgents had been driven out of Canada by General
Carleton, and nothing remained to complete the separation of the two
sections of the American States but to march an invading army from the
north, which, forming a junction with Howe, should secure the country
and the strong-holds upon Lakes Champlain and George and the Hudson
River.

Such an expedition was planned jointly by the king, Lord George Germain,
* and General Burgoyne, and agreed upon in council. ** The general
command was intrusted to Burgoyne, who was a natural son of Lord
Bingley, and at that time high in the confidence of the king and his
advisers. *** He was brave, skillful, and humane, proud of distinction,
sanguine of success, and eager for military renown. If the tactics of
European warfare had been appropriate for the expedition, success might
have attended his efforts. But in his appointment, as well as in the
minute and positive instruction-given him, without reference to any
contingency that might demand a wide departure from their letter and
spirit, the British ministry, always at fault in the management of

* Lord George Germain, then colonial secretary, in a letter to Governor
Carleton, of Canada, dated March 26th, 1777, observes, "With a view of
quelling the rebellion as soon as possible, it is become ( highly
necessary that the most speedy junction of the two armies should be
effected [the forces from Canada and those of General Howe at New York];
and, therefore, as the security and good government of Canada absolutely
require your presence there, it is the king's determination to leave
about 3000 men under your command for the defense and duties of that
province, and to employ the remainder of your army upon two expeditions,
the one under the command of Lieutenant General Burgoyne, who is to
force his way to Albany, and the other under Lieutenant Colonel St.
Leger, who is to make a diversion on the Mohawk River."--Burgoyne's
Statement of the Expedition from Canada, &c. (Appendix), p. xiii.,
London, 1780.

** Pictorial History of George III., vol. i., p. 306.

*** Lieutenant General Burgoyne was an illegitimate son of Lord Bingley.
He entered the army at an early age, and his education and the influence
of his father soon placed him in the line of promotion. In 1762 he was
sent into Portugal with an English force to assist in the defense of
that kingdom against the Spaniards. He then held the commission of a
brigadier, and distinguished himself in the capture of the garrison of
Almeida. After his return to England, he became a privy councillor, and
was elected to a seat in Parliament as representative for Preston, in
Lancashire. He came over to America in 1775, and was at Boston at the
time of the battle of Bunker Hill. He was sent to Canada the same year,
but early in 1776 returned to England. Through the influence of the king
and Lord George Germain, he was appointed to the command of the northern
British army in America in the spring of 1777. After some successes, he
was captured, with all his army, at Saratoga, in October of that year.
After some delay, he was allowed to return to England on parole, and he
was actually engaged in debates upon the floor of the British House of
Commons at the very time he was a prisoner to the Americans. His
misfortunes lost him the friendship of the king, and he was denied
access to his presence. In 1780 he published a narrative of his
Expedition, together with the proceedings of his trial before a
committee of Parliament, in which he well vindicated his character. He
soon afterward resigned his emoluments from government, amounting to
$15,000 a year. In 1781 he joined the opposition in Parliament, and
opposed the further prosecution of the war against the Americans as
impolitic and cruel. From the conclusion of peace until his death, he
devoted his time to pleasure and literary pursuits. He died of an attack
of gout, on the 4th of August, 1792. Among his literary productions are
_The Maid of the Oaks, Bon Ton, and The Heiress_, dramas which at one
time were highly popular. Benevolence and humanity were strong features
in Burgoyne's character, and I think the fierce anathema of Philip
Freneau, a poet of the Revolution, was altogether too severe. After
giving Burgoyne several hard rubs in the course of his epic, he
describes an ice- bound, fog-covered, dreary island north of Scotland,
and there consigns the Tories, with Burgoyne at their head, as follows:

"There, Loyals, there, with loyal hearts retire,

There pitch your tents, and kindle there your fire,

There desert Nature will her stings display,

And fiercest hunger on your vitals prey;

And with yourselves let John Burgoyne retire,

To reign your monarch, whom your hearts desire."

Freneau's Poems, p. 246

Burgoyne s Arrival in Canada.-- His Preparations for the Campaign.--
Appointment of General Schuyler to the Command.

038American affairs, made a most egregious blunder. Sir Guy Carleton,
then Governor of Canada, and perfectly acquainted with the people and
country, should have been placed in command. Burgoyne was almost totally
ignorant of the Canadians and Indians, who formed a large part of his
force, and he knew absolutely nothing of the true character and temper
of the people he was sent to oppose and oppress.

Burgoyne arrived at Quebec, in March, 1777, bearing the commission of a
lieutenant general. Carleton, though greatly aggrieved, nobly aided
Burgoyne in preparing the expedition. By extraordinary activity, vessels
were constructed, stores were collected, and a force of more than seven
thousand men was mustered at St. John's, at the foot of Lake Champlain,
on the first of June. Lieutenant Colonel St. Leger, with a detachment of
seven hundred Bangers, was sent up the St. Lawrence and Lake Ontario to
Oswego, to penetrate the country from that point, arouse and conciliate
the Indians, capture Fort Schuyler, * sweep the valley of the Mohawk
with the aid of Johnson and his Tories, and join Burgoyne at Albany when
Lake Champlain and the valley of the Upper Hudson should lie prostrate
at his feet.

As soon as Congress perceived the storm that was gathering on the
northern frontier, they felt the necessity of prompt action and the
services of an influential commander. Fear, loyalty, British gold, would
undoubtedly lead the van of the invading army, and none but a wise and
tried man could quiet the alarm of the people and command the fidelity
of the militia.

Philip Schuyler, ** a gentleman of fortune, and possessed of military
skill, experience, sound judgment, prudent forethought, and lofty
patriotism, was reappointed to the command of the forces of the north,
in which position he had been superseded, in effect, a few weeks before,
by Horatio Gates, the Adjutant General of the Continental army. No
appointment could have been more popular with the people of Northern New
York, who were in a state of great excitement and alarm. In the late
campaigns against the French and Indians upon Lakes George and
Champlain, he had rendered essential service to the colony and to the
people of the northern frontier, and his many virtues endeared him to
all who knew him. His large estate was lying directly in the path of the
invader; and if a mercenary feeling could have existed in a soul so
noble as his, the defense of his own broad acres and costly mansion
would have made him vigilant and brave.

1777.

General Schuyler arrived in Albany on the third day of June, where he
met General Gates, and, with all the frankness of a generous and
unsuspecting

* Fort Schuyler stood at the head of boat navigation, on the Mohawk,
where the village of Rome now is. It was erected in 1758, and was then
called Fort Stanwix. It was repaired in 1776, and named Fort Schuyler,
in honor of General Schuyler, in whose military department it was
located.

** General Philip Schuyler was born at Albany, on the 22d of November,
1733. His grandfather, Peter Schuyler, was Mayor of Albany, and
commander of the northern militia in 1690. His father, John Schuyler,
married Cornelia Van Courtlandt, a woman of strong mind, and Philip was
their eldest son. By virtue of primogeniture law, he inherited the real
estate of his father at his death, but he generously shared it with his
brothers and sisters. His father died when Philip was young, and to the
thorough training of his gifted mother he was greatly indebted for his
success in life. He entered the army against the French and Indians in
1755, and commanded a company which attended Sir William. Johnson to
Fort Edward and Lake George. He soon attracted the attention of Lord
Howe, who commanded the first division of the British army against the
forts on Lake George and Lake Champlain, and was placed in the
commissariat department. When Lord Howe fell at Ticonderoga, to Colonel
Schuyler was intrusted the duty of conveying.the body of that greatly-
beloved young nobleman to Albany for sepulture. After the peace of 1763,
he was much in active service in the civil government of his state. In
the Colonial Assembly of New York, he was one of the warmest opponents
of the British government in its attempts to tax the colonies without
their consent. He was elected a delegate to the Continental Congress
which assembled in May, 1775, and in June following he was appointed by
that body one of the major generals (the third) of the American army. He
was charged by Washington with the command of the army in the province
of New York, and directed to secure the lakes and prepare for invading
Canada. He was taken sick, and the command devolved on Montgomery.
During 1776, he was active in Indian affairs, and in perfecting the
order and discipline of the northern army. For causes quite
inexplicable, he was superseded, in effect, by Gates in March, 1777, but
was reinstated in May. Again, when Burgoyne drove St. Clair from
Ticonderoga, and prudence caused General Schuyler to retreat with his
army from Fort Edward down the Hudson River, calumny, that had
successfully poisoned the minds of the Eastern people and the militia,
became so clamorous for his removal, that Congress placed Gates again in
charge of the army in August. Injured and insulted, the patriot still
continued to devote his services and his fortune in aid of his country.
He demanded a court of inquiry, and its verdict, acquitting him of all
blame, conferred as much honor upon him as his successes won at
Saratoga. He was urged by Washington to accept military command, but he
preferred to lend his aid to his country in another way. He was a member
of the old Congress under the Confederation; and after the adoption of
the Constitution of the United States, he was a senator from New York,
with Rufus King. He was again a senator, in place of Aaron Burr, in
1797. He died at Albany, November 18th, 1804, aged 71 years. He has two
daughters still living-Elizabeth, the venerable widow of General
Alexander Hamilton, and now (1849) ninety-two years of age; and
Catharine, his youngest daughter, widow of the late Major Cochrane, of
Oswego, son of Dr. Cochrane, the distinguished Surgeon General of the
Revolutionary Army. See page 199, Vol. II.

Schuyler and Gates.-- Advance of Burgoyne.-- Condition of the
Continental Army

039nature, sought the aid of his counsel and his sword. But he
encountered a smaller mind than his own, and both counsel and sword were
refused. He was coldly received by the adjutant general, who was deeply
offended because Congress had not allowed him to retain his command. A
brave soldier always seeks the post of greatest danger; and General
Schuyler, not doubting the courage or devotion of Gates, offered him the
command of Ticonderoga, the point where the first conflict with Burgoyne
would inevitably take place, and where the first laurels were to be won.
But the pride of Gates stifled his patriotism. He refused to serve under
Schuyler, and, at his own request, had leave to withdraw from the
department, where, indeed, he had done literally nothing.

All was terror and alarm among the inhabitants of the north, as Burgoyne
victoriously swept Champlain from St. John's to Crown Point, and with
his formidable force, daily augmented by loyalists and savage allies,
prepared to beleaguer the strong fortress of Ticonderoga.

Mount Hope, commanding the road to Lake George, was occupied; the
American outposts were driven in; the lake was studded with armed
vessels, and the formidable height of Mount Defiance was scaled, and
artillery planted upon its very summit, seven hundred feet above the
fort below.

General St. Clair, who commanded the garrison, when he saw the battery
above him, and the girdle of strong battalions that was closing around
him, knew that resistance would be madness. Under cover of night, he
retreated across to Mount Independence, and, with the small garrison
there, fled toward Fort Edward by the way of Castleton and
Skenesborough, leaving the stores and ammunition behind. The British
eagerly pursued the flying Americans. The battle of Hubbardton, so
disastrous to the patriots, was fought. The boom across the lake at
Ticonderoga was broken, and a free passage made for the vessels of the
enemy. They swept the lake to Skenesborough (now Whitehall), when the
American works and the stores that were left became an easy prey to the
invaders.

The army under General Schuyler was in a wretched condition, and daily
diminishing. Food, clothing, ammunition, and artillery were all wanting.
The pecuniary resources and credit of Congress were daily failing, and
all the future seemed dark, and foreboding of evil. The Eastern militia,
sick and disheartened by late reverses, became restless and insubordi-

Retreat of Schuyler to the Mohawk.-- St. Leger in the Mohawk Valley.--
Relief of the Valley proposed by Schuyler.

040nate, and nearly all of them left the army and returned home. These
things were exceedingly discouraging to the commander, yet his stout
heart never failed. "Should it be asked," July 24, 1777 he said a letter
to the Albany Committee, from Moses's Creek, four miles below Fort
Edward, "what line of conduct I mean to hold amid this variety of
difficulties and distress, I would answer, _to dispute every inch of
ground with General Burgoyne, and retard his descent into the country as
long as possible_."

Burgoyne's force, in the mean while, was constantly augmented by
accessions from the families of the loyal and the timid. Slowly and
surely he advanced from Skenesborough to Fort Anne, and was pressing
onward, in the midst of fearful obstacles, toward the Hudson.

Under all these circumstances, General Schuyler thought it prudent to
retreat until new recruits, or a re-enforcement from Washington, should
give more strength to his army. He accordingly fell back from Fort
Edward, the general rendezvous of his forces after the evacuation of
Ticonderoga, Mount Independence, and Fort George. As Burgoyne
approached, the people fled, in terror and dismay, toward Albany,
leaving their ripe harvest fields and pleasant homes to be trodden down
or burned by the enemy. Burgoyne at length reached Fort Edward; and as
he marched slowly down the valley of the Hudson, Schuyler retreated in
good order to Saratoga, then to Stillwater, and finally to Cohoes'
Falls.

In the mean while the people in the Mohawk Valley were in the greatest
consternation. St. Leger had arrived from Oswego, and was besieging Fort
Schuyler, while the Tories and Indians were spreading death and
desolation on every hand. Colonel Gansevoort, with a handful of men, was
closely shut up in the fort; General Herkimer, with the brave militia of
Tryon county, had been defeated at Oriskany, and the people below hourly
expected August 6 the flood of destroyers to pour down upon them. It was
a fearful emergency. Without aid all must be lost. Brave hearts were
ready for bold deeds, and during a night of fearful tempest of thunder
and rain, Colonel Willett and Lieutenant Stockwell crept stealthily from
the fort, through groups of sleeping besiegers, beyond their lines, and
at dawn on the second day, mounted upon fleet horses, sped down the
valley to the headquarters of General Schuyler, at Stillwater, and, in
the name of the beleaguered garrison and the people of Tryon county,
implored assistance.

Not a moment was to be lost. The subjugation of the whole valley would
inevitably follow the surrender of Fort Schuyler, and the victors,
gathering strength, would fall like an avalanche upon Albany, or, by
junction, swell the approaching army of Burgoyne. The prudent foresight
and far-reaching humanity of General Schuyler at once dictated his
course. He called a council, * and proposed sending a detachment
immediately to the relief of Fort Schuyler. His officers opposed him,
with the plea that his whole force was not then sufficient to stay the
oncoming of Burgoyne. The clearer judgment of Schuyler made him persist
in his opinion, and he earnestly besought them to agree with him. While
pacing the floor in anxious solicitude, he overheard the half-whispered
remark, "He means to weaken the army." ** Treason in the heart of Philip
Schuyler! Never was a thought more foul

* General Schuyler was then quartered in the house of Derrick Swart,
Esq., at Stillwater. The house is still standing, just at the foot of
the hill.- Charles Neilson, Esq.

** At this time jealousy had created secret enemies for General
Schuyler, and he was even charged with being associated with St. Clair
in preliminary acts of treason, about the time the latter evacuated
Ticonderoga. The ridiculous story got abroad that they had been paid for
their treason by the enemy in silver balls, shot from Burgoyne's guns
into the American camp!-See Thatcher's Military Journal, p. 86.

Note.-It will be observed that, in this rapid view of events connected
with the American encampment at the mouth of the Mohawk, I have avoided
all details, where, perhaps, the reader may have wished more minute
information. The necessity for this course arises from the nature of the
plan of my work, which is to notice in detail the various important
localities, in the order in which I visited them, and not in
chronological succession, as the mere historian would do. For example, I
visited Cohoes' and Bemis's Heights before Fort Edward and Ticonderoga.
I therefore describe the scenery and events of the former places
minutely, and reserve similar minute details concerning the latter
until, in the order of the narrative of my tour, I reach them. This
explanation is necessary, as some might suppose that important places
are to be slightly noticed, while others of less moment have an undue
share of attention. I have visited all the most important localities of
the Revolution, and each in its turn, in the course of the work, will
receive its full share of notice.

It is my intention to give in notes, in the course of the work, brief
biographical sketches of all the most important actors in our
Revolutionary war, both domestic and foreign. These sketches will be
introduced at points where the record exhibits the most prominent events
in the life of the subject. Prominent men will, therefore, be mentioned
often before a biography will be given; but the reader may rely upon
finding it in the work, if a memoir can be found.

Volunteers for the Relief of Fort Schuyler.-- Position of the Americans
at Cohoes.-- Active Preparations to oppose Burgoyne.

041or charge more wicked. Wheeling suddenly toward the slanderer and
those around him, and unconsciously biting into several pieces a pipe he
was smoking, he indignantly exclaimed, "Gentlemen, I shall take the
responsibility upon myself; where is the brigadier that will take
command of the relief? I shall beat up for volunteers to-morrow." The
brave and impulsive Arnold, ever ready for deeds of daring, at once
stepped forward and offered his services. The next morning the drum
beat, and eight hundred stalwart men August 15, 1777were enrolled for
the service before meridian. Fort Schuyler was saved, and the forces of
St. Leger scattered to the winds. In after years the recollection of
those burning words of calumny always stirred the breast of the veteran
patriot with violent emotions If ever a bosom glowed with true devotion
to country, it was that of Philip Schuyler.

Such, in brief, were the events which placed the remnant of the main
army of the north at the mouth of the Mohawk in August, 1777, and caused
Van Schaick's and Haver's Islands to be fortified. That seemed to be the
most eligible point at which to make a stand in defense of Albany
against the approaches of the enemy from the north and from the west.
Nowhere else could the comparatively feeble force of the Americans so
effectually oppose the overwhelming number of the invaders. At that time
there were no bridges across the Hudson or the Mohawk, and both streams
were too deep to be fordable except in seasons of extreme drought. There
was a ferry across the Mohawk, five miles above the falls, * and one
across the Hudson at Half Moon Point, ** or Waterford. The "sprouts" of
the Mohawk, between the islands, were usually fordable; and as Burgoyne
would not, of course, cross tho Hudson, or attempt the ferry upon the
Mohawk, where a few resolute men could successfully oppose him, his path
was of necessity directly across the mouth of the river. Fortifications
were accordingly thrown up on the islands and upon the main land, faint
traces of which are still visible.

In this position, with his headquarters at Stillwater, in advance of his
army, General Schuyler brought all his energies and resources into
requisition for the augmentation and discipline of his troops,
preparatory to a first determined conflict with Burgoyne. His private
purse was freely opened, *** and by unwearied exertions day and night
the army rapidly improved in numbers, discipline, and spirits. His
correspondence at that time with men of every degree, from the President
of Congress and the commander-in-chief to subordinate officers and
private gentlemen, was very extensive, all having relation to the one
great wish of his heart, the checking of the progress of the British
army. He addressed the civil and military authorities in every
direction, urging them to assist him with men and arms. The Council of
Safety, at Albany, was appealed to. "Every militia-man," he said, "ought
to turn out without delay in a crisis the most alarming since the
contest began." He appealed to the Eastern States. "If," he said, in a
letter to Governor Trumbull, of Connecticut, "the Eastern militia do not
turn out with spirit and behave better, we shall be ruined." To
Washington he repeated, in substance, what he had said on the 12th of
July previous. "If my countrymen will support me with vigor and
dexterity, and do not meanly despond,

* Loudon's ferry. At this place the left wing of the army rested, under
the command of General Arnold.

** So called from the name of Henry Hudson's ship, the Half Moon.

*** General Schuyler never allowed his private interest to interfere in
the least degree with the public good. When the Continental army was
retreating from Fort Edward, Mrs. Schuyler rode up from Albany to their
beautiful country seat at Saratoga, and superintended the removal of
their furniture. While there she received direction from her husband to
set fire with her own hands to his extensive fields of wheat, and to
request his tenants to do the same, rather than suffer them to be reaped
by the enemy.- Women of The Revolution, vol. i., p. 60.

Schuyler superseded by Gates.-- Factions in Congress.-- Noble Conduct of
Schuyler.

042 we shall he able to prevent the enemy from penetrating much further
into the country." At the same time all was life and activity in his
camp. From his own state recruits were constantly filling his thinned
regiments, and the heart of the patriot was cheered with the prospect of
soon winning back those laurels which, by the late reverses and the
events of the last campaign, had been, in a measure, stripped from his
brow.

But secret enemies had been for some time plotting his disgrace by
poisoning the minds of the Eastern people, and raising a clamor in favor
of the reinstatement of Gates, who as yet, for obvious reasons, had met
with no reverses. The friends of that officer were an active faction in
Congress at that time, _sub rosa_, but the next year were far more
undisguised in favoring the scheme for giving Gates the chief command in
place of Washington. We are so accustomed to look upon all the men of
the Revolution who took sides with the friends of America as pure and
holy in all their thoughts and actions, that we reluctantly yield to the
conviction that they were ever actuated by motives less worthy and
exalted than those of the loftiest patriotism. This is claiming too much
for human nature. While we may award to them all that is noble and
disinterested in feeling, when the good of the common cause demanded
personal sacrifice and pliancy of opinion, it is folly to deny that the
spirit of faction was rife among the members of the Old Continental
Congress, and that selfish motives often controlled their actions.
Congress, listening to the clamors from the East, the importunities of
Gates's friends, and the suggestions of a false military philosophy,
deprived General Schuyler of his command just as he was about to lead
his troops to victory.

General Gates, with his new commission, arrived at Van Schaick's on the
19th of August, three days after the battle of Bennington, a battle
which, in its effect upon the British army, gave full assurance of
future victory to the Americans. How nobly did the conduct of Schuyler
on this occasion contrast with that of Gates a few weeks previous. On
Gates's arrival, without the slightest indication of ill humor, the
patriot resigned his command, communicated all the intelligence he
possessed, and put every interesting paper into his hands simply adding,
"I have done all that could he done, as far as the means were in my
power, to injure the enemy, and to inspire confidence in the soldiers of
our own army, and, I flatter myself, with some success; but the palm of
victory is denied me, and it is left to you, general, to reap the fruit
of my labors. I will not fail, however, to second your views; and my
devotion to my country will cause me with alacrity to obey all your
orders." * "I am sensible," he said, in a letter to Congress, "of the
indignity of being ordered from the command of the army at the time when
an engagement must soon take place yet he preferred to suffer reproach
in silence rather than allow his bleeding country to be injured by the
withdrawal of a single arm from its support. Although disgraced by the
act of Congress, he persevered assiduously in strengthening the army and
preparing for the coming conflict. "I shall go on," he said to
Washington, "in doing my duty and endeavoring to deserve your esteem."
And when General Gates arrived, he cordially proffered his co-operation,
was very active in promoting the success of the battles which soon after
took place, was present at Saratoga when Burgoyne surrendered his sword,
and rejoiced, because his country was the gainer, when the laurels which
should have graced his brow were placed upon that of another. Warmed by
such impulses, who can doubt that the bosom of the generous patriot on
that day heaved with nobler pride and purer joy than that of the lauded
victor?

* Garden, p. 359.

Canal Voyage from Waterford to Bemia's Heights.--Appearance of the
Country

043

CHAPTER II.

"Led on by lust of lucre and renown,

Burgoyne came marching with his thousands down,

High were his thoughts and furious his career,

Puff'd with self-confidence and pride severe;

Swoll'n with the idea of his future deeds,

Onward to ruin each advantage leads."

Philip Freneau, 1778.

E left Waterford at two o'clock P.M. for Bermis's Heights, the famous
battle-ground where Burgoyne was checked and defeated in the autumn of
1777, a few weeks after General Gates succeeded to the command of the
northern Our conveyance was a neat little canal packet, its cabin
crowded with passengers and a well-supplied dinner-table, and its deck
piled with as much luggage and as many loungers as low bridges and a hot
sun would allow. For a loiterer who takes no note of passing hours but
to mark and mourn their excessive length, and who loves to glide along
listlessly among green fields and shady woods without the disturbance of
even a carriage ride, a day voyage upon a canal is really delightful,
especially if the face of nature is attractive, and a pleasant companion
or agreeable book assists in smoothing the passage of time. Such seemed
to be the character of nearly all our fellow-passengers, pleasure from
personal enjoyment being their chief object. When dinner was over, some
slept some read, and every body talked to every body as freely as old
acquaintances would chat.

The country through which we passed is very fertile, and beautifully
diversified in aspect. The plain over which the Hudson here flows is a
narrow alluvial bottom, of garden richness, along the western edge of
which passes the canal. Green woods and cultivated fields skirted the
river on either side, and those conical hills and knolls, like western
tumuli, which are prominent features from Stillwater to Sandy Hill, here
begin to appear. Some of them were still covered with the primeval
forest, and others were cultivated from base to summit, giving a
pleasing variety to the ever-changing landscape. The dark green corn,
just flowering; the wheat ears, fading from emerald to russet; the
blackberries, thick in the hedges; the flowers innumerable, dotting the
pasture fields, and the fragrance of the new-mown hay, scattered in
wind-rows along the canal, were pleasant sights to one just escaped from
the dust and din of the city, and imparted a gratification which only
those can feel and appreciate who seldom enjoy it. There was one thing
wanting, which leafy June would have supplied-the melody of birds.

" Silence girt the woods; no warbling tongue

Talks now unto the echo of the groves;

Only the curled stream soft chidings kept;

And little gales that from the green leaves swept

Dry summer's dust, in fearful whisperings stirr'd,

As loth to waken any singing bird,"

for it was just the season when the warblers of the forest are still,
except at early morning when they carol a brief matin hymn, and then are
quiet. Yet

" The poetry of earth is never dead.

When all the birds are faint with the hot sun,

And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run

"Silence girt the woods; no warbling tongue

Talks now unto the echo of the groves;

Only the curled stream soft chidings kept;

And little gales that from the green leaves swept

Dry summer's dust, in fearful whisperings stirr'd,

As loth to waken any singing bird,"

for it was just the season when the warblers of the forest are still,
except at early morning, when they carol a brief matin hymn, and then
are quiet. Yet

"The poetry of earth is never dead.

When all the birds are faint with the hot sun,

And hide in cooling trees, a voice will run

Young Tourists from Saratoga Springs.--Gates and Burgoyne.--An Evening
Visit to Bemis's Heights

044

From hedge to hedge about the new-mown mead;

That is the grasshopper's."

Keats.

At the Borough, or Mechanicsville, nine miles above Waterford, the rail-
road from Saratoga Springs reaches the canal. Here our boat was filled
to repletion with a bevy of young people, who, tired of medicinals and
midnight merriment at that Mecca of fashion in summer, had determined to
take a "slow coach" to Whitehall, and meet the stronger tide of gay
tourists flowing to Ticonderoga from Lake George. They were full of
life, and not one of them had ever passed a night upon a canal-boat.
Poor souls! how we pitied them, while we rejoiced at our own better
fortune, intending, as we did, to debark toward cooling sunset. If
"affliction is necessary to temper the over-joyous," our young travelers
were doubtless well annealed before morning in the vapor bath of a
packet cabin.

One of the passengers was a roving journeyman printer, full of the
general intelligence of the craft, an inveterate tobacco chewer, and
evidently a boon companion of John Barleycorn and his cousins. His hat
was a-slouch and his coat seedy. His wit kept the deck vocal with
laughter; yet, when at times he talked gravely, the dignity of
intelligence made us all respectful listeners. He was perfectly familiar
with the history of the classic grounds through which we were then
passing. His father was one of the special adjutants appointed by
General Gates on the morning of the action of the 19th of September, and
from him he had often received minute details of the events of that
contest. He mentioned a circumstance connected with the commander on
that occasion, which, in some degree, explains the singular fact that he
was not upon the field of action-a fact which some have adduced as
evidence of cowardice. It is admitted that General Gates did not leave
his camp during the contest; and the special adjutant referred to
asserted boldly that _intoxication_ was the chief cause. That, in the
opinion of the world at that time, was a weakness far more excusable,
and a crime less heinous, than cowardice; for a night's debauch and a
morning of dullness and stupidity were things too common among
_gentlemen_ to affect reputation seriously, unless bad consequences
ensued. He was not alone in devotion to the wine-cup at that very time,
for it is said that Burgoyne and Earl Balcarras did not leave their
flagon and their cards until dawn that morning. Burgoyne and the earl,
however, had either stouter heads or stouter hearts than Gates, for they
were on duty in the field when the contest was raging. It may be that
neither wine nor cowardice controlled the American commander. Let us
charitably hope that it did not, and charge the fault upon a weak
judgment; for we should be ever ready to act toward erring brother-man
according to the glorious injunction of Prior:

"Be to his faults a little blind;

Be to his virtues very kind."

We reached Bemis's Heights between five and six o'clock in the evening.
The hotel is situated a few rods south of the site of the old residence
of Bemis. The obliging landlord anticipated our impatience to view the
battle-ground, and when supper was over we found a horse and light wagon
in readiness to carry us to the residence of Charles Neilson, Esq., on
the summit of the heights, whence a fine view of the whole scene of
conflict and of the surrounding country might be obtained. * It was too
late for much observation, for twilight soon spread its veil over every
object. After spending an hour pleasantly and profitably with Mr.
Neilson and his family, I made an engagement to meet him early next
morning, to ride and ramble over the historic grounds in the
neighborhood.

* Mr. Neilson occupies the mansion owned by his father, an active Whig,
at the time of the battles there He has written and published a volume
entitled "An original, compiled, and corrected Account of Bur-goyne's
Campaign and the memorable Battles of Bemis's Heights." It contains many
details not found in other books, which he gathered from those who were
present, and saw and heard what they related It is valuable on that
account.

View from Bemia's Heights. Topography. Origin of the Name. Headquarters
of Revolutionary Officers.

045

The morning broke with an unclouded sky, and before the dew was off the
grass I was upon Bemis's Heights, eager to see what yet remained of the
military works of a former time. Alas! hardly a vestige is to be seen;
hut a more beautiful view than the one from Mr. Neilson's mansion I have
seldom beheld. The ground there is higher than any in the vicinity,
except the range of hills on the east side of the Hudson, and the eye
takes in a varied landscape of a score of miles in almost every
direction. Bounding the horizon on the north and west are the heights of
Saratoga and the high mountains on the eastern shore of Lake George. On
the south stretch away into the blue distance toward Albany the gentle
hills and the pleasant valley of the Hudson. On the east, not far
distant, rises Willard's Mountain, and over and beyond its southern
neighbors of less altitude may be seen the heights of Bennington on the
Walloomsoik, * the Green Mountains, and the lofty summit of far-famed
Mount Tom.

Bemis's Heights are situated on the right bank of the Hudson, about four
miles north of the pleasant village of Stillwater (which is on the same
side of the river), and about twenty-five miles from Albany. The ground
here rises abruptly from an extensive alluvial flat, about half a mile
in width a little above, but here tapering until it forms quite a narrow
defile of not more than thirty or forty rods on each side of the river.
At the time of the Revolution, the whole country in this vicinity was
covered with a dense forest, having only an occasional clearing of a few
acres; and deep ravines furrowed the land in various directions.
Fronting the river, a high bluff of rocks and soil, covered with stately
oaks and maples, presented an excellent place on which to plant a
fortification to command the pas sage of the river and the narrow valley
below. The bluff is still there, but the forest is gone, and many of the
smaller ravines have been filled up by the busy hand of cultivation.

The only road then much traveled passed along the margin of the river.
Upon the road, at the southern extremity of the bluff, was a tavern kept
by a man named Bemis, the only one of note between Albany and Fort
Edward. Good wines and long pipes, a spacious ball-room and a capital
larder, made Bemis's house a famous place of resort for sleighing
parties in winter, throughout the whole of the Saratoga valley of the
Hudson. He owned a portion of the heavy-timbered heights near him, and
from that circumstance the hill derived its name.

On the summit of the height, three fourths of a mile northwest of
Bemis's, the father of Mr. Neilson owned a clearing of a few acres when
the war broke out, and he had erected a small dwelling and a log barn
thereon. The dwelling, with large additions, is still there, but the log
barn, which was picketed and used for a fort, has long since given place
to another. Around that old mansion cluster many interesting historic
associations, and if its walls could articulate, they might tell of
heroism in action and patient endurance which the pen of history has
never yet recorded.

Upon the next page are given a group of localities about Bemis's Heights
and a miniature map of the engagements there. The picture at the top of
the page represents the mansion of Mr. Neilson, as seen from the
opposite side of the road, looking eastward. It stands upon the east
side of the highway leading to Quaker Springs, about one hundred rods
north of the road from Bemis's Heights to the watering places of
Ballston and Saratoga. It is a frame house, and the part next to the
road is modern compared with the other and smaller portion, which is the
original dwelling. The room in the old part (a sketch of which is given
in the third picture from the top) is quite large, and was occupied by
Brigadier-general Poor and Colonel Morgan as quarters at the time of the
encampments there. It was in this room that Major Ackland, the brave
commander of the British Grenadiers, who was severely wounded in the
battle of the 7th of October, was kindly received by the American
officers, and visited and nursed by his heroic wife, Lady Harriet
Ackland, of whom, and the event in question, I shall hereafter speak.
The bed of the wounded officer was beneath

* It is said that the smoke of the battle of Bennington, thirty miles
distant, was distinctly seen from Bemis's Heights. 046

Localities about Bemis's Heights.--Gates's Quarters.--Willard's
Mountain.--Condition of the Northern Army.

047

the window on the left. The door in the center opens into a small bed-
room; and this as well as every thing else about the room, is carefully
preserved in its original condition. Where the smaller poplar tree
stands was a building which General Arnold occupied; and further to the
left the small buildings are upon the spot where the fortified log barn
stood, which was at the northwest angle of the American works. In
compliment to the owner, the rude fortification was called Fort Neilson.

Between the smaller poplar tree and the house is seen Willard's
Mountain, five miles distant, on the east side of the Hudson. This
eminence commands a fine view of the valley for many miles. From its
summit a Mr. Willard and a few others, with a good spy-glass, watched
all the movements of Burgoyne, and made regular reports to General
Gates. This service was exceedingly valuable, for a fair estimate of the
number of troops, their baggage, stores, artillery, &c., was made from
his observations. His name is immortalized by a gigantic monument, which
has borne it ever since.

The second vignette from the top is a view of Gates's headquarters at
the time of the battle of the 7th of October. He first made his
headquarters at Bemis's house, but afterward removed them hither. This
house was demolished about four years ago, but, from a sketch furnished
by Mr. Neilson, I am enabled to give a correct view. The old well curb
is still there, and seems as though it might survive a generation yet.
This house stood about one hundred and fifty rods south of Fort Neilson,
and the traces of the cellar may now be seen a few yards to the left of
the Ballston road, ascending from the river.

The third vignette represents the room mentioned above. The picture at
the bottom of the page is a view from the Bemis's Heights Hotel,
representing the Champlain Canal, the Hudson River, and the hills on the
eastern side. Near the large trees on the left may be seen traces of a
redoubt which defended a floating bridge that was thrown across the
river here, and so constructed that one end could be detached at
pleasure, allowing the bridge to swing around with the current, and thus
prevent the enemy from entering upon it. The lumber for this bridge was
furnished by General Schuyler, at his own private expense, and floated
down the river from Saratoga or Schuylerville.

The map I shall have occasion to refer to when noticing the
fortifications and the battles. The halbert, represented on the left of
the picture, was plowed up in the neighborhood, and is in the possession
of Mr. Neilson. When found, it had a small British flag or cloven pennon
attached to it, which soon occupied the utilitarian and more peaceful
position of patches in the bed-quilt of a prudent housewife.

When General Gates took the command of the Northern army, (August 19,
1777) events were occurring favorable to his success. Burgoyne was at
Fort Edward, paralyzed with alarm and perplexity on account of the
failure of an expedition to Bennington--a failure, in its immediate as
well as prospective effects, extremely disastrous. The obstructions
which General Schuyler had thrown in the way on his retreat from Fort
Anne, made the march of the enemy slow and toilsome in the extreme. *
The plethora of the commissariat department was rapidly subsiding by the
delay; the supplies of the surrounding country, already heavily levied
on, were totally inadequate to the demand, and the capture of American
stores was an object called for by stern necessity. Burgoyne, therefore,
halted at Fort Edward, and sent an expedition to Bennington to seize a
large quantity of clothing and pro-

* General Schuyler felled large trees across the roads and bridle-paths
through the woods, sunk deep ditches, and destroyed all the bridges.
These evils Burgoyne was obliged to overcome and repair. With immense
toil, the obstructions were removed, and no less than forty bridges over
streams and morasses were constructed, so as to allow the passage of
artillery. It must be remembered, too, that a soldier in actual service
is not so lightly accoutered as a soldier on parade. Besides the actual
fatigue of traveling and labors, he has a heavy back-burden to hear.
Respecting this, we quote Burgoyne's own words: "It consists of a
knapsack, containing his bodily necessaries, a blanket, a haversack with
provisions, a canteen, a hatchet, and a fifth share of the general camp
equipage belonging to his tent." These articles (reckoning the
provisions to be for four days), added to his accouterments, arms, and
sixty rounds of ammunition, make a bulk totally incompatible with
combat, and a weight of about sixty pounds.

British Reverses in the Mohawk Valley.--Perplexity of Burgoyne.--
Advance of Gates to Stillwater.--Kosciusko

048

visions which the Americans had collected there. The detachment sent
thither so weakened his forces that he dared not proceed until it should
return, bringing back, as he confidently expected, ample provisions for
his army until he should enter Albany triumphant. But the New England
militia were on the alert, and they not only saved their stores and live
cattle at Bennington, but defeated and dispersed the enemy, capturing a
large number, together with arms and ammunition, then much needed by the
growing ranks of

August 16. the volunteers.

Burgoyne had hardly recovered from this shock, before a courier, guided
by a friendly Indian, came in breathless haste by the way of Saratoga
Lake and Glenn's Falls, bearing the direful news of the desertion of the
Indians, the defection of the loyalists of the Mohawk Valley, and the
complete defeat of St. Leger at Fort Schuyler. These reverses August 22.
fell like an incubus upon the spirits of his army. The Indians in his
camp, already vexed because Burgoyne's humanity had restrained their
purposes of rapine and murder, began to waver in their fidelity, and the
Canadians and timid loyalists became luke warm through very cowardice,
and deserted by hundreds.

Burgoyne was greatly perplexed. To proceed at that time would be
madness; to retreat would not only lose him a promised _order_, perhaps
a peerage, but would operate powerfully in giving friends to the
republicans. The idea of British invincibility would be dissipated, and
thousands who favored the cause of the king on account of that supposed
invincibility and the hopelessness of resistance, would join the
patriots, or would, at least, become mere _passive_ loyalists. In view
of all these difficulties, the British commander wisely resolved to
remain at Fort Edward until the panic should subside and stores should
be brought for ward from his posts on Lake George and Lake Champlain. He
was also in daily expectation of advices from General Howe or Sir Henry
Clinton, at New York, announcing a movement upon the Hudson for the
purpose of producing a diversion in favor of Burgoyne, by drawing away a
portion of the American army from the North.

These disasters of the enemy greatly inspirited the Americans, and the
Eastern militia, among whom Gates was very popular, flocked to his
standard with great alacrity. The murder of Jane M'Crea at Fort Edward
(of which I shall hereafter speak) was another powerful agency in
swelling the ranks of the patriots. Fierce indignation was aroused in
every honest heart by the highly-colored recital of that event, and
loyalists by hundreds withdrew their support from a cause which employed
such instrumentalities as savage warriors to execute its purposes.

Perceiving the disposition of Burgoyne to halt at Fort Edward, and the
difficulties that were gathering around him, General Gates advanced up
the Hudson to Stillwater, and prepared to act offensively or
defensively, as circumstances should dictate. It was at first resolved
to throw up fortifications at the place where the village of Stillwater
now is; but the narrowness of the valley and the abruptness of the bank
on the western margin of the flat at Bemis's offered a more advantageous
position, and there, by the advice of Kosciusko, who was an engineer in
the army, General Gates made his encampment and fortified it. *

* Thaddeus Kosciusko was born in Lithuania in 1736, of an ancient and
noble family. He was educated at the military school of Warsaw, and
afterward became a student in France. There he became acquainted with
Dr. Franklin, and was by him recommended to General Washington. Before
leaving Poland, he had eloped with a beautiful lady of high rank. They
were overtaken in their flight by her father, who made a violent attempt
to rescue his daughter. The young Pole had either to slay the father or
abandon the young lady. Abhorring the former act, he sheathed his sword,
and soon after obtained permission of his sovereign to leave his
country. He came to America, and presented himself to the commander-in-
chief He answered the inquiry of his excellency, "What do you seek
here?" by saying, "I come to fight as a volunteer for American
independence."

"What can you do?" asked Washington. "Try me," was Kosciusko's laconic
reply. Greatly pleased with him, Washington made him his aid. In
October, 1776, he was appointed engineer by Congress, with the rank of
colonel. In the autumn of 1777 he fortified the camp of Gates at Bemis's
Heights, and afterward superintended the construction of the works at
West Point, among the Hudson Highlands. He was greatly esteemed by the
American officers, and admitted a member of the Cincinnati Society At
the close of our Revolution he returned to Poland, and was made a major
general under Poniatowski. He commanded judiciously and fought bravely;
and when, in 1794, a new revolution broke out in Poland, he was made
generalissimo, and vested with the power of a military dictator. In
October of that year he was overpowered, wounded, and taken prisoner. In
reference to this event, Campbell, in his Pleasures of Hope, says,

"Hope for a season bade the world farewell,

And freedom shrieked when Kosciusko fell."

He was kept in prison in St. Petersburg until the death of the Empress
Catharine, when he was liberated by Paul, loaded with honors, and
offered a command in the Russian service, which he declined. The emperor
besought him to accept the proffered honor, and presented him with his
own sword. But bitterly reflecting that his country had been
annihilated, he refused to receive his sword, saying, "I no longer need
a sword, since I have no longer a country to defend." He visited the
United Stales in 1797, and received from Congress a grant of land for
his services. He returned to Switzerland toward the close of his life,
and died There October the 16th, 1817. His remains were taken to Cracow,
and at Warsaw a public funeral was made for him. At West Point, on the
Hudson, the cadets erected a monument to his memory. We have given a
drawing of the monument, and a more particular notice, on page 705, of
this volume.

Fortifications at Bemis's Heights.--Their present Appearance.--
Preparations for Battle

049

Alone: the brow of the hill toward the river a line of breast-works was
thrown up, about three fourths of a mile in extent, with a strong
battery at each extremity, and one near the center in such position as
to completely sweep the valley, and command even the hills upon the
eastern side of the river. Faint traces of these redoubts and the
connecting breast-works are still visible. At the northern extremity,
where the largest and strongest battery was erected, the mound is
leveled, but the ditch is quite deep, and may be traced many rods
westward from the brow of the hill, along the line of breast-works that
were thrown up after the first battle. But every year the plow casts in
the soil of its furrows, and ere long no vestige will remain of these
intrenchments. Within the area of the northeast redoubt, at the time of
my visit, potatoes in desecrating luxuriance were flourishing, except
upon a very small spot occupied as a burial-place for a few of the
Vanderburgh family. It really seemed sacrilegious for the vulgar vines
of the nutritious tuber to intertwine with the long grass and beautiful
wild flowers that covered the graves. The elder one of those buried
there was an active republican, and had his house burned by the enemy. A
few plain slabs with inscriptions tell who lie beneath the several
mounds, but no stone marks the grave where sleeps that venerable
patriot.

From the foot of the hill, across the flats to the river, an
intrenchment was opened, and at the extremity, on the water's edge, a
strong battery was erected, which guarded the floating bridge
constructed there, and also commanded the plain on the east side of the
river in such a manner that the enemy might have been terribly enfiladed
in case they had attempted to pass down the river or the valley.

Near where the road crossed Mill Creek, a small stream nearly half a
mile above Bemis's tavern, were a short line of breast-works and a
strong battery, which, with those mentioned above, composed all the
fortifications previous to the first battle. These being completed about
the 15th of September, and the enemy approaching, General Gates made
preparations for resistance. Brave officers and determined soldiers, in
high spirits, were gathered around him, and the latter were hourly
increasing in numbers. The counsels of General Schuyler and the known
bravery of General Arnold were at his command; and he felt confident of
victory, aided by such men as Poor, Learned, Stark, Whipple, Paterson,
Warner, Fellows,

Expedition against the Posts on Lakes George and Champlain.--March of
Burgoyne to Saratoga and Stillwater

050

Bailey, Glover, Wolcott, Bricketts, and Tenbroeck, with their full
brigades, and the bravo Virginian, Colonel Morgan, with his unerring
marksmen, supported by the regiments of Dearborn, Brooks, Cilley,
Scammel, and Hull.

Small successes about this time, important in the aggregate result,
tended materially to keep up the spirits of the American troops, and
made them eager to encounter the main body of the enemy. General
Lincoln, with about two thousand militia, got in the rear of Burgoyne,
and, by dividing his force into detachments, operated with much effect.
One detachment, under Colonel Brown, surprised the British posts on Lake
George, captured a vessel containing provisions for the enemy, took
possession of Mount Hope and Mount Defiance, and, appearing before
Ticonderoga, demanded its surrender. But the walls and garrison were too
strong, and, after a cannonade of four days, the siege was abandoned,
and all the troops prepared to unite and attack the enemy in the rear.
The threatening aspect of this movement of Lincoln at the beginning, and
the probability of having his supplies from the lakes cut off, induced
Burgoyne, in self-defense, to move forward and execute promptly what he
intended to do. Having, by great diligence, brought forward provisions
for about thirty days, he advanced along the left bank of the Hudson to
the mouth of the Batten Kill, where he encamped preparatory to crossing
the river. * His officers were somewhat divided in opinion in regard to
the expediency of further attempts to reach Albany; and it had been
plainly intimated to Burgoyne that it might be greater wisdom to fall
back from Fort Edward, rather than advance, for it was evident that
perils of no ordinary kind were gathering around the invading army.

Unwilling to act in opposition to the _expressed_ opinions of his
officers, Burgoyne avoided any intimations of judgment on their part by
omitting to consult them at all; and he assumed the responsibility of
crossing the Hudson, resting for his defense, if adversity should ensue,
upon the peremptory nature of his instructions. ** He constructed a
bridge of boats, and on the 13th and 14th of September passed his whole
army over, and encamped on the heights and plains of Saratoga, at the
mouth of the Fish Creek, where Schuylerville now is, and within about
five miles of the American works below. On the 15th, having succeeded in
getting his artillery, baggage, and stores across the river, Burgoyne
moved down as far as Do-ve-gat (now Coveville), where he halted until
the morning of the 17th, for the purpose of repairing the roads and
bridges before him, when he advanced as far as Swords's house and
encamped for the night. On the morning of the 18th he moved down as far
as the place now called Wilbur's Basin, within two miles of the American
camp, and here he made preparations for battle. His chief officers were
Major-general Phillips, of the artillery, who had performed signal
service in Germany; Brigadier-general Fraser, commander of the
grenadiers and light infantry; Brigadiers Hamilton and Powell; and the
Brunswick major general, Baron de Riedesel, with his brigadiers, Specht
and Gall, Earl Balcarras, Colonel Breyman, Major Ackland, Lieutenant
Kingston, and others of minor grade, were men of tried courage, and
ardently attached to their general and the service.

When the defeat of Burgoyne, a few days later, became known in England,
the crossing of the Hudson River and his persistence in pressing toward
Albany, with the American army in front and a wilderness filling with
armed republicans in his rear, formed the chief theme for the
vituperative assaults of his enemies; and to these steps all his
subsequent misfortunes were attributed. But, as we have seen, he
retreated behind the peremptory instructions of ministers; and Botta
very justly observes, "that at that time he had not

* His place of encampment was about one hundred rods north of Lansing's
saw-mill. The farm, till within a few years, was occupied by Mr. Thomas
Rogers. Burgoyne had quite an extensive slaughter-yard there, which so
enriched the soil, that its effects are still visible on the corn crops
and other productions.--C. Neilson.

** In his dispatch to Lord George Germain, dated at Albany, October
20th, 1777, Burgoyne alludes to this fact, and says, "I did not think
myself authorized to call any men into council, where the peremptory
tenor of my orders and the season of the year admitted no alternative."-
State of the Expedition, &c., Appendix, p. lxxxiv.

Material of the American Army on Bemis's Heights.--Relative Position of
the two Armies.--Burgoyne's Plan of Attack

051

yet received any intelligence either of the strength of the army left at
New York, or the movements which Sir Henry Clinton intended to make, or
had made, up the North River toward Albany. He calculated on a powerful
co-operation on the part of that general. Such was the plan of the
ministers, and such the tenor of their peremptory instructions." *
"Whether the movement was judicious or injudicious we will not stop to
inquire, but having arranged the two armies within cannon-shot of each
other, will pass on to the consideration of an event which solved the
question by arguments far more potential than logic can command.

THE FIRST BATTLE OF STILLWATER. **

The morning of the 19th of September was clear and calm, and every thing
without

1777 was white with hoar-frost. The hostile armies, within ear-shot of
each other's _reveille_, were disposed in similar order, each extending
from the river westward over the hills. The main body of the American
army composing the right wing, which consisted chiefly of Glover's,
Nixon's, and Patterson's brigades, was under the immediate command of
General Gates, and occupied the hills near the river and the narrow
flats below them. The left wing, composed of the brigade of General
Poor, consisting of Cilley's, Scammel's, and Hale's regiments, of New
Hampshire; Van Courtlandt's and Henry Livingston's, of New York: Latimer
and Cook's Connecticut militia; the corps of riflemen under Morgan, and
infantry under Dearborn, was posted on the heights about three fourths
of a mile from the river, and commanded by General Arnold. *** The
center, on the elevated plain near the residence of Mr. Neilson, was
composed of Learned's brigade, with Bailey's, Wesson's, and Jackson's
regiments, of Massachusetts, and James Livingston's, of New York.

The left wing of the British army, which included the immense train of
artillery under Generals Phillips and Riedesel, rested upon the flats
upon the bank of the river. The center and the right wing, composed
principally of Hessians, **** extended westward upon the hills, and were
commanded by Burgoyne in person, covered by General Fraser and Colonel
Breyman, with the grenadiers and light infantry. The front and flanks
were covered by the Indians, Canadians, and loyalists, who still
remained in the camp.

General Gates resolved to maintain a defensive position, and await the
approach of Burgoyne, who, on the contrary, had made every preparation
for advancing. Phillips and Reidesel were to march with the artillery
along the road on the margin of the river. The Canadians and Indians in
front were to attack the central outposts of the Americans, while
Burgoyne and Fraser, with the grenadiers and infantry, in separate
bodies, and strongly flanked by Indians, were to make a circuitous route
through the woods back of the river hills, form a junction, and fall
upon the rear of the American camp. It was arranged that three minute-
guns should be fired when Burgoyne and Fraser should join their forces,
as a signal for the artillery to make an attack upon the American front
and right, force their way through the lines, and scatter them in
confusion.

At an early hour the American pickets observed great activity in the
British camp; the glitter of bayonets and sabers and the flashing of
scarlet uniforms were distinctly seen through

* Otis's Botta, vol. ii.. p. 9.

** The conflicts at this point are known by the several titles Bemis's
Heights, Stillwater, and Saratoga, from the fact that the battles
occurred upon Bemis's Heights, in the town of Stillwater, and county of
Saratoga.

*** These were the same troops which formed the left wing of the army
when encamped at the mouth of the Mohawk. They were stationed at
Loudon's ferry, five miles from the mouth of the river, and there Arnold
took the command after his return from Fort Schuyler.

**** The Hessians were some of the German soldiers, hired by Great
Britain of their masters, petty German princes, at a stipulated sum per
head, to come to America and butcher her children. The Landgrave of
Hesse-Cassel furnished the larger number, and from that circumstance all
of the Germans received the general appellation of Hessians. I have
given a minute account of them, and of the debates in Parliament which
the infamous bill providing for the hiring of these mercenaries
produced, on page 589, of this volume.

Approach of the two Armies.--Engagement between the Advance Corps.---
Maneuvers of Arnold and Fraser

052

the vistas of the forest as the troops of the enemy marched and
countermarched to form the various lines for battle. These movements
were constantly reported to General Gates, yet he issued no orders and
evinced no disposition to fight. About ten o'clock it was clearly
perceived that the whole of the enemy's force was in motion, and
separated into three divisions. Phillips and Reidesel, with the
artillery, commenced marching slowly down the road along the river;
Burgoyne, with the center division, followed the course of the stream,
now forming Wilbur's Basin, westward; and Fraser and Breyman commenced a
circuitous route along a new road partially opened from the basin, and
intersecting the road from Bemis's shout two and a half miles north of
the American lines.

Arnold was fully apprised of all this, and became as impatient as a
hound in the leash. His opinion, earnestly and repeatedly expressed to
the commander during the morning, that a detachment should be sent out
to make an attack, was at length heeded. About noon, Colonel Morgan with
his light-horse, and Major Dearborn with his infantry, were detached
from Arnold's division, and, marching out, made a vigorous attack upon
the Canadians and Indians who swarmed upon the hills. They met at the
middle ravine, south of Freeman's cottage. * The enemy was repulsed; but
so furious was Morgan's charge, that his men became scattered in the
woods, and a re-enforcement of loyalists under Major Forbes soon drove
the Americans back. Captain Van Swearingen and Lieutenant Morris, with
twenty privates, fell into the hands of the British. For a moment, on
finding himself almost alone, Morgan felt that his corps was ruined; but
his loud signal-whistle soon gathered his brave followers around him,
and the charge was renewed. Dearborn seconded him, and Cilley and
Scammel hastened to their support. The contest was quite equal, and both
parties at length retired within their respective lines.

About the same time a party of Canadians, savages, and loyalists were
detached through the skirt of the woods along the margin of the flats
near the river. They were met by the American pickets on a flat piece of
ground near Mill Creek, and a smart skirmish ensued. The enemy was much
cut up and broken, and finally fled, leaving thirteen dead on the field
and thirty-five taken prisoners. In the mean while, Burgoyne and Fraser
were making rapid movements for the purpose of falling upon the
Americans in front and on the left flank. The center division marched
through some partial clearings to Freeman's farm, ** while Fraser,
having reached a high point about one hundred and fifty rods north of
the "cottage," moved rapidly southward for the purpose of turning the
left flank of the Americans. Arnold, at the same time, made a similar
attempt upon Fraser. He called upon Gates for a re-enforcement from the
right wing, but the commander deemed it prudent not to weaken it, for
the left of Burgoyne's army was then within half a mile of his lines,
and spreading out upon the heights.

Arnold resolved to do what he could with those under his command, which
consisted of General Learned's brigade and the New York troops. With
these he attempted to turn the enemy's right, and, if possible, cut off
the detachment of Fraser from the main army. So dense was the forest and
so uneven was the ground, that neither party fairly comprehended the
movements of the other, or knew that each was attempting the same
maneuver. They met suddenly and unexpectedly upon the level ground near
Mill Creek, or Middle Ravine, about sixty yards west of Freeman's
cottage, and at once an action, warm and destructive, began. Arnold led
the van of his men, and fell upon the foe with the fury and impetuosity
of a tiger. By voice and action he encouraged his troops; but the
overwhelming numbers of the enemy for a time repulsed them. By a quick
movement, Fraser attacked the left flank of the right wing of the
American army; but fearing that Arnold (who had

* The attention of the reader is called to the small map or plan of the
engagement, upon page 46, while perusing the notices of the battle.

** Freeman's farm, as it was called, was a small cultivated clearing,
about half a mile east of the present road leading to Quaker Springs.
The farm was an oblong clearing in front of the cottage, about sixty
rods in length from east to west, skirted by thick woods, and sloping
south.-Neilson, p. 141.

Approach of a British Re-enforcement under Phillips.--View of the
Battle-ground.--A Lull in the Battle

053

rallied his troops, and was re-enforced by four regiments under
Lieutenant-colonels Brooks, Cilley, and Scammel, and Majors Dearborn and
Hull) might cut the British lines and separate the two wings, he brought
up the twenty-fourth regiment, some light infantry, and Breyman's
riflemen, to strengthen the point of attack. The Americans made such a
vigorous resistance, that the British began to give way and fall into
confusion; but General Phillips, who, from his position below the
heights, heard the din of conflict on the right wing of his army,
hurried over the hills, through the thick woods, with fresh troops and
part of the artillery under Captain Jones, and appeared upon the ground
at the very moment when victory seemed within the grasp of the
Americans. *

For an hour the republicans had disputed the ground inch by inch, but
the crushing force of superior numbers pressed them back to their lines.

It was now about three o'clock. The contest suddenly ceased, but it was
only the lull which precedes a more furious burst of the tempest. Each
army took breath, and gathered up new energies for a more desperate
conflict. They were beyond musket-shot of each other, and separated by a
thick wood and a narrow clearing. Each was upon a gentle hill, one
sloping toward the south, the other toward the north. The Americans were
sheltered by the intervening wood; the British were within an open pine
forest. The Americans stood

* This view is taken from near the house of Mr. Neilson, looking
northwest. In the foreground, on the right, are seen the remains of the
intrenchments which here crossed the road from Fort Neilson, the
fortified log barn. The light field in the distance, toward the right of
the picture, with a small house within it, is the old clearing called
"Freeman's farm." On the rising ground over the tree upon the slope,
near the center of the foreground, is the place where Fraser wheeled
southward to turn the right flank of the Americans. On the level ground,
near the small trees on the right of the large tree upon the slope, is
the place where Arnold and Fraser met and fought. On the high middle
ground beyond the woods, toward the left, where several small houses are
seen, the British formed their line for the second battle on the 7th of
October. The detachments under Poor, Learned, and Morgan, which marched
to the attack on that day, diverged from near the point seen in the
foreground on the right, and marched down the slope by the sheep, across
the flat. The brigade of Learned passed on where are seen the dark trees
on the left. Morgan kept further to the extreme left, and Poor made a
direct line across the level ground and up the hill in the direction
marked by the four slender trees by the fence in the center of the
picture. The range of mountains in the extreme distance borders the
eastern shore of Lake George. The highest peak in the center is Buck
Mountain, and that upon the extreme left is French Mountain, at the foot
of which are the remains of Forts George and William Henry, at the head
of Lake George.

Renewal of the Battle.--Loss sustained by both Armies.--The number and
the particular Troops engaged.

054

in determined silence, and heard distinctly the voices of the officers
upon the opposite hill as they gave their orders along the lines.

Again the enemy made the first hostile movement, and from a powerful
battery opened a terrible fire, but without effect. To this the
Americans made no reply. Burgoyne then ordered the woods to be cleared
by the bayonet, and soon, across the open field, column after column of
infantry steadily advanced toward the patriot lines. The Americans kept
close within their intrenchments until the enemy fired a volley and
pressed onward to the charge, when they sprang upon their assailants
with a force that drove them far back across the clearing. Like the
ebbing and flowing of the tide, the contending armies alternately
advanced and retreated, and for more than three hours the conflict was
severe and the result doubtful. And it was not until the sun went down
and darkness came upon them, that the warriors ceased their horrid
strife. Even amid the gloom of evening there were furious contentions.
Just at dusk, Lieutenant-colonel Marshall, with the tenth Massachusetts
regiment, encountered some British grenadiers and infantry on a rise of
ground a little west of Freeman's cottage, and a brisk but short action
ensued. * The commander of the enemy was killed, and the troops fled in
confusion. Lieutenant-colonel Brooks, of the eighth Massachusetts
regiment, remained upon the field until eleven o'clock at night, and in
the course of the evening he had a skirmish on the extreme left with
some of Breyman's riflemen, whom he knew as such only by the brass
match-cases upon their breasts. He was the last to leave the field of
action. The conflict at length ended. The Americans retired within their
lines, and the British rested on their arms all night upon the field of
battle. **

The loss of the Americans was, officers included, sixty-four killed, two
hundred and seventeen wounded, and thirty-eight missing; in all, three
hundred and nineteen. *** The British lost, in killed, wounded, and
prisoners, "rather more than less than five hundred." **** Both parties
claimed the honor of victory. The British, it is true, remained masters,
or, at least, possessors, of the field, but this was not their ultimate
object. It was to _advance_, and that they failed to do; while the
Americans were intent only upon maintaining their ground, and this they
accomplished. The advantage, therefore, was certainly on the side of the
republicans.

Very few battles have been marked by more determined bravery and patient
endurance on both sides than this. Phillips and Riedesel, who had served
in the wars in Flanders and other parts of Europe, said they never knew
so long and hot a fire; and Burgoyne, in his defense before Parliament,
remarked, "few actions have been characterized by more obstinacy in
attack or defense." The number of Americans engaged in the action was
about two thousand five hundred, and of the British about three
thousand. The whole British army in camp and on the field numbered about
five thousand, and that of the American about seven thousand.

Although the aggregate number of killed on both sides did not exceed one
hundred and fifty, the slaughter and maiming were dreadful in particular
instances. Major Jones, of the British army, commanded a battery, and
fell, while at his post, during the swaying to and fro of the armies
across the clearing, toward evening, when several of the cannons were
taken and retaken a number of times. Thirty-six out of forty-eight of
his artillery-men were killed or wounded. Lieutenant Hadden was the only
officer unhurt, and he had his cap shot from his head by a musket-ball
while spiking the cannon. The sixty-second regiment *v

* At the urgent solicitation of Arnold, Gates sent out this feeble re-
enforcement, which was all that was detached from the right wing during
the action. Had fresh troops been supplied to support the left wing, no
doubt the Americans would have gained a decided victory.

** See Gordon, Ramsay, Botta, Marshall, Sparks, Pictorial History of the
Reign of George III., Stedman, Burgoyne's State of the Expedition,
Thatcher, Neilson, &c.

*** Report to the Board of War.

**** Lieutenant-colonel Kingston, the adjutant general, before a
committee of Parliament.

*v The particular troops engaged in this action were, of the British,
the ninth, twenty-first, sixty-second, and twentieth of Hamilton's
brigade; the twenty-fourth, belonging to Fraser's brigade; Breyman's
riflemen;

a corps of grenadiers; a part of the artillery, and a motley swarm of
Indians and loyalists. The American troops in action were those under
Morgan and Dearborn; the first, second, and third New Hampshire
regiments; the eighth, ninth, and tenth Massachusetts regiments; the
second and third of New York, and a Connecticut regiment of militia.

Baroness Reidesel's Notice of the Battle.--Major Hull.--Narrow Escape of
Burgoyne.--Arnold, and the Testimony of History

055

of Hamilton's brigade, which consisted of six hundred when it left
Canada, was so cut in pieces, that only sixty men and five officers were
left capable of duty. The commander, Colonel Anstruther, and Major
Harnage, were both wounded.

The Baroness Riedesel, wife of General Riedesel, who accompanied her
husband through this whole campaign, wrote an admirable narrative of the
various events connected there with. In relation to the battle of the
19th of September, she says, "An affair happened, which, though it
turned out to our advantage, yet obliged us to halt at a place called
Freeman's farm. I was an eye-witness to the whole affair, and, as my
husband was engaged in it, I was full of anxiety, and trembled at every
shot I heard. I saw a great number of the wounded, and, what added to
the distress of the scene, three of them were brought into the house in
which I took shelter. One was a Major Harnage, of the sixty-second
regiment, the husband of a lady of my acquaintance; another was a
lieutenant, married to a lady with whom I had the honor to be on terms
of intimacy; and the third was an officer by the name of Young."

More than one half of an American detachment under Major Hull, *
consisting of two hundred men, was killed or wounded. Some of the
Americans ascended high trees, and from their concealed perches picked
off the British officers in detail. Several were killed by the bullets
of these sure marksmen. Burgoyne himself came very near being made a
victim to this mode of warfare. A bullet, intended for him, shattered
the arm of Captain Green, aid-de-camp to General Phillips, who at that
moment was handing a letter to Burgoyne. The captain fell from his
horse. In the confusion of the smoke and noise, it was supposed to be
Burgoyne, and such was the belief, for some hours, in the American camp.
Among the Americans who were killed in the battle were Colonels Adams
and Colburn, valuable officers. But it is unpleasant and unprofitable to
ponder upon the painful details of a battle, and we will pass on to the
consideration of subsequent events.

Let us pause a moment, however, and render justice to as brave a soldier
as ever drew blade for freedom. Although in after years he was recreant
to the high and sacred responsibilities that rested upon him, and
committed an act deserving the execrations of all good men, strict
justice demands a fair acknowledgment of his brave deeds. I mean
Benedict Arnold

The testimony of historians is in conflict respecting the part which
Arnold performed in the battle just noticed; and prejudice and evident
falsehood have denied him the honor of being personally engaged in it.
Gordon says, "Arnold's division was out in the action, but he himself
did not head them; he remained in the camp the whole time." General
Wilkinson, the adjutant general of Gates at that time, says in his
_Memoirs_ that "no general officer was on the field of battle during the
day," and intimates that he himself chiefly conducted affairs. He
further says, that when, toward evening, Gates and Arnold were together
in front of the camp, Major Lewis ** came in from the scene of action,
and announced that its progress was undecisive. Arnold immediately
exclaimed, "I will soon put an end to it," and set off in a full gallop
from the camp. Gates dispatched an officer after him, and ordered him
back. Botta, who was acquainted with many of the foreign officers who
served in this war, and whose sources of correct information were very
ample, observes,

* He was a major general in our war with Great Britain in 1812. He
surrendered his whole army, with all the forts and garrisons in the
neighborhood-of Detroit, to General Brock on the 16th of August of that
year. His wife, Sarah Hull, to whom he had been married but a few weeks
when the battle of Stillwater occurred, determined to share the fortunes
and perils of her husband, was in the camp, and was active among those
American women who extended comfort and kind attentions to the ladies of
the British army after the surrender of Burgoyne. Because of his
surrender at Detroit, General Hull was tried for cowardice, treason,
&c., and condemned to be shot; but, in consideration of his
Revolutionary services and his age, he was pardoned He lived to see his
character vindicated, and died in 1825. His wife died the following
year.

** Morgan Lewis, afterward governor of the state of New York.

Colonel Varick's Letter respecting Arnold.--General Gates's Treatment of
Arnold.--Rupture between them

056

"Arnold exhibited upon this occasion all the impetuosity of his courage;
he encouraged his men by voice and example." Stedman, a British officer
who served under Cornwallis here, says, in his "History of the American
War,"

"The enemy were led to the battle by General Arnold, who distinguished
himself in an extraordinary manner." Allen, in his Biographical
Dictionary, says, "In the battle near Stillwater, September the 19th, he
conducted himself with his usual intrepidity, being engaged incessantly
for four hours." M'Farlane, ' in the Pictorial History of England, says,
"Gates's detachment, being re-enforced and led on by Arnold, fell upon
Burgoyne and the right wing." Again: "Arnold behaved with extraordinary
gallantry, but he could make an impression nowhere." Again: "Every time
that Arnold was beaten back, Gates sent him more men from the star
redoubt." The well-founded traditions of the vicinity support the
position that Arnold was actively engaged in the conflict, and a
knowledge of the locality is sufficient to cause a doubt of the
correctness of Wilkinson's statement.

Finally, Colonel Yarick, writing from camp to General Schuyler, three
days after the action, said, "He [Gates] seems to be piqued that
Arnold's division had the honor of beating the enemy on the 19th. This I
am certain of, that Arnold has all the credit of the action. And this I
further know, that Gates asked where the troops were going when
Scammel's battalion marched out, and, upon being told, he declared no
more troops should go; he would not suffer the camp to be exposed. Had
Gates complied with Arnold's repeated desires, he would have obtained a
general and complete victory over the enemy. But it is evident to me he
never intended to fight Burgoyne, till Arnold urged, begged, and
entreated him to do it." In another letter which he wrote to Schuyler,
about a month afterward, from Albany, Colonel Yarick observed, "During
Burgoyne's stay here, he gave Arnold great credit for his bravery and
military abilities, especially in the action of the 19th, whenever he
spoke of him, and once in the presence of Gates."

Under ordinary circumstances, the statements of General Wilkinson, he
being adjutant general at that time, and presumed to be cognizant of all
the events of the battle, ought to be received as semi-official; but in
this case they must be taken with great allowance. Gates was evidently
jealous of Arnold's well-earned reputation and growing popularity with
the army; and Wilkinson, who was his favorite, and seemed ever ready to
pander to his commander's vanity, caused, by his officious interference
at that very time, a serious misunderstanding between the two generals,
which resulted in an open rupture. In the first place, he caused a part
of Arnold's division to be withdrawn without his knowledge, and he was
put in the ridiculous light of presuming to give orders which were
contravened by the general orders of the commander-in-chief. Wilkinson
also insisted on the return of a part of Arnold's division (Morgan's
corps) being made directly to him, and Gates sustained the unjust demand
in general orders. And then, to crown his injustice toward a brave
officer, Gates, in his communication to Congress respecting the battle,
said nothing of Arnold or his division, but merely observed that "the
action was fought by detachments from the army." This was ungenerous,
not only to Arnold, but to the troops under his command, and he justly
complained of the neglect when it became known. Harsh words passed
between the two officers, and Gates even told Arnold that he thought him
of little consequence in the army, that when Lincoln arrived he should
take away his command, and that he would give him a pass to leave the
camp as soon as he pleased. *

Under the excitement of his feelings, Arnold demanded a pass for himself
and suite to join General Washington. The pass was granted, but in his
cooler moments he saw how injurious it might be to the cause, and how
hazardous to his reputation, if he should voluntarily leave the army
when another battle was hourly expected. He remained, but without any
employment in the camp, for Gates put his threat into execution, took
command of Arnold's division himself, and, on the arrival of General
Lincoln, on the 29th, placed him over the right wing.

* Sparks's Life of Arnold.

Condition of the Armies after the Battle.--Burgoyne's Encampment.--
Poverty of the American Commissariat

057

The morning of the 20th of September was cloudy, dull, and cheerless,
and with the gloomy aspect of nature the spirits of the British army
sympathized. The combatants had slumbered upon the field during the
night, and at dawn, seeing no disposition on the part of the Americans
to renew the conflict, they retired to their camp on the river hills,
and upon the flats at the mouth of the creek, now Wilbur's Basin.

Burgoyne's Encampment on the West Bank of the Hudson, September 20,
1777. From a print published in London, 1779.

Burgoyne was surprised and mortified at the hold and successful
resistance of the Americans, and saw clearly that it would be useless to
attempt to carry the works by storm, or in any other way to push forward
toward Albany. He resolved to strengthen his position, endeavor to
communicate with Howe and Clinton at New York, and effect by their co-
operation what his own unaided troops could not accomplish. Had he been
aware of the true condition of the Americans on the morning after the
battle, he might easily have won a victory, for the soldiers composing
the left wing, which sustained the conflict, had only a single round of
cartridges left. Nor was the magazine in a condition to supply them, for
such was the difficulty of procuring ammunition at that time, that the
army had a very meager quantity when the conflict began the day
previous, and now there were not in the magazine forty rounds to each
man in the service. At no time was there more than three days'
provisions in the camp, and on the day of action there was no flour. A
supply arrived on the 20th, and the disheartening contingency of short
allowance to the weary soldiers was thus prevented. General Gates alone
was privy to this deplorable deficiency, and it was not until after a
supply of powder and window-leads for bullets was received from Albany
that he made the fact known, and thus gave a plausible reason for not
complying with Arnold's urgent request to commence the battle early
again the next morning.

Both parties now wrought diligently in strengthening their respective
positions. The Americans extended and completed their line of breast-
works from the northeastern angle on the river hills, * westward about
three fourths of a mile, to the heights, a few rods north

* See the small map on page 46.

Fortifications of both Camps.--Junction of Lincoln with the Army at
Bemis's.--Relative Position of the Armies

058

of the dwelling of Mr. Neilson. From this point they were extended south
and southwest to a large ravine, now on the south side of the road
leading to Saratoga Springs. At the northwest angle, near Mr. Neilson's,
stood the log barn before alluded to. This was strengthened by a double
tier of logs on three sides. Strong batteries, in circular form,
extended about one hundred and fifty feet south. The whole was encircled
by a deep trench and a row of strong palisades. The area within was
about half an acre. When completed, it formed quite a strong bulwark,
and was named Fort Neilson.

About fifty rods south of the fort was a strong battery; and in the
rear, near the center of the encampment, stood the magazine, made bomb-
proof. The front of the camp was covered by a deep ravine skirted by a
dense forest, running nearly parallel with the lines, from the river
hills westward. For some distance west of the fort, large trees were
felled, and presented a strong _abatis_ toward the enemy. *

Burgoyne was equally busy in strengthening his position. His camp was
pitched within cannon-shot of the American lines. Across the plain to
the river hills a line of intrenchments, with batteries, was thrown up,
crossing the north ravine not far from its junction with the Middle
Ravine or Mill Creek. The intrenchments extended northward on the west
side of Freeman's farm. The Hessian camp was pitched upon an eminence
about half a mile northwest of Freeman's farm, where a strong redoubt
was reared, and a line of intrenchments of a horse-shoe form was thrown
up. Intrenchments were also made along the hills fronting the river; and
four redoubts, upon four hills or huge knolls, were erected, two above
and two below Wilbur's Basin. A short line of intrenchments, with a
battery, extended across the flats to the river, and covered their
magazine and hospital in the rear. These composed the principal defenses
of the enemy. In many places these works may still be traced, especially
by mounds and shallow ditches in the woods.

As soon as the works were completed, General Gates moved his quarters
from Bemis's house to the one delineated in the second picture from the
top, among the group of localities on page 46. The house belonged to
Captain Ephraim Woodworth. A barn, which stood about fifteen rods east
of the house, was used for a hospital.

September, 1777 General Lincoln, with two thousand New England troops,
joined the main army on the 29th. Gates at once gave up the right wing
to him, and assumed the command of the left, which was composed of two
brigades under Generals Poor and Learned, Colonel Morgan's rifle corps,
and a part of the fresh New England militia. Morgan occupied the heights
immediately south of the fort; Learned's brigade the plain on the east,
and General Poor's brigade the heights south of Morgan, between him and
Gates's headquarters. ** In fact, the position of the American army was
about the same as at the time of the battle of the 19th. Burgoyne
disposed his troops to the best advantage. The Hessians, under Colonel
Breyman, occupied a height on the extreme right, and formed a flank
defense rather than a wing of the main army. The light infantry, under
Earl Balcarras, with the choicest portion of Fraser's corps, flanked on
the left by the grenadiers and Hamilton's brigade, occupied the vicinity
of Freeman's farm; the remainder of the army, including the artillery
under Phillips and Beidesel, occupied the plain and the high ground
north of Wilbur's Basin; and the Hessians of Hanau, the forty-seventh
regiment, and some loyalists, were situated upon the flats near the
river, for the protection of the bateaux, hospital, and magazine. Thus
in parallel lines to each other, and within cannon-shot, the two armies
lay in menacing attitude from the 20th of September until the 7th of
October. Each exercised the utmost vigilance, expecting the other to
fall upon them in full power, or entangle them by strategy. There were
constant skirmishes between small detachments, sometimes foraging
parties, and at others a few pickets; and not a night passed without the
per-

* Abatis is a French word signifying trees cut down. It is a phrase used
in fortifications; and an abatis which is composed of trees felled, so
as to present their branches to the enemy, is frequently found in woody
country one of the most available and efficient kinds of defense.

** Neilson, p. 15, 35

Effect of the Battle on the People.--Diminution of Burgoyne's Army, and
Increase of Gates's.--Condition of the Enemy

059

formance of some daring exploit, either for the sake of adventure, or to
annoy each other. The Americans were constantly gaining strength, and
their superiority of numbers enabled them to form expeditions to harass
the British, without weakening their lines by fatigue or endangering the
safety of the camp.

The success of the Americans in the late battle, and the rapid increment
of the army, almost annihilated loyalty in the neighborhood, and made
every republican, whether soldier or citizen, bold and adventurous. At
one time about twenty young Americans, farmers residing in the vicinity,
not belonging to the camp, and intent on having a frolic, resolved to
capture an advance picket-guard of the enemy, stationed on the north
bank of the middle ravine. They selected their officers, and each being
armed with a fowling-piece and plenty of powder and shot, they marched
silently through the woods in the evening, until they got within a few
yards of the picket. The captain of the party then gave a tremendous
blast upon an old horse-trumpet whieh he carried, and, with yells and
the noise of a whole regiment, they rushed through the bushes upon the
frightened enemy. No time was given for the sentinel's hail, for,
simultaneously with their furious onset, the captain of the frolickers
cried out lustily, "Ground your arms, or you are all dead men!"
Supposing half the American army was upon them, the astonished pickets
obeyed, and thirty British soldiers were taken by the jolly young
farmers into the republican camp with all the parade of regular
prisoners of war. This was one of many similar instances, and thus the
British camp was kept in a state of constant alarm. *

Burgoyne saw, with deep anxiety, the rapid increase of the American
forces, while his own were daily diminishing by desertion. Nearly one
hundred and fifty Indian warriors, from the tribes of the Oneidas,
Tuscaroras, Onondagas, and Mohawks, accepted the war-belt, partook of
the feast, and joined the republican army within three days after the
battle of the 19th. The Indians with Burgoyne were so dissatisfied with
the results of that battle, and so disappointed in their hopes of blood
and plunder, that they deserted him in large numbers in that hour of his
greatest peril. It was their hunting season, too, and this was another
strong inducement to return to their wives and children, to keep
starvation from their wigwams. The Canadians and loyalists were not much
more faithful. **

Burgoyne used every means in his power to transmit intelligence of his
situation to Howe, and to implore his assistance either by co-operation
or a diversion in his favor. But the American pickets, vigilant and
wary, were planted in all directions; and it was by the merest chance
that the British commander received a letter from Sir Henry Clinton, at
New York, *** written in cipher on the 10th, informing him that he
should make a diversion in his favor by attacking Forts Clinton and
Montgomery, in the Hudson Highlands, on the 20th. This information
raised the hopes of Burgoyne, for he supposed that the attack at those
points would draw off large detachments from Gates for their defense,
and render the belligerent forces at Stillwater nearly equal in numbers.
He immediately dispatched two officers in disguise, and several other
persons in different directions, to Sir Henry Clinton, with a letter,
urging him to make the diversion without fail, and saying that he had
provisions enough to hold out until the 12th of October.

Time rolled on, and Burgoyne heard nothing further from Clinton. His
provisions began to fail, and on the 1st of October he was obliged to
put his troops on short allowance. Not a man or a biscuit was allowed to
reach him from any quarter. The militia were flocking into Gates's camp
from all directions, and perils of every kind were weaving their web
around the proud Briton. At last he was reduced to the alternative to
fight or fly.

* "I do not believe either officer or soldier ever slept during that
interval without his clothes, or that any general officer or commander
of a regiment passed a single night without being upon his legs
occasionally at different hours, and constantly an hour before
daylight."-Burgoyne's "Review of the Evidence," p. 166.

** Marshall's Life of Washington.

* General Howe had left Clinton in command at New York, and was then
engaged against Washington on the Delaware, for the purpose of making a
conquest of Philadelphia.

Hostile Movements of the British.--Preparations of the Americans for
Battle.--Second Battle of Stillwater.

060

The latter was both impracticable and inglorious, and at a council of
officers it was resolved to fight.

On the morning of the 7th of October, Burgoyne, at the head of fifteen
hundred regular troops, with two twelve pounders, two howitzers, and six
six pounders, moved toward the American left, to the northern part of a
low ridge of land about three fourths of a mile northwest from the
American camp, where they formed a line in double ranks. He was seconded
by Phillips, Riedesel, and Fraser. The guard of the camp upon the high
grounds was committed to Brigadiers Hamilton and Specht, and that of the
redoubts and plain near the river to Brigadier-general Gall. This
movement was for a two-fold purpose, to cover a foraging party sent out
to supply the pressing wants of the camp, and, if the prospect was
favorable, to turn the left of the American army, and fall upon its
flank and rear. Small parties of loyalists and Indians were sent around
through by-paths, to hang upon the American rear and keep them in check.

Before this movement was known to General Gates, he had ordered out a
detachment of three hundred men under Colonel Brooks, to gain the rear
of the enemy and fall upon his outposts. While Brooks was at
headquarters, receiving his instructions, a sergeant arrived with
intelligence of the movement of the British army. The order to Colonel
Brooks was revoked, the officers in camp were summoned to their posts,
and an aid was sent out by the commander-in-chief to ascertain the exact
position and probable intentions of the enemy. He proceeded to a rise of
ground covered with woods, half a mile from Fort Neilson (near the house
of Asa Chatfield), where he discovered the British in a wheat field
cutting straw, and several officers on the top of a cabin (Joseph
Hunger's) with a spy-glass, endeavoring to ascertain the condition of
the American left. The aid returned, and had just reached headquarters
with his intelligence, when a party of Canadians, Indians, and
loyalists, who had been sent forward to scour the woods, attacked the
American pickets near the middle ravine. They were soon joined by a
detachment of grenadiers, drove the Americans before them, and pressed
forward until within musket-shot of the republican lines. For half an
hour a hot engagement ensued at the breast-work, a little south of the
fort. Morgan, with his riflemen, supported by a corps of infantry, at
length charged the assailants with such deadly effect, that they
retreated in confusion to the British line, which was forming upon a
newly-cleared field, preparatory to marching into action.

It was now two o'clock, about the same hour at which the two armies
summoned their strength for combat on the 19th of September. The
grenadiers, under Major Ackland, and the artillery, under Major
Williams, were stationed on the left, upon a gentle eminence on the
borders of a wood, and covered in front by Mill Creek or Middle Ravine.
The light infantry, under Earl Balcarras, were placed on the extreme
right, and the center was composed of British and German troops, under
Generals Phillips and Beidesel. Near the cabin of Mr. Munger, and in
advance of the right wing, General Fraser had command of a detachment of
five hundred picked men, destined to fall upon the American flank as
soon as the action in front should commence.

This design was at once perceived, and, at the suggestion of Morgan,
Gates dispatched that sagacious officer, with his rifle corps and other
troops amounting to fifteen hundred men, in a circuitous route to some
high ground on the extreme right of the enemy, thence to fall upon the
flanking party under Fraser at the same moment when an attack should be
made upon the British left. For the latter serviee the brigade of
General Poor, composed of New York and New Hampshire troops, and a part
of Learned's brigade, were detached.

About half past two the conflict began. The troops of Poor and Learned
marched steadily up the gentle slope of the eminence on which the
British grenadiers, and part of the artillery under Ackland and
Williams, were stationed, and, true to their orders not to fire until
after the first discharge of the enemy, pressed on in awful silence
toward the battalions and batteries above them. Suddenly a terrible
discharge of musket-balls and grape-shot made great havoc among the
branches of the trees over their heads, but scarcely a shot took effect
among the men. This was the signal to break the silence of our troops,
and,

Bravery of both Armies.--Quick and bold Movements of Morgan.--
Impetuosity and Bravery of Arnold.--General Fraser

061

with a loud shout, they sprang forward, delivered their fire in rapid
volleys, and opened right and left to avail themselves of the covering
of the trees on the margin of the ridge on which the artillery was
posted.

The contest now became fierce and destructive. The Americans rushed up
to the very mouths of the cannon, and amid the carriages of the heavy
field-pieces they struggled for victory. Valor of the highest order on
both sides marked the conflict, and for a time the scale seemed
equipoised. Five times one of the cannon was taken and retaken, but at
last it remained in possession of the republicans as the British fell
back. Colonel Cilley, who, during the whole contest, had fought at the
head of his troops, leaped upon the captured piece, waved his sword high
in air, dedicated the brazen engine of death to "the American cause,"
wheeled its muzzle toward the enemy, and with their own ammunition
opened its thunder upon them. It was all the work of a moment of
exultation when the enemy fell back from their vantage ground. The
effect was electrical, and seemed to give the republicans stronger
sinews and fiercer courage. The contest was long and obstinate, for the
enemy were brave and skillful. Major Ackland, who was foremost in the
conflict, was at last severely wounded, and Major Williams was taken
prisoner. Suddenly deprived of their superior officers, the grenadiers
and artillery-men fled in confusion, and left the field in possession of
the Americans.

Almost simultaneously with the attack on the British left, Morgan with
his corps rushed down the hills that skirted the flanking party of
Fraser in advance of the enemy's right, and opened upon them such a
destructive storm of well-aimed bullets, that they were driven hastily
back to their lines. Then, with the speed of the wind, Morgan wheeled
and fell upon the British right flank with such appalling force and
impetuosity, that their ranks were at once thrown into confusion. The
mode and power of attack were both unexpected to the enemy, and they
were greatly alarmed. While thus in confusion, Major Dearborn, with some
fresh troops, came up and attacked them in front. Thus assailed, they
broke and fled in terror, but were rallied by Earl Balcarras, and again
led into action. The shock on right and left shook the British center,
which was composed chiefly of Germans and Hessians, yet it stood firm.

General Arnold had watched with eager eye and excited spirit the course
of the battle thus far. Deprived of all command, he had no authority
even to _fight_, much less to _order_. Smarting under the indignity
heaped upon him by his commander; thirsting for that glory which
beckoned him to the field; burning with a patriotic desire to serve his
country, now bleeding at every pore; and stirred by the din of battle
around him, the brave soldier became fairly maddened by his emotions,
and, leaping upon his large brown horse, he started off on a full gallop
for the field of conflict. Gates immediately sent Major Armstrong *
after him to order him back. Arnold saw him approaching, and,
anticipating his errand, spurred his horse and left his pursuer far
behind, while he placed himself at the head of three regiments of
Learned's brigade, who received their former commander with loud huzzas.
He immediately led them against the British center, and, with the
desperation of a madman, rushed into the thickest of the fight, or rode
along the lines in rapid and erratic movements, brandishing his
broadsword above his head, and delivering his orders every where in
person. Armstrong kept up the chase for half an hour, but Arnold's
course was so varied and perilous that he gave it up.

The Hessians received the first assault of Arnold's troops upon the
British center with a brave resistance; but when, upon a second charge,
he dashed furiously among them at the head of his men, they broke and
fled in dismay. And now the battle became general along the whole lines.
Arnold and Morgan were the ruling spirits that controlled the storm on
the part of the Americans, and the gallant General Fraser was the
directing soul of the British troops in action. His skill and courage
were every where conspicuous. When the

* The author of the celebrated "Newburgh letters," written in the spring
of 1783. See pages 672 to 678, inclusive, of this volume.

Death of General Fraser.--Censure of Morgan.--Panic in the British
Line.--Timothy Murphy

062

lines gave way, he brought order out of confusion; when regiments began
to waver, he infused courage into them by voice and example. He was
mounted upon a splendid iron-gray gelding; and, dressed in the full
uniform of a field officer, he was a conspicuous object for the
Americans. It was evident that the fate of the battle rested upon him,
and this the keen eye and sure judgment of Morgan perceived. * In an
instant his purpose was conceived, and, calling a file of his best men
around him, he said, as he pointed toward the British right, "That
gallant officer is General Fraser. I admire and honor him, but it is
necessary he should die; victory for the enemy depends upon him. Take
your stations in that clump of bushes, and do your duty." Within five
minutes Fraser fell mortally wounded, and was carried to the camp by two
grenadiers. Just previous to being hit by the fatal bullet, the crupper
of his horse was cut by a rifle-ball, and immediately afterward another
passed through the horse's mane, a little back of his ears. The aid of
Fraser noticed this, and said, "It is evident that you are marked out
for particular aim; would it not be prudent for you to retire from this
place?" Fraser replied, "My duty forbids me to fly from danger," and the
next moment he fell. **

Morgan has been censured for this order, by those who profess to
understand the rules of war, as guilty of a highly dishonorable act; and
others, who gloat over the horrid details of the slaying of thousands of
humble rank-and-file men as deeds worthy of a shout for glory, and drop
no tear for the slaughtered ones, affect to shudder at such a cold-
blooded murder of an officer upon the battle-field. War is a monstrous
wrong and cruel injustice at all times; but if it is right to kill at
all upon the field of battle, I can perceive no greater wrong in slaying
a _general_ than a _private_. True, he wears the badge of distinction,
and the trumpet of Renown speaks his name to the world, but his life is
no dearer to himself, and wife, and children, and friends, than that of
the humblest private who obeys his commands. If Daniel Morgan was guilty
of no sin, no dishonor, in ordering his men to fall upon and slay those
under the command of Fraser, he was also guiltless of sin and dishonor
in ordering the sacrifice of their chief. Indeed, it is probable that
the sacrifice of _his_ life saved that of hundreds, for the slaughter
was stayed.

As soon as Fraser fell, a panic spread along the British line. It was
increased by the appearance, at that moment, of three thousand New York
troops, under General Tenbroeck. Burgoyne, who now took command in
person, could not keep up the sinking courage of his men. The whole line
gave way, and fled precipitately within the intrenchments of the

* Samuel Woodruff, Esq., of Connecticut, a volunteer in the army at the
time, visited Bemis's Heights some years since, and wrote an interesting
account of some of the transactions of the day. He says the importance
of the death of Fraser was suggested to Morgan by Arnold.

** The name of the rifleman who killed General Fraser was Timothy
Murphy. He took sure aim from a small tree in which he was posted, and
saw Fraser fall on the discharge of his rifle. Fraser told his friends
before he died that he saw the man who shot him, and that he was in a
tree. Murphy afterward accompanied General Sullivan in his expedition
against the Indians in Central and Western New York, where he had a
narrow escape from death. In the fall of 1778 he was stationed in
Schoharie county, where he became enamored of a young girl of sixteen,
named Margaret Feeck. He was twelve years her senior, yet his love was
reciprocated. Her parents "denied the bans," and attempted to break off
the engagement by a forcible confinement. But "love laughs at
locksmiths," and, under pretense of going after a cow some distance from
home to milk her, she stole away one evening barefooted, to meet her
lover, according to an appointment through a trusty young friend, upon
the bank of the Schoharie Creek. He was not there, and she forded the
stream, determined to go to the fort where Murphy was stationed. She
found him, however, upon the opposite side of the stream, and, mounting
his horse behind him, they entered the fort amid the cheering of the
inmates. The young females there fitted her up with comfortable attire,
and the next day they set out for Schenectady. There the soldier
purchased for his intended bride silk for a gown, and several dress-
makers soon completed it. They repaired to the house of Rev. Mr.
Johnson, where they were married, and then returned to Schoharie. The
parents became reconciled, and they lived happily together many years.
Murphy was an uneducated man, but was possessed of a strong intellect,
and had a good deal of influence over a certain class. He was an early
friend of the Hon. William C. Rouck, late governor of New York, and was
among the most active in bringing him forward in public life. He lost
his Margaret in 1807, and in 1812 married Mary Robertson. He died of a
cancer in his throat in 1818-See Simm's "History of Schoharie County."

Bravery of General Arnold.--Assault on the German Works.--Arnold
Wounded.--Gates and Sir Francis Clarke

063

camp. The tumultuous retreat was covered by Phillips and Reidesel. The
Americans pursued them up to their very intrenchments in the face of a
furious storm of grape-shot and musket-balls, and assaulted their works
vigorously without the aid of field pieces or other artillery.

The conflict was now terrible indeed, and in the midst of the flame, and
smoke, and metal hail, Arnold was conspicuous. His voice, clear as a
trumpet, animated the soldiers, and, as if ubiquitous, he seemed to be
every where amid the perils at the same moment. With a part of the
brigades of Patterson and Glover, he assaulted the works occupied by the
light infantry under Earl Balcarras, and at the point of the bayonet
drove the enemy from a strong _abatis_, through which he attempted to
force his way into the camp. He was obliged to abandon the effort, and,
dashing forward toward the right flank of the enemy, exposed to the
cross-fire of the contending armies, he met Learned's brigade advancing
to make an assault upon the British works at an opening in the _abatis_,
between Balcarras's light infantry and the German right flank defense
under Colonel Breyman. Canadians and loyalists defended this part of the
line, and were flanked by a stockade redoubt on each side.

Arnold placed himself at the head of the brigade, and moved rapidly on
to the attack He directed Colonel Brooks to assault the redoubt, while
the remainder of the brigade fell upon the front. The contest was
furious, and the enemy at length gave way, leaving Breyman and his
Germans completely exposed. At this moment Arnold galloped to the left,
and ordered the regiments of Wesson and Livingston, and Morgan's corps
of riflemen, to advance and make a general assault. At the head of
Brooks's regiment, he attacked the German works. Having found the sally-
port, he rushed within the enemy's intrenchments. The Germans, who had
seen him upon his steed in the thickest of the fight for more than two
hours, terrified at his approach, fled in dismay, delivering a volley in
their retreat, which killed Arnold's horse under him, and wounded the
general himself very severely, in the same leg which had been badly
lacerated by a musket-ball at the storming of Quebec, two years before.
Here, wounded and disabled, at the head of conquering troops led on by
his valor to the threshold of victory, Arnold was overtaken by Major
Armstrong, who delivered to him Gates's order to return to camp, fearing
he'"might do some rash thing!" He indeed did a rash thing in the eye of
military discipline. He led troops to victory without an order from his
commander. His conduct was rash indeed, compared with the stately method
of General Gates, who directed by orders from his camp what his presence
should have sanctioned. While Arnold was wielding the fierce sickle of
war without, and reaping golden sheaves for Gates's garner, the latter
(according to Wilkinson) was within his camp, more intent upon
discussing the merits of the Revolution with Sir Francis Clarke,
Burgoyne's aid-de-camp, who had been wounded and taken prisoner, and was
lying upon the commander's bed at his quarters, than upon winning a
battle, all-important to the ultimate triumph of those principles for
which he professed so warm an attachment. When one of Gates's aids came
up from the field of battle for orders, he found the general very angry
because Sir Francis would not allow the force of his arguments. He left
the room, and, calling his aid after him, asked, as they went out, "Did
you ever hear so impudent a son of a b-h?" Poor Sir Francis died that
night upon Gates's bed.

"It is a curious fact," says Sparks, "that an officer who really had not
command in the army was the leader of one of the most spirited and
important battles of the Revolution. His madness, or rashness, or
whatever it may be called, resulted most fortunately for himself. The
wound he received at the moment of rushing into the arms of danger and
of death added fresh luster to his military glory, and was a new claim
to public favor and applause. In the heat of the action, he struck an
officer on the head with his sword, an indignity and offense which might
justly have been retaliated upon the spot in the most fatal manner. The
officer forbore; and the next day, when he demanded redress, Arnold
declared his entire ignorance of the act, and expressed his regret." *

* Life of Arnold, p. 118.

Retreat of the Germans, and Close of the Battle.--Preparations of
Burgoyne to Retreat.--The Killed and Wounded

064

It was twilight when Arnold was wounded and conveyed by Major Armstrong
and a sergeant (Samuel Woodruff) from the field. The Germans who fled at
his approach, finding the assault general, threw down their arms and
retreated to the interior of the camp, leaving their commander, Colonel
Breyman, mortally wounded. The camp of Burgoyne was thus left exposed at
a strong point. He endeavored to rally the panic-stricken Germans in the
midst of the increasing darkness, but they could not be again brought
into action.1 In truth, both armies were thoroughly fatigued, and the
Americans were as loth to follow up the advantage thus presented as were
the British to repair their discomfiture. As night drew its curtain over
the scene, the conflict ended, the clangor of battle was hushed, and all
was silent except the groans of the wounded, an occasional word of
command, and the heavy tread of retiring columns, seeking for a place of
repose.

About midnight, General Lincoln, with his division, which had remained
in camp during the action, marched out to relieve those upon the field,
and to maintain the ground acquired. Perceiving this, and knowing the
advantage the Americans would possess with fresh troops and such an easy
access to his camp, Burgoyne felt the necessity of guarding against the
peril at once by changing his position. Before dawn he removed the whole
of his army, camp, and artillery about a mile north of his first
position, above Wilbur's Basin, whence he contemplated a speedy retreat
toward Fort Edward.

October, 1777 Early on the morning of the 8th the Americans took
possession of the evacuated

British camp, and skirmishes took place between detachments from the two
armies during the day, in one of which General Lincoln was badly wounded
in the leg. As the news that the British had retreated spread over the
surrounding country, a great number of men, women, and children came
flocking into camp to join in the general joy, or to perform the more
sorrowful duty of seeking for relatives or friends among the wounded and
slain.

The loss of the Americans in killed and wounded did not exceed one
hundred and fifty Arnold was the only commissioned officer who received
a wound. The British army suffered severely, and their loss in killed,
wounded, and prisoners was about seven hundred. Among the officers
killed were the gallant Fraser, Sir Francis Clarke (Burgoyne's aid-
decamp,) Colonel Breyman, and Lieutenant Reynell. The latter two died on
the field; Sir Francis Clarke was taken prisoner and carried to Gates's
quarters, where he died that night. Major Ackland, who was severely
wounded, was also taken prisoner, and, with Major Williams, was carried
into the American camp; and Fraser, who was conveyed to the house of
John Taylor, near Wilbur's Basin, expired the next morning at about
eight o'clock Burgoyne had several narrow escapes. One ball passed
through his hat and another his coat.

The house in which General Fraser died stood until 1846, upon the right
bank of the Hudson, about three miles above Bemis's Heights, near
Ensign's store, and exhibited the marks of the conflict there numerous
bullet-holes. It was used by BurgoyneOctober 8.

* Evidence of Captain Money before a committee of Parliament in the case
of Burgoyne.

** "The British and Hessian troops killed on the battle-field. It was
not uncommon, after the land was cleaned and cultivated, to see many,
sometimes twenty, human skulls piled upon stumps in the fields. I have
myself, when a boy, seen human bones thickly strewn about the ground,
which had been turned up by the plow."--C. Neilson. Burgoyne's Campaign,
p. 182. I saw, in the possession of Mr. Neilson, many relics plowed up
from the battle-field, such as cannon-balls, in the foregoing actions
were slightly covered with earth and brush grape-shot, tomahawks, arrow-
heads, buttons, knives, &c., and among them were some teeth, evidently
front ones, but double. It is supposed that they belonged to the
Hessians, for it is said that many of them had double teeth all around,
in both jaws. The annexed are drawings of two tomahawks in my
possession. No. 1 is made of iron, No 2 of stone. It is graywacke, and
is creased for the purpose of securing the handle by a string or by
green withes

Place of General Fraser's Death.--Account of his Death by the Baroness
Reidesel.--Fraser's last Request granted.

065

for quarters when he first pitched his camp there, and it was a shelter
to several ladies attached to the British army, among whom were the
Baroness Riedesel and Lady Harriet Ackland. General Fraser was laid upon
a camp-bed near the first window on the right of the door, where he
expired. I can not narrate this event and its attendant circumstances
better than by quoting the simple language of the Baroness Riedesel.

"But," she says, "severer trials awaited us, and on the 7th of October
our misfortunes began. I was at breakfast with my husband, and heard
that something was intended. On the same day I expected Generals
Burgoyne, Phillips, and Fraser to dine with us. I saw a great movement
among the troops; my husband told me it was merely a reconnoissance,
which gave me no concern, as it often happened. I walked out of the
house, and met several Indians in their war dresses, with guns in their
hands. When I asked them where they were going, they cried out, 'War!
war!' meaning that they were going to battle. This filled me with
apprehension, and I had scarcely got home before I heard reports of
cannon and musketry, which grew louder by degrees, till at last the
noise became excessive.

"About four o'clock in the afternoon, instead of the guests whom I
expected, General Fraser was brought on a litter, mortally wounded. The
table, which was already set, was instantly removed, and a bed placed in
its stead for the wounded general. I sat trembling in a corner; the
noise grew louder, and the alarm increased; the thought that my husband
might, perhaps, be brought in, wounded in the same manner, was terrible
to me, and distressed me exceedingly. General Fraser said to the
surgeon, '_Tell me if my wound is mortal; do not flatter me_.' The ball
had passed through his body, and, unhappily for the general, he had
eaten a very hearty breakfast, by which the stomach was distended, and
the ball, as the surgeon said, had passed through it. I heard him often
exclaim, with a sigh, '_O fatal ambition!_ Poor General Burgoyne! Oh! my
poor wife!' He was asked if he had any request to make, to which he
replied that, _if General Burgoyne would permit it, he should like to be
buried at six o'clock in the evening, on the top of a mountain, in a
redoubt which had been built there_. I did not know which way to turn;
all the other rooms were full of sick. Toward evening I saw my husband
coming; then I forgot all my sorrows, and thanked God that he was spared
to me. He ate in great haste, with me and his aid-de-camp, behind the
house. We had been told that we had the advantage over the enemy, but
the sorrowful faces I beheld told a different tale; and before my
husband went away, he took me aside, and said every thing was going very
badly, and that I must keep myself in readiness to leave the place, but
not to mention it to any one I made the pretense that I would move the
next morning into my new house, and had every thing packed up ready.

"I could not go to sleep, as I had General Fraser and all the other
wounded gentlemen in my room, and I was sadly afraid my children would
wake, and, by their crying, disturb the dying man in his last moments,
who often addressed me and apologized '_for the trouble he gave me_.'
About three o'clock in the morning I was told that he could not hold out
much longer; I had desired to be informed of the near approach of this
sad crisis, and I then wrapped up my children in their clothes, and went
with them into the room below About eight o'clock in the morning _he
died_.

"After he was laid out, and his corpse wrapped up in a sheet, we came
again into the room, and had this sorrowful sight before us the whole
day; and, to add to the melancholy scene, almost every moment some
officer of my acquaintance was brought in wounded. The cannonade
commenced again; a retreat was spoken of, but not the smallest motion
was made toward it. About four o'clock in the afternoon I saw the house
which had just been built for me in flames, and the enemy was now not
far off. We knew that General Burgoyne would not refuse the last request
of General Fraser, though, by his acceding to it, an unnecessary delay
was occasioned, by which the inconvenience of the army was much
increased. At six o'clock the corpse was brought out, and we saw all the
generals attend it to the mountain. The chaplain, Mr. Brudenell,
performed the funeral service, rendered

Burial of Fraser.--Humanity of the Americans.--Lady Harriet Ackland.

066

unusually solemn and awful from its being accompanied by constant peals
from the enemy's artillery. Many cannon-balls flew close by me, but I
had my eyes directed toward the mountain * where my husband was standing
amid the fire of the enemy, and of course I could not think of my own
danger."

It was just at sunset, on that calm October evening, that the corpse of
General Fraser was carried up the hill to the place of burial within the
"great redoubt." It was attended only by the members of his military
family and Mr. Brudenell, the chaplain; yet the eyes of hundreds of both
armies followed the solemn procession, while the Americans, ignorant of
its true character, kept up a constant cannonade upon the redoubt. The
chaplain, unawed by the danger to which he was exposed, as the
cannonballs that struck the hill threw the loose soil over him,
pronounced the impressive funeral service of the Church of England with
an unfaltering voice. *** The growing darkness added solemnity to the
scene.

Suddenly the irregular firing ceased, and the solemn voice of a single
cannon, at measured intervals, boomed along the valley, and awakened the
responses of the hills. It was a minute-gun fired by the Americans in
honor of the gallant dead. The moment information was given that the
gathering at the redoubt was a funeral company, fulfilling, amid
imminent perils, the last-breathed wishes of the noble Fraser, orders
were issued to withhold the cannonade with balls, and to render military
homage to the fallen brave.

How such incidents smooth the rough features of war! In contrast with
fiercer ages gone by, when human sympathy never formed a holy communion
between enemies on the battlefield, they seem to reflect the radiance of
the future, and exhibit a glimpse of the time to which a hopeful faith
directs our vision, when "nation shall not war against nation," when
"one law shall bind all people, kindreds, and tongues, and that law
shall be the law of UNIVERSAL BROTHERHOOD."

The case of Major Ackland and his heroic wife presents kindred features.
He belonged to the corps of grenadiers, and was an accomplished soldier.
His wife accompanied him to Canada in 1776, and during the whole
campaign of that year, and until his return to England after the
surrender of Burgoyne, in the autumn of 1777, endured all the hardships,
dangers, and privations of an active campaign in an enemy's country. At
Chambly, on the Sorel, she attended him in illness, in a miserable hut;
and when he was wounded in the battle of Hubbardton, Vermont, she
hastened to him at Skenesborough from Montreal, where she had been
persuaded to remain, and resolved to follow the army thereafter. Just
before crossing the Hudson, she and her husband came near losing their
lives in consequence of their tent taking fire from a candle overturned
by a pet dog. During the terrible engagement of the 7th of October she
heard all the tumult and dreadful thunder of the battle in which her
husband was engaged; and when, on the morning of the 8th, the British
fell

* The height occupied by Burgoyne on the 18th, which ran parallel with
the river till it approached General Gates's camp.

** The hill on which the "great redoubt" was erected, and where General
Fraser was buried, is about one hundred feet high, and almost directly
west from the house wherein he died. The relative situation of this
eminence to the Hudson will be best understood by looking at the view of
Burgoyne's encampment, page 57. The center hill in that drawing is the
one here represented. The grave is within the inclosure on the summit of
the hill.

*** Burgoyne's "State of the Expedition," p. 169. Lieutenant Kingston's
Evidence, p. 107.

Courage and Fortitude of Lady Harriet Ackland.--Burgoyne's Request and
Gates's Generosity.

067

Lady Harriet Ackland with the other women, was obliged to take refuge
among the dead and dying, for the tents were all struck, and hardly a
shed was left standing. Her husband was wounded, and a prisoner in the
American camp. That gallant officer was shot through both legs when Poor
and Learned's troops assaulted the grenadiers and artillery on the
British left, on the afternoon of the 7th. Wilkinson, Gates's adjutant
general, while pursuing the flying enemy when they abandoned their
battery, heard a feeble voice exclaim, "Protect me, sir, against that
boy." He turned and saw a lad with a musket, taking deliberate aim at a
wounded British officer, lying in a corner of a worm fence. Wilkinson
ordered the boy to desist, and discovered the wounded man to be Major
Ackland. He had him conveyed to the quarters of General Poor (now the
residence of Mr. Neilson), on the heights, where every attention was
paid to his wants.

When the intelligence that he was wounded and a prisoner reached his
wife, she was greatly distressed, and, by the advice of her friend, the
Baroness Riedesel, resolved to visit the American camp, and implore the
favor of a personal attendance upon her husband. On the 9th she sent a
message to Burgoyne by Lord Petersham, his aid, asking October, 1777
permission to depart. "Though I was ready to believe," says Burgoyne,
"that patience and fortitude, in a supreme degree, were to be found, as
well as every other virtue, under the most tender forms, I was
astonished at this proposal. After so long an agitation of spirits,
exhausted not only for want of rest, but absolutely want of food,
drenched in rains for twelve hours together, that a woman should be
capable of such an undertaking as delivering herself to an enemy,
probably in the night, and uncertain of what hands she might fall into,
appeared an effort above human nature. The assistance I was enabled to
give was small indeed; I had not even a cup of wine to offer her; but I
was told she had found, from some kind and fortunate hand, a little rum
and dirty water. All I could furnish to her was an open boat and a few
lines, written upon dirty wet paper, to General Gates, recommending her
to his protection." *

She set out in an open boat upon the Hudson, accompanied by Mr.
Brudenell the chaplain, Sarah Pollard her waiting-maid, and her
husband's valet, who had been severely wounded while searching for his
master upon the battle-field. It was about sunset when they started, and
a violent storm of rain and wind, which had been increasing since
morning, rendered the voyage tedious and perilous in the extreme. It was
long after dark when they reached the American outposts. The sentinel
heard their oars and hailed them. Lady Harriet returned the answer
herself. The clear, silvery tones of a woman's voice amid the darkness
filled the soldier on duty with superstitious fear, and he called a
comrade to accompany him to the river bank. The errand of the voyagers
was made known, but the faithful guard, apprehensive of treachery, would
not allow them to land until they sent for Major Dearborn. This delay
was only for a few minutes, not "seven or eight dark and cold hours," as
asserted by Burgoyne. They were invited by that officer to his quarters,
where a cup of tea and other comforts were provided; and Lady Harriet
was also comforted by the joyful tidings that her husband was safe. In
the morning she experienced parental tenderness from General Gates, who
sent her to her husband at Poor's quarters, under a suitable escort.
There she remained until he was removed to Albany. **

* The following is a copy of the note from Burgoyne to General Gates:
"Sir-Lady Harriet Ackland, a lady of the first distinction of family,
rank, and personal virtues, is under such concern on account of Major
Ackland, her husband, wounded and a prisoner in your hands, that I can
not refuse her request to commit her to your protection. Whatever
general impropriety there may be in persons in my situation and yours to
solicit favors, I can not see the uncommon perseverance in every female
grace and exaltation of character of this lady, and her very hard
fortune, without testifying that your attentions to her will lay me
under obligations. "I am, sir, your obedient servant,

"J. Burgoyne." ***

** Major Ackland reciprocated the generous treatment here extended, by
doing all in his power, while on parole in New York, to alleviate the
condition of distinguished American prisoners there. After his return to
England, he warmly defended American courage, at a dinner party, against
the aspersions of a Lieutenant Lloyd. High words passed, and a duel
ensued. The major was shot dead; Lady Harriet became a maniac, and
remained so two years. After her recovery, she married Mr Brudenell, the
chaplain already mentioned.

*** The original is among Gates's papers (voL x.), in the possession of
the New York Historical Society, from which this was copied.

Lines by Mrs. Morton.--Death of Major Ackland.--Second Marriage of Lady
Harriet.

068

When we consider the delicate form, the gentleness and refinement in
which she had been nurtured in the lap of rank and fortune, the shining
virtues of connubial constancy, heroic devotion, and unbending fortitude
stand out in bold relief in the character of Lady Harriet Ackland; and
these, in their practical development in her case, furnish romance with
a stranger page than imagination can command, and lend to poetry half
its inspiration. They gave impulse to the lyre of the accomplished lady
of Perez Morton, Esq.; and I will close this chapter with an extract
from her poem, suggested by the events above noticed.

"To gallant Gates, in war serenely brave,

The tide of fortune turns its refluent wave;

Forced by his arms, the bold invaders yield

The prize and glory of the well-fought field:

Bleeding and lost, the captured Ackland lies,

While leaden slumber seals his Fraser's eyes;

Fraser! whose deeds unfading glories claim,

Endeared by virtues and adorned by fame.

.....

'Twas now the time, when twilight's misty ray

Drops the brown curtain of retiring day,

The clouds of heaven, like midnight mountains, lower,

Waft the wild blast and dash the drizzly shower,

Through the wet path her restless footsteps roam,

To where the leader spread his spacious dome.

Low-at his feet she pours the desperate prayer-

Give my lost husband to my soothing care,

Give me in yonder solitary cave,

With duteous love, his burning wounds to lave;

On the warm pillow which his breast supplies,

Catch his faint breath and close his languid eyes,

Or in his cause my proffered life resign-

Mine were his blessings, and his pains were mine."

Present Peacefulness at Saratoga.--Curious Meteorological Phenomena.--
Departure for Schuylerville.

069

CHAPTER III.

URGOYNE and his army are at Wilbur's Basin, prepared to retreat toward
Lake Champlain, but lingering to pay a last sad tribute of affectionate
regard to the remains of the accomplished Fraser. Night has drawn its
veil over the scene, and we will turn away for a moment from the
sorrowful contemplation of war and its horrid retinue, to glance at a
picture lovely to the eye, ennobling to the spirit, and fruitful of
pleasant impressions upon the heart and memory.

Like a "dissolving view," the smoking ruins, the sodden field, the
trailing banner, the tent and breast-work and abatis, and slaughtered
hundreds, and wailing families, painted in gore by the hand of human
discord; and the roar of cannon, the rattle of musketry, the roll of
drums, the hiss and detonation of bombs, the savage yell, the loud
huzza, the shriek and groan, the prayer and curse made audible by the
boastful voice of physical strength, have all passed away with the
darkness, and a bright summer's sunlight is upon the landscape. Turning
the eye northward from the American camp, there are the same gentle
slopes, and deep ravines, and clustering hills, and flowing river; and
the heights of Saratoga in the far distance loom up as of yore. But
herds are grazing upon the lowlands, and flocks are dotting the hills;
the ring of the mower's scythe is heard in the meadow, and the merry
laugh goes up from the russet harvest-field. Art, with its strong arm of
industry, has dug another river along the plain for the use of commerce;
the forest has been reaped by agriculture, habitations of prosperity are
on every hand, and the white wing of peace is spread out over all. It is
a pleasant sight; therefore let us enjoy it, and, for a while, forget
the dark picture of the past which we have been contemplating.July 27,
1848

It was excessively warm, although a strong breeze from the south
constantly prevailed. As early as ten o'clock dark clouds began to rise
in the west, and the rumbling of distant thunder was audible. All day
long, shower after shower arose threateningly, sometimes approaching so
near that sharp claps of thunder would startle us; but they all swept
along the horizon west and north, and disappeared behind the eastern
hills. Not a drop of rain fell at Bemis's. I remarked the phenomenon,
and was told that showers never reached there from the west. Their
birth-place seems to be Saratoga Lake, about six miles westward from the
Hudson, and the summer rain-clouds which rise there generally pass up
the lake to its outlet, the Fish Creek, and, traversing that stream
until it falls into the Hudson, cross the valley and pass on to the
Green Mountains, or spend their treasures upon the intervening country.

About half past three in the afternoon a canal packet arrived from the
south, and we embarked for Schuylerville, nine miles above Bemis's. As
usual, the boat was crowded to excess, and, the sun being veiled by the
clouds in the west, the passengers covered the deck. As we passed
quietly along the base of the hills whereon was Gates's camp, crossed
Mill Creek or Middle Ravine, and approached Wilbur's Basin, it required
but small exercise of the imagination, while listening to the constant
roll of thunder beyond the heights, to realize the appalling sounds of
that strife of armies which shook those hills seventy years before, as
it fell upon the eager ears of wives, and sisters, and children whose
cherished ones were in the midst of the storm.

Proceeding northward, we approached the track of the showers, and, just
before we

Approach of a Tempest.--A violent Gale.--Misfortunes of an Irish Way-
passenger

070

reached Wilbur's Basin, a cloud, black as Erebus, and so low that it
seemed to rest upon the hill-tops, spread out above us like the wings of
a monster bird; and in its wake huge masses of vapor, wheeling like the
eddies of a whirlpool, came hastening on. The experienced boatmen
understood these portents, and covering the baggage with strong canvas,
lashed it tightly to the vessel. The breeze was still, and a hot,
suffocating calm ensued. The passengers, warned by the helmsman,
retreated into the cabin, and the windows were closed. The cattle in the
fields huddled in groups, and every bird and fowl, conscious of
impending danger, sought shelter. A flash of lightning, followed
instantly by a crashing thunder-peal, broke over the valley, and seemed
to sever the fetters of the wind. A sullen roar was heard in the
distance, like the rush of great waters; the trees of the forest began
to rock, and from the roads behind us clouds of dust arose and filled
the air. In a few moments a tornado was upon us in its strength. It
lasted only two minutes, but in its track the results of the labor of
the farmer for many days were destroyed. Hay-cocks and wheat sheaves
were scattered like thistle-down, and the standing grain was laid upon
the earth as by the tread of a giant footstep. As the wind passed by,
the rain came down gently, and continued to fall until we reached
Schuylerville.

There came on the boat at Bemis's "a poor exile from Erin," with a
patched coat and pair of thin pantaloons hanging over one arm. He was
immediately introduced to the captain by the attentive steward, when he
pleaded poverty, and declared that he hadn't a "cint in the world." He
was ordered ashore, and the boat was guided accommodatingly near the
bank. The poor fellow urged fatigue, and the weight of his brogans
testified to the truth of the appeal, if he had walked a mile. It was
cruel to doubt the honesty of that hard-favored face, and fifty cents
were soon collected for him as a peace-offering to the captain. When the
gust came on, he refused to go into the cabin. He had been in a three
days' gale upon the Atlantic, and was not to be frightened by a squall
on land. The first blast of the hurricane wheeled him several times
around upon deck, and came very near putting him ashore, willing or not
willing. While he was endeavoring to seize a support, the wind grasped
his extra pantaloons, and, in utter dismay, he saw them gyrating, like a
spread eagle, high in air, and becoming "small by degrees and
beautifully less" in the distance. The loss distressed him greatly--far
more than the helmsman thought necessary, and he ordered him to be
quiet. "Indade," said the poor fellow, "do ye think a man can be quiet
when the wind is rolling him like a bag o' feathers tied fast at one
end, and all he has in the world snatched from him by the blackguard
gale?" and he looked agonizingly toward the point where his pantaloons
had vanished.

"Precious small estate," answered the amused helmsman, "if a pair of old
pantaloons is all you have in the world. I'll give you a better pair
than that if you'll stop your noise."

"An' wid three Vickeys sowed up in the waistbands?" eagerly inquired the
exile.

His cautiousness was here at fault. He hadn't a "_cint_ in the world,"
but he had three sovereigns sewed up in the waistbands of the pantaloons
which had gone a-ballooning. As soon as the gale passed by, a child of
the Green Isle was a foot-passenger upon the tow-path, bearing sorrowful
testimony to the truth of the ethical maxim, that retributive justice is
always swift to punish offenders against truth and honesty. No doubt his
thoughts were all with his absconded sub-treasurer, and the prose of
Holmes's poem evidently engrossed his mind:

"I saw them straddling through the air,

Alas! too late to win them;

I saw them chase the clouds as if

The devil had been in them.

They were my darlings and my pride,

_They carried all my riches_:

'Farewell, farewell!' I faintly cried,

'My breeches! O my breeches!'"

It was about four o clock when we passed the burial-place of General
Fraser. It had been my intention to stop there for an hour, and visit
the last earth-home of the illustrious

Fraser's Grave--Do-ve-gat or Coveville.--Colonel Van Vechten.-- Origin
of "Whig" and "Tory".--Arrival at Schuylerville.

701

dead. But the rain fell fast, and the day was so far consumed that I was
obliged to forego the melancholy pleasure. The canal is so near the base
of the hill, that I easily made the sketch of it (printed on page 67)
from the cabin-window. Many years ago a distant relative of the general
proposed to remove his remains to Scotland, and lay them beside those of
his mother; but they are still undisturbed where his sorrowing comrades
laid them.

We reached the little settlement of Coveville at half past four, the
rain still falling gently. This was formerly Do-ve-gat, or Van Vechten's
Cove, as it was sometimes called, the place where the British tarried
from the 15th till the 17th of September, while a working party repaired
the roads and bridges in advance to Wilbur's Basin. Here was the
residence of Colonel Van Vechten, of the Saratoga militia, one of
General Gates's staff. He was a zealous Whig, and the active Tories,
whose plans his vigilance often frustrated, were greatly imbittered
against him politically, while they honored him as a brave man and good
neighbor. * Burgoyne, on his retreat to Saratoga after the battle of the
7th of October, ordered the dwellings of several Whigs to be destroyed;
and at Do-ve-gat the buildings of Colonel Van Vechten were the first to
which the torch of the invader was laid. His family fled to Albany on
the approach of Burgoyne from Fort Edward; and when they returned, late
in October, their fine estate was a perfect wreck, and they had no
shelter for their heads.

Colonel Van Vechten was at Albany, on public business, at the time of
the first battle on Bemis's Heights. He had received an order from the
Committee of Safety at that city, when Burgoyne marched from Fort
Edward, to remove every Tory or disaffected person from his vicinage
into Connecticut. This order touched his excellent heart with grief, for
many of those included in the proscription were his neighbors, and some
were his personal friends, who honestly differed from him in relation to
the momentous political questions at issue. Within six hours after
receiving the order he was in Albany, and procured its recall. The
humanity, policy, and sound wisdom of that step were soon illustrated by
the firm support which some of these disaffected ones gave to the
American cause.

We landed at Schuylerville in the midst of "sun and shower," for the sky
was clear in the west, yet the rain-drops came glittering down
profusely. The Fish Creek, which here has a succession of falls and
rapids for nearly a mile, affording fine water-power for several mills,
was brimful with the showers of the day, and poured its flood, roaring
and foaming, under the canal viaduct with such force as to shake the
solid masonry. It empties its waters into the Hudson about one hundred
rods east of the canal, at the southeast angle of Old Fort Hardy, now
among the buried things of the past. Upon the plain north of the creek,
near the old fort, the forces of Burgoyne laid down their arms; and on
every side of that pleasant village scenes of historic interest lie
scattered. The earth was too wet to invite a sunset ramble, and we
contented ourselves with viewing the beauty of the scene that spread out
before us eastward while loitering upon the upper piazza of the
Schuylerville House.

* I have already had occasion to use the terms Whig and Tory, and shall
do so often in the course of this work. They were copied by us from the
political vocabulary of Great Britain, and were first used here, to
distinguish the opposing parties in the Revolution, about 1770. The term
originated during the reign of Charles II., or about that time. Bishop
Burnet, in his History of his own Times, gives the following
explanation: "The southwest counties of Scotland have seldom corn enough
to serve them round the year: and the northern parts producing more than
they need, those in the west come in the summer to buy at Leith the
stores that come from the north; and, from a word, whiggmi, used in
driving their horses, all that drove were called whiggamores, and
shorter, whiggs. Now in that year, after the news came down of Duke
Hamilton's defeat, the ministers animated their people to rise and march
to Edinburgh, and then came up marching at the head of their parishes,
with unheard-of fury, praying and preaching all the way as they came.
The Marquis of Argyle and his party came and headed them, they being
about six thousand. This was called the Whiggamore's inroad, and ever
after that all that opposed the courts came, in contempt, to be called
Whigg; and from Scotland the word was brought into England, where it is
now one of our unhappy terms of distinction." Subsequently all whose
party bias was democratic were called Whigs. The origin of the word Tory
is not so well attested. The Irish malcontents, half robbers and half
insurgents, who harassed the English in Ireland at the time of the
massacre in 1640, were the first to whom this epithet was applied. It
was also applied to the court party as a term of reproach.-See, also,
Macaulay's History of England, i., 240.

Beautiful Evening Scene.--Commencement of Burgoyne's Retreat toward
Saratoga.--His Retreat anticipated by Gates.

072

It was, indeed, a charming scene, enhanced by the associations of the
vicinity. The face of nature was washed clean by the drenching showers;
the trees and shrubs were brilliant green; and from the clustering
knolls or loftier hills beyond the Hudson, once bristling with bayonets
or wreathed by the smoke of cannon, the evening sunlight was reflected
back by the myriad rain-drops lying upon trees, and grass, and blooming
corn. Nor was this all. Upon the dark background of the hills was Iris,

"That beautiful one,

Whose arch is refraction, whose keystone the sun;

In the hues of its grandeur sublimely it stood

O'er the river, the village, the field, and the wood."

Charles Swain.

Springing from the plain, its double arch spanned the whole ground where
British pride was humbled and American valor acknowledged. I never gazed
upon the "bow of promise" with so much interest, for thought
unconsciously bridged over the chasm of seventy buried years, and it
seemed for a moment as if the dark hours of our rebellious conflict had
returned, and that in the covenant seal before me the eye of hope read
prophetically the history of the happy present. As the sun went down and
the bow faded, the Spirit of Beauty left traces of its pencil on my
thoughts, and I felt, with "Amelia," that

"There are moments, bright moments, when the spirit receives

Whole volumes of thought on its unwritten leaves,

When the folds of the heart in a moment unclose,

Like the innermost leaves from the heart of the rose;

And thus, when the rainbow had passed from the sky,

The thoughts it awoke were too deep to pass by;

It left my full soul like the wings of a dove,

All flutt'ring with pleasure, and flutt'ring with love."

In the evening I visited the son of Colonel Van Vechten just named, a
man of three score and ten years. His memory is unclouded, and extends
back to the closing scenes of the Revolution. His father stored that
memory with the verbal history of his times, and every noteworthy
locality of Saratoga is as familiar to him as the flower-beds of his
beautiful garden. He kindly offered to be my guide in the morning to all
the places here made memorable by the events connected with the
surrender of Burgoyne.

While awaiting the dawn, let us turn to the past, and view occurrences
from the burial of Fraser to the closing scenes of the drama.

October, 1777 As soon as the funeral ceremonies at Fraser's burial were
ended on the evening of the 8th, Burgoyne, fearing that the Americans
(whose forces constantly increased, and whose activity denoted
preparations for some bold movement) might succeed in turning his right
and surrounding him, commenced a night march toward Saratoga. A retreat
was anticipated by General Gates, and, previous to the action on the
7th, he sent General Fellows with a detachment of fourteen hundred men
to occupy the high grounds east of the Hudson, opposite the Saratoga
ford, intending, in case the enemy retreated, to follow so closely in
pursuit as to be able to re-enforce that officer from the ranks of the
main army. He also sent another detachment, after the action, to occupy
ground higher up near Fort Miller, and ordered a selected corps of two
thousand men to push forward and occupy the heights beyond Saratoga, in
the direction of Lake George. But the retreat of Burgoyne was at a time
when Gates least expected it. The troops of the former had been in
motion all the night before, and under arms all day on the 8th, and he
supposed that they would tarry for rest until the morning of the 9th.

At sunset on the 8th a lurid haziness in the west indicated an
approaching storm, and before midnight the rain began to fall. The enemy
felt that his situation was too perilous to be maintained, and the whole
British army commenced its march at nine o'clock in the evening. The
loss of Fraser was now severely felt, for he had always showed as
consummate skill in managing a retreat as bravery in leading to an
attack. General Riedesel

Melancholy Condition of the British Army.--Gates's Kindness to the
Invalids.--Destruction of Schuyler's Mills and Mansion.

073

commanded the van-guard and General Phillips the rear-guard. The night
was so dark, the rain so incessant in the morning, and the roads were so
bad, that the royal army did not reach Saratoga until the evening of the
9th. They made a halt about six o'clock in the morning, and General
Riedesel, exhausted by fatigue, went into the caleche in which his wife
and children were, and slept soundly for about three hours. Wet and
weary, and harassed by the Americans all the way, the poor soldiers were
too much exhausted even to cut wood for fires, and they lay down upon
the cold, wet ground and slept. The generals reposed in the open air,
upon mattresses, with no other covering than oil-cloth. The Baroness
Reidesel and other women of the British camp were obliged to submit to
these privations. "My dress," the former says, "was wet through and
through with rain, and in this state I had to remain the whole night,
having no place to change it; I, however, got close to a large fire, and
at last lay down on some straw. At this moment General Phillips came up
to me, and I asked him why he had not continued our retreat, as my
husband had promised to cover it and bring the army through. 'Poor dear
woman,' he said, 'I wonder how, drenched as you are, you have the
courage still to persevere, and venture further in this kind of weather.
I wish,' he continued, 'you were our commanding general; General
Burgoyne is tired, and means to halt here to-night and give us our
supper.'" * No doubt there was more sincerity than compliment in General
Phillips's wish, for the frequent halts and great delays of Burgoyne had
dissatisfied his officers, and were, doubtless, chief causes of his
misfortunes. His ambition and his love of ease were often wrestling, and
the latter too frequently gained the mastery.

The retreat of Burgoyne was so sudden, that he left all his sick and
wounded in the hospital behind him, together with a great number of
wheel carriages and other things collected at Wilbur's Basin. The
invalids, amounting to about three hundred, were treated by General
Gates with the utmost humanity, which Burgoyne afterward gratefully
acknowledged. On retiring, the English burned the houses they had
occupied, and many other things which they could not carry away with
them. They also wantonly set fire to several buildings on the way, by
order of Burgoyne himself; and among others, when they crossed the Fish
Creek, the mansion of General Schuyler, his mills and other property,
amounting in value to twenty thousand dollars, were destroyed by them.

The house of General Schuyler was elegant for the times, and was very
pleasantly situated upon the south bank of the Fish Kill or Fish Creek.
It was rebuilt after the war, but in a style much inferior in beauty and
expense. It is still standing, and in the present possession of George
Strover, Esq. The broad lawn in front is beautifully shaded with
venerable trees; and the falls of the Fish Creek close by contribute, by
their music and wild beauty, much to the interest of the scene. The mill
was also rebuilt in the same style. In the engraving is given a correct
representation of it. Many of the logs in the dam are the same that
curbed the stream in the time of the Revolution; and I was told that
little was wanted to make the whole appear as at that r period, but that
the surrounding hills should be covered with dense woods.

The rain was so heavy on the 9th, that General Gates did not commence
his pursuit until nearly noon on the tenth. The

* Letters of the Baroness Riedesel

Situation of Fellows's Detachment.--Conduct of the American Militia.--
Burgoyne's Attempt to Retreat

074

detachment under Fellows was unconsciously in a perilous situation for
want of re-enforcements. Resting in supposed security on the night of
the 9th, his camp was left so entirely unguarded that an officer, who
had been sent forward by Burgoyne to reconnoiter, marched all around it
without meeting a sentinel! This neglect would have been fatal if
Burgoyne had known the exact position of his enemies around him. The
officer urged him to allow him to surprise Fellows, but misfortune had
made the British general wary and suspicious, and, fortunately for the
Americans, the request was denied.

The main army of Gates reached the high ridge between Saratoga Church
and the Fish Creek at about four in the afternoon of the 10th. The
British had crossed over the creek, and were encamped upon the high
grounds on the slope of which Schuylerville is now built. The two armies
were within the sound of each other's music. The boats of Burgoyne, with
his baggage and provisions, were at the mouth of the creek. A fatigue
party began to carry the stores from the boats to the heights, but
Fellows constantly played upon them with two field pieces stationed on
the flats beyond the river, and they were obliged to retreat to the
camp. Several of the bateaux of the enemy, with their provisions, were
captured, and immediately became objects of plunder for the raw militia
and motley followers of the army. Even the Continental troops were
implicated in taking "pay and rations" for services, directly from the
enemy, instead of receiving them through the paymaster. These
irregularities became so extensive that General Gates issued an order on
the 12th, in which he declared that he "saw so many scandalous and mean
transactions committed by persons who sought more after plunder than the
honor of doing their duty, that it was his unalterable resolution to
have the first person who should thereafter be detected in pillaging the
baggage and stores taken from the enemy, tried and punished with the
utmost severity of the military law." **

Finding the ford across the Hudson strongly guarded by the Americans,
Burgoyne resolved to continue his retreat up the right bank of the river
to the front of Fort Edward, force his way across, and take possession
of that fortress. He sent forward a working party, consisting chiefly of
loyalists, guarded by Fraser's marksmen, to repair the bridges and open
the roads, and also a detachment of troops to take possession of the
fort. The Americans, who were spreading out in small detachments upon
every height, on all sides, soon drove the workmen back into the camp;
and the British troops found the fort in the possession of two hundred
Americans, under Colonel Cochrane. The militia were flocking to the fort
to strengthen the garrison, and the enemy, believing the Americans to be
as numerous in front as in rear, hastily retreated back to their lines.

* The village of Schuylerville is on the north bank of the Fish Creek.
Old Saratoga, with its church, was on the south side. The church was
about eight hundred yards south of the creek, on the road to Albany.

** It is said that when Burgoyne proposed in council, on the 13th, to
retreat precipitately, he mildly reproached Major Skene, a stanch
loyalist, with having brought him into this difficulty by injudicious
advice, particularly with regard to the expedition to Bennington. "You
have brought me into this difficulty," he said; "now advise me how to
get out of it."

"Scatter your baggage, stores, and every thing else that can be spared,
at proper distances," replied the major, "and the militia will be so
engaged in collecting and securing the same, that the troops will have
an opportunity of getting clear off."

*** The two victories on Bemis's Heights greatly inspirited the
Americans, and when, after the last battle, General Gates, in order to
make victory secure, applied to the Legislature of New Hampshire for
more troops, the militia turned out with alacrity. The speaker of the
Assembly, John Langdon, Esq., upon receiving the application,
immediately proposed an adjournment, and that as many members as could
should set off directly as volunteers for the cause, taking with them
all the men they could collect. It was agreed to, and done by himself
and others.-Gordon, ii., 262.

Unsuccessful Stratagem of Burgoyne.--Perilous Situation of two American
Brigades.--Deserters from the British Army.

075

Thus the cloud of perils thickened around Burgoyne. He now abandoned all
idea of saving his artillery and baggage, and saw no other mode of
escape than a precipitate retreat. The provisions and other stores in
his bateaux were captured or destroyed by the republicans, and from
every direction he was galled by a desultory fire from cannon and small
arms. So overwhelming was the number of the Americans, that to fight
would be madness, and Burgoyne lost all hope of saving his doomed army.

But in the midst of all these perils and despondencies, a stratagem of
the British commander, suggested by an erring apprehension on the part
of General Gates, aided by the occurrence of a natural phenomenon, came
very near being successful, and for a time greatly cheered the drooping
spirits of the enemy. Rumor reached General Gates that the whole British
army had moved toward Fort Edward, leaving only a small detachment, as a
rearguard, in defense of the camp. This rumor originated from the march
of the detachment already mentioned, which was sent forward to Fort
Edward. General Gates, therefore, determined to cross the Fish Creek on
the morning of the 11th, fall in full force upon and crush the British
rear-guard, and make a vigorous pursuit after the main body.

By some means this determination of Gates's became known to Burgoyne,
and he resolved to profit by the false rumor. He left a strong guard at
the battery on the creek, and concealed his troops in the thicket, a few
rods in the rear. In the morning the sky was cloudless, but a thick fog
rested upon the whole country and obscured every object. This was hailed
as a favorable event by both generals, Gates supposing that it would
veil his movements from the British rear-guard, and Burgoyne confidently
believing that it would conceal his ambush, and that victory was now
certain.

The brigades of Generals Nixon and Glover, and Morgan's corps, were
ordered to cross the creek and fall upon the enemy's camp. Morgan
advanced at about daylight, the fog being so thick that he could see but
a few rods around him. He at once fell in with the British pickets, who
poured in a volley upon him and killed a lieutenant and several
privates. Morgan instantly conceived that the rumor was false, and that
the enemy was in force near. At that moment Deputy Adjutant-general
Wilkinson, who had been sent by Gates to reconnoiter, rode up, and,
coinciding in opinion with Morgan, hastened to report to his commander
the supposed peril of his corps. The brigades of Patterson and Learned
were immediately dispatched to its support. Nixon and Glover were at the
same time pressing forward to attack the camp, while the whole army
advanced to the heights immediately south of the creek. Nixon crossed
the creek to the plain, and surprised a picket guard at Fort Hardy; and
Glover was about to follow him, when a British soldier was seen hastily
fording the stream. He was captured, and professed to be a deserter.
Glover questioned him, and was informed that the entire British army
were in their camp, drawn up in order of battle. The general suspected
him of untruth, and threatened him with instant death if he should
deceive him. The soldier declared that he was an honest deserter, and
solemnly affirmed the truth of his tale, which was soon confirmed by a
German deserter, and by the capture of a reconnoitering party,
consisting of a subaltern and thirty-five men, by the advance guard,
under Captain Goodale, of Putnam's regiment. The deserter was
immediately sent with one of Glover's aids to General Gates, and
information was forwarded to General Nixon, with urgent advice to halt.
Satisfied of the deserter's truth, Gates revoked all the orders of the
evening previous, and directed the troops to return to their respective
positions. His headquarters were nearly a mile in the rear of his army,
and his order came almost too late to save the troops, who had General
Gates's Headquarters at Saratoga. *

* This house is still standing. The view is taken from the road, a few
rods southwest of the building. It is of wood, and has been somewhat
enlarged since the Revolution. It was used by General Gates for his
quarters from the 10th of October until after the surrender of Burgoyne
on the 17th. It belonged to a Widow Kershaw, and General Gates amply
compensated her for all he had, on leaving it. It is now well preserved.
It stands on the east side of the Albany and Whitehall turnpike, about a
mile and a half south of the Fish Creek. The Champlain Canal passes
immediately in the rear of it; and nearly half a mile eastward is the
Hudson River.

Retreat of the Americans to their Camp.--Perplexity of Burgoyne.--A
scattered Retreat proposed

076

The fog soon passed away and discovered them to the enemy, then in full
view, and under arms upon the heights. Nixon, however, had retreated,
and the cannonade opened upon him by the British took effect only upon
the rear of his brigade. *

General Learned, in the mean while, with his own and Patterson's
brigades, had reached Morgan's corps, and was pressing on rapidly to the
attack when Wilkinson came up, not with a counter order from Gates, but
with the intelligence that the right wing of the Americans had given
way. The brave veteran disliked the idea of retreating, preferring to
carry out the standing order of the previous day to the very letter;**
but, on counseling with Colonels Brooks and Tupper, and some other
officers, a retreat was deemed advisable. As they turned, the British,
who were awaiting an attack, opened a fire upon them; but the Americans
were soon masked by the woods, and Morgan took post upon the flank and
rear of the enemy.

Thus, by the providential circumstance of a deserter flying to our camp,
our army was saved from a terrible, perhaps fatal, loss; for, had the
several brigades of Nixon, Glover, Learned, and Patterson been cut off,
Burgoyne might have so much weakened the American army, and strengthened
his own by the adherence of the now wavering loyalists and Indians, as
to scatter the remainder of the Continental forces and reach Albany, the
darling object of all his efforts. But the breath of the deserter
blasted all his hopes, and the incident was, to use his own words, "one
of the most adverse strokes of fortune during the campaign." ***

Burgoyne now saw no way of escape. He sent out scouts toward the north,
who reported the roads impassable and the woods swarming with
republicans. The few Indians who had remained now left him, utterly
disheartened; and the loyalists, feeling that their personal security
would be jeoparded in case of a surrender, left the army every hour. It
was proposed to make a scattered retreat, each soldier carrying in his
knapsack provisions enough for two or three days, Fort George being the
place of rendezvous; but such a step would be perilous in the extreme,
for the Americans, apparently as numerous as the leaves upon the trees,
and ever on the alert, would cut them off in detail. In battle, a
fortunate circumstance might occur in their favor; but General Gates,
assured that he had his enemy in his power, could not be induced to
jeopard the lives of his troops by an engagement. Burgoyne's only hope
rested upon aid from Clinton below. Not a word, however, could he get
from that general; yet, clinging with desperation to every hope, however
feeble, he resolved to await that succor quietly in his strong camp as
long as his exhausted stores and a powerful enemy would allow.

Burgoyne's camp, upon the heights near the Fish Creek, was fortified,
and, extending more than half a mile in the rear, was strengthened by
artillery. On an elevated plain, northwest of the village of
Schuylerville, his heavy guns were chiefly posted. Directly in his rear
Morgan and his corps were stationed. In front, on the east side of the
Hudson,

* John Nixon was born at Framingham, Massachusetts, March 4th, 1726. He
was at the siege of Louisburg in 1745, was captain in the provincial
troops under Abercrombie at Ticonderoga, and was esteemed a valiant
soldier during the whole of the French and Indian war. He took the
patriot side when our Revolution broke out. He was one of the minute men
at the Lexington battle, was at the head of a regiment in the battle of
Bunker Hill, and was made a brigadier in the Continental army in August,
1776. He was then placed in command at Governor's Island, near New York.
In the battle of Bemis's Heights a cannon-ball passed so near his head
it impaired the sight of one eye and the hearing of one ear. On account
of ill health, he resigned his commission in 1780. He died March 24th,
1815, aged 90 years.

** The standing order was, "In case of an attack against any point,
whether front, flank, or rear, the troops are to fall on the enemy at
all quarters."

*** Letter to Lord George Germain, dated Albany 20th, 1777.

Relative Position of the two Camps.--Exposed Condition of the British
Camp.--Burgoyne determines to Surrender

077

Fellows, with three thousand troops, was strongly intrenched. The main
body of the American army, under Gates, was on the south side of the
Fish Creek; and in every direction small detachments of Continentals or
republican militia were vigorously watching the enemy at bay. * Fort
Edward was in possession of the Americans, and upon high ground in the
vicinity of Glenn's Falls they had a fortified camp.

Burgoyne was completely environed, and every part of the royal camp was
exposed to the fire of cannon and musketry. The soldiers slept under
arms continually. There was not a place of safety for the sick, wounded,
and dying, or for the women and children of the officers and soldiers.
There was no secure place for a council. None dared go to the river for
water, and thirst began to distress the camp.2 The desertions of the
Indians and Canadians, the cowardice and disaffection of the loyalists,
and the losses in killed and wounded, had so thinned Burgoyne's ranks,
that his army was reduced one half, and a large proportion of those who
remained were not Englishmen. There was not bread for three days in
store, and of course none could be obtained. Not a word came from
General Clinton, and Burgoyne was totally ignorant of his having made
any movement up the Hudson. The last ray of hope faded away, and toward
the evening of the 12th the British commander held a council with
Generals Reidesel, Phillips, and Hamilton. It was decided to retreat
before morning, if possible; but returning scouts brought only hopeless
intelligence respecting the roads and the strength of the enemy.

On the morning of the 13th Burgoyne called a general council of all
officers, including captains of companies. Their deliberations were held
in a large tent, which was several times perforated by musket-balls from
the Americans. Several grape-shot struck near the tent, and an eighteen
pound cannon-ball swept across the table at which sat Burgoyne and the
other generals. Their deliberations were short, as might be expected,
and it was unanimously resolved to open a treaty with General Gates for
an honorable surrender. It was a bitter pill for the proud lieutenant
general, but there was no alternative.

* By reference to the above map, the position of the two armies at this
juncture will be more clearly understood. They held the same relative
position until the surrender on the 17th.

** The consideration of Americans for women was conspicuously displayed
at this time. While every man who went to the river for water became a
target for the sure marksmen of the Americans, a soldier's wife went
back and forth as often as she pleased, and not a gun was pointed at
her.

Proposition of Burgoyne to surrender his Troops.--Terms proposed by
Gates.--Terms finally agreed upon.

078

Toward evening a flag was sent to General Gates, with a note, intimating
that General Burgoyne was desirous of sending a field officer to him
upon a matter of great moment to both armies, and wishing to know at
what hour the next morning it would suit General Gates to receive him.
The reply was, "At ten o'clock, at the advanced post of the army of the
United States." Accordingly, Lieutenant Kingston, Burgoyne's adjutant
general, appeared at the appointed hour and delivered the following note
from his commander: "After having fought you twice, Lieutenant-general
Burgoyne has waited some days in his present position, determined to try
a third conflict against any force you could bring against him. He is
apprized of your superiority of numbers, and the disposition of your
troops to impede his supplies, and render his retreat a scene of carnage
on both sides. In this situation, he is impelled by humanity, and thinks
himself justified by established principles and precedents of state and
war, to spare the lives of brave men upon honorable terms. Should Major
general Gates be inclined to treat upon that idea, General Burgoyne
would propose a cessation of arms during the time necessary to
communicate the preliminary terms by which, in any extremity, he and his
army mean to abide."

General Gates had already prepared a schedule of terms upon which he was
willing to treat. It enumerated the distresses of the British army, and
declared that they could only be allowed to surrender as prisoners of
war, and that they must lay down their arms in their camp. Burgoyne
replied, with spirit, that he would not admit that the retreat of his
army was cut off while they had arms in their hands, and that the
degrading act of laying down their arms within their own camp would not
be submitted to. The latter condition was waived, and in the afternoon
General Gates ordered a cessation of hostilities till sunset.
Negotiations continued until the 16th, when every thing was agreed upon
and adjusted, ready for the signatures of the contracting parties. This
last act was to be performed on the morning of the 17th.

The substance of the "_Convention between Lieutenant-general Burgoyne
and Major-general Gates_," as the British commander superscribed it,
was, 1st. That Burgoyne's troops were to march out of their camp with
all the honors of war, the artillery to be moved to the verge of the
Hudson, and there left, together with the soldiers' arms-the said arms
to be piled by word of command from their own officers; 2d. That a free
passage should be granted the troops to Great Britain, on condition of
their not serving again during the war; 3d. That if any cartel should
take place by which Burgoyne's army, or any part of it, should be
exchanged, the foregoing article should be void as far as such exchange
should extend; 4th. That the army should march to the neighborhood of
Boston by the most expeditious and convenient route, and not be delayed
when transports should arrive to receive them, 5th. That every care
should be taken for the proper subsistence of the troops till they
should be embarked; 6th. That all officers should retain their
carriages, horses, bat-horses, &c., and their baggage, and be exempt
from molestation or search; 7th. That on the march, and while the army
should remain at Boston (the port selected for their embarkation), the
officers should not be separated from their men; 8th. That all corps
whatsoever, whether composed of sailors, bateaux-men, artificers,
drivers, independent companies, or followers of the army, of whatever
country they might be, should be included in the fullest sense and to
the utmost extent of the articles, and comprehended in every respect as
British subjects, whose general had capitulated for them; 9th. That all
Canadians and persons belonging to the Canadian establishment should be
permitted a free return to Canada, should be conducted by the shortest
route to the British posts on Lake George, should be treated in all
respects like the rest of the army, and should be bound by the same
conditions not to serve during the war, unless exchanged; 10th. That
passports should be immediately granted for three officers, to carry
Burgoyne's dispatches to General Howe at Philadelphia, to Sir Guy
Carleton in Canada, and to the government of Great Britain by way of New
York; 11th. That all officers, during their stay in Boston, should be
admitted to parole, and from

* This was to afford protection to the loyalists or Tories.

Message to Burgoyne from General Clinton.--Disposition of Burgoyne to
withhold his Signature.--Laying down of Arms.

079

first to last be permitted to wear their side-arms; 12th. That if the
army found it necessary to send for their clothing and other baggage
from Canada, they should be permitted to do so, and have the necessary
passports granted them; 13th. That these articles should be signed and
exchanged on the following morning at nine o'clock, the troops to march
out of their intrenchments at three o'clock in the afternoon.

Appended October 17. to these articles was an addendum or postscript,
signed by General Gates, declaring that General Burgoyne, whose name was
not mentioned in the above treaty, was fully comprehended in it. *

During the night of the 16th Captain Campbell succeeded in eluding the
American sentinels, and reached the British camp with dispatches from
Sir Henry Clinton announcing his capture of the forts among the Hudson
Highlands, and the expedition of Vaughan and Wallace as far up the river
as Esopus. Here was a ray of hope, and Burgoyne felt disposed to
withhold his signature from the "convention." General Gates was apprized
of this, and of the cause which had excited new hopes in the British
commander. He was better acquainted, too, with the threatening aspect
below than Burgoyne, and he knew that "delays are dangerous." He drew up
his army on the morning of the 17th in order of battle, and then sent a
peremptory message to Burgoyne, that if the articles were not signed by
him immediately, he should open a fire upon him. Under the
circumstances, the terms were exceedingly humane and honorable; far more
so than might be expected if the negotiation should be here broken off
and again commenced. With reluctance Burgoyne subscribed his name, and
preparations were immediately made for the ceremonies of surrender.

The British army left their camp upon the hills, and marched sorrowfully
down upon the "green" or level plain in front of old Fort Hardy, **
where the different companies were drawn up in parallel lines, and, by
order of their several commanders, grounded their arms and emptied their
cartridge-boxes. They were not subject to the mortification of thus
submitting under the gaze of an exulting foe, for General Gates, with a
delicacy and magna-

* A copy of these articles, said to be in the handwriting of General
Gates, and signed by the two commanders, is in the possession of the New
York Historical Society, from which the above fac-similes were copied.

** Fort Hardy was situated at the junction of the Fish Creek with the
Hudson River, on the north side of the former. It was built of earth and
logs, and was thrown up by the French, under Baron Dieskau, in 1755,
when Sir William Johnson was making preparations at Albany to march
against the French on Lakes Champlain and George. It was abandoned by
the French, and named by the English Fort Hardy, in honor of Sir Charles
Hardy, who was that year appointed Governor of New York. The lines of
the intrenchments of the fort inclosed about fifteen acres, bounded
south by the Fish Creek and east by the Hudson River. This fort was a
ruin at the time of the Revolution; yet, when I visited it (July, 1848),
many traces of its outworks were still visible. Its form may be seen by
reference to the map, page 77. Many military relics have been found near
the fort, and I was told that, in excavating for the Champlain Canal, a
great number of human skeletons were found. The workmen had, doubtless,
struck upon the burial-place of the garrison.

Courtesy of General Gates. The Place of Surrender. First personal
Meeting of Gates and Burgoyne

080

nimity of feeling which drew forth the expressed admiration of Burgoyne
and his officers, had ordered all his army within his camp, out of sight
of the vanquished Britons. * Colonel Wilkinson, who had been sent to the
British camp, and, in company with Burgoyne, selected the place where
the troops were to lay down their arms, was the only American officer
present at the scene. **

The sketch here presented, of the place where the British army
surrendered, was made from one of the canal bridges at Schuylerville,
looking east-northeast. The stream of water in the fore-ground is Fish
Creek, and the level ground seen between it and the distant hills on the
left is the place where the humiliation of the Britons occurred. The
tree by the fence, in the center of the picture, designates the north-st
angle of Fort Hardy, and the other three trees on the right stand nearly
on the line of the northern breast-works. The row of small trees,
apparently at the foot of the distant hills, marks the course of the
Hudson, and the hills that bound the view are those on which the
Americans were posted. This plain is directly in front of Schuylerville,
between that village and the Hudson. General Fellows was stationed upon
the high ground seen over the barn on the right, and the eminence on the
extreme left is the place whence the American cannon played upon the
house wherein the Baroness Reidesel and other ladies sought refuge.

As soon as the troops had laid down their arms, General Burgoyne
proposed to be introduced to General Gates. They crossed Fish Creek, and
proceeded toward headquarters, Burgoyne in front with his adjutant
general, Kingston, and his aids-de-camp, Captain Lord Petersham and
Lieutenant Wilford, behind him. Then followed Generals Phillips,
Riedesel, and Hamilton, and other officers and suites, according to
rank. General Gates was informed of the approach of Burgoyne, and with
his staff met him at the head of his camp, about a mile south of the
Fish Creek, Burgoyne in a rich uniform of scarlet and gold, and Gates in
a plain blue frock-coat. "When within about a sword's length, they
reined up and halted. Colonel Wilkinson then named the gentlemen, and
General Burgoyne, raising his hat gracefully, said, "The fortune of war,
General Gates, has made me your prisoner." The victor promptly replied,
"I shall always be ready to bear testimony that it has not

* Letter of Burgoyne to the Earl of Derby. Stedman, i., 352. Botta, ii.,
21.

** See Wilkinson.

Humiliating Review of the British Prisoners.--Burgoyne's Surrender of
his Sword.--The Spoils of Victory.--Yankee Doodle.

081

been through any fault of your excellency."

The other officers were introduced in turn, and the whole party repaired
to Gates's headquarters, where a sumptuous dinner was served. *

After dinner the American army was drawn up in parallel lines on each
side of the road, extending nearly a mile. Between these victorious
troops the British army, with light infantry in front, and escorted by a
company of light dragoons, preceded by two mounted officers bearing the
American flag, marched to the lively tune of Yankee Doodle. *** Just as
they passed, the two commanding generals, who were in Gates's marquee,
came out together, and, fronting the procession, gazed upon it in
silence a few moments. What a contrast, in every particular, did the two
present! Burgoyne, though possessed of coarse features, had a large and
commanding person; Gates was smaller and far less dignified in
appearance. Burgoyne was arrayed in the splendid military trappings of
his rank; Gates was clad in a plain and unassuming dress. Burgoyne was
the victim of disappointed hopes and foiled ambition, and looked upon
the scene with exceeding sorrow; Gates was buoyant with the first flush
of a great victory. Without exchanging a word, Burgoyne, according to
previous understanding, stepped back, drew his sword, and, in the
presence of the two armies, presented it to General Gates. He received
it with a courteous inclination of the head, and instantly returned it
to the vanquished general. They then retired to the marquee together,
the British army filed off and took up their line of march for Boston,
and thus ended the drama upon the heights of Saratoga.

The whole number of prisoners surrendered was five thousand seven
hundred and ninety-one, of whom two thousand four hundred and twelve
were Germans and Hessians. The force of the Americans, at the time of
the surrender, was, according to a statement which General Gates
furnished to Burgoyne, thirteen thousand two hundred and twenty-two, of
which number nine thousand and ninety-three were Continentals, or
regular soldiers, and four thousand one hundred and twenty-nine were
militia. The arms and ammunition which came into the possession of the
Americans were, a fine train of brass artillery, consisting of 2 twenty-
four pounders, 4 twelve pounders, 20 sixes, 6 threes, 2 eight inch
howitzers, 5 five and a half inch royal howitzers, and 3 five and a half
inch royal mortars; **** in all forty-two

* See Wilkinson.

** This view is taken from the turnpike, looking south. The old road was
where the canal now is, and the place of meeting was about at the point
where the bridge is seen.

*** Thatcher, in his Military Journal (p. 19), gives the following
account of the origin of the word Yankee and of Yankee Doodle; "A farmer
of Cambridge, Massachusetts, named Jonathan Hastings, who lived about
the year 1713, used it as a favorite cant word to express excellence, as
a yankee good horse or yankee good cider. The students of the college,
hearing him use it a great deal, adopted it, and called him Yankee
Jonathan; and as he was a rather weak man, the students, when they
wished to denote a character of that kind, would call him Yankee
Jonathan. Like other cant words, it spread, and came finally to be
applied to the New Englanders as a term of reproach. Some suppose the
term to be the Indian corruption of the word English-Yenglecs, Yangles,
Yankles, and finally Yankee. "A song, called Yankee Doodle, was written
by a British sergeant at Boston, in 1775, to ridicule the people there,
when the American army, under Washington, was encamped at Cambridge and
Roxbury." See "Origin of Yankee Doodle," page 480, of this volume.

**** Two of these, drawings of which will be found on page 700, are now
in the court of the laboratory of the West Point Military Academy, on
the Hudson.

The Germans and Hessians.--Their Arrival at Cambridge and wretched
Appearance.--Kindness of the People.

082

pieces of ordnance. There were four thousand six hundred and forty-seven
muskets, and six thousand dozens of cartridges, besides shot, carcasses,
cases, shells, &c. Among the English prisoners were six members of
Parliament. *

Cotemporary writers represent the appearance of the poor German and
Hessian troops as extremely miserable and ludicrous. They deserved
commiseration, but they received none. They came not here voluntarily to
fight our people; they were sent as slaves by their masters, who
received the price of their hire. They were caught, it is said, while
congregated in their churches and elsewhere, and forced into the
service. Most of them were torn reluctantly from their families and
friends; hundreds of them deserted here before the close of the war; and
many of their descendants are now living among us. Many had their wives
with them, and these helped to make up the pitiable procession through
the country. Their advent into Cambridge, near Boston, is thus noticed
by the lady of Dr. Winthrop of that town, in a letter to Mrs. Mercy
Warren, an early historian of our Revolution: "On Friday we heard the
Hessians were to make a procession on the same route. We thought we
should have nothing to do but view them as they passed. To be sure, the
sight was truly astonishing. I never had the least idea that the
creation produced such a sordid set of creatures in human figure-poor,
dirty, emaciated men. Great numbers of women, who seemed to be the
beasts of burden, having bushel baskets on their backs, by which they
were bent double. The contents seemed to be pots and kettles, various
sorts of furniture, children peeping through gridirons and other
utensils. Some very young infants, who were born on the road; the women
barefooted, clothed in dirty rags. Such effluvia filled the air while
they were passing, that, had they not been smoking all the time, I
should have been apprehensive of being contaminated." **

The whole view of the vanquished army, as it marched through the country
from Saratoga to Boston, a distance of three hundred miles, escorted by
two or three American officers and a handful of soldiers, was a
spectacle of extraordinary interest. Generals of the first order of
talent; young gentlemen of noble and wealthy families, aspiring to
military renown; legislators of the British realm, and a vast concourse
of other men, lately confident of victory and of freedom to plunder and
destroy, were led captive through the pleasant land they had coveted, to
be gazed at with mingled joy and scorn by those whose homes they came to
make desolate. "Their march was solemn, sullen, and silent; but they
were every where treated with such humanity, and even delicacy, that
they were overwhelmed with astonishment and gratitude. Not one insult
was offered, not an opprobrious reflection cast; and in all their long
captivity **** they experienced the generous kindness of a people
warring only to be free.

* Gordon, ii., 267.

** Women of the Revolution, i., 97

*** Mercy Warren, ii., 40.

**** Although Congress ratified the generous terms entered into by Gates
with Burgoyne in the convention at Saratoga, circumstances made them
suspicious that the terms would not be strictly complied with. They
feared that the Britons would break their parole, and Burgoyne was
required to furnish a complete roll of his army, the name and rank of
every officer, and the name, former place of abode, occupation, age, and
size of every non-commissioned officer and private soldier. Burgoyne
murmured and hesitated. General Howe, at the same time, was very
illiberal in the exchange of prisoners, and exhibited considerable
duplicity. Congress became alarmed, and resolved not to allow the army
of Burgoyne to leave our shores until a formal ratification of the
convention should be made by the British government. Burgoyne alone was
allowed to go home on parole, and the other officers, with the army,
were marched into the interior of Virginia, to await the future action
of the two governments. The British ministry charged Congress with
positive perfidy, and Congress justified their acts by charging the
ministers with meditated perfidy. That this suspicion was well founded
is proved by subsequent events. In the autumn of 1778, Isaac Ogden, a
prominent loyalist of New Jersey, and then a refugee in New York, thus
wrote to Joseph Galloway, an American Tory in London, respecting an
expedition of four thousand British troops which Sir Henry Clinton sent
up the Hudson a week previous: "Another object of this expedition was to
open the country for many of Burgoyne's troops that had escaped the
vigilance of their guard, to come in. About forty of these have got safe
in. If this expedition had been a week sooner, greater part of
Burgoyne's troops probably would have arrived here, as a disposition of
rising on their guard strongly prevailed, and all they wanted to effect
it was some support near at hand."

Relative Condition and Prospect of the Americans before the Capture of
Burgoyne.--Effect of that Event

083

The surrender of Burgoyne was an event of infinite importance to the
struggling republicans. Hitherto the preponderance of success had been
on the side of the English, and only a few partial victories had been
won by the Americans. The defeat on Long Island had eclipsed the glory
of the siege of Boston; the capture of Fort Washington and its garrison
had overmatched the brilliant defense of Charleston; the defeat at
Brandywine had balanced the victory at Trenton; White Plains and
Princeton were in fair juxtaposition in the account current; and at the
very time when the hostile armies at the north were fighting for the
mastery, Washington was suffering defeats in Pennsylvania, and Forts
Clinton, Montgomery, and Constitution were passing into the hands of the
royal forces. Congress had fled from Philadelphia to York, and its
sittings were in the midst of loyalists, ready to attack or betray. Its
treasury was nearly exhausted; its credit utterly so. Its bills to the
amount of forty millions of dollars were scattered over the country. Its
frequent issues were inadequate to the demands of the commissariat, and
distrust was rapidly depreciating their value in the public mind.
Loyalists rejoiced; the middlemen were in a dilemma; the patriots
trembled. Thick clouds of doubt and dismay were gathering in every part
of the political horizon, and the acclamations which had followed the
Declaration of Independence, the year before, died away like mere
whispers upon the wind.

All eyes were turned anxiously to the army of the north, and upon that
strong arm of Congress, wielded, for the time, by Gates, the hopes of
the patriots leaned. How eagerly they listened to every breath of rumor
from Saratoga! How enraptured were they when the cry of victory fell
upon their ears! All over the land a shout of triumph went up, and from
the furrows, and workshops, and marts of commerce; from the pulpit, from
provincial halls of legislation, from partisan camps, and from the
shattered ranks of the chief at White Marsh, it was echoed and re-
echoed. Toryism, which had begun to lift high its head, retreated behind
the defense of inaction; the bills of Congress rose twenty per cent, in
value; capital came forth from its hiding-places; the militia readily
obeyed the summons to the camp, and the great patriot heart of America
beat strongly with pulsations of hope. Amid the joy of the moment, Gates
was apotheosized in the hearts of his countrymen, and they

* The engraving exhibits a view of both sides of the medal, drawn the
size of the original. On one side is a bust of General Gates, with the
Latin inscription, "Horatio Gates Duci Strenuo Comitia Americana;" The
American Congress, to Horatio Gates, the valiant leader. On the other
side, of reverse, Burgoyne is represented in the attitude of delivering
up his sword; and in the background, on either side of them, are seen
the two armies of England and America, the former laying down their
arms. At the top is the Latin inscription, "Safety of the northern
region or department. Below is the inscription, "Enemy at Saratoga
surrendered October 11th, 1777.

Wilkinson before Congress.--Gold Medal awarded to Gates. --Proceedings
of the British Parliament.--Speech of Chatham.

084

generously overlooked the indignity offered by him to the commander-in-
chief when he refused, in the haughty pride of his heart in that hour of
victory, to report, as in duty hound, his success to the national
council through him. Congress, too, overjoyed at the result, forgot its
own dignity, and allowed Colonel Wilkinson, * the messenger of the glad
tidings, to stand upon their floor and proclaim, "The whole British army
have laid down their arms at Saratoga; our own, full of vigor and
courage, expect your orders; it is for your wisdom to decide where the
country may still have need of their services." Congress voted thanks to
General Gates and his army, and decreed that he should be presented with
a medal of gold, to be struck expressly in commemoration of so glorious
a victory.

This victory was also of infinite importance to the republicans on
account of its effects beyond the Atlantic. The highest hopes of the
British nation, and the most sanguine expectations of the king and his
ministers, rested on the success of this campaign. It had been a
favorite object with the administration, and the people were confidently
assured that, with the undoubted success of Burgoyne, the turbulent
spirit of rebellion would be quelled, and the insurgents would be forced
to return to their allegiance.

Parliament was in session when the intelligence of Burgoyne's defeat
reached England; December 3, 1777, and when the mournful tidings were
communicated to that body, it instantly aroused all the fire of opposing
parties. ** The opposition opened anew their eloquent batteries upon the
ministers. For several days misfortune had been suspected. The last
arrival from America brought tidings of gloom. The Earl of Chatham, with
far-reaching comprehension, and thorough knowledge of American affairs,
had denounced the mode of warfare and the material used against the
Americans. He refused to vote for the laudatory address to the king.
Leaning upon his crutch, he poured forth his vigorous denunciations
against the course of the ministers like a mountain torrent. "This, my
lords," he said, "is a perilous and tremendous moment! It is no time for
adulation. The smoothness of flattery can not now avail-can not save us
in this rugged and awful crisis. It is now necessary to instruct the
throne in the language of truth..... You can not. I venture to say it,
you can not conquer America. What is your present situation there? We do
not know the worst, but we know that in three campaigns we have suffered
much and gained nothing, and perhaps at this moment the northern army
(Burgoyne's) may be a total loss..... You may swell every expense, and
every effort, still more extravagantly; pile and accumulate every
assistance you can buy or borrow; traffic and barter with every little
pitiful German prince that sells and sends his subjects to the shambles
of a foreign power; your efforts are forever vain and impotent; doubly
so from this mercenary aid on which you rely, for it irritates to an
incurable resentment the minds of your enemies. To overrun with the
mercenary sons of rapine and plunder, devoting them and their
possessions to the rapacity of hireling cruelty! If I were an American,
as I am an Englishman, while a foreign troop was landed in my country, I
never would lay down my arms--never, never, never!" ***

The Earl of Coventry, Earl Temple Chatham's brother-in-law, and the Duke
of Richmond, all spoke in coincidence with Chatham. Lord Suffolk, one of
the Secretaries of State, undertook the defense of ministers for the
employment of Indians, and concluded by saying, "It is perfectly
justifiable to use all the means that God and nature have put into our
hands." This sentiment brought Chatham upon the floor. "That God and
nature put

* James Wilkinson was born in Maryland about 1757, and, by education,
was prepared for the practice of medicine. He repaired to Cambridge as a
volunteer in 1775. He was captain of a company in a regiment that went
to Canada in 1776. He was appointed deputy adjutant general by Gates,
and, after the surrender of Burgoyne, Congress made him a brigadier
general by brevet. At the conclusion of the war he settled in Kentucky,
but entered the army in 1806, and had the command on the Mississippi. He
commanded on the northern frontier during our last war with Great
Britain. At the age of 56 he married a young lady of 26. He died of
diarrhea, in Mexico, December 28th, 1825, aged 68 years.

** Pitkin, i., 399.

*** Parliamentary Debates.

The Opposition in the House of Commons.--Policy of Lord North.-- Exalted
Position of the American Commissioners at Paris.

085

into our hands!" he reiterated, with bitter scorn. "I know not what idea
that lord may entertain of God and nature, but I know that such
abominable principles are equally abhorrent to religion and humanity.
What! attribute the sacred sanction of God and nature to the massacres
of the Indian scalping-knife, to the cannibal and savage, torturing,
murdering, roasting, and eating-literally, my lords, _eating_-the
mangled victims of his barbarous battles.....These abominable
principles, and this most abominable avowal of them, demand most
decisive indignation. I call upon that right reverend bench (pointing to
the bishops), those holy ministers of the Gospel and pious pastors of
the Church-I conjure them to join in the holy work, and to vindicate the
religion of their God."

In the Lower House, Burke, Fox, and Barré were equally severe upon the
ministers; and on the 3d of December, when the news of Burgoyne's defeat
reached London, the latter arose in his place in the Commons, and, with
a severe and solemn countenance, asked Lord George Germain, the
Secretary of War, what news he had received by his last expresses from
Quebec, and to say, upon his word of honor, what had become of Burgoyne
and his brave army. The haughty secretary was irritated by the cool
irony of the question, but he was obliged to unbend and to confess that
the unhappy intelligence had reached him, but added it was not yet
authenticated. *

Lord North, the premier, with his usual adroitness, admitted that
misfortune had befallen the British arms, but denied that any blame
could be imputed to ministers themselves, and proposed an adjournment of
December, 1778 Parliament on the 11th (which was carried) until the 20th
of January. ** It was a clever trick of the premier to escape the
castigations which he knew the opposition would inflict while the nation
was smarting under the goadings of mortified pride.

The victory over Burgoyne, unassisted as our troops were by foreign aid,
placed the prowess of the United States in the most favorable light upon
the Continent. Our urgent solicitations for aid, hitherto but little
noticed except by France, were now listened to with respect, and the
American commissioners at Paris. Dr. Franklin, Silas Deane,3 and Arthur
Lee,4 * * occupied a commanding position among the diplomatists of
Europe. France, Spain, the States General of Holland, the Prince of
Orange, and even Catharine of Russia and Pope Clement XIV. (Ganganelli),
all

* History of the Reign of George III., i., 326.

** Pitkin, i., 397. Annual Register, 1778, p| 74.

*** Silas Deane was a native of Groton, Connecticut. He graduated at
Yale College, 1758, and was a member of the first Congress, 1774. He was
sent to France Early in 1776, as political and commercial agent for the
United Colonies, and in the autumn of that year was associated with
Franklin and Lee as commissioner. He seems to have been unfit, in a
great degree, for the station he held, and his defective judgment and
extravagant promises greatly embarrassed Congress. He was recalled at
the close of 1777, and John Adams appointed in his place. He published a
defense of his character in 1778, and charged Thomas Paine and others
connected with public affairs with using their official influence for
purposes of private gain. This was the charge made against himself, and
he never fully wiped out all suspicion. He went to England toward the
close of 1784, and died in extreme poverty at Deal, 1789.

**** Dr. Lee was born in Virginia in 1740-a brother to the celebrated
Richard Henry Lee. He was educated at Edinburgh, and, on returning to
America, practiced medicine at Williamsburgh about five years. He went
to London in 1766, and studied law in the Temple. He kept his brother
and other patriots of the Revolution fully informed of all political
matters of importance abroad, and particularly the movements of the
British ministry. He wrote a great deal, and stood high as an essayist
and political pamphleteer. He was colonial agent for Virginia in 1775.
In 1776 he was associated with Franklin and Deane, as minister at the
court of Versailles. He and John Adams were recalled in 1779. On
returning to the United States, he was appointed to offices of trust. He
died of pleurisy, December 14th, 1782, aged nearly 42.

Our relative Position to the Governments of Europe.--Policy of
Vergennes.--Beaumarchais's Commercial Operations

086

of whom feared and hated England because of her increasing potency in
arms, commerce, diplomacy, and the Protestant faith, thought kindly of
us and spoke kindly to us. We were loved because England was hated; we
were respected because we could injure England by dividing her realm and
impairing her growing strength beyond the seas. There was a perfect
reciprocity of service; and when peace was ordained by treaty, and our
independence was established, the balance-sheet showed nothing against
us, so far as the governments of continental Europe were concerned.

In the autumn of 1776, Franklin and Lee were appointed, jointly with
Deane, November resident commissioners at the court of Versailles, to
negotiate a treaty of amity and commerce with the French king. They
opened negotiations early in December with the Count De Vergennes, the
premier of Louis XVI. He was distinguished for sound wisdom, extensive
political knowledge, remarkable sagacity, and true greatness of mind. He
foresaw that generous dealings with the insurgent colonists at the
outset would be the surest means of perpetuating the rebellion until a
total separation from the parent state would be accomplished-an event
eagerly coveted by the French government. France hated England
cordially, and feared her power. She had no special love for the Anglo-
American colonies, but she was ready to aid them in reducing, by
disunion, the puissance of the British empire. To widen the breach was
the chief aim of Vergennes. A haughty reserve, he knew, would discourage
the Americans, while an open reception, or even countenance, of their
deputies might alarm the rulers of Great Britain, and dispose them to a
compromise with the colonies, or bring on an immediate rupture between
France and England. A middle line was, therefore, pursued by him. *

While the French government was thus vacillating during the first three
quarters of 1777, secret aid was given to the republicans, and great
quantities of arms and ammunition were sent to this country, by an agent
of the French government, toward the close of the year, ostensibly
through the channel of commercial operations. **

* Ramsay, ii., 62, 63.

** In the summer of 1776, Arthur Lee, agent of the Secret Committee of
Congress, made an arrangement by which the French king provided money
and arms secretly for the Americans. An agent named Beaumarehais was
sent to London to confer with Lee, and it was arranged that two hundred
thousand Louis d'ors, in arms, ammunition, and specie, should be sent to
the Americans, but in a manner to make it appear as a commercial
transaction. Mr. Lee assumed the name of Mary Johnson, and Beaumarchais
that of Roderique, Hortales, & Co. Lee, fearing discovery if he should
send a written notice to Congress of the arrangement, communicated the
fact verbally through Captain Thomas Story, who had been upon the
continent in the serviee of the Secret Committee. Yet, after all the
arrangements were made, there was hesitation, and it was not until the
autumn of 1777 that the articles were sent to the Americans. They were
shipped on board Le Henreux, in the fictitious name of Hortales, by the
way of Cape François, and arrived at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, on the
1st of November of that year. The brave and efficient Baron Steuben was
a passenger in that ship.

Unmasking of thE French King.--Independence of the United States
acknowledged by France.--Letter of Louis XVI.

087

This arrangement, under the disguise of a mercantile operation,
subsequently produced a great deal of trouble, a more minute account of
which is given in the Supplement to this work.

Beaumarehais was one of the most active business men of his time, and
became quite distinguished in the literary and political world by his
"Marriage of Figaro," and his connection with the French Revolution in
1793. Borne, in one of his charming Letters from Paris, after describing
his visit to the house where Beaumarchais had lived, where "they now
sell kitchen salt," thus speaks of him: "By his bold and fortunate
commercial undertakings, he had become one of the richest men in France.
In the war of American liberty, he furnished, through an understanding
with the Freneh government, supplies of arms to the insurgents. As in
all such undertakings, there were captures, shipwrecks, payments
deferred or refused, yet Beaumarchais, by his dexterity, succeeded in
extricating himself with personal advantage from all these difficulties.

"Yet this same Beaumarchais showed himself, in the (French) revolution,
as inexperienced as a child and as timid as a German closet-scholar. He
contracted to furnish weapons to the revolutionary government, and not
only lost his money, but was near losing his head into the bargain.
Formerly he had to deal with the ministers of an absolute monarchy. The
doors of great men's cabinets open and close softly and easily to him
who knows how to oil the locks and hinges. Afterward Beaumarchais had to
do with honest, in other words with dangerous people; he had not learned
to make the distinction, and accordingly he was ruined." He died in
1799, in his 70th year, and his death, his friends suppose, was
voluntary.

Burgoyne and his army (intelligence of which arrived at Paris by express
on the 4th of December) reached Versailles, and the ultimate success of
the Americans was hardly problematical, Louis cast off all disguise, and
informed the American commissioners, through M. Gerard, one of his
Secretaries of State, that the treaty of alliance and commerce, already
negotiated, would be ratified, and "that it was decided to acknowledge
the independence of the United States." He wrote to his uncle, Charles
IV. of Spain, urging his co-operation; for, according to the family
compact of the Bourbons, made in 1761, the King of Spain was to be
consulted before such a treaty could be ratified. * Charles refused to
cooperate, but Louis persevered, and in February, 1778, he acknowledged
the independence of the United States, and entered into treaties of
alliance and February 6 commerce with them on a footing of perfect
equality and reciprocity. "War against England was to be made a common
cause, and it was agreed that neither contracting party should conclude
truce or peace with Great Britain without the formal consent of the
other first obtained; and it was mutually covenanted not to lay down
their arms until the independence of the United States should be
formally or tacitly assured by the treaty or treaties that should
terminate the war. *** Thus allied, by treaty, with the ancient and
powerful French nation, the Americans felt certain of success.

* This letter of Louis was brought to light during the Revolution of
1793. It is a curious document, and illustrates the consummate duplicity
practiced by that monarch and his ministers. Disclosing, as it does, the
policy which governed the action of the French court, and the reasons
which induced the king to accede to the wishes of the Americans, its
insertion hero will doubtless be acceptable to the reader. It was dated
January 8th, 1778. "The sincere desire," said Louis, "which I feel of
maintaining the true harmony and unity of our system of alliance, which
must always have an imposing character for our enemies, induces me to
state to your majesty my way of thinking on the present condition of
affairs. England, our common and inveterate enemy, has been engaged for
three years in a war with her American colonies. We had agreed not to
intermeddle with it, and, viewing both sides as English, we made our
trade free to the one that found most advantage in commercial
intercourse. In this manner America provided herself with arms and
ammunition, of which she was destitute; I do not speak of the succors of
money and other kinds which we have given her, the whole ostensibly on
the score of trade. England has taken umbrage at these succors, and has
not concealed from us that she will be revenged sooner or later. She has
already, indeed, seized several of our merchant vessels, and refused
restitution. We have lost no time on our part. We have fortified our
most exposed colonies, and placed our fleets upon a respectable footing,
which has continued to aggravate the ill humor of England. "Such was the
posture of affairs in November last. The destruction of the army of
Burgoyne and the straitened condition of Howe have lately changed the
face of things. America is triumphant and England cast down; but the
latter has still a great, unbroken maritime force, and the hope of
forming a beneficial alliance with the colonies, the impossibility of
their being subdued by arms being now demonstrated. All the English
parties agree on this point. Lord North has himself announced in full
Parliament a plan of pacification for the first session, and all sides
are assiduously employed upon it. Thus it is the same to us whether this
minister or any other be in power. From different motives they join
against us, and do not forget our bad offices. They will fall upon us in
as great strength as if the war had not existed. This being understood,
and our grievances against England notorious, I have thought, after
taking the advice of my council, and particularly that of M. D'Ossune,
and having consulted upon the propositions which the insurgents make, to
treat with them, to prevent their reunion with the mother country. I lay
before your majesty my views of the subject. I have ordered a memorial
to be submitted to you, in which they are presented in more detail. I
desire eagerly that they should meet your approbation. Knowing the
weight of your probity, your majesty will not doubt the lively and
sincere friendship with which I am yours," &c.--Quoted by Pitkin (i.,
399) from Histoire, &c., de la Diplomatique Française, vol. vii.

** Sparks's Life of Franklin, 430, 433.

A Lady of the Revolution.--Sufferings of herself and Family.--.Her
Husband's Pension allowed her

088

CHAPTER IV.

"The sun has drunk

The dew that lay upon the morning grass;

There is no rustling in the lofty elm

That canopies my dwelling, and its shade

Scarce cools me. All is silent save the faint

And interrupted murmur of the bee,

Sitting on the sick flowers, and then again

Instantly on the wing. The plants around

Feel the too potent fervors; the tall maize

Rolls up its long green leaves; the clover droops

Its tender foliage, and declines its blooms.

But far in the fierce sunshine tower the hills,

With all their growth of woods, silent and stern,

As if the scorching heat and dazzling light

Were but an element they loved."

Bryant.

It was early in the morning of such a day as the poet refers to that we
commenced a ride and a ramble over the historic grounds of Saratoga near
Schuylerville, accompanied by the friendly guide whose proffered
services I have already mentioned. We first rode to the residence of
Mrs. J-n, one of the almost centenarian representatives of the
generation cotemporary with our Revolution, now so few and hoary. She
was in her ninety-second year of life, yet her mental faculties were
quite vigorous, and she related her sad experience of the trials of that
war with a memory remarkably tenacious and correct. Her sight and
hearing were defective, and her skin wrinkled; but in her soft blue eye,
regular features, and delicate form were lingering many traces of the
beauty of her early womanhood. She was a young lady of twenty years when
Independence was declared, and was living with her parents at Do-ve-gat
(Coveville) when Burgoyne came down the valley. She was then betrothed,
but her lover had shouldered his musket, and was in Schuyler's camp.

While Burgoyne was pressing onward toward Fort Edward from
Skenesborough, the people of the valley below, who were attached to the
patriot cause, fled hastily to Albany. Mrs. J-n and her parents were
among the fugitives. So fearful were they of the Indian scouts sent
forward, and of the resident Tories, not a whit less savage, who were
emboldened by the proximity of the invader, that for several nights
previous to their flight they slept in a swamp, apprehending that their
dwelling would be burned over their heads or that murder would break in
upon their repose. And when they returned home, after the surrender of
Burgoyne, all was desolation. Tears filled her eyes when she spoke of
that sad return. "We had but little to come home to," she said. "Our
crops and our cattle, our sheep, hogs, and horses, were all gone, yet we
knelt down in our desolate room and thanked God sincerely that our house
and barns were not destroyed." She wedded her soldier soon afterward,
and during the long widowhood of her evening of life his pension has
been secured to her, and a few years ago it was increased in amount. She
referred to it, and with quiver ing lip-quivering with the emotions of
her full heart-said, "The government has been very kind to me in my
poverty and old age." She was personally acquainted with General
Schuyler, and spoke feelingly of the noble-heartedness of himself and
lady in all the relations of life. While pressing her hand in bidding
her farewell, the thought occurred that we

Remains of the Fortifications of Burgoyne's Camp.--The Riedesel House.--
Narrative of the Baroness Riedesel.

089

represented the linking of the living, vigorous, active present, and the
half-buried, decaying past; and that between her early womanhood and now
all the grandeur and glory of our Republic had dawned and brightened
into perfect day.

From Mrs. Jn's we rode to the residence of her brother, the house
wherein the Baroness Riedesel, with her children and female companions,
was sheltered just before the surrender of Burgoyne. It is about a mile
above Schuylerville, and nearly opposite the mouth of the Batten Kill.
On our way we paused to view the remains of the fortifications of
Burgoyne's camp, upon the heights a little west of the village.
Prominent traces of the mounds and ditches are there visible in the
woods. A little northwest of the village the lines of the defenses
thrown up by the Germans, and Hessians of Hanau may be distinctly seen.
(See map, page 77.)

The house made memorable by the presence and the pen of the wife of the
Brunswick general is well preserved. At the time of the Revolution it
was owned by Peter Lansing, a relative of the chancellor of that name,
and now belongs to Mr. Samuel March 1848who has the good taste to keep
up its original character. It is upon the high bank west of the road
from Schuylerville to Fort Miller, pleasantly shaded in front by
locusts, and fairly embowered in shrubbery and fruit trees.

We will listen to the story of the sufferings of some of the women of
Burgoyne's camp in that house, as told by the baroness herself: "About
two o'clock in the afternoon we again heard a firing of cannon and small
arms; instantly all was alarm, and every thing in motion. My husband
told me to go to a house not far off. I immediately seated myself in my
caleche, with my children, and drove off; but scarcely had we reached it
before I discovered five or six armed men on the other side of the
Hudson. Instinctively I threw my children down in the caleche, and then
concealed myself with them. At this moment the fellows fired, and
wounded an already wounded English soldier, who was behind me. Poor
fellow! I pitied him exceedingly, but at this moment had no power to
relieve him.

"A terrible cannonade was commenced by the enemy against the house in
which I sought to obtain shelter for myself and children, under the
mistaken idea that all the generals were in it. Alas! it contained none
but wounded and women. We were at last obliged to resort to the cellar
for refuge, and in one corner of this I remained the whole day, my
children sleeping on the earth with their heads in my lap; and in the
same situation I passed a sleepless night. * Eleven cannon-balls passed
through the house, and we could distinctly hear them roll away. One poor
soldier, who was lying on a table for the purpose of having his leg
amputated, was struck by a shot, which carried away his other; his
comrades had left him, and when we went to his assistance we found him
in a corner of the room, into which he had crept, more dead than alive,
scarcely breathing. ** My reflections on the danger to which my husband
was exposed now agonized me exceedingly, and the thoughts of my
children, and the necessity of struggling for their preservation, alone
sustained me.

* The cellar is about fifteen by thirty feet in size, and lighted and
ventilated by two small windows only.

** The place where this ball entered is seen under the window near the
corner, and designated in the picture by a small black spot.

Companions in Misery of the Baroness Riedesel.--Wounded Soldiers.--
Kindness of General Schuyler.

090

"The ladies of the army who were with me were Mrs. Harnage, a Mrs.
Kennels the widow of a lieutenant who was killed, and the lady of the
commissary. Major Harnage, his wife, and Mrs. Kennels made a little room
in a corner with curtains to it, and wished to do the same for me, but I
preferred being near the door, in case of fire. Not far off my women
slept, and opposite to us three English officers, who, though wounded,
were determined not to be left behind; one of them was Captain Green, an
aid-de-camp to Major-general Phillips, a very valuable officer and most
agreeable man. They each made me a most sacred promise not to leave me
behind, and, in case of sudden retreat, that they would each of them
take one of my children on his horse; and for myself one of my husband's
was in constant readiness..... The want of water distressed us much; at
length we found a soldier's wife who had courage enough to fetch us some
from the river, an office nobody else would undertake, as the Americans
shot at every person who approached it; but, out of respect for her sex,
they never molested her.

"I now occupied myself through the day in attending the wounded; I made
them tea and coffee, and often shared my dinner with them, for which
they offered me a thousand expressions of gratitude. One day a Canadian
officer came to our cellar, who had scarcely the power of holding
himself upright, and we concluded he was dying for want of nourishment;
I was happy in offering him my dinner, which strengthened him, and
procured me his friendship. I now undertook the care of Major
Bloomfield, another aid-de-camp of General Phillips; he had received a
musket-ball through both cheeks, which in its course had knocked out
several of his teeth and cut his tongue; he could hold nothing in his
mouth, the matter which ran from his wound almost choked him, and he was
not able to take any nourishment except a little soup or something
liquid. We had some Rhenish wine, and, in the hope that the acidity of
it would cleanse his wound, I gave him a bottle of it. He took a little
now and then, and with such effect that his cure soon followed; thus I
added another to my stock of friends, and derived a satisfaction which,
in the midst of sufferings, served to tranquilize me and diminish their
acuteness.

"One day General Phillips accompanied my husband, at the risk of their
lives, on a visit to us. The general, after having beheld our situation,
said to him, 'I would not for ten thousand guineas come again to this
place; my heart is almost broken.'

"In this horrid situation we remained six days; a cessation of
hostilities was now spoken of, and eventually took place."

The baroness, in the simple language of her narrative, thus bears
testimony to the generous courtesy of the American officers, and to the
true nobility of character of General Schuyler in particular: "My
husband sent a message to me to come over to him with my children. I
seated myself once more in my dear caleche, and then rode through the
American camp. As I passed on I observed, and this was a great
consolation to me, that no one eyed me with looks of resentment, but
they all greeted us, and even showed compassion in their countenances at
the sight of a woman with small children I was, I confess, afraid to go
over to the enemy, as it was quite a new situation to me. When I drew
near the tents a handsome man approached and met me, _took my children
from the caleche, and hugged and kissed them, which affected me almost
to tears_. 'You tremble,' said he, addressing himself to me; 'be not
afraid.' 'No,' I answered, 'you seem so kind and tender to my children,
it inspires me with courage.' He now led me to the tent of General
Gates, where I found Generals Burgoyne and Phillips, who were on a
friendly footing with the former. Burgoyne said to me, 'Never mind; your
sorrows have now an end.' I answered him that I should be reprehensible
to have any cares, as he had none; and I was pleased to see him on such
friendly footing with General Gates. All the generals remained to dine
with General Gates.

"The same gentleman who received me so kindly now came and said to me,
'You will be very much embarrassed to eat with all these gentlemen;
_come with your children to my tent, where I will prepare for you a
frugal dinner, and give it with a free will_' I said, '_You are
certainly a husband and a father, you have shown me so much kindness._'

* General Burgoyne boasted at Fort Edward that he should eat a
Christinas dinner in Albany, surrounded by his victorious army.

Arrival of the British Officers and Women at Albany.--Courtesy of
General Schuyler and Family.

091

I now found that he was General Schuyler. He treated me with excellent
smoked tongue, beef-steaks, potatoes, and good bread and butter! Never
could I have wished to eat a better dinner; I was content; I saw all
around me were so likewise; and, what was better than all, my husband
was out of danger.

"When we had dined he told me his residence was at Albany, and that
General Burgoyne intended to honor him as his guest, and invited myself
and children to do so likewise. I asked my husband how I should act; he
told me to accept the invitation. As it was two days' journey there, he
advised me to go to a place which was about three hours' ride distant.

"Some days after this we arrived at Albany, where we so often wished
ourselves; but we did not enter it as we expected we should-victors! *
We were received by the good General Schuyler, his wife, and daughters,
not as enemies, but kind friends; and they treated us with the most
marked attention and politeness, as they did General Burgoyne, who had
caused General Schuyler's beautifully-finished house to be burned. In
fact, they behaved like persons of exalted minds, who determined to bury
all recollections of their own injuries in the contemplation of our
misfortunes. General Burgoyne was struck with General Schuyler's
generosity, and said to him, 'You show me great kindness, though I have
done you much injury.' 'That was the fate of war,' replied the brave
man; 'let us say no more about it.'"

General Schuyler was detained at Saratoga when Burgoyne and suite
started for Albany.

British Officers at Schuyler's House.--Execution-place of Lovelace.--
Active and Passive Tories.--Rendezvous of Lovelace.

092

He wrote to his wife to give the English general the very best reception
in her power. "The British commander was well received," says the
Marquis de Chastellux, * in his Travels in America, "by Mrs. Schuyler,
and lodged in the best apartment in the house. An excellent supper was
served him in the evening, the honors of whieh were done with so much
grace that he was affected even to tears, and said, with a deep sigh, '
Indeed, this is doing too much for the man who has ravaged their lands
and burned their dwellings.' The next morning he was reminded of his
misfortunes by an incident that would have amused any one else. His bed
was prepared in a large room; but as he had a numerous suite, or family,
several mattresses were spread on the floor for some officers to sleep
near him. Schuyler's second son, a little fellow about seven years old,
very arch and forward, but very amiable, was running all the morning
about the house. Opening the door of the saloon, he burst out a laughing
on seeing all the English collected, and shut it after him, exclaiming,
'You are all my prisoners!' This innocent cruelty rendered them more
melancholy than before."

We next visited the headquarters of General Gates, south of the Fish
Creek, delineated on page 75. On our way we passed the spot, a few rods
south of the creek, where Lovelaee, a prominent Tory, was hung. It is
upon the high bluff seen on the right of the road in the annexed sketch,
which was taken from the lawn in front of the rebuilt mansion of General
Schuyler.

Lovelaee was a fair type of his class, the bitterest and most implacable
foes of the republicans. There were many Tories who were so from
principle, and refused to take sides against the parent country from
honest convictions of the wrongfulness of such a course. They looked
upon the Whigs as rebels against their sovereign; condemned the war as
unnatural, and regarded the final result as surely disastrous to those
who had lifted up the arm of opposition. Their opinions were courteously
but firmly expressed; they took every opportunity to dissuade their
friends and neighbors from participation in the rebellion; and by all
their words and acts discouraged the insurgent movement. But they
shouldered no musket, girded on no sword, piloted no secret expedition
against the republicans. They were passive, noble-minded men, and
deserve our respect for their consistency and our commiseration for
their sufferings at the hands of those who made no distinction between
the man of honest opinions and the marauder with no opinions at all.

There was another elass of Tories, governed by the footpad's axiom, that
"might makes right." They were Whigs when royal power was weak, and
Tories when royal power was strong. Their god was mammon, and they
offered up human sacrifices in abundance upon its altars. Cupidity and
its concomitant vices governed all their acts, and the bonds of
consanguinity and affection were too weak to restrain their fostered
barbarism. Those born in the same neighborhood; educated (if at all) in
the same school; admonished, it may be, by the same pastor, seemed to
have their hearts suddenly closed to every feeling of friendship or of
love, and became as relentless robbers and murderers of neighbors and
friends as the savages of the wilderness. Of this elass was Thomas
Lovelaee, who, for a time, became a terror to his old neighbors and
friends in Saratoga, his native district.

At the commencement of the war Lovelace went to Canada, and there
confederated with five other persons from his own county to come down
into Saratoga and abduct, plunder, or betray their former neighbors. He
was brave, expert, and cautious. His quarters were in a large swamp
about five miles from the residence of Colonel Van Vechten at Do-ve-gat,
but his place of rendezvous was cunningly concealed. Robberies were
frequent, and several inhabitants were carried off. General Schuyler's
house was robbed, and an attempt was

* A French officer, who served in the array in this country during a
part of the Revolution.

Capture and Death of Lovelace.--Daring Adventure of an American
Soldier.--Departure from Schuylerville

093

made by Lovelace and his companions to carry off Colonel Van Vechten;
but the active vigilance of General Stark, then in command of the
barracks north of the Fish Creek, * in furnishing the colonel with a
guard, frustrated the marauder's plans. Intimations of his intentions
and of his place of concealment were given to Captain Dunham, who
commanded a company of militia in the neighborhood, and he at once
summoned his lieutenant, ensign, orderly, and one private to his house.
* At dark they proceeded to the "Big Swamp," three miles distant, where
two Tory families resided. They separated to reconnoiter, but two of
them, Green and Guiles, were lost. The other three kept together, and at
dawn discovered Lovelace and his party in a hut covered over with
boughs, just drawing on their stockings. The three Americans crawled
cautiously forward till near the hut, when they sprang upon a log with a
shout, leveled their muskets, and Dunham exclaimed, "Surrender, or you
are all dead men!" There was no time for parley, and, believing that the
Americans were upon them in force, they came out one by one without
arms, and were marched by their captors to General Stark at the
barracks. They were tried by a court-martial as spies, traitors, and
robbers, and Lovelace, who was considered too dangerous to be allowed to
escape, was sentenced to be hung. He complained of injustice, and
claimed the leniency due to a prisoner of war; but his plea was
disallowed, and three days afterward he was hung upon the brow of the
hill at the place delineated, during a tremendous storm of rain and
wind, accompanied by vivid lightning and clashing thunder-peals. These
facts were communicated to me by the son of Colonel Van Vechten, who
accompanied me to the spot, and who was well acquainted with all the
captors of Lovelace and his accomplices.

The place where Gates and Burgoyne had their first interview (delineated
on page 81) is about half way between the Fish Creek and Gates's
headquarters. After visiting these localities, we returned to the
village, and spent an hour upon the ground where the British army laid
down their arms. This locality I have already noted, and will not detain
the reader longer than to mention the fact that the plain whereon this
event took place formed a part of the extensive meadows of General
Schuyler, and to relate a characteristic adventure which occurred there.

While the British camp was on the north side of the Fish Creek, a number
of the officers' horses were let loose in the meadows to feed. An expert
swimmer among the Americans who swarmed upon the hills east of the
Hudson, obtained permission to go across and capture one of the horses.
He swam the river, seized and mounted a fine bay gelding, and in a few
moments was recrossing the stream unharmed, amid a volley of bullets
from a party of British soldiers. Shouts greeted him as he returned;
and, when rested, he asked permission to go for another, telling the
captain that _he_ ought to have a horse to ride as well as a private.
Again the adventurous soldier was among the herd, and, unscathed,
returned with an exceedingly good match for the first, and presented it
to his commander. ***

Bidding our kind friend and guide adieu, we left Schuylerville toward
evening, in a private carriage, for Fort Miller, six miles further up
the Hudson. The same beautiful and diversified scenery, the same
prevailing quiet that charmed us all the way from Waterford, still
surrounded us; and the river and the narrow alluvial plain through which
it flows, bounded on either side by high undulations or abrupt pyramidal
hills, which cast lengthened shadows in the evening sun across the
meadows, presented a beautiful picture of luxurious repose. We crossed
the Hudson upon a long bridge built on strong abutments, two miles and a
half above Schuylerville, at the place where Burgoyne and his army
crossed on the 12th of September, 1777. The river is here quite broad
and shallow, and broken by frequent rifts and rapids.

We arrived at Fort Miller village, on the east bank of the river,
between five and six o'clock; and while awaiting supper, preparatory to
an evening canal voyage to Fort Edward, nine miles above, I engaged a
water-man to row me across to the western bank, to

* The place-where these barracks were located is just within the
northern suburbs of Schuylerville.

** Davis, Green, Guiles, and Burden.

*** Neilson, 223

Visit to the Site of old Fort Edward.--Tragedy of "Bloody Run."-- Daring
Feat by Putnam.--Fort Miller Fording-place.

094

view the site of the old fort. He was a very obliging man, and well
acquainted with the localities in the neighborhood, but was rather
deficient in historical knowledge. His attempts to relate 'the events
connected with the old fort and its vicinity were amusing; for Putnam's
ambush on Lake Champlain, and the defeat of Pyles by Lee, in North
Carolina, with a slight tincture of correct narrative, were blended
together as pans of an event which occurred at Fort Miller.

We crossed the Hudson just above the rapids. A dam for milling purposes
spans the stream, causing a sluggish current and deeper water for more
than two miles above. Here was the scene of one of Putnam's daring
exploits. While a major in the English provincial army, nearly twenty
years before the Revolution, he was lying in-a bateau on the east side
of the river, and was suddenly surprised by a party of Indians. He could
not cross the river swiftly enough to escape the balls of their rifles,
and there was no alternative but to go down the foaming rapids. In an
instant his purpose was fixed, and, to the astonishment of the savages,
he steered directly down the current, amid whirling eddies and over
shelving rocks. In a few moments his vessel cleared the rush of waters,
and was gliding upon the smooth current below, far out of reach of the
weapons of the Indians. It was a feat they never dared attempt, and
superstition convinced them that he was so favored by the Great Spirit
that it would be an affront to Manitou to attempt to kill him with
powder and ball.

Other Indians of the tribe, however, soon afterward gave practical
evidence of their unbelief in such interposition.

There is not a vestige of Fort Miller left, and maize, and potatoes, and
pumpkin vines were flourishing where the rival forces of Sir William
Johnson and the Baron Dieskau alternately paraded. At the foot of the
hill, a few rods below where the fort stood, is a part of the trench and
bank of a redoubt, and this is all that remains even of the outworks of
the fortification.

An eighth of a mile westward is Bloody Run, a stream which comes leaping
in sparkling cascades from the hills, and affords fine trout fishing. It
derives its name from the fact that, while the English had possession of
the fort in 1759, a party of soldiers from the garrison went out to fish
at the place represented in the picture. The hills, now cultivated, were
then covered with dense forests, and afforded the Indians excellent
ambush. A troop of savages, lying near, sprang silently from their
covert upon the fishers, and bore off nine reeking scalps before those
who escaped could reach the fort and give the alarm.

This clear mountain stream enters the Hudson a little above Fort Miller,
where the river makes a sudden curve, and where, before the erection of
the dam at the rapids, it was quite shallow, and usually fordable. This
was the crossing-place for the armies; and there are still to be seen
some of the logs and stones upon the shore which formed a part of the
old "King's Road" leading to the fording-place. They are now sub-

* This view is taken from the site of the fort, looking northward. The
fort was in the town of Northumberland. It was built of logs and earth,
and was never a post of great importance

Canal Voyage to Fort Edward.--Scene on Board.--Fort Edward.--National
Debt of England.

095

merged, the river having been made deeper by the dam; but when the water
is limpid they can be plainly seen. It was twilight before we reached
the village on the eastern shore.

We supped and repaired to the packet office, where we waited until nine
o'clock in the evening before the shrill notes of a tin horn brayed out
the annunciation of a packet near. Its deck was covered with passengers,
for the interesting ceremony of converting the dining-room into a
dormitory, or swinging the hammocks or berths and selecting their
occupants, had commenced, and all were driven out, much to their own
comfort, but, strange to say, to the dissatisfaction of many who lazily
preferred a sweltering lounge in the cabin to the delights of fresh air
and the bright starlight. Having no interest in the scramble for beds,
we enjoyed the evening breeze and the excitement of the tiny tumult. My
companion, fearing the exhalations upon the night air, did indeed
finally seek shelter in one end of the cabin, but was driven, with two
other young ladies, into the captain's state-room, to allow the "hands"
to have full play in making the beds. Imprisoned against their will, the
ladies made prompt restitution to themselves by drawing the cork of a
bottle of sarsaparilla and sipping its contents, greatly to the
consternation of a meek old dame, the mother of one of the girls, who
was sure it was "bed-bug pizen, or something a pesky sight worse." We
landed at Fort Edward at midnight, and took lodgings at a small but
tidily-kept tavern close by the canal.

Fort Edward was a military post of considerable importance during the
French and Indian wars and the Revolution. * The locality, previous to
the erection of the fortress, was called the _first carrying-place_,
being the first and nearest point on the Hudson where the troops,
stores, &c., were landed while passing to or from the south end of Lake
Champlain, a distance of about twenty-five miles. The fort was built in
1755, when six thousand troops were collected there, under General
Lyman, waiting the arrival of General Johnson, the commander-in-chief of
an expedition against Ticonderoga and Crown Point. It was at first
called Fort Lyman, in Fort Edward.* honor of the general who
superintended its erection. It

* I refer particularly to the war between England and France, commonly
called, in Europe, the Seven Years' War. It was declared on the 9th of
June, 1756, and ended with the treaty at Paris, concluded and signed
February 10th, 1763. It extended to the colonies of the two nations in
America, and was carried on with much vigor here until the victory of
Wolfe at Quebec, in 1759, and the entire subjugation of Canada by the
English. The French managed to enlist a large proportion of the Indian
tribes in their favor, who were allied with them against the Britons. It
is for that reason that the section of the Seven Years' War in America
was called by the colonists the "French and Indian War." I would here
mention incidentally that that war cost Great Britain five hundred and
sixty millions of dollars, and laid one of the largest foundation stones
of that national debt under which she now groans. It was twenty millions
in the reign of William and Mary, in 1697, and was then thought to be
enormous; in 1840 it was about four thousand millions of dollars!

** Explanation: a a a a a a, six cannons; A, the barracks; B, the store-
house; C, the hospital; D, the magazine; E, a flanker; F, a bridge
across Fort Edward Creek; and G, a balm of Gilead tree which then
overshadowed the massive water-gate. That tree is still standing, a
majestic relic of the past, amid the surrounding changes in nature and
art. It is directly upon the high bank of the Hudson, and its branches,
heavily foliated when I was there, spread very high and wide. At the
union below its three trunks it measures more than twenty feet in
circumference.

Daring Feat of Putnam at Fort Edward.--Jane M'Crea Tree.--Sir William
Johnson and his Title.--Fortifications.

096

was built of logs and earth, sixteen feet high and twenty-two feet
thick, and stood at the junction of Fort Edward Creek and the Hudson
River. From the creek, around the fort to the river, was a deep fosse or
ditch, designated in the engraving by the dark dotted part outside of
the black lines.

There are still very prominent traces of the banks and fosse of the
fort, but the growing village will soon spread over and obliterate them
forever. Already a garden was within the lines; and the old parade-
ground, wherein Sir William Johnson strutted in the haughty pride of a
victor by accident, * was desecrated by beds of beets, parsley,
radishes, and onions.

Fort Edward was the theater of another daring achievement by Putnam. In
the winter of 1756 the barracks, then near the northwestern bastion,
took fire. The magazine was only twelve feet distant, and contained
three hundred barrels of gunpowder. Attempts were made to batter the
barracks to the ground with heavy cannons, but without success. Putnam,
who was stationed upon Rogers's Island, in the Hudson, opposite the
fort, hurried hither, and, taking his station on the roof of the
barracks, ordered a line of soldiers to hand him water. But, despite his
efforts, the flames raged and approached nearer and nearer to the
magazine. The commandant, Colonel Haviland, seeing his danger, ordered
him down; but the brave major did not leave his perilous post until the
fabric began to totter. He then leaped to the ground, placed himself
between the falling building and the magazine, and poured on water with
all his might. The external planks of the magazine were consumed, and
there was only a thin partition between the flames and the powder. But
Putnam succeeded in subduing the flames and saving the ammunition. His
hands and face were dreadfully burned, his whole body was more or less
blistered, and it was several weeks before he recovered from the effects
of his daring conflict with the fire.

The first place of historic interest that we visited at Fort Edward was
the venerable and blasted pine tree near which, tradition asserts, the
unfortunate Jane M'Crea lost her life while General Burgoyne had his
encampment near Sandy Hill. It stands upon the west side of the road
leading from Fort Edward to Sandy Hill, and about half a mile from the
canal-lock in the former village. The tree had exhibited unaccountable
signs of decadence for several years, and when we visited it, it was
sapless and bare. Its top was torn off by a November gale, and almost
every breeze diminishes its size by scattering its decayed twigs. The
trunk is about five feet in diameter, and upon the bark is engraved, in
bold letters, Jane M'Crea, 1777. The names of many ambitious visitors
are intaglioed upon it, and reminded me of the line "Run, run, Orlando,
carve on every tree." I carefully sketched all its branches, and the
engraving is a faithful portraiture of the interesting relic, as viewed
from the opposite side of the road. In a few years this tree, around
which history and romance have clustered so many associations, will
crumble and pass away forever. **

The sad story of the unfortunate girl is so interwoven in our history
that it has become a component part; but it is told with so many
variations, in essential and non-essential par-

* Sir William Johnson had command of the English forces in 1755,
destined to act against Crown Point. He was not remarkable for courage
or activity. He was attacked at the south end of Lake George by the
Freneh general, Deiskau, and was wounded at the outset. The command then
devolved on Major-general Lyman, of the Connecticut troops, who, by his
skill and bravery, secured a victory over the French and Indians.
General Johnson, however, had the honor and reward thereof. In his mean
jealousy he gave General Lyman no praise; and the British king (George
II.) made him a baronet, and a present of twenty thousand dollars to
give the title becoming dignity.Note.--As I shall have frequent occasion
to employ technical terms used in fortifications, I here give a diagram,
which, with the explanation, will make those terms clear to the reader.
The figure is a vertical section of a fortification. The mass of earth,
ab c d ef g h, forms the rampart with its parapet; ab is the interior
slope of the rampart; b c is the terre-plein of the rampart, on which
the troops and cannon are placed; d e is the banquette, or step, on
which the soldiers mount to fire over the parapet; ef g is the parapet;
g h is the exterior slope of the parapet-, hi is the revetment, or wall
of masonry, supporting the rampart; h 1c, the exterior front covered
with the revetment, is called the escarp; i hi the ditch; l m is the
counterscarp; m n is the covered way, having a banquette nop; s r is the
glacis. When there are two ditches, the works between the inner and the
outer ditch are called ravelins, and all outside of the ditches,
outworks.-See Brande's Cyc., art. Fortification.

** It was cut down in 1853, and converted into canes, boxes, &c.

The Fort Edward Romance.--Mrs. M'Neil and her Grand-daughter.--Narrative
of the latter

097

ticulars, that much of the narratives we have is evidently pure fiction;
a simple tale of Indian abduction, resulting in death, having its
counterpart in a hundred like occurrences, has been garnished with all
the high coloring of a romantic love story. It seems a pity to spoil the
_romance_ of the matter, but truth always makes sad havoc with the
frost-work of the imagination, and sternly demands the homage of the
historian's pen.

All accounts agree that Miss M'Crea was staying at the house of a Mrs.
M'Neil, near the fort, at the time of the tragedy. A granddaughter of
Mrs. M'Neil (Mrs.F--n) is now living at Fort 1848. Edward, and from her
I received a minute account of the whole transaction, as she had heard
it a "thousand times" from her grandmother. She is a woman of remarkable
intelligence, about sixty years old. When I was at Fort Edward she was
on a visit with her sister at Glenn's Falls. It had been my intention to
go direct to Whitehall, on Lake Champlain, by way of Fort Ann, but the
traditionary accounts in the neighborhood of the event in question were
so contradictory of the books, and I received such assurances that
perfect reliance might be placed upon the statements of Mrs. F-n, that,
anxious to ascertain the truth of the matter, if possible, we went to
Lake Champlain by way of Glenn's Falls and Lake George. After
considerable search at the falls, I found Mrs. F-n, and the following is
her relation of the tragedy at Fort Edward.

Jane M'Crea was the daughter of a Scotch Presbyterian clergyman of
Jersey City, opposite New York; and while Mrs. M'Neil (then the wife of
a former husband named Campbell) was a resident of New York City, an
acquaintance and intimacy had grown up between Jenny and her daughter.
After the death of Campbell (which occurred at sea) Mrs. Campbell
married M'Neil. He, too, was lost at sea, and she removed with her
family to an estate

Residence of Jane M'Crea at Fort Edward.--Her Betrothal.--Abduction of
Mrs. M'Neil and Jane.

098

owned by him at Fort Edward. Mr. M'Crea, who was a widower, died, and
Jane went to live with her brother near Fort Edward, where the intimacy
of former years with Mrs. M'Neil and her daughter was renewed, and Jane
spent much of her time at Mrs. M'Neil's house. Near her brother's lived
a family named Jones, consisting of a widow and six sons, and between
Jenny and David Jones, a gay young man, a feeling of friendship budded
and ripened into reciprocal love. When the war broke out the Joneses
took the royal side of the question, and David and his brother Jonathan
went to Canada in the autumn of 1776. They raised a company of about
sixty men, under pretext of re-enforcing the American garrison at
Ticonderoga, but they went further down the lake and joined the British
garrison at June l, 1777 Crown Point. When Burgoyne collected his forces
at St. John's, at the foot of Lake Champlain, David and Jonathan Jones
were among them. Jonathan was made captain and David a lieutenant in the
division under General Fraser, and at the time in question they were
with the British army near Sandy Hill. Thus far all accounts nearly
agree.

The brother of Jenny was a Whig, and prepared to move to Albany; but
Mrs. M'Neil, who was a cousin of General Fraser (killed at Stillwater),
was a stanch loyalist, and intended to remain at Fort Edward. When the
British were near, Jenny was at Mrs. M'Neil's, and lingered there even
after repeated solicitations from her brother to return to his house,
five miles further down the river, to be ready to flee when necessity
should compel. A faint hope that she might meet her lover doubtless was
the secret of her tarrying. At last her brother sent a peremptory order
for her to join him, and she promised to go down in a large bateau *
which was expected to leave with several families on the following day.

Early the next morning a black July 27, 1777 servant boy belonging to
Mrs. M'Neil espied some Indians stealthily approaching the house, and,
giving the alarm to the inmates, he fled to the fort, about eighty rods
distant. Mrs. M'Neil's daughter, the young friend of Jenny, and mother
of my informant, was with some friends in Argyle, and the family
consisted of only the widow and Jenny, two small children, and a black
female servant. As usual at that time, the kitchen stood a few feet from
the house; and when the alarm was given the black woman snatched up the
children, fled to the kitchen, and retreated through a trap-door to the
cellar. ** Mrs. M'Neil and Jenny followed, but the former being aged and
very corpulent, and the latter young and agile, Jenny reached the trap-
door first. Before Mrs. M'Neil could fully descend, the Indians were in
the house, and a powerful savage seized her by the hair and dragged her
up. Another went into the cellar and brought out Jenny, but the black
face of the negro woman was not seen in the dark, and she and the
children remained unharmed.

With the two women the savages started off, on the road toward Sandy
Hill, for Bur-goyne's camp; and when they came to the foot of the ascent
on which the pine tree stands, where the road forked, they caught two
horses that were grazing, and attempted to place their prisoners upon
them. Mrs. M'Neil was too heavy to be lifted on the horse easily, and as
she signified by signs that she could not ride, two stout Indians took
her by the arms and hurried her up the road over the hill, while the
others, with Jenny on the horse, went along the road running west of the
tree.

The negro boy who ran to the fort gave the alarm, and a small detachment
was imme-

* Bateaux were rudely constructed of logs and planks, broad and without
a keel. They had small draught, and would carry large loads in quite
shallow water. In still water and against currents they were propelled
by long driving-poles. The ferry-scows or flats on the southern and
western rivers are very much like the old bateaux. They were sometimes
furnished with a mast for lakes and other deep water, and had cabins
erected on them.

** Traces of this cellar and of th: foundation of the house are still
visible in the garden of Dr. Norton, in Fort Edward village, who is a
relative of the family by marriage.

Flight of the Indians toward Sandy Hill.--Treatment of Mrs. M'Neil.--
Indian Account of the Death of Jane.--The Spring.

099

diately sent out to effect a rescue. They fired several volleys at the
Indians, but the savages escaped unharmed. Mrs. M'Neil said that the
Indians, who were hurrying her up the hill, seemed to watch the flash of
the guns, and several times they threw her upon her face, at the same
time falling down themselves, and she distinctly heard the balls whistle
above them. When they got above the second hill from the village the
firing ceased; they-then stopped, stripped her of all her garments
except her chemise, and in that plight led her into the British camp.
There she met her kinsman, General Fraser, and reproached him bitterly
for sending his "scoundrel Indians" after her. He denied all knowledge
of her being away from the city of New York, and took every pains to
make her comfortable. She was so large that not a woman in camp had a
gown big enough for her, so Fraser lent her his camp-coat for a garment,
and a pocket-handkerchief as a substitute for her stolen cap.

Very soon after Mrs. M'Neil was taken into the British camp, two parties
of Indians arrived with scalps. She at once recognised the long glossy
hair of Jenny, * and, though shuddering with horror, boldly charged the
savages with her murder, which they stoutly denied.

They averred that, while hurrying her along the road on horseback, near
the spring west of the _pine tree_, a bullet from one of the American
guns, intended for them, mortally wounded the poor girl, and she fell
from the horse. Sure of losing a prisoner by death, they took her scalp
as the next best thing for them to do, and that they bore in triumph to
the camp, to obtain the promised reward for such trophies. Mrs. M'Neil
always believed the story of the Indians to be true, for she knew that
they were fired upon by the detachment from the fort, and it was far
more to their interest to carry a prisoner than a scalp to the British
commander, the price for the former being much greater. In fact, the
Indians were so restricted by Burgoyne's humane instructions respecting
the taking of scalps, that their chief solicitude was to bring a
prisoner alive and unharmed into the camp. ** And the probability that
Miss M'Crea was killed as they alleged is strengthened by the fact that
they took the corpulent Mrs. M'Neil, with much fatigue and difficulty,
uninjured to the British lines, while Miss M'Crea, quite light and
already on horseback, might have been carried off with far greater ease.

It was known in camp that Lieutenant Jones was betrothed to Jenny, and
the story got abroad that he had sent the Indians for her, that they
quarreled on the way respecting the reward he had offered, and murdered
her to settle the dispute. Receiving high touches of coloring as it went
from one narrator to another, the sad story became a tale of darkest
horror, and produced a deep and wide-spread indignation. This was
heightened by September 2, 1777 a published letter from Gates to
Burgoyne, charging him with allowing the In-

* It was of extraordinary length and beauty, measuring a yard and a
quarter. She was then about twenty years old, and a very lovely girl;
not lovely in beauty of face, according to the common standard of
beauty, but so lovely in disposition, so graceful in manners, and so
intelligent in features, that she was a favorite of all who knew her.

** "I positively forbid bloodshed when you are not opposed in arms. Aged
men, women, children, and prisoners must be held sacred from the knife
and hatchet, even in the time of actual conflict. You shall receive
compensation for the prisoners you take, but you shall be called to
account for scalps. In conformity and indulgence of your customs, which
have affixed an idea of honor to such badges of victory, you shall be
allowed to take the scalps of the dead when killed by your fire and in
fair opposition; but on no account, or pretense, or subtilty, or
prevarication are they to be taken from the wounded, or even the dying;
and still less pardonable, if possible, will it be held to kill men in
that condition on purpose, and upon in supposition that this protection
to the wounded would be thereby evaded."-Extract from the Speech of
Burgoyne to the Indians assembled upon the Bouquet River, June 21, 1777.

*** This is a view of a living spring, a few feet below the noted pine
tree, the lower portion of which is seen near the top of the engraving.
The spring is beside the old road, traces of which may be seen.

Massacre of the Allen Family.--Gates's Letter.--Inquiry respecting the
Death of Miss M'Crea.--Desertion of Lieutenant Jones

100

dians to butcher with impunity defenseless women and children. "Upward
of one hundred men, women, and children," said Gates, "have perished by
the hands of the ruffians, to whom, it is asserted, you have paid the
price of blood." Burgoyne flatly denied this assertion, and declared
that the case of Jane M'Crea was the only act of Indian cruelty of which
he was informed. His information must have been exceedingly limited, for
on the same day when Jenny lost her life a party of savages murdered the
whole family, of John Allen, of Argyle, consisting of himself, his wife,
three children, a sister-in-law, and three negroes. The daughter of Mrs.
M'Neil, already mentioned, was then at the house of Mr. Allen's father-
in-law, Mr. Gilmer, who, as well as Mr. Allen, was a Tory. Both were
afraid of the savages, nevertheless, and were preparing to flee to
Albany. On the morning of the massacre a younger daughter of Mr. Gilmer
went to assist Mrs. Allen in preparing to move. Not returning when
expected, her father sent a negro boy down for her. He soon returned,
screaming, "They are all dead-father, mother, young missus, and all!" It
was too true. That morning, while the family were at breakfast, the
Indians burst in upon them and slaughtered every one. Mr. Gilmer and his
family left in great haste for Fort Edward, but proceeded very
cautiously for fear of the savages. When near the fort, and creeping
warily along a ravine, they discovered a portion of the very party who
had plundered Mrs. M'Neil's house in the morning. They had emptied the
straw from the beds and filled the ticks with stolen articles. Mrs.
M'Neil's daughter, who accompanied the fugitive family, saw her mother's
looking-glass tied upon the back of one of the savages. They succeeded
in reaching the fort in safety.

Burgoyne must soon have forgotten this event and the alarm among the
loyalists because of the murder of a Tory and his family; forgotten how
they flocked to his camp for protection, and Fraser's remark to the
frightened loyalists, "It is a conquered country, and we must wink at
these things;" and how his own positive orders to the Indians, not to
molest those having protection, caused many of them to leave him and
return to their hunting-grounds on the St. Lawrence. It was all dark and
dreadful, and Burgoyne was willing to retreat behind a false assertion,
to escape the perils which were sure to grow out of an admission of half
the truth of Gates's letter. That letter, as Sparks justly remarks, was
more ornate than forcible, and abounded more in bad taste than
simplicity and pathos; yet it was suited to the feelings of the moment,
and produced a lively impression in every part of America. Burke, in the
exercise of all his glowing eloquence, used the story with powerful
effect in the British House of Commons, and made the dreadful tale
familiar throughout Europe.

Burgoyne, who was at Fort Ann, instituted an inquiry into the matter. He
summoned the Indians to council, and demanded the surrender of the man
who bore off the scalp, to be punished as a murderer. Lieutenant Jones
denied all knowledge of the matter, and utterly disclaimed any such
participation as the sending of a letter to Jenny, or of an Indian
escort to bring her to camp. He had no motive for so doing, for the
American army was then retreating; a small guard only was at Fort
Edward, and in a day or two the British would have full possession of
that fort, when he could have a personal interview with her. Burgoyne,
instigated by motives of policy rather than by judgment and inclination,
pardoned the savage who scalped poor Jenny, fearing that a total
defection of the Indians would be the result of his punishment. *

Lieutenant Jones, chilled with horror and broken in spirit by the event,
tendered a resignation of his commission, but it was refused. He
purchased the scalp of his Jenny, and with this cherished memento
deserted, with his brother, before the army reached Saratoga, and
retired to Canada. Various accounts have been given respecting the
subsequent fate of Lieutenant Jones. Some assert that, perfectly
desperate and careless of life, he rushed into the thickest of the
battle on Bemis's Heights, and was slain; while others allege that he
died within three years afterward, heart-broken and insane. But neither
assertion is true. While searching for Mrs. F----n among her friends at
Glenn's Falls, I called at the

* Earl of Harrington's Evidence in Burgoyne's "State of the Expeditions.
66.

Effect of Miss M'Crea's Death on Lieutenant Jones.--Attack of Indians
upon American Troops.--Reinterment of Miss M'Crea

101

house of Judge R--s, whose lady is related by marriage to the family of
Jones. Her aunt married a brother of Lieutenant Jones, and she often
heard this lady speak of him. He lived in Canada to be an old man, and
died but a few years ago. The death of Jenny was a heavy blow, and he
never recovered from it. In youth he was gay and exceedingly garrulous,
but after that terrible event he was melancholy and taciturn. He never
married, and avoided society as much as business-would permit. Toward
the close of July in every year, when the anniversary of the tragedy
approached, he would shut himself in his room and refuse the sight of
any one; and at all times his friends avoided any reference to the
Revolution in his presence.

At the time of this tragical event-the American army under General
Schuyler was encamped at Moses's Creek, five miles below Fort Edward.
One of its two divisions was placed under the command of Arnold, who had
just reached the army. His July 03, 1777 division included the rear-
guard left at the fort. A picket-guard of one hundred men, under
Lieutenant Van Vechten, was stationed on the hill a little north of the
pine tree; and at the moment when the house of Mrs. M'Neil was attacked
and plundered, and her self and Jenny were carried off, other parties of
Indians, belonging to the same expedition, came rushing through the
woods from different points, and fell upon the Americans. Lieutenant Van
Vechten and several others were killed and their scalps borne off. Their
bodies, with that of Jenny, were found by the party that went out from
the fort in pursuit. She and the officer were lying near together, close
by the spring already mentioned, and only a few feet from the pine tree.
They were stripped of clothing, for plunder was the chief incentive of
the savages to war. They were borne immediately to the fort, which the
Americans at once evacuated, and Jane did indeed go down the river in
the bateau in which she had intended to embark, but not glowing with
life and beauty, as was expected by her fond brother. With the deepest
grief, he took charge of her mutilated corse, which was buried at the
same time and place with that of the lieutenant, on the west bank of the
Hudson, near the mouth of a small creek about three miles below Fort
Edward.

Mrs. M'Neil lived many years, and was buried in the small village
cemetery, very near the ruins of the fort. In the summer of 1826 the
remains of Jenny were taken up and deposited in the same grave with her.
They were followed by a long train of young men and maidens, and the
funeral ceremonies were conducted by the eloquent but unfortunate Hooper
Cummings, of Albany, at that time a brilliant light in the American
pulpit, but destined, like a glowing meteor, to go suddenly down into
darkness and gloom. Many who were then young have a vivid recollection
of the pathetic discourse of that gifted man, who on that occasion "made
all Fort Edward weep," as he delineated anew the sorrowful picture of
the immolation of youth and innocence upon the horrid altar of war.

A plain white marble slab, about three feet high, with the simple
inscription _Jane M'Crea_, marks the spot of her interment. Near by, as
seen in the picture, is an antique brown stone slab, erected to the
memory of Duncan Campbell, a relative of Mrs. M'Neil's first husband,
who was mortally wounded at Ticonderoga in 1758. * Several others of the
same name lie near, members of the family of Donald Campbell, a brave
Scotchman who was with Montgomery at the storming of Quebec in 1775.

"We lingered long in the cool shade at the spring before departing for
the village burial-ground where the remains of Jenny rest. As we emerged
from the woods we saw two or

* The following is the inscription: Here Lyes The Body of Duncan-
Campbell, of Inversaw. Esqr., Major to the Old Highland Regt., Aged 55
Years, Who Died The 17th July, 1758. of The Wounds He Received in the
Attack of The Retrenchments of Ticonderoga or Carillon the 8th July,
1758.

Young Girl struck by Lightning.--Village Burial-ground.--Colonel Cochran
and his Adventures.--Rogers's Island.

102

three persons with a horse and wagon, slowly ascending the hill from the
village. In the wagon, upon a mattress, was a young girl who had been
struck by lightning, two days before while drawing water from a well. *
Although alive, her senses were all paralyzed by the shock, and her
sorrowing father was carrying her home, perhaps to die. With brief words
of consoling hope, we stepped up and looked upon the stricken one. Her
breathing was soft and slow-a hectic glow was upon each cheek; but all
else of her fair young face was pale as alabaster except her lips. It
was grievous, even to a stranger, to look upon a young life so suddenly
prostrated, and we turned sadly away to go to the grave of another, who
in the bloom of young womanhood was also smitten to the earth, not by
the lightning from Heaven, but by the arm of warring man.

The village burial-ground is near the site of the fort, and was thickly
strewn with wild flowers. We gathered a bouquet from the grave of Jenny,
and preserved it for the eye of the curious in an impromptu herbarium
made of a city newspaper. A few feet from her "narrow house" is the
grave of Colonel Robert Cochran, whom I have already mentioned as
commanding a detachment of militia at Fort Edward at the time of
Burgoyne's surrender. He was a brave officer, and was warmly attached to
the American cause. In 1778 he was sent to Canada as a spy. His errand
being suspected, a large bounty was offered for his head. He was obliged
to conceal himself, and while doing so at one time in a brush-heap, he
was taken dangerously ill. Hunger and disease made him venture to a log
cabin in sight. As he approached he heard three men and a woman
conversing on the subject of the reward for his head, and discovered
that they were actually forming plans for his capture. The men soon left
the cabin in pursuit of him, and he immediately crept into the presence
of the woman, who was the wife of one of the men, frankly told her his
name, and. asked her protection. That she kindly promised him, and gave
him some nourishing food and a bed to rest upon. The men returned in the
course of a few hours, and she concealed Cochran in a cupboard, where he
overheard expressions of their confident anticipations that before
another sun they would have the rebel spy, and claim the reward. They
refreshed themselves, and set off again in search of him. The kind woman
directed him to a place of concealment, some distance from her cabin,
where she fed and nourished him until he was able to travel, and then he
escaped beyond the British lines. Several years afterward, when the war
had closed, the colonel lived at Ticonderoga, and there he accidentally
met his deliverer, and rewarded her handsomely for her generous fidelity
in the cause of suffering humanity.

Colonel Cochran died in 1812, at Sandy Hill, and was buried at Fort
Edward.

It was hot noon when I left the village cemetery, and took shelter under
the shadow of the venerable balm of Gilead tree at the place of the
water-gate of the fort. A few rods below is the mouth of Fort Edward
Creek, on the south of which the British army were encamped when
Burgoyne tarried there to send an expedition to Bennington, and, after
that disastrous affair, to recruit and discipline his forces. Dividing
the waters of the Hudson in front of the fort is Rogers's Island, a
beautiful and romantic spot, which was used as a camp-ground by the
English and French alternately during the French and Indian war. Almost
every year the

* This mournful event occurred in the village, very near the same spot
where, a year before, five men in a store were instantly killed by one
thunder-bolt.

** This sketch is taken from within the intrenchments of Fort Edward,
near the magazine, looking southwest. On the left, just beyond the balm
of Gilead tree, is seen the creek, and on the right, across the water,
Rogers's Island.

Relics found on Rogers's Island.--A remarkable Skull.--Silver Coin found
at Fort Edward.

103

plow turns lip some curious relics of the past upon the island, such as
bayonets, tomahawks, buttons, bullets, cannon-balls, coin, arrow-heads,
&c.

Dr. Norton, of Fort Edward, gave me a skull that had been exhumed there,
which is remarkable for its excessive thickness; not so thick, however,
as to resist the force of a musket-ball which penetrated it, and
doubtless deprived its owner of life. It is three eighths of an inch
thick where the bullet entered in front, and, notwithstanding its long
inhumation, the sutures are perfect. Its form is that of the negro, and
it probably belonged to the servant of some officer stationed there.

The silver coin found in the vicinity of Fort Edward is called by the
people "cob money."

The derivation of this name I could not learn. I obtained two pieces of
it, both of which are Spanish coin. The larger one is a cross-pistareen,
of the value of sixteen cents; the other is a quarter fraction of the
same coin. They are very irregular in form, and the devices and dates
are quite imperfect. The two in my possession are dated respectively
1741, 1743 These Spanish small coins composed the bulk of specie
circulation among the French in Canada at that time

Ride from Fort Edward to Glenn's Falls.--Appearance of the Country.--
Interesting Character of the Region.

104

CHAPTER V.

"Though of the past from no carved shrines,

Canvass, or deathless lyres, we learn,

Yet arbor'd streams and shadowy pines

Are hung with legends wild and stern:

In deep dark glen-on mountain side,

Are graves whence stately pines have sprung,

Naught telling how the victims died,

Save faint tradition's faltering tongue."

Street.

E dined at three, and immediately left the pleasant little village of
Fort Edward in a barouche for Glenn's Falls, by the way of Sandy Hill, a
distance of six miles. The latter village is beautifully situated upon
the high left bank of the Hudson, where the river makes a sudden sweep
from an easterly to a southerly course. Here is the termination of the
Hudson Valley, and above it the river courses its way in a narrow
channel, among rugged rocks and high, wooden bluffs, through as wild and
romantic a region as the most enthusiastic traveler could desire.

It was early in the afternoon when we reached the Mansion House at
Glenn's Falls, near the cataract. All was bustle and confusion, for here
is the brief tarrying-place of fashionable tourists on their way from
Saratoga Springs to Lake George. There was a constant arrival and
departure of visitors. Few remained longer than to dine or sup, view the
falls at a glance, and then hasten away to the grand summer lounge at
Caldwell, to hunt, fish, eat, drink, dance, and sleep to their heart's
content. We were thoroughly wearied by the day's ramble and ride, but
time was too precious to allow a moment of pleasant weather to pass by
unimproved. Comforted by the anticipation of a Sabbath rest the next
day, we brushed the dust from our clothes, made a hasty toilet, and
started out to view the falls, and search for the tarrying-place of Mrs.
F-n, of Fort Edward.

Here the whole aspect of things is changed. Hitherto our journey had
been among the quiet and beautiful; now every thing in nature was
turbulent and grand. The placid river was here a foaming cataract, and
gentle slopes, yellow with the ripe harvest, were exchanged for high,
broken hills, some rocky and bare, others green with the oak and pine or
dark with the cedar and spruce. Here nature, history, and romance
combine to interest and please, and geology spreads out one of its most
wonderful pages for the scrutiny of the student and philosopher. All
over those rugged hills Indian warriors and hunters scouted for ages
before the pale face made his advent among them; and the slumbering
echoes were often awakened in the last century by the crack of musketry
and the roar of cannon, mingled with the loud war-hoop of the Huron, the
Iroquois, the Algonquin, the Mohegan, the Delaware, the Adirondack, and
the Mohawk, when the French and English battled for mastery in the vast
forests that skirted the lakes and the St. Lawrence. Here, amid the roar
of this very cataract, if romance may be believed, the voice of Uncas,
the last of the Mohegans, was heard and heeded; here Hawk Eye kept his
vigils; here David breathed his nasal melody; and here Duncan Heyward,
with his lovely and precious wards, Alice and Cora Monroe, fell into the
hands of the dark and bitter Mingo chief. *

* See Cooper's "Last of the Mohicans."

Scenery about the Falls.--"Indian Cave" and "Big Snake".--Departure for
Lake George.

105

The natural scenery about the falls is very picturesque, but the
accompaniments of puny art are exceedingly incongruous, sinking the
grand and beautiful into mere burlesque. How expertly the genius of man,
quickened by acquisitiveness, fuses the beautiful and useful in the
crucible of gain, and, by the subtle alchemy of profit, transmutes the
glorious cascade and its fringes of rock and shrub into broad arable
acres, or lofty houses, or speeding ships, simply by catching the bright
stream in the toils of a mill-wheel. Such meshes are here spread out on
every side to ensnare the leaping Hudson, and the rickety buildings, the
clatter of machinery, and the harsh grating of saws, slabbing the huge
black marble rocks of the shores into city mantels, make horrid
dissonance of that harmony which the eye and ear expect and covet where
nature is thus beautiful and musical.

A bridge, nearly six hundred feet long, and resting in the center upon a
marble island, spans the river at the foot of the falls, and from its
center there is a fine view of the cataract. The entire descent of the
river is about sixty feet. The undivided stream first pours over a
precipice nine hundred feet long, and is then separated into three
channels by rocks piled in confusion, and carved, and furrowed, and
welled, and polished by the rushing waters.

Below, the channels unite, and in one deep stream the waters flow on
gently between the quarried cliffs of fine black marble, which rise in
some places from thirty to seventy feet in height, and are beautifully
stratified. Many fossils are imbedded in the rocks, among which the
_trilobite_ is quite plentiful. Here the heads (so exceedingly rare) are
frequently found.

By the contribution of a York shilling to an intelligent lad who kept
"watch and ward" at a flight of steps below the bridge, we procured his
permission to descend to the rocks below, and his services as guide to
the "Big Snake" and the "Indian Cave." The former is a petrifaction on
the surface of a flat rock, having the appearance of a huge serpent; the
latter extends through the small island from one channel to the other,
and is pointed out as the place where Cooper's sweet young heroines,
Cora and Alice, with Major Heyward and the singing-master, were
concealed. The melody of a female voice, chanting an air in a minor key,
came up from the cavern, and we expected every moment to hear the pitch-
pipe of David and the "Isle of Wight." The spell was soon broken by a
merry laugh, and three young girls, one with a torn barege, came
clambering up from the narrow entrance over which Uncas and Hawk Eye
cast the green branches to conceal the fugitives. In time of floods this
cave is filled, and all the dividing rocks below the main fall are
covered with water, presenting one vast foaming sheet. A long drought
had greatly diminished the volume of the stream when we were there, and
materially lessened the usual grandeur of the picture.

We passed the Sabbath at the falls. On Monday morning I arose at four,
and went down to the bridge to sketch the cascade. The whole heavens
were overcast, and a fresh breeze from the southeast was driving
portentous scuds before it, and piling them in dark masses along the
western horizon. Rain soon began to fall, and I was obliged to retreat
under the bridge, and content myself with sketching the more quiet scene
of the river and shore below the cataract.

We left Glenn's Falls in a "Rockaway" for Caldwell, on Lake George, nine
miles northward, at nine in the morning, the rain falling copiously. The
road passes over a wild, *

* This view was taken from under the bridge, looking down the river. The
noted cave opens upon the river just below where the figures stand.

Williams's Rock.--Approach of Dieskau.--Hendrick, the Mohawk Sachem.

106

broken, and romantic region. Our driver was a perfect. Jehu. The plank
road (since finished) was laid a small part of the way, and the speed he
accomplished thereon he tried to keep up over the stony ground of the
old track, to "_prevent jolting!"_

On the right side of the road, within four miles of Lake George, is a
huge boulder called "Williams's Rock." It was so named from the fact
that near it Colonel Ephraim Williams was killed on the 8th of
September, 1755, in an engagement with the French and Indians under
Baron Dieskau. Major-general (afterward Sir William) Johnson was at that
time at the head of Lake George, with a body of provincial troops, and a
large party of Indians under Hendrick, the famous Mohawk sachem.
Dieskau, who was at Skenesborough, marched along the course of Wood
Creek to attack Fort Edward, but the Canadians and Indians were so
afraid of cannon that, when within two miles of the fort, they urged him
to change his course, and attack Johnson in his camp on Lake George. To
this request he acceded, for he ascertained by his scouts that Johnson
was rather carelessly encamped, and was probably unsuspicious of danger.

Information of his march was communicated to the English commander at
midnight, September 7th, and early in the morning a council of war was
held. It was determined to send out a small party to meet the French,
and the opinion of Hendrick was asked. He shrewdly said, "If they are to
fight, they are too few; if they are to be killed, they are too many."
His objection to the proposition to separate them into three divisions
was quite as sensibly and laconically expressed. Taking three sticks and
putting them together, he remarked, "Put them together, and you can't
break them. Take them one by one, and you can break them easily."
Johnson was guided by the opinion of Hendrick, and a detachment of
twelve hundred men in one body, under Colonel Williams, was sent out to
meet the approaching enemy.

Before commencing their march, Hendrick mounted a gun-carriage and
harangued his warriors in a strain of eloquence which had a powerful
effect upon them. He was then about sixty-five years old. His head was
covered with long white locks, and every warrior loved him with the
deepest veneration. *** President Dwight, referring to this speech,
says, "Lieutenant-colonel

* This view is taken from the road, looking northward. In the distance
is seen the highest point of the French Mountain, on the left of which
is Lake George. From this commanding height the French scouts had a fine
view of all the English movements at the head of the lake.

** The portrait here given of the chief is from a colored print
published in London during the lifetime of the sachem. It was taken
while he was in England, and habited in the full court dress presented
to him by the king. Beneath the picture is engraved, "The brave old
Hendrick, the great sachem or chief of the Mohawk Indians, one of the
six nations now in alliance with, and subject to, the King of Great
Britain."

*** Hendrick (sometimes called King Hendrick) was born about 1680, and
generally lived at the Upper Castle, upon the Mohawk. He stood high in
the estimation of Sir William Johnson, and was one of the most active
and sagacious sachems of his time. When the tidings of his death were
communicated to his son, the young chief gave the usual groan upon such
occasions, and, placing his hand over his heart, exclaimed, "My father
still alive here. The son is now the father, and stands here ready to
fight."--Gentlemen's Magazine. Sir William Johnson obtained from
Hendrick nearly one hundred thousand acres of choice land, now lying
chiefly in Herkimer county, north of the Mohawk, in the following
manner: The sachem, being at the baronet's house, saw a richly-
embroidered coat and coveted it. The next morning he said to Sir
William, "Brother, me dream last night." "Indeed," answered Sir William;
"what did my red brother dream?" "Me dream that coat be mine." "It is
yours," said the shrewd baronet. Not long afterward Sir William visited
the sachem, and he too had a dream. "Brother," he said, "I dreamed last
night." "What did my pale-faced brother dream?" asked Hendrick. "I
dreamed that this tract of land was mine," describing a square bounded
on the south by the Mohawk, on the east by Canada Creek, and north and
west by objects equally well known. Hendrick was astonished. He saw the
enormity of the request, but was not to be outdone in generosity. He sat
thoughtfully for a moment, and then said, "Brother, the land is yours,
but you must not dream again." The title was confirmed by the British
government, and the tract was called the Royal Grant.-Simms's Schoharie
County, p. 124.

Speech of Hendrick.--Fight with the French, and Death of Colonel
Williams and Hendrick.--Bloody Pond.

107

Pomeroy, who was present and heard this effusion of Indian eloquence,
told me that, although he did not understand a word of the language,
such were the animation of Hendrick, the fire of his eye, the force of
his gestures, the strength of his emphasis, the apparent propriety of
the inflections of his voice, and the natural appearance of his whole
manner, that himself was more deeply affected with this speech than with
any other he had ever heard."

The French, advised by scouts of the march of the English, approached
with their line in the form of a half moon, the road cutting the center.
The country was so thickly wooded that all correct observation was
precluded, and at Rocky Brook, four miles from Lake George, Colonel
Williams and his detachment found themselves directly in the hollow of
the hall moon. A heavy fire was opened upon them in front and on both
flanks at the same moment, and the slaughter was dreadful. Colonel
Williams was shot dead near the rock before mentioned, and Hendrick
fell, mortally wounded by a musket-ball in the back. This circumstance
gave him great uneasiness, for it seemed to imply that he had turned his
back upon his enemy. The fatal bullet came from one of the extreme
flanks. On the fall of Williams, Lieutenant-colonel Whiting succeeded to
the command, and effected a retreat so judiciously that he saved nearly
all of the detachment who were not killed or wounded by the first
onslaught. *

So careless and apathetic was General Johnson, that he did not commence
throwing up breast-works at his camp until after Colonel Williams had
marched, and Dieskau was on the road to meet him. The firing was heard
at Lake George, and then the alarmed commander began in earnest to raise
defenses, by forming a breast-work of trees, and mounting two cannon
which he had fortunately received from Fort Edward the day before, when
his men thus employed should have been sent out to reenforce the
retreating regiment. Three hundred were, indeed, sent out, but were
totally inadequate. They met the flying English, and, joining in the
retreat, hastened back to the camp, closely pursued by the French.

A short distance from Williams's Rock is a small, slimy, bowl-shaped
pond, about three hundred feet in diameter, and thickly covered with the
leaves of the water-lily. It is near the battle-ground where Williams
and his men were slain, and the French made it the sepulcher for the
slaughtered Englishmen. Tradition avers that for many years its waters
bore a bloody hue,

* Colonel Ephraim Williams was born in 1715, at Newton, Massachusetts.
He made several voyages to Europe in early life. Being settled at
Stockbridge when the war with France, in 1740, commenced, and possessed
of great military talent, he was intrusted with the command of the line
of Massachusetts forts on the west side of the Connecticut River. He
joined General Johnson, at the head of a regiment, in 1755, and, as we
have seen, fell while gallantly leading his men against the enemy. By
his will, made before joining Johnson, he bequeathed his property to a
township west of Fort Massachusetts, on the condition that it should be
called Williamstown, and the money used for the establishment and
maintenance of a free school. The terms were complied with, and the
school was afterward incorporated (1793) as a college. Such was the
origin of Williams's College. Colonel Williams was forty years old at
the time of his death.

Arrival at Caldwell. Indian and French Names of Lake George. Fort
William Henry. Attack upon Johnson's Camp, 1755

108

and it has ever since been called _Bloody Pond_. I alighted in the rain,
and made my way through tall wet grass and tangled vines, over a newly-
cleared field, until I got a favorable view for the sketch here
presented, which I hope the reader will highly prize, for it cost a pair
of boots, a linen "sack" ruined by the dark droppings from a cotton
umbrella, and a box of cough lozenges.

It was almost noon when we reined up at the Lake House at Caldwell. We
had anticipated much pleasure from the first sight of Horicon, but a
mist covered its waters, and its mountain frame-work was enveloped in
fog; so we reserved our sentiment for use the next fair day, donned dry
clothing, and sat quietly down in the parlor to await the sovereign
pleasure of the storm.

Lake George is indeed a beautiful sheet of water, and along its whole
length of thirty-six miles almost every island, bay, and bluff is
clustered with historic associations. On account of the purity of its
waters, the Indians gave it the name of _Horicon, or Silver Water._ They
also called it _Canideri-oit_, or _The Tail of the Lake_, on account of
its connection with Lake Champlain. * It was visited by Samuel Champlain
in 1609, and some suppose that he gave his name to this lake instead of
the one which now bears it. It is fair to infer, from his own account,
that he penetrated southward as far as Glenn's Falls; and it is not a
little remarkable that in the same year, and possibly at the same
season, Hendrick Hudson was exploring below the very stream near the
head-waters of which the French navigator was resting. Strange that two
adventurers, in the service of different sovereigns ruling three
thousand miles away, and approaching from different points of the
compass, so nearly met in the vast forests of wild America. The French,
who afterward settled at Chimney Point, on Lake Champlain, frequently
visited this lake, and gave it the name of _Sacrament_, its pure waters
suggesting the idea. **

The little village of Caldwell contains about two hundred inhabitants,
and is situated near the site of Fort William Henry, at the head of the
lake, a fortress erected by General Johnson toward the close of 1755,
after his battle there with the French under Dieskau. That battle
occurred on the same day when Colonel Williams and his detachment were
routed at Rocky Brook. The French pursued the retreating English
vigorously, and about noon they were seen approaching in considerable
force and regular order, aiming directly toward the center of the
British encampment. When within one hundred rods of the breast-works, in
the open valley in front of the elevation on which Fort George (now a
picturesque ruin) was afterward built, Dieskau halted and disposed his
Indians and Canadians upon the right and left flanks. The regular
troops, under the immediate command of the baron, attacked the English
center, but, having only small arms, the effect was trifling. The
English reserved their fire until the Indians and Canadians were close
upon them, when with sure aim they poured upon them a volley of musket-
balls which mowed them down like grass before the

* Spafford's Gazetteer of New York.

** The bed of the lake is a yellowish sand, and the water is so
transparent that a white object, such as an earthen plate, may be seen
upon the bottom at a depth of nearly forty feet. The delicious salmon
trout, that weigh from five to twenty pounds, silver trout, pike,
pickerel, and perch are found here in great abundance, and afford fine
sport and dainty food for the swarms of visitors at the Lake House
during the summer season.

*** The extent of the embankments and fosse of this fort was fourteen
hundred feet, and the barracks were built of wood upon a strong
foundation of lime-stone, which abounds in the neighborhood. This plan
is copied from a curious old picture by Blodget, called a "Prospective
Plan of the Battles near Lake George 1755."

Battle of Lake George, and Death of Dieskau.--Weakness of British
Commanders.--The Six Nations.--Hendrick's Rebuke.

109

scythe. At the same moment a bomb-shell was thrown among them by a
howitzer, while two field pieces showered upon them a quantity of grape-
shot. The savage allies, and almost as savage colonists, greatly
terrified, broke and fled to the swamps in the neighborhood. The
regulars maintained their ground for some time, but, abandoned by their
companions, and terribly galled by the steady fire from the breast-
works, at length gave way, and Dieskau attempted a retreat. Observing
this, the English leaped over their breast-works and pursued them. The
French were dispersed in all directions, and Dieskau, wounded and
helpless, was found leaning upon the stump of a tree. As the provincial
soldier * who discovered him approached, he put his hand in his pocket
to draw out his watch as a bribe to allow him to escape. Supposing that
he was feeling for a pocket pistol, the soldier gave him a severe wound
in the hip with a musket-ball. He was carried into the English camp in a
blanket and tenderly treated, and was soon afterward taken to Albany,
then to New York, and finally to England, where he died from the effects
of his wounds. Johnson was wounded at the commencement of the conflict
in the fleshy part of his thigh, in which a musket-ball lodged, and the
whole battle was directed for five consecutive hours by General Lyman,
the second in command. **

Johnson's Indians, burning with a fierce desire to avenge the death of
Hendrick, were eager to follow the retreating enemy; and General Lyman
proposed a vigorous continuation of efforts by attacking the French
posts at Ticonderoga and Crown Point, on Lake Champlain. But Johnson,
either through fear, a love of ease, or some other inexplicable cause,
withheld his consent, and the residue of the autumn was spent in
erecting Fort William Henry.

In the colonial wars, as well as in the war of our Revolution, the
British government was often unfortunate in its choice of commanders.
Total inaction, or, at best, great tardiness, frequently marked their
administration of military affairs. They could not comprehend the
elastic activity of the provincials, and were too proud to listen to
their counsels. This tardiness and pride cost them many misfortunes,
either by absolute defeat in battle, or the theft of glorious
opportunities for victory through procrastination. Their shrewd savage
allies saw and lamented this, and before the commissioners of the
several colonies, who met at Albany in 1754 to consult upon a plan of
colonial alliance, in which the Six Nations *** were invited to join,
Hendrick administered a pointed rebuke to the governor and military
commanders. The sachems were first addressed by James Delaney, then
lieutenant-governor of New York; and Hendrick, who was a principal
speaker, in the course of a reply remarked, "Brethren, we have not as
yet confirmed the peace with them (meaning the French-Indian allies).
'Tis your fault, brethren; we are not strengthened by conquest, for we
should have gone and taken Crown Point, but you hindered us. We had
concluded to go and take it, but were told it was too late, that the ice
would not bear us. Instead of this, you burned your own fort at _Sar-
ragh-to-gee_ [near old Fort Hardy], and ran away from it, which was a
shame and a scandal to you. Look about your country, and see; you have
no fortifications about you--no, not even to this city. 'Tis but one
step from Canada hither, and the French may easily come and turn you out
of doors.

"Brethren, you were desirous we should open our minds and our hearts to
you: look at

* This soldier is believed to have been General Seth Pomeroy, of
Northampton, Massachusetts.-Everett's Life of Stark.

** At this battle General Stark, the hero of Bennington, then a
lieutenant in the corps of Rogers's Rangers, was first initiated in the
perils and excitements of regular warfare.

*** The Six Nations consisted of the tribes of the Mohawks, Onondagas,
Oneidas, Senecas, Cayugas, and Tuscaroras. The first five were a long
time allied, and known as the Five Nations. They were joined by the
Tuscaroras of North Carolina in 1714, and from that time the
confederation was known by the title of the Six Nations. Their great
council fire was in the special keeping of the Onondagas, by whom it was
always kept burning. This confederacy was a terror to the other Indian
tribes, and extended its conquests even as far as South Carolina, where
it waged war against, and nearly exterminated, the once powerful
Catawbas. When, in 1744, the Six Nations ceded a portion of their lands
to Virginia, they insisted on the continuance of a free war-path through
the ceded territory.

Lord Loudon. Montcalm's first Attack on Fort William Henry.--Perfidy and
Cowardice of Webb.--Vigilance of Stark

110

the French, they are men--they are fortifying every where; but, we are
ashamed to say it, you are like women, bare and open, without any
fortifications."*

The head of Lake George was the theater of a terrible massacre in 1757.
Lord Loudon, a man of no energy of character, and totally deficient in
the requisites for a military leader, was appointed that year governor
of Virginia, and commander-in-chief of all the British forces in North
America. A habit of procrastination, and his utter indecision, thwarted
all his active intentions, if he ever had any, and, after wasting the
whole season in getting here and preparing to do something, he was
recalled by Pitt, then prime minister, who gave as a reason for
appointing Lord Amherst in his place, that _the minister never heard
from him, and could not tell what he was doing._ **

Opposed to him was the skillful and active French commander, the Marquis
Montcalm, who succeeded Dieskau. Early in the spring he made an attempt
to capture Fort William March 16, 1757 Henry. He passed up Lake George
on St. Patrick's eve, landed stealthily behind Long Point, and the next
afternoon appeared suddenly before the fort. A part of the garrison made
a vigorous defense, and Montcalm succeeded only in burning some
buildings and vessels which were out of reach of the guns at the fort.
*** He returned to Ticonderoga, at which post and at Crown Point he
mustered all his forces, amounting to nine thousand men, including
Canadians and Indians, and in July prepared for another attempt to
capture Fort William Henry.

General Webb, who was commander of the forces in that quarter, was at
Fort Edward with four thousand men. He visited Fort William Henry under
an escort of two hundred men commanded by Major Putnam, and while there
he sent that officer with eighteen Rangers down the lake, to ascertain
the position of the enemy on Champlain. They were discovered to be more
numerous than was supposed, for the islands at the entrance of Northwest
Bay were swarming with French and Indians. Putnam returned, and begged
General Webb to let him go down with his Rangers in full force and
attack them, but he was allowed only to make another reconnoissance, and
bring off two boats and their crews which he left fishing. The enemy
gave chase in canoes, and at times nearly surrounded them, but they
reached the fort in safety.

Webb caused Putnam to administer an oath of secrecy to his Rangers
respecting the proximity of the enemy, and then ordered him to escort
him back immediately to Fort Edward. This order was so repugnant to
Putnam, both as to its perfidy and unsoldierly character, that he
ventured to remonstrate by saying, "I hope your excellency does not
intend to neglect so fair an opportunity of giving battle should the
enemy presume to land." Webb coolly and cowardly replied, "What do you
think we should do here?" The near approach of the enemy was cruelly
concealed from the garrison, and under his escort the general returned
to Fort Edward. The next day he sent Colonel Monroe with a regiment to
re-enforce and to take command of the garrison at Lake George.

Montcalm, with more than nine thousand men, and a powerful train of
artillery, landed

* Reported for the Gentlemen's Magazine, London, 1755.

** This is asserted by Dr. Franklin in his Autobiography (Sparks's Life,
219), where he gives an anecdote illustrative of the character of
Loudon. Franklin had occasion to go to his office in New York, where he
met a Mr. Innis, who had brought dispatches from Philadelphia from
Governor Denny, and was awaiting his lordship's answer, promised the
following day. A fortnight afterward he met Innis, and expressed his
surprise at his speedy return. But he had not yet gone, and averred that
he had called at Loudon's office every morning during the fortnight, but
the letters were not yet ready. "Is it possible," said Franklin, "when
he is so great a writer? I see him constantly at his escritoire." "Yes,"
said Innis, "but he is like St. George on the signs, _always on
horseback, but never rides forward_."

*** The garrison and fort were saved by the vigilance of Lieutenant
Stark, who, in the absence of Rogers, had command of the Rangers, a
large portion of which were Irishmen. On the evening of the 16th he
overheard some of these planning a celebration of St. Patrick's (the
following day). He ordered the sutler not to issue spirituous liquors
the next day without a written order. When applied to he pleaded a lame
wrist as an excuse for not writing, and his Rangers were kept sober. The
Irish in the regular regiments got drunk, as usual on such an occasion..
Montcalm anticipated this, and planned his attack on the night of St.
Patrick's day. Stark, with his sober Rangers, gallantly defended and
saved the fort.

Montcalm's second Attack on Fort William Henry.--Surrender of the
Garrison.--Perfidy of the French and Indians.

111

at the head of the lake, and beleaguered the garrison, consisting of
less than three thousand men. * He sent in proposals to Monroe for a
surrender of the fort, urging his humane desire to prevent the bloodshed
which a stubborn resistance would assuredly cause. Monroe, confidently
expecting re-enforcements from Webb, refused to listen to any such
proposals. The French then commenced the siege, which lasted six
consecutive days, without much slaughter on either side. Expresses were
frequently sent to General Webb in the mean while, imploring aid, but he
remained inactive and indifferent in his camp at Fort Edward. General
Johnson was at last allowed to march, with Putnam and his Rangers, to
the relief of the beleaguered garrison; but when about three miles from
Fort Edward, Webb recalled them, and sent a letter to Monroe, saying he
could render him no assistance, and advising him to surrender. This
letter was intercepted by Montcalm, and gave him great joy, for he had
been informed by some Indians of the movements of the provincials under
Johnson and Putnam, who represented them to be as numerous as the leaves
on the trees. Alarmed at this, Montcalm was beginning to suspend the
operations of the siege preparatory to a retreat, when the letter from
the pusillanimous Webb fell into his hands. He at once sent it in to
Monroe, with proposals for an immediate surrender.

Monroe saw that his case was hopeless, for two of his cannon had
bursted, and his ammunition and stores were nearly exhausted. Articles
of capitulation were agreed upon, and, under promise of protection, the
garrison marched out of the fort preparatory to being escorted to Fort
Edward. **

The savages, two thousand warriors in number, were enraged at the terms
of capitulation, for they were induced to serve in this expedition by a
promise of plunder. *** This was denied them, and they felt at liberty
to throw off all restraint. As soon as the last man left the gate of the
fort, they raised the hideous war-whoop, and fell upon the English with
the fury of demons. The massacre was indiscriminate and terrible, and
the French were idle spectators of the perfidy of their allies. They
refused interference, withheld the promised escort, and the savages
pursued the poor Britons with great slaughter, half way to Fort Edward.
**** Fifteen hundred of them were butchered or carried into hopeless
captivity. Montcalm utterly disclaimed all connivance, and declared his
inability to prevent the massacre without ordering his men to fire upon
the Indians. But it left a deep stain upon his otherwise humane
character, and the indignation excited by the event aroused the English
colonists to more united and vigorous action.

Montcalm burned and otherwise destroyed every thing connected with the
fortification. Major Putnam, who had been sent with his Rangers from
Fort Edward August 1757 to watch the movements of Montcalm, reached Lake
George just as the rear of the enemy left the shore, and truly awful was
the scene there presented, as described by himself: "The fort was
entirely demolished; the barracks, out-houses, and buildings were a heap
of ruins; the cannon, stores, boats, and vessels were all carried away.
The fires were still burning, the smoke and stench offensive and
suffocating. Innumerable fragments, human skulls and bones, and
carcasses half consumed, were still frying and broiling in the decaying
fires.

* The place where Montcalm landed is a little north of the Lake House,
at Caldwell, and about a mile from the site of the fort.

** It was stipulated, 1st. That the garrison should march out with their
arms and baggage; 2d. Should be escorted to Fort Edward by a detachment
of French troops, and should not serve against the French for a term of
eighteen months; 3d. The works and all the warlike stores should be
delivered to the French, 4th. That the sick and wounded of the garrison
should remain under the protection of Montcalm, and should be permitted
to return as soon as they were recovered.

*** Dr. Belknap.

**** The defile through which the English retreated, and in which so
many were slaughtered, is called the Bloody Defile. It is a deep gorge
between the road from Glenn's Falls to Lake George and the high range of
hills northward, called the French Mountain. In excavations for the
plank road near the defile a large number of skeletons were exhumed. I
saw the skull of one, which was of an enormous size, at least one third
larger than any other human head I ever saw. The occipital portion
exhibited a long fracture, evidently made by a tomahawk.

Destruction of Fort William Henry.--Brilliant Expedition under
Abercrombie.--Visit to the Ruins of Fort George

112

Dead bodies, mangled with scalping-knives and tomahawks in all the
wantonness of Indian fierceness and barbarity, were every where to be
seen. More than one hundred women, butchered and shockingly mangled, lay
upon the ground, still weltering in their gore. Devastation, barbarity,
and horror every where appeared, and the spectacle presented was too
diabolical and awful either to be endured or described."

Fort William Henry was never rebuilt. Upon an eminence about a mile
southeast of it, and half a mile from the lake, Fort George was erected,
but it was never a scene of very stirring events. A little south of Fort
George was a small fortification called Fort Gage, so named in honor of
General Gage, who served under Lord Amherst, and succeeded him in the
command of the forces in America in 1760, and was Governor of
Massachusetts when the Revolution broke out. Hardly a vestige of this
fort can now be seen.

The English, under General Abercrombie and the young Lord Howe,
quartered at Fort George in 1758, preparatory to an attack upon the
French posts upon Lake Champlain. Seven thousand regulars and nine
thousand provincial troops were there assembled, with a one train of
artillery and all necessary military stores, the largest and best-
appointed army yet seen in America. On the 5th of July they embarked on
Lake George, on board nine hundred bateaux and one hundred and thirty-
five whale-boats, and the next day landed at the foot of the lake and
pushed on toward Ticonderoga. Of the events which befell them there I
shall hereafter write. Let us glance a moment at the present.

Toward evening the rain abated, and, accompanied by an old resident
shoemaker as guide, I made a visit to the remains of the two English
forts. The elder one (Fort William Henry) stood directly upon the lake
shore, on the west side of a clear mountain stream called West Creek,
the main inlet of Lake George. Nothing of it now remains but a few
mounds and shallow ditches, so leveled and filled that the form of the
works can not be distinctly traced. The road along the lake shore passes
across the northeast and northwest angles, but the features of the past
are hardly tangible enough to attract the attention of a passer-by. A
little southwest of the fort, at the base of Rattlesnake or Prospect
Hill, is a level clearing called the French Field. It is the place where
Dieskau halted and disposed his troops for action. Many of the slain
were buried there; and I saw a rough-hewn stone at the head of a grave,
upon which was inscribed, in rude characters, "Jacques Cortois, 1755."

Fort George, the remains of which are scattered over several acres, was
situated about a mile southeast from William Henry, upon an eminence
gently sloping back from the lake. The dark limestone or black marble,
such as is found at Glenn's Falls, here every where approaching near the
surface or protruding above, formed a solid foundation, and supplied
ample materials for a fortress. A quadrangular citadel, or sort of
castle, was built within the lines of breast-works, and the ruins of
this constitute all that is left of the old fort. I observed vestiges of
the foundations of the barracks and other buildings; and the quarries
whence materials were taken for the buildings and ramparts seem almost
as fresh as if just opened. The wall of the citadel, on the eastern side
(the left of the picture), is now about twenty feet high. Within the
ancient area of the fort there is just sufficient earth to nourish a
thick growth of dark juniper bushes, which, with the black rocks and
crumbling masonry, presented a somber aspect. Both forts commanded a
fine view of the lake for ten miles north.

The indications of fair weather which lured me out suddenly disappeared,
and before I reached the Lake House the heavy clouds that came rolling
up from the south poured down their contents copiously. Dark masses of
vapor hovered upon the mountains that begirt the lake, and about sunset
the tops

Storm upon Lake George.--Arrivals from Ticonderoga.--Departure from
Caldwell.

113

were buried in the driving mists. We seemed to be completely shut up
within mighty prison walls, and early in the evening vivid lightning and
heavy thunder-peals contributed to produce a scene of singular grandeur
and awe. In the midst of the elemental strife the steam-boat arrived
with passengers from Ticonderoga, and those pleasure seekers who came in
her, bedraggled and weary, were capital studies for an artistic Jeremiah
in search of lamentations personified. But an excellent supper, in dry
quarters, soon brought the sunshine of gladness to every face, and
before ten o'clock more than half the new-comers were among the
liveliest in quadrille, cotillion, waltz, or gallopade.

I arose the next morning at four. The scene from my chamber window was
one of quiet beauty. The sky was cloudless, and the lake, without a
ripple, was spread out before me,

"A glorious mirror of the Almighty's form."

The east was all glowing with the soft radiance of approaching sunlight,
giving a deeper gray to the lofty hills that intervened, and every tree
was musical with the morning song of the birds.

"The south wind was like a gentle friend,

Parting the hair so softly on my brow.

It had come o'er the gardens, and the flowers

That kissed it were betrayed; for as it parted

With its invisible fingers my loose hair,

I knew it had been trifling with the rose

And stooping to the violet. There is joy

For all God's creatures in it."

Willis.

From the piazza of the Lake House, fronting the water, a comprehensive
view of the historic grounds in the vicinage may be seen, as delineated
in the picture. In the extreme distance on the left is the range of the
French Mountain, and on the right is Rattlesnake Hill (one thousand five
hundred feet high), with other lofty elevations, heavily wooded to their
very summits. By the trees on the shore, in the center of the picture,
is the site of Fort William Henry; and further on the left, and directly
over the flag-staff is the site of Fort George.

We left this fine summer resort in the steam-boat William Caldwell, at
eight in the morning. The air was clear and cool, the company agreeable,
and the voyage down the lake delightful. The mountain shores, the deep
bays, and the numerous islands (said to be three hundred and sixty-five,
the number of days in the year) present a constant variety, and all that
the eye takes in on every side is one vision of beauty. I procured a
seat in the pilot's room aloft, whence I had a broad view of the whole
ever-changing panorama of the lake in the course of the voyage.

The first island which we passed, of any considerable size, was Diamond
Island, * lying

* This name was given it on account of the number and beauty of the
quartz crystals which are found upon it. In shape and brilliancy they
resemble pure diamonds.

Diamond Island.--Successful Expedition under Colonel Brown.--Long Point,
Dome Island, and the Narrows.

114

directly in front of Dunham's Bay. Here was a depot of military stores
for Burgoyne's army in 1777, and the scene of a sharp conflict between
the small garrison that defended it and a detachment of Americans under
Colonel Brown. Between the actions of the 19th of September and 7th of
October at Bemis's Heights, General Lincoln, with a body of New England
militia, got in the rear of Burgoyne near Lake Champlain. He sent
Colonel Brown with a strong division to attempt the recapture of
Ticonderoga and the posts in the vicinity, and thus to cut off the
retreat of the British as well as their supplies. It was a service
September 25, 1777 exactly suited to Brown's active and energetic
character, and, by a rapid and stealthy movement on a stormy night, he
surprised and captured all the British outposts between the landing-
place at the north end of Lake George and the main fortress at
Ticonderoga. Mount Hope, Mount Defiance, the French lines, and a block-
house, with an armed sloop, two hundred bateaux, and several gun-boats,
fell into his hands. He also captured two hundred and ninety-three
prisoners, and released one hundred Americans; and, among other things,
he retook the old Continental standard which St. Clair left at
Ticonderoga when he evacuated that post. He then attacked the fortress,
but its walls were impregnable, and he withdrew.

Flushed with success, Colonel Brown determined to sweep Lake George, and
in the vessels they had captured the Americans proceeded to Diamond
Island. The little garrison there made a vigorous resistance, and the
republicans were repulsed with some loss. They then pushed for the shore
on the south side of Dunham's Bay, where they burned all the vessels
they had captured, and returned to Lincoln's camp.

A little north of Diamond Island is Long Island, which lies directly in
front of Long Point, a narrow, fertile strip of land that projects far
into the lake from the eastern shore. The estuary between the north side
of the point and the mountains is Harris's Bay, the place where Montcalm
moored his bateaux and landed on the 16th of March, 1757.

About twelve miles from Caldwell, in the center of the lake, is Dome
Island, which, at the distance of two or three miles, has the appearance
of the upper portion of a large dome, with an arch as regular as if made
by art. This island was the shelter for Putnam's men whom he left in the
two boats while he informed General Webb of the presence of the French
and Indians upon the two islands near the entrance of Northwest Bay, and
nearly in front of the landing-place at Bolton, on the western shore.

Shelving Rock, a lofty cliff on the eastern shore, and Tongue Mountain,
a bold, rocky promontory on the west, flank the entrance to the Narrows,
where the islands are so numerous, varying in size from a few rods to an
acre, that there is only a very narrow channel for a steam-boat to pass
through. A little north of Shelving Rock is the Black Mountain, its
summit twenty-two hundred feet high, thickly covered with the dark
spruce, and its sides robed with the cedar, fir, pine, and tamarac.
There the wild deer, the bear, and the catamount have free range, for
the hunter seldom toils up its weary ascent.

* This little sketch was taken from the steam-boat, near the south end
of Long Island, which appears in the foreground. Long Point is seen in
the center, and on the right are Dunham's Bay and the northern extremity
of the French Mountain. The highest peak on the left is Deer Pasture, or
Buck Mountain

Sabbath Day Point.--Skirmish in 1756.--Halt of Abercrombie's Army.--
Splendid Appearance of the Armament.

115

A few miles beyond the entrance to the Narrows, on the western shore, is
another fertile strip of land projecting into the lake, called Sabbath
Day Point. It is between three and four miles from the little village of
Hague, in the midst of the most picturesque scenery imaginable. Here, in
1756, a small provincial force, pressed by a party of French and
Indians, and unable to escape across the lake, made a desperate
resistance, and defeated the enemy with considerable slaughter. Here, in
the summer of 1758, General Abercrombie, with his fine army, already
noticed as having embarked in bateaux and whale-boats at the head of the
lake, landed for refreshments. It was just at dark, on a sultry Saturday
July 5, 1758 evening, when the troops debarked and spread over the
beautiful cape for a few hours' repose. The young Lord Howe, the well-
beloved of both officers and soldiers, was there, and called around him,
in serious consultation, some of the bravest of the youthful partisans
who accompanied the expedition. Captain Stark (the Revolutionary
general) was invited to sup with him; and long and anxious were the
inquiries the young nobleman made respecting the fortress of Ticonderoga
and its outposts, which they were about to assail, as if a presentiment
of personal disaster possessed his mind.

It was after midnight when the whole armament moved slowly down the
lake, and it was late on the Sabbath morning before they reached the
landing-place at the foot of it. ** The scene exhibited by this strong
and well-armed force of sixteen thousand men was very imposing. "The
order of march," says Major Rogers, "exhibited a splendid military
show." Howe, in a large boat, led the van of the flotilla. He was
accompanied by a guard of Rangers and boatmen. The regular troops
occupied the center and the provincials the wings. The sky was clear and
starry, and not a breeze ruffled the dark waters as they slept quietly
in the shadows of the mountains. Their oars were muf-

* 'Explanation of "the references: 1. Fort Ticonderoga. 2. Fort Howe. 3.
Mount Defiance. 4. Mount Independence. 5. Village of Alexandria. 7.
Black Point. 8. Juniper Island. 9. Anthony's Nose. 10. M'Donald's Bay.
11. Rogers's retreat on the ice to Fort William Henry. 12. Cook's
Islands. 13. Scotch Bonnet. 14. Odell Island. 15. Buck Mountain and
Rattlesnake Dens. 16. Shelving Rock. 17. Phelps's Point. 18. Long Point.
19. Long Island. 20. Dome Island. 21. Diamond Island. 22. Dunham's Bay.
23. Harris's Bay. 24. The route of Dieskau from Skenesborough to Fort
William Henry.

** It being early on Sunday morning when the army left the point,
General Abercrombie named the place Sabbath Day Point. The little sketch
here given was taken from the steam-boat, half a mile above, look ing
northeast.

Skirmish at Sabbath Day Point, 1776.--Rogers's Slide.--Narrow Escape of
Major Rogers.--Prisoners' Island

116

fled; and so silently did they move on in the darkness, that not a scout
upon the hills observed them. Day dawned just as they were abreast of
the Blue Mountain, four miles from the landing-place; and the first
intimation which the outposts of the enemy, stationed there, had of the
approach of the English was the full blaze of red uniforms which burst
upon their sight as the British army swept around a point and prepared
to land.

At Sabbath Day Point a party of American militia of Saratoga county had
a severe battle with Tories and Indians in 1776. Both were scouting
parties, and came upon each other unexpectedly. The Americans repulsed
the enemy, and killed and wounded about forty. There are now a few
buildings upon the point, and the more peaceful heroism of the
culturist, in conflict with the unkindness of nature, is beautifying and
enriching it.

On the western shore of the lake, three miles northward of the little
village of Hague, is Rogers's Bock, or Rogers's Slide. The lake is here
quite narrow, and huge masses of rocks, some a hundred feet high, are
piled in wild confusion on every side. The whole height of Rogers's Rock
is about four hundred feet, and the "slide," almost a smooth surface,
with a descent on an angle of about twenty-five degrees from meridian,
is two hundred feet. This hill derives its name from the fact, that from
its summit Major Rogers, commander of a corps of Rangers, escaped from
Indian pursuers. With a small party who were reconnoitering at the
outlet of the lake, in the winter of 1758, he was surprised and put to
flight by a band of Indians. He was equipped with snow-shoes, and eluded
pursuit until he came to the summit of the mountain. Aware that they
would follow his track, he descended to the top of the smooth rock, and,
casting his knapsack and his haversack of provisions down upon the ice,
slipped off his snow-shoes, and, without moving them, turned himself
about and put them on his feet again. He then retreated along the
southern brow of the rock several rods, and down a ravine he made his
way safely to the lake below, snatched up his pack, and fled on the ice
to Fort George. The Indians, in the mean while, coming to the spot, saw
the two tracks, both apparently approaching the precipice, and concluded
that two persons had cast themselves down the rock rather than fall into
their hands. Just then they saw the bold leader of the Rangers making
his way across the ice, and believing that he had slid down the steep
face of the rock, considered him (as did the Indians Major Putnam at
Fort Miller) under the special protection of the Great Spirit, and made
no attempt at pursuit. **

In consequence of a detention at Bolton, we did not reach the landing-
place at the outlet of the lake until noon. Within a mile of the landing
is a small island covered with shrubbery, called Prisoners' Island,
where the French, in the Seven Years' War, kept their English captives
who were taken in that vicinity. The first party confined there easily
es-

* This sketch is from the lake, a little south of Cook's Point, seen
just over the boat on the left. Immediately beyond is seen the smooth
rock. Nearly opposite the "slide" is Anthony's Nose, a high, rocky
promontory, having the appearance of a human nose in shape when viewed
from a particular point.

** Major Rogers was the son of an Irishman, who was an early settler of
Dumbarton, in New Hampshire. He was appointed to the command of a party
of Rangers in 1755, and with them did signal serviee to the British
cause. In 1759 he was sent by General Amherst from Crown Point to
destroy the Indian village of St. Francis. He afterward served in the
Cherokee war. In 1766 he was appointed governor of Michilli-maekinae. He
was accused of constructive treason, and was sent in irons to Montreal
for trial. In 1769 he went to England, was presented to the king, but
soon afterward was imprisoned for debt. He returned to America, and in
the Revolution took up arms for the king. In 1777 he returned to
England, where he died. His name was on the proscription list of Tories
included in the aet of New Hampshire against them, in 1778. His journal
of the French War, first published at London in 1765, was republished at
Concord in 1831.

Debarkation of British Troops.--A pleasant traveling Companion.-- Trip
from Lake George to Ticonderoga.

117

caped, in consequence of the carelessness of the victors in not
ascertaining the depth of the water, which on one side is fordable. A
small guard was left in charge of them, and, as soon as the main body of
the French had retreated, the English prisoners _waded_ from the island
and escaped.

Directly west of this island is Howe's Landing, the place where Lord
Howe with the van-guard of Abercrombie's army first landed, the outlet,
a mile below, being in possession of the enemy. The whole British force
debarked here on the morning after leaving Sabbath Day Point, and before
noon the Rangers under Rogers and Stark were pushing July 6, 1758
forward toward Ticonderoga, as a flank or advance-guard to clear the
woods, while the main army pressed onward.

The distance from the steam-boat landing to Fort Ticonderoga is four
miles. We found vehicles in abundance awaiting our arrival, and prepared
to carry passengers with all their baggage, from a clean dickey only to
a four-feet trunk, for twenty-five cents each. I succeeded in securing
my favorite seat on a pleasant day, the coachman's perch. At the Lake
House we became acquainted with a young lady from the vicinity of the
lofty Catskills, whose love of travel and appreciation of nature made
her an enthusiast, and one of the most agreeable companions imaginable.
She fairly reveled in the beauties of Lake George, not exhibited in the
simpering lip-sentimentality, borrowed from the novelist, which so often
annoys the sensible man when in the midst of mere fashionable tourists,
but in hearty, intelligent, and soul-stirring emotions of pleasure,
which lie far deeper in the heart than mortal influence and fashion, and
which gleam out in every lineament of the face. While others were afraid
of spoiling their complexions in the sun, or of crumpling their smooth
dresses or fine bonnets, she bade defiance to dust and crowds, for her
brown linen "sack," with its capacious pockets for a guide-book and
other accessories, and her plain sun-bonnet gave her no uneasiness; and
her merry laughter, which awoke ringing echoes along the hills as she,
too, mounted the coachman's seat to enjoy the fresh air and pleasant
landscape, was the very soul of pleasure. We rambled with herself and
brother that afternoon over the ruins of Ticonderoga, and at evening
parted, company. We hope her voyage of life may be as pleasant and
joyous as those few hours which she spent that day, where,

"In the deepest core

Of the free wilderness, a crystal sheet

           Expands its mirror to the trees that crowd

Its mountain borders."

The road from the foot of Lake George to Fort "Ty" is hilly, but the
varied scenery makes the ride a pleasant one. We crossed the outlet of
the lake twice; first at the Upper Falls, where stands the dilapidated
village of Alexandria, its industrial energies weighed down, I was told,
by the narrow policy of a "lord of the manor" residing in London, who
owns the fee of all the land and of the water privileges, and will not
sell, or give long leases. The good people of the place pray for his
life to be a short and a happy one-a very generous supplication. From
the high ground near the village a fine prospect opened on the eastward;
and suddenly, as if a curtain had been removed, the cultivated farms and
pleasant villages of Vermont along the lake shore, and the blue line of
the Green Mountains in the far distance, were spread out before us.

The second or Lower Falls is half way between the two lakes, and here
the thriving village of Ticonderoga is situated. A bridge and a saw-mill
were there many years before the Revolution; and this is the spot where
Lord Howe, at the head of his column, crossed the stream and pushed
forward through the woods toward the French lines, a mile and a quarter
beyond. We arrived at the Pavilion near the fort at one o'clock, dined,
and with a small party set off immediately to view the interesting ruins
of one of the most noted fortresses in America. Before noticing its
present condition and appearance, let us glance at its past history.

Ticonderoga is a corruption of Cheonderoga, an Iroquois-word, signifying
"Sounding wa

Topography of Ticonderoga.--The Fortress.--Its Investment by
Abercrombie.--Bravery of Lord Howe.

118

ters," and was applied by the Indians to the rushing waters of the
outlet of Lake George at the falls. The French, who first built a fort
at Crown Point (Fort St. Frederic), established themselves upon this
peninsula in 1755, and the next year they began the erection of a strong
fortress, which they called _Fort Carillon_. * The Indian name was
generally applied to it, and by that only was it known from the close of
the French and Indian war in 1763. **

The peninsula is elevated more than one hundred feet above the lake, and
contains about five hundred acres. Nature and art made it a strong
place. Water was upon three sides, and a deep swamp extended nearly
across the fourth. Within a mile north of the fortress intrenchments
were thrown up, the remains of which may still be seen at each side of
the road, and are known as the French lines. The whole defenses were
completed by the erection of a breast-work nine feet high, upon the
narrowest part of the neck between the swamp and the outlet of Lake
George; and before the breast-work was a strong _abatis._

Here, as I have already mentioned, was the general rendezvous of the
French under Montcalm, August 3, 1757 preparatory to the attack on Fort
William Henry. It continued to be the head-quarters of that general
until Quebec was threatened by an expedition under Wolfe, up the St.
Lawrence, when he abandoned the posts on Lake Champlain, and mustered
all his forces at the capital of Lower Canada.

Montcalm commanded a force of four thousand men at Ticonderoga when
Abercrombie July 6, 1758 approached, and was in daily expectation of
receiving a re-enforcement of three thousand troops under M. de Levi.
The English commander was advised of this expected re-enforcement of the
garrison, and felt the necessity of making an immediate attack upon the
works. His army moved forward in three columns; but so dense was the
forest that covered the whole country, that their progress was slow.
They were also deficient in suitable guides, and in a short time were
thrown into a great deal of confusion. They pressed steadily forward,
and the advanced post of the French (a breast-work of logs) was set fire
to by the enemy themselves and abandoned. Lord Howe, who was
Abercrombie's lieutenant, or second in command, led the advanced column;
and as they pressed onward after crossing the bridge, Major Putnam, with
about one hundred men, advanced as a scouting party to reconnoiter. Lord
Howe, eager to make the first attack, proposed to accompany Putnam, but
the major tried to dissuade him, by saying, "My lord, if I am killed the
loss of my life will be of little consequence, but the preservation of
yours is of infinite importance to this army." The answer was, "Putnam,
your life is as dear to you as mine is to me. I am determined to go."
*** They dashed on through the woods, and in a few minutes fell in with
the advanced guard of the French, who had retreated from the first
breast-works, and, without a guide and bewildered, were endeavoring to
find their way back to the lines. A sharp skirmish ensued, and at the
first fire Lord Howe, another officer, and several privates were

* This is a French word, signifying chime, jingling, noise, bawling,
scolding, racket, clatter, riot.--Boyer. Its application to this spot
had the same reference to the rush of waters as the Indian name Che-
onderoga.

** This fortress was strongly built. Its walls and barracks were of
limestone, and every thing about it was done in the most substantial
manner. Explanation of the ground plan: a, entrance and wicket gate; b,
counterscarp twenty feet wide; c c, bastions; d, under-ground room and
ovens; e e e e, barracks and officers' quarters; f court or parade-
ground; g g, trench or covert-way, sixteen feet wide and ten feet deep;
h, the place where Ethan Allen, and his men entered by a covert-way from
the outside.

*** Humphrey's Life ef Putnam..

Fight with the French, and Death of Howe.--Attack on Ticonderoga, and
Defeat of the English.--Other Expeditions

119

killed. * The French were repulsed with a loss of three hundred killed
and one hundred and forty-eight taken prisoners. The English columns
were so much broken, confused, and fatigued, that Abercrombie marched
them back to the landing-place on Lake George, to bivouac for the night.
Early the next morning Colonel Bradstreet advanced and took possession
of the saw-mills, near the present village of Ticonderoga, which the
enemy had abandoned.

Abercrombie sent an engineer to reconnoiter, and on his reporting that
the works were unfinished and might easily be taken, the British troops
were again put in motion toward the fortress. As they approached the
lines, the French, who were completely July 8, 1758 sheltered behind
their breast-works, opened a heavy discharge of artillery upon them, but
they pressed steadily forward in the face of the storm, determined to
assault the works, and endeavor to carry them by sword and bayonet. They
found them so well defended by a deep _abatis_, that it was almost
impossible to reach them; yet, amid the galling fire of the enemy, the
English continued for four hours striving to cut their way through the
limbs and bushes to the breast-works with their swords. Some did,
indeed, mount the parapet, but in a moment they were slain. Scores of
Britons were mowed down at every discharge of cannon. Perceiving the
rapid reduction of his army, Abercrombie at last sounded a retreat, and,
without being pursued by the French, the English fell back to their
encampment at the foot of Lake George, from which the wounded were sent
to Fort Edward and to Albany The English loss was nearly two thousand
men and twenty-five hundred stand of arms. Never did troops show bolder
courage or more obstinate persistence against fearful obstacles. The
whole army seemed emulous to excel, but the Scotch Highland regiment of
Lord John Murray was foremost in the conflict, and suffered the severest
loss. One half of the privates and twenty-five officers were slain on
the spot or badly wounded. Failing in this attempt, Abercrombie changed
his plans. He dispatched General Stanwix to build a fort near the head-
waters of the Mohawk, at the site of the present village of Rome, Oneida
county. Colonel Bradstreet, at his own urgent solicitation, was ordered,
with three thousand troops, mostly provincials, to proceed by the way of
Oswego and Lake Ontario, to attack Fort Frontenac, where Kingston, in
Upper Canada, now stands; and himself, with the rest of the army,
returned to Albany. **

While misfortunes were attending the English under the immediate command
of Abercrombie, and the power and influence of the French were gaining
strength on the lake, a British force was closely beleaguering
Louisburg, on the Island of Cape Breton, at the mouth of the St.
Lawrence, then the strongest fortification in America, and the rallying
point of French power on this Continent. Early in 1758 Admiral Boscawen
sailed fromMay 28.

* George, Lord-viscount Howe, was the eldest son of Sir E. Scrope,
second Viscount Howe in Ireland. He commanded five thousand British
troops which landed at Halifax in 1757, and, as we have seen, the next
year accompanied General Abercrombie against Ticonderoga. Alluding to
his death, Mante observes, "With him the soul of the army seemed to
expire." He was the idol of his soldiers, and, in order to accommodate
himself and his regiment to the nature of the service, he cut his hair
short, and fashioned his clothes for activity. His troops followed his
example, and they were, indeed, the soul of Abercrombie's army. He was
in the thirty-fourth year of his age when he fell. The General Court of
Massachusetts Bay, as a testimony of respect for his character,
appropriated two hundred and fifty pounds sterling for the erection of a
monument in Westminster Abbey. Captain (afterward general) Philip
Schuyler, who was highly esteemed by Lord Howe, and who at that time was
employed in the commissary department, was commissioned to carry the
young nobleman's remains to Albany and bury them with appropriate
honors. They were placed in a vault, and I was informed by a daughter of
General Schuyler (Mrs. Cochran, of Oswego) that when, many years
afterward, the coffin was opened, his hair had grown to long, flowing
locks, and was very beautiful.

** General James Abercrombie was descended from a wealthy Scotch family,
and, in consequence of signal services on the Continent, was promoted to
the rank of major general. In 1758 fifty thousand troops were placed
under his command by Mr. Pitt, and sent with him to America to attempt a
recovery of all that the French had taken from the English. He was the
successor of Lord Loudon, but was not much superior to the earl in
activity or military skill. He was superseded by Amherst after his
defeat at Ticonderoga, and in the spring of 1759 he returned to England.

Siege and Capture of Louisburg.--Preparations for the Conquest of
Canada.--Capture of Ticonderoga and Crown Point.

120

Halifax, Acadia, * with forty armed vessels, bearing a land force of
twelve thousand men under General Amherst. General Wolfe was second in
command; and in appointing that young soldier to a post so important,
Pitt showed that sagacity in correctly appreciating character for which
he was so remarkable.

On the 2d of June the fleet anchored in Gabarus Bay, and the whole
armament reached the shore on the 8th. The French, alarmed at such a
formidable force, called in their outposts, dismantled the royal
battery, and prepared for a retreat. But the vigilance and activity of
Wolfe prevented their escape. He passed around the Northeast Harbor, and
erected a battery at the North Cape, from which well-directed shots soon
silenced the guns of the smaller batteries upon the island. Hot shots
were also poured June 25 into the small fleet of French vessels lying in
the harbor of Louisburg, and three of them were burned. The town was
greatly shattered by the active artillery; the vessels which were not
consumed were dismantled or sunken; and several breaches were July 21
made in the massive walls. Certain destruction awaited the garrison and
citizens, and at last the fortress, together with the town and St.
John's (now Prince Edward's July 26. Island) was surrendered into the
hands of the English by capitulation.

The skill, bravery, and activity of General Amherst, exhibited in the
capture of Louisburg, gained him a vote of thanks from Parliament, and
commended him to Pitt, who, the next year, appointed him to the chief
command in America, in place of the less active Abercrombie. So much did
Pitt rely upon his judgment and ability, that he clothed him with
discretionary powers to take measures to make the complete conquest of
all Canada in a single campaign. His plans were arranged upon a
magnificent scale. Appreciating the services of Wolfe, one expedition
was placed under his command, to ascend the St. Lawrence and attack
Quebec. General Prideaux was sent with another expedition to capture the
strong-hold of Niagara, while Amherst himself took personal command of a
third expedition against the fortress on Lake Champlain. It was arranged
for the three armies to form a junction as conquerors at Quebec.
Prideaux, after capturing the fort at Niagara, was to proceed down the
lake and St. Lawrence to attack Montreal and the posts below, and
Amherst was to push forward after the capture of Ticonderoga and Crown
Point, down the Richelieu or Sorel Elver to the St. Lawrence, and join
with Wolfe at Quebec.

Amherst collected about eleven thousand men at Fort Edward and its
vicinity, and, moving cautiously along Lake Champlain, crossed the
outlet of Lake George, and appeared before Ticonderoga on the 26th of
July. He met with no impediments by the way, and at once made
preparations for reducing the fortress by a regular siege. The garrison
were strong, and evinced a disposition to make a vigorous resistance.
They soon discovered, however, that they had not Abercrombie to deal
with, and, despairing of being able to hold out against the advancing
English, they dismantled and abandoned the fort, and fled to Crown
Point. Not a gun was fired or a sword crossed; and the next day Amherst
marched in and took possession of the fort. He at once set about
repairing and enlarging it, and also arranging an expedition against the
enemy at Crown Point, when, to his astonishment, he learned from his
scouts that they had abandoned that post also, and fled down the lake to
Isle Aux Noix in the Richelieu or Sorel. Of his operations in that
direction I shall hereafter write.

* Acadia was the ancient name of the whole country now comprehended
within the boundaries of Nova Scotia, or New Scotland.

Ticonderoga and its Associations.--Visit to the Ruins of the Fort.-- A
living Soldier of the Revolution 121 121

CHAPTER VI.

"I'm not romantic, but, upon my word,

There are some moments when one can't help feeling

As if his heart's chords were so strongly stirred

By things around him, that 'tis vain concealing

A little music in his soul still lingers,

Whene'er the keys are touched by Nature's fingers."

C. F. Hoffman.

ATURE always finds a chord of sympathy in the human heart harmoniously
respondent to her own sweet music; and when her mute hut eloquent
language weaves in with its teachings associations of the past, or when,
in the midst of her beauties, some crumbling monument of history stands
hoary and oracular, stoicism loses its potency, and the bosom of the
veriest churl is opened to the genial warmth of the sun of sentiment.
Broken arches and ruined ramparts are always eloquent and suggestive of
valiant deeds, even where their special teachings are not comprehended;
but manifold greater are the impressions which they make when the
patriotism we adore has hallowed them. To impressions like these the
American heart is plastic while tarrying among the ruins of Ticonderoga,
for there the first trophy of our war for independence was won, and
there a soldier of the British realm first stooped a prisoner to the
aroused colonists, driven to rebellion by unnatural oppression.

A glimpse from the coach, of the gray old ruins of the fortress of "Ty,"
as we neared the Pavilion, made us impatient as children to be among
them. Our own curiosity was shared by a few others, and a small party of
us left early and ascended the breast-works, over scattered fragments of
the walls, and eagerly sought out the most interesting localities, by
the aid of a small plan of the fort which I had copied for the occasion.
Without a competent guide, our identifications were not very reliable,
and our opinions were as numerous and diverse as the members of our
party. We were about to send to the Pavilion for a guide and umpire,
when a venerable, white-haired man, supported by a rude staff, and
bearing the insignia of the "Order of Poverty," came out from the ruins
of the northern line of barracks, and offered his services in
elucidating the confused subject before us. He was kind and intelligent,
and I fingered with him among the ruins long after the rest of the party
had left, and listened with pleasure and profit to the relation of his
personal experience, and of his familiar knowledge of the scene around
us.

Isaac Rice was the name of of our octogenarian guide, whose form and
features, presented upon the next page, I sketched for preservation. *
Like scores of those who fought our battles for freedom, and lived the
allotted term of human fife, he is left in his evening twilight to
depend upon the cold friendship of the world for sustenance, and to feel
the practical ingratitude of a people reveling in the enjoyment which
his privations in early manhood contributed to secure He performed
garrison duty at Ticonderoga under St. Clair, was in the field at
Saratoga in 1777, and served a regular term in the army; but, in
consequence of some lack of doc-

* Mr. Rice sat down in the cool shadow of the gable of the western line
of barracks while I sketched his person and the scenery in the distance.
He is leaning against the wall, within a few feet of the entrance of the
covert-way to the parade-ground, through which Allen and his men
penetrated. In the middle ground is seen the wall of the ramparts, and
beyond is the lake sweeping around the western extremity of Mount
Independence, on the left beyond the steam-boat. For a correct
apprehension of the relative position of Mount Independence to
Ticonderoga, the reader is referred to the map, ante page 115.

Isaac Rice.--Position of Affairs in the Colonies at the beginning of
1775.--Secret Agent sent to Canada

122uments or some technical error, he lost his legal title to a pension,
and at eighty-five years of age that feeble old soldier was obtaining a
precarious support for himself from the free-will offerings of visitors
to the ruins of the fortress where he was garrisoned when it stood in
the pride of its strength, before Burgoyne scaled the heights of Mount
Defiance. He is now alone, his family and kindred having all gone down
into the grave.

His elder brother, and the last of his race, who died in 1838, was one
of the little band who, under Colonel Ethan Allen, surprised and
captured Fort Ticonderoga in the spring of 1775. We will consider that
event and its consequences before further examining the old ruins around
us.

The contempt with which the loyal and respectful addresses of the first
Continental Congress of 1774 were treated by the British ministry and a
majority in Parliament; the harsh measures adopted by the government
early in 1775, to coerce the colonists into submission, and the
methodical tyranny of General Gage at Boston, and of other colonial
governors, convinced the Americans that an appeal to arms was
inevitable. They were convinced, also, that the province of Quebec, or
Canada, would remain loyal, * and that there would be a place of
rendezvous for British troops when the colonies should unite in open and
avowed rebellion. The strong fortresses of Ticonderoga and Crown Point
formed the key of all communication between New York and Canada, and the
vigilant patriots of Massachusetts, then the very hot-bed of rebellion,
early perceived the necessity of securing these posts the moment
hostilities should commence. Early in March, Samuel Adams and Joseph
Warren, members of the Committee of Correspondence of Boston, sent a
secret agent into Canada to ascertain the opinions and temper of the
people of that province concerning the great questions at issue and the
momentous

* On the 26th of October, 1774, the Congress adopted an address to the
people of Canada, recounting the grievances the American colonies
suffered at the hands of the parent country, and including that province
in the category of the oppressed, urging them to affiliate in a common
resistance. But its Legislative Assembly made no response, and Congress
construed their silence into a negative.--Journals of Congress, i., 55

Report of the secret Agent.--Plan formed in Connecticut to Capture
Ticonderoga.--Expedition under Ethan Allen.

events 123then pending. After a diligent but cautious performance of his
delicate task, the agent sent word to them from Montreal that the people
were, at best, lukewarm, and advised that, the moment hostilities
commenced, Ticonderoga and its garrison should be seized, This advice
was coupled with the positive assertion that the people of the New
Hampshire Grants were ready to undertake the bold enterprise. *

Within three weeks after this information was received by Adams and
Warren, the battle of Lexington occurred. The event aroused the whole
country, and the patriots April 19, 1775 looked to the neighborhood of
Boston from all quarters. The provincial Assembly of Connecticut was
then in session, and several of its members ** concerted and agreed upon
a plan to seize the munitions of war at Ticonderoga, for the use of the
army gathering at Dambridge and Roxbury. They appointed Edward Mott and
Noah Phelps a committee to proceed to the frontier towns, ascertain the
condition of the fort and the strength of the garrison, and, if they
thought it expedient, to raise men and attempt the surprise and capture
of the post. One thousand dollars were advanced from the provincial
treasury to pay the expenses of the expedition.

The whole plan and proceedings were of a private character, without the
public sanction of the Assembly, but with its full knowledge and tacit
approbation. Mott and Phelps collected sixteen men as they passed
through Connecticut; and at Pittsfield, Massachusetts, they laid their
plans before Colonel Easton and John Brown (the latter was afterward the
Colonel Brown whose exploits on Lake George have been noticed), who
agreed to join them. Colonel Easton enlisted volunteers from his
regiment of militia as he passed through the country, and about forty
had been engaged when he reached Bennington. There Colonel Ethan Allen,
a man of strong mind, vigorous frame, upright in all his ways, fearless
in the discharge of his duty, and a zealous patriot, joined the
expedition with his _Green Mountain Boys_, and the whole party, two
hundred and seventy men, reached Castleton, fourteen miles east of
Skenesborough, or Whitehall, at dusk on the 7th of May. A council of war
was immediately held, and Allen was appointed commander of the
expedition, Colonel James Easton, second in command, and Seth Warner,
third. It was arranged that Allen and the principal officers, with the
main body, should march to Shoreham, opposite Ticonteroga; that Captain
Herrick, with thirty men, should push on to Skenesborough, and capture
the young Major Skene (son of the governor, who was then in England),
confine his people, and, seizing all the boats they might find there,
hasten to join Allen at Shoreham;

* By the grant of Charles II. to his brother James, duke of York, the
tract in America called New York was bounded on the east by the
Connecticut River, while the charters of Massachusetts and Connecticut
gave those provinces a westward extent to the "South Sea" or the Pacific
Ocean. When, toward the middle of the last century, settlements began to
be made westward of the Connecticut River, disputes rose, and the line
between Connecticut and New York was finally drawn, by mutual agreement,
twenty miles east of the Hudson. Massachusetts claimed a continuation of
the Connecticut line as its western boundary, but New York contested the
claim as interfering with prior grants to that colony. New Hampshire,
lying north of Massachusetts, was not as yet disturbed by these
disputes, for the country west of the Green Mountains was a wilderness,
and had never been surveyed. When Benning Wentworth was made Governor of
New Hampshire, he was authorized to issue patents for unimproved lands
within his province, and in 1749 applications were made to him for
grants beyond the mountains. He gave a patent that year for a township
six miles square, having its western line twenty miles east of the
Hudson; and in his honor it was named Bennington. The Governor and
Council of New York remonstrated against this grant, yet Wentworth
continued to issue patents; and in 1754 fourteen townships of this kind
were laid out and settlements commenced. During the French and Indian
war settlements increased tardily, but after the victory of Wolfe at
Quebec numerous applications for grants were made; and at the time of
the peace, in 1763, one hundred and thirty-eight townships were surveyed
west of the Connecticut River, and these were termed the New Hampshire
Grants., The controversy between New York and the Grants became so
violent that military organizations took place in the latter section to
resist the civil power of New York, and about 1772 the military thus
enrolled were first called Green Mountain Boys; among the most active
and daring of whom were Ethan and Ira Allen and Remember Baker, men of
whom I shall have occasion to speak hereafter.--See Sparks's Life of
Ethan Allen, and Thompson's Vermont, part ii.

** Among these were Silas Deane, David Wooster, Samuel H. Parsons, and
Edward Stevens, all distinguished men during the Revolution.

Expedition against Ticonderoga.--Arnold joins Allen at Castleton. --
Dispute about Rank.--Surprise of the Garrison

124and that Captain Douglas should proceed to Panton, beyond Crown
Point, and secure every boat or bateau that should fall in his way.

Benedict Arnold, who joined the army about this time, doubtless received
a hint of this expedition before he left New Haven, for the moment he
arrived at Cambridge with the company of which he was captain, he
presented himself before the Committee of Safety, and proposed a similar
expedition in the same direction. He made the thing appear so feasible,
May 3, 1775that the committee eagerly accepted his proposal, granted him
a colonel's commission, and gave him the chief command of troops, not
exceeding four hundred in number, which he might raise to accompany him
on an expedition against the lake fortresses. Not doubting his success,
Arnold was instructed to leave a sufficient garrison at Ticonderoga, and
with the rest of the troops return to Cambridge with the arms and
military stores that should fall into his possession. He was also
supplied with one hundred pounds in cash, two hundred pounds weight each
of gunpowder and leaden balls, one thousand flints, and ten horses, by
the provincial Congress of Massachusetts. His instructions were to raise
men in Western Massachusetts, but, on reaching Stockbridge, he was
disappointed in finding that another expedition had anticipated him, and
was on its way to the lake. He remained only long enough to engage a few
officers and men to follow him, and then hastened onward and May 9, 1775
joined the other expedition at Castleton. He introduced himself to the
officers, pulled a bit of parchment from his pocket, and, by virtue of
what he averred was a superior commission, as it was from the
Massachusetts Committee of Safety, claimed the supreme command. This was
objected to, for he came single-handed, without officers or troops; and
the soldiers, a large proportion of whom were Green Mountain Boys, and
who were much attached to Allen, declared that they would shoulder their
muskets and march home rather than serve under any other leader. Arnold
made a virtue of necessity, and united himself to the expedition as a
volunteer, maintaining his rank, but having no command.

The momentary interruption of Arnold produced no change in the plans,
and Allen marched to the shore of the lake, opposite Ticonderoga, during
the night. He applied to a farmer in Shoreham, named Beman, for a guide,
who offered his son Nathan, a lad who passed a good deal of time within
the fort, with the boys of the garrison, and was well acquainted with
every secret way that led to or within the fortress. * But a serious
difficulty now occurred. They had but a few boats, and none had been
sent from Skenesborough or May 10, 1775 Panton. The day began to dawn,
and only the officers and eighty-three men had crossed the lake. Delay
was hazardous, for the garrison, if aroused, would make stout
resistance. Allen, therefore, resolved not to wait for the rear division
to cross, but to attack the fort at once. He drew up his men in three
ranks upon the shore, directly in front of where the Pavilion now
stands, and in a low but distinct tone briefly harangued them; and then,
placing himself at their head, with Arnold by his side, they marched
quickly but stealthily up the height to the sally port. The sentinel
snapped his fusee at the commander, but it missed fire, and he retreated
within the fort under a covered way. The Americans followed close upon
his heels, and were thus guided by the alarmed fugitive directly to the
parade within the barracks. There another sentinel made a thrust at
Easton, but a blow upon the head from Allen's sword made him beg for
quarter, and the patriots met with no further resistance.

As the troops rushed into the parade under the covered way, they gave a
tremendous shout, and, filing off into two divisions, formed a line of
forty men each along the southwestern and northeastern range of
barracks. The aroused garrison leaped from their pallets, seized their
arms, and rushed for the parade, but only to be made prisoners by the
intrepid New Englanders. At the same moment Allen, with young Beman at
his elbow as guide, ascended the steps to the door of the quarters of
Captain Delaplace, the commandant

* He died in December, 1846, in Franklin county, New York, when nearly
ninety years old. He had lived to see our confederacy increase from
thirteen to thirty states, and from three millions of people to twenty
millions.

Interview between Allen and Delaplaee.--Allen's Order to surrender
obeyed.--Trouble with Arnold about command.

125of the garrison, and, giving three loud raps with the hilt of his
sword, with a voice of peculiar power, ordered him to appear, or the
whole garrison should be sacrificed. It was about four o'clock in the
morning. The loud shout of the invaders had awakened the captain and his
wife, both of whom sprang to the door just as Allen made his strange
demand. Delaplace appeared in shirt and drawers, with the frightened
face of his pretty wife peering over his shoulder. He and Allen had been
old friends, and, upon recognition, the captain assumed boldness, and
authoritatively demanded his disturber's errand. Allen pointed to his
men and sternly exclaimed, "I order you instantly to surrender."

"By what authority do _you_ demand it?" said Delaplaee. "In the name of
the Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress!" * thundered Allen, and,
raising his sword over the head of the captain, who was about to speak,
ordered him to be silent and surrender immediately. There was no
alternative. Delaplaee had about as much respect for the "Continental
Congress" as Allen had for "Jehovah," and they respectively relied upon
and feared powder and ball more than either. In fact, the Continental
Congress was but a shadow, for it did not meet for organization until
six hours afterward, ** and its "authority" was yet scarcely
acknowledged even by the patriots in the field. But Delaplaee ordered
his troops to parade without arms, the garrison of forty-eight men were
surrendered prisoners of war, and, with the women and children, were
sent to Hartford, in Connecticut. The spoils were one hundred and twenty
pieces of iron cannon, fifty swivels, two ten-inch mortars, one
howitzer, one cohorn, ten tons of musket-balls, three cart-loads of
flints, thirty new carriages, a considerable quantity of shells, a ware-
house full of material for boat building, one hundred stand of small
arms, ten casks of poor powder, two brass cannon, thirty barrels of
flour, eighteen barrels of pork, and some beans and peas.

Warner crossed the lake with the rear division, and marched up to the
fort just after the surrender was made. As soon as the prisoners were
secured, and all had breakfasted, he was sent off with a detachment of
men in boats to take Crown Point; but a strong head wind drove them
back, and they slept that night at Ticonderoga. Another and successful
attempt was made on the 12th, and both fortresses fell into the hands of
the patriots without bloodshed.

Arnold, who yielded his claims to supreme command at Castleton, assumed
control the moment the fort was surrendered. But his orders were not
heeded, and the Connecticut Committee, *** of semi-official origin,
which accompanied the expedition, interposed, formally installed Colonel
Allen in the command of Ticonderoga and its dependencies, and authorized
him to remain as such until the Connecticut Assembly or the Continental
Congress should send him instructions. They affirmed that the government
of Massachusetts had no part in the transaction; that the men from
Pittsfield were paid by Connecticut; and that Arnold could be considered
only as a volunteer. Finding his commands unheeded, and unwilling to
allow personal considerations to affect, inimically, the public good,
Arnold again yielded He sent a written protest, with a statement of his
grievances, to the Massachusetts Legislature. The Connecticut Committee
also sent a statement to the same body. The appointment of Allen was
confirmed, and the Assembly of Massachusetts directed Arnold not to
interfere. He soon afterward went down the lake to seize a British sloop
of war at St. John's, and to seek other occasions where glory might be
won in the service of his country.

The capture of Ticonderoga and Crown Point was an event wholly unlooked
for by the

* According to Mr. Rice, history has omitted the suffix to this demand,
which in those days was considered a necessary clincher to all solemn
averments. It is characteristic of the man and the times. Rice's brother
was within a lew feet of Allen, and said he exclaimed, "In the name of
the Great Jehovah and the Continental Congress, by God."

** The second Continental Congress assembled at Philadelphia at ten
o'clock that day (May 10th), and chose Peyton Randolph President, and
Charles Thompson Secretary.

*** One of the committee, Mr. Phelps, visited the fort, in disguise, the
day before Allen and his men arrived. He pretended to be a countryman
wishing to be shaved, and, while looking about for the garrison barber,
observed every thing carefully, and saw the dilapidation of the walls
and the laxity of duty and discipline, particularly as to sentinels.

Forbearance of the Colonists.--Consistent Course of their Delegates in
Congress.--Various Addresses of the second Congress.

126Continental Congress, then in session at Philadelphia, and many
members were alarmed at the serious aspect of affairs at the east and
north, for as yet the Americans had harbored no distinct thought or wish
derogatory to the truest loyalty. They were aggrieved by the rulers and
legislators of the parent country, and were earnestly seeking redress.
Ten years they had been petitioning the king and Parliament to exercise
righteousness and equity toward them, but their prayers were unheeded
and their warnings were scoffed at and answered by new oppressions. Yet
the colonists remained loyal, and never breathed an aspiration for
political independence. The colonial Assemblies, as well as the mass of
the people, looked forward with anxiety for a reconciliation, for they
felt proud of their connection with the British realm, whose government
was then among the most powerful upon earth.*

When the news of the capture of the forts on Champlain reached Congress,
they recommended to the committees of New York and Albany to remove the
cannon and stores to the south end of Lake George, and to erect a strong
post at that place. They also directed an exact inventory of the cannon
and military stores to be taken, "in order," as the dispatch said, "that
they may be safely returned when the restoration of harmony between
Great Britain and the colonies, _so ardently desired by the latter_,
shall render it prudent and consistent with the over-ruling law of self-
preservation." **

The delegates to the first Continental Congress, who met in September of
the previous year, while they exhibited rare firmness of purpose in tone
and manner, again and again avowed their loyalty, and made most humble
petitions to the king and the Legislature for a redress of grievances.
And those of the Congress in session when the first hostile movements on
Lake Champlain occurred, while they saw clearly that nothing but a
general resort to arms was now left for the colonists, resolved to make
fresh appeals to the king and Parliament before taking decidedly
offensive steps in acts of open hostility. They felt quite certain,
however, that the haughtiness of power would not bend so long as its
pride was wounded, and that it would never yield to an agreement for a
reconciliation upon terms other than the absolute submission of the
insurgents. Congress, therefore, correctly representing the public
sentiment, resolved to be, at the same time, _free men_ and _loyal
subjects_ as long as a link of consistency should bind those conditions
in unity. They adopted an a-May 29, 1775 address to the inhabitants of
Canada;(a) a declaration, setting forth the causes and b-July 6the
necessity for the colonies to take up arms;(b) an humble petition to the
king; July 8 address to the Assembly of Jamaica;(d) *** and an address
to the people of IreJuly 25land.(e) **** To the king they expressed
their continued devotion to his person, and

July 28 their deep regret that circumstances had in the least weakened
their attachment to the crown. To the people of Great Britain they
truthfully declared that their acts were wholly defensive; that the
charge which had been made against them, of seeking absolute
independence, was a malicious slander; and that they had never, directly
or indirectly, applied to a foreign power for countenance or aid in
prosecuting a rebellion. They truly set forth that the rejection of
their petitions and the accumulation of oppressive acts of Parliament
were the causes that placed them in the attitude of resistance which
they then assumed--an atti-

* The affections of the people of the colonies were very much alienated
by the grievances of the Stamp Act in 1765, and kindred measures, yet
they still had a strong attachment to the mother country, even when the
Revolution finally broke out. Dr. Franklin's testimony in 1766 may be
quoted as illustrative of the temper of the people nearly ten years
later. In answer to the question concerning the feelings of the people
of America toward Great Britain before the passage of the Stamp Act, he
said, "They had not only a respect but an affection for Great Britain,
for its laws, its customs, and its manners, and even a fondness for its
fashions, that greatly increased the commerce. Natives of Britain were
always treated with particular regard; and to be an Old Englandman was
of itself a character of some respect, and gave a kind of rank among
us."--Examination of Dr. Franklin before the British House of Commons
relative to the Repeal of the American Stamp Act.

** Pitkin, i., 355.

*** Jamaica, one of the West India Islands, was then a British colony,
with a provincial Legislature like those on the American Continent.

**** See Journals of Congress, i., p. 100-168.

Military Preparations made by Congress.--The Continental Army.-- Spirit
of the People.--Ticonderoga.

127tude at once necessary and justifiable, and worthy of the free
character of subjects of the British realm. "While we revere," they
said, "the memory of our gallant and virtuous ancestors, we never can
surrender these glorious privileges for which they fought, bled, and
conquered: your fleets and armies can destroy our towns and ravage our
coasts; these are inconsiderable objects--things of no moment to men
whose bosoms glow with the ardor of liberty. We can retire beyond the
reach of your navy, and, without any sensible diminution of the
necessaries of life, enjoy a luxury which, from that period, you will
want--the luxury of being free."

While petitions and addresses were in course of preparation and
adoption, Congress proceeded to make extensive military arrangements.
The militia of the various colonies, and such volunteers as could be
obtained, were mustered into service under the title of the Continental
army; and the troops which had flocked to the vicinity of Boston from
all parts of New England after the skirmishes at Lexington and
Concord,(a) and were then investing that city, were adopted and enrolled
under the April 19, 1775 same title.(b) Congress voted to issue bills ol
credit, or paper money, to the amount of three millions of dollars, for
the pay of the army, and also took measures for the June, 1775
establishment of provisional Assemblies in the several colonies instead
of the royal governments; for acts of Parliament, declaring the colonies
in a state of rebellion, and providing for the destruction of the
commerce of several sea-port towns, and for the sending of fleets and
armies to enforce submission, were regarded by the Americans as virtual
acknowledgments of the abdication of all power here. * Thus, while the
colonists kept the door of reconciliation wide open, they prepared to
maintain the righteous position which they had assumed at all hazards.

Let us for a moment close the chronicles of the past, and consider one
of the most interesting relics of the Revolution yet remaining--the
ruins of Ticonderoga. I lingered with the old soldier among the
fragments of the fortress until sunset; and just as the luminary

* See Parliamentary Register (1775), p 6-69.

Present Appearance of Fort Ticonderoga and Vicinity.--The Bakery.--
Grenadiers' Battery

128went down behind Mount Defiance I made the preceding sketch, which
may be relied upon as a faithful portraiture of the present features of
Fort Ticonderoga. The view is from the remains of the counterscarp, near
the southern range of barracks, looking northward. The barracks or
quarters for the officers and soldiers were very substantially built of
limestone, two stories high, and formed a quadrangle. The space within
was the parade. Upon the good authority of his brother, our venerable
guide pointed out the various localities of interest, and, having no
doubt as to the correctness of his information, I shall accord it as
truth The most distinct and best-preserved building seen in the sketch
is the one in which the commandant of the garrison was asleep when Allen
and his men entered the fort. On the left of the group of figures in the
fore-ground is the passage leading from the covered way into the parade,
through which the provincials passed. The two lines of forty men each
were drawn up along the range of buildings, 'the remains of which are
seen on the right and left of the picture. The most distant building was
the officers' quarters. A wooden piazza, or sort of balcony, extended
along the second story, and was reached from the ground by a flight of
stairs at the left end. The first door in the second story, on the left,
was the entrance to Delaplace's apartment. It was up those rickety
steps, with young Beman at his side, that Colonel Allen ascended; and at
that door he thundered with his sword-hilt, confronted the astonished
captain, and demanded his surrender. Between the ruined walls on the
extreme left is seen Mount Defiance, and on the right is Mount Hope. The
distant wall in the direction of Mount Hope is a part of the ramparts or
out-works, and the woods beyond it mark the location of the remains of
the "French lines," the mounds and ditches of which are still very
conspicuous.

Near the southeastern angle of the range of barracks is the bakery; it
is an under-ground arched room, and was beneath the _glacis_, perfectly
bomb-proof, and protected from all danger from without. This room is
very well preserved, as the annexed sketch of it testifies; but the
entrance steps are much broken, and the passage is so filled with
rubbish that a descent into it is difficult. It is about twelve feet
wide and thirty long. On the right is a window, and at the end were a
fire-place and chimney, now in ruins. On either side of the fire-place
are the ovens, ten feet deep.

We had no light to explore them, but they seemed to be in good condition
This bakery and the ovens are the best-preserved portions of the
fortress. For more than half a century the walls of the fort have been
common spoil for all who chose to avail themselves of such a convenient
quarry; and the proximity of the lake affords rare facility for builders
to carry off the plunder. The guide informed me that sixty-four years
ago he assisted in the labor of loading a vessel with bricks and stones
taken from the fort, to build an earthen-ware factory on Missisqui Bay,
the eastern fork of the lower end of Lake Champlain. Year after year the
ruins thus dwindle, and, unless government shall prohibit the robbery,
this venerable landmark of history will soon have no abiding-place among
us. The foundation is almost a bare rock, earthed sufficient to give
sustenance to mullens, rag-weed, and stinted grass only, so that the
plowshare can have no effect; but desecrating avarice, with its wicked
broom, may sweep the bare rock still barer, for the site is a glorious
one for a summer hotel for invalids. I shall, doubtless, receive
posthumous laudation for this suggestion from the money-getter who here
shall erect the colonnade, sell cooked fish and flavored ices, and coin
wealth by the magic of the fiddle-string.

On the point of the promontory, just above the steam-boat landing, are
the remains of the "Grenadiers' Battery," a strong redoubt built of
earth and stone. It was constructed by the French, and enlarged by the
English. It commanded the narrow part of the lake, between that point
and Mount Independence, and covered the bridge, which was made by the
Americans, extending across to the latter eminence. The bridge was
supported by

The floating Bridge.--View of the Ruins by Moonlight.--The old Patriot,
his Memories and Hopes.

129twenty-two sunken piers of large timber, at nearly equal distances;
the space between was made of separate floats, each about fifty feet
long and twelve feet wide, strongly fastened together by chains and
rivets, and also fastened to the sunken piers. Before this bridge was a
boom, made of very large pieces of timber, fastened together by riveted
bolts and chains of iron, an inch and a half square. * There was a
battery at the foot of Mount Independence, which covered that end of the
bridge; another half way up the hill; and upon the table-land summit was
a star fort well picketed. Here, strongly stationed, the Americans held
undisputed possession from the 10th of May, 1775, until the 5th of July,
1777, when they were dislodged by Burgoyne, who began to plant a battery
upon Sugar Hill, or Mount Defiance. This event we shall consider
presently.

I went up in the evening to view the solitary ruins by moonlight, and
sat upon the green sward of the old esplanade near the magazine. All was
hushed, and association, with its busy pencil, wrought many a startling
picture. The broken ruins around me, the lofty hills adjacent, the quiet
lake at my feet, all fading into chaos as the evening shadows came on,
were in consonance with the gravity of thought induced by the place and
its traditions.

"The darkening woods, the fading trees,

The grasshopper's last feeble sound,

The flowers just waken'd by the breeze,

All leave the stillness more profound.

The twilight takes a deeper shade,

The dusky pathways blacker grow,

.

           And silence reigns in glen and glade--

All, all is mute below."

_Miller's Evening Hymn_.

So smoothly ran the current of thought, that I was almost dreaming, when
a footstep startled me. It was that of the old patriot, who came and sat
beside me. He always spends the pleasant moonlight evenings here, for he
has no companions of the present, and the sight of the old walls kept
sluggish memory awake to the recollections of the light and love of
other days. "I am alone in the world," he said, "poor and friendless;
none for me to care for, and none to care for me. Father, mother,
brothers, sisters, wife, and children have all passed away, and the busy
world has forgotten _me_. I have been for almost eighty years a toiler
for bread for myself and loved ones, yet I have never lacked for
comforts. I can say with David, 'Once I was young, but now I am old, yet
I have never seen the righteous forsaken or his seed begging bread.' I
began to feel my strength giving way last spring, and looked fearfully
toward the poor-house, when I heard that the old man who lived here, to
show visitors about, was dead, and so I came down to take his place and
die also." He brushed away a tear with his hard and shriveled hand, and,
with a more cheerful tone, talked of his future prospects. How true it
is that blessed

"Hope springs immortal in the human breast,"

for this poor, friendless, aged man had bright visions of a better
earthly condition even in the midst of his poverty and loneliness. He
took me to an opening in the broken wall, which fronted a small room
near the spot where the provincials entered, and with a low voice, as if
afraid some rival might hear his business plans, explained how he
intended, another year, to clear away the rubbish, cover the room over
with boards and brush, arrange a sleeping-place in the rear, erect a
rude counter in front, and there, during the summer, sell cakes, beer
and fruit to visitors. Here I saw my fancied hotel in embryo. He
estimated the cash capital necessary for the enterprise at eight
dollars, which sum he hoped to save from his season's earnings, for the
French woman who gave him food and shelter charged him but a trifling
weekly sum for his comforts. He calculated upon large profits and
extensive sales, and hoped, if no opposition marred his plans, to make
enough to keep him comfortable through

* Burgoyne's Narrative, Appendix, p. xxx.

Trip to Mount Defiance.--Ascent of the Mountain.--An English Major and
Provincial Subaltern.

130life. He entertained me more than an hour with a relation of his own
and his father's adventures, * and it was late in the evening when I
bade him a final adieu. "God bless you, my son," he said, as he grasped
my hand at parting. "We may never meet here again, but I hope we may in
heaven!"

August 2, 1848 Early the next morning I started for Mount Defiance in
company with an English gentleman, a resident of Boston. We rode to the
"lower village," or Ticonderoga, where we left our ladies to return by
the same stage, while we climbed the rugged heights. We hired a horse
and vehicle, and a lad to drive, who professed to know all about the
route to the foot of the mountain. We soon found that he was bewildered;
and, unwilling to waste time by losing the way, we employed an aged
resident near the western slope to pilot us to the top of the eminence.
He was exceedingly garrulous, and boasted, with much self-gratulation,
of having assisted in dragging a heavy six pounder up to the top of the
mountain, five years ago, for the purpose of celebrating the "glorious
Fourth" on the very spot where Burgoyne planted his cannon sixty-six
years before. We followed him along a devious cattle-path that skirted a
deep ravine, until we came to a spring that bubbled up from beneath a
huge shelving rock whose face was smooth and mossy. The trickling of the
water through the crevices within, by which the fountain below was
supplied, could be distinctly heard. From a cup of maple-leaves we took
a cool draught, rested a moment, and then pursued our toilsome journey.

Our guide, professing to know every rock and tree in the mountain, now
left the cattle-path for a "shorter cut," but we soon wished ourselves
back again in the beaten track The old man was evidently "out of his
reckoning," but had too much "grit" to acknowledge it. For nearly an
hour we followed him through thickets tangled with vines, over the
trunks of huge trees leveled by the wind, and across a dry morass
covered with brakes and wire-grass shoulder high, where every trill of
the grasshopper sounded to our suspicious and vigilant ears like the
warning of a rattle-snake, until at length we were confronted by a wall
of huge broken rocks, almost perpendicular, and at least fifty feet
high. It seemed to extend north and south indefinitely, and we almost
despaired of scaling it. The guide insisted upon the profundity of his
knowledge of the route, and we, being unable to contradict his positive
assertions that he was in the right way, followed him up the precipice.
It was a toilsome and dangerous ascent, but fortunately the sun was yet
eastward of meridian, and we were in shadow. We at last reached a broad
ledge near the summit, where, exhausted, we sat down and regaled
ourselves with some mulberries which we had gathered by the way. A large
wolf-dog, belonging to our guide, had managed to follow his master, and
seemed quite as weary as ourselves when he reached us. Another scramble
of about twenty minutes, over broken rocks and ledges like a giant's
stair-case, brought us upon the bold, rocky summit of the mountain. The
view from this lofty hill is one of great interest and beauty, including
almost every variety of natural scenery, and a region abounding with
historical

* His father was a lieutenant in the English service, and belonged to
the Connecticut troops that were with Amherst when he took Ticonderoga.
While the English had possession of that post, before seizing Crown
Point, he was much annoyed by a swaggering English major, who boasted
that no American in the country could lay him upon his back. Lieutenant
Rice accepted the general challenge. For twenty minutes it was doubtful
who the successful wrestler would be. Rice was the more agile of the
two, and, by a dexterous movement, tripped his adversary and brought him
upon his back. The burly major was greatly nettled, and declared the act
unfair and unmanly. Rice made a rejoinder, and hard words passed, which
ended in a challenge from the major for a duel. It was accepted, and the
place and time of meeting were appointed. But the fact having reached
the ears of Amherst, he interposed his persuasion. The Englishman was
resolved on fighting, and would listen to no remonstrance until Amherst
touched his national and military pride. "Consider," he said, "how
glorious is our conquest. We have taken this strong fortress without
shedding one drop of blood. Shall Britons be such savages, that, when
they can not spill the blood of enemies, they will shed that of each
other?" The appeal had the desired effect, and the parties sealed their
reconciliation and pledged new friendship over a glass of grog. They
then tried their strength again. The major was prostrated in an instant
by a fair exertion of superior strength, and from that hour he was
Rice's warmest friend. The major's name was Church. He was a lieutenant
colonel under Prévost, and was killed at Savannah on the 16th of
September, 1779.

View from the Top of Mount Defiance.--Mount Independence, Ticonderoga,
the Lake, and the Green Mountains

131associations. The fore-ground of the picture represents the spot
whereon Burgoyne began the erection of a battery; and a shallow hole,
drilled for the purpose of making fastenings for the cannon, may still
be seen.

The sheet of water toward the left is the outlet of Lake George, where
it joins Lake Champlain, which sweeps around the promontory in the
middle ground, whereon Fort Ticonderoga is situated. Gray, like the
almost bald rock on which they stand, the ruins were scarcely
discernible from that height, and the Pavilion appeared like a small
white spot among the green foliage that embowers it. On the point which
the steam-boat is approaching is the _Grenadiers' Battery_ already
mentioned, and on the extreme right is seen a portion of Mount
Independence at the mouth of East Creek. This eminence is in Vermont--
Mount Defiance and Fort Ticonderoga are in New York. The point beyond
the small vessel with a white sail is the spot whence the Americans
under Allen and Arnold crossed the lake to attack the fort; and between
Mount Independence and the _Grenadiers' Battery_ is the place where the
bridge was erected. The lake here is quite narrow, and, sweeping in
serpentine curves around the two points, it flows northward on the left,
and expands gradually into a sheet of water several miles wide. The
hills seen in the far distance are the Green Mountains of Vermont,
between which lofty range and the lake is a beautifully diversified and
fertile agricultural country twelve miles wide, a portion of the famous
New Hampshire Grants. From this height the eye takes in a range along
the lake of more than thirty miles, and a more beautiful rural panorama
can not often be found. Let us retreat to the cool shadow of the
shrubbery on the left, for the summer sun is at meridian; and, while
gathering new strength to make our toilsome descent, let us open again
the volume of history, and read the page on which are recorded the
stirring events that were enacted within the range of our vision.

View from the Top of Mount Defiance.

Grown Point and Ticonderoga invested by Burgoyne. Material of his Army.
Weakness of the Garrison at Ticonderoga

132 Lieutenant-general Burgoyne, with a strong and well-appointed army
of more than seven thousand men, * including Indians, came up Lake
Champlain and appeared before Crown Point on the 27th of June. The few
Americans in garrison there abandoned the fort 1777 and retreated to
Ticonderoga. The British quietly took possession, and, after
establishing a magazine, hospital, and stores there, proceeded to invest
Ticonderoga on the 30th. Some light infantry, grenadiers, Canadians, and
Indians, with ten pieces of light artillery, under Brigadier-general
Fraser, were encamped on the west side of the lake, at the mouth of
Putnam's Creek.

These moved up the shore to Four Mile Point, so called from being that
distance from Ticonderoga. The German reserve, consisting of the
chasseurs, light infantry, and grenadiers, under Lieutenant-colonel
Breyman, were moved at the same time along the eastern shore, while the
remainder of the army, under the immediate command of Burgoyne himself,
were on board the Royal George and Inflexible frigates and several gun-
boats, which moved up the lake between the two strong wings on land. The
land force halted, and the naval force was anchored just beyond cannon-
shot from the American works.

Major-general Arthur St. Clair ** was in command of the American
garrison at Ticonderoga, a post of honor which Schuyler had offered to
Gates. He found the garrison only about two thousand strong; and so much
were the stores reduced, that he was afraid to make any considerable
addition to his force from the militia who were coming in from the east,
until a replenishment of provisions could be effected. Had the garrison
been well supplied with stores, six or eight thousand men might ha\'e
been collected there before the arrival of the enemy.

* The day when the British army encamped before Ticonderoga (July 1st),
the troops consisted of British, rank and file, three thousand seven
hundred and twenty-four; Germans, rank and file, three thousand and
sixteen; Canadians and provincials about two hundred and fifty, and
Indians about four hundred, making a total of seven thousand four
hundred and ninety.

** Arthur St. Clair was a native of Edinburgh, in Scotland. He was born
in 1734, and came to America with Admiral Boscawen in 1759. He served in
Canada in 1759 and 1760, as a lieutenant under General Wolfe, and, after
the peace of 1763, was appointed to the command of Fort Ligonier, in
Pennsylvania. In January, 1776, he AAras appointed a colonel in the
Continental army, and was ordered to raise a regiment destined for
service in Canada. Within six weeks from his appointment his regiment
was on its march. He was appointed a brigadier in August of that year,
and was an active participant in the engagements at Trenton and
Princeton. In February, 1777, he received the appointment of major
general, and on the 5th of June was ordered by General Schuyler to the
command of Ticonderoga. He reached that post on the 12th, and found a
garrison of two thousand men, badly equipped and very short of
ammunition and stores. He was obliged to evacuate the post on the 5th of
July following. In 1780 he was ordered to Rhode Island, but
circumstances prevented him from going thither. When the allied armies
marched toward Virginia, in 1781, to attack Cornwallis, St. Clair was
directed to remain at Philadelphia with the recruits of the Pennsylvania
line, for the protection of Congress. He was, however, soon afterward
allowed to join the army, and reached Yorktown during the siege. From
Yorktown he was sent with a considerable force to join Greene, which he
did at Jacksonville, near Savannah. He resided in Pennsylvania after the
peace; was elected to Congress in 1786, and was president of that body
in 1787. Upon the erection of the Northwestern Territory into a
government in 1788, he was appointed governor, which office he held
until 1802. when Ohio was admitted as a state into the Union, and he
declined an election to the post he had held. His military operations
within his territory against the Indians were disastrous, and when he
retired from office he was almost ruined in fortune. He made
unsuccessful applications to Congress for the payment of certain claims,
and finally died almost penniless, at Laurel Hill in Western
Pennsylvania, Aug. 31,1818, aged 84 years.

Outposts undefended.--Fort on Mount Independence.--Tardiness of Congress
in supplying Men and Munitions

133St. Clair was an officer of acknowledged bravery and prudence, yet he
was far from being an expert and skillful military leader. His self-
reliance and his confidence in the valor and strength of those under him
often caused him to be less vigilant than necessity demanded; and it was
this fault, in connection with the weakness of the garrison, which gave
Burgoyne his only advantage at Ticonderoga. He soon perceived, through
the vigilance of his scouts, that St. Clair had neglected to secure
those two important eminences, Mount Hope and Sugar Loaf Hill (Mount
Defiance), and, instead of making a direct assault upon the fortress,
the British general essayed to possess himself of these valuable points.

When Burgoyne approached, a small detachment of Americans occupied the
old French lines north of the fort, which were well repaired and guarded
by a block-house. They also had an outpost at the saw-mills (now the
village of Ticonderoga), another just above the mills, and-a block-house
and hospital at the entrance of the lake. Between the lines and the old
fort were two block-houses, and the Grenadiers' Battery on the point was
manned.

The garrison in the star fort, on Mount Independence, was rather
stronger than that at Ticonderoga, and better provisioned. The fort was
supplied with artillery, strongly picketed, and its approaches were well
guarded by batteries. The foot of the hill on the northwestern side was
intrenched, and had a strong _abatis_ next to the water. Artillery was
placed in the intrenchments, pointing down the lake, and at the point,
near the mouth of East Creek, was a strong circular battery. The general
defenses of the Americans were formidable to an enemy, but the tardiness
of Congress, in supplying the garrison with food, clothing, ammunition,
and re-enforcements, made them quite weak. * Their lines and works were
extensive, and instead of a full complement of men to man and defend
them, and to occupy Sugar Loaf Hill and Mount Hope, the whole force
consisted of only two thousand five hundred and forty-six Continentals
and nine hundred militia. Of the latter not one tenth had bayonets.

While at Crown Point, Burgoyne sent forth a pompous and threatening
proclamation, intended to awe the republicans into passiveness, and
confirm the loyalists in their position by a sense of the presence of
overshadowing power. ** In his proclamation the British commander set
forth the terrible character of the Indians that accompanied him,
greatly exaggerated their numbers, and magnified their eagerness to be
let loose upon the republicans, whether found in battle array or in the
bosom of their families. "I have," he said, "but to give stretch to the
Indian forces under my direction, and they amount to thousands, to
overtake the hardened enemies of Great Britain and America. I consider
them the same wherever they may lurk." Protection and security, clogged
with conditions, were held out to the peaceable who remained in their
habitations. All the outrages of war arrayed in their most terrific
forms, were denounced against those who persisted in their

* It was generally believed, until Burgoyne appeared at St. John's, that
the military preparations in progress at Quebec were intended for an
expedition by sea against the coast towns still in possession of the
Americans; and influenced by this belief, as well as by the pressing
demands for men to keep General Howe and his army from Philadelphia,
Congress made but little exertion to strengthen the posts on Lake
Champlain. This was a fatal mistake, and it was perceived too late for
remedy.

** This swaggering proclamation commenced as follows: "By John Burgoyne,
Esquire, lieutenant general of his majesty's forces in America, colonel
of the Queen's regiment of Light Dragoons, governor of Fort William, in
North Britain, one of the Commons of Great Britain in Parliament, and
commanding an army and fleet employed on an expedition from Canada," &e.
"From the pompous manner in which he has arrayed his titles," says Dr.
Thatcher, "we are led to suppose that he considers them as more than a
Match for all the military force which we can bring against them."--
Military Journal, p. 82. General Washington, from his camp at
Middlebrook, in New Jersey, issued a manifesto or counter proclamation,
which, in sincerity and dignity, was infinitely superior to that issued
by Burgoyne. He alluded to the purity of motives and devotion of the
patriots, the righteousness of their cause, and the evident guardianship
of an overruling Providence in the direction of affairs, and closed by
saying, "Harassed as we are by unrelenting persecution, obliged by every
tie to repel violence by force, urged by self-preservation to exert the
strength which Providence has given us to defend our natural rights
against the aggressor, we appeal to the hearts of all mankind for the
justice of our cause; its event we leave to Him who speaks the fate of
nations, in humble confidence that as his omniscient eye taketh note
even of the sparrow that falleth to the ground, so he will not withdraw
his countenance from a people who humbly array themselves under his
banner in defense of the noblest principles with which he has adorned
humanity."

Ticonderoga invested by the British.--Council of War in the American
Camp.--The British on Mount Defiance.

134hostility. But the people at large, and particularly the firm
republicans, were so far from being frightened, that they treated the
proclamation with contempt, as a complete model of pomposity. *

1777 On the 2d of July the right wing of the British army moved forward,
and General St. Clair believed and hoped that they intended to make a
direct assault upon the fort. The small American detachments that
occupied the outposts toward Lake George made but a feeble resistance,
and then set fire to and abandoned their works. Generals Phillips and
Fraser, with an advanced corps of infantry and some light artillery,
immediately took possession of Mount Hope, which completely commanded
the road to Lake George, and thus cut off all supplies to the patriot
garrison from that quarter. This accomplished, extraordinary energy and
activity were manifested by the enemy in bringing up their artillery,
ammunition, and stores to fortify the post gained, and on the 4th
Fraser's whole July corps occupied Mount Hope. ** In the mean while
Sugar Loaf Hill had been reconnoitered by Lieutenant Twiss, the chief
engineer, who reported that its summit had complete command of the whole
American works at Ticonderoga and Mount Independence, and that a road to
the top, suitable for the conveyance of cannons, though difficult, might
be made in twenty-four hours. It was resolved to erect a battery on the
height, and, by arduous and prolonged labor, a road was cleared on the
night of the 4th. The Thunderer, carrying the battery train and stores,
arrived in the afternoon, and light twelve pounders, medium twelves, and
eight-inch howitzers were landed.

So completely did the enemy occupy the ground between the lake, Mount
Hope, and Sugar Loaf Hill, that this important movement was concealed
from the garrison; and when, at dawn on the morning of the 5th, the
summit of Mount Defiance *** glowed with the scarlet uniforms of the
British troops, and heavy artillery stood threateningly in their midst,
the Americans were paralyzed with astonishment, for that array seemed
more like the lingering apparitions of a night vision than the terrible
reality they were forced to acknowledge. From that height the enemy
could look down into the fortress, count every man, inspect all their
movements, and with eye and cannon command all the extensive works of
Ticonderoga and Mount Independence. St. Clair immediately called a
council of war, and presented to them the alarming facts, that the whole
effective strength of the garrison was not sufficient to man one half of
the works; that, as the whole must be constantly on duty, they could not
long endure the fatigue; that General Schuyler, then at Fort Edward, had
not sufficient troops to re-enforce or relieve them; that the enemy's
batteries were nearly ready to open upon them, and that a complete
investment of the place would be accomplished within twenty-four hours.
It seemed plain that nothing could save the troops but evacuation, and
the step was proposed by the commander and agreed to by his officers. It
was a critical and trying moment for St. Clair. To remain would be to
lose his army, to evacuate would Ju]y 6 1777 be to lose his character.
He chose to make a self-sacrifice, and at about two o'clock on the
following morning the troops were put in motion.

As every movement of the Americans could be seen through the day from
Mount Defiance, no visible preparations for leaving the fort were made
until after dark, and the purpose of the council was concealed from the
troops until the evening order was given. It was arranged to place the
baggage, and such ammunition and stores as might be expedient, on board
two hundred bateaux, to be dispatched, under a convoy of five armed
galleys, up the lake to Skenesborough (Whitehall), and the main body of
the army to proceed by land to

* Gordon, ii., 205.

** This title was given to it by General Fraser, in allusion to the hope
they entertained of dislodging the Americans.

*** I was informed by an old man, ninety years of age, residing at
Pittsford, not far from the battle-ground at Hubbardton, that the
British gave the name of Mount Defiance to Sugar Loaf Hill on the day
when they ereeted their battery upon it, for from that height they
defied the Americans either to resist or dislodge them. The old man was
one of the British regulars under Burgoyne, but soon afterward deserted
to the Continentals.

Retreat of the Americans from Ticonderoga and Mount Independence.--
Imprudence of Fermoy.--Pursuit by the Enemy.

135the same destination, by way of Castleton. The cannons that could not
be moved were to be spiked; previous to striking the tents, every light
was to be extinguished; each soldier was to provide himself with several
days' provisions; and, to allay any suspicions on the part of the enemy
of such a movement, a continued cannonade was to be kept up from one of
the batteries in the direction of Mount Hope until the moment of
departure.

These arrangements were all completed, yet so short was the notice that
a good deal of confusion ensued. The garrison of Ticonderoga crossed the
bridge to Mount Independence at about three o'eloek in the morning, the
enemy all the while unconscious of the escape of their prey. The moon
was shining brightly, yet her pale light was insufficient to betray the
toiling Americans in their preparations and flight, and they felt
certain that, before day light should discover their withdrawal, they
would be too far advanced to invite pursuit. But General De Fermoy, who
commanded on Mount Independence, regardless of express orders, set fire
to the house he had occupied as the troops left. The light of the
conflagration revealed the whole scene and every movement to the enemy,
and the consciousness of discovery added to the confusion and disorder
of the retreating republicans. The rear-guard, under Colonel Francis,
left the mount at about four o'eloek in the morning, and the whole body
pressed onward in irregular order toward Hubbardton, where, through the
energy and skill of the officers, they were pretty well organized after
a halt of two hours. The main army then proceeded to Castleton, six
miles further, and the rear-guard, with stragglers picked up by the way,
were placed under the command of Colonel Seth Warner, and remained at
Hubbardton until some, who were left behind, should come up. Here a
desperate, and, to the Americans, a disastrous battle was fought the
next morning, the details of which will be given hereafter.

As soon as the movement of the Americans was perceived by the British,
General Fraser commenced an eager pursuit with his pickets, leaving
orders for his brigade to follow. At daylight he unfurled the British
flag over Ticonderoga, and before sunrise he had passed the bridge and
Mount Independence, and was in close pursuit of the flying patriots. *
Major-general Riedesel and Colonel Breyman, with their Germans and
Hessians, soon followed to sustain Fraser, while Burgoyne, who was on
board the Royal George, prepared for an immediate pursuit of the bateaux
and convoy by water. The Americans placed great reliance upon their
strong boom at Ticonderoga, and regarded pursuit by water as almost
impossible; but the boom and bridge were speedily cleft by the enemy.
Long before noon a free passage was made for the gun-boats and frigates,
and the whole flotilla were crowding all sail to overtake the American
bateaux. These, with the baggage and stores, were all destroyed at
Skenesborough before sunset.

The evacuation of Ticonderoga, without efforts at defense, was loudly
condemned throughout the country, and brought down a storm of indignant
abuse upon the heads of Generals St. Clair and Schuyler, for much of the
responsibility was laid upon the latter because he was the commander-in-
chief of the northern department. The weakness of the garrison, the
commanding position of the enemy upon Mount Defiance, where they could
not be reached by the guns of the fort, and the scarcity of stores and
ammunition, were not taken into the account, and, consequently, the
verdict of an excited publie was very unjust toward those unfortunate
officers. Washington had placed great reliance upon them both; nor did
the event destroy his confidence in their ability and bravery, yet he
"was perplexed, ** and

* This was the third time in consecutive order that the fortress was
captured by an enemy to the garrison without bloodshed, namely, in 1759,
by the English under General Amherst; in 1775, by the New England
provincials under Colonel Ethan Allen, and now (1777) by the British
under Lieutenant-general Burgoyne.

** The chief thus wrote to General Schuyler on hearing of the disaster:
"The evacuation of Ticonderoga and Mount Independence is an event of
chagrin and surprise not apprehended nor within the compass of my
reasoning. I know not upon what principle it was founded, and I should
suppose it would be still more difficult to be accounted for if the
garrison amounted to five thousand men in high spirits, healthy, well
supplied with provisions and ammunition, and the Eastern militia were
marching to their succor, as you mentioned in your letter of the 9th
[June] to the Council of Safety of New York."

Washington's Recommendation of Arnold.--Acquittal of Schuyler and St.
Clair of Blame.--Return to Ticonderoga.

136 clearly foresaw that some other leader would be necessary to inspire
sufficient confidence in the minds of the Eastern militia to cause them
to turn out in force to oppose the progress of Burgoyne. Accordingly, he
recommended Congress to send an "active, spirited officer to conduct and
lead them (the militia) on." * But Congress went further. Unwisely
listening to and heeding the popular clamor, they suspended St. Clair
from command, and ap-, pointed Adjutant-general Gates to supersede
General Schuyler. St. Clair did not leave the army, but was with
Washington at the battle of Brandywine. By a general court-martial, held
in the autumn of 1778, he was acquitted of all blame, with the highest
honor, and this decision was fully confirmed by Congress in December
following. The noble conduct of General Schuyler toward Gates, and his
continued patriotic efforts in behalf of his country after suffering the
injustice inflicted by Congress, have been mentioned in another chapter.
After the lapse of several months the public mind was brought to bear
with calmness upon the subject, and, before the close of the war, both
generals were fully reinstated in the confidence of the people.

Our historic picnic upon the mountain-top is ended, and, being well
rested, let us "gather up the fragments, that nothing be lost," and
descend to the village of "Ty," by the way of the military road which
was made impromptu by General Phillips for his cannon, up the northern
slope of Defiance. Very slight traces of it are now visible, and these
consist chiefly of a second growth of timber, standing where the road
was cut.

We parted with our guide at the foot of the mountain. Our boy-driver and
the vehicle had disappeared, and we were obliged to walk in the hot sun
to the village. Our good tempers were not at all improved when we
learned the fact that the stage from Lake George had passed nearly an
hour before, and that no conveyance could be procured until toward
evening to take us to the fort, unless the boy, who had not returned,
should make his appearance; and where he had gone was a mystery. Dinner
at the Pavilion was an event only a half hour in the future, and two
miles in distance stretched between us and the viands. So we stopped
grumbling, trudged on, and, whiling away the moments by pleasant
conversation, we reached the Pavilion in time to take our places at
table, too much heated and fatigued, however, to enjoy the luxuries set
before us. Our Boston friends left that afternoon, but we tarried until
two o'clock the next morning, when we departed on the Burlington for
Whitehall.

The air was cool and the sky unclouded when we left Ticonderoga. The
moon had gone down, and it was too dark to see more than the outlines of
the romantic shores by which we were gliding, so we took seats upon the
upper deck and surveyed the clear heavens, jeweled with stars. The
Pleiades were glowing in the southern sky, and beautiful Orion was upon
the verge of the eastern horizon. Who can look upward on a clear night
and not feel the spirit of worship stirring within! Who can contemplate
those silent watchers in the firmament and not feel the impulses of
adoration!

"I know they must be holy things

That from a roof so sacred shine,

Where sounds the beat of angels' wings,

And footsteps echo* all divine.

Their mysteries I never sought,

Nor hearken to what science tells:

For oh, in childhood I was taught

That God amid them dwells."

Miller.

* In his letter to Congress (from which this sentence is quoted), dated
at Morristown, July 10th, 1777, Washington continues, "If General Arnold
has settled his affairs, and can be spared from Philadelphia, I would
recommend him for this business, and that he should immediately set out
for the northern department. He is active, judicious, and brave, and an
officer in whom the militia will repose great confidence. Besides this,
he is well acquainted with that country, and with the routes and most
important passes and defiles in it. I do not think he can render more
signal services, or be more usefully employed at this time, than in this
way. I am persuaded his presence and activity will animate the militia
greatly, and spur them on to a becoming conduct." Arnold was sent
accordingly, and his signal services at Bemis's Heights we have already
considered.

Arrival at Whitehall or old Skenesborough.--Historical Notice of the
Place.--Capture of Major Skene and his People.

137Just as the day dawned tiny spiral columns of vapor began to rise
from the lake, and before sunrise we were completely wrapped in a dense
fog. After passing the bay south of Mount Independence, the lake becomes
very narrow, and the channel is so sinuous that our vessel proceeded
very cautiously in the dense mist. At the _Elbow_, half a mile from
Whitehall Landing, a rocky point containing "Putnam's Ledge" projects
from the west, and occasions such a short and narrow turn in the lake,
that it is with much difficulty large class steam-boats make their way
through. It can only be done by the use of hawsers attached to the bow
and stern, and this process requires an annoying delay. We reached
Whitehall, at the mouth of Wood Creek, * at the head of the lake, about
seven in the evening, and found comfortable quarters at a well-conducted
temperance hotel near the landing. **

This is ancient Skenesborough, and was a point of considerable
importance during the wars on our northern frontier, from 1745 till the
close of the Revolution. Here armies halted, and provisions, ammunition,
and stores were collected and distributed. A picketed fort was erected
here during the French and Indian war, upon the brow of the hill east of
Church-street. Soon after the peace of Paris, in 1763, Philip K. Skene,
an English major under half pay, purchased several soldiers' grants
located here, and, to make his title secure, procured a royal patent. He
effected a small settlement at this point, and named it Skenesborough,
which title it bore until after the Revolution. He had procured a second
patent, and became possessor of the whole of the land comprised within
the present township of Whitehall, except four thousand acres on its
eastern border. He was a magistrate of the crown, the owner of black
slaves, and was sometimes honored with the title of governor, on account
of having held the office of Lieutenant-governor of Crown Point and
Ticonderoga. In addition to a stone residence, he erected another stone
edifice, one hundred and thirty feet long, for a military garrison and
depot, upon the spot used as a garden by the family of the late Judge
Wheeler. Near the east end was an arched gateway, the key-stone of which
is now in the north basement wall of the Baptist Church, and bears the
initials "P. K. S.," and date "1770."

Skenesborough was a point included in the programme of operations
against Ticonderoga in the expedition under Colonel Allen in 1775. The
council held at Castleton, where Allen was appointed commander-in-chief,
resolved to send thirty men, under Captain Herrick, to surprise
Skenesborough, capture the son of the proprietor (the latter was then in
Europe), his negroes and tenantry, seize all the boats and other vessels
that might be found there, and hasten down the lake with them to
Shoreham. The surprise was so complete, that the plan was all
accomplished without bloodshed. Major Skene the younger was captured
while out shooting; the twelve negroes and fifty tenants were secured,
and the governor's strong stone buildings were taken possession of by
the captors. In the cellar of his house was found the body of the wife
of the elder Skene, where it had been preserved many years to secure to
the husband an annuity devised to her "while she remained above ground!"
The Amer-

* In the older histories and in the geographies of the state of New York
the whole narrow part of Lake Champlain south of Ticonderoga was called
respectively Wood Creek and South River. For fifty years these names for
that portion of the lake have become obsolete, and as historians write
for the future, they should be careful to note these changes, so as not
to mislead the student. Mr. Headly carelessly observes, when speaking of
the retreat from Ticonderoga, that "their long procession of boats began
by moonlight to wind up Wood Creek," &c. Again, speaking of Putnam's
position when he attacked the French and Indians in their canoes, he
represents the place as upon "Wood Creek where it falls into the lake."
The fact is, the spot is upon the lake, about a mile below where Wood
Creek proper "falls into the lake." He says again, "A whole fleet of
canoes, filled with soldiers, was entering the mouth of the creek." The
mouth of the creek being a cascade, it would have been difficult for the
canoes to enter it. Wood Creek proper rises in French Pond, in Warren
county, and, flowing by Fort Anne in a deep and sluggish stream,
receives the waters of the Pawlet, and falls into Lake Champlain at
Whitehall.

** Whitehall is a growing and flourishing village. It is within a rocky
ravine at the foot of a high eminence called Skene's Mountain, at the
mouth of Wood Creek and the northern terminus of the Champlain Canal and
Railroad. It has a beautiful agricultural country behind it, and the
natural scenery in the vicinity is very picturesque. The Indian name of
the locality, when the whites first explored the neighborhood, was Kah-
cho-qua-na, which, literally interpreted, is, "place where dip fish."

Destruction of American Vessels at Skenesborough.--Flight of the
Americans toward Fort Anne.--Major Skene.

138icans buried the body in the rear of the house, and, embarking on
board a schooner in the harbor, belonging to Skene, they sailed down the
lake to join Allen at Shoreham. *

A garrison was stationed at Skenesborough in 1776, and there the vessels
of the little fleet which Arnold commanded in an action on the lake,
below Crown Point, were constructed and partially armed. The Americans
strengthened the military works there, and made it quite a strong post.
This was the stipulated point for rendezvous of the army under St.
Clair, on its retreat from Ticonderoga in 1777. I have already observed
that those who escaped by water were unsuspicious of pursuit, and that
the flotilla was scarcely moored at Skenesborough before the frigates
appeared and attacked the galleys. Two of them were captured, and the
other three were blown up. Unsupported by the feeble garrison at
Skenesborough or by detachments from the army retreating by land, ** and
conscious of the futility of contention with such a force as Burgoyne
presented, the Americans abandoned their bateaux, set fire to them,
together with the fort, mills, block-houses, &c., and fled toward the
camp of General Schuyler at Fort Edward. *** At Fort Anne they were
joined by a few other troops sent forward with provisions and ammunition
by General Schuyler, but it was a feeble reenforcement, for he had with
him at Fort Edward only about seven hundred Continentals and fifteen
hundred militia. The supplies which he sent so reduced the ammunition
and stores of his garrison, that they were several days without lead,
except a small quantity which they received from Albany, and which was
obtained by stripping the windows.

The troops borne by the flotilla under Burgoyne, and those that marched
from Ticonderoga in pursuit of the Americans, conjoined at
Skenesborough, where the British commander resolved to make thorough
preparations for pushing forward to the Hudson River. He was informed by
the people at Skenesborough that the Americans were retreating toward
Fort Edward. Lieutenant-colonel Hill, of the ninth regiment, was sent
forward on the July, 1777. 7th to take the post at Fort Anne and watch
the movements of the republicans. The rest of the British army were
encamped at Skenesborough and vicinity, where they remained nearly three
weeks, while detachments were repairing the roads and bridges, and
constructing new ones on the way to Fort Anne. Burgoyne and his staff
were entertained at the mansion of Major Skene, whose familiarity with
the country and the people caused him to be introduced into the military
family of the commander. He was considered a valuable acquisition, but
the result proved otherwise. He advised the disastrous expedition to
Bennington, and accompanied the enemy there. He was personally known to
many of the Americans engaged in that affair, who made great efforts to
capture him alive. Four horses were shot under him, but, mounting a
fifth, he made his escape, although the poor animal fell and expired
from the effects of a shot, after carrying his rider beyond the reach of
his foes. Skene was with Burgoyne when his army surrendered at Saratoga.
He dared not return home under his parole, but went to England. He
ordered his house to be burned, to prevent its falling into the hands of
the Americans. His lands were confiscated and sold by the state, ****
and soon after the Revolution the name of Skenesborough was repudiated
by the people, and that of Whitehall substituted. Hardly a vestige of
the Revolution

* See Reverend Lewis Kellogg's Historical Discourse, Whitehall, 1847.

** At Castleton St. Clair was informed of the approach of Burgoyne by
water, and, instead of marching to Skenesborough, he struck off into the
woods on the left, fearing that he might be intercepted by the enemy at
Fort Anne.

*** General Mattoon, late of Amherst, Massachusetts, was a subaltern in
the American convoy. According to his account, there were then only four
houses at Skenesborough, besides those belonging to Skene. While he was
in one of them, occupied by a French family, and just in the act of
partaking of some refreshments, a cannon-ball from the enemy's fleet
entered, crushed the table, and scattered the victuals in all directions
over the room.--Kellogg's Discourse, p. 6.

**** The place was very unhealthy at that time. The mortality from
sickness among the troops stationed there during the Revolution was
fearful; and so bad was the reputation of Whitehall in this particular
at the close of the war, that, when the lands of Skene were offered for
sale, no competitor appeared, and 29,000 acres were struck off at the
first offer of £14 10s. to an agent of the purchasers, John Williams.
Joseph Stringham, and John Murray.--Kellogg's Discourse, p. 14. A
remarkable case of longevity occurred near Whitehall. Henry Francisco, a
native of England, died near there in November, 1820, aged one hundred
and thirty-four years. He was present at the coronation of Queen Anne,
March 8th, 1702. He served in the French wars and in the Revolution, and
lived in this country nearly ninety years; since deceased.

Whitehall in 1814.--Ride to Fort Anne Village.--Site of the Fort.--
Present Appearance of the Locality

139is now left there. When another war was waged against us by the same
enemy, in 1812, this was again the theater of hostile preparations. The
block-house within the old fort was repaired, furnished with artillery,
and garrisoned for the defense of the place. Intrenchments and a
magazine were constructed on an island a few hundred yards north of the
village, and barracks were erected on the brow of the hill west of
Church Street, the remains of which have but recently been demolished.
The American fleet engaged in September 11, 1814 the battle of
Plattsburgh, with the vessels captured from the enemy in that
engagement, were anchored in the harbor at Whitehall soon after that
event; and the remains of some of the vessels of both nations may now be
seen decaying together in the lake, a short distance from the harbor.

After breakfast, on the morning of our arrival at Whitehall, I rode to
Fort Anne August 3, 1848 Village, eleven miles south, accompanied by the
editor of the "_Democrat_,"' whose inland attentions and free
communications of valuable knowledge concerning historical localities in
the vicinity contributed much to the pleasure and instruction of the
journey thither.

It is a pleasant little village, situated upon a gently undulating plain
near the junction of Wood Creek and East Creek, and exhibited a charming
picture of quiet and prosperity There I found a venerable kinsman,
nearly eighty years of age, who, in the vigor of manhood, fifty years
ago, purchased an extensive tract of land in this then almost unbroken
wilderness.

His dwelling, store-house, and barns occupy the site of Fort Anne, the
only traces of which are the stumps of the strong pine pickets with
which it was stockaded. It was built by the English, under General
Nicholson, in 1757, two years after the construction of Fort Edward. It
was a small fortress, and was never the scene of any fierce hostility.
Although ninety years had elapsed since its pickets were set in the
ground, what remained of them

* D. S. Murray, Esq.

** William A. Moore, Esq., president of the Whitehall Bank.

*** This view is from the bridge which crosses Wood Creek, looking
south. The distant building on the right is the dwelling of Mr. Moore.
Nearer is his store-house, and on the left are his out-houses. The
stumps of the pickets may be traced in a circular line from his dwelling
along the road to the crook in the fence, and so on to the barns and in
their yards.

Putnam and Rogers near Fort Anne.--Ambush of French and Indians. --
Desperate Battle.--Perilous Situation of Putnam.

140

exhibited but slight tokens of decay, and the odor of turpentine was
almost as strong and fresh when one was split as if it had been planted
but a year ago.

August, 1778 About a mile northwest of Fort Anne is the place where a
severe battle was fought between a corps of five hundred Rangers,
English and provincials, under Putnam and Rogers, and about the same
number of French and Indians, under the famous partisan Molang. Putnam
and Rogers were sent by Abercrombie to watch the enemy in the
neighborhood of Ticonderoga. When they arrived at South Bay, an
expansion of Lake Champlain near Whitehall, the two leaders separated,
taking with them their respective divisions, but, being discovered by
the watchful Molang, they deemed it expedient to reunite and return
immediately to Fort Edward. Their troops were marched in three
divisions, the right commanded by Rogers, the left by Putnam, and the
center by Captain Dalyell (sometimes written D'Ell).

They halted at evening on the border of Clear River, a fork of Wood
Creek before its junction with East Creek, and within a mile of Fort
Anne. Early in the morning, while the lines were forming, Major Rogers,
regardless of the teachings of the Ranger's great virtue, precaution,
amused himself by firing at a target with a British officer. The sound
reached the vigilant ears of Molang and his Indian allies, who, unknown
to the Americans, were then encamped within a mile of them. He had been
searching for the Rangers to intercept them, and the firing was a sure
guide. His men were posted in ambush along the paths which he knew they
must take, and as the Americans, just at sunrise, emerged from a dense
thicket into the open woods, Molang and his followers fell upon them
with great fury. Rogers seemed to be appalled by the fierce onslaught
and fell back, but Putnam and Dalyell sustained their position and
returned the fire. The conflict became desperate. At length Putnam's
fusee missed fire when the muzzle was within a few inches of the breast
of a giant savage, who thrust it aside and fell upon the major with the
fierceness of a panther, made him prisoner, bound him firmly to a tree,
and then returned to the battle. Captain Dalyell now assumed the
command. The provincials fell back a little, but, rallying, the fight
continued with great vigor. The tree to which Putnam was bound was about
midway between the combatants, and he stood in the center of the hottest
fire of both, utterly unable to move body or limb, so firmly had the
savage secured him. His garments were riddled by bullets, but not one
touched his person. For an hour he remained in this horrible position,
until the enemy were obliged to retreat, when he was unbound and carried
off by his savage captors. * Wounded, exhausted, and dispirited, Putnam
was forced to make a weary march over a rough country, led on by

* At one time, when the provincials fell back, and the Indians were near
him, a young warrior amused himself by trying his skill in throwing his
tomahawk as near Putnam's head as possible without hitting him. When he
was tired of his amusement, a French subaltern, more savage than the
Indian, leveled his musket at Putnam's breast, but it missed fire. The
major claimed the consideration due to a prisoner of war, but the
barbarous Frenchman was unmoved, and, after striking him a violent blow
upon his cheek with the butt end of his musket, left him to die, as he
thought.

Humanity of Putnam's Captor.--Preparation for Torture.-- Interposition
of Moling.--Battle-ground near Fort Anne.

141the savages, who had tied cords so tightly around his wrists that his
hands were swollen and dreadfully tortured. He begged for release either
from the pain or from life. A French officer interposed and unbound the
cords; and just then his captor came up, and, with a sort of savage
humanity, supplied him with moccasins, and expressed great indignation
because of the harsh treatment his prisoner had endured. I say _savage
humanity_, for it was present kindness, exercised while a dark and
atrocious intention for the future made the Indian complaisant--the
prisoner was reserved for the stake, and all those exquisite tortures
with which savage cruelty imbitters the death of its victims. Deep in
the forest he was stripped naked, and with green withes was bound fast
to a sapling. The wood was piled high around him, and the wild death-
songs of the savages, mingled with fierce yells, were chanted. The torch
was applied, and the crackling flame began to curl around the fagots,
when a black cloud, that for an hour had been rising in the west, poured
down such a volume of water that the flames were nearly extinguished.
But they burst forth again in fiercer intensity, and Putnam lost all
hope of escape, when a French officer dashed through the crowd of
savages, scattered the burning wood, and cut the cords of the victim. It
was Molang himself. Some relenting savage had told him of the horrid
orgies in the forest, and he flew to the rescue of Putnam, just in time
to save him. After enduring much suffering, he was delivered to Montcalm
at Ticonderoga, and by him sent to Montreal, where he experienced great
kindness from Colonel Peter Schuyler, a fellow-prisoner, through whose
influence he was exchanged for a prisoner taken by Colonel Bradstreet at
Fort Frontenac. *

About three fourths of a mile north of Fort Anne is a narrow, rocky
defile, through which Wood Creek and the Champlain Canal flow and the
rail-road is laid. Art has widened the defile by excavation, and
cultivation has swept away much of the primitive forest. Here in this
rocky gorge, then just wide enough for the stream and a narrow pathway,
a severe engagement occurred between the ninth British regiment, under
Lieutenant-colonel Hill, and a detachment of Americans, under Colonel
Long. This officer, with about five July 8, 1777 hundred republicans,
principally of the invalids and convalescents of the army, was posted at
Fort Anne by General Schuyler, with directions to defend it. Warned of
the approach of the enemy, Colonel Long prepared not only for defense,
but to go out and meet him. The Americans fit for duty were mustered,
and early in the morning they marched up to the southern edge of the
defile. "At half past ten in the morning," said Major

* See Humphrey's and Peabody's Biographies of Putnam.

** This sketch was taken from the rail-road, looking north. The forest
upon the left is the "thick wood" of the Revolution, but on the right
cultivated fields have taken the place of the forest to a considerable
extent. On the right is seen the Champlain Canal, here occupying the bed
of Wood Creek. The fence on the left indicates the place of the publie
road between Fort Anne and Whitehall When this sketch was made (1848)
the rail-road was unfinished.

Battle near Fort Anno.--Return to Whitehall.--Visit to "Putnam's Rock."-
-View of the Scene

142Forbes in his testimony on the trial of Burgoyne, "they attacked us
in front with a heavy and well-directed fire; a large body of them
passed the creek on the left, and fired from a thick wood across the
creek on the left flank of the regiment; they then began to recross the
creek and attack us in the rear; we then found it necessary to change
our ground, to prevent the regiment being surrounded; we took post on a
high hill to our right. As soon as we had taken post, the enemy made a
very vigorous attack, which continued upward of two hours; and they
certainly would have forced us, had it not been for some Indians that
arrived and gave the Indian hoop, which we answered with three cheers;
the rebels soon after that gave way." * The major's facts are correct,
but his inferences are wide of the mark. The Americans were not
frightened by the Indian war-hoop, for it was a sound very familiar to
their ears, but they "gave way" because their ammunition gave, out, Had
Colonel Long been well supplied with powder and ball, the British troops
would have been destroyed or made prisoners. Captain Montgomery, of
Hill's regiment, was severely wounded and captured by the Americans,
who, when they gave way, set fire to Fort Anne and retreated to the
headquarters of General Schuyler at Fort Edward.

We returned to Whitehall toward evening. The ride was delightful through
a country ever-changing and picturesque, particularly when approaching
the lake. On the left rise the lofty summits of the hills on Lake
George; on the east those of Vermont and Massachusetts; and down the
lake, northward, Mount Defiance may be plainly seen. After an early
evening meal, I procured a water-man and his boat, and, accompanied by
my traveling companion and Mr. M., proceeded to "Put's Bock," near "the
Elbow," a mile from the landing, and near the entrance of South Bay. **
The lake is here very narrow, and the shores on either side are abrupt,
rocky, and wooded. It was about sunset when we arrived at the scene of
Putnam's exploit, and the deep shadows that gathered upon the western
shore, where the famous ledge is situated, heightened the picturesque
character of the scenery and the force of the historical associations
which lionize the spot. Upon the rough ledge of rocks seen on the right
of the picture Major Putnam and fifty men boldly opened a musket battery
upon about five hundred French and Indian warriors under the famous
Molang, who were in canoes upon the water.3 This event occurred a few
days previous to the unfortunate battle

* Burgoyne's State of the Expedition, &c., p. 81.

** Here I will correct a serious geographical error which I find in
Peabody's Life of Putnam. He says. "Abercrombie ordered Major Putnam to
proceed with fifty men to South Bay, in Lake George." Again. "The
detachment marched to Wood Creek, near the point where it flows into
South Bay." South Bay is in Lake Champlain, and Wood Creek does not flow
into it at all. See note respecting Wood Creek, ante, page 137.

*** The view is taken front the Vermont shore, where rafts of timber and
piles of lumber (as seen on the left) betoken the chief article of
commerce here. The ledge of rocks, which rises about fourteen feet in
height, is on the New York side. From the perpendicular point, rugged
and broken, there is a gentle slope thickly covered with timber and
shrubbery, and affording an excellent place for an ambuscade. The small
trees in the distance mark the point at the Elbow, and the hill beyond
is a portion of Skene's Mountain which overlooks the harbor at
Whitehall.

Putnam and Rogers on Lake Champlain.--Attack of the former on the French
and Indians.--The Saratoga and Confiance

143near Fort Anne, where Putnam was taken prisoner. Major Rogers, who
was also sent by Abercrombie to watch the movements of the enemy, had
taken a station twelve miles distant, and Putnam and his fifty rangers
composed the whole force at this point. Near the front of the ledge he
constructed a parapet of stone, and placed young pine trees before it in
such a natural manner that they seemed to have grown there, and
completely hid the defense from observers on the water below. Fifteen of
his men, disabled by sickness, were sent back to the camp at Fort
Edward, and with his thirty-five he resolved to attack what ever force
might appear upon the lake. Four days he anxiously awaited the
appearance of the enemy, when early one evening he was gratified by the
intelligence that a large fleet of canoes, filled with warriors, was
leisurely approaching from South Bay. It was the time of full moon, the
sky was unclouded, and from his hiding-place every movement of the In
dians could be distinctly seen. Putnam called in all his sentinels, and
in silence every man was stationed where his fire might be most
effective. Not a musket was to be moved until orders were given by the
commander. The advanced canoes had passed the parapet, when one of the
soldiers hit his firelock against a stone. The sound was caught by the
watchful ears of Molang and his followers. The canoes in the van halted,
and the whole fleet was crowded in confusion and alarm directly beneath
the ledge. A brief consultation ensued, and then they turned their prows
back toward South Bay. As they wheeled the voice of Putnam shouted
"Fire," and with sure aim each bullet reached a victim. The enemy
returned the fire, but without effect, and for a time the carnage
produced by the Rangers was dreadful in that dense mass upon the waters.
Molang soon perceived by the firing that his assailants were few, and
detached a portion of his men to land below and attack the provincials
in the rear. Putnam had perceived this movement, and sent a party of
twelve men, under Lieutenant Durkee, who easily repulsed them when they
attempted to land. About daybreak he learned that the enemy had actually
debarked at a point below, and was marching to surround him. This fact,
and the failure of his ammunition, warned him to retreat. Nearly half
the number of the enemy perished on that fatal night, while Putnam lost
but two men, who were wounded. * While retreating through the thick
forest, an unexpected enemy fired upon them, but wounded only one man.
Putnam instantly ordered his men to charge, when his voice was
recognized by the other leader, who cried out, "Hold, we are friends!"
"Friends or foes," shouted Putnam, "you deserve to perish for doing so
little execution with so fair a shot." The party proved to be a
detachment sent to cover their retreat.

It was late in the evening twilight before I finished my sketch, but our
obliging waterman would not consent to row us back until we should go to
his house near by and see his "pullet and chickens"--his wife and
children. His dwelling was at the foot of the steep Vermont shore,
completely hemmed in by rocks and water, but embowered in shrubbery. His
children brought us fruit, and we were refreshed by draughts of water
from a mountain spring close by, of icy coldness. The moon was shining
brightly when we passed the Elbow on our return, and by its pale light
we could see the ribs and other decaying timber of the British ship of
war _Confiance_ and the American ship _Saratoga_. The former was sunk
there in 1814, and the latter, which was afterward used as a store-ship,
was scuttled by some miscreants while her officers and crew were at the
village participating in a Fourth of July celebration. It was about nine
in the evening when we reached the hotel. There I met that distinguished
and venerable divine, Rev. Mr. Pierce, of Brookline, Massachusetts, and
was charmed and edified by his conversation for more than an hour. **
His memory was

* These men, one a provincial, the other an Indian, were placed under an
escort of two others, and sent toward the camp. They were pursued and
overtaken by the Indians. The wounded men told the escort to leave them
to their fate, which they did. When the savages came up, the provincial,
knowing that he would be put to death, fired and killed three. He was
instantly tomahawked. The Indian was kept a prisoner, and from him
Putnam learned the above facts when they met some time afterward in
Canada.

** Mr. Pierce was seventy-five years old. He distinctly remembered
Washington's visit to Boston in 1789. The cavalcade halted near the
entrance to the city, and Washington was obliged to sit on horseback two
hours, while the state authorities and the selectmen decided a point of
etiquette--whose province it was to receive him. The selectmen carried
the day. He explained to me the nature of the apparent error in the
registration of the birth and christening of Dr. Franklin. The entries
of both events are upon the same day, Sunday, 17th of January, 1706. An
old man, who remembered the circumstance well, for it caused some gossip
at the time, told him that Dr. Franklin's mother went to church and
received the communion in the morning, gave birth to her son at noon,
and in the afternoon the child was christened.

Departure from Whitehall. Sholes's Landing. Ride to the Battle-ground of
Hubbardton. Picturesque Scenery.

144richly stored with historic learning, and our intercourse was to me a
pleasant and profitable appendix to the events and studies of the day.

Early the next morning we left Whitehall on the steamer _Saranac_, and
landed at Chip-man's Point, or Sholes's Landing, the port of Orwell, and
the most eligible point whence to reach the battle-ground of Hubbardton.
The morning was delightful, and the ride in a light wagon, accompanied
by the intelligent son of Mr. Sholes, proved to be one of peculiar
pleasure. Our route was through the pleasant little village of Orwell,
five miles southeast of the landing. There we turned southward, and
followed the margin of the broad ravine or valley through which the
retreating Americans and pursuing British passed when St. Clair
evacuated Ticonderoga. The road was made very tortuous to avoid the high
ridges and deep valleys which intersect in all directions, while at the
same time it gradually ascends for several miles. I never passed through
a more picturesque country. The slopes and valleys were smiling with
cultivation, and in every direction small lakes were sparkling in the
noonday sun. Within about six miles of the battle-ground we descended
into a romantic valley imbosomed in a spur of the Green Mountains-. We
passed several small lakes, lying one below another, over which arose
rough and lofty precipices, their summits crowned with cedar, hemlock,
pine, and spruce. The tall trunks of the pines, black and branchless,
scathed by lightning and the tempest, arose above the surrounding
forests like mighty sentinels, and added much to the wild grandeur of
the scene. From the rough and narrow valley we ascended to a high,
rolling table-land, well cultivated; and upon the highest part of July
7, 1777 this tract, surrounded on the south and east by loftier hills,
the battle of Hubbardton occurred.

General Fraser, whom I have already mentioned as having started after
the Americans July 6. from Ticonderoga, continued his pursuit of St.
Clair and his army through the day, and, learning from some Tory scouts
that they were not far in advance, he ordered his men to lie that night
upon their arms, to be ready to push forward at daybreak. About three in
the morning his troops were put in motion, and about five o'clock his
advanced scouts discovered the American sentries, who discharged their
pieces and retreated to the main body of the detachment, which was left
behind by St. Clair, under the command of Colonels Warner and Francis.
Their place of encampment was in the southeast part of Hubbardton,
Rutland county, near the Pittsford line, upon the farm of John Selleck,
* not far from the place where the Baptist meeting-house now stands. The
land is now owned by a son of Captain Barber, who was in the engagement.
He kindly accompanied me to the spot, and pointed out the localities,
according to the instructions of his patriotic father. The engraving on
the opposite page represents the general view of the place of encampment
and the battle-ground. When the British advanced guard discovered the
Americans, they were breakfasting near a dwelling which stood close by
the Baptist meeting-house, the two-story building seen in the center of
the picture. The dark spot near the fence, seen between the larger trees
in the foreground ("I" in the map of the battle), marks the remains of
the cellar of the old house. The road on the right is that leading
toward Ticonderoga; and the roofs of the houses, seen over the orchard
on the right, mark the direction of the road lead-

* The first settlement in this town was in the spring of 1774, and
consisted of only two families. In 1775 seven other families joined
them, among whom was Mr. Selleck, and these nine constituted the whole
population of the town when the battle occurred. On the day previous a
party of Indians and Tories, under Captain Sherwood, came upon the
inhabitants and made prisoners of two farmers named Hickock, and their
families, and two young men named Keeler and Kellogg. They captured two
or three others, and carried them all off to Ticonderoga, leaving their
families to shift for themselves. The sorrowing wives and children made
a toilsome journey over the mountains to Connecticut, whence they had
emigrated. The men remained prisoners at Ticonderoga (except two who
escaped) until after the surrender of Bur-goyne in October, when that
fortress was retaken by the Americans.--See Thompson's Gazetteer of
Vermont.

View of the Battle-ground.--The Battle.--Retreat and Surrender of
Colonel Hale.--His reasonable Excuse.

145ing down to the valley toward Castleton.

The large "boulder in front is famed by local tradition as the
observatory of the first man of the British van who discovered the
Americans; and it is related that he was shot by a sentinel before he
could leap down. The range of hills in the distance are the Pitts-ford
Mountains, over which a portion of the Americans fled toward Rutland. A
small branch of a tributary of Castleton Creek runs through the
intervale between the meeting-house and the hills beyond. The hottest of
the fight occurred upon the slope between the large tree and the
meeting-house. It was covered with ripe grain when I visited it, and
August, 1848 the achievements of the tiller gathering his sheaves seemed
more truly great than all the honors and renown which wholesale
slaughter ever procured for a warrior chieftain.

It was an excessively hot morning in July when the battle of Hubbardton
July 7, 1777 commenced. The American force consisted of the three
regiments of Warner, Francis, and Hale, and such stragglers from the
main army then at Castleton (six miles in advance) as had been picked up
on the way. The Americans were about thirteen hundred strong, and the
British, under Fraser, about eight hundred. Reidesel and his Germans
were still in the rear, but, expecting his arrival every moment, Fraser
began the attack at seven in the morning, fearing that the Americans
might escape if he delayed. The charge of the enemy was well received,
and the battle raged furiously. Had Warner been well sustained by the
militia regiment under Colonel Hale, he might have secured a victory;
but that officer, with his troops, fled toward Castleton, hoping to join
the main army there under St Clair, leaving the commander with only
seven hundred men to oppose the enemy. On the way, Hale and his men fell
in with an inconsiderable party of British soldiers, to whom they
surrendered, without offering any resistance, although the numbers were
about equal. * They

* Colonel Hale has been severely censured for this act of apparent
cowardice, but when every circumstance is taken into account, there is
much to induce a mitigation of blame. Himself and a large portion of his
men were in feeble health, and quite unfit for active service, and his
movement was one of precaution rather than of cowardly alarm. Rivals,
soon after he surrendered, circulated reports unfavorable to his
reputation. On hearing of them, he wrote to General Washington, asking
him to obtain his exchange, that he might vindicate his character by a
court-martial; but before this could be accomplished he died, while a
prisoner on Long Island, in September, 1780.

Battle of Hubbardton.--Defeat of the Americans.--Death of Colonel
Francis.

146were well stationed upon the brow of the hill, but so sudden and
unexpected was the attack, that no other breast-works could be thrown up
than such as a few trees afforded.

For a long time the conflict was severe, for Reidesel still did not make
his appearance. The British grenadiers occupied the Castleton road, and
prevented the Americans from retreating in that direction; but the
republicans poured in such a galling fire upon them, that they gave way
and victory was almost within the grasp of the patriots. At that moment
Riodesel with his companions appeared, his drums beating and banners
flying. The firing reaching his ears, he had pressed on as rapidly as
the rough forest road would allow. His Chasseurs, under Major Barner,
were immediately brought into action in support of Fraser's left flank.
At that moment the whole British line made a bayonet charge upon the
Americans with terrible effect. The latter, supposing that the Germans
in full force were coming upon them, broke and fled with great
precipitation, some over the Pittsford Mountains toward Rutland, and
others down the valley toward Castleton. * The Americans lost three
hundred and twenty-four in killed, wounded, and The brave Colonel
Francis was slain while gallantly fighting at the head of his regiment,
and twelve officers were made prisoners. The British loss was one
hundred and eighty-three, among whom were Major Pratt and about twenty
inferior officers. ** The British also captured about two hundred stand
of arms.

When General St. Clair heard the firing at Hubbardton, he attempted to
send a force to the relief of Warner, but the militia absolutely refused
to go, and the regulars and others were too far on their way to Fort
Edward to be recalled. St. Clair had just learned, too, that Burgoyne
was at Skenesborough, and he hastened forward to join General Schuyler,
which he did on the 12th, with his troops worn down by fatigue and lack
of provisions. The loss to the Americans by the evacuation of these
posts on the lake was one hundred and twenty-eight pieces of cannon and
a considerable quantity of ammu-

July, 1777.

* Explanation of the Map.--A, advanced corps of General Fraser, attacked
at B; C, position of the corps while it was forming; D, Earl of
Balcarras detached to cover the right wing; E, the van-guard and
Brunswick company of Chasseurs coming up with General Reidesel; F,
position of the Americans after Riedesel arrived. The lines extending
downward show the course of the retreat of the Americans over the
Pittsford Mountains. H, position of the British after the action; I,
house where the wounded were carried, mentioned in the description of
the picture on page 144; 0, position of the Americans previous to the
action. This map is a reduced copy of one drawn by P. Gerlach,
Burgoyne's deputy quartermaster general.

* Many of the Americans, in their precipitate retreat, threw away their
muskets to rid themselves of the encumbrance. Some have been found,
within a few years, in the woods on the line of the retreat. One of
them, of American manufacture, is in my possession, and dated 1774. The
bayonet is fixed, the flint is in the lock, and the powder and ball are
still in the barrel.

** The statements concerning the loss in this battle are various and
contradictory. Some accounts say that nearly six hundred, who were
wounded, crawled off into the woods and died; and others, again, put the
American loss down at less than three hundred. There is a preponderance
of testimony in favor of the number I have given, and it is, doubtless,
near the truth.

General Schuyler's Forces at Fort Edward.--Return to Lake Champlain.--An
old Soldier.--Mount Independence.

147nition and stores. In every respect the event was disastrous, and, as
we have seen, produced much discontent in the army and disappointment
throughout the country.

General Schuyler summoned the fragments of the broken armies to his camp
at Fort Edward. All united, numbered only four thousand four hundred
men, and this was the whole effective force opposed to the southward
progress of Burgoyne. Nearly one half of these deserted, not to the
enemy, but to their homes, before the end of the month. Yet the general
neither despaired nor remained idle. He kept his men busily engaged in
destroying bridges, felling trees, digging deep trenches, and making
other obstructions in the forest paths from Fort Anne to Fort Edward, to
delay the progress of the enemy; and this labor resulted in greatly
impeding Burgoyne's march, and in delaying his arrival upon the Hudson.
The subsequent events connected with these two armies, excepting the
battle of Bennington and the expedition of St. Leger, have already been
noticed in detail. The latter will be considered in their proper order.

I lingered upon the battle-ground in Hubbardton as long as time would
allow, for the view from that lofty table-land is both beautiful and
grand, particularly in the direction of Castleton, on the southwest. A
broad valley, bounded on either side by ranges of high hills, cultivated
to their summits, and diversified by rich intervales covered with ripe
harvests and dark green corn, spread out below us, a lovely picture of
peace and prosperity. The view at its further extremity is bounded by
the high hills near the Hudson, and on the left some of the higher
summits were dark with spruce and cedar trees. We returned to Sholes's
by the way of Hyde's, in Sudbury, where we dined. As usual, every
delicacy of the season was upon his table. Indeed, "a table equal to
Hyde's" has become a proverbial expression of praise among tourists, for
it is his justifiable boast that he spreads the choicest repasts that
are given between Montreal and New Orleans. His beautifully embowered
mansion is near the base of the Green Mountains, by the margin of a
charming lake, on the borders of a rich valley, about twelve miles east
of Lake Champlain, and a more delightful summer retreat can not well be
imagined. Our route thither was over a rough mountain road. Among the
rugged hills we met a venerable, white-haired man leaning upon two
canes, and greatly bowed by the weight of years. I accosted him with
reverence, and, in answer to my inquiry whether he was a soldier of the
Revolution, he informed me that he was with General Sullivan on Rhode
Island, and was on duty in the fort on Butt's Hill at the time of the
engagement there on the 29th of August, 1778, known as the battle of
Quaker Hill.

We arrived at Sholes's between five and six o'clock in the evening. Our
excellent host and his neighbor and friend, living at the foot of Mount
Independence, anticipating my wishes, had a skiff in readiness to convey
us across the bay to visit that memorable spot. Although I had ridden
forty miles during the day, and storm-clouds had been gathering thick
and fast for two hours, and now threatened a speedy down-pouring, I was
too anxious for the visit to allow fatigue or rain to thwart my purpose.
Accompanied by my companion and another young lady, the daughter of Mr.
S., we pushed across the bay--five of us in a light skiff, and the wind
rising--to the foot of Mount Independence, on its steep southern side.

We ascended by the old road constructed in 1776. The top of the summit
is flat tableland, and afforded a very eligible site for strong military
works. It was first occupied by the Americans early in 1776, when they
commenced the erection of batteries, barracks, and houses, with the view
of making it a place of general rendezvous, and a recruiting station for
the army of the north. * It was heavily timbered when they took
possession of it, but almost all the trees were felled for building
purposes and for fuel. A second growth of tim-

* Mount Independence is situated in the southwest corner of Orwell, in
Vermont, one mile north of Sholes's Landing, and contains about two
hundred and fifty acres of land, some of whieh is arable. The troops
stationed there in 1776 received the news of the adoption of the
Declaration of Independence, by the Continental Congress, with the most
extravagant demonstrations of joy. It was just after the reveille, on
the morning of the 18th of July, that a courier arrived with the glad
tidings; and, by a general order, a gala day for the soldiers ensued. At
sunset they fired a salute of thirteen guns, in honor of the
confederation, and named the place on which they were encamped Mount
Independence, in commemoration of the event.

Present Appearance of Mount Independence.--Graves of Soldiers.--
Vandalism.--Money-digging.

148ber now covers it, except where the parades were. The trees are
chiefly maple, some of them twenty inches in diameter. There are about
two hundred of them on the mount, large enough for the extraction of sap
for sugar. The young shoots never sprang up where the old parades were,
and they present bald spots, bearing only stinted vegetation.

During the summer and autumn of 1776 the Americans were diligent in
fortifying this spot. They erected a picketed fort and several
batteries, dug many wells, and constructed nearly three hundred houses
for the use of the soldiers. The remains of these are scattered in all
directions upon the mount; and the foundation walls of the hospital,
just commenced when the evacuation in 1777 took place, are now nearly as
perfect as when first laid. Narrow ditches, indicating the line of
pickets on the north part of the mount, and running in various
directions and at every angle, are distinctly seen; and the remains of
the "horseshoe battery," on the extreme north end, are very prominent.
Near this battery is a flint quarry, which seems to have been well known
and used by the Indians, for arrow-heads in every stage of manufacture,
from the almost unshapen flint to the perfect weapon, are found there, I
was told, in abundance. Toward the close of 1776 a fatal epidemic
prevailed in the garrison there, called the "camp distemper," and the
graves of the victims are thickly strewn among the trees.

At one time the deaths were so numerous that it was found impossible to
dig a grave for each, and the spot was shown to me where fourteen bodies
were deposited in a single broad grave, about daylight one morning.
Among the hundreds of these mounds of the dead, scattered over the
mount, there was only one individualized by an inscribed stone. The rude
monument is a rough limestone, and the inscription, "M. Richardson
Stoddard," appeared as if carved with the point of a bayonet. The tenant
was probably an officer of militia from a town formerly named Stoddard,
in Vermont. Already some Vandal visitor had broken off a "relic" from
its diminutive bulk, and ere this some patriotic antiquary has doubtless
slipped the whole stone into his pocket, and secured a legacy of rare
value for his wondering children! A propensity to appropriate to private
use a fragment of public monuments, and a pitiful ambition, allied in
kind to that of the Ephesian incendiary, to associate one's name by
pencil or penknife inscription with places of public resort, have
already greatly marred and disfigured a large proportion of our few
monuments, and can not be too severely condemned. Charity, that
"covereth the multitude of sins," has not a mantle broad enough to hide
this iniquity, for none but heartless knaves or brainless fools would
thus deface even the meanest grave-stone in a church-yard. Wolfe's
monument on the Plains of Abraham, and the monuments at Red Bank and
Paoli, bear mournful testimony of this barbarism which is abroad.

At various times Mount Independence, as well as Crown Point and other
localities in the neighborhood of Lake Champlain, has been scarred by
money-diggers. In 1815 a company came hither from Northern Vermont, to
search for military treasures which wise seers and the divining rod
declared were buried there. The chief of the party, entertaining
misgivings on his arrival as to the success of money-digging, purchased
land in the neighborhood, and while his more credulous companions were
digging deep into the mount, he was plowing deep into his land. He
raised grain and esculent roots--they raised gravel and worthless clay.
When their patience and money were exhausted, they shouldered their
picks and departed for Western New York. He remained, became a thrifty
farmer, and, by the unerring divining rod of industry, found the
treasure. Credulous people still dig at these localities, and several
pits were pointed out to me which had been recently excavated. *

* Three or four years ago the white wife of a negro dreamed three times-
-the cabalistic number--that at a certain place on Mount Independence
immense treasures were buried when the Americans evacuated that post.
They were, doubtless, the identical silver balls which calumny asserted
Burgoyne fired into St. Clair's camp as the price of treason. The negro
procured aid, and a pure white dog to watch them while digging. A
moonlight night was the chosen time. The secret leaked into the ears of
some boys, and set their mischievous wits at work. A large pumpkin was
emptied of its seeds, and staring eyes, wide nostrils and grinning teeth
were cut out of the rind, and a lighted candle was placed within the
sphere. This hideous head, with its fiery eyes and nostrils, was placed
on the caput of a bold boy, who marched up to the pit where the money-
diggers were at work. The dog first discovered the grinning specter, and
with a loud yell, leaped from the cavity and ran for life. The men
followed, leaving pick, spade, hat, and coat behind, quite sure that the
"gentleman in black" was close upon their heels -, and they have ever
since believed that he guards the treasures, and sometimes takes an
evening stroll on Mount Independence.

Return to Sholes's.--Darkness on the Lake.--View from Sholes's Landing.

149Darkness came on, and the rain pattered upon the leaves before we
descended to the shore; and by the time we were fairly out upon the lake
our destined haven was invisible.

The wind was fresh and the waters rough. One of the ladies guided the
helm, but her bright eyes could not discern the distant shore, and her
nautical skill was unavailing. The son of Mr. S., anticipating such a
dilemma, discharged a small swivel at the landing, and by its beacon
flash we were safely guided until we came within the rays of the candles
at the house. Wet and weary, we supped and retired early, to resume our
journey in the morning. *

* This is a view from Chipman's Point, or Sholes's Landing, looking
north. The high ridge on the right, in the distance, is Mount
Independence. The higher and more distant hill on the left, over the
cedar, is Mount Defiance, and the elevation beyond is Mount Hope. Fort
Ticonderoga is on the other side of Mount Independence, in a line with
the highest part.

Chimney Point.--First Settlement by the French.--Fort St. Frederic.--
Distant View of Crown Point

150

CHAPTER. VII.

"The green earth sends its incense up from every mountain shrine,

From every flower and dewy cup that greeted the sunshine.

The mists are lifted from the rills like the white wing of prayer

They lean above the ancient hills, as doing homage there.

The forest-tops are lowly cast o'er breezy hill and glen,

As if a prayerful spirit pass'd on nature as on men."

Whittier.

LIGHT mist was upon the water when we departed from Sholes's, but a
gentle breeze swept it off to the hills as we turned the point of Mount
Independence and entered the broader expanse near Ticonderoga. We caught
a last glimpse of the gray ruins as our boat sped by, and before nine
o'clock we landed at Chimney Point, opposite Crown Point, where the lake
is only half a mile wide. * Here the French established their first
settlement on Lake Champlain, in 1731, and commenced the cultivation of
the grains of the country. They erected a stone wind-mill in the
neighborhood, which was garrisoned and used as a fort during the wars
with the English colonies. When Professor Kalm, the Swedish naturalist
and traveler, during his botanical tour through New York and Canada in
1749, visited this settlement, five or six cannons were mounted in the
mill. The place was then called Wind-mill Point. **

The same year in which the French settled at Chimney Point, they built a
strong fort upon the shore opposite, and called it Fort St. Frederic, in
honor of Frederic Maurepas, the then Secretary of State. It was a
starwork, in the form of a pentagon, with bastions at the angles, and
surrounded by a ditch walled in with stone. Kalm says there was a
considerable settlement around the fort, and pleasant, cultivated
gardens adorned the rude dwellings.

There was a neat little church within the ramparts, and every thing
betokened a smiling future for a happy and prosperous colony. But the
rude clangor of war disturbed their repose a few years afterward; the
thunder of British artillery frightened them away, and they retired to
the north end of the lake. For many years the chimneys of their deserted
dwellings on the eastern shore were standing, and gave the name of
Chimney Point to the bold promontory. **

* Chimney Point is in the southwestern corner of Addison town, Vermont,
and is the proper landing-place for those who desire to visit the ruins
of Crown Point fortress, on the opposite side of the lake.

** From Kalm's account it appears probable that the wind-mill was upon
the shore opposite, at the point where now may be seen the ruins of what
is called the Grenadiers' Battery. He says it was "within one or two
musket-shots of Fort St. Frederic," a fortification immediately on the
shore opposite Chimney Point.

*** This view is taken from the green in front of the inn at Chimney
Point, looking west-southwest. The first land seen across the lake is
Crown Point, with the remaining barracks and other works of the
fortress, and the dwellings and outhouses of Mr. Baker, a resident
farmer. Beyond the point is Bulwaggy Bay, a broad, deep estuary much
wider than the lake at Chimney Point. Beyond the bay, and rising from
its western shore, is Bulwaggy Mountain, varying in perpendicular height
from four to nine hundred feet, and distant from the fort between one
and two miles. A little to the right of the larger tree on the shore is
the site of Fort St. Frederic, and at the edge of the circle on the
left, along the same shore, is the locality of the Grenadiers' Battery.
The wharf and bridge in the foreground form the steam-boat and ferry
landing at Chimney Point.

Visit to Crown Point.--Description of the Fortress.--Its present
Appearance.

151Anxious to leave in the evening boat for Burlington, we sent our
light baggage to the inn, and immediately crossed over to Crown Point on
a horse-boat, the only ferry vessel there. Mr. Baker, an aged resident
and farmer upon the point, kindly guided us over the remains of the
military works in the vicinity, where we passed between three and four
hours. We first visited old Fort St. Frederic, the senior fortress in
chronological order. It is upon the steep bank of the lake, and the
remains of its bomb-proof covered way, oven, and magazine can still be
traced; the form of its ramparts is indicated by a broken line of
mounds.

The average width of the peninsula of Crown Point is one mile, and the
principal works are upon its highest part, near the northern end. The
peninsula is made up of dark limestone, covered quite slightly with
earth. This physical characteristic lent strength to the post, for an
enemy could not approach it by parallels or regular advances, but must
make an open assault. _St. Frederic_, standing close by the water,
lacked this advantage; and the French, feeling their comparative
weakness, exercised the valor of prudence, and abandoned it on the
approach of the English and provincials under General Amherst, in 1759,
and retired to the Isle Aux Noix, * in the Sorel. The British commander
took July 26 immediate possession, but the works were so dilapidated
that, instead of repairing them, he at once began the erection of a new
and extensive fortress about two hundred yards southwest of it, and upon
more commanding ground.

The ramparts were about twenty-five feet thick, and nearly the same in
height, of solid masonry The curtains varied in length from fifty- to
one hundred yards, and the whole circuit, measuring along the ramparts,
and including the bastions, was eight hundred and fifty-three yards, a
trifle less than half a mile. A broad ditch cut out of solid limestone
surrounded it. The fragments taken from the excavation were used to
construct the reveting, and the four rows of barracks erected within. On
the north was a gate, and from the northeastern bastion was a covered
way leading to the lake. Within this bastion a well, nearly eight feet
in diameter and ninety feet deep, was sunk, from which the garrison was
supplied with water. This fortress was never entirely finished, although
the British government spent nearly ten millions of dollars upon it and
its outworks. Its construction was a part of the grand plan devised by
Pitt to crush French power in America, and hence, for

* This is pronounced O Noo-ah.

** There were four large buildings used for barracks within the fort,
the walls or chimneys of which were built of limestone. One of them has
been entirely removed, and another, two hundred and eighty-seven feet
long, is almost demolished. Portions of it are seen on the left, in the
foreground of the picture. The walls of the other two--one, one hundred
and ninety-two, and the other two hundred and sixteen feet long, and two
stories high--are quite perfect, and one of them was roofed and
inhabited until within two or three years. At each end, and between
these barracks, are seen the remains of the ramparts. The view is from
the northwestern angle of the fort, a little south of the remains of the
western range of barracks, and looking southeast. The hills in the
distance are the Green Mountains on the left, and the nearer range
called Snake Mountain, on the right.

* Explanation of the Plan.--A, B, C, the barracks,- D, the well; the
black line denotes the ramparts, with its parapet; the white space next
to it the ditch, and the shaded part outside, the covered way,
banquette, and glacis.

Proposed Attack on the French at Isle Aux Noix.--Approach of Winter. --
Appearance of Crown Point.--Inscriptions

152this as well as for every other part of the service here, the most
extraordinary efforts were made, and pecuniary means were freely
lavished. *

Amherst constructed several small vessels at Crown Point, and, leaving a
garrison to defend the partly finished fort, embarked with the rest of
his troops, and sailed down the lake, to attack the French in their new
position in the Sorel. Storm after storm arose upon the lake, and
greatly endangered the safety of his men and munitions in the frail
vessels. The season being considerably advanced, he abandoned the
design, and resolved not to risk the snow-storms that would soon ensue,
and the general barrenness of food and forage that now October 2, 1759
prevailed in an enemy's country. So he returned to Crown Point, and went
into winter-quarters.

The works at Crown Point are much better preserved than those at
Ticonderoga, and the present owner of the ground, with a resolution
which bespeaks his taste and patriotism, will not allow a stone to be
removed The view here given is from the parapet near the end of the
southeastern range of barracks, where the flag-staff was, looking down
the lake northwest. At the foot of the hills on the lake shore, toward
the left, is Cedar Point, at the entrance of Bulwaggy Bay, and a little
north of it is the village of Port Henry, the location of the There is a
ferry between this place and Chimney Point, the boats touching at Crown
Point.

In the gable wall of the nearest barracks in the view are two inscribed
stones, faced smooth where the inscription is carved. One bears the
initials "G. R.," George Rex or King; the rude form of an anchor, a mark
peculiar to Great Britain, and placed upon her cannon-ball? and other
military articles; and the date of the construction of the fortress,
"1759."

The other stone has the initial "G." without the R., the monogram of
Amherst, the anchor, and a number of rectangular and diagonal lines of
inexplicable meaning. The deep well, already alluded to, is close by the
covered way that leads to the lake, and a few rods northeast from the
eastern range of barracks. It was nearly filled with rubbish, and almost
hidden from view by the weeds and shrubbery upon its margin. I was
informed that a general impression prevailed in the vicinity, about
twenty-five years ago, that this deep well was the depository of vast
treasures, which were east into it by the French for conceal-

* For the campaign of 1759 the Legislature of New York authorized the
levy of two thousand six hundred and eighty men, and issued the sum of
five hundred thousand dollars in bills of credit, bearing interest, and
redeemable in 1768 by the proceeds of an annual tax.

Search for Treasure in the Well.---A venerable Money-digger. ---Capture
of Crown Point by the Patriots.--Seth Warner.

153ment when they abandoned the fort in 1759. Accordingly, a stock
company of fifty men, whose capital was labor, and whose dividends were
to be the treasure found, cleared the well of all its rubbish, in search
of the gold and silver.

One of the company furnished the whisky which was drunk on the occasion,
and agreed to wait for his pay until the treasure was secured. The men
"kept their spirits up by pouring spirits down," and before the work was
completed nearly three hogsheads of alcohol were swallowed by them. They
cleared and drained the well to its rocky bottom, and all the metal
which they found was iron in the form of nails, spikes, bolts, axes,
shovels, &c. The whisky and the labor were lost to the owners, but they
found the saying correct, that "truth lies at the bottom of a well," for
they discovered, when at the bottom, the important truth, which
doubtless taught them wisdom, that credulity is a faithless though
smiling friend, and a capricious and hard master to serve. Money-digging
still continues in the neighborhood, and several excavations within the
fort were pointed out as the scene of quite recent labor in that line.

In 1844 a venerable, white-haired man, apparently between eighty and
ninety years of age, leaning upon a staff and accompanied by two
athletic men, came to the fort and began to dig. They were observed by
Mr. B., and ordered away. The old man was urgent for leave to dig, for
he had come from the northern part of Vermont, was very poor, knew
exactly where the treasure was, as he had assisted in concealing it, and
asked but thirty minutes to finish his work. Mr. B. left them, and,
returning an hour afterward, saw quite a deep hole, but no man was near.
The diggers were gone, and the impression is that they really "found
something!" There has been a great deal of money-digging upon Snake
Mountain, on the eastern side of the lake, induced, to some extent, by
the wonderful discovery of a crucible there. Among those rugged hills
was doubtless the residence of "May Martin," the lovely heroine of the
"Money-diggers." *

Crown Point remained in the quiet possession of the British from 1759
until 1775, when it was surprised and taken by a small body of
provincials called "Green Mountain Boys," under Colonel Seth Warner. **
I have already mentioned the fact that he attempted its capture on the
same day that Delaplace surrendered Ticonderoga to Ethan Allen, but was
thwarted and driven back by a storm. That was on the 10th of May. The
attempt was renewed on the 12th, with success, and the garrison,
consisting of only a sergeant and eleven men, were made prisoners
without firing a shot. *** Among the spoils were a hundred and fourteen
cannons, of which only sixty-one were fit for service.

* See Thompson's pretty fiction, "May Martin, or the Money-diggers."

** Seth Warner was born in Woodbury, Connecticut, about 1744. He moved
to Bennington, Vermont, in 1773, and was noted for his skill in hunting.
He and Ethan Allen were the leaders of the people of the New Hampshire
Grants in their controversy with New York, and on the 9th of March,
1774, the Legislature of the latter province passed an act of outlawry
against them. After the capture of Ticonderoga and Crown Point, he
received a colonel's commission from the Continental Congress, and
joined Montgomery in Canada. His regiment was discharged at St. John's,
and, after the death of his general, he raised another body of troops
and marched to Quebec. He covered the retreat of the Americans from
Canada to Ticonderoga, was with the troops when they evacuated that post
in 1777, and commanded the rear-guard that fought a severe battle at
Hubbardton. He was one of General Starks's aids at the battle of
Bennington, and then joined the army under Gates at Stillwater. His
health soon afterward gave way, and he died at Woodbury in 1785, aged
forty-one years. The state of Vermont gave his widow and children a
valuable tract of land.--Allen's American Biography.

** On the day when Allen captured Ticonderoga, he sent a message to
Captain Remember Baker, one of his colleagues in the violent boundary
disputes between the New Yorkers and the people of the New Hampshire
Grants, to join him at that post. Baker obeyed the summons, and when he
was coming up the lake with his party, he met two small boats with
British soldiers, going to St. John's with the intelligence of the
reduction of Ticonderoga, and to solicit a re-enforcement of the
garrison at Crown Point. Baker seized the boats, and with his prisoners
arrived at the fort just in time to join Warner in taking posses non of
it.--Sparks's Life of Ethan Allen.

Expeditions of Allen and Arnold against St. John's.--Preparations to
oppose General Carleton on the Lake.

154Arnold arrived at Ticonderoga the same evening, and on the 14th about
fifty men, who had enlisted in compliance with his orders given by the
way while hurrying on to Castleton to overtake Allen, arrived from
Skenesborough, and brought with them the schooner which belonged to
Major Skene. He manned this vessel instantly, armed it with some of the
guns taken at the fort, and sailed down the lake to St. John's, on the
Sorel. There he surprised and made prisoners the garrison, consisting of
a sergeant and twelve men; captured a king's sloop with seven men;
destroyed five bateaux; seized four others; put on board some of the
valuable stores from the fort, and with his prisoners, and favored by a
fair wind which had chopped around from south to north just as he had
secured his prizes, he returned to Ticonderoga. Colonel Allen, with one
hundred and fifty men in bateaux, started upon the same expedition, but
Arnold's schooner outsailed the flat-boats, and Allen met him within
fifteen miles of St. John's, returning with his prizes. Arnold was on
board the king's sloop, where Allen visited him, and, after ascertaining
the actual state of affairs, the latter determined to go on to St.
John's and garrison the fort with about one hundred men. He landed just
before night, marched about a mile toward Laprairie, and formed his men
in ambush to attack an expected re-enforcement for the enemy. He soon
learned that the approaching force was much larger than his own, and
retired across the river, where he was attacked early in the morning by
two hundred men. He fled to his boats and escaped to Ticonderoga, with a
loss of three men taken prisoners. Thus within one week the strong
fortresses of Ticonderoga and Crown Point, with all their dependencies
upon the lake, were snatched from the British by the bold provincials,
without their firing a gun or losing a man; and their little fleet upon
the lake, their only strength left, was captured and destroyed in a day.

These events aroused General Carleton, the governor of Canada, and a re-
enforcement of more than four hundred British and Canadians was speedily
sent to St. John's. It was determined to send small water craft from
Chambly and Montreal, to be armed and manned at St. John's; and other
measures were planned for dispatching a sufficient force up the lake to
recapture Ticonderoga and Crown Point. Tidings of these preparations
soon reached the ears of Arnold, and afforded him an opportunity to
sever his connection with Allen, so ill suited to his restless and
ambitious spirit. A fleet to oppose the enemy was now necessary, and,
having had some experience at sea in earlier life, Arnold assumed to be
the commander of whatever navy should be fitted out. His assumption was
not complained of, and he proceeded vigorously in arming and manning
Skene's schooner, the king's corvette, and a small flotilla of bateaux.
With these and about one hundred and fifty men, he took post at Crown
Point to await the approach of the enemy. There he organized his little
navy by the appointment of a captain and subordinate officers for each
vessel. He mounted six carriage guns and twelve swivels in the sloop,
and four carriage guns and eight swivels in the schooner He was also
active in sending off the ordnance from Crown Point to the army at
Cambridge, and at the same time he sent emissaries to Montreal and the
Caughnawagas to sound the intentions of the Canadians and Indians, and
ascertain what was the actual force under Carleton and the nature of his
preparations. He also wrote to the Continental Congress in June,
proposing a plan of operations whereby, he confidently believed, the
whole of Canada might be conquered by two thousand men. He asserted that
persons in Montreal had agreed to open the gates when a strong
Continental force should appear before the city; assured Congress that
Carleton had only five hundred and fifty effective men under him; and
offered to lead the expedition and to be responsible for consequences.
His representations were doubtless true, but Congress was not prepared
to sanction such an expedition. Allen, in a letter dated Crown Point,
June 2d, 1775, made a similar proposition to the Provincial Congress of
New York. In the mean while letters had been sent from Ticonderoga to
the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, complaining of Arnold's
arrogant assumptions, and otherwise dis-

Commission from Massachusetts.--Re-enforcements for the Lake Forts.--
Regiment of Green Mountain Boys.

155paraging his deeds. A committee of inquiry was appointed, who
proceeded to Lake Champlain. Arnold was at Crown Point, acting as
commandant of the fort and commodore of the navy, and, not suspecting
the nature of their visit, he was enthusiastic in his discourse to them
of his expected victories. The first intimation of their errand aroused
Arnold's indignation; and when he fully understood the purport of their
commission, he wrote them a formal letter of resignation, discharged his
men, and returned to Cambridge, uttering loud complaints of ill usage by
the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts. Thus ended the naval
operations upon the lake in 1775.

When Ticonderoga and Crown Point were securely in the power of the
provincials, Colonel Easton went to Massachusetts and Connecticut, and
explained to the respective governments all the transactions connected
with the reduction of these important posts. The Massachusetts Assembly
wrote to Governor Trumbull of Connecticut, expressing their willingness
to allow that colony all the honor, and to withhold all interference in
future operations in that quarter. Trumbull immediately prepared to send
a re-enforcement for the garrisons, of four hundred men. Meanwhile
messages were sent to the Continental Congress, and, through courtesy,
to the Provincial Congress of New York, within whose jurisdiction the
fortresses were situated, to ascertain their views. The Continental
Congress approved the measures of Governor Trumbull, and requested the
Convention of New York to supply the troops with provisions. The four
hundred men were immediately sent, under Colonel Hinman, who superseded
Colonel Allen in the command at Ticonderoga. The latter, with Warner,
set off for the Continental Congress at Philadelphia, to procure pay for
their soldiers, whose terms had expired, and to solicit authority to
raise a new regiment in Vermont. The appearance of these men occasioned
a great sensation in Philadelphia, and they were introduced upon the
floor of Congress, to make their communications to that body orally.
Congress at once acquiesced in their wishes, granted the soldiers the
same pay as was received by those of the Continental army, and
recommended to the New York Convention that, after consulting General
Schuyler, they should "employ in the army to be raised in defense of
America those called Green Mountain Boys, under such officers as the
said Green Mountain Boys should choose." This resolution was dispatched
to the New York Convention, and thither Allen and Warner repaired, and
obtained an audience. * The Assembly resolved that a regiment of Green
Mountain Boys, consisting of seven companies, and not exceeding five
hundred men in number, should be raised. The matter was referred to
General Schuyler, who immediately notified the people of the New
Hampshire Grants, and ordered them to raise the regiment. Allen and
Warner were not members of the regiment, but soon afterward they both
joined General Schuyler at Ticonderoga, where he wras stationed with
about three thousand troops from New York and New England, August, 1775
preparatory to an invasion of Canada. Early in September Generals
Schuyler and Montgomery sailed from Ticonderoga and Crown Point with
their whole force, and appeared before St. John's, on the Sorel. Let us
for a moment take a general view of affairs having a relation to the
northern section of operations at this juncture and immediately
antecedent thereto.

* The Assembly of New York was embarrassed when Allen and Warner
appeared at the door of its hall and asked for admission, and a warm
debate ensued. During the then recent controversy of the Legislature of
New York with the people of the New Hampshire Grants, these men had been
proclaimed outlaws, and that attainder had never been wiped off by a
repeal. There were members of that body who had taken a very active
part, personally, in the controversy, and they were unwilling to give
their old enemies a friendly greeting. Their prejudices, and the
scruples of others who could not recognize the propriety of holding
public conference with men whom the law of the land had declared to be
rioters and felons, produced a strong opposition to their admission to
the hall. The debates were becoming very warm, when Captain Sears (the
noted "King Sears") moved that "Ethan Allen be admitted to the floor of
the House." It was carried by a very large majority, as was also a
similar resolution in regard to Warner. Allen afterward wrote a letter
of thanks to the New York Assembly, in which, after referring to the
formation of the battalion of Green Mountain Boys, he concluded by
saying, "I will be responsible that they will reciprocate this favor by
boldly hazarding their lives, if need be, in the common cause of
America."

General View of Affairs.--The "Canada Bill."--Opposition to it in
Parliament.--Denunciations of Barré.

156The British ministry, alarmed at the rapid progress of the rebellion
in America, and particularly at the disaffection to the royal government
which was manifest in Canada, and observing that all their coercive
measures in relation to Massachusetts had thus far augmented rather than
diminished the number and zeal of the insurgents in that colony,
determined, in 1774, to try a different policy with Canada, to secure
the loyalty of the people. A large proportion of the inhabitants were of
French descent, and members of the Romish communion. Those who composed
the most influential class were of the old French aristocracy, and any
concessions made in favor of their caste weighed more heavily with them
than any that might be made to the whole people, involving the extension
of the area of political freedom, an idea which was a mere abstraction
to them. Religious concessions to the other and more ignorant class were
a boon of great value, and by these means the king and his advisers
determined to quiet the insurrectionary spirit in Canada. A bill was
accordingly introduced into Parliament, "For making more effectual
provision for the government of the province of Quebec, in North
America." It provided for the establishment of a Legislative Council,
invested with all powers except that of levying taxes. It was provided
that its members should be appointed by the crown, and continue in
authority during its pleasure; that Canadian subjects professing the
Catholic faith might be called to sit in the Council; that the Catholic
clergy, with the exception of the regular orders, should be secured in
the enjoyment of their professions, and of their tithes from all those
who professed their religion; that the French laws without jury should
be re-established, preserving, however, the English laws, with trial by
jury, in criminal cases. The bill also provided that the limits of
Canada should be extended so as to inclose the whole region between the
lakes and the Ohio and Mississippi Rivers, regardless of the just claims
of other colonies under old and unrepealed charters. * These liberal
concessions to the Canadians would have been highly commendable, had not
other motives than a spirit of liberality manifestly actuated ministers.
The most obtuse observer could plainly perceive their object to be to
secure a strong footing north and west of the refractory colonies, where
troops might be concentrated and munitions of war collected, to be used
at a moment's warning, if necessary, in crushing rebellion near. Such a
design was at once charged upon ministers by the ever-vigilant Colonel
Barré, on the floor of the British House of Commons. "A very
extraordinary indulgence," he said, "is given to the inhabitants of this
province, and one calculated to gain the hearts and affections of these
people. To this I can not object, if it is to be applied to good
purposes; but if you are about to raise a popish army to serve in the
colonies, from this time all hope of peace in America will be destroyed.
The Americans will look on the Canadians as their task-masters, and, in
the end, their executioners." It was urged by ministers that common
justice demanded the adoption of such a measure, for a very large
proportion of the people of Canada were Roman Catholics. ** Edmund
Burke, Thomas Townshend, Charles Fox, Sergeant Glynn, and others joined
Colonel Barré in his denunciations of the bill, particularly in relation
to the clauses concerning the Roman Catholic religion, and that
providing for the establishment of a Legislative Council to be appointed
by the crown. The former were considered a dangerous precedent for a
Protestant government, and the latter was regarded as shadowing forth
the ultimate design of the king and his ministers to subvert the popular
form of government in America, and to make the legislators mere
creatures of the crown. By its provisions the Governor of Canada was
vested with almost absolute and illimitable power, and permitted to be
nearly as much a despot, if he chose, as any of the old Spanish viceroys
of

* Thomas and John Penn, son and grandson of William Penn, then the
proprietaries of Pennsylvania and Delaware, entered a protest against
the boundary section of this bill, because it contemplated an
encroachment upon their territory. Burke, who was then the agent of the
colony of New York, also opposed this section of the bill for the same
reason, in behalf of his principal. The letter of that statesman to the
Assembly of New York on the subject is published among the Collections
of the New York Historical Society, and is said to be the only one known
to be extant of all those which he wrote to that body.

** Governor Carleton asserted, on oath, before a committee of
Parliament, that there were then only about three hundred and sixty
Protestants in Canada, while the Roman Catholics numbered one hundred
and fifty thousand.

Passage of the "Canada Bill."--Effect of the Measure in the Colonies.--
Boldness of Orators and the Press.

157South America. On this point Lord Chatham (William Pitt) was
particularly eloquent, and he also took ground against the religious
features of the bill, as an innovation dangerous to the Protestant faith
and to the stability of the throne. The bill, however, with all its
exceptionable clauses, was adopted by quite a large majority in both
Houses, and received the royal assent on the 22d of June. It was
introduced into the House of Lords by the Earl of Dartmouth, and passed
that House without opposition. This bill is refer red to in our
Declaration of Independence as one of the "acts of pretended
legislation" that justified the separation from the parent country.

While this act, with the Boston Port Bill, that for the subversion of
the charter of Massachusetts, and the law authorizing the transportation
of criminals to Great Britain for trial, were in transit through
Parliament and receiving the royal signature, the colonists were
preparing to make a successful resistance against further legislative
encroachments. Throughout the whole summer and autumn of 1774 the
greatest excitement prevailed. The committees of correspondence were
every where active and firm, and were constantly supplied with minute
knowledge of all the movements of the home government by secret agents
in the British metropolis. The people by thousands signed non-
importation agreements, and otherwise attested their willingness to make
personal sacrifices in the cause of freedom. The press spoke out boldly,
and orators no longer harangued in parables, but fearlessly called upon
the people to unite. The events of the French and Indian war had
demonstrated the prowess and strength of the Anglo-Americans against the
foes of Britain, and they felt confident in that strength against
Britain herself, now that she had become the oppressor of her children,
if a bond of union could be made that should cause all the colonies to
act in concert. A general Congress, similar to that which convened in
New York in 1765, was therefore suggested. Throughout the colonies the
thought was hailed as a happy one, and soon was developed the most
energetic action. The Congress met in September, adopted loyal addresses
to the king and Parliament, to the people of the colonies, of Canada, of
Ireland, and of Great Britain, and took precautionary measures
respecting future aggressions upon their rights. The people, highly
indignant, every where evinced the strength of that feeling by open
contempt for all royal authority exercised by officers of the crown. The
acts alluded to were denounced as "barbarous and bloody," the British
ministry were published in the gazettes, and placarded upon the walls as
_papists_ and as _traitors to the Constitution_, and the patriots even
had the boldness to lampoon the king and Parliament. (For an
illustration, see next page.)

Such was the temper of the Americans at the opening of the year 1775.
The events at Lexington and Concord added fuel to the flame of
indignation and rebellion. As we have seen, Ticonderoga and other posts
on Lake Champlain were assailed, and fell into the hands of the
Americans. In June the battle of Bunker Hill was fought. A Continental
June 17, 1775 army was speedily organized. Hope of reconciliation
departed. The sword was fairly drawn, and at the close of summer an
expedition was arranged to invade Canada, for which an armament was
collected at Ticonderoga. Such a step seemed essential for two reasons:
first, to confirm the Canada patriots (who were chiefly in the
neighborhood of Montreal) in their opposition to Great Britain by the
pressure of armed supporters; and, secondly, to secure the strong-hold
of Quebec while its garrison was yet weak, and before General Carleton
could organize a sufficient force to defend it. That officer, it was
well known, was vested with almost unlimited power as governor of the
province, under the act which we have just considered; and it was also
well known that he was using every means at his command to induce the
Canadians to take up arms against the rebellious colonists. Neither
bribes nor promises were spared. The imperial government resolved to
send out fifteen thousand muskets to arm the French Catholics, and
agents of the crown were busy among the Indian tribes upon the St.
Lawrence and the Ottawa, inciting them to an alliance with the army of
the king.

Congress had already sent an affectionate address "To the oppressed
inhabitants May 29, 1775 of Canada," and its effects were so palpable to
Governor Carleton, that he feared

The British Government caricatured.--Carleton's attempt to seduce the
Bishop of Quebec.--Consistency of the Prelate

158entire disaffection to the royal government would ensue. The people
were disappointed in the operations of the act of 1774, and all but the
nobles regarded it as tyrannical.

Unable to make an impression favorable to the king upon the Canadians by
an appeal to their loyalty, Carleton had recourse to the authority of
religion. He endeavored to seduce Brand, the Roman Catholic bishop of
Quebec, from his exalted duties as a Christian pastor, to engage in the
low political schemes of a party placeman, and publish a _mandement_, to
be read from the pulpit by the curates in time of divine service. He
also urged the prelate to exhort the people to take up arms against the
colonists. But the consistent bishop refused to exert his influence in
such a cause, and plainly told Carleton that such conduct would be
unworthy of a faithful pastor, and derogatory to the canons of the
Romish Church. A few priests, however, with the nobility, seconded
Carleton's views, but their influence was feeble with the mass of the
people, who were determined to remain neutral. The governor now tried
another scheme, and with better effect. He could make no impression upon
the masses by appeals to their loyalty or their religious prejudices,
and he determined to arouse them by

* The above engraving is an exact copy, reduced, of a caricature which I
found in the possession of the Massachusetts Historical Society at
Boston, entitled "Virtual Representation." On the back of it, apparently
in the hand-writing of the time, is the following:

* "A full explanation of the within print.--No. 1 intends the K--g of G.
B., to whom the House of Commons (4) gives the Americans' money for the
use of that very H. of C., and which he is endeavoring to take away with
the power of cannon. No. 2, by a Frenchman, signifies the tyranny that
is intended for America. No. 3, the figure of a Roman Catholic priest
with his crucifix and gibbet, assisting George in enforcing his
tyrannical system of civil and religious government. Nos. 5 and 6 are
honest American yeomen, who oppose an oaken staff to G--'s cannon, and
determine they will not be robbed. No. 7 is poor Britannia blindfolded,
falling into the bottomless pit which her infamous rulers have prepared
for the Americans. Nos. 8, 9 represent Boston in flames and Quebec
triumphant, to show the probable consequence of submission to the
present wicked ministerial system, that popery and tyranny will triumph
over true religion, virtue, and liberty. "N.B. Perhaps this may remind
the Bostonians of the invincible attachment of the Numantines * to their
liberty," &c.

** The Numantinee inhabited a city on the banka of the Douro, in Spain.
Twenty years they were besieged by the Romans, until at length the
younger Scipio Africanus entered their city (one hundred and thirty-
three years B.C, and twelve years after the destruction of Carthage).
The Numantinea, seeing all hope gone, set fire to their city and
perished in the flames rather than become slaves to their oppressors.

Royal Highland Regiment, how raised.--Our Departure from Crown Point.--
Split Rock.--War-feast on the Bouquet River

159appealing to their cupidity. Accordingly, he caused the drums to beat
up for volunteers in Quebec, and by offers of good pay, privileges, and
bounties, he succeeded in enrolling a few, under the title of the _Royal
Highland Regiment_. * About the same time Colonel July, 1775 Guy Johnson
arrived at Montreal with a large number of Indian chiefs and warriors of
the Six Nations, who, despite their solemn promises of neutrality, were
induced to join the soldiers of the king. They made oath of allegiance
to the crown in the presence of Carle-ton, and were held in readiness to
serve him when he should call.

A small number of regular British troops, with the volunteers and
Indians, composed the bulk of Carleton's army at the close of the summer
of 1775, the time when General Schuyler was preparing, at Ticonderoga
and Crown Point, for a campaign against Canada. We thus come back from
our historic ramble to our starting-place at Crown Point. The ruins are
sufficiently explored; let us pass over to Chimney Point and dine, for
the steamer will soon come down the lake to convey us to our Sabbath
resting-place at Burlington.

We left Chimney Point in the evening, a cool, gentle breeze blowing from
the northwest. The western shore is bold, and in many places
precipitous, and in the distance the blue peaks and lofty ridges of the
Adirondack Mountains skirt, the horizon. The eastern margin is the
termination of the pleasant slopes and beautiful intervales between the
Green Mountains and the lake, cultivated and wooded alternately to the
water's verge. At dusk we reached the famous _Split Rock_. The moon was
shining brightly in the west, where faint tints of daylight still
lingered, and we passed so near that we had a fine view of that
geological wonder. It is on the west side of the lake, about thirty
miles below Crown Point. Here is a sharp promontory jutting into the
lake, the point ol which, containing about half an acre, and covered
with bushes, is separated from the main land by a cleft fifteen feet
wide. It was observed as a curiosity by the old French explorers.
Soundings to the depth of five hundred feet have been made between the
fragment and the main rock, without finding a bottom. Geologists differ
in opinion respecting the cause which formed the chasm, some ascribing
it to an earthquake, and others to the slow attrition of the current
upon a portion of the rock of softer texture than the rest. A light-
house stands near as a guide to the navigator, for the lake is only a
mile wide at this point. Here it suddenly expands, and at the mouth of
the Bouquet River, eight miles above, it is about five miles wide.

At the falls in the Bouquet, two miles from the lake, is the village of
Willsborough, the place where Burgoyne encamped and gave a war-feast to
about four hundred Indians of the tribes of the Algonquins, Iroquois,
and Ottawas, who, accompanied by a Roman Catholic priest, joined him
there. Both he and Carleton were averse to the measure of June 21, 1777
employing the savages in the British army, but the express instructions
of ministers demanded it, and he dared not disobey. ** He made a speech
to them, in which he humanely endeavored to soften their savage ferocity
and restrain their thirst for rapine and blood. His exordium was words
of flattery in praise of their sagacity, faithfulness, forbearance, and
loyalty. He then spoke of the abused clemency of the king toward the
colonies, and declared to the warriors their relief from restraint. "Go
forth," he said, "in the might of your valor

* Their time of service was limited to the continuance of the
disturbances; each soldier was to receive two hundred acres of land in
any province in North America he might choose; the king paid himself the
accustomed duties upon the acquisition of lands; for twenty years new
proprietors were to be exempted from all contribution for the benefit of
the crown; every married soldier obtained other fifty acres, in
consideration of his wife, and fifty more for account of each of his
children, with the same privilege and exemptions, besides the bounty of
a guinea at the time of enlistment.--Botta, vol. i., p. 220.

** The employment of Indians by the British ministry, in this campaign,
has been excused upon the lame plea, which has not the shadow of truth,
that, unless they were thus employed, the Americans would have mustered
them into their service.--See Knight's Pictorial England, vol. v., p.
306.

Burgoyne's Interview with the Indians.--Speech of an Iroquois.--Approach
to Burlington.

160and your cause. Strike at the common enemies of Great Britain and of
America; disturbers of public order, peace, and happiness; destroyers of
commerce; parricides of the state."

He told them that his officers and men would endeavor to imitate their
example in perseverance, enterprise, and constancy, and in resistance of
hunger, weariness, and pain. At the same time he exhorted them to listen
to his words, and allow him to regulate their passions, and to conform
their warfare to his, by the rules of European discipline and the
dictates of his religion and humanity. He reminded them that the king
had many faithful subjects in the provinces, and, therefore,
indiscriminate butchery of the people might cause the sacrifice of many
friends. He then charged them, in the words quoted from his speech in
the note on ante, page 99, not to kill for scalps, or destroy life
except in open warfare, and claimed for himself the office of umpire on
all occasions. When he had finished, an old Iroquois chief arose and
said:

"I stand up in the name of all the nations present, to assure our father
that we have attentively listened to his discourse. We receive you as
our father, because when you speak we hear the voice of our great father
beyond the great lake. We rejoice in the approbation you have expressed
of our behavior. We have been tried and tempted by the Bostonians,1 but
we loved our father, and our hatchets have been sharpened upon our
affections. In proof of the sincerity of our professions, our whole
villages able to go to war are come forth. The old and infirm, our
infants and wives, alone remain at home. With one common assent we
promise a constant obedience to all you have ordered and all you shall
order; and may the Father of Days give you many and success." **

These promises were all very fine, and Burgoyne, to his sorrow, had the
credulity to rely upon them. At first the Indians were docile, but as
soon as the scent of blood touched their nostrils their ferocious
natures were aroused, and the restraints imposed by the British
commander were too irksome to be borne. Their faithfulness disappeared;
and in the hour of his greatest need they deserted him, as we have seen,
by hundreds, and returned home.

As the lake widened and the evening advanced, the breeze freshened
almost to a gale, and, blowing upon our larboard quarter, it rolled up
such swells on our track that the vessel rocked half the passengers into
silent contemplation of the probability of casting their supper to the
fishes. The beacon upon Juniper Island was hailed with delight, for the
Burlington break-water was just ahead. We entered the harbor between
nine and ten in the evening,

* The old chief spoke truly. They had been "tempted by the Bostonians,"
but not by the Boston patriots. General Gage, then governor of
Massachusetts, and other loyalists in Boston, sent emissaries among the
Indians in various ways, and these were the tempters which the old chief
confounded with the enemies of the crown. I shall have occasion
hereafter to speak of Connelly, one of Gage's 'emissaries, who went to
Virginia, and, under the auspices of Lord Dunmore, carried promises and
money to the Indians on the frontier, to instigate them to fall upon the
defenseless republicans of that stanch Whig state.

** So interpreted by Burgoyne in his "State of the Expedition," &c.

Sabbath Morning in Burlington.--Visit to the Grave of Ethan Allen.--Ira
Allen

161and were soon in comfortable quarters at the American, fronting the
pleasant square in the center of the village.

The next morning dawned calm and beautiful. The wind was hushed, and the
loveliness of repose was upon the village, lake, and country. It was our
second Sabbath from home, and never was its rest more welcome and
suggestive of gratitude, for the preceding week had been to me one of
unceasing toil, yet a toil commingled with the most exalted pleasure. I
had been among scenes associated with the noblest sentiments of an
American's heart; and when, mingling with the worshipers in St. Paul's
Church, the clear voice of Bishop Hopkins repeated the divine
annunciation, "From the rising of the sun unto the going down of the
same, my name shall be great among the heathen, saith the Lord," I felt
that our own country, so late a wilderness and abiding-place for pagans,
but now blooming under the beneficent culture of free institutions that
were born amid the labor-throes of the Revolution, was a special
illustration of that glorious declaration.

Early on Monday morning we procured saddle horses and rode out to the
resting-place of General Ethan Allen, a burial-ground embowered in
shrubbery, lying upon the brow of the hill overlooking the Winooski, and
within sound of its cascades. It is on the south side of the road
leading east from Burlington, nearly half a mile from the University of
Vermont, that stands upon the summit of the hill, upon the western slope
of which is the village. Allen's monument is a plain marble slab,
resting upon a granite foundation, and bears the following inscription:

THE

CORPOREAL PART OF

General Ethan Allen

RESTS BENEATH THIS STONE,

the 12th day of Feb., 1789,

AGED 50 YEARS.

his spirit tried the mercies of his God,

IN WHOM ALONE HE BELIEVED AND STRONGLY TRUSTED.

Near his are the graves of his brother Ira * and several other
relatives. The whole are inclosed within a square defined by a chain
supported by small granite obelisks. A willow drooped over the tombs of
the patriot dead, and rose-bushes clustered around the storm-worn
monuments. The dew was yet upon the grass, and its fragrant exhalations
filled the air with such grateful incense, that we were loth to leave
the spot. We galloped our horses back to the village in time for
breakfast, delighted and profited by our morning's ride. Halt-

* Ira Allen was born in Salisbury. Connecticut, in 1752. He went to
Vermont in early life, and became one of the most active citizens of
that state, particularly in the controversy between Vermont and New York
respecting the territory called the New Hampshire Grants. It is said
that when the Revolution broke out he sided with the crown and went to
Canada. His stanch Whig brother, Ethan, indignant at his choice,
recommended the Vermont Assembly to confiscate his brother's property.
Ira heard of it, and challenged Ethan to fight a duel. Ethan refused, on
the ground that it would be "disgraceful to fight a Tory," and so the
matter ended. Ira finally became a warm republican, and was active
during the remainder of the war. He was a member of the Convention which
formed the Constitution of Vermont, and became the first secretary of
the state. He was afterward treasurer, member of the council, and
surveyor general. He rose to the rank of major general of militia, and
in 1795 he went to Europe to purchase arms for the supply of his state.
Returning with several thousand muskets and some cannon, he was captured
by an English vessel and carried to England, where he was accused of
supplying the Irish rebels with arms. A litigation for eight years, in
the Court of Admiralty, was the consequence, but a final decision was in
his favor He died at Philadelphia, January 7th, 1814, aged 62 years.

Burlington and Vicinity.--Adjacent Lake Scenery.--Place of Arnold's
first Naval Battle.--Military Operations on the Lake

162ing near the university a few minutes, we enjoyed the beautiful view
which the height commands. The Green Mountains stretched along the east;
the broken ranges of the Adirondack, empurpled by the morning sun,
bounded the western horizon; and below us, skirting the lake, the
pleasant village lay upon the slope, and stretched its lengthening form
out toward the rich fields that surrounded it. To the eye of a wearied
dweller in a dense city all villages appear beautiful in summer, but
Burlington is eminently so when compared with others.

We left the metropolis of the lake for Plattsburgh about noon. On our
left, as we emerged from the harbor, were the Four Brothers, small
islands swarming with water-fowl, and the bald point of Rock Dunder, a
solitary spike rising, shrubless and bare, about twenty feet above the
water. Before us spread out the two Heros (North and South), green
islands, which belonged to the Allen family during the Revolution. The
first landing-place below Burlington is Port Kent, on the west side of
the lake, ten miles distant. A little below is Port Jackson, nearly west
of the south end of Valcour's Island. This is an interesting portion of
the lake to the American tourist, for it is the place where our first
naval battle with Great Britain was fought. This event took place
October the 11th, 1776. The American flotilla was commanded by Benedict
Arnold, and the English vessels by Captain Pringle, accompanied by
Governor Carleton. In order to a lucid understanding of the position of
affairs at that time, we must consider for a moment the connecting chain
of events from the autumn of 1775, when General Schuyler was at
Ticonderoga and Crown Point preparing to invade Canada, to the meeting
of the belligerents in question.

The forces under Generals Schuyler and Montgomery proceeded to execute
the will of September 10, 1775 Congress, and in September appeared
before St. John's, at the Sorel. Finding the fort, as they supposed, too
strong for assault, they returned to and fortified _Isle Aux Noix_.
Schuyler went back to Ticonderoga and hastened forward re-enforcements,
but was unable to return on account of sickness. Montgomery succeeded
him in command. He captured Fort St. John's and Fort Chambly, and
entered Montreal in triumph. He then pushed on to Quebec, when he was
joined by a force under Arnold, and early in December laid siege to that
city. After besieging it unsuccessfully for three weeks, the Americans
December 31, 1775 commenced an assault. Montgomery was killed, the
Americans were re-pulsed, and many of them made prisoners. Arnold was
wounded. He became the chief in command, and kept the remnant of the
republican army together in the vicinity of Quebec, until the arrival of
General Wooster early in the spring and General Thomas in May. General
Carleton soon afterward received re-enforcements from England, and by
the middle of June the Americans, after retreating from post to post,
were driven out of Canada.

Not doubting that Carleton would follow up his successes by providing
water craft upon the lake, to attempt the capture of Ticonderoga and
Crown Point, a council of officers, under General Gates, who in June was
appointed to the command of the Northern army, resolved to abandon the
latter post and concentrate all their forces at the former. Accord-

* This sketeh was made from the pilot's room of the steam-boat just
after leaving Port Jackson. On the left is a point of the main land, and
on the right is seen a portion of Valcour's Island. The high ground in
the extreme distance, on the left, is Cumberland Head, and that dimly
seen in the center of the picture is the Vermont shore.

Formation of a little Fleet--Excursion down the Lake.--Appearance of the
British Fleet.--Plan of the Battle.

163ingly, General Sullivan, who was at Crown Point, withdrew with his
forces to Ticonderoga, and active measures for offensive and defensive
operations were there adopted. Materials for constructing vessels, as
well as skillful artisans, were scarce. The latter had to be obtained
from the sea-ports; yet such was the zeal of the Americans, that by the
middle of August a small squadron, consisting of one sloop, three
schooners, and five gondolas, was in readiness and rendezvoused at Crown
Point under Arnold, who received the command of it from General Gates.
The sloop carried twelve guns, one schooner the same number, the others
eight, and the gondolas three each. Toward the close of the month Arnold
sailed down the lake, under positive instructions from Gates not to pass
beyond _Isle Aux Tètes_, near what is now called Rouse's Point, and to
act only on the defensive. He halted at Wind-mill Point, four miles
above _Isle Aux Tètes_, to reconnoiter, and anchored his vessels across
the lake, to prevent any boats of the enemy from passing up.

As soon as Carleton was advised of the movements of the Americans at
Ticonderoga, he sent seven hundred men from Quebec to St. John's, to
construct a fleet, and in the course of a few weeks several strong
vessels were finished and armed for duty. A radeau called the
_Thunderer_ (a kind of flat-bottomed vessel carrying heavy guns), and
twenty-four gunboats, armed each with a field piece or carriage gun,
were added to the fleet. Forty boats with provisions accompanied the
expedition.

Convinced that his position was dangerous, for the British and Indians
were collecting on the shores, Arnold fell back about ten miles to _Isle
La Motte_, where he need not fear an attack from the main land. Here his
fleet was considerably increased, and consisted of three schooners, two
sloops, three galleys, eight gondolas, and twenty-one gun-boats.
Ignorant of the real strength of the armament1776. which he knew
Carleton was preparing at St. John's, and unwilling to engage a superior
force on the broad lake, Arnold withdrew his fleet still further back,
and anchored it across the narrow channel between Valcour's Island and
the western shore.

Early on the morning of the 11th of October the British fleet appeared
off Cumberland Head, moving up the lake, and in a short time it swept
around the southern point of Valcour's Island. The enemy's force was
formidable, for the vessels were manned by seven hundred chosen seamen.

Captain Pringle was commodore, and made the _Inflexible_ his flagship.
Among the young officers in the fleet was Edward Pellew, afterward
Admiral Viscount Exmouth, one of the most distinguished of England's
naval commanders. The action began about twelve o'clock, by the attack
of the Carleton upon the American schooner _Royal Savage_ and three
galleys. The latter, in attempting to return to the line, grounded,

* Explanation of the Map.--A, American fleet under Arnold; B, 21 gun-
boats; C, schooner Carleton, 12 six pounders; D, ship Inflexible, 18
twelve pounders; E, anchorage of the British fleet during the night, to
cut off the Americans' retreat; F, radeau Thunderer, 6 twenty-four
pounders and 12 six pounders; G, gondola Loyal Convert, 7 nine pounders;
H, schooner Maria, 14 six pounders, with General Carleton on board; I,
the place where the American schooner Royal Savage, of 8 six pounders
and 4 four pounders, was burned. This plan is copied from Brasrier's
Survey of Lake Champlain, edition of 1779.

Severe Battle on the Lake.--Escape of the Americans through the British
Line.--Chase by the Enemy.--Another Battle

164and was burned, but her men were saved. Arnold was on board the
_Congress_ galley, and conducted matters with a great deal of bravery
and skill. About one o'clock the engagement became general, and the
American vessels, particularly the _Congress_, suffered severely. It was
hulled twelve times, received seven shots between wind and water, the
main-mast was shattered in two places, the rigging cut to pieces, and
many of the crew were killed or wounded. Arnold pointed almost every gun
on his vessel with his own hands,1 and with voice and gesture cheered on
his men. In the mean while the enemy landed a large body of Indians upon
the island, who kept up an incessant fire of musketry, but with little
effect. The battle continued between four and five hours, and the
Americans lost, in killed and wounded, about sixty men.

Night closed upon the scene, and neither party were victors. The two
fleets anchored within a few hundred yards of each other. Arnold held a
council with his officers, and it was determined to retire during the
night to Crown Point, for the superiority of the vessels, and the number
and discipline of the men composing the British force, rendered another
engagement extremely hazardous. Anticipating such a movement on the part
of the Americans, the British commander anchored his vessels in a line
extending across from the island to the main land. A chilly north wind
had been blowing all the afternoon, and about sunset dark clouds
overcast the sky. It was at the time of new moon, and, therefore, the
night was very dark, and favored the design of Arnold. About ten o'clock
he weighed anchor, and with the stiff north wind sailed with his whole
flotilla, unobserved, through the enemy's lines. Arnold, with his
crippled galley, brought up the rear. It was a bold movement. At
daybreak the English watch on deck looked with straining eyes for their
expected prey, but the Americans were then at Schuyler's Island, ten
miles south, busily engaged in stopping leaks and repairing sails. The
British weighed anchor and gave chase. Toward evening the wind changed
to the south, and greatly retarded the progress of both fleets during
the night. Early on the morning of the 13th the enemy's October, 1776
vessels were observed under full sail, and rapidly gaining upon the
Americans. The _Congress_ galley (Arnold's "flag-ship") and the
Washington, with four gondolas, were behind, and in a short time the
British vessels _Carl et on_, _Inflexible_, and _Maria_ were alongside,
pouring a destructive fire upon them. The Washington soon struck, and
General Waterbury the commander, and his men, were made prisoners. **
The whole force of the

* Sparks's Life of Arnold.

** Among the prisoners was Joseph Bettys, afterward the notorious outlaw
and bitter Tory, better known as "Joe Bettys." He was a native of
Saratoga county, and joined the Whigs on the breaking out of the
Revolution. While a captive in Canada, after the battle on Lake
Champlain, he was induced to join the royal standard, and was made an
ensign. He became notorious as a spy, and, having been caught by the
Americans, he was at one time conducted to the gallows. At the instance
of his aged parents, Washington granted him a reprieve on condition of
his thoroughly reforming. But he immediately joined the enemy again, and
for a long time his cold-blooded murders, his plunder and incendiarism
made him the terror of the whole region in the neighborhood of Albany.
At last he was captured (1782), and was executed as a spy and traitor,
at Albany.

Bravery of Arnold on the Congress Galley.--Desperate Resistance. --
Retreat to Crown Point--Effect of the Battle.

165attack now fell upon the _Congress_, but Arnold maintained his ground
with unflinching resolution for four hours. The galley was at length
reduced almost to a wreck, and surrounded by seven sail of the enemy.
Longer resistance was vain, and the intrepid Arnold ran the galley and
four gondolas into a small creek on the east side of the lake, about ten
miles below Crown Point, and not far from Panton. He ordered the marines
to set fire to them as soon as they were grounded, leap into the water
and wade ashore with their muskets, and form in such a manner upon the
beach as to guard the burning vessels from the approach of the enemy.
Arnold remained in his galley till driven off by the fire, and was the
last man that reached the shore. He kept the flags flying, and remained
upon the spot until his little flotilla was consumed, and then, with the
small remnant of his brave soldiers, marched off through the woods
toward Chimney Point, and reached Crown Point in safety. The rapidity of
his march saved him from an Indian ambush that waylaid his path an hour
after he passed by. Two schooners, two galleys, one sloop, and one
gondola, the remnant of his fleet, were at Crown Point, and General
Waterbury and most of his men arrived there on parole the next day, when
all embarked and sailed to Ticonderoga. General October 14, 1776
Carleton took possession of Crown Point, and for a few days threatened
Ticonderoga, but the season was so far advanced that he prudently
withdrew, and sailed down the lake to go into winter-quarters in Canada.
* The whole American loss in the two actions was between eighty and
ninety, and that of the enemy about forty.

Although the republicans were defeated, and the expedition was
disastrous in every particular, yet such were the skill, bravery, and
obstinate resistance of Arnold and his men against a vastly superior
force, the event was hailed as ominous of great achievements on the part
of the patriots when such fearful odds should not exist. Arnold's
popularity, so justly gained at Quebec, was greatly increased, and the
country rang with his praises. Sparks justly observes, respecting
Arnold's conduct in the engagement on the 13th, that "there are few
instances on record of more deliberate courage and gallantry than were
displayed by him from the beginning to the end of this action."

We arrived at Plattsburgh at about two o'clock in the afternoon. The day
was excessively warm, and I felt more like lounging than rambling. In
fact, the spot has no Revolutionary history worth mentioning, for its
existence as a lonely settlement in the wilderness is only coeval with
that of our independence. Count Vredenburgh, a German nobleman, who
married a lady of the household of the queen of George II. of England,
obtained a grant for thirty thousand acres of land on Cumberland Bay,
and just before the Revolution he settled there. When the war broke out
he sent his family to Montreal, and soon afterward his splendid mansion,
which stood where the Plattsburgh Hotel now is, and his mills, three
miles distant, were burned. He had remained to look after his property,
and it is supposed that he was murdered for his riches, and his house
plundered and destroyed. In 1783 some Canadian and Nova Scotia refugees,
under Lieutenant (afterward Major-general) Mooers ** who were stationed
on the Hudson near Newburgh, left Fishkill Landing in a boat, and,
proceeding by the way of Lakes George and Champlain, landed and
commenced the first permanent settlement in that neighborhood, within
seven or eight miles of the present village of Plattsburgh. Judge
Zephaniah Platt and others formed a company, after the war, to purchase
military land-warrants, and they located their lands on Cumberland Bay,
and organized the town of Plattsburgh in 1785. Such is its only
connection with the history

* It is related that while Carleton was at Ticonderoga, Arnold ventured
in the neighborhood in a small boat. He was seen and chased by young
Pellew (afterward Lord Exmouth), and so rapidly did his pursuers gain
upon him, that he ran his boat ashore and leaped on land, leaving his
stock and buckle behind him. It is said that the stock and buckle are
still in possession of the Pellew family.--See Ostler's Life of Admiral
Viscount Exmouth.

** Benjamin Mooers served as a lieutenant and adjutant in the
Revolution. He commanded the militia in the battle of Plattsburgh in
1814. For thirty years he was county treasurer, and often represented
his county in the Assembly and Senate of New York. He died in February,
1838

Battle of Plattsburgh.--Military Remains.--Incidents of the Naval
Battle.--Relic of Washington.

166of our Revolution. It is a conspicuous point, however, in the history
of our war with Great Britain commenced in 1812, for it is memorable as
the place where one of the severest engagements of that contest took
place, on the 11th of September, 1814, between the combined naval and
military forces of the Americans and British. General Macomb commanded
the land, and Commodore M'Donough the naval forces of the former, and
General Prévost and Commodore Downie * those of the latter. The
engagements on the land and water were simultaneous, and for some time
the issue was doubtful. The Americans, however, were successful. When
the flag of the British commodore's ship was struck, the enemy on land,
disheartened and confused, retreated across the Saranac, and the carnage
ceased. The loss of the Americans was about one hundred and fifty; that
of the enemy, in killed, wounded, prisoners, and deserters, more than
one thousand.

I passed a considerable portion of the afternoon with General St. John
B. L. Skinner, who was a volunteer under Macomb in the battle. He was a
member of a company of young men and boys of the village, who, after the
military had gone out on the Chazy road, organized and offered their
services to the commander-in-chief. They were accepted, and the brave
youths were immediately armed with rifles and ordered to the
headquarters of General Mooers. Only three of the company were over
eighteen years old, and not one of them was killed, though for a long
time they were exposed to a hot fire while occupying a mill upon the
Saranac and keeping the enemy at bay. General Skinner's beautiful
mansion and gardens are upon the lake shore, and from an upper piazza we
had a fine view of the whole scene of the naval engagement, from
Cumberland Head on the north to the whole region in the neighborhood of
Albany. At last he was captured (1782), and was executed as a spy and
traitor, at Albany.

the whole region in the neighborhood of Albany. At last he was captured
(1782), and was executed as a spy and traitor, at Albany.

Valcour's Island on the south, including in the far distance eastward
the blue lines of the northern range of the Green Mountains. The bay in
which the battle occurred is magnificent, fringed with deep forests and
waving grain-fields. A substantial stone break-water defends the harbor
from the rude waves which an easterly wind rolls in, and the village is
very pleasantly situated upon a gravelly plain on each side of the
Saranac River.

A short distance from the village of Plattsburgh are the remains of the
cantonments and breast-works occupied by Macomb and his forces; and to
the kind courtesy of General Skinner, who accompanied me to these relics
of the war, I am indebted for many interesting details in relation to
that memorable battle. ** But as these have no necessary connection with
our subject, on account of their remoteness from the time of the
Revolution, I will bid adieu to Plattsburgh, for the evening is far
gone, the lights of the "Burlington" are sparkling upon the waters near
Valcour's Island, and the coachman at the hotel front is hurrying us
with his loud "All aboard!"

It was nearly midnight when we passed the light on Cumberland Head, ***
and we reached

* Commodore Downie was slain in the battle and buried at Plattsburgh.
His sister-in-law, Mary Downie, erected a plain monument to his memory
over his remains.

** General S. mentioned one or two circumstances connected with the
naval engagement worth recording. He says that, when the fleet of the
enemy rounded Cumberland Head, M'Donough assembled his men on board his
ship (Saratoga) on the quarter-deck. He then knelt, and, in humble,
fervent supplication, commended himself, his men, and his cause to the
Lord of Hosts. When he arose, the serenity of faith was upon his
countenance, and seemed to shed its influence over his men. A curious
incident occurred on his ship during the engagement. The hen-coop was
shot away, and a cock; released from prison, flew into the rigging, and,
flapping his wings, crowed out a lusty defiance to the enemy's guns.

** There he remained, flapping his wings and crowing, until the
engagement ceased. The seamen regarded the event as encouraging, and
fought like tigers while the cock cheered them on. A notice of a relic
of Washington, in the possession of General S., may not be inappropriate
here. It is a pouch and puff-ball, for hair-powder, which belonged to
the chief several years. It is made of buckskin, and is about twelve
inches long. The puff is made of cotton yarn. Mr. Gray, who was a number
of years sheriff of Clinton county, readily recognized it as the one
used by himself in powdering Washington's hair, when he was a boy and
attached to the general in the capacity of body servant. When La Fayette
was at Burlington, in 1824, Mr. Gray went up to see him, and the veteran
remembered him as the "boy Gray" in Washington's military family.

*** On this point Is situated the farm presented to Commodore M'Donough
by the Legislature of Vermont. The point is connected with Grand Island,
or North Hero (the largest island in the lake), by a ferry.

Rouse's Point and Military Works.--The Territorial Line.--Isle Aux
Noix.--Historical Associations

167Rouse's Point, the last landing-place on the lake within "the
States," between one and two in the morning, where we remained until
daylight, for the channel here, down the outlet of the lake, is so
narrow and sinuous that the navigation is difficult in the night. On a
low point a little northward of the landing the United States government
commenced building a fort in 1815, and, after expending about two
hundred thousand dollars, it was discovered that the ground was British
soil. The work was abandoned, and so remained until the conclusion of
the treaty formed by Daniel Webster and Lord Ashburton in 1842, when the
territorial line was run a little north of the fort. It is now in course
of completion.

The morning on which we left Rouse's Point was clear and calm. A slight
August 8, 1848 mist lay upon the water, and over the flat shores of the
Richelieu or Sorel River, which we had entered, a thin vapor, like a
gauze veil, was spread out. We watched with interest for the line of
separation between the territories. It was about four o'clock in the
morning when we crossed it, twenty-three miles south of St. John's, and
so became "foreigners." A broad stripe like a meadow-swathe, running
east and west, cut in the dwarf forest upon either side, denotes the
landmark of dominion, and by a single revolution of the paddle-wheel we
passed from the waters of our republic to those of the British realm. In
less than an hour we were at the landing-place on _Isle Aux Noix_, a
small low island in the Sorel, strongly fortified by the British as one
of their most important outposts in the direction of the United States.
This island is all clustered with historic associations. While the fussy
custom-house officer and his attendants are boarding our boat, let us
look into the mirror of retrospection.

When the French settlement at Chimney Point was broken up on the
approach of General Amherst in 1799.

They gave it a name significant of this fact. Commanding, as it does,
completely the outlet of Lake Champlain, the importance of its position,
in a military view, was at once appreciated. But the French held
possession only a few months, for in the spring of 1760 they were driven
from it by Amherst in his march toward Montreal. After the treaty of
Paris in 1763, the necessity for a garrison upon _Isle Aux Noix_ no
longer existed, and the fortifications were allowed to crumble into
ruins.

In the autumn of 1775 the island was occupied by the Americans, under
General Schuyler. With a considerable force, destined to invade Canada,
he sailed down the lake and appeared before St. John's. Informed that
the garrison there was too strong for September 6, 1775 him, he returned
to _Isle Aux Noix_ and fortified it. From this post he sent out a
declaration among the Canadians, by Colonel Allen and Major Brown,
assuring them that the Americans intended to act only against the
British forts, and not to interfere with the people or their religion. *

* The sketch was made from the pilot's room of the steam-boat, about
half a mile above the island, looking east-northeast. The landing is a
little beyond the trees on the right, where sentinels are stationed. The
island is small, and wholly occupied by the military works. A broad fen
extends some distance from the northern side, and the wild ducks that
gather there afford fine amusement for sportsmen during the hunting
season.

St.John's St.--Custom-house Officer.--Suspicious of an Israelite.--
Apparently treasonable Acts of leading Vermonters.

168Early in October the Americans, under General Montgomery (Schuyler
being ill), left the island and proceeded to St. John's, whence they
marched victoriously to Quebec. From that time until the close of the
Revolution no permanent garrison was established there, but the island
was the halting-place for the troops of both parties when passing up and
down the lake. It was the principal scene of the negotiations between
some of the leading men of Vermont and British officers, which were so
adroitly managed by the former as to keep an English army of ten
thousand men quite inactive on our northern frontier for about three
years. * The British strongly fortified it in 1813, and it has been
constantly garrisoned since.

We arrived at St. John's, on the Richelieu or Sorel River, between six
and seven o'clock in the morning, where our luggage was overhauled by
the custom-house officer, who was received on board at _Isle Aux Noix_.
The operation was neither long nor vexatious, and seemed to be rather a
matter of legal form than induced by a desire or expectation of
detecting contraband articles. In fact, the polite government
functionary seemed to have great faith in mere assertions, and to rely
more upon physiognomy than personal inspection of the luggage for
assurance that her majesty's revenue laws were inviolate. He looked
every trunk-owner full in the face when he queried about the nature of
his baggage, and only two persons were obliged to produce their keys for
his satisfaction. Our trunk was of prodigious size and weight, and made
him very properly suspicious of the truth of my allegations that its
contents were only articles for personal use. A descendant of Abraham at
my elbow, with nothing but a rotund bandana handkerchief, appeared to be
my scape-goat on the occasion, for while the officer was making him
untie its hard knots, he ordered my luggage to pass. I was told that the
word of a poor Jew is never believed by the uncircumcised Gentile who
"sits at the receipt of customs but in this instance his incredulity was
rebuked, for the Israelite's bundle contained nothing but a tolerably
clean shirt, a cravat, and a small Hebrew Bible. At eight

* In 1779-80 the partial dismemberment of Vermont and its connection
with New York and New Hampshire produced great bitterness of feeling,
and the Legislature of the former demanded of Congress the entire
separation of that state from the other states, and its admission into
the confederacy upon a basis of perfect equality. The disputes ran high,
and the British entertained hopes that Vermont would be so far alienated
from the rebel cause, by the injustice of Congress, as to be induced to
return to its allegiance to the British crown. Accordingly, in the
spring of 1780, Colonel Beverly Robinson wrote to Ethan Allen from New
York, making overtures to that effect. The letter was not answered, and
in February, 1781, he wrote another, inclosing a copy of the first.
These letters were shown to Governor Chittenden and a few others, and
they concluded to make use of the circumstances for the benefit of
Vermont. Allen sent both letters to Congress, and at the same time wrote
to that body, urging the justice of the demand of his state. He closed
his letter by saying, "I am as resolutely determined to defend the
independence of Vermont as Congress is that of the United States; and,
rather than fail, I will retire with the hardy Green Mountain Boys into
the desolate caverns of the mountains and wage war with human nature at
large." * In the mean while, some British scouting parties had captured
some Vermonters, and Governor Chittenden sent Ira Allen and others to
negotiate with Colonel Dundas for an exchange of prisoners. They met
upon _Isle Aux Noix_, and there Dundas, under the direction of General
Haldimand, made verbal overtures similar to the written ones of Robinson
to Ethan Allen. The proposals of the British officers were received by
Allen with apparent favor. Haldimand and Dundas were delighted with
their skill in diplomacy, and readily acceded to the proposition of
Allen not to allow hostilities on the Vermont frontier until after the
next session of its Legislature. The British force, consisting of about
ten thousand men, was thus kept inactive. These negotiations with the
enemy excited the suspicion of the Whigs and the fears of Congress; yet
with such consummate skill did Allen manage the affair, that when he
reported the result of his mission to the Legislature of Vermont, where
British emissaries as well as ardent Whigs were in waiting, he satisfied
both parties. Soon afterward a letter from Lord George Germain to Sir
Henry Clinton was intercepted and sent to Congress. It contained so much
evidence of the treasonable designs of the leading men in Ver mont, that
Congress felt more disposed to accede to the demands of that state, and
thus retain her in the Union. Peace soon afterward ensued, and Vermont
was one of the United States included in the treaty. How far the designs
of the Allens, of Chittenden, the Fays, and others, were really
treasonable, or were measures of policy to bring Congress to terms, and
prevent hostilities upon their weak frontier, can not be certainly
determined. The probabilities are in favor of the _ruse_ rather than the
_treason_. At any rate, they should have the benefit of a doubt, and a
verdict of acquittal of all wrong intentions.

** A convention, held at Westminster on the 15th of January, 1777,
declared "That the district and territory comprehending and usually
known by the name and description of the New Hampshire Grants of right
ought to be and is declared forever hereafter to be a free and
independent jurisdiction or state, to be forever hereafter called,
known, and distinguished by the name of New Connecticut, alias
Vermont."--See Slade's State Papers, p. 70.

Military Remains at St. John's.--Present Works.--Athenaise.-- Approach
of the Americans in 1775.

169o'clock my companion and our luggage proceeded by rail-road by way of
La Prairie to Montreal, while I prepared to journey to the same city in
a light wagon by way of Chambly and Longueuil.

St. John's is pleasantly situated upon the western side of the Sorel, at
the termination of steam-boat navigation on Lake Champlain, and near the
head of Chambly Rapids. It has always been a place of considerable
importance as a frontier town since the Revolution, although its growth
has been slow, the population now amounting to not quite four thousand.
The country on both sides of the river here is perfectly flat, and there
is no place whence the town may be seen to advantage. A little south of
the village, and directly upon the shore, is a strong military
establishment, garrisoned, when we visited it, by three companies of
Highland infantry. Accompanied by an intelligent young gentleman of the
village as guide, I visited all the points of historic interest in the
vicinity. We crossed the deep, sluggish river in a light zinc shallop,
and from the middle of the stream we obtained a fine view of the long
bridge ** which connects St. John's with St. Athenaise on the opposite
shore, where the steep roof and lofty glittering spire of the French
church towered above the trees.3 After visiting the remains of
Montgomery's block-house, we recrossed the river and rambled among the
high mounds which compose the ruins of old Fort St. John's. They occupy
a broad area in the open fields behind the present military works. The
embankments, covered with a rich green sward, averaged about twelve feet
in height, and the whole were surrounded by a ditch with considerable
water in it. We lingered half an hour to view a drill of the garrison,
and then returned to the village to prepare for a pleasant ride to
Chambly, twelve miles distant.

Military works were thrown up at St. John's by the French, under
Montcalm, in 1758, and these were enlarged and strengthened by Governor
Carleton at the beginning of our Revolution. Here, as we have seen, the
first organized American flotilla, under Arnold, made a regular assault
upon British vessels and fortifications, and aroused Sir Guy Carleton to
a sense of the imminent danger of Montreal and Quebec. Here too was the
scene of the first regular siege of a British fort by the rebellious
colonists. In September, September 6 1775, the Americans, as we have
already noticed, sailed down the Richelieu and appeared before St.
John's. They were fired upon by the English garrison when about two
miles distant, but without effect. They landed within about a mile and a
half of the fort, and, while marching slowly toward the outworks, a
small party of Indians attacked them and produced some confusion. In the
evening General Schuyler was informed, by a man who appeared to be
friendly and intelligent, that, with the exception of only fifty men
retained in Montreal by General Carleton, the whole regular British
force in Canada was in the garrison at St. John's; that this and the
fort at Chambly were strongly fortified and well supplied; that one
hundred Indians were in the fort at St. John's, and that another large
body, under Colonel John Johnson, was hovering near; that a sixteen gun
vessel was

* This view is taken from the eastern side of the river, near the
remains of a block-house erected by Montgomery when he besieged the fort
in 1775. On the right is seen the fort, which incloses the magazine, in
the center is the building occupied by the officers, on either side of
which are the barracks of the soldiers. The large building on the left
is the hospital, and the smaller one still further left is the dead-
house. The river here is about a quarter of a mile wide. The present
military works are upon the site of those of the Revolution.

** It was built by the Honorable Robert Jones, the proprietor, and is
called Jones's Bridge.

*** This spacious church was not finished. The old one, a small wooden
structure, was undisturbed within the new one, and was used for worship
until the completion of the exterior of the present edifice-

Advance of Montgomery against St. John's.--Mutiny in the American Camp.-
-Operations at St. John's.

170about ready to weigh anchor at St. John's; and that not a single
Canadian could be induced to join the insurgent standard. The informer
was doubtless an enemy to the Americans, for his assertions were
afterward proved to be untrue. General Schuyler, however, gave credence
to them, and returned with his troops to _Isle Aux Noix_, where illness
obliged him to leave the army in charge of Montgomery, and retire to the
healthier post of Ticonderoga. Thence he soon went to Albany, and, his
health being partially restored, he was active in forwarding re-
enforcements to _Isle Aux Noix_.

Montgomery, with more impetuosity and less caution than Schuyler,
determined to push forward at once, for the season was near when
military operations there would be difficult. About this time a small
train of artillery and a re-enforcement arrived, and he made vigorous
preparations to invade Canada. Before leaving the island, a chevaux-de-
frise was thrown across the channel to intercept the progress of
Carleton's vessels up the lake. On the September, 1775 seventeenth his
whole force was landed on the west side of the Richelieu. On the
eighteenth he led a corps of five hundred men, in person, to the north
side of the fort, where the village now is. There he met a detachment
from the garrison, which had just repulsed and pursued a small party of
Americans under Major Brown, and a short skirmish ensued. Two field
pieces and the whole detachment would doubtless have been trophies for
the Americans had they been true to themselves; but here that
insubordination which gave Montgomery so much trouble was strongly
manifested, and caution, secrecy, and concert of action were out of the
question.1 Montgomery pushed on a little further north-west, and, at the
junction of the roads running respectively to Montreal and Chambly,
formed an entrenched camp of three hundred men to cut off supplies for
the enemy from the interior, and then hastened back to his camp to bring
up his artillery to bear upon the walls of the fort. The supplies for a
siege were very meager. The artillery was too light, the mortars were
defective, the ammunition scarce, and the artillerists unpracticed in
their duties. The ground was wet and swampy, and in many places closely
studded with trees. In a day or two disease began to appear among the
troops, and, in consequence of their privations, disaffection was
working mischief in the army. To escape these unfavorable circumstances,
Montgomery proposed to move to the northwest side of the fort, where the
ground was firm and water wholesome, and commence preparations for an
assault. But the troops, unused to military restraint, and judging for
themselves that an attack would be unsuccessful, refused to second the
plan of their leader. Unable to punish them or convince them of their
error, Montgomery yielded to the pressure of circumstances, and so far
gratified the mutinous regiments as to call a council of war. It
resulted, as was expected, in a decision against his plan. Disorder
continually reigned in the American camp. Irregular firing occurred
almost daily, and the enemy threw some bombs, but it was a waste of
ammunition by both parties. At length the proposed plan of Montgomery
was adopted, and the camp was moved October 7, 1775 to the higher ground
northwest of the fort, where breast-works were thrown up.

While the main army was thus circumvallating St. John's, but, for want
of ammunition and heavy guns, unable to breach the walls, small
detachments of Americans, who were joined by many friendly Canadians,
were active in the vicinity. One, under Ethan Allen, attempted the
capture of Montreal. Of this foolish expedition I shall hereafter write.

But another, and a successful one, was undertaken, which hastened the
termination of the siege of St. John's. Carleton, supposing that the
fort at Chambly, twelve miles northward, could not be reached by the
Americans unless the one at St. John's was captured, had neglected to
arm it, and kept but a feeble garrison there. Montgomery was informed of
this by Canadian scouts, and immediately sent Colonel Bedell of New
Hampshire, Major Brown of Massachusetts, and Major Livingston of New
York, with detachments, to capture the fort. The method of attack was
planned by Canadians familiar with the place. Artillery was placed upon
bateaux, and during a dark night was conveyed past the fort at St.
John's to the head of Chambly Rapids, where it was mounted on carriages
and taken to the

* Montgomery's dispatch to General Schuyler.

Attack upon and Surrender of Fort Chambly.--Repulse of Carleton at
Longueuil.--Surrender of St. John's.--The Spoils

171point of attack. The garrison made but a feeble resistance, and soon
surrendered. This was a most important event, for it furnished
Montgomery with means to carry on the siege of St. John's vigorously. **

The large quantity of ammunition that was captured was sent immediately
to the besiegers, who, by vigorous exertions, erected a strong battery
within wo hundred and fifty yards of the fort. A strong block-house was
also erected before it, in the opposite side of the river. The former
was mounted with four guns and October 30. six mortars, and the latter
had one gun and two mortars.

While these preparations were in progress, Carleton, informed of the
capture cf Fort Chambly, left Montreal with a re-enforcement for the
garrison at St. John's. He embarked upon the St. Lawrence in bateaux and
flat-boats, and attempted to land at Longueuil, a mile and a half below
the city. Colonel Seth Warner, with three hundred Green Mountain Boys,
was on the alert in the neighborhood, and lay in covert near the spot
where Carleton was about to land. He allowed the boats to get very near
the shore, when he opened a terrible storm of grape-shot upon them from
a four pound cannon, which drove them across the river precipitately and
in great confusion. The tidings of this event reached Montgomery
November 1, 1775 toward evening, and Colonel Warner soon afterward came
in with several prisoners captured from one of Carleton's boats that
reached the shore. The eommander-in-chief immediately sent a flag and
letter to Major Preston, the commandant of the garrison, by one of
Warner's prisoners, informing him of the defeat of Carleton, and
demanding a surrender of the fortress to prevent further effusion of
blood. Hostilities ceased for the night, and in the morning Preston
asked for a delay of four days before he should make proposals to
surrender. The request "was denied and the demand renewed." There was no
alternative, and the garrison surrendered prisoners of war. The siege
had continued six weeks, and the bravery and perseverance of the British
troops were such, that Montgomery granted them honorable terms. They
marched out of the fort with the honors of war, and the troops

* This is a view of the south and west sides of the fort, looking toward
the river. It stands directly upon the Richelieu, at the foot of the
Chambly Rapids, and at the head of the navigation of the river up from
the St. Lawrence. It is strongly built of stone, and, as seen in the
picture, is in a state of excellent preservation.

** The spoils taken at Chambly were 6 tons of powder; 80 barrels of
flour; a large quantity of rice, butter, and peas; 134 barrels of pork;
300 swivel shot; 1 box of musket shot; 6364 musket cartridges; 150 stand
of French arms; 3 royal mortars; 61 shells; 500 hand grenades; 83 royal
fusilleer's muskets with accouterments; and rigging for 3 vessels. The
prisoners consisted of 1 major, 2 captains, 3 lieutenants, captain of a
schooner, a commissary and surgeon, and 83 privates. The colors of the
seventh regiment of British regulars were there, and were captured.
These were sent to the Continental Congress, and were the first trophies
of the kind which that body received. There were a great number of women
and children in the fort, and these were allowed to accompany the
prisoners, who were sent with their baggage to Connecticut.

Surrender of St. John's.--Insubordination.--Retreat of the Americans out
of Canada.

November 3 grounded 172their arms on the plain near by. The officers
were allowed to keep their side-arms, and their fire-arms were reserved
for them. Canadian gentlemen and others at St. John's were considered a
part of the garrison. The whole number of troops amounted to about five
hundred regulars and one hundred Canadian volunteers.1 The Continental
troops took possession of the fort, and Montgomery proposed to push on
to Montreal.

Insubordination again raised its hydra-head in the American camp. The
cold season was near at hand, and the raw troops, unused to privations
of the field, yearned for home, and refused, at first, to be led further
away. But the kind temper, patriotic zeal, and winning eloquence of
Montgomery, and a promise on his part that, Montreal in his possession,
no further service would be exacted from them, won them to obedience,
and all but a small garrison for the fort pressed onward toward the
city. **

The fort at St. John's remained in possession of the Americans until the
latter part of May, 1776, when they were completely driven out of
Canada. Arnold and Sullivan, with their detachments, were the last to
leave that province. The former remained in Montreal until the last
moment of safety, and then pressed on to St. John's, with the enemy
close at his heels. Two days before, he had ordered the encampment
closed there, and a vessel upon the stocks to be taken apart and sent to
Ticonderoga. Sullivan, who was stationed at the mouth of the Sorel, also
retreated to St. John's. The commanders wished to defend the fort
against the pursuing enemy, but the troops absolutely refused to serve
longer, and they all embarked, and sailed up the lake to _Isle Aux
Noix_. When every loaded boat had left the shore, Arnold and Wilkinson,
his aid, rode back two miles and discovered the enemy in rapid march
under Burgoyne. They reconnoitered them a few moments, and then galloped
back,

* The spoils of victory were 17 brass ordnance, from two to twenty-four
pounders; 2 eight-inch howitzers; 7 mortars; 22 iron ordnance, from
three to nine pounders; a considerable quantity of shot and small
shells; 800 stand of arms, and a small quantity of naval stores. The
ammunition and provisions were inconsiderable, for the stock of each was
nearly exhausted.

** Armstrong's Life of Montgomery,

Rendezvous of Burgoyne's Army at St. John's.--Departure for Chambly.--
French Canadian Houses, Farms, and People.

173stripped and shot their horses, set fire to the works at St. John's,
pushed off from shore in a small boat, and overtook the flotilla before
they reached _Isle Aux Noix_. Having no vessels with which to pursue the
Americans, Burgoyne rested at St. John's. In the course of the autumn he
returned to England.

Early in the summer of 1777 St. John's was the theater of active
preparations, on the part of the British, for the memorable campaign
which terminated in the capture of Burgoyne and his whole army at
Saratoga. This campaign was planned chiefly by Lord George Germain, the
Secretary of War, and Burgoyne, with the approval of the king and the
full sanction of the Council. Burgoyne was made commander of the
expedition, and arrived at Quebec on the 6th of May. Carleton gave him
his cordial co-operation, and St. John's was the place of general
rendezvous for all the regulars, provincials, and volunteers. On the 1st
of June an army of six thousand men was collected there, and, embarking
in boats, sailed up the lake to Cumberland Head, where it halted to
await the arrival of ammunition and stores. These collected, the whole
armament moved up the lake to the north of the Bouquet, where, as
already narrated, a council was held with the Indian tribes. As the rest
of the story of that campaign, so disastrous to British power in
America, has been told in preceding chapters, we will return to St.
John's, and pass on to Chambly.

I left St. John's about eleven o'clock in a light wagon, accompanied by
the young man who acted as guide among the old military remains. There
is but little in the appearance of St. John's to distinguish it from a
large village in the States, but the moment we emerged into the country
I felt that I was in a strange land. The road traverses the line of the
Chambly Canal, which runs parallel with the Richelieu or Sorel River.
The farm-houses are thickly planted by the roadside; so thickly that all
the way from St. John's to Chambly and Longueuil we seemed to be in a
village suburb. The farms are diminutive compared with ours, averaging
from fifteen to forty acres each, and hence the great number of
dwellings and out-houses. They are generally small, and built of hewn
logs or stone. Most of the dwellings and out-houses are whitewashed with
lime, even the roofs, which gives them a very neat appearance, and forms
a beautiful contrast in the landscape to the green foliage which
embowers them. I was told that each house contains a _consecrated
broom_. When a new dwelling is erected, a broom is _tabooed_ by the
priest and hung up in the dwelling by the owner, where it remains
untouched, a sort of Lares or household god.

Many of them have a cross erected near, as a talisman to guard the
dwelling from evil. They are generally dedicated to St. Peter, the chief
patron saint of the rural French Canadians. A box, with a glass door,
inclosing an image of the saint, a crucifix, or some other significant
object, is placed upon or within the body of the cross, and the whole is
usually surmounted by a cock. A singular choice for a crest, for it is a
fowl identified with St. Peter's weakness and shame.

It was in the time of hay harvest, and men, women, and children were
abroad gathering the crops. As among the peasantry of Europe and the
blacks of our Southern States, the women labor regularly in the fields.
They are tidily habited in thin stuff of cotton or worsted, generally
dyed blue, and all of domestic manufacture. Their costume is graceful,
and, sitting loosely, gives full play to the muscles, and contributes to
the high health which every where abounds in the rural districts of this
region. Their broad-rimmed straw hats, like the Mexican sombrero, afford
ample protection against the hot sun. These also are home-made, and the
manufacture of them for our markets, during the long Canadian winters.
affords quite a cash revenue to most of the families. These simple
people are generally

The Richelieu and its Rapids.--Chambly.--The Fort.--Beloeil Mountain.--
Large Cross

174uneducated, and superstition is a strong feature in their religious
character. They art honest, kind-hearted, and industrious, have few
wants, live frugally, and, in their way, seem to enjoy a large share of
earthly happiness.

The Richelieu has either a swift current or noisy rapids nearly the
whole distance between St. John's and Chambly. The stream is broad, and
in many places deep, for it is the outlet for the whole volume of the
waters of Lake Champlain into the St. Lawrence. In some places the
foaming rapids produce a picturesque effect to the eye and ear, and vary
the pleasure of the otherwise rather monotonous journey between the two
villages.

Chambly is an old town, at the foot of the rapids, and bears evidence of
thrift. A Frenchman bearing that name built a small wood fort there,
which was afterward replaced by the solid stone structure pictured on
page 171. The latter retained the name of the original fort, as also
does the village. It is a military station at present, and, being at the
head of the navigation of the Richelieu or Sorel from the St. Lawrence,
has a commanding position

The river here, at the foot of the falls, expands into a circular basin
about a mile and a hall in diameter. The old fort is dismantled and
ungarrisoned, and is now used only for a store-house. Near it are seen
the remains of the battery erected by Bedell, while pre paring to storm
the fort in 1775. I tarried at Chambly long enough only to reconnoiter
ant sketch the old fortress and the features of the Beloeil, the only
mountain range in view, ant then went to an inn to dine, a mile on the
road toward Longueuil. There I learned that a French Canadian, nearly
one hundred years old, was living near. Although the sun was declining,
and we had seventeen miles' travel before us, I determined to visit the
old man.

* This sketeh is taken from the southeast angle of old Fort Chambly,
showing the rapids in the fore ground. The mountain is twenty miles
distant, near the Sorel. On the highest point of the range the Bishop of
Nancy, a French prelate, ereeted a huge cross in 1843, the pedestal of
which was sufficiently large to form a chapel capable of containing
fifty persons. In November, 1847, during a severe thunder gust, the
lightning and wind completely demolished the cross, but spared the
pedestal, and that, being white, may be seen at a great distance.

Francois Yest.--His Age and Reminiscences.--Temperance Pledge.-- Ride to
Longueuil.--A Caleche.

175and sound in his memory. We met him upon the road, coming toward the
inn. He had just left his rake in the field, and had on a leather apron
and broad-rimmed hat. He was a small, firmly-built man, apparently
sixty-five years old. Conversation with him was difficult, for his
dialect, professedly French, was far worse than Gascon. Still we managed
to understand each other, and I gleaned from him, during our brief
interview, the facts that he was born in Quebec in 1752; remembered the
storming of the city by the English under Wolfe; removed to Chambly in
1770; was a spectator of the capture of the fort by a detachment from
Montgomery's army in 1775; assisted in furnishing stores for Burgoyne's
army at St John's in 1777; and has lived upon and cultivated the same
small farm of thirty acres from that time until the present. He was
ninety-six years old, and appeared to have stamina sufficient for twenty
years more of active life.

He seemed to be a simple-hearted creature, ignorant of the world beyond
the Richelieu and the adjacent village, and could not comprehend my
movements while sketching his honest countenance. He was delighted,
however, when he saw the outlines of an old man's face, and knew them to
be his own; and when I presented him with a silver coin, he laughed like
a pleased child. But when the young man who accompanied me, with
intended generosity, offered him a glass of brandy, his eyes sparkled
with indignation, and in his bad French he uttered an emphatic refusal.
He had signed the temperance pledge a year before, and he felt insulted
by the seeming attempt to win him from his allegiance. Glorious old
convert, and firm old preacher of principle in the very den of the
fierce lion, for decanters were at his elbow, and a friendly hand
proffered the contents to his lips! A vow of total abstinence from
intoxicating drinks at the age of ninety-five! For that I pressed the
hard hand of Francois Yest with a firmer grasp when I bade him adieu.

We had a pleasant ride from Chambly to Longueuil (seventeen miles) over
a plank road. Unlike similar roads in New York, the planks were laid
diagonally. They had been in use twelve years, and were but little
decayed. The country all the way to the St. Lawrence is flat. The soil,
though rather wet, is productive, and almost every rood of it was under
cultivation. Here and there were a few groves, but no forests; and a
solitary huge bowlder by the road-side, shivered by lightning, was the
only rock that I saw between the Richelieu and the St. Lawrence.

When within three miles of Longueuil, the glittering domes and spires of
Montreal appeared in the distance like gems set in the dark mountain
that formed a background beyond. It was five o'clock when we reached
Longueuil, a mile and a half below Montreal, on the opposite side of the
river. There I parted from the young gentleman whose light wagon had
conveyed me from St. John's, and proceeded to Montreal on the steam
ferry-boat that connects it with Longueuil. Neither cab nor omnibus was
in waiting, and I was obliged to ride a mile in a rickety calèche, *
drawn

* The caleche is a two-wheeled vehicle, much used in Lower Canada. It is
similar in form to our gig, but, instead of having but one seat, there
is one for the driver upon the dash-board. Four can ride comfortably in
one of them. Some are made elegantly, with a folding cover to ward off
the sun or rain, and they are a pleasant vehicle to ride in. I found
them in universal use in the narrow streets of Quebec. Such was the
vehicle in use in Canada at the time of our Revolution, and mentioned by
the Baroness Reidese, as the kind in which she and her children traveled
with the British army.

Ride in a Caleche.--Safe Arrival of my Companion.--An Evening Stroll.--
Aurora Borealis

176by a representative of Rosinante. The vehicle, horse, driver, and
ride altogether made a funny affair. The driver was a little Frenchman,
with a jocky-coat and breeches, and a red tasseled skull-cap.

All the way he belabored his beast with blows and curses, but the
animal's hide and ears seemed impervious. I could think of nothing but a
parody on a couplet of the old song, "If I had a donkey," &c. As we
wheeled up a narrow court from St. Paul's Street to the Exchange Hotel,
a merry laugh of half a furlong's audibility rang out from a group of
young ladies upon an upper piazza, and that was my first evidence that
my traveling companion, Miss B------had arrived safely, as per
consignment in the morning to the care of the urbane proprietors of that
excellent establishment. She had rambled through the city with pleasant
company until thoroughly wearied, so I took an evening stroll alone. The
day had been very warm, but the evening was cool. The stars were
brilliant, yet it was too dark to see much beyond the dim forms of massy
buildings, wrapped in deep shadows. But above, in the far north, a
phenomenon seldom exhibited in summer was gorgeously displayed; more so
than we often see it in lower latitudes in winter, and I stood an hour
in the Place d'Arms, watching the ever-changing beauties of the
brilliant Aurora Borealis. It is a strange sight, and well might the
ignorant and superstitious of other times regard it with fearful wonder.
Lomonosov, a native Russian poet, thus refers to the sublime spectacle:

"What fills with dazzling beams the illumined air?

What wakes the flames that light the firmament?

The lightning's flash; there is no thunder there,

And earth and heaven with fiery sheets are blent;

The winter's night now gleams with brighter, lovelier ray

Than ever yet adorned the golden summer's day.

"Is there some vast, some hidden magazine,

Where the gross darkness flames of fire supplies--

Some phosphorous fabric, which the mountains screen,

Whose clouds of light above those mountains rise,

When the winds rattle loud around the foaming sea,

And lift the waves to heaven in thundering revelry?"

Montreal--A ride to the Mountain--Innervating view--Visit the City
Churches--Parliament house--grey nunnery

177

CHAPTER VIII.

HE pleasure-seeker will find much about Montreal to amuse him; and the
staid traveler, searching for the gold of general knowledge might fill a
large chapter in his journal, in recording what is noteworthy amoung
present things there.

(!!!The remainder of the page is damaged.!!!)

The Grey Nuns at Prayer.--First Settlements at Montreal.-- Cartier.--
Jealousy of the Indians.

178Sisters of Charity connected with it, being devoted to the relief of
poor and infirm old persons, and the nurture and education of orphans. *
The building is spacious, and a large number of both classes are there
made comfortable. Our visit was at mid-day. When the clock struck
twelve, a long procession of the nuns, veiled, marched slowly into the
chapel, singing a Gregorian chant, and knelt within the nave in prayer.

We followed in respectful silence. Each nun had a small crucifix and
string of beads attached; and whatever may have been the case with their
thoughts, their eyes never wandered, notwithstanding strangers were
gazing upon them. They were habited in dark drab dresses, bound with
black velvet and looped up behind; aprons with stripes, and over the
head (on which they wore a cap with a deep border), covering the face
and neck, a thin black veil was thrown, through which the features were
discernible. Some were young and pretty, others old and plain, but the
sacred character of their labor of love invested them all with beauty.
We visited a few other places of note, and, after "lunch," I left my
company and went down to Longueuil, where Carleton was defeated by
Warner in 1775. We are upon historic ground; let us open the old volume
a few moments.

Montreal is built upon an island thirty miles long and twelve wide, and
is upon the site of ancient _Hochelaga_, a noted Indian village which
gave its name to the river in this vicinity. The first white man who
visited the spot was Jaques Quartier or Cartier, a October 3, 1535
French navigator, who discovered the Gulf and River St. Lawrence, and
gave them the name they bear. ** The vicinity, even up the slopes of the
mountain, was tilled and covered with corn-fields.

Cartier was enchanted with the view from the mountain--a view of "thirty
leagues radius"--and, in honor of his king (Francis I.), he called it
Mount Royal. In time the name was modified to Montreal, and in this form
was borne by the white settlement that gathered there in 1640. The spot
was consecrated by the superior of the Jesuits, and a chapel built in
1642.

The Indians, at first friendly, became jealous, and at length hostile.
The town was stockaded and slight bastions were built, but finally a
strong wall of masonry was constructed, fifteen feet high, with
battlements and six gates. The town gradually increased in size and
commercial importance, and at the time of our Revolution was nearly as
populous as Quebec. When, toward the middle of the last century,
hostilities commenced between the English and French colonies, Montreal
was an important place as a frontier town. There Duquesne de Menneville
and Vaudreuil de Cavagnal, French governors of Canada, fitted out their
expeditions against the English on the Ohio and the unfriendly Indians
of New York. Montreal was threatened by the English under Amherst in
1759, but it was not until the autumn Septembers 8, 1760 of 1760 that it
passed out of the possession of the French. Quebec surrendered a year
before, and Vaudreuil retreated to Montreal, with a determination to
make

* This hospital was founded by M. Charron and others, in 1692. In 1748
it passed into the hands of a society of ladies, at the head of whom was
Madame Youville, who, being left a widow at the age of twenty-eight,
determined to devote her life and fortune to the relief of the infirm
poor. In 1755 the plan of the establishment was enlarged, so as to
embrace orphans, the cause of which was singular, as given in Bos-
worth's "Picture of Montreal." One winter day, as Madame Y. was passing
the "Little River," she saw an infant hard frozen in the ice, with a
poniard sticking in its throat, and one of its little hands raised
through the ice as if in the attitude of demanding justice against the
perpetrator of the crime. Madame Y. was dreadfully shocked at the sight,
and, on consultation with her associates, it was resolved to extend
their charity and protection to orphans and foundlings.

** He arrived in the gulf on the festival of St. Lawrence (10th of
August), and, on account of that circumstance, named the waters in honor
of the saint.

*** He built a fort on the Ohio, which was called Fort Duquesne. It is
memorable as the place near which Braddock was defeated in 1755, when
Washington's military talents were first conspicuously developed. The
name of the fort was changed to Pitt, and the present city of Pittsburgh
stands upon its site.

Montreal in 1760.--Captured by the English.--Ethan Allen in Canada.--
Proposed Attack on Montreal.

179 there a bold stand in defense of French dominion in Canada. The
English invested Montreal in September, 1760.

Amherst approached down the St. Lawrence from Oswego, General Murray
advanced up the river from Quebec, and Colonel Haviland took post on the
south side of the St. Lawrence, opposite the city. Vaudreuil perceived
that September 6, 1760 resistance would be vain, and two days afterward
the city was surrendered to the English. With this event French dominion
ceased in Canada. The terms of capitulation were honorable to both
parties. Private property was respected; the revenues of the priesthood
were held sacred to their use; the Roman Catholic religion was
undisturbed; the privileges of all classes were preserved and
guaranteed; and every thing was done to reconcile the people to their
new masters. General Gage, afterward Governor of Massachusetts, was
appointed Governor of Montreal.

Montreal remained in quiet possession of the English until 1775, when
the invading army of the insurgent colonies disturbed its repose, after
the capture of Forts St. John's and Chambly. A month previous to these
events the town was alarmed by the appearance of an American detachment
under Ethan Allen, but the result quieted their fears. When the command
of the Northern army devolved upon Montgomery, he sent Allen, who had
been traversing Canada in the neighborhood of the St. Lawrence, to
retrace his steps and further arouse the people in favor of the
rebellion. Active and brave, Allen gathered a large number to his
standard. A week after he left the American camp at _Isle Aux Noix_ he
was at St. Ours, twelve miles south of the Sorel, with two hundred and
fifty Canadians under arms He wrote to Montgomery that within three days
he would join him in laying siege to St. John's, with at least five
hundred armed Canadians. On his way to join the main army, he marched up
the east side of the St. Lawrence to Longueuil. When between that place
and La Prairie, he fell in with Major Brown, at the head of an advanced
party of Americans and Canadians, who informed him that Montreal was
weak and defenseless, and proposed to make a joint attack upon the city.
Allen had confidence in the courage and judgment of Brown, and, as the
scheme opened an adventurous field, he agreed to the proposition

* The island with buildings, seen on the left, is St. Helen's or Helena,
now strongly fortified. It is in front of the city, a mile distant, and
is a beautiful summer resort. It formerly belonged to the Barons of
Longueuil, and is now the property of the crown. The picture is a fac-
simile of the print, with all its defects in drawing.

Battle near Montreal.--Capture of Allen.--Brutality of Prescott-- Harsh
Treatment of the Prisoners.--Biography of Allen.

180Allen was to return to Longueuil, procure canoes, and cross the St.
Lawrence with his troops below the city, while Brown was to cross above
the town, with two hundred men, and the attack was to be made at
opposite points simultaneously.

September 24, 1775 Allen crossed the river at night with eighty
Canadians and thirty Americans.

It was a rough, windy night, and so few were the canoes that they had to
cross three times, yet the whole party passed the foaming waters in the
light vessels safely before daylight. At dawn Allen expected to hear the
signal of Brown, but the morning advanced, and it was evident that the
latter had not crossed over. Guards were placed upon the roads to
prevent persons from carrying intelligence into the town, and Allen
would have retreated if his boats could have carried all over at once.

The Americans being discovered, armed men were soon seen issuing from
the gates. A force of forty British regulars, more than two hundred
Canadians, and a few Indians came down upon them from the town; but,
notwithstanding the disparity in numbers, such was the bravery of some
of the Americans, that the engagement lasted an hour and three quarters.
At length, his men having all deserted but twenty-eight, seven of whom
were wounded, Allen agreed to a surrender upon being promised honorable
terms. They were marched to Montreal, and the officers who were on the
field acted very civilly toward them; but when they were delivered into
the custody of General Prescott, they experienced the most brutal
treatment at his hands. On learning, by conversation with Allen, that he
was the same man who had captured Ticonderoga, Prescott was greatly
enraged, threatened him with a halter, and ordered him to be bound hand
and foot in irons and placed on board the Gaspee war schooner. A bar of
iron eight feet long was attached to his shackles, and, with his fellow-
prisoners, who were fastened together in pairs with handcuffs, he was
thrust into the lowest part of the ship, where neither seat nor bed was
allowed them. * We shall have con-

* Ethan Allen was born in Roxbury, Litchfield county, in Connecticut. He
went to Vermont at an early age, and about 1770 took an active part in
the disturbances that occurred between the Hampshire Grants and the
state of New York. The Legislature of the latter province proclaimed him
an outlaw, and offered fifty pounds sterling for his apprehension. A
party, determining to capture him while on a visit to his friends in
Salisbury and lodge him in the jail at Poughkeepsie, came near effecting
their object. He afterward led the expedition against Ticonderoga, and
his former sins were forgotten by his enemies. In the autumn of 1775 he
was twice sent into Canada to observe the disposition of the people,
and, if possible, win them over to the American cause. On returning from
his last tour to camp, he was induced by Major Brown to cross the St.
Lawrence and attack Montreal. The former failed to co-operate with him,
and he was captured and put in irons. He remained five weeks in irons on
board the Gaspee, at Montreal, and when Carleton was repulsed by Warner
at Longueuil, the vessel was sent down to Quebec. There he was
transferred to another vessel, where he was treated humanely, and sent
to England to be tried for treason. He was placed in charge of Brook
Watson, a resident of Montreal, and afterward Lord Mayor of London.
Allen, in his grotesque garb, attracted great attention in the streets
of Falmouth, where he was landed. He was confined for a time in
Pendennis Castle, near Falmouth, and was sent to Halifax in the spring
of 1776. He was confined in jail there until autumn, and was then sent
to New York, then in possession of the British. There he was kept about
a year and a half. In May, 1778, he was exchanged for Colonel Campbell,
and returned to his fireside in Vermont. He never afterward actively
engaged in military service. He died at Colchester, Vermont, February
13th, 1789, and his remains repose in a beautiful cemetery near the
Winooski, at Burlington. Ethan Allen was a blunt, honest man, of purest
virtue and sternest integrity. In religion he was a free-thinker, and
passed for an infidel. An anecdote is related of him, which illustrates
the purity of his principles. He owed a citizen of Boston sixty pounds,
for which he gave his promissory note. It was sent to Vermont for
collection. It was inconvenient for Allen to pay, and the note was put
in suit. Allen employed a lawyer to attend the court, and have the
judgment postponed until he could raise the money. The lawyer determined
to deny the genuineness of the signature, as the readiest method of
postponing the matter, for in that case a witness at Boston would have
to be sent for. When the case was called, it happened that Allen was in
a remote part of the court-house, and, to his utter astonishment, heard
his lawyer gravely deny the signature of the note. With long and fierce
strides he rushed through the crowd, and, confronting the amazed "limb
of the law," rebuked him in a voice of thunder. "Mr.--------, I did not
hire you to come here and lie. That is a true note--I signed it--I'll
swear to it--and I'll pay it. I want no shuffling, I want time. What I
employed you for was to get this business put over to the next court,
not to come here and lie and juggle about it." The result was, that the
postponement of the claim was amicably arranged between the two lawyers.

Montgomery's March upon Montreal.--Flight and Capture of Prescott.--
Escape of Carleton.--Mutiny in Montgomery's Camp.

181siderable to say of the character and career of the brutal Prescott,
while commanding afterward on Rhode Island.

The cause of Major Brown's failure to cross, and, with Allen, attack
Montreal, has never been explained. The plan was good, and would
doubtless have been successful. Half carried out, it proved disastrous,
and both Brown and Allen were blamed, the one for proposing, the other
for attempting, such a hazardous enterprise.

After the fall of St. John's, General Montgomery pressed on toward
Montreal. Carleton knew its weakness, and at once retreated on board one
of the vessels of a small fleet lying in the river. Montgomery entered
the town in triumph the day after Carleton and November 13, 1775 the
garrison left it. He treated the people humanely, and secured their
confidence and good will. Finding there a large supply of woolen goods,
he set about clothing his army, so that those who accompanied him
further in the campaign might be prepared for the rigors of a Canadian
winter.

As soon as Montgomery saw the disposition of the garrison to flee, he
dispatched Colonel Easton with Continental troops, cannon, and armed
gondolas to the mouth of the Sorel. This force was so advantageously
posted that the British fleet could not pass, and General Prescott,
several officers, members of the Canadian Council, and one hundred and
twenty private soldiers, with all the vessels, surrendered by
capitulation. * At the midnight preceding Governor Carleton was conveyed
in a boat, with muffled oars, past the American post to Three Rivers,
and arrived safely at Quebec. The Americans were very anxious to secure
Governor Carleton, for his talents, judgment, and influence formed the
basis of strength against the invaders. They were watchful in their
guard-boats, but a dark night and a secret way favored his escape, and
they secured a far inferior captive in Prescott, whose conduct, on many
occasions, made him a disgrace to the British army.

Notwithstanding all officers, and it required all the address the
general was master of to induce a respectable force to march to Quebec,
after garrisoning Montreal. But amid all these discouragements *

* There were eleven sail of vessels. Their contents were 760 barrels of
flour, 675 barrels of beef, 376 firkins of butter, 3 barrels of powder,
4 nine and six pounders, cartridges and ball, 2380 musket cartridges, 8
chests of arms, 200 pairs of shoes, and a quantity of intrenching tools.

** Guy Carleton, afterward Lord Dorchester, was Wolfe's quartermaster at
the storming of Quebec, and was appointed a major in the British army in
1772. In 1774 he was constituted Captain-general and Governor of Quebec
or Canada. He successfully commanded the British at Quebec when attacked
by Montgomery in 1775, compelled the Americans to raise the siege in
1776, and drove them out of the province. In October he recaptured Crown
Point. He was unjustly superseded in military command by Burgoyne in
1777. He was appointed to succeed Sir Henry Clinton in 1782, and was in
command of the British troops when they evacuated New York on the 25th
of November, 1783. He died in England at the close of 1808, aged 83
years the important posts in Canada except Quebec were now in possession
of the Americans, Montgomery justly asserted, in a letter to Congress,
that, "till Quebec is taken, Canada is unconquered." Impressed with this
idea, he determined to push forward to the capital despite the
inclemency of the season and the desertion of his troops. The term of
service of many had expired, and others absolutely refused to proceed
further. Insubordination manifested itself among the

Return Home of the Disaffected.--Visit to Longueuil.--The Village
Oracle.--Fruitless Historical Research.

182the hopeful general did not despair. He knew that Arnold was
traversing the wilderness along the Kennebeck and the Chaudière to join
him, and was then, perhaps, menacing Quebec; and he knew also that the
troops under Carleton and M'Lean were hardly adequate to defend the
city, even against a smaller force than his own. He winnowed his army of
the recusant and mutinous, and then pushed onward down the St. Lawrence.
*

I remarked that I left my pleasant company at Montreal, and went down to
Longueuil. My object was to ascertain, if possible, the place where
Warner planted his battery and repulsed the boats of Carleton. Longueuil
is an old town, chiefly composed of small stone houses with steep roofs.
It has a spacious French church, of antique appearance, though not more
than thirty years old. The people all speak bad French, and for more
than an hour I sought the "oldest inhabitant." That mysterious creature
was an old woman of unknown age, and so deaf that she could not hear
half I said, or understand a word. I reciprocated the latter infirmity,
and now confess profound ignorance of all she attempted to say. An
intelligent lad came to the rescue, and silenced our jargon batteries by
referring me to his uncle, who lived near the beach, and "knew every
thing." He was a man about fifty, and spoke English pretty well. I made
my business known, and he at once assumed the patronizing air of Sir
Oraele, said he knew it all, and pointed to the shore a little above as
the very spot where "the cavalry horses were stabled," and where "the
English dragoons drank a health to King George and vowed death to the
Yankees." He knew Sir George Prévost, and praised the veterans of
Wellington who accompanied him. As British dragoons and Wellington's
veterans were not with Carleton, and as my mentor's first birth-day
doubtless occurred twenty years after the time in question, I properly
doubted his knowledge of the facts I was in search of. I told him that
it was the American Revolution I was inquiring about. He did not seem to
understand me, and I called it _rebellion_. "Oh oui yes, yes, I know,"
he exclaimed. "Two hundred crossed here for St. John's. Captain Glasgow
was a fine fellow. Pity Lord Elgin wasn't as great a man as Sir John
Colborne." With exhausted patience, I explained to him the time and
nature of the revolution of the last century, but he had never heard of
it! He knew nothing behind his own "life and times." As he represented
the "collective wisdom" of the village, I despaired of better success,
and returned to Montreal with the fruit of a three hours' expedition
under a hot sun--a Yankee's postulate--a shrewd _guess_. I was as little
successful in my search at Montreal for the battle-ground where Ethan
Allen and his men were made prisoners. An intelligent gentleman, who was
one of the leaders in the rebellion there in 1837, assured me that the
spot was unknown to the inhabitants, for tradition has but little
interest in keeping its finger upon the locality, and not a man was
living who had personal knowledge of the event. It is probable that the
northern suburbs of the city now cover the locality, and that the place
is not far from the present Longueuil ferry-landing.

Having accomplished my errand at Montreal, we departed for Quebec toward
evening, in the fine steamer _John Munn_, accompanied by our Burlington
friends of the morning. The magnificent stone quays were crowded with
people, and our boat had a full complement of passengers. At the lower
end of St. Helen's we entered the St. Mary's Rapids, and, darting past
Longueuil, were soon out of sight of the spires of Montreal. The banks
of the river are low, and on either side villages and cultivated fields
exhibited an ever-changing and pleasing panorama. Beloeil Mountain
loomed up eastward of us, and the white chapel, the pedestal of the
bishop's huge eross upon the loftiest summit, sparkled like a star in
the beams of the setting sun. It was twilight when we arrived at William
Henry, or Sorel, an old town, forty-five miles below Montreal, at the
mouth of the Richelieu or Sorel River. A

* Several hundred of the militia, regardless of order, took the nearest
route to their respective homes in New England and New York. About three
hundred arrived in a body at Ticonderoga, and, flinging their heavy
packs over their shoulders, crossed the lake on the ice, and traversed
the wilderness through the deep snow to their homes in New Hampshire,
Massachusetts, and Connecticut. It was an undertaking quite as perilous
as the siege of Quebec. The endearments of home were the goal of the
one, military glory was that of the other. The choice, though not
creditable to them as patriots, deserves our respectful homage.

Arrival at-Sorel.--Voyage down the St. Lawrence.--Morning View of
Quebec.--The Walla ol Quebeo.

183French engineer named Sorel built a fort there as early as 1665, and
the present town occupies its site. Our boat tarried there an hour for
passengers and freight, but it grew too dark to see much of the town. A
motley group crowded the narrow wharf, and when we left, the forward
deck was covered with cabbages, leeks, and onions for the Quebec market,
which afforded perfume gratuitously for the whole boat.

Sorel was a place of considerable importance at the time of our
Revolution. Standing at the mouth of a navigable river, and at the
narrowest part of the St. Lawrence between Montreal and Quebec, its
possession was important to both belligerents. When the Americans
approached Canada in 1775, Colonel M'Lean, with a Scotch regiment of
Royal Highlanders, went up from Quebec and took station there. When
Carleton left Montreal to reenforce the garrison at St. John's, M'Lean
was to join him near Longueuil; but the unexpected repulse of the former
by the Green Mountain Boys, and the spreading of American detachments
over the country east of the St. Lawrence, between it and the Puchelieu,
so alarmed M'Lean, that he not only fell back precipitately to Sorel,
but abandoned that post to Colonel Easton, and retired to Quebec. At
Sorel, Colonel Easton did good service a few weeks later, when, with
floating batteries and cannon on shore, he disputed the passage of the
British fleet retreating from Montreal, and captured the whole flotilla,
with General Prescott.

Leaving Sorel, we passed several islands, and then entered Lake St.
Peter's, an expansion of the St. Lawrence about twenty-five miles long,
and having an average width of nine miles. A half moon dimly lighted the
sluggish waters, and defined an outline of the huge serpent of smoke
which our vessel left trailing behind. The shores disappeared in the
night shadows, and one after another of the passengers retired to bed,
until the promenade deck was deserted, except by two young ladies, whose
sweet voices charmed us for an hour with "Dearest May" and kindred
melodies. It was near midnight when the nightingales ceased their
warbling, and I sought the repose of my stateroom.

Three Rivers, St. Anne's, the Richelieu Rapids, Cape Rouge, Chaudière,
Sillery Cove, and New Liverpool were all passed during our slumbers, but
we were upon the deck in the morning in time to catch the first glimpse
of Quebec in the distance. A forest of masts, above which loomed Cape
Diamond crowned with the gray citadel and its threatening ordnance, were
the first objects in view. But as our vessel made a graceful sweep
toward Point Levi, and "rounded to" at the Queen's Wharf, I think I
never saw a more picturesque scene.

It was just at sunrise, and the morning was cloudless. As the orb of day
came up from the eastern hills, the city, spread out upon the steep
acclivities and along the St. Charles, reflected back its bright rays
from a thousand windows, and roofs of polished tin. All was a-glow with
luster, except the dark walls and the shipping, and for the moment the
creations of Aladdin's Lamp seemed before us. The enchantment was soon
over, and was succeeded by the sober prose of travel, as we passed
slowly to the upper town along the narrow and crooked Mountain Street,
through Prescott Gate, closely jammed in a pigmy coach. We found
comfortable quarters at the Albion, on Palace Street, one of the most
respectable English hotels in the upper city. After breakfast we ordered
a barouche, to visit the Falls of Montmorenci, the Plains of Abraham,
and other places of note, and obtained a permit from the commandant to
enter the citadel. Before making the interesting tour, let us turn to a
map of the city, trace out its walls and gates and general topography,
and consult the chronicle of its history; then we shall view its
celebrities understandingly.

* Explanation of the Diagram.--A is the St. Charles River; B, the St.
Lawrence; a is Palace Gate; 6, Gate St. John's; c, Gate St. Louis; d,
Governor's Garden, wherein is a stone monument in memory of Wolfe and
Montcalm; e, the portion of Cape Diamond at the foot of which Montgomery
was killed; the grand battery; g, Preseott Gate; h, Hope Gate; o is a
bold point of rock in the Sault-au-Matelot, where Arnold was wounded.
The walls here given, with the citadel in the upper town.

Situation of Quebec.--Early Settlements and Growth.--French Operations
in America.--Approach of Wolfe to Quebec

184Quebec is situated upon and around a lofty promontory at the
confluence of the St. Lawrence and the St. Charles Rivers, and is so
strongly guarded against intruders, by steep acclivities on nearly three
sides, that it has been aptly named the "Gibraltar of America." Art has
added strength to these natural defenses, and, except on the rear, it is
absolutely impregnable to any known implements of war. Before it spreads
out a magnificent basin, where a hundred ships of the line might ride at
anchor; and around it, as far as the eye can reach, industry has planted
a beautiful garden. The plains of the St. Charles, the towering Cap
Tourment, the Falls of Montmorenci and of the Chaudière, the lovely
Island of Orleans, and the pleasant slopes of Point Levi, unite, with
the city itself, to make up a cluster of attractions with which those of
few places on earth can vie. July, 1608 The foundation of the city was
laid two hundred and forty years ago, by Samuel Champlain, and yet it is
just upon the margin of the primeval forest, which extends from a narrow
selvage of civilization along the St. Lawrence to the Arctic regions.
When Champlain, with great parade, laid the foundation stone of the
future city, Old _Hochelaga_ (now Montreal), discovered by Cartier more
than a hundred years before, was blotted from existence, and but a few
whites were planting corn and sowing wheat where the Indian gardens had
flourished. Religion and commerce joined hands, and the new city soon
became the capital of French dominion in America. From it missionaries
and traders went westward to obtain peltry and furs, make geographical
discoveries, and convert the heathen, and in a few years the French
language was heard in the deep forests that skirted the vast lakes, from
the Thousand Islands at the foot of Ontario to the broad waters of the
Huron. Immigration steadily augmented the population, churches and
convents were erected, * and the bastioned walls of old Fort St. Louis,
mounted with cannon, were piled around the temples of the Prince of
Peace at Quebec; for the treacherous Algonquin, the wily Iroquois, and
the bloody Huron, though mutual enemies, coalesced in jealousy of the
French and a desire to crush their rising strength. As the colony
increased in power, and, through its missionaries, in influence over the
Indian tribes, the more southern English colonies became jealous, and a
deep-seated animosity between them prevailed for a generation. At length
the two governments quarreled, and their respective colonies gladly
espoused each the cause of the parent state. To guard the St. Lawrence,
the French built a strong fortress upon the Island of Cape Breton, and
also began a cordon of forts along the lakes and the Ohio and
Mississippi. Frontenac, Oswego, Niagara, Duquesne, and Detroit arose
along the frontier. Fleets and armies came from the Old World; the
colonists armed and formed strong battalions; the savage tribes were
feasted, and bribed, and affiliated with European warriors, and
wilderness America became a battle arena. In a little while the
different fortresses changed masters; Louisburgh, the strong-hold of
French military power in America, fell before the skill and bravery of
Amherst and Wolfe; and at the beginning of 1759 Quebec was the only
place of considerable importance in possession of the French.

We have considered, in a preceding chapter, the success of Amherst and
Wolfe in the capture of Louisburgh, and the high reputation which that
event gave them. Pitt, relying upon the skill and bravery of these two
commanders, resolved, if possible, to conquer all Canada in a single
campaign, intrusting the chief command to Amherst. That general, with a
large force, attempted to join Wolfe at Quebec, by sweeping Lake
Champlain and capturing Montreal; he was unsuccessful, and Wolfe alone
had the glory of the siege of Quebec.

Wolfe embarked eight thousand troops at Louisburgh, under convoy of a
fleet of twenty-two ships of the line, and an equal number of frigates
and smaller armed vessels, commanded by Admirals Saunders and Holmes. He
landed his army safely near the Church of St. LauJune 27, 1759 rent,
upon the Island of Orleans, a few miles below Quebec, where, under the
direction of Sir Guy Carleton (afterward governor of Canada), batteries
were erected.

* These were placed upon the most accessible portions of the promontory,
and near them the rude buildings of the people were erected. To these
circumstances Mr. Hawkins, author of a capital "Guide to Quebec,"
ascribes the present irregular course of the streets.

Position of Montcalm's Army.--British Possession of Orleans and Point
Levi.--Land near Montmerenci.

185The brave and accomplished Montcalm, with an army of thirteen
thousand men, six battalions of which were regulars, and the others
Canadians and Indians, occupied the city with a garrison, and a strongly
intrenched camp upon the heights of Beauport, extending from the St.
Charles to the River Montmorenci. The center of the camp and Montcalm's
headquarters were at Beauport.

The whole front was intrenched and well defended from the English
cannon. Beyond the right wing a bridge was thrown across the St.
Charles, and strongly protected, to keep up a communication with the
city. There were also two batteries for its defense, placed upon hulks
sunk in the channel.

Wolfe sent General Monkton to take possession of Point Levi, opposite
Quebec.

He landed at Beaumont, and marched up to the point with little
opposition, where he erected batteries, from which the shots dealt
destruction upon the lower town lying upon the St. Charles, but had no
effect upon the walls of the city. Finding efforts from that point
unavailing, Wolfe, with his division on Orleans, crossed the north
channel of the St. Lawrence, and encamped near the left bank of the
Montmorenci, within cannon-shot of the left wing of the enemy on the
other side of the river. He met with fierce opposition, but succeeded in
maintaining his ground and erecting two batteries there. Still, Quebec
was too distant to be affected by any of his works, and he resolved upon
the bold measure of storming the strong camp of the enemy. On the last
day of July the troops at Point Levi, and a large number of grenadiers
under General Monkton, crossed the St. Lawrence in the boats of the
fleet, and landed a little above the Montmorenci. At the same time those
below Montmorenci, under Generals Townshend and Murray, crossed that
stream by fording it near its mouth, at low water, and joined the other
division upon the beach. The enemy at once made arrangements to receive
them. The right of the French was *

* This sketch is taken from Durham Terrace, near the north wall of the
Castle Garden. In the foreground are the tops of the houses below in
Champlain, Notre Dame, and St. Peter's Streets, and in the distance,
across the St. Lawrence, is seen Point Levi, with its pretty little
village, its church and wharves. On the extreme left, in the distance,
is the upper end of the Island of Orleans, which divides the channel.
The point seen is the place whore Wolfe erected batteries.

Junction of the English Division.--Severe Battle.--Wolfe disheartened.--
Camp broken up.--Wolfe's Cove

186under Baron de St. Ours, the center under De Senezergues, and the
left under M. Herbin The garrison in the city was commanded by M. de
Ramezay.

It was nearly night when the English divisions joined, and heavy
thunder-clouds were rolling up from the west. The grenadiers, impatient
of restraint, rushed madly upon the enemy's works, before the other
troops that were to sustain them had time to form. Consequently they
were driven back to the beach with a severe loss, and sought shelter
behind a redoubt which had been abandoned by the enemy. The French kept
up a galling fire, till the gathering tempest burst with great fury upon
the belligerents. Night closed in while the storm was yet raging. The
tide came roaring up against the current of the St. Lawrence with
uncommon strength, and the British were obliged to retreat to their camp
across the Montmorenci, to avoid submersion on the beach by the foaming
waters. The loss of the English in that unfortunate attempt was one
hundred and eighty killed and six hundred and fifty wounded.

Wolfe was greatly dispirited by this event, for he was very sensitive to
censure, and that he expected for this miscarriage. The emotions of his
mind, co-operating with fatigue of body upon his delicate constitution,
brought on a fever and dysentery, that nearly proved fatal. It was
nearly a month before he was able to resume the command. When
sufficiently recovered to write, he drew up a letter to Pitt, in which,
after detailing September 2 the events, referring to his illness, and
frankly confessing that he had called a council of war, he said, "I
found myself so ill, and am still so weak, that I begged the general
officers to consult together for the general safety.... We have almost
the whole force of Canada to oppose us. In this situation there is such
a choice of difficulties, that I own myself at a loss how to determine.
The affairs of Great Britain require the most vigorous measures; but
then the courage of a handful of brave men should be exerted only where
there is some hope of a favorable event." When this letter reached
England, it excited consternation and anger. * Pitt feared that he had
mistaken his favorite general, and that the next news would be that he
had either been destroyed or had capitulated. But in the conclusion of
his melancholy epistle Wolfe had said he would do his best; and that
best turned out a miracle of war. He declared that he would rather die
than be brought to a court-martial for miscarrying, and, in conjunction
with Admiral Saunders, he concerted a plan for scaling the Heights of
Abraham, and gaining possession of the elevated plateau at the back of
Quebec, on the side where the fortifications were the weakest, as the
French engineers had trusted to the precipices and the river beneath. **

The camp at Montmorenci was broken up, and the artillery and troops were
conveyed across to Point Levi, whence they were taken some distance up
the river by a September 12 a portion of the fleet under Holmes, while
Saunders, with the rest of the fleet, remained behind to make a feigned
attack upon the intrenchments at Beauport. Montcalm, unable to
comprehend these movements, remained in his camp, while Bougainville was
stationed a little above the Plains of Abraham, to watch the operations
of the division of the English fleet that sailed up the river.

At night the troops were all embarked in flat-boats, and proceeded up
the river with the tide. Bourgainville saw them, and marched up the
shore to prevent their landing. It was starlight, yet so cautiously did
the boats, with muffled oars, move down the river toward daylight, with
ebb tide, that they were unperceived by the French detachment, and
landed safely in a cove below Sillery, now called _Wolfes Cove_. The
first division was commanded by Lieutenant-colonel (afterward General)
Sir William Howe, and were all on shore at dawn The light infantry
scrambled up the woody precipice, and dispersed a French guard under
Captain de Verjer, *** while the rest of the army clambered up a winding
and steep ravine.

* The news of the failure of Wolfe at Montmorenci reached England on the
morning of the 16th of October, and was published in an extra Gazette of
that date. The same evening Captain Hale arrived and brought the news of
the triumph upon the Plains of Abraham. The general grief was suddenly
changed into great joy, and a day for public thanksgiving was set apart
by the old king.

** Pictorial History of England, iv., 609.

*** The French guard, who could not comprehend the noise below them,
fired down the precipice at random, and so the British fired up. They
all fled but the captain, who was wounded and taken prisoner. It is said
the poor fellow begged the British officer to sign a certificate of his
courage and fidelity, lest ho should be punished for accepting a bribe,
in the belief that Wolfe's bold enterprise would be deemed impossible
without corruption.

Ascent of the English to the Plains of Abraham.--The Battle-ground.--
Preparations for Battle.--Wolfe's Ravine.

187The second division, under General Townshend, landed in good order,
and before sunrise five thousand British troops were drawn up in battle
array upon the Plains of Abra September 13, 1759 ham, three hundred feet
above the St. Lawrence.

The appearance of the English troops upon the heights was the first
intimation Montcalm had of the real intentions of his enemy. He at once
saw the imminent danger to which the city and garrison were exposed, and
immediately marched his whole army across the St. Charles to attack the
English. He brought his troops into battle line about ten o'clock in the
morning. He had two field pieces; the English but one, a light six
pounder, which some sailors succeeded in dragging up the ravine at about
eight o'clock in the morning.

I am indebted to Alfred Hawkins, Esq., of Quebec, for the following
account of the position of the two armies, and the present localities
identified therewith: "The battle-ground presents almost a level surface
from the brink of the St. Lawrence to the St. Foy Road. The _Grand
Allée_, or road to Cape Rouge, running parallel to that of St. Foy,
passes through its center. That road was commanded by a field redoubt, a
four-gun battery on the English left, which was captured by the light
infantry. The remains of this battery are distinctly seen near the
present race-stand. There were also two other redoubts, one upon the
rising ground in the rear of Mr. C. Campbell's house--the scene of
Wolfe's death--and the other toward the St. Foy Road, which it was
intended to command. On the site of the country seat called Marchmont,
at present the residence of Major-general Sir James Hope, K.C.B., there
was also a small redoubt commanding the intrenched path leading to the
cove. This was taken possession of by the advanced guard of the light
infantry immediately on ascending the height. At the time of the battle
the plains were without fences or inclosures, and extended to the walls
oh the St Louis side. The surface was dotted over with bushes, and the
roads on either side were more dense than at present, affording shelter
to the French and Indian marksmen.

"In order to understand the relative position of the two armies, if a
line be drawn to the St. Lawrence from the General Hospital, it will
give nearly the front of the French army at ten o'clock, after Montcalm
had deployed into line. His right reached beyond the St. Foy Road, where
he made dispositions to turn the left of the English. Another parallel
line, somewhat in advance of Mr. C. G. Stewart's house on the St. Foy
Road, will give the front of the British army before Wolfe charged at
the head of the grenadiers of the twenty-second, fortieth, and forty-
fifth regiments, who had acquired the honorable title of the Louisburgh
Grenadiers, from having been distinguished at the capture of that place,
under his own command, in 1758. To meet the attempt of Montcalm to turn
the British left, General Townshend formed the fifteenth regiment _en
potence_, or representing a double front. The light infantry were in the
rear of the left, and the reserve was placed near the right, formed in
eight subdivisions, a good distance apart."

Wolfe placed himself on the right, at the head of the twenty-eighth
regiment of _Louisburgh Grenadiers_, who were burning with a desire to
avenge their defeat at the Montmorenci. The English had waited four
hours for the approach of the French, and were fully *

* This scene is about half way up the ravine from Wolfe's Cove, looking
down the road, which is a steep and winding way from the river to the
summit of the Plains of Abraham. It is a cool, shaded nook--a delightful
retreat from the din and dust of the city in summer.

Battle on the Plains of Abraham.--Bravery and Death of Wolfe.-- Death of
Montcalm.--Burial-place of Montcalm.

188prepared for action. Montcalm was on the left of the French, at the
head of the regiments of _Languedoc, Bearne, and Guienne_. Wolfe ordered
his men to load with two bullets each, and reserve their fire until the
French should be within forty yards. These orders were strictly obeyed,
and their double-shotted guns did terrible execution. "The hottest of
the fight occurred," says Hawkins, "between the right of the race-stand
and the martello towers." *

After delivering several rounds in rapid succession, which threw the
French into confusion, the English charged furiously with their
bayonets. While urging on his battalions in this charge, Wolfe was
singled out by some Canadians on the left, and was slightly wounded in
the wrist. He wrapped a handkerchief around to stanch the blood, and,
while still cheering on his men, received a second wound in the groin; a
few minutes afterward another struck him in the breast and brought him
to the ground, mortally wounded. At that moment, regardless of self, he
thought only of the victory for his troops. "Support me," he said to an
officer near him; "let not my brave soldiers see me drop. They day is
ours--keep it." He was taken to the rear, while his troops continued to
charge. The officer on whose shoulder he was leaning exclaimed,

"They run, they run!" The light returned to the dim eyes of the dying
hero, and he asked, with emotion,

"Who runs?"

"The enemy, sir; they give way every where."

"What," feebly exclaimed Wolfe, "do they run already? Go to Colonel
Preston and tell him to march Webb's regiment immediately to the bridge
over the St. Charles, and cut off the fugitives' retreat. Now, God be
praised, I die happy!" These were his last words, and in the midst of
sorrowing companions, just at the moment of victory, he died. Montcalm,
who was gallantly fighting in the front rank of the French left,
received a mortal wound, and died the next morning about five o'clock,
and was buried in an September 14. excavation made by the bursting of a
shell within the precincts of the Ursuline Convent, where his remains
still rest. *** When Lord Aylmar was Governor of Canada, he

* The Martello Towers are four strong structures erected at different
distances in rear of the city, between the St. Lawrence and the St.
Charles. Cannons are mounted upon their tops. They are very thick on the
side toward the open country, but thin toward the city. The object of
this manner of construction is, that, if taken by an enemy, they can
easily be laid in ruins by the shot of the garrison.

** James Wolfe was born in Westerham, in Kent, January 2d, 1727. He
entered the army very young, and soon distinguished himself by skill,
judgment, and bravery. After his return from the expedition against
Louisburgh, in 1758, he was appointed to the command of that section of
the expedition against Canada that went up the St. Lawrence. His assault
on Quebec was one of the boldest military achievements ever attempted,
but, just at the moment of victory, he lost his life, at the early age
of 32 years. His body was conveyed to England on board the Royal
William, and buried at Greenwich on the 20th of November, 1759, where,
in the family vault, the hero rests by the side of his father and
mother. His father, Edward Wolfe, was a lieutenant general, and died in
March of the same year, aged 74. The British government erected a
monument to the memory of the young hero, in Westminster Abbey.

*** Lewis Joseph de St. Veran, Marquis de Montcalm, descended from a
noble family of Candiac, in France. He was educated for a soldier, and
distinguished himself at the battle of Piacenza in 1746. He rose by
degrees to the rank of field marshal, and in 1756 was appointed Governor
of Canada. He ably opposed the English under Abercrombie, but fell while
gallantly fighting Wolfe at Quebec, on the 13th of September, 1759. His
remains are within the grounds of the Ursuline Convent at Quebec. A few
years ago a plain marble slab was placed to his memory, in the chapel of
that nunnery, by Lord Aylmar, on whieh is the following inscription:

Honneur a

Montcalm

Le destin, en lui dérobant

La victoire,

L' a recompensé par Une mort glorieuse.

Monument where Wolfe fell.--Capitulation of Quebec.--Levi's Attempt to
recapture it.--Ills Repulsion.--Capture of Montreal.

189caused a small granite pillar, about ten feet high, to be erected
upon the spot where Wolfe fell upon the Plains of Abraham, now just
within the southern suburb of Quebec. It bears the brief inscription,

Here died Wolfe, victorious. That Vandalism under the specious guise of
reverence for the great, of which I have already had occasion to speak,
has sadly mutilated this monument, as may be seen in the engraving. The
pedestal has lost many a pound of _relic_, and the iron railing around
the monument has been broken down.

Wolfe and Montcalm were both able commanders, and were idolized by their
respective troops. The former, though so young, was almost reverenced by
his officers, for to bravery and great military skill he united all the
virtues and graces of the perfect gentleman. The expressions of
attachment made by General (afterward Marquis) Townshend illustrate the
sentiment of his officers and men. In a letter written just after the
battle, he says, "I am not ashamed to own to you that my heart does not
exult in the midst of this success. I have lost but a friend in General
Wolfe. Our country has lost a sure support and a perpetual honor. If the
world were sensible at how dear a price we have purchased Quebec in his
death, it would damp the public joy. Our best consolation is, that
Providence seemed not to promise that he should remain long among us. He
was himself sensible of the weakness of his constitution, and determined
to crowd into a few years actions that would have adorned length of
life."

Five days after the battle the city of Quebec capitulated and passed
into the September 18, 1759 possession of the English, and the remnant
of the grand army of the French, under M. Levi, who succeeded Montcalm,
retired to Montreal. General Murray was left to defend battered and
half-ruined Quebec, and the British fleet, fearful of frost, retreated
down the St. Lawrence to the ocean. Levi determined on attempting to
regain all that the French had lost, and in the spring of 1760 he
marched upon Quebec with a motley army of ten thousand men, composed of
French, Canadians, and Indians. Murray, with seven thousand men, went
out and attacked him, but was sorely defeated, lost all April 28, 1760
his guns, and was nearly cut off in his retreat back to the city. Levi
followed up his success vigorously, and as soon as the ice left the St.
Lawrence he brought up six French frigates and prepared to beleaguer the
city by land and by water. He encamped upon the heights above Point
Levi, and felt sure of his prey. Fortunately for the English, Lord
Colville arrived at this juncture with two good frigates, and destroyed
the French vessels under the eyes of Levi. Thoroughly frightened by the
suddenness of the event, and May 16 learning that these two fast sailers
were only the van of a powerful fleet, the French commander retreated
precipitately to Montreal, leaving his artillery and stores behind him.
Vaudreuil, the governor general of the province, was at Montreal, and
Amherst, Murray, and Haviland proceeded to invest that city. Despairing
of succor from abroad, Vaudreuil capitulated on the 8th of September,
and on that memorable day French power in Canada expired and hostilities
in America ceased. Peace ensued between the two governments by the
conclusion and signing of a treaty at Paris, on the 10th of February,
1763, and thus ended the famous "Seven Years' War." From that time the
two races have not been arrayed in battle against each other in the
Western world, except while the French were here as allies in 1780--81,
and assisted in the battle at Yorktown and the capture of Cornwallis. *

* Since my visit to Quebee (August, 1848) the remains of this monument
have been removed, and a column forty feet high, surmounted by a bronze
helmet and sword, has been erected. The monument is from the design of
Sir James Alexander

Collection of an Army near Boston.--Washington's Appointment.--His
Generals.--Expedition under Arnold planned

190Quebec enjoyed tranquillity until the Americans, under Montgomery and
Arnold, invaded Canada in the autumn and winter of 1775. We left the
former pressing forward toward the city, with the rigors of a Canadian
winter gathering around him. Let us return and watch the progress of
that little army of patriots, and also consider the wonderful expedition
of the brave Arnold through the wilderness of the east.

We mentioned incidentally, in a previous chapter, that when the tidings
of the capture of the forts on Lake Champlain reached the Continental
Congress, that body promptly took action to defend the liberties of the
people, and secure their rights by force of arms, if necessary. The
skirmishes at Lexington and Concord, the menaces against Massachusetts,
and Boston in particular, fulminated by the home government, and the
arrival of several regiments of British troops, for the avowed purpose
of crushing the anticipated rebellion, aroused a spirit of resistance in
the colonies hitherto unknown, even when the Stamp Act, ten years
before, had awakened a terrible storm of indignation throughout the
land. From all directions men flew to arms, and in a few weeks a large
patriot army invested Boston, and threatened Governor Gage and his
mercenary troops with destruction. The incongruous material which
composed the army was partially organized by appointing Artemas Ward *
commander-in-chief until the general Congress should act in the
premises. That action was not long delayed, and on the 15th of June
Congress adopted a resolution to appoint a general "to command all the
Continental forces raised for the defense of American liberty." George
Washington was unanimously chosen to fill the important office, ** July
12, 1775 he repaired to Cambridge, near Boston, and took command of the
army. He-set about organizing and disciplining the troops, and making
preparations for an active campaign.

About the middle of August, a committee of Congress visited Washington
in his camp, and a plan was then devised to send a force to Canada, by
way of the Kennebec River, to co-operate with Schuyler, already
preparing to invade that province by way of the North ern lakes. Arnold
was then at Cambridge, uttering loud complaints of ill usage upon Lake
Champlain. His bravery was well known, and the proposed expedition was
exactly suited to his adventurous disposition. To silence his complaints
and to secure his services, Washington appointed him to the command of
that perilous expedition, and at the same time gave him a commission of
colonel in the Continental army. Eleven hundred hardy men were detached
for the service from the army, consisting of ten companies of musketeers
from New England and three companies of riflemen from Virginia and
Pennsylvania. Arnold's field officers were Lieutenant-colonel
Christopher Greene (the hero of Red Bank, on the Delaware), Lieutenant-
colonel Roger Enos, and Majors Meigs and Bigelow. The riflemen were
commanded by Captain Daniel Morgan, the renowned partisan leader in
subsequent years of the war.

Arnold and his troops marched from Cambridge to Newburyport, where they
embarked September 18 on board eleven transports for the mouth of the
Kennebec. They reached Gardiner in safety and found two hundred bateaux
ready for them at Pitts-ton, on the opposite side of the river.
Carpenters had been previously sent to construct

* Artemas Ward was a native of Massachusetts, and graduated at Harvard
in 1748. He was successively a representative in the Legislature and
member of the Council of his state. He was also a justice of the Court
of Common Pleas for Worcester county. Having considerable military
knowledge, he was chosen to command the army that gathered around Boston
in the spring of 1775. Congress appointed him the first of the four
major generals under Washington, and to him was assigned the division of
the army at Roxbury, when the siege of Boston, in 1776, took place. He
resigned his commission a month after that event, yet, at the request of
Washington, he continued in command till toward the last of May. He was
a member of Congress under the Confederation, and also after the
adoption of the present Constitution. He died at Shrewsbury in 1800,
aged 73 years.

** Four major generals and eight brigadiers were appointed at the same
time. To the former rank were chosen Artemas Ward, Charles Lee, Philip
Schuyler, and Israel Putnam (the Major Putnam in the French and Indian
war); to the latter, Seth Pomeroy (supposed to be the soldier who shot
Dieskau), Richard Montgomery, David Wooster, William Heath, Joseph
Spencer, John Thomas, John Sullivan, and Nathaniel Greene. Horatio Gates
was appointed adjutant general, with the rank of brigadier.

Arrival at Fort Western.--Norridgewock Falls.--The Ancient Indians.--
Father Ralle.--Fatiguing Portage.

191then rendezvoused at Fort Western, opposite the present town of
Augusta. This was on the verge of an uninhabited and almost unexplored
wilderness, * and toward its fearful shadows these brave men turned
their faces.

A small reconnoitering party was sent in advance to Lake Megantic, or
Chaudière Pond, and another to survey the course and distances of the
Dead River, a tributary of the Kennebec. The main body moved forward in
four divisions, a day apart in time. Morgan, with the riflemen, was in
the van; next were Greene and Bigelow, with their companies of
musketeers; Meigs, with four other companies, followed, and the rear was
brought up by Elios, with three remaining companies. Arnold was the last
to leave Fort Western. He proceeded in a birch canoe, passed the several
parties, and overtook Morgan on the third day at Norridgewock Falls.
Here, upon a beautiful plain on the eastern bank of the river, the
ancient Norridgewock Indians, a tribe of the Abenakes, had a village,
and in the midst of the grandeur, beauty, and fertility of nature, and
the barbarous heathenism of man in this picturesque region, Father
Ralle, a French Jesuit, had erected a Christian altar, and taught the
sublime truths of the Gospel. **

Here the first severe toils of the little army began, for they were
obliged to carry all their bateaux, provisions, and stores around the
falls, a mile and a quarter, into the navigable waters above. The banks
were rocky and precipitous. They found, too, that their boats were
leaky, and much of their provisions was spoiled or greatly damaged.
Seven days were consumed in passing the falls and repairing the 191these
vessels. The troops vessels. The same labor, though not so fatiguing,
was demanded at the Carratunc Falls.

* Colonel Montressor, a British officer, had traversed the wilderness
fifteen years before. He ascended the Chaudière from Quebec, crossed the
Highlands near the head waters of the Penobscot, passed through Moose-
head Lake, and entered the eastern branch of the Kennebec. Arnold
possessed an imperfect copy of the printed journal of Montressor, and
this, with information received from some St. Francis Indians who
visited Washington's camp, gave him an idea of the country and the
privations his men must suffer. The same region was traversed by a
French missionary named Decuillettes, more than two hundred years
before. He crossed the St. Lawrence to the sources of the Kennebec, down
which river he descended to its mouth, and thence coasted eastward to
the missionary station on the Penobscot.--Hildreth, ii., 84.

** Father Ralle resided among the Norridgewocks twenty-six years, and
possessed great influence over them. He was considered an enemy to the
British settlers in Massachusetts, and an expedition was planned against
him and the settlement. A party fell upon them suddenly, and killed and
scalped the priest and thirty of the Indians. This event occurred in
1724, and when Colonel Arnold was there, in 1775, the foundations of the
church and altar were still visible, but the red men had forever
departed. Father Ralle left a manuscript dictionary of the Abenake
language (the dialect of the Norridgewocks), which is preserved in the
library of Harvard University.

Voyage up the Kennebec.--The Dead River.--Elevated Country.--A Freshet.
Return of Enos.--His Trial and Acquittal

192Desertions and sickness reduced their number to about nine hundred
and fifty effective men when they arrived at the great carrying-place,
twelve miles below the junction of Dead River with the Kennebec. So
rapid was the stream, that the men waded more than half way, pushing the
bateaux against the current; yet they were in good spirits, and seemed
to partake of the enthusiasm of their leader.

Arnold now examined his muster-roll and commissariat. The troops, though
somewhat reduced in number, were strong and enthusiastic, and he
ascertained that he had twenty-five days' provisions in store. The
Chaudière, on which were French settlements, he estimated to be at a
distance of ten days' travel. The weather was fine, and the prospect so
encouraging that they pushed forward with alacrity. The great carrying-
place was a portage of fifteen miles, broken by three ponds. Oxen
dragged the bateaux part of the way on sleds, and the baggage and stores
were carried on the shoulders of the men. Over craggy knolls and tangled
ravines, through deep morasses, creeks, and ponds, they pursued their
journey, sometimes carrying their vessels and the vessels sometimes
bearing them, until they reached the Dead River. The ponds afforded an
abundance of delicious salmon-trout, and want of food had not yet been
among their privations. The surface of the Dead River was smooth, and
the waters flowed on in a gentle current in the midst of the magnificent
forest, now rendered gorgeous by the brilliant hues imparted to the
foliage by early frost. Occasional falls interrupted their progress, but
the labors of the men were far less severe than hitherto. Suddenly the
monotony of the vast forest was broken by the appearance of a lofty
mountain covered with snow, at the foot of which Arnold encamped three
days, raising the Continental flag over his tent. * A small hamlet
called Flag-staff, in commemoration of the event, is upon the camp-
ground, and the lofty eminence bears the name of Mount Bigelow. **

When the expedition moved forward, a heavy rain set in, which sent down
such torrents from the hills that the river arose eight feet in one
night, overflowing its banks October 22-23 and filling its channels with
rafts of drift wood. So suddenly did this freshet occur, that the water
came roaring down the valley where the soldiers were encamped, so
unexpectedly and powerfully that they had barely time to retreat to
their bateaux before the whole plain was overflowed. Seven boats were
overturned and the provisions lost, and others were in imminent peril in
the midst of the flood. They were yet thirty miles from the head of the
Chaudière, and but about twelve days' provisions remained. The storm and
exposure made many sick, and despondency supplanted cheerfulness, for
the future seemed pregnant with misery. A council of war was held, and
it was decided to send the sick and feeble back, and to press forward
with the healthy. Arnold wrote to Greene and Enos, who were in the rear,
to select as many of their best men as they could supply with fifteen
days' provisions, and come on with them, leaving the others to return to
Norridgewock. Enos, either through a false construction of the order or
willful disobedience, returned to Cambridge with his whole division. His
appearance excited the greatest indignation in the Continental camp, and
Enos was looked upon as a traitor for thus deserting his companions and
endangering the whole expedition. He was tried by a court-martial, and
it being proved that he was short of provisions, and that none could be
procured in the wilderness, he was acquitted. He never was restored in
public estimation, however, and soon afterward left the army.

In the mean while Arnold, with the rest of the troops, pressed onward.
The rain changed to snow, and ice formed upon the water in which the men
waded to push the bateaux as

* What the device on this flag, or what its color was, we have no means
of ascertaining. The stripes and stars were not used until 1777. On the
14th of June that year, Congress "resolved that the flag of the thirteen
United States be thirteen stripes, alternate red and white; that the
Union be thirteen stars, white in a blue field, representing a new
constellation." Since then we have added a star for every new state.

** Tradition asserts that, while the Americans encamped there, Major
Bigelow ascended to the summit of the mountain, with the expectation of
seeing the spires of Quebec! From this supposed adventure the mountain
derives its name. .

Lake Megantie and the Chaudière.--Perilous Voyage.--Narrow Escape.--
Sertigan.--Timely Relief for the Troops

October 29. 193they passed the numerous ponds and marshes near the
sources of the Dead River. Seventeen falls were passed, and on a bleak
day, marching through snow two inches deep, they reached the Highlands
which separated the waters of New England from Canada. A portage of four
miles brought them to a small stream, down which they pushed their
vessels and reached Lake Megantic, the great source of the Chaudière.
There they found Lieutenants Steele and Church, who had been sent
forward from the great carrying-place to explore and clear the portages.
Here also was Jakins, who had been sent to the French settlers on the
Chaudière to ascertain their political sentiments, which he reported to
be favorable. *

The little army encamped on the eastern shore of the lake, and the next
morning Arnold, with a party of fifty-five men on shore, under Captain
Hanchet, and thirteen men with himself, in five bateaux and a birch
canoe, pushed onward down the Chaudière to the French settlements, there
to obtain provisions and send them back to meet the main forces. It was
a fearful voyage. As soon as they left the lake and October 27. 1775
entered the river, the current ran with great rapidity, boil ing and
foaming over a rocky bottom. They had no guide. They lashed their
baggage and provisions to the bateaux and committed themselves to the
mercy of the stream. At length the fearful roar of rushing waters met
their ears, and in a few minutes they were plunging amid rapids. Three
of the boats were dashed in pieces upon the rocks and their contents
ingulfed, but, fortunately, no lives were lost. Six men struggled long
in the waters, but were saved. The other bateaux were moored in shallow
estuaries, while aid was rendered to those in the stream, and this
proved the salvation of the whole party. The apparent calamity was a
mercy in disguise, for had they not been thus checked, they must all
have plunged into destruction over a fall just beyond, which was
discovered by one of the rescued men. For seventy miles falls and rapids
succeeded each other, but the voyagers reached Sertigan (four miles
below the mouth of Des Lou-pis), the first French settlement, in safely.
The people were friendly, and sold provisions freely. As soon as the
wants of his own party were supplied, Arnold sent back some Canadians
and Indians with flour and cattle for the approaching troops, who were
in great distress, all their boats having been destroyed, with their
provisions. They had slaughtered their last ox several days before. In a
few days the whole army emerged in detachments from the forests,
wilderness, and united at Sertigan. **

October 30

* Two Indians were sent forward with Jakins to carry letters, one to
General Schuyler on Lake Champlain, the other to some persons in Quebec.
They betrayed their trusts, for the latter, named Eneas, was known to
have reached Quebec, but the letters went into the hands of Lieutenant-
governor Carmache instead of those for whom they were intended. The
letters to General Schuyler never reached him.

** Judge Henry, who at the close of the last century was president of
the second judicial district in Pennsylvania, was one of the soldiers in
this expedition, and has left behind him a lucid and exceedingly
interesting narrative of the ''hardships and sufferings of that band of
heroes." In reference to the destitute condition of the troops before
food was sent back from Sertigan, he says, "Coming to a low, sandy beach
of the Chaudière, for we sometimes had such, some of our companies were
observed to dart from the file, and with their nails tear out of the
sands roots which they esteemed eatable, and ate them raw, even without
washing. The knowing one sprang; half a dozen followed; he who obtained
it ate the root instantly.... They washed their moose-skin moccasins in
the river, scraping away the dirt and sand with great care. These were
brought to the kettle and boiled a considerable time, under the vague
but consolatory hope that a mucilage would take place. The poor fellows
chewed the leather, but it was leather still. They had not received food
for the last forty-eight hours. Disconsolate and weary we passed the
night." A dog was killed and furnished material for broth, but
starvation would have destroyed them all in a few days. *

* "My dog was very large and a great favorite. I gave him up to several
men of Captain Goodrich's company. They caried him to their company, and
killed and divided him among those who were suffering most severely from
hunger. They ate every part of him, not excepting his entrails."--Letter
of General Dearborn to the Rev. William Allen.

Valley of the Chaudière.--Washington's Manifesto.--Joined by Indians.--
Arrival at Point Levi.--Incidents of the March

194The beautiful valley of the Chaudière was now before them, enlivened
with a friendly population and blessed with abundance of provisions.
Arnold had been furnished with printed copies, in French, of a manifesto
by Washington, to be distributed among the people. It explained the
causes of the contest, and asked them, as neighbors and friends, to join
the standard of liberty. Arnold, with great discretion, circulated these
freely, at the same time acquiescing in the wishes of Washington by
treating the inhabitants with the greatest respect. Every thing received
from them was paid for, and they rendered aid in return with a hearty
good will. *

About forty Indians of the Norridgewoeks, under the famous _Natanis_ and
his brother _Sabatis_, here joined the Americans, and on the 9th of
November the whole army that remained arrived at Point Levi, opposite
Quebec, after one of the most wonderful marches on record, during the
space of two months. Thirty-two days they traversed the gloomy
wilderness without meeting a human being. Frost and snow were upon the
ground, and ice was upon the surface of the marshes and streams, which
they were obliged to traverse and ford, sometimes armpit deep in water
and mud; yet they murmured not, and even women followed in the train of
the suffering patriots. ** It was an effort in the cause of freedom
worthy of its divine character; and the men who thus periled life and
endured pain, whatever may have been their course in after life, deserve
the highest praise from the hearts and lips of posterity. ***

* I met a gentleman at Quebec (August, 1848) who had just made a journey
across the country from the Kennebec to the St. Lawrence by the way of
the Chaudière. He said that many of the old habitans were still living
in that beautiful valley, and spoke very highly of the "good
Bostonians," whose passage through their country was one of the greatest
events in the quiet lives of those isolated and simple people. He showed
me an order for flour and cattle, signed by Arnold at Sertigan, which he
procured from an old man 93 years of age. Many documents of the kind
are, he said, preserved in the families of the old settlers.

** Judge Henry speaks of two women, the wives of soldiers attached to
the division of the army to which he belonged. Their names deserve
preservation for the admiration of posterity. "One was the wife of
Sergeant Grier, a large, virtuous, and respectable woman." The other was
the wife of a private soldier named Warner. Judge H. says, in reference
to their march through the wet country near Megantic Lake, "Entering the
ponds, and breaking the ice here and there with the butts of our guns
and feet, we were soon waist deep in mud and water. As is generally the
case with youths, it came to my mind that a better path might be found
than that of the more elderly guide. Attempting this, the water in a
trice cooling my armpits, made me gladly return in the file. Now Mrs.
Grier had got before me. My mind was humbled, yet astonished, at the
exertions of this good woman. Her clothes more than waist high, she
waded on before me to firm ground. Not one, so long as she was known to
us, dared to intimate a disrespectful idea of her."

*** Those most prominent afterward in the history of our country, who
accompanied Arnold on that expedition, were Morgan, Greene, Dearborn,
Febiger, Meigs, and Burr. "Here it was" (near Sertigan), says Judge
Henry, "that, for the first time. Aaron Burr, a most amiable youth of
twenty, came to my view. He was then a cadet."

American Army at Point Levi.--Alarm of the Canadians.--Storm on the St.
Lawrence.--Passage of the Army.

195

CHAPTER IX.

"Oh, few and weak their numbers were,

A handful of brave men;

But to their God they gave their prayer,

And rush'd to battle then.

They left the plowshare in the mold,

Their flocks and herds without a fold,

The sickle in the unshorn grain,

The corn half garner'd on the plain,

And muster'd in their simple dress

For wrongs to seek a stern redress--

To right those wrongs, come weal, come wo,

To perish or o'ercome their foe."

McLellan.

UCH were the men who followed the bold Arnold, through terrible
difficulties and privations, from their quiet homes in New England, and,
in the midst ol light falling snow, appeared like a specter army on the
heights of Point Levi, to the wondering people of Quebec. Through the
treachery of the Indian Eneas (who pretended to have been taken
prisoner), Cramahé and his council knew that a small American force was
in the wilderness, but they would not believe that it would ever reach
Quebec; therefore the fact was not made known to the military or the
people. They had taken the precaution, however, to keep all boats on the
Quebec side of the river. It was about eight o'clock in the morning when
Arnold and his followers emerged from the forest and displayed upon the
banks of the St. Lawrence., Quebec was at once in a tumult. The drums
beat to arms, and the Canadians were terribly alarmed. Some near Point
Levi had fled across to the city, and their fears caused them to greatly
magnify the number and character of the Americans. By a mistake of a
single word the fears of the people were greatly increased, for the news
spread that the mysterious army that descended from the wilderness was
clad in _sheet iron._ *

Arnold resolved to cross the river immediately, and found means to
communicate his intentions to his friends in Quebec. * But for several
days and nights a tempest of wind and sleet raged upon the St. Lawrence,
and he was obliged to wait its pleasure at Point Levi. In the mean while
the garrison of the city was strengthened by troops from Sorel, under
McLean, and the prospect of success for the patriots was proportionably
lessened. At length the wind ceased. Between thirty and forty birch
canoes were procured, and about nine o'clock in the evening of the 13th
the first division crossed; before daylight five November, 1775 hundred
Americans landed safely, and rendezvoused at Wolfe's Cove. The ene- my
had placed a frigate (the Lizzard) and a sloop in the river, to
intercept them, but the vigilance of these they eluded until just as the
last party passed a guard-boat. One hundred and fifty men were at Point
Levi, but it was too late to return for them. No time was

* Morgan's riflemen wore linen frocks, their common uniform. The
Canadians, who first saw these emerge from the woods, said they were
_vêtu en toile_--clothed in linen cloth. The word _toile_ was changed
_tole_, iron plate.

** In earlier life Arnold was engaged in trafficking in horses, and
shipped many for the West Indies. He visited Quebec several times to
procure stock, and thus became well acquainted with the place and many
people there. His knowledge of the city and vicinity was doubtless one
cause that led to his appointment to the command of the expedition.

Arnold's Troops on the Plains of Abraham.--Expected Aid from within.--
Arnold's formal Summons to surrender

196to be lost, for the garrison would soon be alarmed. Arnold, placing
himself at the head of his little band of heroes, scaled the heights
where Wolfe had ascended sixteen years before, and at dawn they stood
upon the lofty Plains of Abraham. That goal where glory was to be won
and freedom vindicated, which had lured them from the camp at Cambridge,
and haunted them in their disturbed dreams amid the perils of the
wilderness, was now before the zealous patriots; but their hearts sank,
and the whisperings of hope were like the breathings of despair, when
they saw the dark castle and the massy walls that inclosed the garrison
of the enemy. They numbered only seven hundred and fifty men. They had
no artillery, and nearly half their muskets were rendered useless during
their march through the wilderness. They learned, too, that troops from
Sorel and Newfoundland had been added to the garrison, making an attack
upon the town a hopeless waste of effort. * But Arnold relied upon the
friendly disposition of the Canadian militia and the people of the city,
and, to ascertain their feelings, he drew up his men within eight
hundred yards of the walls and gave three cheers, hoping that the
regulars would sally out to attack them, and that then, the gates being
unclosed, he might rush in, and, by the aid of friends within, secure
the city. The parapets of the walls were lined by hundreds of the
people, and many of them huzzaed in return. Several guns were fired by
the Americans, but without effect. The British at length brought a
thirty-two pounder to bear upon the patriots, but not a shot injured
them. Lieutenant-governor Cramahé and M'Lean were too wary to be lured
into such a snare as making a sortie, for they knew well the disloyalty
of the French citizens and most of the leading men of Quebec. The
English citizens were much dissatisfied with the French laws that had
governed them since the passage of the "Quebec Bill," the previous year.

1774 The French, on the other hand, though petted, so as to be won,
could not forget their ancient national animosities, and were willing to
see the English discomfited. The unruly conduct of the soldiery had also
disgusted the people, and some were loud in their complaints against
Carleton and his deputy, for exposing Quebec, by withdrawing its
garrison when Montreal was threatened. The Royal Scotch, under M'Lean,
were all that could be certainly relied upon. These elements of
disaffection combined, made the force in the city, securely sheltered,
quite inactive, for M'Lean well knew that Arnold's little army was too
weak to attempt an assault, and he felt sure that the fierce winter
winds and driving snow would soon force them from their bleak
encampment.

Finding his attempts vain, by frequent hostile displays upon the
heights, to draw out the garrison, Arnold, in accordance with military
usage, sent a flag to M'Lean, with a formal summons to surrender,
threatening him with terrible disasters if he refused. The movement was
exceedingly ridiculous, and was not only treated with utter contempt by
the British commander, but the bearer was fired upon. ** About this time
Arnold learned that Carleton, who had fled from Montreal, was
approaching Quebec. He also inspected his ammunition and stores, and to
his surprise found that nearly all the cartridges were spoiled, hardly
five rounds to a man being left fit for use. Learning, also, from his
friends in the city, that a sortie was about to be made, he broke up his
camp and retreated to _Point aux Trembles_, twenty miles above Quebec,
to await the approaching troops of Montgomery. On his arrival at _Aux
Trembles_, Arnold was informed that Carleton had gone from that place
but a few hours before, and shortly afterward was heard the cannonading
at Quebec that welcomed his

* The garrison, including the regulars and militia within the town, and
the marines in the ships, was about eighteen hundred strong. Surprise
has been expressed that these did not march out and destroy the feeble
force of the Americans. The obvious reason was, that the majority of the
garrison troops were militia, and supposed to be ready to join the
Americans in the event of a battle.

** "It must be confessed," says Judge Henry, "that this ridiculous
affair gave me a contemptible opinion of Arnold. Morgan, Febiger, and
other officers did not hesitate to speak of it in that point of view.
However, Arnold had a vain desire to gratify. He was well known at
Quebee. Formerly, he had traded from this port to the West Indies, most
particularly in the article of horses; hence he was despised by the
principal people. The epithet of _horse-jockey_ was freely and
universally bestowed upon him by the British. Having now obtained power,
he became anxious to display it in the faces of those who had formerly
despised and contemned him."

Junction of Montgomery and Arnold.--Ineffectual Efforts against the
Town.--Mutiny in the Camp.--Plan of Assault

197return to the city. Montgomery landed at _Point aux Trembles_ on the
1st of December, his troops, by sickness and desertion, reduced to a
mere handful. There he took command of the combined troops, amounting to
only about nine hundred effective men. He brought clothing from Montreal
for Arnold's half-naked troops. The next day, in the face of a driving
snow-storm, they started for Quebec, and arrived in sight of the city on
the 5th. Their march was slow and excessively fatiguing, for the snow
was deep, and drifted high in the roads. Montgomery established his
headquarters at Holland House, and Arnold occupied a house near Scott's
Bridge. The Americans were chiefly encamped near the Intendant's Palace,
by the St. Charles, in the suburb St. Roche.

The American forces were considerably inferior in numbers to those of
the garrison, but this was unknown within the city. Montgomery
endeavored to send a summons to surrender, but Carleton would not allow
a flag to approach the walls. At length a letter was conveyed by a
citizen to Governor Carleton, in which Montgomery demanded an immediate
surrender, at the same time magnifying the number of his followers, and
threatening all the calamities of an assault. Although Carleton thought
Montgomery's army larger than it really was, he was not easily
frightened. Montgomery, like Arnold, counted upon friends within the
city, but they were paralyzed by the presence of troops, and dared do
nothing favorable to the besiegers. With no other ordinance than some
light cannon and a few mortars, a feeble, ill-clad, and ill-fed army,
exposed to the severest frost in the open fields, and snow falling
almost constantly, the American commander nearly despaired of success;
yet the love of his adopted country, and thoughts of the depression of
spirit throughout the colonies which a failure would produce, moved him
to extraordinary efforts. He resolved to annoy the people into
submission by harassing attacks upon the city, and accordingly attempted
to throw bombs over the walls. These efforts were unavailing, and he
then erected a six-gun battery upon some heaps of snow and ice within
seven hundred yards of the walls, but his guns were too light for any
efficiency. Nearly three weeks were thus consumed in unavailing attempts
to make an entrance. Mutinous murmurs were audible in the camp, the term
of service of many of the troops had nearly expired, the small-pox
appeared among the soldiers, and the general looked for a speedy
dissolution of his whole army.

Perils were gathering a fearful web around the brave Montgomery. He
called a council of war, and it was resolved, as a last resort, to make
a regular assault upon the town at different points. The troops were
accordingly ordered to parade in three divisions at two o'clock on the
morning of the 31st of December. All obeyed with alacrity, except three
companies of Arnold's detachment, whose term of service was about
expiring. They threatened to leave the army at once unless transferred
to another command, but the firmness and wisdom of Montgomery restored
order, and they took their places in the ranks. * The New York regiments
and a part of Easton's militia paraded at Holland House, under the
immediate command of Montgomery; the Cambridge detachment and Colonel
Lamb's company of artillerists, with one field piece, at Morgan's
quarters; and the two small corps of Livingston and Brown at their
respective parade-grounds. The plan was, for the first and second
divisions to assault the lower town on opposite sides, and the third,
under Livingston and Brown, to make feigned attacks, from the Plains of
Abraham, upon the upper town, in the neighborhood of St. John's and St.
Louis Gates and Cape Diamond Bastion.

Montgomery, at the head of the first division, descended from the Plains
of Abraham to Wolfe's Cove, south of the city, and commenced his march
toward the lower town by a road (now Champlain Street) that ran along
the margin of the river, under Cape Diamond. Ar-

* The cause of this outbreak is not known. Montgomery, in a letter to
Schuyler (the last he ever wrote), spoke of the occurrence, and
intimated that Major Brown was at the bottom of it. He promised a full
explanation in his next, but, alas! "the next" was never written. It
appears that Arnold had quarreled with Hanchet, one of his captains,
before reaching Point Levi, and two others took sides with the captain.
Brown and Arnold had quarreled at Ticonderoga, and it is supposed that
the former took this opportunity to gall Arnold, by widening the breach
between him and his captains, and endeavoring to get them detached from
Arnold's command and joined to his own.

Montgomery's Approach to Cape Diamond.--Opposing Battery.--His Charge
upon the Battery.--His Death.

198nold, at the head of the second division, advanced from the general
hospital, around the north side of the town, on the St. Charles.

Both parties were to meet at Mountain Street, and force Prescott Gate.
The snow was falling fast, and furious winds were piling it in frightful
drifts. Cautiously Montgomery led his men in the dark toward the
narrowest point under Cape Diamond, called _Pres de Ville_, where the
enemy had planted a battery of three pounders. * This post was in charge
of a captain of Canadian militia, with thirty-eight men, and nine
British seamen, under Captain Barnsfare, master of a transport, to work
the guns. On the river side was a precipice, and on the left the rough
crags of dark slate towered far above him. When within fifty yards of
the battery, the Americans halted to reconnoiter. The guard at the
battery and the artillerymen with lighted matches were perfectly silent,
and Montgomery concluded that they were not on the alert.

But Barnsfare, through the dim light of early dawn and the drifting
snow, saw faintly their movements. Montgomery, in the van of his troops,
cried out, "Men of New York, you will not fear to follow where your
general leads. March on!" and rushed boldly over heaps of ice and snow
to charge the battery.

At that moment, when the Americans were within forty paces, Captain
Barnsfare gave the word, the match was applied, and a discharge of
grape-shot swept the American column with terrible effect. Montgomery,
Major M'Phunn his aid, and Captain Cheeseman were killed, together with
several privates near. The rest, appalled at the dreadful havoc and the
death of their general, fled in confusion back to Wolfe's Cove, where
Colonel Campbell took the command, but made no further attempts to force
a junction with Arnold. Ten minutes the battery belched its iron storm
in the dim space, but, after the first discharge, there was no enemy
there to slaughter. **

* Judge Henry, who was one of the American prisoners at Quebec, was
allowed, with some others, to go out and see the place where Montgomery
was slain. He thus describes the British fortification there: It was a
sort of block-house forty or fifty feet square. The logs, neatly hewn,
were tightly bound together by dove-tail work. The lower story contained
loop-holes for musketry, so narrow that those within could not be harmed
by those without. The upper story had four or more port-holes for cannon
of a large caliber. These guns were charged with grape and canister
shot, and were pointed with exactness toward the avenue at Cape Diamond.
The block-house seemed to take up the space between the foot of the hill
and the river, leaving only a cart-way on each side. The bulwarks of the
city came only to the edge of the hill, above that place; hence down the
side of the precipice, slantingly to the brink of the river, there was a
stockade of strong posts fifteen or twenty feet high, knit together by a
stout railing at bottom and top with pins. It was asserted that
Montgomery sawed four of these posts himself, so as to admit four men
abreast to attack the block-house.

** This is a view of the spot where Montgomery was killed. The cliff is
Cape Diamond, crowned with the citadel. The street at the foot of it is
called Champlain, and is inhabited chiefly by a mixed population of
French, Canadians, and Irish. It extends from Mountain Street south
almost to Wolfe's Cove. This view is from Champlain Street, a few rods
south of _Près de Ville_, looking north. High upon the rocks Alfred
Hawkins, Esq., of Quebec, has placed a board with this inscription:
"Here Major-general Montgomery fell, December 31st, 1775."

Arnold's Operations.--Wounded.--Assailants led by Morgan.--Severe Fight-
-Capture of Dearborn.

199While this dreadful scene was in progress at Cape Diamond, Arnold, at
the head of the second division, was pressing onward along the St.
Charles, where the snow was worse drifted than on the St. Lawrence. He
led his men in files until he reached the narrow street called _Sault au
Matelot,_ where, under a high, jutting rock, the enemy had a two-gun
picketed battery, well manned.

Like Montgomery, he headed his men, and, while leading Lamb's artillery
to the attack upon the barrier, was completely disabled by a musket-
wound in the knee, and was carried back to the general hospital, where
he heard of the death of Montgomery. The command of his division now
devolved upon Morgan, and for more than an hour the Americans withstood
the storm of grape-shot and musket-balls at the first barrier, and
finally carried it, for the deadly aim of the riflemen caused great
consternation in the ranks of the enemy. Passing the first barrier, the
patriots rushed on to the second, which commanded both _Sault au
Matelot_ and St. Peter's Streets. The defenses here extended from the
cliff to the river; and the present custom-house, then a private
dwelling, had cannons projecting from the windows of the gable. Here a
fierce contest of three hours ensued, and many were killed on both
sides. At length the Americans took shelter from the fire of the
battery, in the houses on both sides of the street, and in the narrow
pass that leads up to Hope Gate. The English and Canadians already
occupied houses near, and the patriots were terribly galled on all
sides, and from the walls of the city above them.

Captain Lamb was severely wounded by a grape-shot, which carried away a
part of his cheek-bone, and other officers were more or less injured.
The Americans finally captured the barrier, and were preparing to rush
into the town, when Carleton sent a large detachment from the garrison,
through Palace Gate, to attack them in the rear. The news of the death
of Montgomery and the retreat of his detachment gave the people and the
troops within the walls fresh courage. Captain Dearborn, with some
provincials, was stationed near Palace Gate, and was completely
surprised when its leaves were thrown open and the troops rushed out. It
was a movement entirely unlooked for; and so suddenly and in such
overwhelming force did the enemy pour upon them, that: they were obliged
to surrender.

While Morgan was pressing on vigorously into the town, he heard of the
death of Montgomery, the capture of Dearborn and his company, and the
advance of the enemy in his rear. Surrounded by foes on all sides, and
every support cut off,

* This view is in a narrow alley near the north end of _Sault au
Matelot_ Street, in the rear of St. Paul's Street. At the time in
question St. Paul's Street did not exist, and the water, at high tide,
came nearly up to the precipice. The first barrier and battery extended
from the jutting roek seen in the picture, to the water. The present
alley was then the beach. The circular wall on the top of the roek is a
part of the grand battery, one of the most formidable and commanding
defenses in the world.

** This is one of the most beautiful gates of the city, and opens toward
the St. Charles, on the northern side of the town. A strong guard-house
is seen at the left, pierced for muskets to defend the entrance.
Immediately adjoining this gate are the artillery barracks. The gate is
at the northern extremity of Palace Street, one of the broadest in the
city, and "so named," says Hawkins, from the circumstance that it led
out to the Intendants house, or palace, which stood on the beach of the
St. Charles, where the queen's wood-yard now is.

Loss of the Americans at Quebec.--Recovery and Burial of Montgomery's
Body.--His Life and Services.--Courtesy of Carleton

200the patriots yielded, and surrendered themselves prisoners of war. *
The remainder of the division in the rear retreated to their camp,
leaving behind them one field piece and some mortars in a battery at St.
Roche. The whole loss of the Americans at Cape Diamond and _Sault au
Matelot_, in killed and wounded, was about one hundred and sixty. The
British loss was only about twenty killed and wounded.

As soon as hostilities ceased, search was made for the bodies of those
who fell with Montgomery. Thirteen were found nearly buried in the snow,
and with them was Montgomery's orderly sergeant, dreadfully wounded, but
alive. The sergeant would not acknowledge that his general was killed,
and persisted in his silence until he died, an hour afterward. For
several hours Carleton was uncertain whether the general was slain; but
a field officer among the captured troops of Arnold's division
recognized the body of the young hero among those in the guard-house,
and, it is said, he there pronounced a most touching eulogium on the
bravery and worth of the deceased, while tears of grief coursed down his
cheeks. ** Cramahé, the lieutenant governor, who had known Montgomery
years before, took charge of the body, and it was buried within a wall
that surrounded a powder magazine, near the ramparts bounding on St.
Louis Street, where it remained forty-two years. *** It has been well
observed that it would be difficult to select, from so small a body of
men as that engaged in besieging Quebec, so large a number who afterward
distinguished themselves for patriotism and courage, as that little band
presented. Morgan and his rifle corps became world renowned. Dearborn
was distinguished

* The force that surrendered consisted of 1 lieutenant colonel, 2
majors, 8 captains, 15 lieutenants, 1 adjutant, 1 quartermaster, 4
volunteers, 350 rank and file, and 44 officers and soldiers, who were
wounded, making a total of 426. The prisoners were treated humanely. The
officers were confined in the seminary, the oldest literary institution
in Quebec. Major Meigs was sent out for the clothing and baggage of the
prisoners, and all testified to the humanity of Carleton.

** Montgomery had a watch in his pocket which Mrs. M. was very desirous
of obtaining. She made her wishes known to Arnold, who sent word to
Carleton that any sum would be paid for it. Carleton immediately sent
the watch to Arnold, and refused to receive any thing in return.

*** Richard Montgomery was born in the north of Ireland in 1737. He
entered the army at the age of twenty, and was with Wolfe at the
storming of Quebec in 1759. He was in the campaign against the Spanish
West Indies, and afterward resided some time in this country. He quitted
his regiment and returned to England. While here he imbibed an
attachment for the country, and in 1772, returned to make it his home.
He purchased an estate upon the Hudson, in Rhinebeck, Dutchess county,
and married the daughter of Robert R. Livingston. When the Revolution
broke out, he espoused the cause of the colonists, and in the autumn of
1775 was second in command, under Schuyler, in the expedition against
Canada, with the rank of brigadier. The illness of Schuyler caused the
chief command to devolve upon Montgomery, and in the capture of St.
John's, Chambly, and Montreal, and his attack on Quebec, he exhibited
great judgment and military skill. He was commissioned a major general
before he reached Quebec. In "that campaign he had every difficulty to
contend with undisciplined and mutinous troops, scarcity of provisions
and ammunition, want of heavy artillery, lack of clothing, the rigor of
winter, and desertions of whole companies. Yet he pressed onward, and,
in all probability, had his life been spared, would have entered Quebec
in triumph. His death was a great public calamity, and throughout the
land public honors were paid to his memory. The eloquence of Chatham,
Burke, and Barré sounded his praises upon the floor of the British
Parliament, and the prime minister (Lord North), while acknowledging his
worth, and reprobating the cause in which he fell, concluded by saying,
"Curse on his virtues, they have undone his country." As soon as the
news of his death reached Congress, resolutions of condolence with his
family for their bereavement, and expressive of their "grateful
remembrance, profound respect, and high veneration," were adopted. It
was voted to erect a monument to his memory, which was accordingly done,
in the front of St. Paul's Church in New York city, on which is the
following inscription: This monument is erected by order of Congress,
25th of January, 1776, to transmit to posterity a grateful remembrance
of the patriotic conduct, enterprise, and perseverance of Major-general
Richard Montgomery, who, after a series of success amid the most
discouraging difficulties, Fell in the attack on Quebec, 31st December,
1775, aged 37 years.

*** In 1818 a request in behalf of the widow of General Montgomery was
made to the Governor-in-chief of Canada, Sir John Sherbrooke, to allow
his remains to be disinterred and conveyed to New York. The request was
readily acceded to, and Mr. James Thompson, of Quebec, who was one of
the engineers at the time of the storming of the city, and assisted in
burying the general, also assisted in the disinterment, making an
affidavit to the identity of the body. He said, in his affidavit, that
the body was taken to the house of Mr. Gobert, and placed in a coffin
lined with flannel and covered with black cloth; that Rev. Mr. de
Montmolin, chaplain to the garrison, performed the funeral service; that
Montgomery's aids (M'Pherson and Cheeseman) were buried in their
clothes, without coffins; and that he (Thompson) afterward wore
Montgomery's sword, but the American prisoners were so affected by the
sight of it, that he laid it aside. He identified the coffin taken up on
the 16th of June, 1818, as the one. The remains were placed in another
coffin and deposited beneath the monument.

*** The following is the inscription upon a silver plate on the coffin:
"The state of New York, in honor of General Richard Montgomery, who fell
gloriously fighting for the independence and liberty of the United
States before the walls of Quebec, the 31st of December, 1775, caused
these remains of the distinguished hero to be conveyed from Quebec, and
deposited, on the 8th day of July (1818), in St.' Paul's Church, in the
city of New York, near the monument erected to his memory by the United
States."

*** General Montgomery left no children whom "the state, in gratitude
toward their father, distinguished with every mark of kindness and
protection," as Botla asserts. His widow survived him more than half a
century. When at the house of his brother-in-law, the late Peter R.
Livingston, at Rhinebeck, a few years ago, I saw an interesting memento
of the lamented general. A day or two before he left home to join the
army under Schuyler, he was walking on the lawn in the rear of his
brother-in-law's mansion with the owner, and as they came near the
house, Montgomery stuck a willow twig in the ground, and said, "Peter,
let that grow to remember me by." It did grow, and is now a willow with
a trunk at least ten feet in circumference.

Eminent Officers at Quebec.--Promotion of Arnold.--Blockade of Quebec.--
Honor to the Memory of Montgomery.

201as a skillful officer at Saratoga and other fields of the Revolution,
and commanded the troops that captured York, in Upper Canada, in the
spring of 1813. Meigs boldly attacked April 27 and destroyed shipping
and stores at Sag Harbor, and of his regiment, and that of Febiger, were
the forlorn hope at Stony Point. Greene's prowess and skill were well
attested at Red Bank, on the Delaware. Thayer behaved nobly in defense
of Fort Mifilin, opposite Red Bank. Lamb was distinguished at Compo,
Fort Montgomery, and Yorktown. Oswald was at Compo, and fought bravely
at Monmouth; and Poterfield was killed at Camden, in South Carolina,
when Gates was so terribly defeated there. M'Pherson and Cheese-man, *
Montgomery's aids, were brave and accomplished, and gave assurance of
future renown; but they fell with their leader, and share with him the
grateful reverence of posterity.

Colonel Arnold took command of the remnant of the patriot army after the
death of Montgomery, and was promoted to the rank of brigadier general.
He could muster only about eight hundred men; and, feeling unsafe in his
camp under the walls of the city, he retired about three miles from the
town, intrenched himself as well as circumstances would allow, and
assumed the attitude of a blockade, hoping, by cutting off supplies for
the city from the country, to bring the enemy to terms. Carleton,
feeling secure within the walls, and expecting re-enforcements from
England as soon as the ice should move out of the St. Law-

* This officer had a presentiment that he should not survive the battle.
When preparing to go forth on that stormy December morning, he dressed
himself with more care than usual, and putting a considerable sum of
money, in gold, in his pocket, remarked, with a smile, "This will insure
me a decent burial." He was of the New York line. A sergeant and eleven
men fell with him. He was not instantly killed, but arose to press
forward to charge the battery. It was a feeble effort, and he fell back
a corpse, in a winding-sheet of snow.

Small-pox in the Army.--Preparations to storm Quebec.--Arrival and Death
of General Thomas.--Temperance Cross.

202rence, remained quiet; and in this relative position the belligerents
continued until the 1st of April, when General Wooster, who had remained
inactive all winter in Montreal, came down, and, being superior in rank
to Arnold, took the chief command. The force which he brought with him,
and the small addition made by troops that reached the encampment from
New England during the winter, and Canadian recruits, swelled the army
to nearly three thousand, eight hundred of whom were sick with the
small-pox, which raged terribly in the American camp.

Preparations were made to beleaguer the city at once. A battery was
erected upon the Plains of Abraham, and another at Point Levi, and a
cannonade was opened upon the town, but without effect. At that moment
the falling of Arnold's horse upon his wounded leg so disabled him, that
he was unfit for active service, and he asked and obtained leave from
General Wooster (with whom he was upon unfriendly terms) to retire to
Montreal. General Thomas, who was appointed to succeed Montgomery,
arrived early in May, but Carleton having received re-enforcements under
Burgoyne, the Americans were obliged to make a hasty retreat, leaving
their stores and sick behind. The latter were kindly treated, and
finally sent home. At the mouth of the Sorel the Americans were re-
enforced, but they could not brave the power of the enemy. General
Thomas died there of small-pox, and Sullivan succeeded to the command. *
But Burgoyne, with a considerable force, was pressing forward, and
ultimately, as we have noted in a preceding chapter, the patriots were
driven out of Canada.

We have taken a long historic ramble; let us vary our pleasure by a ride
to Montmorenci, and a visit to other celebrities about Quebec.

The morning was excessively hot when we left, the city for the falls of
the Montmorenci

Our egress was from the Palace Gate, and with us was quite a train of
vehicles destined for the same point. We passed through the suburb of
St. Boche, in the lower town, and crossed over Dorchester Bridge, a
noble structure which spans the St. Charles, a short distance below the
site of the old bridge fortified by Montcalm. The distance from Quebec
to the Montmorenci is between seven and eight miles. The road
(McAdamized) is very good, and passes through a rich and thoroughly
cultivated region. Like the road from St. John's to Chambly and
Longueuil, it is so thickly strewn with farmhouses that we seemed to be
in a suburban street the whole distance. The village of Beauport, an old
town, where Montcalm's headquarters were, is about midway between the
St. Charles and the Montmorenci, and, like other Lower Canadian
villages, has an antiquated appearance. Between Quebec and Beauport we
passed a large gilt cross reared upon the top of a beautiful Corinthian
column, painted white, green, and vermilion. It was erected, as we were
told, by some priests in Quebec, and consecrated to the cause of
temperance. A strong iron railing incloses it, except in front, where
two o three steps lead to a platform at the foot of the column, whereon
devout passers-by may kneel in prayer. **

* John Thomas was descended from a respectable family of Plymouth,
Massachusetts. He served, with reputation, in the French and Indian war.
At the head of a regiment raised by himself in Kingston, Massachusetts,
he marched to Roxbury in 1775, and joined the Continental army. Congress
appointed him one of the first eight brigadier generals, and he
commanded a division at the siege of Boston. In March, 1776, he was
appointed a major general, and on the 1st of May following joined the
army before Quebec. He died of small-pox, at Chambly, on the second of
June. General Thomas was greatly beloved by his soldiers, and his
judgment, prudence, and firmness commended him to Washington as one
promising to do much for the cause of the colonists.

**This sketch is a view from within Palace Street, looking out upon the
open country beyond the St Charles. The river, with a few masts, is seen
just over the top of the gate. Adjoining the gate, on the right, is seen
a portion of the guard-house.

French Canadian Children.--Falls of Montmorenci.--Island of Orleans.--
Point Levi Quebec in the Distance.

203After passing Beauport, we were beset by troops of urchins, who stood
in groups making polite bows to win attention and coin, or ran beside
the carriage with the speed of trotting horses, lustily crying out, with
extended hand, "_un sou! un sou!_"

They were miniature Falstaffs in figure, some not more than four or five
years old, with dark skins and lustrous black eyes. It was amusing to
see their vigorous but good-natured scrambles for a _sou_ when cast
among them, and the persevering race of the unsuccessful for the next
expected piece of copper. Many a dollar is thus scattered and picked up
by the road side to Montmorenci, during "the season," for the amusement
of the passengers and the comfort of the habitans.

We left our barouche on the south side of the Montmorenci, and crossing,
upon a bridge, the turbulent stream that rushes, leaping and foaming
among broken rocks, toward the cascade 'ust below, we paid a _sou_ each
to a pretty French girl who guarded a gate opening to a winding pathway
through the fields to the margin of the bank a little below the falls.
The path is down a gentle slope for several rods, and at almost every
step the picturesque scenery of the cascade assumes a new aspect.

These falls, though much higher than those of Niagara, have none of the
grandeur of that great wonder. Our first thought here is, How beautiful,
but when the eye and the ear are first impressed with the avalanche of
waters at Niagara, the solemn thought is, How sublime and wonderful!
When we visited the Montmorenci, a long drought had greatly diminished
the volume of its waters, yet it exhibited a scene strikingly
picturesque and pleasing. For two or three hundred yards the river is
confined in a narrow limestone bed, whence it rushes with great velocity
to the brink of the precipice, and leaps into a crescent-shaped bay of
the St. Lawrence, more than two hundred feet below. There, at low tide,
the bare rocks receive the flood, and send up clouds of spray a hundred
feet or more, on which the rays of the evening sun often depict the
beautiful bow. In front, cleaving the broad bosom of the St. Lawrence,
is the Island of Orleans, a paradise of beauty in summer, and a place of
much resort by the citizens of Quebec, particularly the English
residents, who see in it much that resembles their "sweet Devonshire
coast." Its length is nineteen miles, and its average breadth about
five. A population of five thousand inhabit it, and its rich soil is
thoroughly cultivated for the production of vegetables for the Quebec
market. Beyond, on the right, is Point Levi, and up the St. Lawrence,
glittering in the sun, lies Quebec. Grouping the beauties of the natural
scenery, the historical associations, and the delights of a summer ride,
a trip to Montmorenci is an event to be long remembered with pleasure.
The sun was at meridian, and the mercury indicated ninety-

* The river, in this channel, is not more than twelve feet wide, and
here the Natural Steps occur. They rise on one side of the stream like
irregular stairs. They have been formed by the action of the water on
the softer layers of limestone, and present a curiosity for the visitor.

Religious Edifices in Quebec.--The Citadel and the Walls.--View from
Dalhousie Bastion.--Plains of Abraham.

204three degrees in the shade. The points of view were sparsely shadowed
by trees, and we tarried only long enough to glance at the beauties of
the fall and steal its features with a pencil, and then returned to
Quebee, where, before dinner, we visited several churches, the chapel of
the Ursuline Convent, * the Seminary of Quebec, **the chapel of the
Hotel Dieu, *** and the citadel.

The citadel crowning Cape Diamond is a combination of powerful works. It
is three hundred and fifty feet above the river, and is terminated on
the east by a round tower, over which floats the national standard of
England, the flag

"That's braved, a thousand years,

The battle and the breeze."

The approach to the citadel is by a winding road through the acclivity
of the _glacis_ from St. Louis Gate. It is foreign to my plan to notice
in detail modern fortifications upon Revolutionary ground, and we will
stop to consider only a few points of interest in this most perfect
military work. The main entrance is through Dalhousie Gate, where we
presented our permit, and were joined by a young Highland soldier to
guide and guard us. On the top of _Dalhousie Bastion_ is a covered way
with a broad gravel walk, from which is obtained the finest view of the
city, harbor, and surrounding country. The St. Charles is seen winding
through a beautiful undulating plain, and the spires of Beauport.
Charlesbourg, and Lorette, with the white cottages around them, form a
pleasing feature in the landscape. The citadel and its ravelins cover
about forty acres; and the fortifications, consisting of bastions,
curtains of solid masonry, and ramparts twenty-five to thirty feet in
height, mounted with cannon, are continued entirely around the upper
town. Upon the cliff called _Sault au Matelot_ is the grand battery, of
eighteen thirty-two pounders, commanding the basin and harbor below. At
the different gates of the city sentinels are posted day and night, and
in front of the jail and other publie buildings the solemn march of
military guards is seen The garrison at Quebee numbered about three
thousand soldiers. Among them was the 79th regiment of Scotch
Highlanders, lately from Gibraltar. They were six hundred strong, and,
dressed in their picturesque costume, made a fine appearance. To a
stranger the military forms a principal feature of Quebee, and the mind
is constantly carried back to the era of Froissart, when "Everie fayre
towne had strong high walls, and bowmen and spearmen were more numerous
than all others."

We left the citadel, emerged from St. Louis Gate, and, after visiting
the monument where "Wolfe died victorious," rode over the battle-ground
upon the Plains of Abraham, and, crossing to the _St. Foix_ Road, went
into the country as far as Holland House (the headquarters of
Montgomery), and then returned, pleased and wearied, to the Albion. We
strolled at evening through the governor's garden, rested upon Durham
Terrace (see view on page 185), which was crowded with promenaders, and,
losing our way in trying to ferret out the Albion, found ourselves at
Hope Gate, where a kind priest, in long black cassock and broad beaver,
conducted us back to Palace Street.

I devoted the following day to business. Before breakfast I went to
Durham Terrace,

* The Ursuline Convent is situated on Parloir Street, near the English
Cathedral. Influenced by an appeal from the French Jesuits of Canada, a
young widow of Alençon, named Madame de la Poltrie, resolved to devote
her life and fortune to the work of establishing a convent in Quebee.
She founded the Ursuline Convent in 1641. An excellent school for the
education of females is attached to it. In the chapel, as already
noticed, is an inscribed marble slab, in memory of Montcalm, whose body
lies within the grounds of the institution.

** This literary institution was founded in 1633, by De Laval de
Montmorency, the first bishop of Canada The professors, and all attached
to it, receive no money compensation; they are simply guarantied "food
and raiment, in sickness and in health." The chapel contains several
fine paintings. The library has nearly 10,000 volumes.

*** The Hotel Dieu, a nunnery, stands between Palace and Hope Gates. It
was founded in 1636, by the Duchess d'Aquillon, a niece of the famous
Cardinal Richelieu. The cardinal was a liberal benefactor of the
establishment during his life. The chapel is plain, and has but a few
paintings.

Historical Localities at Quebec.--An alarmed Englishman.--Wolfe and
Montcalm's Monument.--Departure for Montreal.

205and sketched Point Levi and the adjacent scenery beyond the St.
Lawrence; and after receiving explicit directions respecting the various
historical localities about the city from an old and intelligent
resident, I procured a caleche and started in search of them, the result
of which is given in the several sketches and the descriptions on
preceding pages. As the day advanced, the heat became almost
intolerable, until we reached the cool retreats of Wolfe's Cove, where,
in the shade of a maple that overhangs a bubbling spring, I loitered an
hour., dreading my intended ramble over the Plains of Abraham above. We
slowly ascended the steep and winding road up Wolfe's Ravine (in pity
for the poor horse, walking half the way), and at the top I dismissed
the vehicle and went over the plains on foot. Hardly a shrub breaks the
smooth surface. The ground slopes from the city, and only a few chimney-
tops and a roof or two indicated the presence of a populous town.

While sketching the broken monument on the spot where Wolfe fell, a
young Englishman, full of zeal for the perpetuity of British colonial
rule, was a spectator, and was very inquisitive respecting my
intentions. With a pointer's keen perception, he determined my
whereabout when at home, and of course looked upon me as a meddling
foreigner. He saw me using the pencil on Durham Terrace in the morning,
and also happened to pass while I was delineating Palace Gate. The idea
of "horrible rebellion" and "Yankee sympathy" seemed to haunt his mind,
and I fed his suspicions so bountifully with sinless fibs, that before I
finished my sketch he started off for the city, fully impressed with the
notion that he had discovered an emissary from the War Department at
Washington, collecting military data preparatory to an invasion of her
majesty's dominions!

I soon followed him, glad to escape from the burning heat upon the
plains, and took shelter under the lofty trees in the governor's garden,
near the citadel, a delightful public promenade on the west side of _Des
Carrières_ Street. In the garden, near the street, is a fine monument,
consisting of an obelisk and pedestal of granite, erected to the memory
of Wolfe and Montcalm. At the suggestion of Earl Dalhousie, who was
Governor of Canada in 1827, a subscription was opened for the purpose,
and when it reached seven hundred pounds, the earl made up the
deficiency and superintended the erection of the monument. It bears the
names of Wolfe and Montcalm, and a Latin explanatory inscription. *

We left Quebec toward evening for Montreal, August 11, 1848 on our way
up the St. Lawrence to Ontario. A gentle shower crossed our track two
miles distant, leaving a cool breeze upon the waters, and dispelling the
haziness of the atmosphere. Like a thin veil, it hung athwart the
eastern sky, not thick enough to cover the face of the moon that gleamed
dimly through it, yet sufficiently dense to refract and reflect the
solar rays, and exhibit the radiant bow. While admiring the beautiful
phenomenon, I had occasion to administer a quiet rebuke to a young fop,
whose attempts at wit, loud tone, and swaggering manner had attracted
our attention at the dinner-table at Quebec. He was accompanied by an
elderly lady and two young maidens, and on the boat I observed him
contributing largely to the amusement of the latter by asking silly
questions of unsuspecting passengers, and receiving grave and polite
answers, over which they made merry. At length it was my turn to be his
"subject."

"Can you tell me," he said, "what causes that rainbow?" "Do you ask for
information?" I inquired, in return. "Well, yes," he said, a little
confused. "Do you understand the Newtonian

* The following is the inscription: Mortem virtus, commtinem famam
historia, monumentum postcrita dedit. Hanc columnam in virorum
illustrium memoriam Wolfe et Montcalm P. C. Georgius Comes De Dalhousie
in Septentrionalis Americæ partibus ad Britannos pertimentibus summam
rerum adminisirans; opus per multos annos prætermissum, quid duci
egregio convenientius? Auctorifate promorens, exemplo stimulans,
munificentia fovens A.S., MDCCCXXVII., Georgio IV., Britanniarum Rege.

A Fop's Lesson.--Arrival at La Chine.--The Cascades.--Dangerous Voyage.-
-Moore's Boat Song.

206theory of light? the laws of refraction and reflection? and are you
familiar with the science of optics?" I asked, with a serious manner.
"No, not much," he mumbled, with an effort to assume a careless air. "I
perceive, sir, that you are not far enough advanced in knowledge to
understand an explanation if I should give it," I mildly replied, and
left him to his own reflections. Perhaps I was rude in the presence of
that matron and those young girls, but the injunction of high authority,
to "answer a fool according to his folly," did not parley with
politeness. The maidens, half smiling, bit their lips, while the young
man gazed steadfastly from the window of the saloon upon the beautiful
shores we were passing by. They were, indeed beautiful, dotted with
villages, neat white farm-houses, fields of grain, and wide-spreading
woods bathed in the light of the evening sun; and I hope the calm beauty
of the scene, above and below, soothed the disquieted spirit of the
young gazer, and awakened in his bosom aspirations for that wisdom which
leads her willing pupils to perceive

"Tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,

Sermons in stones, and good in every thing."

We arrived at Montreal at six in the morning, left it by rail-road at
ten for La Chine, nine miles distant, and at the head of La Chine Rapids
embarked in the steamer British Queen for Ogdensburgh. We were soon at
the foot of the Cascades, or St. Ann's Rapids, near the southwestern
extremity of the Island of Montreal.

The St. Lawrence here falls eighty-seven feet in the distance of seven
miles. Steamboats and other vessels go _down_ the rapids, but are
obliged to ascend through the Beauharnois Canal, which we entered at
about noon. This canal is fifteen miles long, fifty feet wide, and nine
feet deep. The navigation of the rapids is very dangerous, and vessels
are sometimes wrecked upon the submerged rocks. A sloop, loaded with
staves and lumber, was lying in the midst of the foaming rapids, where
it had struck the day before while guided by an unskillful pilot. The
canal voyage was slow, for we passed nine locks before we reached the
waters above Lake St. Louis, an expansion of the river, where the Ottawa
or Utawas comes sweeping around each side of Isle Pero, at its mouth,
and swells the volume of

* These rapids are so called from the circumstance that a village of the
same name is near. This was considered by the Canadian _voyageurs_ the
place of departure when going from Montreal on fur-trading excursions,
as here was the last church upon the island. This fact suggested to
Moore the thoughts expressed in the first verse of his _Canadian Boat
Song _:

"Faintly as tolls the evening chime,

Our voices keep tune and our oars keep time,

Soon as the woods on shore look dim,

We'll sing at St. Ann's our evening hymn.

Row, brothers, row, the stream runs fast,

The rapids are near, and the daylight's past."

* Moore says, in reference to this song, "I wrote these words to an air
which our boatmen sung to us frequently while descending the St.
Lawrence from Kingston to Montreal. Our voyageurs had good voices, and
sung perfectly in tune together. I remember when we had entered, at
sunset, upon one of those beautiful lakes into which the St. Lawrence so
grandly and unexpectedly opens, I have heard this simple air with a
pleasure which the finest compositions of the first masters have never
given me."

Junction of the Ottawa and St. Lawrence.--Cedars Rapids.--Garrison there
in 1776.--Conduct of Bedell and Butterfield.

207the St. Lawrence with its turbid flood. * We were most of the time in
full view of the river, and had a fine opportunity to observe the
people, dwellings, and agricultural operations along ihe line of the
canal.

We passed the Cedars Rapids, twenty-four miles from La Chine, at about
three o'clock. These rapids vary in intricacy, depth, and rapidity of
current, and are nine miles long, running at the rate of nine to twelve
miles an hour. In some places the rocks are covered with only a few feet
of water, and the descent is at all times rather perilous. Small
islands, covered with trees and shrubbery, accelerate the speed of the
waters. These rapids derive their name from the village of Cedars, on
the north side of the St. Lawrence, in Vaudreuil district. The sketch
was made from the steam-boat, in the canal, while stopping for wood and
water at St. Timothy.

The Cedars occupy quite a conspicuous place in the annals of the
Northern campaign of 1775--76. Three hundred and ninety Americans, under
Colonel Bedell, of the New Hampshire line, occupied a small fortress
there in the spring of 1776. Early in May, Captain Foster, of the
British army, with a detachment of forty regulars, one hundred
Canadians, and five hundred Indians, under the celebrated Brant, or
Thayendanegea, descended from the British station at the mouth of the
Oswegatchie (now Ogdensburgh), and approached the fort. Bedell, under
pretense of going to Montreal for re-enforcements, left the garrison in
command of Major Butterfield, an officer quite as void of courage as his
superior. Both have been branded by cotemporary writers as cowards, and
their conduct on this occasion confirms the opinion. ** Butterfield did
not even make a fair show of resistance, but quietly

* For several miles below the confluence of the two rivers the muddy
water of the Ottawa and the clear stream of the St. Lawrence are seen
contending for the mastery. The line of derbarkation may be traced by
the color even below the St. Ann's Rapids.

** Washington, writing to General Sehuyler under date of June 10th,
1776, said, "If the accounts of Colonel Bedell and Major Butterfield's
conduct be true, they have certainly acted a part deserving the most
exemplary notice. I hope you will take proper measures, and have good
courts appointed to bring them, and every other officer that has been or
shall be guilty of misconduct, to trial, that they may be punished
according to their offenses. Our misfortunes at the Cedars were
occasioned, as it is said, entirely by their base and cowardly behavior,
and can not be ascribed to any other cause." A late writer for one of
our weekly papers, in giving a "true account of the Northern campaign,"
is particularly laudatory of the bravery of Colonel Bedell at St. John's
and Chambly. He seems to regard all the official and other records of
the events there as quite erroneous, and "sets the matter right" by
quoting a letter written by Bedell to the Committee of Safety of New
Hampshire. He calls the style of the letter "Caesarean," and in the free
use of the pronoun I there is certainly a similarity to Caesar's _Veni,
Vidi, Vici_. Taking the colonel's letter as verity, we must suppose
that, in the capture of Forts Chambly and St. John's, Montgomery and all
other officers were mere puppets in his hands. In a postscript he says,
"This moment I have got possession of St. John's; and the post being
obliged to set off, have not time to copy the articles of capitulation;
and to-morrow shall march for Montreal, leaving a detachment to keep the
fort." Other portions of his letter plainly indicate that he wished to
impress those who sent him to the field with the idea that he was the
master-spirit there. I should not have noticed this matter so minutely
but for the disposition of a class of writers at present to make
prominent the exploits of subalterns, upon ex-parte evidence, by hiding
the brilliant deeds of those to whom compatriots and cotemporary
historians have awarded the highest meed of praise. It is an easy, and
the only, way to make a sapling conspicuous, to fell the noble trees
that surround and overshadow it.

Massacre of Sherburne's Corps.--Attempt of Arnold to release the
Prisoners.--Menaces of the Indians.--Letter from Sherburne

May 15, 1775 surrendered208 the fort and garrison as soon as Foster
arrived. Meanwhile, Major Henry Sherburne was sent by Arnold from
Montreal, with one hundred and forty men, to re-enforce the, garrison,
but Bedell, "valuing safety more than fidelity and honor," * refused to
accompany him. Sherburne arrived upon the shore of Lake St. Louis on the
day of the surrender, and, having crossed the day after, left forty men
as guards, and, with one hundred, proceeded toward the fort, unconscious
of the disgraceful conduct of Butterfield. About five in the evening the
whole force of Foster's Canadians and Indians burst from an ambuscade
and fell upon the republicans. They made a brave defense for nearly an
hour and a half, when the Indians, in number greatly superior, formed a
girdle around them, and at a given signal rushed upon the devoted little
band and disarmed them. Infuriated by the obstinate resistance of the
Americans, the Indians butchered about twenty of them with knives and
tomahawks, and, stripping the remainder almost naked, drove them in
triumph to the fort. ** The loss of the Americans, in the action and by
massacre, was fifty-eight; the enemy lost twenty-two, among whom was a
brave of the Senecas.

As soon as Arnold heard of the disasters at the Cedars, he marched with
about eight hundred men against the enemy, then at Vaudreuil, for the
two-fold purpose of chastising May, 1776 them and releasing the American
prisoners. He arrived at St. Ann's on the afternoon of the 20th, at
which time the bateaux of the enemy were distinctly seen taking the
American prisoners from an island three miles distant, toward the main
land on the south side of the St. Lawrence. About the same time a party
of Caughnawaga Indians, *** whom Arnold had sent to the hostile savages
in the morning, demanding a surrender of the prisoners, and threatening
them with extermination if any more murders of Americans should be
perpetrated, returned with an answer of defiance. The Indians sent back
word to Arnold that they were too numerous to fear him, and that if he
should attempt to cross the river and land, for the purpose of rescuing
the Americans, every prisoner should be immediately put to death.
Unmindful of this threat, Arnold filled his boats with men, and
proceeded to the island which the enemy had just left. Five Americans,
naked and almost famished, were there, and informed him that all the
other prisoners, except two (who, being sick, were butchered), had been
taken to _Quinze Chiens_, four miles below. Arnold, with his flotilla,
proceeded thither. The enemy opened an ineffectual fire upon them, but
as night May 26, 1776 was closing in, and his men were fatigued, the
general returned to St. Ann's and called a council of war. He there
received a flag from the British commander, accompanied by a letter from
Major Sherburne, giving him the assurances that if he persisted in his
design of attacking him, it would be entirely out of his power to
restrain his savages from disencumbering themselves of the prisoners, by
putting them to death. Major Sherburne confirmed the information that a
massacre had already been agreed upon. Foster also demanded of Arnold an
agreement, on his part, to a proposed cartel which Sherburne and the
other officers had been compelled to sign. This agreement covenanted for
the delivery of

* Gordon, ii., 65.

** Stone, in his Life of Brant, asserts that that chief used his best
endeavors to restrain the fury of the In dians after the surrender of
Sherburne. Captain M'Kinstry (late Colonel M'Kinstry, of Livingston's
Manor, Columbia county) commanded the company, on that occasion, which
fought most obstinately with the In dians. On that account the savages
had determined to put him to death by the torture, and had made
preparations for the horrid rite. Brant interposed, and, in connection
with some humane English officers, made up a purse and purchased an ox,
which the Indians roasted for their carousal instead of the prisoner.
Brant and M'Kinstry became personal friends, and the chief often visited
the latter at the manor after the war.--_Life of Brant,_ i., 155.

*** The Caughnawagas called themselves the Seven Nations of Canada. Many
of them were with the Mohawks and others of the Six Nations of New York
in the battle of the Cedars, but those upon the Island of Montreal were
friendly to the republicans. A remnant of the tribe now inhabit a
village called Caughnawaga, about twelve miles from Montreal, and
profess Christianity. They have a handsome church, are industrious,
temperate, and orderly, and, unlike others of the Indian tribes,
increase rather than diminish in population. I saw several of them in
Montreal selling their ingenious birch bark and bead work. They are
quite light, having doubtless a liberal tincture of French blood. Their
language is a mixture of Iroquois and French.

Dishonorable Conduct of a British Commander.--Washington's Opinion.--
Final Adjustment--Cairn on the St. Lawrence

209an equal number of British soldiers in exchange for the Americans,
with the condition that the latter should immediately return to their
homes, and not again take up arms. Four American captains were to go to
Quebec as hostages till the exchange should be effected. Arnold was
strongly averse to making such an agreement, but the dictates of
humanity and the peculiar circumstances of the case caused him to yield
to the terms, except the conditions that the Americans should not again
take up arms, and that they should be pledged not to give any
information, by words, writings, or signs, prejudicial to his majesty's
service. Foster waived these points, and the convention was signed. *

The part performed by Foster in coercing the American officers into
compliance with his demands, by suspending the bloody hatchet of the
Indians over their heads, was thought disgraceful, and Congress refused
to ratify the agreement, except upon such terms as the British
government would never assent to. Although Washington abhorred the act,
he considered the convention binding; and General Howe complained of the
bad faith of Congress. The British government, however, indicated its
appreciation of the matter by letting the waters of oblivion flow
quietly over the whole transaction. The prisoners were finally released
by General Carleton, and the hostages at Quebec were sent home on
parole.

Arnold, with his detachment, returned to Montreal, where, a few days
afterward, a Committee of Congress, consisting of Franklin, Chase, and
Carroll, arrived, to inquire into the state of affairs. Their mission
was fruitless, for all hope of maintaining a foothold in Canada was
abandoned by the military leaders, and, as previously noted, the
Americans soon afterward withdrew entirely from the province.

We entered the lake near Grand Island, above Cedars Rapids, and, passing
the Rapids of _Coteau du Lac_, six miles above the latter, landed at a
pretty little village of the same name. Here the St. Lawrence expands
into one of those broad lakes which mark its course from Ontario to the
gulf. It is called Lake St. Francis, and is forty miles long, and in
some places twelve or thirteen broad. Beautiful islands, covered with
timber and luxuriant shrubbery, are scattered over its bosom. We passed
many of those floating islands--extensive rafts of lumber--which
indicate a chief feature in the commerce of that noble river. On one of
the small islands on the northern shore, opposite the district of
Glengary, is a huge "cairn," sixty feet high, the pinnacle of which is
an iron cannon, from whose muzzle a flag-staff is projected. A spiral
path-way leads from base to summit, sufficiently wide for a person to
pass up and down by it in safety.

It is built of loose stones, without mortar or cement.

The people of the neighboring parish of Glengary (who are chiefly
Scotch), under the direction of Colonel Carmichael, reared it, in
general testimony of their loyalty during the Canadian rebellion so
called, of 1837--8, and in especial honor of Sir John Colborne (now Lord
Seaton), who was the commander-in-chief of the British forces in Canada
at that time. In imitation of the manner in which tradition asserts that
the ancient cairns were built, each person in the district, man, woman,
and child, capable of lifting a stone, went to the island and added one
to the pile. We passed St. Cairn **

* Marshall, Gordon, Allen, Sparks.

** This is probably the only structure of the kind on the American
continent. Cairn is a word of Celtic origin, used to denote the conical
piles of stones frequently found upon the hills of Britain. These piles
are supposed by some to have been erected as memorials of some local
event, while others assign to them a sepulchral character. Some are
supposed to be sacrificial, like the carnedd of the Welsh. They all have
a similar appearance wherever found, being composed of loose stones
piled in a conical form.

St Regis and its ancient Church.--Passage of Rapids.--Wind-mill Point
and Ogdensburgh.--Loyalty of a British Veteran

210Regis, * the first village upon the St. Lawrence within the territory
of the United States, about sunset, and before the twilight had entirely
faded we were again out of the river and in the Cornwall Canal, on the
north side of the St. Lawrence, to avoid the swift rapids, called the
_Long Sault,_ nearly two miles in extent. We passed the _Du Platte_
Rapids in the night, and at dawn entered the _Gallopes or Galoose_
Rapids, nine miles below Ogdensburgh. These are a mile and a half long,
and present a formidable obstacle to the upward passage of vessels. The
channel is exceedingly narrow, and very near the southern shore. With
three men at the tiller-wheel, and a full head of steam, our goodly
"Queen" came up to the most rapid and intricate part, where, for nearly
ten minutes, it was difficult to determine whether an inch of progress
was made, and we were more than half an hour in making the mile and a
half. The usual time occupied in going down from Ogdensburgh to Montreal
by steam-boat is nine hours. On account of rapids and currents, and the
canal navigation, the voyage up occupies about seventeen hours.

We caught the first rays of the morning sun reflected from the spires at
Prescott and Ogdensburgh, flourishing villages, which flank the St.
Lawrence at the head of all its numerous rapids. Wind-mill Point, on the
Canada side, is close by, and as we passed the famous cape we were
edified with a running commentary on the beneficence of monarchy and the
horrors of republicanism, from an old officer of a British corps of
marine engineers, who, with his daughter, was a passenger from Montreal.
He had amused me for an hour the evening previous, after passing St.
Regis, by a relation of his personal adventures in that vicinity during
our last war with Great Britain. He then commanded a gun-boat with
eighty men; and he boasted, with much warmth and satisfaction, of the
terrible manner in which he galled the Yankees with "grape and
cannister" at the time of the engagements at Chrysler's Farm,
Williamsburgh, and near St. Regis. He was bubbling over with loyalty,
and became rabid at the mere mention of _annexation_. His head was white
with the bleaching of threescore and ten years. Great experience and
extensive practical knowledge, with frankness and volubility in
conversation, made him a most agreeable companion, and we much regretted
parting with him and his amiable daughter at Kingston.

I called Wind-mill Point a "famous cape." Its notoriety is very
youthful, yet its history is one of those epitomes of progress worth
noticing, which make up the movements of the nations. It was here that
the Canada patriots (so called) in 1837 took post with a view of
attacking Fort Wellington, a small fortification between the point and
Prescott. There

* St. Regis is an old Indian village, and contains a small Roman
Catholic Church, built about the year 1700. It is said that the priest
informed the Indians that a bell was highly important to their worship,
and they were ordered to collect furs sufficient to purchase one. They
obeyed, and the money was sent to France for the purpose. The French and
English were then at war. The bell was shipped, but the vessel that
conveyed it fell into the hands of the English, and was taken into
Salem, in the fall of 1703. The bell was purchased for a small church at
Deerfield, on the Connecticut River, the pastor of which was the Rev.
Mr. Williams.

The priest of St. Regis heard of the destination of his bell, and, as
the Governor of Canada was about to send an expedition, under Major
Rouville, against the colonies of New England, he exhorted the Indians
to accompany him and get possession of it. Rouville, with 200 French and
142 Indians, arrived near Deerfield in the evening of the 29th of
February, 1704. During the night they attacked the unsuspecting
villagers, killed 47, and made 112 prisoners. The latter, among whom
were the pastor and a part of his family, were taken to Canada. The only
house left standing was that of Mr. Williams, which the assailants
themselves occupied in securing their prisoners. It is still standing,
near the center of the village, and is represented in the annexed cut.
The bell was conveyed in triumph through the forest to Lake Champlain,
to the spot where Burlington now stands, and there they buried it with
the benedictions of Father Nicolas, the priest of St. Regis, who
accompanied them. Thus far they had carried it, by means of timber, upon
their shoulders. They hastened home, and returned in early spring with
oxen and sled to convey the sacred bell, now doubly hallowed in their
minds, to its destination.

The Indians of the village had never heard the sound of a bell, and
powerful was the impression upon their minds when its deep tones, louder
and louder, broke the silence of the forest as it approached their
village at evening, suspended upon a cross piece of timber, and rung
continually by the delighted carriers. It was hung in the steeple, and
there it remains. The material incidents of this narrative doubtless
occurred, but later investigations show that the bell was taken to a
church at Caughnawaga, near Montreal, instead of St. Regis.--See Hough's
_Hist, of St. Lawrence and Franklin Counties_, p 114.

The "Patriots" of 1837.--Preparations for a Battle.--Fort Wellington.--
Battle at Windmill Point.--Defeat of the "Patriots."

211were several stone buildings and a strong stone wind-mill on the
point. These were taken possession of by the insurgents toward noon on
the 12th of November, 1838. They numbered about two hundred, many of
them being from our frontier towns. They came in two schooners, which
were towed down the St. Lawrence by the steamer United States, the
captain (Van Cleve) supposing them to be, as represented by a passenger,
laden with merchandise. As soon as he discovered the character of the
vessels, he resolved to go no further, and stopped at Morristown, ten
miles above Ogdensburgh. The schooners' lines were cast, and the next
morning, filled with armed men, they were at anchor between Ogdensburgh
and Prescott. The insurgents landed at Wind-mill Point, and commenced
fortifying their position. Recruits from our shores swelled their ranks
for the first twelve hours after their landing. Ogdensburgh and Prescott
were in great commotion, and before night not a living being was to be
seen in the latter place, for there would evidently be the battle-field.

Preparations were immediately made at Fort Wellington to dislodge the
patriots, and a British armed steam-boat, lying at Prescott, prepared to
co-operate with the garrison. During the evening the steam-boat
Telegraph arrived, having on board Colonel Worth, of the United States
army, and two companies of troops, with a marshal, to maintain
neutrality. Early next morning two armed British steamers arrived with
troops, and an assault was commenced upon the patriots by throwing bombs
upon the houses and the mill. The field pieces of their battery on shore
returned the fire, and, after a fight of an hour, the British were
driven back into the fort, with the loss of about one hundred men
killed, and many wounded. Many of the patriots had fled in the morning,
and when the action commenced there were only a hundred and twenty-eight
left on the point, while the government troops amounted to more than six
hundred. The insurgents lost five men killed and thirteen wounded. The
next day they sent out a flag, but the bearer was shot. On the 15th the
British received a re-enforcement of four hundred regulars, with cannon
and gun-boats. The patriots were also re-enforced, and numbered more
than two hundred. The government troops, with volunteers from Kingston,
in all about two thousand men, surrounded the patriots by land and
water, and kept up a continual cannonading until the evening of the
16th, when the latter surrendered. A white flag was displayed from the
mill, and three or four others were sent out by the patriots, but the
bearers were shot down. ** Indeed, there seemed to be but little
disposition on the part of the conquerors to give quarter. The dwellings
in the vicinity of the wind-mill were burned, and it is asserted that a
number of the patriots were consumed in one of them, which stood upon
the beach. Other buildings have been burned since, and their blackened
ruins, with the wind-mill, battered by cannon-balls, stand there now,
gloomy mementoes of an abortive attempt to sever the chains of colonial
vassalage.

According to Theller, thirty-six patriots were killed, two escaped, and
ninety were made prisoners. The British lost a hundred and fifty men and
twenty officers killed, among whom was Captain Drummond. The commander
of the insurgents was a young Pole, only thirty-one years of age, named
Von Schoultz, who, with ten others, was hung, and a large portion of the
remainder of the prisoners was banished to Van Diemen's Land.

At Ogdensburgh we left the British Queen, and went on board the Lady of
the Lake, bound for Oswego. Having an hour to pass before her departure,
we employed it in a pleas-

* This view was sketched from the steam-boat, when a little below the
wind-mill, looking west-northwest. The mill is a strong stone structure,
and answered a very good purpose for a fort or block-house. Its narrow
windows were used by the patriots as loop-holes for their muskets during
the action.

** See "Theller's Canada in 1837-8."

The Oswegatchie.--Old French Fort at Ogdeneburgh.--Putnam's Feats.--
Testimony of History.

212ant ramble through the town and along the banks of the dark
Oswegatchie. It was Sabbath morning, and all was quiet in that pleasant
village. We traversed the high banks of the stream, along its majestic
course from the bridge to the dam, about half a mile. The declivity of
the bank is studded with oaks, sycamores, and pines, and lofty trees
shade the pleasant pathway the whole distance, making it a delightful
promenade either at hot noon or in the evening twilight. The water is of
an amber color when not turbid, and from this one of its chief
tributaries, the Black Lake, derives its name.

Ogdensburgh is near the site of the old French fort generally known as
_Fort Oswegatchie_, but on their maps, as early as 1740, it is called
_Fort Presentation_, and sometimes _La Gallette_. This fort was
garrisoned by the French during a part of the Seven Years' War, but was
taken by the English in 1760, while they were descending the St.
Lawrence to attack Montreal. It is related that Putnam, then a
lieutenant colonel, performed one of his daring and original feats here,
in the attack upon the fort and upon the two armed vessels that lay at
the mouth of the Oswegatchie R-iver. Humphreys says that he undertook,
with one thousand men in fifty bateaux, to capture the vessels by
boarding. With beetle and wedges, he proceeded to secure the rudders, to
disable the vessels and prevent them from bringing their broadsides to
bear, and then to make a furious attack upon and board them. As they
approached, the crew of one of the vessels, panic-struck, forced the
commander to surrender, and the other vessel was run ashore. The fort
was the next object of solicitude. With the permission of Amherst,
Putnam caused a number of boats to be prepared with musket-proof
fascines * along the sides, so as to form a shelter from the fire of the
enemy. The fort was defended by an _abatis_ overhanging the water; and,
to overcome such a formidable obstacle, he caused a broad plank, twenty
feet in length, to be attached to the bow of each boat, so that it might
be raised and lowered at pleasure. This was to form a bridge over the
projecting abatis, on which the besiegers might pass to the attack on
the fort. As soon as the boats, thus strangely equipped, began to move
toward the fort, the alarmed garrison, unused to such martial enginery,
surrendered without firing a shot.

These tales, like many others of which Putnam is the reputed hero,
partake somewhat of the marvelous, and in this instance rather conflict
with cotemporary history as well as probability. Colonel Mante, who was
intimate with Rogers and Putnam, says that one of the vessels was
grounded before the attack, and that an action of _four hours_ occurred
with the other. He also says that "the general ordered the vessels [of
the English] to fall down the stream, post themselves as close to the
fort as possible, and man their tops well, in order to fire upon the
enemy, and prevent their making use of their guns, while the grenadiers
rowed in with their broadswords and tomahawks, fascines and scaling-
ladders, under cover of the light infantry, who were to fire into the
embrasures." ** He says nothing about Putnam's project or the "planks."
Dr. Trumbull says, "The general, receiving intelligence that one of the
enemy's vessels was aground and disabled, and that another lay off La
Gallette, determined, with the utmost dispatch, to go down the river and
attack Oswegatchie and Isle Royal. On the 17th of August the row-galleys
fell in with the French sloop commanded by M. de la Broquirie, who,
after a smart engagement, surrendered to the English galleys.... By the
23d two batteries were opened against the fort, and it was cannonaded by
them in concert with the row-galleys in the river. M. Ponchaut, the
commander, beat a parley, and surrendered the fort on terms of
capitulation." *** From personal observation of the ground, I am
inclined to think that a plank twenty feet long could hardly have
_reached the abatis_ from the water, even in a perpendicular position,
unless the altitude of the shores was less then than now. Very possibly
the ingenious idea of wedging up the rudders of the vessels and of
scaling the outworks of the fort was conceived by the fertile

* Fascines, from the Latin fascina, fagot, is a term used in
fortifications to denote bundles of fagots, twigs, or branches of trees,
which, being mixed with earth, are used for filling up ditches, forming
parapets, &c.

** History of the Late War in North America, &c., by Thomas Mante, major
of a brigade in the campaign of 1764; London, 1772.

*** History of Connecticut from 1630 to 1764, by Benjamin Trumbull, D.D.

Capture of Fort Oswegatchie by the English.--Attacks upon Ogdensburgh by
the British in 1813-13.

213mind of Putnam, but it is not one of the strong points upon which the
reputation of the general for skill and bravery rests, for it must have
been a failure if attempted. One thing is certain--Fort Oswegatchie fell
into the hands of the English at that time, after a pretty warm
engagement. Lieutenant-colonel Massey, with the grenadiers, took
possession of the fort, the garrison were sent to New York, and the post
was named by Amherst Fort William Augustus.

Ogdensburgh was a place of considerable importance, in a military point
of view, during our war with England, begun in 1812. Lying directly
opposite a Canadian village (Prescott) and a military post, it was among
the earliest of the points of attack from Canada. As early as the 2d of
October, 1812, it was assaulted by the enemy. General Jacob Brown, with
four hundred Americans, commanded there in person. On Sunday, the 4th,
the British, one thousand in number, in forty boats, approached to storm
the town, but, after a sharp engagement, they were repulsed. Another
attack was planned, and in February following it was carried into
effect. On the 21st of that month, the British, twelve hundred strong,
attacked it in two columns, and, after an hour of hard fighting, drove
Captain Forsyth and his troops out of the place as far as Black Lake,
and took possession of the village. The Americans lost twenty men in
killed and wounded, the British about sixty.

We can not stay longer upon the beautiful banks of the Oswegatchie, for
the signal-bell for departure is ringing merrily upon the Lady of the
Lake.

Departure from Ogdensburgh.--The St. Lawrence and the Thousand Islands.-
-Kingston.

214

CHAPTER X.

August 13, 1848

"Billows! there's not a wave! the waters spread

One broad, unbroken mirror; all around

Is hush'd to silence--silence so profound

That a bird's carol, or an arrow sped

Into the distance, would, like 'larum-bell,

Jar the deep stillness and dissolve the spell."

Park Benjamin.

CALM, sweetly consonant with ideas of Sabbath rest, was upon the main,
the islands, and the river, and all the day long not a breath of air
rippled the silent-flowing but mighty St. Lawrence. We passed the
morning in alternately viewing the ever-changing scene as our vessel
sped toward Ontario, and in perusing Burke's "Essay on the Sublime and
Beautiful." I never read that charming production with so much pleasure
as then, for illustrative examples were on every side. And when, toward
noon, our course was among the Thousand Islands, the propriety of his
citation of the stars as an example, by their number and confusion, of
the cause of the idea of sublimity was forcibly illustrated. "The
apparent disorder," he says, "augments the grandeur, for the appearance
of care is highly contrary to our idea of magnificence." So with these
islands. They fill the St. Lawrence through nearly sixty miles of its
course, commencing fifteen miles below Kingston, and vary in size from a
few yards to eighteen miles in length. Some are mere syenite rocks,
bearing sufficient alluvium to produce cedar, spruce, and pine shrubs,
which seldom grow to the dignity of a tree; while others were
beautifully fringed with luxuriant grass and shaded by lofty trees. A
few of the larger are inhabited and cultivated. They are twelve hundred
and twenty-seven in number. Viewed separately, they present nothing
remarkable; but scattered, as they are, so profusely and in such
disorder over the bosom of the river, their features constantly changing
as we made our rapid way among them, an idea of magnificence and
sublimity involuntarily possessed the mind, and wooed our attention from
the tuition of books to that of nature.

We reached Kingston, Upper Canada, at about four o'clock, where we
remained until nearly sunset. This is a large and flourishing town, at
the lower end of Lake Ontario, and its commercial position is valuable
and important. It stands near the site of old Fort Frontenac, and is now
a British military post. It seems strongly fortified, and completely
commands, by its military works, the entrance of the St. Lawrence from
Ontario. A strong bomb-proof round tower stands upon Cedar Island, just
below the city. Similar structures guard the portals of Fort Henry, the
open space between the city and the fort, and one is a huge sentinel in
the harbor, directly in front of the magnificent market-house that
fronts upon the quay. They are mounted with cannon, and the hollow
buttresses are pierced for musketry. A flourishing Indian settlement,
called _Candaragui_, was upon the site of Kingston when first discovered
by the French, and traces of the builder's art, evidently older than the
fortifications of the whites, have been discovered. I was informed by a
resident at Kingston, whom I met at Quebec, that while excavating to
form a terrace near his residence, a few months previous, his workmen

Fort Frontenac.--Its Capture by Colonel Bradstreet.--His Life.--
Bradstreet's Officers.--Lake Ontario.--Oswego.

215struck the stump of a tree three feet in diameter, and, upon removing
it, a stone wall, regularly laid, was found beneath it.

This spot, known as Fort Frontenac, was a place of much importance
during the intercolonial wars of the last century. It was first a fur
trading and missionary station of the Quebec colony. In 1673, Count
Louis Frontenac, governor of Canada, erected a fort there and gave it
his own name, and for eighty years it was one of the strongest military
posts in America. It was from this point that Father Marquette (under
the patronage of Frontenac) and other missionaries took their final
departure for explorations in the Far West, and here provisions and
stores were kept to supply other military and religious establishments
upon the great lakes. Fort Frontenac remained in possession of the
French until 1758, when Colonel Bradstreet, * with a detachment of men,
chiefly provincials of New York and New England, captured it. After the
disastrous defeat of Abercrombie at Ticonderoga, Colonel Bradstreet
solicited and obtained permission to undertake that expedition. He
traversed the wilderness to Oswego, where he embarked in three vessels
already prepared for him, descended the lake, and suddenly appeared
before Frontenac. The weak garrison, overwhelmed by numbers, surrendered
without resistance. The commander of the fort was exchanged for Colonel
Peter Schuyler, then a prisoner in Canada.

Leaving a small garrison to keep the post, Bradstreet and his troops
returned and aided in building Fort Stanwix, upon the Mohawk, at the
portage between that river and Wood Creek, a tributary of Oneida Lake.
Among his officers were, Colonel Charles Clinton, of Ulster county, New
York; Major Nathaniel Woodhull, who fell on Long Island in 1776, and
Goosen Van Schaick, of Albany, and Lieutenant Marinus Willett, of New
York, who were afterward colonels in the New York Revolutionary line. **

We did not land at Kingston, for the tarrying time of the boat was
uncertain. It was nearly sunset when we left, and we passed the southern
extremity of Gage Island just in time to see its last rays sparkling
upon the tree-tops on Amherst Island, in the far distance. Ontario, like
the St. Lawrence, was unruffled, and the evening voyage between Kingston
and Sackett's Harbor was exceedingly pleasant, rendered so chiefly by a
cool breeze, cushioned seats, agreeable company, and the anticipations
of meeting dear friends at Oswego the next morning. We landed there a
little after daybreak, and tarried three days before starting for the
"Niagara frontier."

Oswego is beautifully situated upon Lake Ontario, on each side of the
Chouegesen or Oswego River, a large and rapid stream, through which flow
the waters of eight considerable lakes in the interior of New York--the
Canandagua, Crooked, Seneca, Cayuga, Owasoo, Skaneateles, Onondaga, and
Oneida, with their numerous little tributaries--and drains a surface of
four thousand five hundred square miles. Beautifully significant are the
Indian names of Oswego and Ontario--_rapid water and pretty lake_--for
the river comes foaming

* John Bradstreet was a native of England. He was Lieutenant-governor of
St. John's, Newfoundland, in 1746, and ten years afterward accompanied
the expeditions against the French on the frontier of New York. In 1756
he was commissary general, and engaged in keeping up a communication
between Albany and Oswego. He had charge of boats that carried
provisions, and so much were they annoyed by the In dians in the French
service, while passing down the Onondaga or Oswego River, that it
required a great deal of skill and bravery to defend them. A small
stockade fort near the site of the present village of Rome was cut off
by the enemy, and they were obliged to depend upon their own power, in
the open forest, for protection. He had a severe engagement near the
margin of Oneida Lake, with a large war party of savages, but gained a
victory, leaving nearly two hundred of the enemy dead upon the field.
His own loss was about thirty. His capture of Fort Frontenac, in 1758,
put into the possession of the English the fort, nine armed vessels,
forty pieces of cannon, a vast quantity of provisions and stores, and
one hundred and ten prisoners. In the summer of 1764 he was employed
against the Indians on the borders of Ontario, and at Presque Isle he
compelled the Delawares, Shawnees, and other tribes to agree to terms of
peace. He was appointed major general in 1772, and died at New York,
October 21st, 1774.

** The captains of the New York troops engaged in this expedition were,
Jonathan Ogden, of West Chester; Peter Dubois, of New York; Samuel
Bladgely and William Humphrey, of Dutchess; Daniel Wright and Richard
Howlet, of Queens; Thomas Arrowsmith, of Richmond; Ebenezer Seely, of
Ulster; and Peter Yates and Goosen Van Schaick, of Albany

Oswego.--Expedition of Frontenac.--Fort built by Governor Burnet.-- Fort
Niagara

216down broad rapids several miles before it expands into the harbor and
mingles its flood with the blue waters of Ontario. Its hydraulic power,
its commercial position relative to Canada and the great West of our own
dominion, and the healthfulness of its climate, mark out Oswego for a
busy and populous city. These advantages of locality were early
perceived by the English, and were probably not entirely overlooked by
the French. But military occupation, for the purpose of spreading wide
the overshadowing wings of empire, through the two-fold influences of
religion and traffic, seemed to be the chief design of the French in
planting small colonies at commanding points.

As early as July, 1696, Frontenac, governor of Canada, fitted out an
expedition to attack the Five Nations in New York, * and Oswego was made
his place of rendezvous. There he built a small stockade fort on the
west side of the river, and then proceeded with fifty men into the
interior as far as the Onondaga Valley. The Indians fled before him, but
upon the shore of Onondaga Lake, near the present Salina, they left
their emblem of defiance--two bundles of rushes suspended from a branch.
The governor returned to Oswego, and sailed for Fort Frontenac, without
accomplishing any good for himself or harm to the Indians, except
burning their dwellings when they fled from them. Three years
previously, Frontenac, by another route, fell upon the Indians on the
Mohawk, near Schenectady, slew many, and took about three hundred
prisoners.

These expeditions seemed to be a part of the grand scheme of the French
to confine the English, now pushing into the wilderness in all
directions, to the Atlantic sea-board; but their forts on the lakes and
upon the Ohio, and their extensive alliances with Indian tribes, could
not repress the spirit of adventure and love of gain which marked their
southern neighbors. The great confederacy of the Five Nations of New
York remained for a long time the fast friends and allies of the
English, none but the Caughnawagas, as the French Jesuits termed their
converts of the confederacy, lifting the hatchet against them. Protected
by these friendly savages, trading posts were founded, and these in turn
became military establishments. In 1722, Governor Burnet, of New York
(son of the celebrated English bishop of that name), established a
trading house at Oswego. His object seemed to be political rather than
commercial, for he desired to gain a foothold there, and thus, in a
measure, command Lake Ontario. He had been advised by the Board of
Trade, after the treaty of Utrecht in 1713, "to extend with caution the
English settlements as far as possible, as there was no probability of
obtaining an arrangement of general boundaries." Acting under this
advice and the promptings of his own clear judgment, he planted the
English standard, for the first time, upon the great lakes, and, in
spite of the remonstrances of the French and the mur-murings of the
Oneidas and Senecas (who disliked to see fortresses rising in their
neighborhood), he built and armed, at his own expense, a small fort at
Oswego in 1727. The French, in the mean while, had strongly fortified
their trading post at the mouth of the Niagara River, and thus
outflanked the English so far as the lake was concerned. Beauharnois,
the governor of Canada, ordered Burnet to desist. Burnet defied, the
Frenchman threatened, but, after blustering for a while, the latter, as
a countervailing measure, took possession of Crown Point and built Fort
St. Frederic there. From that time until 1755, the English had
undisturbed possession of Burnet's fort, and kept it garrisoned by a
lieutenant and twenty-five men.

I am indebted to E. W. Clarke, Esq., of Oswego, for much local
information concerning that city and neighborhood. He kindly permitted
me to use the manuscript of a lecture delivered by him before a literary
society there, and from it I gleaned a description of the trading-house
and fort erected by Governor Burnet. It was situated on the west side of
the river, directly on the bank of the lake, and forty feet above the
water. The bank, composed of rock and hard-pan, was almost
perpendicular. The building was of stone, and about ninety feet square.
The eastern end was circular. It was provided with port-holes and a

* The name of the Confederation of the Five Nations was changed to that
of Six Nations when it was joined by the Tuscaroras of Carolina in 1714.

Description of Burnet's Fort.--Erection of other Fortifications.-- Fort
Ontario.--Shirley's Expedition against Niagara.

217 deep well. The ascent to it from the south was a flight of stone
steps (see engraving), the remains of which have been visible within a
few years.

The earth embankments of the fort, with its ditch and palisades, were
about two hundred feet west of the building, upon' higher ground, and
traces of these might be seen until the late growth of the city
obliterated them. The bluff on which the trading-house and fort rested
has been leveled in filling in the basin, for the construction of
wharves.

While Braddock was making his fatal march against Fort Duquesne, at the
junction of the Ohio and Monongahela, in 1755, Governor Shirley, of
Massachusetts, with a force of about one thousand five hundred men,
composed of provincials and Indians, was on the march from Albany to
Oswego, for the purpose of making attacks simultaneously upon Niagara
and Frontenac.

His march through the wilderness was perilous and fatiguing, and when he
arrived at Oswego in August, his troops were reduced by sickness, and
dispirited by the intelligence of Braddock's defeat. But Shirley, who
succeeded Braddock in the chief command, was not disheartened. He
strengthened Oswego by erecting two other forts; one westward of old
Fort Oswego, called New Fort, one hundred and seventy feet square, with
bastions and a rampart of earth and stones; and another on the opposite
side of the basin, four hundred and seventy yards distant from the old
fort. The east fortification, called Fort Ontario, was built of logs
from twenty to thirty inches in diameter. It was eight hundred feet in
circumference, and its outer walls were fourteen feet high. Around it
was a ditch fourteen feet wide and ten deep, and within were barracks
for three hundred men. It was intended to mount sixteen pieces of
cannon. This fort was on a commanding site, the perpendicular bank being
higher than that upon the west side. **

Shirley built vessels and made other great preparations at Oswego to
proceed against Niagara. He constructed and equipped a sloop and
schooner of sixty tons each, two row-galleys of twenty tons each, and
eight whale-boats, each capable of carrying sixteen men. His views were
promptly seconded by the New York Assembly. That body had already voted
eight thousand pounds toward the enlistment of two thousand men in
Connecticut, and raised four hundred men of their own in addition to
their eight hundred then in the field. Shirley was also directed to
complete the forts, and prepare for building one or more vessels of a
large class, to mount ten six pounders besides swivels, two more row-
galleys, and one hundred whale-boats. But heavy rains delayed his
embarkation so long, that winter approached, and he abandoned the
expedition against Niagara. He left seven hundred men in garrison at
Oswego, and returned to Albany, where the remainder of his troops were
disbanded. Additional fortifications, to complete the works, were made
to the fort on the west side of the river, and stronger outworks were
added to Fort Ontario.

* This view is looking north toward the lake. It is a reduced copy of
the frontispiece to Smith's History of New York, first edition, London,
1757, and represents the encampment of Shirley there at that time.

** Smith's History of New York; Clarke's MS.

*** There are but few traces left of old Fort Oswego. The light-house
that stood upon the bluff between the old fort and the present Fort
Ontario, is removed, and another substantial one is erected upon the
left pier, in front of the harbor. The city, on the east, is now fast
crowding upon the ravelins of the old Fort.

Remains of the "New Fort."--Shirley's Preparations at Albany.--
Montcalm's Approach to Oswego.--Attack on the Works.

1756. 218The remains of the ramparts and ditches of the New Fort are now
quite prominent at the junction of Montcalm and Van Buren Streets. The
annexed engraving is a view of the appearance of these remains when I
August, 1848 visited them. The view is from Montcalm Street, looking
north, toward the lake. The mounds and ditch were covered with a green
sward; and decayed stumps of trees, three feet in diameter, were upon
the former. The fort had been abandoned about ninety years (for Fort
Ontario became the main fortification after 1758), and, therefore, those
large trees must have been produced within that time.

Shirley made vigorous preparations at Albany to re-enforce Oswego, the
following spring, for the Marquis de Montcalm, an enterprising and
experienced commander, was governor of Canada, and offensive operations
on the part of the French were certainly expected. Colonel Bradstreet
was appointed commissary general, and, aided by Captain (afterward
General) Philip Schuyler, forwarded large quantities of provisions to
Oswego. William Alexander, afterward Lord Sterling, of the Revolutionary
army, was Shirley's secretary. Early in the spring an army of seven
thousand men, under General Winslow, was at Albany, waiting the arrival
of the commander-in-chief, Lord Loudon. Has procrastination, which
defeated all the plans for the season's campaign, was fatal in this
instance. He did not arrive until late in the summer. In the mean while
the French, about five thousand in number, under the Marquis de
Montcalm, came up the lake from Fort Frontenac, and landed stealthily
behind a heavily-wooded cape (now called Four-mile Point), a few miles
below Oswego. Montcalm was there nearly two days before the fact was
known to the garrison. He had thirty pieces of heavy artillery, and was
about commencing a march through the forest, to take Fort Ontario by
surprise, when he was discovered by the English. Colonel Mercer, the
commandant of the garrison, ordered a brigantine to cruise eastward, and
prevent any attempt of the enemy to approach the fort by water. The next
day a heavy gale drove the brigantine ashore, and while she was thus
disabled, the French transported their cannon, unmolested, to within two
miles of the fort. One or two other small vessels were sent out to annoy
them, but the heavy guns of the French drove them back to the harbor.
The enemy pressed steadily forward through the woods, and toward noon of
the same day invested the fort with thirty-two pieces of cannon, ranging
from twelve to eighteen pounders, several large brass pounders, and
about five thousand men, one half of whom were Canadians and July 9,
1755 Indians. Some of this artillery was taken from the English when
Braddock was defeated. The garrison, under Colonel Mercer, numbered only
one thousand four hundred, and a large portion of these were withdrawn
to the fort on the west side of the river, to strengthen it, and to
place the river between Mercer's main body and the enemy. The French
began the assault with small arms, which were answered by the guns of
Fort Ontario, and bombs from the small fort on the other side of the
basin. Finding an open assault dangerous, Montcalm commenced approaching
by parallels during the night, and the next day he began another brisk
fire with small arms. On the day following he opened a battery of
cannons within sixty yards of the fort. As soon as Colonel Mercer
perceived this, he sent word to the garrison, consisting of three
hundred and seventy men, to destroy their cannon, ammunition, and
provisions, and retreat to the west side. This they effected without the
loss of a man. During the night of the 13th the enemy were employed, in
the face of a destructive cannonade, in erecting a heavy battery to play
upon the fort. On the morning of the 14th they had finished their
battery of twelve heavy guns, and under its cover two thousand five
hundred Canadians and Indians crossed the river in three divisions.
Colonel Mercer was killed during this movement, and the command devolved
upon Colonel

August 11.

August 12.

Surrender of the Forts and Garrison to Montcalm.--His Courtesy.--
Destruction of the Forts.--St. Leger. Mrs. Grant

219Littlehales. The enemy had a mortar battery in readiness by ten
o'clock, and their forces were so disposed that all the works of defense
were completely enfiladed. At the same time, the regulars, under the
immediate command of Montcalm, were preparing to cross to the attack.
Colonel Littlehales called a council of war, and, it being agreed that a
defense was no longer practicable, a _chamade_, or parley, was beaten by
the drums of the fort, and the firing ceased on both sides. Two officers
were sent to the French general to inquire upon what terms he would
accept a surrender. He sent back a polite and generous answer,
remarking, at the same, time that the English were an enemy to be
esteemed, and that none but a brave nation would have thought of
defending so weak a place so long. * The fort, the whole garrison, one
hundred and twenty cannons, fourteen mortars, a large quantity of
ammunition and stores, and quite a respectable fleet in the harbor, were
the spoils of victory The forts were dismantled, the prisoners were
placed on transports for Frontenac, and, without leaving a garrison
behind, the whole military armament went down the lake, and left Oswego
solitary and desolate.

The destruction of the forts was a stroke of policy on the part of
Montcalm. They had been a continual eyesore to the Six Nations, for they
had reason to suspect that, if the English became strong enough, their
fortifications would be used as instruments to enslave the tribes. This
act of Montcalm was highly approved by the Indians, and caused them to
assume a position of neutrality toward the belligerent Europeans. This
was what Montcalm desired, and he gained far more power by destroying
the forts than he would by garrisoning them. French emissaries were sent
among the Indians, and by their blandishments, and in consequence of
their successes, they seduced four of the tribes wholly from the British
interest. These were the Oneidas, Onondagas, Cayugas, and Senecas.

The following year English troops again took possession of Fort Ontario,
and partially restored it to its former strength, and in 1759 it was
rebuilt on a larger scale.

They also erected a small stockade fort near the Oswego Falls, and built
Fort Stanwix, on the Mohawk. Thus, in a military point of view, Oswego
remained until our war for independence broke out. **

This post was rather too remote for active operations, during the first
years of the war, to attract the serious attention of either party, and
the fort was garrisoned by only a few men until the summer of 1777, when
St. Leger, with seven hundred Hangers, detached from the army of
Burgoyne at St. John's, on the Sorel, made this his place of rendezvous
preparatory to his incursion into the Valley of the Mohawk. Here he was
joined by Sir John Johnson and Colonel Daniel Claus, with nearly seven
hundred Indians, under Brant, and four hundred regular troops. Here a
war feast was given, and, certain of success, the party, in high
spirits, departed to invest Fort Stanwix. A different scene was
exhibited a few weeks later at Oswego. St. Leger, foiled, and his troops
utterly routed, came hastening back in all the terror and confusion of a
retreat, the victors in hot pursuit. His Indian allies, greatly alarmed,
were scattered over the vast forests, and a mere remnant of his army,

1757.

1758.

* His note to Colonel Littlehales was as follows: "The Marquis of
Montcalm, army and field marshal, commander-in-chief of his most
Christian majesty's troops, is ready to receive a capitulation upon the
most honorable conditions, surrendering to him all the forts. They shall
be shown all the regard the politest nation can show. I send an aid-de-
camp on my part, viz., Mons. de Bougainville, captain of dragoons; they
need only send the capitulation to be signed. I require an answer by
noon. I have kept Mr. Drake for a hostage. "Montcalm." "August 14,
1756."

* Mrs. Grant, of Edinburgh, Scotland, in her "Memoirs of an American
Lady," gives a charming picture of the scenery about Oswego in 1761-2.
She was then a child, and resided there with her father; and her book
presents all the vividness of a child's impressions. She noted, in
particular, a feature in the forest scenery which now delights the
sojourner upon the southern shores of Lake Ontario--the sudden bursting
forth of leaves and flowers in the spring. Major Duncan, who was in
command of the fort at that lime, was a gentleman of taste, and, in
addition to a large and well-cultivated garden, he had a bowling green
and other pleasure grounds. These were the delight of the author of the
"Memoirs," whose pleasing pictures may be found in chapters xliv. to
xlvii. inclusive.

Willett's Attempt to Capture Fort Oswego.--Oswego in 1798.--Attack upon
Oswego in 1814.--Fort Oswego

220without arms, half naked, and nearly starved, followed him to Fort
Ontario, whence he fled to Montreal. The details of the siege of Fort
Stanwix will be given hereafter.

There was no engagement at Oswego during the Revolution. Just at the
close of the war, Washington conceived the design of securing Fort
Ontario, and sent an expedition thither under the command of Colonel
Marinus Willett, who had been an efficient officer in the Mohawk Valley
from the time of the siege of Fort Stanwix. Preliminary articles of
peace had been signed in November previous, but as the terms were not
definitely agreed upon, it was the policy of the commander-in-chief to
be prepared for the reopening of hostilities, and, therefore, until the
settlement was finally made, in September, 1783, by the signing of the
definitive treaty, his vigilance was unrelaxed. This enterprise was
undertaken in mid-winter. Willett assembled his troops at Fort Herkimer,
on the German Flats, and on the 9th of February crossed the Oneida Lake
on the ice, and reached Oswego Falls 1783 the next morning. Not being
strong enough in numbers to attempt a siege or an open assault, he there
prepared scaling-ladders, and determined to surprise the garrison that
night. A deep snow lay upon the ground, and the weather was so intensely
cold that one of the soldiers was frozen to death. A young Oneida Indian
acted as guide, but the snow and the darkness caused him to lose his
way.

At daylight they found themselves in sight of the fort, and soon
afterward they discovered three wood-choppers near. Two of them were
captured, but the third escaped to the fort and gave the alarm. Willett
and his party immediately retreated, and thus ended the expedition. * In
1796 this post, with all others upon the frontier, was given up by the
English to the United States.

A prize, in the shape of public stores deposited at the Oswego Falls,
attracted the attention of the British in 1814, and a fleet, bearing
three thousand men, appeared before the town on the fifth of May. Fort
Oswego, (called Ontario when repaired subsequent to the War,) on the
East side of the harbor, was quite dilapidated, and the little garrison
had small means of defense. They had only six cannons, and three of
these had lost their trunnions. As soon as the sail of the enemy
appeared, information was sent to Captain Woolsey, of the navy, then at
the village on the west side of the river, and to the neighboring
militia. Four large ships, three brigs, and a number of gun and other
boats 1814 appeared, about seven miles distant, at dawn on the morning
of the fifth of May.

The Americans prepared a battery on the shore, and gave the enemy such a
warm reception, while approaching in boats to land, that they returned
to their ships. Early on the morning of the 6th the fleet came within
cannon-shot of the works, and for three hours kept up a discharge of
grape and heavy balls against the fort and batteries. *** The troops
finally effected a landing, and the little band of Americans, not
exceeding three hundred in number, after maintaining their ground as
long as possible, withdrew into the rear of the fort, and halted within
four hundred yards of it. After fighting about half an hour, they march-

* Clarke's MS.

** This view is from the west side of the river, near the site of the
present United States Hotel.

*** I visited Fort Ontario, which is now a strong and admirably
appointed fortification. A small garrison is usually stationed there,
but at the time of my visit the fort was vacated by troops and left in
charge of a sergeant (Mr. Brown), whose courtesy made our little party
feel as much at home amid the equipments of war as if we were veritable
soldiers and our ladies _attaches_ of the camp. He gave me a four-pound
cannon-ball, which was fired into the fort from the British ship Wolfe,
the only ship engaged in the action, on the morning of the Sixth of May,
1814. It bears the rude anchor mark of British ordnance shot, and was
labeled by the sergeant, "A present from John Bull to Uncle Sam."

Result of the Battle in 1814.--Oswego at Present.--Major Cochran.--Dr.
John Cochran.

221ed toward the falls, to defend the stores, destroying the bridges in
their rear. The British burned the barracks, and, after spiking some of
the guns, evacuated the fort, and retired to their ships at three
o'clock on the morning of the 7th. The loss of the Americans was six
killed, thirty-eight wounded, and twenty-five missing. The enemy lost,
in killed, wounded, drowned, and missing, two hundred and thirty-five. *
They returned on the 9th, and sent a flag into the village, to inform
the people of their intention to land a large force and capture the
stores; but, being informed that the bridges were destroyed and the
stores removed, the fleet weighed anchor and returned to Kingston.

Scarcely a feature of old Oswego is left. The little hamlet of the
Revolution and the tiny village of 1814 have grown into a flourishing
city. Heavy stone piers, built by the United States government, guard
the harbor from storms, and a strong fortification protects it from
enemies. Lake commerce enlivens the mart, and a canal and rail-road
daily pour their freights of goods and travel into its lap.

"While in Oswego I visited the venerable Major Cochran and his excellent
lady, the daughter of General Philip Schuyler. Major Cochran was then
nearly eighty years old, and feeble in bodily health, but his mind was
active and vigorous. His father was Dr. John Cochran, ** the surgeon
general of the Middle Department of the Revolutionary army; and himself
was a member of Congress during the administration of the elder Adams.
**** His family relationship and position made him acquainted with all
the general officers of the Revolution, and his reminiscences afforded
me much pleasure and instruction during my brief visit. He has since
gone down into the grave, and thus the men of that generation, like the
sands of an hour-glass, fall into their resting-

* Letter of Commodore Chauncy to the Secretary of the Navy.

** Dr. Cochran was born in Chester, Pennsylvania, in 1730. His father
came from the north of Ireland. He studied medicine at Lancaster, and
served as surgeon's mate in the hospital department during the French
and Indian war. At the close of that contest he settled in Albany, and
married Gertrude, the only sister of General Schuyler. He entered the
Revolutionary army, and in the spring of 1777 Washington appointed him
surgeon general of the Middle Department, and in October, 1781, director
general of the hospitals of the United States. He removed to New York
after the peace, and his eminent services were not forgotten by
Washington, who nominated him commissioner of loans for that state. He
died at Palatine, Montgomery county, April 6th, 1807, aged 76.

*** This view is from the top of the United States Hotel, looking east-
northeast. It was hastily sketched during the approach of a thunder-
storm, and the "huge herald drops" came down just as I traced the
distant water-line of the lake. The objects by the figure in the
foreground are the balustrade and chimney of the hotel, now (1848) a
summer boarding-house for strangers. The first height beyond the water
or the right is the point on which stands Fort Oswego. The land in the
far distance, on the same side, is Four-mile Point, behind which
Montcalm landed his forces. On the left is seen the light-house upon one
of the stone piers, and beyond it spread out the waters of Lake Ontario.

**** Circumstances connected with his election are rather amusing. A
vessel was to be launched upon (I think) Seneca Lake, at Geneva, and, it
being an unusual event, people came from afar to see it. The young folks
gathered there, determined to have a dance at night. A fiddle was
procured, but a fiddler was wanting. Young Cochran was an amateur
performer, and his services were demanded on the occasion. He gratified
the joyous company, and at the supper-table one of the gentlemen
remarked, in commendation of his talents, that he was "fit for
Congress." The hint was favorably received by the company, the matter
was "talked up," and he was nominated and elected a representative in
Congress for the district then comprising the whole state of New York
west of Schenectady. He always claimed to have fiddled himself into
Congress.

Attempted Abduction of General Schuyler by Waltermeyer.--Alarm of the
Family.--Narrow Escape of an Infant.

222place. His lady, many years his junior, was the youngest and favorite
daughter of General Schuyler. She was his traveling companion during his
old age, and constantly enjoyed the advantages of the refined society by
which he was surrounded. When her mother departed from earth, she was
his companion and solace, and was at his bedside, to minister to his
wants, in the hour of death. * Although the stirring scenes of the
Revolution were passed before the years of her infancy were numbered,
her intercourse with the great and honorable of that generation, during
her youth and early womanhood, brought facts and circumstances to her
vigorous mind so forcibly, that their impressions are as vivid and
truthful as if made by actual observation. She related many interesting
circumstances in the life of her father, and among them that of an
attempted abduction of his person in 1781.

At the time in question, General Schuyler was residing in the suburbs of
Albany, having left the army and engaged in the civil service of his
country. Notwithstanding his comparatively obscure position, his aid and
counsel were constantly sought, in both military and civil transactions,
and he was considered by the enemy one of the prominent obstacles in the
way of their success. He was then charged by Washington with the duty of
intercepting all communications between General Haldimand in Canada and
Clinton in New York. For some time the Tories in the neighborhood of
Albany had been employed in capturing prominent citizens and carrying
them off to Canada, for the purpose of exchange. Such an attempt was
made upon Colonel Gansevoort, and now a bold project was conceived to
carry off General Schuyler. John Waltermeyer, a bold partisan and
colleague of the notorious Joe Bettys, was employed for the purpose.
Accompanied by a gang of Tories, Canadians, and Indians, he repaired to
the neighborhood of Albany, but, uncertain how well General Schuyler
might be guarded, he lurked among the pine shrubbery in the vicinity
eight or ten days. He seized a Dutch laborer, and learned from him the
exact position of affairs at Schuyler's house, after which he extorted
an oath of secrecy from the man and let him go. The Dutchman seems to
have made a mental reservation, for he immediately gave information of
the fact to General Schuyler. A Loyalist, who was the general's personal
friend, and cognizant of Waltermeyer's design, also warned him. In
consequence of the recent abductions, the general kept a guard of six
men constantly on duty, three by day and three by night, and after these
warnings they and his family were on the alert.

August, 1781 At the close of a sultry day, the general and his family
were sitting in the front hall. The servants were dispersed about the
premises. The three guards relieved for the night were asleep in the
basement room, and the three on duty, oppressed by the heat, were lying
upon the cool grass in the garden. A servant announced to the general
that a stranger desired to speak to him at the back gate. The stranger's
errand was at once comprehended. The doors of the house were immediately
shut and close barred. The family were hastily collected in an upper
room, and the general ran to his bed-chamber for his arms. From the
window he saw the house surrounded by armed men. For the purpose of
arousing the sentinels upon the grass, and perchance to alarm the town,
he fired a pistol from the window. The assailants burst open the doors,
and at that moment Mrs. Schuyler perceived that, in the confusion and
alarm of the retreat from the hall, her infant child, a few months old,
had been left in the cradle in the nursery below. Parental love subdued
all fear, and she was flying to the rescue of her child, when the
general interposed and prevented her. But her third daughter **
instantly rushed down the two flights of stairs, snatched the still
sleeping infant from the cradle, and bore it off safely. One of the
miscreants hurled, a sharp tomahawk at her as she left the room, but it
effected no other harm than a slight injury to her dress, within a few
inches of the infant's head. As she ascended a private stair-case she
met Waltermeyer, who, supposing her to be a servant, exclaimed, "Wench,
wench, where

* Grief for the loss of his wife, and the melancholy circumstances
connected with the death of his son-inlaw, General Alexander Hamilton,
weighed heavily upon his spirits. His death was hastened by exposure and
fatigue while accompanying two French dukes over the battle-ground of
Saratoga. He was taken ill there, and never recovered.

** Margaret, afterward the first wife of the late venerated General Van
Rensselaer (the patroon) of Albany.

Robbery of General Schuyler's House.--Retreat of the Marauders.
Abduction of other Patriots.--Mrs. Cochran.

223is your master?"

"With great presence of mind, she replied, "Gone to alarm the town."

The Tory's followers were then in the dining-room, plundering it of the
plate and other valuables, and he called them together for consultation.

At that moment the general threw up a window, and, as if speaking to
numbers, called out, in a loud voice, "Come on, my brave fellows,
surround the house and secure the villains, who are plundering." The
assailants made a precipitate retreat, carrying with them the three
guards that were in the house, and a large quantity of silver plate.
They made their way to Ballstown by daybreak, where they took General
Gordon a prisoner from his bed, and with their booty returned to Canada.
* The bursting open of the doors of General Schuyler's house aroused the
sleeping guards in the cellar, who rushed up to the back hall, where
they had left their arms, but they were gone. Mrs. Church, ** another
daughter of General Schuyler, who was there at the time, without the
slightest suspicion that they might be wanted, caused the arms to be
removed a short time before the attack, on account of apprehended injury
to her little son, whom she found playing with them. The guards had no
other weapon but their brawny fists, and these they used manfully until
overpowered. They were taken to Canada, and when they were exchanged,
the general gave them each a farm, in Saratoga county. Their names were
John Tubbs, John Corlies, and John "Ward.

Mrs. Cochran was the infant rescued by her intrepid sister. The incident
is one of deep interest, and shows the state of constant alarm and
danger in which the people lived at that day, particularly those whose
position made them conspicuous. Mrs. Cochran kindly complied with my
solicitation for a likeness of herself to accompany the narrative here
given.

* Major Cochran related to me an incident connected with the booty in
question. Among the plundered articles was a silver soup tureen. He was
at Washington city at the time of the inauguration of Harrison, in 1841,
and while in the rotunda of the Capitol, viewing Trumbull's picture of
the surrender of Bur-goyne, a stranger at his elbow inquired, "Who is
that fine-looking man in the group, in citizen's dress?" "General
Schuyler," replied Major Cochran. "General Schuyler!" repeated the
stranger. "Why, I ate soup not long since, at Belleville, in Canada,
from a tureen that was carried off from his house by some Tories in the
Revolution." This was the first and only trace the family ever had of
the plundered articles.

** She was the wife of John B. Church, Esq., an English gentleman, who
was a contractor for the French army in America under Rochambeau. He
returned to England, and was afterward a member of Parliament.

Departure from Oswego.--The Genesee River.--Storm on the Lake.-- Sea-
sickness.--Fort Niagara.

224It was my intention to go directly from Oswego to Rome, by the plank
road that traverses the old war-paths of the last century between those
points, for the region westward is quite barren of incident connected
with the Revolution. Old Fort Niagara, at the mouth of the Niagara
River, was a place of rendezvous for Tories and Indians while preparing
for marauding excursions on the borders of civilization in New York, or
when they returned with prisoners and scalps. Beyond this it offered no
attractions, for hardly a remnant of its former material is left. But
having been joined at Oswego by another member of my family, who, with
my traveling companion, was anxious to see the great cataract, and
desirous myself to look again upon that wonder of the New World, I
changed my course, and on a August 17, 1848 stormy morning, with a
strong north wind awakening the billows of Ontario, we left Oswego for
Lewiston in the steamer Cataract, commanded by the same excellent Van
Cleve whose vessel got a little entangled, ten years before, in the
affair at Wind-mill Point, near Ogdensburgh. The lake was very rough,
and nearly all on board turned their thoughts inwardly, conversing but
little until we entered the Genesee River in the afternoon. Many lost
the breakfast they had paid for, and others, by commendable abstinence
and economy, saved the price of dinner by shunning it altogether.

The scenery upon the tortuous course of the Genesee is very picturesque.
The stream is deep and narrow, and its precipitous shores are heavily
wooded. The voyage terminated three fourths of a mile below the Lower
Falls of the Genesee, and five miles from Ontario. Here is the port of
Rochester. The city lies upon the plains at the Pipper Falls, two miles
distant. Our boat remained there until toward evening, and, the rain
having abated, I strolled up the winding carriage-way as far as the
Lower Falls. This road is cut in the precipitous bank of the river,
presenting overhanging cliffs, high and rugged, on one side, and on the
other steep precipices going down more than a hundred feet below to the
sluggish bed of the stream. Every thing about the falls is broken and
confused. The stream, the rocks, the hills, and trees are all commingled
in chaotic grandeur, varying in lineament at each step, and defying
every attempt to detect a feature of regularity. There sandstone may be
seen in every stage of formation, from the loose soil to shale, and
slate-like lamina, and the solid stratified rock. The painter and the
geologist are well rewarded for a visit to the Lower Falls of the
Genesee.

We descended the river toward evening. Heavy clouds were rolling over
the lake; and the white caps that sparkled upon its bosom, and the spray
that dashed furiously over the unfinished stone pier at the mouth of the
river, betokened a night of tempest and gloom. The wind had increased
almost to a gale upon the lake while we had been quietly lying in the
sheltering arms of the Genesee. Premonitions of sea-sickness alarmed my
prudence, and by its wise direction I slipped into my berth before eight
o'clock, and slept soundly until aroused by the porter's bell, a little
before daybreak, at Lewiston Landing. The rain continued, though falling
gently. We groped our way up the slippery road to the cars, and,
shivering in the damp air, took seats for Niagara, fully resolved to
give the bland invitation of the "lake route" a contemptuous refusal on
our return eastward. It may be very pleasant on a calm day or a
moonlight night, but _our_ experience made us all averse to the aquatic
journey.

We passed from Ontario into the Niagara River, seven miles below
Lewiston, while slumbering, and, consequently, I have nothing to say of
Fort Niagara from personal observation. We will turn to veritable
history for the record, and borrow the outlines of an illustration from
another pencil.

In 1679, during the administration of Frontenac, a French officer named
De Salle inclosed a small spot in palisades at the mouth of the Niagara
River, and in 1725, two years before Governor Burnet built his fort at
Oswego, a strong fortification was erected there. It was captured by the
British, under Sir William Johnson, in 1759. The forces, chiefly
provincials, that were sent against the fort were commanded by General
Prideaux, who sailed July 7, 1757 from Oswego, and landed near the mouth
of the river in July. He at once opened his batteries upon the fortress,
but was soon killed by the bursting of a gun. The

Attack on Fort Niagara.---Stratagem of the French.--Traditions
respecting the Fort--A Refuge for Tories and Indians

225command then devolved upon Johnson. An army of French regulars,
twelve hundred strong, drawn chiefly from western posts, and accompanied
by an equal number of Indians, marching to the relief of the garrison,
were totally routed by Johnson, and a large part of them made prisoners.

The siege had then continued more than a fortnight, and the beleaguered
garrison, despairing of succor, surrendered the next day. In addition
July 23, 1759 to the ammunition and stores that fell into their hands,
the strong fort itself was an important acquisition for the English.
Within its dungeons were found instruments for executions or murders,
and the ears of the English received many horrid tales from the captive
Indians of atrocities committed there during French rule.

It is said that the mess-house, a strong building still standing within
the fort, was built by the French by stratagem. The Indians were opposed
to the erection of any thing that appeared like a fortress. The French
troops were kindly received by the savages, and obtained their consent
to build a wigwam. They then induced the Indians to engage in an
extensive hunt with some French officers, and when they returned the
walls were so far advanced that they might defy the savages if they
should attack them. It grew into a large fort, with bastions and
ravelins, ditches and pickets, curtains and counter-scarp, covered way,
draw-bridge, raking batteries, stone towers, bakery, blacksmith shop,
mess-house, barracks, laboratory, magazine, and a chapel with a dial
over its door to mark the progress of the hours. It covered about eight
acres. A few rods from the barrier-gate was a burial-ground, over the
portal of which was painted, in large letters, Rest. The dungeon of the
mess-house, called the black-hole, was a strong, dark, and dismal place,
and in one corner of the room was fixed an apparatus for strangling
those whom the despotic officers chose to kill. The walls were profusely
inscribed with French names and mementoes in that language, and the
letters and emblems were many of them so well executed as to prove that
some of the victims were not of common stamp. When, in June, 1812, an
attack upon the fort by the English was momentarily expected, a
merchant, residing near the fort, deposited some valuable articles in
the dungeon. He went there one night with a light, and discovered his
own family name upon the walls. Like other ruins, it has its local
legends. The headless trunk of a French officer has been seen sitting on
the margin of the well in the dungeon; and large sums of money have been
buried there, and their localities pointed out by fingers visible only
to money-diggers. **

During the American Revolution "it was the headquarters," says De Veaux,
"of all that was barbarous, unrelenting, and cruel. There were
congregated the leaders and chiefs of those bands of murderers and
miscreants who carried death and destruction into the remote American
settlements. There civilized Europe reveled with savage America, and
ladies of education and refinement mingled in the society of those whose
only distinction was to wield the bloody tomahawk and the scalping-
knife. There the squaws of the forests were raised to eminence, and the
most unholy unions between them and officers of the highest rank smiled
upon and countenanced. There, in their strong-hold, like a nest of
vultures, securely, for seven years, they sallied forth and preyed upon
the distant settlements of the Mohawk and

* This is copied from one published in Barber and Howe's "Historical
Collections of New York." They copied it from an engraving published
during the war of 1812. It gives the appearance of the locality at that
time. The view is from the west side of the Niagara River, near the
light-house. The fort is on the east side (the right of the picture), at
the mouth of the river. The steam-boat seen in the distance is out on
Lake Ontario.

** See De Veaux's Niagara Falls.

The Niagara River.--Events there of the War of 1812.--American Militia.-
-Brock's Death.--His Monument

226Susquehanna Valleys. It was the depot of their plunder: there they
planned their forays, and there they returned to feast, until the time
of action came again."

The shores of Niagara River, from Erie to Ontario, abound in historic
associations connected with the military operations on that frontier
during the war of 1812. The battles of Chippewa, Lundy's Lane,
Queenston, and Fort Erie occurred in this vicinity; but these events are
so irrelevant to our subject, that we must give them but brief
incidental notice as we happen to pass by their localities.

Fort Niagara was feebly garrisoned by the Americans, and on the 19th of
December, 1813, a British force of twelve hundred men crossed the river
and took it by surprise. The garrison consisted of three hundred and
seventy men. The commanding officer was absent, the gates were open and
unguarded, and the fortress, strong as it was, became an easy prey to
the enemy. Sixty-five of the garrison were killed, and twenty-seven
pieces of ordnance and a large quantity of military stores were the
spoils of victory for the British.

It was broad daylight when our train moved from Lewiston, and across the
Niagara, on the Canada shore, the heights of Queenston, surmounted by
Brock's monument, were in full view. The battle that renders this
towering slope so famous occurred on the 13th of October, 1812. The
Americans were commanded by the late General Stephen Van Rensselaer, the
British by General Sir Isaac Brock. The former were about twenty-five
hundred strong; the latter numbered about the same, besides a horde of
Chippewa Indians. The British were strongly posted upon the heights. At
four o'clock on the morning of the 13th about six hundred Americans,
under Colonel Solomon Van Rensselaer and Lieutenant-colonel Christie,
crossed over in boats to dislodge the enemy. The passage was made in the
face of a destructive fire, and the brave Americans rushed impetuously
up the acclivity and attacked the first battery, captured it, and soon
stood victorious upon the height from which they had driven the enemy.
General Brock endeavored, in person, to rally his scattered troops, and
was fatally wounded while leading them to the charge. * Dismayed when
they saw their leader fall, they fled in great confusion. At this time
Colonel Scott, ** with a reenforcement of six hundred men, regulars and
volunteers, crossed over; and the enemy was also re-enforced by troops
from Fort George, and five hundred Chippewa Indians. The strife was
fierce for a long time. The British, re-enforced, far outnumbered the
Americans, and the militia remaining at Lewiston could not be induced to
cross over to support their friends in the combat. Overwhelming numbers
closed in upon the Americans, and, after fighting eleven hours, they
were obliged to surrender. The American loss was about ninety killed and
nine hundred wounded, missing, and prisoners. The behavior of many of
our militia on this occasion was extremely disgraceful. Taking advantage
of the darkness when they crossed in the morning, they hid themselves in
the clefts of the rocks and clumps of bushes near the shore, where they
remained while the fighting ones were periling life upon the heights
above. The cowards were dragged out from their hiding-places by the
legs, by the British soldiers, after the surrender.

The rail-road cars from Lewiston to the Falls ascend in their course an
inclined plane that winds up what is evidently the ancient southern
shore of Lake Ontario. Deposits of pebbles at the foot of the ridge, and
many other facts connected with this physical feature of the country
from Niagara to Oswego, prove conclusively, to the mind of the close
observer, that this was the shore of Ontario before the great convulsion
took place which formed the

* General Brock was lieutenant governor of Upper Canada. The Legislature
of that province caused a monument to be erected to his memory, on the
heights near the spot where he fell. It is in a position so elevated,
that it may be seen at different points nearly fifty miles distant. The
monument is constructed of freestone. The base, which covers the vault
wherein lie the remains of General Brock and his aid, Lieutenant-colonel
John M'Donald (who was killed in the same action), is twenty feet
square. The shaft rises one hundred and twenty-six feet from the ground.
A miscreant named Lett attempted to destroy it by gunpowder on the night
of the 17th of April, 1840. The keystone over the door was thrown out,
and the shaft was cracked nearly two thirds of its height.

** Now Major-general Scott, of the United States army. The present
General Wool was a captain, and commanded a company in the action.

Arrival at Niagara.--Falls Village.--View from Goat Island. --Biddle's
Tower.--Sublime Voyage in the "Maid of the Mist."

227Falls of Niagara. We leave what questions upon this point remain
open, to be settled by wiser minds, and hasten on to the Falls. We
caught a few glimpses of the green waters from the windows of the car,
and in a few minutes were in the midst of the tumult of porters at the
village, more clamorous for our ears than the dull roar of the cataract
near by. The fasting upon the lake and the early morning ride had given
us a glorious appetite for breakfast, and as soon as it was appeased we
sallied out, guide-book in hand, to see the celebrities. These have been
described a thousand times. Poets, painters, travelers, historians,
philosophers, and penny-a-liners have vied with each other in magnifying
this wonder, and as I can not (if I would) "add one cubit to its
stature" for the credulous, a thought concerning its sublimity and
beauty for the romantic, a hue to the high coloring of others for the
sentimental, or a new fact or theory for the philosophical, I shall pass
among the lions in almost perfect silence, and speedily leave the
excitements of this fashionable resort for the more quiet grandeur and
beauty of the Mohawk Valley, once the "dark and bloody ground," but now
a paradise of fertility, repose, and peace.

We crossed the whirling rapids and made the circuit of Goat Island. In
this route all the remarkable points of the great cataract are brought
to view. From the Hog's Back, at the lower end of the island, there is a
fine prospect of the river below, and the distant Canada shore beyond.
The almost invisible Suspension Bridge, like a thread in air, was seen
two miles distant; and beneath us, through the mist of the American
Fall, glorious with rainbow hues, the little steam-boat, the "Maid of
the Mist," came breasting the powerful current. We looked down from our
lofty eyrie (literally, in the clouds), through the mist veil, upon her
deck, and her passengers appeared like Lilliputians in a tiny skiff.
From the southern side of the island we had a noble view of the Horse-
shoe Fall, over which pours the greater portion of the Niagara River.
The water is estimated to be twenty feet deep upon the crown of the
cataract. Biddle's Tower is a fine observatory, overlooking, on one
side, the boiling abyss below the fall, and standing apparently in the
midst of the rushing waters as they hurry down the rapids above. We
spent two hours upon the verge of the floods, in the shadows of the
lofty trees that cover the island, but these scenes were tame compared
with what we beheld from the "Maid of the Mist" toward noon. We rode
nearly to the Suspension Bridge, and, walking down a winding road cleft
in the rocks, reached the brink of the river at the head of the great
rapids above the whirlpool. There we embarked on the little steam-boat,
and moved up the river to the cataract. As we approached the American
Fall, all retreated into the cabins, and, the windows being closed, we
were soon enveloped in spray. It was a sight indescribably grand. As we
looked up, the waters seemed to be pouring from the clouds. A feeling of
awe, allied to that of worship, pervaded us, and all were silent until
the avalanche of waters was passed. The beautiful lines of Brainerd came
vividly up from the shrine of memory, and aided my thoughts in seeking
appropriate language:

"It would seem

As if God poured thee from his 'hollow hand,'

And hung his bow upon thine awful front,

And spoke in that loud voice which seemed to him

Who dwelt in Patmos for his Savior's sake,

'The sound of many waters,' and had bade

The flood to chronicle the ages back,

And notch his cent'ries in the eternal rocks.

Deep calleth unto deep. And what are we

That hear the question of that voice sublime?

Or what are all the notes that ever rung

From war's vain trumpet, by thy thundering side?

Yea, what is all the riot man can make

In his short life to thy unceasing roar?

And yet, bold babbler, what art thou to Him

Who drowned the world, and heaped the waters far

Above its loftiest mountains? a light wave

That breaks and whispers of its Maker's might."

Buckingham's Lines.--Voyage of the Maid of the Mist.--Romantic
Marriage.--The Whirlpool.--The Suspension Bridge.

228Beautifully has Buckingham expressed the reverential thoughts which
fill the mind and part the lips for utterance in that majestic presence:

"Hail! sovereign of the world of floods! whose majesty and might

First dazzles--then enraptures--then o'erawes the aching sight;

The pomp of kings and emperors in every clime and zone

Grow dim beneath the splendors of thy glorious watery throne.

"No fleets can stop thy progress, no armies bid thee stay,

But onward, onward, onward thy march still holds its way;

The rising mist that veils thee, as thine herald, goes before,

And the music that proclaims thee is the thundering cataract's roar.

"Thy reign is of the ancient days, thy scepter from on high--

Thy birth was when the distant stars first lit the gloomy sky;

The sun, the moon, and all the orbs that shine upon thee now,

Beheld the wreath of glory which first bound thy infant brow!"

Our little boat, after sweeping around as near the great Horse-shoe Fall
as prudence would allow, touched a moment at the landing on the Canada
side, and then returned to her moorings. We felt relieved when we stood
again on land, for there is some peril in the voyage; yet the wonderful
scene yields a full compensation for the risk. It affords an opportunity
to exhibit courage more sensibly than the foolish periling of life in
clambering over the slippery rocks under the Falls, and sentiment has
here some chance for respectable display. The week previous to our visit
a young couple, with a parson, took passage in the "Maid of the Mist,"
and, when enveloped in the spray of the cataract, were united in
wedlock. What an altar before which to make nuptial vows! Can they ever
forget the solemn promises there made, or be unfaithful to the pledge
there sealed?

We visited the whirlpool, and that wonder of art, the Suspension Bridge,
before returning to the village. The former is at the elbow of the
Niagara River, two and a half miles below the cataract, and should never
be left unseen by the visitor at the Falls. The Suspension Bridge spans
the river near the head of the rapids above the whirlpool. The present
structure is only the _scaffolding_ for constructing the one intended
for the passage of a train of rail-road cars. Numerous foot-passengers
were upon it, and a coach and horses, with driver and two passengers,
crossed it while we were there.

The light structure bent beneath the weight like thin ice under the
skater, yet the passage is considered perfectly safe. I visited it again
toward evening, and made the accompanying sketch to illustrate the
method of its construction and its relative position-to the Falls.1 To
attempt to sketch the Falls truthfully is vain. They have never yet been
portrayed

* The bridge from pier to pier is eight hundred feet long. Its breadth
is eight feet. The whole bridge is suspended upon eight cables, four on
each side, which pass over towers fifty-four feet high, built of heavy
timbers. The towers for the large bridge will be of solid masonry eighty
feet high. Each cable is eleven hundred and sixty feet long, and
composed of seventy-two number ten iron wires, around which is wrapped
small wire three times boiled in linseed oil, which anneals it, and
gives it a coat that can not be injured by exposure to the weather, and
preserves the wire from rust. The cables, after passing over the piers
on the banks, are fast anchored in masonry fifty feet back of them. The
suspenders are composed of eight wires each, and are placed four and a
half feet apart. The bridge is two hundred feet above the water.

** This view, looking up the river, comprises about one half the bridge,
a portion of the bank on the Canada side on the right, the American
shore on the left, and a part of the Falls, seen under the bridge, in
the extreme distance.

Departure from the Falls.--A Day upon the Rail road.--Syracuse. --Early
History of that Region.--The French.

229in their grandeur, and never can be. A picture can not convey an idea
of their magnificence to the eye. They must be seen to be known. Art
utterly fails in attempts to transfer their features to canvas, and
degrades nature by its puny efforts. In their _motion_ consists their
great sublimity, and the painter might as well attempt to delineate the
whirlwind as to depict Niagara in its glory.

We left Niagara early on Saturday morning, stopped in Buffalo just long
enough August 19, 1848 to go from one rail-way station to another, and
reached Syracuse at about eight in the evening, a distance of two
hundred miles. That day's journey seems more like a dream than reality,
for hills and valleys, woods and meadows, hamlets and villages, lakes
and rivers, the puff of the engine, the rattle of the train, men, women,
and children in serried ranks, are all mingled in confusion in the
kaleidescope of memory, and nothing but a map or a Traveler's Guide-book
can unravel the tangled skein of localities that was spun out in that
rapid journey of fourteen hours. We remember the broad Niagara, the dark
Erie with white sails upon its bosom, the stately houses and busy
streets of Buffalo, the long _reaches_ of flat, new country, dotted with
stumps, from Buffalo to Attica and beyond, the stirring mart of
Rochester, the fields, and orchards, and groves of lofty trees that
seemed waltzing by us, the beautiful villages of Canandaigua and Geneva,
the falls of the Seneca, the long bridge of Cayuga, the strong prison
and beautiful dwellings of Auburn, and the golden sunset and cool breeze
that charmed us as we approached Syracuse. In that flourishing city of
the recent wilderness we passed a quiet Sabbath with some friends, and
the next morning I journeyed to Rome.

Although a quarter of a century has scarcely passed since Syracuse was a
village of mean huts, * it has a history connected with European
civilization more than two hundred years old. At Salina, now a portion
of the city of Syracuse, where the principal salt-wells are, the French,
under the Sieur Dupuys, an officer of the garrison at Quebec, made a
settlement as early as 1655. The Onondaga tribe then had their villages
in the valley, a few miles from Syracuse, and a good understanding
prevailed between them and the new-comers. The jealousy of the Mohawks
was aroused, and they attempted to cut off the colonists while on their
way up the St. Lawrence. They, however, reached their destination in
safety, and upon the borders of the Onondaga Lake they reared dwellings
and prepared for a permanent colony. But the uneasiness of the Indian
tribes soon manifested itself in hostile preparations, and in the winter
of 1658 Dupuys was informed that large parties of Mohawks, Oneidas, and
even Onondagas, were arming. Unable to procure assistance in time from
Quebec, he succeeded, by stratagem, in constructing some bateaux and
escaping with the whole colony secretly down the river to Oswego, and
thence to Montreal.

Relying implicitly upon the good faith and promised friendship of the
Indians, Dupuys had neglected to preserve his canoes. To construct new
ones in view of the Indians would advertise them of his intentions, and
bring their hatchets upon the settlement at once. He therefore had small
bateaux made in the garret of the Jesuit's house, and kept them
concealed when finished. A young Frenchman had been adopted into the
family of a chief, and had

* In 1820 the late William L. Stone visited Syracuse in company with Mr.
Forman, one of the earliest and most industrious friends of the Erie
Canal. "I lodged for the night," says Mr. Slone, "at a miserable tavern,
thronged by a company of salt-boilers from Salina, forming a group of
about as rough-looking specimens of humanity as I had ever seen. Their
wild visages, beards thick and long, and matted hair even now rise up in
dark, distant, and picturesque effect before me. I passed a restless
night, disturbed by strange fancies, as I yet well remember. It was in
October, and a flurry of snow during the night had rendered the morning
aspect of the country more dreary than the evening before. The few
houses I have already described, standing upon low and almost marshy
ground, and surrounded by trees and entangled thickets, presented a very
uninviting scene. 'Mr. Forman,' said I, 'do you call this a village? It
could make an owl weep to fly over it.' 'Never mind,' said he, in reply,
'you will live to see it a city yet.'" Mr. Slone did, indeed, live to
see it a city in size, when he wrote the above in 1810, and it is now a
city in fact, with mayor and aldermen, noble stores and dwellings, and a
population of some 14,000. Judge Forman was one of the projectors of the
Erie Canal, and the founder of Syracuse. He died at Rutherfordton, North
Carolina, on the 4th of August, 1849, aged 72 years.

Stratagem of a young Frenchman.--Escape of the French.--Early
Explorations.--Monumental Stone.--Silver-bottomed Lake.

230acquired great influence over the tribe. By their customs an adopted
son had all the privileges of a son by birth. When Dupuys had a
sufficient number of bateaux finished, this young man went to his
foster-father, and in a solemn manner related that he had dreamed, the
previous night, that he was at a feast, where the guests ate and drank
every thing that was set before them. He then asked the old chief to
permit him to make such a feast for the tribe. The request was granted,
and the feast was spread. Many Frenchmen were present, and with horns,
drums, and trumpets, they kept a continual uproar. The French, in the
mean while, were diligently embarking and loading their bateaux,
unobserved by the feasting savages. At length the guests, who had been
eating and drinking for hours, ceased gormandizing, to take some repose.
The young Frenchman commenced playing upon a guitar, and in a few
minutes every red man was in a profound slumber. He then joined his
companions, and before morning the whole colony were far on their way
toward Oswego. Late the next day the Indians stood wondering at the
silence that prevailed in the dwellings of the whites, and when, at
evening, having seen no signs of human fife through the day, they
ventured to break open the fastened dwellings, they were greatly
astonished at finding every Frenchman gone; and greater was their
perplexity in divining the means by which they escaped, being entirely
ignorant of their having any vessels. *

Ten years afterward another French colony settled in what now is called
Pompey, about fourteen miles from Syracuse, and for three years it
prospered, and many converts were made to the Catholic faith from the
Onondaga tribe. A company of Spaniards, having been informed of a lake
whose bottom was covered with brilliant scales like silver, arrived
there, and in a short time the animosities of the respective adventurers
caused them to accuse each other to the Indians of foul designs upon the
tribes. The Onondagas believed both parties, and determined to rid
themselves of such troublesome neighbors. Assisted by the Oneidas and
Cayugas, they fell upon the colony on All-Saints' day, 1669, and every
Frenchman and Spaniard was massacred. **

Evidences of much earlier visits by Europeans have been found in the
vicinity, among which was a sepulchral stone that was exhumed near
Pompey Hill. It was of an oblong figure, being fourteen inches long by
twelve wide, and about eight inches in thickness. In the center of the
surface was a figure of a tree, and a serpent climbing it; and upon each
side of the tree was an inscription, as seen in the cut: "Leo X., De
Viz, 1520. L. S." This inscription may be thus translated: "Leo X., by
the grace of God; sixth year of his pontificate, 1520." The letters L.
S. were doubtless the initials of the one to whose memory the stone was
set up. The cross denoted that he was a Roman Catholic, but the meaning
of the inverted U is not so clear. It has been supposed that the stone
was carved on the spot by a friend of the deceased, who may have been
one of several French or Spanish adventurers that found their way hither
from Florida, which was discovered by the Spaniards in 1502. They were
amused and excited by stories of a lake far in the north, whose bottom
was lined with silver, and this was sufficient to cause them to peril
every thing in searching it out. De Soto's historian speaks, in the
course of his narrative of the adventures of that commander in the
interior of America, of extreme cold at a place called by the natives
_Saquechama_. It is supposed that this name and _Susquehanna_ are
synonymous appellations for the country in Central New York, and that
the silver-bottomed lake was the Onondaga, the flakes and crystals of
salt which cover its bottom giving it the appearance of silver. ***

* See extracts from a MS. history of Onondaga county, by Rev. J. W.
Adams, of Syracuse, quoted in the Historical Collections of New York, p.
398.

** Dewitt Clinton's Memoir on the Antiquities of Western New York.

*** See Clinton's Memoir, &c.; also, Sandford's Aborigines, note on page
114. The crystals of salt on the bottom of the lake, into which the salt
springs flow, were, like the scales of mica discovered on the eastern
coast by Gosnold and his party, mistaken for laminæ of silver. There are
not many salt springs near the surface, but under the marshes that
surround Onondaga Lake, and beneath the lake itself, there seems to lie
a vast salt lake, and shafts are sunken from the surface above into it.
The water or brine is pumped up from these shafts or wells, and vast
quantities of salt are manufactured annually in the neighborhood of
Syracuse. A great number of men find employment there, and the state
derives a handsome revenue from the works.

Rome.--Site of Fort Stanwix.--Forts Newport and Ball.--The Portage and
Canal.--The Mohawk Valley.

231We have already noticed the expedition of the French, under
Frontenac, as far as the Onondaga Valley. From that time nothing but
Indian feuds disturbed the repose that rested upon Onondaga Lake and the
beautiful country around, until business enterprise within the present
century began its warfare upon the forests and the rich soil.

I arrived at Rome, upon the Mohawk, toward noon. It is a pleasant
village, and stands upon the site of old Fort Stanwix, on the western
verge of the historical ground of the Mohawk Valley. Here was the
outpost of active operations in this direction, and here was enacted one
of the most desperate defenses of a fortress that occurred during our
struggle for independence. The village, in its rapid growth, has
overspread the site of the fortification, and now not a vestige of
antiquity remains, except a large elm-tree by the house of Alvah Mudge,
Esq., which stood within the southwest angle of the fort. Mr. Mudge
kindly pointed out to me the area comprehended within the fort, and the
portion of the village seen in the picture covers that area. The mason-
work in the foreground is a part of the first lock of the Black River
Canal, at present an unproductive work. The large building in the center
of the pic ture is the mansion of John Striker, Esq., president of the
Rome Bank, and stands near the site of the northeast angle of the fort.
The whole view is only a few rods northwest of the Mohawk River, and a
mile eastward of Wood Creek, the main inlet of Oneida Lake. Here was a
portage of a mile, and the only interruption of water communication
between Schenectady and Oswego. This inconvenience was obviated by the
construction of a canal between the Mohawk and Wood Creek, in 1797.

Fort Stanwix: was built in 1758, under the direction of General Stanwix,
after the defeat of Abercrombie at Ticonderoga. It was a strong square
fortification, having bomb-proof bastions, a glacis, covered way, and a
well-picketed ditch around the ramparts. Its position was important in a
military point of view, for it commanded the portage between the Mohawk
and Wood Creek, and was a key to communication between the Mohawk Valley
and Lake Ontario. Other, but smaller, fortifications were erected in the
vicinity. Fort Newport, on Wood Creek, and Fort Ball, about half way
across the portage, formed a part of the military works there, and
afforded not only a strong post of resistance to French aggression in
that direction, but also a powerful protection to the Indian trade. The
works cost the British and Colonial government two hundred and sixty-six
thousand four hundred dollars, yet when the Revolution broke out the
fort and its outposts were in ruins.

From the commencement of hostilities the Mohawk Valley was a theater of
great activity, and all through the eventful years of the contest it
suffered dreadfully from the effects of partisan warfare. Every rood of
ground was trodden by hostile parties, and for seven years the fierce
Indian, and the ofttimes more ferocious Tory, kept the people in
continual alarm, spreading death and desolation over that fair portion
of our land. So frequent and sanguinary were the stealthy midnight
attacks or open daylight struggles, that Tryon county *

Site of Fort Stanwix.--Sir William Johnson and his Associates.--Effect
of Political Movements upon the People.--Formation of Parties.

obtained232 the appropriate appellation of "the dark and bloody ground,"
and, long after peace blessed the land, its forests were traversed with
fear and distrust.

Here was the seat of Sir William Johnson, agent for the British
government in its transactions with the Six Nations. He was shrewd,
cunning, and licentious, having little respect for the laws of God or
man, and observed them only so far as compliance was conducive to his
personal interest. By presents, conformity in dress and manners, and
other appliances, he obtained almost unbounded influence over the tribes
of the valley, and at his beck a thousand armed warriors would rush to
the field. He died before the events of our Revolution brought his vast
influence over the Indians into play, in active measures against the
patriots. Yet his mantle of power and moral sway fell, in a great
degree, upon his son, Sir John Johnson, who succeeded to his title,
office, and estates. The latter, his cousin Guy Johnson, Thayendanegea
(Brant) the Mohawk sachem, Daniel Claus, and the Butlers were the
leading spirits of loyalty in Tryon county, and the actors and abettors
of scenes that darken the blackest page in the history of our race.
These will be noticed hereafter. For the present we will confine our
thoughts to the most prominent local events immediately antecedent to
the siege of Fort Stanwix, or Schuyler, upon the site of which, at Rome,
we are standing. The excitement of the Stamp Act reached even the quiet
valley of the Mohawk, and implanted there the seeds of rebellion, and
the people were eager listeners while the conflict of power and
principle was going on upon the sea-board, during the ten years
preceding the organization of the Continental army. (a) The meeting of
the general  a 1775 Continental Congress caused opinions to take a
definite shape and expression, and in the autumn of that year the
demarkation line between patriots and Loyalists was distinctly drawn
among the people of this inland district.

In the spring of 1775, just before the second Congress assembled at
Philadelphia, at a court holden at Johnstown, the Loyalists made a
demonstration against the proceedings of 1705.

* Tryon county then included all the colonial settlements in New York
west and southwest of Schenectady. It was taken from Albany county in
1772, and named in honor of William Tryon, then governor of the
province. The name was changed to Montgomery in 1784. The county
buildings were at Johnstown, where was the residence of Sir William
Johnson (still standing).

** Sir William Johnson was born in Ireland, about the year 1714. He was
a nephew of Sir Peter Warren, the commodore who was distinguished in the
attack on Louisburgh, Cape Breton, 1745. Sir Peter married a lady (Miss
Watts) in New York, purchased large tracts of land upon the Mohawk, and
about 1734 young Johnson was induced to come to America and take charge
of his uncle's affairs in that quarter. He learned the Indian language,
adopted their manners, and, by fair trade and conciliatory conduct, won
their friendship and esteem. He built a large stone mansion on the
Mohawk, about three miles west of Amsterdam, where he resided twenty
years previous to the erection of Johnson Hall at Johnstown. It was
fortified, and was called Fort Johnson. It is still standing, a
substantial specimen of the domestic architecture of that period. In
1755 he commanded a force intended to invest Crown Point. He was
attacked by Dieskau at the head of Lake George, where he came off
victorious.. For this he was made major general and a knight. He
commanded the assault upon Niagara, after the death of Prideaux, and was
successful there. He was never given credit for great military skill or
personal bravery, and was more expert in intriguing with Indian
warriors, and sending them to the field, than in leading disciplined
troops boldly into action. He died at Johnson Hall (Johnstown) on the
11th of July, 1774, aged 60 years.

Violence of Loyalists.--Assault upon Jacob Sammons.--Caughnawaga
Church.--Meeting at Cherry Valley.--John Johnson.

233the National Council, by drawing up and obtaining signatures to a
declaration disapproving of the acts of that body in the preceding
autumn. This proceeding of the Tories aroused the indignation of the
Whigs, who composed a considerable majority of the whites in Tryon
county. Committees were appointed and public meetings were called in
every district in the county. The first was held at the house of John
Veeder, in Caughnawaga, * where patriotic speeches were made, and a
liberty pole, a most offensive object to the eyes of the Loyalists, was
erected.

Before this was accomplished, Sir John Johnson, accompanied by Colonel
Claus, Guy Johnson, and Colonel John Butler, with a large number of
their retainers, armed with swords and pistols, arrived upon the ground
and interrupted the proceedings.

Guy Johnson mounted a high stoop near the old church and harangued the
people. He expatiated upon the strength of the king and government, and
the folly of opposing the authority of the crown. He had not a
conciliatory word for the people, but denounced their proceedings in
virulent and abusive language, so irritating, that Jacob Sammons, a
leader among the Whigs, could no longer restrain himself, but boldly
pronounced the speaker a liar and a villain. Johnson leaped from his
tribune and seized Sammons by the throat; one of his party felled the
patriot to the ground by a blow from a loaded whip-handle, and then
bestrode his body. When Sammons recovered from the momentary stupor, he
hurled the fellow from him, and, springing upon his feet, stripped off
his coat and prepared to fight, when he was again knocked down. Most of
his Whig friends had fled in alarm, and he was carried to his father's
house, "bearing upon his body the first scars of the Revolutionary
contest in the county of Tryon." ***

A spirited Whig meeting was held soon afterward, in Cherry Valley, where
the conduct of the Tories at Johnstown was strongly condemned; but in
the Palatine district and other places the threats and the known
strength of the Johnsons and their friends intimidated the Whigs for a
while.

In the mean time, Colonel Johnson fortified the baronial hall by
planting swivels around it. He paraded the militia, armed the Scotch
Highlanders (who lived in the vicinity of Johnstown, and were Roman
Catholics), and by similar acts, hostile to the popular movement, the
suspicions of the Whigs were confirmed that he was preparing for the
suppression of all patriot demonstrations in the county, and was
inciting the Indians to join the enemies

* Caughnawaga is the ancient name of the Indian village that stood a
little eastward of the present village of Fonda. Its name signifies
coffin, and was given to the place in consequence of there being in the
Mohawk, opposite the village, a black stone (still to be seen)
resembling a coffin, and projecting above the surface at low water.--
Historical Collections of New York, p. 281.

** This old church, now (1848) known as the Fonda Academy, under the
management of Rev. Douw Van Olinda, is about half a mile east of the
court-house, in the village of Fonda. It is a stone edifice, and was
erected in 1763 by voluntary contributions. Sir William Johnson
contributed liberally. Its first pastor was Thomas Romayne, who was
succeeded in 1795 by Abraham Van Horn, one of the earliest graduates of
King's (now Columbia) College, in the city of New York. He was from
Kingston, Ulster county, and remained its pastor until 1840. During his
ministry he united in marriage 1500 couples. The church was without a
bell until the confiscated property of Sir John Johnson was sold in the
Revolution, when the _dinner-bell_ of his father was purchased and hung
in the steeple. The bell weighs a little more than one hundred pounds,
and bears the following inscription: ''S. R. William Johnson, baronet,
1774. Made by Miller and Ross, in Eliz. Town."--Simms's Schoharie
County, &c. Over the door of the church is a stone tablet, with this
inscription in English, "Come ye, and let us go up to the mountain of
the Lord; to the house of the God of Jacob, and he will teach us his
ways, and we will walk in his paths."

*** Stone's Life of Brant, i., 53.

Attempted Removal of Mr. Kirkland.--Hostile Movements of the Johnsons.--
Indian Councils.--Rev. Samuel Kirkland.

234of liberty as soon as actual hostilities should commence. * Another
circumstance confirmed these suspicions. Brant was the secretary of
Colonel Guy Johnson, the superintendent of Indian affairs after the
death of Sir William, and his activity in visiting the tribes and
holding secret conferences with the sachems was unceasing. Suddenly his
former friendly intercourse with Mr. Kirkland, the faithful Christian
missionary, was broken off in 1774, and, at Brant's instigation, an
Oneida chief preferred charges against the pious minister to Guy
Johnson, and asked for his removal. It was well known that Mr. Kirkland
was a Whig, ** and this movement of the wily sachem could not be
misinterpreted. But the Oneida nation rallied in support of the
minister, and his removal was for a time delayed.

During the summer of 1775 the Johnsons were very active in winning the
_Six Nations_. from their promises of neutrality in the coming contest.3
A council of the Mohawks was 1775. held at Guy Park in May, which was
attended by delegates from the Albany and the Tryon county Committees.
_Little Abraham_, brother of the famous Hendrick who was killed near
Lake George, was the principal chief of the Mohawks, and their best
speaker on the occasion. Guy Johnson, the Indian agent, was in
attendance at the council, but the result was unsatisfactory to both
parties. The delegates, cognizant of the disaffection and bad faith of
the Indians, could not rely upon their present promises; and Guy
Johnson, alarmed by the events at Lexington and Concord, and by
intimations which he had received that his person was in danger of
seizure by order of the General Congress, broke up the council abruptly,
and immediately directed the assembling of another at the Upper Castle,
on the German Flats, whither himself and family, attended by a large
retinue of Mohawks, at once repaired. But this council was not held, and
Johnson, with his family and the Indians, pushed on to Fort Stanwix. His
sojourn there was brief, and he moved on to Ontario, far beyond the
verge of civilization. Brant and the Butlers attended him, and there a
large council was held, composed chiefly of Cayugas and Senecas.

Thus far no positive acts of hostility had been committed by Guy Johnson
and his friends, yet his design to alienate the Indians and prepare them
for war upon the patriots was undoubted. His hasty departure with his
family to the wilderness, accompanied by a large train of Mohawk
warriors, and the holding a grand council in the midst of the fierce
Cayu-

* See letter of the Palatine Committee to the Committee of Safety at
Albany, dated May 18th, 1775.

** Samuel Kirkland was son of the pious minister, Daniel Kirkland, of
Norwieh, Connecticut. He learned the language of the Mohawks, was
ordained a missionary to the Indians at Lebanon in 1766, and removed his
wife to the Oneida Castle in 1769. The next spring he removed to the
house of his friend, General Herkimer, near Little Falls, where his twin
children were born, one of whom was the late Dr. Kirkland, president of
Harvard College. The very air of Norwieh seemed to give the vitality of
freedom to its sons, and Mr. Kirkland early imbibed those patriotic
principles which distinguished him through life. His attachment to the
republican cause was well known, and, after the battles of Lexington and
Concord, the provincial Congress of Massachusetts, desirous of securing
either the friendship or neutrality of the Six Nations, sent a letter to
him inclosing an address to the Indians, and requesting him to use his
influence in obtaining the ends in view. Mr. Kirkland succeeded in
securing the attachment of the Oneidas to the patriot cause, and
continued his religious labors among them during the war, when the other
tribes, through the influence of Brant and the Johnsons, had taken up
arms for the king. He officiated as chaplain to the American forces in
the vicinity of his labors, and accompanied Sullivan in his expedition
in 1779. The state of New York, in consideration of his patriotic
services, gave him the lands of the "Kirkland patent," in the town of
Kirkland. After 40 years' service for his God and country, he fell
asleep at Paris, Oneida county, on the 28th of March, 1808, in the 67th
year of his age.

*** General Sehuyler had held a conference with the chiefs of the Six
Nations during the previous winter, and, setting before them the nature
of the quarrel that had led to hostile movements, received from them
solemn promises that they would remain neutral.

**** This was the residence of Guy Johnson, and is still standing, on
the north side of the Mohawk, about a mile from the village of
Amsterdam, in Montgomery county. It is substantially built of stone, and
may stand a century yet. Embowered in trees, it is a beautiful summer
residence.

Alarm of the People of the Mohawk Valley.--Sir John Johnson and
Highlanders.--Orders to General Schuyler.

235gas and Senecas, greatly alarmed the people of the lower valley, *
inasmuch as his reply to a letter from the Provincial Congress of New
York, which he wrote from the council-room July 8, 1775 in the
wilderness, glowed with sentiments of loyalty. It was, moreover,
positively asserted that he was collecting a large body of savages on
that remote frontier, to fall upon the inhabitants of the valley, and
this belief was strengthened by the fact that Sir John Johnson, who held
a commission of brigadier general of militia, remained at Johnson Hall,
then fortified and surrounded by a large body of Loyalists. The alarmed
patriots appealed to the Committee of Safety at Albany for protection,
and every preparation was made to avert the threatened disaster. Guy
Johnson, however, did not return to the valley, but went to Oswego,
where he called another council, and then, accompanied by a large number
of chiefs and warriors of the Six Nations, among whom was Brant,
departed for Canada. He descended the St. Lawrence to Montreal, where he
met Sir Guy Carleton and Sir Frederic Haldimand, then governor of
Canada, with whom the Indians entered into a formal agreement to take up
arms for the king. ** These were the Indians who appeared against the
Americans at St. John's, on the Sorel, and who, in connection with some
Caughnawa-gas, made the terrible massacre of Major Sherburne's corps at
the Cedars in the following spring, noticed in a previous chapter.

These movements of the Johnsons and their friends, the strengthening of
Johnson Hall, the military organization of the Scotch Highlanders in the
vicinity, the increasing alienation of the Indians, the boldness of the
Tories, and the continual alarm of the people of Tryon county, caused
the General Congress, in December, 1775, to take active measures in that
direction. The Dutch and Germans in the Mohawk Valley, Schoharie, Cherry
Valley, and, indeed, in all parts of that extensive country, were ardent
Whigs; and the Highlanders, with the retainers of the Johnsons and their
friends, composed the bulk of the Tory population, except a few
desperate men who looked for plunder and reward. Had these alone been
inimical to the patriots, there would have been little alarm; but the
country swarmed with Indians, who were hourly becoming more and more
hostile to the Whigs, through the influence of the Johnsons and their
powerful ally, Joseph Brant. It was also reported that military stores
were collected at Johnson Hall, and that three hundred Indians were
ready to fall upon the whites when Sir John Johnson should give the
signal. Congress, therefore, ordered General Schuyler (who had returned
to Albany from Lake Champlain, on account of ill health) to take such
measures as he should think proper to seize the military stores, to
apprehend the Tory leaders, and to disarm the loyal inhabitants. He had
no troops at command, but, aided by the Albany Committee of Safety, he
soon mustered seven hundred men and marched to Schenectady. The Mohawks
of the "Lower Castle" (near Amsterdam), with Little Abraham at their
head, had not been seduced by Brant and Johnson, but kept to their
promise to remain neutral. To preserve their goodwill Schuyler sent to
them a messenger (Mr. Bleeeker, the Indian interpreter, then residing at
Albany) with a January 15, 1776 belt, informing them of the object of
his expedition. They were not pleased with the idea of invasion, and a
deputation was sent to the general to persuade him to desist. He
conferred with them at Schenectady, satisfied them of his good
intentions and the necessity of the movement, and then marched on as far
as Guy Park. He dispatched a January 16. letter at the same time to Sir
John Johnson, requesting a personal interview with him. They met at Guy
Park in a friendly way, and General Schuyler proposed terms by

* On the 11th of July, Colonel Herkimer wrote from Canajohario to the
Palatine Committee, that he had received credible intelligence that
morning that Johnson was ready to march back upon the settlement with a
body of 800 or 900 Indians, and that his point of attack would be just
below the Little Falls. This intelligence proved to be untrue.

** British historians assert that General Carleton was averse to the
employment of the savages against the Americans. Mr. Slone, in his Life
of Brant, quotes from a speech of that chief, wherein the reverse is
asserted. The British commanders never failed to employ Indians in
warfare, when their services could be obtained. Their feelings of
humanity doubtless revolted when coalescing with the savages of the
forest to butcher their brethren, but with them principle too often
yielded to expediency in that unrighteous war.

Disarming of the Tories at Johnson Hall.--Perfidy of Sir John Johnson.--
His Flight--Royal Greens.

236which the matter might be settled without bloodshed. He demanded the
immediate surrender of all arms, ammunition, and stores in the
possession of Johnson, the delivery to him of all the arms and military
accouterments held by the Tories and Indians, and Sir John's parole of
honor not to act inimically to the patriot cause. Sir John asked twenty-
four hours for consideration. His reply was unsatisfactory, and Schuyler
marched on to January 18. within four miles of Johnstown. The militia
had turned out with alacrity, and his force of seven hundred men had
increased to three thousand. Sir John, alarmed, acceded to all the terms
proposed by General Schuyler, and the next day that officer proceeded to
Johnson Hall, where arms and other munitions of war were surrendered by
the baronet. About three hundred Scotchmen also delivered up their arms.
Colonel (afterward General) Herkimer was empowered to complete the
disarming of the Tories, and General Schuyler and his forces marched
back to Albany.

It soon afterward became evident that what Sir John had promised when
constrained by fear would not be performed when the cause of that fear
was removed. He violated his parole of honor and the Highlanders began
to be as bold as ever in their opposition to the Whigs. Congress thought
it dangerous to allow Johnson his liberty, and directed Schuyler to
seize his person, and to proceed vigorously against the Highlanders in
his interest. Colonel Dayton was intrusted with the command of an
expedition for the purpose, and in 1776 May he proceeded to Johnstown.
The baronet had friends among the Loyalists in Albany, by whom he was
timely informed of the intentions of Congress. His most valuable
articles were put in an iron chest and buried in his garden * when he
heard of Dayton's approach, and, hastily collecting a large number of
his Scotch tenants and otter Tories, he fled to the woods by the way of
the Sacandaga, where it is supposed they were met by Indians sent from
Canada to escort them thither. ** Amid perils and hardships of every
kind, they traversed the wilderness between the head waters of the
Hudson and the St. Lawrence, and, after nineteen days' wanderings,
arrived at Montreal. Sir John was immediately commissioned a colonel in
the British service, raised two battalions of Loyalists called the
_Johnson Greens_, and became one of the bitterest and most implacable
enemies of the Americans that appeared during the war. He afterward, as
we shall observe, scourged the Mohawk Valley with fire and sword, and
spread death and desolation among the frontier settlements even so far
south as the Valley of Wyoming.

After the flight of Johnson and the Tories, Tryon county enjoyed a short
season of repose, and nothing of importance occurred during the
remainder of 1776 and the winter of 1777. Yet the people did not relax
their vigilance. The Declaration of Independence was received by them
with great joy, but they clearly perceived that much was yet to be done
to _support_ that declaration. Congress, too, saw the importance of
defending the Northern and Western frontiers of New York from the
incursions of the enemy and their savage allies. The fortresses on Lake
Champlain were already in their possession, and General Schuyler was
ordered to repair and strengthen old Fort Stanwix, then in ruins, and to
erect other fortifications, if necessary, along the Mohawk River.
Colonel Dayton was charged with the duty

* Sir John had a faithful black slave, to whom he intrusted the duty of
burying his iron chest. Colonel

Volkert Veeder bought the slave when Johnson Hall was sold, but he would
never tell where the treasure was concealed. Sir John visited the Mohawk
Valley in 1780, recovered his slave, and by his directions found the
iron chest.--Simms.

** This is inferred from a sentence in one of Brant's speeches, quoted
by Mr. Stone, as follows: "We then went in a body to a town then in
possession of the enemy, and rescued Sir John Johnson, bringing him
fearlessly through the streets." Brant and Guy Johnson were both in
England at that time. Lady Johnson was conveyed to Albany, and there
kept for some time, as a sort of hostage for the good conduct of her
husband. Among the articles left in Johnson Hall was the family Bible of
Sir William. When the confiscated property was sold, the Bible was
bought by John Taylor, who was afterward Lieutenant-governor of New
York. Perceiving that it contained the family record of the Johnsons,
Mr. Taylor wrote to Sir John, offering its restoration. A rude messenger
was sent for the Bible. "I have come for Sir William's Bible." he said,
"and there are the four guineas which it cost." The man was asked what
message Sir John had sent. He replied, "Pay four guineas and take the
book."--Stone's Life of Brant, ii., 145

Repairs of Fort Stanwix.--Brant at Oghkwaga.--His hostile Movements.--
Expeditions of Herkimer and of Colonel Harper.

237of repairing Fort Stanwix, with the assistance of the Tryon county
militia, but he seems to have made little progress, for it was not
complete when, in the summer of the next year, it was invested by St.
Leger. He named the new fortress Fort Schuyler, in honor of the
commanding general of the Northern Department, and by that appellation
it was known through the remainder of the war. *

In the course of the spring of 1777, Brant came from Canada, and
appeared among the Mohawks at Oghkwaga, ** or Oquaca, with a large body
of warriors. He had not yet committed any act of hostility within the
borders of New York, nor was his presence at the Cedars known in the
Mohawk Valley. Yet none doubted his hostile intentions, and his presence
gave much uneasiness to the patriots, while the Tories became bolder and
more insolent. In June his intentions became more manifest, when he
ascended the Susquehanna, from Oghkwaga to Unadilla, with about eighty
of his warriors, and requested an interview with the Rev. Mr. Johnstone,
of the "Johnstone Settlement." He declared that his object was to
procure food for his famished people, and gave the whites to understand
that, if provisions were not furnished, the Indians would take them by
force. Mr. Johnstone sounded Brant concerning his future intentions, and
the chief, without reserve, told him that he had made a covenant with
the king, and was not inclined to break it. The people supplied him with
food, but the marauders, not satisfied, drove off a large number of
cattle, sheep, and swine. As soon as the Indians had departed, not
feeling safe in their remote settlement, the whites abandoned it, and
took refuge in Cherry Valley. Some families in the neighborhood of
Unadilla fled to the German Flats, and others to Esopus and Newburgh, on
the Hudson River.

As the Indian forces were constantly augmenting at Oghkwaga, it was
determined by General Schuyler and his officers, in council, that
Herkimer (now a brigadier) should repair thither and obtain an interview
with Brant. Herkimer took with him three hundred Tryon county militia,
and invited Brant to meet him at Unadilla. This the chief agreed to. In
the mean while, Colonel Van Schaick marched with one hundred and fifty
men as far as Cherry Valley, and General Schuyler held himself in
readiness to repair to Unadilla if his presence should be needed. These
precautions seemed necessary, for they knew not what might be the
disposition of Brant.

It was a week after Herkimer arrived at Unadilla before Brant made his
appearance. He came accompanied by five hundred warriors. He dispatched
a runner to Herkimer to inquire the object of his visit. *** Herkimer
replied that he came to see and converse with

* This change in the name of the fort, from Stanwix to Schuyler,
produced some confusion, for there was already an old fort at Utica
called Fort Schuyler, so named in honor of Colonel Peter Schuyler, a
commander of provincial troops in the war with the French and Indians.

** Toward the close of the winter of 1777 a large gathering of Indians
was held at Oghkwaga. The Provincial Congress of New York dispatched
thither Colonel John Harper, of Harpersfield, to ascertain their
intentions. He arrived on the 27th of February, and was well received by
the Indians. They expressed their sorrow for the troubles that afflicted
Tryon county, and gave every assurance of their pacific dispositions.
Colonel Harper believed them, and gave them a feast by roasting an ox.
It was afterward discovered that all their friendship was feigned; their
professions of peaceful intentions were gross hypocrisy. A few weeks
subsequently, while taking a circuit alone through the woods near the
head waters of the Susquehanna, Harper met some Indians, who exchanged
salutations with him. He recognized one of them as Peter, an Indian whom
he had seen at Oghkwaga, but they did not know him. His great-coat
covered his uniform, and he feigning to be a Tory, they told him they
were on their way to cut off the Johnstone settlement on the east shore
of the Susquehanna, near Unadilla. Colonel Harper hastened back to
Harpersfield, collected fifteen stout and brave men, and with them gave
chase to the marauders. In the course of the following night they came
upon the Indians in the valley of Charlotte River. It was almost
daylight when their waning fires were discovered. The savages were in a
profound slumber. Their arms were silently removed, and then each man of
Harper's party, selecting his victim, sprang upon him, and before he was
fairly awake the savage found himself fast bound with cords which the
whites had brought with them. It was a bolder achievement than if the
red men had been killed, and nobler because bloodless. When the day
dawned, and the Indians saw their captors, Peter exclaimed, "Ugh!
Colonel Harper! Why didn't I know you yesterday?" They were taken to
Albany and surrendered into the hands of the Committee of Safety. The
real object of the conference is not known. It is supposed that, as
Herkimer and Brant had been near neighbors and intimate friends, the
former hoped, in a personal interview, to persuade the chief to join the
patriots, or, at least, to remain neutral. It is also supposed that he
went to demand restitution for the cattle, sheep, and swine of which the
savages had plundered the Johnstone and Unadilla settlements.

Conference with Brant. His Frankness. Herkimer's precautionary Measures.
Haughty Bearing of Brant

238his brother, Captain Brant. "And all these men wish to converse with
the chief too?" asked the quick-witted messenger. He returned to Brant
and communicated the reply. The parties were encamped within two miles
of each other, and the whole assemblage made an imposing display. By
mutual agreement, their arms were to be left in their respective
encampments. The preliminaries being arranged, Brant and about forty
warriors appeared upon the skirt of a distant wood, and the parties met
in an open field. A circle was formed, and the two commanders, with
attendants, entered it for conference. After exchanging a few words,
Brant asked Herkimer the object of his visit. He made the same reply as
to the messenger. "And all these have come on a friendly visit too?"
said the chief. "All want to see the poor Indians. It is very kind," he
added, while his lip curled with a sarcastic smile. After a while the
conversation became animated, and finally the chief, being pressed by
direct questions concerning his intentions, firmly replied, "That the
Indians were in concert with the king, as their fathers had been; that
the king's belts were yet lodged with them, and they could not violate
their pledge; that General Herkimer and his followers had joined the
Boston people against their sovereign; that, although the Boston people
were resolute, the king would humble them; that General Schuyler was
very smart on the Indians at the treaty of German Flats, but, at the
same time, was not able to afford the smallest article of clothing; and,
finally, that the Indians had formerly made war on the white people when
"they were all united, and, as they were now divided, the Indians were
not frightened." He also told General Herkimer that a war-path had been
opened across the country to Esopus, for the Tories of Ulster and Orange
to join them. The conference ended then, with an agreement to meet the
next morning at nine o'clock, the respective forces to remain encamped
as they were. *

During the conference, some remarks made by Colonel Cox greatly
irritated the sachem, and on his signal to his warriors, who were near,
they ran to their encampment, raised the shrill war-hoop, and returned
with their rifles. In the mean while the chief became pacified, and the
warriors were kept at a proper distance. Herkimer, however, fearful that
Brant's pacific appearance might be feigned, prepared to act with
decision on the following morning. He charged an active young soldier,
named Wagner, with the duty of shooting Brant, if any hostile movement
should appear on the part of the chief. Wagner was to select two
assistants, who were to shoot the two attendants of Brant at the same
time. He chose Abraham and George Herkimer, nephews of the general, and
the three stood by the side of Herkimer the next morning. There was no
necessity for their services, and, haply, no blood was shed on the
occasion. Mr. Stone seems to have mistaken Herkimer's precaution, in
this instance, for premeditated perfidy, and says that, had the intent
been perpetrated, the stain upon the character of the provincials would
have been such that "all the waters of the Mohawk could not have washed
it away." Mr. Wagner was yet living at Fort Plain when I visited that
place in 1848, and I have his own authority for saying that the
arrangement was only a precautionary one, for which Herkimer deserved
praise. Mr. Stone gives his version upon "the written authority of
Joseph Wagner himself." Simms has declared, in his "History of Schoharie
County," and repeated in conversation with myself, that Wagner told him
he never furnished a MS. account of the affair to any one. Here is some
mistake in the matter, but the honorable character of General Herkimer
forbids the idea of his having meditated the least perfidy.

Again they met, and the haughty chief--haughty because conscious of
strength--as he entered the circle, addressed General Herkimer, and
said, "I have five hundred warriors with me, armed and ready for battle.
You are in my power, but, as we have been friends and neighbors, I will
not take advantage of you." He then gave the signal, and all his
warriors, painted in the hideous colors that distinguished them when
going into battle, burst

* Campbell's Annals of Tryon County.

Breaking up of the Council.--Grand Council at Oswego.--Seduction of the
Indians.--Their Coalescence with the Whites.

239from the surrounding forest, gave the war-hoop, and discharged their
rifles in the air. Brant coolly advised the general to go back to his
house, thanked him for his courtesy on the occasion, expressed a hope
that he might one day return the compliment, and then turned proudly
upon his heel and disappeared in the shadowy forest. "It was early in
July, and the morning was remarkably clear and beautiful. But the echo
of the war-hoop had scarcely died away before the heavens became black,
and a violent storm obliged each party to seek the nearest shelter. Men
less superstitious than many of the unlettered yeomen, who, leaning upon
their arms, were witnesses of the events of this day, could not fail, in
after times, to look back upon the tempest, if not as an omen, at least
as an emblem, of those bloody massacres with which these Indians and
their associates subsequently visited the inhabitants of this
unfortunate frontier." *

A few days after this conference, Brant withdrew his warriors from the
Susquehanna and joined Sir John Johnson and Colonel John Butler, who
were collecting a large body of Tories and refugees at Oswego,
preparatory to a descent upon the Mohawk and Schoharie settlements.
There Guy Johnson and other officers of the British Indian Department
summoned a grand council of the Six Nations. They were invited to
assemble "to eat the flesh and drink the blood of a Bostonian"--in other
words, to feast on the occasion of a proposed treaty of alliance against
the patriots, whom the savages denominated Bostonians, for the reason
that Boston was the focus of the rebellion. There was a pretty full
attendance at the council, but a large portion of the sachems adhered
faithfully to their covenant of neutrality made with General Schuyler,
until the appeals of the British commissioners to their avarice overcame
their sense of honor. The commissioners represented the people of the
king to be numerous as the forest leaves, and rich in every possession,
while those of the colonies were exhibited as few and poor; that the
armies of the king would soon subdue the rebels, and make them still
weaker and poorer; that the _rum_ of the king was as abundant as Lake
Ontario; and that if the Indians would become his allies during the war,
they should never want for goods or money. Tawdry articles, such as
scarlet clothes, beads, and trinkets, were then displayed and presented
to the Indians, which pleased them greatly, and they concluded an
alliance by binding themselves to take up the hatchet against the
patriots, and to continue their warfare until the latter were subdued.
To each Indian were then presented a brass kettle, a suit of clothes, a
gun, a tomahawk and scalping-knife, a piece of gold, a quantity of
ammunition, and a promise of a bounty upon every scalp he should bring
in. ** _Thayendanegea_ (Brant) was thenceforth the acknowledged grand
sachem of the Six Nations, and soon afterward commenced his terrible
career in the midst of our border settlements. ***

We have thus glanced at the most important events that took place in the
Mohawk Valley and adjacent districts prior to the attack of St. Leger
upon Fort Stanwix, or Schuyler (as it will hereafter be called), which
mark the progress of the Revolution there, before Brant and his more
savage white associates brightened the tomahawk and musket, and bared
the knife, in avowed alliance with the enemies of liberty. Volumes might
be, and, indeed, have been, written in giving details of the stirring
events in Tryon county during our Revolutionary struggle. **** To these
the reader is referred for local particulars, while we consider
transactions there of more prominent and general interest.

* Campbell's Annals of Tryon County.

** See Life of Mary Jemison. This pamphlet was written in 1823, and
published by James D. Bemis of Canandaigua, New York. She was taken a
captive near Fort Duquesne (now Pittsburgh) when a child and was reared
among the Indians. She married a chief, and became an Indian in every
particular, except birth. At the council here spoken of she was present
with her husband. Her death occurred at the age of 89. She says that the
brass kettles mentioned in the text were in use among the Seneca Indians
as late as 1823, when her narrative was printed.

*** Soon after Brant joined the Indians at Oghkwaga, he made a hostile
movement against the settlement of Cherry Valley. He hovered around that
hamlet for some days, but did not attack it. Of this a detailed account
will be given hereafter.

**** The most voluminous are Campbell's Annals of Tryon County, Stone's
Life of Brant and Simms'. Schoharie County and Border Wars of New York.

Indian Battle-ground.--Fort Schuyler.--Colonel Peter Gansevoort

240

CHAPTER XI.

"A scream! 'tis but the panther's--naught

Breaks the calm sunshine there;

A thicket stirs! a deer has sought

From sight a closer lair;

Again upon the grass they droop,

Then bursts the well-known whoop on whoop,

Shrill, deafening on the air,

And onward from their ambush deep,

Like wolves, the savage warriors leap."

Street.

E are now upon an Indian battle-ground, in the bosom of the deep forest,
where the cunning and ferocity of the savage had free exercise in the
panther-like maneuvers of the ambuscade, and the unrestrained use of the
hatchet and knife. Hitherto we have seen the red warriors subordinate,
and comparatively ineffective in the conflicts we have considered,
except in the battle at Lake George and in the massacre at the Cedars.
We have seen their method of warfare wholly subverted by European
tactics, and their fiery courage controlled by a policy unknown in their
sanguinary battles, unsuited to their martial training, and
unsatisfactory to their fierce natures when aroused by the flow of
blood.

But in the siege of Fort Schuyler, which we are about to chronicle, and
particularly in the battle of Oriskany, which formed a part of the
operations of that siege, the Indians, commanded by Brant, the most
subtle and accomplished war chief of his time, formed the strong right
arm of St. Leger, and were left free to fight according to the customs
of their race.

In the spring of 1777, Colonel Peter Gansevoort * was appointed to the
command of Fort Schuyler, and held that post in the summer of that year,
when Burgoyne was making his victorious march toward Albany by way of
Lake Champlain. The successful progress of the British commander greatly
alarmed the people of the north, and those of Tryon county were
particularly disturbed by intelligence that a de-

* Peter Gansevoort was born in Albany, July 17th, 1749. He accompanied
Montgomery into Canada in 1775, with the rank of major, and the next
year he was appointed a colonel in the New York line, which commission
he held when he defended Fort Schuyler against St. Leger. For his
gallant defense of that post he received the thanks of Congress, and in
1781 was promoted to the rank of brigadier general by the state of New
York. After the war he was for many years a military agent. He held
several offices of trust, and was always esteemed for his bravery and
judgment as a soldier, and for his fidelity, intelligence and probity as
a citizen. He died July 2d, 1812, aged 62 years. a citizen. He died July
2d, 1812, aged 62 years.

A Spy's Intelligence. Rumored Preparations for an Invasion. Effect on
the Whigs. Approach of St. Leger.

241scent upon them from Oswego might be expected. As early as June, a
man from Canada, arrested as a spy, had disclosed the fact that a
detachment of British troops, Canadians and Indians, was to penetrate
the country by way of Oswego and the Mohawk, to join Burgoyne when he
should reach Albany. This intelligence was soon after confirmed by
Thomas Spencer, a friendly Oneida half-breed sachem, who was sent to
Canada a secret emissary for information. He was present at a council
where Colonel Claus, * a brother-in-law of Sir John Johnson, presided,
and there he became acquainted with the general plans of Burgoyne. The
Oneida further informed the inhabitants that Sir John Johnson and
Colonel Claus, with their families, were then at Oswego in command of
seven hundred Indians and four hundred regular troops; that there were
six hundred Tories at Oswegatchio (Ogdensburgh) ready to join them; and
that Colonel John Butler was to arrive at Oswego on the 14th of July,
from Niagara, with Tories and Indians.

This information, instead of arousing the Whigs of the Mohawk Valley to
prompt and efficient action, seemed to paralyze them with alarm. The
timid were backward in preparing for the field, and the wavering,
considering the patriot cause almost hopeless, became Loyalists, or, at
best, passive Whigs.

Fort Schuyler was still unfinished, and feebly garrisoned, and certain
discomfiture seemed to await the patriots in that region. Colonel
Gansevoort, however, was vigilant, active, and hopeful. He wrote
spirited letters to General Schuyler, imploring aid, and that officer as
urgently laid the condition of Tryon county before the Provincial
Congress of New York, and also the General Congress. But u was then too
late to expect succor from a distance, and the people of the Mohawk
Valley were thrown upon their own feeble resources for defense. St.
Leger and his Rangers, with the forces of Johnson, Claus, Butler, and
Brant, mentioned by the Oneida chief, were already in motion, and on the
1st of August the enemy, one thousand seven hundred strong, came up
Oneida Lake, and near the ruins of old Fort Newport prepared to invest
Fort Schuyler. The Indians were led by Brant, and the whole beleaguering
force, at the beginning of the march at Oswego Falls, was disposed in
admirable order for the journey through the forest. The main body was
led by the Indians, under Brant, in five columns, four hundred and sixty
paces in front of the advanced guard. The Indians marched in single
file, at large distances apart.

Between the five columns and the rear-guard a file of Indians, ten paces
apart, formed a line of communication. The advanced guard was one
hundred paces in front of the main column, which was disposed in Indian
file, the right and left flanks covered by a file of savages. The rear-
guard was formed of regular troops. The advanced guard was composed of
sixty marksmen, selected from the corps of Johnson's Royal Greens, and
led by Captain Watts, a brother-

* Daniel Claus married the daughter of Sir William Johnson, and was a
man of considerable influence. Brant entertained for him sentiments of
the strongest personal hostility, although both were engaged in the same
cause. His wife died in Canada in 1801, and Brant, in the name of the
Five Nations, made a speech of condolence on her death. William Claus,
deputy superintendent of Indian affairs, was his son.--Sabine's Lives of
Ike Loyalists.

* This diagram, representing the order of march of the besieging force,
is a reduced copy of an engraving in Stone's Life of Brant. The original
drawing, beautifully colored, was found in the writing-desk of St.
Leger, which he left behind when he fled from his camp before Fort
Schuyler. The following is an explanation of the diagram: aaaaa, five
columns of Indians in front, flanking the British flag; 6, advanced
guard; n, line of communication between the advanced guard and Indian
columns; cc, dd, the left and right wings of the eighth and thirty-
fourth regiments (the thirty-fourth on the left side); e, rear-guard,
Indians on the right and left flanks; i i, line of communication.

Investiture of Fort Schuyler.--A curious Flag.--Arrival of St Leger.--
His pompous Manifesto

242in-law of Sir John Johnson. Each corps was likewise furnished with
practiced marksmen at short intervals, who were ordered to concentrate
their strength upon any point that might be attacked. St. Leger, as
appears from his private diary, was much annoyed on the way by the
disposition of his Indian allies to proceed according to their own
notions of expediency. They were averse to approaching the fort in a
body, but the commander finally persuaded them to be governed by his
directions, which, at Oswego, they had promised to obey, and 1777 on the
2d of August Lieutenant Bird and Brant commenced the investment of the
fort.

The garrison, under Colonel Gansevoort, consisted of seven hundred and
fifty men. In July, Colonel Marinus Willett, an active and judicious
officer, had joined the garrison with his regiment, and, on the very day
when Bird commenced the investiture of the fort, Lieutenant-colonel
Mellon, of Colonel Wesson's * regiment, arrived with two hundred men,
and two bateaux laden with provisions and military stores. With this
timely addition, the garrison had sufficient provision for six weeks,
and a plentiful supply of ammunition for small arms. But for their
cannon, their most important means of defense, they had only about four
hundred rounds, or nine cartridges for each piece a day for that length
of time. The garrison was also _without a flag_ when the enemy appeared,
but their pride and ingenuity soon supplied one in conformity to the
pattern adopted by the Continental Congress. Shirts were cut up to form
the white stripes, bits of scarlet cloth were joined for the red, and
the blue ground for the stars was composed of a cloth cloak belonging to
Captain Abraham Swartwout, of Dutchess county, who was then in the fort.
** Before sunset the curious mosaic-work standard, as precious to the
beleaguered garrison as the most beautifully-wrought flag of silk and
needle-work, was floating over one of the bastions.

On the 3d, Colonel St. Leger arrived before the fort with his whole
force. It was a motley collection of British regulars, a few Hessians
and Canadians, well-armed Tories, and troops of warriors from the
various tribes of the Six Nations, except the Oneidas, who were faithful
to their agreement to remain neutral. St. Leger dispatched an officer,
bearing a flag, to the fort, immediately after his arrival, with a copy
of a pompous manifesto which he had sent among the people, conceived
very much in the vein of the one issued by Burgoyne from Crown Point, a
few weeks before. He magnified the power, clemency, and justice of the
king, and charged the General Congress, and other assemblies,
committees, &c., with cruelty in the form of "arbitrary imprisonment,
confiscation of property, persecution and torture, unprecedented in the
inquisitions of the Romish Church." He also denounced the patriot civil
authorities everywhere as guilty of "the profanation of religion," and
of "shocking proceedings" of almost every shade of darkness. He then
exhorted the people who were disposed to do right, to remember that he
was "at the head of troops in the full power of health, discipline, and
valor, determined to strike when necessary and anxious to spare when
possible," and tempted them with offers of employment if they would join
his standard, security to the infirm and industrious, and payment in
coin for all supplies for his army that might be brought into his camp.
"If, notwithstanding these endeavors and sincere intentions to effect
them," he said, in conclusion, "the phrensy of hostility should remain,
I trust

* The name of this officer is variously spelled in the books--Weston,
Wesson, and Wessen. At the close of an autograph letter of his among
Gates's Papers (vol. x.), in the New York Historical Society, it is
written Wesson, and, presuming that he spelled his own name correctly, I
give that orthography. It will be remembered that Colonel Wesson and his
regiment were active participators in the battles of Bemis's Heights, a
few weeks later than the time in question.

** It was in Captain Swartwout's company, while at Poughkeepsie, that
Samuel Geake, an emissary of Sir Henry Clinton, enlisted, in the
character of a recruit, insinuated himself into the good graces of the
officers at Fort Schuyler, and acquired much valuable information
respecting the means, designs, and expectations of the Americans. He was
suspected, arrested, tried by court-martial as a spy, and was condemned
to death. He was spared, however, as a witness against Major Hammell,
another recreant American, who had accompanied him to Poughkeepsie, and
who was under arrest at that time. Geake confessed that he was employed
for the purpose of which he was accused. He said that Major Hammell (who
had been taken prisoner by the British) had espoused the cause of the
enemy, and was promised a colonelcy in the British army, and that he
(Geake) was to receive the commission of lieutenant as soon as he should
return to New York from Fort Schuyler.

Siege of Fort Schuyler.--Operations of the Indians.--Visit to the
Oriskany Battle-ground.--General Herkimer and the Militia.

243I shall stand acquitted in the eyes of God and man in denouncing and
executing the vengeance of the state against the willful outcasts. The
messengers of justice and of wrath await them in the field; and
devastation, famine, and every concomitant horror that a reluctant, but
indispensable, prosecution of military duty must occasion, will bar the
way to their return." The patriot people who received the manifesto
treated it with derision, and the little garrison, which had already
counted the cost of a siege, and determined upon, a defense of the fort,
laughed at its threats, and regarded its offer of bribes with scorn.

The siege commenced on the 4th. A few bombs were thrown into the fort,
and August, 1777 the Indians, concealed behind trees and bushes, wounded
several men who were employed in raising the parapets. Similar
annoyances occurred on the 5th, and toward evening the Indians spread
out through the woods, encircled the fort, and, by hideous yells through
the night, attempted to intimidate the garrison. St. Leger, confident of
success, sent a dispatch to Burgoyne at this juncture, expressing his
assurance that Fort Schuyler would be in his possession directly, and
the hope that they would speedily meet as victors at Albany. Let us
leave the besiegers and besieged a moment, and ride down to Oriskany,
eight miles eastward of Fort Schuyler, where a terrible episode in the
siege occurred.

I left Rome (site of Fort Schuyler) at about two o'clock, in an open
light wagon, for Oriskany. * The day was very warm; the road, although
nearly level, was excessively stony, and when I arrived at the village I
was almost overcome by the heat and fatigue. Desirous of reaching Utica
that evening, I stayed at the village only long enough to procure a
competent guide to the battle-ground. Mr. George Graham, a resident of
the village (who was one of the committee of arrangements for the
celebration held upon the battle-ground, on the anniversary of the
event, in 1844), kindly accompanied me to the spot, and pointed out the
various localities which were identified on the occasion referred to by
many August 6 old men who were present, some of whom were in the battle.
The locality is about two miles west of the canal landing in the
village, and in the midst of a beautiful agricultural country. Let us
consult the history while on our way thither, and then we shall better
understand our "topographical survey."

As soon as St. Leger's approach up Oneida Lake was known to General
Herkimer, he summoned the militia of Tryon county to the succor of the
garrison at Fort Schuyler. The timidity which seemed to have abated the
fire of the Whigs, when the first intimations of the invasion were given
by the Canada spy and the Oneida sachem, now disappeared, when the
threatened danger was at their doors, and the call of Herkimer was
responded to with alacrity, not only by the militia, but most of the
members of the Tryon county committee entered the field as officers or
volunteers. They rendezvoused at Fort Dayton, on the German Flats, and,
on the day when the Indians encircled the fort, Herkimer was near
Oriskany with more than eight hundred men, eager to face the enemy. He
August 2 sent a messenger to Gansevoort, informing him of his approach,
and requesting him to apprise him of the arrival of his courier by
discharging three guns in rapid succession, which he knew would be heard
at Oriskany. But the messenger did not arrive until near noon the next
day. Herkimer was brave, but cautious, and determined to halt there
until he should receive re-enforcements or hear the signal guns from the
fort. His officers, influenced by the impatience of their men to press
on toward the fort, were opposed to delay. Herkimer, self-relying, was
firm. Harsh words ensued, and two of his colonels, Cox and Paris, more
impertinent than generous, denounced the old man as a coward and a Tory.
This bitter taunt sank deep into his heart, but his duty governed his
feelings, and he calmly replied, "I am placed over you as a father and
guardian, and shall not lead you into difficulties from which I may not
be able to extricate you." But they persisted in their demands for an
immediate advance, and continued their ungenerous taunts. Stung by
imputations

* Oriskany is a little village about eight miles west of Utica, at the
junction of the Oriskany Creek with the Mohawk. The Erie Canal and the
rail-road both pass through it, and the establishment of woolen
factories there promises growth and prosperity to the pleasant town.

Herkimer's Advance to Oriskany Sortie from Fort Schuyler, under Colonel
Willett.--Biographical Sketch of Willett

244of cowardice, Herkimer at length yielded, and gave the word to "March
on!" at the same time telling those who boasted loudest of their courage
that they would be the first to run on seeing the enemy. St. Leger had
intelligence of the advance of Herkimer, and detached a division of
Johnson's Greens, under Major Watts, Colonel Butler with his Rangers,
and Brant with a strong body of Indians, to intercept him, and prevent
an attack upon his intrenchments.

* Before the arrival of Herkimer's messenger, Gansevoort had observed
the silence of the enemy's camp, and also the movement of a portion of
his troops along the margin of a wood down the river. The arrival of the
courier dispelled all doubts as to the destination of the detachment,
and the signal guns were immediately fired. Herkimer had informed
Gansevoort, by the messenger, that he intended, on hearing the signals,
to cut his way to the fort through the circumvallating camp of the
enemy, and requested him to make a sortie at the same time. This was
done as soon as the arrangement could be made, and a detachment of two
hundred men, consisting of portions of Gansevoort's and Wesson's
regiments, was detailed for the purpose, who took with them an iron
three pounder. Fifty men were also added, to protect the cannon, and to
act otherwise as circumstances might require. The enterprise was
intrusted to Colonel Marinus Willett, * who, by quick and judicious
movements and daring courage, with his small force, accomplished wonders
in a few hours. Rain was falling copiously while preparations for the
sortie were in progress, but the moment it ceased Willett sallied out
and fell furiously upon that portion of the camp occupied by Sir John
Johnson and his Royal Greens, a detachment of whom, as we have seen,

* Marinus Willett was born at Jamaica, Long Island, July 31st (O.S.),
1740. He was the youngest of six sons of Edward Willett, a Queen's
county farmer. He was early imbued with a military spirit, and joined
the army, under Abercrombie, as a lieutenant in Colonel Delaney's
regiment, in 1758. He was in the disastrous battle at Ticonderoga, and
accompanied Bradstreet in his expedition against Fort Frontenac.
Exposure in the wilderness injured his health, and he was confined by
sickness in the newly-erected Fort Stanwix until the end of the
campaign. Willett early espoused the republican cause when British
aggression aroused resistance here. When the British troops in the New
York garrison were ordered to Boston, after the skirmish at Lexington,
they attempted, in addition to their own, to carry off a large quantity
of spare arms. Willett resolved to prevent it, and, though opposed by
the mayor and other Whigs, he captured the baggage-wagons containing
them, and took them back to the city. These arms were afterward used by
the first regiment raised by the state of New York. He was appointed
second captain of a company in Colonel M'Dougal's regiment, and
accompanied Montgomery in his northern expedition. He was placed in
command of St. John's, and held that post until January, 1776. He was
that year appointed lieutenant colonel, and, at the opening of the
campaign of 1777, placed in command of Fort Constitution, on the Hudson.
In May he was ordered to Fort Stanwix, or Schuyler, where he performed
signal services, as noticed in the text. He was left in command of the
fort, and remained there until the summer of 1778 when he joined the
army under Washington, and was at the battle of Monmouth. He accompanied
Sullivan in his campaign against the Indians in 1779, and was actively
engaged in die Mohawk Valley in 1780, 1781, and 1782. In 1792 he was
sent by Washington to treat with the Creek Indians at the south; and the
same year he was appointed a brigadier general in the army intended to
act against the Northwestern Indians. He declined the appointment, for
he was opposed to the expedition. He was for some time sheriff of New
York, and was elected mayor of the city in 1807. He was chosen elector
of President and Vice-president in 1824, and was made president of the
Electoral College. He died in New York, August 23d, 1830. in the 91st
year of his age.

Dispersion of Johnson's Camp.--Capture of Stores and other Valuables.--
View and Description of the Oriskany Battle-ground.

245had been sent to oppose the approach of Herkimer. The advanced guard,
unable to withstand the impetuosity of the attack, were driven in; and
so suddenly was Sir John's camp assailed, that he was not allowed time
to put on his coat. He endeavored to bring his troops into order, but
they fled in dismay. The Indian encampment was then assaulted, and in a
few moments the savages, too, were scattered. Sir John and his troops
fled across the river, to the temporary camp of St. Leger, and the
Indians buried themselves in the deep forest near. No less than twenty-
one wagon-loads of spoil, consisting of clothing, blankets, stores, camp
equipage, five British standards, the baggage of Sir John, with all his
papers, and those of other officers, containing every kind of
information necessary to the garrison, were captured. Having secured
their prize, Willett and his party returned to the fort without the loss
of a man. The five British colors were raised in full view of the enemy,
upon the flag-staff', beneath the uncouth American standard, and the
whole garrison, mounting the parapets, made the forest ring with three
loud cheers. This chivalrous exploit was duly noticed by Congress, and
an elegant sword was presented to Colonel Willett in the name of the
United States.

General Herkimer, in the mean while, had moved from the mills, at the
mouth of Oriskany Creek, toward the fort, entirely unconscious of the
ambuscade that, in a deep ravine two miles distant, awaited his
approach. The morning was dark, sultry, and lowering. His troops,
composed chiefly of the militia regiments of Colonels Cox, Paris,
Visscher, and Klock, were quite undisciplined, and their order of march
was irregular and without precaution. The contentions of the morning had
delayed their advance until about nine o'clock, and the hard feelings
that existed between the commander and some of his officers caused a
degree of insubordination which proved fatal in its consequences. Brant
and his Tory asso-

* This sketch was made from the eastern side of the ravine, looking
west. The marsh in the bottom of the ravine, mentioned in the text, is
partially drained by a rivulet. When I visited the spot (August, 1848),
many logs of the old causeway were still visible, and afforded a
crossing-place for cattle. These logs are seen in the picture. The road
on the left is the present highway between Oriskany and Rome. The barn
stands upon the western side of the ravine, and along the high ground
upon which it is situated, and crossing the road southeasterly, the
ambush was placed. The hottest of the battle occurred upon the high
plain between the ravine in the foreground and another beyond the most
distant trees in the picture The hills seen in the extreme distance, on
the right, are those upon the north side of the Mohawk. The frame-work
in the ravine is the remains of the scaffolding erected for the speakers
at the celebration alluded to, in 1844. The chief speakers on the
occasion were John A. Dix and Senator Dickinson, and the audience was
estimated at 15,000 people. The scaffold was erected upon the spot, as
nearly as it could be defined, where General Herkimer fell. In the
middle of the field beyond the scaffold, in the f lightest part near the
tree, toward the barn, is seen a dark spot. It marks the site, now
indicated by a cavity, where the beach-tree stood under which Herkimer
sat and delivered his orders. The tree was cut down about eight years
ago, and then uprooted the stump to make room for a more precious hill
of potatoes. This view is about two miles west of Oriskany, on the north
side of the main road. Arrow-heads, bullets, bayonets, tomahawks, pipes,
&c., are still found there by the cultivator. The bowl of an earthen
pipe was shown to me by a resident upon the ground (whose house is seen
in the distance, beyond the barn), which he had plowed up the day
before. He had several other relics of the battle, but would not part
with any. The above is a drawing of the pipe-bowl.

Indian Ambush.--Surprise of Herkimer and his Troops.--The General
wounded.--His Coolness.--Desperate Battle.

246ciates had learned from their scouts the exact route the patriots had
taken, and arranged an ambuscade accordingly. A deep ravine crossed the
path of Herkimer in a north and south direction, extending from the high
grounds on the south to the river, and curved toward the east in a
semicircular form. The bottom of this ravine was marshy, and the road
crossed it by means of a causeway of earth and logs. On each side of the
ravine the ground was nearly level, and heavily timbered. A thick growth
of underwood, particularly along the margin of the ravine, favored
concealment. It was upon the high ground on the western side of this
ravine that the ambush of the Tories and Indians was laid, in such a
manner that the causeway was surrounded by them, as by a circle, leaving
only a small segment open where the road entered. Unsuspicious of the
proximity of the enemy, the whole body of provincials, except the rear-
guard, composed of Visscher's regiment, descended into the ravine,
followed by the baggage-wagons. Brant gave a signal, and in an instant
the circle closed, the war-hoop was sounded, and spear, and hatchet, and
deadly rifle-ball fell upon the patriots like hail from the clouds that
hovered over them. The rear-guard, in fulfillment of Herkimer's
prediction, instantly fled, and left their companions in the ravine to
their fate. They were pursued by the Indians, and probably suffered
more, in their cowardly flight, than if they had boldly aided their
environed companions in arms.

This sudden onslaught produced great confusion in the patriot ranks, but
they soon recovered, and fought with the courage and skill of veteran
troops. The slaughter, however, was dreadful. Herkimer was severely
wounded at the commencement of the action, and Colonel Cox and Captain
Van Slyk were killed at the first fire. A musket-ball passed through and
killed the horse of the general, and shattered his own leg just below
the knee. With perfect composure and cool courage, he ordered the saddle
to be taken from his slaughtered horse and placed against a large beech-
tree near. Seated there, with his men falling like autumn foliage, and
the bullets of the enemy, like driving sleet, whistling around him, the
intrepid general calmly gave his orders, and thus nobly rebuked the
slanderers who called him a coward. *

For nearly an hour the fierce action continued, and by slow degrees the
enemy was closing in upon the republicans. The latter then made an
admirable change in their method of repulsion. They formed themselves
into circles, and thus met the enemy at all points. Their fire became so
destructive in this way, that the Johnson Greens and a portion of
Butler's Tories attempted a bayonet charge. This was promptly met by the
patriots, and the battle assumed the terrible form of a death-struggle
in close personal contact. They

"Fought eye to eye, and hand to hand,

Alas! 'twas but to die;

In vain the rifle's deadly flash

Scorch'd eagle plume and wampum sash;

The hatchet hiss'd on high,

And down they fell in crimson heaps,

Like the ripe corn the sickle reaps."

At this moment a heavy thunder-peal broke over the forest, and the rain
came down in such

* It is related that, during the hottest of the action, the general,
seated upon his saddle, quietly took his tinder-box from his pocket,
lighted his pipe, and smoked as composedly as if seated at his own fire-
side.

Intermission in the Battle.--Its Resumption.--Unsuccessful Stratagem of
Colonel Butler.--The Enemy routed.--Mutual Losses.

247torrents that the combatants ceased their strife, and sought shelter
beneath the trees. It was during this heavy shower that Willett made his
preparations at the fort for the successful sortie just noticed; and, as
soon as the rain subsided, he fell upon Johnson's camp, and the battle
was renewed at Oriskany.

During the lull in the conflict, both parties viewed the ground, and
made new arrangements for attack and defense. It had been observed by
the patriots that the Indians, as soon as they saw a gun fired by a
provincial behind a tree, would rush forward and tomahawk him before he
could reload. To meet such an exigency in the renewed conflict, two men
stood together behind a tree, and, while one fired, the other awaited
the approach of the savage with his tomahawk, and felled him with his
bullet. The provincials had also made choice of more advantageous
ground, and, soon after the renewal of the fight, so destructive was
their fire that the Indians began to give way. Major Watts came up with
a detachment of Johnson's Greens to support them, but the presence of
these men, mostly refugees from the Mohawk, made the patriots more
furious, and mutual resentments, as the parties faced and recognized
each other, seemed to give new strength to their arms. They leaped upon
each other with the fierceness of tigers, and fought hand to hand and
foot to foot with bayonets and knives. It was a terrible struggle, and
exhibited the peculiar cruelty and brutality which distinguishes civil
war.

A firing was now heard in the direction of the fort. It was the attack
of Willett upon the enemy's camp. Colonel Butler instantly conceived a
stratagem, and was nearly successful in its execution. He so changed the
dress of a detachment of Johnson's Greens, that they appeared like
American troops. These were made to approach from the direction of the
fort, and were at first (as intended by Butler) mistaken by the patriots
for a re-enforcement from the garrison. But the quick eye of Captain
Gardinier, an officer who performed deeds of great valor on that
memorable day, discovered their real character, and, ordering his men to
fall upon these pretended friends, they were soon scattered in
confusion. The Indians, finding their ranks greatly thinned, and the
provincials still undismayed, raised the loud retreating cry, _Oonah!
Oonah!_ and fled in all directions. The panic was communicated to the
Tories and Canadians, and the whole force of the enemy retreated in
confusion, pursued by the provincials with shouts of victory. Thus,
after a conflict of six hours, ended the battle of Oriskany, the
bloodiest encounter, in proportion to the numbers engaged, that occurred
during the war. Neither party could claim a decided victory. Both had
suffered dreadfully. The patriots remained masters of the field, but
they did not accomplish the design of the expedition, the relief of the
garrison at Fort Schuyler. Their wounded, nearly fifty in number, were
carried from the field on litters, and among them was General Herkimer,
who was taken to his residence below the Little Falls, on the Mohawk,
where he died ten days afterward. The manner and circumstances of his
death will be noticed in the relation of my visit to his mansion, which
is still standing.

The loss in this battle seems not to have been officially given on
either side. St. Leger, in a letter to Burgoyne, dated August 11th, five
days after the battle, says, "Above four hundred [patriots] lay dead on
the field, among the number of whom were almost all of the principal
movers of the rebellion in that county." The enemy also claimed to have
taken two hundred prisoners. Dr. Thatcher, in his Military Journal (page
89), records the loss of the Americans at "one hundred and sixty killed,
and a great number wounded." This is the number stated by Gordon and
other cotemporary writers. The Indians lost about seventy, among whom
were several chiefs. * Major Watts was badly wounded, and left for dead
upon the field. He revived from the faintness produced by loss of blood,
crawled to a brook and quenched his thirst, and there remained until he
was found, nearly three days afterward, by an Indian scout, and taken
into St. Leger's camp. There were many deeds

* Gordon and others relate that, in the course of the battle, a portion
of the Indians became impressed with the belief that there was a
coalition between Johnson's and Herkimer's men to destroy them, and
that, toward the close of the conflict, the savages killed many of the
Tories. "It is thought," says Gordon, "that near as many of Sir John's
Tory party were killed by the Indians as by the militia."

True Aim of History.--Capture of Billenger and Frey.--St. Leger's
Messengers.--Their Threats, Persuasions, and Falsehoods

248of personal courage exhibited in that battle, which, according to the
military ethics of a less benevolent age, would entitle the actors to
the crown of laurel, the applause of multitudes, and the panegyric of
the historian. But the picture is so revolting to the eye of Christian
benevolence, and so repugnant to the nobler feelings of brotherhood,
which are now happily impressing their benignant features upon society,
that it is far better to draw the curtain of silence before it, and
plead for the warriors, in extenuation, the dreadful necessity that
impelled them to deeds so shocking to humanity. It is high time that the
practice of pampering a depraved public taste by giving the horrid
details of slaughter in battle, and of investing with glory, as models
for imitation, those who fight most furiously and slay most profusely,
should fall into desuetude. These details are not essential elements of
history. They contain no useful lesson, no seed of philosophy worthy of
germination, no real benefit for the understanding or the heart. * Thus
far I have avoided such recitals, and I shall do so through the whole
work before me. Neither pen nor pencil shall intentionally contribute
one thought for a panegyric on war or its abettors. The student of our
Revolution, while he may justly rejoice at the vast and invaluable
blessings which followed that event, should be taught to _lament_ rather
than _admire_ the dreadful instrumentalities that were necessarily
employed. He may thus be taught without lessening the veneration which
he ought to feel for those who periled life and fortune in defense of
the liberty we now enjoy. Let us turn from these better contemplations
to the more unpleasant task of tracing out the succeeding events of the
siege of Fort Schuyler.

So completely was the garrison still environed by the besieging force,
after the battle at Oriskany, that no correct intelligence of that event
could reach them. St. Leger took advantage of this circumstance, and, by
false representations of victory for himself, the total discomfiture of
the provincials, and the victorious advance of Burgoyne, endeavored to
bring the garrison to surrender. Colonel Billenger and Major Frey were
made prisoners, and on the evening of the battle they were forced to
write a letter to Colonel Gansevoort, which contained many
misrepresentations, and a recommendation to cease resistance. St.
Leger's adjutant general, Colonel John Butler, delivered the letter to
Gansevoort, and at the same time communicated a verbal demand of
surrender from his commander. Gansevoort refused an answer to a verbal
summons, unless made by St. Leger himself. On the next morning, Colonel
Butler and two other officers approached the fort with a white flag, and
asked permission to enter as bearers of a message to the commander. The
request was granted; they were conducted, blind-folded, within the
fortress, and received by Gansevoort in his dining-room, which was
lighted with candles, the windows being closed. Colonels Willett and
Mellen were present, and the messengers of St. Leger were politely
received. Major Ancram, one of them, more fluent in speech than the
others, made known the wishes of St. Leger. He spoke of the humanity of
his feelings, and his desire to prevent further bloodshed. He assured
Gansevoort that it was with much difficulty the Indians were restrained
from massacre, and that the only salvation of the garrison was an
immediate surrender of the fort and all the public stores. The officers
and soldiers would be allowed to retain their baggage and other private
property, and their personal safety should be guarantied. He ex pressed
a hope that these honorable terms would be immediately complied with,
for, if they were not, it would be out of St. Leger's power to renew the
proposition. The Indians, he remarked, were ready and eager to march
down the country and destroy the inhabitants; and they were reminded
that the total destruction of Herkimer's relief corps, and the fact that
_Burgoyne had possession of Albany_, extinguished all hope of succor for
the garrison.

* An example in an account of the battle in question, given in Stone's
Life of Brant, may be cited as an illustration. A Captain Dillenback was
assailed by three of Johnson's Greens. "This officer," says the
biographer, "had declared he would not be taken alive, and he was not.
One of his three assailants seized his gun, but he suddenly wrenched it
from him and felled him with the butt. He shot the second dead, and
thrust the third through with his bayonet. But in the moment of his
triumph at an exploit of which even the mighty Hector, or either of the
sons of Zeruiah, might have been proud, a ball laid this brave man low
in the dust." It is the last clause which is chiefly objectionable, for
therein the historian, not content with recording the bloody act
(justified by the law of self-preservation), lauds it as a deed worthy
of the highest praise.

Reply of Colonel Willett to St. Leger's Messengers.--St Leger's written
Demand of Surrender.--Gansevoort's Reply

249This speech, made up of falsehood, persuasion, and threats, excited
the indignation of the patriot officers, and Colonel Willett, with the
approbation of Colonel Gansevoort, promptly and properly replied. I give
his words, as contained in his narrative. They were delivered with
emphasis, while he looked the officer, he says, full in the face: "Do I
understand you, sir? I think you say that you came from a British
colonel, who is commander of the army that invests this fort; and, by
your uniform, you appear to be an officer in the British service. You
have made a long speech on the occasion of your visit, which, stripped
of all its' superfluities, amounts to this--that you come from a British
colonel to the commandant of this garrison, to tell him that, if he does
not deliver up the garrison into the hands of your colonel, he will send
his Indians to murder our women and children. You will please to
reflect, sir, that their blood will be upon your heads, not upon ours.
We are doing our duty; this garrison is committed to our charge, and we
will take care of it. After you get out of it, you may turn round and
look at its outside, but never expect to come in again, unless you come
a prisoner. I consider the message you have brought a degrading one for
a British officer to send, and by no means reputable for a British
officer to carry. For my own part, I declare, before I would consent to
deliver this garrison to such a murdering set as your army, by your own
account, consists of, I would suffer my body to be filled with splinters
and set on fire, as you know has at times been practiced by such hordes
of women and children killers as belong to your army."

These words expressed the sentiments of the garrison, and the officers
very justly concluded that Burgoyne could not be at Albany, and the
Tryon county militia all slain or dispersed, else such a solicitude on
the part of the enemy for an immediate surrender, on such favorable
conditions, would not be exhibited. The manner of the messengers and the
tenor of their discourse made the besieged feel stronger, and more
resolved to defend their post.

On the 9th, St. Leger sent a written demand for a surrender, which
contained the August 1777 substance of Major Ancram's speech Gansevoort
immediately replied, in writing, "Sir, your letter of this date I have
received, in answer to which I say, that it is my determined resolution,
with the force under my command, to defend this fort to the last
extremity, in behalf of the United Stales, who have placed me here to
defend it against all their enemies." This prompt and bold stand was
unexpected to the British commander. His cannon had not the least effect
upon the sod-work of the fort, and his "royals had only the power of
teazing." * He therefore commenced approaching the fort by

* Letter of St. Leger to Burgoyne, dated Oswego, August 27th, 1777.

** Description of the Engraving.--A, Fort Schuyler; 6, southwest
bastion, three guns; r, northwest bastion, four guns; d, northeast
bastion, three guns; e, southeast bastion, four guns; g, laboratory; h h
A, barracks; I, horn-works begun; K, covered way; L L, glacis; M, sally-
port; N, officers' quarters; 0 0, Willett's attack. The figures refer lo
the redoubts, batteries, &c., of the enemy. 1, a battery of three guns;
2, bomb battery, four mortars; 3, bomb battery of three guns; 4 4 4,
redoubts lo cover the batteries; 5, line of approaches, 6 6, British
encampment; 7, Loyalists; 8, Indians; 9, ruins of Fort Newport.

A Tory Address.--Continuation of the Siege.--Adventure of Willett and
Stockwell.--Gansevoort's Resolution.

250sapping to such a distance that the rampart might be brought within
their portieres, at the same time all materials were preparing to run a
mine under the most formidable bastion. *

In the mean while an address to the people of Tryon eounty, signed by
Johnson, Claus, and Butler, was issued, strongly protesting their desire
for peace, promising pardon and protection to all that should submit,
and threatening all the horrors of Indian cruelty if they resisted. They
called upon the principal men of the valley to come up and oblige the
garrison at Fort Schuyler to do at once what they would be forced to do
finally--surrender. This document was sent by messengers through Tryon
eounty, but it effected little else than get the messengers themselves
into trouble. ** The siege, in the mean while, was steadily, but feebly,
continued. The garrison, fearing that re-enforcements for the enemy
might arrive, or that the siege might continue until their own
provisions and ammunition should fail, resolved to communicate with
General Schuyler, then at Stillwater, and implore succor. Colonel
Willett volunteered to be the messenger, and on a very stormy night,
when shower August 10, 1777 after shower came down furiously, he and
Lieutenant Stoekwell left the fort by the sally-port at ten o'clock,
eaeh armed with a spear, and crept upon their hands and knees along a
morass to the river. They crossed it upon a log, and were soon beyond
the line of drowsy sentinels. It was very dark, their path-way was in a
thick and tangled wood, and they soon lost their way. The barking of a
dog apprised them of their proximity to an Indian camp, and for hours
they stood still, fearing to advance or retreat. The clouds broke away
toward dawn, and the morning star in the east, like the light of hope,
revealed to them their desired course. They then pushed on in a zigzag
way, and, like the Indians, sometimes traversed the bed of a stream, to
foil pursuers that might be upon their trail. They reached the German
Flats in safety, and, mounting fleet horses, hurried down the valley to
the headquarters of General Sehuyler, who had already heard of the
defeat of Herkimer, August 13. and was devising means for the succor of
the garrison at Fort Sehuyler.

St. Leger continued the siege. He advanced, by parallels, within one
hundred and fifty yards of the fort, and the garrison, ignorant of the
fate of Willett and Stoekwell, or the relief that was preparing for them
below, began to feel uneasy. Their ammunition and provisions being much
reduced in quantity, some hinted an opinion to their commander that a
surrender would be humane policy. Gansevoort's stout and hopeful heart
would not yield admission to such an idea, and he informed the garrison
that he had resolved, in case succor should not appear before their
supplies were exhausted, to sally out at night and cut his way through
the enemy's camp. Suddenly, and mysteriously to the garrison, the
besiegers August 22 broke up their camp, and fled so precipitately from
before the fort that they left their tents, artillery, and camp equipage
behind them.

The mystery was soon solved. We have already noticed the appeal of
General Sehuyler to his troops at the mouth of the Mohawk, and the
readiness with whieh Arnold and several hundred men volunteered to march
to the relief of Gansevoort. These troops consisted chiefly of the
Massachusetts brigade of General Learned. They marched immediately,
under the general command of Arnold, and were joined by the first New
York regiment, under Colonel Livingston. On the 20th, Arnold and a
portion of the troops arrived at Fort Dayton, where he intended to wait
for the remainder, under Learned, to arrive; but, hearing of the near
approaches of St. Leger to Fort Sehuyler, he resolved to push forward,
and hazard a battle before it should be too late. He knew that his small
force was too inconsiderable to warrant a regular engagement, and he
conceived several stratagems to supply his deficiency of strength. One,
whieh proved successful, was adopted. Among the Tory prisoners who were
taken with Walter Butler was a coarse, unlettered, half idiot named Hon-

* Letter of St. Leger to Burgoyne, dated Oswego, August 27th, 1777.

** Walter N. Butler, a son of Colonel John Butler, and afterward one of
the most brutal of the Tory leaders, with fourteen white soldiers and
the same number of Indians, appeared at the German Flats, at the house
of a Tory named Shoemaker. Colonel Wesson was then in command of a small
fortification there, called Fort Dayton, and he sent a party to arrest
Butler and his associates. They succeeded, and Butler was tried and
condemned as a spy, but was afterward sent a prisoner to Albany, under a
reprieve.

Hon-Yost Schuyler.--His successful Mission to St Léger's Camp.--Arnold's
Proclamation.--Alarm of the Indians

251Yost Schuyler, a nephew of General Herkimer, who, with his mother and
brother, lived near Little Falls. He was tried and condemned to death.
His mother hastened to Fort Dayton and pleaded for his life. For a time
Arnold was inexorable, but finally consented to spare him, on condition
that he should go to Fort Schuyler and endeavor so to alarm St. Leger,
by representations of the great number of Americans that were
approaching, as to induce him to raise the siege. Hon-Yost readily
agreed to perform the duty, for, in reality, his political creed was so
chameleon-like, that it would assume any required hue, according to
circumstances. His mother offered herself as a hostage for his
faithfulness, but Arnold chose his brother Nicholas as security. The
latter was placed in confinement, and Hon-Yost, with a friendly Oneida,
who promised to aid him, departed for Fort Schuyler.

Arnold, having issued a proclamation from Fort Dayton to counteract the
address of Johnson, Claus, and Butler, marched ten miles onward toward
Fort Stanwix. There he received a communication from Colonel Gansevoort,
announcing that the siege had suddenly been raised, and that the enemy
had fled, in great haste, toward Wood Creek; why, he could not imagine.
Arnold perceived that Hon-Yost had been faithful. He and the Indian had
managed the affair adroitly, and the charge of idiotcy against Hon-Yost
was wiped out forever. Before leaving Fort Dayton, he had several
bullets shot through his coat, and, with these evidences of a "terrible
engagement with the enemy," he appeared among the Indians of St. Leger's
camp, many of whom knew him personally. He ran into their midst almost
out of breath, and apparently much frightened. He told them that the
Americans were approaching in great numbers, and that he had barely
escaped with his life. His bullet-riddled coat confirmed the story. When
they inquired the number of the Americans, he pointed to the leaves on
the trees, and shook his head mysteriously. The Indians were greatly
agitated. They had been decoyed into their present situation, and had
been moody and uneasy since the battle of Oriskany. At the moment of
Hon-Yost's arrival they were engaged in a religious observance--a
consultation, through their prophet, of Manitou, or the Great Spirit, to
supplicate his guidance and protection. The council of chiefs at the
_pow-wow_ at once resolved upon flight, and told St. Leger so. He sent
for and questioned Hon-Yost, who told him that Arnold, with two thousand
men, would be upon him in twenty-four hours. At that moment, according
to arrangement, the friendly Oneida, who had taken a circuitous route,
approached the camp from another direction, with a belt. On his way he
met two or three straggling Indians of his tribe, who joined him, and
they all confirmed the story of Hon-Yost. They pretended that a bird had
brought them the news that the valley below was swarming with warriors.
One said that the army of Burgoyne was cut to pieces, and another told
St. Leger that Arnold had three thousand men near. They shook their
heads mysteriously when questioned about numbers by the Indians, and
pointed, like Hon-Yost, upward to the leaves. The savages, now
thoroughly alarmed, prepared to flee. St. Leger tried every means, by
offers of bribes and promises, to induce them to remain, but the panic,
and suspicion of foul play, had determined them to go. He tried to make
them drunk, but they refused to drink. He then besought them to take the
rear of his army in retreating; this they refused, and indignantly said,
"You mean to sacrifice us. When you marched down, you said there would
be no fighting for us Indians; we might go down and smoke our pipes;
whereas numbers of our warriors have been killed, and you mean

* The address of Arnold was well calculated to awe the timid and give
courage to the wavering Whigs. The prestige of his name gave great
weight to it. He prefaced it with a flourish of his title and position,
as follows: "By the Honorable Benedict Arnold, Esq., general and
commander-in-chief of the army of the United States of America on the
Mohawk River." He denominated a certain Barry St. Leger "a leader of a
banditti of robbers, murderers, and traitors, composed of savages of
America and more savage Britons," and denounced him as a seducer of the
ignorant and unthinking from the cause of freedom, and as threatening
ruin and destruction to the people. He then offered a free pardon to all
who had joined him or upheld him, "whether savages, Germans, Americans,
or Britons," provided they laid down their arms and made oath of
allegiance to the United States within three days. But if they persisted
in their "wicked courses," and "were determined to draw on themselves
the just vengeance of Heaven and their exasperated country, they must
expect no mercy from either."

August 23, 1777

Flight of St. Leger's Forces to Oswego.--The Spoils.--Amusement of the
Indians.--End of the Siege.--Captain Gregg

August 23, 1777 to sacrifice us 252also." * The council broke up, and
the Indians fled. The panic was communicated to the rest of the camp,
and in a few hours the beleaguering army were flying in terror toward
their boats on Oneida Lake. Hon-Yost accompanied them in their flight as
far as Wood Creek, where he managed to desert. He found his way back to
the fort that night, and was the first to communicate to Colonel
Gansevoort the intelligence of Arnold's approach. ** The Indians, it is
said, made themselves merry at the precipitate flight of the whites, ***
who threw away their arms and knapsacks, so that nothing should impede
their progress. The savages also gratified their passion for murder and
plunder by killing many of their retreating allies on the borders of the
lake, and stripping them of every article of value. They also plundered
them of their boats, and, according to St. Leger, "became more
formidable than the enemy they had to expect." **** Half starved and
naked, the whites of the scattered army made their way to Oswego, and,
with St. Leger, went down Ontario to Canada..

Colonel Gansevoort, on the retreat of St. Leger, sent a dispatch to
Arnold, acquainting him with the fact. That general sent forward nine
hundred men, with directions to attempt to overtake the fugitives, and
the next day reached the fort himself.

Gansevoort had already sent out a detachment to harass the flying enemy,
and several prisoners were brought in, with a large quantity of spoil,
among which was the _escritoire_, or writing-desk, of St. Leger,
containing his private papers. Colonel Willett was left in command of
the garrison at the fort, and Arnold and his men marched back to the
main army (then at Stillwater, under Gates, who had superseded
Schuyler), to perform valiant service in the battle that soon afterward
occurred, on Bemis's Heights. Thus ended the siege of Fort Schuyler, (v)
in the progress of which the courage, endurance, and skill of the
Americans, every where so remarkable in the Revolution, were fully
displayed. (vi)

* Mary Jemison, whose narrative we have referred to, says that the
Indians (at least the Senecas) were greatly deceived. They were sent for
to "see the British whip the rebels." They were told that they were not
wanted to fight, but might sit down and smoke their pipes, and look
quietly on. With this impression, the Seneca warriors accompanied the
expedition, and, as we have seen, suffered great loss.

** Hon-Yost made his way back to Fort Dayton, to the great joy of his
friends. He afterward fled from the valley with his family and fourteen
Tory associates, and joined Sir John Johnson. After the war he returned
to the valley, where he remained until his death in 1818.

*** Gordon (ii., 240), on the verbal authority of the Rev. Mr. Kirkland,
who was at Fort Schuyler, relates that St. Leger, while standing on the
border of a morass alone with Sir John Johnson, reproached the latter
with being the cause of the disaffection of the Indians. High words and
mutual criminations followed. Two chiefs, standing near, overheard the
quarrel, and put an end to it by shouting, "They are coming! they are
coming!" Both officers, terribly alarmed, plunged into the morass. This
was the signal for the general retreat of the whole army. Such was their
haste, that they left their tents, baggage, and artillery behind, and
the bombardier was left asleep in the bomb battery! When he awoke he
found himself alone, the sole representative in camp of the besieging
army. The Indians continued their cry, at intervals, "They are coming!
they are coming!" behind the fleeing Tories, and thus amused themselves
all the way to Oneida Lake.

**** Letter of St. Leger to Burgoyne, August 27th, 1777.

(v) Fort Schuyler was destroyed by fire and flood in 1781, and was never
rebuilt.

(vi) Before the fort was invested by St. Leger, the Indians, in small
parties, annoyed the garrison, and frequently attacked individuals when
away from their dwellings. On one occasion they fired upon three little
girls who were out gathering blackberries. Two were killed and scalped,
but the third escaped. The remarkable adventure of Captain Gregg is
worthy of notice. He was a soldier of the garrison of Fort Schuyler, and
went out one day to shoot pigeons, with two of his soldiers, and a boy
named Wilson (who became an ensign in the army at the age of eighteen,
and conducted the surrender of the British standards at Yorktown).
Fearing the Indians, the boy was sent back. They had not proceeded far
before some savages in ambush shot all three down, scalped them, and
made off. The captain, though badly wounded, was not killed. His two
soldiers, however, were lifeless, and, laying his bleeding head upon the
body of one of them, he expected soon to die. His dog had accompanied
him, and, in great agitation, whined, licked his wounds, and otherwise
manifested his grief and attachment. He told the dog to go for help, and
the animal, as if endowed with reason, at once obeyed. He ran about a
mile, and found two men fishing. By piteous moans he induced them to
follow him to his wounded master. The captain was carried to the fort,
and, after suffering much, was restored to health. "He was a most
frightful spectacle," says Dr. Thacher, from whose journal (page 144)
this account is taken. "The whole of his scalp was removed; in two
places on the forepart of his head the tomahawk had penetrated the
skull; there was a wound on his back with the same instrument, besides a
wound in his side, and another through his arm with a musket-ball."

Return to Oriskany.--Whitesborough.--Utica.--Little Falls.--Visit to the
German Flats.--Origin of the Name

253On my return to Oriskany village, after visiting the battle-ground, I
learned that Mr. Nellis, who was engaged in that conflict, was still
living at Whitesborough, three miles eastward. I had dismissed the
vehicle that conveyed me from Rome to Oriskany, intending to proceed to
Utica from the latter place upon a canal packet. I felt a desire to
visit the old veteran, and yet was anxious to reach Utica that evening.
While deliberating concerning the matter, a constable from Whitesborough
rode up to the hotel in a light wagon, executed his business in haste,
and kindly offered me a seat on his return. I gladly placed myself in
his custody. He said his errand to Oriskany was in search of a thief,
and I have no doubt the people of Whitesborough gave him credit for
success, for my "fatigue dress" and soiled "Panama" made me appear more
like a prowler than a tourist. Mr. Nellis was not at home, so my visit
was fruitless, except in the pleasure derived from a view of the
beautiful village, as we rode in from the westward. It lies upon a
plain, encircled by the arms of the Erie Canal and the Mohawk River.

At sunset, after partially satisfying a long-suffering appetite from a
table at _a restorer,_ on the verge of the canal, where dainty guests
should eat with closed eyes and unwavering faith in the purity of the
viands and the proper proportions of flies and butter, I embarked for
Utica, six miles eastward. It was the close of a calm, sultry day, and
peculiarly grateful August 20, 1848 was the evening breeze that fanned
us as we glided along upon that tiny river, through cultivated fields
and pleasant woodlands.

"Sweet to the pensive is departing day,

When only one small cloud, so still and thin,

So thoroughly imbued with amber light,

And so transparent that it seems a spot

Of brighter sky, beyond the furthest mount,

Hangs o'er the hidden orb; or where a few

Long, narrow stripes of denser, darker grain,

At each end sharpened to a needle's point,

With golden borders, sometimes straight and smooth,

And sometimes crinkling like the lightning's stream,

A half hour's space above the mountain lie."

Carlos Wilcox.

This quiet scene was soon exchanged for the bustle and noise of the busy
town, and, before the twilight had fairly faded. I was jolted over the
paved streets of Utica. There I spent some thirty hours with some
friends. The city has no noteworthy reminiscences of the Revolution,
except the single fact that the army, under Herkimer, crossed the Mohawk
at old

Fort Schuyler (then a fortress in ruins), while on his way to Oriskany,
and the general interest which belongs to it as that portion of Tryon
county which was consecrated by the presence and the prowess of the
patriots. It is a pleasant and thriving city, upon the southern slope of
the Mohawk Valley. Like all other towns in Western New York, it is young
and vigorous, and every feature glows with the beauty of youth and
health.

I left Utica at noon by rail-road, arrived at Little Falls, twenty miles
eastward, at one o'clock, and at two started in a light wagon for Fort
Herkimer, or Mohawk, on the German Flats. The driver and guide was a
courteous young man, but totally deaf. I never practiced pantomime with
better success, for my companion, intelligent, and apparently well
versed in all the local history of the region, easily comprehended my
awkward manipulations, and answered my mute inquiries promptly and
clearly.

The upper valley of the Mohawk, which narrows to a deep, rocky ravine at
Little Falls, has, within a few miles of its lower extremity, a rich and
fertile alluvial plain on each side of the river, known as the German
Flats, so called in consequence of being first settled and cultivated by
German families. The settlement was originally called Burnet's Field,
from the circumstance that the patent had been granted by Governor
Burnet. The patent comprehended the plain and slopes westward of the
junction of West Canada Creek

Stone Church, German Flats.--Its Pulpit.--The two Pastors.--Fort
Herkimer, or Dayton.

254and the Mohawk River, and included about ten miles of the valley east
and west. Toward the eastern extremity of the Flats, and about four
miles west of Little Falls, on the south side of the river, is one of
the churches which were erected under the auspices and by the liberal
contributions of Sir William Johnson. * The church is of stone, but is
somewhat altered in its external appearance.

The walls are very thick, and it has square buttresses at the corners.
It was altered and repaired in 1811, at an expense of nearly four
thousand dollars. The roof (formerly steep) was raised, an upper row of
windows was formed, and a gallery was constructed within. The height of
the old windows is indicated by the arches seen over the present square
ones, and the eaves were just above the key-stones. The original tower,
with its steeple, was similar to the one at Caughnawaga.

The tower, or belfry, was open, and in it was placed a swivel for the
protection of the inhabitants against the Indians, or to sound an alarm
to the people on the neighboring hills. The pulpit, although newly
constructed when the church was repaired, is precisely the same, in
style, as the original. I he sounding-board and panels in front are
handsomely painted in imitation of inlaid work, and the whole has an
elegant appearance. This church has never been without a pastor since
its construction in 1767, yet only two ministers have presided over the
flock during eighty years of its existence. The first was the Rev.
Abraham Rosenkrans. Before the church was built, he preached to the
people in that region in their dwellings, school-houses, and barns. He
was installed pastor of the church in 1767, and remained there until his
death in 1796, when his remains were deposited beneath the pulpit.

He was succeeded by the Rev. John P. Spinner, from Germany, who preached
in the German language exclusively until within twenty years, and
afterward in English and German alternately. He died in May, 1848.

A few rods west of the church was the large stone mansion of the
Herkimer family, which was stockaded and called Fort Herkimer.

Around this, and the church, the humbler dwellings of the farmers were
clustered, for so frequently did the Indian marauder (and as frequently
the unprincipled Tory, in the Revolution) disturb them, that they dared
not live in isolation. Fort Herkimer became a prey to public vandalism
when the Erie Canal was built. The waters flow in part over the site of
the fort, and its stones, so easily quarried, were used in the
construction of a lock near by.

Two miles further westward, on a gravelly plain upon the north side of
the river, is the pretty little village of Herkimer. It occupies the
site of old Fort Herkimer, erected in the early part of the Seven Years'
War, and known as Fort Dayton during the Revolution, occurrences at
which we have already mentioned. This beautiful region, like

* It was built upon the north side of the old German burying-ground.
Near the southern wall of this church is a large brown sandstone slab,
placed there by the provincial government, on which is the following
inscription: "Here reposes the body of John Ring, Esq., of the Kingdom
of Ireland, a CAPTAIN OF HIS MAJESTY'S INDEPENDENT COMPANY OF THE
PROVINCE, WHO DEPARTED THIS LIFE THE 20TH day of September, 1755, in the
30th year of his age." Near this church, it is said, was raised the
first liberty-pole in 1775. White, the sheriff of Tryon county at that
time, came up with a large body of militia from Johnstown and cut it
down.

Plan of Fort Herkimer.--Destruction of Andrustown.--Expedition against
the German Flats.--Destruction of the Settlement.

Fort Herkimer.* 255 of Wyoming, was disturbed and menaced in the earlier
periods of the war, and in 1778 it was made a desolation.

Owing to the distant situation of Fort Schuyler, its garrison afforded
very slight protection to this portion of the valley, and Fort Dayton
had become little better than a dilapidated block-house.

The Tories and Indians were, consequently, bold in their marauding
expeditions, and the murderer and the incendiary kept the patriots in
continual alarm. All the spring and summer succeeding the flight of St.
Leger from Fort Schuyler, the various settlements in Tryon county were
menaced. In July, a secluded hamlet called Andrustown, situated about
six miles southeast of the German Flats, and composed of seven families,
was destroyed by a party of savages, under Brant. They owned a thousand
fertile acres among the hills and pleasant valleys toward the Otsego
Lake, and plunder seemed to be the sachem's chief object. This secured,
some of the people murdered, and others made captive, the torch was
applied, and the whole settlement utterly laid waste.

Success made the Indians more greedy, and toward the close of August
they hung like a gathering storm upon the hills around the German Flats.
Aroused and alarmed by the tragedy at Andrustown, the people had kept
scouts on the alert, and the approach of Brant from Unadilla toward the
settlement was heralded by them in time for the residents to prepare for
the coming invasion. These scouts came in hot haste, and informed the
inhabitants that the savages would be upon them in a few hours. There
was no time to look after and secure their sheep and cattle, but,
gathering up the most valuable things which they could carry from their
houses, the whole settlement took refuge in Forts Dayton and Herkimer,
and in the old church.

Brant, with three hundred Tories and one hundred and fifty Indians,
reached the borders of the settlement early in the evening. ** It was a
dark and rainy night, and he lay concealed in a ravine near Shoemakers
(where Walter Butler was captured the year before) until near daylight,
when his warriors were called to duty, and soon swept, like a fierce
wind, over the plain. The houses were assailed, but neither scalps nor
prisoners were to be found in them. At dawn the fires were kindled.
Barns, filled with the product of an abundant harvest just gathered, the
dwellings of the people, and every thing combustible, were set on fire,
within view of the sorrowing fugitives in the fort. Having nothing but
small arms, the savages did not attack the fort, but, having laid the
whole plain in ashes, collected the horses, sheep,

* I copied this sketch from a manuscript drawing in possession of the
New York Historical Society. It was drawn by a private of Captain
Ogelvie's company, and presented by him to "Charles Clinton, Esq.,*
lieutenant colonel commanding," in July, 1758. Herkimer is there spelled
Herekheimer.

** Explanation of the Sketch.--A, the parade; B, dwelling-house; C,
barracks; D, guard-room; E, officers' kitchen; F, the well; G, draw-
bridge; H H, &c., ten swivel guns; K K, stockades; L, the oven; MM, &c.,
sentry boxes; N, smith's shop; 0, the Mohawk River; 1, terrace; 2,
trench; 3, palisades; 4, parapet; 5, banqueting.

*** At the time in question there were thirty-four houses and as many
barns in the settlement on the south side of the river, and about an
equal number on the north side, at Fort Dayton, now Herkimer village.

* Charles Clinton emigrated to America from Ireland (whither his family
fled from England for refuge in the time of Cromwell) in 1729, and in
1731 he founded a settlement in Ulster county, New York. He was
appointed lieutenant colonel by Governor Delaney, after serving with
distinction under Bradstrcet. He was the father of General James Clinton
(the father of the late Dewitt Clinton) and of Governor George Clinton,
of the Revolution. He died November 19, 1773, aged 82 years.

Incursion of the Oneidas into the Unadilla Settlement.--Damage to the
Tories.--Brant, or Thayendanegea.

256pursued them as far as Edmundston's plantation, on the Unadilla
River, where they found three scouts dead; but they effected nothing in
the way of retaliation or the recovery of property.

A party of friendly Oneidas, however, were more successful. They
penetrated the Unadilla settlement, where Brant * had his headquarters,
burned some of the Tory houses, took several prisoners, and brought away
some of the cattle taken from the people at the German Flats.

A deputation of about one hundred Indian warriors of the Oneidas
communicated the result of this expedition to Major Cochran, then in
command of the garrison at Fort Schuyler. They were a part of those who
proffered their services to General Gates, after the first battle on
Bemis's Heights, in the autumn previous.

I returned to Little Falls toward evening, and the lengthened shadows of
the hills and trees heightened the picturesque beauty of the scene. The
view, on approaching

* Joseph Brant (Thayendanegea) was a Mohawk of pure blood. His father
was a chief of the Onondaga nation, and had three sons in the army with
Sir William Johnson, under King Hendrick, in the battle at Lake George
in 1755.

* Joseph, his youngest son, whose Indian name was Thayendanegea, which
signifies a bundle of sticks, or, in other words, strength, was born on
the banks of the Ohio in 1742, whither his parents immigrated from the
Mohawk Valley.

* His mother returned to Canajoharie with two children, Mary, or Molly,
who became the concubine of Sir William Johnson, and Thayendanegea. His
father, To bowaghwengaraghkwin, a chief of the Wolf tribe* of the
Mohawks, seems to have died in the Ohio country.

* According to Colden, each of the original Five Nations was divided
into three tribes, the Tortoise or Turtle, the Bear, and the Wolf.
Others affirm that there were eight divisions in each, the other tribes
being the Crane, the Snipe, the Hawk, the Beaver, and the Deer. The
first three seem to have been preeminent; and among the Mohawks, with
whom the whites had more direct and extensive business and social
intercourse than with any others, these only were known.

* Title deeds to lands, and other papers, now in the office of the
Secretary of State at Albany, have the signatures or marks of the chiefs
of these three tribes attached. The annexed cuts are fac-similes, which
I copied from the originals. No. 1 is the mark of Teyendagages, or
Little Hendrick, of the Turtle tribe; No. 2, that of Kanadagea, or Hans,
chief of the Bear tribe, and is intended to represent a bear lying on
his back; No. 3 is the signature and hieroglyphic of Great Hendrick, the
celebrated chief of the Wolf tribe, who was killed near Lake George in
1755. Kanadagea sometimes made a simple cross.

* Little Abraimm, or found upon several papers the name of Daniel, a
chief of the Tortoise tribe, often associated with that of Little
Abraham and of Hans. The signatures of the chiefs of all the three
tribes appear to have been essential in making those deeds or
conveyances legal. Besides the eight totums here named, there appears to
have been, at an earlier date, three other tribes, the Serpent, the
Porcupine, and the Fox. Giles F. Yates, Esq., of Schenectady, one of our
most indefatigable antiquaries, discovered a document having the marks
of twenty-one chiefs and that of a woman (Eusena) attached. Among them
are those of Togwayenant, of the Serpent; Sander, of the Porcupine; and
Symon, of the Fox tribe. The date of the document is 1714. It is not my
province, neither have I the apace, to pursue this interesting subject
further, in this connection.

* His mother, after her return, married an Indian called Carribogo
(news-carrier), whom the whiles named Barnet; but, byway of contraction,
he was called Barnt, and, finally, Brant was ealled Joseph, and was
known as Brant's Joseph, or Joseph Brant. Sir William Johnson sent young
Brant to the school of Dr. Wheelock, of Lebanon Crank (now Columbia),
Connecticut, and, after he was well educated, employed him as secretary,
and as agent in publie affairs. He was employed as missionary
interpreter from 1762 to 1765, and exerted himself for the religions
instruction of his tribe. When the Revolution broke out, he attached
himself to the British cause, and in 1775 left the Mohawk Valley, went
to Canada, and finally to England, where his education, and his business
and social connection with Sir William Johnson, gave him free access to
the nobility. The Earl of Warwick caused Romney, the eminent painter, to
make a portrait of him for his collection, and from a print after that
picture the engraving on the preceding page was made. Throughout the
Revolution he was engaged in warfare chiefly upon the border settlements
of New York and Pennsylvania, in connection with the Johnsons and
Butlers. He held a colonel's commission from the king, but he is
generally ealled Captain Brant. After the peace in 1783, Brant again
visited England, and, on returning to America, devoted himself to the
social and religious improvement of the Mohawks, who were settled upon
the Ouise or Grand River, in Upper Canada, upon lands procured for them
by Brant from Sir Frederic Haldimand, governor of the province. The
territory embraced six miles on both sides of the river, from its mouth
to its source. He translated the Gospel of St. Mark into the Mohawk
language; and in many ways his exertions for the spiritual and temporal
welfare of his people were eminently successful, and endeared him to his
nation. He died at his residence at the head of Lake Ontario, November
24th, 1807, aged 65 years. One of his sons (John) was an officer in the
British service, on the Niagara frontier, in the war of 1812. His
daughter married William J. Kerr, Esq., of Niagara, in 1821, and, I
believe, is still living.

Return to Little Falls.--Cole's Pictures.--Scenery at Little Falls.--
Evidences of a great Cataract.--Remarkable Cavity.

257from the west, changes from the quiet beauty of a rolling plain,
enriched by the cultivator's art, and enlivened by a gently gliding
river, to the rugged grandeur of lofty hills, craggy steeps, and
turbulent cascades. It reminded me of two of Cole's beautiful pictures
in his "Voyage of Life," wherein is depicted the course of an ambitious
youth. He is out upon a placid stream, so full of self-confidence that
his guardian angel is left behind. All around is beauty and repose. The
stream meanders on without a riff, but in the distance it sweeps with a
majestic curve around a woodland into a mysterious region. Onward speeds
the bark of the youthful voyager upon the gentle current, until the
valley becomes narrower, the waters run swiftly, the tall trees and
beautiful flowers upon its banks disappear, high and barren rocks wall
in his view, and just before him is the wild leap of a cataract into a
fearful gulf below.

The village of Little Falls is upon the rocky bank of the cascades, and
only westward can the eye see any thing from it but rocks, and trees,
and running water mingled in wild confusion. Here the high ridge of the
Alleghany range, which divides the head waters of the Mohawk and the
Ontario streams from the Susquehanna and other Atlantic rivers, crosses
the Mohawk Valley, and in ages long past, ere the great Falls of Niagara
existed, doubtless formed the crown of a cataract almost as magnificent,
when the waters of Ontario covered the upper valley, and a portion of
its flood here found its way into the great lake that filled the Hudson
basin, whose outlet, in turn, was among the rugged hills of the
Highlands at West Point and vicinity. Such is the theory of the
geologist; and never had opinion stronger presumptive proofs of its
correctness than are found at Little Falls. * An obstruction here,
seventy feet in height, would cause the waters to overflow the Rome
summit, and mingle with those of Ontario by the way of Wood Creek,
Oneida Lake, and the Oswego River. The rugged shores present many
incontestible evidences of abrasion by the violent action of water,
thirty to sixty feet above the present bed of the river.

Many of them are circular perpendicular cavities in the hard rocks,
which are composed chiefly of gneiss, granite, and hornblende. In some
instances masses of stratified rocks present the appearance of Cyclopean
architecture, as seen in the above cut,2 and hundreds of small cavities,
far above the present bed of the

* This name was given in contradistinction to the Great Falls, now
called Cohoes, at the mouth of the Mohawk.

** This is a view of a large circular cavity on the western shore of the
river a few yards from the railroad, and about thirty feet above its
bed. On the side of the cavity toward the river is an opening about ten
feet square, and over the entrance is a massive lintel, which appears as
if hewn and placed there by the hands of man. Within the large cavity,
which is open at the top, are smaller ones upon its concave sides. Two
of these concavities are seen in the engraving. The rocks are covered
with a luxuriant growth of shrubbery, springing from the rich alluvial
deposits in the fissures. An exploration of them is dangerous, for some
of the fissures are broad and deep. Indian legends invest these caverns
with romantic interest. One of them I will repeat, in brief, as it was
told to me, for it is identified with the spot represented in the
picture.

* Long ago, when the river was broader and the falls were more lofty, a
feud arose between two young chiefs of the respective tribes of the
Mohawk nation, the Wolf and the Tortoise. A maiden of the Bear tribe was
the cause of the feud, as maidens often are. She was loved by both the
young chiefs, and for a time she so coquetted that each thought himself
beloved by her in return. Her father was a stern old war rior, and loved
his child tenderly. Both chiefs had fought the Mingoes and Mohegans by
his side, and the bravery of each entitled him to the hand of the
maiden. Her affections were at length stirred by the more earnest
importunities of the Wolf, and she promised to become his bride. This
decision reached the ears of the Tortoise, and the embers of jealousy,
which disturbed both while unaccepted suitors, burst into a flame of
ungenerous revenge in the bosom of the disappointed lover. He determined
to possess the coveted treasure before the Wolf should take her to his
wigwam. With well-dissembled acquiescence in her choice, and expressions
of warm friendship for herself and her affianced, he allayed all
suspicions, and the maiden rambled with him in the moonlight upon the
banks of the river when her affianced was away, unconscious of danger.
The day approached for the maiden to go to the wigwam of her lord. The
Tortoise was with her alone in a secluded nook upon the brink of the
river. His light canoe was near, and he proposed a voyage to a beautiful
little island in the stream, where the fire-flies sparkled and the
whippoorwill whispered its evening serenade. They launched, but, instead
of paddling for the island, the Tortoise turned his prow toward the
cataract. Like an arrow they sped down the swift current, while the
young chief, with vigorous arm, paddled for the western shore. Skillful
as with the bow and hatchet, he steered his canoe to the mouth of the
cavern here pictured, then upon the water's brink, seized the affrighted
maiden, and leaped ashore, at the same moment securing his canoe by a
strong green withe. The cave was dry, a soft bed of the skins of beasts
was spread, and abundance of provision was there stored. At the top of
the cave, far above the maiden's reach, an opening revealed a passage
through the fissures to the rocks above. It was known only to the
Tortoise; and there he kept the maiden many months, until her affianced
gave her up as lost to him forever. At length, while hunting on the
southern hills in flowery May, the Wolf saw the canoe at the mouth of
the cave. It solved the question in his mind. The evening was clear, and
the full moon shone brightly. He waited until midnight, when, with an
arm as strong and skill as accurate as his rival's, he steered his canoe
to the mouth of the cavern, which was lighted up by the moon. By its
light he saw the perfidious Tortoise sleeping in the arms of an
unwilling bride. The Wolf smote the Tortoise, but the wound was slight.
The awakened warrior, unable to grasp his hatchet, bounded through the
opening at the top of the cavern, and closed it with a heavy stone. The
lovers embraced in momentary joy. It was brief, for a fearful doom
seemed to await them. The Tortoise would return with power, and they had
to make choice of death, by the hatchet of the rival chief, or the
waters of the cataract. The latter was their choice, and, in
affectionate embrace, they sat in their canoe and made the fearful leap.
The frail vessel struck propitiously upon the boiling waters, and,
unharmed, passed over the gulf below. Down the broad stream they glided,
and far away, upon the margin of the lower lake, they lived and loved
for two generations, and saw their children's children go out to the
battle and the chase. In the long line of their descent, tradition
avers, came Brant, the Mohawk sachem, the strong Wolf of his nation.

Gulf below Little Falls.--The Erie Canal.--Greatness of the Work.--An
Indian Legend

258stream, indicate the action of pebbles in eddies of water. The hills
on either side rise to an altitude of nearly four hundred feet, and from
that height the ancient cataract may have poured its flood. Immediately
below the present cascades at the foot of Moss Island, or Moss Rock, the
river expands into a. broader basin, more than one hundred feet deep,
from whose depths rocky spikes, like church spires, shoot upward, some
of them to the surface of the water. Into this gulf the great cataract
doubtless poured its flood, while the rocky cones, too hard to be
abraded, resisted the unceasing attrition of the water for ages.

I strolled along the railroad at twilight, by the margin of the rapids
and of the gulf below; and before sunrise I went down upon the tow-path
to view the scene in the shadows of early morning. Art and nature here
vie with each other in claims upon our admiration. Here the former
exhibits its wonderful triumphs, and the latter displays its beauty and
grandeur. On the south side of the river is the Erie Canal, the passage
for which was excavated through solid rock a distance of two miles.
"This narrow defile presented the most formidable obstruction on the
whole line of that great work, and it was supposed that at least two
years would be required to complete the excavation. Skill and
persevering industry accomplished the most difficult portion in ninety
days. The waters of the canal here

View of Little Falls.--First Settlement--Night Attack upon the
Settlement--Escape of Cox and Skinner.--Ride to Danube.

259descend forty feet within a mile, by five locks; and the traveler has
ample lime to view the wild scenery while passing them.

On the north side of the river the hard rocks have also been excavated,
for the railroad which traverses the high bank in its winding course.
Altogether, art and nature have here presented a scene worth a long
journey to behold.

There was a small settlement at Little Falls at the time of the
Revolution. A Scotchman named Ellis had obtained, through Sir William
Johnson, a patent for the mountain gorge, and erected flouring mills
there. These were important for supplying the people at the German Flats
and the small garrisons that were kept at Forts Dayton and Herkimer. A
party of Tories and Indians in 1780 joined in an expedition to destroy
the mills, and thus cut off the supply of flour for the Whig garrisons.
They made a stealthy descent, under cover of night. The mill was
garrisoned by about a dozen men, but so sudden and unexpected was the
attack, that only a few shots were exchanged, and one man killed, before
its defenders fled for safety. Some leaped from the windows when the
Indians entered, and others concealed themselves below. Two men, Cox and
Skinner, hid in the race-way, under the water-wheel, while two others,
Edick and Getman, leaped into the race-way above the mill, and attempted
to conceal themselves by keeping under the water as much as possible. In
this they would have succeeded, had not the assailants set the mill on
fire, the light of which revealed the hiding-place of the latter two,
and they were made prisoners. Cox and Skinner were more fortunate. The
waterwheel protected them from the burning timbers that fell around
them, and they remained safe in their hiding-place until the enemy had
departed. The object of the assailants was accomplished, and they
returned to their rendezvous among the hills, carrying with them five or
six prisoners.

After breakfast I rode down to Danube, to visit the residence of General
Herkimer while living, and the old Castle Church near the dwelling-place
of Brant in the Revolution. It was a pleasant ride along the tow-path,
between the canal and the river. Herkimer's residence is about two and a
half miles below Little Falls, near the canal, and in full view

* This view was taken from the rail-road near the village, looking down
the river. On the right is seen the Erie Canal, and on the left, and
more in the foreground, the Mohawk, at the foot of the falls, with the
rail-road and the magnetic highway. The rugged bluff in the center is
Moss Rock, at the lower extremity of which is the gulf, seen in the
annexed engraving. This view is from the tow-path, below Moss Rook On
the left is the canal, and on the right are the gulf and a portion of
the village in the distance. Moss Rock is an island, formed by the canal
and the river. The summit of this amorphous pile has been suggested as
an appropriate site for the proposed monument to the memory of Dewitt
Clinton. It seems to me that the spot is singularly appropriate for that
purpose. The Erie Canal, with its busy commerce, is his perpetual
memorial; and here is the point where the most wonderful triumphs were
achieved in the construction of that stupendous work. Here, too, pass
all travelers to and from Niagara and the great West from the eastward,
and the monument would be seen, if erected there, by more persons than
at any other locality that may be named, out of the city of New York.

Herkimer's Residence.--His Family Burial-ground.--Public Neglect of his
Grave.--Its Location

260of the traveler upon the rail-road, half a mile distant. It is a
substantial brick edifice, was erected in 1764, and was a splendid
mansion for the time and place.

It is now owned by Daniel Conner, a farmer, who was _modernizing_ it
when I was there, by building a long, fashionable piazza in front, in
place of the small old porch, or stoop, seen in the picture. He was also
_improving_ some of the rooms within. The one in which General Herkimer
died (on the right of the front entrance), and also the one on the
opposite side of the passage, are left precisely as they were when the
general occupied the house; and Mr. Conner has the good taste and
patriotism to preserve them so.

These rooms are handsomely wainscoted with white pine, wrought into neat
moldings and panels, and the casements of the deep windows are of the
same material and in the same style. Mr. Conner has carefully preserved
the great lock of the front door of the _castle_--for castle it really
was, in strength and appointments against Indian assaults. It is sixteen
inches long and ten wide. Close by the house is a subterranean room,
built of heavy masonry and arched, which the general used as a magazine
for stores belonging to the Tryon county militia. It is still used as a
store-room, but with more pacific intentions.

The family burial-ground is upon a knoll a few rods southeast of the
mansion, and there rest the remains of the gallant soldier, as secluded
and forgotten as if they were of "common mold." Seventy years ago the
Continental Congress, grateful for his services, resolved to erect a
monument to his memory, of the value of five hundred dollars; but the
stone that may yet be reared is still in the quarry, and the patriot
inscription to declare its intent and the soldier's worth is not yet
conceived. Until 1847, no stone identified his grave. Then a plain
marble slab was set up, with the name of the hero upon it; and when I
visited it (1848), it was overgrown with weeds and brambles. It was
erected by his grandnephew, W. Herkimer. The consecrated spot is in the
possession of strangers, and, but for this timely effort to preserve the
identity of the grave, the visitor might soon have queried, with the
poet in search of General Wooster's resting-place

"O say, can none tell where the chieftain was laid?

Where our hero in glory is sleeping?

Alas! shall we never more seek out his grave,

While fame o'er his memory is weeping?"

Although General Herkimer was severely wounded at the battle of
Oriskany, his death was the result of unskillful treatment, and, if
tradition speaks truth, of criminal indulgence of appetite on the part
of his surgeon. He was conveyed from the field on a litter to his
residence. The weather was sultry, and the wound, which was a few inches
below the August 16, 1777 knee, became gangrenous. Nine days after the
battle, a young French surgeon, who accompanied Arnold in his march up
the valley, recommended amputation. Dr. Petrie, the general's medical
adviser, was opposed to amputation, but it was done. The performance of
the surgeon was so unskillful that the flow of blood was with great
difficulty stanched. Indeed, the bleeding was not entirely checked, and
it was thought advisable for the surgeon and his assistant to remain
with the general, as his situation was very critical. Colonel Willett
called to see him soon after the operation, and found him sitting up in
his

Incidents of Herkimer's Death.--Castle Church.--Residence and Farm of
Brant.--Fort Plain.--Plan of the Fortification.

261bed, as cheerful as usual, and smoking his pipe. The blood continued
to flow, and what little skill the surgeon possessed was rendered
useless by indulgence in wine. No other physician was at hand, and
toward evening, the blood still flowing, the general became convinced
that his end was near. He called for the Bible, and read composedly, in
the presence of his family and others, the thirty-eighth psalm, applying
the deep, penitential confessions of the poem to his own case. He closed
the book, sank back upon his pillow, and expired. Stone justly observes,
"If Socrates died like a philosopher, and Rousseau like an unbelieving
sentimentalist, General Herkimer died like a Christian hero." *

The Castle Church, as it is called--the middle one of the three
constructed under the auspices of Sir William Johnson--is still standing
(1848), two and a half miles below the Herkimer mansion. It is a wooden
building, and was originally so painted as to resemble stone. Its
present steeple is not ancient, but its form is not unlike that of the
original. Here the pious Kirkland often preached the Gospel to the
heathen, and here Brant and his companions received lessons of heavenly
wisdom. The church stood upon land that belonged to the sachem, and the
house of Brant, where Christian missionaries were often entertained
before he took up the war-hatchet, stood about seventy-five rods
northward of the church. Bricks and stones of the foundation were still
to be seen in an apple orchard north of the road, and the locality was
well defined, when I visited it, by rank weeds, nowhere else in the
field so luxuriant. I returned to Little Falls in time to dine and to
take the western train at one o'clock for Fort Plain, seventeen miles
down the Mohawk.

Fort Plain (near the junction of Osquaga Creek and the Mohawk), one of
the numerous comely children brought forth and fostered by the prolific
commerce of the Erie Canal, is near the site of the fortification of
that name, erected in the Revolution.

This fort was eligibly situated upon a high plain in the rear of the
village, and commanded an extensive sweep of the valley on the right and
left. A sort of defense was thrown up there by the people in the early
part of the war, but the fort proper was erected by the government after
the alarming demonstrations of the Indians in the Mohawk and Schoharie
Valleys in 1778. For a while it was an important fortress, affording
protection to the people in the neighborhood, and forming a key to the
communication with the Schoharie, Cherry Valley, and Unadilla
settlements. Its form was an irregular quadrangle, with earth and log
bastions, embrasures at each corner, and barracks and a strong
blockhouse within. The plain on which it stood is of peninsular form,

* I was unsuccessful in my search for information respecting the career
of General Herkimer in youth and early manhood. He left no children.
Those of the family name are descendants of his only brother, George
Herkimer. His family was among the early settlers of the German Flats,
and, though opulent according to the standard of his times, he seems to
have been quite uneducated. An old man whom I saw near the Flats
remembered him as "a large, square-built Dutchman," and supposed him to
have been about 05 years old when he died. Should this meet the eye of
any of his descendants, they will confer a favor upon the author by
communicating to him any information they may possess concerning the
general and his immediate family.

** An aged resident of Fort Plain, Mr. David Lipe, whose house is near
the canal, below the old fortification, went over the ground with me,
and I made a survey of the outlines of the fort according to his
directions. He aided in pulling down the block-house when it was
demolished after the war, and his memory seemed to be very accurate. I
am indebted to him for much of the information here recorded concerning
Fort Plain.

***Explanation of the Plan.--The black line represents the parapet; a,
the largo block-house; bbbb, small block-houses at each bastion; cc,
barracks. There were two largo apple-trees within the fort, and on the
northern side of the hill is the living spring that supplied the
garrison with water.

Fort Plain Block-house.--Trial of its Strength.--Invasion of the
Settlement.--True Location of Fort Plain

262and across the neck, or isthmus, a breast-work was thrown up. The
fort extended along the brow of the hill northwest of the village, and
the blockhouse was a few rods from the northern declivity.

This blockhouse was erected in 1780, after the fort and barracks were
found to be but a feeble defense, under the supervision of a French
engineer employed by Colonel Gansevoort. The latter, by order of General
Clinton, then in command of the Northern Department, had repaired
thither with his regiment, to take charge of a large quantity of stores
destined for Fort Schuyler. Ramparts of logs and earth were thrown up,
and a strong block-house was erected, a view of which is here given. It
was octagonal in form, three stories in height, and composed of hewn
timbers about fifteen inches square. There were numerous port-holes for
musketry, and in the lower story three or four cannons were placed. The
first story was thirty feet in diameter, the second forty, and the third
fifty. Each of the upper stories projected about five feet, and in the
floor of each projection there were also port-holes, through which to
fire perpendicularly upon an enemy below. The powder magazine of the
fort was placed directly under the block-house for protection.

Some time after the completion of the work, doubts were expressed of its
being cannonball proof. A trial was made with a six pounder placed at a
proper distance. Its ball passed entirely _through_ the block-house,
crossed a broad ravine, and lodged in the hill on which the old
parsonage stands, an eighth of a mile distant. This proved the
inefficiency of the building, and its strength was increased by lining
it with heavy planks. In order to form a protection for the magazine
against hot shot, the little garrison that was stationed there in 1782
commenced throwing up a bank of earth around the block-house. Rumors of
peace, and the quiet that then prevailed in that valley, caused the work
to cease, and, August, 1848 happily, its resumption was never demanded.
The mounds which were raised on the south side of the block-house were
yet quite prominent when I visited the locality.

This place was included in the Canajoharie settlement, and in 1780 felt
severely the vengeance of the Tories and Indians, inflicted in return
for terrible desolations wrought by an army under Sullivan, the previous
year, in the Indian country west of the white settlements. The whole
region on the south of the Mohawk, for several miles in this vicinity,
was laid waste. The approach of the dreaded Thayendanegea along the
Canajoharie Creek, with about five hundred Indians and Tories, to attack
the settlement at Fort Plain, was anAugust 2, 1780nounced to the people,
then engaged in their harvest fields, by a woman who fired a cannon at
the fort. The larger portion of militia had gone with Gansevoort to
guard provisions on their way to Fort Schuyler, and those who remained,
with the boys and old men, unable to defend their lives or property,
fled into the fort for protection. In their approach the enemy burned
every dwelling and barn, destroyed the crops, and carried off every
thing of value. Regardless of the strength of the fort, they marched
boldly up within cannon-shot of the intrenchments, burned the church,
the parsonage, and many other build-

* There is considerable confusion in the accounts concerning Fort Plain,
for which there is no necessity. There was a stockade about two miles
southwest of Fort Plain, called Fort Clyde, in honor of Colonel Clyde,
an officer in the Tryon county militia; and another about the same
distance northwest, called Fort Plank, or Blank, from the circumstance
that it stood upon land owned by Frederic Blank. The latter and Fort
Plain have been confounded. Mr. Stone erroneously considered them as
one, and says, in his Life of Brant (ii., 95), "The principal work of
defense, then called Fort Plank, and subsequently Fort Plain, wras
situated upon an elevated plain overlooking the valley, near the site of
the village still retaining the name of the fortress." Other writers
have regarded the block-house as the fort, when, in fact, it was only a
part of the fortifications. The drawing here given is from one published
in Stone's Life of Brant, with a description from the Fort Plain Journal
of December 26th, 1837. Mr. Lipe considered it a correct view, except
the lower story, which, it was his impression, was square instead of
octagonal, and had four port-holes for heavy ordnance.

A Female's Presence of Mind.--Burning of the Church.--Indians deceived.-
-Tardiness of Colonel Wemple.

263ings, and carried off several women and children prisoners. The house
of Johannes Lipe, to a place of concealment in a hollow at the rear, and
had made several deposits there. The last time she returned she met two
prowling Indians at the gate. She was familiar with their language, and,
without any apparent alarm, inquired of them if they knew any thing of
her two brothers, who were among the Tories that fled to Canada.
Fortunately, the savages had seen them at Oswegatehie, and, supposing
her to be a Tory likewise, they walked off, and the house was spared.

The church spire had a bright brass ball upon it, which the Indians
believed was gold.

While the edifice was burning, they waited anxiously for the steeple to
fall, that they might secure the prize. When it fell, the savages rushed
forward, scattered the burning timbers, and several of them in
succession seized the glittering ball. It was speedily dropped, as each
paid the penally of blistered fingers, and discovered that "all is not
gold that glistens."

With the destruction of Fort Ariani the devastation was, for the time,
stayed. In a day the fairest portion of the valley had been made
desolate. Fifty-three dwellings and as many barns were burned, sixteen
of the inhabitants were, slain, and between fifty and sixty persons,
chiefly women and children, were made captives. More than three hundred
cattle and horses were driven away, the implements of husbandry were
destroyed, and the ripe grain-fields, just ready for the sickle, were
laid in ashes. ** The smoke was seen as far as Johnstown, and the people
immediately left the fields and joined the Albany and Schenectady
militia, then marching up the valley, under Colonel Wemple. The colonel
seemed to be one of those men who deem prudence the better part of
valor, and was opposed to forced marches, particularly when in pursuit
of such fierce enemies as were just then attracting his attention. He
managed to reach Fort Plain in time to see the smouldering embers of the
conflagration, and to rest securely within its ramparts that night. The
work of destruction was over, and the Indians and Tories were away upon
another war-path.

At Fort Plain I was joined by my traveling companions, whom I had left
at Syracuse, and made it my headquarters for three days, while visiting
places of interest in the vicinity. It being a central point in the
hostile movements in Tryon county, from the time of the flight of St.
Leger from before Fort Stanwix until the close of the war, we will plant
our telescope of observation here for a time, and view the most
important occurrences within this particular sweep of its speculum. The
battle of Minisink, and the more terrible tragedy in the Valley of
Wyoming, radii in the hostile operations of the Indians and Tories from
our point of view, will be noticed in other chapters. It is difficult to
untie the complicated knot of events here, and make all parts
perspicuous, without departing somewhat from the plan of the work, and
taking up the events in chronological order. Every thing being
subordinate to the history, I shall, therefore, make such departure for
the present, and reserve my notes of travel until the story of the past
is told.

* This view is from the high plain on the right of the block-house,
looking north. The building upon the hill across the ravine is the old
parsonage, which was immediately built upon the ruins of the one that
was burned. On the left I have placed a church in its proper relative
position to the parsonage, as indicated by Mr. Lipe. It was about half a
mile northwest of the fort. On the right are seen the Mohawk River and
Plain, a train of cars in the distance, and the hills that bound the
view on the north side of the Mohawk Valley, in the direction of Stone
Arabia and Kloek's Field, where two battles were fought in 1780. These
will be hereafter noticed.

** Letter of Colonel Clyde to Governor Clinton. The father of David, my
informant, which is still standing, was saved from plunder and fire by
the courage and presence of mind of his wife.

** She had been busy all the evening carrying her most valuable articles
from her house.

Aspect of Affairs in Tryon County.--The Western Indians.--Girty and his
Associates.--Fidelity of White Eyes.

264

CHAPTER XII.

ARK and threatening was the aspect of affairs for the people of the
Mohawk Valley, in the spring of 1778, the year succeeding the dispersion
of St. Leger's motley force at Fort Schuyler. Brant, with his warriors,
retired to Fort Niagara after that event, and during the autumn and
winter he and the British and Tory leaders made extensive preparations
for war the ensuing spring. Colonel Hamilton was in command at Detroit,
engaged actively in endeavors to induce the tribes along the southern
shores of the western lakes and the head waters of the Mississippi to
join the four divisions of the Six Nations of New York who were in
alliance with the crown against the patriots. He was aided by three
malignant Tories, M'Kee, Elliot, and Simon Girty. ** They had been
confined at Pittsburgh, but, escaping, they traversed the country thence
to Detroit, and by proclaiming that the Americans had resolved on the
destruction of the Indians, and that their only safety consisted in the
immediate alliance of the Delawares and Shawnees with the soldiers of
the king, aroused these tribes to a desire for war. Already they had
been excited against the whites in general by the irruption into their
county of Daniel Boon and others (of which I shall hereafter write), and
they listened favorably to the appeal of the refugees. The expedition of
McIntosh into the Ohio Valley gave apparent confirmation to the
assertions of the Tories, and Captain _Pipe_ (the rival chief of White
Eyes of the Delawares, a fast friend of the Americans) at once assembled
his warriors, and urged them to follow him immediately upon the war-
path. He proclaimed every one an enemy who should speak against his
proposition. But White Eyes, the beloved of all, persuaded his people to
desist, and sent a message *** to the Shawnees, which had the effect to
keep them in check for a time. We shall consider the Indian wars in the
Ohio country in detail in a future chapter.

The Johnsons and Colonel John Butler were also active at this juncture
upon the St. Lawrence, recruiting Tory refugees, and inducing the
Caughnawagas and other tribes to take up the hatchet; and at the dawn of
the year a powerful combination was in progress, which threatened the
destruction of all the settlements in the Mohawk and Schoharie Valleys.

Two of the Six Nations, the Oneidas and the Tuscaroras, were still
faithful to their pledge of neutrality, nor were the tribes of the other
four yet generally in arms. Congress, therefore, resolved to make
another effort to secure their neutrality, if not a defensive alliance.
****

* The Mohawks, Senecas, Onondagas, and Cayugas.

** Girty was an unmitigated scoundrel, and was far more savage in his
feelings than the Indians. He was present when Colonel Crawford was
tortured by the Indians in 1782, and looked upon his agonies with
demoniac pleasure. The same year he caused the expulsion of the peaceful
Moravians, who were laboring usefully among the Wyandots; and he
personally ill treated them when driven away. He instigated an Indian
warrior, at the defeat of St. Clair in 1791, to tomahawk the American
General Butler, who lay wounded on the field, and to scalp him, and take
out his heart for distribution among the tribes. There were some Tories,
even active ones, whom we can respect; but miscreants like Girty and
Walter Butler, of the Mohawk Valley, present no redeeming quality to
plead for excuse.

*** The message was as follows: "Grandchildren, ye Shawnees: Some days
ago a flock of birds [M'Kec, Elliot, and Girty], that had come on from
the east, lit at Gaschochking, imposing a song of theirs upon us, which
song had nigh proved our ruin. Should these birds, which, on leaving us,
took their flight toward Scioto, endeavor to impose a song on you
likewise, do not listen to them, for they lie."

**** A resolution to this effect was adopted by Congress on the 2d of
February, 1778. They instructed the commissioners to "Speak to the
Indians in language becoming the representatives of free, sovereign, and
independent states, and in such a tone as to convince them that they
felt themselves so."--Journals of Congress, iv., 63.

Council at Johnstown.--Disposition of the Different Notions.--Colonel
Campbell and La Fayette.--Forts strengthened.

265A council was called, and the chiefs of all the Six Nations were
invited to attend. General Schuyler and Volkert P. Douw were appointed
commissioners to attend the meeting and act in behalf of Congress. They
requested Governor Clinton to send a special commissioner to be present
at the council, and James Duane was accordingly appointed. The council
met at Johnstown on the 9th of March. More than seven hundred Indians
were present, consisting of Tuscaroras, Oneidas, and Onondagas, a small
number of Mohawks, 1777 three Cayugas, but not one of the Senecas, the
most powerful and warlike tribe of the confederacy. The latter not only
refused to attend, but sent a message affecting great surprise that they
were invited to such a council. * It is not certainly known that General
Schuyler was present at the meeting. La Fayette accompanied Duane, and
the latter seems to have conducted the proceedings on the part of
Congress. They were opened by an address from that body, charging the
Indians with perfidy, cruelty, and treachery, while the conduct of the
United States had been true and magnanimous toward them. An old Onondaga
hypocritically acknowledged and bewailed the sins of his tribe, but
charged them upon the young and headstrong warriors who had been seduced
by the Tory leaders. The Mohawks and Cayugas were sullen and silent,
while an Oneida chief, conscious of the faithfulness of his own tribe
and of the Tuscaroras, spoke eloquently in behalf of both, concluding
with a solemn assurance that the United States might rely upon their
abiding friendship. Those two tribes were applauded by the
commissioners, while the others were dismissed with an admonition to
look well to their ways, as the arm of the United States was powerful,
and vengeance might penetrate the remotest settlements of the Senecas.
The council, on the whole, was unsatisfactory, for it was evident that
the most warlike and important tribes, with Brant at their head, still
brooded over their loss at Oriskany, and were determined on revenge.

While La Fayette was at Johnstown, Colonel Samuel Campbell, of Cherry
Valley, waited upon him and directed his attention to the exposed
condition of that settlement and of those upon the Schoharie Creek. The
people had built three slight fortifications the preceding year, but
they were quite insufficient for sure protection. They were merely
embankments of earth thrown up around strong stone houses, and
stockaded, into which the women and children might flee for safety in
the event of an invasion. They were respectively known as the Upper,
Middle, and Lower Forts. ** By direction of La Fayette, these were each
manned by a company of soldiers, with a small brass field piece. He also
directed a fort to be erected in the Oneida country, and Forts Schuyler
and Dayton to be strengthened; and, as we have already noticed, Fort
Plain was afterward enlarged and more strongly fortified. These and far
more efficient preparations for defense were necessary; for the recovery
of the Mohawk-Valley, where their property was situated, was an object
too important to the Johnsons, Butlers, and the large number of refugees
who accompanied them to Canada, not to induce extraordinary efforts for
its attainment. Their spies and scouts were out in every direction, and,
at the very time of the council at Johnstown, Colonel Guy Carleton, a
nephew of the Governor of Canada of the same name, was lurking in the
neighborhood, to watch the actions and to report upon the dispositions
of the chiefs in conclave. His employers at the same time were upon the
frontiers, preparing for invasion.

* "It is strange," said the messenger, "that while your tomahawks are
sticking in our heads [referring to the battle of Oriskany], our wounds
bleeding, and our eyes streaming with tears for the loss ol our friends
at German Flats [Oriskany], the commissioners should think of inviting
us to a treaty."--From a MS. Letter of James Duane, cited by Stone.

** These were situated in the Schoharie Valley. The Upper Fort was near
the margin of Schoharie Creek, about five miles southeast of Middleburgh
village, and within the limits of the present town of Fulton. The
remains of the Middle Fort are still visible, near Middleburgh, on the
plain east of the road lending to Schoharie. The Lower Fort was five
miles north of Middleburgh, at the village of Schoharie. An old stone
church (yet standing, but much altered from the original), one mile
northward of the court-house, was within the intrenchments, and formed
the citadel of the fort. The ramparts inclosed the two story stone house
of John Becker, the kitchen part of which was, until recently, well
preserved. Temporary dwellings were erected within the inclosure, and in
these the inhabitants kept their most valuable things. See Simms's
Schoharie, &c., p. 269.

Settlers of Tryon County.--Destruction of Springfield.--M'Kean and Brant

266Early in the spring, Brant and his warriors, with a large number of
Tories, appeared 1778 at Oghkwaga, his headquarters the previous year.
There he organized scalping parties and sent them out upon the
borderers.

The settlers were cut off in detail. Marauding parties fell upon
isolated families like bolts from the clouds, and the blaze of dwellings
upon the hills and in the valleys nightly warned the yet secure
inhabitant to be on the alert. Their dwellings were transformed into
block-houses. The women were taught the use of weapons, and stood
sentinels when the men were at work. Half-grown children were educated
for scouts, and taught to discern the Indian trail, and every man worked
armed in his field. Such was the condition of the dwellers of Tryon
county during almost the whole time of the war.

Brant's first hostile movement of consequence, after his return to
Oghkwaga, was the destruction of a small settlement at Springfield, at
the head of Otsego lake, ten miles west of Cherry Valley. It was in the
month of May. Every house was burned but one, into which the women and
children were collected and kept unharmed. The absence of Tories in that
expedition, and the freedom to act as he pleased on the part of Brant,
may account for this humanity. Several men were made captive, and, with
considerable property, were carried off to Oghkwaga.

In June, Captain McKean, at the head of some volunteers, was sent to
reconnoiter Brant's encampment at Oghkwaga. M'Kean's headquarters were
at Cherry Valley. On his way down the valley of the Charlotte River, he
learned that large war-parties were out, and, fearing a surprise,
thought it prudent to return. He halted an hour to refresh, and wrote a
letter to Brant, censuring him for his predatory warfare; he intimating
that he was too cowardly to show himself in open and honorable conflict,
M'Kean challenged him to meet him in single combat, or with an equal
number of men, to try their skill, courage, and strength; and concluded
by telling him that if he would come to Cherry Valley, they would change
him from a _Brant_ to a _goose_. * This was an injudicious movement,
and, doubtless, incited

* This letter was fastened to a stick and placed in an Indian path. It
soon reached Brant, and irritated him exceedingly. In a letter written
soon afterward to a Tory named Cass, he said, 'Who people of Cherry
Valley, though bold in words, will find themselves mistaken in calling
me a goose.

Battle in the Schoharie Country.--Arrival of Regulars.--Escape of Walter
Butler.--Treachery of Great Tree

267the sachem, in some degree, to join Butler, a few months later, in
desolating that settlement.

There was an engagement on the 2d of July, on the upper branch of the
Cobelskill, between a party of regular troops and Schoharie militia,
fifty-two in number, and an Indian force four hundred and fifty strong.
The Americans, commanded by Captain Christian Brown, were overpowered.
Fourteen were killed, eight wounded, two were missing, and the remainder
escaped. The dwellings were burned, and the horses and cattle, which the
victors could not take with them, were slaughtered in the fields. At the
same time, Colonel John Butler, who had penetrated the country from
Niagara with a body of Indians and Tories, eleven hundred strong, broke
into the Valley of Wyoming and laid it waste. July 3-4, 1778 Of this I
shall write in detail hereafter. We have already considered the
destruction of the settlement at German Flats, toward the close of this
summer. Scalping parties continued to infest the Schoharie and
neighboring settlements until quite late in September, when troops from
the main army checked their depredations for a while. A few days after
the battle of Monmouth, a Colonel William Butler, with a Pennsylvania
regimentJune 23, 1778 and a detachment of Morgan's rifle corps, * was
ordered to Tryon county, and took post at Schoharie, whence parties were
sent out to chastise the white and red savages, and to protect
threatened settlements. They accomplished but little, however, except in
intercepting bands of Tories that were making their way from the Hudson
River settlements to join Johnson at Niagara. One of these parties,
collected in the vicinity of Catskill, under a Captain Smith, was
dispersed, the Commander killed, and several of the men made prisoners.
This, and a few other exploits of a similar character, inspired the
people with confidence, and they anticipated a season of repose. But it
was of short duration, for already a cloud was gathering in the west,
full charged with desolation.

We have noticed the fact that Walter Butler, a son of Colonel John
Butler, was arrested near Fort Dayton in August, 1777, tried, and
condemned to death as a spy, but reprieved and sent a prisoner to
Albany. He was closely confined in the jail there until the spring of
1778, when, through the interposition of his father's friends, some of
them of the highest respectability, he was liberated from prison, and
allowed to reside with a private family, having a single sentinel to
guard him. This family proved to be Tories in disguise. The sentinel was
made drunk, and young Butler, mounting a fleet horse, escaped, and
joined his father at Niagara, just after the massacre of Wyoming. On his
way through the Seneca country he excited the Indians, by tales of the
extensive preparations which the Americans were making to penetrate and
lay waste their country, and they were soon ripe for invading the white
settlements.

About this time a Seneca chief, called _Great Tree_, who was with
Washington during the summer, left for his own country and nation, with
the strongest professions of friendship for the Americans. He promised
to use his influence in keeping the Senecas neutral, and, if
unsuccessful, he was to return with his personal adherents and join the
friendly Oneidas. According to his own account, he found his people in
arms, and uttering loud defiance against the whites. The chiefs and
principal warriors were collected at Kanadaseago and Genesee; and _Great
Tree_, believing the stories of Butler, and finding his people very
united, resolved to join his nation in chastising any whites that might
penetrate their county. He was a popular orator and warrior, and his
adherence gave the Senecas much joy. The Indians west of the Oneidas
"were thus prepared to follow a leader upon the war-path.

Walter Butler obtained from his father the command of a detachment of
his Rangers, and permission to employ them, with the forces of Captain
Brant, in an expedition against the

* Timothy Murphy, the man who shot General Fraser at Bemis's Heights,
was in this detachment, and became the terror of the Indians and Tories
in the Schoharie country. He used a double-barreled rifle, and the
Indians, seeing him fire twice without stopping to load, supposed that
he could fire as often as he pleased in the same manner.

Butler and Brant march toward Cherry Valley.--Colonel Alden warned.--
Capture of American Scouts

268settlements in Tryon county. It was late in the season, but he
thirsted for revenge because of his imprisonment, and departed eastward
early in October. While on his way, and near

1778 Genesee, he met Brant, with his warriors, going from his camp upon
the Susquehanna to his winter-quarters at Niagara. Brant felt a deep
personal hatred toward young Butler, and this feeling was greatly
increased on finding himself made subordinate to the latter. But the
difficulty, which threatened, at first, to be serious, was soon
adjusted. Thayendanegea had thought much of the insulting letter of
Captain M'Kean, and more willingly turned his face back toward the
settlements. The united forces amounted to about seven hundred men.

This movement was known to Mr. Dean, an Indian interpreter in the Oneida
country, early in October, and he communicated the information to Major
Cochran, then in command at Fort Schuyler. That officer sent a messenger
with the intelligence to Colonel Alden, at Cherry Valley, and also to
the garrisons of the Schoharie forts; but the presence of the
Pennsylvania troops and riflemen had lulled the people into fancied
security, and the report of the oncoming invasion was treated as an idle
Indian tale.

Cherry Valley, the wealthiest and most important settlement near the
head waters of the eastern branch of the Susquehanna, was the enemy's
chosen point of attack. Colonel Ichabod Alden, of Massachusetts, was in
command of the fort there, with about two hundred and fifty Continental
troops. * On the 8th of November the commandant received a dispatch from
Fort Schuyler, informing him that his post was about to be attacked by a
large force of Indians and Tories, then assembled upon the Tioga River.
Colonel Alden treated the information with unconcern, but the
inhabitants were greatly alarmed. They asked permission to move into the
fort or to deposit their most valuable articles there, but the colonel,
regarding the alarm as really groundless, refused his consent. He
assured them, at the same time, that he would be vigilant in keeping
scouts upon the look-out and the garrison in preparation, and,
accordingly, on the 9th parties were sent out in various directions. One
of these, which went down toward the Susquehanna, built a fire at their
encampment, fell asleep, and awoke prisoners in the hands of Butler and
Brant. All necessary information concerning the settlement was extorted
from them, and the next day the enemy moved forward and encamped upon a
lofty hill covered with evergreens, about a mile southwest of the
village, and overlooking the whole settlement. From that observatory
they could see almost every house in the village; and from the prisoners
they learned that the officers were quartered out of the fort, and that
Colonel Alden and Lieutenant-colonel Stacia were at the house of Robert
Wells, recently judge of the county, and formerly an intimate friend of
Sir William Johnson and Colonel John Butler.

November 10, 1778 Early in the morning the enemy marched slowly toward
the village. Snow had fallen during the night, and the morning was dark
and misty. When near the village, the Tories halted to examine their
muskets, for the dampness had injured their powder. The Indians, and
particularly the ferocious Senecas, eager for blood and plunder, pushed
forward in the van during the halt. A settler, on horseback, going
toward the village, was shot, but, being slightly wounded, escaped and
gave the alarm. Colonel Alden could not yet believe that the enemy was
near in force, but he was soon convinced by the sound of the war-whoop
that broke upon the settlement, and the girdle of fierce savages, with
gleaming hatchets, that surrounded the house of Mr. Wells. They rushed
in and murdered the whole family. ** Colonel Alden escaped from a
window, but was pursued, tomahawked, and scalped.

* While Brant was collecting his troops at Oghkwaga the previous year,
the strong stone mansion of Colonel Samuel Campbell, at Cherry Valley,
was fortified, to be used as a place of retreat for the women and
children in the event of an attack. An embankment of earth and logs was
thrown up around it, and included two barns. Small block-houses were
erected within the inclosure. This was the only fort at Cherry Valley at
the time in question.

** The family of Mr. Wells consisted of himself and wife, mother,
brother and sister (John and Jane), and a daughter. His son John (the
late eminent counselor of New York) was then at school in Schenectady,
and was the only survivor of the family. They had all been living at
Schenectady for some months, for security, but the alarm in the region
of Cherry Valley having subsided, they had just returned. The
destruction of the Wells family was marked by circumstances of peculiar
ferocity, and I mention them to exhibit the infernal character which the
passions of men assume when influenced by the horrid teachings in the
school of war. One of the Tories boasted that he cleft open the head of
Mr. Wells while on his knees in prayer. His sister Jane was
distinguished for her beauty, virtues, and accomplishments. When the
enemy burst into the house, she fled to a pile of wood and endeavored to
conceal herself. An Indian pursued and caught her. He then wiped his
knife, dripping with the blood of her relatives, sheathed it, and
deliberately took his tomahawk from his girdle. At that moment a Tory,
who had been a domestic in the family of Mr. Wells, relented, and,
springing forward, claimed her as his sister. The savage thrust him
aside and buried his hatchet in her temple. It is said that Colonel John
Butler, professedly grieved at the conduct of his son at Cherry Valley,
remarked, on one occasion, "I would have gone miles on my knees to save
that family, and why my son did not do it, God only knows."

Mr. Dunlap.--Mr. Mitchell.--Destruction of the Settlement.--Treatment of
Prisoners.--Butler's Savageism and Brant's Humanity

269The house of the venerable minister, Mr. Dunlap (whose wife was the
mother of Mrs. Wells), and that of a Mr. Mitchell, were next attacked,
and most of the inmates murdered. Mr. Dunlap and his daughter at home
were protected by Little Aaron, a Mohawk chief, who led him to his door
and there stood by his side, and preserved his life and property. But
the good old man sank under the terrible calamity of that day, and
joined his lost ones in the spirit land within a year thereafter. Many
other families of less note were cut off. Thirty-two of the inhabitants,
mostly women and children, and sixteen soldiers of the garrison, were
killed. The whole settlement was plundered after the massacre had
ceased, and every building in the village was fired when the enemy left
with their prisoners and booty. Among the prisoners were the wife and
children of Colonel Campbell, who was absent at the time. He returned to
find his property laid waste and his family carried into captivity.

The prisoners, numbering nearly forty, were marched down the valley that
night in a storm of sleet, and were huddled together promiscuously, some
of them half naked, with no shelter but the leafless trees, or resting-
place but the wet ground. The marauders, finding the women and children
cumbersome, sent them all back the next day, except Mrs. Campbell, her
aged mother, ** and her children, and a Mrs. Moore, who were kept as
hostages for the kind treatment and ultimate exchange of the family of
Colonel John Butler. The returning prisoners carried back with them a
letter from Walter Butler to General Schuyler, in which he pretended
that feelings of mercy for the almost naked and helpless captives were
the incentive that caused him to release them; disclaimed all desire to
injure the weak and defenseless; and closed by assuring him that, if
Colonel John Butler's family were longer detained, he would not restrain
the Indians from indulgence in murder and rapine. The "tender mercy" of
Butler was that of "the wicked." He was the head and front of all the
cruelty at Cherry Valley on that day. He commanded the expedition, and
while he saw, unmoved, the murder of his father's friend and family, and
of others whose age and sex should have secured his regard, his _savage_
ally, the "monster Brant," hastened to save that very family, but was
too late. *** Butler would not allow his Rangers even to warn their
friends

* Mr. Mitchell was in the field when the invasion took place, and found
safety in the woods. After the enemy had retired, he hastened to the
village, when he found his house on fire and the dead bodies of his wife
and three children lying within. He extinguished the flames, and
discovered his little daughter terribly mangled, but yet alive. He took
her to the door, hoping fresh air might revive her, when he discovered a
straggling party of the enemy near. He had just time to conceal himself,
when a Tory sergeant named Newberry, whose acts in Schoharie entitle him
to a seat in the councils of Pandemonium, approached, and, seeing the
poor child lying upon the door-stone, dispatched her with a blow of a
hatchet. This miscreant was afterward caught and hung by order of
General Clinton.

** Mrs. Cannon, the mother of Mrs. Campbell, was quite old. She was an
encumbrance, and a savage slew her with his tomahawk, by the side of her
daughter, who, with a babe eighteen months old in her arms, was driven
with inhuman haste before her captors, while, with uplifted hatchets,
they menaced her life. Arriving among the Senecas, she was kindly
treated, and installed a member of one of the families. They allowed her
to do as she pleased, and her deportment was such that she seemed to
engage the real affections of the people. Perceiving that she wore caps,
one was presented to her, considerably spotted with blood. On
examination, she recognized it as one that had belonged to her friend,
Jane Wells. She and her children (from whom she was separated in the
Indian country) were afterward exchanged for the wife and family of
Colonel John Butler, then in the custody of the Committee of Safety at
Albany.

*** There are many well-authenticated instances on record of the
humanity of Brant, exercised particularly toward women and children. He
was a magnanimous victor, and never took the life of a former friend or
acquaintance. He loved a hero because of his heroism, although he might
be his enemy, and he was never known to take advantage of a conquered
soldier. I have mentioned the challenge which Captain M'Kean sent to
Brant. After the affair at Cherry Valley, he inquired of one of the
prisoners for Captain M'Kean, who, with his family, had left the
settlement. "He sent me a challenge," said Brant. "I came to accept it.
He is a fine soldier thus to retreat." It was replied, "Captain M'Kean
would not turn his back upon an enemy when there was any probability of
success." "I know it," replied Brant. "He is a brave man, and I would
have given more to take him than any other man in Cherry Valley; but I
would not have hurt a hair of his head."

*** Dr. Timothy Dwight relates that Walter Butler ordered a woman and
child to be slain, in bed, at Cherry Valley, when Brant interposed,
saying, "What! kill a woman and child! That child is not an enemy to the
king nor a friend to Congress. Long before he will be big enough to do
any mischief, the dispute will be settled." When, in 1780, Sir John
Johnson and Brant led a desolating army through the Schoharie and Mohawk
Valleys, Brant's humanity was again displayed. On their way to Fort
Hunter an infant was carried off. The frantic mother followed them as
far as the fort, but could get no tidings of her child. On the morning
after the departure of the invaders, and while General Van Rensselaer's
officers were at breakfast, a young Indian came bounding into the room,
bearing the infant in his arms and a letter from Captain Brant,
addressed to "the commander of the rebel army." The letter was as
follows: "Sir--I send you, by one of my runners, the child which he will
deliver, that, you may know that, whatever others may do, I do not make
war upon women and children. I am sorry to say that I have those engaged
with me who are more savage than the savages themselves." He named the
Butlers and others of the Tory leaders This incident was related to Mr.
Stone by the late General Morgan Lewis.

Character of Walter Butler.--The Settlements menaced.--Expedition
against the Onondagas.--Destruction of their Towns

270in the settlement of the approaching danger, but friend and foe were
left exposed to the terrible storm; he had sworn vengeance, and his bad
heart would not be content until its cravings were satisfied.

Tender charity may seek to cloak his crimes with the plea that partisan
warfare justified his deeds; and lapse of time, which mellows such
crimson tints in the picture of a man's character, may temper the
asperity with which shocked humanity views his conduct; yet a just
judgment, founded upon observation of his brief career, must pronounce
it a stain upon the generation in which he lived. After the destruction
of Cherry Valley his course was short, but bold, cruel, and bloody.
British officers of respectability viewed him with horror and disgust;
and when, in 1781, he was slain by the Oneidas on the banks of the West
Canada Creek, his body was left to decay, while his fallen companions
were buried with respect.

With the destruction of Cherry Valley all hostile movements ceased in
Tryon county, and were not resumed until the following spring, when an
expedition was sent against the Onondagas by General Clinton. Frequent
messages had been sent by the Oneidas during the winter, all reporting
that Brant and his Tory colleagues were preparing for some decisive
blow. The Onondagas, in the mean while, were making peaceful
professions, expressing a desire to remain neutral, while they were in
league and in secret correspondence with the leaders in the hostile camp
at Niagara. Policy, and even the necessity born of the law of self-
preservation, seemed to demand the infliction of summary and severe
chastisement upon the savages who menaced and desolated the Tryon county
settlements. Early in the winter General Schuyler had assured Congress
that, unless something of the kind was speedily done, Schenectady must
soon become the boundary of settlement in that direction.

The arrangement of an expedition against the Indians was intrusted to
General Clinton. April 18,1779 In April he dispatched a portion of the
regiments of Colonels Gansevoort and Van Schaick, under the latter
officer, against the Onondagas., The party consisted of five hundred and
fifty-eight strong men. Van Schaick was instructed to burn their castle
and villages in the Onondaga Valley, destroy all their cattle and other
effects, and make as many prisoners as possible. He was further
instructed to treat the women that might fall into his hands with all
the respect due to chastity. The expedition went down Wood Creek and
Oneida Lake, and thence up the Oswego River to the point on Onondaga
Lake where Salina now is. A thick fog concealed their movements, and
they had approached to within four or five miles of the valley before
they were discovered. As soon as the first village was attacked, the
alarm spread to the others. The people fled to the forests, leaving
every thing, even their arms, behind them. Three villages, consisting of
about fifty houses, were destroyed; twelve Indians were killed, and
thirty-three were made prisoners. A large quantity of

Alarm of the Oneidas.--Expedition against Oswegatchle.--Attack on
Cobelskill.--Scalping Parties.

271provisions, consisting chiefly of beans and corn, was consumed. The
council-house, or castle, was not burned, but the swivel in it was
spiked. All the horses and cattle in the vicinity were slaughtered; and,
when the work of destruction was ended, the expedition returned to Fort
Schuyler, after an absence of only six days, and without the loss of a
man.

This expedition, cruel and of doubtful policy, alarmed the neutral
Oneidas. * They were faithful to the Americans, yet, having intermarried
freely with the Onondagas, their relations had been slain or
impoverished, and this distressed them. They sent a deputation to Fort
Schuyler to inquire into the matter. Colonel Van Schaick pacified, if he
did not satisfy, them, and they returned-to their people. But the ire of
the Onondagas was fiercely kindled, not only on account of the
destruction of their property, but because of the extinguishment of
their council fire. Three hundred braves were immediately sent upon the
war-path, charged with the vengeance of the nation. Guided by a Tory,
they came down fiercely upon the settlement at Cobelskill, ** murdering,
plundering, and burning. The militia turned out to repulse them, but,
being led into an ambuscade, a number of them were killed. They fought
desperately, and while the militia was thus contending, and beating back
the savages, the people fled in safety to Schoharie. Seven of the
militia took post in a strong house, which the savages set fire to, and
these brave young men all perished in the flames. The whole settlement
was then plundered and burned. The patriots lost twenty-two killed, and
forty-two who were made prisoners.

While this expedition was in progress, scalping parties appeared at the
different points in the lower section of the Mohawk, and the settlements
were menaced with the fate of Cherry Valley. On the south side of the
Mohawk a party fell upon the Canajoharie settlement, took three
prisoners, captured some horses, and drove the people to Fort Plain. On
the same day another party attacked a small settlement at Stone Arabia,
*** burned some April 18, 1779 houses, and killed several people. A
party of Senecas appeared at Schoharie on the same day, drove the people
to the fort, plundered the houses, and carried away two men prisoners.
These simultaneous attacks were part of a plan for cutting off the
settlement in detail. The Indians on the south of the Mohawk were from
the Seneca country, and those on the north from Canada, both, doubtless,
the advanced parties of larger forces. The settlements were thoroughly
alarmed. The Palatine **** Committee wrote immediately to General
Clinton, at Albany, for succor. That efficient officer afforded
immediate aid, and, by the timely check thus given to the invaders, the
settlers of the valley were prevented from being driven into
Schenectady. (v) Other settlements near the Delaware and on the
frontiers of Ulster county were visited by the Indians# in May and the
early part of June; and in July the battle of Minisink occurred, the
particulars of which will be hereafter July 20, 1779 related.

In the spring of thig year it was determined to send a formidable force
into the Indian country of Western New York, for the purpose of
chastising the savages and their Tory allies so thoroughly that the
settlements upon the Mohawk and the upper branches of the Susquehanna
might enjoy a season of repose. The tribes of the Six Nations were then
populous. They had many villages, vast corn-fields, and fruitful
orchards and gardens in the

* At the time of this expedition there were about forty Oneida warriors
at Fort Schuyler. These were sent, with a party of regulars, under
Lieutenants M'Lellan and Hardonburgh, northward to attack the fort at
Oswegatchie. This expedition was unsuccessful in its ostensible object,
the garrison having been apprised of their approach. It is supposed that
the employment of the Oneidas so far away that they could not notify
their kinsmen, the Onondagas, of the invasion, was the principal object
of this northern movement, and in that it was successful. The Oneidas
were really friendly to the patriots, but to their credit it was said by
General Clinton (who knew them well), in a letter to General Sullivan,
"Their attachment to one another is too strong to admit of their being
of any service when employed against their fellows."

** Cobelskill was taken from Schoharie. The little village is about ten
miles west of the former.

*** Stone Arabia is about three miles north of the Mohawk, in the rear
of Palatine, and thirteen west of Johnstown.

**** Palatine is on the north side of the Mohawk, opposite Cannjoharie,
with which it is connected by a bridge

(v) Campbell's Annals; Stone's Brant.

Preparations to invade the Indian Country.--General Sullivan, Commander-
in-chief.--General James Clinton

272fertile country westward of Otsego Lake.

It was supposed that the most effectual method to subdue or weaken them
would be to destroy their homes and lay waste their fields, and thus
drive them further back into the wilderness toward Lake Erie.

Already the Mohawks had been thrust out of the valley of their name, and
their families were upon the domains of the Ca-yugas and Senecas. It
was, therefore, determined to make a combined movement upon them of two
strong divisions of military, one from Pennsylvania and the other from
the north, at a season when their fields and orchards were fully laden
with grain and fruits. It was a part of the plan of the expedition to
penetrate the country to Niagara, and break up the nest of vipers there.

General Sullivan * was placed in the chief command, and led in person
the division that ascended the Susquehanna from Wyoming, while General
Clinton ** commanded the forces that penetrated the country from the
mouth of the Canajoharie. It was arranged to unite the two divisions at
Tioga.

Clinton's troops, fifteen hundred strong, were mustered at Canajoharie
on the 15th of June, and on the 17th he commenced the transportation of
his bateaux and provisions across the hilly country to Springfield, at
the head of Otsego Lake, a distance of more than twenty

* John Sullivan was born in Berwick, Maine, on the 17th of February,
1740. His family emigrated to Ameriea from Ireland in 1723. He was a
farmer in his youth, and, after arriving at maturity, he studied law,
and established himself in practice in Durham, New Hampshire. He was
chosen a delegate to the first Continental Congress. After retiring from
that body, he and John Langdon, the speaker of the Provincial Congress
of New Hampshire, commanded a small force which seized Fort William and
Mary, at Portsmouth, and carried off all the cannon. He was appointed
one of the eight brigadiers when the Continental army was organized in
1775, and early in the following year he was made a major general. He
superseded Arnold in the command of the American army in Canada in 1776.
When General Greene became in on Long Island, he took command of his
division, and was made prisoner at the battle fought there in August,
1776. He was exchanged, and took command of General Charles Lee's
division in New Jersey after the capture of that officer. In the autumn
of 1777 he was engaged in the battles at the Brandywine and Germantown,
and in the winter following he took command of the troops on Rhode
Island. He besieged Newport in August, 1778, was unsuccessful, and
retreated from the island after a severe battle near the north end. He
commanded the expedition against the Indians in 1779, and this was the
last of his military career. Having offended some of the members of the
Board of War, and believing himself ill treated, he resigned his
commission in 1779. He was afterward a member of Congress, and, for
three years from 1786, was President of New Hampshire. In 1789 he was
appointed district judge, whieh office he held until his death, whieh
occurred January 23d, 1795.

** James Clinton was born in Ulster county, New York, August 9th, 1736.
At the age of twenty (1756) he was captain, under Bradstreet, in the
attack on Fort Frontenac. In 1763 he was intrusted with the command of
four companies in Ulster and Orange, raised for defense against the
inroads of the savages. He, with his brother George (the Governor of New
York during the Revolution), early espoused the patriot cause. He was
appointed a colonel in 1775, and accompanied Montgomery to Canada. In
August, 1776, he was made a brigadier; and he was in command, under
Governor Clinton, at Forts Montgomery and Clinton when they fell into
the hands of the enemy in 1777. He escaped, and made his way to his
residence in safety. Conjointly with Sullivan, he led the expedition
against the Indians in 1779. During the remainder of the war he was
connected with the Northern Department, having his quarters at Albany.
He retired to his estate, near Newburgh, Orange county, New York, after
the Revolution, where he died December 22d, 1812, aged 75 years. He was
the father of De Witt Clinton, the eminent Governor of New York in 1826-
7.

Capture of Hare and Newberry.--Information from General Schuyler.--Mr.
Denne.--Damming of Otsego Lake.--Its Effects.

273miles. It was an arduous duty, for his boats numbered two hundred and
twenty, and he had provisions sufficient for three months. He reached
Springfield, with all his luggage, on the 30th. On his way he captured
Hare and Newberry, two notorious spies, the former a lieutenant in the
British service, and the latter the miscreant whom we have already
noticed as the murderer of Mr. Mitchell's wounded child at Cherry
Valley. They were tried, and hanged "pursuant to the sentence of the
court, and to the entire satisfaction of the inhabitants of the county."
*

Clinton, with his division, proceeded to the foot of Otsego Lake, and
there awaited July 1,1779 orders from Sullivan. A day or two after his
arrival, General Schuyler communicated to him the important information
that the purpose of the expedition was known to the enemy, and that four
hundred and fifty regular troops, one hundred Tories, and thirty Indians
had been sent from Montreal to re-enforce the tribes against whom it was
destined. This information General Schuyler received from a spy whom he
had sent into Canada. The spy had also informed him that they were to be
joined by one half of Sir John Johnson's regiment and a portion of the
garrison at Niagara. On the 5th, Mr. Deane, ** the Indian interpreter,
arrived with thirty-five Oneida warriors, who came to explain the
absence of their tribe, whom Clinton, by direction of Sullivan, had
solicited to join him. *** They confirmed the intelligence sent by
Schuyler, and added that a party of Cayugas and Tories, three hundred in
number, were then upon the war-path, and intended to hang upon the
outskirts of Clinton's army on its march to Tioga.

Clinton remained at the south end of Otsego Lake, awaiting the tardy
movements of Sullivan, until the first week in August. His troops became
impatient, yet he was not idle. He performed a feat which exhibited much
ingenuity and forecast. He discovered that, in consequence of a long
drought, the outlet of the lake was too inconsiderable to allow his
boats to pass down upon its waters. He therefore raised a dam across it
at the foot of the lake, by which the waters would be so accumulated
that, when it should be removed, the bed of the outlet would be filled
to the brim, and bear his boats upon the flood. The work was soon
accomplished, and, in addition to the advantages which it promised to
the expedition, the damming of the lake caused great destruction of
grain upon its borders, for its banks were overflowed, and vast corn-
fields belonging to the Indians were deluged and destroyed. The event
also greatly alarmed the savages. It was a very dry season, and they
regarded the sudden rising of the lake, without any apparent cause, as
an evidence that the Great Spirit was displeased with them. And when
Clinton moved down the stream with his large flotilla upon its swollen
flood, the Indians along its banks were amazed, and retreated into the
depths of the forest.

Sullivan and Clinton formed a junction at Tioga on the 22d of August,
the entire force amounting to five thousand men, consisting of the
brigades of Generals Clinton, 1779

* So said General Clinton in a letter to General Schuyler. The latter
remarked, in reply, "In executing Hare you have rid the state of the
greatest villain in it. I hope his abettors in the country will meet
with a similar exaltation."

** James Deane was the first settler in the town of Westmoreland, Oneida
eounty. He was the son of pious New England parents, and at the age of
eleven years was sent among the Indians upon the Susquehanna to learn
their language, for the purpose of becoming a missionary among them. He
was afterward a student in Dartmouth College. On the breaking out of the
war, he was appointed Indian agent, with the rank of major in the army,
and during the contest he was most of the time among the Oneidas. At the
close of hostilities the Oneidas granted him a tract of land two miles
square, near Rome, in Oneida county, which he afterward exchanged for a
tract in Westmoreland, where he removed in 1786, and resided until his
death in 1832.

*** General Clinton was averse to the employment of the Oneidas or any
other Indians; but such being the orders of his superior, he engaged Mr.
Deane to negotiate with them. The Oneidas, to a man, volunteered to
accompany the expedition, and the few Onondagas who still adhered to the
Americans were also ready to join Clinton. But on the 23d the Oneidas
received an address at Fort Schuyler, from General Haldimand, written in
the Iroquois language; and so alarming were the menaces it contained,
that they suddenly changed their minds, and determined to stay at home
and defend their own castles and dwellings.

March of Sullivan's Expedition.--Fortifications of the Enemy.--General
Edward Hand.--The Battle

274Hand, Maxwell, and Poor, together with Proctor's artillery and a
corps of riflemen. The movement of the expedition had been so slow that
the enemy was prepared to receive them. Near Conewawah * (Newtown in the
histories of the battle), a considerable Indian village at the junction
of the Newtown Creek with the Chemung River, they had thrown up
breastworks half a mile in length, where they had determined to make a
bold stand against the invaders.

The Americans moved cautiously up the Tioga and Chemung, having large
flanking par ties on either side, and p. strong advanced and rear guard,
for they were told that detachments of the enemy were hovering around,
ready to strike when an opportunity should offer. On their march they
destroyed a small Indian settlement August 29, 1779 and the next day
Major Parr, of the advanced guard, discovered the enemy's works. These
were about a mile in advance of Conewawah, and were so covered by a bend
in the river, that only the front and one flank were exposed to the fire
of the assailants. That flank rested upon a steep hill or ridge running
nearly parallel with the river.

Further to the left was another ridge, running in the same direction,
and passing in the rear of the American army. Detachments of the enemy
were stationed on both hills, having a line of communication; and they
were so disposed that they might fall upon the assailants, flank and
rear, as soon as the action should commence. The Tories and Indians were
further protected by the pine-trees and shrub oaks that covered the
ground. Hoping that the Americans might not discover their concealed
fortification, they had arranged it in such a relative position to the
road along which the invaders must pass, that the whole flank of the
army would be exposed to an enfilading fire. Happily for the Americans,
their preparations were discovered in time.

General Hand *** formed the light infantry about four hundred yards from
the breast-works, and, while thus waiting for the main body to come up,
was several times attacked by small parties of Indians, who sallied out,
raised the war-whoop, and then retreated within the works. The hill upon
the right swarmed with savages, and Sullivan ordered Poor to sweep it
with his brigade. He immediately commenced the ascent, and the action
became warm His progress was bravely disputed for two hours, when the
enemy slowly gave way. They darted from tree to tree as they yielded
inch by inch; and from behind rocks, and bushes, and trees they galled
the Americans terribly with a scattering fire. Brant was at the head of
the savages, and Sir John Johnson, aided by the Butlers and Captain
M'Donald, one of

* Conewawah was upon the site of the present village of Elmira. The name
is an Iroquois word, signifying a head on a pole. It was beautifully
situated in-the midst of a fertile valley, and, at the time of the
invasion, was surrounded by fruitful orchards and broad fields of
flowering corn. The place became a white settlement, and was
incorporated by the name of Newtown in 1815, which was changed to Elmira
in 1825. There are no vestiges to be seen here of the battle of Chemung,
as the engagement that took plaee there is sometimes called. The spot
where Sullivan landed is a few rods below the "Sullivan Mill," which
stands upon the Conewawah or Newtown Creek, near its junction with the
Chemung. The works thrown up by Sullivan, and destroyed when he returned
from the Genesee country, were a little south of the mill.

** Explanation of the Plan.--The advanced guard, composed of light
infantry, one mile in advance, a a, flanking corps, b b, the main body.
Clinton's and Hand's brigades were on the right, and Poor's and
Maxwell's were on the left, c, Proctor's artillery and the pack horses.
The rifle corps composed a portion of the strong rear-guard.

*** General Edward Hand was a native of Leinster province, Ireland, and
was born at the close of 1744. His amiable disposition and urbanity of
manner endeared him to his men, and he maintained, throughout the war,
the unlimited confidence and respect of his superior officers. After the
war he was much engaged in civil offices of trust, and his name is
attached to the Pennsylvania Constitution of 1790. So highly did
Washington esteem him, that when, during Adams's administration, he
consented to take the chief command of the American army to be raised to
resist the threatened and actual aggressions of France, he desired the
appointment of General Hand as adjutant general. He died in 1803.

The Effect of the Artillery.--Retreat of the Enemy.--Destruction of
Catharlnestown and other Villages and Plantations.

275the Scotch refugees from Johnstown, commanded the Tories. It is
believed that Guy Johnson was also in the battle, but this is not
certainly known. They fought skillfully and courageously, and, but for
the artillery that was brought into play as speedily as possible, the
victory would doubtless have been on their side. The cannonade produced
a great panic among the Indians, yet their leader, who was seen at all
points, and in the hottest of the fight, kept them long from retreating.
Poor at length gained the summit of the ridge, outflanked the enemy, and
decided the fortunes of the day. Brant, perceiving that all was lost,
raised the loud, retreating cry, _Oonah! Oonah!_ and savages and Tories,
in great confusion, abandoned their works and fled across the river,
pursued by the victors. Thus ended the battle of Chemung. The force of
the enemy was estimated by Sullivan at fifteen hundred, including five
companies of British troops and Rangers. The Americans numbered between
four and five thousand, a considerable portion of whom were not brought
into action at all. Considering the length of time occupied in the
battle, and the numbers engaged, the loss was very inconsiderable. Only
five or six of the Americans were killed, and about fifty wounded. The
loss of the enemy was much greater. In their flight eight Indians were
slain and _scalped_ by their pursuers. Ay, _scalped!_ for the Americans
had been apt scholars in learning the Indian art of war that had been so
terribly taught them in Tryon county for three years.

Sullivan's army rested upon the battle-ground that night, and the next
morning pushed onward toward Catharinestown, an Indian settlement
northwest from Conewawah, and about three miles from the head of Seneca
Lake. The march was difficult and dangerous. The route lay through
narrow defiles and a deep valley traversed by a stream so sinuous that
they had to ford it several times, the water often waist high. At night
they bivouacked in a dark and tangled cedar swamp, without blankets or
food, and in continual fear of an enemy in ambush. * The whole army
reached Catharinestown in safety, and encamped before it on the 2d of
September. The people fled, and the next day the village and surrounding
corn-fields and orchards were destroyed.

The flying campaign, charged with destruction, had now fairly begun.
"The Indians shall see," said Sullivan, "that there is malice enough in
our hearts to destroy every thing that contributes to their support,"
and cruelly was that menace executed. The Indians fled before him like
frightened deer to cover, and the wail of desolation was heard
throughout their pleasant land, from the Susquehanna to the Genesee.
Village after village was laid waste, and fields and orchards were
desolated. Kendaia was swept from September 6, 1779 existence; (a) other
and smaller villages were annihilated; and on the 7th of September the
conquerors sat down before Kanadaseagea, the capital of the Senecas,
near the head of the beautiful lake of that name. Sixty indifferent
cabins, surrounded by fine orchards of apple, peach, and pear trees,
became a prey to the army. Not a roof was left to shelter the sorrowing
inhabitants on their return--not a fruit-tree to shade them or to give
them sustenance---not an ear of corn of all the abundance that lay
before the invaders when they approached, was saved from the devouring
flames.

While the chief portion of the army was engaged in this work,
detachments went out and wrought equal devastation elsewhere. Four
hundred men went down the west side of the lake and destroyed
Gotheseunquean, or Gaghsiungua, and the plantations around it, and
another party, under Colonel Harper, marched to Schoyere, near Cayuga
Lake, and utterly destroyed it and its fields of grain.

Taking breath at Kanadaseagea, the invaders marched on to Kanandaigua,
at the head of the little lake of that name, and in a few hours after
their arrival the "twenty-September 10three very elegant houses, mostly
framed, and, in general, large," ** with the extensive fields of corn
and beans, and orchards of heavily-laden fruit-trees, were destroyed.

* The enemy might have rallied upon the hills along this perilous route,
and greatly thinned, if not quite destroyed or captured, the invading
army. But, as Brant afterward said, they did not believe that Sullivan
would commence a march so soon over so bad a route; and the Indians were
so terrified by the cannons, and disheartened by the result of the
battle, that they could not be readily induced to attempt another.

** See General Sullivan's official account of this expedition.

Approach to Genesee.--Council of the Indian Villages.--A Battle.--
Capture and Torture of Lieutenant Boyd.

276Honeoye, or Anyeaya, a village lying in the path of the invading army
in its march toward the Valley of the Genesee, was next swept away, and
Sullivan prepared to desolate the broad valley in whose bosom nestled
the great capital of the Western tribes, and the most important of all
the Indian settlements.

Thus far the enemy had fled in terror before the invading army, and the
villages of the Indians were destroyed without an effort being made to
defend them. The beautiful Valley of the Genesee, the earthly paradise
of the Six Nations, was now menaced. A council of the villages of the
plain was held, and they resolved to turn and strike another blow in
defense of their homes. Their women and children were removed to the
deep shelter of the forest, and the warriors prepared for battle upon a
plain between Honeyoe and the head of Connissius Lake, now known as
Henderson's Flats. There they waited in ambush the approach of
Sullivan's army, and rose upon the advanced guard with the desperation
of wounded panthers. The battle was short, the savages were routed, and
all that they had gained was the capture of two Oneida chiefs. *

On the 12th, Kanaghsaws and its plantations were laid in ashes. Here the
progress of the army was temporarily checked by a deep stream, which it
was necessary to bridge in order to pass over with the baggage and
stores. Before them lay the village of Little Beard's Town, and, while
the army was delayed in constructing a bridge, Lieutenant Boyd, of the
rifle corps, with a detachment of twenty-six men, went to reconnoiter
the town. He found it deserted, except by two Indians, whom he killed
and scalped. Returning, his route lay near the party who had captured
the two Oneidas. One of them, as we have seen, was killed, the other was
spared for torture. He broke loose from his captors, and fled in the
direction of Sullivan's camp. Many Indians started in pursuit, and these
were joined by Brant and a large body of warriors, who had lain in
ambush to cut off Boyd on his return. September 13, 1779 The pursuing
Indians came upon Boyd and his party. Surrounded by overwhelming
numbers, he saw no way to escape but by cutting his way through the
fierce circle. Three times he made the attempt; almost all his men were
killed, and himself and a soldier named Parker were made prisoners and
carried in triumph to Little Beard's Town. ** Brant treated them
humanely, but, having business elsewhere, the chief left them in the
custody of Colonel John Butler, who, with his Rangers, was there. The
unfeeling Tory handed them over to the tender mercies of the Indians. By
them Boyd was tortured in the most cruel manner, and then beheaded.
Parker was beheaded without being tortured. Among the few who escaped
was Timothy Murphy, the slayer of Fraser at Bemis's Heights. The
Americans found the bodies of the two victims at Little Beard's Town,
and buried them upon the bank of Little Beard's Creek, under a clump of
wild plum-trees on the road now running from Moscow to Genesee.

The Tories and Indians now held another council, and it was concluded
that further attempts to oppose such an army as Sullivan's was futile.
They therefore resolved to leave their beautiful country; and their
women and children were hurried off toward Niagara,

* One of these was General Sullivan's guide, and had rendered the
Americans very important services. He had an elder brother engaged with
the enemy, and here they met for the first time since their separation
at the Oneida Castle. Fierce was the anger of the elder chief when he
recognized his brother in the prisoner. Approaching him with violent
gestures, he said, "Brother! you have merited death! The hatchet or the
war-club shall finish your career!" He then reproached him for aiding
the rebellion, for driving the Indians from their fields, and for
butchering their children. "No crime can be greater," he said. "But
though you have merited death, and shall die on this spot, my hands
shall not be stained with the blood of a brother! Who will strike?"
Instantly a hatchet gleamed in the hand of Little Beard, the sachem of a
village near by, * and the next moment the young Oneida was dead at the
feet of his brother.--See Campbell's Annals.

** Han Yerry, an Oneida sachem, was with Lieutenant Boyd, serving him as
guide. He fought with signal courage. The Indians knew him, and, several
springing upon him, he was literally hacked in pieces by their hatchets.
Han Yerry lived at Oriskany at the time of the battle there, and joined
the Americans. He was a powerful man, and did great execution. For this
the Indians defeated in that battle entertained toward him feelings of
the most implacable hatred.

* Little Beard's Town, now Leicester, in Livingston county.

Destruction of Genesee and the surrounding Country.--Picture of the
Desolation.--Name given to Washington.--Corn Planter.

277while the warriors hovered around the conquering army, to watch its
movements and strike a blow if opportunity should occur.

Sullivan proceeded to the Genesee Valley. Gathtsegwarohare and Little
Beard's Town were destroyed, and on the 14th he crossed the river, and
the army encamped september, 1779 around Genesee, the Indian capital.
Here every thing indicated the presence of civilization. There was not a
wilderness feature in the scene. The rich intervales presented the
appearance of cultivation for many generations, * and the farms, and
orchards, and gardens bespoke a degree of comfort and refinement that
would be creditable to any civilized community. But a terrible doom hung
over the smiling country. The Genesee Castle was destroyed, and the
capital was laid in ashes. "The town" [Genesee], said Sullivan, in his
dispatch to Washington, "contained one hundred and twenty-eight houses,
mostly large and very elegant. It was beautifully situated, almost
encircled with a clear flat, extending a number of miles, over which
extensive fields of corn were waving, together with every kind of
vegetable that could be conceived." Yet the contemplation of this scene
could not stay the destroyer's hand; and over the whole valley and the
surrounding country the troops swept with the besom of desolation. Forty
Indian towns were burned; one hundred and sixty thousand bushels of corn
in the fields and in granaries were destroyed; a vast number of the
finest fruit-trees, ** the product of years of tardy growth, were cut
down; hundreds of gardens covered with edible vegetables were desolated;
the inhabitants were driven into the forests to starve, and were hunted
like wild beasts; their altars were overturned, and their graves
trampled upon by strangers; and a beautiful, well-watered country,
teeming with a prosperous people, and just rising from a wilderness
state, by the aid of cultivation, to a level with the productive regions
of civilization, was desolated and cast back a century within the space
of a fortnight. *** To us, looking upon the scene from a point so
remote, it is difficult to perceive the necessity that called for a
chastisement so cruel and terrible. But that such necessity seemed to
exist we should not doubt, for it was the judicious and benevolent mind
of Washington that conceived and planned the campaign, and ordered its
rigid execution in the manner in which it was accomplished. It awed the
Indians for the moment, but did not crush them. In the reaction they had
greater strength. It kindled the fires of deep hatred, which spread far
among the tribes upon the lakes and in the valley of the Ohio.
Washington, like Demetrius, the son of Antigonus, received from the
savages the name of An-na-ta-kau-les, which signifies _a taker of
towns_, or Town Destroyer. ****

* The race of Indians that then inhabited the Valley of the Genesee had
no knowledge of the earlier cultivators of the soil. They asserted,
according to Mary Jemison, that another race, of which they had no
knowledge, had cultivated the land long before their ancestors came into
the valley; and she saw the disentombment of skeletons much larger than
those of the race she was among.

** Many of the orchards were uncommonly large. One that was destroyed by
the axe contained fifteen hundred trees.

*** Stone says (Life of Brant, ii., 25), "It is apprehended that few of
the present generation are thoroughly aware of the advances which the
Indians, in the wide and beautiful country of the Cayugas and Senecas,
had made in the march of civilization. They had several towns and many
large villages, laid out with a considerable degree of regularity. They
had framed houses, some of them well finished, having chimneys, and
painted. They had broad and productive fields; and, in addition to an
abundance of apples, were the enjoyment of the pear and the more
luscious peach."

**** At a council held in Philadelphia in 1792, Corn Planter, the
distinguished Seneca chief, thus addressed the President: "Father--The
voice of the Seneca nation speaks to you, the great counselor, in whose
heart the wise men of all the thirteen fires have placed their wisdom.
It may be very small in your cars, and, therefore, we entreat you to
hearken with attention, for we are about to speak to you of things which
to us are very great. When your army entered the country of the Six
Nations, we called you The Town Destroyer; and to this day, when that
name is heard, our women look behind them and turn pale, and our
children cling close to the necks of their mothers. Our counselors and
warriors are men, and can not be afraid; but their hearts are grieved
with the fears of our women and children, and desire that it may be
buried so deep that it may be heard no more." Corn Planter was one of
the earliest lecturers upon temperance in this country. While speaking
upon this subject in 1822, he said, "The Great Spirit first made the
world, next the flying animals, and formed all things good and
prosperous. He is immortal and everlasting. Alter finishing the flying
animals, he came down to earth and there stood. Then he made different
kinds of trees, and woods of all sorts, and people of every kind. He
made the spring and other seasons, and the weather suitable for
planting. These he did make. But stills to make whisky to give to the
Indians he did not make.... The Great Spirit has ordered me to stop
drinking, and he wishes me to inform the people that they should quit
drinking intoxicating drinks."

Return of the invading Army.--A Celebration.--Arrival of the Expedition
at Wyoming.--The Oneidas driven from Home.

278From causes not clearly understood, Sullivan did not extend his
victorious march to Niagara, the head-quarters of the Tories and
Indians, the breaking up of which would have been far more efficient in
bringing repose to the white settlements than the achievements just
accomplished; but, having desolated the Genesee Valley, he crossed the
river and re-September 20, 1779 traced his steps. When the army
recrossed the outlet of Seneca Lake, Colonel Zebulon Butler, of Wyoming,
was sent with a detachment of five hundred men, to pass round the foot
of Cayuga Lake and destroy the Indian towns on its eastern shore.
Lieutenant Dearborn was dispatched upon similar service along its
western shore; and both corps, having accomplished their mission, joined
the main body on the Chemung. * September 28. Butler had burned three
towns and the capital of the Cayugas, and Dearborn had destroyed six
towns and a great quantity of grain and fruit-trees. The army reached
Tioga, its starting-place, on the 3d of October, where it was joined by
the garrison left in charge of Fort Sullivan. Destroying that stockade,
they took up their line of march on the 4th for Wyoming, where they
arrived on the 7th, and pitched their tents on the former campground
near Wilkesbarre. The next day a large portion of the troops left for
Easton, on the Delaware, at which place they were dismissed. Thus ended
a campaign before which we would gladly draw the vail of forgetfulness.

Although beaten back into the wilderness, and their beautiful country
laid waste, the Indians were not conquered, and in the spring of the
following year Brant and some of his followers were again upon the war-
path. During the winter the threat of Sir Frederic Haldimand against the
Oneidas was executed. Their castle, church, and villages were destroyed,
and the inhabitants were driven down upon the white settlements for
protection. They collected together near Schenectady, where they
remained until after the war. ** These, too, were particular objects for
the vengeance of the hostile savages. They regarded the Oneidas as
double traitors, and determined to punish them accordingly, should an
opportunity offer to do so.

In April, in connection with a band of Tories, the savages destroyed
Harpersfield, and then marched to the attack of the Upper Schoharie
Fort. On their way they captured Captain Alexander Harper and a small
company who were with him, engaged in making maple sugar. Three of the
yeomanry were killed, and ten made prisoners and taken to Niagara. With
difficulty Brant kept his Indians from murdering them by the way. At
Niagara Harper met with his niece, the daughter of Mr. Moore, of Cherry
Valley, whose family, with that of Colonel Campbell, was carried into
captivity in 1778. She had married a British officer named Powell, and
through his exertions Captain Harper and his associates were kindly
treated at Niagara. But they were doomed to a long absence from home,
for they were not released until the peace in 1783 opened all the prison
doors. *** The borders of Wyoming, and the Dutch settlements along the
western frontiers of the

* Lieutenant-colonel Hubley, an officer of the Pennsylvania line, has
left an interesting account of this expedition in his Journal. He says
that, on the 25th of September, the army held a celebration in testimony
of their pleasure "in consequence of the accession of the King of Spain
to the American alliance, and the generous proceedings of Congress in
augmenting the subsistence of the officers and men." General Sullivan
ordered five of his fattest bullocks to be slaughtered, one for the
officers of each brigade. In the evening, after the discharge of
thirteen cannons, the whole army performed a feu de joie. Thirteen
appropriate toasts were drunk. The last was as follows: "May the enemies
of America be metamorphosed into pack horses, and sent on a western
expedition against the Indians."

** A remnant of this tribe now occupies land in the vicinity of Rome,
Oneida county, New York.

*** Among the Tory captors of Harper and his associates was a brute
named Becraft, who boasted of having assisted in the murder of the
Vrooman family in Schoharie. He had the audacity to return to Schoharie
after the war. The returned prisoners, who had heard his boast, and
others, informed of his presence, caught him, stripped him naked, and,
tying him to a tree, gave him a severe castigation with hickory whips.
They enumerated his several crimes, and then gave him a goodly number of
stripes for each. On releasing him, they charged him never to come to
the county again. Of course he did not.

Johnson's Incursions into the Schoharie Country.--Attack on the
Schoharie Forts.--Boldness of Murphy.

279present Ulster and Orange comities, suffered from scalping parties
during the spring and summer of 1780. We have already noticed the
destruction of the settlement and mills at Little Falls, on the Mohawk;
also the devastation of the Canajoharie settlements and the hamlet at
Fort Plain, which occurred in August of that year. The irruption of Sir
John Johnson into the valley in the neighborhood of Johnstown will be
considered when writing of my visit to Johnson Hall.

1780 During the autumn an extensive expedition was planned against the
Mohawk and Schoharie settlements. The Indians were thirsting for revenge
for the wrongs and misery inflicted by Sullivan. The leaders were Sir
John Johnson, Brant, and the famous half-breed Seneca warrior, Corn
Planter. * The Indians rendezvoused at Tioga Point, and, ascending the
Susquehanna, formed a junction at Unadilla with Sir John Johnson and his
forces, which consisted of three companies of his Greens, one company of
German Yagers, two hundred of Butler's Rangers, one company of British
regulars, under Captain Duncan, and a number of Mohawks. They came from
Montreal by way of Oswego, bringing with them two small mortars, a brass
three pounder, and a piece called a _grasshopper_.

The plan agreed upon by the invaders was, to proceed along the Charlotte
River, the east branch of the Susquehanna, to its source, thence across
to the head of the Schoharie, sweep all the settlements along its course
to its junction with the Mohawk, and then devastate that beautiful
valley down to Schenectady. They began their march at nightfall, and
before morning they had passed the Upper Fort unobserved, and October 15
were applying the torch to dwellings near the Middle Fort (Middleburgh).
At daylight signal guns at the Upper Fort announced the discovery of the
enemy there, but it was too late to save the property, already in
flames. The proceeds of a bountiful harvest were in the barns, and
stacks of hay and grain were abundant.

Major Woolsey, who seems to have been a poltroon, ** was the commander
of the garrison at the Middle Fort, and sent out a detachment against
the foe, under Lieutenant Spencer, who was repulsed, but returned to the
fort without losing a man. That post was now formally invested by the
enemy, and Sir John Johnson sent a flag, with a summons to surrender.
The bearer was fired upon by Murphy, the rifleman already mentioned, but
was unhurt; and, on his return to the camp, Johnson commenced a siege.
The feeble garrison had but little ammunition, while the enemy, though
well supplied, did very little execution with his own. The siege was a
singular, and even ridiculous, military display. While a party of the
besiegers were awkwardly trying to cast bomb-shells into the apology for
a fort, the rest were valiantly attacking deserted houses and stacks of
grain. Failing to make any impression, Sir John sent another flag toward
noon. Murphy again fired upon the bearer, and again missed his mark.
Woolsey had ordered him to desist, but Murphy plainly told his
commanding officer that he was a coward, and meant to surrender the
fort; and excused his breach of the rules of war in firing upon a flag
by the plea that the enemy, in all his conduct, paid no regard whatever
to military courtesy.

The siege continued, and again a flag was sent, and was fired upon a
third time by Murphy. The officers and regulars in the fort had menaced
him with death if he should again thus violate the rules of war. But the
militia, among whom he was a great favorite, rallied around him, and
Woolsey and his men were set at defiance. At length Johnson, suspecting
the garrison to be much stronger than it really was, or fearing re-
enforcements might arrive from Albany, abandoned the siege, and marched
rapidly down the valley, destroying

* Corn Planter now first became conspicuous. According to Stone, this
chief, and the afterward more famous Red Jacket, were among the Indians
at the battle of Chemung. They became rivals, and Red Jacket finally
supplanted Corn Planter. Brant always despised Red Jacket, for he
declared him to have acted the part of a coward during Sullivan's
expedition, in trying to get the chiefs to sue for peace upon the most
ignominious terms.

** Campbell, in his Annals, says, "Woolsey's presence of mind forsook
him in the hour of danger. He concealed himself at first with the women
and children in the house, and, when driven out by the ridicule of his
new associates, he crawled around the intrenchments on his hands and
knees, amid the jeers and bravos of the militia, who felt their courage
revive as their laughter was excited by the cowardice of the major."

Johnson's March to Fort Hunter.--Destruction of Property.--Expedition of
General Van Rensselaer.--Death of Colonel Brown.

280with fire every thing combustible in his way. He attacked the Lower
Fort, but, being repulsed by a shower of grape-shot and musket-balls
from the garrison in the church, he continued his march down the river
to Fort Hunter, * at its junction with the Mohawk. Not a house, barn, or
grain-stack, known to belong to a Whig, was left standing, and it was
estimated that one hundred thousand bushels of grain were destroyed by
the invaders in that one day's march. The houses and other property of
the Tories were spared, but the exasperated Whigs set them on fire as
soon as the enemy had gone, and all shared a common fate. Only two
persons in the besieged fort were killed, but about one hundred of the
inhabitants were murdered during the day. The Vroomans, a numerous
family in Schoharie, suffered much, many of them being among the slain.

October, 1780 Sir John remained at Fort Hunter on the 17th, and
destroyed every thing belonging to the Whigs in the neighborhood. On the
18th he began a devastating march up the Mohawk Valley. Caughnawaga was
laid in ashes, and every dwelling on both sides of the river, as far up
as Fort Plain, was destroyed. ** On the night of the 18th Sir John
encamped with his forces near "The Nose," and the following morning he
crossed the Mohawk at Keder's Rifts, *** sending a detachment of fifty
men to attack a small stockade called Fort Paris, in Stone Arabia, about
three miles north of the river. The main body kept in motion at the same
time, and continued the work of destruction along the wide line of its
march.

As soon as the irruption of Johnson into the Schoharie settlement was
made known at Albany, Governor George Clinton, accompanied by General
Robert Van Rensselaer, of Claverack, at the head of a strong body of
militia, marched to the succor of the people in Tryon county. They
arrived at Caughnawaga on the 18th, while it was yet in flames; and,
ascertaining that Fort Paris was to be attacked the next day, Van
Rensselaer dispatched orders to Colonel Brown, then stationed there, to
march out and meet the enemy. Brown promptly obeyed, and near a ruined
military work, called Fort Keyser, confronted the invaders. A sharp
action ensued, and the overwhelming numbers of the enemy bore down the
gallant little band of Brown, who, with forty of his soldiers, was
slain. **** The remainder of his troops found safety in flight.

* Fort Hunter was built at the mouth of the Schoharie Creek during the
French-and Indian war. It inclosed an edifice called Queen Anne's
Chapel, to which a parsonage, built of stone, was attached. The old fort
was torn down at the commencement of the Revolution, but it was
afterward partially restored and often garrisoned. The chapel was
demolished in 1820, to make room for the Erie Canal. The parsonage is
still standing in the town of Florida, half a mile below the Schoharie,
and a few rods south of the canal.

** Among the many sufferers at this time was Major Jelles Fonda, from
whom the present village of Fonda, near old Caughnawaga, derives its
name. He was absent from home at the time, attending a meeting of the
state Legislature, of which he was a member, then in session at
Poughkeepsie, Dutchess county. His mansion was at a place called "The
Nose," in the town of Palatine. His wife escaped under cover of a thick
fog, and on foot made her way to Schenectady. The house was burned,
together with property valued at $60,000.--Antiquarian Researches, by
Giles F. Yates, Esq.

*** Rifts are short, shallow rapids, the frequent occurrence of which in
the Mohawk River makes navigation of that stream, even with bateaux,
quite difficult.

**** Colonel Brown was a distinguished soldier in former campaigns of
the Revolution in the Northern Department, as the reader has already
noticed, he was born in Sandersfield, Berkshire county, Massachusetts,
October 19th, 1744. He graduated at Yale College in 1771, and studied
law with Oliver Arnold (a cousin of the traitor), at Providence, Rhode
Island. He commenced practice at Caughnawaga, New York, and was
appointed king's attorney. He soon went to Pittsfield, Massachusetts,
where he became active in the patriot cause. He was chosen by the State
Committee of Correspondence, in 1774, to go to Canada to excite
rebellion, in which perilous duty he had many adventures. He was elected
to Congress in 1775, but before the meeting of that body he had joined
the expedition under Allen and Arnold against Ticonderoga. He assisted
in the capture of Fort Chambly in the autumn of that year, and planned
the attack on Montreal, which resulted so disastrously to Colonel Ethan
Allen. He was at the storming of Quebec at the close of the year. The
following year Congress gave him the commission of lieutenant colonel.
In 1777 he conducted the expedition that attacked Ticonderoga and other
posts in its vicinity, released one hundred American prisoners at Lake
George, and captured quite a large quantity of provisions and stores
belonging to the enemy. Soon after this he retired from the service on
account of his detestation of Arnold. Three years before the latter
became a traitor, Brown published a hand-bill, in which he denounced him
as an avaricious and unprincipled man, charged him with "selling many a
life for gain," and predicted that he would prove a traitor, in the
remarkable words with which the hand-bill closed: "Money is this man's
God, and to get enough of it he would sacrifice his country!" This was
published at Albany in the winter of 1776-7, while Arnold was quartered
there. Arnold was greatly excited when told of it, called Brown a
scoundrel, and declared that he would kick him whensoever and
wheresoever they might meet. This declaration was communicated to Brown.
The next day, Brown, by invitation, went to a dinner where he would meet
Arnold. The latter was standing with his back to the fire when the
former entered the door, and he and Brown thus met each other face to
face. Brown walked boldly up to Arnold, and, looking him sternly in the
face, said, "I understand, sir, that you have said you would kick me. I
now present myself to give you an opportunity to put your threat into
execution." Arnold made no reply. Brown then said, "Sir, you are a dirty
scoundrel." Arnold was still silent, and Brown left the room, after
apologizing to the gentlemen present for his intrusion. *

* Colonel Brown, after he left the army, was occasionally employed in
the Massachusetts service. In the fall of 1780, with many of the
Berkshire militia, he marched up the Mohawk Valley, to aet as
circumstances might require. He was slain at Stone Arabia on his birth-
day (October 19th, 1780), nged 35 years. On his way to the Mohawk
country, he called upon Ann Lee, the founder of the sect of Shaking
Quakers in this country, then established near Albany. He assured her,
by way of pleasantry, that on his return he should join her society. A
fortnight after his death two members of the society waited upon his
widow, told her that her husband, in spirit, had joined "Mother Ann,"
and that he had given express orders for her to become a member. She was
not to be duped, and bade them begone. On the anniversary of Colonel
Brown's death (as well as of his birth), in 1836, a monument was reared
to his memory by his son, the late Henry Brown, Esq., of Berkshire,
Massachusetts, near the place where he fell, in the town of Palatine.
Upon the monument is the following inscription: In memory of Colonel
John Brown, who was killed in battle on the 19th day of October, 1780,
at Palatine, in the county of Montgomery.

Pursuit of Johnson by Van Rensselaer.--Inaction of the latter.--Battle
of Klock's Field.--Capture of some Tories.

281Sir John now dispersed his forces in small bands to the distance of
five or six miles in each direction, to pillage the county. He desolated
Stone Arabia, and, proceeding to a place called Kloek's Field, halted to
rest. General Van Rensselaer, with a considerable force, was in close
pursuit. He had been joined by Captain M'Kean, with a corps of
volunteers, and a strong body of Oneida warriors, led by their principal
chief, Louis Atyataronghta, whom Congress had commissioned a colonel. *
His whole force was now fifteen hundred strong. Van Rensselaer's pursuit
was on the south side of the Mohawk, while Johnson was ravaging the
country on the north side. Johnson took care to guard the ford while his
halting army was resting, and the pursuers were there kept at bay. The
tardy movements of Van Rensselaer, who, instead of pushing across to
attack the wearied troops of the invader, _rode off to Fort Plain to
dine with Governor Clinton_, were justly censured; and the Oneida chief
even denounced him as a Tory. This accusation, and the remonstrances of
some of his officers, quickened his movements, and toward evening his
forces crossed the river and were arrayed for battle. The whites of the
enemy were upon a small plain partially guarded by a bend in the river,
while Brant, with his Indians, occupied, in secret, a thicket of shrub
oaks in the vicinity. The van of the attack was led by the late General
Morgan Lewis, then a colonel. Colonel Dubois commanded the extreme
right, and the left was led by Colonel Cuyler, of Albany. Captain M'Kean
and the Oneidas were near the right. Johnson's right was composed of
regular troops; the center, of his Greens; and his left was the Indian
ambuscade. When the patriots approached, Brant raised the war-whoop, and
in a few moments a general battle ensued. The charge of the Americans
was so impetuous that the enemy soon gave way and fled. Brant was
wounded in the heel, but escaped. Van Rensselaer's troops wished to
pursue the enemy, but it was then twilight, and he would not allow it.
They were ordered to fall back and encamp for the night, a movement
which caused much dissatisfaction. **

* He was a representative of three nations, for in his veins ran the
blood of the French, Indian, and negro

** While some of M'Kean's volunteers were strolling about, waiting for
the main army to cress, they came upon a small block-house, where nine
of the enemy were in custody, having surrendered during the night. On
one of them being asked how he came there, his answer was a sharp
commentary upon the criminal inaction of General Van Rensselaer. "Last
night, after the battle," he said, "we crossed the river; it was dark;
we heard the word 'lay down your arms some of us did so. We were taken,
nine of us, and marched into this little fort by seven militia men. We
formed the rear of three hundred of Johnson's Greens, who were running
promiscuously through and over one another. I thought General Van
Rensselaer's whole army was upon us. Why did you not take us prisoners
yesterday, after Sir John ran off with the Indians and left us? We
wanted to surrender." The man was a Tory of the valley.--See Life of
Brant, ii., 123.

* Stone's Life of Brant, ii., 117.

Pursuit of Johnson and Brant.--Conduct of Van Rensselaer.--Capture of
Vrooman and his Party.--Threatened Invasion.

282Louis and M'Kean did not strictly obey orders, and early in the
morning they started off with their forces in pursuit. Johnson, with the
Indians and Yagers, fled toward Onondaga Lake, where they had left their
boats concealed. His Greens and the Rangers followed. Van Rensselaer and
his whole force pursued them as far as Fort Herkimer, at the German
Flats, and there M'Kean and Louis were ordered to press on in advance
after the fugitives. They struck the trail of Johnson the next morning,
and soon afterward came upon his deserted camp while the fires were yet
burning. Van Rensselaer had promised to push forward to their support;
but, having little confidence in the celerity of his movements, and
fearing an ambuscade, Louis refused to advance any further until assured
that the main body of the Americans was near. The advanced party halted,
and were soon informed by a messenger that Van Rensselaer had actually
abandoned the pursuit, and was then on his return march! It was a
shameful neglect of advantage, for, with proper skill and action,
Johnson might have been captured at the Nose, * before Stone Arabia was
desolated, or else overtaken and secured in his flight.

When Van Rensselaer heard of the concealment of Johnson's boats on the
Onondaga, he dispatched a messenger to Captain Vrooman, then in command
at Fort Schuyler, ordering him to go with a strong detachment and
destroy them. Vrooman instantly obeyed. One of his men feigned sickness
at Oneida, and was left behind. He was there when Johnson arrived, and
informed him of Vrooman's expedition. Brant and a body of Indians
hastened forward, came upon Vrooman and his party while at dinner, and
captured the whole of them without firing a gun. Johnson had no further
impediments in his way, and easily escaped to Canada by way of Oswego,
taking with him Captain Vrooman and his party prisoners, but leaving
behind him a great number of his own men. ** Tryon county enjoyed
comparative repose through the remainder of the autumn and part of the
winter.

In January, 1781, Brant was again upon the war-path in the neighborhood
of Fort Schuyler. The slender barrier of the Oneida nation had been
broken the previous year by driving that people upon the white
settlements, and the warriors from Niagara had an unimpeded way to the
Mohawk Valley. They were separated into small parties, and cut off load
after load of supplies on their way to Forts Plain, Dayton, and
Schuyler. During the month of March two detachments of soldiers near
Fort Schuyler were made prisoners, and the provisions they were guarding
were captured. All the information that could be got respecting the
movements of the enemy strengthened the belief that it was his
determination to make another invasion of the valley, and penetrate, if
possible, as far as the settlement at Schenectady, to destroy the
Oneidas who had found shelter there.

Already the scarcity of provisions at Forts Schuyler and Dayton warned
the people that, if supplies were not speedily obtained, those posts
must be abandoned, and the whole county would thus be left open to the
savages. The distress at Fort Schuyler was greatly increased by a flood
early in May, which overflowed the works and destroyed considerable
provisions. The damage was so great, that it was decided, at a council
of officers, that the strength of May 12, 1781 the garrison was totally
inadequate to make proper repairs. A few days afterward the destruction
of the fort was completed by fire, the work, it was supposed, of an
incendiary. The post was then necessarily abandoned, and the garrison
was marched down to Forts Dayton and Plain.

* The Nose, or Anthony's Nose, as it is sometimes called, is a bluff at
a narrow part of the Mohawk, in the town of Palatine, and derives its
name from the circumstance that its form is something like that of the
human nose. Here a ridge evidently once crossed the valley and kept the
waters in check above, for the effects of the action of running streams
and eddies are very prominent in the rocks. At the upper end of the
plain below are bowlders and large gravel stones, which diminish to sand
at the lower end.

** Campbell's Annals.

Gloomy Prospect in the Mohawk Country.--Patriotism of Colonel Willett.--
His Command of the Tryon County Militia

283At this period every thing combined to cast gloom over the Mohawk
country. Vermont, as we have noticed in a former chapter, had assumed an
equivocal position, amounting almost, in appearance, to a treasonable
rebellion against Congress. General Haldimand, with a large regular
force, was menacing the northern country from his post upon Lake
Champlain; the Johnsons, Butlers, and Brant were laying plans for an
extensive invasion of Tryon county and the settlements near the
Delaware; the forts that served for a defense for the people were weak
from lack of provisions, ammunition, and men; the principal one, the key
to the Mohawk Valley from the west, was destroyed; and, worse than all,
a spirit of discontent and despondency was rife in that quarter, induced
by the inefficiency of Congress in furnishing supplies, and the seeming
hopelessness of the patriot cause. General Schuyler and others expressed
their conviction that, if another invading army should come upon the
settlements during the existing state of things, large numbers of the
people would join the royal standard. The undisciplined militia,
necessarily engaged in farm labor, and often insubordinate, were a weak
reliance, and nothing but an efficient military force, either of paid
levies or soldiers of the regular army, could give confidence and real
protection.

The expectation of such aid was but a feeble ray of hope at the
beginning of the summer, for Washington and the French commander (De
Rochambeau) were concocting plans far more important than the defense of
a single frontier section of the vast extent of the colonies. Governor
Clinton was greatly pained and embarrassed by the gloomy prospect in his
department. In this dilemma, his thoughts turned to Colonel Willett, who
had just been appointed to the command of one of the two regiments
formed by the consolidation of five New York regiments. His name was a
"tower of strength" among the people of the Mohawk Valley, and Clinton
implored him to take command of all the militia levies and state troops
that might be raised for the summer campaigns. He consented, left the
main army, and established his head-quarters at Fort Rensselaer *
(Canajoharie), toward the close of June.

The spirits of the people were revived, although the forces of Willett
consisted of mere fragments of companies hastily collected from the
ruins of the last campaign. "I confess myself," he said, in a letter to
Governor Clinton, "not a little disappointed in having such a trifling
force for such extensive business as I have now on my hands; and, also,
that nothing is done to enable me to avail myself of the militia. The
prospect of a suffering country hurts me. Upon my own account I am not
uneasy. Every thing I can do shall be done; and more can not be looked
for. If it is, the reflection that I have done my duly must fix my
tranquillity." **

While the enemy is threatening invasion and Willett is preparing to
repel him, let us turn from the exciting chronicle, and resume our quiet
journey, in the course of which some of the stirring incidents of the
subsequent strife between the patriots and the enemy, in Tryon county,
will come up in review.

* This was upon the Canajoharie Creek, near the junction of its two
branches, in the town of Root.

** Willett's Narrative.

Changes in the Mohawk Country.--Present Aspect of the Mohawk Valley.--
Fultonville.--Fonda

284

CHAPTER XIII.

The earth all light and loveliness, in summer's golden hours,

Smiles, in her bridal vesture clad, and crown'd with festal flowers;

So radiantly beautiful, so like to heaven above,

We scarce can deem more fair that world of perfect bliss and love.

Anonymous.

Look now abroad--another race has fill'd

These populous borders--wide the wood recedes,

And towns shoot up, and fertile plains are till'd;

The land is full of harvests and green meads;

Streams numberless, that many a fountain feeds,

Shine, disembower'd, and give to sun and breeze

Their virgin waters; the full region leads

New colonies forth, that toward the western seas

Spread, like a rapid flame among the autumnal leaves.

Bryant.

HO that has passed along the Valley of the Mohawk, near the close of a
day in summer, has not been deeply impressed with the singular beauty of
the scene? or who, that has traversed the uplands that skirt this fruit-
ml garden, and stretch away to other valleys, and mingle with the
loftier hills or fertile intervales within the borders of ancient Tryon
county, is not filled with wonder while contemplating the changes that
have been wrought there within a life-span? When the terrible drama
which we have been considering was performed, almost the whole country
was covered with the primeval forest. Clearings were frequent along the
Mohawk River, and cultivation was assiduous in producing the blessings
of abundance and general prosperity; but the southern portions of
Herkimer and Montgomery, and all of Schoharie and Otsego, down to the
remote settlement of Unadilla, were a wilderness, except where a few
thriving settlements were growing upon the water courses. The traveler,
as he views the "field joined to field" in the Mohawk Valley, all
covered with waving grain, green pastures, or bending fruit-trees,
inclosing, in their arms of plenty, elegant mansions; or watches the
vast stream of inland commerce that rolls by upon the Erie Canal; or the
villages of people that almost hourly sweep along its margin after the
vapor steed; or rides over the adjacent hill-country north and south,
enlivened by villages and rich in cultivation, can hardly realize the
fact that here, seventy years ago, the wild Indian was joint possessor
of the soil with the hardy settlers, and that the light of civilization
was as scattered and feeble, and for a while as evanescent and fleeting
in these broad solitudes, as is the sparkle of the fire-fly on a summer
evening. Yet such is the wonderful truth; and as I passed down the canal
at the close of the day, from Fort Plain to Fultonville, surrounded with
the activity, opulence, and beauty of the Mohawk Valley, I could not,
while contrasting this peacefulness and progress with the discord and
social inertia of other lands, repress the feelings of the Pharisee.

Fultonville is sixteen miles below Fort Plain, and it was long after
dark when I arrived August 24, 1848 there. Early on the following
morning I procured a conveyance to visit old Caughnawaga and Johnstown,
north of the Mohawk. A gentleman of leisure and intelligence, residing
at Fultonville, kindly offered to accompany me, and his familiarity with
the history and localities of the neighborhood, and freedom of
communication, made my morning's ride pleasant and profitable.
Fultonville is upon the canal, and may be called the _port_ of the
village of Fonda, whieh lies upon the rail-road, on the northern verge
of the valley.

Caughnawaga.--John Butler's Residence.--Johnstown.--An Octogenarian.--
Biography of Butler

285The Mohawk cleaves the center of the plain between the two villages,
and is spanned by a fine covered bridge. Fonda and Caughnawaga (now
Mohawk) lie in close embrace. The former has all the freshness of
infancy, while the latter, with its gray old church, * has a matronly
gravity in its appearance.

It is only about half a mile eastward from its blooming daughter, at the
foot of the hills over which winds the eastern fork of the road from
Johnstown. On a commanding eminence, about a mile north of Fonda, we
came to the house where Colonel John Butler resided,' which is believed
to be the oldest dwelling in that section, and coeval with Caughnawaga
Church. It overlooks the Mohawk Valley on the south, and commands an
extensive prospect of a fine agricultural country in every direction. It
is now owned by a Mr. Wilson, and is often visited by the curious, who
are as frequently attracted by the eminently infamous as by the
eminently good. It is a fair specimen of the middling class of houses of
that period. The posts stand directly upon the stone foundation, without
sleepers, and there are no plaster walls or ceilings in the house, the
sides of the rooms being lined with pine boards. The bricks of the
chimney are the small, imported kind which distinguished many of the
edifices in the old states, that were constructed about a century ago.

The village of Johnstown, which was included in the town of Caughnawaga,
organized in 1798, lies pleasantly in the bosom and along the slope of
an intervale, about four miles north of Fonda. *** I met there a
venerable citizen, John Yost, eighty years of age, who had been a
resident of the vicinity from his birth. He was often dandled on the
knee of Sir William Johnson, and has a clear recollection of the
appearance of the baronet and the circumstances of his death.

His father was an adherent of the Whig cause, and instructed him early
in the principles of the Revolution. He was several times employed by
Colonel Willett as an express to carry dispatches from Fort Plain to
Tripe's Hill and other points in the valley, his extreme youth guarding
him from suspicion. He was still an active August, 1848 man when I saw
him, and his bodily health promised him the honors of a centenarian.
Johnson Hall, the residence of Sir William and Sir John Johnson, **** is
situated upon a

* See page 263.

** John Butler was one of the leading Tories of Tryon county during the
whole war of the Revolution. Before the war he was in close official
connection with Sir William Johnson, and, after his death, with his son
and nephew, Sir John and Guy Johnson. When he fled with the Johnsons to
Canada, his family were left behind, and were subsequently held as
hostages by the Americans, and finally exchanged for the wife and
children of Colonel Samuel Campbell, of Cherry Valley. He was active in
the predatory warfare that so long distressed Tryon county, and
commanded the eleven hundred men who desolated Wyoming in 1778. He was
among those who opposed the progress of Sullivan in the Indian country
in 1779, and accompanied Sir John Johnson in his destructive mareh
through the Schoharie and Mohawk settlements in 1780. After the war he
went to Canada, where he resided until his death, whieh occurred about
the year 1800. His property upon the Mohawk, by an aet of the
Legislature of New York, was confiscated; but he was amply rewarded by
the British government for his infamous services in its behalf. He
succeeded Guy Johnson as Indian agent, with a salary of $2000 per annum,
and was granted a pension, as a military officer, of $1000 more. Like
his son Walter, he was detested for his cruelties by the more honorable
British officers; and, after the massacre at Wyoming, Sir Frederic
Haldimand, then Governor of Canada, sent word to him that he did not
wish to see him. It is but justice to Colonel Butler to say, that he was
far more humane than his son Walter, and that his personal deeds at
Wyoming were not so heinous as the common accounts have made them. These
will be considered when the attack upon that settlement shall receive a
more particular notice.

*** The old jail in the village was standing when I was there, in
August, 1848. It was built in 1762, and was consumed by fire on the 8th
of September, 1849.

**** John Johnson was the son of Sir William Johnson by his first wife.
He was born in 1742, and succeeded his father in his title and estates
in 1774. He was not as popular as his father, being less social and less
acquainted with human nature. His official relations to the parent
government, and his known opposition to the rebellious movements of the
colonies, caused him to be strictly watched, and, as we have noted in
the text, not without just cause. Expelled from his estate, his property
confiscated, his family in exile, he became an uncompromising enemy of
the republicans, and until the close of the war his influence was
exerted against the patriots. Soon after the close of the war Sir John
went to England, and, on returning in 1785, settled in Canada. He was
appointed superintendent and inspector general of Indian affairs in
North America, and for several years he was a member of the legislative
council of Canada. To compensate him for his losses, the British
government made him several grants of lands. He died at the house of his
daughter, Mrs. Bowes, at Montreal, in 1830, aged 88 years. His son, Sir
Adam Gordon Johnson, succeeded him in his title.

Johnson Hall.--Its Staircase and Brant's Hatchet Marks.--Progress of
Western New York.

286gentle eminence, about three fourths of a mile northward of the
court-house in the village, and near the state road to Black River. This
was probably the finest mansion in the province, out of the city of New
York, at the time of its erection, about the year 1760.

The nail, or main building, is of wood, and double clap-boarded in a
manner to represent blocks of stone. Its exterior dimensions are forty
feet wide, sixty feet long, and two stories high. The detached wings,
built for flanking block-houses, are of stone. The walls of these are
very thick, and near the eaves they are pierced for musketry. The
entrance passage, which extends entirely through the house, is fifteen
feet wide, from which rises a broad stair-case, with heavy mahogany
balustrades, to the second story. The rail of this balustrade is scarred
by hatchet blows at regular intervals of about a foot, from the top to
the bottom, and tradition avers that it was done by the hands of Brant
when he fled from the hall with Sir John Johnson, in 1776, to protect
the house from the torch of marauding savages, for he asserted that such
a token would be understood and respected by them.

The rooms in both stories are large and lofty, and the sides are
handsomely wainscoted with pine panels and carved work, all of which is
carefully preserved in its original form by Mr. Eleazer Wells, the
present proprietor. He has been acquainted with the house for fifty
years, and within that time one of the rooms has been neither painted
nor papered. * The

* In that room Mr. Wells was married in 1807, the house then belonging
to his mother-in-law. Mr. Wells related to me a fact which illustrates
the wonderful progress of Western New York in population and wealth
within half a century. About the time of his marriage he went west, with
the intention of purchasing a farm in the Genesee country, always so
celebrated for its fertility. Among other places, he visited the site of
the present large city of Rochester. Then a solitary cabin was there.
The land was offered to him for two dollars an acre, but it seemed too
wet for his purpose, and he refused to buy. "Had I purchased then," said
Mr. Wells, "it might have made me a millionaire, although such a result
is by no means certain, for the original owner of all the land where
Utica now stands was a tenant, and his descendants still are tenants, of
other proprietors of the soil there." The prize within the reach of the
person to whom he alluded was allowed, through lack of prudence and
forecast, to slip through his fingers, and not a rood of all the acres
of Utica is now his own.

Only Baronial Hall in the United Slates.--Sir William Johnson and his
Wives.--The Dutch Girl.--Molly Brant.

287paper hangings upon it have been there that length of time, and are
doubtless the same that were first put upon the wall by the baronet.
Every thing of the kind is well preserved, and the visitor is gratified
by a view, in its original aspect, of the _only baronial hall in the
United States._

Here Sir William lived in all the elegance and comparative power of an
English baron of the Middle Ages. He had many servants and retainers,
"wives and concubines, sons and daughters of different colors." * His
hall was his castle, and around it, beyond the wings, a heavy stone
breast-work, about twelve feet high, was thrown up. Invested with the
power and influence of an Indian agent of his government in its
transactions with the confederated Six Nations, possessed of a fine
person and dignity of manners, and of a certain style of oratory that
pleased the Indians, he acquired an ascendency over the tribes never
before held by a white man. When, in 1760, General Amherst embarked at
Oswego on his expedition to Canada, Sir William brought to him, at that
place, one thousand Indian warriors of the Six Nations, which was the
largest number that had ever been seen in arms at one time in the cause
of England. He made confidants of many of the chiefs, and to them he

* Sir William is said to have been the father of a hundred children,
chiefly by native mothers, who were young squaws, or the wives of
Indians who thought it an honor to have them intimate with the
distinguished king's agent. He availed himself of a custom which Colden
says was then prevalent among the Six Nations. "They carried their
hospitality so far as to allow distinguished strangers," he says, "the
choice of a young squaw from among the prettiest in the neighborhood,
washed clean and dressed in her best apparel, as a companion during his
sojourn with them." Sir William had two wives, although they were not
made so until they had lived long with the baronet. Simms says, on the
authority of well-authenticated tradition, that his first wife was a
young German girl, who, according to the custom of the times, had been
sold to a man named Phillips, living in the Mohawk Valley, to pay her
passage money to the captain of the emigrant ship in which she came to
this country. She was a handsome girl, and attracted considerable
attention. A neighbor of Sir William, who had heard him express a
determination never to marry, asked him why he did not get the pretty
German girl for a housekeeper. He replied, "I will." Not long afterward
the neighbor called at Phillips's, and inquired where the High Dutch
girl was. Phillips replied, "Johnson, that tamned Irishman, came tother
day and offered me five pounds for her, threatening to horsewhip me and
steal her if I would not sell her. I thought five pounds petter than a
flogging, and took it, and he's got the gal." She was the mother of Sir
John Johnson, and of two daughters, who became the wives respectively of
Guy Johnson and Daniel Claus. * When she was upon her death-bed, Sir
William was married to her in order to legitimate her children. After
her death her place was supplied by Molly Brant, sister of the Mohawk
sachem, by whom he had several children. Toward the close of his life,
Sir William married her in order to legitimate her children also, and
her descendants are now some of the most respectable people in Upper
Canada. Sir William's first interview and acquaintance with her, as
related by Mr. Stone (Note, Life of Brant, i., 387), have considerable
romance. She was a very sprightly and beautiful girl, about sixteen,
when he first saw her at a militia muster. One of the field officers,
riding upon a fine horse, came near her, and, "by way of banter, she
asked permission to mount behind. Not supposing she could perform the
exploit, he said she might. At the word, she leaped upon the crupper
with the agility of a gazelle. The horse sprang off at full speed, and,
clinging to the officer, her blanket flying and her dark hair streaming
in the wind, she flew about the parade-ground as swift as an arrow. The
baronet, who was a witness of the spectacle, admiring the spirit of the
young squaw, and becoming enamored of her person, took her home as his
wife." According to Indian customs, this act made her really his wife,
and in all her relations of wife and mother she was very exemplary.

* These two daughters, who were left by their dying mother to the care
of a friend, were educated almost in solitude. That friend was the widow
of an officer who was killed in battle, and, retiring from the world,
devoted her whole time to the care of these children. They were
carefully instructed in religious duties, and in various kinds of
needle-work, but were themselves kept entirely from society. At the age
of sixteen they had never seen a lady, except their mother and her
friend, or a gentleman, except Sir William, who visited their room
daily. Their dress was not conformed to the fashions, but always
consisted of wrappers of finest chintz over green silk petticoats. Their
hair, which was long and beautiful, was tied behind with a simple band
of ribbon. After their marriage they soon acquired the habits of
society, and made excellent wires.

Sir William Johnson's Diploma.--His Amusements and sudden Death.--Flight
of Sir John.--His Invasion of the Valley in 1780.

288was in the habit of giving a diploma, testifying to their good
conduct. One of these is in the possession of the New York Historical
Society, a copy of which, with the vignette, is given in the note. * His
house was the resort of the sachems of the Six Nations for counsel and
for trade, and there the presents sent out by his government were
annually distributed to the Indians. On these occasions he amused
himself and gratified his guests by fêtes and games, many of which were
highly ludicrous. ** Young Indians and squaws were often seen running
foot-races or wrestling for trinkets, and feats of astonishing agility
were frequently performed by the Indians of both sexes.

Sir William's death was sudden, and was by some ascribed to poison,
voluntarily 1774 taken by him, and by others to apoplexy, induced by
over-excitement. His possessions, which, with his offices and titles,
passed into the hands of his son, did not long remain undisturbed, but
were abandoned, as we have seen, in 1776, and were afterward sold to
strangers under an act of attainder and confiscation passed by the
Legislature of New York.

Sir John, as we have already noted, fled to Canada, where he received a
colonel's commission. The sequestration of his immense landed property
inspired him with feelings of implacable revenge, which were manifested
by his terrible visitations to the settlements in Tryon county. One of
these was chiefly for the purpose of recovering the plate and other
valuables belonging to the baronet, which had been buried near Johnson
Hall. The events of this incursion were as follows:

About midnight on Sunday, the 21st of May, 1780, Sir John, with a force
of five hundred Tories and Indians, who had penetrated the country from
Crown Point to the Sacondaga River, appeared at Johnson Hall without
being seen by any but his friends. His forces were divided into two
detachments, and between midnight and dawn he began to devastate the
settlement by burning every building, except those which belonged to
Tories. One division was sent around in an easterly course, so as to
strike the Mohawk at Tripes Hill, *** below Caughnawaga, whence it was
ordered to proceed up the valley, destroy Caughnawaga, and form a
junction with the other division at the mouth of Cayudutta Creek. This
march was performed; many dwellings were burned and several lives were
sacrificed. Sir John, in the mean while, at the head of one division,
proceeded through the village of Johnstown unobserved by the sentinels
at the small picketed fort there, and before daylight was at the Hall,
once his Own, where he secured two prisoners.

On his way to join the other division upon the Cayudutta, he came to the
residence of Sampson Sammons, who was, with his

* By the Honorable Sir William Johnson, Bart., His Majesty's sole Agent
and Superintendent of Indian Affairs for the Northern Department of
North America, Colonel of the Six United Nations, their Allies and
Dependants, &c., &c.

* "To------------Whereas, I have received repeated proofs of your
attachment to his Britannic Majesty's Interests and Zeal for his
service, upon sundry occasions, more particularly............I do
therefor give you this public Testimonial thereof, as a proof of his
Majesty's Esteem and Approbation, Declaring you, the said......, to be
a.........of your........., and recommending it to all his Majesty's
Subjects and faithful Indian Allies to Treat and Consider you upon all
occasions agreeable to your character, station, and services......Given
under my hand and seal at Arms, at Johnson Hall, the.........day
of........, 17..

* "By command of Sir W. Johnson."

** Among the amusements invented by Sir William were foot-races, in
which the competitors had meal-bags drawn up over their legs and tied
under their arms; a hog, with its tail greased, would be offered as a
prize to the one that should catch it by that extremity; a half pound of
tea was a prize offered to the one who could make the wryest face; a
bladder of Scotch snuff to the greatest scold of two old women; and
children might be seen exploring pools of muddy water, into which the
baronet had cast several pennies.--Simms, 121.

*** At this place lived Garret Putnam, a very active Whig, and his house
was the first one assailed. Unknown to the invaders, Putnam had rented
his house to two Englishmen named Gort and Platto, stanch Tories. The
assailants broke into the house, scalped the two men, who had not time
to reveal their characters, and it was not until daylight that they
discovered their victims to be their own friends instead of Putnam and
his son, as they had supposed.

Capture of the Sammons Family.--Cruelties and Crimes of the Invaders.--
Johnson's Retreat--Recovery of his Negro and Plate

289whole family, among the most active and intrepid patriots in Tryon
county. Sir John had always respected Mr. Sammons, and still held him in
high estimation, but he was determined to carry him and his family away
prisoners, if possible, and thus lessen the number of his more
influential enemies in the Mohawk Valley. It was not yet light when a
Tory, named Sunderland, with a resolute band, surrounded the house of
Sammons, and the first intimation the family had of danger was the
arrest of Thomas, the younger of three sons, as he stepped out of the
door to observe the weather. * The father and three sons were made
prisoners, but the females of the family were left undisturbed, after
the house was plundered of every thing valuable. The marauders then
marched with their prisoners to the mouth of the Cayudutta, and both
divisions went up the valley, burning, plundering, and murdering. A
venerable old man, named David Fonda, was killed and scalped by an
Indian party attached to the expedition, and in its march of a few miles
nine aged men, four of them upward of eighty years old, were murdered.
Returning to Caughnawaga, the torch was applied, and every building,
except the church, was laid in ashes. From Caughnawaga they proceeded to
Johnstown ** by way of the Sammonses, on whose premises every building
was burned, and the females, bereft of their protectors and helpers,
were left houseless and almost naked. Seven horses that were in the
stables were taken away, and that happy family of the morning were
utterly destitute at evening.

Toward sunset Johnson perceived that the militia of the neighborhood
were gathering, under the direction of Colonel John Harper, and resolved
to decamp. Several Loyalists had joined him, and he succeeded in
obtaining possession of twenty negro slaves whom he had left behind at
the time of his flight, in the spring of 1776. Among these was the
faithful negro who buried his chests of plate. With his prisoners,
slaves, and much booty, he directed his course toward the Sacondaga. The
inhabitants seemed so completely May 22, 1780 taken by surprise, and
were so panic-stricken by the suddenness and fierceness of the invasion,
that he was unmolested in his retreating march, and reached St. John's,
on the Sorel, in safety. The captives were sent to Chambly, twelve miles
distant, and confined in the fortress there. ***

* Thomas Sammons, who was then a lad, lived until within a few years,
and furnished much of the interesting matter concerning this irruption
of Sir John, to the author of the Life of Brant, from whose pages I have
gleaned much of the narrative here given. Mr. Sammons was a
representative in Congress from 1803 to 1807, and again from 1809 to
1813.

** I have before mentioned that the silver plate and other valuable
articles belonging to Johnson were buried by a faithful slave. When the
Hall and other property were taken possession of by the Tryon county
Committee, under the aet of sequestration, the elder of Mr. Sammon's
sons became the lessee, and the purchaser of the slave William, who had
buried the plate. This slave Sir John found at the Hall, and while he
tarried there for several hours on the day in question, the negro,
assisted by four soldiers, disinterred the plate, which filled two
barrels. It was then distributed among forty soldiers, who placed it in
their knapsacks, the quarter-master making a memorandum of the name of
each with the article of plate intrusted to him, and in this way it was
carried safely to Montreal. Johnson Hall, with seven hundred acres of
land, had been sold by the commissioners to James Caldwell, of Albany,
for $30,000, the payment to be made in public securities. To show the
real value of such securities--in other words, the state of public
credit of the colonies about 1779, it may be mentioned that Mr. Caldwell
immediately resold the property for $7000, $23,000 less on paper than he
gave for it, and then made money by the operation. He had bought the
securities for a trifle, and received hard cash from the man who
purchased from him.

*** While halting on the day after leaving Johnstown, the elder Mr.
Sammons requested a personal interview with Sir John, which was granted.
He asked to be released, but the baronet hesitated. The old man then
recurred to former times, when he and Sir John were friends and
neighbors. "See what you have done, Sir John," he said. "You have taken
myself and my sons prisoners, burned my dwelling to ashes, and left the
helpless members of my family with no covering but the heavens above,
and no prospect but desolation around them. Did we treat you in this
manner when you were in the power of the Tryon county Committee? Do you
remember when we were consulted by General Schuyler, and you agreed to
surrender your arms? Do you not remember that you then agreed to remain
neutral, and that upon that condition General Schuyler left you at
liberty on your parole? Those conditions you violated. You went off to
Canada; enrolled yourself in the service of the king; raised a regiment
of the disaffected, who abandoned their country with you; and you have
now returned to wage a cruel war against us, by burning our dwellings
and robbing us of our property. I was your friend in the Committee of
Safety, and exerted myself to save your person from injury. And how am I
requited? Your Indians have murdered and scalped old Mr. Fonda, at the
age of eighty years, a man who, I have heard your father say, was like a
father to him when he settled in Johnstown and Kingsborough. You can not
succeed, Sir John, in such a warfare, and you will never enjoy your
property more!" The appeal had its effect. The baronet made no reply,
but the old gentleman was set at liberty, and a span of his horses was
restored to him. A Tory, named Doxstader (whom we shall soon meet again
at Currytown), was seen upon one of the old man's horses, and refused to
give him up. After the war he returned to the neighborhood, when Mr.
Sammons had him arrested, and he was obliged to pay the full value of
the animal. The two elder sons of Mr. Sammons, Frederic and Jacob, were
taken to Canada. At Chambly they concerted a plan for escape by the
prisoners rising upon the garrison, but the majority of them were too
weak-hearted to attempt it. The brothers, however, succeeded in making
their escape a few days afterward, and the narrative of their separate
adventures, before they reached their homes, forms a wonderful page in
the volume of romance. It may be found in detail in the second volume of
Stone's Life of Brant. Jacob, after a toilsome journey from St. John's
to Pittstown, in Vermont, through the trackless wilderness, reached
Schenectady in safety, a few weeks after his capture, where he found his
wife and children. But Frederic was recaptured, and it was nearly two
years before he returned. His adventures in making his escape from an
island among the St. Lawrence rapids, above Montreal, and his subsequent
travel through the wilderness from the St. Lawrence to the Mohawk, with
a fellow-prisoner, partake of all the stirring character of the most
exciting legendary fiction. Almost naked, and with matted hair, they
entered the streets of Schenectady, a wonder and a terror to the
inhabitants at first, but, when known, they were the objects of profound
regard. A strange but well-attested fact is related in connection with
the return of Frederic. After the destruction of his property upon the
Mohawk, the elder Sammons and his family returned to Marbletown, in
Ulster county, whence they had emigrated. On the morning after his
arrival at Schenectady, Frederic dispatched a letter to his father, by
the hand of an officer on his way to Philadelphia. He left it at the
house of Mr. Levi De Witt, five miles distant from Mr. Sammons's. On the
night when the letter was left there, Jacob dreamed that his brother
Frederic was living, and that a letter, announcing the fact, was at Mr.
De Witt's. The dream was twice repeated, and the next morning he related
it to the family. They had long given Frederic up as lost, and laughed
at Jacob for his belief in the teachings of dreams. Jacob firmly
believed that such a letter was at De Witt's, and thither he repaired
and inquired for it. He was told that no such letter was there, but
urged a more thorough search, when it was found behind a barrel, where
it had accidentally fallen. Jacob requested Mr. De Witt to open the
letter and examine it, while he should recite its contents. It was done,
and the dreamer repeated it word for word! Frederic lived to a good old
age, enjoying the esteem and confidence of his fellow-citizens. He was
chosen an elector of President and Vice-president in 1837.

Pursuit of Johnson.--Incursion of Ross and Butler.--Action of Willett.--
Battle at Johnstown.--Adventures of the Sammonses.

290Governor Clinton was at Kingston, Ulster county, when intelligence of
this invasion reached him. He repaired immediately to Albany, and sent
such forces, composed of militia and volunteers, as he could raise, to
overtake and intercept the invaders. One division, commanded by the
governor in person, pushed forward to Lakes George and Champlain, and at
Ticonderoga was joined by a body of militia from the New Hampshire
Grants. At the same time Colonel Van Schaick, with eight hundred
militia, pursued the enemy by way of Johnstown. But Sir John was far
beyond the reach of pursuers, and too cautious to take a route so well
known as that of the lakes. He kept upon the Indian paths through the
wilderness west of the Adirondack Mountains, and escaped. This was the
last visit made by Johnson to the Mohawk Valley during the war, but his
friends invaded the settlement the following year, and near Johnson Hall
a pretty severe battle took place.

On the 24th of October, 1781, Major Ross and Walter Butler, at the head
of about one thousand troops, consisting of regulars, Indians, and
Tories, approached the settlement so stealthily that they reached Warren
Bush (not far from the place where Sir Peter Warren made his first
settlement, and the place of residence of Sir William Johnson on his
arrival in America) without their approach being suspected. The
settlement was broken into so suddenly that the people had no chance for
escape. Many were killed, and their houses plundered and destroyed. As
soon as Colonel Willett, then stationed at Fort Rensselaer, was informed
of this incursion, he marched with about four hundred men for Fort
Hunter, on the Mohawk. Colonel Rowley, of Massachusetts, with a part of
his force, consisting of Tryon county militia, was sent round to fall
upon the enemy in the rear, while Willett should attack them in front.
The belligerents met a short distance above Johnson Hall, and a battle
immediately ensued. The militia under Willett soon gave way, and fled in
great confusion to the stone church in the village; and the enemy would
have had an easy victory,

Retreat of Rosa and Butler.--Fight on West Canada Creek.--Death of
Walter Butler.--Last Battle near the Mohawk.

291had not Howley emerged from the woods at that moment, and fallen upon
their rear. It was then nearly four o'clock in the afternoon, and the
fight was kept up with bravery on both sides until dark, when the enemy
retreated, or rather fled, in great disorder, to the woods. During the
engagement, and while Rowley was keeping the enemy at bay, Willett
succeeded in rallying the militia, who returned to the fight. The
Americans lost about forty killed and wounded. The enemy had about the
same number killed, and fifty made prisoners.

The enemy continued their retreat westward nearly all the night after
the battle, and early in the morning Willett started in pursuit. He
halted at Stone Arabia, and sent forward a detachment of troops to make
forced marches to Oneida Lake, where, he was informed, the enemy had
left their boats, for the purpose of destroying them. In the mean while
he pressed onward with the main force to the German Flats, where he
learned that the advanced party had returned without accomplishing their
errand. From a scouting party he also learned that the enemy had taken a
northerly course, along the West Canada Creek. With about four hundred
of his choicest men, he started in pursuit, in the face of a driving
snow-storm. He encamped that night in a thick wood upon the Royal Grant,
* and sent out a scouting party, under Jacob Sammons, to search for the
enemy. Sammons discovered their forces a few miles in advance of the
Americans, and, after reconnoitering their camp, communicated the fact
to Willett that they were well armed with bayonets. That officer
deferred his meditated night attack upon them, and continued his pursuit
early in the morning, but the enemy were as quick on foot as he. In the
afternoon he came up with a lagging party of Indians, and a brisk but
short skirmish ensued. Some of the Indians were killed, some taken
prisoners, and others escaped. Willett kept upon the enemy's trail along
the creek, and toward evening came up with the main body at a place
called Jerseyfield, on the northeastern side of Canada Creek. A running
fight ensued; the Indians became terrified, and retreated across the
stream at a ford, where Walter Butler, who was their leader, attempted
to rally them. A brisk fire was kept up across the creek by both parties
for some time, and Butler, who was watching the fight from behind a
tree, was shot in the head by an Oneida, who knew him and took
deliberate aim. His troops thereupon fled in confusion. The Oneida
bounded across the creek, and found his victim not dead, but writhing in
great agony. The Tory cried out, "_Save me! Save me! Give me quarters!"_
while the tomahawk of the warrior glittered over his head. "_Me give you
Sherry Falley quarters!_" shouted the Indian, and buried his hatchet in
the head of his enemy. He took his scalp, and, with the rest of the
Oneidas, continued the pursuit of the flying host. The body of Butler
was left to the beasts and birds, without burial, for charity toward one
so blood-stained had no dwelling-place in the bosoms of his foes. The
place where he fell is still called _Butler's Ford._ The pursuit was
kept up until evening, when Willett, completely successful by entirely
routing and dispersing the enemy, wheeled his victorious little army,
and returned to Fort Dayton in triumph. ** This was the closing scene of
the bloody drama performed in the Valley of the Mohawk during the
Revolution, a tragedy terrible in every aspect; and we, who are dwelling
in the midst of peace and abundance, and so far removed, in point of
time, from the events, that hardly an actor is living to tell us of
scenes that seem almost fabulous, can not properly estimate the degree
of moral and physical courage, long suffering, patient endurance, and
hopeful vigilance which the people of that day exhibited. It was a
terrible ordeal for the patriots. Like the three holy men of Babylon,
they passed through a "fiery furnace heated one seven times more than it
was wont to

* The Royal Grant, it will be remembered, was the tract of land which
Sir William Johnson shrewdly procured from Hendrick, the Mohawk sachem,
by outwitting him in a game of dreaming.--See page 106.

** The sufferings of the retreating army must have been many and acute.
The weather was cold, and in their hasty flight many of them had cast
away their blankets, to make their progress more speedy. The loss of the
Americans in this pursuit was only one man; that of the enemy is not
known. It must have been very great. Colonel Willett, in his dispatch to
Governor Clinton, observed, "The fields of Johnstown the brooks and
rivers, the hills and mountains, the deep and gloomy marshes through
which they had to pass they only could tell; and perhaps the officers
who detached them on the expedition."

Return to Fultonville.--The Sammons House.--Local Historians.--The
departed Heroes.--The Kane House.

292be," yet they came out unscathed--"neither were their coats changed
nor the smell of fire had passed on them." We are yet to visit
Currytown, Sharon Springs, and Cherry Valley, and note some incidents of
the civil war, reserved for record here, and then we shall leave old
Tryon county, with the pleasant anticipations of the "homeward-hound."

We returned to Fultonville, from our excursion to Johnstown, by the
western road, and passed the premises formerly owned by Sampson Sammons,
near the winding Cayadutta. The house, which was built upon the
foundation of the one destroyed by the miscreants under Johnson, has a
venerable appearance; but the trailing vines that cover its porch, and
the air of comfort that surrounds it, hide all indications of the
desolation of former times. We arrived at Fultonville in time to dine,
and there I spent an hour pleasantly and profitably with Jeptha R.
Simms, Esq., the author of a "History of Schoharie County and the Border
Wars of New York," a work of much local and general interest, and a
valuable companion to Campbell's "Annals of Tryon County." It is greatly
to be lamented that men like Campbell and Simms, and Miner, of Wyoming,
who gathered a large proportion of the facts concerning the Revolution
from the lips of those who participated in its trials, have not been
found in every section of our old thirteen states equally industrious
and patriotic. It is now too late, for the men of the Revolution are
mostly in the grave. I have found but few, very few, still alive and
sufficiently vigorous to tell the tales of their experience with
perspicuity; and a hundred times, in the course of my pilgrimage to the
grounds where

Discord raised its trumpet notes

And carnage beat its horrid drum,

have my inquiries for living patriots of that war been answered with
"Five years ago Captain A. was living," or "three years ago Major B.
died;" or "last autumn Mother C. was buried;" all of whom were full of
the unwritten history of the Revolution. But they are gone, and much of
the story of our struggle for independence is buried with them. They are
gone, but not forgotten:

"They need

No statue or inscription to reveal

Their greatness. It is round them; and the joy

With which their children tread the hallow'd ground

That holds their venerated bones, the peace

That smiles on all they fought for, and the wealth

That clothes the land they rescued--these, though mute,

As feeling ever is when deepest--these

Are monuments more lasting than the fanes

Rear'd to the kings and demi-gods of old."

Percival.

I returned to Fort Plain, by rail-road, toward evening, and the next
morning, accompanied by the friend with whom we were sojourning, I
started for Currytown. * We went by the way of Canajoharie, a pleasant
little village on the canal, opposite Palatine, and thence over the
rugged hills southward. A little below Canajoharie we sketched an old
stone house which was erected before the Revolution, and was used soon
afterward by the brothers Kane, then the most extensive traders west of
Albany. An anecdote is related in connection with the Kanes, which
illustrates the proverbial shrewdness of Yankees, and the confiding
nature of the old stock of Mohawk Valley Dutchmen. A peddler (who was,
of course, a Yankee) was arrested for the offense of traveling on the
Sabbath, contrary to law, and taken before a Dutch justice near
Caughnawaga. The peddler pleaded the urgency of his business. At first
the Dutchman was inexorable, but at length, on the payment to him of a
small sum, agreed to furnish the Yankee with a written permit to travel
on. The justice, not being expert with the pen, requested the peddler to
write the "pass." He wrote a draft upon the Kanes for fifty dollars,
which the unsus-

* The name is derived from William Curry, the patentee of the lands in
that settlement.

Dutch Magistrate and Yankee Peddler.--Currytown.--Jacob Dievendorff.--
Indian Method of Scalping.

293pecting Dutchman signed. The draft was presented and duly honored,
and the Yankee went on his way rejoicing. A few days afterward the
justice was called upon to pay the amount of the draft. The thing was a
mystery, and it was a long time before he could comprehend it. All at
once light broke in upon the matter, and the victim exclaimed,
vehemently, in broken English, "Eh, yah! I understands it now. Tish mine
writin', and dat ish de tam Yankee pass!" He paid the money and resigned
his office, feeling that it was safer to deal in corn and butter with
honest neighbors, than in law with Yankee interlopers.

We reached Currytown, a small village nearly four miles south of
Canajoharie, at about noon. The principal object of my visit there was
to see the venerable Jacob Dievendorff, who, with his family, was among
the sufferers when that settle ment was destroyed by Indians and Tories
in July, 1781. Accompanied by his son-in-law (Dr. Snow, of Currytown),
we found the old patriot busily engaged in his barn, threshing grain;
and, al though nearly eighty years of age, he seemed almost as vigorous
and active as most men are at sixty. His sight and hearing are somewhat
defective, but his intellect, as exhibited by his clear remembrance of
the circumstances of his early life, had lost but little of its
strength. He is one of the largest land-holders in Montgomery county,
owning one thousand fertile acres, lying in a single tract where the
scenes of his sufferings in early life occurred. In an orchard, 'a short
distance from his dwelling August, 1848 was still standing, which was
stockaded and used as a fort. It is fast decaying, but the venerable
owner allows time alone to work its destruction, and will not suffer a
board to be taken from it. The occurrences here have already been
recorded, by Campbell and Simms, as related to them long ago by Mr.
Dievendorff and others, and from these details I gather the following
facts, adding such matters of interest as were communicated me by Mr.
Dievendorff himself and his near neighbor, the venerable John Keller.

On the 9th of July, 1781, nearly five hundred Indians, and a few
Loyalists, commanded by a Tory named Doxstader, attacked and destroyed
the settlement of Currytown, murdered several of the inhabitants, and
carried others away prisoners.

The house of Henry Lewis (represented in the engraving) was picketed and
used for a fort. ** The

* I here present a portrait of Mr. Dievendorff which he kindly allowed
me to make while he sat upon a half bushel in his barn. Also, a sketch
of the back of his head, showing its appearance where the scalp was
taken off. The building is a view of the one referred to in the text as
the Currytown fort, now standing in Mr. Dievendorff's orchard. The
method used by the Indians in scalping is probably not generally known.
I was told by Mr. Dievendorff and others familiar with the horrid
practice that the scalping-knife was a weapon not unlike, in appearance,
the bowie-knife of the present day. The victim was usually stunned or
killed by a blow from the tomahawk. Sometimes only a portion of the
scalp (as was the case with Mr. Dievendorff) was taken from the crown
and back part of the head, but more frequently the whole scalp was
removed. With the dexterity of a surgeon, the Indian placed the point of
his knife at the roots of the hair on the forehead, and made a circular
incision around the head. If the hair was short, he would raise a lappet
of the skin, take hold with his teeth, and tear it instantly from the
skull. If long, such as the hair of females, he would twist it around
his hand, and, by a sudden jerk, bare the skull. The scalps were then
tanned with the hair on, and often marked in such a manner that the
owners could tell when and where they were severally obtained, and
whether they belonged to men or women. When Major Rogers, in 1759,
destroyed the chief village of the St. Francis Indians, he found there a
vast quantity of scalps, many of them comically painted in
hieroglyphics. They were all stretched on small hoops.

** Mr. Dievendorff told me that on one occasion the fort was attacked by
a party of Indians. There were several women, but only one man, in the
fort. The savages approached stealthily along a ravine, a little north
of the fort, and were about to make an assault upon the frail
fortification, when they were saluted with a warm fire from it. There
were several muskets in it, which the women loaded as fast as the man
could fire; and so rapid were the discharges, that the Indians,
supposing quite a large garrison to be present, fled to the woods. The
remains of the building are still scarred by many bullet marks.

Attack on Currytown.--The Captives.--Expedition under Captain Gross.--
Battle at New Dorlach, now Sharon Springs.

294settlers, unsuspicious of danger, were generally at work in their
fields when the enemy fell upon them. It was toward noon when they
emerged stealthily from the forest, and with torch and tomahawk
commenced the work of destruction. Among the sufferers were the
Dievendorffs, Kellers, Myerses, Bellingers, Tanners, and Lewises. On the
first alarm, those nearest the fort fled thitherward, and those more
remote sought shelter in the woods. Jacob Dievendorff, the father of the
subject of our sketch, escaped. His son Frederic was overtaken,
tomahawked, and scalped, on his way to the fort, * and Frederic's
brother Jacob, then a lad eleven years old, was made prisoner. A negro
named Jacob, two lads named Bellinger, Mary Miller, a little girl ten or
twelve years old, Jacob Myers and his son, and two others, were
captured. The Indians then plundered and burned all the dwellings but
the fort and one belonging to a Tory, in all about twelve, and either
killed or drove away most of the cattle and horses in the neighborhood.
When the work of destruction was finished, the enemy started off in the
direction of New Dorlach, or Turlock (now Sharon) with their prisoners
and booty.

Colonel Willett was at Fort Plain when Currytown was attacked. On the
previous day he had sent out a scout of thirty or forty men, under
Captain Gross, to patrol the country for the two-fold purpose of
procuring forage and watching the movements of the enemy. They went in
the direction of New Dorlach, and, when near the present Sharon Springs,
discovered a portion of the camp of the enemy in a cedar swamp. **
Intelligence of this fact reached Willett at the moment when a dense
smoke, indicating the firing of a village, was seen from Fort Plain, in
the direction of Currytown. Captain Robert M'Kean, with sixteen levies,
was ordered to that place, with instructions to assemble as many of the
militia on the way as possible. With his usual celerity, that officer
arrived at the settlement in time to assist in extinguishing the flames
of some of the buildings yet unconsumed. Colonel Willett, in the mean
time, was active in collecting the militia. Presuming that the enemy
would occupy the same encampment that night, and being joined during the
day by the forces under M'Kean and Gross, he determined to make an
attack upon them at midnight, while they were asleep. His whole strength
did not exceed one hundred and fifty effective men, while the enemy's
force, as he afterward learned, consisted of more than double that
number. The night was dark and lowering, and the dense forest that
surrounded the swamp encampment of the enemy was penetrated only by a
bridle path. His guide became bewildered, and it was six o'clock in the
morning before he came in sight of the enemy, who, warned of his
approach, had taken a more advantageous position. From this position it
was desirable to draw them, and for that purpose Willett sent forward a
detachment from the main body, which he had stationed in crescent form
on a ridge now seen on the south side of the turnpike, opposite the
swamp, who fired upon the Indians and then retreated. The stratagem
succeeded, for the Indians pursued them, and were met by Willett,
advancing with one hundred men. M'Kean was left with a reserve in the
rear, and fell furiously upon the flank of the enemy. A desperate fight
for a short time ensued, when the Indians broke and fled, but kept up a
fire from behind trees and rocks. Willett and his men, understanding
their desultory warfare, pursued them with bullet and bayonet, until
they relinquished the fight, and fled precipitately down their war-path
toward the Susquehanna, leaving their camp and all their plunder behind.
They left forty dead upon the field. The American loss was five killed,
and nine wounded and missing. The brave M'Kean was

* He was not killed, but lay several hours insensible, when he was
picked up by his uncle, Mr. Keller, who carried him into the fort. He
recovered, and lived several years, when he was killed by the falling of
a tree.

** A part of this swamp may still be seen on the north side of the
western turnpike, about two miles east of the springs.

Death of Captain M'Kean.--The Currytown Prisoners.--Dievendorff.--Sharon
Springs.--Analysis of the Waters

295mortally wounded, and died at Fort Plain a few days after the return
of the expedition to that post. I was informed by Mr. Lipe, at Fort
Plain, that the body of the captain was buried near the block-house, and
that the fort was afterward called Fort M'Kean, in honor of the deceased
soldier.

At the time of the attack, the Indians had placed most of their
prisoners on the horses which they had stolen from Currytown, and each
was well guarded. When they were, about to retreat before Willett,
fearing the recapture of the prisoners, and the consequent loss of
scalps, the savages began to murder and scalp them. Young Dievendorff
(my informant) leaped from his horse, and, running toward the swamp, was
pursued, knocked down by a blow of a tomahawk upon his shoulder,
scalped, and left for dead. Willett did not bury his slain, but a
detachment of militia, under Colonel Veeder, who repaired to the field
after the battle, entombed them, and fortunately discovered and
proceeded to bury the bodies of the prisoners who were murdered and
scalped near the camp. Young Dievendorff, who was stunned and
insensible, was seen struggling among the leaves; and his bloody face
being mistaken for that of an Indian, one of the soldiers leveled his
musket to shoot him. A fellow-soldier, perceiving his mistake, knocked
up his piece and saved the lad's life. He was taken to Fort Plain, and,
being placed under the care of Dr. Faught, a German physician, of Stone
Arabia, was restored to health. It was five years, however, before his
head was perfectly healed; and when I saw him (August, 1848), it had the
tender appearance and feeling of a wound recently healed. He is still
living (1849), in the midst of the settlement of Currytown, which soon
arose from its ashes, and is a living monument of savage cruelty and the
sufferings of the martyrs for American liberty. *

Toward evening we left Currytown for Cherry Valley, by the way of Sharon
Springs. The road lay through a beautiful, though very hilly, country.
From the summits of some of the eminences over which we passed the views
were truly magnificent. Looking down into the Canajoharie Valley from
the top of its eastern slope, it appeared like a vast enameled basin,
having its concavity garnished with pictures of rolling intervales,
broad cultivated fields, green groves, bright streams, villages, and
neat farm-houses in abundance; and its distant rim on its northern verge
seemed beautifully embossed with wooded hills, rising one above another
in profuse outlines far away beyond the Mohawk. We reached the Springs
toward sunset, passing the Pavilion on the way. ** They are in a broad
ravine, and along the margin of a hill; and near them the little village
of Sharon has grown up. ** Our stay was brief---just long enough to have
a lost shoe replaced by another upon our horse, and to visit the famous
fountains--for, having none of the "ills which flesh is heir to" of
sufficient malignity to require the infliction of sulphureted or
chalybeate draughts, we were glad to escape to the hills and vales less
suggestive of Tophet and the Valley of Hinnom. How any _but invalids_,
who find the waters less nauseous than the allopathic doses of the
shops,

* The little girl (Mary Miller) was found scalped, but alive, and was
taken, with the lad Dievendorff, toward Fort Plain. She was very weak
when found, and on taking a draught of cold water, just before reaching
the fort, instantly expired.

** The Pavilion is a very large hotel, situated upon one of the loftiest
summits in the neighborhood, and commanding a magnificent view of the
country. It was erected in 1836 by a New York company, and is filled
with invalids and other visitors during the summer.

*** The Sharon Sulphur Springs have been celebrated for their medical
properties many years, and are said to be equal in efficacy to those in
Virginia. There is a chalybeate spring in the neighborhood. The whole
region abounds in fossils, and is an interesting place for the
geologist.

Arrival at Cherry Valley.--Judge Campbell and his Residence.--His
Captivity.--Movements of Brant

296and, consequently, are happier than at home, can spend a "season"
there, within smelling distance of the gaseous fountains, and call the
sojourn _pleasure_, is a question that can only be solved by Fashion,
the shrewd alchemist in whose alembic common miseries are transmuted
into conventional happiness. The sulphureted hydrogen does not infect
the Pavilion, I believe, and a summer residence there secures the
enjoyment of pure air and delightful drives and walks in the midst of a
lovely hill country.

It was quite dark when we reached Cherry Valley, eight miles west of
Sharon Springs. * This village lies imbosomed within lofty hills, open
only on the southwest, in the direction of the Susquehanna, and as we
approached it along the margin of the mountain on its eastern border,
the lights sparkling below us, like stars reflected from a lake, gave us
the first indication of its presence.

In the course of the evening we called upon the Honorable James S.
Campbell, who, at the time of the destruction of the settlement in 1778,
was a child six years of age. He is the son of Colonel Samuel Campbell,
already mentioned, and father of the Honorable William W. Campbell, of
New York city, the author of the _Annals of Tryon County_, so frequently
cited. With his mother and family, he was carried into captivity. He has
a clear recollection of events in the Indian country while he was a
captive, his arrival and stay at Niagara, his subsequent sojourn in
Canada, and the final reunion of the family after an absence and
separation of two years. ** His residence, a handsome modern structure,
is upon the site of the old family mansion, which was stockaded and used
as a fort at the time of the invasion. The doors and window-shutters
were made bullet-proof, and the two barns that were included within the
ramparts were strengthened.

In a former chapter we have noticed that Brant's first hostile movement,
after his return from Canada and establishment of his head-quarters at
Oghkwaga, was an attempt to cut off the settlement of Cherry Valley, or,
at least, to make captive the members of the active Committee of
Correspondence. It was a sunny morning, toward the close of May, when
Brant and his warriors cautiously moved up to the brow of the lofty hill
on the east side of the town, to reconnoiter the settlement at their
feet. He was astonished and chagrined on seeing a fortification where he
supposed all was weak and defenseless, and greater was his
disappointment when quite a large and well-armed garrison appeared upon
the esplanade in front of Colonel Campbell's house. These soldiers were
not as formidable as the sachem supposed, for they were only half-grown
boys, who, full of the martial spirit of the times, had formed
themselves into companies, and, armed with wooden guns and swords, had
regular drills each day. It was such a display, on the morning in
question, that attracted Brant's attention. His vision being somewhat
obstructed by the trees and

* Cherry Valley derived its name, according to Campbell, from the
following circumstance: "Mr. Dunlop [the venerable pastor whose family
suffered at the time of the massacre in 1778], engaged in writing some
letters, inquired of Mr. Lindesay [the original proprietor of the soil]
where he should date them, who proposed the name of a town in Scotland.
Mr. Dunlop, pointing to the fine wild cherry-trees and to the valley,
replied, 'Let us give our place an appropriate name, and call it Cherry
Valley,' which was readily agreed to."--Annals of Tryon County.

** The children of Mrs. Campbell were all restored to her at Niagara,
except this one. In June, 1780, she was sent to Montreal, and there she
was joined by her missing boy. He had been with a tribe of the Mohawks,
and had forgotten his own language; but he remembered his mother, and
expressed his joy at seeing her, in the Indian language. Honorable
William Campbell, late surveyor general of New York, was her son. She
lived until 1836, being then 93 years of age. She was the last survivor
of the Revolutionary women in the region of the head waters of the
Susquehanna.

*** This pleasant dwelling is upon the northern verge of the town, on
the road leading from Cherry Valley to the Mohawk. The sketch was taken
from the road.

Brant deceived by Boys.--Death of Lieutenant Wormwood.--Shrewdness of
Sitz.--"Brant's Rock."

297shrubs in which he was concealed, he mistook the boys for full-grown
soldiers, and, considering an attack dangerous, moved his party to a
hiding-place at the foot of the Tekaharawa Falls, in a deep ravine north
of the village, near the road leading to the Mohawk. * In that deep,
rocky glen, "where the whole scene was shadowy and almost dark even at
mid-day," his warriors were concealed, while Brant and two or three
followers hid themselves in ambush behind a large rock by the road
side', for the purpose of obtaining such information as might fall in
his way.

On the morning of that day, Lieutenant Wormwood, a promising young
officer of Palatine, had been sent from Fort Plain to Cherry Valley with
the information, for the committee at the latter place, that a military
force might be expected there the next day. His noble bearing and rich
velvet dress attracted a good deal of attention at the village; and
when, toward evening, he started to return, accompanied by Peter Sitz,
the bearer of some dispatches, the people, in admiration, looked after
him until he disappeared beyond the hill. On leaving, he had cast down
his portmanteau, saying, "I shall be back for it in the morning." But he
never returned.

As the two patriots galloped along the margin of the Tekaharawa Glen,
they were hailed, but, instead of answering, they put spurs to their
horses. The warriors in ambush arose and fired a volley upon them. The
lieutenant fell, and Brant, rushing out from his concealment, scalped
him with his own hands. Sitz was captured, and his dispatches fell into
the hands of Brant. Fortunately they were double, and Sitz had the
presence of mind to destroy the genuine and deliver the fictitious to
the sachem. Deceived by these dispatches concerning the strength of
Cherry Valley, Brant withdrew to Cobelskill, and thence to Oghkawaga,
and the settlement 'was saved from destruction at that time.' Its
subsequent fate is recorded in a previous chapter.

Judge Campbell kindly offered to accompany us in the morning to "Brant's
Rock." *** Having engaged to be back at Fort Plain in time the next day
to take the cars for Albany at two o'clock, and the distance from the
"rock" being twelve miles, over a rough and hilly road, an early start
was necessary, for I wished to make a sketch of the village and valley,
as also

* The Tekaharawa is the western branch of the Canajoharie or Bowman's
Creek, which falls into the Mohawk at Canajoharie, opposite Palatine.

** Campbell's Annals.

*** This rock, which is about four feet high, lies in a field on the
left of the road leading from Cherry Valley to the Mohawk, about a mile
and a half north of the residence of Judge Campbell. It is a
fossiliferous mass, composed chiefly of shells. Behind this rock the
body of Lieutenant Wormwood, lifeless and the head scalped, was found by
the villagers, who had heard the firing on the previous evening. Judge
Campbell, who accompanied us to the spot, pointed out the stump of a
large tree by the road side, as the place where Lieutenant Wormwood
fell. The tree was pierced by many bullets, and Judge Campbell had
extracted several of them when a boy.

Morning Scene near Cherry Valley.--Light--Departure for Albany.--
Woodworth's Battle

298of the rock. At early dawn, the light not being sufficient to
perceive the outline of distant objects, I stood upon the high ridge
north of the village which divides the head waters of the eastern branch
of the Susquehanna from the tributaries of the Mohawk. As the pale light
in the east grew ruddy, a magnificent panorama was revealed on every
side; and as the stars faded away, and trees, and fields, and hills, and
the quiet village arose from the gloom, and the sun's first rays burst
over the eastern hills into the valley, lighting it up with sudden
splendor, while the swelling chorus of birds and the hum of insects
broke the stillness; and the perfumes of flowers arose from the dewy
grass like sweet incense, the delighted spirit seemed to hear a voice in
the quivering light, saying,

"From the quicken'd womb of the primal gloom

The sun roll'd black and bare,

Till I wove him a vest, for his Ethiop breast,

Of the threads of my golden hair;

And when the broad tent of the firmament

Arose on its airy spars,

I pencil'd the hue of its matchless blue,

And spangled it round with the stars.

I waken the flowers in their dew-spangled bowers,

The birds in their chambers of green,

And mountains and plain glow with beauty again

As they bask in my matinal sheen.

Oh, if such the glad worth of my presence to earth,

. Though fitful and fleeting the while,

What glories must rest on the home of the blest,

Ever bright with the Deity's smile."

William Pitt Palmer.

On the north the Valley of the Canajoharie stretches away to the Mohawk,
twelve miles distant, whose course was marked by a white line of mist
that skirted the more remote hills; and on the south Cherry Valley
extends down among the mountains toward the Susquehanna proper, and
formed the easy war-path to the settlement at its head, from Oghkwaga
and Unadilla. From the bosom of the ridge whereon I stood spring the
head waters of the eastern branch of the Susquehanna and those of
Canajoharie. I had finished the sketch here given before the sun was
fairly above the tree-tops, and, while the mist yet hovered over the
Tehakawara, we were at Brant's Rock, within the sound of the tiny
cascades. There we parted from Judge Campbell, and hastened on toward
Fort Plain, where we arrived in time to breakfast, and to take the
morning train for Albany. Before leaving, let us take a parting glance
at the Revolutionary history of the Mohawk Valley, for we may not have
another opportunity.

Soon after the irruption of Dockstader, or Doxstader, into the Currytown
and New Dor-lach settlements, a party of Tories and Indians made a
descent upon Palatine, under the conduct of a son of Colonel Jacob
Klock. They were betrayed by one of their number, and fled to the woods
for safety, without accomplishing any mischief. At the German Flats and
in that vicinity several spirited rencounters took place between the
enemy and the patriot militia. One of them was marked by great bravery
on the part of Captain Solomon Woodworth, and a small company of rangers
which he had organized. He marched from Fort Dayton to the Royal Grant
for the purpose of observation. On the way he fell in with an Indian
ambush. Without warning, his little band was surrounded by savages, who
made the forest ring with the war-whoop. One of the most desperate and
bloody engagements of the war ensued. Woodworth and a large number of
his rangers were slain, and the victorious Indians took several of them
prisoners. Only fifteen escaped.

Another affair occurred at a settlement called Shell's Bush, about five
miles north of Herkimer village, which deserves a passing notice. A
wealthy German named John Christian Shell, or Schell, had built a block-
house of his own, two stories high, the upper one projecting so as to
allow the inmates to fire perpendicularly upon the assailants. * One
sultry

* At that time there were no less than twenty forts, so called, between
Schenectady and Fort Schuyler. They were generally strong dwellings
stockaded, and so arranged that fifteen or twenty families might find
protection in each.

Descent of Tories upon "Shell's Bush."--Shell's Block-house.--Furious
Battle.--Capture of M'Donald.--Luther's Hymn.

299afternoon in August, while the people were generally in their fields,
Donald M'Donald, one of the Scotch refugees from Johnstown, with a party
of sixty Indians and Tories, made a descent upon Shell's Bush. The
inhabitants mostly fled to Fort Dayton, but Shell and his family took
refuge in his block-house. He and two of his sons (he had eight in all)
were at work in the field. The two sons were captured, but the father
and his other boys, who were near, reached the block-house in safety. It
was finally besieged, but the assailants were kept at a respectful
distance by the _garrison_. Shell's wife loaded the muskets, while her
husband and sons discharged them with sure aim. M'Donald tried to burn
the blockhouse, but was unsuccessful. He at length procured a crow-bar,
ran up to the door, and attempted to force it. Shell fired upon him, and
so wounded him in the leg that he fell. Instantly the beleaguered
patriot opened the door and pulled the Scotchman within, a prisoner. He
was well supplied with cartridges, and these he was obliged to surrender
to his captors. The battle ceased for a time. Shell knew the enemy would
not attempt to burn his castle while their leader was a prisoner within
it, and, taking advantage of the lull in the battle, he went into the
second story, and composedly sang the favorite hymn of Luther amid the
perils that surrounded him in his controversies with the pope. * But the
respite was short. The enemy, maddened at the loss of several of their
number killed, and their commander a prisoner, rushed up to the block-
house, and five of them thrust the muzzles of their pieces through the
loop-holes. Mrs. Shell seized an ax, and, with well-directed blows,
ruined every musket by bending the barrels. At the same time Shell and
his sons kept up a brisk fire, which drove the enemy off. At twilight he
went to the upper story and called out to his wife, in a loud voice,
informing her that Captain Small was approaching from Fort Dayton with
succor. In a few minutes, with louder voice, he exclaimed, "Captain
Small, march your company round upon this side of the house. Captain
Getman, you had better wheel your men off to the left, and come upon
that side." This was a successful stratagem. There were no troops
approaching, but the enemy, deceived by the trick, fled to the woods.
M'Donald was taken to Fort Dayton the next day, where his leg was
amputated, but the blood flowed so freely that he died in a few hours.
** The two sons of Shell

* The following is a literal translation of the hymn, made for the
author of the Life of Brant by Professor Bokum, of Harvard University.
It is from a German hymn book published in 1741.

A firm fortress is our God, a good defense and weapon;

He helps us free from all our troubles which have now befallen us.

The old evil enemy, he is now seriously going to work;

Great power and much cunning are his cruel equipments,

There is none like him on the earth.

2.

With our own strength nothing can be done, we are very soon lost:

For us the right man is fighting, whom God himself has chosen.

Do you ask, who is he? His name is Jesus Christ,

The Lord Jehovah, and there is no other God;

He must hold the field.

3.

And if the world were full of devils, ready to devour us,

We are by no means much afraid, for finally we must overcome The prince
of this world, however badly he may behave,

He can not injure us, and the reason is, because he is the judge,

A little word can lay him low. '.

4.

That word they shall suffer to remain, and not to be thanked for either;

He is with us in the field, with his spirit and his gifts.

If they take from us body, property, honor, child, and wife,

Let them all be taken away, they have yet no gain from it,

The kingdom of heaven must remain to us.

** M'Donald wore a silver-mounted tomahawk, which Shell took from him.
Its handle exhibited thirty-two scalp notches, the tally of horrid deeds
in imitation of his Indian associates.

Death of Shell and his Son.--Cessation of Hostilities.--Departure from
Fort Plain.--Albany.--Hendrick Hudson.

300 were carried into Canada, and they asserted that nine of the wounded
enemy died on the way. Their loss on the ground was eleven killed and
six wounded, while not one of the defenders of the block-house was
injured. Soon after this event Shell was fired upon by some Indians,
while at work in his field with his boys. He was severely wounded, and
one of his boys was killed. The old man was taken to the fort, where he
died of his wound. *

During this summer the Tories and Indians went down upon Warwasing and
other portions of the frontier settlements of Ulster and Orange
counties. These expeditions will be elsewhere considered. The irruption
of Hoss and Butler into the Johnstown settlement in October, and their
repulse by Colonel Willett, have been related. With that transaction
closed the hostilities in Tryon county for the year, and the surrender
of Cornwallis October 19, 1781 and his whole army at Yorktown, in
Virginia, so dispirited the Loyalists that they made no further
demonstrations, by armed parties, against the settlements. Attempts,
some of them successful, were made to carry off prominent citizens. **
The Indians still hung around the borders of the settlements in small
parties during 1782, but they accomplished little beyond producing
alarms and causing general uneasiness. Peace ensued, the hostile savages
retired to the wilderness, a few of the refugee Tories, tame and
submissive, returned, and the Mohawk Valley soon smiled with the
abundance produced by peaceful industry.

We left Fort Plain toward noon, and reached Albany in time to depart for
New York the same evening. Columns of smoke were yet rising from the
smouldering ruins of a large portion of the business part of the city
lying near the river, south of State Street; and the piers along the
basin, black and bare, exhibited a mournful contrast to the air of busy
activity that enlivened them when we passed through the place a few
weeks before. I have been in Albany many times; let us take a seat upon
the promenade deck of the Isaac Newton, for the evening is pleasant,
and, as we glide down the Hudson, chat a while about the Dutch city and
its associations, and its sister settlement Schenectady, and thus close
our

FIRST TOUR AMONG THE SCENES OF THE REVOLUTION.

The site of Albany was an Indian settlement, chiefly of the Mohawk
tribes, long before Hendrick Hudson sailed up the North River. It was
called _Scagh-negh-ta-da_, a word signifying _the end of the pine woods,
or beyond the pine woods._ Such, and equally appropriate, was also the
name of a settlement on the Mohawk, at the lower end of the valley,
which still retains the appellation, though a little Anglicised in
orthography, being spelled Schenectady. From the account given in Juet's
Journal, published in the third volume of Purchas's Pilgrimages, of
Hudson's voyage up the river, it is supposed that he proceeded in his
vessel (the _Half Moon_) as far as the present site of Albany, and
perhaps as high as Troy. *** But he left no colony there, and the
principal fruit of his voyage, which he carried back to the Old World,
was intelligence of the discovery of a noble river, navigable one
hundred and sixty miles, and passing through the most fertile and
romantic region imaginable. This

* Stone's Life of Brant.

** The most prominent Tories engaged in this business were Bettys and
Waltermeyer. We have noticed in another chapter the attempt of the
latter to abduct General Schuyler. Among the prisoners thus made by
these two miscreants, from Ballston, were Samuel Nash, Joseph Chaird,
Uri Tracy, Samuel Patchin, Epenetus White, John Fulmer, and two brothers
named Bontas. They were all taken to Canada, and, after being roughly
treated, were either exchanged, or became free at the conclusion of the
war.

*** Henry or Hendrick Hudson was a native of England. While seeking a
northwest passage to Japan and China, he explored the coasts of
Greenland and Labrador in 1607-8. After returning to England from a
second voyage, he went to Holland and entered the service of the Dutch
East India Company, who fitted out the _Half Moon_ for him to pursue his
discoveries. It was during this voyage that he sailed up the river which
bears his name. The next year (1610) he was sent out by an association
of gentlemen, and in that voyage discovered the great bay at the north
called Hudson's Bay, where he wintered. In the spring of 1611 he
endeavored to complete his discoveries, but, his provisions failing, he
was obliged to relinquish the attempt and make his way homeward. Going
out of the straits from the bay, he threatened to set one or two of his
mutinous crew on shore. These, joined by others, entered his cabin at
night, pinioned his arms behind him, and with his sons, and seven of the
sick and most infirm on board, he was put into a shallop and set adrift.
He was never heard of afterward.

Early History of Albany.--Fort Orange.--First Stone House.--The Church.-
-The Portrait of Hudson.

301discovery was made early in the autumn of 1609.

As soon as the intelligence reached the Dutch East India Company, they
sent out men to establish trading posts in the country in 1614, and the
place was named, by the Dutch, Beaverwyek, or Beaver town, from the
circumstance that great numbers of beavers were found there. A
fortification, called Fort Orange, was built in 1623. * The town
retained its original name until 1664, when the New Netherlands (as the
country upon the Hudson was called) passed into the hands of the
English.

1610 These traders ascended the river and built a blockhouse on the
north point of Boyd's Island, a little below Albany; and it may be said*
that in 1612 Albany was founded, for in that year the first permanent
trading post was established there. Next to Jamestown, in Virginia, it
was the earliest European settlement within the thirteen original
colonies. A temporary fort was erected by the name of Albany, one of the
titles of James, duke of York, the brother of Charles II., afterward
King James II. of England.

The first permanent settlement that was made at Albany (the traders
resorting thither only in the autumn and winter) was in 1626, and from
that time until 1736 many respectable Dutch families came over and
established themselves there and in the vicinity. Among them occur the
names of Quackenboss, Lansing, Bleeeker, Van Ness, Pruyn, Van Wart,
Wendell, Van Eps, and Van Rensselaer, names familiar to the readers of
our history, and their descendants are numerous among us. The first
_stone_ building, except the fort, was erected at Albany in 1647, on
which occasion "eight ankers" (one hundred and twenty-eight gallons) of
brandy were consumed. *** About this time the little village of
Beaverwyek was stockaded with strong wooden pickets or palisades, the
remains of which were visible until 1812. The government was a military
despotism, and so rigorous were the laws that quite a number of settlers
left it and established themselves upon the present site of Schenectady,
about one hundred years since. A small church was erected in 1655, and
the Dutch East India Company sent a bell and a pulpit for it, about the
time when its first pastor, Rev. Gideon Schaats, sailed for Beaverwyek.
It became too small for the congregation, and in 1715 a new and larger
edifice was erected on its site. This stood about ninety-two years, in
the open area formed by the angle of State, Market, and Court Streets.

Albany had become a considerable town when Kalm visited it in 1749. He
says the people all spoke Dutch. The houses stood with the gable ends
toward the streets, and the water gutters at the eaves, projecting far
over the streets, were a great annoyance to the people. The cattle,
having free range, kept the streets dirty. The people were very social,
1657.

* Eight curious pieces of ordnance were mounted upon the ramparts of
Fort Orange, called by the Dutch, according to Vanderkempt,
stiengestucken, or stone pieces, because they were loaded with stone
instead of iron balls. These cannon were formed of long stout iron bars
laid longitudinally, and bound with iron hoops Their caliber was
immense. The fort does not seem to have been a very strong work, for in
1639 a complaint was made to the Dutch governor that the fort was in a
state of miserable decay, and that the "hogs had destroyed a part of
it."

** This picture is copied from a painting said to be froth life, now in
the possession of the Corporation of the city of New York, and hanging
in the "Governor's Room," in the City Hall. It was in the old Stadt
House, and was in existence in Governor Stuyvesant's time.

*** Letter of the commissary, De la Montagnie, to the Dutch governor of
New Amsterdam (New York).

Kalm's Description of Albany.---Its Incorporation.---Destruction of
Schenectady.---Colonial Convention.--Walter Wilie.

302and the spacious stoops, or porches, were always filled at evening,
in summer, with neighbors mingling in chit-chat. They knew nothing of
stoves; their chimneys were almost as broad as their houses; and the
people made wampum, a kind of shell on strings, used as money, to sell
to Indians and traders. * They were very cleanly in their houses; were
frugal in their diet, and integrity was a prevailing virtue. Their
servants were chiefly negroes. In 1777, according to Dr. Thatcher
(Military Journal, p. 91), Albany contained "three hundred houses,
chiefly in the Gothic style, the gable ends to the streets." He mentions
the "ancient stone church," and also "a decent edifice called City Hall,
which accommodates generally their assembly and courts of justice." It
also had "a spacious hospital," erected during the French war. It was
incorporated a city in 1686, and was made the capital of the state soon
after the Revolution.

Albany was an important place, in a military point of view, from the
close of the seventeenth century until the hostilities, then begun
between the English and French colonies, ceased in 1763. It was the
place where councils with the Indians were held, and whence expeditions
took their departure for the wilderness beyond. It never became a prey
to French conquest, though often threatened. In the depth of the winter
of 1690 a party of two hundred Frenchmen and Canadians, and fifty
Indians, chiefly Caughnawaga Mohawks, sent out February 8, 1691 by
Frontenac, menaced Albany. They fell upon Schenectady at midnight,
massacred and made captive the inhabitants, and laid the town in ashes.
Sixty-three persons were murdered and twenty-seven carried into
captivity. The church and sixty-three houses were burned. A few persons
escaped to Albany, traveling almost twenty miles in the snow, with no
other covering than their night-clothes. Twenty-five of them lost their
limbs in consequence of their being frozen on the way. Schenectady, like
Albany, was stockaded, having two entrance gates. These were forced open
by the enemy, and the first intimation the inhabitants had of danger was
the bursting in of their doors. ** Informed that Albany was strongly
garrisoned, the marauders, thinking it not prudent to attack it, turned
their faces toward Canada with their prisoners and booty. The settlement
suffered some during the French and Indian war, but it was rather too
near the strong post of Albany to invite frequent visits from the enemy.
It is said that Schenectady was the principal seat of the Mohawks before
the confederacy of the five Iroquois nations was formed.

One of the most prominent events that occurred at Albany, which has a
remote connection with our Revolution, was the convention of colonial
delegates held there in 1754. For a long time the necessity for a closer
political union on the part of the English colonies had been felt. They
had a common enemy in the French, who were making encroachments upon
every interior frontier, but the sectional feelings of the several
colonies often prevented that harmony of action in the raising of money
and troops for the general service which proper efficiency required. It
was also evident that the Indians, particularly the Six Nations of New
York, were becoming alienated from the English, by the influence of
French emissaries among them, and a grand council, in which the several
English colonies might be represented, was thought not only expedient,
but highly necessary. Lord Holderness,

* Wampum is made of the thick and blue part of sea clam-shells. The thin
covering of this part being split off, a hole is drilled in it, and the
form is produced and the pieces made smooth by a grindstone. The form is
that of the cylindrical glass beads called bugles. When finished, they
are strung upon small hempen cords about a foot long. In the manufacture
of wampum, from six to ten strings are considered a day's work. A
considerable quantity is manufactured at the present day in Bergen
county, New Jersey.

** Walter Wilie, who was one of a party sent from Albany to Schenectady
as soon as the intelligence reached that place of the destruction of the
town, wrote a ballad, in the style of Chevy Chase, in which the
circumstances are related in detail. He says of his ballad, "The which I
did compose last night in the space of one hour, and am now writing, the
morning of Friday, June 12th, 1690." He closes it with, "And here I end
the long ballad, * The which you just have redde; I wish that it may
stay on earth Long after I am dead."

Proceedings of the Colonial Convention.--Names of the Delegates.--Plan
of Union submitted by Franklin.

303the English Secretary of State, accordingly addressed a circular
letter to all the colonies, proposing a convention, at Albany, of
committees from the several colonial assemblies, the chief design of
which was proclaimed to be the renewal of treaties with the Six Nations.
Seven of the colonies, namely, New York, Massachusetts, New Hampshire,
Connecticut, Rhode Island, Pennsylvania, and Maryland, responded to the
call, and the convention assembled at Albany, in the old City Hall, on
the 19th of June, 1754. James Delaney was chosen president of the
convention. The chiefs of the Six Nations were in full attendance, their
principal speaker being Hendrick, the sachem afterward killed near Lake
George while in the service of the English. The proceedings were opened
by a speech to the Indians from Delaney; and while the treaty was in
progress, the convention was invited, by the Massachusetts delegates, to
consider whether the union of the colonies, for mutual defense, was not,
under existing circumstances, desirable. The General Court of
Massachusetts had empowered its representatives to enter into articles
of union and confederation. The suggestion was favorably received, and a
committee, consisting of one member from each colony, was appointed. **
Several plans were proposed. Dr. Franklin, whose fertile mind had
conceived the necessity of union, and matured a plan before he went to
Albany, now offered an outline in writing, which was adopted in
committee, and reported to the convention. The subject was debated "hand
in hand," as Franklin observes, "with the Indian business daily," for
twelve consecutive days, and finally the report, substantially as drawn
by him, was adopted, the Connecticut delegates alone dissenting. *** It
was submitted to the Board of Trade, but that body did not approve of it
or recommend it to the king, while the colonial assemblies were
dissatisfied with it. "The assemblies did not adopt it," says Franklin,
"as they all thought there was too much _prerogative_ in it, and in
England it was judged to have too much of the _democratic_." The Board
of Trade had already proposed a plan of their own--a grand assembly of
colonial governors and certain select members of their several councils,
with power to draw on the British treasury, the sums thus drawn to be
reimbursed by taxes imposed on the colonies by the British Parliament.
This did not suit the colonists at all, and Massachusetts specially
instructed her agent in England "to oppose everything that shall have
the remotest tendency to raise a revenue in America for any public uses
or serv-

* The following are the names of the commissioners from the several
states:

New York.--James Delaney, Joseph Murray, William Johnson, John Chambers,
William Smith.

Massachusetts.--Samuel Welles, John Chandler, Thomas Hutchinson, Oliver
Partridge, John Worthington

New Hampshire.--Theodore Atkinson, Richard Wibird, Mesheck Weare, Henry
Sherburne.

Connecticut.--William Pitkin, Roger Wolcott, Elisha Williams.

Rhode Island.--Stephen Hopkins, Martin Howard.

Pennsylvania.--John Penn, Benjamin Franklin, Richard Peters, Isaac
Norris.

Maryland.--Benjamin Tasker, * Benjamin Barnes. **

** The committee consisted of Hutchinson of Massachusetts, Atkinson of
New Hampshire, Pitkin of Connecticut, Hopkins of Rhode Island, Smith of
New York, Franklin of Pennsylvania, and Tasker of Maryland.

*** The plan proposed a grand council of forty-eight members--seven from
Virginia, seven from Massachusetts, six from Pennsylvania, five from
Connecticut, four each from New York, Maryland, and the two Carolinas,
three from New Jersey, and two each from New Hampshire and Rhode Island.
The number of forty-eight was to remain fixed, no colony to have more
than seven nor less than two members; but the apportionment to vary
within those limits, with the rates of contribution. This council was to
have the general management of civil and military affairs. It was to
have control of the armies, the apportionment of men and money, and to
enact general laws, in conformity with the British Constitution, and not
in contravention of statutes passed by the imperial Parliament. It was
to have for its head a president general, appointed by the crown, to
possess a negative or veto power on all acts of the council, and to
have, with the advice of the council, the appointment of all military
officers and the entire management of Indian affairs. Civil officers
were to be appointed by the council, with the consent of the president.-
-Pitkin, i., 143. It is remarkable how near this plan, submitted by
Franklin, is the basis of our Federal Constitution. Coxe, of New Jersey,
who was Speaker of the Assembly of that province, proposed a similar
plan in his "Carolana" in 1722, and William Penn, seeing the advantage
of union, made a similar proposition as early as 1700.--Hildreth, ii.,
444.

* This name is differently spelled by different writers. Pitkin, in his
text (vol. L, p. 142), writes it Trasker, and in the list in in his
appendix (429) it is Trasher.

** Williams, in his Statesman's Manual, has it Abraham instead of
Benjamin. I have followed Pitkin.

Early Patriotism of Massachusetts.--Albany in the Revolution.--General
Schuyler's Mansion.--Return to New York.

304ices of government." This was the first proposition to tax the
colonies without their consent, and thus early we find Massachusetts
raising her voice as fearlessly against it as she did twenty years
afterward, when her boldness drew down upon her the vengeance of the
British government.

During the Revolution, and particularly after the British took
possession of New York-city, Albany was the focus of revolutionary power
in the state. There the Committee of Safety had its sittings; and, after
the destruction of the forts in the Highlands, and the burning of Esopus
(Kingston), it was generally the head-quarters of the military and civil
1777 officers in the Northern Department. There the captive officers of
Burgoyne's invading army were hospitably entertained by General Schuyler
and his family at their spacious mansion, then "half a mile below the
town."

The house is still standing, at the head of Schuyler Street, a little
west of South Pearl Street, upon an eminence some thirty feet high in
front, and completely imbosomed in trees and shrubbery. Within it the
Baroness Reidesel was entertained, and there occurred those events
mentioned by her and Chastellux, which I have noticed in a preceding
chapter (pages 91 and 92). It was the scene, also, of the attempted
abduction of the general by the Tory, Waltemeyer, when he robbed the
patriot of his plate in 1781, mentioned on page 223. There La Fayette,
Steuben, Rochambeau, and other foreign officers of eminence were
entertained, and there the noblest of the land, as well as distinguished
travelers from abroad, were frequent guests during the life of the
owner; and its doors were opened as freely when the voice of poverty
pleaded for assistance as when the great claimed hospitality and
courtesy.

We arrived in New York on the morning of the 1st of September. The air
was cool and bracing, the day was fine, and the lately-deserted streets
and shops were thronged with mingled citizens and strangers plunged as
deeply in the maze of business as if no forgetfulness of the leger and
till had occurred while babbling brooks and shady groves wooed them to
Nature's worship. There I rested a few days, preparatory to a visit to
the beautiful valley "On Susquehanna's side, fair Wyoming!". *

* This view is from Schuyler Street. The edifice is of brick, having a
closed octagonal porch or vestibule in front. It was built by Mrs.
Schuyler while her husband was in England in 1760--1. The old family
mansion, large and highly ornamented, in the Dutch style, stood nearly
upon the site of the present City Hall, between State and Washington
Streets. It was taken down in 1800.

Departure for Wyoming.--Newark and its Associations.--The old Academy.--
Trip to Morristown.

305

CHAPTER XIV.

"The sultry summer past, September comes,

Soft twilight of the slow, declining year;

All mildness, soothing loneliness, and peace;

The fading season ere the falling come,

More sober than the buxom, blooming May,

And therefore less the favorite of the world,

But dearest month of all to pensive minds."

Carlos Wilcox.

N the morning of the 12th of September I left New York on my second
tour. My chief destination was Wyoming, after a visit to a few
noteworthy places in New Jersey, of which Morristown was the first. I
was in Newark just in time to be too late for the morning train for
Morristown. Newark is beautiful and eligible in location, and a thriving
city; but it has only a few scraps of Revolutionary history, exclusively
its own, for the entertainment of an inquirer. The village contained
about one thousand inhabitants at that time. British, republicans, and
Hessians were alternately billeted upon the people; and, being on the
line of travel from New York to Brunswick and Trenton, its monotony was
often broken by the passage of troops. Political parties were nearly
balanced at the commencement of the war, and, when the Declaration of
Independence was put forth, many of the Loyalists left the place and
went to New York, among whom was the pastor of the Protestant Episcopal
Church of Newark. It suffered much during the war from the visitations
of regular troops of both armies, and of marauders. When Washington fled
toward the Delaware, in November, 1776, his army (three thousand in
number) encamped there from the 22d to the 28th. On that day Cornwallis
entered the town with a pursuing force. Both armies were quartered upon
the inhabitants. Cornwallis left a strong guard there, which remained
until after the battle of Princeton. Foraging parties and plunderers
kept the inhabitants in a state of continual alarm. On the night of the
25th of January, 1780, a party of five hundred of the enemy went from
New York to Newark on the ice, burned the academy, * carried off an
active Whig named Hedden, and would doubtless have laid the town in
ashes had not the light of a conflagration at Elizabethtown (the burning
of the Presbyterian Church by another party, unknown to the first)
alarmed them, and caused them to hasten back to New York. No other
events of much general importance occurred there during the war. It
seems to have been as famous in early times as now for its _cider_.
Governor Carteret wrote, in a letter to the proprietors in 1682, "At
Newark are made great quantities of cider, exceeding any we can have
from New England, Rhode Island, or Long Island." I left Newark for
Morristown at two o'clock, by rail-road, through a beautifully-
diversified region. The road passes above the upper verge of the sandy
plains, through a very hilly country, and makes some broad curves in its
way from Newark to Morristown, a distance, by the track, of about
twenty-two miles. Springfield on the left and the Short Hills

* In that building the collegiate school, now the College of New Jersey,
seated at Princeton, was held, while under the charge of the Rev. Aaron
Burr, the father of the Vice-president of the United States of that
name. This school was instituted at Elizabethtown by Jonathan Dickinson,
in 1746. He died the following year, and the students were sent to
Newark, and placed under the charge of Mr. Burr, who thus became the
second president of the institution. It continued at Newark eight years,
and was then removed to Princeton.

Arrival at Morristown.--Kimble's Mountain.--Fort Nonsense.--September
Sunset--The "Head-quarters."

306on the right, places of note in our revolutionary history, were
pointed out as we sped rapidly by, and, before memory could fairly
summon the events which made them famous, we were at the station at
Morristown, a quarter of a mile eastward of the village green. The town
is pleasantly situated upon a table land, with steep slopes on two
sides. On the west is a high ridge called Kimble's Mountain, two hundred
and fifty feet above the town, its summit commanding a magnificent
prospect of the adjacent country, and considerably resorted to during
the summer. It was upon the southern slope of this mountain that the
American army, under the immediate command of Washington, was encamped
during the winter of 1779--80; and upon the same ridge (which terminates
abruptly at the village), half a mile from the green, are the remains of
Fort Nonsense. It was nearly sunset when I ascended the hill,
accompanied by Mr. Vogt, the editor of one of the village papers. The
embankments and ditches, and the remains of the block-houses of Fort
Nonsense, are very prominent, and the form of the embryo fortification
may be distinctly traced among the trees. Its name was derived from the
fact that all the labor bestowed upon it was intended merely to
counteract the demoralizing effects of idleness. The American army was
comfortably _hutted_, and too remote and secure from the enemy to make
camp duty at all active. Washington foresaw the evil tendency of
idleness, and discreetly ordered the construction of a fort upon a hill
overlooking the town. There was no intention to complete it, and when
the winter encampment broke up in the spring the work was, of course,
abandoned.

From the mountain we saw one of those gorgeous September sunsets so
often seen in the Northern States, and so beautifully described by
Wilcox:

"The sky, without the shadow of a cloud,

Throughout the west is kindled to a glow

So bright and broad, it glares upon the eye,

Not dazzling, but dilating, with calm force,

Its power of vision to admit the whole.

Below, 'tis all of richest orange dye;

Midway, the blushing of the mellow peach

Paints not, but tinges the ethereal deep;

And here, in this most lovely region, shines,

With added loveliness, the evening star.

Above, the fainter purple slowly fades,

Till changed into the azure of mid-heaven."

As the warm glow in the west faded, the eastern sky was radiant with the
light of the full moon that came up over the hills, and under it we made
our way along the sinuous mountain path down to the village. I spent the
evening with the Honorable Gabriel Ford, who owns the fine mansion which
was occupied by Washington as his head-quarters during the winter
encampment there in 1779--80. It belonged to Judge Ford's mother, then a
widow, himself being a boy about fourteen years old. His well-stored
mind is still active, notwithstanding he is eighty-four years old, and
he clearly remembers even the most trifling incidents of that encampment
which came under his observation. He entertained me until a late hour
with anecdotes and facts of interest, and then kindly invited me to pass
the night under his hospitable roof, remarking, "You shall sleep in the
room which General Washington and his lady occupied." That certainly was
the proffer of a rare privilege, and I tarried till morning. Before
making further notes of a personal character, let us look at the
history.

Morristown was twice the place of a winter encampment of the division of
the American army under the personal command of Washington. The first
time was in 1777, after his brilliant achievements at Trenton, and the
battle of Princeton. When the fortieth and fifty-fifth British
regiments, which Washington encountered in that battle, fled, he pursued
them as far as Kingston, where he had the bridge taken up, and, turning
short to the left, crossed the Millstone River twice, and arrived at
Pluckemin the same evening. It had been his intention to march to New
Brunswick, to capture British stores deposited there; but his troops
were so exhausted, not having slept for thirty-six hours, and Cornwallis
was

Spirit and Condition of the Continental Army.--Place of Encampment.--
Free-masonry.--Inoculation of the Army.--Jenner.

307so near, that he abandoned the design and advanced to Morristown,
where he went into winter quarters. He had achieved much, far more than
the most sanguine patriot hoped for. At the very moment when his army
appeared upon the verge of dissolution, and retreating from town to
town, he struck a blow so full of strength that it paralyzed the enemy,
broke up the British line of cantonments upon the Delaware, and made
Cornwallis turn his eyes back wistfully to more secure quarters at New
York, under the wing of General Howe, the British Commander-in-chief.
Nor did Washington sit down quietly at Morristown. He had established
cantonments at various points from Princeton on the right, under the
control of General Putnam, to the Hudson Highlands on the left, at which
post General Heath was still in command, having been left there when the
American army fled from Fort Lee, on the Hudson, to the Delaware, the
previous autumn. He was in the midst of hills and a fertile country
teeming with abundance, but he did not trust to the strong barriers of
nature for his protection. Weak and poorly clad as was his army, he sent
out detachments to harass the British, and with such spirit were those
expeditions conducted, that, on or before the 1st of March, not a
British or Hessian soldier remained in the Jerseys, except at New
Brunswick and Amboy. Under the circumstances, it was a splendid triumph,
and greatly inspirited the friends of the republican cause. The martial
spirit of the people seemed to revive, and it was thought that the
thinned battalions of the army would be speedily replenished. New
courage was infused into the Continental Congress, the members of which,
alarmed at the rapid approach of the British to Philadelphia, then the
national metropolis, had fled to Baltimore, and held their sittings
there.

The American army was encamped in log huts at Morristown, and
Washington's headquarters were at the old Freeman Tavern, which stood on
the north side of the village green. In the Morris Hotel, a building
then used as a commissary's store-house, the chief often participated in
the rites of Free-masonry, in a room over the bar, which was reserved
for a ball-room and for the meetings of the Masonic Lodge. There he
conferred the degrees of the Order upon his companions-in-arms, and his
warm attachment to the institution lasted until his death.

Some writers assert that, toward the close of January, the small-pox
broke out violently in the American camp, and that Washington resorted
to a general inoculation of the army to stay its fatal progress. As Dr.
Thacher, who performed this service in the camp in the Highlands,
opposite West Point, at a later period, does not mention the
circumstance in his Journal, and as cotemporary writers are silent on
the subject, it was reasonable to conclude that such an event did not
occur at Morristown. But Dr. Eneas Munson, one of Dr. Thacher's
assistants, and still living in New Haven, has settled the question. I
wrote to him upon the subject, inquiring also whether _vaccination_ was
ever substituted for _inoculation_ during the Revolution. It was during
the preceding year that Jenner, a young English surgeon, had made his
famous discovery of the efficacy of _vaccination_. * It had attracted
the attention of Washington, for the soldiers of the Northern army had
suffered terribly from the disease in Canada during the spring of 1776,
and one of the most promising officers of the Continental army (General
Thomas) had fallen a victim to the loathsome malady. Dr. Munson kindly
answered my letter, as follows, under date of November 1st, 1849: "In
reply to your inquiries of the 30th ult., I can say that _vaccination_
was not practiced

* Edward Jenner, who was born in 1749, had his attention turned to the
subject of vaccination at about the beginning of 1776, by the
circumstance of finding that those who had been affected by the cow-pox,
or kine-pox, as it is popularly called, had become incapable of
receiving the variolous infection. Inoculation, or the insertion of the
virus of the common small-pox, had long been practiced. It was
introduced into general notice by Lady Mary Wortley Montague in 1721,
whoso son was inoculated at Constantinople, and whose daughter was the
first to undergo the operation in England. It was reserved for Jenner to
discover the efficacy and introduce the practice of vaccination, or the
introduction of the virus of the cow-pox, more than fifty years
afterward. It was first introduced into the British capital in 1796, but
met with great hostility on the part of the medical faculty. The triumph
of Jenner was finally complete, and his fame is world wide. Oxford
presented him with a diploma, the Royal Society admitted him as a
member, and the British Parliament voted him $100,000.

Proclamation of the Brothers Howe.--Disappointment of the People.--
Washington's counter Proclamation

308generally, nor at all, to my knowledge, in the American army of the
Revolution. At Morristown there was a partial _inoculation_, but it was
not general there. At the Highlands, opposite West Point, it
(inoculation) was general, and I assisted in it professionally. *
Vaccination was practiced by my father one year after the close of the
war of the Revolution." ** This is unquestionable authority.

When the British entered New Jersey, the proclamation of the brothers
Howe, offering a free pardon to all rebels who should lay down their
arms, and full and ample protection of person and property to those who
should take an oath of allegiance to the British crown, was freely
circulated. *** This proclamation was received by the people while the
American army was flying before the Britons, and general despondency was
crushing every hope for the success of the patriot cause. Its effect
was, therefore, powerful and instantaneous, and hundreds, whose
sympathies were with the Americans, timid and hopeless, accepted the
protection upon the prescribed terms. They generally remained in their
houses while the belligerent armies were in motion. But they soon found
their hopes cruelly disappointed, and those who should have been their
protectors became their worst oppressors. The Hessians, in particular,
being entirely mercenary, and influenced by no feelings of sympathy,
plundered, burned, and destroyed every thing that came in their way,
without discriminating between friend and foe. The people of all parties
were insulted and abused in their own houses, their dwellings were
rifled, their women were oftentimes ravished by the brutal soldiers, and
neither smiling infancy nor decrepit age possessed immunity from their
outrages. The British soldiery sometimes participated in these crimes,
and upon the British government properly rested the guilt, for the
Hessians were its hired fighting machines, hired contrary to the solemn
protests and earnest negative pleadings of the best friends of England
in its national legislature. But these enormities proved favorable to
the republican cause. Those who had received _paper_ protections
regarded Sir William Howe as a perjured tool of oppression, and the
loyalty of vast numbers of the disaffected and lukewarm, that burned so
brightly when recording their oaths of allegiance, was suddenly
extinguished, and their sad hearts, touched by the persuasions of self-
interest, felt a glow of interested patriotism. Washington January 25,
1777 took advantage of this state of feeling, and issued a counter
proclamation, commanding all persons who had received protections from
the British commissioners to repair to head-quarters, or to some general
officer of the army, to deliver up such protections, and take an oath of
allegiance to the United States. It nevertheless granted full liberty to
all such as preferred "the interests and protection of Great Britain to
the freedom and happiness of their country, forthwith to withdraw
themselves and their families within the enemy's lines." The reasonable
time of thirty days was allowed the inhabitants to comply with these
requisitions, after which those who remained, and refused to give up
their protections, were to be regarded and treated as adherents to the
king and enemies of the United States.

* In his Military Journal, p. 250, Dr. Thacher, alluding to the
inoculation in the Highlands, says, "All the soldiers, with the women
and children, who have not had the small-pox, are now under
inoculation.... Of five hundred who have been inoculated here, four only
have died." He mentions a fact of interest connected with the medical
treatment of the patients. It was then customary to prepare the system
for inoculation, by doses of calomel and jalap. An extract of butternut,
made by boiling down the inner bark of the tree, was substituted, and
found to be more efficacious and less dangerous than the mineral drug.
Dr. Thacher considered it "a valuable acquisition to the materia
medica."

** Dr. Munson's father was an eminent physician, and was for many years
the President of the Medical Society of Connecticut. He was a native of
New Haven, graduated at Yale College in 1753, and, having been a tutor,
he was a chaplain in the army on Long Island in 1775. He died at New
Haven in 1826, aged nearly ninety-two years. He was a practicing
physician seventy years. Being a man of piety, he often administered
medicine to the mind, by kneeling at the bed-side of his patients and
commending them to God in prayer.

*** General Sir William Howe, the commander-in-chief of the British
forces in America, and his brother Richard, Earl Howe, the admiral of
the fleet on our coast, were appointed by Parliament commissioners to
negotiate for peace with the American Congress, or to prosecute the war,
as events might determine. They issued a circular letter to all the
royal governors, and a proclamation to the people, offering pardon and
protection. This commission will be considered hereafter.

Opposition to Washington's Policy.--His Independence and Sagacity.--
Good Effect of his Proclamation

309Notwithstanding Washington had been vested by Congress with the power
Decembers 27,1776 of a military dictator, and the wisdom and equity of
the proclamation were not questioned, the Legislature of New Jersey
regarded it as an infringement upon state rights, that political
stumbling-block in the progress of the Revolution; and even members of
the Continental Congress censured the commander-in-chief. The former
claimed that each state possessed the exclusive power of requiring such
an oath, and the latter deemed the oath absurd when the states were not
legally confederated, and such a thing as "United States" did not exist.

But Washington, conscious of the necessity and wisdom of his course, did
not heed these foolish murmurs. His plan worked admirably, and hundreds
flocked to the proper officers to give up their British protections. The
state was purged of the most inimical Tories, and the ranks of the army
were so rapidly filled by volunteers and new recruits, that, when the
campaign opened in June, his force, which numbered about eight thousand
men when he left his head-quarters at Morristown, toward the close of
May, for Middlebrook (a strong position, twelve miles from the British
camp at New Brunswick), had swelled to fourteen thousand. He had
previously written to the republican governors of the several states,
urging them to adopt prompt and efficient co-operative measures, by
raising recruits and filling up the broken regiments. He also wrote
stirring appeals to Congress, but that body, acting under powers
undefined, and swayed by the jealousies of the several states
represented therein, was tardy and inefficient in its action. He was
obliged, in his public declarations, to magnify the strength of his
army, in order to encourage the desponding people and awe the enemy; and
this justifiable deception made his appeals less effective, for the
necessity did not seem so great as represented. These were trying
circumstances for the commander-in-chief, but his stout heart did not
despond, and his hopeful spirit saw brighter prospects in the future.

Morristown was again the head-quarters of Washington during the winter
of 1779-80 The campaigns for the season had been fruitless of very
favorable results to either party. The war had been carried on chiefly
at the extreme south, and in the vicinity of New York city, at the
north. Toward the close of the year, Sir Henry Clinton, who had
succeeded Sir William Howe in the chief command, sailed from New York
for Charleston, and the main body of the American army went into winter
quarters near Morristown. They re-

* This view is from the forks of the road, directly in front of the
mansion. The house is of brick, covered with planks, and painted white.
The rooms are large and well finished, and it was a fine mansion for the
times.

Winter Encampment at Morristown.--The Life-guard and their Duties.--
Pulaski and his Cavalry.--Effect of Alarum Guns.

310mained in tents until the 14th of February, when log huts were
completed for their use. Strong detachments were stationed at West Point
and other posts near the Hudson, and the American cavalry were cantoned
in the western part of Connecticut. Washington, as we have noted, made
his head-quarters at the residence of the widow of Colonel Jacob Ford,
who had commanded a regiment of Morris county militia during
Washington's retreat through New Jersey. It is situated nearly three
fourths of a mile east of the village green, on the Newark and
Morristown turnpike. The general and his suite occupied the whole of the
large building, exeept two rooms on the eastern side of the main
passage, whieh were reserved for Mrs. Ford and her family. The lower
front room, on the left of the door, was his dining-room, and the
apartment immediately over it was his sleeping-room while Mrs.
Washington was at head-quarters. He had two log additions made to the
house, one for a kitchen, on the east end, and the other, on the west
end, was used as the offices of Washington, Hamilton, and Tilghman. In
the meadow, a few rods southeast of the dwelling, about fifty log huts
were erected for the accommodation of the life-guard, whieh consisted of
two hundred and fifty men, under General William Colfax. In that meadow
Count Pulaski exercised his legion of cavalry, and his dexterous
movements were the wonder and emulation of the officers, many of whom
were considerably injured in attempts to imitate his feats. *

The main body of the army, as we have noticed, was encamped upon the
southern slope of Kimble's Mountain, beginning about two miles from
head-quarters, and extending several miles westward. They were
sufficiently near to be ealled into service instantly, if necessary
During the winter many false alarms occurred, which set the whole camp
in motion. Sentinels were placed at intervals between the camp and head-
quarters, and pickets were planted at distant points toward the Raritan
and the Hudson, with intervening sentinels. Sometimes an alarm would
begin by the firing of a gun at a remote point. This would be answered
by discharges along the whole line of sentinels to the head-quarters and
to the camp. The life-guard would immediately rush to the house of the
general, barricade the doors, and throw up the windows. Five soldiers,
with their muskets cocked and brought to a charge, were generally placed
at eaeh window, and there they would remain until the troops from the
camp marched to head-quarters, and the cause of the alarm was
ascertained. It was frequently the case that the attempts of some young
suitor, who had been _sparking_ until a late hour, and attempted to pass
a sentinel without giving the countersign, caused the discharge of a
musket, and the commotion in the camp. These occasions were very
annoying to the ladies of the household, for both Mrs. Washington and
Mrs. Ford were obliged to lie in bed, sometimes for hours, with their
rooms full of soldiers, and the keen winter air from the open windows
piercing through their drawn curtains.

The winter of 1780 was one of uncommon severity, and the troops suffered
dreadfully from a lack of provisions, clothing, and shelter. ** The snow
fell in great quantities, and the

* It is related that, among other feats, that daring horseman would
sometimes, while his steed was under full gallop, discharge his pistol,
throw it in the air, catch it by the barrel, and then hurl it in front
as if at an enemy. Without checking the speed of his horse, he would
take one foot from the stirrup, and, bending over toward the ground,
recover his pistol, and wheel into line with as much precision as if he
had been engaged in nothing but the management of the animal.

** Dr. Thacher, in his "Military Journal," p. 181, says, "The sufferings
of the poor soldiers can scarcely be described; while on duty they are
unavoidably exposed to all the inclemency of storms and severe cold, at
night they now have a bed of straw upon the ground, and a single blanket
to each man; they are badly clad, and some are destitute of shoes. We
have contrived a kind of stone chimney outside, and an opening at one
end of our tents gives us the benefit of the fire within. The snow is
now [January 6th, 1780] from four to six feet deep, which so obstructs
the roads as to prevent our receiving a supply of provisions. For the
last ten days we have received but two pounds of meat a man, and we are
frequently for six or eight days entirely destitute of meat, and then as
long without bread. The consequence is, the soldiers are so enfeebled
from hunger and cold as to be almost unable to perform their military
duty, or labor in constructing their huts. It is well known that General
Washington experiences the greatest solicitude for the suffering of his
army, and is sensible that they, in general, conduct with heroic
patience and fortitude." In a private letter to a friend, Washington
said, "We have had the virtue and patience of the army put to the
severest trial. Sometimes it has been five or six days together without
bread, at other times as many without meat, and once or twice two or
three days at a time without either.... At one time the soldiers eat
every kind of horse food but hay. Buckwheat, common wheat, rye, and
Indian corn composed the meal which made their bread. As an army, they
bore it with the most heroic patience; but sufferings like these,
accompanied by the want of clothes, blankets, &c., will produce frequent
desertions in all armies; and so it happened with us, though it did not
excite a single mutiny."

Sufferings and Fortitude of the Army.--Sterling's Secret Expedition.--
Extreme Cold.--Chevalier Luzerne.--Death of Miralles

311channels of transportation for provisions being closed, Washington
found it necessary to levy contributions upon the inhabitants in
neighboring towns. He applied to the magistrates for aid, apprehending
some difficulty in the exercise of his power, but the people cheerfully
complied with his requisitions, and the pressing wants of the army were
supplied. The chief was greatly annoyed by complaints of frequent thefts
committed by his soldiers; but such was the force of the first law of
nature--self-preservation--when the commissariat was empty, that the
severest punishments did not deter them from stealing sheep, hogs, and
poultry. Repeated warnings were given to the army, in general orders and
otherwise, against the marauding practice, yet many suffered the
inflictions of the lash, and in some cases of robbery the death penalty
was incurred. *

In January, Major-general Lord Sterling, with about fifteen hundred men
in sleighs, set off at night on a secret expedition, ostensibly to
procure provisions, but really to attack the enemy in their quarters on
Staten Island. They passed over on the ice from Elizabethtown about
midnight. It was a starry night, and the weather was extremely cold. The
enemy had notice of their approach, and the object of the expedition was
defeated. They captured some blankets and stores, and then returned to
camp about daylight. The snow was three feet deep on the ground, and so
excessive was the cold, that five hundred of the party were more or less
frozen. ** A retaliating movement was made soon January 27, 1780
afterward by the enemy. A party attacked the American picket guard, and
carried off a major and forty men. Two or three enterprises of a like
nature were all that varied the monotonous round of duties until the
arrival at head-quarters of the Chevalier de Luzerne, the minister from
the French government. He succeeded M. Gerard, the April 19 first
minister sent to the insurgent colonies from France, and had arrived in
Philadelphia the September previous. He was an accomplished and highly
honorable gentleman, and was received with much regard by the commander-
in-chief. Don Juan de Miralles, a distinguished Spaniard, accompanied
him; and during their visits the military education which Baron Steuben,
the celebrated tactician, had imparted to the army was several times
displayed in reviews and difficult evolutions. Luzerne remained some
time at head-quarters, and a ball, which was attended by Washington and
his lady, all his officers, Governor Livingston and his lady, and many
other distinguished persons, was given in his honor, at the Morris
Hotel. Miralles, in the mean while, was seized, at head-quarters, with a
pulmonic fever, and died on the 28th. The religious ceremonies of the
funeral were conducted by a Spanish Catholic priest, and the body was
interred with great pomp in the common burying-ground near the church in
Morristown. *** A guard of soldiers was placed near the grave, to

* Dr. Thacher says (Military Journal, p. 182) that whipping with knotted
cords, which often cut through the flesh at every blow, applied to the
bare back, was the most common punishment. The drummers and fifers were
made the executioners, and it was the duty of the drum major to see that
the chastisement was well performed. The soldiers adopted a method which
they said somewhat mitigated the anguish of the lash. They put a leaden
bullet between their teeth, and bit on it while the punishment was in
progress. They would thus often receive fifty lashes without uttering a
groan or hardly wincing.

** So intense was the cold that winter that New York Bay was thickly
frozen over, and large bodies of troops, with heavy cannons, were
transported on the ice, from New York city to Staten Island, a distance
of nine miles.

*** Dr. Thacher has left a record of the burial. "The deceased," he says
(page 188), "had been about one year a resident with our Congress, from
the Spanish court. The corpse was dressed in rich stale, and exposed to
public view, as is customary in Europe. The coffin was most splendid and
stately, lined throughout with fine cambric, and covered on the outside
with rich black velvet, ornamented in a superb manner. The top of the
coffin was removed, to display the pomp and grandeur with which the body
was decorated. It was in a splendid full dress, consisting of a scarlet
suit embroidered with rich gold lace, a three-cornered gold-laced hat,
and a genteel cued wig, white silk stockings, large diamond shoe and
knee buckles; a profusion of diamond rings decorated the fingers, and
from a superb gold watch, set with diamonds, several rich seals were
suspended. His excellency, General Washington, with several other
general officers and members of Congress, attended the funeral
solemnities, and walked as chief mourners. The other officers of the
army, and numerous respectable citizens, formed a splendid procession,
extending about a mile. The pallbearers were six field officers, and the
coffin was borne on the shoulders of four officers of artillery, in full
uniform. Minute guns were fired during the procession, which greatly
increased the solemnity of the occasion." Dr. Thacher adds, "This
gentleman is said to have been in possession of an immense fortune, and
has left to his three daughters, in Spain, one hundred thousand pounds
sterling (half a million of dollars) each. Here we behold the end of all
earthly riches, pomp, and dignity. The ashes of Don Miralles mingle with
the remains of those who are clothed in humble shrouds, and whose career
in life was marked by sordid poverty and wretchedness."

Mutiny at Morristown.--Excuses for the Movement.--Injustice toward the
Soldiers.--Policy and Success of Wayne.

312prevent its desecration in search of hidden treasure, until the body
could be removed to Philadelphia.

Morristown was the scene of the only serious and decided mutiny in the
American army during the Revolution. It occurred on the 1st of January,
1781. The whole movement, when all the circumstances are taken into
account, should not be execrated as a military rebellion, for, if ever
there was just cause for men to lift up their strength against
authority, those mutineers possessed it. They had suffered every
privation during a long, and, in many respects, disastrous campaign, and
not a ray of hope appeared in the gloomy future. Their small stipend of
money was paid irregularly, sometimes not at all, and generally in
Continental bills, which were every day becoming more valueless. The
frequent promises of Congress had as frequently been unfulfilled, and
the illiberal interpretations which the officers gave to the expressed
terms of the enlistment of the soldiers produced great dissatisfaction.
It was stipulated in those terms that they (the soldiers of the
Pennsylvania line, who revolted) should serve for three years, or during
the war. The soldiers interpreted these words to mean that they should
be entitled to a discharge at the end of three years, or sooner, if the
war should terminate. This was doubtless the spirit of the agreement,
but the officers read it otherwise, and claimed their service until the
conclusion of the war, however long that time might be. This was the
principal cause of dissatisfaction, and a quarrel with the officers led
to open rebellion.

The Pennsylvania line at that time consisted of about two thousand men,
and was stationed at the old camp-ground near Morristown. The three
years' enlistment had expired with most of them. A bounty of three half
joes (about twenty-five dollars) had been offered to new recruits, while
the pay of these veterans of three years' service was not increased.
There was still due them their pay for twelve months, and nakedness and
famine were their daily companions. The officers had murmured somewhat,
and the soldiers, hearing the whisperings of complaint, took courage and
spoke out boldly. They appointed a sergeant major their commander,
styling him major general; and in the evening of the 1st of

January, on a preconcerted signal, the whole line, except a part of
three regiments, paraded under arms without officers, marched to the
magazines, supplied themselves with provisions and ammunition, and,
seizing six field pieces, took horses from General Wayne's stables to
transport them. The officers of the line collected those who had not
joined the insurgents, and endeavored to restore order, but some of the
revolters fired, killing a Captain Billings and wounding several others.
The mutineers then ordered the minority to come over to their side
immediately, or suffer destruction by the bayonet, and the command was
obeyed.

General Wayne was in command of the Pennsylvania troops, and was much
beloved by them. He exerted all his influence, by threats and
persuasions, to bring them back to duty until their grievances should be
redressed. They would not listen to his remonstrances, and, on his
cocking his pistol, they presented their bayonets to his breast, saying,
"We respect and love you; often have you led us into the field of
battle, but we are no longer under your command; we warn you to be on
your guard; if you fire your pistol, or attempt to enforce your
commands, we shall put you instantly to death." Wayne appealed to their
patriotism; they pointed to the impositions of Congress. He reminded
them of the strength their conduct would give to the enemy; they
exhibited their tattered garments and emaciated forms. They avowed their
willingness to support the cause of freedom, for it was dear to

Final Adjustment of Difficulties.--Emissaries of Sir Henry Clinton.--
Patriotism of the Mutineers.--Fate of the Emissaries.

313their hearts, if adequate provision could be made for their comfort,
and declared their intention to march directly to Philadelphia, and
demand from Congress a redress of their grievances. Finding threats and
persuasion useless, Wayne resolved upon a line of policy that proved
effective. He supplied them with provisions, and, with Colonels Stewart
and Butler, officers whom they greatly respected, marched with them to
prevent their depredating upon the inhabitants, and to draw from their
leaders a statement of their claims and wishes. They reached Princeton
on the 3d, and there a committee of sergeants submitted to Wayne, in
writing, the following demands: First, a discharge for all those,
without exception, who had served three years under their original
engagements, and not received the increased bounty and re-enlisted for
the war. Second, an immediate payment of all arrears of pay and
clothing, both to those who should be discharged and those who should be
retained. Third, the residue of their bounty, to put them on an equal
footing with the recently enlisted, and future substantial pay to those
who should remain in the service. General Wayne was not authorized to
promise a full acquiescence in their demands, and further negotiations
were referred to the civil authority of the state of Pennsylvania.

Intelligence of this revolt reached Washington and Sir Henry Clinton on
the January 3,1781 same day. The head-quarters of the former were at New
Windsor, on the Hudson, just above the Highlands; of the latter, in the
city of New York. Washington called a council of war, and, as the extent
of the disaffection was unknown, it was determined to have one thousand
men, drafts from the several regiments in the Highlands, held in
readiness to march at a moment's notice, to quell the rebellion, if
called upon. The council heartily approved of the course pursued by
General Wayne; and Washington, whose patience had often been severely
tried by the tardy movements of Congress, was willing to have that body
aroused to activity by circumstances which should demand immediate and
undivided attention. Sir Henry Clinton, mistaking the spirit of the
mutineers, thought to gain great advantage by the event. He dispatched
two emissaries, a British sergeant, and a New Jersey Tory named Ogden,
to the insurgents, with the written offer that, on laying down their
arms and marching to New York, they should receive their arrearages, and
the amount of the depreciation of the Continental currency, in hard
cash; that they should be well clothed, have free pardon for all past
offenses, and be taken under the protection of the British government;
and that no military service should be required of them, unless
voluntarily offered. Sir Henry requested them to appoint agents to treat
with his and adjust the terms of a treaty; and, not doubting the success
of his plans, he went to Staten Island himself, with a large body of
troops, to act as circumstances might require. Like his masters at home,
he entirely misapprehended the spirit and the incentives to action of
the American soldiers. They were not mercenary--not soldiers by
profession, fighting merely for hire. The protection of their homes,
their wives and little ones, and the defense of holy principles, which
their general intelligence understood and appreciated, formed the motive
power and the bond of union of the American army, and the soldier's
money stipend was the least attractive of all the inducements which
urged him to take up arms. Yet, as it was necessary to his comfort, and
even his existence, the want of it afforded a just pretext for the
assumption of powers delegated to a few. The mutiny was a democratic
movement; and, while the patriot felt justified in using his weapons to
redress grievances, he still looked with horror upon the armed
oppressors of his country, and regarded the act and stain of treason,
_under any circumstances_, as worse than the infliction of death.
Clinton's proposals were, therefore, rejected with disdain. "See,
comrades," said one of the leaders, "he takes us for traitors. Let us
show him that the American army can furnish but one Arnold, and that
America has no truer friends than we." They immediately seized the
emissaries, who, being delivered, with Clinton's papers, into the hands
of Wayne, * were tried and executed as spies, and the reward which had
been offered for their apprehension was

* When they were delivered up, the insurgents stipulated that they
should not be executed until their own affairs were compromised, and, in
case of failure, that the prisoners should be delivered when demanded.

Mutiny of the New Jersey Line.--Prompt Action of Washington.--Success of
Howe.--Illustrations of Washington's Character.

314tendered to the mutineers who seized them. They sealed the pledge of
their patriotism by nobly refusing it, saying, "Necessity wrung from us
the act of demanding justice from Congress, but we desire no reward for
doing our duty to our bleeding country!"

Congress appointed a commissioner to confer with the insurgent troops at
Princeton. The result was, a compliance with their just demands, and the
disbanding of a large part of the Pennsylvania line for the winter,
which was filled by new recruits in the spring. Thus "terminated," as
Thacher remarks, "a most unfortunate transaction, which might have been
prevented had the just complaints of the army received proper attention
in due season."

The wisdom of Washington's precaution in having a thousand men ready for
sudden marching orders was soon demonstrated. About the middle of
January a portion of the New Jersey line, cantoned at Pompton, *
followed the example of the Pennsylvania mutineers, and revolted. The
chief resolved not to temporize with them, and ordered a detachment of
five hundred men, under Major-general Robert Howe, to reduce them to
subordination. Howe reached their encampment, after a fatiguing march of
four days through deep snow, on the 27th of January. His troops were
well armed, and, parading them in line, he ordered the insurgents to
appear in front of their huts, unarmed, within five minutes. They
hesitated, but a second order, as promptly given, made them obedient.
Three of the ringleaders were tried and condemned to be executed on the
spot. Two of them were shot, and their executioners were twelve of the
most prominent of their guilty associates. The other one, less guilty,
was pardoned. Their punishment was quick and terrible, and never were
men more humble and submissive than were the remainder of the
insurgents. General Howe then addressed them effectively, by platoons,
and ordered their officers, whom the mutineers had discarded, to resume
their respective commands. The hopes of Sir Henry Clinton had been again
excited, but the emissary whom he sent to the revolted troops, hearing
of the fate of the others, played false to his master, by going directly
to Howe and delivering the papers into his hands. Revolt, that followed
so closely upon Arnold's treason a few months before, was thus
effectually nipped in the bud.

I have said that I spent an evening at Morristown with Judge Ford, the
proprietor of the head-quarters of Washington. I look back upon the
conversation of that evening with much pleasure, for the venerable
octogenarian entertained me until a late hour with many pleasing
anecdotes illustrative of the social condition of the army, and of the
private character of the commander-in-chief. As an example of
Washington's careful attention to small matters, and his sense of
justice, he mentioned the fact that, when he took up his residence with
his (Ford's) mother, he made an inventory of all articles which were
appropriated to his use during the winter. When he withdrew in the
spring, he inquired of Mrs. Ford whether every thing had been returned
to her. "All but one silver table-spoon," she answered. He took note of
it, and not long afterward she received from him a spoon bearing his
initials, G. W. That spoon is preserved as a precious relic in the
family. His tender care for the comfort of Mrs. Ford was often evinced.
On the occasions when the alarms, which we have noticed, were given, he
always went to her room, drew the curtains close, and soothed her by
assurances of safety. And when her son, a lad of seventeen, was brought
home from the Springfield battle, seriously wounded, his first care in
the morning was to inquire after the sufferer. ** Washington's moral and
religious feelings were never blunted by

* Pompton is a small town upon a fertile plain on the Pompton River, in
Pequannock county.

** The wounded lad recovered, and afterward became a distinguished
lawyer in a southern pity. A remarkable instance of Washington's
remembrance of persons was related to me, as having occurred in
connection with the wounded boy. Many years afterward, when success had
crowned his professional industry with wealth, and two daughters had
nearly reached womanhood, he was returning south with them in his
carriage, after a visit to his friends at Morristown, and stopped at
Mount Vernon to see the retired chief. Reasonably concluding that
Washington had forgotten the boy of 1780, he had procured a letter of
introduction. When he drove up to Mount Vernon, Washington was walking
upon the piazza. He went to the carriage, and as the servant of Mr. Ford
threw open the door, and he stepped out, the general extended his hand,
and said, with all the confidence of a recent acquaintance, "How do you
do. Mr. Ford?" Eighteen years had elapsed since Washington had seen his
face, and the boy had grown to mature manhood.

Prohibition of Gambling.--Washington's religious Toleration.--Anecdote
of Colonel Hamilton.--Room occupied by Washington.

315the influences of the camp. While at Morristown, he observed that
gambling was frequent among the officers and soldiers. This growing vice
he arrested by prohibition and threats of punishment, put forth in
general orders. It is related that he called upon the Rev. Dr. Jones,
the pastor of the Presbyterian Church of Morristown, on learning that
the communion service was to be observed in his church on the following
Sabbath, and inquired whether communicants of another denomination were
permitted to join with them. The doctor replied, "Most certainly; ours
is not the Presbyterian's table, general, but the Lord's; and hence we
give the Lord's invitation to all his followers, of whatever name."

"I am glad of it," said the general; "that is as it ought to be; but, as
I was not quite sure of the fact, I thought I would ascertain it from
yourself, as I propose to join with you on that occasion Though a member
of the Church of England, I have no exclusive partialities." Washing ton
was at the communion table on the following Sabbath.

General Schuyler was with Washington during the winter of 1780. His
head-quarters were at a house (still standing) a few rods eastward of
the rail-way station. A portion of his family was with him, among whom
was his daughter Elizabeth, a charming girl, about twenty-two years of
age. Colonel Alexander Hamilton, who was Washington's aid and military
secretary, was smitten with her charms and accomplishments, and his
evenings were usually spent with her at her father's quarters. Mr. Ford,
then a lad, was a favorite with Hamilton, and, by permission of the
chief, the colonel would give him the countersign, so as to allow him to
play at the village after the sentinels were posted for the night. On
one occasion he was returning home, about nine o'clock in the evening,
and had passed the sentinel, when he recognized the voice of Hamilton in
a reply to the soldier's demand of "Who comes there?" He stepped aside,
and waited for the colonel to accompany him to the house. Hamilton came
up to the point of the presented bayonet of the sentinel to give the
countersign, but he had quite forgotten it. "He had spent the evening,"
said Judge Ford, who related the anecdote to me, "with Miss Schuyler,
and thoughts of her undoubtedly expelled the countersign from his head."
The soldier lover was embarrassed, and the sentinel, who knew him well,
was stern in the performance of his duty. Hamilton pressed his hand upon
his forehead, and tried hard to summon the cabalistic words from their
hiding-place, but, like the faithful sentinel, they were immovable. Just
then he recognized young Ford in the gloom. "Ay, Master Ford, is that
you?" he said, in an undertone; and, stepping aside, he called the lad
to him, drew his ear to his mouth, and whispered, "Give me the
countersign." He did so, and Hamilton, stepping in front of the soldier,
delivered it. The sentinel, seeing the movement, and believing that his
superior was testing his fidelity, kept his bayonet unmoved. "I have
given you the countersign; why do you not shoulder your musket?" asked
Hamilton. "Will that do, colonel?" asked the soldier, in reply. "It will
for this time," said Hamilton; "let me pass." The soldier reluctantly
obeyed the illegal command, and Hamilton and his young companion reached
headquarters without further difficulty. Colonel Hamilton afterward
married Miss Schuyler. She still survives him (1849), and at the age of
ninety-two years is the attractive center of a circle of devoted friends
at Washington city, her present place of residence.

I passed the night under the hospitable roof of Judge Ford, and in the
room which Washington and his lady had occupied. The carpet upon the
floor, dark and of a rich pattern, is the same that was pressed by the
feet of the venerated chief nearly seventy years ago; and in an
apartment below were a looking-glass, secretary, and book-case that
formed a portion of the furniture of the house at that time. * The room
fronts south, and, the sky being

* Since my interesting visit, Judge Ford has been taken from among the
living, and these relics will doubtless lose their value, by being
separated and distributed among the family. I have preserved drawings of
the articles here named. Judge Ford expressed his surprise that the
mirror was not demolished, for the room in which it hung was occupied,
at one time, by some of the subalterns of the Pennsylvania line, who
were sons of some of the leading men of that state--gentlemen by birth,
but rowdies in practice. They injured the room very much by their
nightly carousals, but the mirror escaped their rough treatment.

View of an Eclipse of the Moon.--Reflections.--Finances of the
Revolutionary Government.--Emission of Bills of Credit

September 12, 1848 perfectly 316clear, I had a fine view, from the
window, of an almost total eclipse of the moon, which occurred at about
midnight. As from that interesting observatory I watched the progress of
the obscuration, and then the gradual enlightenment of the satellite, it
appeared to me a most significant emblem of the political condition of
America, and the cause of the patriots, at the time when, from the same
window, Washington, with anxious eye, had doubtless gazed upon the same
moon in its silent path-way among the stars. It was the gloomiest period
of the war. For many months the bright prospects of the patriots were
passing deeper and deeper within the penumbra of British power and
oppression, and, at the beginning of 1780, only a faint curve of light
was seen upon the disk of hope; the eclipse was almost total. _Financial
embarrassment_ was the chief bane of the patriots, and the expected
antidote of rebellion for the Loyalists and the king. Let us here take a
brief view of the financial affairs of the Revolutionary government.

When the Continental army was organized, in June, 1775, and other
methods of defense were adopted by the General Congress, the necessity
for providing pecuniary means for defraying the expenses, demanded and
received the most serious attention of the delegates. The colonies,
deprived, in a great measure, of all commercial intercourse with other
parts of the world, by the unwise and oppressive policy of the mother
country, a paper medium seemed to be their only resource. It was a
blessing at the beginning, but proved a curse in the end. To place it
upon a footing that should command the public confidence, and to secure
it from depreciation, was important and difficult. The New York
Convention, foreseeing the necessity of such a measure, had already
considered the subject, and a committee of that body had reported
suggestions a few weeks previously. They proposed three distinct modes
of issuing paper money. First, that each colony should issue, for
itself, the sum which might be appropriated to it by Congress. Second,
that the united colonies should issue the whole sum necessary, and each
colony become bound to sink its proportionable part; and, third, that
Congress should issue the whole sum, every colony be bound to discharge
its proportion, and the united colonies be obliged to pay that part
which any colony should fail to discharge. The convention preferred the
last mode, as affording higher security to those who should receive the
paper, and, of consequence, as likely to obtain more ready, general, and
confidential circulation. It was also believed that it would be an
additional bond of union to the associated colonies. *

The Continental Congress adopted, substantially, the last proposition,
and, in the course of the session of 1775, three millions of dollars
were issued in bills of credit, and the faith of the confederated
colonies was pledged for their redemption. ** This sum was appropriated

* Pitkin, i., 347. Records of the New York Convention.

** The resolution providing for the first emission of bills was adopted
on the 22d of June, 1775, and was as follows: "Resolved, That a sum not
exceeding two millions of Spanish milled dollars be emitted by the
Congress in bills of credit, for the defense of America." On the next
day the committee appointed for the occasion reported and offered
resolutions (which were adopted) as follows: "Resolved, That the number
and denomination of the bills to be emitted be as follows:

_Numb--bills--Amount_

49,000  8  $392,000 49,000  7  "343,000 49,000  6  "294,000 49,000  5
"245,000 49,000  4  "196,000 49,000  3  "147,000 49,000  2   "98,000
49,000  1   "49,000 11,800 20  "236,000 Total,   $2,000,000

Continental Paper Money.--Form of the Bills.--Devices and Mottoes.--Paul
Revere and contemporary Engravers.

317among the colonies according to the supposed number of the
inhabitants, including negroes and mulattoes, and each colony was to pay
its proportion, in four equal annual payments.

The several Colonial Conventions were to provide, by taxes, for sinking
their proportion of the bills, and the bills themselves were to be
received in payment for such taxes. Two general treasurers were
appointed, and it was recommended to each colony to appoint a treasurer.
The amount of the first emission was two millions of dollars.

"Resolved, That the form of the bills be as follows:

CONTINENTAL CURRENCY.

No.------------Dollars.

This bill entitles the bearer to receive-------Spanish milled dollars,
or the value thereof in gold and silver, according to the resolutions of
the Congress, held at Philadelphia on the tenth day of May, A.D. 1775.

"Resolved, That Mr. J. Adams, Mr. J. Rutledge, Mr. Duane, Dr. Franklin,
and Mr. Wilson be a committee to get proper plates engraved, to provide
paper, and to agree with printers to print the above bills." *

* The paper on which these bills were printed was quite thick, and the
enemy called it "the pasteboard money of the rebels." The vignettes were
generally, both in device and motto, significant. The one most prominent
in the engraving represents a beaver in the slow but sure process of
cutting down a tree with its teeth. The motto, "Perseverando--by
Perseverance," said to the colonists, "Persist, and you will be
successful." I will notice a few other devices and mottoes of bills
which I have seen. A globe, with the motto, in Latin, "The Lord reigns;
let the earth rejoice." A candlestick with thirteen branches and
burners, denoting the number of states; motto, "One fire, and to the
same purpose." A thorn-bush with a hand grasping it; motto, "Sustain or
abstain." A circular chain bearing on each link the name of a state, an
emblem of union; motto, "We are one." I have in my possession a coin,
made of some composition resembling German silver of the present day (of
which the following is a fac-simile the proper size), bearing the same
device on one side. On a three dollar note is a device representing a
stork struggling with an eagle--the feeble colonies warring with strong
Great Britain; motto, "The result is uncertain." This bill is dated
eighteen days after the adoption of the Declaration of Independence.

A majestic oak-tree; motto, "I SHALL FLOURISH THROUGH AGES of ages." A
hand planting a young tree; motto, "For posterity." A boar encountering
a spear; motto, "Death, or life with decency." A harp, denoting harmony;
motto, "Large THINGS ARE CONSONANT WITH small ones." A figure of
Justice; motto, "The will of Justice."

* The plates were engraved on copper by Paul Revere, of Boston. Himself,
Nathaniel Hurd, of the same city, Amos Doolittle, of New Haven, and an
Englishman named Smithers, in Philadelphia, were the only engravers in
America at that time, Hurd engraved as early as 1760. Revere began a
little later. In 1766 he engraved a picture emblematic of the repeal of
the Stamp Act. This, and a caricature called The Seventeen Rescinders,
were very popular, and had an extensive sale. He engraved and published
a print in 1770, representing the "Boston Massacre," and in 1774 he
engraved another of a similar size, representing the landing of the
British troops in Boston. In 1775 he engraved the plates, made the
press, and printed the bill of the paper money ordered by the Provincial
Congress of Massachusetts. Doolittle was at Lexington and Concord, and
made drawings and engravings of the skirmishes at thoso places. The
sketches were made on the morning after the engagements, and were
engraved during the summer of 1775. Mr. Doolittle assisted in re-
engraving the battle of Lexington on a smaller scale, in 1830, forty-
three years afterward, for Barber's "History and Antiquities of New
Haven." A copy of it, by permission, la inserted in this work.

New Emissions of Continental Bills.--Plans for Redemption.--Counterfeits
issued by the Tories.--First coined Money

318On the 25th of July the Continental Congress ordered the issuing of
one million of dollars more, * and from time to time new emissions were
authorized, to meet the demands upon the treasury, until, at the
beginning of 1780, the enormous sum of two hundred millions of dollars
had been issued, no part of which had been redeemed. While, the amount
of the issues was small, the credit of the bills was good; but when new
emissions took place, and no adequate measures for redemption were
exhibited, the people became suspicious of those frail representatives
of money, and their value began to depreciate. This effect did not occur
until eighteen months from the time of the first emission had elapsed.
Twenty millions of the Continental bills were then in circulation,
besides a large amount of local issues by the several states. It was now
perceived that depreciation was inevitable, and Congress proposed, as a
substitute for further issues, a loan of five millions, at an interest
of four per cent. A lottery was also authorized, designed to raise a
like sum on loan, the prizes being payable in loan office certificates.
These offices were opened in all the states; the rate of interest was
raised from four to six per cent., but the loans came in very slowly.
The treasury ran low, the loan offices were overdrawn by the
commissaries' drafts, the issue of bills was reluctantly recommenced,
and ten additional millions were speedily authorized. During the year
1778 sixty millions and a half were added to the issues already made.
The commissioners in France (see page 86) had been instructed to borrow
money there, but as yet they had been unsuccessful.

Various plans were proposed at different times to sink those issues of
bills of credit, but none could be put into efficient practical
operation. The several states issued paper money independently of the
Continental Congress; and the Loyalists, aided by Sir Henry Clinton, in
the autumn of 1778 sent out large quantities of counterfeits of the
Continental emissions of May 20th, 1777, and April 11th, 1778, and
scattered them as widely among the people as their means would allow. **
Under these circumstances, Congress felt the necessity of making an
extraordinary effort to sustain the declining credit of the bills, by
making some provision for their actual redemption. On the 2d of January,
1779, it was "Resolved, That the United States be called on to pay in
their respective quotas of fifteen millions of dollars for the year
1779, and of six millions of dollars annually for eighteen years from
and after the year 1779, as a fund for sinking the emissions and loans
of the United States to the 31st of December, 1778, inclusive." It was
provided that any bills emitted by order of Congress prior to 1780, and
no others, should be received in payment of those quotas. A period of
five months was given for taking out of circulation the emissions which
had been counterfeited, during which time they were to be received into
the public treasury in pay-

* As the signing of so many bills would require more time than the
members could spare from public duties, Congress appointed twenty-eight
gentlemen to perform the duty, allowing each one dollar and thirty-three
cents for every thousand bills signed and numbered by him. It was
necessary for each bill to have the signature of two of them.

** See page 662, Vol. II.

Depreciation of the Paper Money.--Confusion in Trade.--Foreign and
Domestic Debt Specie Value of the Bills.

319ment of debts and taxes, and also into the Continental loan offices,
either on loan or to be exchanged for other bills of a new tenor,
bearing interest at five per cent., and redeemable in specie within six
years. The old bills thus called in were to be destroyed. *

This effort, like its predecessors, was unsuccessful. Prices rose as the
money sank in value, and every branch of trade was deranged. In several
states laws limiting prices were still in force, and the rapid
depreciation of the bills threw all contracts into confusion. The amount
in circulation on the 1st of September, 1779, was a hundred and sixty
millions. Congress resolved that the issues should not exceed two
hundred millions in the whole. The loans prior to the 1st of August,
1778, the interest of which was payable in bills on France, were seven
millions and a half. The loans contracted since were more than twenty-
six millions. The debt abroad was estimated at four millions. Only three
millions out of the sixty millions of paper dollars already called for
from the states had been paid into the public treasury.

Congress was powerless to stay the downward tendency of the paper
currency. It continued to depreciate and prices to rise. Early in 1780,
forty paper dollars were worth only one in specie. ** The commissaries
found it extremely difficult to purchase supplies for the army, for the
people refused to exchange their articles for the almost worthless
paper. Direct taxes had been unsuccessfully tried to replenish the
treasury, and, as supplies could not be obtained, a speedy dissolution
of the army and abandonment of the rebellion seemed inevitable.

Congress was obliged to open new resources for the supply of the army,
and required each state to furnish a certain quantity of beef, pork,
flour, corn, forage, and other articles, which were to be deposited in
such places as the commander-in-chief should determine. The states were
to be credited for the amount at a fixed valuation in specie. This
scheme was utterly

* Journals of Congress, vol. i., p. 5.

* Value of $100 in Specie in Continental Money.

1777.  1778.     1779.    1780.     1781. January......$105   $325.....
$742.....$2934.....$7400 February..... 107   350..... 868..... 3322.....
7500 March...      109   370..... 1000..... 3736..... April...      112
400..... 1104..... 4000..... May           400..          1215.....
4600.. June...       120   400..... 1342..... 6400..... July
425.....       1477..... 8900.. August....... 150   450..... 1630.....
7000..... September.... 175   475..... 1800......7100.. October......
275   500..... 2030..... 7200..... November....  300   545.....
2308..... 7300..... December....  310   634..... 2593..... 7400..

* Captain M'Lane was the father of the late Secretary of the Treasury.

Unjust Financial Law.--Washington's Deprecation of it.--Hopes of the
Tories.--Cipher Writing of the Loyalists.

320impracticable, from the want of authority to enforce the demands, and
the distance of several states from the army, and Congress speedily
abandoned it. The several states were then recommended by Congress to
pass laws making paper money a legal tender, at its nominal value, for
the discharge of debts which had been contracted to be paid in hard
cash. Such laws were enacted, and many dishonest debtors took advantage
of them. Although the bills were passing at the rate of twenty for one,
they were made a lawful tender, and debts were discharged at a cheap
rate. It was one of the most unwise and unjust acts committed by
Congress during the war. The honest and simple were defrauded, and the
rogues were immense gainers. * The people justly raised a great clamor,
while the friends of the king greatly rejoiced in seeing the growth of
what they deemed the canker-worm in the seed of rebellion. **

Among the most prominent evils arising from the rapid depreciation of
the paper was a spirit of speculation and fraud, which excited unfounded
jealousies and suspicions. The

* Washington opposed the measure from the beginning as iniquitous,
unjust, and fraught with the direst evils. He was a considerable loser
by it. While at Morristown, a respectable man in the neighborhood was
very assiduous in his attentions to the chief, and they were generally
reciprocated. This man paid his debts in the depreciated currency, under
the law, and the fact became known to Washington. Some time afterward
the man called at head-quarters, but the general hardly noticed him.
This coldness was observed by the officers, and La Fayette remarked,
"General, this man seems much devoted to you, and yet you have scarcely
noticed him." Washington replied, smiling, "I know I have not been
cordial; I tried hard to be civil, and attempted to speak to him two or
three times, but that Continental money stopped my mouth."

** Rev. Charles Inglis, who was rector of Trinity Church, in New York,
from 1777 until 1782, and, after the peace, was made Lord Bishop of Nova
Scotia, in a letter to Joseph Galloway, the great Pennsylvania Loyalist,
then in London, thus writes, under date of December 12th, 1778, in
reference to the immense issues and the depreciation of the bills of
credit: "The fee simple of the thirteen United States is not equal to
this sum, which is still increasing. I therefore think it utterly
impossible to support the credit of this money; and were there nothing
else, this would be sufficient to destroy the rebellion, if Britain
would hold the places she now possesses, and keep a moderate number of
cruisers on the coast. The mode of securing French debts, by which the
colonies became mortgaged for the fripperies of every French peddler, is
another embarrassing article on this head, which must prove ruinous to
America."

* Daniel Coxe, a member of the king's council of New Jersey, and a
refugee in New York, writing to Galloway, under date of February 14th,
1779, says, "The current depreciation of their money now at Philadelphia
is fifteen for one; and the' there are clubs and private associations
endeavoring to support its credit, nothing will do, nor can any thing,
in my opinion, now save 'em on this point but a foreign loan, and which,
though they affect otherwise, I think they can not negotiate any where
in Europe, unless all the moneyed nations are turned fools; and if they
can not command a loan, and are prevented from all remittances and trade
southward, they must sink, never again, I hope, to rise......In short,
they never were so wretched and near destruction as at this moment, and,
unless some unforeseen event takes place in their favor soon, I firmly
expect the next summer must end their independence and greatness.....For
God's sake, then, encourage every degree of spirit and exertion all you
can, and quickly; a good push, and they go to the wall infallibly." Such
was the tenor of the letters sent to England by the Loyalists from 1778
until 1781. The financial embarrassments of Congress gave Loyalists and
friends of government strong hopes that it would accomplish what British
arms had failed to do. It may be here remarked that many of the letters
which passed between the Loyalists here and their friends abroad were
written in cipher, so that, should they fall into the hands of the
patriots, they might not be read, to the disadvantage of the writers and
their cause. I here give, for the gratification of the curious, an
alphabetical key, and a fac-simile or two lines of the cipher writing,
copied from one of the letters of a distinguished Tory, together with
the interpretation.

Charge against General Greene.--Excitement throughout the Country.--Riot
in Philadelphia.--Convention at Hartford

321rapid rise in prices was unjustly attributed to extortion on the part
of public officers, and even General Greene, who acted as quarter-master
general, was accused of enriching himself at the public expense, because
he received for his salary a percentage on all moneys disbursed, and the
depreciation made the nominal amount vast. Individual speculators and
monopolizers were the extortioners and the oppressors of the people, and
of them Washington said, in a letter to President Reed, "I would to God
that some of the more atrocious in each state were hung in gibbets upon
a gallows four times as high as the one prepared for Haman." It was
remarked, "that while the honest and patriotic were impoverished, rogues
and Tories were fast growing rich."

Toward the close of the summer of 1779, the country was greatly agitated
by the existing financial embarrassments. Meetings were held in the
chief cities on the subject. In Philadelphia, party feelings, growing
out of the currency question, became so strong and decided that a riot
took place under the very eyes of Congress. A committee had undertaken
to regulate the prices of flour, rum, sugar, molasses, coffee, salt, and
other articles of general use. Robert Morris and other leading merchants
refused to conform to the regulation. Wilson, Clymer, and Mifflin, with
their friends, were threatened with banishment to New York, as abettors
and defenders of the Tories. They armed themselves, and repaired to
October 4,1779 Wilson's house. A mob, with fire-arms and two cannons,
approached. Some shots were fired, and one of the defenders of the house
was killed. A man and a boy of the mob were also killed. The mob were
about to force the door, when Reed, the president of Congress, appeared
with some cavalry, and partially restored order, but it was necessary
for the citizens to turn out and patrol the streets. It was several days
before quiet was restored. In the midst of this general excitement a
convention of the five Eastern States October 20, 1799 was held at
Hartford, and Congress, unable longer to disguise the fact that its
bills of credit were permanently depreciating, approved of, and
recommended, a plan elaborated by that convention, to regulate prices on
the basis of twenty paper dollars for one of specie. This measure
partially quieted the public mind. Before the end of the year the two
hundred millions were emitted, and the press was stopped. * At that time
the depreciation stood thirty for one, and was constantly increasing.
The diversion of labor from agricultural and other industrial pursuits,
the destruction of grain by the belligerent forces in various parts of
the country, combined with the embarrassed state of the finances of
government, which we have briefly considered, threatened famine and
general bankruptcy; and during the winter and spring of 1780, when
Washington had his quarters at Morristown, the hope of the patriot was
suffering an almost total eclipse; it was the gloomiest period of the
Revolution. The financial operations which subsequently occurred will be
noticed hereafter, such as long drafts on the United States
commissioners abroad, and foreign loans.

We have made a wide but necessary digression in turning aside to view
the financial affairs of the patriots at the period under consideration.
Let us resume our journey and historic annotations.

I left Morristown for Springfield in the early morning train. The air
was September 13, 1848 cool and bracing, and I had a pleasant walk of
about a mile from the station, at the foot of the Short Hills, to the
pretty village lying in the bosom of a fertile plain near the banks of
the Rahway River. The trees upon the surrounding hills were beginning to
assume the variegated livery of autumn, not from the effects of frosts,
but of a long drought, yet on the plain every thing was as green as in
June, except the ripening maize. I sought for the "oldest inhabitant,"
and found him in the person of the venerable Gilbert Edwards, who was a
half-grown boy at the time of the battle of Springfield, and sold apples
to the American soldiers when they came down from the Short Hills to
oppose the invasion of the enemy under Knyphausen, the German general.
** He kindly accompanied me to the place

* Pitkin, Marshall, Ramsay, Gordon, Sparks, Hildreth.

* General, the Baron Knyphausen, was a native of Alsace, then one of the
Rhenish provinces. His father was a colonel in the German regiment of
Dittforth, in the service of John, Duke of Marlborough. The general was
bred a soldier, and served under Frederic the First, father of Frederic
the Great of Prussia. The twelve thousand German troops hired by the
English government, for service in America, were placed under his
command, and the Hessians were led by the Baron de Reidesel. He arrived
with his troops, under convoy of Admiral Lord Howe, in June, 1776, and
was engaged in the battle of Long Island in August following. He was
also in the battle of Brandywine, and commanded an expedition to
Springfield, New Jersey. For some months during the absence of Sir Henry
Clinton at the south, Knyphausen was in eommand of the city of New York.
He was about sixty years of age, possessed of a fine figure, and was
remarkably amiable and simple-minded. La Fayette used to tell an
anecdote concerning him, on the authority of British officers. The
passage to Ameriea was very long, and one night, while playing whist in
the cabin, Knyphausen suddenly turned to the captain and said, with an
air of much sincerity, "Captain, ain't we hab sailed past America?" He
died on the frontiers of Germany toward the close of the last century.

Battle-ground at Springfield.--Invasion by General Knyphausen.--
Clinton's Designs.--Plan of the Springfield Battle.

322where the principal engagement occurred, which is on the right of the
present turnpike leading from Springfield to Elizabethtown, and a few
rods westward of the Rahway. Nothing now remains upon the spot to
indicate military operations, for no works were thrown up on the
occasion.

The battle was the result of an unexpected invasion. The knoll on which
the Americans were posted, then covered with apple-trees, is now bare,
only a few stumps remaining; but on the eastern slope a few of the trees
are left, venerable in form and feature, and venerated for their
associations. One of them is pictured in the engraving. It bears several
scars of wounds inflicted by the cannon-balls of the approaching enemy.
They are "honorable scars," and I bespeak for the veteran a perpetual
pension of respect.

On the 6th of June, 1780, General Knyphausen, then in temporary command
of the British troops in New York during the absence of Sir Henry
Clinton at the south, dispatched Brigadier-general Mathews from Staten
Island with about five thousand troops, who landed at Elizabethtown
Point. He had been informed that the American army at Morristown was
much dissatisfied, and ripe for mutiny and treason, and that the people
of New Jersey were ready to join the royal standard as soon as ample
protection should be guarantied them. Influenced by these opinions,
Knyphausen ordered Mathews to march toward Morristown, but the
annoyances which he met with on the way soon undeceived him. He turned
the village of Connecticut Farms, and advanced on Springfield, but,
being informed that Washington had sent a force to oppose him, he
wheeled and returned to Elizabethtown. Many of his soldiers were cut off
during the recession, by small parties of Jerseymen concealed behind
fences, rocks, and bushes. On reaching Elizabethtown Point, he
intrenched his forces within the old works thrown up there by the
Americans, where they remained about a fortnight.

In the mean while, General Clinton arrived from the south, and
determined to carry out the plan arranged by Knyphausen, to capture the
stores at Morristown, and, if possible, draw Washington out from his
strong position among the Short Hills, into a general engagement. He
also took pains to mislead Washington, by em-

* Explanation of the Map.--The stream with branches, and running in a
southerly direction, is the Rahway River; a is the house (still
standing) of Mrs. Mathews, near which the enemy formed for battle; b,
the site of Byram's Tavern, at the foot of the first range of hills; c,
the Springfield and Elizabethtown turnpike; d, the Vauxhall Road; e, the
first position of the brigades of Stark and Maxwell, near the mill and
north of the rail-road; f, Shrieve's regiment at the seeond bridge; g,
the mill; h, post of the Americans, on the hills in the rear of Byram's
Tavern. The other localities are printed on the map.

Washington deceived by Clinton.--Second Invasion under Knyphausen.--
Disposition of opposing Troops.--The Battle

323barking troops in transports on the Hudson, as if an expedition was
intended against "West Point. Washington _was_ deceived by this
movement, and, with a considerable force, marched toward the Highlands,
leaving Major-general Greene in command at Springfield. Clinton,
perceiving the success of his stratagem, crossed over to Elizabethtown,
with Knyphausen and additional troops, and at break of day on the 23d
the whole army, consisting June, 1780 of about five thousand infantry, a
considerable body of cavalry, and from fifteen to twenty pieces of
artillery, advanced toward Springfield. They moved in two columns, one
on the main road (the present turnpike) leading to Springfield, the
other on the Vauxhall Road, leading to the principal pass among the
Short Hills, a series of high ridges at the head of the Springfield
plains. The Americans were under the immediate command of Greene. The
right column of the enemy, on the Vauxhall Road, was opposed by Major
Henry Lee with his cavalry, and some pickets under Captain Walker, and
the left was confronted by Colonel Dayton, of the New Jersey line. * The
remainder of the American troops had been posted upon the roads leading
to the different passes over the mountains, and it was with considerable
difficulty that they were collected in force at Springfield to oppose
the enemy concentrating there. The latter, after maneuvering to gain the
flanks of the Americans, formed upon a gentle eminence on the eastern
side of the Rahway, near the house of Mrs. Mathews, which is still
standing. Colonel Angell, with his regiment, was posted in the orchard
upon the knoll west of the stream, with a single field piece under the
charge of Captain Littell, to defend the bridge; and Colonel Shrieve's
regiment was drawn up at the second bridge, in the rear of the town, to
cover the retreat of the Americans, if such a movement should become
necessary.

Lee's dragoons, and the pickets under Captain Walker, were stationed at
the Vauxhall Bridge, and the militia were drawn up on the flanks,
principally under the command of General Dickinson, of New Jersey.

The first attack was made by the enemy upon Lee's force at the Vauxhall
Bridge, and the Americans were repulsed. At that instant the British 1
>* Vv troops near the first Springfield Bridge moved to attack Colonel
Angell in the orchard. Captain Littell played his artillery so briskly
and well, that he kept the enemy east of the bridge for some time; but
bringing their artillery to bear, they pressed forward, forded the
stream (which is there only about two rods wide), and drove the
Americans from their position and across the second bridge. The
artillery of the British, being leveled too high, did but little
execution, except among the branches of the apple-trees, and the
Americans retreated with very little loss.

The enemy were warmly received at the second bridge by Shrieve's
regiment, but overwhelming numbers obliged the gallant little band of
Americans to fall bak and join the brigades of Maxwell and Stark upon
the hill. The situation of the patriot army was now critical. The enemy
was pushing vigorously forward on the Vauxhall Road, leading in

* Elias Dayton was born in Elizabethtown, New Jersey, in 1735. He joined
the army during the French and Indian war. He was a member of the corps
called "Jersey Blues," raised in 1759 by Edward Hart, the father of
John, one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. With that
corps he fought under Wolfe at Quebec. He was one of the Committee of
Safety at Elizabethtown at the beginning of the Revolution; in February,
1778, Congress appointed him colonel of a New Jersey regiment; and in
1782 he was promoted to the rank of brigadier general. He was in several
of the principal battles of the Revolution, and had three horses shot
under him--one at Germantown, one at Springfield, and one at Crosswick
Bridge. He was the first president of the Cincinnati of New Jersey, and,
during the life of Washington, enjoyed the warm personal friendship of
that distinguished man. He died at Elizabethtown in 1807.

** This sketch was made from the left bank of the Rahway, at the site of
the old bridge. This is now the rear of the house, but, at the time of
the battle, the road was upon this side of it, which formed the front.
The deviation of the road is indicated in the map by a dotted line
Remains of the abutments of the old bridge, where the British crossed,
may still be seen.

Partial Retreat of the Americans.--Burning of Springfield.--Retreat of
the Enemy.--Colonel Barber.--Connecticut Farms.

324their rear, and their numbers were too small to guard the several
passes through the mountains, and have a respectable force engaged in
battle. Greene accordingly ordered the main body of the army, except the
two brigades already mentioned, to take post on the hills in the rear of
Byram's Tavern, and detached the regiments of Colonels Webb and Jackson,
with one piece of artillery, to check the advance of the enemy on the
Vauxhall Road. The movement was successful, and that important pass was
secured.

The Americans were now advantageously posted, and General Greene was
anxious for an engagement; but Knyphausen saw his own disadvantage, and,
after setting fire to the village, began a retreat toward Elizabethtown.
Greene ordered out detachments to extinguish the flames of such houses
as were not within the reach of the enemy's cannon, but their efforts
were of little avail. The church, and every house and barn in the
village but three, were burned. One of the latter now stands close by
the tavern of Mr. Reynolds. It is a very well built house, and exhibits
an orifice in the northwestern gable, made by the passage of a cannon-
ball. The parsonage was saved, and in it the congregation worshiped
until a more convenient place was supplied.

As soon as the village was fired, the enemy began their retreat. Captain
Davis, with one hundred and twenty men and large parties of militia,
fell upon their flanks and rear, and kept up a continual fire upon them
all the way to Elizabethtown. The retreat was so precipitate that
Stark's brigade, which was put in motion, could not overtake them. At
midnight the enemy began crossing over to Staten Island on a bridge of
boats, and by six o'clock in the morning they had evacuated
Elizabethtown and removed their bridge. * The loss in killed and wounded
has not been fully given on either side. Lieutenant-colonel Barber, in
his return to General Greene, reported thirteen Americans killed, and
fifty-eight wounded and missing. In this report was not included the
return of Davis's detachment and of the militia that pursued the enemy
to Elizabethtown. The militia had twelve wounded and none killed. The
loss of the enemy is unknown. The newspapers of the day put down their
loss in the skirmish at Connecticut Farms and vicinity, two weeks
previous, at one hundred and fifty killed, and as many wounded. Colonel
Barber, who acted as deputy adjutant general on the occasion, was
particularly recommended for his activity, by General Greene, in his
report of the engagement. ** General Washington, on hearing of the
movement of the enemy toward Springfield, sent a re-enforcement, but it
was too late to save the town. Greene, in his report, says, "I lament
that our force was too small to save the town from ruin. I wish every
American could have been a spectator; they would have felt for the
sufferers, and joined to revenge the injury."

After much difficulty, I procured a conveyance to Elizabethtown. Mr.
Meeker, a resident of Springfield, seventy-four years old, kindly left
his plow, and in a light wagon took me thither, by the way of
Connecticut Farms, a small village now called Union, lying four miles
northwest of Elizabethtown. Almost every building in that village was
destroyed by the British invaders while on their way to Springfield, on
the 6th of June, 1780. An event occurred there at that time, which
excited the greatest indignation throughout the country. The family of
the Rev. James Caldwell, the pastor of the First Presbyterian Church at
Elizabethtown, and an ardent Whig, had removed to Connecticut Farms as a
place of greater security, and occupied the parsonage. Mrs. Caldwell was
the daughter of John Ogden, of Newark, and was greatly beloved for her
piety and benevolence. When she heard of the

* Report of General Greene to the commander-in-chief.

** Francis Barber was born at Princeton in 1751, and was educated at the
College of New Jersey. He was installed rector of an academic
institution connected with the First Presbyterian Church at
Elizabethtown, in which situation he remained until the commencement of
the Revolution. He joined the patriot army, and in 1776 was commissioned
by Congress a major of the third battalion of New Jersey troops: at the
close of the year was appointed lieutenant colonel, and subsequently
became assistant inspector general under Baron Steuben. He was in
constant service during the whole war, was in the principal battles, and
was present at the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown. He was with the
Continental army at Newburgh in 1783; and on the very day when
Washington announced the signing of the treaty of peace to the army, he
was killed by a tree falling upon him while riding by the edge of a
wood.--Rev. Nicholas Murray.

Murder of Mrs. Caldwell.--Her Murderer Identified.--Timothy Meeker and
his Sons.--His Idea of a Standing Anny.

325approach of the enemy, and the people fled from the town, she
resolved to remain, trusting in Providence for protection. When they
entered the village, she withdrew, with her infant in her arms, into a
private apartment, and engaged in religious devotions. A maid, who had
charge of the other children, and accompanied her to the private
apartment, saw a "redcoat soldier" jump over the fence into the yard,
and told Mrs. Caldwell that he was approaching the window. Mrs. Caldwell
arose from a bed on which she had been sitting, and at that moment the
soldier discharged his musket at her through the window. It was loaded
with two balls, both of which passed through her body, and she fell
lifeless upon the floor, in the midst of her children. * It was with
much difficulty that her body was saved from the conflagration that
ensued. It was dragged into the street, and lay exposed for several
hours in the hot sun, when some of her friends procured liberty to take
it to the house of Captain Wade, on the opposite side of the road. Her
husband was at the Short Hills that night, suffering dreadfully from
anxiety respecting his family. The next day he procured a flag and went
to Connecticut Farms, when he found the village in ruins and his wife no
more. That cold-blooded murder, as well as the wanton destruction of the
peaceful village, changed many Tories to Whigs, and helped to confirm
the settled hatred of the well-affected and the patriots against the
British government, whose military officers winked at such atrocities.

On our way, Mr. Meeker related some interesting facts concerning his
family. His grandfather was a stanch republican, and had eight sons and
four sons-in-law in the Continental army, who were remarkable for their
physical strength and moral courage. The father of Mr. Edwards, the old
gentleman who went over the Springfield battle-ground with me, was one
of the sons-in-law. One of his sons (Mr. Meeker's father) lived up among
the Short Hills, and was a substantial farmer. A conversation which he
had one day with General Dayton, at Elizabethtown, well illustrates the
political character of many of the yeomanry of that period. While a
portion of the standing army, under the administration of the elder
Adams, was at Elizabethtown, Mr. Meeker went to General Dayton to pay
his direct tax, in hard cash, for the support of the army. "Of what use
is your standing army?" asked Meeker. "To support Congress," replied
Dayton. "Ay, to support Congress indeed," said the old man, bitterly.
"To support Congress in taking away our liberties, and in altering the
Constitution so as to place men in public offices for life. I fought for
freedom through the war for nothing (his Continental money was
worthless), and now I want to pay for my land and be _independent_
indeed, but tax upon tax keeps me poor. I could at any time raise one
hundred men among my neighbors upon the Short Hills, say privately to
your standing army, 'Come and help us'--and they would come, and we'd
march to Philadelphia and take your Congressmen from their seats. We
will not have a standing army. Disband it."

"Our standing army," said Dayton, "will intimidate the British."

"Look ahere, General Dayton," said Meeker, while his eyes sparkled with
emotion, "you are well acquainted in London. Write to your acquaintances
there, and tell them that Timothy Meeker is dead, and that he has left
seven sons, every one of whom is a stronger man than he. Tell them we
are seven times stronger than before, and that will intimidate them more
than all your standing armies, that suck the life-blood from the
people." Such was the logic of New Jersey farmers in 1798, and our
government soon acted in accordance with it.

We reached Elizabethtown at about noon, and having ample time before the
departure

* Such is the current history, and the diabolical act was fixed upon "a
British soldier." Some believed that the occurrence was a mere accident,
resulting from the cross firing of the combatants, but there is ample
evidence that it was a deliberate murder. A correspondent of the Newark
Advertiser says that "there is evidence of a very direct character,
which affixes the guilt of murder of the poor lady to a particular
individual."

"A very respectable citizen," he adds, "lately deceased, who was a
witness of the scenes of that day, says that a man named M'Donald, from
the north of Ireland, who had been in the employment of Mr. Caldwell, or
of his family, was the person who committed the atrocious deed. This
man, from some unknown cause, had conceived a violent enmity against his
employer, and it was in this manner he satiated his revenge. The witness
to whom reference is now made, further declared that he saw M'Donald
after the murder, and heard him avow it, saying, at the same time, that
'now he was satisfied,' upon which he joined and went off with the
enemy."

Burial-ground at Elizabethtown.--Caldwell's Monument.--Dickinson's
Tomb.--Boudinot's Vault.

326of the evening train for Middlebrook, my next tarrying-place, I
visited the several Revolutionary localities in the vicinity.

The burial-ground of the First Presbyterian Church, on Broad Street, was
the chief attraction within the village, for therein repose the remains
of many distinguished men of the Revolution. The church that occupied
the site of the present one was burned on the night of the 25th of
January, 1780, together with the academy (which stood upon the ground of
the present lecture room) and the court-house. A notorious Tory named
Cornelius Hetfield fired the church with his own hands, and was heard to
lament that the "black-coated rebel," as he called Dr. Caldwell, the
pastor, was not burned in his pulpit.

Near the Broad Street front of the burying ground stands the monument
erected to the memory of the Rev. James Caldwell and his wife, by
citizens of Elizabethtown. It is a handsome marble obelisk, which, with
an inscribed pedestal, rests upon a granite base. On the left in the
picture are seen a recumbent slab, and also an upright one. The former
is of brown stone, and covers the grave of Jonathan Dickinson, * the
founder of the College of New Jersey, now located at Princeton; the
latter is of white marble, and is sacred to the memory of Margaret Van
Pelt, a grand-daughter of Mr Caldwell. On the west side of the cemetery,
in the rear of the church, are several vaults shaded by a venerable oak,
among which is that of the celebrated Elias Boudinot, who was president
of Congress in 1782, and an active patriot during the Revolution. Of him
I shall have occasion to write hereafter. A little south of Boudinot's
vault is that of General Dayton, just mentioned, and in the vicinity are
the graves of General Crane, an active patriot of the Revolution;
Colonel Barber, already mentioned; Moses Ogden, a young American
officer, who was killed at Connecticut Farms when that settlement was
burned, and of several others of colonial and Revolutionary eminence,
among whom is Governor Belcher.

* Jonathan Dickinson was born in Hatfield, Massachusetts, April 22d,
1688. He graduated at Yale College in 1706, and two years afterward
became the pastor of the First Presbyterian Church at Elizabethtown, New
Jersey, where he continued nearly forty years. He was the cotemporary of
Whitfield, Brainard, Edwards, and the Tenants. He was chiefly
instrumental in organizing the academy at Elizabethtown, which was
chartered as the College of New Jersey in 1746. He was made its first
president, but the institution did not long enjoy the advantages of his
care, as he died on the 7th of October, 1747, aged fifty-nine. The first
commencement of the college was in 1748, when six young men graduated,
five of whom became ministers of the Gospel.

** The following are the inscriptions upon the Caldwell monument: East
Side. "This monument is erected to the memory of the Rev. James
Caldwell, the pious and fervent Christian, the zealous and faithful
minister, the eloquent preacher, and a prominent leader among the
worthies who secured the independence of his country. His name will be
cherished in the church and in the state so long as Virtue is esteemed
and Patriotism honored."

** West Side. "Hannah, wife of the Rev. James Caldwell, and daughter of
Jonathan Ogden, of Newark, was killed at Connecticut Farms by a shot
from a British soldier, June 25th, * 1780, cruelly sacrificed by the
enemies of her husband and of her country."

** North Side. "'The memory of the just is blessed.' 'Be of good
courage--and let us behave ourselves valiant for our people, and for the
cities of our God, and let the Lord do that which is good in his sight.'
'The glory of children are their fathers.'"

** South Side. "James Caldwell. Born in Charlotte county, in Virginia,
April, 1734. Graduated at Princeton College, 1759. Ordained pastor of
the First Presbyterian Church of Elizabethtown, 1762. After serving as
chaplain in the army of the Revolution, and acting as commissary to the
troops in New Jersey, he was killed by a shot from a sentinel at
Elizabethtown Point, November 24th, 1781."

* This is an error, as will be perceived by reference to the text.

Death of Mr. Caldwell.--Execution of his Murderer.--Mr. Caldwell's
Funeral.--His Orphan Family.

327The death of Mr. Caldwell, which occurred a little more than a year
subsequent to that of his wife, was regarded as a foul murder. He was
shot upon the causeway at old Elizabethtown Point, by an American
sentinel named Morgan, who was hung for the deed. The circumstances are
substantially as follows. At the time of the occurrence the Americans
had possession of Elizabethtown, and there was established there a
commissariat of prisoners, under the superintendence of Major Adams. To
facilitate the business for which the commissariat was established, a
sloop made weekly trips between the Point and New York, then the
headquarters of the British army. Passengers with a flag, and also
parcels, were frequently carried by this vessel, and a strong guard was
placed at a tavern on the shore, having one or more sentinels upon the
causeway that extended across the marsh to the wharf On the 24th of
November, 1781, this vessel arrived at the wharf, having on board a Miss
Berlah Murray (afterward Mrs. Martin Hoffman), who had permission to
visit her sister (Mrs. Barnett), at Elizabethtown. Mr. Caldwell went
down to the sloop in his chaise to receive her, but she was not there.
He went on board the vessel, when a small bundle belonging to her was
placed in his charge, with which he started for his vehicle. James
Morgan, a sentinel on duty upon the causeway, ordered Mr. Caldwell to
deliver his bundle to him for examination, as his orders were not to let
any thing of the kind pass without strict scrutiny. Mr. Caldwell told
him it was the property of a lady, which had been placed in his charge,
and refused to give it up. The sentinel reiterated his demand, when Mr.
Caldwell turned from him, and, it is said, went toward the vessel to
leave the bundle, rather than subject it to the inspection of the
soldier. The latter, probably irritated by disobedience of his orders,
and, it may be, by words, leveled his musket and shot Mr. Caldwell dead
upon the spot. Opinions were, and still are, various as to the motive of
the sentinel. Some justify him as acting in strict obedience to his
orders; others believe him to have been bribed to murder the active
patriot when the first opportunity should offer; and others, again,
simply condemn him for exceeding the spirit of his instructions. Morgan
was arrested, the coroner's inquest brought in a verdict of willful
murder against him, and he was tried, found guilty, and executed at
Westfield on the 29th of January, 1782. He was taken to the church,
where a sermon was preached by the Rev. Jonathan Elmer, from the words
of Jeremiah, "O, do not this abominable thing which I hate and
immediately after the close of the services the prisoner was hung. The
place of his execution is about half a mile north of the church, in
Westfield, and still bears the name of Morgan's Hill. A local
controversy has arisen upon the subject, which seems to turn more upon
the _inferences_ of the several writers than upon the material facts
here given. "Who shall decide when doctors disagree?" Cotemporary
records form the best umpire in such cases, and correct history, the
_patient_ in question, is not likely to suffer from such a disagreement.

The death of Mr. Caldwell, a pious and eloquent minister, and such an
active patriot, made a powerful impression on the public mind, and there
was "a voice of mourning" wherever his eminent virtues were known. It
was Saturday afternoon when he was shot. His body was conveyed to the
house of his friend, Mrs. Noel, whence it was buried the following
Tuesday. "Many," says Dr. Murray, "were ignorant of the tragical deed
until they came to church on the Sabbath; and, instead of sitting with
delight under his instructions, there was a loud cry of wailing over his
melancholy end. There was a vast concourse assembled to convey him to
his tomb. The corpse was placed on a large stone before the door of the
house of Mrs. Noel (now the residence of Miss Spalding), where all could
take a last view of the remains of their murdered pastor. After all had
taken their last look, and before the coffin was closed, Dr. Elias
Boudinot came forward, leading nine orphan children, and, placing them
around the bier of their parent, made an address of surpassing pathos to
the multitude in their behalf." *

I rode down to Elizabethtown Point, a place famous in the annals of the
Revolution.

* Notes on Elizabethtown, page 77. The funeral sermon was preached by
Dr. M'Whorter, of Newark, from Ecclesiastes, viii., 8.

Old Elizabethport.--Ancient Tavern and Wharf.--Fortification of the
Point.--Naval Expedition.--Franklin Stove

328The distance is about two miles, and so nearly adjacent are the
houses along the road, that it may be said the village extends all the
way to the Point. The old wharf or landing is about three quarters of a
mile northeast of the present bustling port, and only a solitary
dwelling, the traces of the eauseway, and the apparition, at low water,
of some of the logs of the ancient wharf, constitute the remains of the
Revolution there, exeept slight indications of the works thrown up by
the Americans in the rear.

Making a journey in a direct line through some shrub oaks and a field of
tangled buckwheat, I visited and sketched the old tavern, now the
property of Mr. Isham, of New York, where many of the stirring scenes of
the Revolution occurred. There American and British officers were
alternately quartered, from 1776 until the close of the war, and in that
house the corpse of Mr. Caldwell was laid while a wagon was procured to
convey it to the town. In front of it is a flat shore, overflowed at
high tide, across which was a substantial eauseway about seventy-five
rods in length, with a wharf at the end. Here was, the landing-plaee of
troops passing and repassing to and from Staten Island, closely
contiguous; and from this wharf extended the bridge of boats over whieh
the British retreated after the battle of Springfield. There Washington
embarked in the barge prepared to convey him to New April 24, 1789 York,
to be inaugurated the first President of the United States, and in the
old tavern he breakfasted that morning.

When the British fleet appeared off Sandy Hook with the troops of
General Howe, in June, 1776, great alarm spread through New Jersey; for,
as the Americans then had military occupation of New York city, it was
supposed the enemy would land on the Jersey coast. Governor Livingston,
at the head of the New Jersey militia, established his camp at
Elizabethtown Point, and caused a fortification to be constructed by
digging ditches and throwing up breast-works, whieh extended from the
old to the new Point, and on which a few cannons were mounted. These
works were never of any material use, and hardly a vestige of them
remains.

From the Point several water expeditions were fitted out, for the narrow
and tortuous channel, and low, marshy shore protected the place from the
visits of large vessels of war. One of these expeditions was under the
eommand of Elias Dayton and William Alexander. The latter is better
known in our history as Lord Stirling, and was Governor Shirley's
military secretary at Albany twenty years before. Informed that a
British transport and provision ship was on the coast, the Committee of
Safety at Elizabethtown ordered four armed boats to attempt its capture.
They came in sight of the vessel about forty miles from Sandy Hook. The
men in the boats were all concealed under hatches, except two in each,
unarm-

* This view is looking eastward. In the distance, on the right, is seen
a vessel, at the entrance of Newark Bay, and the land beyond is the high
ground intervening between it and Jersey City. In one of the rooms of
the old tavern is a Franklin stove, which has probably been a tenant
there ever since it came from the foundery. I gave a sketch of it, not
only because it is a relic of the time, but because it doubtless shows
the form of the stove as invented by Dr. Franklin in 1742,* before an
"improvement" was made. On its front, in raised letters, are the words
"Ross and Bird's Hibernia Foundry, 1782." Ross had a foundery at
Elizabethtown in 1774, as appears by the inscription upon the dinner-
bell of Sir William Johnson, now in the belfry of the old Caughnawaga
Church at Fonda. See note, page 233.

* Franklin says, in reference to this invention, "Governor Thomas was so
pleased with the construction of this stove, that he offered to give me
a patent for the sole vending of them for a term of years; but I
declined it, from a principle which has ever weighed with me on such
occasions, viz., that, as we enjoy great advantages from the inventions
of others, we should be glad of an opportunity to serve others by an
invention of ours; and this we should do freely and generally." A London
iron-monger made some alterations, which Franklin says "hurt its
operation," got a patent for it there, and made a small fortune by it.

Capture of a Provision Ship.--Privateering.--London Trading.--"Liberty
Hall."--Designs against Governor Livingston.

329ed, who managed the oars. The enemy mistook them for fishing vessels,
and allowed them to come along side. At a preconcerted signal, the
hatches were raised, the armed Americans poured upon the deck of the
ship, and in a few minutes she was their prize, hardly a show of
resistance having been made. She was taken in triumph to Elizabethtown
Point, where her cargo was landed. This exploit was performed in the
summer of 1775, soon after the battle on Bunker Hill. Some privateering
expeditions were fitted out here and at Amboy during the war; but, with
the exception of the invasion already detailed, there were few military
operations there. There are a few blemishes in the general good
character for Whiggery, claimed by Elizabethtown. During the war there
was a great deal of "London trading," or supplying the enemy with
provisions and other things, carried on there. The high price paid by
the British on Staten Island tempted even the most ardent Whigs to put
money in their purses by the traffic. Many took their pay in British
goods, and actually opened stores in the village with articles thus
obtained. Governor Livingston, alluding to the practice, said, "The
village now consists of unknown, unrecommended strangers, guilty-looking
Tories, and very knavish Whigs."

Having an hour to spare on my return to the village, I walked out to old
"Liberty Hall," the former residence of Governor Livingston, now the
property of Mr. John Kean. It is a fine old mansion, imbowered in shrubs
and overshadowed by venerable trees. It is situated upon the left of the
Springfield Turnpike, beyond the Elizabeth Enver, and about three
fourths of a mile north of the rail-way station in the village. Governor
Livingston was an active partisan, and during the whole war was
continually employed in public duties or in wielding his pen in favor of
the Republican cause. For this reason he was extremely obnoxious to the
enemy, and particularly to the Tories, whom he cordially hated and
despised. Several attempts were made to abduct him, but they were all
unsuccessful. It was also said that Sir Henry Clinton offered a bounty
for his life, if he could not be taken alive, and that a prominent Tory
of New Jersey had been solicited to assassinate him for a price. Of this
Governor Livingston accused Clinton, in a letter. The latter did not
deny the charge, but, in a very discourteous reply, said, "Had I a soul
capable of harboring so infamous an idea as assassination, you, sir, at
least, would have nothing to fear; for, be assured, I should not blacken
myself with so foul a crime to obtain so trifling an end." Sir Henry,
however, thought the "end not too trifling" to fit out an expedition for
the express purpose of capturing the "rebel governor." It was midnight,
on the 28th of February, 1779, that a party of British troops, sent by
Clinton from New York, landed at Elizabethtown Point, and,

* Some time after the death of Governor Livingston this property was
purchased by Lord Bolingbroke, who, under the assumed name of John
Belesis, ran away from England with a daughter of Baron Hompaseh, a
German general. She was at a boarding school there, and Bolingbroke had
a wife living. He married the girl here. She died in England in 1848.
The grandmother of the present proprietor, Susan, the daughter of Peter
Van Burgh Livingston, bought the farm of Lord Bolingbroke, and it has
been in possession of the family ever since. Her first husband was John
Kean, a member of Congress from South Carolina from 1785 to 1787, and
was first cashier of the first United States Bank, chartered by an act
of Congress passed February 8th, 1791. Her second husband was Count
Nicmccwicz, a Polish nobleman.

Scenes at "Liberty Hall."--Spirit of Governor Livingston's Daughters.--
Sketch of the Life of Livingston

330marching directly to "Liberty Hall," burst open the doors, and
shouted vociferously for "the damned rebel governor." Fortunately, the
governor had left home some hours before, to pass the night with a
friend, a few miles distant. After becoming convinced that he was not
there, they demanded his papers. Those of the greatest importance (his
recent correspondence with Washington, and with Congress and the state
officers) were in the box of his sulky, in his parlor. This box the
officer in command was about to seize, when Livingston's daughter
Catharine, a girl of great spirit and presence of mind, represented to
him that the box contained her private property, and appealed to his
courtesy as a gentleman and a soldier to protect it for her. A guard was
placed over it, and she then led the men to the library, where they
filled their foraging bags with worthless law papers. After threatening
to burn the house, they returned to Elizabethtown, burned one or two
dwellings in the village, and then departed for New York. *

Mr. Sedgwick relates a tradition connected with the family of Governor
Livingston. At the time of the invasion, when the village of Connecticut
Farms was burn ed, Governor Livingston was absent from home on official
duty. The family had spent the day in great alarm, for immediately in
front of their dwelling the smoke and flames of the conflagration of
that village were distinctly seen.

Late in the evening several British officers came to the house, told
them that then-troops were retreating, and proposed to pass the night
there. The family felt secure from marauders while such protectors were
present, and retired to bed.

About midnight they were aroused. The officers were called away, and
soon afterward some exclaiming, "God! it's Mrs. Caldwell, that we killed
to-day!"

Drunken soldiers rushed into the hall, swearing that they would burn the
"rebel house." There were none but women in the house. The maid servant
fastened herself in the kitchen, and the ladies of the family locked
themselves in another room. The ruffians discovered their hiding-place,
and, fearing to exasperate them by refusing to come out, one of the
governor's daughters boldly opened the door. A drunken soldier seized
her by the arm, and at the same moment she seized him by the collar with
a force that alarmed him At that instant a gleam of light illumined the
hall and fell upon the white dress of the lady. The soldier staggered
back, They soon left the house.

* Sedgwick's Life of William Livingston, p. 322.

** William Livingston was descended from the old Scotch family of that
name, whose first representative in this country was Robert, the "first
lord of the manor" upon the Hudson. He was born in November, 1723, and
graduated in Yale College in 1741. He was well educated, and possessed
many solid as well as brilliant attainments in law and literature. He
early espoused the cause of the colonists, and, having removed from New
York to New Jersey, was elected a delegate to the first Continental
Congress from that state. In 1776, after the people of New Jersey had
sent Governor Franklin, under a strong guard, to Connecticut, Mr.
Livingston was elected chief magistrate of the state; and such were his
acknowledged talents, and republican virtue, and the love of the people
for him, that he was annually elected to that office until his death. In
1787 he was a delegate to the convention that formed the Federal
Constitution; and, after being actively employed in public life for
almost twenty years, he died at "Liberty Hall," near Elizabethtown, July
25th, 1790, aged sixty-seven years. The silhouette here given is copied
from one in Sedgwick's Life of Livingston, which he says was probably
taken from life, about 1773. The Livingstons are descended from a noble
Scotch family. Lord Livingston, afterward Earl of Linlithgow, was one of
the custodians of Mary, Queen of Scots, while in Dumbarton Castle in
1547. The great-grandson of the Earl was John Livingston, a pious Scotch
minister who fled from persecution, and went to Holland. He was the
common ancestor of all the Livingstons in America. His son Robert, the
first "lord of the manor" of Livingston, in Columbia County, New York,
came to America about 1675, and from him all the family in this country
have descended. They were all remarkable for their patriotism during the
Revolution: and for sixty years afterward the Livingstons were among our
prominent public men.

Arrival at Middlebrook.--Place of the Encampment of the American Army.--
Howe's Stratagem.--Skirmishes

331I left Elizabethtown in the cars, at about three o'clock, and arrived
at Middlebrook, a pleasant little village on the Raritan, toward sunset,
passing on the way Scotch Plains and the thriving town of Plainfield.
The road passes over an almost level country, and, though the soil is
light and sandy, thrift appeared on every side. Middlebrook and
Roundbrook lie close together, and are included in one village. Here,
toward the last of May, 1777, Washington encamped his army, after
breaking up his cantonments at Morristown. His troops rapidly augmented;
and when, in June, General Howe began to show some disposition to open
the summer campaign, the American army mustered about fourteen thousand
effective men. They were strongly posted upon the Heights of
Middlebrook, in the rear of the village, near the place of the winter
encampment in 1778-9, which will be presently noticed. Washington
suspected Howe's design to be to make an attempt to capture
Philadelphia. He concentrated the Northern forces on the Hudson; a
strong division under Arnold was posted on the Delaware, and a
considerable force was under his immediate command at Middlebrook.
General Howe had encamped at New Brunswick, ten miles distant, and
endeavored to draw Washington out from his strong position, into a
general engagement upon the plains. But the chief would not hazard a
battle while his forces were so divided. Howe remained two days at New
Brunswick; but, concluding that Washington was too strongly posted among
the hills to be attacked with impunity, the British commander sought to
accomplish by stratagem what he had failed to do by open and obvious
movements. For this purpose June 14,1777 he advanced rapidly toward
Somerset Court-house, feigning a design to cross the Delaware. Failing
to draw Washington from his post by this maneuver, he made another
feint, a few days afterward, which succeeded better. He suddenly
retreated, first a June, 19 toward New Brunswick, (a) and then to Amboy,
(b) and even sent some detachments [b June 22] over to Staten Island.
Partly deceived by these movements, and hoping to reap some advantage by
harassing the British rear, Washington sent strong detachments after the
retreating enemy, and also advanced with his whole force to Quibbletown
(now New Market), five or six miles from Middlebrook. This was exactly
what Howe desired to accomplish, and, accordingly, on the night of the
25th, he suddenly recalled his troops from Staten June Island and Amboy,
and early the next morning marched rapidly toward the American lines,
hoping to cut off their retreat to Middlebrook, and thus bring on a
general action. Washington was too quick and vigilant for Howe, and
reached his strong position again. The advanced guard of the British
fell in with Lord Stirling's division, and a warm skirmish ensued. On
the approach of Cornwallis with a considerable force, Stirling retreated
to his camp with inconsiderable loss. Other skirmishes ensued, but
neither party suffered much. At Westfield the British forces wheeled,
and, marching back to Amboy, passed over to Staten Island, leaving the
Americans in the quiet possession of New Jersey.

It was on the gentle slope from the plain to the steep acclivities of
the mountain in the rear of Middlebrook, that seven brigades of the
American army were _hutted_during the winter of 1779--80. After the
battle of Monmouth, (c) the American army crossed the c June 28,1778
Hudson River, and took post chiefly in Westchester county. The head-
quarters of Washington were at White Plains. In the mean while the Count
d'Estaing had arrived at Sandy Hook with a French fleet; but, being
unable to pass the bar with his heavy ships, to attack Lord Howe in the
bay, he sailed eastward to co-operate with General Sullivan in a
proposed attack upon Newport, on Rhode Island. Of this expedition, which
proved unsuccessful, I shall hereafter write.

Washington continued at White Plains until late in autumn, suspecting
the design of Sir Henry Clinton to be to make a movement eastward. Sir
Henry gave currency to the reports that such were his intentions, until
Washington moved his head-quarters to Freder-

Clinton's Operations in New Jersey.--Disposition of the American
Forces.--Encampment at Middlebrook.--Pluckemin.

332icsburg, near the Connecticut line, and turned his attention
decidedly to the protection of the eastern coast. Clinton then sent
foraging parties into New Jersey, and ravaged the whole country, from
the Hudson to the Raritan, and beyond. The abandonment of the siege of
Newport, the return of Howe's fleet to New York, and the entire
withdrawal of forces from the east by Clinton, except those stationed
upon Rhode Island, convinced Washington that the British commander had
no further designs in that direction, and he prepared to put his army
into the most advantageous winter-quarters. Nine brigades were stationed
on the west side of the Hudson, exclusive of the garrison at West Point.
One of these was at Smith's Cove, in the rear of Haverstraw, one at
Elizabethtown, and the other seven were at Middlebrook. Six brigades
were cantoned on the east side of the Hudson and at West Point. One was
at West Point, two were at Continental Village, a hamlet near Peekskill,
and three in the vicinity of Danbury, in Connecticut. The artillery was
at Pluckemin, in Bedminster county, New Jersey. * The head-quarters of
the chief were in the vicinity of Middlebrook. Knox, Greene, and Steuben
were among the general officers that accompanied him; and the ladies of
several of the officers, among whom was Mrs. Washington, enlivened the
camp by their presence during the winter.

The place of encampment was about three fourths of a mile northwest from
the village. Log huts were completed, for the use of the soldiers, in
February, after they had suffered exposure under canvas tents for
several weeks. The huts, according to the description of Dr. Thacher,
who was there, were made very comfortable by filling the interstices
between the logs with mud, as log houses in our Western and Southwestern
states are now made. The huts were arranged in straight lines, forming a
regular and compact village. The officers' huts were arranged in front
of the line, according to their rank, with kitchens in the rear; and the
whole was similar in form to a tent encampment. Remains of these are
still found in the fields where the encampment was. I could not
ascertain where Washington was quartered; and, as far as I could learn
by inquiries, there is only one house remaining in the neighborhood
which was occupied by any of the general officers at that time, and that
is the dwelling of Mr. Staats, where Major-general Baron Steuben had his
quarters. From a remark by Dr. Thacher, in his Military Journal (page
156), I infer that Washington's quarters were at or near Pluckemin, a
few miles from the camp. The doctor speaks of an event that occurred
"near head-quarters, at Pluckemin."

In the evening of my arrival at Middlebrook, I called on Mrs. Polly Van
Norden, a small, but vigorous old lady, eighty-four years of age. She
lived near the Monmouth battle-ground at the time of the conflict there,
and was well acquainted with the sufferings of the Whigs in that region
from the depredations of the desperate band of Tories called the Pine
Robbers. She was a woman of strong but uncultivated mind, and became
excited with feelings of the

* Pluckerain lies at the base of a high mountain, about six miles
northwest of Somerville. There the American army halted on the 4th of
January, 1777 (the day after the battle of Princeton), on its way to
Morristown. In the village burial-ground is the grave of Captain Leslie,
of the British army, who was mortally wounded at Princeton. Mr. Custis,
in his Recollections of the Life of Washington, says, "It was while the
commander-in-chief reined up his horse, upon approaching the spot, in a
plowed field, where lay the gallant Colonel Harslet, mortally wounded,
that he perceived some British soldiers supporting a wounded officer,
and, upon inquiring his name and rank, was answered, 'Captain Leslie.'
Dr. Benjamin Rush, who formed a part of the general's suite, earnestly
asked, 'A son of the Earl of Levin?' to which the soldiers replied in
the affirmative. The doctor then addressed the general-in-chief: 'I beg
your excellency to permit this wounded officer to be placed under my
care, that I may return, in however small a degree, a part of the
obligation I owe to his worthy father for the many kindnesses received
at his hands while a student at Edinburgh.' The request was immediately
granted; but, alas! poor Leslie was soon _past all surgery._" He died
the same evening, after receiving every possible kindness and attention,
and was buried the next day at Pluckemin, with the honors of war. His
troops, as they lowered the body to the soldier's last rest, shed tears
of sorrow over the remains of their much-loved commander. On a plain
monument erected to his memory is the following inscription: "In memory
of Captain William Leslie, of the seventh British regiment, son of the
Earl of Levin, in Scotland. He fell, January 3d, 1777, aged 26 years, at
the battle of Princeton. His friend, Benjamin Rush, M.D., of
Philadelphia, hath caused this stone to be erected, as a mark of his
esteem for his worth, and respect for his family."

Steuben's Head quarters.--Recollections of Mrs. Doty.---Visit to the
Camp-ground.---"Washington's Rock." View from it.

September 11, 1848 333bitterest hatred against the Tories while telling
me of their deeds--a hatred, the keenness of which the lapse of seventy
years has scarcely blunted.

Early the following morning, in company with a gentleman of the village,
I rode to the residence of the venerable Bergen Bragaw, a hale old man
of eighty-seven. From him I learned the exact locality of the American
encampment, brother was one of the Pennsylvania line, and my informant
often visited him in the camp. He said the slope where the huts were
erected was heavily timbered at that time, but it was completely cleared
in cutting down trees for the log houses, and has been a cultivated
tract ever since.

From Mr. Bragaw's we rode to the house formerly owned by Abraham Staats,
and now in possession of his son Three sisters survive, one of whom
(Mrs. Jane Doty), nearly eighty years of age, who resided there during
the Revolution, has a clear recollection of many events connected with
Baron Steuben's occupancy of the house. Although she was then a child
eight or ten years old, she remembers the dignity of his appearance, the
urbanity of his manners, for which he was noted, and the elegance and
richness of the ornaments with which he was adorned. She spoke of a
brilliant medal that hung by a ribbon upon his breast. * Mrs. Doty
recollected two visits made to the baron by Washington and his lady, one
to dine and the other to take tea with him. On the latter occasion
several ladies were present. She also remembers an entertainment given
by the bar 1779. on to the American officers and their ladies, on which
occasion the table was spread in a grove near by. This occurred a short
time before the encampment broke up, which event took place early in
June.

Returning to the village, we proceeded to visit the camp-ground, which
is upon the left of the main road over the mountains to Pluckemin; also
"Washington's Rock." The former exhibits nothing worthy of particular
attention; but the latter, situated upon the highest point of the
mountain in the rear of Middlebrook, is a locality, independent of the
associations which hallow it, that must ever impress the visitor with
pleasant recollections of the view obtained from that lofty observatory.
We left our wagon at a point half way up the mountain, and made our way
up the steep declivities along the remains of the old road. How loaded
wagons were managed in ascending or descending this mountain road is
quite inconceivable, for it is a difficult journey for a foot-passenger
to make. In many places not even the advantage of a zigzag course along
the hill sides was employed, but a line as straight as possible was made
up the mountain. Along this difficult way the artillery troops that were
stationed at Pluckemin crossed the mountain, and over that steep and
rugged road heavy cannons were dragged. Having reached the summit, we
made our way through a narrow and tangled path to the bold rock seen in
the picture on the next page. It is at an elevation of nearly four
hundred feet above the plain below, and commands a magnificent view of
the surrounding country included in the segment of a circle of sixty
miles, having its rundle southward. At our feet spread out the beautiful
rolling plains like a map, through which course the wind-

* Baron Steuben had received from the King of Prussia a splendid medal
of gold and diamonds, designating the Order of Fidelity, which he always
wore when in full military dress.

** This view is from the field in front of the house, looking north. The
dwelling is at the end of a lane several rods from the main road leading
to Middlebrook from New Brunswick. It is on the western side of the
Raritan, and about a mile from the bridge near Middlebrook. Only the
center building was in existence at the time in question, and that seems
to have been enlarged. Each wing has since been added. The interior of
the old part is kept in the same condition as it was when Steuben
occupied it, being, like most of the better dwellings of that time,
neatly wainscoted with pine, wrought into moldings and panels.

View from Washington's Rock.--Another similar Rock at Plainfield.--
Celebration at Pluckemin in 1779.

334ing Raritan and the Delaware and Hudson Canal. Little villages and
neat farm-houses dotted the picture in every direction. Southward, the
spires of New Brunswick shot up above the intervening forests, and on
the left, as seen in the picture, was spread the expanse of Raritan and
Amboy Bays, with many white sails upon their bosoms. Beyond were seen
the swelling hills of Staten Island, and the more abrupt heights of
Neversink or Navesink Mountains, at Sandy Hook. Upon this lofty rock
Washington often stood, with his telescope, and reconnoi-tered the
vicinity. He overlooked his camp at his feet, and could have descried
the marchings of the enemy at a great distance upon the plain, or the
evolutions of a fleet in the waters beyond.

In the rear of Plainfield, at an equal elevation, and upon the same
range of hills, is another rock bearing a similar appellation, and from
the same cause. It is near the brow of the mountain, but, unlike the one
under consideration, it stands quite alone, and rises from a slope of
the hill, about twenty-five feet from base to summit.

From this latter lofty position, it is said, Washington watched the
movements of the enemy in the summer of 1777, recorded on page 331.
While upon the mountains, a haze that dimmed the sky in the morning,
gathering into thick clouds, assumed the nimbus form, and menaced us
with rain. This fact, and the expectation of the speedy arrival of the
train for Somerville, where I was to take stage for Easton, on the
Delaware, hurried us back to the village. I met an old February 6, 1778.
gentleman who, though a small boy at the time, remembered the grand
display at Pluckemin during the encampment, on the anniversary of the
alliance of America with France. * He remembered an incident which I
have not seen mentioned in the published accounts of that

* The following account of this celebration, published at the time, will
doubtless interest the reader. It must be remembered that on the 6th of
February, 1778, Dr. Franklin and other American commissioners, and
commissioners appointed by the French government, signed a treaty of
friendship and alliance between the two countries. The event alluded to
occurred on the first anniversary (1779) of the alliance, or a few days
afterward. It was postponed until the 18th, on account of Washington's
absence from camp. The general-in-chief, and all the principal officers
of the army there, Mrs. Washington, Mrs. Knox, Mrs. Greene, and the
ladies and gentlemen for a large circuit around the camp, were of the
company; and there was a vast concourse of spectators from every part of
New Jersey. The artillery were posted upon a piece of rising ground, and
the entertainment was given by General Knox and the officers of the
artillery corps. The entertainment and ball were held at the academy of
the Park. The celebration was commenced at about four o'clock in the
afternoon, by a discharge of thirteen cannons. The company invited then
sat down to dinner in the academy. In the evening a display of fireworks
was made, under the direction of Colonel Stevens, "from the point of a
temple one hundred feet in length, and proportionately high." The temple
showed thirteen arches, each displaying an illuminated painting. The
center arch was ornamented with a pediment larger than any of the
others; and the whole edifice was supported by a colonnade of the
Corinthian order. The illuminated paintings were disposed in the
following order: The 1st arch on the right represented the commencement
of hostilities at Lexington, with this inscription: "The scene opened."
2d. British clemency, represented in the burning of Charlestown,
Falmouth, Norfolk, and Kingston. 3d. The separation of America from
Britain. A magnificent arch broken in the center, with this motto: "By
your tyranny to the people of America, you have separated the wide arch
of an extended empire." 4th. Britain represented as a decaying empire,
by a barren country, broken arches, fallen spires, ships deserting its
shores, birds of prey hovering over its moldering cities, and a gloomy
setting sun. Motto,

"The Babylonian spires are sunk,

Acliaia, Rome, and Egypt moldered down;

Time shakes the stable tyranny of thrones,

And tottering empires crush by their own weight."

* 5th. America represented as a rising empire. Prospect of a fertile
country, harbors and rivers covered with ships, new canals opening,
cities arising amid woods, splendid sun emerging from a bright horizon.
Motto,

"New worlds are still emerging from the deep,

The old descending, in their turns to rise."

* 6th. A grand illuminated representation of Louis the Sixteenth, the
encourager of letters, the supporter of the rights of humanity, the ally
and friend of the American people. 7th. The center arch, The Fathers in
Congress. Motto, "Nil desperandum reipublicae." 8th. The American
philosopher and embassador extracting lightning from the clouds. 9th.
The battle near Saratoga, 7th of October, 1777. 10th. The Convention of
Saratoga. 11th. A representation of the sea fight, off Ushant, between
Count d'Orvil-liers and Admiral Keppel. 12th. Warren, Montgomery,
Mercer, Wooster, Nash, and a crowd of heroes who have fallen in the
American contest, in Elysium, receiving the thanks and praises of
Brutus, Cato, and those spirits who in all ages have gloriously
struggled against tyrants and tyranny. Motto, "Thoso who shed their
blood in such a cause shall live and reign forever." 13th represented
Peace, with all her train of blessings. Her right hand displaying an
olive branch; at her feet lay the honors of harvest; the background was
filled with flourishing cities; ports crowded with ships; and other
emblems of an extensive empire and unrestrained commerce. When the fire-
works were finished, the company concluded the celebration by a splendid
ball, which was opened by Washington, whose partner was the lady of
General Knox.

Incident at Pluckemin.--Departure from Middlebrook.--Somerville.--
Incidents by the Way.--Arrival at Easton.

335affair. He said that several boys had possession of a small swivel,
and, in firing it, one of them, while loading, had his hand blown off by
a premature discharge of the piece. The boy was the son of a widow, and
Washington, hearing of the circumstance, sent his mother two guineas.

I left Middlebrook at noon, and within half an hour was at dinner in
Somerville, five or six miles distant, whence, at one o'clock, I
departed in a stage-coach for Easton. Within the coach were seven grown
persons, three children about ten years old, and two babies of a
respectable size and sound lungs; while on the outside were four
passengers and the driver, and an indefinite quantity of baggage. The
roads were excessively dusty. The rain that commenced falling gently
soon after leaving Somerville relieved us of that annoyance, but
produced a greater--the necessity of having the windows of the coach
closed, to keep out the drippings of the increasing storm. A wheezing
old gentleman in green goggles insisted upon keeping the window open
near him, to save him from suffocation; while a shadowy, middle-aged
lady, upon the next seat, wrapped in a cloak, as earnestly declared that
it should be closed to save her from an ague that had threatened her for
a week. The matter appeared to be very properly a _casus belli_, as
prime ministers say; but, unlike the action of prime ministers in
general, the controversy was compromised by mutual concessions, the
crooked roads over the rough hills presenting a basis for an amicable
treaty of peace. It was agreed that, when the course of the road brought
the lady to the windward, the window was to be closed, and at other
times the gentleman was to be accommodated with fresh air.

The country through which we passed is beautifully diversified with
lofty hills and deep ravines, forming numerous water courses, whose
irrigating streams fertilize the broad valleys which are found
occasionally imbosomed among the less fertile, but cultivated mountains.
Of these, the Musconeteong, * through which flows a small river of the
same euphonious name, dividing the counties of Hunterdon and Warren, is
said to be one of the most charming. We crossed the Musconeteong at the
pretty little village of Bloomsbury, at twilight, but the _gloaming_ and
the rain deprived us of the pleasure of a view of the valley and its
thriving town. We were now within six miles of the Delaware, and as the
darkness deepened the storm increased; and when, at seven o'clock, we
crossed the river, and reined up at the hotel in Easton, we seemed to
alight in the very court of Jupiter Pluvius.

Easton is upon the right bank of the Delaware, at its confluence with
the Lehigh River, thirty-seven miles northwest from Somerville. Arriving
there after dark, and departing the next morning before daylight, I had
no opportunity to view it. It is said to be a place of much business,
and inhabited by a well-educated, social, and highly moral population,
and is in the midst of natural scenery singularly picturesque. It has
but little Revolutionary history, and that relates chiefly to contests
with the Indians. Here the division of the army

* This is an Indian word, signifying "a rapid-running stream."

Sullivan's Expedition.--Indian Council.--Whitefield and Brainerd.

336of Sullivan, under his immediate command, rendezvoused previous to
its flying and desolating campaign against the Six Nations in central
New York in 1779, and hither came the poor fugitives from the blackened
Valley of Wyoming, after the terrible massacre and burning there in
1778. It has history antecedent to this, but in a measure irrelevant to
our subject. Here, in 1758, the chiefs of the Indian tribes, the
Delawares, Shawnees, Miamis, Nanticokes, Mohicans, Conoys, Monseys, and
all of the Six Nations, assembled in grand council with the Governors of
Pennsylvania and New Jersey, Sir William Johnson, and other
distinguished men; and the eloquence and good sense of the great Indian
diplomatist, Teedyuscung, were here displayed on several occasions.
Here, too, before the cabin of the white man was built upon the Delaware
above Trenton, the surrounding hills echoed the voices of the eminent
Whitefield and Brainerd, * as they proclaimed the Gospel of Peace to the
heathen; and here the good Moravians sang their hymns and held their
love-feasts in the wigwams of the Indians.

* George Whitefield was born in Gloucester, England, December 16th,
1714. After making some progress in learning, he was obliged to assist
his mother, who kept an inn. At the age of eighteen he entered Oxford,
where he became acquainted with the Wesleys (John and Charles), the
founders of the Methodists. He joined these eminent Christians, took
orders, and was ordained by the bishop in June, 1736. Mr. John Wesley
was then in Georgia, and by his persuasion Whitefield embarked for
America. He arrived at Savannah in May, 1738, and returned to England in
September following. Bishop Benson ordained him priest in January, 1739.
He made several voyages to America, and traveled through nearly all the
colonies. He went to the Bermudas in 1748. In 1769 he made his seventh
and last voyage to America. After preaching in different parts of the
country, he died suddenly at Newburyport, Massachusetts, September 30th,
1770, aged fifty-five. His powers of eloquence were wonderful, and his
ministry was exceedingly fruitful. His voice was powerful. Dr. Franklin
estimated that thirty thousand people might hear him distinctly when
preaching in the open air. Of him Cowper wrote,

"He loved the world that hated him; the tear

That dropped upon his Bible was sincere;

Assailed by scandal and the tongue of strife,

His only answer was a blameless life;

And he that forged and he that threw the dart,

Had each a brother's interest in his heart.

Paul's love of Christ and steadiness unhribed

Were copied close in him, and well transcribed,

He followed Paul, his zeal a kindred flame,

His apostolic charity the same;

Like him, crossed cheerfully tempestuous seas,

Forsaking country, kindred, friends, and ease;

Like him he labored, and like him content

To bear it, suffer shame where'er he went.

Blush, Calumny I and write upon his tomb,

If honest eulogy can spare thee room,

The deep repentance of thy thousand lies,

Which, aimed at him, have pierced th' offended skies,

And say, blot out my sin, confessed, deplored,

Against thine image in thy saint, oh Lord!"

* David Brainerd was born at Haddam, Connecticut, April 20th, 1718. He
entered Yale College in 1739; but, being expelled in 1742, on account of
some indiscreet remarks respecting one of the tutors, he never obtained
his degree. He immediately commenced the study of divinity. Toward the
close of the year he was licensed to preach, and immediately afterward
was appointed a missionary to the Indians. His first efforts were made
among the Stockbridge Indians, about fifteen miles from Kinderhook, New
York. There he lodged upon straw, and his food was the simple fare of
the savages. After the Stockbridge Indians agreed to remove to
Stockbridge, and place themselves under the instruction of Mr. Sergeant,
Brainerd went to the Indians upon the Delaware. There he labored for a
while, and then visited the Indians at Crossweeksung, or Crosswicks, in
New Jersey, where he was very successful. He worked an entire reform in
the lives of the savages at that place. In the summer of 1746, Mr.
Brainerd visited the Indians upon the Susquehanna. The next spring,
finding his health giving way, he traveled in New England. In July he
halted at Northampton, and there, in the family of Jonathan Edwards, he
passed the remaining weeks of his life. He died October 9th, 1747, aged
twenty-nine years. His exertions in the Christian cause were of short
continuance, but they were intense, incessant, and effectual.

Departure for Wyoming.--Nazareth.--Its Origin.--A chilling Mist--Nap in
the Coach

337

CHAPTER XV.

"On Susquehanna's side, fair Wyoming!

Although the wild flowers on thy ruined wall

And roofless homes a sad remembrance bring

Of what thy gentle people did befall,

Yet thou wert once the loveliest land of all

That see the Atlantic's wave their morn restore."

Campbell.

"Thou com'st in beauty on my gaze at last,

'On Susquehanna's side, fair Wyoming,'

Image of many a dream, in hours long past,

When life was in its bud and blossoming,

And waters, gushing from the fountain spring

Of pure enthusiast thought, dimm'd my young eyes,

As by the poet borne, on unseen wing,

I breathed, in fancy, 'neath thy cloudless skies,

The summer's air, and heard her echoed harmonies."

Halleck

LEFT Easton for the Valley of Wyoming, sixty miles distant, at three
o'clock in the morning. The storm was over, and the broken clouds,
flitting upon a cool wind from the northwest, permitted a few gleams of
moonlight to stray down to earth. Although there were but three
passengers in the coach (two ladies and an infant), I took a seat with
the driver, for there were promises of a bright morning and magnificent
scenery. The coachman was a good-natured Pennsylvania Dutchman, rather
taciturn, and such an adept in his profession that his practiced ear
detected the absence of a shoe from the foot of one of the "leaders"
when three miles from Easton. A blacksmith by the road side was aroused,
the shoe was replaced, and within an hour we had ascended the fertile
slopes of the Delaware and Lehigh, to Nazareth, a Moravian village about
half way between Easton and the Wind-gap in the Blue Mountains. The day
had not yet dawned, yet the snatches of moonlight enabled me to observe
the uniform and neat appearance of the houses in the village.1 We were
now high among the hills, whence the mists from the rivers and valleys
had rolled up when the storm ceased at midnight, and I was glad to take
shelter from the chilling vapor within the coach. The seats were
spacious, and, having one in exclusive possession, I made a couch of it,
using the carpet bag of one of the a pillow, and slept soundly for an
hour. When I awoke, the morning light was

* Nazareth is seven miles northwest of Easton. It contains a church, a
sisters' house, a large and flourishing seminary for boys, and the usual
dead-house and cemetery peculiar to the sect. The place was named, and,
it may be said, founded, by the Rev. George Whitcfield, the eloquent
cosmopolite preacher. He had labored in conjunction with the Moravians
in Georgia. When, about 1740, they refused to take up arms for the
governor of the province, and left Georgia for the more peaceful domain
of William Penn, Whitcfield accompanied them. He began to erect a large
building "in the Forks of the Delaware" as a school for negro children,
while the Moravians, under Bishop Nischman, purchased the site and
founded the town of Bethlehem, about ten miles distant. Whitefield named
his domain, or manor, Nazareth. He did not complete his building, but
sold "the manor of Nazareth" to the Moravians, who finished the edifice.
It is still standing, in the eastern border of the village. The Moravian
Sisters of Bethlehem wrought an elegant banner, and presented it to
Count Pulaski. A drawing of the banner, and the beautiful Consecration
Hymn, written by Longfellow, will be found in another part of this work.

Passage through the Wind-gap--The great Walk.--Roscommon Tavern.--An
Office-hunter.

338abroad, and we were within half a mile of the Wind-gap. I again
mounted the driver's box, for all around us Nature was displaying her
attractions in the plenitude of her magnificence and beauty. Before us,
and in close proximity, were the Blue Mountains, their summits curtained
in a white fog that was rising toward the loftier clouds. Behind us, far
down into the valleys and intervales, orchards, corn-fields, forests,
and meadows were spread out like a carpet of mellow tints, and on every
side the gentle breeze was shaking the rain-drops from the boughs in
diamond showers, glittering in the first rays of the morning sun. While
the bleating of sheep and the bellowing of cattle reminded us of
cultivated fields behind us, the whirring of the pheasant, the drumming
of the partridge, and the whistling of the quail among the rocks and
lofty evergreens around betokened the uncultivated wilderness.

The Wind-gap, unlike the far-famed Water-gap in the same cluster of
mountains, is a deep depression of the summit of the range, is quite
level on both sides of the road for a considerable distance, and
exhibits none of the majestic precipices of the latter. The earth is
covered with masses of angular rocks, among which shoot up cedar and
other trees and shrubs, chiefly of the coniferæ order; but the road, by
industry, is made quite smooth. The hills rise on each side of the Gap
to an altitude of eight hundred feet, clothed and crowned with trees. It
was through this pass in the mountains that two expert walkers crossed
to a spur of the Pocono when measuring the extent of a district of
country northwest of the Delaware, for the proprietors of Pennsylvania,
in 1737. The Indians had agreed, for a certain consideration, to sell a
tract of land included within prescribed points on the river, and
extending back as far as a man could "walk in a day and a half." The
proprietors immediately advertised for the most expert walkers in the
province, and they performed a journey, in the day and a half, of
eighty-six miles! The Indians were greatly dissatisfied, for they had no
idea that such a distance could be accomplished, and it included some of
their finest lands. The walkers _ran_ a considerable portion of the way.
They ate as they traveled, and never stopped from sunrise until sunset.
One old Indian said, bitterly, when complaining of the _cheat_, "No sit
down to smoke--no shoot a squirrel, but lun, lun, lun, all day long."
The Indians, supposing the walk would end not far from the Wind-gap, had
collected there in great numbers; but, to their astonishment, the
walkers reached that point on the evening of the first day.

The turnpike road through the Wind-gap, and across the valleys and
mountains, to Wilkes-barre, was made by Sullivan for the passage of his
troops in 1779, when marching to join General Clinton on the Tioga.
Before that time the pass was little more than a rough Indian war-path,
and its obscurity made the hurried flight of the people from Wyoming
over the solitary region more perplexing and dreadful than it would be
now.

We descended from the Wind-gap, on the western.side of the mountain,
along a steep and winding road, skirting a precipice, crossed a
beautiful mountain stream, and alighted at the Roscommon Tavern, among
the hills, where we breakfasted at seven o'clock. At the table we were
honored by the presence of one of the five candidates for the office of
sheriff of Monroe county. He was out canvassing the district for votes,
and a more earnest, intelligent, good-humored man I have seldom met. His
strongest claim to the honors and emoluments of the office seemed to
rest upon the fact that he was a representative of New England
_pedagogueism_ in the Wyoming Valley as early as "forty years ago had
taught the "young ideas" of the fathers of three Wilkesbarre lawyers
"how to shoot," and, therefore, he assumed to have an undisputed right
to the privilege of hanging the inhabitants of a neighboring county. He
accompanied us to the next tavern, the proprietor of which, a fat little
man, though already bearing upon his shoulders the responsibilities of a
postmaster, was another aspirant ambitiously wheezing for the office of
sheriff. Both were too good-natured to be made _rivals_;

* The Water-gap is the passage through the Kittatinny or Blue Mountains
of the Delaware River, about three miles from Stroudsburg. This village
is upon the Delaware, twenty-four miles above Easton, and was the first
settlement which the fugitives from Wyoming reached when fleeing from
the valley in 1778 There was a fort there, called Hamilton, during the
French and Indian war, and near the eastern end of the village Fort Penn
was built during the Revolution.

Ascent of the Pocono.--The Mountain Scenery.--Solitude of the Region.--A
Soldier Coachman.--First View of Wyoming

339they were only _different candidates_ professing the same political
faith. We left them comparing notes over a glass of whisky, and in the
course of a few hours we had crossed fertile little valleys and parallel
ranges of mountains, and begun the toilsome ascent of the famous Pocono.
From base to summit, the distance, by the road, is about three miles,
one third of which is a straight line up the mountain at an angle of
thirty-five degrees. Then our way was along the precipitous sides of the
hills, from which we could look upon the tops of tall trees, hundreds of
feet below. It was noon when we reached the level summit, two thousand
feet above tide water; and there, three fourths of a mile from the
eastern brow of the mountain, John Smith keeps a tavern, and furnished
us with an excellent dinner.

The road upon the top of Pocono is perfectly level a distance of four
miles; and all the way to the Wilkesbarre Mountains, twenty miles, there
is but little variation in the altitude. On the left, near Smith's, is
an elevation called the Knob, about two hundred feet above the general
level, from the apex of which it is said the highest peaks of the
Catskills, sixty miles distant, may be distinctly seen on a clear
morning. All around is a perfect wilderness as far as the eye can reach,
and so trifling are the variations from a level, that the country
appears like a vast plain. The whole is covered with shrub oaks, from
three to ten feet in height, from which rise lofty pines, cedars, and
tamaracks, interspersed with a few birch and chestnut trees, and
occasionally a mountain ash with its blazing berries. The shrub oaks, at
a distance, appeared like the soft light green grass of a meadow, and
groups of lofty evergreens dotted the expanse like orchards upon a
prairie. Here and there a huge blasted pine, black and leafless, towered
above the rest, a

'Stern dweller of the mountain! with its feet

Grasping the crag, and lifting to the sky

Its haughty crest!"

Vast cranberry marshes spread out upon this high, rolling table-land,
and supply the surrounding settlements with an abundance of that
excellent fruit. Indeed, the whole region is almost a continuous morass,
and the road, a large portion of the way, is a causeway made of logs.
Here the gray eagle wheels undisturbed, the bear makes his lair, and the
wild deer roam in abundance. These, with the flocks of pheasants, and
the numerous rabbits that burrow upon this wild warren, invite the
adventurous huntsman, willing to "camp out" in the wilderness. No
settlements enliven the way; and the cabins and saw-mills of lumbermen,
where the road intersects the streams, are the only evidences of a
resident population, except three or four places where a few acres have
been redeemed from the poverty of nature. This wilderness extends more
than a hundred miles between the Delaware and Susquehanna Rivers, and a
death-like solitude broods over the region.

I kept my seat upon the driver's box all the way from the Wind-gap to
Wilkesbarre, charmed by the romance of the scene, rendered still more
wild and picturesque by the dark masses of cumulous clouds that
overspread the heavens in the afternoon. The wind blew very cold from
the northwest, and the driver assured me that, during the hottest
weather in summer, the air is cool and bracing upon this lofty highway.
Poor fellow, he was an emaciated, blue-lipped soldier, recently returned
from the battle-fields of Mexico, where the _vomito and ague_ had
shattered a hitherto strong constitution, and opened his firm-knit
system to the free entrance of diseases of every kind. He was at Vera
Cruz and Cerro Gordo. He lay sick a whole summer at Perote, and now had
resumed the whip with the feeble hope of regaining lost health.

We crossed the upper waters of the Lehigh at Stoddartsville, in the
midst of the great lumber country, and reached the brow of the
Wilkesbarre Mountains just before sunset. There a scene of rare grandeur
and beauty was revealed, heightened by contrast with the rugged and
forbidding aspect of the region we had just traversed. The heavy clouds,
like a thick curtain, were lifted in the west to the apparent height of
a celestial degree, and allowed the last rays of the evening sun to
flood the deep valley below us with their golden light. The natural
beauties of the vale, reposing in shadow, were for a moment brought

A charming Landscape.--Arrival at Wilkesbarre.--Charles Minor, Esq.--His
Picture of old Wyoming

340out in bold outline; and from our point of view we gazed upon a
picture such as the painter's art can not imitate. Like a thread of
silver the Susquehanna appeared, in its winding course, among the lofty,
overshadowing trees, upon its margin, and the villages, hamlets, green
woodlands, rich bottoms, and fruitful intervales of Wyoming, twenty
miles in extent, and the purple mountains on its western borders were
all included in the range of our vision. The thought, impious though it
may be, came into my mind, that if Satan, when he took Immanuel to the
top of an "exceeding high mountain," exhibited a scene like this, the
temptation was certainly great. Wilkesbarre, * apparently at our feet,
was three miles distant, and it was dark when we reached the Phoenix
Hotel, upon the bank of the river. It had been a fatiguing day's journey
of sixty miles; but a supper of venison, warm biscuit, and honey, and a
comfortable bed, made me feel perfectly vigorous in the morning, and
prepared for a ramble over the historic portions of the valley.

September 16, 1848 After an early breakfast I rode to the residence of
Charles Miner, Esq., about two miles from the village, expecting to rely
chiefly upon his varied and extensive knowledge of the history of the
valley for information concerning the localities of interest, but was
disappointed. * He was suffering from a severe attack of an epidemic
fever then prevailing in the valley, and was unable even to converse
much, yet I have not forgotten the sincere regrets and kind wishes he
expressed. He referred me to several gentlemen in the village,
descendants of the first settlers in the valley, and to one of them (Mr.
Lord Butler, a grandson of Colonel Zebulon Butler) I am indebted for
many kind services while I remained there. He accompanied me to the
several localities of interest in the valley, and furnished me with such
facilities for acquiring information as only a stranger can appreciate.
We visited Kingston, Forty Fort, the monument, the chief battle-ground,
Fort Wintermoot, Monocasy Island, &c.; but a record of the day's ramble
will be better understood after a consultation of the history, and we
will, therefore, proceed to unclasp the old chronicle.

History and song have hallowed the Valley of Wyoming, and every thing
appertaining to it seems to be wrapped in an atmosphere of romance. Its
Indian history, too, long antecedent to the advent of the whites there,
is full of the poetry which clusters around the progress of the
aborigines. Mr. Miner gives a graphic picture of the physical aspect of
the valley. "It is diversified," he says, "by hill and dale, upland and
intervale. Its character of extreme richness is derived from the
extensive flats, or river bottoms, which, in some places, extend from
one to two miles from the stream, unrivaled in expansive beauty,
unsurpassed in luxuriant fertility. Though now generally cleared and
cultivated, to protect the soil from floods a fringe of trees is left
along each bank of the river--the sycamore, the elm, and more especially
the black walnut, while here and there, scattered through the fields, a
huge shell-bark yields its summer shade to the weary laborers, and its
autumn fruit to the black and gray squirrel, or the rival plow-boys.
Pure streams of water come leaping from the mountains, imparting health
and pleasure in their course; all of them abounding with the delicious
trout. Along those brooks, and in the swales, scattered through the
uplands, grow

* This name is compounded of two, and was given in honor of John Wilkes
and Colonel Barre, two of the ablest advocates of America, through the
press and on the floor of the British House of Commons, during the
Revolution.

** Mr. Miner is the author of a "History of Wyoming," a valuable work of
nearly six hundred pages, and possessing the rare merit of originality,
for a large proportion of its contents is a record of information
obtained by him from the lips of old residents whose lives and memories
ran parallel with the Revolutionary history of the valley, and events
immediately antecedent thereto. He folded up little books of blank
paper, took pens and ink, and, accompanied by his daughter Sarah, who,
though blind, was a cheerful and agreeable companion, and possessed a
very retentive memory, visited thirty or forty of the old people who
were in the valley at the time of the invasion in 1778. "We have come,"
he said to them, "to inquire about old Wyoming; pray tell us all you
know. We wish an exact picture, such as the valley presented sixty years
ago. Give us its lights and shadows, its joys and sorrows." At night, on
returning home, he read over to his daughter what he had taken down, and
carefully corrected, by the aid of her memory, "any error into which the
pen had fallen." In this way Mr. Miner collected a great amount of local
history, which must otherwise have perished with the source whence he
derived it. I shall draw liberally upon his interesting volume for many
of my historic facts concerning Wyoming.

Ancient Beauty and Fertility of Wyoming.--Campbell's "Gertrude of
Wyoming."--Its Errors.--First Tribes in the Valley

341the wild plum and the butter-nut, while, wherever the hand of the
white man has spared it, the native grape may be gathered in unlimited
profusion.

I have seen a grapevine bending beneath its purple clusters, one branch
climbing a butter-nut, loaded with fruit, another branch resting upon a
wild plum, red with its delicious burden; the while, growing in the
shade, the hazel-nut was ripening its rounded kernel.

"Such were the common scenes when the white people first came to
Wyoming, which seems to have been founded by Nature, a perfect Indian
Paradise. Game of every sort was abundant. The quail whistled in the
meadow; the pheasant rustled in its leafy covert; the wild duck reared
her brood and bent the reed in every inlet; the red deer fed upon the
hills; while in the deep forests, within a few hours' walk, was found
the stately elk. The river yielded at all seasons a supply of fish; the
yellow perch, the pike, the catfish, the bass, the roach, and, in the
spring season, myriads of shad." *

"Delightful Wyoming! beneath thy skies

The happy shepherd swains had naught to do

But feed their flocks on green declivities,

Or skim perchance, thy lake with light canoe,

From morn till evening's sweeter pastime grew.

With timbrel, when beneath the forest's brow

Thy lovely maidens would the dance renew;

And aye those sunny mountains half way down

Would echo flageolet from some romantic town.

"Then, when of Indian hills the daylight takes

His leave, how might you the flamingo see,

Disporting like a meteor on the lakes--

And playful squirrel on his nut-grown tree:

And every sound of life was full of glee,

From merry mock-bird's song, or hum of men;

While hearkening, fearing naught their revelry,

The wild deer arched his neck from glades, and then,

Unhunted, sought his woods and wilderness again." *

Wyoming, in the Delaware language, signifies "large plains." By what
particular Indian nation or tribe it was first settled is not certainly
known, but it is probable that the Delawares held dominion there long
before the powerful confederacy of the Five Nations, by whom they were
subjugated, was formed. The tribes known as the Wyoming Indians, unto
whom Zinzendorf and his Moravian brethren preached the Gospel, and who
occupied the plains when the white settlers from Connecticut first went
there, were of the Seneca and

* Miner's History of Wyoming, preliminary chapter, p. xiv.

** Gertrude of Wyoming. This beautiful poem is full of errors of every
kind. The "lakes," the "lia mingo," and the "mock bird" are all
strangers to Wyoming; and the historical allusions in the poem are quite
as much strangers to truth. But it is a charming poem, and
hypercriticism may conscientiously pass by and leave its beauties
untouched.

Count Zinzendorf.--His Visit to Wyoming.--Jealousy of the Indians.--
Attempt to murder him.--Providential Circumstance

342Oneida nations, connected "by intermarriage with the Mingoes, and the
subjugated Leni-Lenapes, or Delawares. As it is not my province to
unravel Indian history, we will pass to a brief consideration of the
white settlements there.

The first European whose feet trod the Valley of Wyoming was Count
Zinzendorf, who, while visiting his Moravian brethren at Bethlehem and
Nazareth, in 1742, extended his visits among the neighboring Indians.
His warm heart had been touched by the accounts he had received of the
moral degradation of the savages, and, unattended, except by an
interpreter, he traversed the wilderness and preached salvation to the
red men. In one of these excursions he crossed the Pocono, and
penetrated to the Valley of Wyoming. With a missionary named

Mack, and his wife, who accompanied him, he pitched his tent upon the
western bank of the Susquehanna, a little below the present village of
Kingston, at the foot of a high hill, and near a place in the river
known as Toby's Eddy. A tribe of the Shawnees had a village upon the
site of Kingston. They held a council to listen to the communications of
the missionaries, but, suspicious of all white men, they could not
believe that Zinzendorf and his companions had crossed the Atlantic for
the sole purpose of promoting the spiritual welfare of the Indians. They
concluded that the strangers had come to "spy out their country" with a
view to dispossess them of their lands; and, with such impressions, they
resolved to murder the count. The savages feared the English, and
instructed those who were appointed to assassinate Zinzendorf to do it
with all possible secrecy. A cool-September night was chosen for the
deed, and two stout Indians proceeded stealthily from the town to the
tent of the missionary. He was alone, reclining upon a bundle of dry
weeds, engaged in writing, or in devout meditation. A blanket curtain
formed the door of his tent, and, as the Indians cautiously drew this
aside, they had a full view of their victim. The benignity of his
countenance filled them with awe, but an incident (strikingly
providential) more than his appearance changed the current of their
feelings. The tent-cloth was suspended from the branch of a huge
sycamore, in such a manner that the partially hollow trunk of the tree
was within its folds. At its foot the count had built a fire, the warmth
of which had aroused a rattlesnake in its den; and at the moment when
the savages looked into the tent the venomous reptile was gliding
harmlessly across the legs of their intended victim, who did not see
either the serpent or the lurking murderers. They at once regarded him
as under the special protection of the Great Spirit, were

* Nicolas Lewis, Count Zinzendorf, was descended from an ancient
Austrian family, and was the son of a chamberlain of the King of Poland.
He was born in May, 1700, and was educated at Halle and Utrecht. When
about twenty-one years of age, he purchased the lordship of
Berthholdsdorp, in Lusatia. Some poor Christians, followers of John
Huss, soon afterward settled upon his estate. Their piety attracted his
attention, and he joined them. From that time until his death he labored
zealously for the good of mankind. The village of Hernhutt was built
upon his estate, and soon the sect spread throughout Bohemia and
Moravia. He traveled through Germany, Denmark, and England, and in 1741
came to America, and preached at Germantown and Bethlehem. He returned
to Europe in 1743, and died at Hernhutt in 1760. The Moravian
missionaries were very successful in their operations. They established
stations in various parts of Europe, in Greenland, in the West Indies,
and in Georgia and Pennsylvania. Piety, zeal, benevolence, and self-
denial always marked the Moravians, and at the present day they bear the
character of "the best of people."

Toby's Eddy.--Zinzendorf's Camp ground.--Alienation of the Indians.--
Gnadenhutten.--The Susquehanna Company

343filled with profound reverence for his person, and, returning to the
tribe, so impressed their fellows with the holiness of Zinzendorf's
character, that their enmity was changed to veneration.

A successful mission was established there, which was continued until a
war between the Shawnees and the Delawares destroyed the peace of the
valley.1

Not long afterward the war that ensued between the English and French
drew the line of separation so distinctly between the Indian tribes that
respectively espoused either cause, that the excitements of warlike zeal
repressed the religious sentiments which the indefatigable missionaries
were diffusing among the savages. The tribes in the interest of the
French soon began to hover around the Moravian settlements. Gnadenhutten
was destroyed, and the other settlements were menaced. *** For several
years these pious missionaries suffered greatly, and the white
settlements were broken up. After the defeat of Brad-dock in 1755, the
Delawares went over to the French, and the frontiers of Pennsylvania and
Virginia were terribly scourged by these new allies of the enemies of
the English.

In 1753 an association was formed in Connecticut, called the Susquehanna
Company, the object of which was to plant a colony in the Wyoming
Valley, a region then claimed by Connecticut by virtue of its ancient
unrepealed charter. **** To avoid difficulties with the

* This was originated in the following manner. The Shawnees were a
secluded clan, living, by permission of the Delawares, upon the western
bank of the Susquehanna. On a certain day, when the warriors of both
tribes were engaged in the chase upon the mountains, a party of women
and children of the Shawnees crossed to the Delaware side to gather
fruit, and were joined by some of the squaws and children of the latter.
At length a quarrel arose between two of the children about the
possession of a grasshopper. The mothers took part respectively with
their children, and the quarrel extended to all the women on both sides.
The Delaware squaws were more numerous, and drove the Shawnees home,
killing several on the way. The Shawnee hunters, on their return,
espousing the cause of their women, armed themselves, and, crossing the
river, attacked the Delawares; a bloody battle ensued, and the Shawnees,
overpowered, retired to the banks of the Ohio, and joined their more
powerful brethren. How many wars between Christian nations have
originated in a quarrel about some miserable grasshopper!

** This is a view upon a stream called Mud Creek, a few rods from its
mouth, at Toby's Eddy, in the Susquehanna, about a mile below Kingston.
It was pointed out to me as the place where, tradition avers, Count
Zinzendorf erected his tent, and where the singular circumstance related
in the text occurred. It was near sunset on a mild day (September 16th,
1848) when I visited the spot, and a more inviting place for retirement
and meditation can scarcely be imagined. It is shaded by venerable
sycamore, butternut, elm, and black walnut trees. From the Eddy is a
fine view of the plain whereon the Delawares had their village, and of
the mountains on the eastern side of the valley. The eddy is caused by a
bend in the river.

*** The Moravians had established six missionary settlements in the
vicinity of the Forks of the Delaware, or the junction of the Delaware
and Lehigh Rivers, viz., Nazareth, Bethlehem, Nain, Freidenshal,
Gandenthaul, and Gnadenhutten. The latter, the name of which in English
is "Huts of Mercy," was founded chiefly for the accommodation and
protection of those Indians who embraced the Christian faith. Hence it
was the first settlement attacked by the hostile savages.

**** When the regions in the interior of America were unknown, the
charters given to the colonists were generally very vague respecting
their western boundary. They defined the extent of each colony along the
Atlantic coast, but generally said of the westward extent, "from sea to
sea." Such was the expression in the Connecticut charter, and Wyoming,
lying directly west of that province, was claimed as a portion of its
territory. The intervening portion of New York, being already in actual
possession of the Dutch, was not included in the claim.

Purchase of Wyoming.--The Delaware Company.--Opposition of
Pennsylvanians.--Death of Teedyuscung

344Indians, the agents of the company were directed to purchase the land
of the Six Nations, the actual owners, though it was then in possession
of the Delawares. A deputation for the purpose attended the great
convention and Indian council which was held at Albany in 1754, and,
notwithstanding the strong efforts made by the Governor of Pennsylvania,
through his agents, to the contrary, the purchase was effected. The
tract bargained for included the whole Valley of Wyoming and the country
westward to the Allegany River. The Pennsylvanians were irritated at
what they called an unfair and illegal encroachment of the Connecticut
people, and in strong terms protested against the purchase, for they
claimed that the whole country included therein was covered by the
charter granted to William Penn. Here, then, was planted the seed which
soon burst forth into a mature tree, and bore the apples of discord in
abundance.

Another Connecticut association, called the Delaware Company, had
purchased lands upon the Delaware River, at a place called Cushetunk.
They commenced a settlement there in 1757, and the Susquehanna Company
prepared to plant their colony in Wyoming the following year. But, owing
to the unsettled state of the country, the French and Indian war then
being in progress, the settlement was deferred until 1762, when about
two hundred colonists pushed forward, and commenced building and
planting near the mouth of Mill Creek, a little above the present site
of Wilkesbarre. The Indians, and among them their great chief
Teedyuscung, were at first opposed to this settlement of the whites in
the valley, but were soon reconciled, and lived in daily friendly
intercourse with the new comers. The Pennsylvanians, however, determined
to repel what they held to be a bold encroachment upon their rights.
Proclamations were issued, and writs of ejectment were placed in the
hands of the sheriff of Northampton county, within the limits of which
Wyoming was situated; but the Yankees continued to build and plant. They
brought their families into the valley, and new settlers were rapidly
augmenting their numbers. An event now occurred which at one terrible
blow cut off this flourishing settlement.

I briefly adverted, at the close of the last chapter, to the fact that a
great council was held at Easton in 1758, where Teedyuscung, the
Delaware chief, acted a conspicuous part. The Six Nations regarded the
Delawares as subjects, and were jealous of the popularity and power of
Teedyuscung. They could not brook his advancement, and in the autumn of
1763 a party of warriors descended the Susquehanna, and came to the
valley upon a pretended visit of friendship. As previously concerted,
they set fire to the house of Teedyuscung on a certain night, and the
chief was burned in it; while, to crown their wicked act, they adroitly
charged the deed upon the whites. The Delawares believed the tale. They
loved their chief, and determined on revenge. At broad noon, on the 14th
of October, they attacked

1763 and massacred thirty of the settlers in their fields. * The whole
settlement was speedily alarmed, and men, women, and children fled to
the mountains, from which they saw their houses plundered and their
cattle driven away. At night the torch was applied to their buildings,
and the lovely abode of several hundred peaceful dwellers in the morning
was made a desolation. Over the wilderness of the Pocono they made their
way to the Delaware, and so on to their homes in Connecticut, a distance
of two hundred and fifty miles. The blow was as unexpected as it was
merciless, for they regarded the Delawares as their friendly neighbors.
**

The Susquehanna Company did not attempt a settlement again for several
years; and in the mean time the proprietaries of Pennsylvania, taking
advantage of an Indian council held at Fort Stanwix in 1768, made a
direct purchase of the Wyoming Valley from the Six Nations, and took a
deed from some of the chiefs A lease of the valley for seven years was
given to three Pennsylvanians, *** who established a trading house
there, which they for-

* This is the testimony of current history. Mr Miner, on the contrary,
is persuaded that the same hands that destroyed Teedyuscung--the Six
Nations--perpetrated this outrage.

** Proud, Gordon, Chapman.

*** Charles Stewart, Amos Ogden, and John Jennings. The latter was the
sheriff of the county. Charles Stewart subsequently became a popular and
efficient officer of the Pennsylvania line in the Continental army.

Hostilities between the "Yankees" and "Pennymitea."--Erection of Forts.-
-Capture of Durkee.--Surrender of Ogden.

345tified. Forty pioneers of the Susquehanna Company, prepared to act
promptly, entered the valley in February, 1769, and closely invested the
Pennsylvania garrison. There were but ten men in the block-house, but
they had found means to send a message to Governor Penn, informing him
of their situation. They did not wait for succor, however, but, under
pretense of consulting about an amicable compromise, three of the
Connecticut party were decoyed into the block-house, arrested by Sheriff
Jennings, and sent to Easton Jail. The Connecticut immigrants increased
rapidly, and Jennings called upon the _posse_ of the county and several
magistrates to assist in their arrest. Quite a formidable force marched
to Wyoming, but the Connecticut people had not been idle. They too had
erected a block-house, which they called Forty Fort. Jennings demolished
its doors, and arrested thirty-one of the inmates, most of whom were
taken to Easton Jail. They were admitted to bail, were reenforced by
about two hundred from Connecticut, and, returning to Wyoming, built a
fort, which they called Fort Durkee, in honor of the officer elected to
its command. This fortification was about half a mile below Wilkesbarre,
near the Shawnee Flats. They also built thirty log houses around it,
furnished with loop-holes for musketry, and, the number of the settlers
being three hundred able-bodied men, Jennings could make no further
impression upon them. He reported to the Governor of Pennsylvania that
the whole power of the county was inadequate to dislodge the Yankees.

For a short time hostilities ceased, and the Susquehanna Company sent
commissioners to Philadelphia to endeavor to negotiate a compromise. *
Governor Penn refused to treat with them, and sent an armed force to the
valley, under the command of Colonel Francis. He demanded a surrender of
Fort Durkee, but the order was not obeyed. He reconnoitered, and,
finding the works too strong to be successfully assaulted, returned to
Philadelphia, leaving Ogden, one of the lessees of the valley, with a
small force in the neighborhood. A larger force was assembled under
Sheriff Jennings, well armed, and provided with a six pound cannon.
Captain Ogden, who was prowling about the settlement, hearing of the
approach of Jennings, darted suddenly among the houses with forty men,
and captured several inhabitants, among whom was Colonel Durkee. He was
taken to Philadelphia, and closely imprisoned. Jennings, with two
hundred armed men, appeared before the fort, and began the erection of a
battery. The garrison, alarmed, proposed to surrender upon certain
conditions, which were agreed to. The articles of capitulation were
drawn up in due form and signed, but Ogden acted in bad faith, and the
seventeen settlers who were allowed by the capitula tion to remain in
the valley and harvest their crops, were plundered of every thing and
driven over the mountains.

In February, 1770, Lazarus Stewart led an armed party from Lancaster
into the Valley of Wyoming, who were joined by another armed party from
Connecticut. They captured Fort Durkee, and, proceeding to the house of
Ogden (who was then absent), seized the cannon already mentioned.
Captain Ogden, on hearing of these transactions, hastened to Wyoming
with fifty men, and garrisoned his own house. A party of fifty Yankees
was sent against him, and a skirmish ensued. Several Connecticut people
were wounded, and one was killed. Colonel Durkee ** had now been
released, and had returned from Philadelphia. Under his command the
Yankees commenced a regular siege upon the fortress of the Penny-mites.
*** They mounted the four pound cannon upon the opposite side of the
river, and for several days played upon Ogden's house. Receiving no
succor from Governor Penn, he surrendered upon terms similar to those
allowed the Yankees the year before. He was to with-

* Colonel Dyer, and Jedediah Elderkin, of Windham, Connecticut.

** John Durkee was a native of that portion of Norwich, Connecticut,
called Bean Hill, and was generally called the "bold Bean Hiller." He
left Wyoming and returned to Connecticut. When the Revolution broke out,
he entered into the contest zealously. He was at Bunker Hill, and was
commissioned a colonel in the Connecticut line. He was in the battle on
Long Island, at Germantown, and other engagements. He died at his
residence at Bean Hill in 1782, aged fifty-four years, and was buried
with military honors.

*** This civil commotion is usually termed the Pennymite and Yankee war.
The former name was derived from John Penn, governor of Pennsylvania
when hostilities commenced.

Treatment of Ogden.--Another Attack on the Yankees.--Capture of Fort
Durkoe.--Pennymites Expelled.--New Fortifications.

346draw himself and all his men from the valley, except six, who were to
remain and guard his property. But the Yankees, imitating Ogden's bad
faith with them, seized his property and burned his house as soon as he
was gone. Warrants were afterward issued by the Governor of Pennsylvania
against Lazarus Stewart, Zebulon Butler, and Lazarus Young, for the
crime of arson, but they were never harmed.

Governor Penn, fearing political outbreaks in his capital at that time,
and unwilling to send any of the few troops away from Philadelphia,
called upon General Gage, then in command at New York, for a detachment
of his majesty's troops to restore order at Wyoming. Gage refused
compliance, and the Pennsylvanians were obliged to rely upon their own
resources. It was autumn before another attempt was made against the
Yankees. Ogden, with only one hundred and forty men, marched by the
Lehigh route, to take the settlers by surprise. From the tops of the
mountains he saw the people at work in groups in their fields, and,
separating his force into parties equal in numbers to the unsuspecting
farmers below, they rushed down upon them, made several prisoners, and
sent them to Easton. Ogden lay concealed in the mountains, awaiting
another opportunity to assail the Yankees. The latter sent messengers to
solicit aid from their friends on the Delaware. These fell into Ogden's
hands, and, learning from them the exact position of Fort Durkee, he
made a night attack upon it. It was filled with women and children, and
the garrison, too weak to defend it, surrendered unconditionally. The
fort and the houses of the settlement were plundered, and many of the
principal inhabitants were sent prisoners to Easton and Philadelphia.

A small garrison was left by Ogden in Fort Durkee. The Yankees having
left the valley, they were not very vigilant. On the night of the 18th
of December, between twenty and thirty men, under Lazarus Stewart,
reached the fort by stealth, and captured it, shouting, "Huzza for King
George!" The Pennymites were now, in turn, driven from the valley.
Stewart held possession of the fort until the middle of January
following, when the sheriff of Northampton county, with a considerable
force, arrived before it. Captain Ogden and his brother Nathan
accompanied the expedition. A skirmish ensued at the fort, and Nathan
Ogden was killed. * Stewart perceived that he could not long hold out,
January 1771 on the night of the 20th withdrew from the valley, leaving
twelve men in the fort. These were made prisoners and sent to Easton,
and quiet again prevailed at Wyoming.

For six months the Pennymites were undisturbed in the possession of the
valley, and the number of the settlers of Ogden's party had increased to
about eighty. But their repose was suddenly broken by the descent from
the mountains, on the 6 th of July, of seventy armed men from
Connecticut, under Captain Zebulon Butler, and a party under Lazarus
Stewart, who had joined him. Ogden had built another and a stronger
fort, whieh he called Fort Wyoming. ** The invaders were almost daily
re-enforced, and commenced several military works with a view of
besieging Ogden and his party in the forts. The besieged were well
supplied with provisions, and, their works being strong, they defied the
assailants. Ogden, in the mean while, escaped from the fort by
stratagem, *** proceeded to Philadelphia, and succeeded in inducing the
acting governor (Hamilton) to send a detachment of one hundred men to
Wyoming. The expedition was unsuccessful. After prosecuting the siege
until the 11th of August, Captain Butler sent to the garrison a formal
summons to surrender. The gar-

* A settler named William Speddy was recognized as the man who
discharged the musket that killed Ogden, and in November he was tried
for murder, at the Supreme Court held in Philadelphia. He was acquitted.

** This fort stood upon the ground now occupied by the court-house in
Wilkesbarre. There was another fort on the bank of the river, a little
below the Phoenix Hotel. Traces of the ditches were visible when I
visited the spot in 1848.

*** Ogden prepared a light bundle that would float upon the water, on
which he fastened a hat. To this bundle he attached a cord several yards
in length, and, entering the river, swam past the sentinels, drawing the
bundle at the distance of the length of the cord behind him. The hat was
fired at several times, but Ogden escaped unhurt.

Close of the Civil War.--Organization of a Government--Effort to adjust
Difficulties.--"Lawyers and Bull-frogs."

347rison refused compliance. Butler had no ordnance, and a colonist
named Carey * made a cannon of a pepperidge log. At the second discharge
the cannon burst, but they had no further need of artillery, for the
garrison surrendered. On the 14th a detachment of sixty men from
Philadelphia, to re-enforce the garrison, had arrived within two miles
of the fort; but, hearing of the surrender, they retraced their steps.
Several persons were killed during the siege. By the terms of the
capitulation, Ogden and his party were all to leave the valley. Thus
closed the civil war in Wyoming for the year 1771, and the Yankees were
left in possession of their much-coveted domain.

The settlement now increased rapidly, and the Susquehanna Company
applied to the General Assembly of Connecticut to take them under its
protection until the decision asked of the king should be made. The
Assembly advised them to organize a government by themselves. Pursuant
to this advice, the inhabitants of Wyoming established a thoroughly
Democratic government. "They laid out townships," says Chapman, "founded
settlements, erected fortifications, levied and collected taxes, passed
laws for the direction of civil suits, and for the punishment of crimes
and misdemeanors, established a militia, and provided for the common
defense and general welfare of the colony." The supreme legislative
power was vested directly in the people, and exercised by themselves in
their primary meetings. A magistracy was appointed; courts were
instituted, having civil and criminal jurisdiction; and a high court of
appeals, called the Supreme Court, was established, composed, like their
Legislature, of the people themselves in primary assembly. The
government was well administered, the colony rapidly increased, the
people were happy, and for two years the smiles of peace and prosperity
gladdened the Valley of Wyoming.

During this season of repose the Assembly of Connecticut made an effort
to adjust all difficulties between the settlers and the government of
Pennsylvania. Richard Penn was then governor of that province, and would
enter into no negotiations on the subject. The Connecticut Assembly,
therefore, made out a case and sent it to England for adjudication. **
It was submitted to the ablest lawyers of the realm--Lord Thurlow,
Wedderburne, Richard Jackson, and John Dunning--and their decision was
in favor of the Susquehanna Company.

* Mr. Carey was a native of Dutchess county, New York, and went to
Wyoming with his sons in 1769. His brother, Samuel Carey, was a
distinguished Quaker preacher. His sons became permanent settlers in
Wyoming, and lived to a good old age.

** Colonel Eliphalet Dyer was sent to England as agent for the
Connecticut Assembly. He was one of the most eminent lawyers of that
province. His eloquence was of the most persuasive kind. In allusion to
this intellectual power, a wit wrote the following impromptu, while Dyer
was advocating the cause of the Susquehanna Company on the floor of the
Assembly chamber:

"Canaan of old, as we are told.

When it did rain down manna,

Wa'nt half so good, for heavenly food,

As Dyer makes Susquehanna."

** This is the same Dyer alluded to in the amusing doggerel entitled
"Lawyers and Bull-frogs," in which the people of Old Windham, in
Connecticut, were interested. The poem is printed in the Historical
Collections of Connecticut, page 448. The introduction avers that, after
a long drought, a frog-pond became almost dry, and a terrible battle was
fought one night by the frogs, to decide who should keep possession of
the remaining water. Many "thousands were found defunct in the morning."
There was an uncommon silence for hours before the battle commenced,
when, as if by a preconcerted agreement, every frog on one side of the
ditch raised the war-cry, Colonel Dyer! Colonel Dyer! and at the same
instant, from the opposite side, resounded the adverse shout of Elderkin
too! Elderkin too! Owing to some peculiarity in the state of the
atmosphere, the sounds seemed to be overhead, and the people of Windham
were greatly frightened. The poet says,

"This terrible night the parson did fright

His people almost in despair;

For poor Windham souls among the bean-poles

He made a most wonderful prayer.

Lawyer Lucifer called up his crew;

Dyer and Elderkin," you must come too:

Old Colonel Dyer you know well enough.

He had an old negro, his name was Cuff."

* Jedediah Elderkin accompanied Colonel Dyer to Philadelphia in 1769, in
behalf of the Susquehanna Company

Peace and Prosperity of Wyoming.--Renewal of Hostilities.--Action of
Congress.--Expedition of Plunkett

348The settlement was now taken under the protection of Connecticut, and
incorporated into that colony. The territory was erected into a
chartered town called Westmoreland, and attached to Litchfield county;
representatives from it were admitted to seats in the General Assembly,
and Zebulon Butler and Nathan Denison were commissioned justices of the
peace. Repose continued to reign in the valley, and unexampled
prosperity blessed the settlement. A town immediately adjoining Wyoming
Fort was planted by Colonel Durkee, and named Wilkesbarre; and the whole
valley became a charming picture of active life and social happiness.
The foot-prints of civil war were effaced, and the recollections of the
gloomy past were obliterated. A dream of happiness lulled the people
into the repose of absolute security. Isolated in the bosom of the
mountains, and far removed from the agitations which disturbed the
people upon the ocean coasts, they had heard little of the martial sound
of preparations for the hostilities then elaborating in the imperial and
colonial councils. They were enjoying, in full measure, the blessings of
virtuous democracy, and felt none of the oppressions of Great Britain,
then bearing with such heavy hand upon the commercial cities of America;
yet they warmly sympathized with their suffering brethren, and their
hearts and hands were open to the appeals of the patriots of the east.

Four years Wyoming enjoyed uninterrupted peace, when its repose was
suddenly broken by an attack upon a branch of the colony, located about
sixty miles below Wilkesbarre, by a body of Northumberland militia, who
were jealous of the increasing prosperity of the Yankees. On the 28th of
September, 1775, the unsuspecting inhabitants were suddenly assailed,
several of them were killed, and the residue were sent to Sunbury and
imprisoned. About the same time several boats from Wyoming, trading down
the river, were plundered by the Pennsylvanians. The Continental
Congress was then in session in Philadelphia, and the Connecticut people
of Wyoming, preferring peaceful measures to a renewal of the civil war,
petitioned that body for redress. Congress, "considering that the most
perfect union between the colonies was essentially necessary for the
preservation of the just rights of North America," adopted resolutions
urging the governments of Pennsylvania and Connecticut to "take the most
speedy and effectual steps to prevent hostilities" and to adjust
difficulties. * But the lawless invaders had not yet learned to respect
the voice of Congress. Its resolutions were unheeded, and the imprisoned
settlers were more rigidly confined, under the apprehension that the
exasperated people of Wyoming, now become numerous, might make a
retaliatory movement against Sunbury. A proposition was made to raise a
force, and march against Wyoming to subjugate it before the people could
organize a military government. Governor Penn favored the design, and
Colonel Plunkett, who was also a magistrate, was placed in command of
the expedition. He was ostensibly vested with civil powers, and his
December 20, 1775 force was called the posse of the county. Congress,
still in session in Philadelphia, passed a resolution urging the
immediate termination of all hostilities be-tween the parties. ** But
the Pennsylvanians paid no attention to the resolution, and Plunkett
advanced toward Wyoming. His progress was slow, for the river was much
obstructed by ice; and before he came to the Nanticoke Rapids, at the
south end of the valley, where he was obliged to leave his boats, the
people had made ample preparations to receive him. The military were
under the command of Colonel Zebulon Butler, and numbered about three
hundred effective men.

From the summit of a bold rock on the western side of the river, that
overhung the road along which Plunkett was marching, a volley of
musketry was discharged as he approached, and arrested his progress. By
means of a bateau, which he caused to be brought above the rapids by
land, his men attempted to cross the river, to march against Fort
Wyoming on the eastern side. They were assaulted by an ambuscade on
shore, and the whole invading force immediately retreated to their
provision boats, moored below the rapids, where a council of war was
held. This council wisely concluded that the chances of success were
few, and the expedition was abandoned.

* Journals of Congress, vol. i., p. 215.

** Ibid., p. 279.

The Colonies before the Revolution.--Exposed Position of Wyoming.--
Indian Outrage.--Indian Speech.

349The war of the Revolution had now fairly commenced. The proprietary
government of Pennsylvania was soon afterward virtually abolished, a
constituent assembly was organized (a) and the people and the
governments of both colonies had matters of much greater importance to
attend to than disputes about inconsiderable settlements. Henceforth the
history of Wyoming is identified with the general history of the Union.
I have glanced briefly at the most important events connected with its
early settlement, for they form an interesting episode in the general
history of our republic, and exhibit prominently those social and
political features which characterized the colonies when the war of
independence broke out. Separate provinces, communities, and families,
having distinct interests, and under no very powerful control from
without, had learned independence of thought and action, self-reliance,
patient endurance under the pressure of circumstances, and indomitable
courage in the maintenance of personal and political rights, from the
circumstances in which their relations to each other had placed them. It
was in schools like that of the Pennymite war, the resistance of the New
Hampshire Grants to the domination of New York, the opposition to the
Stamp Act and kindred measures, and the Regulator movement in the
Carolinas, that the people were tutored for the firm resistance which
they made to British oppressions during the seven years of our struggle
for political emancipation; and there is more of the true philosophy of
our great Revolution to be learned by studying antecedent, but relative
events, than in watching the progress of the war itself. We will now
turn to a consideration of the events which occurred in Wyoming during
our Revolution.

The defection of a large portion of the Six Nations, the coalition of
the Delawares and Shawnees with the friends of the king westward of the
Alleganies, and the menaces of the tribes bordering on Virginia, with
whom Lord Dunmore, the royal governor of that province, had long
tampered, seeking to bring their hatchets upon the frontier settlements
of that rebellious state, gave the Continental Congress much uneasiness
at the beginning of 1776. Thousands of mercenary Germans were preparing
to come like "destroying locusts upon the east wind the British
Parliament had voted fifty-five thousand men for the American service;
loyalty to the crown was rife throughout the land; and the dark cloud of
savages upon the western border of the colonies, smarting under the
wrongs inflicted by the white men for a century and a half, and without
any definite ideas of the nature of the quarrel in question, or means of
discriminating between the parties to the feud, were ready to raise the
war-cry, and satiate their appetites for vengeance, rapine, and blood.
Westmoreland, or Wyoming, was peculiarly exposed, lying upon the verge
of the Indian country, and to the people of its lovely valley the
conciliation of the Indians was a matter of vast importance. The council
of Onondaga, the chief head of the Six Nations, made professions of
peaceful intentions, but there was evident hypocrisy underlying the fair
appearance of the surface, and occasional outrages upon the remote
settlers had been committed without rebuke. On one occasion a man named
Wilson, living within the limits of Westmoreland, had been cruelly
treated by the Indians, and Colonel Zebulon Butler sent a messenger to
ascertain the true intentions of the savages. A chief called John
returned with the messenger, and, in a speech replete with Indian
eloquence, disclaimed, in behalf of the Six Nations, all thoughts of
hostility to the friends of Congress. The Rev. Mr. Johnson, the first
pastor in Wyoming, acted as interpreter. "We are sorry," said the chief,
"to have two brothers fighting with each other, and should be glad to
hear that the quarrel was peaceably settled. We choose not to interest
ourselves on either side. The quarrel appears to be unnecessary. We do
not well understand it. We are for peace." He continued:

"Brothers, when our young men come to hunt in your neighborhood, you
must not imagine they come to do mischief; they come to procure
themselves provisions, also skins to purchase them clothing.

"Brothers, we desire that Wyoming may be a place appointed where the
great men may meet, and have a fire, which shall ever after be called
Wyomick, where you shall judge best how to prevent any jealousies or
uneasy thoughts that may arise, and thereby preserve our friendship.

Colonel Butler deceived.--Strangers in Wyoming.--Suspicions of the
People.

350"Brothers, you see but one of our chiefs. You may be suspicious on
that account; but we assure you this chief speaks in the name of the Six
Nations. We are of one mind.

"Brothers, what we say is not from the lips, but from the heart. If any
Indians of little note should speak otherwise, you must pay no regard to
them, but observe what has been said and written by the chiefs, which
may be depended on.

"Brothers, we live at the head of these waters [Susquehanna]. Pay no
regard to any reports that may come up the stream or any other way, but
look to the head waters for truth; and we do now assure you, as long as
the waters run, so long you may depend on our friendship. We are all of
one mind, and we are all for peace."

This was the strong language of assurance, and Colonel Butler, confident
of its sincerity, wrote accordingly to Roger Sherman of the Connecticut
Assembly. He mentioned in his letter that the Indians wanted an
_American flag_ as a token of friendship; and the whole tone of his
communication evinced a belief in the professed attachment of the
savages to the republicans. But at that very time the Mohawks,
Onondagas, and Senecas were leaguing against the patriots; and already
Brant and five hundred warriors had struck a severe blow of hostility to
the republicans at the Cedars, on the St. Lawrence. The proposed council
fire at Wyoming was doubtless intended as a pretense for assembling a
large body of warriors in the heart of the settlement, to destroy it;
and the desire for an American flag was undoubtedly a wish to have it
for a decoy when occasion should call for its use. Events soon occurred
which confirmed these suspicions, and the people of Wyoming prepared for
defense against their two-fold enemy, the Indians and the Tories. *

When the war broke out, the Connecticut Assembly prevented further
immigration to Westmoreland. But people came there, from the Hudson and
the Mohawk Valleys, having no sympathy with either of the parties in the
"Pennymite war," and, as it appeared, no sympathy with the republicans.
Almost every original settler had espoused the cause of the Whigs; and
the open expression of hostility to Congress by these interlopers, the
most active of whom were the Wintermoots, Van Gorders, Van Alstyns, and
a few other families, excited the indignation of the Wyoming people. **
The recommendation of the Continental Congress, to organize committees
of vigilance in every town, had been promptly acted upon in Wyoming, and
these new comers, the avowed friends of the king, were soon subjected to
the severest scrutiny of the committee there. The people of Wyoming,
numbering nearly three thousand, and united in thought and action, were
pursuing peacefully their various occupations. The sudden influx of
strangers to them, not only in person but in political creed, justly
excited suspicions that they were a colony of vipers, come to nestle
among them for the purpose of disseminating the poison of Toryism.
Influenced by these fears, several of the most suspicious of the
interlopers were arrested and sent to Connecticut. This was an unwise
act, although perhaps justifiable, and was one cause of subsequent
disasters.

In the mean while two companies of regular troops, of eighty-two men
each, had been raised in the valley, under a resolution of Congress,
commanded by Captains Ransom and

* On the 10th of March, 1777, the following resolutions were adopted at
a town meeting held at Wilkes-barre: "Voted, That the first man that
shall make fifty weight of good saltpetre in this town shall be entitled
to a bounty of ten pounds lawful money, to be paid out of the town
treasury." "Voted, That the select-men be directed to dispose of the
grain now in the hands of the treasurer or collector in such a way as to
obtain powder and lead to the value of forty pounds lawful money, if
they can do the same." It was also subsequently voted to empower a
committee of inspectors "to supply the soldiers' wives and the soldiers'
widows with the necessaries of life." This was a noble resolution.

** Mr. Miner, in a letter to the late William L. Stone, mentions the
fact that among the papers of Colonel Zebulon Butler he found a list of
Tories who joined the Indians. The list contained sixty-one names, of
which only three were those of New England men. Most of them were
transient persons, who had gone to Wyoming as hunters and trappers. Six
of them were of one family (the Wintermoots), from Minisink. Nine were
from the Mohawk Valley, doubtless in the interest of the Johnsons, four
from Kinderhook, and six from West Chester, New York. There were not ten
Tory families who had resided two years in Wyoming.--See Stone's History
of Wyoming, p. 181.

The Wintcrmoots.--Erection of a Fort--Counteraction of the old
Settlers.--Affair on the Millstone River.

351Durkee, and were attached to the Connecticut line. * The Wintcrmoots,
who had purchased land toward the head of the valley, and upon the old
banks of the Susquehanna, ** at a place where bubbled forth a large and
living spring of pure water, erected a strong fortification known as
Wintermoot's Fort. The town meeting alluded to, suspicious of the design
of the Wintermoots, who had hitherto acted so discreetly that a charge
of actual hostility to Congress could not properly be made against them,
thought it best to counteract their apparent belligerence, and resolved
that it had "become necessary for the inhabitants of the town to erect
suitable forts as a defense against the common enemy."

August 24, 1776 A fort was accordingly built, about two miles above
Wintermoot's, under the supervision of the families of Jenkins and
Harding, and called Fort Jenkins.' Forty Fort (so called from the first
forty Yankees, the pioneers of the Susquehanna settlers in Wyoming),
then little more than a weak block-house, was strengthened and enlarged,
and sites for other forts were fixed on, at Pittstown, Wilkesbarre, and
Hanover. It was agreed in town meeting that these several fortifications
should be built by the people, "without either fee or reward from the
town."

As we have observed in a former chapter, the tribes of the Six Nations
which had receded from their solemn agreement of neutrality were not
brought actively into the service of the king until the summer of 1777.
It was then that the people of Wyoming perceived, and fully appreciated,
the perils attendant upon their isolation, and the attention of the
Continental Congress was often called to their exposed situation. While
St. Leger was investing Fort Stanwix, some straggling parties of savages
hung about and menaced Wyoming; but, after the siege was raised, the
people were not disturbed again during the remainder of the year and the
following spring. But early in the summer of 1778 the movements of Brant
and his warriors, and the Johnsons and Butlers and their Tory legions,
upon the upper waters of the Susquehanna, together with the actions of
the Tories in the Valley of Wyoming, who were greatly exasperated on
account of the harsh treatment of some of their number by the

* These two companies served with distinction at the skirmish on
Millstone River, in New Jersey, on the 20th of January, 1777. This
occurred while the main army of the Americans were suffering from the
smallpox at Morristown. A line of forts had been established along the
Millstone River, in the direction of Princeton. One of these, at
Somerset Court-house, was occupied by General Dickinson with these two
regular companies and about three hundred militia. A mill on the
opposite bank of the stream contained considerable flour. Cornwallis,
then lying at New Brunswick, dispatched a foraging party to capture it.
The party consisted of about four hundred men, with more than forty
wagons. The British arrived at the mill early in the morning, and,
having loaded their wagons with flour, were about to return, when
General Dickinson, leading a portion of his force through the river,
middle deep, attacked them with so much spirit, that they fled in haste,
leaving the whole of their plunder, with their wagons, behind them.

** Along the western side of the Susquehanna, a largo part of the way
from the head of the valley to the village of Kingston, opposite
Wilkesbarre, are traces of a more ancient shore than the present, when
the river was broader and perhaps deeper than now. The plain extending
from the ancient shore to the foot of the mountain is a uniform level,
several feet above the alluvial bottom between it and the present bank
of the river.

*** There was another fort, called Fort Jenkins, upon the Susquehanna,
about half way between Wilkesbarre and Fort Augusta, or Sunbury. The
fort in question was about eight miles above Wilkesbarre.

**** This view is from the ancient bed of the Susquehanna, looking west.
The building, formerly the property of Colonel Jenkins, and now owned by
Mr. David Goodwin, is upon the site of old Fort Wintermoot, which was
destroyed at the time of the invasion in 1778. It is upon the ancient
bank of the river, here from fifteen to twenty feet high, and about
sixty rods from the stream in its present channel.

Alarm in Wyoming.--Condition of the Settlement.--Apathy of Congress.--
Patriotism of Wyoming Women.

352Whigs, greatly alarmed the people. Several of the Loyalists had left
and joined the forces under Colonel John Butler, and the people very
properly apprehended their return with power sufficient to satisfy their
manifest spirit of vengeance. Early in May the savages had committed
many robberies, and in June some murders, in the neighborhood of Tioga,
and other points on the upper borders of Westmoreland. The Indians were
in considerable force at Conewawah (now Elmira, in Chemung county, New
York), and were in constant communication with the Tory settlers, by
runners, at Wyalusing and in the neighborhood of Tunkhannoek, within the
precincts of Westmoreland. These circumstances were alarming; yet the
exposed territory, cut off as it was from immediate aid, if demanded,
was weakened by drafts upon its able-bodied men for the Continental
army, and demands upon its local treasury for the use of the Connecticut
Assembly. Mr. Miner has given, in a spirited historic "pen-and-ink
sketch," a picture of the condition of Wyoming at the close of 1777, and
at the opening of the active operations the following year. He says,
"Nearly all their able-bodied men were away in the service. The
remaining population, in dread of the savages, were building six forts
or stockades, requiring great labor, 'without fee or reward.' All the
aged men out of the train bands, exempt by law from duty, were formed
into companies to garrison the forts, one of the captains being also
chief physician to the people and surgeon to the military. Of the
militia the whole were in constant requisition, to go on the scout and
guard against surprise. The small-pox pestilence was in every district.
A tax to go to Hartford was levied in the assessment of the year, of two
thousand pounds," * not in Continental bills of credit at their nominal
value, but "lawful money of the state of Connecticut."

Such was the condition of Wyoming when, in June, 1778, an expedition of
Tories and Indians was prepared to fall upon the defenseless
inhabitants. Congress was apprised of the dark design. The officers and
men in the army, from Wyoming, pleaded for their wives and little ones.
General Schuyler wrote a touching letter to Congress on the subject; yet
that body, always tardy in its movements, and at that time too much
employed in sectional disputes and factious intrigues, left the
settlement uncared for, and apparently unnoticed, except by the
resolutions to permit the people to take measures for self-defense by
raising troops among themselves, and finding "their own arms, and
accouterments, and blankets." ** The heads of the families there exposed
were cruelly detained in the ranks of the Continental army elsewhere,
and thus, naked and helpless, the settlement presented an easy prey to
the vultures that scented them from Niagara, and whose companions were
then glutting their appetites in the Mohawk and Schoharie settlements.

A force, consisting of the Tory Rangers of Colonel John Butler, a
detachment of Johnson's Royal Greens, and from five to seven hundred
Indians, under the general command of Butler, and numbering in all about
eleven hundred men, crossed the Genesee country from Niagara, and
appeared at Tioga Point, in June, whence they embarked in canoes, and
landed

* History of Wyoming, page 207. Mr. Miner mentions an instance of the
patriotism of the women of Wyoming, and the draft which the people made,
under the pressure of circumstances, upon their undeveloped resources.
Gunpowder was very scarce at the time when the settlement was menaced by
the enemy. The husbands, fathers, and brothers were away in the
Continental ranks, and the females plowed, sowed, and reaped. Nor was
this all: they manufactured gunpowder for the feeble garrisons in the
forts. "They took up the floors of their houses, dug out the earth, put
it in casks, and ran water through it, as ashes are leached. They then
took ashes in another cask, and made ley, mixed the water from the earth
with weak ley, boiled it, and set it to cool, and the saltpetre rose to
the top. Charcoal and sulphur were then used, the mixture was pounded in
an implement brought to the valley by Mr. Hollenbaek, and thus powder
was produced for the public defense."--Page 212.

** See resolution of March 16th, 1778, in the Journals of Congress, vol.
iv., p. 113. This resolution authorized the raising of "one full company
of foot in the town of Westmoreland." Nothing further was done by
Congress in behalf of the people there until the 23d of June following,
when a resolution was passed to write to the two independent companies
under Durkee and Ransom, then greatly reduced by battle and sickness,
and permit them to return home for the defense of the settlement.
Congress also resolved to pay the officers and soldiers of the companies
authorized to be raised by the resolution of the 16th of March
preceding, for their arms and accouterments. The sum of $1440 was
granted to the Board of War, to be issued to Colonel Denison. The
Continental paper dollars were then rapidly depreciating, four of them
being at that time worth only one in specie.

Approach of Indians and Tories.--Preparations for Defense.--Council of
War.--Position of the Wyoming Forts

353near the mouth of Bowman's Creek, on the west side of the river,
about twenty miles above Wyoming. They entered the valley through a
notch from the west, not far from the famous Dial Rock, * and attacked
the people near Fort Jenkins, three of whom were killed. ** Butler then
made his head-quarters at Wintermoot's Fort, whence he sent out scouts
and July 2, 1778 foraging parties.

Virtually abandoned by Congress, the people had made all the
preparations in their power to meet the invaders, of whose approach they
had been informed. A company of forty of fifty regulars (so called only
because the raising of the company was authorized by Congress), and a
few militia, under the general command of Captain Hewett, then
recruiting in the valley, composed the military force to oppose the
enemy. Grandfathers and their aged sons, boys, and even women, seized
such weapons as were at hand. Colonel Zebulon Butler, then an officer in
the Continental army, happening to be at home when the enemy entered the
valley, was, by common consent, made commander-in-chief.

Forty Fort was made the place of general military rendezvous, and
thither the women and children of the valley fled for safety. Aged men
garrisoned some of the smaller forts. There were fearful odds, and no
alternative was left but to fight or submit to the tender mercies of the
Indians and the more savage Tories. "Retirement or flight was alike
impossible, and there was no security but in victory unequal as was the
conflict, therefore, and hopeless as it seemed in the eye of prudence,
the young and athletic men fit to bear arms, and enlisted for their
special defense, being absent with the main army, the inhabitants,
looking to their dependent wives, mothers, sisters, and little ones,
took counsel of their courage, and resolved to give the enemy battle."
***

On the morning of the 3d of July a council of war was held in Forty
Fort, to determine what action was proper. Some, among whom were
Colonels Butler and Denison and Lieutenant-colonel Dorrance, were in
favor of a delay, hoping that a re-enforcement from General Washington's
camp, then near New Brunswick, in New Jersey might reach them in time,
or that Captain Spalding, who was on the march for the valley with his
company, might arrive. Others, having little hope of succor, were
anxious to meet the enemy at once. While the debates were going on, five
commissioned officers from the army arrived at Forty Fort. Hearing of
the anticipated in-

* Dial Rock, or Campbell's Rock, as it is sometimes called, is a high
bluff at the junction of the Susquehanna and Lackawana Rivers. Its name
is derived from the circumstance that the rays of the sun first strike
its western face at meridian, and the farmers in the valley have always
an unerring indicator of noontide on clear days.

** The victims were all scalped. The bodies were interred by their
friends, and over the graves of two of the Harding family, who were
killed, a stone was raised, many years afterward, on which is the
following inscription: "Sweet is the sleep of those who prefer death to
slavery."

*** Wyoming Memorial to the Legislature of Connecticut.

**** Explanation of the Plan.--The several divisions, Hanover,
Wilkcsbarre, Kingstown, Sec., mark the districts into which the town of
Westmoreland was divided; in military language, the different beats. It
marks the site of Fort Durkee; B, Wyoming or Wilkcsbarre Fort; C, Fort
Ogden; D, village of Kingston; E, Forty Fort. [This in the early
histories of the Revolution is called Kingston Fort.] F, the
battleground; G, Wintermoot's Fort; H, Fort Jenkins; 7, Monocasy Island;
7, the three Pittstown stockades. The dot below the G marks the place of
Queen Esther's Rock. The village of Troy is upon the battleground, and
that of Wilkesbarre, upon the site of Wilkcsbarre Fort and its ravelins.
The distances of the several points from the present bridge at
'Wilkcsbarre are as follows: Fort Durke, half a mile below, on the left
bank. Fort Ogden, three and a half miles above, and the Pittstown
stockades, about eight miles, on the same side. Forty Fort, three and a
half miles; the Monument, on the battle-ground, five and a half; Queen
Esther's Rock, six and a half; Wintermoot's Fort and Fort Jenkins, eight
miles above, on the west or right bank of the river. Kingston is
directly opposite Wilkcsbarre, half a mile westward.

Decision of the Wyoming People.--Preparations for Battle.--Forces of the
Enemy.--Campbell's Injustice toward Brant

354vasion, they had obtained permission to return home to protect their
families. Already Fort Jenkins had been captured, four of the garrison
slain, and three made prisoners, and the other stockade would doubtless
share the same fate. Already a demand for the surrender of Forty Fort
and the valley had been made by Colonel John Butler, and the tomahawks
of the Indians were lifted above the heads of those families who had not
succeeded in reaching the fort. Upon prompt action appeared to depend
their salvation; and, influenced by the pleadings of the only hope of
safety left--victory in battle--the majority decided to march at once
against the invaders. The decision was rash, and the minority yielded
with much reluctance.

About one o'clock in the afternoon the little army, consisting of about
three hundred vigorous men, old men, and boys, divided into six
companies and marched from the fort, leaving the women in the most
painful anxiety. They were joined by the justices of the court and other
civil officers, and marched up the river to Wintermoot's Fort, intending
to surprise the enemy, but Colonel John Butler was too vigilant to be
caught napping. He had news of their approach, and sent for the party
then demolishing Fort Jenkins to join him immediately. When the patriots
approached, the enemy was prepared to meet them. Colonel John Butler and
his Hangers occupied the left, which rested upon the river bank near
Wintermoots; and the right, extending into a marsh at the foot of the
mountains on the western verge of the plain, was composed principally of
Indians and Tories, under a celebrated Seneca chief named Gi-en-gwa-tah,
which signifies _He who goes in the smoke._ * John

* Until the late Mr. Stone made his researches for materials for his
interesting biography of Joseph Brant, or Thayendanegea, it was believed
that Brant and his Mohawk warriors were engaged in the invasion of
Wyoming. Gordon, Ramsay, Thacher, Marshall, and Allen assert that he and
John Butler were joint commanders on that occasion, and upon his memory
rested the foul imputation of being a participant in the horrid
transactions in Wyoming. Misled by history, Campbell, in his Gertrude of
Wyoming, makes the Oneida say,

"This is no time to fill the joyous cup; The mammoth comes--the foe--the
monster Brant, With all his howling, desolating band."

And again:

"Scorning to wield the hatchet for his tribe, 'Gainst Brant himself I
went to battle forth, Accursed Brant I he left of all my tribe Nor man,
nor child, nor thing of living birth. No I not the dog that watched my
household hearth Escaped that night of blood upon the plains. All
perish'd! I alone am left on earth! To whom nor relative nor blood
remains--No, not a kindred drop that runs in human veins."

* Brant always denied any participation in the invasion, but the
evidence of history was against him, and the verdict of the world was,
that he was the chief actor in the tragedy. From this aspersion Mr.
Stone vindicated his character in his Life of Brant. A reviewer,
understood to be Caleb Cushing, of Massachusetts, disputed the point,
and maintained that Stone had not made out a clear case for the sachem.
Unwilling to remain deceived, if he was so, Mr. Stone made a journey to
the Seneca country, where he found several surviving warriors who were
engaged in that campaign. The celebrated Seneca chief Kaoundoowand,
better known as Captain Pollard, who was a young chief in the battle,
gave Mr. Stone a clear account of the events, and was positive in his
declarations that Brant and the Mohawks were not engaged in that
campaign. The Indians were principally Senecas, and were led by Gi-en-
gwa-tah, as mentioned in the text. John Brant, a son of the Mohawk
sachem, while in England in 1823, on a mission in behalf of his nation,
opened a correspondence with Mr. Campbell on the subject of the
injustice which the latter had done the chief in his Gertrude of
Wyoming. The result was a partial acknowledgment of his error by the
poet, in the next edition of the poem that was printed. He did not
change a word of the poem, but referred to the use of Brant's name
there, in a note, in which he says, "His son referred to documents which
completely satisfied me that the common accounts of Brant's cruelties at
Wyoming, which I had found in books of travels, and in Adolphus's and
other similar histories of England, were gross errors.... The name of
Brant, therefore, remains in my poem a pure and declared character of
fiction." This was well enough as far as it went; but an omission, after
such a conviction of error, to blot out the name entirely from the poem,
was unworthy of the character of an honest man; and the stain upon the
poet's name will remain as long as the libel upon a humane warrior shall
endure in the epic.

Disposition of the Belligerents for Battle.--Speech of Colonel Zebulon
Butler.--The Attack.--Colonel Zebulon Butler.

355son's Greens, under Captain Caldwell, * formed on Butler's right, and
Indian marksmen were placed at intervals along the line. Colonel Zebulon
Butler commanded the right of the Americans, aided by Major Garratt. The
left was commanded by Colonel Denison, of the Wyoming militia, assisted
by Lieutenant-colonel Dorrance. The battle-ground was a level plain,
partly cleared and cultivated, and partly covered by shrub oaks and
yellow pines

As the Americans approached the lines of the enemy, they perceived
Wintermoot's Fort, in flames, fired, no doubt, to prevent its falling
into the hands of the patriots, an event that seemed quite probable to
the Tory leader, who was ignorant of the exact number of men marching
against him. Captains Durkee and Ransom, and Lieutenants Ross and Wells,
were sent forward to reconnoiter and select the position for battle. The
Wyoming companies approached separately, and as they were wheeled into
line, Colonel Zebulon Butler thus addressed them: "Men, yonder is the
enemy. The fate of the Hardings tells us what we have to expect if
defeated. We come out to fight, not only for liberty, but for life
itself, and, what is dearer, to preserve our homes from conflagration,
our women and children from the tomahawk. Stand firm the first shock,
and the Indians will give way. Every man to his duty." **

At the conclusion of Colonel Butler's short address, the Americans
opened the battle on the enemy's left. It was about four o'clock, the
sky cloudless, and the heat quite oppressive. The Americans were ordered
to advance a step at each fire. Soon the battle became general, and the
British left, where Colonel John Butler, stripped of his feathers and
other trap-

* It is uncertain whether either of the Johnsons was in this campaign..
As they do not appear in any official connection, it is probable they
were not.

** Zebulon Butler was one of the early settlers in the Wyoming Valley.
He was a native of Lyme, New London county, Connecticut, and was born in
1731. On the breaking out of the French and Indian war lie entered the
array as an ensign. He was at Ticonderoga, Crown Point, and other places
in Northern New York. He was also in the memorable expedition to Havana
during that war, and rose to the rank of captain. He left the service at
the peace in 1763. In 1769 he emigrated to Wyoming, and became one of
the leading men in that settlement. Before he left Connecticut he was
strongly imbued with feelings of hostility to the mother country, which
the agitations of the Stamp Act had engendered, and when the Revolution
broke out he was found an active patriot. He was appointed colonel in
1778. He accompanied Sullivan in his memorable Indian expedition in
1779, and served with distinction throughout the war. In 1787 he was
made lieutenant of the new county of Luzerne, which office he held until
its abrogation by the new Constitution in 1790. He died on the 28th of
July, 1795, at his residence, about a mile and a half above Wilkesbarre,
and his remains were buried in the grave-yard at the borough. "Among
other marks of respect to his memory," says Mr. Minor, "a monody of a
dozen verses was written, one of which was inscribed on his tombstone:

"Distinguished by his usefulness. At home and when abroad, At court, in
camp, and in recess, Protected still by God."

** Colonel Butler was thrice married. His first wife was Ellen Lord; his
second, the daughter of the Rev Mr. Johnson, of Wyoming (the Indian
interpreter already mentioned); and the third was Miss Phobe Haight,
whom he married while he was on duty at West Point, near the close of
the war. Colonel Butler was a well-educated and intelligent man, as his
letters show.

** An autograph letter to General Washington, kindly given me by his
grandson, the Hon. Chester Butler, of Wilkesbarre, from which this
facsimile of his signature is copied, is a good specimen, not only of
the chirography, but of the perspicuity, terseness, and comprehensive
style that characterized the military dispatches of the Revolutionary
officers. He was one of those reliable men whom Washington cherished in
memory, and after the war he received tokens of the chief's regard.
Activity, energy, and a high sense of honor were the distinguishing
'rails of Colonel Butler's character. He was not a relative of the Tory
John Butler, as some have asserted.

Battle of Wyoming.--Denison's Order mistaken.--Retreat of the
Americans.--Scene at Monocasy Island.

356pings, appeared, with a handkerchief tied round his head, earnestly
cheering his men, began to give way. But a flanking party of Indians,
which covered that wing of the enemy, and was concealed under some
bushes upon the ancient river bank, kept up a galling fire. Captain
Durkee was slain by one of their shots. * In the mean time the Indian
sharp-shooters along the line kept up a horrid yell, the sound of which
reached the ears of the women and children at the fort: For half an hour
the battle was waged with unceasing energy on both sides, but the vastly
superior numbers of the enemy began to manifest its advantage. The
Indians on the American left, sheltered and half concealed by the swamp,
succeeded in outflanking Colonel Denison, and fell with terrible force
upon his rear. He was thus exposed to the cross fire of the Tories and
Indians. Perceiving this, he ordered his men to fall back in order to
change his position. The order was mistaken for one to _retreat_. That
word was uttered with fatal distinctness along the line, and his whole
division fled in confusion at the moment when the British left was
giving way.

A few minutes more of firm resistance might have given victory to the
republicans. The American Colonel Butler and Colonel Dorrance used every
exertion to rally the fugitives and retrieve the loss, but in vain.
Colonel Butler, seemingly unconscious of danger, rode along the lines
exposed to the fire of the contending parties, beseeching his troops to
remain firm. "Don't leave me, my children," he exclaimed, "and the
victory is ours!" But it was too late; the Indians leaped forward like
wounded tigers. Every American captain that led a company into action
was slain at the head of his men. Longer resistance was vain, and the
whole American line, broken, shattered, and dispersed, fled in
confusion, some in the direction of Forty Fort, and others toward
Monocasy Island, nearly a mile distant, and the only point on the river
that promised them an opportunity to escape. The scene that ensued was
terrible indeed. A portion of the flanking party of Indians rushed
forward to cut off the retreat to Forty Fort, while the rest of the
invaders, following the main portion of the army, who fled through the
fields of grain toward Monocasy Island, slaughtered them by scores. Many
who could not swim, and hesitated upon the brink of the river, were shot
down; and others, who hid themselves in bushes upon the shore, were
dragged out and shot or tomahawked, regardless of their cry for quarter.
Many swam to Monocasy Island, whither their pursuers followed and hunted
them like deers in cover. Others were shot while swimming; and some, who
were lured back to the shore by promises of quarter, were butchered.
Only a few escaped to the eastern side of the river and fled in safety
to the mountains. **

* Captain Robert Durkee was a younger brother of Colonel John Durkee.
When the Valley was menaced, and he was refused permission to return
home, he resigned his commission in the army, and hastened to the
defense of his family. He was a volunteer in the battle where he lost
his life.

** This view is from the left or eastern bank of the Susquehanna,
opposite the center of Monocasy Island, looking up the river. Toward the
foreground, on the right of the picture, a little beyond the bar-post,
is seen a ravine, through which the fugitives who crossed the river in
safety made their way. On the left are seen the upper end of Monocasy,
and a sand-bar which divides the waters of the river. The distant hills
on the left are those which bound the western side of the valley. From
the head of Monocasy Island, across the sand-bar, the river is often
fordable in summer to the eastern side.

*** It would be neither pleasant nor profitable to relate the many
instances of suffering on that occasion. All the horrors of war,
although on a small scale, were exhibited on that memorable day; and
were the particulars chronicled, the most rapacious gourmand of horrors
might be surfeited. I will mention one or two circumstances, which
sufficiently exhibit the bestiality of human character developed by
civil war, destroying or stifling every feeling of consanguineous
affection or neighborly regard. One of the fugitives, named Pensil, hid
himself among the willows upon Monocasy Island. His Tory brother, who
had joined in the pursuit, found him there concealed, and recognized
him. The fugitive cast himself at his brother's feet and begged his
life, promising to serve him till death if he would spare him. But the
brother was changed to a demon. "Mighty well, you damned rebel!" he
tauntingly replied, and instantly shot him dead! The Oneida savage
mentioned in a previous chapter refused to imbrue his hands in his
brother's blood. The worst passions raged with wild and desolating fury.
All the sweet charities of life seemed extinguished. Lieutenant
Shoemaker, one of the most generous and benevolent of men, whose wealth
enabled him to dispense charity and do good, which was a delight to him,
fled to the river, when Windecker, a man who had often fed at his board
and drunk of his cup, came to the brink. "Come out, come out," he said;
"you know I will protect you." How could Shoemaker doubt it? Windecker
reached out his left hand as if to lead him, much exhausted, ashore, and
dashed his tomahawk into the head of his benefactor, who fell back and
floated away.--See Miner, p. 225.

Escape of Colonels Butler and Denison.--Cruelties of the Indians.--Scene
at "Queen Esthers's Rock."--Queen Esther.

357Colonel Zebulon Butler escaped to Wilkesbarre Fort and Colonel
Denison to Forty Fort, where the latter mustered the few soldiers that
came in, placed sentinels, and prepared for a defense of the women and
children collected there.

Darkness put an end to the pursuit, but not to the horrors. It was a
dreadful night for Wyoming, for the enemy, elated by victory, held their
fearful orgies upon the battle-field.

"Whoop after whoop with rack the car assail'd,

As if unearthly fiends had hurst their bar;

While rapidly the marksman's shot prevail'd,

And aye, as if for death, some lonely trumpet wail'd.'' *

Many prisoners suffered the martyrdom of savage torture, while some of
their friends on the opposite shore, near Pittston, powerless to help
them, observed the dreadful proceedings by the light of the fires.
Captain Bidlack was thrown, alive, upon the burning timbers of
Wintermoot's Fort, where he was held down with pitchforks until he
expired! Prisoners were arranged in circles around large stones, and,
while strong Indians held them, they were dispatched with a tomahawk.
One of these stones, called Queen Esther's Rock, is pointed out to the
curious. It is upon the old river bank, about forty rods east of the
main road, three miles above Forty Fort, and near the house that
belonged to a Mr. Gay. Around it sixteen prisoners were arranged in a
circle, and each was held by a savage. A half-breed Indian woman, called
Queen Esther, *** assumed the office of executioner, and, using a maul
and tomahawk alternately as she passed around the

* Gertrude of Wyoming.

** This view is near the ancient river bank, looking westward. The rock
is a sort of conglomerate, a large proportion of which is quartz. Some
of it is of a reddish color, which the credulous believe to bo stains of
blood still remaining. The rock projects only about eighteen inches
above the ground, and its size is denoted by the figure standing beside
it. In the distance, on the left, is seen the monument which has been
erected to the memory of those who fell on the occasion. This scene
includes a portion of the battle-ground. The little village of Troy also
occupies a part of the field of conflict.

*** Queen Esther, as she was called, was the celebrated Catharine
Montour, whose residence was at Catharinestown, near the head of Seneca
Lake, in New York. The town was named after her, and was the first of
the Indian villages destroyed by Sullivan in 1779, after the battle of
Chemung. She was a native of Canada, and her father was one of the
French governors, probably Frontenac. She was made a captive during the
wars between the Hurons and French and the Six Nations, and was carried
into the Seneca country, where she married a young chief who was
signalled in the wars against the Catawbas. He fell in battle, about the
year 1730. Catharine had several children by him, and remained a widow.
Her superior mind gave her great ascendency over the Senecas, and she
was a queen indeed among them. She accompanied the delegates of the Six
Nations to Philadelphia on several occasions, where her refinement of
manners and attractive person made her an object of much regard, and she
was greatly caressed by the ladies of that city. From the circumstance
of her refinement of manners, Mr. Stone argues that she could not have
been guilty of the atrocities at Wyoming which history has attributed to
her. But Mr. Miner, whose means for correct information on points
connected with the history of Wyoming were much superior to those of Mr.
Stone, clearly fixes the guilt upon her. She was well known to Colonel
Denison and Colonel Franklin, and they both explicitly charge her with
the deed. Two of her sons accompanied her in the expedition, and it is
said that her fury on the occasion was excited by the death of one of
them, in the fight that occurred near Fort Jenkins on the 2d of July,
the day before the battle of Wyoming. She must have been then nearly
eighty years of age. One of General Sullivan's men, in his journal,
cited by Minor, speaks of reaching "Queen Esther's plantation"
[Sheshequin], where she "dwelt in retirement and sullen majesty. The
ruins of her palace," he said, "are still to be seen. In what we
supposed to be the chapel we found an idol, which might well be
worshiped without violating the third commandment on account of its
likeness to any thing in heaven or on earth. About sunrise the general
gave orders for Catharinestown to be illuminated, and accordingly we had
a glorious bonfire of upward of thirty buildings." One of the sons of
Kate Montour, as she was familiarly called, was with Walter Butler at
Cherry Valley, and with his own hands captured Mr. Cannon, the father of
Mrs. Campbell, mentioned in our account of the invasion of that
settlement. The old man's life was spared, and he was taken to Niagara.
Kate Montour was there, and "was greatly enraged," says Stone, "because
her son had not killed him outright." This "exhibition of a savage
temper" is in accordance with her acts at Bloody Rock.

Cruelties of Queen Esther.--Scenes at Forty Fort.--Negotiations for a
Surrender.--Escape of Colonel Zebulon Butler.

358singing the death-song, deliberately murdered the prisoners in
consecutive order as they were arranged. The time was midnight, and, the
scene being lighted up by a large fire burning near, she appeared like a
very fury from Pandemonium while performing her bloody work. With the
death of each victim her fury increased, and her song rose clearer and
louder upon the midnight air. Two of the prisoners (Lebbeus Hammond and
Joseph Elliot), seeing there was no hope, shook off the Indians who held
them, and, with a desperate spring, fled to a thicket, amid the rifle-
balls and tomahawks that were sent after them, and escaped. Similar
scenes were enacted on other portions of the battle-field on that
dreadful night, but we will draw a vail before the revolting picture,
and view occurrences at Forty Fort, where the hopes of the settlement
were now centered.

Terrible were the suspense and anxiety of the people at the fort while
the battle was in progress. They could distinctly hear the firing, and,
when the shots became fewer and nearer, hope departed, for they knew the
Americans were dispersed and retreating. At twilight Captain John
Franklin arrived at Forty Fort, with the Hunterdon and Salem company, of
thirty-five men. It was a timely re-enforcement, and revived the hopes
of the little remnant of Denison's force. The night was spent in
sleepless vigilance and alarm by those within the forts, while the
people without were flying to the mountains and the wilderness July 4,
1778 beyond, under cover of the darkness. Early the next morning a
messenger was dispatched to Wilkesbarre Fort, to send up the cannon, and
cause the whole settlement to concentrate for defense at Forty Fort. But
all was confusion. The people were flying in dismay, and leaving their
homes a prey to the invaders. The messenger returned with his melancholy
tidings just as another arrived from Colonel John Butler, demanding a
surrender, and requesting Colonel Denison to come up to head-quarters,
near the still burning ruins of Wintermoot's Fort, to agree on terms of
capitulation. Already the principal stockade at Pittston (Fort Brown)
had surrendered, and, there being no hope of a successful defense,
Colonel Denison complied. Colonel Butler demanded the surrender of all
the forts, and also of Colonel Zebulon Butler and his Continental troops
(numbering only fifteen men) as prisoners of war. Colonel Denison
hastened back, by agreement, to consult with his brother officers. He
conferred with Colonel Zebulon Butler at Wilkesbarre Fort, and it was
agreed that the latter and his men should immediately retire from the
valley. He placed Mrs. Butler behind him upon his horse, and that night
they slept at Conyngham, in the Nescopeek Valley, twenty miles from
Wilkesbarre. Colonel Denison, on returning, reported to the British
leader that the Continentals were beyond his command, and negotiations
were opened without reference to them. The terms were verbally agreed
upon, but, there being no conveniences for writing at hand, the
contracting parties went to Forty Fort, and, upon a table belonging to a
Mr. Bennet, the terms of capitulation were drawn up and signed. *

* The following is a copy of the articles of capitulation, dated
Westmoreland, July 4th, 1778:

"Art. 1st. That the inhabitants of the settlement lay down their arms,
and the garrisons be demolished.

"2d. That the inhabitants occupy their farms peaceably, and the lives of
the inhabitants be preserved entire and unhurt.

"3d. That the Continental stores be delivered up.

"4th. That Major Butler  will use his utmost influence that the private
property of the inhabitants shall be preserved entire to them.

"5th. That the prisoners in Forty Fort be delivered up, and that Samuel
Finch, now in Major Butler's possession, be delivered up also.

"6th. That the property taken from the people called Tories, up the
river, be made good, and they to remain in peaceable possession of their
farms, unmolested in a free trade in and throughout the state, as far as
lies in my power.

"7th. That the inhabitants that Colonel Denison now capitulates for,
together with himself, do not take up arms during the present contest.

"Nathan Denison

Signed John Butler.

"Zarah Beech, Samuel Gustin,

John Johnson, William Caldwell."

Surrender of the Fort.--Treaty Table.--Conduct of the Tories.--Bad Faith
of the Indiana.--The Treaty.

359Colonel Butler, ascertaining that there were several casks of whisky
in the fort, ordered them to be rolled to the bank of the river and
emptied, fearing that they might fall into the hands of the Indians and
make them unmanageable.

Every thing being arranged, the two gates of the fort were thrown open.
The arms of the patriots were piled up in the center, and the women and
children retired within the huts that lined the interior of the
stockade. At the appointed time the victors approached, with drums
beating and colors flying. They came in two columns, whites and Indians.
The former were led by Colonel John Butler, who entered the north gate,
and the latter by Queen Esther, the bloody priestess of the midnight
sacrifice. She was followed by Gi-en-gwa-tah, who, with his warriors,
entered the south gate. The Wily chief, fearing treachery, glanced
quickly to the right and left as he entered. The Tories, with their
natural instinct for plunder, immediately seized the piled arms. Butler
ordered them to desist, and presented the muskets to the Indians. The
inhabitants were then marked by the Indians with black paint in their
faces, and ordered to carry a white cloth on a stick. These were badges
which, the savages said, would insure their protection.

The terms of the capitulation were respected by the invaders,
particularly the Indians, for a few hours only. Before night they spread
through the valley, plundering the few people that were left, and
burning the dwellings of those already gone to the wilderness. The
village of Wilkesbarre, containing twenty-three houses, was burned, and
the inhabitants, with others remaining in the valley, fled in dismay
toward the mountains, whither a great number of their friends had gone
during the night. Only one life *** was taken after the surrender

* The table on which the capitulation was drawn up and signed was still
in possession of a daughter of Mr. Bennet (Airs. Myers) when I visited
her in September, 1848. I shall have occasion to mention this venerable
woman presently. The table is of black walnut, small, and of oval form,
and was a pretty piece of furniture when new. It is preserved with much
care by the family. The house of Mr. Bennet was near Forty Fort, and
himself and family, with their most valuable effects, were within the
stockade when it surrendered.

** This was Sergeant Boyd, a deserter from the British army. Standing in
the gateway of the fort after the capitulation, Colonel Butler
recognized him, and said, sternly, "Boyd, go to that tree!" "I hope,"
said Boyd, imploringly, "your honor will consider me a prisoner of war."
"Go to that tree, sir," shouted Butler. The sergeant obeyed, and a
volley from some Indian marksmen laid him dead upon the spot.

* In all accounts of the war John Butler is denominated a colonel, while
here he gives what was doubtless his true title. Lord George Germaine,
in a dispatch to Sir Henry Clinton, gives him the rank of lieutenant
colonel. This capitulation was highly honorable, and certainly affords a
plea in favor of the merciful character of Butler claimed for him by his
friends. In the transactions which subsequently took place he declared
his inability to control the Indians. Thia may have been true. But no
honorable man would have headed such an expedition; and whatever may
have been his efforts to allay the whirlwind of destruction which he had
raised, history holds him responsible, next to his government, for the
dreadful tragedy in Wyoming. The stories of his cruelties, set afloat by
the flying fugitives from the valley, and incorporated in the histories
of Gordon, Ramsay, and other early historians of the war, have been
refuted by ample testimony, and proved to be the offspring of
Imaginations greatly excited by the terrors of the battle and flight.
The story, that when Colonel Denison asked Butler upon what terms he
would accept a surrender, he replied, "The hatchet," and tales of a
kindred nature of cruelties permitted by him, have no foundation in
truth.

Flight of the People over the Pocono.--Incidents of the Flight.--
Providential Aid of Mr. Hollenback.--Preservation of Papers

360of Forty Fort, but numbers of women and children perished in their
flight in the great swamp on the Pocono Mountains, known as the _Shades
of Death_, and along the wilderness paths by the way of the Wind-gap and
Water-gap, to the settlements on the Lehigh and Delaware. So sudden was
their departure, that scarcely a morsel of food was secured. Terrible
indeed were the incidents of that flight, as related by the sufferers
and their friends, and recorded by Chapman and Miner. "Tears gushed from
the eyes of the aged widow of Mr. Cooper," says Mr. Miner, "when she
related that her husband had lain on his face to lap up a little meal
which a companion in their flight had spilled on the earth. Children
were born, and several perished in the 'Dismal Swamp,' or 'Shades of
Death,' as it is called to this day. Mrs. Treusdale was taken in labor;
daring to delay but a few minutes, she was seen with her infant moving
onward upon a horse. Jabez Fish, who was in the battle, escaped; but,
not being able to join his family, was supposed to have fallen; and Mrs.
Fish hastened with her children through the wilderness. Overcome by
fatigue and want, her infant died. Sitting down a moment on a stone, to
see it draw its last breath, she gazed in its face with unutterable
anguish. There were no means to dig a grave, and to leave it to be
devoured by wolves seemed worse than death; so she took the dead babe in
her arms and carried it twenty miles, when she came to a German
settlement. Though poor, they gave her food; made a box for the child,
attended her to the grave-yard, and decently buried it, kindly bidding
her welcome until she should be rested.

"The wife of Ebenezer Marcy was taken in labor in the wilderness. Having
no mode of conveyance, her sufferings were inexpressibly severe. She was
able to drag her fainting steps but about two miles that day. The next,
being overtaken by a neighbor with a horse, she rode, and in a week was
more than a hundred miles with her infant from the place of its birth.

"Mrs. Rogers, from Plymouth, an aged woman, flying with her family,
overcome by fatigue and sorrow, fainted in the wilderness, twenty miles
from human habitation. She could take no nourishment, and soon died.
They made a grave in the best manner they could.... Mrs. Courtwright
relates that she, then a young girl flying with her father's family, saw
sitting by the road side a widow, who had learned the death of her
husband. Six children were on the ground near her--the group the very
image of despair, for they were without food. Just at that moment a man
was seen riding rapidly toward them from the settlements. It was Mr.
Hollenback. * Foreseeing their probable destitution, he had
providentially loaded his horse with bread, and was hastening back, like
an angel of mercy, to their relief. Cries and tears of gratitude and
welcome went up to heaven. He imparted a morsel to each, and hastened on
to the relief of others.

The widow of Anderson Dana, Esq., ** and her widowed daughter, Mrs.
Whiton, did not learn certainly the death of their husbands until they
were at Bullock's, on the mountain, ten miles on their way. Many then
heard the fate of their relatives, and a messenger brought to Mr.
Bullock word that both his sons were dead on the field. Then were heard
mourning and lamentation, with wringing of hands. Mrs. Dana had been
extraordinarily careful. Not only had she provided food, but had taken a
pillow-case of valuable papers (her husband being much engaged in public
business), the preservation of which has thrown much light on our path
of research. Depending chiefly on charity, the family sought their
ancient home in

* Mr. Hollenback survived the battle, and escaped by swimming the river
at Monocasy Island. He crossed the mountains to the settlements in
advance of the fugitives.

** Anderson Dana was from Ashford, Windham county, Connecticut. He was a
lawyer of good attainments; his talents and zeal, in the promotion of
the welfare of the Wyoming settlement, obtained from the people their
unanimous suffrage, and he was elected a member of the Connecticut
Assembly. Returning home when Wyoming was threatened, he mounted his
horse, and, riding from family to family throughout the valley, aroused
the people to action, and, though exempt from military duty, hastened to
the field and fell. His son-in-law, Stephen Whiton, but a few weeks
married, also went into the battle and was slain.

Picture of the Flight.--Story of the Fugitives published at
Poughkeepsie.--Errors of History.--Bad Faith of the Invaders

361Connecticut. These few instances, selected from a hundred, will
present some idea of the dreadful flight."1

What a picture did that flight present! No embellishment of fancy is
needed to give it effect. One hundred women and children, with but a
single man to guide and protect them, are seen, in the wildest terror,
hurrying to the mountains. "Let the mind picture to itself a single
group, flying from the valley to the mountains on the east, and climbing
the steep ascent; hurrying onward, filled with terror, despair, and
sorrow; the affrighted mother, whose husband has fallen, with an infant
on her bosom, a child by the hand, an aged parent slowly climbing the
rugged steep behind them; hunger presses them severely; in the rustling
of every leaf they hear the approaching savage; a deep and dreary
wilderness before them, the valley all in flames behind; their dwellings
and harvests all swept away in this spring flood of ruin, and the star
of hope quenched in this blood shower of savage vengeance." **

From the settlements on the Delaware the fugitives made their way to
Connecticut by various routes, and the tales of horror of a few who
crossed the Hudson at Poughkeepsie were published in a newspaper printed
there. The account of the atrocities therein related was repeated every
where in America and in Europe, and, remaining uncontradicted, formed
the material for the darkest chapter in the annals of the Revolution, as
recorded by the earlier historians. No doubt the fugitives believed they
were telling truths. The battle, the devastation of the valley, and the
flight across the wilderness were matters of their own experience; and
other refugees, joining them in their flight, added their various
recitals to the general narrative of woe. We will not stop to detail
what has been erroneously written. The pages of Gordon, Ramsay, and
Botta will satisfy those who wish to "sup on horrors." The researches of
Mr. Minor have obliterated half the stain which those recitals cast upon
human nature, and we should rejoice at the result, for the honor of the
race. It is but just to the memory of the dead to say, in passing, that
the conduct of Colonels Zebulon Butler and Nathan Denison *** on the
occasion has been falsely represented, and injustice done to their
characters. All that could be done was done by those brave and devoted
men.

Our story of the disaster in Wyoming is almost ended. Although alarm and
distress prevailed there until the close of the war, there were no
hostilities of greater moment than the menaces of savages and a few
skirmishes with marauders. But, before closing the historic tome, let us
briefly glance at the events in the valley which followed the surrender
of the forts and the flight of the people.

As we have seen, the terms of capitulation were broken by the invaders
within a few hours after the treaty was signed, and the houses of the
people and fields of waving grain were plundered and destroyed. The
Indians began by breaking open the trunks and boxes in the huts of the
surrendered fort. The town papers were scattered, and many valuable
records were destroyed. Colonel Denison called upon Butler repeatedly to
enforce the terms of capitulation by restraining the Indians. Butler
did, indeed, attempt to restrain them, but they utterly disregarded his
orders. At length, finding his authority set at naught, doubtless
considering his own life in danger should he attempt harsh measures of
control, and probably fearing greater enormities on the part of the
Indians, Butler withdrew from the July 8, 1778 valley. **** Gi-en-gwa-
tah interposed his authority, and a greater part of the Indians

* History of Wyoming, p. 230.

** The Hazleton Travelers. This is not a volume, but a series of
biographical and historical sketches by Charles Miner, Esq., in the form
of colloquies between two travelers from Hazleton. They were published
in the Wyoming Republican in 1837-8. They are admirably conceived and
written, and contain vivid pictures of the character and sufferings of
the people of Wyoming during the Revolution.

*** Colonel Nathan Denison was a native of New London, Connecticut, and
was one of the early settlers in Wyoming. He was well educated, and was
an active man in the valley. After the close of the war he held several
important offices under the authority of Pennsylvania. He died January
25th, 1809, aged sixty-eight years.

**** Mr. Miner gives Colonel Butler full credit for humane intentions,
and believes that he desired to regard faithfully the terms of the
capitulation, and that he made the most earnest endeavors to prevent the
pillage and murders which ensued. On the authority of a Mr. Finch, a
prisoner at the time, who went over the battle-ground with Mr. Miner in
1838, he says that Colonel Butler received a letter on the 5th, which
hastened his departure from the valley. It probably gave him notice of
the approach of Captain Spalding or some other expected re-enforcements.
Mr. Miner tells an amusing anecdote of Finch. They called together upon
Mrs. Jenkins, an aged lady, more than eighty years old, who was a
prisoner in Forty Fort. She instantly recognized Finch, and said, with
much archness and humor, "Oh, yes, Finch, to be sure I remember you. An
old squaw took you and brought you in. She found you in the bushes, and,
as she drove you along, patted you on the back, saying, 'My son, my
son!'" Finch did not relish the exposure as well as the by-standers. He
had been playing the hero in his account of the battle. Mrs. Jenkins
stripped him of his plumage, and he soon after left the valley.

Departure of the Invaders from the Valley.--Indian Cruelties.--Arrival
at Succor.--Expedition against the Indians.

362followed the leaders, with Queen Esther and her retinue in the van.
The appearance of the retiring enemy was extremely ludicrous, aside from
the melancholy savageism that was presented. Many squaws accompanied the
invaders, and these brought up the rear. Some had belts around their
waists, made of scalps stretched upon small hoops; some had on from four
to six dresses of chintz or silk, one over the other; and others,
mounted on stolen horses, and seated, "not sidewise, but otherwise," had
on their heads four or five bonnets, one within another.

As soon as Butler and the main body of the invaders left the valley, the
Indians that remained, wholly uncontrolled, swept over the plains in
small bands of from five to ten, and wantonly destroyed the crops,
burned houses and barns, and treated the few remaining people most
cruelly. * Several murders were committed, and terror again reigned in
the valley. Colonel Denison, and all who remained at Forty Fort, fled,
some down the river and some to the mountains. Except a few who gathered
about the fort at Wilkesbarre, the whole people abandoned the
settlement. It presented one wide scene of conflagration and ruin.

Captain Spalding was between the Pocono and Blue Mountains, nearly fifty
miles from Wilkesbarre, on the day of the battle. Apprised of the event
by the flying settlers, he hastened forward, and when within twelve
miles of the valley sent two scouts to reconnoiter. From the brow of the
mountain they saw the flames rising in all directions, and the valley in
complete possession of the invaders. The efforts of a single company
would be vain, and Captain Spalding returned to Stroudsburg, to await
the orders of Colonel Zebulon Butler, August 3, 1778 who soon returned
to Wyoming. When the enemy had left the valley, Spalding marched
thither, and took up his quarters at Wilkesbarre Fort, a which he
strengthened. Other means for the defense of the valley were adopted,
and a few of those who had fled returned, with the hope of securing
something that might be left of all their desolated possessions. Some of
them were waylaid and shot by straggling Indians and Tories. There was
no security; throughout that fertile valley fire was the only reaper,
and the luscious fruits fell to the earth ungathered. Even the dead upon
the battle-ground lay unburied until the autumn frosts had come; and
when their mutilated and shriveled bodies were collected and cast into
one common receptacle of earth, but few could be identified, October 22
That sad office was performed by guarded laborers, while parties of the
enemy, like hungry vultures, scented their prey from afar, and hovered
upon the mountains, ready to descend upon the stricken settlers when
opportunity should offer.

Colonel Hartly, of the Pennsylvania line, joined Colonel Zebulon Butler,
and an expedition was arranged to expel the marauders. In September a
detachment of one hundred and thirty men marched to Shesequin, Queen
Esther's plantation, a beautiful plain on the east branch of the
Susquehanna (now in Bradford county), where a battle ensued. Several of

* One illustrative instance I will mention. From the farm of an old man
named Weekes, seven persons, three of whom were his sons, one a
grandson-in-law, two relatives, and the last a boarder, went out to the
battle. At night the whole seven lay dead on the field! After the
capitulation, a band of Indians came to his house and ordered him away.
"How can I?" he said; "my whole family you have killed. How can I with
fourteen grandchildren, all young and helpless." They feasted on the
food in his house; and one of the Indians, taking the hat from the old
man's head, and placing himself in a large rocking-chair which he had
taken to the road, rocked with much glee. They then informed him that he
might have three days allowed him to prepare for departure, and the use
of a pair of oxen and a wagon to carry away his grandchildren. He
departed, and the savages set fire to the building, and destroyed all
that was left. Over the rough country along the Lackawanna Mr. Weekes
made his way to Orange county.--See Miner's Wyoming, p. 238, and
Hazleton Travelers.

Return of Settlers.--Continued Alarm.--Murder of Mr. Slocum.--Sullivan's
Expedition.--Situation of Wyoming.

363the Indians were killed, their settlement was broken up, and a
quantity of plunder that had been taken from Wyoming was recovered.
Returning to Wyoming, Colonel Hartly was called away, but left a
garrison of one hundred men at Wilkesbarre Fort. Thus defended, although
the season was much advanced, a few armed settlers plowed and sowed.
Marauding parties of the enemy still hovered upon the mountains, and
several of the whites were murdered in their fields, among whom was
Jonathan Slocum, a member of the Society of Friends. The interesting
story of the abduction of his little daughter, and her subsequent
discovery among the Indians, will be related in the next chapter.

In March, 1779, the garrison at Wilkesbarre was menaced by a party of
about two hundred and fifty Indians and painted Tories, who surrounded
the fort. The discharge of a field piece drove them away, but, the
garrison being too feeble to attempt a pursuit, the marauders carried
off' much plunder, not, however, without suffering considerably in some
smart skirmishes with the inhabitants. In April a re-enforcement for the
garrison, under Major Powell, while marching toward Wyoming, fell into
an Indian ambuscade. April 30Six of his men were killed, but the Indians
were routed.

Toward the close of June, General Sullivan arrived in the valley, with
his division of the army destined for the invasion of the Seneca
country, the events of which have been narrated in a preceding chapter.
The troops had rendezvoused at Easton, and marched to Wyoming by the way
of the present turnpike. They arrived on the 23d of June, and encamped
on the flats below Wilkesbarre. A large fleet of boats, that had been
prepared in the lower waters of the Susquehanna, arrived, with
provisions and stores, on the 24th. We have seen that Sullivan's
movements were remarkably slow, and that the enemy became perfectly
acquainted with his strength and his plans before he reached Tioga. The
Indians, guided by the mind of Brant, tried to divert the attention of
Sullivan by attacks upon his outposts. * Several of these occurred, but
the American force was too large to be much affected by them, and on the
31st of July the tents were struck, and the whole army, with martial
music and the thunder of cannon, moved up the Susquehanna, proceeding on
the east side. As the fleet of boats approached Monocasy Island and the
battle-ground, the lively music of fife and drum was changed to a solemn
dirge, in honor of the patriot dead. The army encamped the first night a
little above Pittston, near the confluence of the Susquehanna and
Lackawanna Rivers. On the 5th it arrived at Wyalusing, on the 9th at
Queen Esther's Plains (Shesequin), and on the 11th reached Tioga Point.
The remainder of the story of the expedition has already been told.

As soon as the American army was gone, the Indians and Tories came
prowling upon the borders of the valley, and, until peace was
proclaimed, the settlers had no an hour of repose. "Revenge upon
Wyoming," says Stone, "seemed a cherished luxury to the infuriated
savages, hovering upon her outskirts upon every side. It was a scene of
war, blood, and suffering.... In the course of this harassing warfare
there were many severe skirmishes, several heroic risings of prisoners
upon their Indian captors, and many hair-breadth escapes." ** It would
require a volume to detail them, and the reader, desirous of more minute
information, is referred to the works of Chapman, Miner, and Stone. I
have other and broader regions to traverse and explore, and other pages
of our wondrous history to open and recite. Let us close the book for
the present, and ramble a while along the banks of the Susquehanna,
where the tragedy we have been considering was enacted, but where now
the smiles of peace, prosperity, and repose gladden the heart of the
dweller and the stranger.

* The boldness of the Indians was remarkable. Although the Americans in
camp were three thousand strong, they approached within two or three
miles of the tents, and committed murders.

** History of Wyoming p. 206.

Present Scenery in Wyoming.--Allusion to Campbell's Poem--Visit to
Kingston and Forty Fort

364

CHAPTER XVI.

"I then but dream'd: thou art before me now

In life, a vision of the brain no more.

I've stood upon the wooded mountain's brow,

That beetles high fly lovely valley o'er.

Nature hath made thee lovelier than the power

Even of Campbell's pen hath pictured; he

Had woven, had ne gazed one sunny hour

Upon thy smiling vale, its scenery

With more of truth, and made each rock and tree

Known like old friends, and greeted from afar;

And there are tales of sad reality

In the dark legends of thy border war,

With woes of deeper tint than his own Gertrude's are."

Halleck.

MIST still reposed upon the waters, and veiled the fringe of trees along
the Susquehanna, when, late in the morning, I left Wilkesbarre, in
company with Mr. Lord Butler, to visit the celebrities of the valley.
The poetry of the bard and the solemn prose of the historian awakened
thoughts and associations which invested every venerable tree and
antiquated dwelling, the plains, the river, and the mountains, with all
the glowing characteristics of romance. The simple beauty of nature,
though changed in feature, is as attractive as of old.

"But where are they, the beings of the mind,

The bard's creations, molded not of clay,

Hearts to strange bliss and sufferings assign'd--

Young Gertrude, Albert, Waldegrave--where are they?

Waldegrave 'twere in vain

To point out here, unless in yon scarecrow

That stands full uniform'd upon the plain

To frighten flocks of crows and blackbirds from the grain.

"For he would look particularly droll

In his 1 Iberian boot' and ' Spanish plume,'

And be the wonder of each Christian soul,

As of the birds that scarecrow and his broom.

But Gertrude, in her loveliness and bloom,

Hath many a model here; for woman's eye,

In court or cottage, wheresoe'er her home,

Hath a heart-spell too holy and too high

To be o'er-praised, even by her worshiper--Poesy."

Halleck.

We crossed the plain to Kingston, a pretty village about half a mile
westward of Wilkesbarre, and then proceeded to the site of Forty Fort,
three and a half miles above, which is reached by a road diverging
toward the river from the main road to the head of the valley. It stood
near the river bank, at a curve in the stream. Not a single trace of it
is left, the spot having been long a common, perfectly smooth, and
covered with a green sward. Near the site of the fort is a venerable
house, one of the few that escaped the general conflagra-

The "Treaty Table" at Forty Fort.--Site of the Fort.--Visit to the
Monument.--Inscription upon it.

365tion, and close by is the residence of one of Mrs. Myers's family, in
whoso possession I found the _treaty table_, pictured in the last
chapter. The venerable owner was not there, but I afterward saw her at
the house of her son, near Kingston. A cottage and its garden occupy the
bank of the river where the trembling families at Forty Fort stood and
listened to the noise of the battle; and from that point is a charming
river view, bounded on the northwest by the lofty range of the Shawnee
Mountains, through which the Susquehanna makes its way into the valley.

From Forty Fort we rode up to the monument, which is situated in a field
a few rods east of the main road, near the pleasant little village of
Troy, five and a half miles from Wilkesbarre. It is constructed of hewn
blocks of granite, quarried in the neighborhood, is sixty two and a half
feet in height, and stands upon the spot where the dead were buried in
the autumn succeeding the battle. * On two marble tablets are engraved
the names of those who fell, so far as could be ascertained, and also of
those who were in the battle and survived. Another marble tablet
contains an inscription, written by Edward Mallory, Esq. ** This
monument, like many others proposed to be erected to the memory of
Evolutionary men or events, was tardily conceived and more tardily
executed. It remained unfinished nearly forty years after the first
movements were made toward raising money for the purpose. As early as
1809,

Mr. Minor, the historian of the valley, wrote several essays intended to
awaken public attention to the duty of erecting a monument, and in 1810
Charles F. Wells, Esq., wrote a stirring ode, concluding with the
patriotic interrogation,

"O, when shall rise, with chisel'd head,

The tall stone o'er their burial-place,

Where the winds may sigh for the gallant dead,

And the dry grass rustle around its base?"

* Professor Silliman visited many of the Revolutionary grounds about
twenty years ago. In his Journal, vol. xviii., p. 310, in describing his
visit to Wyoming, he says that a Mr. Perrin, one of those who assisted
in the burial of the dead, went over the ground with him, and assured
him that, owing to the intense heat and dryness of the air, the bodies
were shriveled, dry, and quite inoffensive. ** The following is the
inscription upon the monument:

Near this spot was fought,

On the afternoon of Friday, the third day of July, 1778,

THE BATTLE OF WYOMING,

In which a small band of patriot Americans,

Chiefly the undisciplined, the youthful, and the aged,

Spared, by inefficiency, from the distant ranks of the republic,

Led by Colonel Zebulon Butler and Colonel Nathan Denison With a courage
that deserved success,

Boldly met and bravely fought A combined British, Tory, and Indian force
Of thrice their number.

Numerical superiority alone gave success to the invader,

And wide-spread havoc, desolation, and ruin Marked his savage and bloody
footsteps through the valley.

THIS MONUMENT,

Commemorative of these events,

And of the actors in them,

Has been erected Over the bones of the slain,

By their descendants and others, who gratefully appreciate

The services and sacrifices of their patriot ancestors.

Efforts to erect the Wyoming Monument.--Success of the Ladies.--
Incidents of the Battle.--The Inman Family.

366 These appeals caused meetings to be held and resolutions to be
adopted, but little more substantial was done until 1839, when a
committee from Wyoming repaired to Hartford, to solicit pecuniary aid
from the Legislature of Connecticut. The committee set forth the claims
of the Wyoming people upon Connecticut, in consideration of past
allegiance and services. A report was made, proposing a grant of three
thousand dollars, but no further action was taken during that session.
In 1841 another petition was presented, and so ably was the matter
conducted that the lower branch of the Legislature voted the
appropriation asked for, by a large majority. The Senate did not concur,
and another failure was the consequence. The ladies of Wyoming,
doubtless feeling the truth of Dr. Clarke's assertion, that "in all
benevolent or patriotic enterprises the services of one woman are equal
to those of seven men and a half," resolved that the monument should be
erected. They formed a "Luzerne Monumental Association," * solicited
donations, held fairs, and by their energy obtained the necessary funds
and erected a monument, commemorative alike of patriotic deeds and of
female influence. There is a world of philosophy (which solicitors of
subscriptions would do well to observe) in the saying of Judge
Halliburton's clock peddler, "The straight road to the _pockets_ of the
men is through the _hearts_ of the women."

From the monument northward to the site of Wintermoot's Fort, a mile and
a half, the road passes over the battle-ground; but tillage has so
changed the whole scene, that nothing remains as token or landmark of
the fight, except the ancient river bank, and the tangled morass toward
the mountains, through' which the Indians made their way and fell upon
Colonel Denison's rear. The place was pointed out to me, upon the road
side, where, tradition says, one of the Wyoming men, somewhat
intoxicated, lagged behind and fell asleep, when the little band marched
to the attack of the invaders. When the retreat became general, and
Colonel Zebulon Butler saw no other means of safety but flight, he put
spurs to his horse. A swift-footed settler, hotly pursued by savages,
caught the tail of Colonel Butler's horse as he passed by, and, with the
tenacity of the witch that fastened upon the tail of Tam O'Shanter's
mare, held on until he was far beyond danger. As they passed the spot
where the inebriate had just awaked, perfectly sober, the man at the
tail shouted to him to shoot the pursuing savage. He did so, and the
Indian fell dead in the road. Near the same spot Rufus Bennet was
pursued by an Indian. Both had discharged their pieces, and the savage
was chasing with tomahawk and spear. Richard Inman, one of five brothers
who were in the battle, shot the Indian with his rifle, who fell dead
within a few feet of his intended victim.' Passing over the battle-
ground, we visited the site of Wintermoot's Fort, a view of which is
given on page 351, and, going down on the ancient bank of the
Susquehanna, we came to Queen Esther's Rock, noticed and described on
page 357. There is a scow ferry near, by which we crossed to the eastern
side of the river, along whose margin, skirted with lofty-trees, we had
a delightful ride to the ravine opposite Monocasy Island. Here the road
departs from the river bank, and passes among fertile intervales between
that point and Wilkesbarre. The wheat harvests were garnered, but the
corn-fields and orchards were laden with the treas-

* The most active ladies in the association were descendants of those
who suffered at the time of the invasion. The names of the officers of
the society are as follows: Mrs. Chester Butler, President; Mrs. G M.
Hollenback and Mrs. E. Carey, Vice-presidents; Mrs. J. Butler, Mrs.
Nicholson, Mrs. Hollenback, Mrs Lewis, Mrs. Ross, Mrs. Conyngham, Sirs.
Beaumont, Mrs. Drake, Mrs. Bennet, Mrs. Carey, Executive Committee; Miss
Emily Cist, Treasurer; Miss Gertrude Butler, Secretary; Mrs. Donley,
Mrs. L. Butler, Corresponding Committee.

** The Inman family were terrible sufferers. Five brothers went to the
field of battle. Two others (for the father had seven sons) would have
gone forth, but they had no arms. Two were killed on the field, two
escaped without injury, and the fifth, plunging into the waters under
some willows on the river shore while heated by the exertions of the
battle and the flight, took such a cold that in a few weeks he was in
his grave. The remainder of the family fled with the rest of the
settlement. In the fall they ventured to return, and put in some winter
grain. A surviving son, a lad of nineteen years, while in the field,
heard, as he supposed, some wild turkeys in the woods. He went after
them, shots were heard, but the boy never came back. In the spring his
body was found. He had been murdered and scalped by the Indians. Thus
four sons of Elijah Inman perished within a few months. One of the sons,
Colonel Edward Inman, is still living, I believe, upon a fine farm a few
miles below Wilkesbarre.

Residence and Grave of Colonel Zebulon Butler.--Mr. Slocum and his
Family History.--Abduction of his Sister.

367ures of the season, their abundance betokening the extreme fertility
of the soil. We passed the homestead of Colonel Butler, near which,

"On the margin of yon orchard hill,

Are marks where time-worn battlements have been,

And in the tall grass traces linger still.

Of arrowy frieze and wedged ravelin."

Near the entrance to the village we came to the cemetery where repose
many of the patriot dead of Wyoming. There rest the remains of Colonel
Butler and his wife. The rude slab that first marked the bed of the hero
had been removed, and in its place a neat white marble stone is laid,
bearing the following inscription: "In memory of Colonel Zebulon Butler,
of the Revolutionary army, who died July 28th, 1795, in the 64th year of
his age; and also in memory of Mrs. Phoebe H. Butler, his wife, who died
January 19th, 1837, in the 82d year of her age."

It was late in the day when I reached my lodgings, and, wearied by the
rambles of the morning, resolved to pass the remainder of the afternoon
with the _Hazleton Travelers_. Their conversation was exclusively of
those who acted and suffered at the time of the _massacre_, and I
listened with intense interest to the recitals of the "knowing one." I
would gladly give the details here, if my space would allow, for they
furnish one of the most interesting of those chapters in our
Revolutionary history, showing the terrible cost at which our liberties
were purchased. Mr. Minor has made the record, and to it the reader is
referred.

I passed the evening with the venerable Joseph Slocum, whose family was
among the sufferers in the Wyoming Valley. He related to me all the
particulars of the capture and final discovery of his sister Frances,
and other incidents connected with the sufferings of his family. His
father was a Quaker, and was distinguished for his kindness to the
Indians. He remained unharmed at the time of the invasion, and, while
the torch was applied to the dwellings of others, his was left
untouched. But his son Giles was in the battle. This doubtless excited
the ire of the Indians, and they resolved on vengeance. Late in autumn
they were seen prowling about the house, which was situated about one
hundred rods from the Wilkesbarre Fort. A neighbor named Kingsley had
been made a prisoner, and his wife and two sons had a welcome home in
Mr. Slocum's family. One morning the November 2, 1778 two boys were
grinding a knife near the house, when a rifle-shot and a shriek brought
Mrs. Slocum to the door. An Indian was scalping the eldest boy, a lad of
fifteen, with the knife he had been grinding. The savage then went into
the house, and caught up a little son of Mrs. Slocum. "See!" exclaimed
the frightened mother, "he can do thee no good; he is lame." The Indian
released the boy, took up her little daughter Frances, aged five years,
gently in his arms, and, seizing the younger Kingsley, hastened to the
mountains. Two Indians who were with, him carried off a black girl,
about seventeen years old Mr. Slocum's little daughter, aged nine years,
caught up her brother Joseph (my informant) two and a half years old,
and fled in safety to the fort, where an alarm was given, but the
savages were beyond successful pursuit.

About six weeks afterward Mr. Slocum and his father-in-law, Ira Trip,
were December 16 shot and scalped by some Indians while foddering cattle
near the house. Again the savages escaped with their horrid trophies.
Mrs. Slocum, bereft of father, husband, and child, and stripped of all
possessions but the house that sheltered her, could not leave the
valley, for nine helpless children were yet in her household. She
trusted in the God of Elijah, and, if she was not fed by the ravens, she
was spared by the vultures. She mourned not for the dead, for they were
at rest; but little Frances, her lost darling, where was she? The lamp
of hope kept on burning, but years rolled by, and no tidings of the
little one came. When peace returned, and friendly intercourse with
Canada was established, two of the little captive's brothers started in
search of her. They traversed the wilderness to Niagara, offering
rewards for her discovery, but all in vain. They returned to Wyoming,
convinced that the child was dead. But the mother's heart was still the
shrine of hope,

Mrs. Slocum's Presentiments.--A Foundling.--Disappointment.--Singular
Discovery of the "lost Sister."

368and she felt assured that Frances was not in the grave. Her soul
appeared to commune with that of her child, and she often said, "I know
Frances is living." At length the mother's heart was cheered; a woman
(for many years had now passed, and Frances, if living, must be a full-
grown woman) was found among the Indians, answering the description of
the lost one. She only remembered being carried away from the
Susquehanna. Mrs. Slocum took her home and cherished her with a mother's
tenderness. Yet the mysterious link of sympathy which binds the maternal
spirit to its offspring was unfelt, and the bereaved mother was bereaved
still. "It may be Frances, but it does not seem so. Yet the woman shall
be ever welcome," said Mrs. Slocum. The foundling also felt no filial
yearnings, and, both becoming convinced that no consanguinity existed,
the orphan returned to her Indian friends. From time to time the hope of
the mother would be revived, and journeys were made to distant Indian
settlements in search of the lost sister, but in vain. The mother went
"down into the grave mourning," and little Frances was almost forgotten.
Her brothers had become aged men, and their grandchildren were playing
upon the very spot whence she had been taken.

In the summer of 1837, fifty-nine years after her capture, intelligence
of Frances was received. Colonel Ewing, an Indian agent and trader, in a
letter from Logansport, Indiana, to the editor of the Lancaster
Intelligencer, * gave such information that all doubts respecting her
identity were removed, and Joseph Slocum, with the sister who carried
him to the fort, and yet survived, immediately journeyed to Ohio, where
they were joined by their younger brother Isaac. They proceeded to
Logansport, where they found Mr. Ewing, and ascertained that the woman
spoken of by him lived about twelve miles from the village. She was
immediately sent for, and toward evening the next day she came into the
town, riding a spirited young horse, accompanied by her two daughters,
dressed in full Indian costume, and the husband of one of them. An
interpreter was procured (for she could not speak or understand
English), and she listened seriously to what her brothers had to say.
She answered but little, and at sunset departed for her home, promising
to return the next morning. The brothers and sister were quite sure that
it was indeed Frances, though in her face nothing but Indian lineaments
were seen, her color alone revealing her origin.

True to her appointment, she appeared the following morning, accompanied
as before. Mr. Joseph Slocum then mentioned a mark of recognition, which
his mother had said would be a sure test. While playing one day with a
hammer in a blacksmith's shop, Joseph, then a child two and a half years
old, gave Frances a blow upon the middle finger of the left hand, which
crushed the bone and deprived the finger of its nail. This test Mr.
Slocum had withheld until others should fail. When he mentioned it, the
aged woman was greatly agitated, and, while tears filled the furrows of
her face, she held out the wounded finger. There was no longer a doubt,
and a scene of great interest ensued. Her affections for her

*This letter was dated January 20th, 1835, a year and a half previous,
and gave the following account: "There is now living near this place,
among the Miami tribe of Indians, an aged white woman, who, a few days
ago, told me that she was taken away from her father's house, on or near
the Susquehanna River, when she was very young. She says her father's
name was Slocum; that he was a Quaker, and wore a large-brimmed hat;
that he lived about half a mile from a town where there was a fort. She
has two daughters living. Her husband is dead. She is old and feeble,
and thinks she shall not live long. These considerations induced her to
give the present history of herself, which she never would before,
fearing her kindred would come and force her away. She has lived long
and happily as an Indian, is very respectable and wealthy, sober and
honest. Her name is without reproach." The cause of the delay in the
publication of the letter, and of its final appearance and effect, was
not a little singular. Mr. Ewing sent it to the postmaster at Lancaster,
with a request that he would have it published in a Pennsylvania paper.
The postmaster, not acquainted with the writer, concluded that it was a
hoax, and cast the letter among other papers, where it remained a year
and a half. One day his wife, while engaged in arranging the office, saw
the letter, and, having her feelings very much interested, sent it to
the editor of the Intelligencer. It so happened that the issue of his
paper in which the letter was published contained an important
temperance document, and a large number of extra copies were printed for
general distribution. One of these was sent to a gentleman in Wyoming,
who, having heard the story of the "lost sister," and knowing Mr. Joseph
Slocum, put the paper into his hands; and thus, by a series of
providential circumstances, a clew to Frances was discovered.

Interview between the "lost Sister" and her white Kindred.--Her
Narrative.--Her Condition.--Children and Grandchildren

369kindred, that had slumbered half a century, were aroused, and she
made earnest inquiries after her father, mother, brothers, and sisters.
Her full heart--full with the cherished secrets of her history--was
opened, and the story of her life freely given.

She said the savages (who were Delawares), after taking her to a rocky
cave in the mountains, departed for the Indian country. The first night
was the unhappiest of her life. She was kindly treated, being carried
tenderly in their arms when she was weary. She was adopted in an Indian
family, and brought up as their daughter. For years she led a roving
life, and loved it. She was taught the use of the bow and arrow, and
became expert in all the employments of savage existence. When she was
grown to womanhood both her Indian parents died, and she soon afterward
married a young chief of the nation, and removed to the Ohio country.
She was treated with more respect than the Indian women generally; and
so happy was she in her domestic relations, that the chance of being
discovered and compelled to return among the whites was the greatest
evil that she feared, for she had been taught that they were the
implacable enemies of the Indians, whom she loved. Her husband died,
and, her people having joined the Miamies, she went with them and
married one of that tribe. The last husband was also dead, and she had
been a widow many years Children and grandchildren were around her, and
her life was passing pleasantly away When she concluded the narrative,
she lifted her right hand in a solemn manner, and said, "All this is as
true as that there is a Great Spirit in the heavens!" She had entirely
forgotten her native language, and was a pagan. To her Christ and the
Christian's Sabbath were unknown.

On the day after the seeond interview, the brothers and sister, with the
interpreter, rode out to her dwelling. It was a well-built log house, in
the midst of cultivation. A large herd of cattle and sixty horses were
grazing in the pastures. Every thing betokened plenty and comfort, for
she was wealthy, when her wants and her means were compared. Her annuity
from government, which she received as one of the Miami tribe, had been
saved, and she had about one thousand dollars in specie. Her white
friends passed several days very agreeably with her; and subsequently
her brother Joseph, with his daughter, the wife of

* This portrait I copied from a painting of life size in the possession
of her brother, Mr. Joseph Slocum, of Wilkesbarre. It was painted for
him by an artist named Winter, residing at Logansport. Her underdress is
scarlet, and the mantle with the large sleeve is black cloth. The
Indians gave her the name of Ma-con-a-qua, a Young Bear. The names of
her children and grandchildren are as follows: Eldest daughter, Kich-ke-
ne-che-quah, Cut Finger; youngest daughter, O-saw-she-quah, Yellow Leaf.
Grandchildren: Kin-pe-no-quah, Corn Tassel; Wap-pa-no-se-a, Blue Corn;
Kim-on-sa-quah, Young Panther.

A Sabbath in Wyoming.--Visit to Mrs. Myers.--Incidents of her Life.--
Escape of her Father and Brother from Indians.

370the Hon. Ziba Bennet of Wyoming, made her another visit, and bade her
a last farewell. She died about four years ago, and was buried with
considerable pomp, for she was regarded as a queen among her tribe. *

September 18, 1848 I passed a Sabbath in Wyoming. It was a dull and
cheerless day. The mountains were hooded with vapor, and all day a
chilly drizzle made the trees weep. But Monday morning dawned clear and
warm, and in the course of the day I revisited Forty Fort and the
battle-ground, ascended the mountain to Prospect Rock, to obtain another
glorious view of the valley, peeped into the black caverns of the coal
mines at the foot of the hills, and at noon took shelter from the hot
sun in the shaded walks of Toby's Eddy, where Zinzendorf pitched his
tent. Thence I rode to the residence of Mr. Myers, a son of the
venerable lady already alluded to, where I passed an interesting hour
with the living chronicle of the woes of Wyoming. I found her sitting in
an easy chair, peeling apples, and her welcome was as cheerful and
cordial as she could have given to a cherished friend. Her memory was
clear, and she related the incidents of her girlhood with a perspicuity
that evinced remarkable mental vigor. Although blindness has shut out
the beautiful, and deprived her of much enjoyment, yet pious
resignation, added to natural vivacity, makes her society extremely
agreeable. "I am like a withered stalk, whose flower hath fallen," she
said; "but," she added, with a pleasant smile, "the fragrance still
lingers." She was sixteen years old at the time of the invasion, and was
in Forty Fort when it surrendered. Every minute circumstance there she
remembered clearly, and her narrative of events was substantially the
same as recorded in the last chapter. Her father's house was near the
fort, and for a week after the surrender it was spared, while others
were plundered and destroyed. Every morning when she arose her first
thought was their house, and she would go early to see if it was safe.
One morning as she looked she saw the flames burst through the roof, and
in an hour it was a heap of embers. She remained two weeks in the valley
after the surrender of the fort. The Indians kept her face painted and a
white fillet around her head, as a protection against the tomahawks of
strange savages, and she was treated very kindly by them. When Colonel
Denison and others fled from the valley, she and her family accompanied
them. After the savages left the valley, her family returned, and for
seventy years she has enjoyed the sweets of peace and domestic
happiness. Her maiden name was Bennet, and her family were conspicuous
in the events at Wyoming during the Revolution.1 2 She has been many
years a widow. One of her sons was high sheriff of Luzerne county,
another was a magistrate, and a daughter is the wife of the Rev. Dr.
Peck, the editor of the Methodist Episcopal Review, published at the
"Book Concern," in New York. She is yet living (November, 1849), at the
ripe age of eighty-eight years, honored and beloved by all.

I returned to Wilkesbarre at sunset. The evening was as pleasant as
June, September 20. the moonlight scene from the upper piazza of the
Phoenix, embracing the quiet-flowing Susquehanna, with its fringe of
noble trees; the sparkling of the lights at

* When the Miamies were removed from Indiana, the "lost sister" and her
Indian relatives were exempted. The affecting story of her life was laid
before Congress, and so eloquently did John Quincy Adams plead her
cause, that he drew tears from the eyes of many members. Congress gave
her a tract of land a mile square, to be held in perpetuity by her
descendants, and there her children and grandchildren still dwell.

** Her brother Solomon was in the battle. In the spring succeeding the
invasion, the father of Mrs. Myers, her brother (a lad), and Lebbeus
Hammond (one of the two who escaped from Queen Esther at the bloody
rock) were captured by a party of Indians while at work in the field,
and hurried away to the north. It was evident that they were destined
for torture, and, while the Indians were drinking at a spring on the
third day of their journey into the wilderness, they concerted a plan
for escape. Mr. Bennet, being old, was allowed to travel unbound, but
the arms of Hammond and the boy were tied. There were six Indians in the
party. At night all were laid down to sleep but Mr. Bennet and an
Indian. The former brought in dry wood for the fire, and kept himself
busy for some time. He then sat down by the fire, and, taking up a
spear, he rolled it playfully on his thigh. The Indian finally began to
nod, and the others were snoring soundly. Watching his opportunity,
Bennet thrust the savage through with the spear, cut the cords that
bound his son and Hammond, and the three attacked the sleeping savages.
Five were killed, the other one escaped. The captives returned home,
bringing, as trophies, the scalps of the slain savages.

Revival of Civil War in Wyoming.--Decree of Trenton.--Its Effect.
Injustice toward the "Yankees."--Inaction of Congress.

371Kingston, and the dark outline of the Shawnee Mountains, all hallowed
by historic associations, was one of great beauty and interest. Let us
employ the quiet hour in reminiscences of some stirring events that
occurred, within trumpet call of our presence, after the Revolution, for
early on the morrow I must leave Wyoming, perhaps forever.

We have considered the civil war that disturbed Wyoming before the
Revolution. That great movement absorbed all lesser topics; but as soon
as the storm had subsided, and private interests again became paramount,
old jealousies and animosities were resuscitated, and struggled into
active life. As soon as all fear of the Indians had subsided,
Connecticut poured hundreds of immigrants into this paradise of the
Susquehanna. The influx was regarded with jealousy by the
Pennsylvanians, and it was not long before all the rancor of the Penny-
mite and Yankee war was reproduced.

The Articles of Confederation, under which the general government of the
United States was carried on, having made provision for the adjustment
of difficulties that might arise between states, and Connecticut
insisting upon the maintenance of its jurisdiction over Wyoming,
Pennsylvania applied to Congress to appoint a commission to hear the
claimants by representatives, and to determine the question in dispute.
The commissioners met at Trenton, in New Jersey, toward the close of
1782, and, after a session of five weeks, decided, unanimously, that
Connecticut had no right to the land in controversy, and that the
jurisdiction and preemption of all lands belonged to Pennsylvania. The
people of Wyoming appeared to be well satisfied with the decision, for,
considering it a question of jurisdiction only, they deemed it a matter
of little moment whether they rendered allegiance to Connecticut or
Pennsylvania. The Pennsylvanians, however, did not so construe the
decision, but contended not only for jurisdiction, but for the soil, and
steps were immediately taken for a sweeping ejectment of the Connecticut
settlers. In March ensuing, two companies were sent to garrison the fort
at Wilkesbarre, under the pretext of affording protection to the people;
and the name of the fort was changed to Dickinson, in honor of the
President of the Council of the State. Pennsylvania had already
appointed three commissioners to repair to Wyoming, to inquire into the
state of affairs, and report proper measures to be adopted toward the
settlers. Their report proposed an entire surrender, on the part of the
Wyoming people, of their tenures, and all claim to the soil then in
their possession, with their improvements; in lieu of which they were to
receive an indefinite compensation, at the option of their oppressors,
in the wild lands of some unknown region. It was a most unjust and
tyrannical measure, for the right to the soil had been purchased, not
only with money, but with the dreadful sufferings of those about to be
driven away. This report of the commissioners, and the quartering of
troops in the valley, now that the war was ended, and the spirit of
tyrannical domination that characterized the soldiers, greatly
exasperated the people, and they were upon the verge of open
insurrection for several months.

Early in the autumn two special justices of the peace were appointed,
who, in concert with the military, formed a tribunal for the
adjudication of all questions arising under the civil law. The real
object of constituting this tribunal, sustained by military force, was
obvious; it was to dispossess the Connecticut people of their farms. The
tribunal became an instrument of cruelty and oppression, and a disgrace
to the character of civilization. The next year, according to Chapman,
"the people were not only subject to insult, but their crops were
destroyed in their fields, their cattle were seized and driven away, and
1783 in some instances their houses were destroyed by fire and the
females rendered victims of licentiousness." But why this rigorous
treatment? "It was," says Pickering, "not only to strip the people of
their possessions, but, by wearying them of their 'promised land,' drive
them from the valley." Although the inhabitants were greatly excited,
they loved peace and order, and appealed to the Legislature of
Pennsylvania for justice. Their appeal was unnoticed, and they sent a
memorial to Congress. That body resolved (a) that a a January 23, 1784
committee of the states should hear both parties on the first Monday in
June following; but neither Congress nor a committee of the states were
in session at the time designated, and the people were left without
redress.

Great Deluge in Wyoming.--Danger and Distress of the Inhabitants.--
Reappearance of the Soldiers.--Renewal of Hostilities.

372In the mean while a terrible scourge swept over the valley. The
winter had been intensely cold; snow fell to a great depth, and the
Susquehanna was bridged by ice of uncommon thickness. The mountains,
covered with forests, treasured up vast beds of snow among their rocks
and in their deep ravines, from the action of the sun. In March, a warm
rain fell for nearly three days in succession. The snow melted, and
every mountain rivulet became a sweeping torrent, pouring its volume
into the Susquehanna. The ice in the river was broken up, and the huge
masses, borne upon the flood, obstructed by trees, formed immense dams,
spreading the waters of the swollen river over the plains. At length the
narrow Nanticoke pass at the lower end of the valley became blocked with
the ice, and the water, flowing back, submerged the river flats, and
filled all the lower intervales. Houses and barns were uplifted on the
bosom of the waters. The people fled to the higher points in the valley,
some to the mountains. For several hours the waters continued to rise,
until suddenly a dam in the mountain gorge, at the upper end of the
valley, gave way, and down came the flood with fearful strength. All the
ice barriers in the valley were broken up, and the ponderous masses of
ice, mingled with floating houses, barns, fences, drowned cattle and
sheep, stacks of hay, furniture, and agricultural implements, were
scattered over the plains, * or hurried forward to the broader expanse
of the river below. It was a scene of fearful grandeur, and to the poor
settlers, shivering in the mountains, or huddled upon the little hills
in the midst of the roaring floods, the star of hope seemed forever set.
The present was utter desolation--the future would unveil injustice and
oppression.

As soon as the floods subsided the inhabitants returned, and with them
came the soldiers, who snatched from them nearly all of the little food
that had been saved, for they were "quartered upon the people." Their
rapacity and oppression were greater than ever, and the settlers,
anxious to retrieve their farms from the ruin of the flood, were not
allowed to work in peace, but were tormented by them continually. At
length the people resolved to oppose their oppressors by force, and
armed for the purpose. The magistracy, indignant at their presumption,
sent out the soldiers to disarm them; and in the process one hundred and
fifty families, many of whom had lost portions of their household in the
battle of Wyoming, were turned out of their newly-constructed dwellings,
and compelled to fly on foot through the wilderness to the Delaware, a
distance of eighty miles. Houses were burned, and other atrocities were
committed. Ashamed of such conduct, the Legislature of Pennsylvania
(which had refused to vote supplies to the sufferers by the flood), when
the naked facts were known, endeavored to heal the wounds which, under
its sanction, had been inflicted, and, in a measure, to wipe out the
stain that rested upon the state authorities. The troops were
discharged, except a small guard left at Fort Dickinson, and a
proclamation was issued, inviting the people who had been driven away to
return. Some of them did so, but the valley was allowed but a short
season of repose.

So many of the discharged soldiers joined the guard at the Wilkesbarre
Fort, that the people, alarmed, garrisoned Forty Fort. A party of them,
having occasion to visit their July 20, 1784 grain-fields below, were
fired upon by a detachment of thirty from the other fort, and two
promising young men were killed. The people resolved on retaliation, and
about midnight marched to Wilkesbarre Fort, to take the garrison by
surprise. The latter, informed of the movement, were prepared to receive
them, and the settlers returned to Forty Fort with a stock of
provisions. On the 27th, the people, led by Colonel John Franklin, a
native of Connecticut, invested the Wilkesbarre Fort, and made a formal
summons for surrender. Two hours were allowed the besieged for an
answer. Before one hour had elapsed information was received that a
considerable re-enforcement for the garrison was approaching. The siege
was raised, and the besiegers returned to Forty Fort. It was a false
alarm; the strangers, who were supposed to be the pioneers of a large
number who were approaching,

* It is said that so huge were many of the masses of ice that were
lodged in different portions of the valley, that it was the last of July
before they were melted away.

Armstrong's Expedition.--Stratagem.--Change in Publie Sentiment--The
Censors.--Appeal for Relief.

a September 17. 373were a committee appointed by the state council to
proceed to Wyoming and disarm both parties. A conference was held, and
such was the state of feeling that neither party would listen to the
commissioners.

Stronger measures were now deemed necessary, and Colonel John Armstrong
was sent with a considerable force to establish order in the valley.
From Easton he sent forward a detachment, which was captured among the
mountains on its way to Wyoming, by a party of Connecticut people.
Armstrong pushed forward, and on the 4th of August 2, 1784

August reached Wyoming, where his whole force numbered about four
hundred men, including the garrison in Wilkesbarre or Dickinson Fort. He
found Forty Fort too strong for successful attack, and resorted to
stratagem. He professed pacific intentions, and proposed to the people
of all parties to deliver up their arms at Fort Dickinson, and there
reclaim any property which they might identify as their own. Numbers of
the Connecticut people believed him sincere, went to the fort, delivered
up their arms, and were captured. Forty of them were sent to the prison
at Sunbury, and nearly as many to Easton. The jailer of the latter place
was knocked down by a young man named Inman, and the whole party
escaped. (a) They returned to the valley in company with about forty
Vermonters, and, finding Armstrong and the few men left with him (for a
large portion of his men had been discharged when the prisoners were
sent to jail) harvesting the crops, they attacked them and drove them
into Fort Dickinson. Forty Fort was again garrisoned by the people, and
a plan was arranged for recovering the arms which they had surrendered.
A blockhouse in which they were stored was attacked, and the arms
recovered. Two men in the block-house were mortally wounded.

On hearing of this latter event, the executive council sent another
expedition to Wyoming, under Armstrong, who was at the same time
promoted to the office of adjutant general of the state. But the
sympathies of the people of Pennsylvania began to be enlisted in favor
of the Wyoming settlers, and they were regarded as a persecuted party.
President Dickinson also remonstrated with the Council and General
Assembly, but to no purpose. * It so happened that about this time the
Board of Censors held their septennial meeting. They called upon the
Assembly for papers relative to Wyoming. The Assembly refused
acquiescence. A mandamus was issued, but the Assembly treated it with
contempt. Thus treated, and viewing affairs justly, the Censors openly
espoused the cause of the Connecticut people, condemned all of the
military proceedings, and passed a vote of censure upon the government
of the state. This strengthened the hands and hearts of the Wyoming
people. They defied Armstrong and his troops; and as winter was
approaching, food scarce, and not a recruit could be obtained, that
officer discharged the garrison and returned to Philadelphia Though
relieved of the presence of the military, the condition of the settlers
was indeed deplorable. What the spring flood had spared was small, and
the presence of the troops had prevented sowing and reaping. They
appealed to Congress and to Connecticut for aid, ** but they received
little more than the cold charity of words--"Be ye clothed, and be ye
fed"--without contributing to their necessities. The last military
expedition against Wyoming had been accomplished, yet the question of
possession was unsettled, and they had but little heart to improve their
lands, not knowing how soon other efforts might be made to dispossess
them. The population, however, increased rapidly, and for two years
quiet prevailed

* Pennsylvania, under its first independent state Constitution, had no
officer bearing the title of governor. The government of the
commonwealth was vested in a House of Representatives, a president, and
council. There was also a Board of Censors, elected by the people, who
were to meet once in seven years, to inquire whether the Constitution
had, in the mean while, been violated, and to transact other general
supervisory business, such as trying impeachments, recommending the
repeal of unwholesome laws, &c.

** In their appeal to the Connecticut Assembly they set forth that their
"numbers were reduced to about two thousand souls, most of whom were
women and children, driven, in many cases, from their proper
habitations, and living in huts of bark in the woods, without provisions
for the approaching winter, while the Pennsylvania troops and land
claimants were in possession of their houses and farms, and wasting and
destroying their cattle and subsistence."

Luzerne.--Timothy Pickering in Wyoming.--Organization of the County.--
Memoir of Pickering

1786 in 374Wyoming. On the petition of the people, the district of
Wyoming and vicinity were formed into a new county, which they named
Luzerne. *

About this time Colonel Timothy Pickering, ** of Massachusetts, but then
a resident of Pennsylvania, visited Wyoming, and made himself thoroughly
acquainted with the affairs of the valley. He became convinced that the
settlers were satisfied with the political system of the state, and were
ready to become obedient citizens of the commonwealth if they could be
quieted in the possession of their farms. These views he communicated to
Dr. Rush and other eminent men in Philadelphia, who, anxious to have an
amicable adjustment of the difficulties, proposed to Mr. Pickering to
accept of the five principal county offices, and remove to Wyoming; for
he, being a New England man, would doubtless exercise great influence
over the people. He accepted the proposition and went to Wyoming,
hearing to the Connecticut people the full assurance that the
Pennsylvania Legislature would pass a law quieting them in their
possessions.

Clothed with the necessary power, Colonel Pickering proceeded to hold
elections and to organize the county. He succeeded in persuading the
people to memorialize the Legislature for a compromise law, the chief
provisions of which should be, that, in case the

* So called in honor of the Chevalier de Luzerne, the distinguished
ambassador from France to the United States during the latter years of
the Revolution.

** Timothy Pickering was born in Salem, Massachusetts, on the 17th of
July, 1745. He entered Harvard University at the age of fourteen years,
and received collegiate honors in 1763. He was elected register of deeds
in the county of Essex; and before the Revolution he was a colonel of
the Essex militia, and acquired a thorough knowledge of military
tactics. When the town meeting was held at Salem in 1774, and an address
voted to General Gage on the subject of the Boston Port Bill, Colonel
Pickering was appointed to write the address and deliver it in person to
the governor. For him is claimed the distinction of conducting the first
resistance, in arms, to the power of the mother country. On Sunday, the
26th of February, 1775, an express arrived at Salem from Marblehead with
the intelligence that British troops were landing from a transport, with
the intention of marching through Salem to seize some military stores in
the interior. The people were dismissed from their churches, and, led by
Colonel Pickering, they opposed the progress of the British at a draw-
bridge. A compromise was effected, the British were compelled to march
back to Marblehead, and bloodshed was avoided. * When he heard of the
battle of Lexington, Colonel Pickering marched, with his regiment, to
intercept the enemy. In 1775 he was appointed a judge of the Court of
Common Pleas for Essex. In the fall of 1776, with seven hundred Essex
men, he performed duty under Washington, and was with the chief in his
retreat across the Jerseys. He was engaged in the battles of Brandywine
and Germantown, holding the office and rank of adjutant general.
Congress appointed him a member of the Board of War with Gates and
Mifflin; and in 1780 he succeeded General Green as quartermaster
general. At the close of the war he fixed his residence in Philadelphia,
soon after which he was deputed to attempt the settlement of the
troubles in Wyoming. He was a member of the convention called to revise
the Constitution of Pennsylvania in 1790. Washington appointed him
postmaster general in 1791, which office he held nearly four years,
when, on the resignation of General Knox, he was appointed Secretary of
War. In 1795 Washington made him his Secretary of State, which position
he held until 1800, when he was removed by President Adams on political
grounds. He was poor on leaving office, and, building a log house for
his family upon some wild land that he owned in Pennsylvania, he
commenced the arduous duties of clearing it for cultivation. Through the
liberality of his friends, he was induced to return to his native state,
out of debt, and a comfortable living in prospect. He was a United
States senator in 1803, and again in 1805. He was a member of the Board
of War in Massachusetts in 1812, and in 1814 was elected a member of the
United States House of Representatives. He retired from public life in
1817, and died in Salem on the 29th of January, 1829, aged eighty-four
years.

* Of this exploit, Trumbull, in his M'Fingal, wrote: "Through Salem
straight, without delay, The bold battalion took its way; March'd o'er a
bridge, in open sight Of several Yankees arm'd for fight; Then, without
loss of time or men, Veer'd round for Boston back again, And found so
well their projects thrive, That every soul got back alive!"

New Difficulties in Wyoming.--John Franklin.--Arrest of Franklin.--Ethan
Allen.

1787. 375commonwealth would grant them the seventeen townships * which
had been laid out, and on which settlements had been commenced previous
to the decree of Trenton, they would, on their part, relinquish all
their claims to any other lands within the limits of the Susquehanna
purchase. The law was enacted, but new difficulties arose. Many of the
best lands in these townships had been granted by the government of
Pennsylvania to its own citizens, in the face of the claims of the
Connecticut people. These proprietors must be satisfied.

Commissioners were accordingly appointed, under the law, to go to
Wyoming to examine and adjust claims on both sides. ** They met in May,
arranged the preliminaries, and adjourned until August. The law
satisfied those within the seventeen townships, but the Connecticut
people had extended settlements beyond these limits, and these, excluded
from the benefits of the law, were much dissatisfied. It was also said
that, pending the negotiations, the Susquehanna Company had been using
great exertions to increase the number of settlers in the unincluded
districts, and Colonel Pickering positively asserted that gratuitous
offers of land were made to such as would come _armed_, "to man their
rights." *** The most active man in this alleged movement was John
Franklin, whose great popularity enabled him to stir up a violent
commotion among the "out-siders"--so violent that the commissioners were
obliged to flee from the valley for personal safety. Chief-justice
M'Kean issued a warrant for the arrest of Franklin, on the charge of
high treason. But how should they catch him? They could not trust the
proper officer, the sheriff of Luzerne county, who was living in the
midst of the _insurgents,_ as they were called. Four strong, bold men,
two of whom had served in the Revolutionary army, were selected for the
purpose, and they repaired to Wyoming. ****

Franklin was then thirty-five miles distant, exciting the people to
armed resistance. Preparations were made for his safe-conduct to
Philadelphia, and, on his return, he was arrested at the "Red House,"
near the river. It was with great difficulty that he was secured, and,
as the people were assembling for his rescue, he would doubtless have
escaped, had not Colonel Pickering interfered. Observing the commotion
from the window of his house, he sallied out with his pistols, and,
presenting one to the breast of Franklin, kept him quiet while he was
securely bound to a horse. Franklin was carried to Philadelphia and cast
into prison.

The interference of Colonel Pickering greatly exasperated the people,
and retaliatory measures were immediately adopted. He was informed of
the fact that a party was about to seize him,

* These townships were Salem, Newport, Hanover, Wilkesbarre, Pittston,
Westmoreland, Putnam, Braintree, Springfield, Claverack, Ulster, Exeter,
Kingston, Plymouth, Bedford, Huntington, and Providence. These towns
were represented as nearly square as circumstances would permit, and to
be about five miles on a side, and severally divided into lots of three
hundred acres eaeh. Some of these lots were set apart as glebes, some
for schools, and others for various town purposes.

** The commissioners were Timothy Pickering, William Montgomery, and
Stephen Balliott.

***About this time "no little sensation was produced in the valley,"
says Minor, "by the appearance of the far-famed General Ethan Allen,
from Vermont, arrayed in cocked hat and regimentals. The purpose of his
visit was as well understood by Pickering as by Franklin and his
associates. A grant of several thousand acres was made to him by the
Susquehanna Company. How many men he was pledged to lead from the Green
Mountains we have no means of ascertaining; but it was not doubted that
his object was to re-connoiter, and concert measures for early and
decisive action."

**** Three of these were Captain Lawrence Erbe, Captain Brady, and
Lieutenant M'Cormick. The other name is not known.

the river, and about seventy-five rods below the bridge. It is the place
where John Franklin was arrested. On his return from a political tour
down the valley, he came up by the way of Hanover to Wilkesbarre. While
standing near the ferry, an acquaintance came up to him and said, "A
friend at the Red House wishes to speak to you." Franklin walked to the
house, where a person caught him from behind, and attempted to pinion
his hands. He was a powerful man. and shook off his captors; but, a
noose being thrown over his head, he was secured. They then attempted to
get him on horseback, when he cried out, "Help, help! William Slocum!
where is William Slocum?" and, drawing his pistols, discharged one, but
without effect. He was felled by a blow, and laid almost senseless. It
was seeding time, and nearly all the men were in the fields. But the
Yankee blood of Mrs. Slocum (the mother of the "lost sister") was up,
and, seizing a gun, she ran to the door, exclaiming, "William! Who will
call William? Is there no man here? Will nobody rescue him?"--Miner.
Colonel Pickering's dwelling was near the "Red House." It is still
standing, but so modernized what its original character is lost.

Pickering's Escape to Philadelphia.--His Return. Abduction and
Treatment--Wyoming quieted.--Departure from Wyoming.

376and he fled to the mountains, whence he made his way to Philadelphia.
The partisans of Franklin now became alarmed. They acknowledged their
offense to the council, and prayed for pardon. Under these
circumstances, Pickering thought it safe for him to return to his
family, particularly as the very people whose acts had driven him away
had chosen him a delegate to the General Assembly during his exile! He
returned, but found many of the people still much exasperated against
him, and he was often menaced. Finally, one night in June, fifteen
ruffians, with painted faces, burst open the door of the room where 1778
himself and wife were sleeping, bound him with cords, and in the
darkness of the night carried him up the valley. For twenty days he was
kept by them in the forest, and subjected to ill treatment in various
forms. Sometimes they threatened him with death; then he was manacled
and chained, and in this way the miscreants tormented him, and tried to
wring from him a letter to the executive council recommending the
discharge of Franklin. When this requirement was first proposed, and his
own release promised on his compliance, Pickering promptly replied, "The
executive council better understand their duty than to discharge a
traitor to procure the release of an innocent man." This determined tone
and manner he preserved throughout. They finally released him, and he
found his way back to Wilkesbarre, where his death was considered a
matter of certainty. Haggard and unshaven, his wife regarded him with
consternation, and his children fled from him affrighted.

This was the last scene in the drama of violence so long enacted in
Wyoming. Franklin was liberated on bail, and finally discharged; and he
and Pickering often met as friends in public life afterward. The
disputes about land titles and possessions in Wyoming remained unsettled
for nearly fifteen years, while the population rapidly increased.
Ultimately the claims were all quieted by law, and for the last forty
years the sweet vale of Wyoming has presented a beautiful picture of
repose and prosperity. * We will close the record and retire, for the
moon has gone down behind the western hills, and chilly vapors are
coming up from the bosom of the river.

September 20, 1848 I left Wilkesbarre on the mail-coach early on Tuesday
morning, for the Lackawanna Valley and the coal regions of Luzerne. The
whole of Wyoming was wrapped in a dense fog, and from the driver's box,
where I had secured a seat, it was with difficulty that we could observe
objects beyond the leaders. The coveted pleasure of another view of the
beautiful scenery as we passed along the uplands was denied; but when we
arrived at Pittston, the cool breeze that came through the mountain
gateway of the Susquehanna, and from the valley of the Lackawanna, swept
away the vapor, and revealed the rich plains at the head of the valley,
the majestic curve of the river where it receives its tributary, and the
grandeur of its rocky margins toward the north. At the junction of the
rivers we turned eastward, and in a few moments Wyoming and all its
attractions were left behind, and scenery and associations of a far
different cast were around us.

The Lackawanna River flows in a deep bed, and its valley, wider than
Wyoming, is very rough and hilly, but thickly strewn with fertile spots.
Iron and anthracite every where abound; and the latter is so near the
surface in many places, that the farmers in autumn quarry out their
winter's stock of fuel upon their own plantations with very little
labor. Several iron manufactories are seated upon the river between its
mouth and Carbondale, and little villages, brought forth and fostered by
these industrial establishments, enliven the otherwise ungenial features
of the route. At one of these, called Hyde Park, we lunched and changed
horses, receiving an addition to our company in the person of a tall,
cadaverous Yankee lumberman, who, with a huge musk-melon and jack-knife
in his hand, took a seat

* Chapman. Gordon, Miner, Stone.

A Yankee Lumberman.--Carbondale.--The Coal Mines.--Fatal Accident.--
Heroic Benevolence of Mr. Bryden.

377beside me on the driver's box. Having satisfied his own appetite with
the melon, he generously handed the small remainder to the driver and
myself; and the moment his jaws ceased mastication, his tongue began to
wag like a "mill-tail." He discoursed fluently, if not wisely, upon the
general demerits of fever and ague, whose subject he had been for nearly
a year, and upon the particular productiveness of "Varmount."

"It's a garden of flowers," he said, while York state, and all 'tother
side on't, is wild land, raisin' nothin' but snakes and agers."

"Compared to New England, our horses are colts,

Our oxen are goats, and a sheep but a lamb;

The people poor blockheads and pitiful dolts--

Mere Hottentot children, contrasted with them."

He was a capital specimen of the genus "brag," refined by superb
Munchausen polish. His voice was a shrill falsetto, and, every word
being audible to the passengers, we soon had a laughing chorus within
the coach that awoke the echoes of the hills.

Approaching Carbondale, the road gently ascends a mountain ridge until
all traces of cultivation disappear, and pines and cedars compose the
forest. From this rugged height it winds along the steep acclivities;
and the mining village, in the bosom of a deep, rocky intervale, may be
seen below, at a distance of more than a mile. It was about two o'clock
when we arrived at Carbondale. Having two hours leisure before the
departure of the mail-coach for Honesdale and the Delaware, I applied to
Mr. James Clarkson, the chief surveyor at the mines, for permission to
enter one of them. It was cordially granted, and, in company with his
assistant, Mr. Alexander Bryden, as guide, I entered the one wherein an
appalling circumstance, resulting in the death of several miners,
occurred on the morning of the 12th of January, 1846. Indications of
danger were observed several months previously in one of the chambers.
The pillars of coal and pine logs that supported the roof seemed to be
crushing beneath the superincumbent weight, and the chamber was
abandoned. Other portions of the mine appeared to be safe, although in
some cases the roof of slate was cracked. Suddenly, at about eight
o'clock on the morning in question, nearly sixty acres of the hill
covering the mines sunk about two feet, crushing every thing beneath it,
and producing a powerful concussion. The fall was accompanied by a sound
similar to distant thunder, and a shock which was perceptible throughout
the village. Fortunately, a large portion of the workmen were at
breakfast. Under or beyond the fallen body were about sixty men. The
intelligence of the disaster rapidly spread, and general alarm pervaded
the town. There were few who did not fear that some relative or friend
was buried in the mine. The scene was exceedingly painful, and not
easily described. There were daughters, wives, and mothers at the mouth
of the mine, in an agony of expectation that a loved one was lost, and
for a while it was difficult to enter to attempt a rescue of those
within. The superintendents and others proceeded immediately, and at the
risk of their own lives, to examine the bounds of the destruction. It
was soon perceived that some, whose station must be within the limits of
the fall, were probably killed.

Beyond the point where the roof was secure, some thirty or more of the
men had escaped immediate death, but their situation was truly horrible,
having lost their lights, the roof still cracking and breaking around
them, and scarcely a hope left of escape from the spot. Mr. Bryden, with
courage sustained by love for his fellow-men, boldly entered the mine,
and endeavored to reach the point where the men were imprisoned. He
succeeded, after much labor, and released them. Informed that a man who
had met with a serious accident had been left in another chamber, Mr.
Bryden directed his steps thitherward. He found the wounded man, and
carried him upon his back to his companions. Within five minutes after
Mr. Bryden left the chamber with his burden of life, the passage he had
traversed was entirely closed by the crushed pillars of coal.

Among those known to have been at about the center of the fall a short
time before the occurrence, was a young Scotchman named Hosea, another
of the superintendents. Diligent search was made for him on that and the
succeeding day without success. On the third day, while a party were in
search of him, he emerged from the mines unaided, having

Escape of Mr. Hosea.--Effects of the Concussion. Entrance and
Exploration of the Mine.--Interior Appearance

378dug his way out through fallen masses with his hands! The excitement
relative to him had been extreme, and his sudden appearance, under the
circumstances, produced great joy. He had been recently married. His
young bride, having lost all hope of his recovery alive, was in a store
purchasing mourning materials, when he was carried by homeward in a
sleigh. The people flocked to his house, and saluted him as one risen
from the dead.

The hours he had spent entangled in the passages of the mines were
horrible indeed. At one time he saw the glimmer of lights. He tried to
make himself heard by the party carrying them, but was unsuccessful. He
ran toward them, but, stumbling against a car, he fell senseless. When
he revived, the lights had disappeared, and all was intense gloom. He
scrambled over broken rocks and through narrow apertures', and finally
reached one of the rail-roads and made his way out, having been forty-
eight hours laboring, without food or drink, in removing the fallen
masses. Fourteen perished by the disaster; the bodies of nine have been
recovered, the remainder are still in the chambers--to them the
"chambers of death." The air was expelled from the mine, when the
superincumbent mass settled, with great force.

A train of empty cars, drawn by a horse driven by a boy, was just
entering when the event occurred. The boy and horse were instantly
killed, and the train was shattered in pieces. The horse appeared to
have been rolled over several times by the blast, and pieces of the
harness were found thirty feet from his body.

It was into this mine, now considered perfectly safe, that Mr. Bryden
conducted me. Seated upon a square block of wood on the bottom of one of
a train of mine cars, in the attitude of a toad, each with a torch in
his hand, we entered an aperture at the base of the mountain, by the
side of the canal. The cars (five in a train), running upon iron rails,
and drawn by a horse, are three feet long and two feet wide at top,
tapering to the bottom. Thus boxed up, and our heads bowed in meek
submission to the menaces of the low roof, of the passage, we penetrated
the mountain nearly half a mile, when we came to an inclined plane.
There the horse that took us in was attached to a loaded train that had
just descended, and went back to the entrance. The darkness was so
profound, that objects could be seen by the light of our torches only a
few feet from us, and on all sides were the black walls of anthracite,
glistening in some places with water that trickled through the crevices.
At the foot of the inclined plane we were one hundred and seventy feet
beneath the surface of the earth. Up the rough steep, seven hundred and
fifty feet, we clambered on foot, and, when half way to the summit, we
saw the cables moving and heard the rumble of a descending train. * The
passage is so narrow that there is very little space on each side of the
cars. We were, therefore, obliged, for our safety, to seek out one of
the slippery ledges of anthracite wide enough to sustain us, and, while
thus "laid upon a shelf," the vehicles, with their burden, thundered by.

A little beyond the inclined plane is the region of the fall. Here the
roof is lower than in other parts. Crushed timbers and pulverized
anthracite, the remains of the supporters of the chambers, are seen for
some distance; and the filled-up avenues that led to other chambers,
where some of the bodies remain buried, were pointed out to me. We at
length reached the chambers where men were working, each with a lamp
suspended by a hook from the front of his cap. So intense was the
darkness, that, when a little distance from a workman, nothing of him
could be seen but his head and shoulders below the lamp. The coal is
quarried by blasting with powder; and the sulphurous vapor that filled
the vaults, and the dull lights, with hideous-looking heads, apparently
trunkless, beneath them, moving in the gloom, gave imagination free
license to

* There is a double track upon the inclined plane, and, by means of
cables and pulleys, the loaded train hauls up the empty one by force of
gravity. From the main entrance many avenues are seen that extended to
other chambers now exhausted. As fast as these avenues become useless,
the rails are taken up and they are filled with the slate or other
impurities of the mines.

Fossils--. Ascent from the Mine.--Night Ride.--A Grumbler.--Change in
the Coal Region.

379draw a picture of the palace of Pluto. Added to the sight was the
feeling of awe which the apparent dangers of the place engendered, as
the recollection of the tragedy just recorded was kept alive by the
identification of localities connected with the event, by my guide.

After collecting a few fossils, * we sought the "wind entrance," and,
ascending a flight of steps about twenty-five feet, we stood high upon
the mountain overlooking Carbondale, three quarters of a mile from the
place of our entrance. Notwithstanding the air is comparatively pure
within, except in the working chambers at the time of blasting, I
breathed much freer when standing in the sunlight, and removed from all
danger. Hastening down the mountain to the canal, I washed my fossils
and hurried to the stage-office in the village, where I arrived just in
time to hear the provoking rattle of the coach-wheels half a mile
distant, on the road to Honesdale, leaving me to decide the question
whether to remain over a day, or, departing at nine in the evening, ride
all night. I chose the latter alternative, and passed the remainder of
the afternoon among the mines and miners.

I left Carbondale at nine in the evening, and arrived at Cherry Hill,
thirteen miles distant, at one in the morning. The road was exceedingly
rough and the coach rickety. I had but a single fellow-passenger, and he
was as deaf as a post. He was a grumbler of the first water, and his
loud thoughts so amused me that I had no inclination to sleep. At Cherry
Hill we awaited the coach from Honesdale. Informed that its arrival
would be two hours later, we took beds; but the first dream had scarcely
begun, when the wooden voice

* The coal is covered by a layer of slate, so even on its under surface
that the roofs of the passages, when the coal has been removed, are
quite smooth and flat. Upon this flat surface are impressions of stalks
and leaves of plants of immense size, intermingled with those of the
fern, of the size which now grow on the borders of marshes. Some of
these fossil stalks found between the slate and the coal measure from
ten to sixteens inches across (for they are all flattened, as if by
pressure), and were evidently at least thirty feet long. They lie across
each other in every direction, and in all cases the stalks are
flattened. Many theories have been conceived to account for the origin
of the coal and of the appearance of these fossils. The most plausible
seems to be that the bed of coal was once a vast bed of peat, over
whieh, in ages past, grew these mammoth ferns; that the slate that
covers the upper stratum of coal was thrown up, in a semi-fluid state,
from the bowels of the earth by volcanic action, and flowed over the
fields of peat, easting down the ferns and other vegetables flat beneath
the whelming mass, which, in time, became indurated, and was formed into
slate. The huge stalks that have been found may have belonged to a
species of water-lily that abounded when the mastodon and megatherium
browsed in the marshes that now form the coal beds of the Lackawanna
Valley.

** The miners, when they branch off from the main shaft or avenue, leave
pillars of coal about eighteen feet square, to support the roof or mass
above. These huge pillars were crushed by the great weight upon them, in
the accident recorded.

* Note.--The change whieh the Delaware and Hudson Canal and Mining
Company has wrought in the physical features of this region is
wonderful. Twenty years ago the whole country in the vicinity of
Carbondale was an uninhabited wilderness; now fertile farms and thriving
villages are there. * When Maurice Wurts, of Philadelphia, after
spending years in exploring the country between the Lackawanna and the
Hudson, presented his plan for the gigantic work now in progress, his
friends looked upon him as nearly crazed, and, like Fulton, he was
doomed to have hope long deferred. But there were some who comprehended
the feasibility of the undertaking, and estimated correctly its golden
promises of profit. The work was begun, and in 1829 seven thousand tons
of anthracite coal were forwarded to New York. Wonderfully has the
business increased. The company now employs between five and six
thousand men and boys, over one thousand horses, and nearly nine hundred
canal-boats, independent of the vessels at Rondout. Last year (1848) the
company forwarded to market four hundred and fifty thousand tons of
coal, and its monthly disbursements are about one hundred and fifty
thousand dollars. At Carbondale there are nine mines or entrances; and
about seven hundred men, chiefly Irish and Welsh, are employed under
ground there. The coal is sent from Carbondale to Honesdale, a distance
of sixteen miles, in cars upon an inclined plane, and there it is
shipped for market upon the Delaware and Hudson Canal, the termination
of which is upon the Hudson River, at Rondout, Ulster county.

* Carbondale contained about seven thousand Inhabitants, and Housedale
about four thousand.

A Coach Load.--Result of Politeness.--Bad Coach and Driver.--Milford.--
The Sawkill

380of a Dutch hostler broke our slumbers with the cry of "Stage!" We
were charged a quarter each for the privilege of warming a cold bed,
which made the deaf grumbler swear like a pirate. A young woman, unused
to crowds, occupied a place by the side of the driver, and I was obliged
to shrink into proper dimensions to share a seat within, with two
elderly women who were by no means diminutive. "I can't be squeezed, I
can't be squeezed!" cried one of them, as I opened the coach-door to get
in. My size was magnified in the darkness to very improper dimensions,
but the lady was pacified by a solemn assurance that what she saw was
more than half overcoat. Thus packed, we were trundled over one of the
roughest roads in Pike county, and at six o'clock were set down at
Decker's, among the Lackawanna Mountains, where we breakfasted. Before
reaching there, rain began to fall, and the delicate young lady, who
occupied a seat with the driver for the sake of fresh air, implored
shelter within. Of course her petition was granted, but she proved a
destroyer of the comfort of two of the passengers. She was a plump Dutch
girl, weighing nearly two hundred, and the two old gentlemen, who, in
the plenitude of their good will and politeness, had offered her a seat
upon their knees before she alighted from above, "worked their passage"
down the rough mountain roads, for the horses were allowed a loose rein
while the shower lasted. One of the victims, whose obesity was
conspicuous, declared that his gallantry could not have extended another
rood, and that the announcement of the appearance of Decker's sign-post
was as grateful to him as the "land ho!" is to the returning mariner.

At Decker's we changed coaches, horses, and drivers. The former, like
the morals of the latter, were very dilapidated. A worse vehicle and
more wicked driver than we were in the custody of I never encountered.
The rain fell copiously for two hours, and every passenger was subjected
to the filthy drippings through the leaky roof of the coach, and the
more filthy drippings of profanity and low slang from the lips of the
driver, who was within speaking distance of a companion upon another
stage.

Toward noon the clouds broke, and I escaped from my damp prison to the
driver's box just as we reached the brow of the loftiest hill over which
the road passes before descending to the Delaware Valley. Twenty miles
eastward loomed up the dark range of the Shawangunk Mountains; on our
right, far below, sparkled a beautiful bell-shaped lake fringed with
evergreens, and, as far as the eye could reach, wooded hills stood
"peeping over each others shoulders." The scenery was as wild and more
diversified than that of the Pocono. Suddenly we came upon the brow of
the mountain that overlooks the beautiful plain of Milford, on the
Delaware, and in a few minutes we were rattling through the pretty
village. Milford is remarkable for the picturesque beauty of its own
location and surrounding country, and for the size of one of its
publicans, who died in 1841. * Near it are the beautiful falls of the
Sawkill, where,

"Swift as an arrow from the bow,

Headlong the torrent leaps,

Then tumbling round in dazzling snow

And dizzy whirls it sweeps.

.

           Then shooting through the narrow aisle

Of this sublime cathedral pile,

Amid its vastness, dark and grim,

It peals its everlasting hymn."

Street.

* Milford has been settled about fifty years. The chief business of the
place is the lumber trade. It is quite a large village, and, since 1814,
has been the county seat of Pike. In 1800 there were but two houses and
a blacksmith's shop upon its site. The plain was then covered with
pines, hemlocks, and bushes. The wadding of a hunter's gun set the brush
on fire, and the plain was cleared for a great distance. The buildings,
however, remained untouched. Some wag published an account of the fire,
and said that it had "ravaged the town of Milford, and had left but two
houses and a blacksmith's shop standing!" The publican referred to was a
tavern-keeper named Lewis Cornelius, whose dimensions were nearly as
great as those of the famous Daniel Lambert. His height was six feet; in
circumference at the waist, six feet two and a half inches;
circumference below the waist, eight feet two inches; circumference of
arm above the elbow, two feet two inches; below the elbow, one foot nine
inches; at the wrist, one foot three inches; of the thigh, four feet
three inches; of the calf of the leg, two feet seven inches; weight, six
hundred and forty-five and a half pounds, without any clothes.

Delaware River and Valley.--Port Jervis.--The Neversink Valley.--
Shawangunk Mountains.--Orange and Rockland.

381But the pleasure of a visit thither were denied us by the urgent beck
of time. It was after me o'clock, and we must be at Port Jervis, eight
miles distant, at three, to enter the ears or the Hudson River, our
point of destination.

The road from Milford to Port Jervise * passes along the margin of the
Delaware Valley, sometimes beneath steep acclivities that seem ready to
topple down. We crossed the river upon a bateau propelled by two strong
men with poles, and guided by a rope stretched over the stream, and
reached the rail-way station just as the last bell was ringing and a
dark cloud began to pour out its contents. In a few minutes we were
sweeping along the slopes of the Neversink Valley, and ascending, by a
circuitous route, to the lofty passes among the shawangunk Mountains.

The scenery here was indescribably grand. On the right the hills towered
far above, and on the left, a thousand feet below, was the fertile
valley of the Neversink lying in the shadows of the lofty hills on the
west. The table-land upon the summit inclines gently to the eastward;
and a little before sunset we passed through the fine grazing lands of
Orange, lying between Middletown and Goshen, where the cow-herds furnish
the materials for the far-famed _Goshen butter_. Westward of Middletown
we passed near the historic ground of Minisink, and at twilight,
descending the rugged slopes of Rockland along the winding course of a
mountain stream, we passed by Ramapo and Tappan, places famous in our
Revolutionary history. A visit there was reserved for another occasion,
and, proceeding to Piermont, on the Hudson, the termination of the rail-
road, I embarked for New York, and reached home at nine in the evening.

* Port Jervis was then (1848) the western terminus of travel on the New
York and Erie Railroad. It s situated on the eastern side of the
Delaware, upon a small triangular plain at the mouth of the Neversink
Creek, within the state of New York.

Poughkeepsie.--Origin of its Name.--Condition of the State in 1777.

382

CHAPTER XVII.

"I glory in the sages

Who, in the days of yore,

In combat met the foemen,

And drove them from the shore;

Who flung our banner's starry field

In triumph to the breeze,

And spread broad maps of cities where

Once waved the forest trees.

Hurrah!

I glory in the spirit.

Which goaded them to rise,

And form a mighty nation

Beneath the western skies.

No clime so bright and beautiful

As that where sets the sun;

No land so fertile, fair, and free

As that of Washington.

Hurrah!"

George P. Morris.

O New England, the nursery of the revolutionary spirit, I next turned my
attention, and to that interesting field of research I proceeded, after
visiting the battle-ground of Bennington, upon the Walloomscoick. I went
up the Hudson on the morning of the 25th of September as far as
Poughkeepsie, * where I passed the afternoon, 1848 and in the evening
proceeded to Kingston, or Esopus, memorable in our Revolutionary annals
for its destruction by the British.

Poughkeepsie is one of the finest villages in New York. It lies
principally upon an elevated plain, half a mile from the east bank of
the river, and in the midst of a region remarkable for its beauty and
fertility. Although an old town, having been founded by the Dutch more
than one hundred and fifty years ago, and lying directly in the path of
travel between New York and Canada, it was spared the infliction of
miseries which other places far more isolated suffered during the
Revolution; and it has but little history of general interest beyond the
fact that a session of the state Legislature was held there in 1778, and
that, ten years afterward, the state Convention to consider the Federal
Constitution assembled there.

When the state government was organized, in 1777, by the adoption of a
Constitution, the city of New York was in the possession of the enemy,
and the first session of the Legislature under the new order of things
was appointed to be held at Kingston, in July of that year. But the
invasion of the state at several points--by Burgoyne on the north, by
St. Leger and his Tory and Indian associates on the west, and by Sir
Henry Clinton on the south--compelled Governor Clinton to prorogue that
body until the 1st of September. Greater still, however, was the
excitement in the state at that time, for Burgoyne was pressing
triumphantly toward Albany, and General Clinton was making active
preparations to form a junction with him. No quorum was present until
the 9th, and early in October, before any

* Poughkeepsie is a corruption of the Iroquois word Ap-o-keep-sinek,
which signifies safe harbor. On an old map of the Hudson River in my
possession it is spelled Pocapsey; and I have heard many of the old
inhabitants of Dutchess pronounce it as if so spelled, the a in the
penultimate having the long sound, as in ape.

Meeting of tbo Legislature at Kingston and Poughkeepsle--State
Convention.--Federal Constitution.--Ann Lee.

383 laws could be matured, the session was broken up, on the rapid
approach of the enemy up the Hudson, after the fall of the forts in the
Highlands. Kingston was laid in ashes, and all was confusion.

About the same time Burgoyne was conquered and captured, and Sir Henry
Clinton retired to New York. As soon as the alarm had subsided, Governor
Clinton called a meeting of the Legislature at Poughkeepsie. It
assembled in the old stone building known as the Van Kleek House (then a
tavern), early in January, 1778. Various acts, to complete the
organization of the state government, were passed; provisions were made
for strengthening the civil and military powers of the state; and it was
during that session that the state gave its assent to the February 6,
1778 Articles of Confederation, the organic law of the Federal Union
until our present Constitution was formed and adopted. This building was
the meeting-place of the inhabitants to consult upon the public welfare,
when the Boston Port Bill and kindred measures awakened a spirit of
resistance throughout the country." There the Committee of
Correspondence of Dutchess held their meetings, and there the pledge to
sustain the Continental Congress and the Provincial Assembly was signed
by the inhabitants of Poughkeepsie, in June and July, 1775. ***

* This is from a sketch which I made in 1835, a few weeks before the
venerable building was demolished by the hand of improvement. It stood
upon Mill Street, on the land of Matthew Vassar, Jr., a short distance
from the Congregational Church. It was built by Myndert Vankleek, one of
the first settlers in Dutch-oss county, in 1702, and was the first
substantial house erected upon the site of Poughkeepsie. Its walls were
very thick, and near the eaves they were pierced with lancet loop-holes
for musketry. It was here that Ann Lee, the founder of the sect called
Shaking Quakers, in this country, was lodged the night previous to her
commitment to the Poughkeepsie jail, in 1776. She was a native of
Manchester, England. During her youth she was employed in a cotton
factory, and afterward as a cook in the Manchester Infirmary. She
married a blacksmith named Stanley; became acquainted with James and
Jane Wardley, the originators of the sect in England, and in 1758 joined
the small society they had formed. In 1770 she pretended to have
received a revelation, while confined in prison on account of her
religious fanaticism; and so great were the spiritual gifts she was
believed to possess, that she was soon acknowledged a spiritual mother
in Christ. Hence her name of Mother Ann. Sho and her husband came to New
York in 1774. He soon afterward abandoned her and her faith, and married
another woman. She collected a few followers, and in 1776 took up her
abode in the woods of Watervliet, near Niskayuna, in the neighborhood of
Troy. By some she was charged with witchcraft; and, because she was
opposed to war, she was accused of secret correspondence with the
British. A charge of high treason was preferred against her, and she was
imprisoned in Albany during the summer. In the fall it was concluded to
send her to New York, and banish her to the British army, but
circumstances prevented the accomplishment of the design, and she was
imprisoned in the Poughkeepsie jail until Governor Clinton, in 1777,
hearing of her situation, released her. She returned to Watervliet, and
her followers greatly increased. Sho died there in 1784, aged eighty-
four years. Her followers sincerely believe that she now occupies that
form or figure which John saw in his vision, standing beside the Savior.
In a poem entitled "A Memorial to Mother Ann," contained in a book
called "Christ's Second Appearing," the following stanza occurs:

"How much they are mistaken who think that mother's dead, When through
her ministrations so many souls are saved. In union with the Father, she
is the second, Dispensing full salvation to all who do believe."

** The city of New York elected James Duane, John Jay, Philip
Livingston, Isaac Low, and John Alsop delegates to the first Continental
Congress, in 1774. The Dutchess county committee, whoso meetings upon
the subject were held in the Van Kleek House, adopted those delegates as
representatives for their district.--See Journals of Congress, i., 7.

*** On the 29th of April, 1775, ten days after the skirmish at
Lexington, a meeting of the inhabitants of the city of New York, called
to consider the alarming state of public affairs, formed a general
Association, or fraternized, to use a popular term, and adopted a
pledge. The Association and pledge were approved by the Provincial
Assembly, and copies of the latter were sent to every county in the
state for signatures. The following was the form of the pledge:

*** "Persuaded that the salvation of the rights and liberties of America
depend, under God, on the firm union of its inhabitants in a rigorous
prosecution of the measures necessary for its safety; and convinced of
the necessity of preventing anarchy and confusion, which attend the
dissolution of the powers of government, we, the freemen, freeholders,
inhabitants of-----------, being greatly alarmed at the avowed design of
the ministry to raise a revenue in America, and shocked by the bloody
scene now acting in Massachusetts Bay, do, in the most solemn manner,
resolve never to become slaves; and do associate, under all the ties of
religion, honor, and love to our country, to adopt, and endeavor to
carry into execution, whatever measures may be recommended by the
Continental Congress, or resolved upon by our Provincial Convention for
the purpose of preserving our Constitution, and opposing the execution
of the several arbitrary Acts of the British Parliament, until a
reconciliation between Great Britain and America, on constitutional
principles (which we most ardently desire), can be obtained; and that we
will in all things follow the advice of our General Committee respecting
the purposes aforesaid, the preservation of peace and good order, and
the safety of individuals and property."

The list of signers, and the names of those who refused to sign in
Poughkeepsie, have been preserved. The number of signers was two hundred
and thirteen; the number who refused to sign was eighty-two. A list of
the names of the signers, and those who refused to sign, in the various
precincts in the county, may be found in Blake's History of Putnam
County, p. 102-143 inclusive.

Huddlestone.--State Convention at Poughkeepsie.--Patriot Pledge.--
Federal Constitution.--The Federalist

384Huddlestone, the famous spy, who was captured upon Wild Boar Hill,
near Yonkers, in West Chester county, was tried, condemned, and hung at
Poughkeepsie in April, 1780. The place of his execution was upon a verge
of the plain on which the town stands, known as Forbus's Hill. I have
heard the late venerable Abel Gunn, of Poughkeepsie, who was a drum
major in the Continental army, speak of Huddlestone and of his
execution. He described him as a small man, with a large head and thick
neck. He was accompanied to the scaffold by the county officers and a
small guard of militia enrolled for the purpose.

The state Convention to consider the Federal Constitution assembled at
the Vankleek House, in Poughkeepsie, on the 17th of June, 1788. There
were fifty-seven delegates present, and Governor George Clinton was
chosen the president of the Convention. In that Assembly were some of
the most distinguished men of the Revolution, and the debates were of
the most interesting character. In no state in the Union was hostility
to the Federal Constitution more extensive and violent than in the state
of New York. Forty-six of the fifty-seven delegates, including the
governor, were anti-Federalists, or opposed to the Constitution. The
principal advocates of the instrument were John Jay, Alexander Hamilton,
and Robert Livingston. Mr. Hamilton had been a leading member of the
National Convention that framed the Constitution, and also one of the
principal writers of the _Federalist_. * He felt the responsibility of
his situation, and the Convention readily acknowledged the value of his
judgment. He was perfectly familiar with every topic included in the
wide range which the debates embraced, and he was nobly sustained by his
colleagues, Jay and Livingston. The hostile feelings of many of the
anti-Federalists gradually yielded, and on the 26 th of July the final
question of ratification was carried in the affirmative by a majority of
three votes.

A little more than a mile below Poughkeepsie, on the bank of the Hudson,
is the residence of the late Colonel Henry A. Livingston, a grandson of
Philip Livingston, one of the

* When the Constitution, adopted by the National Convention, was
submitted to the consideration of the people, extensive and violent
opposition was observed, founded principally upon the undue jealousy
with which the doctrine of state rights was regarded. The friends of the
Constitution saw that general public enlightenment upon the subject was
necessary to secure the ratification of the instrument by the requisite
number of states to make it the organic law of the republic. To this end
Jay, Hamilton, and Madison commenced a series of essays in explanation
and vindication of the principles of government. They appeared
successively every week in the New York papers, between October, 1787,
and the spring of 1788. The whole work, which is called The Federalist,
consists of eighty-five numbers. Mr. Jay wrote six numbers, * Mr.
Madison twenty-five, and Mr. Hamilton the residue. They had a powerful
effect upon the public mind and contributed largely to the success which
finally crowned the efforts of the friends of the Constitution.

* Mr. Jay and other gentlemen armed and placed themselves under the
command of Colonel Hamilton, to suppress a riot it New York known as The
Doctors' Mob. He was nearly killed by a stone thrown by one of the
rioters, and was confined to his bed for some time. He had written the
fifth number of the Federalist essays when that event occurred. He
recovered in time to write the sixty-fourth.

The Livingston Mansion.--Henry A. Livingston, Esq.--Kingston, or
Esopua.--Its Dutch Name

385signers of the Declaration of Independence, and son of the late John
H. Livingston, D.D., president of the College of Now Brunswick. It was
built by his paternal grandfather, Henry Livingston, in 1714, and is a
fine specimen of a country mansion of that period.

The situation is delightful, completely imbosomed in venerable trees,
and far removed from the bustle of the highway. * The late occupant, in
the exercise of his good taste and patriotism, preserved the old mansion
from the invasion of modern improvements, and kept up that generous
hospitality which marked the character of the "gentleman of the old
school." Even the orifice in the side of the house, under the piazza,
which was made by a cannon-ball fired from one of the British ships that
conveyed the troops up the river, who burned Kingston, seventy-two years
ago, is preserved with care, and shown to visitors as a token of the
spite of the enemy against active Whigs. The last time I visited the
mansion the late proprietor was living, possessing apparently all the
vigor and cheerfulness of a man of fifty, though then past three score
and ten years. ** In the room which contained his valuable library I
passed several hours, copying the portraits of John and Mary Livingston,
the parents of Robert Livingston, the first emigrant of that name to
America; and also an interesting _genealogical tree_, illustrative of
the family growth and connections, which Colonel Livingston kindly
placed at my disposal. I have referred to these before, and they will be
found in another part of this work.

I left Poughkeepsie at ten in the evening, and reached Kingston village,
ninety-three miles north of New York, a little past midnight. The
landing is upon a rocky island separated from the main land by a morass,
crossed by a causeway. It is nearly three miles from the village, which
lies upon an elevated plain several miles in extent, and is surrounded
by high hills on all sides except toward the Hudson. On the northwest
the Catskill range rises grand and beautiful, and far enough distant to
present an azure hue. I think I never saw a more imposing display of
distant mountain scenery than is presented at Kingston, toward sunset,
when the higher peaks and bold projections cast their long shadows over
the agricultural districts below, reflecting, at the same time, from
their southwestern declivities, the mellow light of departing day.

Kingston was settled by the Dutch as early as 1663, as appears from an
account of troubles between the white settlers and the Indians there,
and was called Wiltwyck--literally _Wild Witch_, or Indian Witch. The
Dutch built a redoubt upon the bank of the creek, near the ancient
landing-place. The creek was called Redoubt Kill, or Creek, and is now
known by the corrupted name of Rondout Creek. *** The Esopus Indians
then occupied the beautiful

* Since my visit the quiet and beauty of the place have been invaded by
the Hudson River Rail-road, which passes within a few feet of the
mansion, and in whose construction the beautiful cove has been
destroyed, and some of the venerable willows, planted by the first
owner, have been uprooted. In our country the beautiful has but a
feather's weight in the scale against the useful.

** Colonel Livingston died June 9th, 1849. Although living in the
retirement of a gentleman of wealth and leisure, he often consented to
serve the public in offices requiring judgment, industry, and integrity,
he was a member of the state Senate one term; and it is a remarkable
fact that he was never absent a day from his post in the Senate Chamber
or in the hall of the Court of Errors. He will long be remembered in
Poughkeepsie as one of its best citizens.

*** Benson's Memoirs, in the Collections of the New York Historical
Society vol. i., part ii.. p. 119

Early Settlement at Kingston.--Indian Troubles.--The Huguenots.--
Formation of the State Constitution.

386flats extending from the creek northward nearly to the present town
of Saugerties, and, becoming dissatisfied with their white neighbors,
resolved to destroy them. For this purpose they fell upon the settlement
while the men were abroad in the fields, and killed or carried off
sixty-five persons. The survivors retreated to the redoubt, and the
Indians began to erect a stockade near it. A message was sent to Nieu
Amsterdam (New York), and Governor Stuyvesant immediately forwarded a
body of troops, under Martin Crygier, who drove the Indians back to the
mountains. During the summer, parties of the Dutch made inroads among
the hill fastnesses, destroyed the Indian villages and forts, laid waste
and burned their fields and stores of maize, killed many of their
warriors, released twenty-two of the Dutch  1663-64 captives, and
captured eleven of the enemy. This chastisement caused a truce in
December, and a treaty of peace in May following.

The Dutch settlement at Kingston received a valuable accession, toward
the close of the century, by the arrival of a company of Huguenots, *
who, after the revocation of the Edict of Nantes, fled from persecution
to America. They were a fragment of the resolute Christian band of eight
hundred thousand who escaped from France into Holland, Germany,
Switzerland, and England. They settled in the fertile valleys of Ulster
and Orange, but that repose which they coveted was a long time denied
them, for the Indians, jealous of the encroachments of the pale faces,
harassed them continually. The school of suffering in which they had
been tutored before leaving Europe had given them patience and
perseverance, and they succeeded in planting the Gospel of Peace in the
midst of the heathen, and gave many hardy sons to do battle in the
council and the field for American independence.

Kingston and the neighboring region suffered much from the Indians and
Tories during the Revolution, for this was emphatically a Whig district;
and when Kingston became so presumptuous as to harbor rebel legislators,
it was marked for severe chastisement by the enemy.

In 1776, after the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, the
General Assembly of New York changed its title from the "Provincial
Congress of the colony" to the "Convention of the Representatives of the
state of New York." The Assembly was to meet in the city of New York on
the 8th of July, the special object of the session being the forming of
a state Constitution. But before that day arrived, the fleet of Admiral
Howe, with a British army, appeared near Sandy Hook, and the new
Congress assembled at White Plains, in West Chester county, twenty-five
miles from the city. At the moment of meeting it received intelligence
of the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, and its first act
was to approve that measure by a unanimous vote. On the 1st of August a
committee was appointed to draw up and report a Constitution. ** John
Jay was the chairman of the committee, and the duty of drafting the
instrument was assigned to him.

During the autumn the labors of the Convention were greatly disturbed by
military events. The enemy had taken possession of New York city and
island; had spread over the lower

* These people occupy a conspicuous place in the history of the
sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and, as will be observed hereafter,
formed an essential element in the machinery of our Revolution,
particularly in the Carolinas. On the 26th of August, 1572, the festival
of St. Bartholomew, seventy thousand Protestants were butchered in
France by royal and papal authority. Terrible persecutions continued
until 1598, when Henry IV. issued an edict, called the Edict of Nantes,
granting toleration to his Protestant subjects. For nearly a century
this edict was in force, but in 1685 Louis XIV. revoked it, and
persecutions began anew. This cruel and injudicious policy lost France
eight hundred thousand of her best subjects, who were Protestants, fifty
thousand of whom made their way to England, where they introduced silk
weaving, the manufacture of jewelry, and other elegant employments then
monopolized by France. Of those who settled in Ulster county the names
of twelve are preserved, whose descendants are numerous, and among the
most respectable citizens of that and Orange eounty. The following are
the names: Lewis Dubois, Andre Lefevre, Louis Bevier, Hugues Frere
[Frear], Christian Deyo, Jean Hasbrouck, Anthony Crispell, Isaac Dubois,
Abraham Hasbrouck, Pierre Deyo, Abraham Dubois, Lyman Lefevre.

** The following are the names of the gentlemen who composed that
committee: John Jay, John Sloss Hobart, William Smith, William Duer,
Gouverneur Morris, Robert R. Livingston, John Broome, John Morris Scott,
Abraham Yates, Jr., Henry Wisner, Sen., Samuel Townsend, Charles De
Witt, and Robert Yates. James Duane was subsequently placed on the
committee, and, Mr. Jay being absent when the draft of the Constitution
was reported, it was submitted to the Assembly by him.--Journal of the
Convention, p. 552 and 833.

Completion and Adoption of the Constitution.--Its Character.--Subsequent
Constitutions.--Effects of a Mixture of Races.

1777. 387part of West Chester county, and expelled the American troops,
and Washington and his army had fled before them to the Delaware. The
Convention migrated from place to place, and held brief sessions at
Harlaem, White Plains, and Fishkill in Dutchess county. At the latter
place the members armed themselves for defense against the British or
Tories who should assail them. * Finally they retreated to Kingston,
where they continued in session from February, 1777, until May of that
year. There, undisturbed, the committee pursued its labors, and on the
12th of March reported the draft of a Constitution.

It was under consideration more than a month, and was finally adopted on
the 20th of April.

It is a document of great merit, and exhibits a clear apprehension of
the just functions of government, which distinguished the mind of its
author. Its preamble sets forth explicitly the cause which demanded the
erection of a new government; and its first article declared that no
authority should be exercised in the state but such as should be derived
from, and granted by, the people.

Great wisdom was manifested in all its provisions for regulating the
civil, military, and judicial powers of the state. It was highly
approved throughout the country, and English jurists spoke of it in
terms of praise. Under it the government of the state was organized by
an ordinance of the Convention, passed in May, and, as we have noticed,
the first May 8, 1777 session of the Legislature was appointed to be
held at Kingston in July. *** This Constitution remained in force, with
a few amendments, until 1823, when a new one was formed by a state
Convention. This, in time, was submitted to the action of a Convention
to revise it, and a third was formed and became law in 1846.

In the history of these movements toward perfecting the organic law of
the state of New York is developed much of the philosophy of that
progress which marks so distinctly the career of our republic. From the
old Dutch laws, sometimes narrow and despotic, but marked by a sound and
expansive policy, to the enlightened features of the Constitution of
1846, we may trace the growth of the benevolent principles of equality,
and a correct appreciation in the public mind of human rights. "We may
see," says Butler, "in the provisions of our several Constitutions, the
effects of the intermixture of the different races: the Dutch; the
English, Scotch, and Irish; the French, Swedes, and Germans; the Anglo-
American from the eastern colonies, from whom our people have been
derived. To this cause, and to the great number and diversity of
religious sects and opinions which have flowed from it, may especially
be ascribed the absolute freedom and perfect equality in matters of
religion, and the utter separation of the Church from the State, secured
by these instruments." ****

* Lives of Gouverneur Morris and John Jay.

** This house, the property and residence of James W. Baldwin, Esq., was
used for the session of the state Convention in 1777. It is built of
blue limestone, and stands on the southwest corner of Maiden Lane and
Fair Street. It is one of the few houses that survived the conflagration
of the village.

*** Popular elections for members of the Legislature were held in all
the counties except New York, Kings, Queens, and Suffolk, which were
then in possession of the enemy. George Clinton, then a brigadier
general in the Continental army, was elected to the offices of governor
and lieutenant governor. The former office he held by successive
elections for eighteen years, and afterward for three years. Pierre Van
Courtlandi, who was president of the Senate, became lieutenant governor;
Robert R. Livingston was appointed chancellor; John Jay, chief justice;
Robert Yates and John Sloss Hobart, judges of the Supreme Court; and
Egbert Benson, attorney general.--Journals of the Convention, p. 916--
918.

**** Outline of the Constitutional History of New York, a discourse
delivered at the annual meeting of the New York Historical Society, in
1317, by Benjamin F. Butler, late attorney general of the United States.

Marauding Expedition up the Hudson.--Landing at Kingston.--Burning of
the Town.--Rhinebeck Flats.

October 6, 1777. Kingston388 (or Esopus), being the capital of the state
when Sir Henry Clinton gained possession of the forts in the Hudson
Highlands, was marked by the conqueror for special vengeance. Having
demolished the _chevaux-de-frise_ at Fort Montgomery, the British fleet
proceeded up the Hudson; the massive iron chain was not yet stretched
across the river at West Point. * All impediments being removed, a
flying squadron of light frigates, under Sir James Wallace, bearing
three thousand six hundred men, under the command of General Vaughan,
sailed up the river.

They were instructed to scatter desolation in their track, and well did
they perform their mission. Every vessel upon the river was burned or
otherwise destroyed; the houses of known Whigs, such as Henry
Livingston, at Poughkeepsie, were fired upon from the ships; and small
parties, landing from the vessels, desolated neighborhoods with fire and
sword. They penetrated as far northward as Kingston, where they landed
on the 13th of October. The frigates were anchored a little above the
present landing on Kingston Point, and a portion of the invaders
debarked in the cove north of the steam-boat wharf. Another division, in
small boats, proceeded to the mouth of Esopus (now Rondout) Creek, and
landed at a place a little northeast of Ron-dout village, called
Ponkhocken Point. The people at the creek fled, affrighted, to Marble-
town, seven miles southwest of Kingston, and their houses were
destroyed. The two divisions then marched toward the village, one by the
upper road and the other by the Esopus Creek Road. Near the house of a
Mr. Yeoman, who was in the army at Stillwater, they seized a negro, and
made him pilot them directly to the town. The detachments joined upon a
gentle eminence near the village, a few rods south of the Rondout Road,
and, after a brief consultation, proceeded to apply the torch. Almost
every house was laid in ashes, and a large quantity of provisions and
stores situated there and at the landing was destroyed. The town then
contained between three and four thousand inhabitants, many of whom were
wealthy, and most of the houses were built of stone. *** Warned of the
approach of the enemy, a few saved their most valuable effects, but many
lost all their possessions, and were driven back upon the interior
settlements upon the Wallkill. Governor Clinton, with the members of the
Legislature, was there, and efforts were made to raise a sufficient
number of militia for the protection of the town, but without success.
The enemy, however, fearing their wanton cruelty would bring the people
in mass upon them, hastily retreated after destroying the village. A
detachment crossed the river and marched to Rhinebeck Flats, **** two
miles eastward, where they burned several houses; and, after penetrating
northward as far as Livingston's Manor, and burning some houses there,
they rejoined the main body, and the fleet returned to New York.

This wanton and apparently useless expedition excited great indignation.
It was supposed that the destination of the enemy was, according to
arrangement, Albany, and a junction with Burgoyne, then hemmed in by
Americans at Saratoga, and anxiously awaiting the

* A detail of this event, and a drawing of the remains of the chain now
at West Point, may be found on page 700 of this volume.

** This view is from the road, looking north. An attempt was made by a
soldier to burn the house, but so rapid was the march of the invaders
that the flames had made but little progress before the troops were far
on their road to the village. A negro woman, who was concealed under
some corn-stalks near, extinguished the flames. The house is about half
a mile from the river, on the right side of the road from the landing to
Kingston village.

*** Governor Clinton, writing to Captain Maehin on the subject of
erecting works for the defense of Kingston, says, "I do not conceive it
necessary to inclose the town, as the houses are stone, and will form
(if the windows are properly secured) good lines of defense."

**** Rhinebeck Flats village is in Dutchess county, about seventeen
miles north of Poughkeepsie. It was eminently a Whig place during the
Revolution. There was the residence of the widow of General Montgomery,
who had been killed at Quebec two years before, and of many of her
numerous relatives, the Livingstons, all of whom were friends of the
patriot cause.

Livingston's Manor.--An Advantage thrown away.--Gates's Letter.--
Loyalists.--Rondout.

389promised aid from Clinton. When Vaughan and his troops were at
Livingston's Mills (which they destroyed), a flood tide would have
carried them to Albany in five hours; and so completely had the army of
Gates drained the country, in that vicinity, of men, that they might
easily have burned the stores at Albany, and taken possession of that
city. Gates afterward declared that, had such an event occurred, he must
have retreated into New England, and Burgoyne would have escaped. But,
instead of becoming honorable victors, Vaughan and his party appeared
content to fulfill the office and earn the renown of successful
marauders. They may have thought that their operations would divert
Gates's attention, and cause him to detach troops for the defense of the
country below, and thus so weaken his force as to enable Burgoyne to
conquer or escape. But this effect was not produced, and the expedition
was fruitless of good to the cause of the king. Gates at that very time
was making the most honorable propositions to Burgoyne for a surrender,
and, when he heard of Vaughan's operations, he wrote that officer a
letter replete with just severity. *

Kingston was the scene of the execution of several Loyalists during the
Revolution, and there Sir Henry Clinton's spy, who was caught at New
Windsor, with a dispatch for Burgoyne in a silver bullet (of which I
shall hereafter write), was hung upon the limb October 12, 1777 of an
apple-tree. Several Tories saved their lives by consenting to enlist in
the Continental army.

The depredations of the Indians and Tories in the Warwasing and
Mamakating Valleys, and other portions of Ulster county, from 1778 till
near the close of the war, will be noticed hereafter, in connection with
the Minisink massacre. Let us now make a flying visit to the
Revolutionary localities in the vicinity of Kingston, and then pass on
to the battle-ground of Bennington.

With the exception of the "Constitution House" (depicted on page 387)
and two or three other stone buildings, and the venerable tomb-stones in
the old Dutch burying-ground, Kingston presents little attraction to the
seeker of Revolutionary relics. ** Its hills, and rich plains, and
distant mountain scenery are still there, but greatly modified by
cultivation. I passed the morning in the village, with General Smith,
and at about noon proceeded to Rondout. This thriving little village is
nestled in a secluded nook near the mouth of the Rondout Creek, which
here comes flowing through a deep and narrow gorge among the hills, and
mingles its waters with the Hudson. Mr. Gossman, the editor of the
_Courier_, kindly offered to accompany me to points of interest
connected with the Revolution, and I passed the remainder of the day in
a pleasant ramble with him. Crossing the creek in a skiff to its
southwestern

* He concluded his letter by saying, "Is it thus that the generals of
the king expect to make converts to the royal cause? Their cruelties
operate as a contrary effect: independence is founded upon the universal
disgust of the people. The fortune of war has delivered into my hands
older and abler generals than General Vaughan is reputed to be: their
condition may one day become his, and then no human power can save him
from the just vengeance of an offended people." The friends of the king
were also displeased at the movement. One of the leading loyalists of
New York, writing to Joseph Galloway, said, "Why a delay was made of
seven days after Clinton had taken the forts, we are ignorant of. The
Highland forts were taken on the 6th of October; Esopus was burned on
the 13th; Burgoyne's convention was signed on the 17th. There was no
force to oppose even open boats on the river. Why, then, did not the
boats proceed immediately to Albany? Had Clinton gone forward,
Burgoyne's army had been saved. Putnam could not have crossed to Albany.
The army amused themselves by burning Esopus, and the houses of
individuals on the river bank." Clinton and the brothers Howe seem to
have been perfect malaprops, striking at the wrong time, and withholding
a blow when most appropriate and promising the best success.

** In the old grave-yard rest the remains of some of the Huguenots and
of many of their descendants; and there repose the bodies of not a few
who suffered during the war for independence. Some of the earlier grave-
stones are rude monuments. One of them, at the head of the grave of
Andries De Witt, is delineated in the engraving.

The inscription is rudely carved. The tall and slender slate stone is
supported by a cedar post, which was probably set up when the stone was
erected, yet it is perfectly preserved, and retains its odor. I saw it
there fifteen years ago, and then "the oldest inhabitant" remembered it
from his boyhood. The meaning of IVLY may need to be explained to young
readers. I was used for J and V for U in former times, and the letters,
therefore, make the word JULY.

An Octogenarian.--Landing-places of the British.--A frightened
Dutchman.--Departure for the North

390side, we called upon the venerable John Sleight, now eighty years
old, who lives in the dwelling of his father, on the slope of a high
hill near the water. He had a clear recollection of the landing of the
British, and directed us to the different localities at the mouth of the
creek. He said there were only three houses where Rondout now is, and
they were burned. The occupants fled to Marbletown, and the few soldiers
stationed at the redoubt on the hill, a little northeast of the village,
with a single cannon, followed the flying inhabitants. The enemy did not
cross the creek, and the house of Mr. Sleight was spared.

From the high hills a quarter of a mile from Mr. Sleight's we had a fine
view of the landing-places of both divisions of the enemy, as seen in
the engraving. The water extending on the left is Ron-dout Creek, and
that on the right and beyond the long point is the Hudson River, the
spectator looking northeast. The high point on the left is the place
where the redoubt was thrown up. The small building beyond, standing
upon the water's edge, is upon Ponkhocken Point,1 and in the cove
between it and the redoubt is the place where the enemy landed. The long
point in the distance is the present landing, immediately above which,
in a sandy cove, the main division of the British army debarked. An
amusing anecdote was related to me, connected with that event. Between
the point and Ponkhocken are extensive flats, bare at low water, and
yielding much coarse grass. When the enemy landed, some Dutchmen were at
work just below the point, and were not aware of the fact until they saw
the dreaded red-coats near them. It was low water, and across the flats
toward Ponkhocken they fled as fast as their legs could carry them, not
presuming to look behind them, lest, like Lot's wife, they might be
detained. The summer hay-makers had left a rake on the marsh meadow, and
upon this one of the fugitives trod. The handle flew up behind him, and
gave him a severe blow on the back of his head. Not doubting that a
"Britisher" was close upon his heels, he stopped short, and, throwing up
his hands imploringly, exclaimed, "O, mein Cot! mein Cot! I kivs up.
Hoorah for King Shorge!" The innocent rake was all the enemy that was
near, and the Dutchman's sudden conversion to loyalty was known only to
a companion in the race, who had outstripped him a few paces.

Passing along the river road to the upper point, we visited the landing-
place of the British. A large portion of the cove is now filled by a
mass of earth, rocks, and trees that slid down from the high shore a few
years ago. The heaps of blue clay have the appearance of huge rocks, and
will doubtless become such in time, by induration. Returning to Ron-
dout, I rode over to Kingston at about sunset, passed the evening with
Mr. Vanderlyn ** the painter, and at midnight embarked in a steamer for
Albany.

Sept. 27, The morning was cold, and every thing without was white with
hoar frost. I was Sept. 271848 in Troy a little after sunrise, and at
eight o'clock, seated with the driver upon a mail-coach, was ascending
the long hills on the road to Hoosick, in Rensselaer county, *** about
twenty-

* The ferry to Rhinebeck was from Ponkhocken Point until 1814, when the
causeway was constructed at the upper point, and the ferry and landing
established there.

** Mr. Vanderlyn was a native of Kingston. He resided many years in
Europe, where he painted his large picture of the Landing of Columbus,
for the rotunda of the Capitol at Washington. It was completed about
three years ago (1846), and now occupies its appropriate place. He died
in 1853.

*** The original Manor of Rensselaer, or Rensselaerwyck, included all of
Rensselaer county, except Hoosick, Schaghticoke, and Pittstown, and also
the greater part of Albany county. The city of Albany is near the center
of the manor. This domain was granted to Killian Van Rensselaer by
patent from the States-Gen-eral of Holland, after he had purchased the
native right to the soil in 1641, and was twenty-four miles wide, on
both sides of the river, and about forty-two miles long east and west.
When the English came into possession of the country, the right to his
domain of the proprietor of Rensselaerwyck, who was called the patroon,*
was not questioned, and on the 4th of March, 1685, it was confirmed by
letters patent under the great seal of the state of New York.

* This title was given to those Dutch purchasers of lands who bought the
soil fairly from the natives, and planted a colony There were several
patroon estates, but that of Van Rensselaer is the only one not
disturbed by political changes. This, how ever, is now on the verge of
extinction, and, for several years past, anti-rentism, as the opposition
to the patroon privilege is called, has been working a change in the
public mind unfavorable to such vast landed monopolies.

Ride to the Hoosick Valley.--Van Schaick's Mills.--Place of the
Bennington Battle-ground.--Baume's Dispatch

391five miles east of the Hudson. The country is very elevated and
hilly, and, when three miles east of Troy, the Green Mountains were seen
in the distance. Before the Hoosick Valley is reached, the country
becomes extremely broken and picturesque. We descended by a romantic
mountain road into the valley, a little past noon, and halted at
Richmond's, at Hoosick Four Corners. This is the nearest point, on the
turnpike, to the Bennington battle-ground. The road thither skirted the
Hoosiek River northward for three miles, to the falls, * where we turned
eastward, and passed through North Hoosick, situated at the junction of
the Walloomscoick and White Creeks.

Here is still standing the old mill known as _Van Schaick's_ in the
Revolution. It was occupied by a party of Americans when Baume and his
Hessians approached; and here the memorable battle of Bennington ended.
From this mill, along the hills and the valley on the right bank of the
Walloomscoick, to the bridge near the house of Mr. Barnet, two miles
above, is the scene of the battle; and the hottest of the fight (which
occurred when the Hessians retreated from the heights) took place
between the little factory village of Starkville and the house of Mr.
Taber. These allusions will be better understood after consulting the
history.

The conflict called the battle of Bennington was a part of the
operations connected with Burgoyne's invasion from Canada, in the summer
and autumn of 1777. The delay whieh he had experienced at Skenesborough
and on his way to Fort Edward had so reduced his stores and provisions,
that a re-

* At the Hoosiek Falls is a manufacturing village containing about one
hundred dwellings. The river here falls about forty feet, and affords
very extensive water power. Near the factories I observed a handsome
octagonal edifice, on the road side, on the front of which, in prominent
letters, is the following:

"SACRED TO SCIENCE.

In sea, earth, and sky, what are untold

Of God's handiwork, both modern and old."

* It contains, I was told, a large collection of natural curiosities,
which the wealthy and tasteful proprietor takes pleasure in exhibiting
freely.

** This battle was fought within the town of Hoosiek, and five or six
miles from Bennington. At that time the boundary line between New York
and New Hampshire (Vermont, as a state, not being then in existence) was
at the Green Mountains, and Bennington was claimed to be within the
borders of New York

*** This view is taken from the left bank of the Walloomscoick, a little
below the bridge. The mill belonged to a Whig named Van Sehaick, who had
joined General Stark's collecting forces at Bennington. Lieutenant-
colonel Baume wrote the following dispatch to Burgoyne from this place:

*** "Sancoik, 14th, August, 1777, 9 o'clock.

*** "Sir--I have the honor to inform your excellency that I arrived here
at eight in the morning, having had intelligence of a party of the enemy
being in possession of a mill, which they abandoned at our approach;
out, in their usual way, fired from the bushes, and took their road to
Bennington. A savage was slightly wounded; they broke down the bridge,
which has retarded our march above an hour; they left in the mill about
seventy-eight barrels of very fine flour, one thousand bushels of wheat,
twenty barrels of salt, and about £1000 worth of pearlash and potash. I
have ordered thirty provincials and an officer to guard the provisions
and the pass of the bridge. By five prisoners taken here, they agree
that from fifteen to eighteen hundred are at Bennington, but are
supposed to leave it on our approach. I will proceed so far to-day as to
fall on the enemy early to-morrow, and make such disposition as I may
think necessary, from the intelligence I may receive. People [Tories]
are flocking in hourly, but want to be armed. The savages can not be
controlled; they ruin and take every thing they please.

*** "I am your excellency's most humble servant, F. Baume."

* See note respecting this name on page 399.

Foraging Expedition to Bennington.--Burgoyne's Instructions.--Baume's
Indian Allies.--Skirmish near Cambridge

392plenishment was necessary. Informed that the Americans had a large
quantity of these, and of cattle and horses, at Bennington and in the
vicinity, he resolved, with the advice of Major Skene, to send a
detachment of his army thither to capture them. Both Phillips and
Reidesel, the most experienced of his generals, were opposed to the
measure; but Burgoyne, actuated by an overweening confidence in his
strength, and deceived as to the extent of the Royalist party in the
colonies, * dispatched Lieutenant-colonel Baume thither with five
hundred Hessians, Canadians, and Tories, and one hundred Indians.
Burgoyne's instructions to the commander of the expedition, dated August
9th, 1777, ** declared the objects to be to try the affections of the
county, to disconcert the councils of the enemy, to mount Reidesel's
dragoons, to complete Peters's corps [of Loyalists], and to obtain large
supplies of cattle, horses, and carriages. Baume was directed "to scour
the country from Rockingham to Otter Creek," to go down Connecticut
River as far as Brattleborough, and return by the great road to Albany,
there to meet General Burgoyne, and to endeavor to make the country
believe his corps was the advanced body of the general's army, who was
to cross Connecticut River and proceed to Boston. He ordered that "all
officers, civil and military, acting under the Congress, should be made
prisoners." Baume was also instructed "to tax the towns where they
halted with such articles as they wanted, and take hostages for the
performance, &c.; to bring all horses fit to mount the dragoons or to
serve as battalion horses for the troops, with as many saddles and
bridles as could be found." Burgoyne stipulated the number of horses to
be brought at thirteen hundred at least, and more if they could be
obtained, and directed them to be "tied in strings of ten each, in order
that one man might lead ten horses." Dr. Thatcher, in his Journal, says,
"This redoubtable commander surely must be one of the happiest men of
the age, to imagine such prodigious achievements were at his command;
that such invaluable resources were within his grasp. But, alas! the
wisest of men are liable to disappointment in their sanguine
calculations, and to have their favorite projects frustrated by the
casualties of war. This is remarkably verified in the present instance."
*** August, 1777 With these full instructions, Baume left his encampment
on the 13th, and the next day arrived at the mill on the Walloomscoick.
He reached Cambridge on the evening previous, near which place an
advanced guard of Tories and Indians attacked a small party of Americans
who were guarding some cattle. The patriots, after delivering a well-
directed fire, retreated to the woods, leaving five of their number
behind, prisoners. Some horses were captured, but, according to a
dispatch from Baume to Burgoyne, the Indians who secured them destroyed
or drove away all that were not paid for in ready cash. In his whole
expedition Burgoyne found the savages more trouble than profit. Let us
leave the invader at "Sancoik's," while we take a retrospect of relative
events on the part of the Americans.

On the evacuation of Ticonderoga, and the advance of Burgoyne toward the
Hudson, the Eastern States were filled with alarm. Burgoyne's
destination was not certainly known, and when he was at Skenesborough it
was thought that Boston might be the point to which he would march. The
whole frontier of New Hampshire and Massachusetts was uncovered,

* Major Skene assured him that "the friends to the British cause were as
five to one, and that they wanted only the appearance of a protecting
power to show themselves."--Gordon, ii., 242.

** The original of these instructions is in the archives of the
Massachusetts Historical Society.

*** Military Journal, p. 92.

Measure for defending Now Hampshire.--Langdon's Patriotism.--Raising of
Troops.--General Stark

393and strenuous efforts were at once made for the defense of these
states, particularly New Hampshire, which was lying nearest the scene of
danger. The Committee of Safety of the New Hampshire Grants (now
Vermont) wrote to the New Hampshire Committee of Safety at Exeter,
apprising them of the pressing danger near, and imploring their
assistance. The Provincial Assembly had finished their session, and had
gone home, but a summons from the committee brought them together again
in three days. Despondency seemed to pervade the whole convention when
they met, until the patriotic John Langdon, * then Speaker of the
Assembly, thus addressed them: "I have three thousand dollars in hard
money. I will pledge my plate for three thousand more. I have seventy
hogsheads of Tobago rum, which shall be sold for the most it will bring.
These are at the service of the state. If we succeed in defending our
firesides and homes, I may be remunerated; if we do not, the property
will be of no value to me. Our old friend Stark, who so nobly sustained
the honor of our state at Bunker Hill, may be safely intrusted with the
conduct of the enterprise, and we will check the progress of Burgoyne."

Langdon's patriotic spirit seemed to be infused into the Assembly, for
the most energetic measures were planned and put in operation. The whole
militia of the state was formed into two brigades. The first was placed
under the command of William Whipple (one of the signers of the
Declaration of Independence), and the second, of John Stark. They
ordered one fourth part of Stark's brigade and one fourth of three
regiments of Whipple's to march immediately, under the command of the
former, to the frontiers of the state, and confront the enemy. The
militia officers were empowered to disarm the Tories. A day of fasting
and prayer was ordered and observed.

Stark was then a private citizen. He had been a brigadier with
Washington at Trenton and Princeton, and, when the army went into
winter-quarters at Morristown, returned to New Hampshire on a recruiting
expedition. Having filled his regiments, he returned to Exeter to await
orders, and there learned that several junior officers had been promoted
by Congress, while he was left out of the list. Feeling greatly
aggrieved, he resigned March 1777 his commission and left the army, not,
however, to desert his country in the hour of peril, for, like General
Schuyler, he was active for good while divested of military authority,
He was very popular, and the Assembly regarded him as a pillar of
strength in upholding the confidence and courage of the militia of the
state. That body offered him the command, and, laying aside his private
griefs, he once more donned his armor and went to the field,
stipulating, however, that he should not be obliged to join the main
army, but hang upon the wing of the enemy on the borders of his state,
strike when opportunity should offer, according to his own discretion,
and be accountable to no one but the Assembly of New Hampshire.

Joy pervaded the militia when their favorite commander was announced as
their chief, and they cheerfully flocked to his standard, which was
raised, first at Charleston and then at Manchester, twenty miles north
of Bennington, where Colonel Seth Warner, with his Green Mountain Boys
was posted. This was only the remnant of the regiment that so gallantly
opposed the enemy at Hubbardton on the 7th of July, and was then
recruiting at

* John Langdon was born at Portsmouth, New Hampshire, in 1740. He
received a mercantile education, and for several years prosecuted
business upon the sea, and, when the Revolution broke out, was a leading
merchant in Portsmouth. He espoused the republican cause, and was one of
the party which removed the powder and military stores from Fort William
and Mary, at New Castle, in 1774. He was a delegate in the Continental
Congress in 1775 and 1776. For a short time he commanded a company of
volunteers in Vermont and on Rhode Island. Pie was Speaker of the
Provincial Assembly of New Hampshire, and Judge of the Court of Common
Pleas in 1776 and 1777. He was Continental agent in New Hampshire in
1779, and was again elected a delegate to Congress in 1783. He served in
the Legislature of his state for several years, and in 1788 was chosen
President of New Hampshire. The next year he was elected a member of the
United States Senate, and in 1794 was re-elected for another term of six
years. From 1805 till 1811 he was four years governor of the state, and
then retired into private lifo. He was of Jefferson's political school,
and in 1812 the majority in Congress selected him for Vice-president of
the United Stales, but he declined the honor. He died at Portsmouth,
September 18th, 1819, aged seventy-eight years.

Stark's Refusal to accompany Lincoln. Censure of Congress. The Result.
Movements to oppose Baume. Life of Stark

August, 1777. Manchester. There394 Stark met General Lincoln, who had
been sent by General Schuyler, then in command of the Northern
Department, to conduct him and his August 19. recruits to the Hudson.
Stark positively refused to go, and exhibited the written terms upon
which he had consented to appear in the field at all.

His refusal was communicated to Congress, and that body resolved that
the Assembly of New Hampshire should be informed that the instructions
which they had given General Stark were "destructive of military
subordination, and highly prejudicial to the common cause and the
Assembly was desired "to instruct General Stark to conform himself to
the same rules which other general officers of the militia were subject
to whenever they were called out at the expense of the United States."1
This \yas sound military logic, but was not adapted to the circumstances
in question. General Stark, as well as the Assembly of New Hampshire,
knew better than Congress what policy, in the premises, was most
conducive to the general good, and the sequel proved that the apparent
insubordination, which seemed so "highly prejudicial to the common
cause," was productive of great benefits to the country. It was at this
very juncture that Burgoyne was planning his expedition to Bennington,
and on the day of the date of Baume's instructions Stark arrived at that
place.

Informed of the presence of Indians at Cambridge, twelve miles north of
Bennington, and of their attack upon the party of Americans there, (a)
he detached Lieutenant-colonela August 13 Gregg, with two hundred men,
to oppose their march. Toward night he received information that a large
body of the enemy, with a train of artillery, was in the rear of the
Indians, and in full march for Bennington. Stark immediately rallied his
brigade, with all the militia that had collected at Bennington, and sent
out an urgent call for the militia in the vicinity. He also sent an
order to the officer in command of Colonel Warner's regiment, at
Manchester, to march his men to Bennington immediately. The order was
promptly obeyed, and they arrived in the night, thoroughly drenched with
rain. On the morning of the 14th, about the time when Baume was at Van
Schaick's Mills, Stark, ** with his whole force, was moving forward to
support Colonel Gregg. He was accompanied by Colonels Warner, Williams,
and Brush. The regiment of the former was not with him; they remained at
Bennington, to dry themselves and prepare their arms for action. After
marching about five miles, they met Gregg retreating, and the enemy
within a mile

August 9.

* Journals of Congress, vol. iii., 273.

** John Stark was the son of a native of Glasgow, in Scotland, and was
born in Londonderry, New Hampshire, August 28th, 1728. His father
removed to Derryfield (now Manchester), on the Merrimac, in 1736 While
on a hunting expedition in 1752, young Stark was taken prisoner and
carried off by a party of St. Francis Indians. He was redeemed by a
Boston friend for the sum of one hundred and three dollars, to pay which
he went on another hunting expedition on the Androscoggin. He served in
Rogers's company of Rangers during the French and Indian war, and was
made a captain in 1756. Repairing to Cambridge on hearing of the battle
of Lexington, he received a colonel's commission, and on the same day
enlisted eight hundred men. He fought bravely on Bunker Hill, his
regiment forming a portion of the left of the American line, and its
only defense being a rail inclosure covered with hay. He went to Canada
in the Spring of 1776, and in the attack at Trenton commanded the van of
the right wing. He was also in the battle of Princeton In March, 1777,
he resigned his commission, and retired to his farm. He commanded the
New Hampshire militia at the battle of Bennington, in August, 1777, and
in September enlisted a new and larger force, and joined the Continental
army, under Gates, with the rank of major general. He served in Rhode
Island in 1778 and 1779, and in New Jersey in 1780. In 1781 he had the
command of the Northern Department at Saratoga. At the close of the war
he left all public employments. In 1818 Congress voted him a pension of
sixty dollars a month. He died on the 8th of May, 1822, in the ninety-
third year of his age. He was buried on a small hill near the Merrimac,
at Manchester, and over his remains is a granite obelisk, inscribed with
the words Major General Stark. A costly monument is now in
contemplation.

Preparations for Battle.--Disposition of the Enemy's Troops.--English
Plans of Battles.--Errors, and Difficulties in Correction.

395of him. Stark immediately disposed his army for battle, and Baume and
his men, halting advantageously upon high ground near a bend in the
Walloomscoick River, began to intrench themselves. Perceiving this,
Stark fell back about a mile, to wait for re-enforcements and arrange a
plan of attack. Baume, in the mean time, alarmed at the strength of the
Americans, sent an express to Burgoyne for aid.

Colonel Breyman was immediately dispatched with about five hundred men,
but he did not arrive in time to render essential service.

The 15th was rainy, and both parties employed the time in preparing for
battle. The Hessians and a corps of Rangers were strongly intrenched
upon the high ground north of the Walloomscoick, and a party of Rangers
and German grenadiers were posted at a ford (now the bridge near Mr.
Barnet's), where the road to Bennington crossed the stream. Some
Canadians, and Peters's corps of Tories, were posted on the south side
of the river, near the ford. At the foot of the declivity, on the east,
near the mouth of a small creek, some chasseurs were posted, and about a
mile distant from the main intrenchments on the height, on the south
side of the river, Peters's American volunteers, or Tories, east up a
breast-work. On the same side, upon the Bennington Road, Stark and the
main body of his army were encamped. The Walloomscoick, though called a
river, is a small stream, August, 1777.

* Note.--The map here given is a copy, reduced, of one drawn by
Lieutenant Durnford, and published in Burgoyne's "State of the
Expedition" * &c. The Walloomscoick is there erroneously called Hosack
(meaning Hoosick), that river being nearly three miles distant from the
plaee of the Hessian intrenchments. I would here remark that we are
obliged to rely almost solely upon British authorities for plans of our
Revolutionary battles. They are, in general, correct, so far as relates
to the disposition and movement of British troops, but are full of
errors respecting the movements of the Americans, and also concerning
the topography of the country, with which they were necessarily little
acquainted. It is too late now to correct many of these errors, for the
living witnesses have departed, and the hearsay evidence of a younger
generation is not sufficiently certain to justify any important
corrections in the published plans of the battles. I have, therefore,
copied such maps as seemed most trustworthy, and endeavored, by slight
alterations, and by descriptions in the text, to make them as correct as
possible, as guides to a full understanding of the military operations
of the time. In this particular, as well as in local traditions, great
caution is necessary in receiving testimony; and, where the subject has
historical importance, I have uniformly rejected traditions, unless
supported by other and concurrent authority, or the strongest
probability.

* The group upon this map, composed of a drum without a head, a musket,
sword, and grenadier's cap, is a representation of those objects thus
arranged and hanging over the door of the Massachusetts Senate Chamber
at Boston. They are trophies of the Bennington battle, and were
presented by General Stark to the Commonwealth of Massachusetts. The
grenadier's cap is made of a coarse fabric resembling flannel, dyed red,
and on the front is a large figured brass plate. The drum is brass; the
sword has an enormous brass guard and hilt; and the bayonet attached to
the musket is blunted and bent.

Skirmishing in the Rain.--The Hessian Encampment.--A bellicose
Clergyman.--Stark's Promise and Fulfillment

396every where fordable when the water is of ordinary depth. Lying in
the midst of high hills, its volume is often suddenly increased by
rains.

Notwithstanding the rain fell copiously on the 15th, there was some
skirmishing. The Americans, in small parties, fell upon detachments of
the enemy; and so annoying did this mode of warfare become, that the
Indians began to desert Colonel Baume, "because," as they told him, "the
woods were filled with Yankees." The Hessians continued their works upon
the hill. By night they were strongly intrenched, and had mounted two
pieces of ordnance which they brought with them.

During the night of the 15th, Colonel Symonds, with a body of Berkshire
militia, arrived. Among them was the Rev. Mr. Allen, of Pittsfield,
whose bellicose ardor was of the most glowing kind. Before daylight, and
while the rain was yet falling, the impatient shepherd, who had many of
his flock with him, went to Stark, and said, "General, the people of
Berkshire have often been summoned to the field without being allowed to
fight, and, if you do not now give them a chance, they have resolved
never to turn out again."

"Well," said Stark, "do you wish to march now, while it is dark and
raining?"

"No, not just this moment," replied the minister of peace. "Then," said
the general, "if the Lord shall once more give us sunshine, and I do not
give you fighting enough, I'll never ask you to come out again."
Sunshine did indeed come with the morrow, for at the opening of the dawn
the clouds broke away, and soon all Nature lay smiling in the warm
sunlight of a clear August morning; and "fighting enough" was also given
the parson and his men, for it was a day of fierce conflict.

August 16, 1777 Early in the morning the troops of both parties prepared
for action. Stark had arranged a plan of attack, and, after carefully
reconnoitering the enemy at the dis-

* This view is from the hill on the southwest bank of the Walloomscoick,
a little west of the road from the bridge to Starkville, looking
northeast. The road over this hill existed at the time of the battle,
and is laid down on the map, page 395. The river, which here makes a
sudden bend, is seen at two points--near the cattle, and at the bridge,
in the distance, on the right. The house on the left, near the bridge,
is Mr. Barnet's, and the road that crosses the center of the picture
from right to left is the road from Bennington to Van Schaick's or North
Hoosick. It passes along the river flat, at the foot of the hills where
the battle occurred. The highest point on the distant hills, covered
with woods, is the place where the Hessians were intrenched. From that
point, along the hills to the left, for about two miles, the conflict
was carried on; and upon the slopes, now cultivated, musket-balls and
other relics of the battle have been plowed up.

Commencement of the Battle of Bennington.--Terror and Flight of the
Indians.--Victory for the Americans.--Second Battle

397tance of a mile, proceeded to act upon it. Colonel Nichols, with two
hundred men, was detached up the little creek that empties into the
Walloomscoick above the bridge, to attack the enemy's left in the rear,
and Colonel Herrick was sent with three hundred to fall upon the rear of
their right, with orders to form a junction with Nichols before making a
general assault. Colonels Hubbard and Sticknoy were ordered to march
down the Walloomscoick with two hundred men, to the right of the enemy,
and with one hundred men in front, near Peters's intrenched corps, in
order to divert Baume's attention to that point. Thus arranged, the
action commenced at three o'clock in the afternoon, on the rear of the
enemy's left, by Colonel Nichols, who marched up from the deep-wooded
valley, and fell furiously upon the Hessian intrenchments. At the same
moment the other portions of the American army advanced to the attack.
As soon as the first volley from Nichols's detachment was heard, Stark,
who remained with the main body at his camp, sprang to his saddle and
gave the word "Forward!" They pressed onward to the hill above the Tory
intrenchments, and there the whole field 'of action was open to their
view. The heights were wreathed in the smoke of the cannon and musketry,
and along the slopes and upon the plains the enemy was forming into
battle order. * The Americans rushed down upon the Tories, drove them
across the stream, and, following after them, the whole of both armies
was soon engaged in the fight. "It lasted," says Stark, in his official
account, "two hours, and was the hottest I ever saw. It was like one
continued clap of thunder." The Tories, who were driven across the
river, were thrown in confusion on the Hessians, who were forced from
their breast-works on the heights. The Indians, alarmed at the prospect
of being surrounded, fled at the commencement of the action, between the
corps of Nichols and Herrick, with horrid yells and the jingling of cow-
bells, and the weight of the conflict finally fell upon the brave corps
of Reidesel's dragoons, led by Colonel Baume in person. They kept their
column unbroken, and, when their ammunition was exhausted, were led to
the charge with the sword. But they were finally overpowered, and gave
way, leaving their artillery and baggage on the field. The Americans,
like the dragoons, displayed the most indomitable courage. With their
brown firelocks, scarce a bayonet, little discipline, and not a single
piece of cannon, they ventured to attack five hundred well-trained
regulars, furnished with the best and most complete arms and
accouterments, having two pieces of artillery, advantageously posted,
and accompanied by one hundred Indians. The mingled incentives of a
defense of homes and promises of plunder ** made the American militia
fight with the bravery of disciplined veterans.

As soon as the field was won, the Americans dispersed to collect
plunder. This nearly proved fatal to them, for at that moment Colonel
Breyman arrived with his re-enforcements for Baume. They had approached
within two miles before Stark was apprised of their proximity. The heavy
rain on the preceding day had kept them back, and, although their march
had been accelerated on hearing the noise of the battle just ended, they
could not reach the field in time to join in the action. They met the
flying party of Baume, which made a rally, and the whole body pushed
forward toward the abandoned intrenchments on the heights. Stark
endeavored to rally his militia, but they were too much scattered to be
well arranged for battle, and the fortunes of the day were, for a
moment, in suspense. Happily the corps of Colonel Warner, which was left
at Bennington in the morning, arrived at this juncture, fresh and well
armed, and fell vigorously upon the enemy. Stark, with what men he had
been able to collect, pushed forward to his assistance. The battle
continued with obstinacy until sunset. It was a sort of running
conflict, partly on the plains and partly on the hills, from the heights
to Van Schaick's, where the enemy made his last stand, and then fled
toward the Hoosick. The Americans pursued them until dark, and Stark was
then obliged

* It was at this moment that Stark made the laconic speech to his men,
which popular tradition has preserved: "See there, men! there are the
red-coats. Before night they are ours, or Molly Stark will be a widow!"
This speech, it is said, brought forth a tremendous shout of applause
from the eager troops, which greatly alarmed the Loyalists in their
works below.

** General Stark, in his orders in the morning, promised his soldiers
all the plunder that should be taken in the enemy's camp.--Gordon, ii.,
244.

Pursuit of the Enemy.--Loss in the Battle.--Stark's Popularity.--Visit
to the Battle-ground.--Anecdotes

398to draw off his men to prevent them from firing upon each other in
the gloom of evening. Seven hundred of the enemy were made prisoners,
among whom was Colonel Baume. He was wounded, and died soon afterward.
"Another hour of daylight," said Stark, in his official report, "and I
would have captured the whole body." Besides the prisoners, four pieces
of brass cannon, two hundred and fifty dragoon swords, several hundred
stand of arms, eight brass drums, and four ammunition wagons were
secured. Two hundred and seven of the enemy were killed. The loss of the
Americans was about one hundred killed, and as many wounded. General
Stark had a horse killed under him, but was not injured, himself. The
total loss of the enemy in killed, wounded, and prisoners was nine
hundred and thirty-four, including one hundred and fifty-seven Tories. *

This victory was hailed with great joy throughout the land. It was
another evidence of the spirit and courage of the American militia when
led to the field by a good commander. ** It also crippled the strong arm
of Burgoyne, and revived the spirits of the American army at Cohoes and
Stillwater. The loud commendatory voice of the people forced Congress to
overlook the insubordination of General Stark, which seemed so "highly
prejudicial to the common cause," and on the 4th of October resolved,
"That the thanks of Congress be 1777.... presented to General Stark, of
the New Hampshire militia, and the officers and troops under his
command, for their brave and successful attack upon, and signal victory
over, the enemy in their lines at Bennington; and that Brigadier Stark
be appointed a brigadier general in the army of the United States." ***

When I visited the Bennington battle-ground, every ancient resident in
the vicinity, who had been familiar with the locality, had departed, and
I was unable to find a person who could point out the exact place of the
German intrenchments. A _vendue_, a few miles distant, had attracted the
men from home; but, through the general familiarity with the scenes of
Mr. Richmond, of Hoosick Four Corners, who accompanied me, and aided by
the map of Lieutenant Durnford, which I had with me, the points of
interest were easily recognized.

Ascending the rough hills northeast of Mr. Barnet's, we soon found, upon
the highest knoll on the crown of the timbered heights, traces of the
German intrenchments. Portions of the banks and ditches are quite
prominent, and for several rods on all sides the timber is young, the
spot having been cleared by the enemy. Descending the gentle slope
northward, we emerged into cleared fields, whence we had a fine view of
the valleys of the White Creek on the north and of the Walloomscoick
**** on the east. Here was the place where Colonel Nichols made his
first attack upon the rear of the enemy's left. The view of the
Walloomscoick Valley was one of the finest I ever beheld. From our point
of vision it stretched away to the eastward, its extremity bounded by
the lofty Green Mountains, about nine miles dis-

* Gordon, Ramsay, Thacher, Marshall, Allen, Burgoyne's Defense, Stedman,
Everett's Life of Stark.

** There are several anecdotes related in connection with this battle,
whieh exhibit the spirit of the people and the soldiers. Thacher says
that an old man had five sons in the battle. On being told that one of
them was unfortunate, he exclaimed, "What, has he misbehaved? Did he
desert his post or shrink from the charge?" "Worse than that," replied
his informant. "He was slain, but he was fighting nobly." "Then I am
satisfied," replied the old man; "bring him to me." After the battle the
body of his son was brought to him. The aged father wiped the blood from
the wound, and said, while a tear glistened in his eyes, "This is the
happiest day of my life, to know that my five sons fought nobly for
freedom, though one has fallen in the conflict." This was an exhibition
of old Spartan patriotism.

** When Warner's regiment came into the field, Stark rode up and ordered
a captain to lead his men into action. "Where's the colonel [Warner]? I
want to see him first," he coolly replied. The colonel was sent for, and
the captain, in a nasal tone, said, "Well, colonel, what d'ye want I
should do?" "Drive those red-coats from the hill yonder," replied
Warner. "Well, it shall be done," said the captain, and in an instant
himself and men were on the run for the thickest of the battle.

*** Journal of Congress, iii., 327. In passing the last clause of the
resolution, the yeas and nays were required and taken. There was but one
dissenting voice, Mr. Chase, of Maryland. The delegates from Virginia
did not vote.

**** This, is said to be a Dutch word, signifying Walloom's Patent. It
is variously spelled. On Durnford's map it is Watmscock. On Tryon's map
of the state of New York, 1779, it is Wallamschock; and others spell it-
Wallamsac, Wolmseee, and Walmsook. The orthography which I have adopted
is that which the New York records exhibit, and is doubtless correct.

View of the Wahoomscoick Valley.--Incident while Sketching.--
Insurrection in that Vicinity.--Its Suppression--

399tant, which formed a line of deeper blue than the sky, the tint
broken a little by gray cliffs and bald summits reflecting occasional
gleams of the evening sun. Through the rich intervales of the broad
basin, the winding Walloomscoick, traversed by the highway, glistened at
various points among the groves that shade its banks; and the whole
valley, dotted with farm-houses, presents one picture of peaceful
industry. On the right, seven miles distant, and nestled among the hills
near the Green Mountains, lies Bennington, the white spire of whose
church was seen above the intervening forests. From the heights we could
plainly discern a brick house in the valley, that belonged, during the
Revolution, to a Tory named Mathews. It is remarkable only for its
position, and the consequences which sometimes resulted therefrom. It
stands upon the line between New York and Vermont, and in it center the
corner points of four towns--Bennington, Shaftsbury, Hoosick, and White
Creek; also, those of the counties of Bennington, Washington, and
Rensselaer. The occupant had only to step from one room to another, to
avoid the operation of a legal process that might be issued against him
in any one of the counties or four towns.

Descending the heights, we crossed the bridge at the old ford, near
Barnet's, and went down the river, on its southern side, to Starkville.
From the hill a few rods south of the place where Peters's Tories were
intrenched (slight traces of the mounds were still visible) we had a
fine view of the whole battle-ground. I tarried long enough upon the
brow of the hill, near the river, to make the sketch on page 396. While
thus engaged, a low bellow, frequently repeated, attracted my attention,
and, seeming to approach nearer, induced me to reconnoiter. Toward the
foot of the hill a huge bull was pawing the earth, and making menacing
advances up the slope. He had mistaken my cloak, fluttering in the wind,
for a formal challenge to combat, and seemed about advancing to the
charge. Regarding an honorable retreat as a wiser measure than the risk
of a probable defeat, I gathered up my "implements of trade," and
retired to the fence, thinking all the way of the similarly-chased
negro's use of Henry Laurens's motto, "Millions for de fence." It was
sunset when we reached Van Schaiek's on our return, and I had barely
light sufficient to complete the drawing of the old mill on page 391,
for heavy clouds were gathering. The twilight was brief, and darkness
was upon us when we arrived at Hoosiek Four Corners.

There was an insurrectionary movement among the militia in this vicinity
in 1781. Situated above the north line of Massachusetts, the country was
within the claimed jurisdiction of the New Hampshire Grants. The
animosities between the state government of New York and the people of
the Grants, which the active Revolutionary operations in that quarter
had, for a time, quieted, now that those operations had ceased, were
renewed in all their former vigor. So warm became the controversy, that,
on the 1st of December, an insurrection broke out in the regiments of
Colonels John and Henry K. Van Rensselaer. The 1781 regiment of Colonel
Peter Yates also became disaffected, and, indeed, a large portion of the
militia between the Batten Kill and the Hoosiek seemed disposed to take
sides with the lawless people of the Grants, who disregarded the urgent
demands of patriotism at that juncture. These disturbances arose in
"Scaghticoke, St. Coych, * and parts adjacent." The insurgent regiments
belonged to General Gansevoort's brigade. He heard of the defection on
the 5th, and immediately directed Colonels Yates, Van Vechten, and Henry
K. Van Rensselaer, whose regiments were the least tainted, to collect
such troops as they could, and march to St. Coych, to quell the
insurrection. An express was sent to Governor Clinton, at Poughkeepsie,
who readily perceived that the movement had its origin among the people
of the Grants. With his usual promptness, he ordered the brigade of
General Robert Van Rensselaer to the assistance of Gansevoort, and gave
the latter all necessary latitude in raising troops for the exigency.
Gansevoort repaired to Saratoga, and solicited troops and a field piece
from General Stark, who was stationed there. The latter declined
compliance, on the plea that his troops were too poorly clad to leave
their quarters at that season, and also that he thought it im-

* This place was Van Schaick's Mill, now North Hoosiek. The name was
variously written by the early historians--St. Coych, Sancoix,
Saintcoix. &c.

Stark and Governor Chittenden.--End of the Insurrection.--Ride to Troy.-
-The Housatonic Valley.--Danbury

400proper to interfere without an order from General Heath, his
superior. Governor Chittenden, of the Grants, had just addressed a
letter to Stark, requesting him not to interfere; and, as his sympathies
were with the Vermonters, that was doubtless the true cause of his
withholding aid from Gansevoort. The latter, with what volunteers he
could raise, pushed on to St. Coych, where he discovered a motley force
of about five hundred men, advancing to sustain the insurgent militia.
Having only eighty men with him, Gansevoort retired about five miles,
and attempted to open a correspondence with the leaders of the
rebellion. He 1782 was unsuccessful, and the rebels remained
undisturbed. Early in January following, Washington wrote a calm and
powerful letter to Governor Chittenden, which had great effect in
quelling disturbances there, and no serious consequences grew out of the
movement. September, 1848 I left Hoosick at nine on the morning of the
28th, on the Bennington mail-coach, for Troy. It was full inside, and
the driver was flanked by a couple of passengers. The only vacant seat
was one covered by a sheep-skin, upon the coach-roof--a delightful place
on a pleasant morning, but now the lowering clouds betokened a storm. It
was "Hobson's choice," however, and, mounting the perch, I had a fine
view of a portion of the Hoosick Valley. The high hills that border it
are cultivated to their summits, and on every side large flocks of
Saxony sheep were grazing. * As we moved slowly up the ravine, the
clouds broke, the wind changed, and, when we reached the high rolling
table-land west of the valley, a bleak nor'wester came sweeping over the
hills from the distant peaks of the Adirondack and other lofty ranges
near the sources of the Hudson. Detained on the road by the cracking of
an axle, it was nearly sunset when we reached Troy. I had intended to
start for Connecticut that evening, but, as the cars had left, I rode to
Albany, and departed in the early morning train for the Housatonic
Valley and Danbury.

The country from Albany to the State. Line, ** where the Housatonic and
Western Rail-roads unite, is quite broken, but generally fertile.
Sweeping down the valley at the rate of twenty miles an hour, stopping
for a few minutes only to take in wood and water, the traveler has very
little opportunity to estimate the character of the region through which
he is passing. The picture in my memory represents a narrow, tortuous
valley, sometimes dwindling to a rocky ravine a few rods wide, and then
expanding into cultivated flats half a mile in breadth, with a rapid
stream, broken into riffs and small cascades, running parallel with our
course, and the whole surrounded on all sides by lofty hills, densely
wooded with maples, oaks, hickories, and chestnuts. At New Milford the
narrow valley spreads out into a broad and beautiful plain, whereon the
charming village stands. Thence to Hawleyville the country is again very
broken, but more generally redeemed from barrenness by cultivation.

At Hawleyville I left the rail-road, and took the mail-coach for
Danbury, seven and a half miles westward, where we arrived at two
o'clock. This village, one of the oldest in the state, is pleasantly
situated upon a plain on the banks of a small stream, about twenty miles
north from Long Island Sound. Its Indian name was _Pahquioque_, and the
first eight families that settled there, in 1685, purchased the land
from the aboriginal proprietors. *** There is nothing remarkable in its
early history, aside from the struggles, privations, and alarms incident
to a new Christian settlement in the midst of pagans. In truth, it seems
to have enjoyed more than ordinary prosperity and repose through the
colonial period, but a terrible blight fell upon it during our war for
independence.

* Wool is the staple production of this region. The first flock of
Saxony sheep in Hoosick was introduced by a German named H. De Grove,
about 1820. The price at which these sheep were then held was enormous.
some bucks having been sold as high as five hundred dollars. But the
great losses incurred in speculations in merino sheep, a few years
previous, made people cautious, and the Saxony sheep soon commanded only
their fair value. In 1845 the number of sheep of this fine breed in the
town of Hoosick was fifty-six thousand.

** The State Line station is upon the boundary between New York and
Massachusetts, thirty-eight miles from Albany and eleven from
Pittsfield.

*** Their names were Taylor, Bushnell, Barnum, Hoyt, two Benedicts,
Beebe, and Gregory. They were all from Norwalk, on the Sound, exeept
Beebe, who came from Stratford--See Robbins's Century Sermon, 1801.

Tyron's Expedition to Danbury.--Trumbull's "M'Fingal."--Life of the
Author.

401

CHAPTER XVIII.

"When Yankees, skill'd in martial rule,

First put the British troops to school;

Instructed them in warlike trade,

And new maneuvers of parade;

The true war-dance of Yankee reels,

And manual exercise of heels;

Made them give up, like saints complete,

The arm of flesh and trust the feet,

And work, like Christians undissembling,

Salvation out with fear and trembling."

Trumbull. *

HE expedition to Danbury, in the spring of 1777, conducted by Governor
Tryon, of New York, in person, was, in its inception, progress, and
result, disgraceful to the British character, no less on account of the
barbarity and savageism displayed than of the arrant cowardice that
marked all the movements of the marauders. Sir William Howe did well for
his own character, in disclaiming any approval of the acts of Tryon on
that occasion, and in endeavoring to excuse the leader of the expedition
by pleading the apparent necessity of such harsh measures. Every
generous American should be ready to accord all the honor, skill,
bravery, and humanity which often belonged to British officers during
the war, for some of them, despite the relation which they held to our
people struggling for freedom, demand our admiration and regard. But
these very officers, guided by a false philosophy, and the instructions
of ministers grossly ignorant of the temper and character of the
colonists, planned and executed measures which every true Briton then
condemned, and which every true Briton now abhors. The destruction of
Danbury, and, two years later, of Norwalk and

* This is quoted from a political poem in three cantos, by John
Trumbull, LL.D., called "M'Fingal," which gained for the author much
celebrity in America and Europe. The first part of the poem was written
in 1775, and published in Philadelphia, where the Continental Congress
was then in session. Numerous editions appeared, and it was republished
in England. It was not finished until 1782, when the whole was printed
at Hartford, in three cantos. It is in the Hudibrastic strain, "and,"
says Griswold, "is much the best imitation of the great satire of Butler
that has been written." The author was born in Waterbury, Connecticut,
in 1750. So extraordinary was the development of his intellect, that he
received lessons in Greek and Latin before he was six years old, and was
pronounced fit to enter Yale College at the age of seven. He entered
college at thirteen, and went successfully through the whole course of
studies. In 1771 he and Timothy Dwight were elected tutors in Yale, and
in 1773 he was admitted to the practice of the law. He went to Boston,
entered the office of John Adams, and there, in the focus of
Revolutionary politics, his republican principles had full play. He
commenced the practice of law in New Haven toward the close of 1774, and
there he wrote his "M'Fingal." He had already acquired considerable
celebrity as a poet. He removed to Hartford in 1782. Joel Barlow,
Colonel David Humphries, and Timothy Dwight were among his most intimate
literary friends. He was one of the "four bards with Scripture names"
whom a London satirist noticed, in some verses commencing,

"David and Jonathan, Joel and Timothy,

Over the water set up the hymn of the," &c.

* In 1800 Trumbull was elected a member of the Legislature, and, the
year following, a Judge of the Superior Court. He was Judge of the
Supreme Court of Errors from 1808 to 1819. His poems were collected and
published in 1820, and in 1825 he removed to Detroit, where he died in
1831, in the 81st year of his age.

Landing of the British at Compo.--Object of the Expedition.--Rising of
the Militia.--Character of the People

402Fairfield; the massacre of Baylor's corps at Tappan and Wayne's
detachment at Paoli, are among the records which Britons would gladly
blot out. Aside from the cold-blooded murder and incendiarism involved,
there was cowardice displayed of the most abject kind. In each case,
when their work of destruction was effected, the troops displayed the

"Manual exercise of heels"

when fleeing back to their respective camps.

On Friday, the 25th of April, 1777, twenty-six sail of British vessels
appeared off Norwalk Islands, standing in for Cedar Point. It was a
mild, sunny afternoon. The inhabitants of Norwalk and Fairfield, aware
of their approach, took measures for the defense of their respective
towns. But both villages were, at that time, spared. A little before
sunset about two thousand well-armed troops landed upon the long beach
at the foot of the beautiful hill of Compo, on the eastern side of the
Saugatuck River, and near its mouth. They were commanded by Governor
William Tryon, assisted by Generals Agnew and Sir William Erskine. The
expedition had been fitted out by Sir William Howe at New York, its
ostensible object being the destruction of American military stores at
Danbury. The force marched about seven miles into the country that
evening, where they rested until toward daylight. Clouds had gathered
during the night, and rain began to fall. Resuming their march, they
reached Reading, eight miles southeast of Danbury, at eight in the
morning, where they halted and breakfasted.

General Silliman, who was attached to the Connecticut militia, was at
his residence at Fairfield when the enemy landed. He immediately sent
out expresses to alarm the country and collect the militia. The call was
responded to, ** and early the next morning he started in pursuit. He
reached Reading about noon, where his force amounted to five hundred
men. He was there joined by Generals Wooster and Arnold, with a small
number of militia. These officers, who were at New Haven, on hearing of
the invasion, started immediately to the aid of Silliman. The Americans
continued the pursuit as far as Bethel, within four miles of Danbury.
They did not reach Bethel until eleven o'clock at night, owing to a
heavy rain. There they determined to halt and postpone their attack upon
the enemy until he should attempt to return to his shipping.

April 26, 1777 The British, piloted by two young men of Danbury--Stephen
Jarvis and Eli Benedict--reached the village between one and two o'clock
in the afternoon. They

* This view is from the top of a high hill northeast of the dwelling of
Mr. Ebenezer Smith, near Norwalk. Its long sand-bar is seen stretching
into the Sound on the right, and over the lowest extremity of the point
the shade trees of Fairfield are visible. The water on the left is the
mouth of the Saugatuck River, and that in the distance, on the right, is
Long Island Sound.

** The people of this region were extremely patriotic, and never
hesitated a moment when their country called. Before actual hostilities
commenced (March, 1775), a company of one hundred men was enlisted in
Danbury, for the colonial service, and joined a regiment of Connecticut
troops, under Colonel Waterbury They were engaged in active service
until Montgomery reached Montreal, in December, when they returned home
without the loss of a single man. The last survivor, David Weed, died in
Danbury, June 13th, 1842, aged ninety-four years. When this little band
of one hundred men left for Lake Champlain, their friends regarded them
as lost. When they all returned, many of those very friends were in
their graves, swept away by a prevalent dysentery.

Enemy's March to Danbury.--Entrance into the Village.--Anecdotes of
Holcomb and Hamilton.--Officers' Head quarters

403proceeded through Weston, by Reading Church, over Hoyt's Hill and
through Bethel and so expeditious was their march, that the people of
Danbury were not warned of their approach until they were within eight
miles of the town. Then all was confusion and alarm Although the chief
object of the invaders--the capture or destruction of the military
stores--was understood, the Revolutionary party felt a presentiment that
the expedition was fraught with cruelty and woes.

Some fled, with the women and children and a few movable effects, to the
woods and adjacent towns, while others remained to watch and guard the
sick and aged who could not depart. There was a small militia force of
only one hundred and fifty in the town, under the Colonels Cook and
Dimon, when the enemy approached ** --too few to attempt resistance.
When Try-on entered the village at the south end, Dimon and his troops,
who were mostly without arms, retired across the Still River at the
north, and, making a circuitous march under cover of night, joined the
Americans at Bethel. ***

Tryon established his head-quarters at the house of a Loyalist named
Dibble, at the south end of the village, and near the public stores.

Generals Agnew and Erskine made their head-quarters in a house near the
bridge, at the upper end of the main street, now owned by Mr. Knapp. All
the other houses in the village were filled with British troops at
night.

As soon as the enemy entered the town they began to insult and abuse the
people, but com-

* At this place the enemy was brought to a halt by a single resolute
American named Luther Holcomb. Wishing to give the people of Danbury as
much time as possible to escape, or prepare for resistance, he rode to
the brow of a hill over which the invaders were about to march, and,
waving his hat, and turning, as if to address an army behind him,
exclaimed, "Halt the whole universe! break off into kingdoms!" It was a
mighty host whose obedience he evoked. Tryon was alarmed. He caused his
army to halt, and, arranging his cannon so as to bear upon the supposed
opponents, sent out flanking parties to reconnoiter. Finding himself in
danger of being surrounded, Holcomb put spurs to his horse and retreated
to Danbury.

** Hearing of the approach of the enemy, Colonel Cook sent to General
Silliman for arms and ammunition. The messenger was Lambert Lockwood,
who, coming suddenly upon the British troops near Reading Church, was
made a prisoner. Tryon recognized him as a young man who had given him
aid when his carriage broke down while passing through Norwalk. On that
account he took Lockwood under his protection, but, in his hasty retreat
from Danbury, left him to take care of himself. Tryon was writing a
protection for him when he was informed that the Americans were coming.
The governor dropped his pen and seized his sword, and the protection
remained unwritten.

*** When the British approached, a citizen named Hamilton resolved to
save a piece of cloth which was at a clothier's at the lower end of the
village. He had just mounted his horse with the cloth, and fastened one
end to the saddle, when the British advanced guard appeared. Three light
horsemen started in pursuit of Hamilton, whose horse was less fleet than
theirs. Drawing near to him, one of the troopers exclaimed, "Stop, old
daddy, stop! We'll have you." "Not yet," said Hamilton, and at that
moment his roll of cloth unfurled, and, fluttering like a streamer
behind him, so frightened the troopers' horses that the old man got
several rods the start. The chase continued through the town to the
bridge at the upper end. Several times the troopers would attempt to
strike, but the cloth was always in the way. The pursuit was finally
abandoned, and the old man escaped.

**** This house is on the south bank of Still River, at the north end of
the main street. It was built by Benjamin Knapp, in 1770, and was owned
by him at the time of the invasion. His birth-place is also standing, on
the north side of the river. They were among the few houses not burned.
At the bridge seen on the right the British planted a cannon, and kept a
strong guard there until their departure. This house is now (1848) owned
by Noah Knapp.

Imprudence of some Citizens.--Retaliation of the British.--Destruction
of Stores and of the Village

1848. 404mitted no great excesses. Had the inhabitants who remained kept
quiet, the town might have been saved from conflagration; but four men,
* whose feelings were wrought to the highest pitch by the free use of
liquor, madly placed themselves in a large and valuable dwelling near
the court-house, belonging to Major Starr, and, as the van of the
British army approached, fired upon them several times from the windows,
without effect. The exasperated troops rushed into the house, seized the
men, thrust them into the cellar, and burned the building over their
heads. The unhappy men perished in the flames, victims of most egregious
folly.

The public stores were now attacked. The Episcopal Church was filled
with barrels ot pork and flour as high as the galleries, and two other
buildings were also filled with provisions. One of them, the barn of Mr.
Dibble, is still standing, on the southwest side of Main Street, at the
lower end of the town. The American commissioners made use of it without
his consent. Being a Tory, his barn was spared, and all the stores in it
were saved. Those in the church were taken into the street and
destroyed. The liquors were freely used by the soldiery, and they passed
the night in drinking and carousing.

As yet, the torch had not been applied. The sky was cloudy and the night
was intensely dark. Having marched a greater portion of the preceding
night, the troops were much exhausted by fatigue and want of sleep.
Those who remained awake were intoxicated, except a few sentinels. The
force of two thousand men that landed at Compo was reduced, in reality,
to three hundred; and could the American generals at Bethel have known
the exact state of things in the hostile camp, they might have
annihilated the invaders. Tryon was on the alert, and slept but little.
He was apprised by a Tory scout of the gathering of the militia at
Bethel. Knowing the present weakness of his army, he resolved on flight,
and accordApril 27, 1777 ingly, before daylight on Sunday morning, his
troops were put in marching order.

Fire-brands were applied to every house in the village, except those
belonging to Tories. These had been marked with a conspicuous cross the
previous evening. At the dawn of day the enemy marched toward Ridgeway,
while for miles around the country was illumined by the burning village.
**

"Through solid curls of smoke the bursting fires

Climb in tall pyramids above the spires,

Concentering all the winds, whose forces, driven

With equal rage from every point of heaven,

Wheel into conflict, round the scantling pour

The twisting flames, and through the rafters roar;

Suck up the cinders, send them sailing far,

To warn the nations of the raging war."

Joel Barlow. ***

* Joshua Porter, Eleazer Starr, Adams, and a negro.

** Robbins's Century Sermon.

*** This is quoted from the Columbiad, a long epic--the American
Revolution its theme. The author was one of the poets of the Revolution
whose writings have outlived them. Dwight, Trumbull, Humphries, Hopkins,
and a few other men of literary reputation in Connecticut, were his
friends and associates. He was a native of Reading, Connecticut, where
he was born in 1755. He was the youngest in a family of ten. He
graduated at Yale College in 1778. He recited an original poem on taking
his bachelor's degree, but it possesses little merit. Four of his
brothers were in the Continental army, and during his collegiate
vacation he went to the field as chaplain. He was in the battle at White
Plains, and displayed good courage in several minor engagements. He
married the sister of the Hon. Abraham Baldwin, of New Haven, and in
1783 removed to Westford, where he commenced the publication of the
"Mercury." He was admitted to the bar in 1785, and the same year, at the
request of several Congregational ministers, pre pared and published an
enlarged and improved edition of Watts's version of the Psalms, and
added to them a collection of hymns, several of them his own. His
"Vision of Columbus" was published in 1787. It was dedicated to the
unfortunate Louis XVI. In London and Paris it was reprinted, and
received considerable applause. He was engaged, with the literary
friends just named, in publishing a satirical poem called he Anarchiad,
which had considerable influence. Privileged Orders," and, the following
year, The Conspiracy of the Kings. He had some correspondence with the
French National Assembly, and, on going to Paris, was honored by the
gift of citizenship, and made France his home. His time was devoted
chiefly to commercial pursuits, by which he amassed a fortune. He
traveled some on the Continent, and in Piedmont wrote a poem called
"Hasty Pudding," the most popular of his writings. Returning to Par is
in 1795, he was appointed by Washington consul at Algiers, with power to
negotiate a treaty of commerce with the dey, and with Tunis and Tripoli.
After an absence of seventeen years, he returned to the United States,
and built a splendid mansion on the bank of the Potomac. In 1791 he
published in London his "Advice to the Washington, known afterward as
"Kalorama." The Colitabiad, the original Vision of Columbus greatly
altered, was published in 1808, in a splendid quarto, richly
illustrated. Its merits have been variously estimated, some regarding it
as a fit companion of the Iliad, Aeneid, and Paradise Lost, and others
allowing it only a small share of merit. Mr. Barlow had prepared to
write a history of the United States, in 1811, when the design was
frustrated by his being appointed minister plenipotentiary to the French
government. In the autumn of 1812 he was invited by the Duke of Bassano
to a conference with Napoleon at Wilna, in Poland. He traveled
thitherward without halting to rest. The fatigue and exposure brought on
an inflammation of the lungs, which caused his death, at an obscure
village near Cracow named Zarnowica, on the 2d of December, in the
fifty-fourth year of his age. He has been charged with abjuration of
Christianity, but the accusation rests solely upon inferences. In
private life he was pure and greatly beloved, and his public career was
without spot or blemish.--Allen's Biographical Dictionary; Grisivold's
American Poets.

Estimated Damage.--Revolutionary Men.--Levi Osborn.--Joel Barlow.--The
Sandemanians.

405Nineteen dwellings, the meeting-house of the New Danbury Society, and
twenty-two stores and barns, with all their contents, were consumed. The
exact amount of military stores that were destroyed is not known, but,
from the best information that could be obtained, there were about three
thousand barrels of pork, more than one thousand barrels of flour, four
hundred barrels of beef, one thousand six hundred tents, and two
thousand bushels of grain, besides many other articles, such as rum,
wine, rice, army carriages, &c. A committee appointed to appraise the
private losses estimated the whole amount at nearly eighty thousand
dollars.

On inquiring for men of the Revolution in Danbury, I was referred to
three, all of whom 1 had the pleasure of seeing. I first called upon the
venerable Levi Osborn, in September, eighty-six years of age. He resided
in Danbury when the village was burned, 1818 and remained, amid the
jeers of Tories and the insults of the invaders, to protect an aged and
sick parent. He is a leader of the sect of Sandemanians, of the division
known as "Os-bornites." * His naturally strong mind was yielding to the
pressure of bodily infirmities, yet he still lives, an honored
representative of the men of 1776.

After sketching Knapp's house, printed on page 403, I walked down to the
old burial-ground, toward the lower part of the village, where the
remains of many of the men of the

* This small sect derives its name from its founder, Robert Sandcman, a
native of Perth, in Scotland. He came to America in 1764, and in Boston
and Danbury organized societies in accordance with his peculiar
religious notions. His doctrines were similar to those of Calvin, and
his distinguishing tenet was, that "faith was a mere intellectual
belief--a bare belief of the bare truth." Like other founders of sects,
he claimed to belong to the only true Church. His followers meet on the
Sabbath and Thursday afternoons of each week, and, seated around a large
circular table, each with a copy of the Scriptures, the men read and
comment on them as they are moved by desire. The females are silent. The
attending congregation not members are mere spectators, and the
worshipers seem not to notice their presence. They have prayer and
singing, after which they go to the house of one of the members, and
partake of a feast of love. Their morals are of the purest kind, and
their influence in society is exceedingly salutary. The two divisions
are known as the Baptist Sandemanians and the Osbornites. The former
practice baptism, the latter do not. Of late years none have joined
them, and death is reducing their number. There are a few in England.
Mr. Sandcman died at Danbury in 1771, aged fifty-three years. His grave
is marked by a handsome marble slab, bearing his name and an epitaph.

Obscurity of Wooster's Grave.--Resolves of Congress.--A centenarian
Loyalist--Treatment by his Neighbors

406Revolution rest, and among them those of the brave General Wooster,
who fell, as we shall presently observe, while gallantly opposing Tryon
and his marauders on their retreat from Danbury. Not even a rough stone
of the field marked his grave, _and no person could then identify it!_
The fact is a disgrace to the people, past and present, among whom he
fell in battle; and the government, whose representatives, with grateful
appreciation of his services, long ago voted money to erect a monument
to his memory, * is guilty of positive ingratitude in so long
withholding the paltry sum, while the long grass is weaving a web of
utter obscurity over his dust.

From the cemetery I strolled down the winding road along which Tryon
entered Danbury, and, returning, called to see the venerable Joseph
Dibble, then in his hundredth year.

He lives with a nephew, near the same as the first hue of light in the
east appeared. Time softened the asperities of feeling, and

* On the 17th of June, 1777, the Continental Congress adopted a
resolution, "That a monument be erected to the memory of General
Wooster, with the following inscription: 'In honor of David Wooster,
brigadier general in the army of the United States. In defending the
liberties of America, and bravely repelling an inroad of the British
forces to Danbury, in Connecticut, he received a mortal wound on the
27th day of April, 1777, and died on the 2d day of May following. The
Congress of the United States, as an acknowledgment of his merit and
services, have caused this monument to be erected.' "Resolved, That the
executive power of the state of Connecticut be requested to carry the
foregoing resolution into execution, and that five hundred dollars be
allowed for that purpose."--Journals of Congress, iii., 197.

* It has been erroneously asserted that the money was subsequently put
into the hands of General Wooster's son, and that it was squandered.
This is not true, as the Journals of Congress will show. A bill for the
purpose passed the House of Representatives in 1822, but, in consequence
of the numerous similar petitions that were presented after the passage
of the resolution by the Lower House, the Senate did not concur. Ezra
Foote, Esq., a citizen of Danbury, aged eighty-four years, informed me
that he could so nearly identify the grave of Wooster as to pronounce it
with certainty to be one of two graves, situated, as I ascertained by
measurement, twenty feet northeast of the grave of Sandeman. General
Wooster was not in the Continental service at the time of his death.
Conceiving himself neglected, he had resigned, and was appointed the
first major general of militia in his native state.--See note l, page
408.

Tory Guides.--Night Ride toward Ridgefleld.--Return to Danbury.--
Ridgefield.--Military Movements.

407for half a century he had lived among his old neighbors and their
descendants, a worthy and respected citizen. The two guides who piloted
the army to Danbury did not fare so well; they were obliged to flee.
After the war, Benedict returned to Danbury for the purpose of residing
there, but the people at once prepared to ride him out of the town upon
a rail, and he fled. Jarvis went to reside in Nova Scotia. Many years
afterward he returned privately to Danbury, to visit his relations. His
presence being known, some citizens prepared tar and feathers for him.
They surrounded his father's house, and demanded his person. His sister
concealed him in an ash-oven, where he lay until the search was over and
the party gone, when he left the town, and never returned.

Mr. Dibble was too nearly a wreck to give me any clear account of
Revolutionary matters in that vicinity, and it was with much difficulty
that he could be made to understand my object in wishing to sketch his
portrait and obtain his autograph. He was a bachelor, and assured me
seriously that he intended to remain one all the days of his life. He
lived almost three years longer, and died in the Summer of 1851.

I also called upon Ezra Foote, Esq., one of the patriarchs of the
village. Although eighty-four years of age, his erect figure, firm
voice, and clear, intelligent eye gave him the appearance of a man of
sixty. After half an hour's pleasant and profitable conversation with
him, on Revolutionary topics connected with the locality, I returned to
the hotel, and prepared to depart for Ridgefield, nine miles distant,
after supper. For two or three hours a strong southeast wind had been
piling the driving scud from the ocean in huge cumulous masses along the
northwestern horizon, and, when darkness came, it was intense. I had
hired a conveyance, and a young man to accompany me from Danbury to
Norwalk, by the way of Ridgefield, and, in the midst of the gloom and
the rain that began to fall, we left the village. For a little while the
beaten road was visible, but, when the light dust became wet with
showers, not a trace of the track could be seen. The young man became
alarmed, and urged me to turn back. I was too anxious to reach New Haven
by Sunday to be easily persuaded, and, borrowing a tin lantern from a
farmer whom he knew, we endeavored to grope our way. The perforations of
the lantern were "like angels' visits, few and far between," and the
light that stole through them was just enough to make "darkness
visible." After tilting half over by the road side once or twice, and
being assured by my companion that there was a "dreadful ugly place in
Sugar Hollow, a mile or two beyond," I consented to turn back, on
condition that he would be ready to start at peep of day. He promised,
and at nine in the evening we were again in Danbury. At dawn we started
for Ridgefield. The rain had ceased, and the clouds were dispersing. We
had a delightful ride over the broken, but fertile country, and before
ten o'clock I had visited the place where Wooster fell, and where Arnold
made his escape, and made sketches of the localities. Let us for a
moment follow the British on their departure from Danbury, and the
Americans in their opposing maneuvers.

Tryon, doubtless fearing that he might be cut off on his retreat
directly back to his shipping at Compo, marched toward Ridgeway, a
parish in the town of Ridgefield, and north of that village. This
movement was probably made to deceive the Americans into the belief that
he intended to return by land through West Chester, and then, by a
sudden turn, push for the shipping along the least guarded route. When
this movement was made known to the American generals, they divided
their forces into two parts. The largest division, consisting of about
four hundred men, under Silliman and Arnold, proceeded to take post in
front of the enemy, while Wooster, with the other division of two
hundred, was left to hang upon and annoy their rear.

After proceeding to Ridgeway, the enemy turned southward toward
Ridgefield, * their route from Danbury thus forming the two sides of a
scalene triangle, of which the present direct

* The tract of land called Ridgefield was named by the Indians
Candatowa, which signifies high ground On some of the hills near the
village Long Island and the Sound may be seen for a distance of forty
miles. Twenty-five of the inhabitants of Norwalk purchased the ground of
Catoonah, the chief sachem, in 1708, and the first settlement was made
the following year.

The British attacked by Wooster.--Return Fire.--Death of Wooster.--
Sketch of his Life.--Approach of Arnold.

April 27, 1777 road from village408 to village is the hypotenuse. This
change of direction was made known to Wooster about nine in the morning,
and, hastening forward, he came up to them when within a few miles of
Ridgefield. He attacked the rear-guard, and, after attack them on the
flank, and a little skirmishing, took forty prisoners.

Thus he harassed them, and kept them in partial check, until they
arrived within two miles of Ridgefield meeting-house, when another smart
skirmish ensued. The ground is very broken, and well adapted for such a
sort of guerrilla warfare as the American militia kept up. While the
enemy were hidden by a hill, near the present road from Ridgefield to
Salem, Wooster encouraged his undisciplined army to push forward and The
British made several discharges of artillery, which caused the American
column to break and give way. Wooster endeavored to rally them.,
exclaiming, "Come on, my boys! Never mind such random shots!" While thus
in the van, urging his troops, a musket-ball took him obliquely in the
side and broke his back-bone. He fell from his horse, and was removed
from the field to Danbury, at which place he died. *

General Arnold, informed of the change in the route of the enemy, made a
forced march across the country to Ridgefield village, where he arrived
at about eleven o'clock in the morning, with his force increased to
about five hundred men. Across the upper end of the main street he cast
up a barricade of carts, logs, stones, and earth, which was flanked on
the right by a house and barn, and on the left by a ledge of rocks.
Behind this barricade he formed his men in battle order, and awaited the
approach of the enemy. As soon as Tryon discovered Arnold, he ordered
General Agnew to advance with the main body in solid col-

* David Wooster was born in Stratford, Connecticut, on the 2d of March,
1710. He graduated at Yale College in 1738, and the following year, when
the Spanish war broke out, was made a lieutenant, and soon afterward was
promoted to the captaincy of the vessel built and armed by the colony as
a guarda costa, or coast guard. In 1740 he married the daughter of Rev.
Thomas Clapp, president of Yale College. He was a captain in Colonel
Burr's regiment, which went on the expedition to Louisburg in 1745, from
which place he went to Europe, in command of a cartel ship. He was not
permitted to land in France, but in England he was received with
distinguished honor. He was presented to the king, and became a favorite
at court. He was made a captain in the regular service, under Sir
William Pepperel, and his likeness (from which our engraving was copied)
was published in the periodical magazines of that day. He was first a
colonel and then a brigadier in the French and Indian or Seven Years'
War that ended in 1763. He espoused the patriot cause, and was one of
the principal conspirators against Ticonderoga in 1775, which resulted
in its capture by the provincials under Allen and Arnold. When the
Continental army was organized, Wooster was appointed one of the eight
brigadiers, third in rank. He was in Canada in 1776, where he had the
chief command for a while. Returning to Connecticut, he was appointed
the first major general of the militia of his state. In that capacity he
was actively employed when Tryon's invasion occurred. He hastened to the
field, was fatally wounded, carried to Danbury, and expired on the 2d of
May, at the age of sixty-seven years. On the 27th of April, 1854, the
corner-stone of a monument to be erected over the obscure grave of the
long-neglected Wooster was laid. When search was made for his grave, it
was identified by unmistakable evidences. With a skeleton was found some
matted wire (the remains of epaulets), a portion of a plume, and a
leaden bullet. The latter was a smooth, English bullet, larger than
those used by the Americans. These were satisfactory evidence that the
right grave had been opened. That bullet undoubtedly gave the death-
wound to the patriot. * The bones were re-interred, with imposing
ceremonies. The Honorable Henry C. Deming was the Orator on the
occasion.

* Colonel David Dimon, one of Wooster's subordinate officers at that
time (mentioned on page 403), was a native of Fairfield, Connecticut,
and was a brave and useful soldier. He was one of the volunteers who
captured British stores at Turtle Bay, New York, and one of Montgomery's
staff in the expedition to Canada in 1775. He was active in the capture
of St. John on the Sorel, and Fort Chambly, after which he returned to
Connecticut on public business, and was not with the army in its reteat
at Quebec. Colonel Dimon continued in active service until after Tryon's
expedition to Danbury. He had the command at the barricades in
Ridgefield, and pursued the British to Compo. A fever, produced by
exposure in the service, caused his death in September following, when
in the 36th year of his age

Barricade at Ridgefield.--Bravery of Arnold.--Narrow Escape.--March to
Compo.--Skirmishes.

409umn, while detachments were sent to outflank him and fall upon his
rear. With only about two hundred men, Arnold confronted nearly two
thousand, who advanced, and delivered and received several fires. In
this way the action continued nearly a quarter of an hour. Agnew
succeeded in gaining the ledge of rocks. From that position a whole
platoon of British infantry fired, with deliberate aim, at Arnold, who
was not more than thirty yards distant. Not a bullet hit him, but his
horse was pierced, and fell dead under him.

Seeing their leader prostrate, the Americans fled. For a moment Arnold
could not extricate his feet from the stirrups. Perceiving this, a Tory
named Coon, from New Fairfield, rushed toward the general with his
bayonet, to seize him. "Surrender! you are my prisoner!" shouted the
Tory. "Not yet," exclaimed Arnold, as, springing to his feet, he drew
his pistol, shot the Tory dead, and bounded toward a thick swamp near
by, followed by a shower of bullets, and escaped. The number of
Americans killed in this skirmish was between forty and fifty; of the
enemy's loss no account was given. Colonel Gould, of Fairfield, was
among the slain. He fell about eighty rods east of the house of Mr.
Stebbins, seen in the engraving, and his body was carried to Fairfield.

Having repulsed the Americans, Tryon's army encamped upon high ground
about a mile south of the Congregational Church in Ridgefield, until
daylight the next morning, April, 1777 when they resumed their march
toward Norwalk and Compo, through Wilton. Four dwellings were burned in
Ridgefield, and other private property was destroyed when the marauders
struck their tents. As they approached Norwalk, Tryon learned that
Arnold was again in the saddle, and was rallying the scattered militia
upon the road leading to Saugatuck Bridge. He filed off eastward, and
forded the Saugatuck some distance above the bridge, where about five
hundred Americans, under Colonel Huntingdon, were posted to oppose his
passage. Small detachments of militia annoyed the British all the way
from Wilton to the Saugatuck; and while the latter were pushing forward
toward Compo and their shipping, on the east side of the creek, the
former kept upon the west side, and galled them with cannon-shot and
musket-balls. A small detachment of Americans forded the stream, picked
off many of the rear-guard of the enemy, and returned without losing a
man.

At the bridge was the battalion of the New York artillery, under Colonel
John Lamb, with three field pieces, under Lieutenant-colonel Oswald.
Perceiving the formidable force there collected, Tryon urged forward his
men as fast as they could run, and they succeeded in passing by the
bridge before the main body of the Americans could get over. Exposed to
an enfilading fire, the enemy were partially checked, and for about
fifteen minutes there was a sharp engagement at the bridge. ** The
Americans pushed across and followed the flying

* This view is at the north end of the main street. It was taken from
the spot where, tradition asserts, Arnold's horse was killed, which is
on the west side of the street, near a maple-tree, about one hundred
yards southwest of the house of Samuel Stebbins, Esq., seen on the right
in the picture. While making this sketch an old man (whose name I forgot
to ask) came along, and informed me that on the day after the battle
himself and some other boys skinned Arnold's horse, and discovered nine
bullet-holes in his hide. The escape of the rider seemed miraculous.

** The bridge where the engagement took place was at the head of
navigation in the Saugatuek, nearly three miles from the sea. There is
now a bridge upon the site, within the pleasant village of Westport
(formerly ealled Saugatuck), which, at the time of the battle, contained
only five houses. Seven or eight men were killed near the present
Congregational Church in Westport. The smooth and really beautiful
elevation of Compo is about two and a half miles south of the village,
and commands a fine view of the Sound and of the distant shores of Long
Island.

Erskine's Maneuver.--The Connecticut Militia.--Action of Congress
concerning Arnold.--Place where Wooster fell.

410enemy to Compo, gaining the right flank of their rear in an
advantageous position. Here another hot skirmish ensued, and, but for a
successful maneuver of Sir William Erskine, the exhausted Britons must
all have been captured. That officer landed some marines from the
vessels, who furiously attacked the fatigued Americans in front, and
drove them back some distance. While this conflict was going on, the
main body of the enemy embarked, amid a galling fire from Lamb's
artillery. The marines, by a sudden retrograde movement, took to their
boats and reached their vessels. At about sunset the fleet weighed
anchor.

A large number of the Connecticut militia had collected at Compo,
besides those actually enrolled in the special service on that day. Many
of them were without arms, others were insubordinate, and a good
proportion of the new-comers behaved in the most cowardly manner. Had
they possessed a tithe of the courage of their leader, who was seen
urging his men at points of most imminent danger, the exhausted troops
of Tryon might have been made prisoners or destroyed. Arnold knew this,
and, unmindful of danger, urged on the militia by voice and example,
until his horse was wounded in the neck and disabled. The opportunity
was not courageously improved, and the enemy escaped.

The loss of the Americans during the invasion was about one hundred men;
the enemy lost, in killed, wounded, and prisoners, about three hundred.
Tryon was slightly wounded. Colonel Lamb, while gallantly leading his
men at Compo, received a violent contusion from a grape-shot. Arnold was
untouched, though a bullet wounded his horse, and another passed through
the collar of his coat. Congress, impressed with the brilliancy of his
achievements, May 30, 1777 directed the quartermaster general (a) to
"procure a horse and present the same, properly caparisoned, to Major-
general Arnold, as a token of their approbation of his gallant conduct
in the action against the enemy in the late enterprise to Danbury." *

It was a little after sunrise when we reached Ridgefield, ** and, after
sketching the place of the barricade in the village, we rode to the spot
where General Wooster fell. It is about a mile north of Mr. Stebbins's,
at the forks of the road, one of which is the way from Ridgefield to
North Salem. For a long time tradition pointed to a large chestnut-tree
as the place where the brave soldier was wounded. The tree has been
converted into rails, and the stump, almost decayed into dust, is
flanked by the two thrifty sugar maples seen toward the left of the
picture. The taller tree is a locust. It is to be hoped that some
monument will be reared to mark the spot, before these mature and decay
by age. The owner of the land pointed out the locality to us, and
expressed the patriotic opinion that "Congress ought to do something."
He had long contemplated the erection of a chestnut post at his own
expense, but, having done that, the public would expect him "to paint
some lettering on t," and he was not disposed to bear the whole burden
himself. Clearly right; it would be asking too much of a single citizen.

Returning to the village, we breakfasted at ten at the tavern of Mr.
Resseque, whose wife is the daughter of Mr. Keeler, the owner of the
dwelling at the time of the invasion. It is about half a mile south of
the Congregational Church, where the British planted a cannon

* Journals of Congress, iii., 158.

** Ridgefield is situated upon a high, rolling plain, and contains about
sixty houses, on one street, within & mile. Like Danbury, it is
beautifully shaded with elms and sycamores.

Relic of the Revolution.--Reading.--Threatened Mutiny there.--Putnam's
Speech.--Putnam at Greenwich.

411after driving the Americans from the barricade. Near the northeast
corner of the house is a four pound cannon-ball, lodged in one of the
posts, where it has remained ever since the Revolution. Some Americans
near the house were the objects at which some balls were discharged. One
passed into the building, just over the north door, and, crossing a
staircase, hit a chimney and fell to the floor. A man was just ascending
the stairs when the ball entered, with a terrible crash, and passed
between his legs. Unhurt, but greatly frightened, he fell to the foot of
the stairs, exclaiming, "I'm killed! I'm a dead man!" and for some time
he insisted that his legs were shot off. As soon as he was undeceived,
he put them in requisition, and fled, as fast as they could carry him,
toward Wilton. The house was set on fire, but the flames were
extinguished by a Tory brother of Mr. Keeler, whose own property was
endangered.

A few miles northeast from Ridgefield is the village of Reading, *
distinguished as being the head-quarters of General Putnam in the winter
of 1779. He occupied that position with General Poor's brigade of New
Hampshire, two Connecticut brigades, Hazen's infantry corps, and a corps
of cavalry under Shelden, for the purpose of covering the country from
the British lines in New York, eastward along the Sound. Like many of
the New England villages, it is scattered, and beautifully shaded with
elms, maples, and sycamores. Putnam's quarters were at a house situated
on the Norwalk and Danbury Road, about three miles westward of the
Congregational Church in Reading.

During the winter a mutinous spirit pervaded the Connecticut troops.
They were badly fed and clothed, and worse paid, for their small
pittance, when received, consisted of the rapidly-depreciating
Continental bills.

Brooding over their hard lot, the Connecticut brigades finally resolved
to march to Hartford and demand of the Assembly a redress of grievances.

The second brigade had assembled under arms for that purpose, when
information of the movement reached Putnam. He immediately galloped to
the encampment, and, in his uncouth, but earnest manner, thus addressed
them: "My brave lads, where are you going? Do you intend to desert your
officers, and to invite the enemy to follow you into the country? Whose
cause have you been fighting and suffering so long in? Is it not your
own? Have you no property, no parents, wives, or children? You have
behaved like men so far; all the world is full of your praise, and
posterity will stand astonished at your deeds, but not if you spoil all
at last. Don't you consider how much the country is distressed by the
war, and that your officers have not been better paid than yourselves?
But we all expect better times, and that the country will do us ample
justice. Let us all stand by one another, then, and fight it out like
brave soldiers. Think what a shame it would be for Connecticut men to
run away from their officers!" If this speech did not display the
polished eloquence of Demosthenes, who made the Athenians cry out with
one voice, "Let us go and fight Philip," it possessed the same spirit
and produced a similar result. When Putnam concluded his short address,
a loud cheer burst from the discontented regiments, and they returned to
their quarters in good humor, resolved to suffer and fight still longer
in the cause of liberty.

It was during Putnam's encampment at Reading, in 1779, that the famous
event occurred at West Greenwich, or Horseneck, in which the general was
the principal actor. He was visiting his outposts at West Greenwich, and
tarrying at the house of the late General Ebenezer Mead. Early on the
morning of the 26th of March, while standing before a a looking-glass,
'shaving, he saw the reflection of a body of "red-coats" marching up the
road from the westward. He dropped his razor, buckled on his sword, and,
half shaven, mounted his horse and hastened to prepare his handful of
men to oppose the approaching enemy. They were a body of nearly fifteen
hundred British regulars and Hessians, under Governor Tryon, who had
marched from their lines in West Chester county, near King's

* The township derived its name from Colonel John Read, one of its most
prominent settlers. His monument is in a small burying-ground a little
west of the town-house. He died in 1786, aged eighty-five years.--
Barber's Historical Collections of Connecticut.

Tryon's Expedition to Horseneck.--Skirmish at Greenwich.--Defeat of the
Americans.--Escape of Putnam

412Bridge, the previous evening, with the intention of surprising the
troops and destroying the salt-works at Horseneck Landing. A scout of
thirty men, under Captain Watson, who had been sent out by Putnam,
discovered the enemy in the night at New Rochelle. At daylight they had
advanced to Rye Neck, and there a slight skirmish ensued between the
British advanced guards and Putnam's scouts. The latter retreated to
Sawpits, on the Byram River, and thence to Horseneck, pursued by the
enemy. *

Putnam arranged his men (only one hundred and fifty in number) upon the
brow of the hill, by the Congregational Church in the village. There he
planted a battery composed of two old iron field pieces, and awaited the
approach of the enemy. They moved up the road in solid column until
almost within musket-shot, when detachments broke off and attempted to
gain Putnam's flanks. At the same moment the British dragoons and some
infantry prepared to charge.

Perceiving this, and discovering the overwhelming numbers of the enemy,
Putnam ordered a retreat, after a few discharges of the field pieces and
some volleys of musketry. So near was the enemy, that the retreat of the
Americans became a rout. The soldiers broke and fled singly to the
adjacent swamps, while the general, putting spurs to his horse, sped
toward Stamford, pursued by several of the dragoons. A quarter of a mile
eastward of the Congregational Church is a steep declivity, on the brow
of which the road turned northward, and passed, in a broad sweep, around
the hill. Putnam perceived that his pursuers were gaining upon him, and,
with the daring of desperation, left the road and wheeled his horse,
while on a gallop, down the rocky height, making a zigzag course to the
bottom, and reaching the road again in safety. The dragoons dared not
follow, and, discharging their pistols at Putnam, without effect, rode
back to the main army, and the general reached Stamford, five miles
eastward, in safety.

Tryon plundered the inhabitants of every thing valuable, and, having
destroyed a few salt a March 26, 1799 works, a small sloop and store,
and damaged the houses of the Whigs, retreated to Rye the same evening,
and the next day reached King's Bridge. As soon as

Putnam arrived at Stamford, he collected some militia and a few of his
fugitives, and returned to attack the enemy on his retreat. He succeeded
in taking thirty-eight prisoners and in recapturing a portion of the
plunder, which he restored to the inhabitants. There were about twenty
Americans killed. The loss of the British in killed is not recorded.

I visited the scene of Putnam's exploit in June, previous to my journey
to Danbury and Ridgefield, and made the accompanying sketch of "Putnam's
Hill," as it is called. It is about five miles west from Stamford, on
the main road to New York from Horseneck *

* This name was given to the peninsula extending into the Sound at
Greenwich, from the circumstance that many horses used to be pastured
upon it.

Putnam's Hill.--Its present Appearance.--Norwalk.--Fitch's Point

413Landing. This sketch is taken from the road near the residence of the
late General Ebenezer Mead, looking westward. The aspect of the place
has materially changed since the Revolution. The old road, as I have
mentioned, made a circuit northward around the hill. The present road,
seen in the engraving, passes directly over the hill, being a causeway
part of the distance, and a deep cut through the rocks on the brow of
the eminence. On the hill, just south of the road, and in a line with
the tall tree by the causeway, stood the old Episcopal Church; and it
was for the accommodation of worshipers there, who lived eastward of the
hill, that a flight of seventy rude stone steps was made. These are the
steps so celebrated in the popular accounts of Putnam's exploit. They
are now quite covered with earth and shrubbery, but their site is
distinctly marked. I have given them more prominence than they really
have, exhibiting them as they probably appeared when Putnam made his
escape.

Between the trees is seen the spire of the Congregational Church at
Greenwich, standing upon the site of the one near which Putnam planted
his battery. General Mead and others saw the descent of Putnam. He
wheeled his horse from the road near the house of Dr. Mead, seen on the
extreme right, and did not go down the steps at all (as popular
tradition avers), except four or five of them near the bottom. As he
hastened by toward Stamford, General Mead distinctly heard him cursing
the British whom he had left behind. The feat was perilous, but, under
the circumstances, not very extraordinary. I was told that in 1825
several of the dragoons in the escort of La Fayette to this place
performed the same Let us resume our journey.

The ride from Ridgefield to Norwalk was very pleasant. The clouds were
dispersed, and the air was almost sultry. The country was rough until we
entered the valley of the Norwalk River, a region of great beauty and
fertility. Our road lay along that winding stream, and, as we approached
Norwalk, the transition from the open country to the populous town was
almost imperceptible. Venerable elms and sycamores, planted by the early
settlers, shaded handsome mansions thickly strewn along the winding
road. These, the tolling of a bell, and the whistle of steam betokened a
village near, and in a few minutes we reined up at the principal hotel
in the compact street of a busy mart. We are again upon Revolutionary
ground, the scene of another of Governor Tryon's marauding expeditions.
*

After laying Fairfield in ashes, Governor Tryon and Brigadier-general
Garth, with their troops, retreated to their vessels and crossed the
Sound to Huntington Bay, Long Island, whence they sailed over to Norwalk
on the night of the 11th of July, 1779. The main body landed at about
nine o'clock in the evening, "in the 'Cow Pasture,' a peninsula on the

*Norwalk is situated near Long Island Sound, not far from the mouth of
the Norwalk River (a small stream), and about forty-eight miles
northeast from New York. It was among the earliest settlements in
Connecticut, having been purchased of the natives in 1640. The bounds of
the east tract, sold to Roger Ludlow, as described in the ancient
records, were "from Norwalk River to Sawhatue [Saugatuck] River, from
sea, Indian one day walk in the country"--that is, one day's north walk
into the country; hence the name of Norwalk. The articles given to the
Indians for the tract were "eight fathoms wampum, six coats, ten
hatchets, ten hoes, ten knives, ten scizers, ten juseharps, ten fathom
tobacko, three kettles of six hands about, and ten looking-glasses." The
articles given for the tract on the west side of the river, between it
and Five Mile River, sold to Captain Patrick, were "of wampum ten
fathoms, hatchets three, howes three, when ships come; six glasses,
twelve tobacko pipes, three knives, ten drills, ten needles."--Barber's
Historical Collections; Hall's Historical Records of Norwalk.

** This view is from the west side of Gregory's Point, looking north-
northwest. The promontory toward the left, covered with dark trees, is
called Fort Point. There was an Indian fortification when the first
settlers arrived at Norwalk. Further to the left, on the extreme edge of
the picture, is seen one end of the rail-road bridge, which crosses
Norwalk River. The New York and New Haven Railroad was then in progress
of construction. The point derives its name from its former proprietor,
Governor Thomas Fitch, whose residence was Norwalk. He was Governor of
the colony of Connecticut, and his name is among the beloved of his
generation. He died July 18th, 1774, in the seventy-fifth year of his
age.

Landing of Tryon at Norwalk.--Destruction of the Village.--Conduct of
Tryon.--Scenes at Darien Church.

414east side of the harbor, within a mile and a half of the bridge." *
They lay on their arms all night, awaiting the expected arrival of a
company of Loyalists. At dawn they marched toward the town, and were met
by a company of about fifty Continental soldiers, under Captain Stephen
Betts, who were posted upon an eminence known as _Gruman's Hill_, a
little east of the road. A skirmish ensued, but the little band of
patriots were soon obliged to flee before overwhelming numbers, leaving
four of their party dead. The people, greatly alarmed, fled to Belden's
Hill, five miles distant, during the night. The Continentals and a few
of the militia took post within "random cannon-shot upon the hills on
the north," whence they annoyed the enemy exceedingly. Tryon halted upon
Gruman's Hill until the other division landed at _Old Well_, ** on the
west side of the stream. The two divisions joined, and soon drove nearly
every Whig inhabitant from the village, dispersed the troops collected
upon the hills, and seized one of their cannon.

The destruction of property then commenced. Governor Tryon thus coolly
related the circumstances in his official dispatch to Sir Henry Clinton:
"After many salt-pans were destroyed, whale-boats carried on board the
fleet, and the magazines, stores, and vessels set in flames, with the
greater part of the dwelling-houses, the advanced corps were drawn back,
and the troops retired in two columns to the place of our first
debarkation, and, unassaulted, took ship, and returned to Huntington
Bay."

While the village was burning, Tryon sat in a rocking-chair upon
Gruman's Hill, and viewed the scene with apparent pleasure--a puny
imitator of Nero, who fiddled while Rome was blazing. It was a cruel and
wanton destruction of property, and none but a small mind and spiteful
heart could have conceived and consummated so foul an act. Two houses of
worship (Episcopal and Congregational), eighty dwellings, eighty-seven
barns, twenty-two stores, seventeen shops, four mills, and five vessels
were laid in ashes in the course of a few hours, and hundreds of women
and children were driven to the woods for shelter. Only six houses were
spared. One of them, now (1848) occupied by Ex-governor Bissell, was
saved through the exertions of a maiden lady living with Mr. Belden, the
then owner. Governor Tryon had been Belden's guest one night, several
years previous, and the lady went up to Gruman's Hill reminded him of
the fact, and asked for and received a protection for the house. Tryon
sent a file of soldiers with her to guard it. When the British left,
most of the resident Tories went with them. Among them was the Rev. Mr.
Leamington, the Episcopalian minister. He had continued praying for the
"king and all others in authority," according to the Liturgy of his
Church, until the people forbade him and threatened him with violence.

About five miles westward of Norwalk, on the main road to Stamford, is a
Congregational Church more than one hundred years old. Its pastor in
1781 was the Rev. Moses Mather. On Sunday, the 22d of July, the church
was surrounded by a party of Tories, under Captain Frost, just as the
congregation were singing the first tune. Dr. Mather and the men of the
congregation were taken to the banks of the Sound, thrust into boats,
and conveyed across to Lloyd's Neck, on Long Island, whence they were
carried to New York and placed in the Provost Jail. Some died there.
Nineteen of the twenty-five prisoners were exchanged and returned to
their families. Peter St. John, one of the prisoners, wrote an account
of the affair in doggerel verse. Of the Provost he says if I must
conclude that in this place We found the worst of Adam's race.

* Tryon's official dispatch.

** This place is situated a little more than a mile from the center of
the village of Norwalk. It received its name from an old well from
which, in ancient times, vessels engaged in the West Indian trade took
their supplies of water.--Barber

Visit to Gregory's Point--The Cow Pasture.--Ancient Regulations.--
Grummon's Hill.--Nathaniel Raymond.

415

Thieves, murderers, and pickpockets too,

And every thing that's bad they'd do:

One of our men found, to his cost,

Three pounds York money he had lost;

His pockets picked, I guess before

We had been there one single hour."

Dr. Mather was cruelly treated in the Provost, until his situation was
made known to Mrs. Irving, mother of our distinguished writer,
Washington Irving, who obtained permission to send him food and
clothing. He was released at the close of the year.

The Rev. Edwin Hall, of the First Congregational Church, whose
historical researches have made him familiar with localities of interest
about Norwalk, kindly accompanied me as cicerone. We rode down to
Gregory's Point, from which I sketched Tryon's landing-place, pictured
on page 413. On the beautiful plain near by stood the ancient village,
the first settlers having chosen the sea-washed level for their
residences, in preference to the higher and rougher ground at the head
of navigation, on which the present town is situated. The old village
had gone into decay, and the new town was just beginning to flourish,
when Tryon laid it in ruins. A little further seaward, upon a neck of
land comprising Fitch's Point and an extensive salt meadow, is the _Cow
Pasture_, so called from the circumstance that the cows belonging to the
settlers were pastured there, under the direction of the town
authorities. *

From Gregory's Point we rode over the hills to the estate of Mr.
Ebenezer Smith, and from a high hill near his house I sketched the
distant view of Compo, on page 402. From that eminence we obtained one
of the most beautiful prospects of land and water imaginable. Southward
was the broad mouth of the Norwalk River, with its beautiful green
islands, and beyond was the heaving Sound, dotted with sails, and
bounded by the wooded shores of Long Island in the distance. On the
right were clustered the white houses of Norwalk, and on the left
swelling Compo was stretched out, scarcely concealing the noble shade
trees of Fairfield beyond.

Returning along East Avenue to the village, I stopped near the residence
of Mr. Hall, and made the accompanying sketch of Grum-an's Hill. It is a
high elevation, a little east of the avenue, partly covered by an
orchard, and commanding a fine prospect of the village, harbor, and
Sound. Tryon sat upon the summit of the hill, where the five Lombardy
poplars are seen. The venerable Nathaniel Raymond, still living, when I
was there (1848), near the Old Well, or West Norwalk Wharf (where he had
dwelt from his birth, ninety-five years), remembers the hill being "red
with the British." He was a corporal of the guard at the time, and,
after securing his most valuable effects, and carrying his aged parents
to a place of safety three miles

* The old records of the town, quoted by Mr. Hall, exhibit many curious
features in the municipal regulations adopted by the early settlers. In
1665 it is recorded that "Walter Hait has undertaken to beat the drumm
for meeting when all occasions required, for which he is to have 10s.
Also, Thomas Benedict has undertaken to have the meeting-house swept for
the yeere ensuing; he is to have 20s." Again: "At c town meeting in
Norwalk, March the 20th, 1667, it was voted and ordered that it shall be
left to the townsmen from yere to yere to appoint a time or day, at or
before the 10th day of March, for the securing of the fences on both
sides, and that they shall give notis to all the inhabitants the night
before, and the drumb to be beten in the morning, which shall bo
accounted a sufficient warning for every man to secure his fence, or
else to bear his own damages." Again: "At the same meeting (October
17th, 1667), voted and ordered that, after the field is cleared, the
townsmen shall hier Steven Beckwith, or some other man, to fetch the
cows out of the neck [the Cow Pasture]; and he that shall be hiered
shall give warning by sounding a home about twelve of the clock, that he
that is to accompany him is to repaire to him."

Time of Tryon's Landing.--Departure from Norwalk.--New England
Villages.--The Green at Fairfield.--Pequots

416distant, shouldered his musket, and was with the few soldiers whom
Tryon boasted of having driven from the hills north of the town. He says
it was Saturday night when Tryon landed, and, like Danbury, the town was
burned on Sunday. Mr. Raymond was quite vigorous in body and mind, and
Time seemed to have used him gently. I desired to visit two other
ancient inhabitants, but the hour for the arrival of the mail-coach for
New Haven was near, and I hastened back to the hotel, whence I left for
the east between three and four o'clock in the afternoon.

The coach, a sort of tin-peddler's wagon in form, was full, and, quite
in accordance with my inclination, I took a seat with the driver. It was
a genial afternoon, and all things in nature and art combined to please
and edify. We reached Bridgeport, at the mouth of the Housatonic River,
fourteen miles east of Norwalk, at sunset, and a more pleasing variety
of beautiful scenery can nowhere be found than charmed us during that
short journey. We passed through Westport (old Saugatuck), Southport,
and Fairfield, lovely villages lying upon estuaries of Long Island
Sound, and all replete with historic interest. Unlike most modern
villages, with their rectangular streets, and exhibiting an ambitious
imitation of large cities, the neat houses, embowered in shrubbery, are
thinly scattered along winding avenues shaded by venerable trees, the
ground on either side left undulating as the hand of Nature fashioned
it. Herein consists the great beauty of the New England villages, a
beauty quite too often overlooked in other states in the process of
laying out towns. Nature and art have here wrought in harmony, and
village and country are beautifully and healthfully blended.

I was informed, before leaving Norwalk, that the "Buckly House," the
last relic of the Revolution in Fairfield, had fallen under the stroke
of public improvement, and also that no living witness of the cruelty of
Governor Tryon was there. I therefore concluded to go directly through
to New Haven that evening. During a detention of the coach for half an
hour at the post-office, in Fairfield, I made a rough sketch of the
annexed view of the village Green, which I subsequently corrected by a
picture in Barber's _Historical Collections of Connecticut_. The view is
from the eastern side of the Green, near the spacious new hotel that
fronts upon it. The jail on the left, the court-house in the center, and
the church on the right were erected upon the foundations of those that
were burned by the British in 1779, and in the same style of
architecture.. Such being the fact, the Green, from our point of view,
doubtless has the same general aspect that it presented before the
marauder desolated it. As the destruction of Fairfield was subsequent to
the incursion of the enemy into New Haven, I shall give the record of
its hard fate after noticing the movements of Tryon and his associates
at the latter place

Immediately back of Fairfield village is the celebrated swamp where the
warlike Pequots made their last stand against the English, in July,
1637. * There they were overthrown

* The Pequots, or Pequods, were a formidable tribe of Indians, having at
least seven hundred warriors. Their principal settlements were on a hill
in Groton, Connecticut. They were a terror to other tribes, and became a
great annoyance to the Connecticut and Massachusetts settlements.
Governor Endicott, of the former province, had tried to treat with them,
but in vain, and their bold defiance of the whites increased Early in
1637 they attacked the small English fort at Saybrook, murdered several
women of Weathersfield, and carried away two girls into captivity. The
colonists mustered all their able men, and, being joined by portions of
the Mohegans, Narragansets, and Niantic tribes, fell upon the Pequots in
their retreat upon the Mystic River. A warm battle ensued, and the
Pequots were beaten. They fought desperately, but were finally driven
westward, and took shelter in the swamp near Fairfield. Sassacus, their
chief, escaped to the Mohawks, by whom he was afterward murdered. The
Indian name of Fairfield was Unguowa. Mr. Ludlow, who accompanied the
English troops, and was afterward Deputy-governor of the colony of
Connecticut, pleased with the country in the neighborhood of the Sasco
Swamp, began, with others, a plantation there, and called it their fair
field. Hence its name.

Destruction of the Pequots.--Greenfield Hill.--Dwight's Poem.--Journey
to New Haven.--A Stroll to East Rock.

417and annihilated, and the place has ever since been called the Pequot
Swamp. They might have escaped had not one of their number, who loitered
behind, been captured by Captain Mason, and compelled to disclose the
retreat of his comrades. One hundred were made prisoners, the residue
were destroyed. The fort at Mystic had previously been demolished, and
they took refuge in this swamp.

We passed in sight of Greenfield Hill, near the village, renowned for
its academy and church, wherein President Dwight, of Yale College,
officiated as tutor and pastor for twelve years. The view from the hill
is said to be exceedingly fine, and from the belfry of the church no
less than seventeen houses of worship may be seen, in Fairfield and the
adjacent villages. Dr. Dwight, while minister of Greenfield, wrote a
poem called "Greenfield Hill." Referring to the view from the belfry, he
exclaims,

"Heavens, what a matchless group of beauties rare

Southward expands! where, crown'd with yon tall oak,

Round Hill the circling land and sea o'erlooks;

Or, smoothly sloping, Grover's beauteous rise,

Spreads its green sides and lifts its single tree,

Glad mark for seamen; or, with ruder face,

Orchards, and fields, and groves, and houses rare,

And scatter'd cedars, Mill Hill meets the eye;

Or where, beyond, with every beauty clad,

More distant heights in vernal pride ascend.

On either side a long, continued range,

In all the charms of rural nature dress'd,

Slopes gently to the main. Ere Try on sunk

To infamy unfathom'd, through yon groves

Once glisten'd Norwalk's white ascending spires,

And soon, if Heaven permit, shall shine again.

Here, sky-encircled, Stratford's churches beam;

And Stratfield's turrets greet the roving eye.

In clear, full view, with every varied charm

That forms the finish'd landscape, blending soft

In matchless union, Fairfield and Green's Farms

Give luster to the day. Here, crown'd with pines

And skirting groves, with creeks and havens fair

Embellish'd, fed with many a beauteous stream,

Prince of the waves, and ocean's favorite child,

Far westward fading, in confusion blue,

And eastward stretch'd beyond the human ken,

And mingled with the sky; there Longa's Sound

Glorious expands."

The evening closed in, mild and balmy, before we reached Stratford,
three miles eastward of Bridgeport, and the beautiful country through
which we were passing was hidden from view. We crossed several small
estuaries, and the vapor that arose from the grassy salt marshes was
grateful to the nostrils. The warm land-breeze ceased at eight o'clock,
and a strong wind from the ocean brought a chilling fog upon its wings,
which veiled the stars, and made us welcome the sparkling lights of New
Haven as we descended Milford Hill and crossed the broad salt marsh that
skirts the western suburbs of the town. We arrived at the _Tontine_ a
little after nine, and supped with a keen appetite, for I had fasted
since breakfast at Ridgefield at ten in the morning. It was Saturday
night, and the weary journeys of the week made the privileges of the
approaching day of rest appear peculiarly valuable.

"The morning dawn'd with tokens of a storm--

A ruddy cloud athwart the eastern sky

Glow'd with the omens of a tempest near;"

Yet I ventured to stroll out to East Rock, two miles east-northeast of
the city. Crossing the bridge at the factory owned by the late Eli
Whitney, inventor of the cotton gin that bears his name, I toiled up the
steep slope through the woods to the summit of the rock,

East Rock.--View from its Summit.--Quinnipiack.--Settlement of New
Haven.

418nearly four hundred feet above the plain below. This rock is the
southern extremity of the Mount Tom range of hills. It lies contiguous
to a similar amorphous mass called West Rock, and both are composed
principally of hornblende and feldspar, interspersed with quartz and
iron. The oxyd of iron, by the action of rains, covers their bare and
almost perpendicular fronts, and gives them their red appearance, which
caused the Dutch anciently to designate the site of New Haven by the
name of _Red Rock._ The fronts of these rocks are composed of
assemblages of vast irregular columns, similar in appearance to the
Palisades of the Hudson, and, like them, having great beds of debris at
their bases. A view from either will repay the traveler for his labor in
reaching the summit. That from the East Rock is particularly attractive,
for it embraces the harbor, city, plain, and almost every point of
historical interest connected with New Haven, or Quinnipiack, as the
Indians called it

"I stood upon the cliff's extremest edge,

And downward far beneath me could I see

Complaining brooks that played with meadow sedge,

Then brightly wandered on their journey free."

Willis Gaylord Clarke.

Winding through the plain were Mill River and the Quinnipiack, spanned
by noble bridges near the city that lay stretched along the beautiful
bay; and

"Beyond

The distant temple spires that lift their points

In harmony above the leaf-clad town--

Beyond the calm bay and the restless Sound

Was the blue island stretching like a cloud

Where the sky stoops to earth: the Rock was smooth,

And there upon the table-stone sad youths

Had carved, unheeded, names, to weave for them

That insect's immortality that lies

In stone, for ages, on a showman's shelf."

           L. M. N.=

East and West Haven, where the two divisions of the British invading
force landed in 1779, Fort Hale, whence they departed; Neck Bridge,
across Mill River, under which the fugitive judges of King Charles I.
were concealed; and West Rock, where they "raised their Ebenezer" and
dwelt in seclusion for some time, were all in full view. With a spirit
fraught with reverence for the past, and with scenery hallowed by the
presence of "young antiquity' spread out before us, let us sit down a
moment and listen to the teachings of the chronicler In the summer of
1637 several wealthy and influential English gentlemen arrived at Bos
ton, preparatory to making a permanent location in wilderness America.
The young colony of Massachusetts Bay regarded them with great favor,
and various settlements coveted the honor of numbering them among their
proprietors. But they determined to plant a distinct colony, and, having
heard of the beautiful country along the Sound, from Saybrook to the
Saugatuck, discovered by the English in their pursuit of the Pequots,
they projected a settlement in that part of the land. In the autumn a
portion of them made a journey to Connecticut, to explore the harbors
and lands along the coasts, who finally decided upon the beautiful plain
on the Quinnipiack for settlement, and built a log hut there. *

In the spring of 1638 the principal men of the new emigration to the
colony--Rev. Mr. Davenport, Mr. Pruden, and Samuel and Theophilus Eaton-
-with the people of their company, sailed from Boston for Quinnipiack.
They reached the haven in about a fortnight, and their first Sabbath
there was the 18th of April, 1638. The people assembled under a large
oak, that stood where George and College Streets intersect; and under
its venerable branches the New Haven and Milford Churches were afterward
formed. Designing to make a large and flourishing settlement, founded on
strict justice, they purchased the land of Mau-

* This was upon the corner of the present Church and George Streets, New
Haven.--Barber.

Organic Law of the New Haven Colony.--The "Regicides."--The
Concealment.--Friendship of Davenport.--Narrow Escape.

419maguin, the chief sachem of that region, on honorable terms, and
entered into what they called a _plantation covenant_ with each other.
They laid out their town-plat in squares, designing it for an elegant
city. They prospered for more than a year without any fixed laws, and in
1639 proceeded to lay the foundation of their civil and religious
polity. Theophilus Eaton was chosen governor, and Mr. Davenport gave him
a serious charge before all the people, from Deut., i., 16, 17. It was
decreed by the freemen that there should be a general court annually in
the plantation, on the last week in October. This was ordained a court
of election, in which all the officers of the colony were to be chosen.
This court determined that the Word of God should be the only rule for
ordering the affairs of government in that commonwealth.

This was the original fundamental Constitution of New Haven, brief in
words, but powerful in principle, for the Bible was the statute book. It
exhibited the same general religious aspect in its external affairs as
that of the Massachusetts colony. Seven pillars of the Church were
chosen, and all government was originally in the Church. The members of
the Church (none others being possessed of the elective franchise)
elected the governor, magistrates, and all other officers. The
magistrates were merely the assistants of the governor. * Thus the new
colony, having its foundation laid upon divine laws and strong faith in
man, began a glorious career; and the little settlement, ambitious of
excellence, has grown to be, if not the largest, one of the most
beautiful cities in the Western World. From the time of its foundation
until the Revolution broke out, its history, like that of the other New
England settlements, exhibits the ebbing and flowing of the tide of
prosperity, under the influences of the laws of the supreme government
and the pressure of Indian hostilities; sometimes burdened and cast down
by the injustice of the former, and menaced with overthrow and ruin by
the latter.

New Haven became famous as the "city of refuge" for three of the English
regicides, or judges who condemned King Charles I. to death. They were
Generals Goffe and Whalley, and Colonel Dixwell. Whalley was descended
from a very ancient family, and was a relative of Oliver Cromwell. Goffe
was the son of a Puritan divine, and married a daughter of Whalley.
Dixwell was a wealthy country gentleman of Kent, and was a member of
Parliament in 1654. On the restoration of Charles II. to the throne of
his father, many of the judges were arrested; thirty were condemned to
death, and ten were executed. The three above named escaped to New
England. Goffe and Whalley arrived at Boston in July, 1660, and took up
their residence in Cambridge. Feeling insecure there, they removed to
New Haven, where their unaffected piety won for them the confidence and
esteem of the people, and particularly of the minister, Mr. Davenport.
Their apparent freedom from danger lasted but a few days. The
proclamation of Charles, offering a large reward for their apprehension,
and the news that pursuers were on the scent, reached them at the same
time, and they were obliged to flee. They took shelter in a rocky
cavern, on the top of West Rock, where they were supplied daily with
food by their friends. They shifted their place of abode from time to
time, calling each locality _Ebenezer_, and occasionally appeared
publicly in New Haven. On one occasion they sat under the Neck Bridge,
upon Mill River, when their pursuers passed over; and several times they
came near falling into their hands. The people generally favored their
escape, and for their lives they owed much to Mr. Davenport. **

* Trumbull's History of Connecticut; Barber's History of New Haven.

** About the time when the pursuers were expected at New Haven, Mr.
Davenport preached publicly from the text, "Take counsel, execute
judgment; make thy shadow as the night in the midst of the noon-day;
hide the outcasts; betray not him that wandereth. Let mine outcasts
dwell with thee, Moab; be thou a covert to them from the face of the
spoilers." Isaiah, xvi., 3, 4. The sermon had the effect to put the
whole town upon their guard, and made the people resolve on concealment
of the "outcasts." The following anecdote is related of Goffe, while he
was in Boston: A fencing-master erected a stage, and upon it he walked
several days, defying any one to a combat with swords. Goffe wrapped a
huge cheese in a napkin for a shield, and, arming himself with a mop
filled with dirty water from a pool, mounted the stage and accepted the
challenge. The fencing-master attempted to drive him off, but Goffe
skillfully received the thrusts of his sword into the cheese. At the
third lunge of his antagonist, Goffe held the sword fast in his soft
shield long enough to smear the face of the fencing-master with the
filthy mop. Enraged, the challenger caught up a broad-sword, when Goffe
exclaimed, with a firm voice, "Stop, sir; hitherto, you see, I have only
played with you, and not attempted to harm you; but if you come at me
now with the broad-sword, know that I will certainly take your life."
Goffe's firmness alarmed the fencing-master, who exclaimed, "Who can you
be? You must be either Goffe, Whalley, or the devil, for there was no
other man in England could beat me."

Goffe at Hadley.--Colonel Dixwell.--Tomb stones of the Regicides.--Stamp
Act Proceedings.

420In the autumn they left New Haven and went to Hadley. While there,
eleven years afterward, _King Philip's War_ took place. While the people
of the town were in their meeting-house, observing a fast, a body of
Indians surrounded them. The continual expectation of such an event made
the inhabitants always go armed to worship. They were so armed on this
occasion, and sallied out to drive off the savages. At that moment there
appeared in their midst a man of venerable aspect and singular costume,
who placed himself at the head of the people, and, by causing them to
observe strict military tactics, enabled them to disperse the
assailants. The stranger then disappeared. The people believed an angel
had been sent to lead them and effect a victory. The angel was General
Goffe.

Colonel Dixwell was with Goffe and Whalley much of the time of their
long exile. His latter years were passed in New Haven, where he called
himself James Davids, Esq. He acknowledged his name and character before
his death, which occurred in 1688, about a month previous to the arrest
of Governor Andros in Boston. The governor was hated by the colonists,
and when the news of the revolution in England, which Dixwell had
predicted, reached Boston, the people seized the obnoxious chief
magistrate and thrust him into prison. *

Goffe and Whalley died at Hadley, and it is supposed that their bodies
were afterward secretly conveyed to New Haven. In the old burying-ground
in that city, in the rear of the Center Church, are stones which bear
the initials of the regicides. They are standing separate; I have
grouped them for convenience. The two marked E. W. are the head and foot
stones of Whatley's grave; and the date, by an extension below the five,
may read 1658 or 1678. He died about 1678. These stones are about two
feet wide and high, and eight inches thick. Goffe's, marked 80 and M.
G., is only ten inches high. The M, it is supposed, is an inverted W.
Dix-well's stone, seen in front, is two and a half feet high and broad.
It is a red stone; the others are a sort of dark blue stone. The reason
given for inscribing only their initials on their stones is, a fear that
some sycophant of royalty, "clothed with a little brief authority" in
New England, might disturb their remains. ** New Haven was greatly
agitated by proceedings growing out of the Stamp Act. It was among the
earliest of the New England towns that echoed the voice of opposition
raised by Boston against the oppression of the mother country, and the
people were generally zealous in maintaining the liberty of action
professed to be secured to them by disannulled charters. When Ingersoll,
who was appointed stamp-master (or the agent of government to sell
"stamped paper"), announced the reception of the objectionable articles,
New Haven soon became in a state of actual rebellion. Ingersoll was
menaced with every indignity, and even his life was proclaimed forfeit
by some, if he persisted in exercising his new vocation. Finding
September 19, 1765 own town too warm for him, he proceeded toward
Hartford. He was met near Weathersfield by a deputation of about five
hundred men, and, when in the town, they demanded his resignation of the
office. He refused acquiescence, on the reasonable plea that he awaited
the action of the General Assembly of Connecticut, whose com-

* Stiles's History of the Regicides; Barber's History of New Haven.

** A lineal descendant of Colonel Dixwell asked and received permission
of the authorities of New Haven to disinter the remains of his ancestor,
and bury them beneath a monument which he proposed to erect to his
memory, on College Green, in the rear of the Center Church. They were
accordingly removed in November 1849, and a neat monument, surrounded by
an iron railing, is erected there.

Treatment of the Stamp-master.--Joy on the Repeal of the Act.--
Patriotism of the People.--Boldness of Benedict Arnold

421mands in the premises he should implicitly obey. But the people would
listen to no legal excuses, and he, "thinking the cause not worth dying
for," yielded to the menaces of the people, and signed a paper declaring
his resignation of the office. He was then forced to stand up and read
it to the people. Not content with this, they made him throw up his hat,
cry out "Liberty and property," and give three cheers. After dining, he
was conducted to Hartford by a cavalcade of about one thousand, who
surrounded the court-house, and caused him to read his resignation in
the presence of the members of the Assembly.

The people were quite as much excited by joy when the news of the repeal
of the noxious act reached them, in May, 1766. The fact was thus
announced on the 23d of May, by a New Haven newspaper: "Last Monday
morning, early, an express arrived here with the charming news, soon
after which many of the inhabitants were awakened with the noise of
small arms from different quarters of the town; all the bells were rung,
and cannon roared the glad tidings. In the afternoon the clergy publicly
returned thanks for the blessing, and a company of militia were
collected, under the principal direction of Colonel [afterward General]
Wooster. In the evening were illuminations, bonfires, and dances, all
without any remarkable indecency or disorder. The arrival of the regular
post from Boston last night has completed our joy for the wise and
interesting repeal of the Stamp Act. Business will soon be transacted as
usual in this loyal colony. In short, every thing in nature seems to
wear a more cheerful aspect than usual--to a great majority."

In all subsequent proceedings, in opposition to the unjust acts of the
British government toward the colonies, New Haven was famed for its zeal
and firmness; and the people of Boston received its warmest sympathies
and support in all the trials through which they had to pass, under the
royal displeasure, from 1768 until 1776, when that city was purged of
the enemies of freedom by the Continental army, under Washington.

New Haven was among the first of the New England towns that sent
soldiers to the fields of the Revolution. The news of the skirmish at
Lexington reached New Haven at about noon the next day. Ben April, 1775
edict Arnold was then the captain of the Governor's Guards. He summoned
his corps, and proposed starting immediately for Lexington. About forty
of them consented to go. * Arnold requested the town authorities to
furnish the company with ammunition. They refused, and the hot patriot
marched his men to the house where the select-men were in session,
formed a line in front, and sent in word that, if the keys of the

* Among the members of the company who went with Arnold were Mr. Earl, a
portrait painter, and Amos Doolittle, an engraver. Mr. Earl made four
drawings of Lexington and Concord, which were afterward engraved by Mr.
Doolittle. The plates were twelve by eighteen inches in size, and were
executed with great dispatch, for in the Connecticut Journal of December
13th, 1775, is the following advertisement:

"This day published,

"And to be sold at the store of Mr. James Lockwood, near the college in
New Haven, four different views of the battles of Lexington, Concord,
&e., on the 19th of April, 1775.

"Plate I., the battle of Lexington.

"Plate II., a view of the town of Concord, with the ministerial troops
destroying the stores.

"Plate III., the battle at the North Bridge, in Concord.

"Plate IV., the south part of Lexington, when the first detachment was
joined by Lord Percy.

"The above four plates are neatly engraven on copper, from original
paintings taken on the spot.

"Price, six shillings per set for plain ones, or eight shillings
colored."

* The engraving of the first of the above-named plates was Mr.
Doolittle's earliest effort in that branch of art; and it is not a
little singular that his last day's labor with the burin was bestowed
upon a reduced copy of the same picture, for Barber's History of New
Haven, executed in 1832. A copy of this print will be found on page 524.

** Arnold lived in Water Street, near the ship-yard. The house is still
standing (1848), on the left side if the street going toward the water
It is a handsome frame building, embowered in shrubbery. In the garret
of the house the sign was found recently which hung over the door of
Arnold's store, in Water Street It was black, with white letters, and
painted precisely alike on both sides. It was lettered

B, Arnold, Druggist,

Bookseller, &c.,

FROM LONDON.

Sibi Tolique.

* The Latin motto may be rendered, For himself and for the whole, or for
all. Arnold combined the selling of drugs and books in New Haven from
1763 to 1767.

March of Arnold and his Company to Cambridge.--Expedition under Tryon.--
Landing of the Troops near New Haven.

422powder-house were not delivered to him within five minutes, he would
order his company to break it open and help themselves. The keys were
given up, the powder was procured, and soon the volunteers were on their
march through Wethersfield and Pomfret, for Cambridge. At Pomfret they
were joined by General Putnam, who left his plow in the furrow, and, on
arriving at Cambridge, they took possession of the elegant mansion of
Governor Oliver, who had fled from the vicinity. Arnold's corps made a
fine appearance, and so correct was their discipline, that they were
chosen to deliver to Governor Gage the body of a British officer who had
died from wounds received at Lexington.

New Haven suffered equally with its sister towns of the sea-board during
the whole war for independence, but the severest trial it endured was an
invasion by a British force, under Governor Tryon of New York, and
Brigadier-general Garth, in the summer of 1779. For some time the idea
of a predatory war against the Americans had occupied the British
commanders here. They finally decided upon the measure, and submitted
their plans to the ministry at home. Wearied by fruitless endeavors to
quell the rebellion, the king and his advisers readily consented to the
prosecution of any scheme that promised success. Arthur Lee, the
political spy abroad upon the movements of the British ministry,
immediately forwarded to Governor Trumbull, of Connecticut, and the
Committee for Foreign Affairs, information of the intended change in
military operations. Under date of Paris, April 6th, 1779, he says, "I
have received intelligence that it is determined in the British cabinet
to send over immediate orders to New York for an expedition through the
Sound, up Connecticut River. The enemy are to land at Wethersfield, and
proceed by land to New Haven Bay, where they are to re-embark, after
having plundered, burned, and destroyed all in their way." Adverse
winds, and the capture of some of the papers sent by Lee, prevented the
Americans from receiving timely warning.

Having received the ministerial instructions, Sir Henry Clinton
proceeded to execute his orders. Governor Tryon was considered a very
proper instrument to perform the nefarious service, and a force of
twenty-six hundred men was put under his command, with Brigadier-general
Garth as his lieutenant. These were placed upon two ships of war (the
Camilla and Scorpion), with transports and tenders, forty-eight in
number, commanded by Commodore Sir George Collier, and toward evening of
the 3d of July they passed through Hell Gate into the Sound. On the 4th,
while the patriots on land were celebrating the adoption of the
Declaration of Independence, the two commanders joined in drawing up a
proclamation and an address to the inhabitants of Connecticut, inviting
and urging them to return to their allegiance, and promising ample
protection in person and property to those who should remain peaceably
in their dwellings, excepting the civil and military officers of the
rebel government. This address was sent on shore and distributed, but,
before the inhabitants had time to consult upon the public good, the
enemy was among them.

July, 1779Collier's fleet sailed up New Haven Bay on the night of the
4th, and early the next (Monday) morning landed in two divisions, those
under Tryon at East Haven, and those under Garth at West Haven. The
latter landed about sunrise, and im-

* This is a view of the spot where Garth landed, in Orange, formerly
West Haven. It is between three and four miles below New Haven, on the
western side of the harbor entrance, and is a place of considerable
resort in summer for the people of the city.

Alarm in New Haven.--Bravery of the Militia.--Battle on Milford Hill.--
West Bridge.--Death of Campbell.

423mediately prepared to march upon the town. Information of the
approach of the enemy having reached New Haven the previous evening,
preparations had been made for defense. All, however, was confusion and
alarm, and the care of families and property occupied those who
otherwise might have made a successful stand against the invaders. Many
of the inhabitants took refuge upon East Rock, where they remained until
the departure of the enemy.

The first opposition to the invaders was made by twenty-five of the
inhabitants of the town (some of whom were students of Yale College),
under Captain Hillhouse, who met an advanced party of the enemy on
Milford Hill. Already the West Bridge on the Milford Road had been
destroyed, some field pieces taken thither, and slight breast-works
thrown up

Although there was but a handful of Americans, they were animated by
such spirit, when they saw their homes and families in peril, that they
drove the advancing enemy nearly back to their landing-place, and took
one prisoner. The whole body of the invaders now moved forward, with
strong flanking parties and two field pieces. The cannons of the
Americans at West Bridge kept up such a brisk fire that the enemy dared
not venture further upon that road, but moved along Milford Hill,
northward to the Derby Road, to enter the town by that avenue. This
movement required a circuitous march of several miles. The first
attacking party of the Americans, continually augmenting, soon swelled
to a hundred and fifty, and a sharp conflict ensued with the enemy's
left flank, near the Milford Road. In this skirmish Major Campbell, the
British adjutant, was killed. He was singled out by a militia-man
concealed behind a rock, and fell, pierced by a musket-ball

* This view is from the Milford Road, eastward of West Bridge. The high
ground in the distance is Milford Hill, on which is seen the road,
directly over the umbrella. A little to the right of the road is the
spot where Major Campbell was buried. West Bridge is about a mile and a
half from the central part of New Haven.

** This rude memorial was erected in 1831, by J. W. Barber, Esq., of New
Haven, the historian of that city, and author of the Historical
Collections of Connecticut, as a tribute of respect for a meritorious
officer. It is about a foot and a half high. The site of Campbell's
grave was pointed out to Mr. Barber by the late Chauncy Ailing, who saw
him buried. Several Americans, who were killed at the same time, were
buried near. Their remains were afterward removed. Those of Adjutant
Campbell rest undisturbed.

Campbell's Grave.--Entrance of tbe Enemy into New Haven.--Dr. Daggett
and his Treatment--Landing of Tryon.

424near his heart. He was wrapped in a blanket, and carried upon a
sheep-litter to a house near by, where he expired. He was buried in a
shallow grave not far from the spot where he fell, on the summit of the
high ground near the intersection of the Milford and West Haven Roads,
in the southwest corner of a field known as _Campbell's Lot._

After the skirmish, the British pressed onward toward the Derby Road.
Eye-witnesses described their appearance from points near the city as
very brilliant; Milford Hill seemed all in a blaze, from the mingled
effects upon the eye of scarlet uniforms and glittering arms. The
Americans annoyed them exceedingly all the way to Thompson's Bridge (now
Westville), on the Derby Road, and the small force at West Bridge, under
Captain Phineas Bradley, hastened to that point to oppose their passage.
Bradley was too late; Garth had possession of the bridge and the
fording-places of the stream, and, after a sharp skirmish of ten
minutes, he drove the militia before him, and marched triumphantly into
the town between twelve and one o'clock. He had been piloted all the way
from the landing-place by a young Tory named William Chandler, who, with
his father and family, left New Haven when the enemy departed.

Among those who went out to the West Bridge and beyond, to oppose the
enemy, was the Rev. Dr. Daggett, * then late President of Yale College,
and a warm republican. Armed with a musket, he joined his friends to
oppose the common enemy. Near the West Bridge he was wounded and made a
prisoner, and, but for the interference of young Chandler, the Tory
guide, who had been a student in the college, he would doubtless have
been murdered. He was cruelly injured with bayonets, and by a severe
blow across the bowels with the butt of a musket, after he had
surrendered and begged for quarters. ** Yet his firmness did not forsake
him. While abused and cursed, he was asked whether, if released, he
would again take up arms against them, and replied, "I rather believe I
shall if I get an opportunity."

As soon as the boats that conveyed the first division of the enemy to
shore returned, the second division, under Tryon, consisting chiefly of
Hessians and Tories, landed, with two pieces of cannon, on the east side
of the harbor, where the light-house now stands. They marched up and
attacked the little fort on Black Rock (now Fort Hale), which was
defended by a feeble garrison of only nineteen men, with three pieces of
artillery. After a slight skirmish, the Americans were driven from the
post. The enemy then pushed toward the town, while their shipping drew
nearer and menaced the inhab-

* Naphtali Daggett was a native of Battleborough, Massachusetts. He
graduated at Yale College in 1748, and in 1756 was appointed professor
of divinity in that institution, whieh office he held until his death.
He officiated as president of the college from 1766 until 1777, when he
was succeeded by Dr. Stiles. He died November 25th, 1780, aged about
sixty years.

** "I was insulted," says the doctor, in his account preserved in MS. in
the office of the Secretary of State, at Hartford, "in the most shocking
manner by the ruffian soldiers, many of which came at me with fixed
bayonets, and swore they would kill me on the spot. They drove me with
the main body a hasty march of five miles or more. They damned me, those
that took me, because they spared my life. Thus, amid a thousand
insults, my infernal drivers hastened me along, faster than my strength
would admit in the extreme heat of the day, weakened as I was by my
wounds and the loss of blood, which, at a moderate computation, could
not be less than one quart. And when I failed, in some degree, through
faintness, he would strike me on the back with a heavy walking-staff,
and kick me behind with his foot. At length, by the supporting power of
God, I arrived at the Green, New Haven. But my life was almost spent,
the world around me several times appearing as dark as midnight. I
obtained leave of an officer to be carried into the Widow Lyman's and
laid upon a bed, where I lay the rest of the day and succeeding night,
in such acute and excruciating pain as I never felt before."

Conduct of the Enemy.--People on East Rock.--Evacuation by the British.-
-Destruction of Fairfield.

425itants with bombardment. At the bridge over Neck Creek (Tomlinson's
Bridge) the Americans made some resistance with a field piece, but were
soon obliged to yield to superior numbers and discipline. Before night
the town was completely possessed by the invaders. Throughout the
remainder of the day and night the soldiery committed many excesses and
crimes, plundering deserted houses, ravishing unprotected women, and
murdering several citizens, among whom were the venerable Mr. Beers, and
an aged and helpless man named English.

The general movements of the enemy through the day could be seen by the
fugitive inhabitants on East Neck, and gloomy indeed was the night they
passed there. Families were separated, for the men were generally
mustering from all parts of the adjacent country to expel the enemy.
Anxiously their hearts beat for kindred then in peril, and eagerly their
eyes were turned toward their homes, in momentary expectation of
beholding them in flames.

It was Garth's intention to burn the town. He declared, in a note to
Tryon, that the "conflagration it so richly deserved should commence as
soon as he should secure the Neck Bridge." But during the night he
changed his mind. Early on Sunday morning, a July 7, 1779perceiving the
militia collecting in large numbers, he called in his guards, and
retreated to his boats. Part of his troops went on board the ships, and
part crossed over to East Haven, where they joined Tryon's division.
Toward that point the militia now directed their attention. In the
afternoon, finding himself hard pressed by the citizen soldiers that
were flocking to New Haven from the adjacent country, Tryon ordered a
retreat to the shipping. Several buildings and some vessels and stores
were set on fire at East Haven when they left. At five o'clock the fleet
weighed anchor and sailed westward, carrying away about forty of the
inhabitants of the town.

The appetite of Tryon and his troops for pillage and murder was not
sated when, on the afternoon of the 7th, they embarked from Fort Rock,
now Fort Hale. * Sailing down the Sound, they anchored off the village
of Fairfield on the morning of the 8th. After a fog that lay upon the
waters had cleared away, they landed a little eastward of Kensie's
Point, at a place called the Pines, and marched immediately to the
village. Dr. Timothy Dwight has given a graphic description of the
destruction of the town. "On the 7th of July, 1779," he says, "Governor
Tryon, with the army I have already mentioned, sailed from New Haven to
Fairfield, and the next morning disembarked upon the beach. A few
militia assembled to oppose them, and, in a desultory, scattered manner,
fought with great intrepidity through most of the day. They killed some,
took several prisoners, and wounded more. But the expedition was so
sudden and unexpected, that efforts made in this manner were necessarily
fruitless. The town was plundered; a great part of the houses, together
with two churches, the court-house, jail, and school-houses, were
burned. The barns had just been filled with wheat and other produce. The
inhabitants, therefore, were turned out into the world almost literally
destitute.

"Mrs. Burr, the wife of Thaddeus Burr, Esq., high sheriff of the county,
resolved to continue in the mansion-house of the family, and make an
attempt to save it from conflagration The house stood at a sufficient
distance from other buildings. Mrs. Burr was adorned with all the
qualities which give distinction to her sex; possessed of fine
accomplishments, and a dignity of character scarcely rivaled; and
probably had never known what it was to be treated with disrespect, or
even with inattention. She made a personal application to Governor
Tryon, in terms which, from a lady of her high respectability, could
hardly have failed of a satisfactory answer from any person who claimed
the title of a gentleman. The answer which she actually received was,
however, rude and brutal, and spoke the want, not only of politeness and
humanity, but even of vulgar civility. The house was sentenced to the
flames, and was speedily set on fire. An attempt was made in the mean
time, by some

* Fort Hale is situated upon an insulated rock, two miles from the end
of Long Wharf, New Haven. It was named in honor of Captain Nathan Hale,
one of the early Revolutionary martyrs. The Americans had a battery of
three guns upon this point, which greatly annoyed the enemy when landing

Dwight's Account of the Destruction of Fairfield.--Tryon's Apology.--
Extent of the Destruction.--The Buckley House.

426of the soldiery, to rob her of a valuable watch, with rich furniture;
for Governor Tryon refused to protect her, as well as to preserve the
house. The watch had been already conveyed out of their reach; but the
house, filled with every thing which contributes either to comfort or
elegance of living, was laid in ashes.

"While the town was in flames a thunder-storm overspread the heavens,
just as night came on. The conflagration of near two hundred houses
illumined the earth, the skirts of the clouds, and the waves of the
Sound with a union of gloom and grandeur at once inexpressibly awful and
magnificent. The sky speedily was hung with the deepest darkness
Wherever the clouds were not tinged by the melancholy luster of the
flames. The thunder rolled above. Beneath, the roaring of the fires
filled up the intervals with a deep and hollow sound, which seemed to be
the protracted murmur of the thunder reverberated from one end of heaven
to the other. Add to this convulsion of the elements, and these dreadful
effects of vindictive and wanton devastation, the trembling of the
earth, the sharp sound of muskets occasionally discharged, the groans
here and there of the wounded and dying, and the shouts of triumph; then
place before your eyes crowds of the miserable sufferers, mingled with
bodies of the militia, and from the neighboring hills taking a farewell
prospect of their property and their dwellings, their happiness and
their hopes, and you will form a just, but imperfect, picture of the
burning of Fairfield. It needed no great effort of imagination to
believe that the final day had arrived, and that, amid this funereal
darkness, the morning would speedily dawn to which no night would ever
succeed; the graves yield up their inhabitants; and the trial commence,
at which was to be finally settled the destiny of man.

"The apology made by Governor Tryon for this Indian effort was conveyed
in the following sentence: 'The village was burned, to resent the fire
of the rebels from their houses, and to mask our retreat.' This
declaration unequivocally proves that the rebels were troublesome to
their invaders, and at the same time is to be considered as the best
apology which they are able to make. But it contains a palpable
falsehood, intended to justify conduct which admits of no excuse, and
rejects with disdain every attempt at palliation. Why did this body of
men land at Fairfield at all? There were here no stores, no fortress, no
enemy, except such as were to be found in every village throughout the
United States. It was undoubtedly the original object of the expedition
to set fire to this town, and the apology was created after the work was
done. It was perfectly unnecessary to mask the retreat. The townsmen,
and the little collection of farmers assembled to aid them, had no power
to disturb it. No British officer, no British soldier would confess
that, in these circumstances, he felt the least anxiety concerning any
molestation from such opposers. The next morning the troops re-embarked,
and, proceeding to Green's Farms, set fire to the church and consumed
it, together with fifteen dwelling-houses, eleven barns, and several
stores." *

The Hessians who accompanied Tryon were his incendiaries. To them he
intrusted the wielding of the torch, and faithfully they obeyed their
master.

When the people fled from the town, not expecting that their houses
would be burned, they left most of their furniture behind. The distress
was consequently great, for many lost every earthly possession.

Among the buildings saved was that

* Dwight's Travels in New England, in., 512. According to a document in
the office of the Secretary of State of Connecticut, the number of
buildings destroyed was ninety-seven dwellings, sixty-seven barns,
forty-eight stores, two school-houses, one county-house, two meeting-
houses, and one Episcopal Church.

* This building stood upon the eastern side of the Green, fronting the
church. It was demolished three or four years ago, having stood more
than a century and a half. The engraving is a copy, by permission of the
author, from Barber's Historical Collections of Connecticut, page 353.
Tryon lodged in the upper room on the right of the main building.

Treatment of Mrs. Buckley.--Interference of General Silliman.--
Humphreys's Elegy on the Burning of Fairfield

427of Mr. Buckley, pictured in the engraving. Tryon made it his head-
quarters. The naval officer who had charge of the British ships, and
piloted them to Fairfield, was Mrs. Buckley's brother, and he had
requested Tryon to spare the house of his sister. Tryon acquiesced, and,
feeling his indebtedness to her brother, the general informed Mrs.
Buckley that if there was any other house she wished to save she should
be gratified. After the enemy left, the enraged militia, under Captain
Sturges, placed a field piece in front of the dwelling, and then sent
Mrs Buckley word that she might have two hours to clear the house, and
leave it, or they would blow her to atoms. She found means to
communicate a notice of her situation to General Silliman, who was about
two miles distant. He immediately went to the town, and found one
hundred and fifty men at the cannon. By threats and persuasion he
induced them to withdraw. The next day Colonel Benjamin Tallmadge, with
his regiment, arrived from White Plains, and, encamping on the smoking
ruins, made Tryon's quarters his own. *

The cruelties committed upon helpless women and children, and the wanton
destruction of property, at Fairfield, were worthy only of savages, and
made the name of Tryon a synonym for every thing infernal. The passions
of the soldiery were excited by strong drink, and murder, pillage, and
brutal violence to women were their employment throughout the night.
Like similar outrages elsewhere, these awakened the strongest feelings
of hatred and revenge against the common enemy, and the pen, the pulpit,
and the forum sent forth their righteous denunciations. Colonel David
Humphreys, the soldier-poet of the Revolution, visited the scene of
destruction soon after the event, and wrote the following elegy while on
the spot.

"Ye smoking ruins, marks of hostile ire,

Ye ashes warm, which drink the tears that flow,

Ye desolated plains, my voice inspire,

And give soft music to the song of woe.

How pleasant, Fairfield, on the enraptured sight

Rose thy tall spires and oped thy social halls!

How oft my bosom beat with pure delight

At yonder spot where stand thy darken'd walls!

But there the voice of mirth resounds no more.

A silent sadness through the streets prevails;

The distant main alone is heard to roar,

The hollow chimneys hum with sudden gales--

Save where scorch'd elms the untimely foliage shed,

Which, rustling, hovers round the faded green--

Save where, at twilight, mourners frequent tread,

Mid recent graves, o'er desolation's scene.

How changed the blissful prospect when compared,

These glooms funereal, with thy former bloom,

Thy hospitable rights when Tryon shared,

Long ere he seal'd thy melancholy doom.

That impious wretch with coward voice decreed

Defenseless domes and hallow'd fanes to dust;

Beheld, with sneering smile, the wounded bleed,

And spurr'd his bands to rapine, blood, and last.

Vain was the widow's, vain the orphan's cry,

To touch his feelings or to soothe his rage--

Vain the fair drop that roll'd from beauty's eye,

Vain the dumb grief of supplicating age.

Could Tryon hope to quench the patriot flame,

Or make his deeds survive in glory's page?

Could Britons seek of savages the same,

Or deem it conquest thus the war to wage?

* Mrs. Buckley was not a friend of the enemy. According to her
testimony, under oath, she was badly treated by the soldiery,
notwithstanding she had a protection from General Garth, the second in
command. They plundered her house, stripped her buckles from her shoes,
tore a ring from her finger, and fired the house five times before
leaving it.--See Hinman's Historical Collections, p. 620.

Tryon's Retreat from Failfield.--Journey resumed.--Return to New Haven.-
-Visit to West Bridge and other Localities.

428

Yes. Britons scorn the councils of the skies,

Extend wide havoc, spurn the insulted foes;

The insulted foes to ten-fold vengeance rise,

Resistance growing as the danger grows.

Red in their wounds, and pointing to the plain,

The visionary shapes before me stand;

The thunder bursts, the battle burns again,

And kindling fires encrimson all the strand.

Long, dusky wreaths of smoke, reluctant driven,

In black'ning volumes o'er the landscape bend:

Here the broad splendor blazes high to heaven,

There umber'd streams in purple pomp ascend.

In fiery eddies round the tott'ring walls,

Emitting sparks, the lighter fragments fly,

With frightful crash the burning mansion falls,

The works of years in glowing embers lie.

Tryon, behold thy sanguine flames aspire,

Clouds tinged with dies intolerably bright:

Behold, well pleased, the village wrapp'd in fire,

Let one wide ruin glut thy ravish'd sight!

Ere fades the grateful scene, indulge thine eyes,

See age and sickness tremulously slow

Creep from the flames. See babes in torture die,

And mothers swoon in agonies of woe.

Go, gaze enraptured with the mother's tear,

The infant's terror, and the captive's pain;

Where no hold bands can cheek thy cursed career,

Mix fire with blood on each unguarded plain!

These be thy triumphs, this thy boasted fame!

Daughters of mem'ry, raise the deathless song,

Repeat through endless years his hated name,

Embalm his crimes, and teach the world our wrong."

Large numbers of militia had collected in the neighborhood of Fairfield
on the morning of the 9th, and at eight o'clock Tryon sounded a retreat
to the shipping. His troops were galled very much by the militia, and it
was noon before all were embarked. At three in the afternoon they
weighed anchor and sailed over to Huntington, Long Island, whence they
made a descent upon, and destroyed, Norwalk.

We will close the record and hasten from the mountain, for

"'Tis Sabbath morn, and lingering on the gale

The mellow'd peals of the sweet bells arise,

Floating where'er the restless wands prevail,

Laden with incense and with harmonies,"

and inviting me back to the city and the open sanctuary. I arrived in
time for a luncheon breakfast, and to listen to an eloquent sermon in
Trinity Church on the College Green, from a stripling deacon who had
just taken orders. The afternoon was warm and lowery, the rain came
pattering down in the evening, and the next morning a nor'easter was
piping its melancholy notes among the stately elms of the city, * while
the rain poured as if Aquarius had overturned his water-jar.

There was a lull in the storm about nine o'clock, and, accompanied by
Mr. Barber, the artist-author, in a covered wagon, I visited some of the
points of interest about the city. We first rode to the West Bridge on
West River, near which the Americans made their first stand against
General Garth, and in the midst of a heavy dash of rain made the sketch
on page 423. Returning to the city, we visited the dwelling of Arnold,
Neck Bridge, and the

Cemetery. In the latter, a large and beautiful "city of the dead," lie
many illustrious remains, among which are those of Colonel David
Humphreys, one of Washington's aids.

* The fine elms which shade the public square and vicinity were planted
by the Rev. David Austin and Hon. James Hillhouse. They are the pride of
New Haven, and have conferred upon it the title of The city of Elms.

The Cemetery.--Humphreys's Monument.--The Grave of Arnold's Wife.--Her
Character.--Colonel Humphreys.

429They lie near the southwestern part of the Cemetery, and over them
stands a fine monument consisting of a granite obelisk and pedestal,
about twelve feet in height.

Upon two tablets of copper, inserted in the pedestal, is the following
inscription, written by his friend, the author of M'Fingal: "David
Humphreys, LL.D., Acad. Scient. Philad., Mass., at Connect., *

In the northeast section of the Cemetery is a dark stone, neatly carved
with an ornamental border, sacred to the memory of Margaret, the first
wife of Benedict Arnold, who died on the 19th of June, 1775, while her
husband was upon Lake Champlain. Her maiden name was Mansfield, and by
her Arnold had three sons. She was thirty-one years old when she died.
She is represented as a woman of the most fervent piety, exalted
patriotism, gentleness of manners, and sweetness of disposition. These
qualities are powerful checks upon unruly passions, particularly when
exerted in the intimate relation of husband and wife. Had she lived
until the close of the Revolution, far different might have been the
fate of her husband, for there is little doubt that his resentments
against Congress and the managers of military affairs for two years
previous to his treason were fostered

* Mr. Barber gives the following translation: "David Humphreys, doctor
of laws, member of the Academy of Sciences of Philadelphia,
Massachusetts, and Connecticut, of the Bath [Agricultural Society] and
of the Royal Society of London. Fired with the love of country and of
liberty, he consecrated his youth wholly to the service of the republic,
which he defended by his arms, aided by his counsels, adorned by his
learning, and preserved in harmony with foreign nations. In the field he
was the companion and aid of the great Washington, a colonel in the army
of his country, and commander of the veteran volunteers of Connecticut.
He went embassador to the courts of Portugal and Spain, and, returning,
enriched his native land with the true golden fleece.* He was a
distinguished historian and poet; a model and a patron of science, and
of the ornamental and useful arts. After a full discharge of every duty,
and a life well spent, he died on the 21st day of February, 1818, aged
sixty-five years." To complete the brief biography given in this
inscription, I will add that Colonel Humphreys was born in Derby,
Connecticut, in 1753, and graduated at Yale College in 1771. He soon
afterward went to reside with Colonel Phillips, of Phillips's Manor, New
York. He joined the Continental army, and in 1778 was one of General
Putnam's aids, with the rank of maior. Washington appointed him his aid
in 1780, and he remained in the military family of the chief until the
close of the war. For his valor at Yorktown, Congress honored him with a
sword. He accompanied Jefferson to Paris, as secretary of legation, in
1784. Kosciusko accompanied them. He was a member of the Legislature of
Connecticut in 1786, and about that time lie, Barlow, and Hopkins wrote
the Anarchiad. From 1788 until he was appointed minister to Portugal, in
1790, he resided with Washington at Mount Vernon. He was appointed
minister plenipotentiary to Spain in 1794; married the daughter of a
wealthy English gentleman at Lisbon in 1797; returned in 1801, and for
ten years devoted his time to agriculture. In 1812 he took the command
of the militia of Connecticut. His death was sudden, caused by an
organic disease of the heart. His literary attainments were
considerable. Besides several poems, he wrote some political pamphlets;
and in 1788, while at Mount Vernon, completed a life of Putnam, a large
portion of the material of which he received from the lips of the
veteran.

* This is in allusion to the fact that Colonel Humphreys was the man who
introduced merino sheep into the United Stales, he sent over from Spain
a flock of one hundred in 1801.

Arnold's Disaffection.--Dr. Eneas Munson.--Death of Colonel Scammell.--
His Epitaph by Humphreys.

430by his intercourse with the Tory friends of his second wife, Margaret
Shippen, of Philadelphia.

Indeed, the Loyalists claimed him for a friend as early as December,
1778. Charles Stewart, writing to Joseph Galloway, said, "General Arnold
is in Philadelphia. It is said that he will be discharged, being thought
a pert Tory. Certain it is that he associates mostly with these people."

On leaving the Cemetery, we called upon the venerable Eneas Munson,
M.D., a vigorous relic of the Revolution. He lived until August, 1852,
when more than eighty-nine years ol age. He was Dr. Thacher's assistant
in the Continental army, and was present at the siege of Yorktown and
the surrender of Cornwallis, in October, 1781. He was then a surgeon in
Colonel Seammell's regiment, which, in that action, was attached to
General Hamilton's brigade.

During the siege Colonel Scammell was shot by a Hessian cav officer,
while reconnoitering a small redoubt on a point of land which had been
alternately in possession of the Americans and British. It was just at
twilight, and, while making careful observations, two Hessian horsemen
came suddenly upon him, and presented their pistols. Perceiving that
there was no chance for escape, he surrendered, saying, "Gentlemen, I am
your prisoner." Either because they did not understand his words, or
actuated by that want of humanity which generally characterized those
mercernaries, one of them fired, and wounded the colonel mortally. He
was carried to Williamsburg, and Dr. Munson was the first surgeon in
attendance upon him. He died there on the 6th of October. Colonel
Humphreys (to whose regiment Dr. Munson was attached after the death of
Scammell) wrote the following poetic epitaph for the tomb of his friend.
I do not know whether the lines were ever inscribed upon marble, or
recorded by the pen of history by Dr. Munson, and I give them as a
memorial of a brave and accomplished officer of the Revolution.

* This portrait is from a Daguerreotype kindly lent me by Dr. Munson,
with permission to copy it

Nathan Beers.--Yale College.--Its political Character in the
Revolution.--A Tory Student

431

"What though no friend could ward thine early fall,

Nor guardian angels turn the treacherous ball;

Bless'd shade, be soothed! Thy virtues all are known--

Thy fame shall last beyond this mouldering stone,

Which conquering armies, from their toils return,

Read to thy glory while thy fate they mourn."

A drawing of the place where Scammell was killed, and a biographical
sketch of that officer, are given in the notice of my visit to Yorktown.
Dr. Munson died in October, 1852.

A few doors from Dr. Munson, in the same street, lived the almost
centenarian, Nathan Beers, who was paymaster in Scammell's regiment at
Yorktown. He was ninety-six years old, and completely demented; second
childhood, with all its trials for the subject and his friends, was his
lot; yet did I look with reverence upon that thin visage and "lack-
luster eye." where once were indices of a noble mind within. A truer
patriot never drew blade for his country, and, above all, he was "an
honest man, the noblest work of God. For years he struggled with the
misfortunes of life, and became involved in debt. At length Congress
made a decision in his favor respecting a claim for a pension as
paymaster in the Continental army, and arrearages amounting to some
thousands of dollars were awarded him. There was enough to give him a
competence in his old age, but even this reward for public services he
handed over to his creditors. He has since gone to receive the final
recompense of the patriot and Christian. He died on the 10th. of
February, 1849, aged almost 98.

After a short visit to the Trumbull Gallery of Paintings and the Library
of Yale College, * I returned to my lodgings, and at four o'clock in the
afternoon departed in the cars for Hartford.

* Yale College, aside from its intrinsic worth as a seminary of
learning, is remarkable for the great number of the leading men of the
Revolution who were educated within its walls. That warm and consistent
patriot, President Daggett, gave a political tone to the establishment
favorable to the republican cause, and it was regarded as the nursery of
Whig principles during the Revolution. When New Haven was invaded by
Tryon, Yale College was marked for special vengeance, but, as we have
seen, the invaders retreated hastily without burning the town. There
were very few among the students, during our war for independence, who
were imbued with Tory principles, and they were generally, if known,
rather harshly dealt with.

* One instance may suffice to show the spirit of the times. In June,
1775, a student named Abiather Camp was reported unfriendly to Congress.
A committee of investigation was appointed, who wrote a very polite note
to the young gentleman, setting forth the charges made against him, and
demanding an explicit denial, if the report was untrue. The young scape-
grace returned the following answer:

"New Haven, June 13,1775.

"To the Honorable and Respectable Gentlemen of the Committee now
residing in Yale College: "May it please your honors, ham--ham--ham.

"Finis cumsistula, popularum gig--

A man without a head has no need of a wig.

"Abiather Camp."

* The insulted committee resolved to advertise Camp as an enemy to his
country, and to treat him with all possible scorn and neglect. Such
advertisement was posted upon the hall door. He braved public opinion
until October, when he recanted, and publicly asked pardon for his
offenses.

* Yale College was founded by ten principal ministers in the colony, who
met for the purpose, at New Haven, in 1700. Each brought a number of
books at their next meeting in 1701, and, presenting them to the
society, said, "I give these books for the founding of a college in the
colony." A proposition to found a college had been named fifty years
before. The first commencement was held at Saybrook, in 1702. In 1717
the first college building was erected in New Haven. It was seventy feet
long and twenty-two wide. From time to time several liberal endowments
have been made to the institution, the earliest and most munificent of
which was from Elihu Yale, in whose honor the college was named. Among
its distinguished benefactors were Sir Isaac Newton, Dean Berkley,
Bishop Burnet, Halley, Edwards, &c. The present imposing pile was
commenced in 1750. Additions have been made at different times, and it
now consists of four spacious edifices, each four stories high, one
hundred and four by forty feet on the ground; a chapel, lyceum,
atheneum, chemical laboratory, dining-hall, and a dwelling-house for the
president.

New England and its Associations.--Arrival at Hartford.--Continuation of
the Storm.

432

CHAPTER XIX

"Land of the forest and the rock--

Of dark blue lake and mighty river--

Of mountains rear'd aloft to mock

The storm's career, the lightning's shock:

My own green land forever.

Oh! never may a son of thine,

Where'er his wandering steps incline,

Forget the sky which bent above

His childhood like a dream of love--

The stream beneath the green hill flowing--

The broad-armed trees above it growing--

The clear breeze through the foliage blowing,

Or hear, unmoved, the taunt of scorn

Breathed o'er the brave New England born."

Whittier

LTHOUGH much of the soil of New England is rough and sterile, and labor-
-hard and unceasing labor--is necessary to procure subsistence for its
teeming population, in no part of our republic can be found stronger
birthplace attachments. It is no sentiment of recent growth, springing
up under the influence of the genial warmth of our free institutions,
but ante-dates our Revolution, and was prominently manifest in colonial
This sentiment, strong and vigorous, gave birth to that zealous
patriotism which distinguished the people of the Eastern States during
the ten years preceding the war for independence, and the seven years of
that contest. Republicanism seemed to be indigenous to the soil, and the
people appeared to inhale the air of freedom at every breath. Every
where upon the Connecticut, and eastward, loyalty to the sovereign--a
commendable virtue in a people governed by a righteous prince--was
changed by kingly oppression into loyalty to a high and holy principle,
and hallowed, for all time, the region where it flourished. To a pilgrim
on an errand like mine the rough hills and smiling valleys of New
England are sanctuaries for patriot worship; and as our long train swept
over the sandy plain of New Haven, and coursed among the hills of
Wallingford and Meriden, an emotion stirred the breast akin to that of
the Jew of old when going up to Jerusalem to _the Great Feast_. A day's
journey before me was Boston--the city of the pilgrims, the nursery of
liberty cradled in the May Flower, the first altar-place of freedom in
the Western World.

The storm, which had abated for a few hours at mid-day, came down with
increased violence, and the wind-eddies wrapped the cars in such wreaths
of smoke from the engine, that only an occasional glimpse of the country
could be obtained. It was almost dark when we October 2, 1848 reached
Hartford, upon the Connecticut River, thirty-six miles northward of New
Haven; where, sick and weary from the effects of exposure and fatigue
during the morning, a glowing grate and an "old arm-chair" in a snug
room at the "United States" were, under the circumstances, comforts
which a prince might covet. Let us close the shutters against the
impotent gusts, and pass the evening with the chroniclers of Hartford
and its vicinage.

Hartford (Suckiag), and Wethersfield, four miles distant, were the
earliest settlements in Connecticut. In 1633 the Dutch from Nieu
Amsterdam went up the Connecticut River,

First Settlement at Hartford. First Meeting house in Connecticut.--
Government organized. Union of New England Colonies

433and established a trading-house and built a small fort on the south
side of the Mill River, at its junction with the Connecticut, near the
site of Hartford. The place is still known as Dutch Point.

About the same time William Holmes and others of the Plymouth colony
sailed up the Connecticut, in a vessel having the frame of a dwelling on
board, and, landing on the west side, near the present Windsor, erected
the first house built in Connecticut. The Dutch threatened to fire on
them, but they were allowed to pass by. In 1635, John Steele and others,
under the auspices of Rev. Thomas Hooker, of Cambridge, reached Holmes's
residence, and began a settlement near. Hooker and his wife, with about
one hundred men, women, and children of his flock, left Cambridge the
following year, and marched June 1636 through the wilderness westward to
the pioneer settlement, subsisting, on the journey, upon the milk of a
herd of cows which they drove before them. Over hills and mountains,
through thickets and marshes, they made their way, with no guide but a
compass, no shelter but the heavens and the trees, no bed save the bare
earth, relying upon Divine Providence and their own indomitable
perseverance for success. The first house of worship was erected the
previous year, and on the 9th of July, 1636, Mr. Hooker first preached,
and administered the holy communion there.

The Dutch looked upon the new-comers as intruders, while the English
settlers in turn regarded the Dutch in that light, because the whole
country north of 40° belonged, by chartered rights, to the Plymouth and
Massachusetts Companies. Much animosity existed for several years, the
Dutch refusing to submit to the laws framed by the English colony, and
often threatening hostilities against them. Finally, in 1654, an order
arrived from Parliament requiring the English colony to regard the
Dutch, in all respects, as enemies. In conformity to this order, the
Dutch trading-house, fort, and all their lands were sequestered for the
benefit of the commonwealth. The Dutch then withdrew.

The first court, or regularly organized government, in Connecticut, was
held at Hartford in the spring of 1636. The people were under the
general government of Massachusetts, but were allowed to have minor
courts of their own, empowered to make war or peace, and form alliances
with the natives within the colony. The English settlement was not
fairly seated, before the Pequots, already mentioned, disturbed it with
menaces of destruction. The Pequot war ensued in 1637, and, although it
involved the colony in debt, and caused a present scarcity of
provisions, it established peace for many years, and was ultimately
beneficial.

In January, 1639, a convention of the free planters of Connecticut was
held at Hartford, and a distinct commonwealth was formed. They adopted a
constitution of civil government, which was organized in April
following, by the election of John Haynes governor, and six magistrates.
In 1642 their criminal code, founded upon Jewish laws as developed in
the Scripture, was completed and entered on record. By this code the
death penalty was incurred by those guilty of worshiping any but the one
true God; of witchcraft; blasphemy; willful murder, except in defense of
life; man-stealing; false swearing, by which a man's life might be
forfeited; unchastity of various grades; cursing or smiting of parents
by a child over sixteen years of age, except when it could be shown that
the child's training had been neglected or the parents were guilty of
cruel treatment; and of a stubborn disobedience of parents by a son over
sixteen years of age.

The following year the colonies of Massachusetts, Plymouth, Connecticut
(as Hartford was called), and New Haven confederated for their mutual
safety and welfare, and called themselves the United Colonies of Neiv
England.' Each colony was author-

* This picture of the first house for Christian worship erected in
Connecticut is copied from Barber's Historical Collections. He obtained
the drawing from an antiquary of Hartford, and believes it correct.

** The term New England was first applied by Captain John Smith,
according to the dedicatory epistle to the "First Sermon preached in New
England" by Robert Cushman. "It was so called," says the address.
"because of the resemblance that is in it of England, the native soil of
Englishmen. It being much what the same for heat and cold in summer and
winter, it being champaign ground, but no high mountains, somewhat like
the soil in Kent and Essex; full of dales and meadow grounds, full of
rivers and sweet springs, as England is. But principally, so far as we
can yet find, it is an island, and near about the quantity of England,
cut out from the main land in America, as England is from Europe, by a
great arm of the sea, which entereth in 40°, and runneth up north and
west by west, and goeth out either into the South Sea or else into the
Bay of Canada. The certainty whereof and secrets of which we have not
yet so found as that as eye-witnesses we can make narration thereof;
but, if God give time and means, we shall, ere long, discover both the
extent of that river, together with the secrets thereof, and so try what
territories, habitations, or commodities may be found either in it or
about it." This address was written, and the sermon preached at
Plymouth, in December, 1621. By the Bay of Canada is meant the St.
Lawrence, and by the "great arm of the sea." the Hudson River. The
explorations of Hendrick Hudson in 1609 seem not to have been known to
the worthy divine, and he imagined a connection between the Hudson and
St. Lawrence, by which New England was made an island.

Conjunction of New Haven and Connecticut Colonies.--James II.--Quo
Warranto.--Governor Andross.--The "Charter Oak.'

434ized to send two commissioners to meet annually in September, first
at Boston, and then at Hartford, New Haven, and Plymouth, with power to
make war and peace, and enact federal laws for the general good. This
union was productive of great benefit, for it made the united
settlements formidable in opposition to their enemies, the Dutch and
Indians.

In 1662, Charles II. granted a charter to the Connecticut colony, by
which the New Haven colony was included within that of the former. At
first there was much dissatisfaction, but in 1655 the two colonies
joined in an amicable election of officers, and chose John Winthrop for
governor.

Charles was succeeded by his brother James, a bigoted, narrow-minded,
and unjust prince. Many of his advisers were ambitious and unprincipled
men, scheming for the consolidation of power in the person of the king.
Immediately on the accession of James, they arranged a plan for
procuring a surrender of all the patents of the New England colonies,
and forming the whole northern part of America into twelve provinces,
with a governor general over  a July, 1683 the whole. Writs of _quo
warranto_ were accordingly issued, (a) requiring the several colonies to
appear, by representatives, before his majesty's council, to show by
what right they exercised certain powers and privileges. * The colony of
Connecticut sent an agent to England with a petition and remonstrances
to the king. The mission was vain, for already the decree had gone forth
for annulling the charters. Sir Edmund Andross was appointed the first
governor general, and arrived at Boston in December, 1686. He
immediately demanded the surrender of the charter of Connecticut, and it
was refused. Nearly a year elapsed, and meanwhile Andross began to play
the tyrant. His first fair promises to the people were broken, and,
supported by royal authority, he assumed a dignity and importance almost
equal to his master's, thoroughly disgusting the colonists.

In October, 1687, he went to Hartford with a company of soldiers while
the Assembly was in session, and demanded an immediate surrender of
their charter. Sir Edmund was received with apparent respect by the
members, and in his presence the subject of his demand was calmly
debated until evening. The charter was then brought forth and placed
upon the table around which the members were sitting. Andross was about
to seize it, when the lights were suddenly extinguished. A large
concourse of people had assembled without, and the moment the lights
disappeared

* A writ of quo warranto issues against any person or corporation that
usurps any franchise or liberty against the king without good title, and
is brought against the usurpers to show by what right and title they
hold and claim such franchise and liberty.--Law Dictionary.

** This venerable relic is still vigorous, and is a "gnarled oak"
indeed. It stands upon the northern slope of the Wyllys Hill, a
beautiful elevation on the south side of Charter Street, a few rods east
of Main Street. This engraving is from a sketch which I made of the tree
from Charter Street, on the 3d of October, 1848. Omitted the picket
fence in front, in order to show the appearance of the whole trunk. The
opening of the cavity wherein the charter was concealed is seen near the
roots. The heavy wind that had been blowing for thirty hours had
stripped the tree of a large portion of its autumnal leaves, and strewn
the ground with acorns. The trunk, near the roots, is twenty-five feet
in circumference. A daughter of Secretary Wyllys, writing to Dr. Holmes
about the year 1800, says of this oak, "The first inhabitant of that
name [Wyllys] found it standing in the height of its glory. Age seems to
have curtailed its branches, yet it is not exceeded in the height of its
coloring or richness of its foliage.... The cavity, which was the asylum
of our charter, was near the roots, and large enough to admit a child.
Within the space of eight years that cavity has closed, as it it had
fulfilled the divine purpose for which it had been reared." The cavity
within remains as large as anciently, but the orifice will hardly admit
a hand.

Concealment of the Charter.--Expulsion of Andross.--Accident at
Hartford.--Washington's Conference with Rochambeau.

435they raised a load huzza, and several entered the chamber. Captain
Wadsworth, of Hartford, seized the charter, and, unobserved, carried it
off and deposited it in the hollow trunk of a large oak-tree fronting
the house of Hon. Samuel Wyllys, then one of the magistrates of that
colony. The candles were relighted, quiet was restored, and Andross
eagerly sought the coveted parchment. It was gone, and none could, or
would, reveal its hiding-place. Sir Edmund stormed for a time, and
threatened the colony with royal displeasure; then quietly taking
possession of the government, he closed the records of the court,
October 31, 1687 or Assembly, with a simple annunciation of the fact.

The administration of Andross was short. His royal master was driven
from his throne and country the next year, and his minion in America was
arrested, and con 1685 fined in the Castle, near Boston, until February,
1689, when he was sent to England for trial. Able jurists in England
having decided that, as Connecticut had never given up her charter, it
remained in full force, the former government was re-established. From
that time until the Revolution no important events of general interest
occurred at Hartford. A melancholy accident occurred there in May, 1766,
on the occasion of rejoicings because of the repeal of the Stamp Act.
The day had been spent in hilarity. Bells, cannons, and huzzas had
testified the general and excessive joy, and great preparations were
making for bonfires, fire-works, and a general illumination. In the
chamber of a brick school-house that stood where the Hartford Hotel was
afterward built, a number of young men were preparing fire-works in the
evening. Under the house was a quantity of gunpowder, from which the
militia had received supplies during the day. The powder had been
scattered from the building to the street. Some boys accidentally set it
on fire, and immediately the building was reduced to a ruin; several of
the inmates were killed, and many badly wounded.

The most important occurrences of general interest at Hartford, during
the Revolution, were the two conferences between Washington and the
Count de Rochambeau, the commander of the French army in America. The
first interview was on the 21st of September, 1780, the second on the
23d of May, 1781. The French fleet, under the command of the Chevalier
de Ternay, conveying the troops sent to our shores by Louis XVI. of
France to aid us, arrived at Newport in July, 1780; and the conference
of Washington with Rochambeau and Ternay, in September following, was to
consult upon future operations. * This interview resulted in the
conclusion that the season was too far advanced for the allies to
perform any thing of importance, and, after making some general
arrangements for the next campaign, Washington returned to his camp at
West Point, in the Hudson Highlands. It was during his absence at
Hartford that Arnold attempted to surrender West Point and its
subordinate posts into the hands of the enemy.

The second conference between Washington and Rochambeau was at
Wethersfield, four miles below Hartford. Rochambeau and General the
Marquis de Chastellux, with their suites, arrived at Hartford on the
21st of May, where they were met by Wash-

* At that time the French fleet was blockaded in Narraganset Bay by a
superior English squadron. Ternay was quite dissatisfied with his
situation, and wrote very discouraging letters to the Count de
Vergennes, the French premier. In one (written September 10th, 1780),
from Newport, he said, "We are actually compelled to remain on a very
strict defensive. The English squadron is superior in number and in
every other respect. The fate of North America is yet very uncertain,
and the Revolution is not so far advanced as it has been believed in
Europe." An account of the negotiations and other circumstances
connected with the sending of troops from France to aid in the
Revolution will be given in a future chapter, devoted to the subject of
the diplomacy of the United States during the war for independence.

Conference at the Webb House.--Its Object--Junction of the allied
Armies.--Attempt on New York.--Windsor.

436ington, and Generals Knox and Du Portail, and their suites. The
meeting was celebrated by discharges of cannon; and, after partaking of
refreshments, the officers, with several private gentlemen as an escort,
rode to Wethersfield. Washington lodged at the house of Mr. Joseph Webb,
* in Wethersfield, and there the conference was held.

The object of the interview was to concert a plan of operations for the
ensuing campaign. The minutes of the conference are in the form of
queries by Rochambeau, which were answered by Washington. The conclusion
of the matter was an arrangement for the French army to march as
speedily as possible to the Hudson River, and form a junction with the
American army encamped there, for the purpose of making a demonstration
upon the city of New York, if practicable. An expedition southward seems
to have been proposed by the French officers, but this idea was
abandoned on account of the lateness of the season, and the danger to
which northern troops would be exposed in the Southern States in summer.
It was also agreed to send to the West Indies for the squadron, under
Count de Grasse, to sail immediately to Sandy Hook, and, forming a
junction with the fleet under Count de Barras, confine Admiral Arbuthnot
to New York Bay, and act in concert with the combined armies in
besieging the city, then the strong-hold of the enemy. The French troops
consisted of about four thousand men, exclusive of two hundred that were
to be left in charge of stores at Providence. A circular letter was sent
by Washington to the Eastern Legislatures, and to that of New Jersey,
requesting them to supply as large a quota of Continental troops as
possible. Such a force as he felt sure could be mustered, Washington
deemed adequate to undertake the siege of New York; and, on his return
from Wethersfield, he began his arrangements for the enterprise. The two
armies formed a junction near Dobbs's Ferry, at the beginning of July.
After several ineffectual attempts upon the upper end of York Island,
circumstances caused Washington to abandon the enterprise. The arrival
of a reenforcement for Clinton in New York, the expressed determination
of De Grasse to sail for the Chesapeake, and the peculiar situation of
affairs in Virginia, where Cornwallis and La Fayette were operating
against each other, induced Washington to march south with the combined
armies. The result was the siege of Yorktown and capture of Cornwallis.

The storm was raging as furiously as ever on the morning after my
arrival in Hartford, and I abandoned the idea of visiting Wethersfield
and Windsor. *** With a letter of introduction to the Rev. Thomas
Robbins, the librarian of the Connecticut Historical Society, I vis-

* "May 18th. Set out this day for the interview at Wethersfield with the
Count de Rochambeau and Admiral Barras. Reached Morgan's Tavern, forty-
three miles from Fishkill Landing, after dining at Colonel Vanderburg's.
19th. Breakfasted at Litchfield, dined at Farmington, and lodged at
Wethersfield, at the house of Mr. Joseph Webb."--Washington's Diary. The
Count Barras was prevented from attending the meeting by the appearance
of a large British fleet, under Admiral Arbuthnot, off Block Island. The
residence of Colonel Vanderburg, where Washington dined, was at
Poughquag, in Beekman, Dutchess county.

* This house is still standing (1848), in the central part of
Wethersfield, a few rods south of the Congregational Church.

*** Windsor is situated upon the Connecticut, a little above Hartford,
at the mouth of the Farmington River. Here was planted the first English
settlement in Connecticut, for here the first house was built. It was
the egg from which sprang Hartford and the Connecticut colony. East
Windsor, on the east side of the Connecticut, has a notoriety in our
Revolutionary annals, on account of its being, for a short time, the
quarters of a portion of the British and Hessian troops of Burgoyne's
captured army, on their way to Boston; also as the quarters of Governor
Franklin, of New Jersey, and General Prescott, captured on Rhode Island,
while prisoners in the hands of the Americans. The events connected with
the capture of these two persons will be noticed elsewhere. They were
confined, under a strong guard, in the house of Captain Ebenezer Grant,
which, I was told, is still standing, a few rods south of the
Theological Seminary.

Connecticut Historical Society.--Dr. Robbins's Library.--Brewster's
Chest.--The Pilgrim Covenant.--Names of the Pilgrims.

437ited the room of that institution, situated in a fine edifice called
the _Wadsworth Atheneum_ This building stands upon the site of the old
"Wadsworth Mansion, the place of Washington's first conference with
Rochambeau.

The cordial welcome with which I was received bv Dr. Robbins was a
prelude to many kind courtesies bestowed by him during a visit of three
hours. He is a venerable bachelor of seventy-two years, and, habited in
the style of a gentleman fifty years ago, his appearance carried the
mind back to the time of Washington. The library of the society, valued
at ten thousand dollars, is its property only in prospective; it belongs
to Dr. Robbins, who has, by will, bequeathed it to the institution at
his death. It contains many exceedingly rare books and MSS., collected
by its intelligent owner during a long life devoted to the two-fold
pursuits of a Christian pastor and a man of letters. There are many
historical curiosities in the library-room, a few of which I sketched.
The one invested with the greatest interest was the chest of Elder
Brewster, of the May Flower, brought from Holland in that Pilgrim ship.
Near it stood a heavy iron pot that belonged to Miles Standish, the
"hero of New England," one of the most celebrated of the Pilgrim
passengers. The chest is of yellow Norway pine, stained with a color
resembling London brown. Its dimensions are four feet two inches long,
one foot eight inches broad, and two feet six inches high.

The key, in size, has more the appearance of one belonging to a prison
than to a clothing receptacle. The chest is a relic of much interest
_per se_, but a fact connected with its history makes it an object
almost worthy of reverence to a New Englander, and, indeed, to every
American. Well-established tradition asserts that the solemn written
compact made by the passengers of the May Flower previous to the landing
of the Pilgrims was drawn up and signed upon the lid of this chest, it
being the most convenient article at hand for the purpose. That compact,
brief and general, may be regarded as the foundation of civil and
religious liberty in the Western World, and was the first instrument of
civil government ever subscribed as the act of the whole people. * It
was conceived in the following terms:

"In the name of God, Amen. We whose names are under written, the Loyal
Subjects of our dread Sovereign Lord King James, by the Grace of God of
Great Britain, France, and Ireland, King, Defender of the Faith, &c..,
Having undertaken, for the Glory of God and the advancement of the
Christian Faith, and Honor of our King and country, a Voyage to plant

* The harbor (Cape Cod) in which the May Flower anchored was ascertained
to be north of the fortieth degree of latitude, consequently the
proposed landing-place and seulement would be beyond the jurisdiction of
the South Virginia Company, from whom these emigrants had received their
charter. That instrument was, therefore, useless. Some of those who
embarked from England had intimated that they would be under no law when
ashore. The majority of the emigrants, concerned on account of this
appearance of faction, thought proper to have recourse to natural law,
and resolved that, before disembarkation, they should enter into an
association, and bind themselves in a political body, to be governed by
the majority. This was the origin of the compact. The following is a
list of the signatures to the instrument: John Carver, William Bradford,
Edward Winslow, William Brewster, Isaac Allerton, Miles Standish. John
Alden. Samuel Fuller, Christopher Martin, William Mullins, William
White,* Richard Warren, John Howland. Stephen Hopkins, Edward Tilley,
John Tilley, Francis Cook, Thomas Rogers, Thomas Tinker, John Ridgedalc,
Edward Fuller, John Turner, Francis Eaton, James Chilton. John
Crackston, John Billington, Moses Fletcher, John Goodman, Degorv Priest,
Thomas Williams, Gilbert Winslow, Edward Margeson, Peter Brown, Richard
Britteridge, George Soule, Richard Clarke, Richard Gardiner, John
Allerton, Thomas English, Edward Doty, Edward Leister. There were forty-
one subscribers to the compact, each one placing opposite his name the
number of his family. The whole number of souls was one hundred and
one.--See Moore's Memoirs of American Governors, i., 25.

* Just previous to the landing of the Pilgrims, the wife of William
White gave birth to a son, the first English child born in New England.
From the circumstances of his birth he was named Peregrine. He died at
Marshfield, July 22, 1704, aged nearly eighty-four years. William White
died soon after the seating of the colony, and his widow married Edward
Winslow. This was the first English marriage in New England. It was a
singular circumstance that Mrs. White was the first mother and the first
bride in New England, and mother of the first native governor of the
colony, who was also the sole bearer of the honer of commander-in-chief
of the forces of the confederate colonies.--See Baylies, ii, 12.

Hand-writing of the Pilgrims.--Robinson's short Sword.--Ancient Chair.

438the first Colony in the Northern parts of Virginia; Do by these
Presents, solemnly and mutually, in the Presence of God, and of one
another, Covenant and Combine ourselves together into a Civil body
Politic, for our better Ordering and Preservation, and Furtherance of
the ends aforesaid; and by Virtue hereof, to enact, constitute, and
frame just and equal laws, ordinances, Acts, Constitutions, and Offices
from Time to Time, as shall be thought most meet and convenient for the
General Good of the Colony; unto which we Promise all due Submission and
Obedience. In witness whereof we have hereunder subscribed our Names at
Cape Cod, the eleventh of November, in the year of the Sign of our
Sovereign Lord, King James, of England, France, and Ireland the
Eighteenth, and of Scotland the Fifty-fourth, Anno Domini, 1620."

Another curious relic of the Pilgrims, preserved by Dr. Robbins, is a
_mincing-knife_, made of the sword-blade that belonged to the Rev. Mr.
Robinson, the pastor of the Pilgrims, at Leyden. Mr. Robinson never came
to New England, but remained at Leyden till his death in 1625. His widow
and family came over, bringing his effects, among which was his short
sword, an article then generally worn by civilians as well as military
men.

His three sons were desirous of possessing this relic. It being
impossible for each to have it entire, it was cut into three pieces, and
the sons, true to the impulses of New England thrift, each had his piece
made into the useful implement here represented.

Another interesting relic is a _chair_ which was an heir-loom in the
family of one of the earlier settlers of New Haven. It is made wholly of
turned wood (except the board bottom), fastened together by wooden pegs,
and is similar, in appearance, to Governor Carver's chair, in the
cabinet of the Massachusetts Historical Society. Its existence is traced
back to the thirteenth century. The material is ash and its construction
ingenious. *

* These were copied from Russell's "Recollections of the Pilgrims." He
obtained them from old deeds and other documents. The writers were
members of the first Plymouth Church, and some of them were passengers
in the May Flower.

Putnam's Tavern Sign.--Other interesting Relics.--The Connecticut
Charter.--Ride to Wethersfield.--Arrival at Boston.

439The tavern sign of General Putnam, which hung before his door in
Brooklyn, Connecticut, about the year 1768, is also preserved. * It is
made of yellow pine, painted, alike on both sides. The device is a full-
length portrait of Wolfe, dressed in scarlet uniform, and, as a work of
art, possesses much merit.

The portrait of the young hero is quite correct. The background is a
faint miniature copy of West's picture of _The Death of Wolfe_, painted
by that artist during the first years of his residence in England. The
sign-board is full of small punctures made by shot, the figure of Wolfe
having been used as a target at some time.

A drum, used to call the people to worship; an ottoman, that belonged to
Mrs. Washington; the vest, torn and bloodstained, worn by Ledyard when
massacred at Groton, and the wooden ease in which the celebrated charter
of Connecticut was sent over and kept, are in the collection. The latter
is about three and a half feet long and four inches wide and deep, lined
with printed paper, apparently waste leaves of a history of the reign of
Charles I. In the center is a circular projection for the great seal,
which was attached. I saw the charter itself in the office of the
Secretary of State. It is written upon fine vellum, and on one corner is
a beautifully drawn portrait of Charles, executed in India ink.

The storm abating a little at about noon, I rode down to Wethersfield
and sketched the Webb House, returning in time to make the drawing of
the Charter Oak pictured on page 434, the rain pouring like a summer
shower, and my umbrella, held by a young friend, scarcely protecting my
paper from the deluge. Pocketing some of the acorns from the venerable
tree, I hastened back to my lodgings, and at a little past five in the
evening departed for Boston. I passed the night at Springfield, ninety-
eight miles west of Boston, and reached the latter place at one o'clock
the next day. The city was enveloped in a cold mist that hung upon the
skirts of the receding storm; and, too ill to ramble for business or
pleasure, even if fine weather had beckoned me out, I passed the
afternoon and evening before a blazing fire at the _Marlborough._

We are now upon the most interesting portion of the classic ground of
the Revolution. Before noting my visit to places of interest in the
vicinity, let us view the wide field of historic research here spread
out, and study some of the causes which led to the wonderful effect of
dismembering a powerful empire, and founding a republic, more glorious,
because more beneficent, than any that preceded it.

* The following letter, in which Putnam alludes to the fact that he had
kept tavern, I copied from the original in his hand-writing, now in
possession of the Connecticut Historical Society: Brooklyn, Feb'y 18,
1782.

* "Gentlemen--Being an Enemy to Idleness, Dissipation, and Intemperance,
I would object against any measure that may be conducive thereto; and as
the multiplying of public houses where the public good does not require
it has a direct tendency to ruin the morals of the youth, and promote
idleness and intemperance among all ranks of people, especially as the
grand object of those candidates for license is money, and where that is
the case, men are not apt to be over-tender of people's morals or
purses. The authority of this town, I think, have run into a great error
in approbating an additional number of public houses, especially in this
parish. They have approbated two houses in the center, where there never
was custom (I mean traveling custom) enough for one. The other custom
(or domestic), I have been informed, has of late years increased, and
the licensing of another house, I fear, would increase it more. As I
kept a public house here myself a number of years before the war, I had
an opportunity of knowing, and certainly do know, that the traveling
custom is loo trifling for a man to lay himself out so as to keep such a
house as travelers have a right to expect; therefore I hope your honors
will consult the good of this parish, so as only to license one of the
two houses. I shall not undertake to say which ought to be licensed;
your honors will act according to your best information. I am, with
esteem, your honors' humble servant,

* "Israel Putnam.

* "To the Hon'ble County Court, to be held at Windham on the 19th inst."

The May Flower.--Rise of the Puritans.--Bishops Hooper and Rogers.--
Henry VIII.--Elizabeth.--Puritan Boldness.

440I have just mentioned the May Flower, and the solemn compact for the
founding of a commonwealth, with a government deriving its powers from
the consent of a majority of the governed, which was drawn up and signed
in its cabin. That vessel was truly the cradle of American liberty,
rocked by the icy billows of Massachusetts Bay. A glance at antecedent
events, in which were involved the causes that led to the emigration to
America of that body of Puritans called The Pilgrims, is profitable in
tracing the remote springs of our Revolutionary movements in New
England, for they contain the germs of our institutions.

Just three hundred years ago, when the exiled Hooper was recalled, and
appointed 1550Bishop of Gloucester, the Puritans had their birth as a
distinct and separate religious body. Henry VIII. quarreled with Pope
Julius III. because he would not grant that licentious monarch a divorce
from Catharine of Aragon, to allow him to marry the beautiful Anne
Boleyn. Henry professed Protestantism, abolished the pope's authority in
England, and assumed to be himself the head of the Church. He retained
the title, "Defender of the Faith," which the pope had previously
bestowed upon him in gratitude for his championship of Rome, for he had
even written a book against Luther. Thus, in seeking the gratification
of his own unhallowed appetites, that monster in wickedness planted the
seeds of the English Reformation. The accession of Edward VI., a son of
Henry by Jane Seymour, one of his six wives, led the way to the firm
establishment of Protestantism in England. The purity of life which the
disciples of both Luther and Calvin exhibited won for them the esteem of
the virtuous and good. Yet the followers of these two reformers differed
materially in the matter of rituals, and somewhat in doctrine. Luther
permitted the cross and taper, pictures and images, as things of
indifference; Calvin demanded the purest spiritual worship. The reform
having begun by decided opposition to the ceremonials as well as dogmas
of the Papal Church, Calvin and his friends deemed it essential to the
full completion of the work to make no concessions to papacy, even in
non-essential matters. The austere principle was announced; and
Puritanism, which then had birth, declared that not even a ceremony
should be allowed, unless it was enjoined by the Word of God. Hooper,
imbued with this spirit, refused  a 1550 for a time to be consecrated in
the vestments required by law, (a) and the Reformed Church of England
was shaken to its center by conflicting views respecting ceremonials.
Churchmen, or the Protestants who adhered to much of the Romish
ceremonials, and the Puritans (first so called in derision) became
bitter opponents. During the reign of 1553-8Mary, a violent and bigoted
papist, both parties were involved in danger. The Puritans were placed
in the greatest peril, because they were most opposed to papacy, and
Hooper and Rogers, both Puritans, were the first martyrs of Protestant
England.

Elizabeth, the youngest daughter of Henry VIII., succeeded Mary, and,
though she professed Protestantism, long endeavored to retain in the
Church of England the magnificent rituals of the Romish Liturgy. She had
in her private chapel images, the crucifix, and tapers; she offered
prayers to the Virgin; insisted upon the celibacy of the clergy; invoked
the aid of saints, but left the doctrine of the real presence in the
Eucharist, which some had been burned for denying, and some for
asserting, as a question of national indifference. With such views,
Elizabeth regarded the Puritans with little favor, while they, having
nothing to fear from earthly power, valuing, as they did, their lives as
nothing in comparison with the maintenance of their principles, were
bold in the annunciation of their views. They claimed the right to
worship according to the dictates of their own consciences, and denied
the prerogative of the sovereign to interfere in matters of religious
faith and practice. They claimed the free exercise of private judgment
in such matters; and the Puritan preachers also promulgated the doctrine
of civil liberty, that the sovereign was amenable to the tribunal of
public opinion, and ought to conform in practice to the expressed will
of the majority of the people. By degrees their pulpits became the
tribunes of the common people, and their discourses assumed a latitude
in discussion and rebuke which alarmed the queen and the great body of
Churchmen, who saw therein elements of revolution that might overturn
the throne and bury the favored hierarchy in its ruins. On all occasions
the Puritan ministers were the bold asserters of that freedom which the
American Revolution established.

Position of Elizabeth.--The Separatists.--Persecutions.--Puritans in
Parliament.--James L--Robinson

441Elizabeth had endeavored firmly to seat the national religion midway
between the supremacy of Rome and the independence of Puritanism. She
thus lost the confidence of both, and also soon learned herself to look
upon both as enemies. Roman Catholic princes conspired against England,
while Puritan divines were sapping the foundations of the royal
prerogatives, and questioning the _divine right_ of monarchs to govern.
A convocation of the clergy was held; the "Thirty-nine Articles," which
constitute the rule of faith of the English Church, were formed, and
other methods were adopted, to give stability to the hierarchy; but
nearly nine years elapsed before Parliament confirmed the Articles by
act, and then not without some limitations, which the Puritans regarded
as concessions to them.

Rigorous orders for conformity were now issued. The Puritans, thoroughly
imbued with an independent spirit, assumed an air of defiance. Thirty
London ministers refused subscription to the Articles, and some talked
openly of secession. A separate congregation was at length actually
formed. The government was alarmed, and several of the leading men and
women were imprisoned for a year. Persecution begat zeal, and a party of
Independents, or Separatists, appeared, under a zealous but shallow
advocate named Brown. The great body of the Puritans desired reform, but
were unwilling to leave the Church. The Independents denounced the
Church as idolatrous, and false to Christianity and truth. Bitter enmity
soon grew up between them, the Puritans reproaching the Separatists with
unwise precipitancy, and they in return were censured for cowardice and
want of faith.

Persecution now began in earnest. A court of high commission was
established, for the detection and punishment of Non-conformists. Its
powers were almost as absolute as those of the Inquisition. Parliament,
particularly the House of Commons, in which was the leaven of
Puritanism, disapproved of the commission, and a feeling of general
dissatisfaction prevailed. Whitgift, archbishop of Canterbury, a man
sincerely, but bigotedly, attached to the English Reformed Church, was
at the head of the hierarchy, and assumed to control the entire body of
the English Church. Conventicles were prohibited, yet, in a few years,
it was asserted in Parliament that twenty thousand persons in England
attended conventicles. Some were banished, others imprisoned, a few were
hanged. The Separatists were nearly extinguished, while the more loyal
branch of the Puritans still suffered contumely and persecution.

Elizabeth died, and the Puritans hailed the accession of James of
Scotland, where independence of thought and action had taken deepest
root, as a favorable event. It was thought that his education, the
restraints from profligacy which the public morals of Scotland imposed,
and his apparently sincere attachment to Protestantism, would guaranty
to them fair toleration, if not actual power. But they were in error. He
was thirty-six years old when he ascended the throne, and, in the
freedom of self-indulgence which his new position afforded, exulted in
gluttony, idleness, and licentiousness. Incapable of being a statesman,
he aimed to be thought a scholar, and wrote books which courtiers lauded
greatly, while wise men smiled and pitied. Bacon pronounced him
incomparable for learning among kings; and Sully of France, who knew his
worth, esteemed him "the wisest fool in Europe." A profligate dissembler
and imbecile coward, he was governed entirely by self-interest, vanity,
and artful men. He loved flattery and personal ease, and he had no fixed
principles of conduct or belief. Such was the man upon whom the
Puritans, for a moment, relied for countenance; but he had scarcely
reached Loudon before his conduct blighted their hopes. "No bishop, no
king," was his favorite maxim; and in 1604 he said of the Puritans, "I
will make them conform, or I will harrie them out of the land, or else
worse; only hang them, that's all." During that year three hundred
Puritan ministers were silenced, imprisoned, or exiled.

Among the exiled ministers at this period was John Robinson. Eminent for
piety and courage, his congregation was greatly attached to him, and
they contrived to have secret meetings every Sunday. But the pressure of
persecution finally determined them to seek an asylum in Holland,
"where, they heard, was freedom of religion for all men." Thither Mr.
Robinson and his little flock, among whom was William Brewster (who
afterward became a ruling elder in the Church), went into voluntary
exile in 1608 They landed at Amster-

Character of the Puritan Pilgrims.--Preparations to sail for America.--
Departure from Delfthaven.--The May Flower

442dam, and then journeyed to Leyden, feeling that they were but
Pilgrims, with no particular abiding-place on earth. They were joined by
others who fled from persecution in England, and finally they
established a prosperous church at Leyden.

While the Pilgrim Puritans were increasing in strength in Holland, and
winning golden opinions from the Dutch on account of their purity of
life and lofty independence of thought, companies were forming for
settling the newly-discovered portions of America, north of the mouth of
the Delaware. Toward the Western World the eyes and hearts of the
Pilgrims were turned, and John Carver and Robert Cushman repaired to
England, to obtain 1617 the consent of the Virginia Company to make a
distinct settlement in the northern part of their territory. Sandys,
Southampton, and other liberal members of the House of Commons,
prevailed upon the king to wink at their heresy. A patent was granted in
1619, and James promised, not to aid them, but to let them alone. This
was all they required of his majesty. Now another difficulty was to be
removed: capital was needed. Several London merchants advanced the
necessary sums. The famous Captain John Smith offered his services, but
his religious views did not suit them. His notions were too
aristocratic, and he complained of their democracy--complained that they
were determined "to be lords and kings of themselves." They were,
therefore, left "to make trial of their own follies." In 1620 the
Pilgrims purchased two ships, the Speedwell, of sixty tons, and the May
Flower, of one hundred and eighty tons; and as many of the congregation
at Leyden as could be accommodated in them left Delfthaven for
Southampton, England. There they were joined August 5, 1620by a few
others, and, with a fair wind, sailed for America. But the captain of
the Speedwell and his company, becoming alarmed, and pretending that the
ship was unseaworthy, put back to Plymouth, and the May Flower, bearing
one hundred and September 6, 1620 one men women, and children, the
winnowed remnants of the passengers in the two vessels, again spread her
sails to an eastern breeze. Their destination was the country near the
Hudson, but adverse winds drove them upon the more northerly and barren
coasts of Massachusetts Bay, after a boisterous voyage of sixty-three
days. Land was espied on the 9th of November, and two days afterward the
May Flower was safely moored in Cape Cod Bay. Before they landed, as we
have already noticed, they formed themselves into a body politic by a
solemn voluntary compact. "In the cabin of the May Flower humanity
recovered its rights, and instituted government on the basis of 'equal
laws' for the general good." John Carver was chosen governor for the
year. Democratic liberty and independent Christian worship were at once
established in America. *

The ocean now lay between the Pilgrims and the persecuting hierarchy,
and the land of promise was before them. Yet perils greater than they
had encountered hovered around that bleak shore, already white with the
snow of early winter. But

"They sought not gold nor guilty ease

Upon this rock-bound shore--

They left such prizeless toys as these

To minds that loved them more.

They sought to breathe a freer air,

To worship God unchain'd;

They welcomed pain and danger here,

When rights like these were gain'd."

Inspired with such feelings, the Pilgrims prepared to land. The shallop
was unshipped, but it needed great repairs. More than a fortnight was
employed by the carpenter in making it ready for sea. Standish,
Bradford, and others, impatient of the delay, determined to go ashore
and explore the country. They encountered many difficulties, and
returned to the ship. When the shallop was ready, the most bold and
enterprising set out upon a cruise along the shore, to find a suitable
place at which to land the whole company. They explored every bay and
inlet, and made some discoveries of buried Indian corn, deserted wig-

* Baem, Barlow, Hume, Hallam, Bancroft.

Exploration of the Const. Attacked by Indians. First Sabbath of the
Pilgrims in New England. Landing on Plymouth Rock.

443wams, and an Indian cemetery. The voyage was fruitless of good, and
they returned to the May Flower. Again Carver, Standish, Bradford,
Winslow, and others, with eight or ten seamen, launched the shallop in
the surf. The day was very cold, and the December 6, 1620 spray froze
upon them and their clothes like iron mail. They passed that night at
Billingsgate Point, at the bottom of Cape Cod Bay, on the western shore
of Wellfleet Harbor. The company divided next morning, but united at
evening, and encamped at Namskeket, or Great Meadow Creek. The next
morning, as they arose from their knees in the deep snow, when their
matin devotions were ended, a flight of arrows and a war-whoop announced
the presence of savages. They were of the Nauset tribe, and regarded the
white people as kidnappers. * But the Indians made no further attacks,
and the boat proceeded along the coast a distance of some forty miles.
Suddenly a storm arose. Snow and rain fell copiously; the heavy swells
snapped the rudder, and with oars alone they guided the frail shallop.
Darkness came on and the storm increased. As much sail as possible was
used to reach the shore; it was too much; the mast broke in three
pieces, and the fragments, with the sail, fell overboard. Breakers were
just ahead, but, by diligent labor with the oars, they passed safely
through the surf into a smooth harbor, landed, and lighted a fire. At
dawn they discovered that they were upon an island, in a good harbor. *
There they passed the day in drying their clothes, cleaning their arms,
and repairing their shallop. Night approached; it was the eve of the
Christian Sabbath. The storm had ceased, but snow nearly eighteen inches
in depth lay upon the ground. They had no tent, no shelter but the rock.
Their ship was more than fifteen leagues away, and winter, with all its
terrors, had set in. Every personal consideration demanded haste. But
the next day was the Sabbath, and they resolved to remain upon that
bleak island and worship God, in accordance with their faith and
obligations as Christians. In the deep snow they knelt in prayer; by the
cold rock they read the Scriptures; upon the keen, wintery air they
poured forth their hymns of thanksgiving and praise. In what bold relief
does that single act present the Puritan character. *

"And can we deem it strange

That from their planting such a branch should bloom

As nations envy?

Oh ye who boast

In your free veins the blood of sires like these,

Lose not their lineaments. Should Mammon cling

Too close around your heart, or wealth beget

That bloated luxury which eats the core

From manly virtue, or the tempting world

Make faint the Christian's purpose in your soul,

Turn ye to Plymouth's beach, and on that rock

Kneel in their footprints, and renew the vow

They breathed to God."

Mrs. Sigourney.

On Monday morning the exploring party pushed through the surf, and
landed December 22, 1622 upon a rock on the main. *** The neighborhood
seemed inviting for a settlement, and in a few days the May Flower was
brought around and moored in the harbor. The whole company landed near
where the explorers stepped ashore: the spot was called New

* The Indians of Cape Cod and the vicinity had experienced the treachery
of the whites, for it must be remembered that the Pilgrims were not the
discoverers of that region. Both French and English ships had visited
the coast. Six years before the landing of the Pilgrims, an Englishman
named Hunt had inveigled several Indians on board a ship, and carried
them to England.

** This island, within the entrance of Plymouth Harbor, has been called
Clarke's Island ever since. It was so named from Clarke, the first man
who stepped ashore from the shallop. The cove in which they were in such
danger lies between the Gurnet Head and Saguish Point, at the entrance
of Plymouth Bay.--Moore, i., 35. The May Flower afterward made two
voyage's from England to America, bearing Emigrants.

*** A portion of this rock was conveyed to a square in the center of the
town of Plymouth in 1774, where it still remains, and is known as The
Forefathers' Rock.

Founding of Plymouth.--Destitution and Sickness.--Death of Carver.--
Election of Bradford.--Defiance of the Indians

444Plymouth, in memory of the hospitalities which they had received at
Plymouth, in England, and in a few days they commenced the erection of
dwellings. The exposure of the explorers, and of others who had reached
the shore by wading, had brought on disease, and nearly one half of the
company were sick when the first blow of the ax was struck in the
primeval forest. Faith and hope nerved the arms of the healthy, and they
began to build. "This was the origin of New England; it was the planting
of the New England institutions. Inquisitive historians have loved to
mark every vestige of the Pilgrims; poets of the purest minds have
commemorated their virtues; the noblest genius has been called into
exercise to display their merits worthily, and to trace the consequences
of their daring enterprise." *

The winter that succeeded the landing of the Pilgrims was terrible for
the settlers. Many were sick with colds and consumptions, and want and
exposure rapidly reduced the numbers of the colony. Governor Carver's
son died soon after landing, and himself and his wife passed into the
grave the next spring. ** William Bradford was elected to fill his
plaee. The living were scarcely able to bury the dead, and at one time
there were only seven men capable of rendering any assistance. Forty-six
of the one hundred died before April, yet not a murmur against
Providence was heard.

The colonists had been apprehensive of an attack from the Indians, but
not one approached the settlement until March, when a chief named
Samoset boldly entered the rude town, exclaiming, in broken English,
which he had learned from fishermen on the coast of Maine,

"Welcome, Englishmen! welcome, Englishmen!" He gave them much
information, and told them of a pestilence that had swept off the
inhabitants a few years before. This accounted for the deserted wigwams
seen by the explorers. Samoset soon afterward visited the colony with
Squanto, a chief who had been carried away by Hunt in 1614; and in April
Massasoit, the chief of the Wampanoags, was induced to make the English
a friendly visit. Treaties of amity were made, and, until the breaking
ont of King Philip's war, fifty years afterward, were kept inviolate.
But Canonicus, a powerful chief of the Narragansets, who lived on the
west side of the Narraganset Bay, regarded the English as intruders, and
sent to them the ominous token of hostility, a bundle of arrows wrapped
in a rattle-snake's skin. Governor Bradford *** at once sent the skin
back to Canonicus, filled with powder and shot. The chief understood the
symbol, and, afraid of the deadly weapons in which such materials were
used, sent them back; the Narragansets were awed into submission.
Massasoit, who lived at Warren, Rhode Island, remained the fast friend
of the English, and his sons, Alexander and Philip (the celebrated King
Philip), kept the bond of friendship unbroken until 1675.

After many difficulties, and receiving some accessions from immigration,
the settlers pur-

* Bancroft, i., 313.

** John Carver was among the English emigrants to Leyden. He was chosen
the first governor of the colony, by a majority of the forty-one male
adults that sailed in the May Flower. There were twelve other candidates
for the honor. On the 23d of March, 1621, a few laws were enacted, and
Carver was regularly inaugurated governor of the new colony. He was
taken suddenly ill in the fields, while laboring, on the 3d of April. A
violent pain in his head ensued, and in a few hours he was deprived of
the use of his senses.

He lived but a few days, and his wife, overcome by grief, followed him
to the grave in about six weeks. He was buried with all the honors the
people could bestow. His broad-sword is preserved in the cabinet of the
Massachusetts Historical Society.

*** William Bradford, the second Governor of Plymouth Colony, was born
at Ansterfield, in the north of England, in 1588. The first Puritan
principles were instilled into his young mind by a minister named
Richard Clifton, and when he was of legal age he was denounced as a
Separatist. He followed Mr. Robinson to Holland, and came to America in
the May Flower. While he was absent, with others, searching for a spot
on whieh to land, his wife fell into the sea and was drowned. He was
appointed governor on the death of Carver, being then only thirty-three
years of age. His energy was of great value to the colony, and so much
was he esteemed, that he was annually elected governor as long as he
lived, except occasionally, when, "by importuning, he got off," as
Winslow says, and another took his plaee pro tempore. His idea of public
office was, "that if it was of any honor or benefit, others besides
himself should enjoy it; if it was a burden, others besides himself
should help him to bear it." Present politicians consider such doctrine
a "barbarous relic." Governor Bradford died in May, 1657, having served
the colony as chief magistrate twenty-five years of the thirty of his
residence in America.

Condition of the Colony.--Further emigration from England.--Winslow.--
Standish.--Seulement of Weymouth.--Shawmut.

445chased the rights of the London merchants who had aided them with
funds, for nine thousand dollars, and the colony thus severed the last
link of pecuniary interest that bound it to Old England, beyond the
claims of commercial transactions. There was one drawback upon their
prosperity--the non-existence of private property. There was a community
of interest in all the land and its products. Thence arose, on the part
of some, an unwillingness to labor, and of others the discontent which
the industrious feel while viewing the idleness of the lazy, for whose
benefit they are toiling. It was now found necessary to enter into an
agreement that each family should plant for itself, and an acre of land
was accordingly assigned to each person in fee. Under this stimulus, the
production of corn became so great that from buyers the colonists became
sellers to the Indians. *

Civil government being fully established to the satisfaction of all, and
news of the fertility of the soil and the beauty of the climate having
reached England, in the following autumn other adventurers prepared to
come to America. In the mean while Edward Winslow, one of the most
accomplished of the colonists, made a journey to the residence of
Massasoit to strengthen the friendship that existed, by presents, and by
amicable agreements respecting future settlers that might come from
England.2 The visit was fruitful of good results. Soon afterward Captain
Standish ** marched against the village of Corbitant, one of Massasoit's
sachems, who held an interpreter in custody, and threatened the tribe
with destruction. The whole country was alarmed at this movement, and on
the 13th of September, 1621, ninety petty sachems came to Plymouth and
signed a paper acknowledging themselves loyal subjects of King James.

New settlers now began to arrive, and new explorations of the coast were
made. Sixty adventurers from London, under the auspices of a merchant
named Weston, began a plantation in the autumn of 1622, at Weymouth,
twelve miles southeast from the present city of Boston, and the whole
coast of Massachusetts Bay was explored. They discovered a spacious
harbor, studded with islands, and inclosing a peninsula remarkable for
three hills, called by the natives Shawmut (sweet water). This was the
harbor and site of the city of Boston. ****

* Hildreth, i., 171.

** Edward Winslow was born in Worcestershire, England, in 1594. While
traveling on the Continent, he became acquainted with Mr. Robinson at
Leyden, joined his congregation, sailed to America in the May Flower,
and was one of the party that first landed on Plymouth Rock. He made
Massasoit a second visit, and found the sachem very sick, but by means
of medicine restored him to health. Grateful for his services, the chief
revealed to Winslow a plot of some savages to destroy a small English
settlement at Weymouth. Winslow went to England that fall, and in the
spring brought over the first cattle introduced into the colony. He was
appointed governor in 1633. He was very active in the colony, and made
several voyages to England in its behalf. In 1655 he was appointed one
of the commissioners to superintend the expedition against the Spaniards
in the West Indies. He died of fever on his passage, between Jamaica and
Hispaniola, May 8th, 1655, aged sixty years. His body was cast into the
ocean.

*** Miles Standish is called the "Hero of New England." He served for
some time in the English army in the Netherlands, and settled with
Robinson's congregation at Leyden. He was not a member of the Church--
"never entered the school of Christ, or of John the Baptist." He came to
America in the May Flower, and was appointed military commander-in-chief
at Plymouth. His bold enterprises spread terror among the Indians, and
secured peace to the colony. In allusion to his exploit in killing
Pecksnot, a bold chief, with his own hand, Mr. Robinson wrote to the
governor, "O that you had converted some before you killed any!"
Standish was one of the magistrates of the colony as long as he lived.
Ho died at Duxbury in 1656, aged about seventy-two years.

**** The Peninsula of Shawmut included between six and seven hundred
acres of land sparsely covered by trees, and nearly divided by two
creeks into three islands when the creeks were filled by the tides. From
the circumstance of the three hills, the English called the peninsula
Tri-mountain, the modern Tremont. These three eminences have since been
named Copp's, Fort, and Beacon Hills. The name of Tri-mountain was
changed to Boston, as a compliment to the Rev. John Cotton, who
emigrated from Boston, in Lincolnshire, England.

Settlement of Endicott and others at Salem.--Arrival of Winthrop.--
Founding of Boston.--Progress of free Principles

446In 1628 a company, under John Endicott, settled at Salem (Na-nm-
keag), and were joined by a few emigrants at Cape Ann, sixteen miles
northward. They received a charter from the king, and were incorporated
by the name of the "Governor and Company of the Massachusetts Bay in New
England."

In 1630 about three hundred Puritan families, under John Winthrop,
arrived, and joined the Massachusetts Bay colony. They established
themselves at Dorchester, Roxbury, Watertown, and Cambridge. A spring of
pure and wholesome water induced some families, among whom was Mr.
Winthrop, to settle upon Shawmut. Winthrop was the chosen Governor of
the colony of Massachusetts Bay; the whole government, including
Plymouth, was removed to the new settlement, and thenceforth Boston
became the metropolis of New England.

I have thus traced, with almost chronological brevity, the rise of the
Puritans in England, their emigration to America, and the progress of
settlement, to the founding of Boston in 1630. It is not within the
scope of this work to give a colonial history of New England in all its
important details, and only so much of it will be developed as is
necessary to present the links of connection between the early history
and the story of our Revolution. That Revolution, being a conflict of
_principle_, had its origin more remote even than the planting of the
New England colonies. The seed germinated when the sun of the
Reformation warmed the cold soil of society in Europe, over which the
clouds of ignorance had so long brooded; and its blossoms were unfolded
when the Puritans of England and the Huguenots of France boldly
asserted, in the presence of kingly power, the grand postulate of
freedom--the social and political equality of the race. These two
sections of independent thinkers brought the vigorous plant to America--
the Puritans to New England, the Huguenots to the Carolinas. The
Covenanters of Scotland, and other dissenting communities, watered it
during the reigns of the Charleses and the bigot James II.; and when the
tactics of British oppression had changed from religious persecution to
commercial and political tyranny, it had grown a sturdy tree, firmly
rooted in a genial soil, and overshadowing a prosperous people with its
beautiful foliage. The fruit of that tree was the American Revolution--
the fruit which still forms the nutriment that gives life and vigor to
our free institutions. * 1

* This is a fac-simile of a map of Boston Harbor and adjacent
settlements in 1667, and is believed to be a specimen of the first
engraving executed in America. Instead of the top of the map being
north, according to the present method of drawing maps, the right hand
of this is north.

The Puritan Character.--Witchcraft. English Laws on the Subject.--The
Delusion in New England.--Effects of the Delusion.

447

"The Pilgrim spirit has not fled;

It walks in noon's broad light,

And it watches the bed of the glorious dead,

With their holy stars, by night.

It watches the bed of the bravo who have bled,

And shall guard the ice-bound shore,

Till the waves of the bay, where tbo May Flower lay,

Shall faint and freeze no more."

Pierpont.

The persecutions of the Quakers, the proceedings against persons accused
of witchcraft, * the disfranchisement of those who were not church
members, and many other enactments in their civil code, considered
alone, mark the Puritan as bigoted, superstitious, intolerant, unlovely
in every aspect, and practically evincing a spirit like that of Governor
Dudley, expressed in some lines found in his pocket after his death.

"Let men of God in courts and churches watch

O'er such as do a toleration hatch,

Lest that ill egg bring forth a cocatrice,

To poison all with heresy and vice.

If men be left, and otherwise combine,

My epitaph's, 'I died no libertine!'"

But when a broad survey is taken of the Puritan character, these things
appear as mere blemishes--spots upon the sun--insects in the otherwise
pure amber. In religion and morality they were sincerely devoted to
right--"New England was the colony of conscience." ** Their worship was
spiritual, their religious observances were few and simple. To them the

* A belief in witchcraft, or the direct agency of evil spirits through
human instrumentality, was prevalent among all classes of Europe toward
the close of the seventeenth century, and this superstition had a strong
hold upon the metaphysical Puritans in America. A statute, enacted in
the reign of Henry VIII., made it a capital offense for a person to
practice the arts of witchcraft. The first James was a firm believer in
witchcraft and sanctioned some severe laws against its practitioners.
Pretenders, called Witch-detectors, arose, and, during the commonwealth,
traveled from county to county, in England, making accusations, in
consequence of which many persons suffered death. The "Fundamentals" of
Massachusetts contained a capital law against such offenses, founded
upon the Scripture injunction, "Thou shalt not suffer a witch to live."-
-Exodus, xxii., 18. Increase Mather, father of the celebrated Cotton
Mather, in a work called "Remarkable Providences," enumerated all the
supposed cases of witchcraft that had occurred in New England. The high
standing of the author turned public attention to the subject, and it
was not long before a real witch was discovered in the person of an old
woman at Newbury, whose house was alleged to be haunted. This was in
1686, and from that time until 1693, when King William's veto on the
Witchcraft Act prevented any further trials, and all accused persons
were released, the colonies were greatly agitated. Chief-justice Hale
had given the weight of his opinion in England in favor of the delusion,
and the Mathers, father and son, of Boston, eminent for their piety and
learning, had written, and preached, and talked, and acted much under
the belief in the reality of witchcraft. Cotton Mather published a book
in 1692, called the "Wonders of the Invisible World," giving a full
account of all the cases and trials, and stimulating the authorities to
further proceedings. The delusion was now at its height, and no class of
society was exempt from suspicion. The wife of Hale, minister of
Beverly, was accused, at the very time when he was most active against
others, and almost every ill-favored old woman was regarded as a servant
of the devil. A son of Governor Bradstrcet was accused, and had to flee
for his life; and even Lady Phipps, the wife of the Admiral Sir William,
the newly-appointed Governor of Massachusetts, was suspected. When royal
authority broke the spell, practical witchcraft ceased to act, and the
people of Massachusetts recovered their senses. Mather, in his
"Magnalia," confessed that things were carried a little too far in
Salem, but never positively renounced his belief in the reality of
witchcraft. His credulity had been thoroughly exposed by a writer named
Calef, who addressed a series of letters to the Boston ministers on the
subject. At first Mather sneered at him as a "weaver who pretended to be
a merchant but Calef laid his truths and sarcasms so strongly over the
shoulders of Mather, that the latter called him a "coal from hell," to
blacken his character, and afterward commenced a prosecution against him
for slander. The mischief wrought by this delusion was wide-spread and
terrible. Society was paralyzed with alarm; evil spirits were thought to
overshadow the land; every nervous influence, even every ordinary
symptom of disease, was ascribed to demoniac power. When the royal veto
arrived, twenty persons had been executed, among whom was a minister of
Danvers named George Burroughs; fifty-five had been tortured or
terrified into a confession of witchcraft, one hundred and fifty were in
prison, and two hundred more had been accused.

** John Quincy Adams.

Religious Character of the Puritans.--Mildness of their Laws.--The
representative System.--Influx of Immigrants

448elements remained but wine and bread; they invoked no saints; they
raised no altar; they adored no crucifix; they kissed no book; they
asked no absolution; they paid no tithes; they saw in the priest nothing
more than a man; ordination was no more than an approbation of the
officers, which might be expressed by the brethren as well as by the
ministers; the church, as a place of worship, was to them but a meeting-
house; they dug no grave in consecrated earth; unlike their posterity,
they married without a minister, and buried their dead without a prayer.
Witchcraft had not been made the subject of skeptical consideration,
and, in the years in which Scotland sacrificed hecatombs to the
delusion, there were but three victims in New England.

Rigorous in their moral and religious code, the Puritans were mild in
their legislation upon other subjects. For many crimes the death penalty
was abolished, and the punishment for theft, burglary, and highway
robbery was more mild than our laws inflict. Divorce from bed and board
was recognized by their laws as a barely possible event, but, during the
first fifty years after the founding of New England, no record of such
an occurrence is given. * Adultery was punished by death, the wife and
paramour both suffering for the crime; while the girl whom youth and
affection betrayed was censured, but pitied and forgiven, and the
seducer was compelled to marry his victim. Domestic discipline was
highly valued, and the undutiful child and faithless parent were alike
punished. Honest men were not imprisoned for debt until 1654; cruelty to
animals was a civil offense, punishable by fine. The people, united in
endurance of hardships during the first years of settlement, were
equally united when prosperity blessed them. They were rich in affection
for one another, and all around them were objects of love. Their land
had become a paradise of beauty and repose, and, even when the fires of
persecution went out in England, none could be tempted to return
thither, for they had found a better heritage. Their morals were pure,
and an old writer said, "As Ireland will not brook venomous beasts, so
will not that land vile livers." Drunkenness was almost unknown, and
universal health prevailed. The average duration of life in New England,
as compared with Europe, was doubled, and no less than four in nineteen
of all that were born attained the age of seventy years. Many lived
beyond the age of ninety, and a man one hundred years old when our
Revolution broke out was not considered a wonder of longevity.

Such were the people who fostered the living principles of our
independence--the parents of nearly one third of the present white
population of the United States. Within the first fifteen years--and
there was never afterward any considerable increase from England--there
came over twenty-one thousand two hundred souls. Their descendants are
now not far from four millions. Each family has multiplied, on the
average, to one thousand souls. To New York and Ohio, where they
constitute half the population, they have carried the Puritan system of
free schools, and their example is spreading it throughout the civilized
world. **

In 1634 the colony had become so populous that it was found inconvenient
for all the freemen to assemble in one place to transact business. By
the general consent of the towns, the representative system was
introduced, and to twenty-four representatives was delegated the power
granted to the whole body of freemen by charter. The appellation of
general court was also applied to the representatives. It was about this
time that Hugh Peters, afterward Cromwell's secretary, and Henry Vane,
afterward Sir Henry Vane, who was made governor, came to the colony,
with a great number of immigrants. It was about this time, also, that
Roger Williams occasioned disturbances, and was banished. These
circumstances will be noticed hereafter.

In 1637 the Pequot war ensued; and about 1640, persecutions having
ceased in England, emigration to the colonies also ceased. The
Confederation was effected in 1643. From that time the permanent
prosperity of the colonies may be dated. *** Their commerce, which

* Trumbull's History of Connecticut, i., 283; Bancroft's United States,
i., 465.

** Bancroft, i., 467-8.

*** Captain Edward Johnson, in his "Wonder-working Providence of Zion's
Savior in New England," writing in 1650, seven years after the union,
says, "Good white and wheaten bread is no dainty, but every ordinary man
hath his choice, if gay clothing and a liquorish tooth after sack,
sugar, and plums lick not away his bread too fast, all which are but
ordinary among those that were not able to bring their own person over
at their first coming. There are not many towns in the country but the
poorest person in them hath a house and land of his own, and bread of
his own growing, if not some cattle. Flesh is now no rare food, beef,
pork, and mutton being frequent in many houses; so that this poor
wilderness hath not only equalized England in food, but goes beyond it
in some places for the great plenty of wine and sugar which is
ordinarily used, and apples, pears, and quince tarts, instead of their
former pumpkin pies. Poultry they have plenty." At that time thirty-two
trades, were carried on in the colony, and shoes were manufactured for
exportation.

Trade of the Colony.--First coined Money.--Marriage of the Mint-master's
Daughter.--The Quakers' Conduct and Punishment

449first extended only to the Indians, and to traffic among themselves,
expanded, and considerable trade was carried on with the West Indies.
Through this trade bullion was brought into New England, and "it was
thought necessary, to prevent fraud in money," to establish a mint for
coding shillings, sixpences, and threepences.

On the first coins the only inscription on one side was N. E., and on
the other, XII., VI., or III. In October, 1651, the court ordered that
all pieces of money should have a double ring, with the inscription
Massachusetts, and a tree in the center, on one side, and New England,
and the year of our Lord, on the other. The first money was coined in
1652, and the date was not altered for thirty years.

In the year 1656 a few fanatics in religion, calling themselves Quakers,
began to disturb the public peace, revile magistrates, and interfere
with the public worship of the people. They assumed the name and garb of
Quakers, but had no more the spirit and consistency of life of that pure
sect than any monomaniac that might declare himself such. The Quakers
have ever been regarded, from their first appearance, as the most order-
loving, peaceful citizens, cultivating genuine practical piety among
themselves, and, with few exceptions, never interfering with the faith
and practice of others, except by the reasonable efforts of persuasion.
Quite different was the character of some of those who suffered from the
persecution of the Puritans. They openly and in harsh language reviled
the authorities in Church and State; entered houses of worship, and
denounced the whole congregation as hypocrites and an "abomination to
the Lord," very much after the fashion of the wall-placarding and
itinerant _prophets_ of our day; and shocked public morals by their
indecencies. ** They were

* This is a fae-simile of the first money coined in America. The mint-
master, who was allowed to take fifteen pence out of every twenty
shillings, for his trouble in coining, made a large fortune by it. Henry
Sewall, the founder of Newbury, in Massachusetts, married his only
daughter, a plump girl of eighteen years. When the wedding ceremony was
ended, a large pair of scales was brought out and suspended. In one disk
the blushing bride was placed, and "pine tree shillings," as the coin
was called, were poured into the other until there was an equipoise. The
money was then handed to Mr. Sewall as his wife's dowry, amounting to a
handsome sum in those days. There are a few pieces of this money still
in existence. One which I saw in the possession of a gentleman in New
York was not as much worn as many of the Spanish quarters now in
circulation among us. The silver appeared to be very pure.

** Hutchinson mentions many instances of fanaticism on the part of the
so-ealled Quakers. Some at Salem, Hampton, Newbury, and other places,
went into the meeting-houses in time of worship, called the ministers
vile hirelings, and the people an abomination. Thomas Newhouse went into
the meeting-house at Boston with two glass bottles, and, breaking them
in the presence of the whole congregation, exclaimed. "Thus will the
Lord break you in pieces." Mary Brewster went into meeting, having her
face smeared with soot and grease; another young married woman, Deborah
Wilson, went through the streets of Salem perfectly naked, in emulation
of the Prophet Ezekiel, as a sign of the nakedness of the land. They
were whipped through the streets at the tail of a cart. Ann Hartley
declared herself a prophetess, and had many followers who seceded from
the congregation of Boston, and zealously propagated schism. A Quaker
woman entered a church in Boston, while the congregation were
worshiping, clothed in sackcloth, with ashes on her head, her feet bare,
and her face blackened so as to personify small-pox, the punishment with
which she threatened the colony.--See Hutchinson's History of
Massachusetts, i., 202--4.

** Whipping was the usual punishment. Marmaduke Stephenson, William
Robinson, Mary Dyer, and Will iam Leddra were hanged. Mary Dyer was
publicly whipped through the streets of Boston. Dorothy Waugh was three
times imprisoned, three times banished, and once whipped, and her
clothes sold. William Brand was four times imprisoned, four times
banished, twice whipped, and branded. John Copeland was seven times
imprisoned, seven times banished, three times whipped, and had his ears
cut off. Christopher Holden was five times banished, five times
imprisoned, twice whipped, and had his cars cut off. These four were the
leading characters who suffered in one year.--New England's Ensigne, p.
105.

Origin of the Quakers.--Their Peculiarities.--Sufferings in America of
those calling themselves Quakers.

450first tenderly dealt with and kindly admonished. Penalties ensued,
and life was finally taken, before some of them would cease interference
with the popular ceremonials of religion. The exercise of power to
maintain subordination finally grew to persecution, and the benevolent
Puritan became, almost from necessity, a persecutor. Enactments for the
preservation of good order were necessary, but the sanguinary laws
against particular doctrines and tenets can not be defended.

The Quaker sect sprang up in England about 1650, under George Fox, and
received their name from the peculiar shaking or quaking of their bodies
and limbs while preaching. They went further than the straitest Puritans
in disregarding human authority when opposed to the teachings of the
Bible, yet they were allowed full liberty of action during the
protectorate of Oliver Cromwell. They denounced war, persecution for
religious opinions, and, above all, the slavish idolatry demanded by
rulers in Church and State of those under their control. They condemned
all ordained and paid priesthoods, refused to take oaths, and thus
struck a direct blow at the hierarchy. They differed from the Puritans
in many things, and became noxious to them. They derived their system of
morals and politics chiefly from the New Testament, while the Puritans
took theirs from the more sanguinary and intolerant codes of the old
dispensation. Laying aside the falsehoods of politeness and flattery,
they renounced all titles, addressed all men, high or low, by the plain
title of Friend, used the expressions yea and nay, and thee and thou;
and offices of kindness and affection to their fellow-creatures,
according to the injunction of the Apostle James, constituted their
practical religion. "The Quakers might be regarded as representing that
branch of the primitive Christians who esteemed Christianity an entirely
new dispensation, world-wide in its objects; while the Puritans
represented those Judaizing Christians who could not get rid of the idea
of a peculiar chosen people, to wit, themselves." *

The English Puritans had warned their brethren in America against these
"children of hell," and the first appearance in the colony of Mary
Fisher and Ann Austin, who came from Barbadoes, and professed the new
doctrine, greatly alarmed the New England theocracy. A special law was
enacted, by which to bring a "known Quaker" into the colony was
punishable with a fine of five hundred dollars, and the exaction of
bonds to carry him back again. The Quaker himself was to be whipped
twenty stripes, sent to the House of Correction, and kept there until
transported. The introduction of Quaker books was prohibited; defending
Quaker opinions was punishable with fine, and finally banishment; and in
1657 it was enacted that for every hour's entertainment given to a
Quaker the entertainer should pay forty shillings. It was also enacted
that every male Quaker should lose an ear on the first conviction, and
the other on a second; and both males and females, on a third
conviction, were to have their tongues bored through with a red-hot
iron. In 1658 the death penalty was enacted. Under it those who should
return to the colony a second time, after banishment, were to suffer
death. From unwillingness to inflict death, it was provided by a new
law, in 1658, that any person convicted of being a Quaker should be
delivered to the constable of the town, "to be stripped naked from the
middle upward, and tied to a cart's tail, and whipped through the town,
and thence be immediately conveyed to the constable of the next town
toward the border of our jurisdiction, and so from constable to
constable, to any the outermost town, and so to be whipped out of the
colony." In case of return, this was to be twice repeated. The fourth
time the convict was to be branded with a letter R on the left shoulder,
and after that, if incorrigible, to incur the death penalty. Chiefly
through the instrumentality of King William, these penal laws against
the Quakers were abrogated by royal authority, and that sect became an
important element in American society during the eighteenth century. In
Pennsylvania and New Jersey, as we shall hereafter see, the Quakers had
a strong controlling influence during the Revolution.

In 1675 King Philip's war commenced, and almost all the Indians in New
England were involved in it. This will be noticed when we are
considering my visit to the neighborhood

* Hildreth, i., 404.

Arrival of Andross.--His Extortions.--Revolution in England.--Government
of Massachusetts.--Hostilities with the French.

451of Mount Hope, the residence of the great sachem. Upon the heels of
this war, when the colonies were much distressed, the ministers of the
second James conspired, as we have seen, to destroy popular government
in America, and consolidate power in the throne. A decision was procured
in the High Court of Chancery, declaring the American charters
forfeited, because of the alleged exercise of powers, on the part of the
colonial governments, not recognized by those charters.

Sir Edmund Andross, who came with the title of governor gen oral, and
empowered to take away their charters from the colonists, made Boston
his head-quarters. He came with the fair mask of kindness, which was
soon cast off. Fees of all officers were increased; public thanksgivings
without royal permission were forbidden, the press was restrained; land
titles were abrogated, and the people were obliged to petition for new
patents, sometimes at great expense; and in various ways Andross and
others man aged to enrich themselves by oppressing and impoverishing the
inhabitants. The free spirit of New England was aroused, and the people
became very restive under the tyrant. Secret meetings were held, in
which the propriety of open resistance was discussed; but before the
people of Boston, afterward so famous for their bold opposition to
imperial power, lifted the arm of defiance, the news came that James was
an exile, and that William and Mary were firmly seated on the throne of
England. Boston was in great commotion. People flocked in from the
country, and cries of "Down with all tyrants" were mingled with the
notes of joy rung out by the church-bells. Andross, alarmed, fled to the
fort, * but was soon arrested, imprisoned, and, as already noticed, sent
home for trial. A new charter was received in 1692, when the territories
of Plymouth, Maine, and Nova Scotia were added to Massachusetts. By that
charter the governor was appointed by the crown, and a property
qualification was necessary to procure the privilege of the elective
franchise in choosing the members of the General Court or Assembly. Such
was the government that existed when the Revolution broke out.

About this time the French, who had settled upon the St. Lawrence, began
to excite the Northern and Eastern Indians against the English
settlements in New England. Dover and Salmon Falls in New Hampshire,
Casco in Maine, and Schenectady in New York were desolated. The colony
fitted out a force, under General Winthrop, to attack Montreal, and a
fleet, under Sir William Phipps, to besiege Quebec. The expedition was a
failure, and for seven years, until the treaty of peace between France
and England was concluded, the frontier was scourged by savage
cruelties. During this time military operations exhausted the treasury
of Massachusetts, and the government emitted bills of credit, the first
_paper money_ issued in the American colonies.

From the beginning of the eighteenth century until the treaty of Paris,
or, rather, of Fontainbleau, in 1763, the New England colonies were
continually agitated by successive wars

* The first fort was upon one of the three eminences in Boston, called
Cornhill, from the circumstance that the first explorers found corn
buried there. The fort was completed in 1634. It had complete command of
the harbor. It is now a green plat, two hundred feet in diameter, and
called Washington Place The eminence is called Fort Hill.

* Another of the eminences is called Beacon Hill, from the circumstance
that on the top of it was a beacon pole, with a tar barrel at its apex,
erected in 1635, which was to be fired, to give an alarm in the country,
if Boston should be attacked by savages. Upon a crane was suspended a
basket containing some combustibles for firing the barrel. This beacon
was blown down in 1789, and the next year a plain Doric column of brick
and stone, incrusted with cement, was erected. It was about sixty feet
high, on an eight feet pedestal. On the tablets of the pedestal were
inscriptions commemorating the most important events from the passage of
the Stamp Act until 1790. This pedestal is preserved in the State House
of Boston. The monument stood a little north of the site of the present
State House. A view of the old beacon is given above.

First American Paper money.--Prowess of Colonial Troops.--The French and
Indian War.--The Revolutionary Era.

452with the French and Indians, by jealousies concerning colonial
rights, which acts of Parliament from time to time seemed to menace with
subversion.

For the wars they furnished full supplies of men and money, and it was
chiefly by the prowess of colonial troops that French dominion in
America was destroyed. During these wars the colonists discovered their
own strength, and, doubtless, thoughts of independence often occupied
the minds of many. The capture of Louisburg, the operations in Northern
New York and upon Lake Ontario and the St. Lawrence, and the final
passage of Quebec and Montreal into the hands of the English, have been
noticed in former chapters. The campaign against the French posts on the
Ohio and vicinity, when Washington first became distinguished as a
military leader, will receive our attention hereafter.

We have now reached the borders of our Revolutionary era, and Boston,
our point of view, where the first bold voice was heard and the first
resolute arm uplifted against measures of the British Parliament that
tended to abridge the liberties of the colonists, is a proper place
whence to take a general survey of events immediately antecedent to, and
connected with, that successful and righteous rebellion.

First Step toward Absolutism.--Democratic Colonies.--Board of Trade.--
Courts of Vice-admiralty.--Commercial Restrictions.

453We have already observed, that after the expulsion of Andross a new
charter was obtained by Massachusetts, but the governor thereafter was
appointed by the crown.

This was the first link forged for the chain of absolutism with which
England for nearly a century endeavored to enslave her American
colonies. Such was the condition of all the colonies, except Connecticut
and Rhode Island, whose original charters had never been surrendered.
The other chartered communities were governed by men appointed by the
king, but Connecticut and Rhode Island always enjoyed the democratic
privilege of electing their own chief magistrates. These royal
governors, by their exactions and their haughty disregard of public
opinion in America, were greatly instrumental, it will be seen, in
arousing the people to rebellion. Discontents, however, arising from an
interference of the imperial government with the commerce of the
colonies, had already begun to excite suspicions unfavorable to the
integrity of the home government.

Among the first acts of Parliament, after the restoration of Charles II.
in 1660, was the establishment of a board of commissioners, to have the
general supervision of the commerce of the American colonies. This
commission was afterward remodeled, and the _Board of Trade and
Plantations_, consisting of a president and seven members, known as
Lords of Trade, was established. This board had the general oversight of
the commerce of the realm; and, although its powers were subsequently
somewhat curtailed, it exercised great influence, particularly in
America, down to the time of the Revolution, and was the strong right
arm of royalty here. It was the legalized spy upon all the movements of
the people; it watched the operations of the colonial assemblies; and in
every conceivable way it upheld the royal governors and the royal
prerogatives. Under its auspices courts of Vice-admiralty were
established throughout the colonies, having powers similar to those of
our United States District Courts, in which admiralty and revenue cases
were tried without jury. These often exercised intolerable tyranny.

Previous to the establishment of the first commission, the acts of trade
had so little affected the colonists that they were hardly a subject of
controversy; but after the Restoration, the commercial restrictions,
from which the New England colonies were exempt during the time of the
commonwealth, were imposed with increased rigor. The harbors of the
colonies were closed against all but English vessels; such articles of
American produce as were in demand in England were forbidden to be
shipped to foreign markets; the liberty of free trade among the colonies
themselves was taken away, and they were forbidden to manufacture for
their own use or for foreign markets those articles which would come in
competition with English manufacturers. In addition to these oppressive
commercial acts, a royal fleet arrived at Boston, bringing
commissioners, who were instructed to hear and determine all complaints
that might exist in New England; and they also had full power to take
"such measures as they might deem expedient for settling the peace and
security of the country on a solid foundation." The people justly
regarded this commission as a prolific seed of tyranny planted among
them. The colonists were alarmed, yet none but Massachusetts dared
openly to complain. She alone, although professing the warmest loyalty
to the king, openly asserted her chartered rights, and not only refused
to acknowledge the authority of the commissioners, but protested against
the exercise of their delegated powers within her domain. So noxious was
the commission to the whole people, that it was soon abolished. In this
boldness Massachusetts exhibited the germ of that opposition to royal
authority for which she was afterward so conspicuous.

In 1672 the British Parliament enacted "that if any vessel which, by
law, may trade in the plantations shall take on board any enumerated
articles [mentioned in the act of 1660], and a bond shall not have been
given with sufficient security to unlade them in England, there shall be
rendered to his majesty, for sugars, tobacco, ginger, cocoa-nut, indigo,
logwood, fustic, cotton, wool, the several duties mentioned in the law,
to be paid in such places in the plantation, and to such officers as
shall be appointed to collect the same; and, for their better
collection, it is enacted that the whole business shall be managed and
the imposts shall be levied by officers appointed by the commissioners
of imposts in England." This was the

First Act of Oppression.--Colonial Claims to the Eight of
Representation.--The Right acknowledged.--Governor Burnet

454first act that imposed customs on the colonies alone; this was the
initial act of a series of like tenor, which drove them to rebellion.
The people justly complained, and as justly disregarded the law. They
saw in it a withering blight upon their infant commerce: they either
openly disobeyed its injunctions, or eluded its provisions; Barbadoes,
Virginia, and Maryland, in particular, trafficked without restraint.

The colonies in general now began to regard the home government as an
oppressor, and acted with a corresponding degree of independence. Edward
Randolph, afterward the surveyor general during the reign of William and
Mary, writing to the commissioners of custom in 1676, iterated the
declarations of the people that the law "made by Parliament obligeth
them in nothing but what consists with the interests of the colonies;
_that the legislative August 16 Power is and abides in them solely_."
Governor Nicholson, of Maryland, writing in 1698, said, "I have observed
that a great many people in all these colonies and provinces, especially
those under proprietaries, and the two others under Connecticut and
Rhode Island, think that no law of England ought to be in force and
binding to them without their own consent; for they foolishly say _they
have no representative sent for themselves to the Parliaments of
England_; and they look upon all laws made in England, that put any
restraint upon them, to be great hardships." Earlier than this the
doctrine that the colonies should not be taxed without their consent was
recognized by Lord Berkley and Sir George Cartwright, and not questioned
by the king. These distinguished men purchased New Jersey of the Duke of
York (afterward James II.), which he had taken from the Dutch by the
authority of his brother Charles.

These "lords proprietors," for the better settlement of the pioneers,
stipulated in their agreement with those who should commence plantations
there that they (the proprietors) were "not to impose, or _suffer to be
imposed,_ any tax, custom, subsidy, tallage, assessment, or any other
duty whatsoever, upon any color or pretense, upon the said province or
inhabitants thereof, _other than what shall be imposed by the authority
and consent of the General Assembly._" * In 1691 the New York General
Assembly passed an act declaring "that no aid, tax, tallage, &c.,
whatsoever shall be laid, assessed, levied, or required of or on any of
their majesties' [William and Mary] subjects within the provinces, &c.,
or their estates, in any manner of color or pretense whatsoever, but by
the act and consent of the governor and council, and representatives of
the people in General Assembly met and convened." In 1692 the
Massachusetts Legislature made a declaration in almost the same
language, and almost all the colonies asserted, in some form, the same
doctrine. Thus we see that, nearly one hundred years before the
Revolution, the fundamental principle upon which the righteousness of
that rebellion relied for vindication--taxation and representation are
inseparable--was boldly asserted by the governed, and tacitly admitted
by the supreme power as correct.

As early as 1729 the conduct of Massachusetts caused a suggestion in the
House of Commons that it was the design of that colony "to shake off its
dependency." Governor Burnet, of New York, was appointed chief
magistrate of the province in 1728. The display that attended his
reception at Boston, and the appearance of general prosperity on every
hand, determined him to demand a fixed and liberal salary from the
Assembly, a demand which had involved Shute, his predecessor, in
continual bickerings with that body. Burnet made the demand in his
inaugural address, and the Assembly treated it in such a manner that
immediately afterward the Council expressed their reprehension of the
undutiful conduct of the members. So bold was the Assembly in denying
royal prerogatives and refusing obedience 1731 to laws, that when
Massachusetts petitioned the House of Commons, praying that they might
be heard by counsel on the subject of grievances, that body resolved
"That the petition was frivolous and groundless, a high insult upon his
majesty's [George I.] government, and _tending to shake off the
dependency of the said colony upon this kingdom, to which, in law and
right, they ought to be subject._" *

In 1739 a proposition was made to Sir Robert Walpole to tax the American
colonies, but

* Smith's History of New Jersey, p. 517.

** Smith's History of New York, p. 75.

Wisdom of Robert Walpole.--Restraining Acts.--Loyalty and Patriotism of
the Colonics.--Heavy voluntary Taxation

455that statesman took an enlightened and liberal view, and said,
smiling, "I will leave that to some of my successors who have more
courage than I have, and are less friends to commerce than I am. It has
been a maxim with me, during my administration, to encourage the trade
of the American colonies in the utmost latitude; nay, it has been
necessary to pass over some irregularities in their trade with Europe;
for, by encouraging them to an extensive growing commerce, if they gain
five hundred thousand pounds, I am convinced that in two years afterward
full two hundred and fifty thousand pounds of their gains will be in his
majesty's exchequer, by the labor and produce of this kingdom, as
immense quantities of every kind of our manufactories go thither; and as
they increase in their foreign American trade, more of our produce will
be wanted. This is taxing them more agreeably to their own Constitution
and ours." Had these views continued to prevail in the British cabinet,
George III. might not have "lost the brightest jewel in his crown had
Walpole yielded, the republic of the United States might have existed
almost half a century earlier.

Walpole's successors _were_ "more courageous" than he, and "less friends
to commerce," for in 1750 an act was passed, declaring "That from and
after the 24th of June, 1750, no mill or other engine for slitting or
rolling of iron, or any platting forge to work with a tilt-hammer, or
any furnace for making steel, shall be erected, or, after such erection,
continued, in any of his majesty's colonies in America." The Navigation
Act of 1660 was retained in full force. Hatters were forbidden to have,
at one time, more than two apprentices; the importation of sugar, rum,
and molasses was not allowed without the payment of considerable duties;
and the felling of pitch-pine-trees not within inclosures was
prohibited. True, these revenue laws were administered with much laxity,
as Walpole acknowledged, and the colonies were not much oppressed by
them, yet they practically asserted the right to tax the Americans--a
right that was strenuously denied. These things were, therefore, real
grievances, for they foreshadowed those intentions to enslave America
which were afterward more boldly avowed.

I have noticed the Colonial Congress (page 303) held at Albany in 1754,
when Dr. Franklin submitted a plan for the union of the colonies for the
general good, and when Massachusetts, ever jealous of her rights,
instructed her representatives to oppose any scheme for taxing them. The
war that had then just commenced (the Seven Years' War) soon diverted
the attention of the colonists from the commercial grievances of which
they complained, and as the common dangers multiplied, loyalty
increased. Cheerfully did they tax themselves, and contribute men,
money, and provisions, for that contest. They lost by the war twenty-
five thousand of their robust young men, exclusive of sailors. Upon
application of Admiral Saunders, the squadron employed against Louisburg
and Quebec was supplied with five hundred seamen from Massachusetts,
besides many who were impressed out of vessels on the fishing banks.
During the whole war Massachusetts contributed its full quota of troops
annually, and also, at times, furnished garrisons for Louisburg and Nova
Scotia in addition. That colony alone contributed more than five
millions of dollars, in which sum is not included the expense of forts
and garrisons on the frontiers. Besides these public expenditures, there
must have been almost an equal amount drawn from the people by extra
private expenses and personal services. The taxes imposed to meet the
pressing demands upon all sides were enormous, * and men of wealth gave
freely toward encouraging the raising of new levies. This, it must be
remembered, was the heavy burden laid upon one colony. Other provinces
contributed largely, yet not so munificently as Massachusetts. Probably
the Seven Years' War cost the aggregate colonies twenty millions of
dollars, besides the flower of their youth; and in return Parliament
granted them, during the contest, at different periods, about five mill-

* Such was the assessment in Boston one year during the war, that, if a
man's income was three hundred dollars, he had to pay two thirds, or two
hundred dollars, and in that proportion. If his house was valued at one
thousand dollars, he was obliged to pay three hundred and sixty dollars.
He had also to pay a poll tax for himself, and for every male member of
his family over sixteen years of age, at the rate of nearly four dollars
each. In addition to all this, he paid his proportion of excise on tea,
coffee, rum, and wine, if he used them.--Gordon.

Designs of the British Ministry.--Expenditures of the British Government
on Account of America.--Accession of George III

456ions four hundred and nine thousand dollars. * Yet the British
ministry, in 1760, while the colonies were so generously supporting the
power and dignity of the realm, regarded their services as the mere
exercise of a duty, and declared that, notwithstanding grants of money
had been made to them, they expected to get it all back, by imposing a
tax upon them after the war, in order to raise a revenue. Such was the
language of Mr. Pitt in a letter to Lieutenant-governor Fauquier, of
Virginia. The war ended favorably to Great Britain, and Massachusetts
and other colonies looked forward with the full hope of uninterrupted
prosperity. New men were at the helm of State. The old king was dead,
and his grandson, the eldest October 26, 1760 son deceased Frederic,
prince of Wales, had ascended the throne with the title of George III.
This was the prince who ruled Great Britain sixty years, in which time
was included our war for independence.

* Parliament subsequently voted one million of dollars to the colonies,
but, on account of the troubles arising from the Stamp Act and kindred
measures, ministers withheld the sum.--Pictorial History of the Reign of
George III., i., 36.

* The following is a list of "The grants in Parliament for Rewards,
Encouragement, and Indemnification to the Provinces in North America,
for their Services and Expenses during the last [seven years] War:

* "On the 3d of February, 1756, as a free gift and reward to the
colonies of New England, New York, and Jersey, for their past services,
and as an encouragement to continue to exert themselves with vigor,
voted $575,000.

* "May 19th, 1757. For the use and relief of the provinces of North and
South Carolina, and Virginia, in recompense for services performed and
to be performed, $250,000.

* "June 1st, 1758. To reimburse the province of Massachusetts Bay their
expenses in furnishing provisions and stores to the troops raised by
them in 1756, $136,900. To reimburse the province of Connecticut their
expenses for ditto, $68,680.

* "April 30th, 1759. As a compensation to the respective colonies for
the expenses of clothing, pay of troops, &c., $1,000,000.

* "March 31st, 1760. For the same, $1,000,000. For the colony of New
York, to reimburse their expenses in furnishing provisions and stores to
the troops in 1756, $14,885.

* "January 20th, 1761. As a compensation to the respective colonies for
clothing, pay of troops, &c. $1,000,000.

* "January 26th, 1762. Ditto, $666,666.

* "March 15th, 1763. Ditto, $666,666.

* "April 22d, 1770. To reimburse the province of New Hampshire their
expenses in furnishing provisions and stores to the troops in the
campaign of 1756, $30,045. Total, $5,408,842."

* In a pamphlet entitled The Rights of Britain and Claims of America, an
answer to the Declaration of the Continental Congress, setting forth the
causes and the necessity of their taking up arms, printed in 1776, I
find a table showing the annual expenditures of the British government
in support of the civil and military powers of the American colonies,
from the accession of the family of Hanover, in 1714, until 1775. The
expression of the writer is, "Employed in the defense of America." This
is incorrect, for the wars with the French on this continent, which cost
the greatest amount of money, were wars for conquest and territory,
though ostensibly for the defense of the Anglo-American colonies against
the encroachments of their Gallic neighbors. During the period alluded
to (sixty years) the sums granted for the army amounted to $43,899,625;
for the navy, $50,000,000; money laid put in Indian presents, in holding
Congresses, and purchasing cessions of land, $30,500,000; making a total
of $123,899,625. Within that period the following bounties on American
commodities were paid: On indigo, $725,110; on hemp and flax, $27,800;
on naval stores imported in Great Britain from America, $7,293,810;
making the total sum paid on account of bounties $8,047,320. The total
amount of money expended in sixty years on account of America
$131,946,945.

Death of George II. announced to his Heir.--Influence of the Earl of
Bute.--Cool Treatment of Mr. Pitt.

457

CHAPTER XX.

"In a chariot of light from the regions of day

The goddess of Liberty came,

Ten thousand celestials directed the way,

And hither conducted the dame.

A fair budding branch from the garden above,

Where millions with millions agree,

She brought in her hand as a pledge of her love,

And the plant she named Liberty Tree.

"The celestial exotic struck deep in the ground,

Like a native it flourish'd and bore;

The fame of its fruit drew the nations around,

To seek out this peaceable shore.

Unmindful of names or distinction they came,

For freemen, like brothers, agree;

With one spirit indued, they one friendship pursued,

And their temple was Liberty Tree.

"But hear, O ye swains ('tis a tale most profane),

How all the tyrannical powers,

Kings, Commons, and Lords, are uniting amain

To cut down this guardian of ours.

From the east to the west blow the trumpet to arms,

Through the land let the sound of it flee;

Let the far and the near all unite with a cheer

In defense of our Liberty Tree."

Thomas Paine.

HE intelligence of the death of his grandfather was communicated to
George, the heir apparent, on the morning of the 25th of October, while
he was riding on horseback, near Kew Palace, with his inseparable
companion, the Earl of Bute. William Pitt, afterward Earl of Chatham,
was the prime minister of the deceased king. He immediately repaired to
Kew, where the young sovereign (then in his twenty-third year) remained
during the day and night. On the 26th George * went to St. James's,
where Pitt waited upon him, and presented a sketch of an address to be
pronounced by the monarch at a meeting of the Privy Council.

The minister was politely informed that a speech was already prepared,
and that every preliminary was arranged. He at once perceived that the
courtier, Bute, the favorite of the king's mother, and his majesty's
tutor and abiding personal friend, had made these arrangements, and that
he would doubtless occupy a conspicuous station in the new
administration.

Bute was originally a poor Scottish nobleman, possessed of very little
general talent, narrow in his political views, but favored with a fine
person and natural grace of manners. He was a favorite of George's
father, and continued to be an inti-

* George the Third was the son of Frederic, prince of Wales. His mother
was the beautiful Princess Augusta, of Saxe Gotha. He was born in London
on the 24th of May, 1738 He was married in September, 1761, nearly a
year after his accession, to the Princess Charlotte, of Mecklenberg
Strelitz, daughter of the late duke of that principality. Her character
resembled that of her husband. Like him, she was domestic in her tastes
and habits, decorous, rigid in the observance of moral duties, and
benevolent in thought and action. George was remarkable for the purity
of his morals; even while a young man, in the midst of the licentious
court of his grandfather, and through life, he was a good pattern of a
husband and father. He possessed no brilliancy of talents, but common
sense was a prime element in his intellectual character. He was tender
and benevolent, although he loved money; and his resentments against
those who willfully offended him were lasting. He was always reliable;
honest in his principles and faithful to his promises, no man distrusted
him. Their majesties were crowned on the 22d of September, 1761, soon
after their marriage, and a reform in the royal household at once
commenced. Their example contributed to produce a great change in
manners. "Before their time," says M'Farland, "the Court of St. James
had much of the licentiousness of the Court of Versailles, without its
polish; during their time it became decent and correct, and its example
gradually extended to the upper classes of society, where it was most
wanted." For two years, from 1787 to 1789, his majesty was afflicted
with insanity. The malady returned in 1801, and terminated his political
life. He died on the 29th of January, 1820, aged nearly eighty-two
years, this being the sixtieth year of his reign. His queer died in
1818.

* Waldegrave's Memoirs

Character of Bute.--His Influence over the King.--Discontents.--
Resignation of Pitt

458mate friend of the king's mother after Prince Frederic's death.
Indeed, scandal uttered some unpleasant suggestions respecting this
intimacy, even after the accession of George.

"Not contented with being wise," said Earl Waldegrave, "he would be
thought a polite scholar and a man of great erudition, but has the
misfortune never to succeed, except with those who are exceedingly
ignorant; for his historical knowledge is chiefly taken from tragedies,
wherein he is very deeply read, and his classical learning extends no
further than a French translation." * Such was the man whom the young
monarch unfortunately chose for his counselor and guide, instead of the
wise and sagacious Pitt, who had contributed, by his talents and energy,
so much to the glory of England during the latter years of the reign of
George II. Like Rehoboam, George "forsook the counsel which the old men
gave him, and took counsel with the young men that were brought up with
him, that stood before him."

It was a sad mistake, and clouds of distrust gathered in the morning sky
of his reign. The opinion got abroad that he would be ruled by the queen
dowager and Bute, and that the countrymen of the earl, whom the English
disliked, would be subjects of special favor. Murmurs were heard in many
quarters, and somebody had the boldness to put up a placard on the Royal
Exchange, with these words: "No petticoat government--no Scotch
minister--no Lord George Sackville."

Thus, at the very outset of his reign, the king had opponents in his own
capital. A general feeling of discontent pervaded the people as soon as
it was perceived that Pitt, their favorite, was likely to become
secondary among the counselors of the king, or, which seemed more
certain, would leave the cabinet altogether. The latter event soon
followed. Disgusted by the assurance and ignorance of Bute, and the
apathetic submission of George to the control of the Scotch earl, and
perceiving that all his plans, the execution of which was pressing his
country forward in a career of glory and prosperity, were thwarted by
the

Secret Agents sent to America.--Writs of Assistance.--Opposition.--James
Otis.--Episcopacy designed for America

459supple tools of the favorite, he resigned his office. The regrets of
the whole nation followed him into retirement, while George, really
esteeming him more highly than any other statesman in his realm, in
testimony of his appreciation of his services, granted a peerage to his
lady, and a pension of fifteen thousand dollars.

Greater discontents were produced in the colonies by the measures which
the new administration adopted in relation to them. By the advice of
Bute, who was the real head of the government, George set about "a
reformation of the American charters." Secret agents were sent to travel
in the different colonies, to procure access to the leading men, and to
collect such information respecting the character and temper of the
people as would enable ministers to judge what regulations and
alterations could be safely made in the police and government of the
colonies, in order to their being brought more effectually under the
control of Parliament. The business of these agents was also to
conciliate men of capital and station, hoping thereby to enlist a large
number of dependents; but herein they erred. Unlike men in a similar
condition in England, the man of wealth here could influence very few;
and in New England such was the general independence of the people, that
such agency was of no avail. The object of the agents was too apparent
to admit of doubt; the proposed reform was but another name for
despotism, and the gossamer covering of deceit could not hide the
intention of the ministry.

The first _reform_ measure which aroused the colonies to a lively sense
of their danger _was the issuing of Writs of Assistance._ These were
warrants to custom-house offi1761cers, giving them and their deputies a
general power to enter houses or stores where it might be suspected that
contraband goods were concealed. The idea of such latitude being given
to the "meanest deputy of a deputy's deputy" created general indignation
and alarm. It might cover the grossest abuses, and no man's privacy
would be free from the invasion of these ministerial hirelings. Open
resistance was resolved upon. In Boston public meetings were held, and
the voice of the fearless James Otis the younger called boldly upon the
people to breast any storm of ministerial vengeance that might be
aroused by opposition here. The Assembly sided with the people, and even
Governor Bernard was opposed to the measure. Respectful remonstrances to
Parliament and petitions to the king were sent, but without effect. That
short-sighted financier, George Grenville, was Bute's Chancellor of the
Exchequer. An exhausted treasury needed replenishing, and ministers
determined to derive a revenue from the colonies, either by direct
taxation or by impost duties, rigorously levied and collected. They had
also determined in council upon bringing about an entire subservience of
the colonies, politically, religiously, and commercially, to the will of
the king and Parliament. *

* Dr. Gordon says he was informed by Dr. Langdon, of Portsmouth, New
Hampshire, that as the Rev. Mr. Whitfield was about leaving that place,
he said to Dr. Langdon, and Mr. Haven, the Congregational minister, "I
can't, in conscience, leave this town without acquainting you with a
secret. My heart bleeds for America. O poor New England! There is a
deep-laid plot against both your civil and religious liberties, and they
will be lost. Your golden days are at an end. You have nothing but
trouble before you. My information comes from the best authority in
Great Britain. I was allowed to speak of the affair in general, but
enjoined not to mention particulars. Your liberties will be lost."--
Gordon, i., 102. It was known that, among other reforms, the Puritan, or
dissenting, influence in religious matters was to be curtailed, if not
destroyed, by the establishment of Episcopacy in the colonies. The
throne and the hierarchy were, in a measure, mutually dependent. In 1748
Dr. Seeker, the archbishop of Canterbury, had proposed the establishment
of Episcopacy in America, and overtures were made to some Puritan
divines to accept the miter, but without effect. The colonists, viewing
Episcopacy in its worst light, as exhibited in the early days of the
American settlements, had been taught to fear such power, if it should
happen to be wielded by the hand of a crafty politician, more than the
arm of civil government. They knew that if Parliament could create
dioceses and appoint bishops, it would introduce tithes and crush
heresy. For years controversy ran high upon this subject, much acrimony
appeared on both sides, and art was brought in requisition to enforce
arguments. In the Political Register for 1769 is a picture entitled "An
attempt to land a Bishop in America." A portion of a vessel is seen, on
the side of which is inscribed The Hillsborough. * She is lying beside a
wharf, on which is a crowd of earnest people, some with poles pushing
the vessel from her moorings. One holds up a book inscribed Sidney on
Government; another has a volume of Locke's Essays; a third, in the garb
of a Quaker, holds an open volume inscribed Barclay's Apology; and from
the mouth of a fourth is a scroll inscribed No lords, spiritual or
temporal, in New England. Half way up the shrouds of the vessel is a
bishop in his robes, his miter falling, and a volume of Calvin's works,
hurled by one on shore, about to strike his head; from his mouth issues
a scroll inscribed, "Lord, now lettest thou thy servant depart in
peace." In the foreground is a paper inscribed, "Shall they be obliged
to maintain bishops that can not maintain themselves?" and near it is a
monkey in the act of throwing a stone at the bishop. This print well
illustrates the spirit of the times.

* William Livingston, afterward governor of New Jersey, seems to have
been one of the most eminent writers against Episcopacy, and Dr.
Chandler and Samuel Seabury (afterward bishop) were among its chief
supporters. An anonymous writer, whose alias was Timothy Tickle, Esq.,
wrote a series of powerful articles in favor of Episcopacy, in Hugh
Gaines's New York Mercury, in 1768, supposed by some to be Dr. Auchmuty,
of Trinity Church. The Synod of Connecticut passed a vote of thanks to
Livingston for his essays, while in Gaines's paper he was lampooned by a
shrewd writer in a poem of nearly two hundred lines. Livingston wrote
anonymously, and the poet thus refers to the author:

"Some think him a Tindall, some think him a Chubb, Some think him a
Ranter that spouts from his Tub; Some think him a Newton, some think him
a Locke, Some think him a Stone, some think him a Stock--But a Stock he
at least may thank Nature for giving, And if he's a Stone, I pronounce
it a Living."

* Episcopacy was introduced into America, took root, and flourished; and
when the Revolution broke out, seven or eight years afterward, there
were many of its adherents found on the side of liberty, though,
generally, so intimate was its relation, through the Mother Church, to
the throne, its loyalty became a subject of reproach and suspicion, for
the Episcopal clergy, as a body, were active or passive Loyalists.

* Lord Hillsborough was then the Colonial Secretary, and it was presumed
to be a plan of his to send a bishop to the colonies.

Enforcement of Revenue Laws.--Resignation of Bute.--Grenville Prime
Minister.--Opposition to Episcopacy

460The idea of colonial subserviency was, indeed, general in England,
and, according to Pitt, "even the chimney-sweepers of the streets talked
boastingly of their _subjects_ in America." *

The admiralty undertook the labor of enforcing the laws, in strict
accordance with the letter, and intrusted the execution thereof to the
commanders of vessels, whose authoritative habits made them most unfit
agents for such a service against such a people. Vessels engaged in
contraband trade were seized and confiscated, and the colonial commerce
with the West Indies was nearly annihilated.

From causes never clearly understood, Lord Bute resigned the premiership
on the 8th of April, 1763, and was succeeded by George Grenville, who,
for a time, had fought shoulder to shoulder with Pitt, but had deserted
him to take office under the Scotch earl. Grenville is represented as an
honest statesman, of great political knowledge and indefatigable
application; but his mind, according to Burke, could not extend beyond
the circle of official routine, and was unable to estimate the result of
untried measures. He proved an unprofitable counselor for the king, for
he began a political warfare against the celebrated journalist, John
Wilkes, which resulted in the most serious partisan against the Stamp
Act, by which Great Britain lost her colonies.

* Parliamentary Debates, iii., 210.

** George Grenville was born in 1722, and in 1750 became a member of the
House of Commons, where he was distinguished for his eloquence and
general knowledge. He was made Treasurer of the Navy in 1754, and in
1760 was appointed Chancellor of the Exchequer. He became First Lord of
the Treasury, or prime minister, in 1763, and the next year originated
the famous Stamp Act. He resigned his office to Rockingham in 1765, and
died on the 13th of November, 1770, aged fifty-eight years. He married
the daughter of Sir William Wyndham. The late Marquis of Buckingham, who
inherited the family estates in Buckinghamshire, was his eldest son.

The Stamp Act proposed.--Right to tax the Americans asserted.--Stamp Act
not new.--Postponement of Action on it

461Grenville found an empty treasury, and the national debt increased,
in consequence of recent wars, to nearly seven hundred millions of
dollars. To meet the current expenses of government, heavy taxation was
necessary, and the English people were loudly complaining of the burden.
Grenville feared to increase the weight, and looked to the American
colonies for relief. He conceived the _right_ * to draw a revenue from
them to be undoubted, and, knowing their ability to pay, he formed a
plan to tax them indirectly by levying new duties upon foreign articles
imported by the Americans. A bill for levying these duties passed the
House of Commons in March, 1764, without much notice, except from
General Conway, who saw in it the seeds of further encroachments upon
the liberties of the colonists. The Assembly of Massachusetts, acting in
accordance with instructions given to the Boston representatives, had
already denied the right to impose duties. Mr. Otis had published a
pamphlet called "The Rights of the British Colonists asserted," which
was highly approved here, and a copy was sent to the Massachusetts agent
in England. In that pamphlet Mr. Otis used the strong language, "If we
are not represented we are slaves!"

Thatcher, of Boston, also published a tract against Parliamentary
taxation, and similar publications were made by Dulaney, the secretary
of the province of Maryland, by Bland, a leading member of the House of
Burgesses of Virginia, and "by authority" in Rhode Island.

On the 5th of May Mr. Grenville submitted to the House of Commons an act
proposing a stamp duty,8 at the same time assuring the colonial agents,
with whom he had conferred, that he should not press its adoption that
session, but would leave the scheme open for consideration. He required
the colonies to pay into the treasury a million of dollars per annum,
and he would leave it to them to devise a better plan, if possible, than
the proposed stamp duty. The idea was not original with Mr. Grenville.
It had been held out as early as 1739, by a club of American merchants,
at the head of whom were Sir William Keith, governor of Pennsylvania,
Joshua Gee, and others. In the colonial Congress at Albany, in 1754, a
stamp act was talked of, and at that time Dr. Franklin thought it a just
plan for taxing the colonies, conceiving that its operations would
affect the several governments fairly and equally. Early in January
(1764) Mr. Huske, a native of Portsmouth, New Hampshire, who had
obtained a seat in Parliament, desirous of displaying his excessive
loyalty, alluded to the proposition of a stamp duty made at the Albany
Convention, and delighted the House by asserting the ability of the
colonists to pay a liberal tax, and recommending the levying of one that
should amount annually to two and a half millions of dollars. *** With
these precedents, and the present assurance of Huske, Grenville brought
forward his bill. It was received, and, on motion of the mover, its
consideration was postponed until the next session.

When the new impost law (which was, in fact, a continuation of former
similar acts) and the proposed Stamp Act reached America, discontent was
every where visible. Instead of being in a condition to pay taxes, the
colonies had scarcely recovered from the effects of the late war; and
the more unjust appeared the Stamp Act, when the previous act was about

* Early in March, 1764, it was debated in the House of Commons whether
they had a right to tax the Americans, they not being represented, and
it was determined unanimously in the affirmative. Of this vote, and the
evident determination of ministers to tax the colonics, Mr. Mauduit, the
agent of Massachusetts, informed the Assembly, and that body immediately
resolved, "That the sole right of giving and granting the money of the
people of that province was vested in them as the legal representatives;
and that the imposition of taxes and duties by the Parliament of Great
Britain, upon a people who are not represented in the House of Commons,
is absolutely irreconcilable with their rights--That no man can justly
take the property of another without his consent; upon which original
principle the right of representation in the same body which exercises
the power of making laws for levying taxes, one of the main pillars of
the British Constitution, is evidently founded."

** It provided that every skin, or piece of vellum, or parchment, or
sheet, or piece of paper used for legal purposes, such as bills, bonds,
notes, leases, policies of insurance, marriage licenses, and a great
many other documents, in order to be held valid in courts of law, was to
be stamped, and sold by public officers appointed for that purpose, at
prices which levied a stated tax on every such document. The Dutch had
used stamped paper for a long time, and it was familiar to English
merchants and companies, but in America it was almost wholly unknown.

*** Gordon, i., 110; Jackson's letter to Lieutenant-governor Hutchinson,
December 26th, 1765.

Opposition to Taxation by the Colonies.--Instructions to their Agents.--
The Stamp Act introduced in Parliament. Townshend

462to intercept their profitable trade with the Spanish main and the
West Indies, whence they derived much of their means to pay a tax. The
_right_ to tax them was also strenuously denied, and all the colonial
Assemblies, wherever the subject was brought up, asserted their sole
right to tax themselves. New England passed strong resolutions of
remonstrance, and forwarded earnest petitions to the king to pause; and
Virginia and New York adopted the same course, using firm, but
respectful, language. They demonstrated, by fair argument, that the
colonies were neither actually nor virtually represented in the British
Parliament; they declared that they had hitherto supposed the pecuniary
assistance which Great Britain had given them (the Parliamentary grants
during the war) offered from motives of humanity, and not as the price
of their liberty; and if she now wished a remuneration, she must make
allowance for all the assistance she had received from the colonies
during the late war, and for the oppressive restrictions she had imposed
upon American commerce. They plainly told Great Britain that, as for her
protection, they had full confidence in their own ability to protect
themselves against any foreign enemy.

Remonstrances and petitions were sent by the colonies to their agents in
London (some of whom had not opposed the Stamp Act), with explicit
instructions to prevent, as far as they had power to act, the adoption
of any scheme for taxing Americans. At this crisis Franklin was
appointed agent for Pennsylvania; and other colonies, relying upon his
skill and wisdom in diplomacy, his thorough acquaintance with government
affairs, his personal influence in England, and, above all, his
fearlessness, also intrusted him with the management of their affairs
abroad. When he arrived in London, Grenville and other politicians
waited upon him, and consulted him respecting the proposed Stamp Act. He
told them explicitly that it was an unwise measure; that Americans would
never submit to be taxed without their consent, and that such an act, if
attempted to be enforced, would endanger the unity of the empire. Pitt,
though living in retirement at his country seat at Hayes, was not an
indifferent spectator, and he also consulted Franklin upon the important
subject.

No doubt the expressed opinion of Franklin delayed, for a while, the
introduction of the Stamp Act into the House of Commons, for it was not
submitted until the 7th of February following. In the mean while
respectful petitions and remonstrances were received from America,
indicating a feeling of general opposition to ministers, and a
determination not to be sheared by the "Gentle Shepherd." * The king, in
his speech on the opening January 10, 1765 Parliament, alluded to
American taxation, and the manifest discontent in the colonies; yet,
regardless of the visible portents of a storm, recommended the adoption
of Grenville's scheme, and assured Parliament that he should use every
endeavor to enFebruary 7, 1765 force obedience in America. The bill,
containing fifty-five resolutions, was brought in, and Mr. Charles
Townshend, the most eloquent man in the Commons, in the absence of Pitt,
spoke in its favor, concluding with the following peroration: "And now
will these Americans, children planted by our care, nourished up by our
indulgence until they are grown to a degree of strength and opulence,
and protected by our arms, will they grudge to contribute their mite to
relieve us from the heavy weight of that burden which we lie under?"
Colonel Barré arose, and, echoing Townshend's words, thus commented:
"_They planted by your care!_ No, your _oppressions_, planted them in
America. They fled from your tyranny, to a then uncultivated and
inhospitable country, where they exposed themselves to almost all the
hardships to which human nature is liable, and, among others, to the
cruelties of a savage foe, the most subtle, and I will take upon me to
say, the most formidable of any people upon the face of God's earth;
yet, actuated by principles of true English liberty, they met all
hardships with pleasure compared with those they suffered in their own

* In the course of a debate on the subject of taxation, in 1762, Mr.
Grenville contended that the money was wanted, that government did not
know where to lay another tax; and, addressing Mr. Pitt, he said, "Why
does he not tell us where we can levy another tax?" repeating, with
emphasis, "Let him tell me where--only tell me where!" Pitt, though not
much given to joking, hummed in the words of a popular song, "Gentle
shepherd, tell me where!" The House burst into a roar of laughter, and
christened George Grenville The Gentle Shepherd.--Pictorial History of
the Reign of George III., i..

Barré's Speech rebuking Townshend.--His Defense of the Americans.--
Effect of his Speech.--Passage of the Stamp Act

463country, from the hands of those who should have been their friends.
_They nourished up by your indulgence_! They grew by your _neglect_ of
them.

As soon as you began to care about them, that care was exercised in
sending persons to rule them in one department and another, who were,
perhaps, the deputies of deputies to some members of this House, sent to
spy out their liberties, to misrepresent their actions, and to prey upon
them--men whose behavior on many occasions has caused the blood of those
sons of liberty * to recoil within them--men promoted to the highest
seats of justice; some who, to my knowledge, were glad, by going to a
foreign country, to escape being brought to the bar of public justice in
their own. _They protected by your arms!_ They have nobly taken up arms
in your defense; have exerted a valor, amid their constant and laborious
industry, for the defense of a country whose frontier was drenched in
blood, while its interior parts yielded all its little savings to your
emoluments. And believe me--remember I this day told you so--that same
spirit of freedom which actuated that people at first will accompany
them still; but prudence forbids me to explain myself further. God knows
I do not at this time speak from motives of party heat; what I deliver
are the genuine sentiments of my heart. However superior to me, in
general knowledge and experience, the respectable body of this House may
be, I claim to know more of America than most of you, having seen and
been conversant in that country. The people, I believe, are as truly
loyal as any subjects the king has; but a people jealous of their
liberties, and who will vindicate them if ever they should be violated.
But the subject is too delicate; I will say no more." For a moment after
the utterance of these solemn truths the House remained in silent
amazement; but the utter ignorance of American affairs, and the fatal
delusion wrought by ideas of royal power and colonial weakness, which
prevailed in that assembly, soon composed their minds. *** Very little
debate was had upon the bill, and it passed the House after a single
division, by a majority of two hundred and fifty to fifty. In the Lords
it received scarcely any opposition. On the 22d of March the king
cheerfully gave his assent, and the famous Stamp Act--the entering wedge
for the dismemberment of the British empire--became a law. The protests
of colonial agents, the remonstrances of London merchants trading with
America, and the wise suggestions of men acquainted with the temper and
resources of Americans were set at naught, and the infatuated ministry
openly declared "that it was intended _to establish the power of Great
Britain to tax the colonies._"

"The sun of liberty is set," wrote Dr. Franklin to Charles Thom-

* This was the origin of the name which the associated patriots in
Ameriea assumed when the speech of Barré reached the colonies, and
organized opposition to the Stamp Act was eommenced.

** Isaac Barré was born in 1727. His early years were devoted to study
and military pursuits, and he attained the rank of colonel in the
British army. Through the influence of the Marquis of Landsdowne he
obtained a seat in the House of Commons, where he was ever the champion
of American freedom. For several years previous to his death he was
afflicted with blindness. He died July 1st, 1802, aged seventy-five
years. Some have attributed the authorship of the celebrated Letters of
Junius to Colonel Barré, the Marquis of Landsdowne, and Counselor
Dunning, jointly, but the conjecture is unsupported by any argument.

*** The apathy that prevailed in the British Parliament at that time
respecting American affairs was astonishing, considering the interests
at issue. Burke, in his Annual Register, termed it the "most languid
debate" he had ever heard; and so trifling did the intelligent Horace
Walpole consider the subject, that, in reporting every thing of moment
to the Earl of Hertford, he devoted but a single paragraph of a few
lines to the debate that day on America. Indeed, Walpole honestly
confessed his total ignorance of American affairs.

Excitement in America.--A Congress proposed.--The Circular Letter of
Massachusetts.--Mrs. Mercy Warren

464son * the very night that the act was passed; "the Americans must
light the lamps of industry and economy."

When intelligence of the passage of the Stamp Act reached America, it
set the whole country in a blaze of resentment. Massachusetts and
Virginia--the _head_ and the _heart_ of the Revolution--were foremost
and loudest in their denunciations, while New York and Pennsylvania were
not much behind them in boldness and zeal. All the colonies were shaken,
and from Maine to Georgia there was a spontaneous expression of
determined resistance.

In October, 1764, the New York Assembly appointed a committee to
correspond with their agent in Great Britain, and with the several
colonial Assemblies, on the subject of opposition to the Stamp Act and
other oppressive measures of Parliament. ** In the course of their
correspondence, early in 1765, this committee urged upon the colonial
Assemblies the necessity of holding a convention of delegates to
remonstrate and protest against the continued violation of their rights
and liberties. Massachusetts was the first to act upon this suggestion.
That action originated with James Otis, Jr., and his father, while
visiting a sister of the former one evening at Plymouth. *** The
recommendation of the New York committee was the subject of
conversation. It was agreed to propose action on the subject in the
General Assembly, and on the 6th of June the younger Mr. Otis, who was a
member of the Legislature, made a motion in the House, which was
adopted, that "It is highly expedient there should be a meeting, as soon
as may be, of committees from the Houses of Representatives, or
burgesses, in the several colonies, to consult on the present
circumstances of the colonies, and the difficulties to which they are,
and must be, reduced, and to consider of a general address--to be held
at New York the first Tuesday in October." The following circular letter
was also adopted by the Assembly, and a copy ordered to be sent to the
Speaker of each of the colonial Assemblies in America:

"Boston, June, 1765.

"Sir--The House of Representatives of this province, in the present
session of general court, have unanimously agreed to propose a meeting,
as soon as may be, of committees from the Houses of Representatives, or
burgesses, of the several British colonies on this continent, to consult
together on the present circumstances of the colonies, and the
difficulties to which they are, and must be, reduced by the operation of
the acts of Parliament for levying duties and taxes on the colonies; and
to consider of a general and united, dutiful, loyal, and humble
representation of their condition to his majesty and to the Parliament,
and to implore relief.

"The House of Representatives of this province have also voted to
propose that such meeting be at the city of New York, in the province of
New York, on the first Tuesday in October next, and have appointed a
committee of three of their members to attend that service, with such as
the other Houses of Representatives, or burgesses, in the several
colonies, may think fit to appoint to meet them; and the committee of
the House of Representatives of this province are directed to repair to
the said New York, on the first Tuesday in October next, accordingly;
if, therefore, your honorable House should agree to this proposal, it
would

* Mr. Thompson was afterward the Secretary of the Continental Congress.
In reply to Franklin's letter he said, "Be assured, we shall light
torches of another sort," predicting the convulsions that soon followed.

** This committee consisted of Robert R. Livingston, John Cruger, Philip
Livingston, William Bayard, and Leonard Lispenard. Mr. Cruger was then
mayor of the city and Speaker of the Assembly.

*** This sister was Mrs. Mercy Warren, wife of James Warren, Esq., of
Plymouth, one of the members of the General Court. She wrote an
excellent history of our Revolution, which was published in three
volumes in 1805. She was born September 5th, 1728, at Barnstable,
Massachusetts. Her youth was passed in the retirement of a quiet home,
and reading, drawing, and needle-work composed the bulk of her
recreations. She married Mr. Warren at the age of twenty-six. The family
connections of both were extensive and highly respectable, and she not
only became intimately acquainted with the leading men of the Revolution
in Massachusetts, but was thoroughly imbued with the republican spirit.
Her correspondence was quite extensive, and, as she herself remarks of
her home, "by the Plymouth fireside were many political plans
originated, discussed, and digested." She kept a faithful record of
passing events, out of which grew her excellent history. She wrote
several dramas and minor poems, all of which glow with the spirit of the
times. Mrs. Warren died on the 19th of October, 1814, in the eighty-
seventh year of her age.

Assembling of a Colonial Congress in New York.--Defection of Ruggles and
Ogden.--The Proceedings. Stamp-masters.

465be acceptable that as early notice of it as possible might be
transmitted to the Speaker of the House of Representatives of this
province."

This letter was favorably received by the other colonies, and delegates
to the proposed ConOctober 7, 1765gress were appointed. They met in the
city of New York on the first Monday in October. The time was earlier
than the meeting of several of the colonial Assemblies, and,
consequently, some of them were denied the privilege of appointing
delegates. The Governors of Virginia, North Carolina, and Georgia
refused to call the Assemblies together for the purpose. It was,
therefore, agreed that _committees_ from any of the colonies should have
seats as delegates, and under this rule New York was represented by its
corresponding committee. Nine of the thirteen colonies were represented,
and the Assemblies of New Hampshire, Virginia, North Carolina, and
Georgia wrote that they would agree to whatever was done by the
Congress.'

The Convention was organized by the election, by ballot, of Timothy
Ruggles, of Massachusetts, as chairman, and the appointment of John
Cotten clerk. It continued in session fourteen consecutive days, and
adopted a _Declaration of Rights, a Petition to the King, and a Memorial
to both Houses of Parliament_, in all of which the principles that
governed the leaders of the soon-following Revolution were clearly set
forth. These documents, so full of the spirit of men determined to be
free, and so replete with enlightened political wisdom, are still
regarded as model state papers. **

All the delegates affixed their signatures of approval to the
proceedings, except Mr. Ruggles, the president, and Mr. Ogden, of New
Jersey, both of whom thus early manifested their defection from a cause
which they afterward openly opposed. The conduct of the former drew down
upon him a vote of censure from the Massachusetts House of
Representatives, and he was reprimanded, in his place, by the Speaker.
He and Otis were the leaders of the opposite parties, and as the
Revolution advanced Ruggles became a bitter Tory. ** Ogden was also
publicly censured for his conduct on that occasion, was burned in
effigy, and at the next meeting of the Assembly of New Jersey was
dismissed from the Speaker's chair, which honorable post he held at the
time of the Congress. The deputies of three of the colonies not having
been authorized by their respective Assemblies to address the king and
Parliament, did not sign the petition and memorial. All the colonies, by
the votes of their respective Assemblies, when they convened
subsequently, approved the measures adopted by the Congress; and before
the day on which the noxious act was to take effect, Amer November
1,1765 ica spoke with one voice to the king and his ministers,
denouncing the measure, and imploring them to be just..

On the passage of the Stamp Act officers were appointed in the several
colonies, to receive and distribute the stamped parchments and papers.
The colonial agents in England were consulted, and those whom they
recommended as discreet and proper persons were appointed. The agents
generally had opposed the measure, but, now that it had become a law,
they were disposed to make the best of it. Mr. Ingersoll, whom I have
mentioned in

* The following delegates were present at the organization of the
Convention:

Massachusetts.--James Otis, Oliver Partridge, Timothy Rugeles.

New York.--Robert R. Livingston, John Cruger, Philip Livingston, William
Bayard, Leonard Lispenard New Jersey.--Robert Oteden, Hendrick Fisher,
Joseph Borden.

Rhode Island.--Metcalf Bowler, Henry Ward.

Pennsylvania.--John Dickenson, John Morton, George Bryan.

Delaware.--Thomas M'Kean, Cæsar Rodney.

Connecticut.--Eliphalet Dyer, David Rowland, William S. Johnson.

Maryland.--William Murdock, Edward Tilghman, Thomas Ringgold.

South Carolina.--Thomas Lynch, Christopher Gadsden, John Rutledge.

** The Declaration of Rights was written by John Cruger; the Petition to
the King, by Robert R. Livingston; and the Memorial to both Houses of
Parliament, by James Otis.

***In Mrs. Warren's drama called The Group, Ruggles figures in the
character of Brigadier Hate-All. He fought against the Americans, at the
head of a corps of Loyalists, and at the close of the war settled in
Nova Scotia, where he has numerous descendants.

Franklin's Advice to Ingersoll.--Arrival of the Stamps.--Patrick Henry's
Resolutions.--"Liberty Tree."--Effigies.

466a former chapter as stamp-master in Connecticut, was in England at
the time. Franklin advised him to accept the office, adding, "Go home
and tell your countrymen to get children as fast as they can"--thereby
intimating that the colonists were too feeble, at that moment, to resist
the government successfully, but ought to gain strength as fast as
possible, in order to shake off the oppressions which, he foresaw, were
about to be laid upon them. But little did he and other agents suspect
that the stamp-masters would be held in such utter detestation as they
were, or that such disturbances would occur as followed, or they would
not have procured the appointments for their friends. The ministry,
however, seem to have anticipated trouble, for a clause was inserted in
the annual Mutiny Act, authorizing as many troops to be sent to America
as ministers saw fit, and making it obligatory upon the people to find
quarters for them.

During the summer and autumn the public mind was greatly disturbed by
the arrival of vessels bringing the stamps, and the first of November
was looked forward to with intense interest--by some with fear, but by
more with firm resolution to resist the operations of the May 30, 1765
oppressive act. Virginia rang the alarum bell, by a series of
resolutions drawn up by Patrick Henry, sustained by his powerful
oratory, and adopted by the House of Burgesses. Of these resolutions,
and of Henry's eloquence on that occasion, I shall hereafter write. So
much did the notes of that alarum sound like the voice of treason, that
a manuscript copy which was sent to Philadelphia, and another to New
York, were handed about with great privacy. In the latter city no one
was found bold enough to print the resolutions, but in Boston they soon
appeared in the Gazette of Edes and Gill, and their sentiments, uttered
in the Assembly, were echoed back from every inhabited hill and valley
in New England.

Before any stamps had arrived in America symptoms of an outbreak
appeared in Boston.

A large elm-tree, which stood at the corner of the present Washington
and Essex Streets, opposite the Boylston Market, received the
appellation of "Liberty Tree," from the circumstance that under it the
association called Sons of Liberty held meetings during the summer of
1765. From a limb of this tree several of the Sons of Liberty *
suspended two effigies early on the morn-. ing of the 14th of August.
One represented Andrew Oliver, secretary of the colony, and just
appointed stamp distributor for Massachusetts; the other was a large
_boot_, intended to represent Lord Bute, with a head and horns, to
personify the devil peeping out of the top. A great number of people
were attracted to these effigies in the course of the day, the
authorities in the mean while taking no public notice of the insult, for
fear of serious consequences. Indeed, Sir Francis Bernard, the royal
governor, had thus far been almost non-committal on the subjects that
were agitating the colonies, although he was strongly suspected of
secretly encouraging the passage of the Stamp Act and kindred measures.
In the evening the effigies were cut down

* John Wery, Jr., Thomas Crafts, John Smith, Henry Wills, Thomas Chase,
Stephen Cleverly, Henry Ross, and Benjamin Edes.

** I am indebted to the Hon. David Sears, of Boston, for this sketeh of
the "Liberty Tree," as it appeared just previous to its destruction by
the British troops and Tories, during the siege of Boston in August,
1775. Mr. Scars has erected a row of fine buildings upon the site of the
old grove of elms, of which this tree was one; and within a niche, on
the front of one of them, and exactly over the spot where the Liberty
Tree stood, he has placed a sculptured representation of it, as seen in
the picture. From the time of the Stamp Act excitement until the armed
possession of Boston by General Gage and his troops in 1774, that tree
had been the rallying-place for the patriots, and had fallen, in
consequence, much in disfavor with the friends of government. It was
inscribed "Liberty Tree," and the ground under it was called "Liberty
Hall." The Essex Gazette of August 31st, 1775, in describing the
destruction of the tree, says, "They made a furious attack upon it.
After a long spell of laughing and grinning, sweating, swearing, and
foaming with malice diabolical, they cut down the tree because it bore
the name of liberty. A soldier was killed by falling from one of its
branches during the operation." In a tract entitled "A Voyage to
Boston," published in 1775 the writer thus alludes to the scene:

"Now shined the gay-faced sun with morning light, All nature gazed,
exulting at the sight, When swift as wind, to vent their base-born rage,
The Tory Williams and the Butcher Gage Rush'd to the tree, a nameless
number near, Tories and negroes following in the rear; Each, axe in
hand, attack'd the honor'd tree, Swearing eternal war with Liberty; Nor
ceased his stroke till each repeating wound Tumbled its honors headlong
to the ground; But ere it fell, not mindless of its wrong, Avenged, it
took one destined head along. A Tory soldier on its topmost limb; The
genius of the Shade look'd stem at him, And mark'd him out that self-
same hour to dine Where unsnuff'd lamps burn low at Pluto's shrine, Then
tripp'd his feet from off their cautious stand; Pale turn'd the wretch--
he spread each helpless hand, But spread in vain--with headlong force he
fell, Nor stopp'd descending till he stopp'd in hell."

Riot in Boston.--Destruction of private Property.--Attack on
Hutchinson's House.--Destruction of "Liberty Tree."

467and carried in procession, the populace shouting, "Liberty and
property forever! No stamps! No taxation without our consent!" They then
proceeded to Kilby Street, and pulling down a small building just
erected by Oliver, to be used, as they suspected, for selling stamps,
they took a portion of it to Fort Hill and made a bonfire of it. The mob
then rushed toward Oliver's house, beheaded his effigy before it, and
broke all the front windows. His effigy was then taken to Fort Hill and
burned. Returning to his house, they burst open the door, declaring
their intention to kill him, and in brutal wantonness destroyed his
furniture, trees, fences, and garden. Mr. Oliver had escaped by a rear
passage, and the next morning, August 15,1765 considering his life in
danger, he resigned his office. Four months afterward he was compelled
by the populace to go under Liberty Tree, and there publicly read his
resignation. In the evening the mob again assembled, and besieged the
house of the late Chief-justice Hutchinson, now lieutenant governor of
the province. They did but little damage, and finished their evening's
orgies by a bonfire on the Common.

On the 25th the Rev. Jonathan Mahew, minister of the West Church in
Boston, preached a powerful sermon against the Stamp Act, taking for his
text, "I would they were even cut off which trouble you. For, brethren,
ye have been called unto liberty: only use not liberty for an occasion
to the flesh, but by love serve one another." * On Monday evening
following a mob collected in King Street, and, proceeding to the
residence of Paxton, the marshal of the Court of Admiralty, menaced it.
The owner assured them that the officer was not there, and, conciliating
the populace by a present of a barrel of punch at a tavern near by,
saved his premises from injury. Maddened with liquor, they rushed to the
house of Story, registrar of the Admiralty, and destroyed not only the
public documents, but his private papers. They next plundered the house
of Hallowell, the controller of customs; and, their numbers being
considerably augmented and their excitement increased, they hurried to
the mansion of Lieutenant-governor Hutchinson, ** on North Square.
Hutchinson and his family escaped

* Galatians, v., 12, 13.

** Thomas Hutchinson was born in 1711, and graduated at Harvard College
in 1727. He studied English constitutional law, with a view to public
employment. For ten years he was a member of the House of
Representatives of Massachusetts, and three years its Speaker. He
succeeded his uncle Edward as Judge of Probate in 1752; was a member of
the Council from 1749 until 1756, and lieutenant governor from 1758 to
1771. He held the office of chief justice after the death of Sewall, in
1760. This office had been promised by Shirley to the elder Otis, and
the appointment greatly displeased that influential family. Several acts
of Hutchinson had made him unpopular with certain of the people. In
1748, the paper currency of the colony having depreciated to about an
eighth of its original value, Hutchinson projected, and carried through
the House, a bill for abolishing it, and substituting gold and silver.
It was a proper measure, but displeased many. He also favored the law
granting Writs of Assistance; and on the bench, in the Council, and in
the Assembly he was always found on the side of the ministry. These
facts account for the violent feelings of the mob against him. In 1768
he was an active coadjutor of Governor Bernard in bringing troops to
Boston, which made him still more unpopular. When Bernard left the
province, in 1769, the government devolved wholly upon Hutchinson. In
1770 the Boston massacre occurred, and much of the responsibility of
that outrage was laid upon him. He was appointed governor in 1771, and
from that time until he left for England, in 1774, he was in continual
trouble with the Assembly. The popular feeling against him was greatly
increased by the publicity given to certain letters of his sent to
ministers, in which he recommended stringent measures against the
colonies. Toward the close of 1773 the destruction of tea in Boston
Harbor was accomplished. The Sons of Liberty had then paralyzed the
government, and there was not a judge or sheriff who dared to exercise
the duties of his office against the wishes of the inflamed people.
Hutchinson then resigned his office, and sailed for England in the
spring of 1774. He died at Brompton, England, June 3rd, 1780, aged
sixty-nine years.

Destruction of Governor Hutchinson's Property.--Character of the Rioters
in Boston.--"Constitutional Courant"

468in time to save their lives, for the mob were prepared, by liquor and
other excitement, for any deed. It was now midnight. With yells and
curses they entered, and by four o'clock in the morning "one of the best
finished houses in the colony had nothing remaining but the bare walls
and floors."

Every thing but the kitchen furniture was taken from the dwelling or
utterly destroyed. The rioters carried off between four and five
thousand dollars in money, a large quantity of plate, family pictures,
and clothing, and destroyed the fine library of the lieutenant governor,
containing a large collection of manuscripts relating to the history of
the colony, which he had been thirty years collecting. This loss was
irreparable. The street in front of the house was next morning strewed
with plate, rings, and money--destruction, not plunder, being the aim of
the mob.

These proceedings were disgraceful in the extreme, and mar the sublime
beauty of the picture exhibited by the steady and dignified progress of
the Revolution. While no apology for mob rioters should be attempted,
extenuating circumstances ought to have their due weight in the balance
of just judgment. All over the land the public mind was excited against
ministers and their abettors, and leading men in the colonies did not
hesitate to recommend forcible resistance, if necessary, to the
oppressions of the mother country. The principles underlying the violent
movement in Boston were righteous, but the mass were too impatient for
their vindication to await the effects of remonstrance and petition,
argument and menace, employed by the educated and orderly patriots. As
is commonly the fact, the immediate actors in these scenes were the
dregs of the population. Yet it was evident that they had, in a degree,
the sympathy of, and were controlled by, the great mass of the more
intelligent citizens. The morning after the destruction of Hutchinson's
house, a public meeting of leading men was held; expressions of
abhorrence for the act were adopted, and the lieutenant governor
received a pledge from the meeting that all violence should cease, if he
would agree not to commence legal proceedings. He acquiesced, and order
was restored.

The disturbances thus begun in Boston were imitated elsewhere during the
summer and autumn. These will be hereafter considered. It may properly
be mentioned here that the opposition to the Stamp Act was not confined
to the continental colonies. The people of the West India plantations
were generally opposed to it, and at St. Kitts the stamp-master was
obliged to resign. Canada and Halifax, on the continent, submitted, and
remained loyal through the Revolution that followed.

Boston, our present point of view, kept up the spirit of liberty, but
avoided acts of violence. A newspaper appeared under the significant
title of "The Constitutional Courant, containing matters instructing to
liberty, and no ways repugnant to loyalty; printed by Andrew Marvel, at
the sign of the Bribe Refused, on Constitution Hill, North America." Its
headpiece was a snake cut into eight pieces (see page 508), the head
part having N. E., the in-

Proceedings in Boston in Relation to the Stamp Act--Effigies burned.--
Effect of the Stamp Act--Non-importation Associations.

469itials of New England, inscribed upon it, and the other pieces the
initials of the other colonies. Accompanying the device was the motto,
Join or die.

The morning of the 1st of November, the day appointed for the Stamp Act
to take effect in America, was ushered in at Boston by the tolling of
muffled bells, and the vessels in the harbor displaying their flags at
half mast, as on the occasion of a funeral solemnity. On Liberty Tree
were suspended two effigies, representing George Grenville and John
Huske; the latter the American member of Parliament whom I have
mentioned as suggesting a heavy tax upon the colonies before the Stamp
Aet was proposed. A label, with a poetic inscription, was affixed to the
breast of each. * The figures remained suspended until about three
o'clock in the afternoon, when they were cut down in the presence of
several thousand people of all ranks, who testified their approbation by
loud huzzas. The effigies were placed in a cart, and taken to the court-
house, where the Assembly were sitting, followed by a vast concourse in
regular procession; thence the people proceeded to the Neck, and hung
the figures upon a gallows erected there. Speeches were made at the
place of _execution_, and, after the lapse of an hour, they were taken
down, torn in pieces, and the limbs thrown in the air. The people were
now desired, by one of the leaders of the pageant, to go quietly home.
They acquiesced, and Boston that night was remarkably tranquil.

The Stamp Act had now become a law. As none but stamped paper was legal,
and as the people were determined not to use it, business was suspended.
The courts were closed, marriages ceased, vessels were delayed in the
harbors, and the social and commercial operations of America were
suddenly paralyzed. Few dared to think of positive rebellion; the strong
arm of government held the sword of power above them, and a general
gloom overspread the colonies. Yet hope was not extinct, and it pointed
out a peaceable, but powerful, plan for effecting a repeal of the
noxious act. The commerce between Great Britain and the colonies had
become very important, and any measure that might interrupt its course
would be felt by a large and powerful class in England, whose influence
was felt in Parliament. The expediency of striking a blow at the trade
occurred to some New York merchants, and, accordingly, on the 31st of
October, the day before the act went into operation, a meeting was held,
and an agreement entered into not to import from England certain
enumerated articles after the first day of January ensuing. ** The
merchants of Phil-

* The following are copies of the labels. On that representing
Grenville, holding out a Stamp Act in his left hand:

"YOUR Servant, Sirs; do you like my Figure? YOU've seen one Rogue, but
here's a bigger. Father of Mischief! how I soar Where many a Rogue has
gone before. Take heed, my Brother Rogues, take heed, In me your honest
Portion read: Dear cousin Peter, no Excuse, Come dance with me without
your shoes, 'Tis G------le calls, and sink or swim, You'd go to h-----l
to follow him." On the figure representing John Huske: Quest. "What,
Brother H----ske? why, this is bad! Ans. Ah, indeed! but I'm a wicked
Lad; My Mother always thought me wild; 'The Gallows is thy Portion,
Child,' She often said: behold, 'tis true, And now the Dog must have his
due, For idle Gewgaws, wretched Pelf, I sold my Country, d----d myself;
And for my great, unequal'd Crime The D----1 takes II----ske before his
time. But if some Brethren I could name, Who shared the Crime, should
share the shame. This glorious tree, though big and tall. Indeed would
never hold 'em all!"

** The meeting was held at the house of George Bums, inn-keeper. As the
agreement entered into there is a type of those adopted by the merchants
and people of other colonies, I copy from the New York Mercury of
November, 1765, the portion of the proceedings of the meeting containing
the resolutions. These were, "First, That in all orders they send out to
Great Britain for goods or merchandise of any nature, kind, or quality
whatsoever usually imported from Great Britain, they will direct their
correspondents not to ship them, unless the Stamp Act be repealed. It
is, nevertheless, agreed that all such merchants as are owners of, and
have, vessels already gone, and now cleared out for Great Britain, shall
be at liberty to bring back in them, on their own accounts, crates and
casks of earthen-ware, grindstones, and pipes, and such other bulky
articles as owners usually fill up their vessels with. Secondly, It is
further unanimously agreed that all orders already sent home shall be
countermanded by the very first conveyance; and the goods and
merchandise thereby ordered not to be sent, except upon the condition
mentioned in the foregoing resolution. Thirdly, It is further
unanimously agreed that no merchant will vend dry-goods or merchandise
sent upon commission from Great Britain, that shall be shipped from
thence after the first day of January next, unless upon the condition
mentioned in the first resolution. Fourthly, It is further unanimously
agreed that the foregoing resolutions shall be binding until the same
are abrogated at a general meeting hereafter to be held for that
purpose. In witness whereof we have hereunto respectively subscribed our
names." [Here followed the names of more than two hundred of the
principal merchants.] In consequence of the foregoing resolutions, the
retail merchants of the city entered into an agreement not to buy or
sell any goods shipped from England after the 1st of January. This was
the beginning of that system of non-importation agreements which hurled
back upon England, with such force, the commercial miseries she had
inflicted upon the colonies.

The Non importation Agreements.--Rockingham made Prime Minister.--Apathy
in Parliament.--Domestic Manufactures

470adelphia readily responded to the measure, and on the 9th of December
those of Boston entered into a similar agreement. Nor were the pledges
confined to merchants alone, but the people in general ceased using
foreign luxuries; articles of domestic manufacture came into general
use, and the trade with Great Britain was almost entirely suspended. *
1765

In July the Marquis of Rockingham, an honorable and enlightened
statesman, succeeded Grenville in the premiership. His cabinet was
composed chiefly of the friends of America, and, for a while, the
colonists hoped for justice. General Conway, who had raised the first
voice of opposition to ministers in their relations to the colonies, was
made one of the Secretaries of State, and Edmund Burke, one of the
earliest friends of America, was Rockingham's private secretary. But the
new ministry, against the determined will of the king and the influence
of a strong power behind the throne, found it difficult to depart from
the line of policy toward the colonies adopted by Grenville, and the
hopes of the Americans faded in an hour.

A strange apathy concerning American affairs seemed still to prevail in
England, notwithstanding every vessel from America carried tidings of
the excited state of the people there.

Parliament met in December. The king, in his speech, mentioned that

* The following extracts from a letter written by a gentleman in
Newport, Rhode Island, to Hugh Gaine, the editor of the New York
Mercury, and published in that paper early in 1768, will give the reader
an idea of the industry of the colonists at that time: "Within eighteen
months past four hundred and eighty-seven yards of cloth and thirty-six
pairs of stockings have been spun and knit in the family of James Nixon
of this town. Another family, within four years past, hath manufactured
nine hundred and eighty yards of woolen cloth, besides two coverlids,
and two bed-ticks, and all the stocking yarn for the family. Not a skein
was put out of the house to be spun, but the whole performed in the
family. We are credibly informed that many families in this colony,
within the year past, have each manufactured upward of seven hundred
yards of cloth of different kinds." Another letter, dated at Newport,
1765, says, "The spirit of patriotism is not confined to the sons of
America, but glows with equal fervor in the benevolent breasts of her
daughters; one instance of which we think is worthy of notice. A lady of
this town, though in the bloom of youth, and possessed of virtues and
accomplishments, engaging, and sufficient to excite the most pleasing
expectations of happiness in the married state, has declared that she
should rather be an old maid than that the operation of the Stamp Act
should commence in these colonies."

Meeting of Parliament.--Speeches of Pitt and Grenville.--Boldness of
Pitt.--Proposition to repeal the Stamp Act

471something had occurred in America which might demand the serious
attention of the Legislature; but that body almost immediately adjourned
until after the Christmas holidays, 1766 and it was the 14th of January
before they reassembled. The king alluded to the disturbances in
America, and assured the Houses that no time had been lost in issuing
orders to the governors of the provinces, and to the commanders of the
forces there, to use all the power of the government in suppressing
riots and tumults. Pitt, who was absent on account of gout when the
passage of the Stamp Act was under consideration, was now in his place,
and, leaning upon crutches, nobly vindicated the rights of the colonies.
After censuring ministers for their delay in giving notice of the
disturbances in America, and animadverting severely upon the injustice
of the Stamp Act, he proceeded to vindicate the Americans. "The
colonists," he said, "are subjects of this kingdom, equally entitled
with yourselves to all the natural rights of mankind and the peculiar
privileges of Englishmen; equally bound by its laws, and equally
participating in the Constitution of this free country. The Americans
are the sons, not the bastards, of England. Taxation is no part of the
governing or legislative power. Taxes are the voluntary gift or grant of
the Commons alone....

When, therefore, in this House we give and grant, we give and grant what
is our own. But in an American tax what do we do? We, your majesty's
Commons for Great Britain, give and grant to your majesty, what? our own
property? No; we give and grant to your majesty the property of your
majesty's Commons of America. It is an absurdity in terms." Grenville
also censured ministers for their delay. "The disturbances," he said,
"began in July, and now we are in the middle of January; lately they
were only _occurrences_; they are now grown to _disturbances, to tumults
and riots_. I doubt they border on open rebellion; and, if the doctrines
of this day be confirmed, that name will be lost in revolution." And so
it was. Grenville also defended his own course, and dissented from Mr.
Pitt respecting the right to tax the colonies. He claimed obedience from
America, because it enjoyed the protection of Great Britain. "The
nation," he said, "has run itself into an immense debt to give them
protection; and now they are called upon to contribute a small share
toward the public expense--an expense arising from themselves--they
renounce your authority, insult your officers, and break out, I might
almost say, into open rebellion." Fixing his eyes intently upon Pitt, he
exclaimed, with great emphasis, "_The seditious spirit of the colonies
owes its birth to factions in this House. Gentlemen are careless of the
consequence of what they say, provided it answers the purposes of
opposition."_

When Grenville ceased speaking, several members arose to their feet,
among whom was Pitt. There was a loud cry of "Mr. Pitt, Mr. Pitt," and
all but he sat down. He immediately fell upon Grenville, and told him
that, since he had challenged him to the field, he would fight him on
every foot of it. "The gentleman tells us," he said, "that America is
obstinate, America is almost in open rebellion. I rejoice that America
has resisted. Three millions of people so dead to all the feelings of
liberty as voluntarily to submit to be slaves, would have been fit
instruments to make slaves of the rest." Alluding to the alleged
strength of Great Britain and the weakness of America, he said, "It is
true, that in a good cause, on a good ground, the force of this country
could crush America to atoms; but on this ground, on this Stamp Act,
many here will think it a crying injustice, and I am one who will lift
up my hands against it. In such a cause your success would be hazardous.
America, if she fall, would fall like the strong man; she would embrace
the pillars of the State, and pull down the Constitution along with
her." * Pitt concluded his speech with a proposition for an absolute and
immediate repeal of the Stamp Act, at the same time recommending an act
to accompany the repeal, declaring, in the most unqualified terms, the
sovereign authority of Great Britain over her colonies. This was
intended as a sort of salvo to the national honor, necessary, as Pitt
well knew, to insure the repeal of the act. Burke, who had been elected
to a seat in the House of Commons, ** Conway, Barré, and others,
seconded the views

* History Debates, &c., of the British Parliament, iv., 292-7.

** It is time Burke commenced his brilliant career as a statesman and an
orator. Dr. Johnson asserted that his two speeches on the repeal of the
Stamp Act "were publicly commended by Mr. Pitt, and filled the town with
wonder."

Position of Lord Camden.--Repeal of the Stamp Act.--Causes that effected
it.--Rejoicings in England and America.

472of Pitt, and with that great statesman were the principal advocates
of a repeal. Chief-justice Pratt, now become Lord Camden, was the
principal friend of the measure in the Upper House, but was opposed to
the Declaratory Act proposed by Pitt. "My position is this," he said, in
the course of debate; "I repeat it; I will maintain it to the last hour-
-taxation and representation are inseparable. The position is founded in
the law of nature. It is more: it is itself an eternal law of nature."

1766 On the 18th of March a repeal bill was passed by a large majority
of the men who, a few months previous, were almost unanimously in favor
of the Stamp Act. It was carried in the House of Commons by a vote of
two hundred and seventy-five to one hundred and sixteen. It met
strenuous opposition in the House of Lords, where it had a majority of
thirty-four. Thirty-three peers entered a strong protest, in which they
declared that "such a submission of king, Lords, and Commons, in so
strange and unheard-of a contest," would amount to an entire surrender
of British supremacy.

The change in the opinions of members of the House of Commons was
wrought more by the petitions, remonstrances, and personal influence of
the London merchants, than by appeals from America, or by disturbances
there. Ministers would not receive the petitions of the colonial
Congress held at New York, because that assembly had not been legally
summoned to meet by the supreme power. It was the importunities of
London merchants and tradesmen, suffering severely from the effects of
the non-importation agreements, that wrought the wondrous change. Half a
million of dollars were then due them from the colonies, and, under the
existing state of things, not a dollar of it was expected to be paid.
Their trade with the colonies was suddenly suspended, and nothing but
bankruptcy and ruin was before them. London being the business heart of
the kingdom, with a cessation of its pulsations paralysis spread to
other portions. Nothing but a retraction could save England from utter
commercial ruin, and, perhaps, civil war. These were the considerations
which made the sensible men in Parliament retrace their steps. According
to Pitt's recommendation, a Declaratory Act, which affirmed the right of
Parliament "to bind the colonies in all cases whatsoever," accompanied
the bill. The repeal of the Stamp Act became a law, by the reluctant
signature of the king, on the day of its enactMarch 18, 1766 ment.

Great joy was manifested in London when the Repeal Act passed. Pitt had
all the honor of the measure, and as he came out to the lobby of the
House of Commons he was greeted by the crowd with the most extravagant
demonstrations of joy. They clung about him like children upon a long-
absent father. The ships in the river displayed their colors; houses at
night, all over the city, were illuminated; and the most fulsome
adulation was bestowed upon the king and Parliament for their goodness
and wisdom! Equally great was the joy that filled the colonies when
intelligence of the repeal of the Stamp Act arrived. The Declaratory
Act, involving, as it really did, the kernel of royal prerogatives which
the colonists rejected, was, for the moment, overlooked, and throughout
America there was a burst of loyalty and gratitude. New York voted
statues to the king and to Pitt, both of which were presently erected; *
Virginia voted a statue to the king;

* The statue of the king was equestrian, and made of lead. It stood
within the present inclosure at the foot of Broadway, New York, called
the Bowling Green. The statue of Pitt was of marble, and stood at the
intersection of William and Wall Streets. The mutilated remains of this
statue are now within an iron railing of the Fifth Ward Hotel, on the
corner of Franklin Street and West Broadway. A sketch of the broken
statue will be found on page 583, Vol. II.

Rejoicing in Boston.--Release of Prisoners for Debt.--Pyramid on the
Common.--Poetic Inscriptions.--Hancock's Liberality.

473Maryland passed a similar vote, and ordered a portrait of Lord
Camden; and the authorities of Boston ordered full-length portraits of
Barré and Conway for Fanueil Hall.

The Repeal Act reached Boston at about noon on Friday, the 13th of May.
It was brought by the brig Harrison, a vessel belonging to John Hancock.
Great was the general joy. The church-bells were immediately rung; the
colors of all the ships were hoisted; cannons were discharged; the Sons
of Liberty gathered under their favorite tree, drank toasts, and fired
guns; and bonfires and illuminations enlivened the evening. A general
celebration was arranged by the select-men for the following Monday. The
dawn, bright and rosy, was ushered in by salvos of cannon, ringing of
bells, and martial music. Through the liberality of some citizens, every
debtor in the jail was ransomed and set at liberty, to unite in the
general joy. "This charitable deed originated in a fair Boston nymph."
The whole town was illuminated in the evening. On the Common the Sons of
Liberty erected a magnificent pyramid, illuminated by two hundred and
eighty lamps, the four upper stories of which were ornamented with
figures of the king and queen, and "fourteen of the patriots who had
distinguished themselves for their love of liberty.'' On the four sides
of the lower apartment were appropriate poetic inscriptions. * "John
Hancock, Esq.," says a newspaper of the day, from which I have drawn
this account, "who gave a grand and elegant entertainment to the genteel
part of the town, and treated the populace to a pipe of Madeira wine,
erected at the front of his house, which was magnificently illuminated,
a stage for the exhibition of his

* The following are the poetic inscriptions referred to. They allude to
emblematic figures on the lower story:

"O thou whom next to Heaven we most revere, Fair Liberty! thou lovely
Goddess, hear! Have we not wooed thee, won thee, held thee long, Lain in
thy Lap, and melted on thy Tongue--Through Death and Dangers, rugged
Paths pursued, And led thee, smiling, to this SOLITUDE--Hid thee within
our Hearts' most golden cell, And braved the Powers of Earth and Powers
of Hell? GODDESS! we can not part, thou must not fly, Be SLAVES! we dare
to scorn it--dare to die." "While clanking Chains and Curses shall
salute Thine ears, remorseless G---le, thine, GB---te, To you, bless'd
PATRIOTS 1 we our cause submit, Illustrious CAMBDEN, Britain's guardian,
PITT! Recede not, frown not, rather let us be Deprived of being than of
LIBERTY. Let Fraud or Malice blacken all our crimes, No disaffection
stains these peaceful climes; O save us, shield us from impending Woes,
The Foes of Britain only are our Foes." "Boast, foul Oppression, boast
thy transient Reien, While honest FREEDOM struggles with her Chain, But
now the Sons of Virtue, hardy, brave, Disdain to lose through mean
Despair to save; Aroused in Thunder, awful they appear, With proud
Deliverance stalking in their rear: While Tyrant Foes their pallid Fears
betray, Shrink from their Arms, and give their Vengeance way; Sec, in
the unequal War, OPPRESSORS fall, The Hate, Contempt, and endless Curse
of all." Our Faith approved, our LIBERTY restored, Our Hearts bend
grateful to our sovereign Lord: Hail, darling monarch I by this act
endear'd, Our firm Affections are our best Reward; Should Britain's self
against herself divide, And hostile Armies form on either side--Should
Hosts rebellious shake our Brunswick's Throne, And as they dared thy
Parent, dare the Son, To this Asylum stretch thy happy Wing, And we'll
contend who best shall love our KING."

Liberality of Otis and others.--The Rejoicings clouded.--New Acts of
Oppression.--Insolence of Public Officers

474fire-works.".... "Mr. Otis, and some other gentlemen who lived near
the Common, kept open house the whole evening, which was very pleasant."
At eleven o'clock, on a signal being given, a horizontal fire-wheel on
the top of the pyramid was set in motion, "which ended in the discharge
of sixteen dozen serpents in the air, which concluded the show. To the
honor of the Sons of Liberty, we can with pleasure inform the world that
every thing was conducted with the utmost decency and good order."

His majesty's Council, by a previous invitation of the governor, met at
the Province House in the afternoon, where many loyal toasts were drunk,
and in the evening they went to the Common to see the fire-works. Past
animosities were forgotten, and the night of the 16th of May was a happy
one for Boston.

The glad sounds of rejoicing because of the repeal of the Stamp Act were
not mellowed into the harmony of confident hope, before the ministry of
England, by its unwise and unjust acts, again awakened loud murmurs of
discontent throughout America. That germ of new oppressions, the
Declaratory Act, which appeared so harmless, began to expand in the
genial soil of ministerial culture. The House of Commons, by
resolutions, demanded of the colonies restitution to the crown officers
who had suffered loss by the Stamp Act riots. This was just, and the
colonies complied; Massachusetts, however, in passing the
Indemnification Bill, inserted a provision that a free pardon should be
extended to all concerned. Much bad feeling was engendered by the
insolent manner in which the settlement of the claims was demanded.
Governor Bernard of Massachusetts was so peremptory and insulting, that
the people of Boston flatly refused to pay; and it was not until the
governor had lowered his authoritative tone very much that they
complied. **

A new clause in the Annual Mutiny Act *** was properly viewed as
disguised taxation, and a measure calculated not only to strengthen the
royal power in America, but to shift a heavy burden from the shoulders
of the home government to those of the colonies. The clause provided
that the British troops that might be sent here should be furnished with
quarters, beer, salt, and vinegar at the expense of the people. It was a
comparatively small tax, and easy to be borne, but it involved the same
principles, substantially, that were avowed in the Stamp Act, and was
more odious, because it was intended to make the people support bayonets
sent to abridge their liberties. New York and Massachusetts refused to
comply with its provisions, and opposition, as zealous as that against
the Stamp Act, was soon aroused. The insolent soldiers met rebuffs at
every corner, and at times serious outbreaks were apprehended in Boston,
New York, and Philadelphia.

On the 2d of August, 1766, the Rockingham cabinet was suddenly
dissolved. It was too liberal for "the king's friends," and was unable
to stem the current of opposition flowing from royalty itself. The new
cabinet was formed, by his majesty's commands, under the con-

* The Province House, the residence of the colonial governors, is still
standing, in the rear of stores on

Washington Street, opposite Milk Street. It is a large brick building,
three stories high, and was formerly decorated with the king's arms
richly carved and gilt.

*** The Mutiny Act granted power to every officer, upon obtaining a
warrant from to search any house, by day or by night, in search of
deserters.

Pitt created Lord Chatham.--Picture of his Cabinet by Burke.--New Scheme
of Taxation.--Commissioners of Customs

475trol of Mr. Pitt, just created Earl of Chatham. * This honor was
conferred on the 29th of July. The transformation of the great Commoner
into an earl was not more surprising than the curious medley of
politicians that formed his cabinet, so diversified and discordant that
neither party knew what confidence to repose in it. "He made an
administration so checkered and speckled," said Burke; "he put together
a piece of joinery so crossly indented and whimsically dove-tailed; a
cabinet so variously inlaid; such a piece of diversified mosaic; such a
tesselated pavement without cement; here a bit of black stone, and there
a bit of white; patriots and courtiers, king's friends and republicans;
Whigs and Tories; treacherous friends and open enemies; that it was,
indeed, a very curious show, but utterly unsafe to touch and unsure to
stand on. The colleagues whom he had assorted at the same boards stared
at each other, and were obliged to ask, 'Sir, your name?' 'Sir, you have
the advantage of me.' 'Mr. Such-a-one, I beg a thousand pardons.' I
venture to say it did so happen that persons had a single office divided
between them, who had never spoken to each other in their lives until
they found themselves they knew not how, pigging together, heads and
points, in the same truckle-bed." ** Had the general direction of
affairs been assumed by Pitt, even this incongruous cabinet might not
have done much mischief; but frequent and serious attacks of gout kept
the great orator confined at Hayes, his country seat in Kent.

"Having," said Burke, "put so much the larger part of his enemies and
opposers into power, the confusion was such that his own principles
could not possibly have any effect or influence in the conduct of
affairs. If ever he fell into a fit of the gout, or any other cause
with-drew him from public cares, principles directly contrary to his own
were sure to predominate.... When his face was hid for a moment, his
whole system was one wide sea without chart or compass." It was during
one of these attacks of illness that Grenville proposed a tax of two
millions of dollars upon America, for the support of troops, &c. Charles
January, 1767 Townshend, Pitt's chancellor of the Exchequer, upon whom
devolved the duty of suggesting financial measures, agreed with
Grenville as to the _right_ thus to tax the colonies, but, in view of
the late excitement produced by the Stamp Act, thought it inexpedient,
at the same time pledging himself to the House to find a revenue in
America sufficient to meet expenses. This pledge he attempted to redeem
in May, by asking leave to bring in a bill to impose a duty upon paper,
glass, painters' colors, lead, and tea imported by the Americans. Leave
was granted, and an act levying such duties became a law by royal assent
on the 29th of June. Another bill became a law on the 2d of July, which
provided for taking off a shilling on a pound of the export tax on all
black and single tea, and granting a drawback upon all teas exported to
Ireland and America. The object of this act was to encourage the
exportation of tea to America, in the belief that the reduced price of
the article would cause a great increase in the consumption, and,
consequently, augment the revenue arising from it under the new act. But
in this ministers reckoned neither wisely nor well.

Another bill was passed, reorganizing the colonial custom-house system,
and the establishment of a Board of Revenue Commissioners for America,
to have its seat at Boston. There was a provision in the first bill for
the maintenance of a standing army in America, and enabling the crown,
by sign manual, to establish _a general civil list_ throughout every
province, fixing the salaries of governors, judges, and other officers,
such salary to be paid by the

* Three weeks before the installation of the new cabinet Pitt received
an autograph letter from the king, commanding him to arrange a new
administration. Pitt spoke of his age and infirmities (he was then
fifty-eight), and proposed taking to himself the office of the privy
seal, which implied and necessitated his removal to the House of Lords!
The king was greatly astonished, but so desperately tangled were the
public affairs, and so great seemed the necessity of having the powerful
Pitt among his friends, that the king was obliged to yield. The witty
Lord Chesterfield, alluding to the ambition of Pitt to acquire a
coronet, said. "Every body is puzzled to account for this step. Such an
event was, I believe, never heard or read of, to withdraw, in the
fullness of his power and in the utmost gratification of his ambition,
from the House of Commons (which procured him his power, and which could
alone insure it to him), and to go into that hospital of incurables, the
House of Lords, is a measure so unaccountable, that nothing but proof
positive could make me believe it; but so it is." Chesterfield called it
a "fall up stairs--a fall which did Pitt so much damage that he will
never be able to stand upon his legs again."

** Speech on American Taxation.

Fresh Excitement in the Colonies.--Increasing Importance of the
Newspapers.--"Letters of a Pennsylvania Farmer."

476crown. Thus the executive and judicial officers, from whom the people
were to expect good government and the righteous administration of laws,
were made entirely independent of the people, and became, in fact, mere
hireling creatures of the crown. This had been the object of almost
every minister from the time of Charles II. *

When intelligence of these acts reached America, the excitement
throughout the colonies was as great as that produced by the Stamp Act,
but action was more dignified and efficient. The royal governors and
their retainers, elated with the prospect of being independent of the
colonial Assemblies, eagerly forwarded the schemes of the ministry, and
aided greatly in fostering opposition among the people. The ministry
seemed totally blind to every light of common sense, and disregarded the
warnings of Lord Shelburne and others in Parliament, and the opinions of
just observers in America. **

The colonists clearly perceived the intention of government to tax them
in some shape, and took the broad ground asserted by Otis in his
pamphlet, that "taxes on trade, if designed to raise a revenue, were
just as much a violation of their rights as any other tax."

The colonial newspapers, now increased to nearly thirty in number, began
to be tribunes for the people, through which leading minds communed with
the masses upon subjects of common interest. They teemed with essays
upon colonial rights, among the most powerful of which were the "Letters
of a Farmer of Pennsylvania to the Inhabitants of the American liberty
which existed, and the fatal consequences of a supine acquiescence in
min-

British Colonies," written by John Dickinson,3 and first published in
the Pennsylvania Chronicle. They were twelve in number, and appeared
during the summer and autumn of 1767. Their effect, like that of the
"Crisis," by Thomas Paine, a few years later, was wonderful in forming
and controlling the will of the people, and giving efficiency to the
strong right arm of action. In a style of great vigor, animation, and
simplicity, Dickinson portrayed the unconstitutionality of the conduct
of Great Britain, the imminent peril to

* Gordon, i., 146.

** Gerard Hamilton (known as Single Speech Hamilton, because when a
member of Parliament he made but one speech) was then in America, and,
writing to Colcraft, a member from Lincolnshire, said, "In the
Massachusetts government in particular there is an express law, by which
every man is obliged to have a musket, a pound of powder, and a pound of
bullets always near him; so there is nothing wanting but knapsacks (or
old stockings, which will do as well) to equip an army for marching, and
nothing more than a Sartonius or a Spartacus at their head requisite to
beat your troops and your custom-house officers out of the country, and
set your laws at defiance."

*** John Dickinson was born in Maryland, November 13th, 1732. His father
was Samuel Dickinson, first judge, in Delaware, of the Court of Common
Pleas, about 1740. His father was wealthy, and John had every means
given him for acquiring learning which the colonies afforded. He studied
law in Philadelphia, and was for three years at the Temple in London. He
first appeared in public life as a member of the Pennsylvania Assembly
in 1764. He was a member from Pennsylvania of the "Stamp Act Congress"
in 1765. He soon afterward began his essays upon various political
subjects, and his pen was never idle during the conflict that succeeded.
Dr. Franklin caused his "Letters of a Pennsylvania Farmer" to be
republished in London in 1768, and in 1769 they were translated into
French and published in Paris. Mr. Dickenson was a member of the first
Continental Congress in 1774. He wrote the Declaration of the Congress
of 1775, setting forth the causes and the necessity for war. He was
opposed to a political separation from Great Britain, and was
intentionally absent from Congress when the final vote on the
Declaration of Independence was taken on the 4th of July, 1776. In 1777
he received the commission of brigadier general. In 1780 he took his
seat in the Assembly of Delaware, and in 1782 was elected President of
Pennsylvania. He was a member of the Convention that framed the Federal
Constitution, and was its warm friend. He continued in public life, in
various ways, until his death, which occurred at Wilmington on the 14th
of February, 1808, at the age of seventy-five.

Honors to John Dickenson.--Massachusetts's Circular Letter.--Boldness of
Otis and Samuel Adams.--The "Rescinders."

477ministerial measures--more fatal as precedents than by the immediate
calamities they were calculated to produce. * The people of Boston, at a
public meeting, passed a vote of thanks to Dickinson, and some who were
afterward leading men of the Revolution composed the committee to write
the letter. In May, 1768, an association in Philadelphia, called the
Society of Fort St. David, presented an address to Mr. Dickinson, "in a
box of heart of oak." The following inscriptions were neatly done upon
it, in gold letters. On the top was represented the cap of liberty on a
spear, resting on a cipher of the letters J. D. Underneath the cipher,
in a semi-circular label, the words Pro Patria. Around the whole, the
following: "_The gift of the Governor and Society of Fort St. David to
the author of The Farmer's Letters, in grateful testimony to the very
eminent services thereby rendered to this country, 1768." On the inside
of the top was the following inscription: "The liberties of the British
colonics in America asserted with Attic eloquence and Roman spirit by
John Dickinson, Esq., barrister at law._" Spirited resolutions were
adopted by the colonial Assemblies, denouncing the acts of Parliament,
and new non-importation associations were formed, which almost destroyed
the commerce with England.

A special session of the Massachusetts Assembly was asked for in
October, to "consider the late acts of Parliament," but Governor Bernard
unwisely refused to call one.

At the opening of the regular session, in December, a large committee
was appointed to "consider the state of the province." It elaborated
several measures, the first of which was a petition to the king,
asserting the principles for which they were contending. A bolder step,
and one that most displeased the British ministry, was now taken; the
Assembly February, 1768 adopted a circular letter, to be addressed to
all the colonies, imbodying the sentiments expressed in the petition to
the king, and inviting their co-operation in maintaining the liberties
of America. When intelligence of this letter reached the ministers, Lord
Hillsborough, the colonial Secretary, sent instructions to Governor
Bernard to call upon the General Assembly of Massachusetts to rescind
its resolutions, and, in the event of non-compliance, to dissolve that
body. But the Assembly, or House of Representatives, consisting of one
hundred and nine members, much the largest legislative Convention in
America, ** were not easily frightened, and, instead of complying with
the governor's demand, made that very demand a fresh cause of complaint.
Mr. Otis and Samuel Adams were the principal speakers on the occasion.
The former made a speech which the friends of government pronounced "the
most violent, insolent, abusive, and treasonable declaration that
perhaps ever was delivered."

"When Lord Hillsborough knows," said Otis, "that we will not rescind our
acts, he should apply to Parliament to rescind theirs. _Let Britons
rescind their measures, or they are lost forever." For nearly an hour he
harangued the Assembly with words like; these, until even the Sons of
Liberty trembled lest he should tread upon the domain of treason. The
House refused to rescind, passed resolutions denunciatory of this
attempt to arrest free discussion and expression of opinion, and then
sent a letter to the governor, inform ing him of their action. "If the
votes of this House," they said, "are to be con January 301768 trolled
by the direction of a minister, we have left us but a vain semblance of
liberty. We have now only to inform you that this House have voted not
to rescind, and that, on a division on the question, there were ninety-
two yeas and seventeen nays." The seventeen "rescinders" became objects
of public scorn. The governor, greatly irritated, proceeded to dissolve
the Assembly; but, before the act was accomplished, that body had
prepared a list of serious accusations against him, and a petition to
the king for his removal. Thus Brit_ ain, through her representative,
struck the first blow at free discussion in America. Massachusetts,
however, felt strong, for the answer to her circular letter from other
colonies glowed with sympathy and assurances of support.

* American Portrait Gallery, vol. iii.

** About this time the debates in the Assembly began to be so
interesting to the public at large, that a gallery was prepared for the
use of spectators, which was usually crowded with citizens.

Treatment of a Tide-waiter.--Seizure of the Sloop Liberty.--Excitement
of the People.--Publie Meeting in Boston.

478A new scene in the drama now opened. The commissioners of customs had
arrived 1767 in May, and were diligent in the performance of their
duties. The merchants were very restive under the strictness of the
revenue officers, and these functionaries were exceedingly odious in the
eyes of the people generally. On the 10th of June the sloop Liberty,
Nathaniel Bernard master, belonging to John Hancock, arrived at Boston
with a cargo of Madeira wine. It was a common practice for the tide-
waiter, upon the arrival of a vessel, to repair to the cabin, and there
to remain, drinking punch with the master, while the sailors were
landing the dutiable goods. * On the arrival of the _Liberty_, Kirke,
the tidesman, went on board, just at sunset, and took his seat in the
cabin as usual. About nine in the evening Captain Marshall, and others
in Hancock's employ, entered the cabin, confined Kirke below, and landed
the wine on the dock without entering it at the custom-house, or
observing any other formula. Kirke was then released and sent ashore.
Captain Marshall died suddenly during the night, from the effects, it
was supposed, of over-exertion in landing the wine. In the morning the
commissioners of customs ordered the seizure of the sloop, and Harrison,
the collector, and Hallowell, the controller, were deputed to perform
that duty. Hallowell proceeded to place the broad arrow upon her (the
mark designating her legal position), and then, cutting her moorings, he
removed the vessel from Hancock's Wharf to a place in the harbor under
the guns of the _Romney_ ship of war.

This act greatly inflamed the people. Already a crowd had collected to
prevent the seizure; but when the vessel was cut loose and placed under
the protection of British cannon, a strong feeling of anger pervaded the
multitude. The assemblage of citizens became a mob, and a large party of
the lower class, headed by Malcomb, a bold smuggler, pelted Harrison and
others with stones, attacked the offices of the commissioners, and,
dragging a customhouse boat through the town, burned it upon the Common.
The commissioners, alarmed for their own safety, applied to Governor
Bernard for protection, but he told them he was utterly powerless. They
found means to escape on board the Romney, and thence to Castle William,
a fortress upon Castle Island, in the harbor, nearly three miles
southeast of the city, where a company of British artillery was
stationed. **

The Sons of Liberty called a meeting at Faneuil Hall on the afternoon of
the 13th. *** A large concourse assembled, and the principal business
done was preparing a petition to the governor, asking him to remove the
man-of-war from the harbor. The Council passed resolutions condemnatory
of the rioters, but the House of Representatives took no notice of the
matter. Legal proceedings were commenced against the leading rioters,
but the difficulty of procuring witnesses, and the bad feeling that was
engendered, made the prosecutors drop the matter in the following
spring.

Alarmed by these tumultuous proceedings, the governor requested General
Gage, then in New York, and captain general of all the British forces in
America, to act upon a permission already given him by Lord
Hillsborough, in a secret and confidential letter, to order some royal
troops from Halifax to Boston. Intelligence of this request leaked out,
and the people of Boston were greatly irritated. The arrival of an
officer sent by Gage to prepare quarters for the coming troops
occasioned a town meeting, and a committee, consisting of James Otis,
Samuel Adams, John Hancock, and John Adams, was appointed to wait upon a
September 12,1768 the governor, ascertain whether the report was true,
and request him to call a special meeting of the Assembly. (a) The
governor frankly acknowledged that troops were about to be quartered in
Boston, but refused to call a meeting of the Assembly until he should
receive instructions from home. Bernard was evidently alarmed; he
perceived the great popularity of the leaders who stood before him, and
his tone was far more pacific

* Gordon.

** The present fort upon Castle Island is called Fort Independence, so
named by the elder Adams while visiting it when he was President of the
United States, in 1799. It stands at the entrance of the harbor, and is
one of the finest forts in Ameriea.

*** The private meeting-place of the Sons of Liberty, according to John
Adams, was the counting-room in Chase and Speakman's distillery, in
Hanover Square, near the Liberty Tree.

Attempted Bribery of Patriots.--Soundness of their Principles.--Proposed
Convention in Boston.--Organization of the Meeting.

479than it had recently been. Nor did his pliancy end here; he actually
stooped to the base alternative of endeavoring to make some of those
leaders his friends by bribes. He gave Hancock a commission honoring him
with a seat in the Council, but the patriot tore the parchment into
shreds in the presence of the people. He offered John Adams the
lucrative office of advocate general, in the Court of Admiralty, but
Adams hurled back the proffered patronage with disdain. Bernard also
approached that sturdy representative of the Puritans, Samuel Adams, but
found him, though poor in purse, as Hutchinson on another occasion said,
"of such an obstinate and inflexible disposition that he could never be
conciliated by any office or gift whatsoever."

The governor having peremptorily refused to convene the Assembly, the
meeting recommended a convention of delegates from all the towns in the
province, to meet in Boston within ten days. "A prevailing apprehension
of war with France" was made the plausible pretense for calling the
meeting; and they requested the people to act in accordance with a law
of the colony, authorizing each one to provide himself with a musket and
the requisite ammunition. Every town and district but one--more than a
hundred in number **--sent a delegate. They met on the 22d, chose Mr.
Thomas Cushing, late Speaker of the Assembly, as their chairman, and
petitioned Governor Bernard to summon a Gen-September

* Faneuil Hall has been denominated "the cradle of American liberty,"
having been the popular gathering-place of the Sons of Liberty during
the incipient stages of the Revolution. It was erected in 1742, at the
sole expense of Peter Faneuil, Esq., of Boston, and by him generously
given to the town--the basement for a market, with a spacious and most
beautiful hall, and other convenient rooms above, for public meetings of
the citizens. It was burned in 1761, nothing but the brick walls
remaining. The town immediately ordered it to be rebuilt. Mr. Faneuil
had then been dead several years. The engraving shows it as it appeared
during the Revolution. It was enlarged in 1805, by the addition of
another story, and an increase of forty feet in its width. The hall is
about eighty feet square, and contains some fine paintings of
distinguished men. The lower part is no longer used as a market. The
original vane, copied from that of the London Royal Exchange, still
turns upon the pinnacle. It is in the form of a huge grasshopper (the
crest of Sir Thomas Gresham), through whose munificence the Royal
Exchange was built.

** At that time Massachusetts contained sixty-six regularly organized
towns.

Governor Bernard's Proclamation.--Meeting of the Convention.--Arrival of
Troops at Boston.--Origin of Yankee Doodle

480eral Court. The governor refused to receive their petition, and
denounced the Convention as treasonable, notwithstanding the
conservatism which the delegates from the country infused into the
proceedings. * They disclaimed all pretension to political authority,
and professed to have met "in this dark and distressing time to consult
and advise as to the best manner of preserving peace and good order."
The governor warned them to desist from further proceedings, and
admonished them to separate without delay. But the Convention, while it
was moderate in its action, was firm in its assumed position. It
remained in session four days, during which time a respectful petition
to the king was agreed to; also a letter to De Berdt, the agent of the
colony in England, the chief topic of which was a defense of the
province against the charge of a rebellious spirit. They also adopted an
address to the people, in which the alarming state of the country was
set forth; but submission to legal authority and abstinence from violent
tumults were strongly inculcated. This was the first of those popular
assemblies in America which speedily assumed the whole political power
in the colonies. September 27, 1768 Two regiments of troops from
Halifax, under Colonels Dalrymple and Carr, borne by a considerable
fleet, arrived at Boston the day after the adjournment of the
Convention. The people had resolved to oppose their landing. There was
room for the troops in the barracks upon Castle Island, and the
inhabitants insisted upon their being landed there. But the governor and
General Gage determined to have the troops near at hand, and, pretending
that the barracks were reserved for two other regiments, ordered by the
home government from Ireland, proceeded to provide quarters in the town.
The governor's Council refused to act in concert with him, and he took
the responsibility upon himself.

On Sunday morning the fleet sailed up the harbor, ** invested the town,
and, under cover

* The following is a copy of the governor's proclamation on the
occasion. Being short, I give it entire, as a fair specimen of the
mildest tone assumed by the royal representatives in America toward the
people:

* "_To the Gentlemen assembled at Faneuil Hall under the name of a
Committee or Convention_:

* "As I have lately received from his majesty strict orders to support
his Constitutional authority within this government, I can not sit still
and see so notorious a violation of it as the calling an assembly of
people by private persons only. For a meeting of the deputies of the
towns is an assembly of the representatives of the people to all intents
and purposes; and it is not the calling it a Committee or Convention
that will alter the nature of the thing. I am willing to believe that
the gentlemen who so hastily issued the summons for this meeting were
not aware of the high nature of the offense they were committing; and
they who have obeyed them have not well considered of the penalties
which they will incur if they should persist in continuing their
session, and doing business therein. A present ignorance of the law may
excuse what is past; a step further will take away that plea. It is,
therefore, my duty to interpose this instant, before it is too late. I
do, therefore, earnestly admonish you that instantly, and before you do
any business, you break up this assembly, and separate yourselves. I
speak to you now as a friend to the province and a well-wisher to the
individuals of it. But if you should pay no regard to this admonition, I
must, as governor, assert the prerogative of the crown in a more public
manner. For assure yourselves (I speak from instruction) the king is
determined to maintain his entire sovereignty over this province, and
whoever shall persist in usurping any of the rights of it will repent of
his rashness. Fra. Bernard. "Province House, Sept. 22d, 1768."

* A respectful reply to this proclamation, signed by Mr. Cushing in
behalf of the Convention, was sent to the governor, but he refused to
receive the message.

** There were eight ships--the Beaver, Senegal, Martin, Glasgow,
Mermaid, Romney, Launceston, and Bonetta. In the Boston Journal of the
Times of September 29th, 1768, I find the following: "The fleet was
brought to anchor near Castle William; that night there was throwing of
sky-rockets, and those passing in boats observed great rejoicings, and
that the Yankee Doodle Song * was the capital piece in the band music.
We now behold Boston surrounded, at a time of profound peace, by about
fourteen ships of war, with springs on their cables and their broadsides
to the town! If the people of England could but look into the town, they
would see the utmost good order and observance of the laws, and that
this mighty armament has no other rebellion to subdue than what existed
in the brain or letter of the inveterate G----.

* "October 3. In King [now State] Street, the soldiers being gathered, a
proclamation was read, offering a reward of ten guineas to such soldier
as should inform of any one who should attempt to seduce him from the
service."

* "October 6. In the morning nine or ten soldiers of Colonel Carr's
regiment were severely whipped on the Common. To behold Britons scourged
by negro drummers was a new and very disagreeable spectacle."

* This air, with quaint words about "Lydia Locket" losing "her pocket,"
was known in Cromwell's time. Our lyric poet, G. P Morris, Esq., in the
following pleasant song, in meter adapted to the air, gives a version of

* THE ORIGIN OF YANKEE DOODLE.

Once on a time old Johnny Bull flew in a raging fury, And swore that
Jonathan should have no trials, sir, by jury; That no elections should
be held across the briny waters: And now said he, "I'll tax the tea of
all his sons and daughters." Then down he sate in burly state, and
bluster'd like a grandee, And in derision made a tune call'd "Yankee
doodle dandy." "Yankee doodle"--these are facts--"Yankee doodle dandy:
My son of wax, your tea I'll tax; you--Yankee doodle dandy." John sent
the tea from o'er the sea, with heavy duties rated; But whether hyson or
bohea I never heard it stated. Then Jonathan to pout began--he laid a
strong embargo--"I'll drink no tea, by Jove 1" so he threw overboard the
cargo. Then Johnny sent a regiment, big words and looks to bandy, Whose
martial band, when near the land, play'd "Yankee doodle dandy." "Yankee
doodle--keep it up--Yankee doodle dandy--I'll poison with a tax your
cup; you--Yankee doodle dandy." A long war then they had, in which John
was at last defeated, And "Yankee doodle" was the march to which his
troops retreated. Cute Jonathan, to see them fly, could not restrain his
laughter; "That tune," said he, "suits to a T. I'll sing it ever after."
Old Johnny's face, to his disgrace, was flush'd with beer and brandy,
E'en while he swore to sing no more this "Yankee doodle dandy." Yankee
doodle--ho, ha, he--Yankee doodle dandy, We kept the tune, but not the
tea--Yankee doodle dandy. I've told you now the origin of this most
lively ditty, Which Johnny Bull dislikes as "dull and stupid"--what a
pity! With "Hail Columbia" it is sung, in chorus full and hearty--On
land and main we breathe the strain John made for his tea party. No
matter how we rhyme the words, the music speaks them handy, And where's
the fair can't sing the air of "Yankee doodle dandy!" Yankee doodle,
firm and true--Yankee doodle dandy--Yankee doodle, doodle doo, Yankee
doodle dandy.

Landing of the Troops.--Imposing Military Display.--Exasperation of the
People.--Non-importation Associations.

481of the guns of the ships, the troops, about seven hundred in number,
landed with charged muskets, fixed bayonets, colors flying, drums
beating, and every other military parade usual on entering a conquered
city of an enemy. A part of the troops encamped on the Common, and part
occupied Faneuil Hall and the town-house. Cannons were placed in front
of the latter; passengers in the streets were challenged, and other
aggravating circumstances attended the entrance of the troops. Every
strong feeling of the New Englander was outraged, his Sabbath was
desecrated, his worship was disturbed, his liberty was infringed upon.
The people became greatly exasperated; mutual hatred, deep and abiding,
was engendered between the citizens and the soldiers, and the terms
_rebel_ and _tyrant_ were daily bandied between them.

All Americans capable of intelligent thought sympathized with
Massachusetts, and the engine of non-importation agreements, which
worked so powerfully against the Stamp Act, was put in motion with
increased energy. * These associations became general in all the
colonies, under the sanction of the Assemblies. An agreement, presented
by Washington in the House of Burgesses of Virginia, was signed by every
member, and the patriotism of the people was every where displayed by
acts of self-denial. **

* The non-importation agreement of the people of Boston was,
substantially, that they would not import any goods for the fall of
1768, except those already ordered; that they would not import any goods
from Great Britain from the 1st of January, 1769, to the 1st of January,
1770, except salt, coals, fish-hooks and lines, hemp and duck, bar lead
and shot, wool cards and card wires; that they would not import on their
own account, or on commission, or purchase from any who should import,
from any other colony in America, from January, 1769, to January, 1770,
any tea, paper, glass, or painters' colors, until the aet imposing
duties on those articles should be repealed.

** A letter from Newport, published in a New York paper in January,
1768, remarks that, at an afternoon visit of ladies, "It was resolved
that those who could spin ought to be employed in that way, and those
who could not should reel. When the time arrived for drinking tea, bohea
and hyperion were provided, and every one of the ladies judiciously
rejected the poisonous bohea, and unanimously, to their very great
honor, preferred the balsamic hyperion." The hyperion here spoken of was
of domestic manufacture--the dried leaves of the raspberry plant. In
Boston a party of some forty or fifty young ladies, calling themselves
Daughters of Liberty, met at the house of the Rev. Mr. Morehead, where
they amused themselves during the day with spinning "two hundred and
thirty-two skeins of yarn, some very fine, which were given to the
worthy pastor, several of the party being members of his congregation."
Numerous spectators came in to admire them. Refreshments were indulged
in, and "the whole was concluded with many agreeable tunes, anthems, and
liberty songs, with great judgment; fine voices performing, which were
animated, in all their several parts, by a number of the Sons of
Liberty." It is added that there were upward of one hundred spinners in
Mr. Morehead's society.

The Duke of Grafton.--The King's Speech, and the Response.--Proposed Re-
enactment of a Statute of Henry VIII.

482Let us consider for a moment the acts of the British Parliament at
this juncture. It assembled on the 8th of November. Pitt was ill at his
country seat, Townshend was dead, and the Duke of Grafton, who had been
one of the Secretaries of State in the Rockingham administration, was
really at the head of this unpopular ministry. He was an able, straight-
forward politician, a warm admirer and friend of Pitt, and a firm
supporter of his principles. *

The king, in his speech from the throne, alluded to fresh troubles in
America, and denounced, in strong terms, the rebellious spirit evinced
by Massachusetts. The response of ministers assured the king of their
determination to maintain "the supreme authority of Great Britain over
every part of the British empire." The address was adopted in the House
of Lords, but met considerable opposition in the Commons, where the
oppressive acts of the government toward America were severely
criticised.

Early in January the consideration of American affairs was taken up in
Parliament. The petition from the Boston Convention was contemptuously
rejected; the Lords recommended, in an address to the king, the
transmission of instructions to the Governor of Massachusetts to obtain
full information of all treasons, and to transmit the offenders to
England, to be tried there under a statute of the 35th of Henry VIII.,
which provided for the punishment of treason committed out of the
kingdom. The address was opposed in the Commons by Pownall (who had been
Governor of Massachusetts (a)), Burke, Barré, and  a 1757 Dowdeswell.
The latter denounced the measure as "unfit to remedy the disorders," and
as "cruel to the Americans and injurious to England." He also censured
Hillsborough for taking the responsibility, during the recess of
Parliament, of ordering colonial governors to dissolve the Assemblies.
Burke thundered his eloquent anathemas against the measure. "At the
request of an exasperated governor," he exclaimed, "we are called upon
to agree to an address advising the king to put in force against the
Americans the Act of Henry VIII. And why? Because you can not trust the
juries of that country! Sir, that word must convey horror to every
feeling mind. If you have not a party among two millions of people, you
must either change your plan of government, or renounce the colonies
forever." Even Grenville, the author of the Stamp Act, opposed the
measure as futile and unjust. Yet the January 26, 1769 address and
resolutions accompanying it were concurred in by a majority of one
hundred and fifty-five against eighty-nine. **

On the 8th of February Mr. Rose Fuller moved to recommit the address,
for he saw in the proposed rigor toward the Americans the portents of
great evil to the nation. He alluded to the miserable attempts to
collect a revenue in America, and the monstrous evils growing out of
them. "As for money," he said, "all that sum might be collected in Lon-

* The Duke of Grafton was the nobleman to whom the celebrated "Junius"
addressed eleven of his scorching letters. In these he is represented as
a most unscrupulous libertine in morals. He succeeded his grandfather in
the family honors in 1757. He died on the 11th of March, 1811, aged
seventy-five years.

** Cavendish's Debates.

Lord North.--Colonel Barré's Warnings.--General Gage in Boston.--No Co
operation--Dissolution of Assemblies.--Bernard

483don at less than half the expense." * Pownall, after alluding to the
early settlement of America, the privations of the people, their virtues
and courage, perseverance and enterprise, remarked, "But now that
spirit, equally strong and equally inflamed, has but a slight and
trifling sacrifice to make; the Americans have not a country to leave,
but a country to defend; and have not friends and relatives to leave and
forsake, but friends and relatives to unite with and stand by in one
common union." But all efforts to avert the evil were vain; Mr. Fuller's
motion was negatived by a majority of one hundred and sixty-nine against
sixty-five.

Lord North had succeeded Charles Townshend as Chancellor of the
Exchequer, he began his long career of opposition to the Americans by
offering a resolution, on the 14th of March, that a respectful petition
or remonstrance from the people of New York _should not be received_.
This proposition, which was adopted, called up Colonel Barré. He
reminded the House that he had predicted all that would happen on the
passage of the Stamp Act, and he now plainly warned ministers that, if
they persisted in their wretched course of oppression, the whole
continent of North America would rise in arms, and those colonies,
perhaps, be lost to England forever. But the British Legislature,
blinded by ignorance of Americans when the Stamp Act was passed, seemed
now still more blind, because of films of prejudice generated by a false
national pride. The motion of Lord North prevailed--the petition was
refused acceptance.

Gage went to Boston in October, to enforce the requisitions of the
Quartering Act. But he found none to co-operate with him except Governor
Bernard, whose zeal in his majesty's service had procured him a
baronetcy, at the king's expense. The Council and the select-men
declined to act, and Gage was obliged to hire houses for the troops, and
provide many articles for them out of his own military chest Thus
matters remained until spring, when intelligence of the several acts of
Parliament against Massachusetts aroused the fiercest sentiments of
opposition, short of actual rebellion, throughout the colonies.
Legislative Assemblies spoke out boldly, and for this crime they were
dissolved by royal governors. Yet amid all the excitement the colonists
held out the olive branch of peace and reconciliation.

The Massachusetts Assembly convened in May and resolved that it was
inconsistent with their dignity and freedom to deliberate in the midst
of an armed force, May 31, 1769 and that the presence of a military and
naval armament was a breach of privilege. They refused to enter upon the
business of supplies, or any thing else but a redress of grievances, and
petitioned the governor to remove the troops from Boston. He not only
refused, but adjourned the Assembly to Cambridge, when he informed them
that he was going to England to lay a statement of the affairs of the
colony before the king. The House unanimously voted a petition to his
majesty, asking the removal of Bernard forever; and adopted a
resolution, declaring that the establishment of a standing army in the
colony, in time of peace, was an invasion of natural rights, a violation
of the British Constitution, high-

* It has been said that when Charles Townshend's project of taxation was
in agitation, the English merchants offered to pay the taxes, or an
equivalent for them, rather than run the risk of provoking the Americans
and losing their trade.--Pictorial History of the Reign of George III.,
i., 72.

** Frederic, Earl of Guilford, better known as Lord North, was a man of
good parts, sincerely attached to English liberty, and conscientious in
the performance of all his duties. Like many other statesmen of his
time, he utterly misapprehended the character of the American people,
and could not perceive the justice of their claims. Devoted to his king
and country, he labored to support the dignity of the crown and the
unity of the realm, but in so doing he aided in bringing fearful misery
upon the Americans for a time. He was a persuasive orator, a fair
logician, amiable in private life, and correct in his morals. He was
afflicted with blindness during the last years of his life. He died
July, 1792, aged sixty years.

Departure of Governor Bernard for England.--Effect of the Non-
importation Agreements.--Hillsborough's Circular Letter

484ly dangerous to the people, and unprecedented. The governor, finding
the members incorrigible, dissolved the Assembly, and sailed for
England,1 leaving the colony in charge August 1, 1769. of his
lieutenant, Thomas Hutchinson.

The effects of the non-importation agreements upon English commerce
again brought ministers to their senses. The English merchants were
really more injured by the acts of Parliament than the Americans, and
they joined their petitions with those of the colonists for a repeal of
the noxious acts. ** Under the direction of Lord North, Hillsborough
sent a circular letter to the colonies, intimating that the duties upon
all articles enumerated in the late act would be taken off, as a measure
of _expediency_, except on tea. This would be a partial relief from the
burden, but not a removal of the cause of complaint. The _principle_ was
the same whether duties were exacted on one article or a dozen, and so
long as the assumed right of Parliament to tax the colonies was
practically enforced in the smallest degree, so long the Americans felt
their rights infringed. Principle, not expediency, was their motive of
action, and, therefore, the letter of Hillsborough had no effect in
quieting the disturbed ocean of popular feeling. The year 1769 closed
without any apparent approximation of Great Britain and her American
colonies to a reconciliation.

* Francis Bernard was Governor of New Jersey after Governor Belcher, in
1756. He succeeded Pownall as Governor of Massachusetts in 1760, and
held the office nine years. The first years of his administration were
satisfactory to the inhabitants, but, associating himself with ministers
in their taxation schemes, he became odious to the Massachusetts people.
His first false step was the appointment of Hutchinson chief justice
instead of the elder Otis. When difficulties arose under the Stamp Act
and kindred measures, Bernard was unfit for his position, for he had no
talent for conciliation, and was disposed to use British power more
prodigally than British justice in maintaining the supremacy of the
laws. He was created a baronet in the summer of 1769. He never returned
to America after leaving it, and died in England in June, 1779.

** The exports from England to America, which in 1768 had amounted to
$11,890,000, $660,000 being in tea, had fallen in 1769 to $8,170,000,
the tea being only $220,000.--Murray's United States, i., 352. Pownall,
in the course of a speech in Parliament, also showed that the total
produce of the new taxes for the first year had been less than $80,000,
and that the expenses of the new custom-house arrangements had reduced
the net profits of the crown revenue in the colonies to only $1475,
while the extraordinary military expenses in America amounted, for the
same time, to $850,000.--Hildreth, ii.. 552.

Secret Workings of the Spirit of Liberty.--Brief Review.--Alternative of
the Colonies.--The Newspaper Press.

485

CHAPTER XXI.

"There is a spirit working in the world,

Like to a silent, subterranean fire;

Yet, ever and anon, some monarch hurl'd

Aghast and pale attests its fearful ire,

The dungeon'd nations now once more respire

The keen and stirring air of liberty.

The struggling giant wakes, and feels he's free;

By Delphi's fountain-cave that ancient choir

Resume their song; the Greek astonish'd hears,

And the old altar of his worship rears.

Sound on, fair sisters! sound your boldest lyres--

Peal your old harmonies as from the spheres.

Unto strange gods too long we've bent the knee,

The trembling mind, too long and patiently."

George Hill.

"Grand jurors, and sheriffs, and lawyers we'll spurn;

As judges, we'll all take the bench in our turn,

And sit the whole term without pension or fee,

Nor Cushing nor Sewall look graver than we.

Our wigs, though they're rusty, are decent enough;

Our aprons, though black, are of durable stuff;

Array'd in such gear, the laws we'll explain,

That poor people no more shall have cause to complain."

Honeywood's "Radical Song."

E have considered, in the preceding chapter, the most important events,
during the first nine years of the reign of George III., having any
bearing on the Revolution. We have seen the germs of oppression, planted
at different times from the era of the Restoration, springing into life
and vigor, and bearing the bitter fruit of tyranny; and observed the
bold freemen of America pruning its most noxious branches, and trampling
in the dust its "apples of Sodom." We have seen the tide of British
power swelling high, and menacing, and beheld the firm rock of sound
principles fearlessly breasting its billows, and hurling them baek
toward their source. We have seen a loyal people, warmly attached to the
person of their sovereign, and venerating the laws of their fatherland,
goaded, by ministerial ignorance and haughty indifference respecting the
claims of right when interfering with expediency, to the assumption of
manly defiance both of king and Parliament, until hireling butchers,
with pike and bayonet, were seated in their midst to "harass the people
and eat out their substance." We now behold them pressed to the
alternative

_TO FIGHT OR BE SLAVES._

For several years the newspaper press had been rapidly growing in
political importance, and the vehicle of mere general news became the
channel of political and social enlightenment. In proportion to the
development of its power and the creation of public opinion favorable to
its views, was the increase of its boldness, and at the beginning of
1770 the American press was not only united in sentiment, but almost as
fearless in the expression of political and religious opinions as the
newspapers of the present day. American liberty was its theme, and
almost every sheet, whether newspaper, almanac, tract, or hand-bill,
issued at this time, was tinctured if not absolutely pervaded, by the
absorbing topic. I have before

Bickerstaff's Boston Almanac.--Explanation of its Frontispiece.--Revival
of the Terms "Whig" and "Tory."

486me a copy of Bickerstaff's Boston Almanac for 1770, the title-page of
which is here given, with a fac-simile of the engraving that adorns it.

The portrait of Otis is supported on one side by Liberty, and on the
other by Hercules, or Perseverance. At the feet of the latter,
uncoiling, preparatory to striking a blow, is the venomous rattlesnake,
an emblem used on some of the colonial flags when the war began. This
was significant of the intention of America, under the guidance of the
Spirit of Liberty, _to 'persevere, and strike a deadly blow, if
necessary_. The poetry and maxims of the almanac are replete with
political sentiments favorable to freedom; and its pages contain the
celebrated "_Massachusetts Song of Liberty_," which became almost as
popular throughout the colonies as did Robert Treat Paine's "Adams and
Liberty" at a later day. * It is believed to have been written by Mrs.
Mercy Warren.

Party lines began now to be strictly drawn, and the old names of Whig
and Tory, used in England toward the close of the seventeenth century,
and recently revived, were adopted here, the former being assumed by
those who opposed Parliamentary taxation, and the latter applied to
those who favored it. *** In Boston the wound inflicted by Bernard, in
the introduction of soldiers, was daily festering. A weekly paper, the
"Journal of the Times," fostered the most bitter animosity against the
soldiers, by the publication of all sorts of stories concerning them,
some true, but many more false and garbled. Daily quarrels between
citizens and soldiers occurred upon the Common and in the streets; and

* We give on the following page a copy of the Massachusetts Song of
Liberty, with the music, as printed in the Boston Almanac.

** See note, page 71.

Abuse of Mr. Otis.--Massachusetts Song of Liberty.

487the fact that Mr. Otis had been severely beaten with fists and canes,
in a coffee-house, by

THE MASSACHUSETTS SONG OF LIBERTY.

Fac-simile of the Music. Come swallow your bumpers, ye Tories, and roar,
That the Sons of fair Freedom are hamper'd once more; But know that no
Cut throats our spirits can tame, Nor a host of Oppressors shall smother
the flame. "In Freedom we're born, and, like Sons of the brace. Will
never surrender, But swear to defend her, And scorn to survive, if
unable to save. "Our grandsires, bless'd heroes, we'll give them a tear,
Nor sully their honors by stooping to fear; Through deaths and through
dangers their Trophies they won. We dare be their Rivals, nor will be
outdone. "In Freedom we're born.

"Let tyrants and minions presume to despise, Encroach on our Rights, and
make Freedom their prize; The fruits of their rapine they never shall
keep, Though vengeance may nod, yet how short is her sleep. "In Freedom
we're born.

"The tree which proud Haman for Mordecai rear'd Stands recorded, that
virtue endanger'd is spared; That rogues, whom no bounds and no laws can
restrain, Must be stripp'd of their honors and humbled again. "In
Freedom we're born.

"Our wives and our babes, still protected, shall know Those who dare to
be free shall forever be so; On these arms and these hearts they may
safely rely For in freedom we'll live, or like Heroes we'll die. "In
Freedom we're born.

"Ye insolent Tyrants! who wish to enthrall; Ye Minions, ye Placemen,
Pimps, Pensioners, all; How short is your triumph, how feeble your
trust, Your honor must wither and nod to the dust. "In Freedom we're
born.

When oppress'd and approach'd, our King we implore, Frill firmly
persuaded our Rights he'll restore; When our hearts beat to arms to
defend a just right, Our monarch rules there, and forbids us to fight."
In Freedom we're born.

"Not the glitter of arms nor the dread of a fray Could make us submit to
their chains for a day; Withheld by affection, on Britons we call,
Prevent the fierce conflict which threatens your fall. "In Freedom we're
born.

All ages shall speak with amaze and applause Of the prudence we show in
support of our cause: Assured of our safety, a Brunswick still reigns,
Whose free loyal subjects are strangers to chains. "In Freedom were
born.

"Then join hand in hand, brave Americans all, To be free is to live, to
be slaves is to fall; Has the land such a dastard as scorns not a Lord,
Who dreads not a letter much more than a sword!" In Freedym we're born.

Evasion of the Non-importation Agreements.--Tea proscribed.--Spirit of
the Women.--Spirit of the Boys.

488one of the commissioners of customs and his friends, * produced the
utmost excitement, and it was with great difficulty that open hostility
was prevented. Numerous fights with straggling soldiers occurred, and a
crisis speedily arrived.

While the non-importation agreements were generally adhered to
faithfully, there were a few merchants who, loving mammon more than
liberty, violated their obligations. In Boston they coalesced with the
military officers, and many of the proscribed articles were imported in
the names of the latter, ostensibly for the use of the soldiers. Many
goods were January 23, 1770 brought in and sold under this cover. This
fact became known, and a meeting of citizens was held at Faneuil Hall to
consider it. Spirited resolutions were adopted, among which was one
agreeing not only "totally to abstain from the use of tea" (the excepted
article mentioned in Hillsborough's letter), and from other of the
enumerated articles, but that they would use all proper measures to
prevent a violation of the non-importation pledges. From that time tea
was a proscribed article, and the living principle of opposition to
British oppression was strongly manifested by the unanimity with which
the pleasant beverage was discarded.

Early in February the females of Boston made a public movement on the
subject of non-importation, and the mistresses of three hundred families
subscribed their names to a league, binding themselves not to drink any
tea until the Revenue Act was repealed. Three days afterward the _young
ladies_ followed the example of the matrons, and multitudes signed a
document in the following terms: "We, the daughters of those patriots
who have, and do now, appear for the public interest, and in that
principally regard their posterity--as such, do with pleasure engage
with them in denying ourselves the drinking of foreign tea, in hopes to
frustrate a plan which tends to deprive a whole community of all that is
valuable in life." All classes were thoroughly imbued with patriotism,
and even the children were sturdy asserters of natural rights. **

Disregarding these expressions of public sentiment, a few merchants in
Boston continued to sell the proscribed articles. Among them were
Theophilus Lillie and four others, who were particularly bold in their
unpopular conduct. To designate his store as one to be February 22, 1770
shunned, a mob, consisting chiefly of half-grown boys, raised a rude
wooden head upon a pole near Lillie's door, having upon it the names of
the other importers. A hand was attached to it, with the dexter finger
pointing to Lillie's establishment. The merchant was greatly irritated.
One of his friends, named Richardson, a stout, rough man, tried to
persuade a countryman to prostrate the pageant by running his wagon
against it. February 9.

* Robinson, one of the commissioners, had made such representations of
Mr. Otis in Britain as provoked him to make a publication in the Boston
Gazette on the subject. For some expression used in that article
Robinson attempted to pull Otis's nose at a coffee-house. An affray
ensued, in which Mr. Otis was so severely beaten that he was obliged to
leave the city and retire to his country residence. From the injuries
then received he never thoroughly recovered. Heavy damages (£2000) were
awarded him against Robinson for the assault, but Otis generously
forgave his assailant, and refused to take the money.

** While the king's troops were in Boston, an incident occurred that
evinced the bold spirit of even the little boys. In the winter they were
in the habit of building little hills of snow, and sliding down them to
the pond on the Common, for amusement. The English soldiers, to provoke
them, would often beat down these hills. On one occasion, having rebuilt
their hills, and finding, on their return from school, that they were
again demolished, several of the boys determined to wait upon the
captain and complain of his soldiers. The officer made light of it, and
the soldiers became more troublesome than ever. At last a meeting of the
larger boys was held, and a deputation was sent to General Gage, the
commander-in-chief. He asked why so many children had called upon him.
"We come, sir," said the tallest boy, "to demand satisfaction." "What!"
said the general, "have your fathers been teaching you rebellion, and
sent you to exhibit it here?" "Nobody sent us, sir," replied the boy,
while his eyes flashed and cheek reddened at the imputation of
rebellion; "we have never injured or insulted your troops, but they have
trodden down our snow-hills and broken the ice on our skating-grounds.
We complained, and they called us young rebels, and told us to help
ourselves if we could. We told the captain of this, and he laughed at
us. Yesterday our works were destroyed the third time, and we will bear
it no longer." The nobler feelings of the general's heart were awakened,
and, after gazing upon them in silent admiration for a moment, he turned
to an officer by his side, and said, "The very children here draw in a
love of liberty with the air they breathe. You may go, my brave boys,
and be assured, if my troops trouble you again, they shall be
punished."--Lossing's "1776," p. 90.

Fracas at the Door of a Merchant.--Death of a Boy.--Its Effect on the
Public Mind.--Pardon of the Murderer.--Riot in Boston

489The man was a patriot, and refused, and Richardson attempted to pull
it down himself. The mob pelted him with dirt and stones, and drove him
into Lillie's house. Greatly exasperated, Richardson brought out a
musket and discharged it, without aim, into the crowd. A lad named
Christopher Gore (afterward Governor of the Commonwealth (a)) was
slightly wounded, and another, Christopher Snyder, son of a poor widow,
was killed. The  a 1809 mob seized Richardson and an associate named
Wilmot, and carried them to Fanueil Hall, where they were examined and
committed for trial. Richardson was found guilty of murder, but
Lieutenant-governor Hutchinson refused to sign his death warrant. After
two years' imprisonment, he was pardoned by the king.

The murder of the boy produced a great sensation throughout the country,
and in Boston it was made the occasion of a most solemn pageant. His
coffin, covered with inscriptions, such as "Innocence itself is not
safe," and others of like tenor, was taken to Liberty Tree, where a
great concourse assembled, and thence followed the remains to the grave.
In that procession between four and five hundred school-boys took the
lead. Six of Snyder's playfellows supported the coffin; after them came
the relatives and friends of the deceased, and nearly fifteen hundred of
the inhabitants. The bells of the city were tolled, and those of the
churches in the neighboring towns. The newspapers were filled with
accounts of the murder and the funeral, and little Christopher Snyder
was apotheosized as the _first martyr_ in the cause of American liberty.

A more serious occurrence took place a few days afterward. A soldier,
passing the rope-walk of John Grey, got into a quarrel with the workmen,
and was severely beaten. He went to the barracks, and, returning with
some comrades, they beat the rope-makers, and chased them through the
streets. A large number of the people assembled in the afternoon,
determined to avenge the workmen, but were stopped by the military. It
was Friday, and the act of vengeance was deferred until Monday, so as
not to disturb the Sabbath. March 5, 1770 On the evening of Monday,
between six and seven o'clock, about seven hundred men, with clubs and
other weapons, assembled in King (now State) Street, shouting, "Let us
drive out these rascals! They have no business here--drive them out!"
The mob speedily augmented in numbers, and about nine o'clock an attack
was made upon some soldiers in Dock Square, the mob shouting, "Town
born, turn out! Down with the bloody backs!" at the same time tearing up
the market-stalls. The fearful cry of "Fire, fire!" was echoed through
the town, and the inhabitants poured into the streets in terror and
confusion. The whole city was in commotion, and before midnight the
shouts of the multitude, the ringing of the alarum bells as if a great
conflagration was raging, and the rattle of musketry, produced a fearful
uproar. Two or three leading citizens endeavored to persuade the mob to
disperse, and had, in a measure, secured their respectful attention,
when a tall man, dressed in a scarlet cloak, and wearing a white wig,
suddenly appeared among them, and commenced a violent harangue against
the government officers and soldiers. He concluded his inflammatory
speech by a loud shout, "To the main guard! to the main guard!" The
populace echoed the shout with fearful vehemence, and, separating into
three divisions, took different routes toward the quarters of the main
guard. As one of these divisions was passing the custom-house, a boy
came up, and, pointing to the sentinel on duty there, cried out, "That's
the scoundrel who knocked me down." * Instantly a score of voices
shouted, "Let us knock him down! Down with the bloody back! kill him!
kill him!" The sentinel loaded his musket, the mob in the mean while
pelting him with pieces of ice and other missiles, and finally
attempting to seize him. He ran up the custom-house steps, but, unable
to procure admission, called to the main guard for assistance. Captain
Preston, the officer of the day,

* This boy was an apprentice to a barber named Piémont, at whose shop
some of the British officers were in the habit of shaving. One of them
had come there some months previous to dress by the quarter, whose bill
Piémont promised to allow to the boy who shaved him, if he behaved well.
The quarter had expired, but the money could not be got, although
frequently asked for. The last application was made on that evening,
and, as the boy alleged, the officer knocked him down in reply to the
"dun." The sentry he pointed out as the man that abused him.--See
"Traits of the Tea Party."

Attack of the Mob upon tbe Soldiers.--Discharge of Musketry.--Three of
the Citizens killed.--Terrible Excitement in Boston

490detailed a picket guard of eight men with unloaded muskets, and sent
them to the relief of the sentinel. As they approached, the mob pelted
them more furiously than they had the sentinel, and a stout mulatto
named Attucks, who was at the head of a party of sailors shouted, "Let
us fall upon the nest! The main guard! the main guard!"

The soldiers now loaded their guns. Attucks dared them to fire; and the
mob pressed so closely upon them that the foremost were against the
points of their bayonets. The soldiers, perfectly understanding the
requirements of discipline, would not fire without orders. Emboldened by
what seemed cowardice, or, perhaps, by a knowledge of the law which
restrained soldiers from firing upon their fellow-citizens without
orders from the civil magistrates, Attucks and the sailors gave three
loud cheers, beat the muskets of the soldiers with their clubs, and
shouted to the populace behind them, "Come on! don't be afraid of 'em--
they daren't fire! knock 'em over! kill 'em!" At that moment Captain
Preston came up, and endeavored to appease the excited multitude.
Attucks aimed a blow with a club at Preston's head, which was parried
with his arm, and, descending, knocked the musket of one of the soldiers
to the ground. The bayonet was seized by the mulatto, and the owner of
the musket was thrown down in the struggle. Just then voices in the
crowd behind Preston cried, "Why don't you fire? why don't you fire?"
The word fire fell upon the ears of Montgomery, the soldier struggling
with Attucks, and as he rose to his feet he fired, and shot the mulatto
dead. Immediately five other soldiers fired at short intervals; three of
the populace were instantly killed, five dangerously wounded, and a few
slightly hurt.

The mob instantly dispersed. It was near midnight; the ground was
covered with snow the air was clear and frosty, and the moon, in its
first quarter, gave just sufficient light to reveal the dreadful scene.
It was a fearful night for Boston. A cry, "The soldiers are rising! To
arms! to arms! Turn out with your guns!" resounded through the streets,
and the town drums beat their alarum call. Captain Preston also ordered
his drums to beat to arms, and in a short time Colonel Dalrymple, the
commander of the troops in the absence of Gage, with Lieutenant-governor
Hutchinson, at the head of a regiment, was on the spot. Order was at
length restored, and the streets were quiet before dawn. Captain
Preston, in the mean time, had been arrested and put in prison, and
during the next forenoon the eight soldiers were also committed, under a
charge of murder.

Early in the morning the Sons of Liberty collected in great numbers, and
Faneuil Hall was crowded with an excited and indignant assembly. The
lieutenant governor also convened his Council. A town meeting was
legally warned and held that afternoon, in the Old South Meeting-house,
then the largest building in the city, where it was voted "that nothing
could be expected to restore peace and prevent carnage but an immediate
removal of the troops." Nearly three thousand voices were unanimous in
its favor. A committee of fifteen, with Samuel Adams as chairman, was
appointed to present the resolution March 6, 1770

* Crispus Attucks, Samuel Gray, and James Caldwell were killed on the
spot; Samuel Maverick and Patrick Carr received mortal wounds, of which
the former died the next morning, and Carr on Wednesday of the next
week.

** This venerable and venerated edifice, that stood through all the
storms of the Revolution, and yet remains, stands on the corner of
Washington and Milk Streets. It is of brick, and was erected in 1729-30,
upon the site of an edifice built by the Pedo-baptists in 1669. The
ancient church was of cedar, two stories high, with a steeple, gallery,
and pews. The "Old South" was the famous gathering-place of the people
during the excitements of 1773. The British troops occupied it as a
circus for the drill of cavalry in 1775, after removing all the wood-
work within, except the eastern gallery and the pulpit and sounding
board. The British officers felt no compunctions in thus desecrating a
Presbyterian chapel. It was repaired in 1782, and remains a fine model
of our early church architecture. This view is from Washington Street.

Delegation of Patriots before the Governor.--Boldness of the second
Committee.--Concessions.--Removal of the Troops.

491to the acting governor and his Council, and to Colonel Dalrymple.
These officers were assured by Royal Tyler, one of the committee, that
the people were determined to remove the troops out of town by force, if
they would not go voluntarily. "They are not such people," he said, "who
formerly pulled down your house, that conduct these measures, but men of
estates, men of religion. The people," he continued, "will come in to us
from all the neighboring towns; we shall have ten thousand men at our
backs, and your troops will probably be destroyed by the people, be it
called rebellion or what it may."

Hutchinson and Dalrymple were in a dilemma. They equally feared the
popular indignation and the censure of ministers, and each endeavored to
make the other responsible for the concessions which they saw must
inevitably be made. Hutchinson would not promise the committee that more
than one regiment of the troops should be removed; their report to the
meeting was, therefore, quite unsatisfactory. In the afternoon another
committee was appointed, consisting of seven of the former deputation, *
who bore the following resolution to the lieutenant governor: "It is the
unanimous opinion of this meeting that the reply made to the vote of the
inhabitants, presented to his honor this morning, is by no means
satisfactory, and that nothing else will satisfy them but a total and
immediate removal of all the troops." Samuel Adams again acted as
chairman. Hutchinson denied that he had power to grant their request;
Adams in a few words proved to him that he had power conferred by the
charter. The governor consulted with Dalrymple in a whisper, and then
made the offer again to remove one regiment. The patriots were not to be
trifled with. Adams, seeming not to represent, but to personify, the
universal feeling, stretched forth his arm, as if it had been upheld by
the strength of thousands, and, with unhesitating promptness and
dignified firmness, replied, "Sir, if the lieutenant governor or Colonel
Dalrymple, or both together, have authority to remove _one_ regiment,
they have authority to remove _two_; and nothing short of a total
evacuation of the town, by all the regular troops, will satisfy the
public mind or preserve the peace of the province."

The officers were abashed before this plain committee of a democratic
assembly. They knew the danger that impended; the very air was filled
with breathings of suppressed indignation. They receded, fortunately,
from the arrogance they had hitherto maintained. Their reliance on a
standing army faltered before the undaunted, irresistible resolution of
free, unarmed citizens. ** Hutchinson consulted his Council. The
concession was agreed upon--the lieutenant governor, Council, and
Dalrymple consenting to bear mutually the responsibility of the act--and
the people were assured of the immediate removal of the troops. On
Monday following the troops were conducted to Castle William, and Boston
beMarch 12, 1770came quiet.

The obsequies of the victims murdered on the night of the 5th were
performed on the 8th. *** The hearses met upon the spot in front of the
custom-house, where the tragedy occurred, and thence the procession, in
platoons six deep, marched to the Middle Burial-ground, wherein the
bodies were deposited. As on the occasion of the burial of young Snyder,
the bells of Boston and adjacent towns tolled a solemn knell, and again
a cry of vengeance burst over the land. The story of the "Boston
massacre," as it was called, became a tale of horror, which every where
excited the most implacable hatred of British domination; and the
justifiable act of the soldiers, in defending their lives against a
lawless mob, was exaggerated into an unprovoked assault of armed
mercenaries upon a quiet and defenseless people.

Captain Preston and the eight soldiers, after the lapse of several
months, were put upon their trial before Judge Lynde for murder. ****
John Adams, an eminent lawyer, one of the

* The committee consisted of Samuel Adams, John Hancock, William
Molineux, William Phillips, Joseph Warren. Joshua Henshaw, and Samuel
Pemborton.

** Snow's History of Boston.

*** Attucks and Caldwell had no relatives, and were friendless. Their
bodies were borne from Faneuil Hall. Maverick, only seventeen years of
age, was borne from the house of his mother, in Union Street, and Gray
from that of his brother, in Royal Exchange Lane.

****Captain Preston's trial commenced on the 24th of October, and lasted
until the 30th. The trial of the soldiers commenced on the 27th of
November, and ended on the 5th of December. So searching was the
examination of witnesses by Mr. Quincy, that Mr. Adams was obliged to
ask him to desist, for he was eliciting from them facts that were not
only irrelevant to the case in hand, but dishonorable to the town.

Defense of the Soldiers by Adams.--Result of the Trial.--New Ministerial
Proposition.--Its Effects upon the Colonies

492leaders in the attempt to procure the removal of the troops, and
greatly esteemed by the people for his patriotism, was solicited to
undertake their defense. It was a severe ordeal for his independence of
spirit, yet he did not hesitate. At the risk of losing the favor and
esteem of the people, he appeared as the advocate of the accused, having
for his colleague Josiah Quincy, another leading patriot, whose eloquent
voice had been often heard at assemblies of the Sons of Liberty. Robert
Treat Paine, afterward one of the signers of the Declaration of
Independence, conducted the prosecution, with great reputation, in the
absence of the attorney general. A Boston jury was empanneled, and,
after a fair trial, Captain Preston and six of the soldiers were
adjudged not guilty. The other two, Montgomery and Killroy, who were
known to have fired their muskets, were found guilty of manslaughter
only. They were branded in the hand, in open court, and discharged. This
trial, when all the circumstances are considered, exhibits one of the
most beautiful of the many pictures of justice and mercy that
characterized the Revolution, and silenced forever the slander of the
British ministry who favored the revival of the Act of Henry VIII., that
American jurors might not be trusted.

March 5, 1770 On the very day of the "Boston massacre" Lord North asked
leave to bring in a bill in the House of Commons, repealing the duties
upon glass, &c., mentioned in Hillsborough's circular, but retaining the
three per cent, duty upon tea. This duty was small, and was avowedly a
"pepper-corn rent," to save the national honor. North's proposition met
with little favor from either party. The friends of America asked for a
repeal of the whole act, and the friends of government opposed a partial
repeal as utterly fruitless of good. The bill, however, after
encountering great opposition in both Houses, and particularly in the
House of Lords, was carried, and received the royal assent on the 12th
of April.

When the intelligence of this act reached the colonies, it was regarded
with very little favor. The same unrighteous principle was practically
asserted, and the people felt that very little concession was made. But
they were beginning, toward the close of 1770, to be less faithful in
observing the non-importation agreements; and in October, at a meeting
of the Boston merchants, it was resolved, in consequence of the almost
universal violation of these agreements in New York, to import every
thing but tea. The Philadelphia and Charleston merchants followed their
example, and that lever of coercion in the hands of the colonists,
operating upon Parliament through English merchants, was almost wholly
abandoned, much to the chagrin of the leading patriots. These
associations, while they had a favorable political effect upon the
colonies, were also instrumental in producing social reforms of much
value. Many extravagant customs, such as pageantries at funerals,
displays of costly finery at balls and parties, and kindred measures,
involving great expenditure of time and money, were discontinued; new
sources of wealth and comfort to be derived from home industry were
developed; and, better than all, lessons of the strictest economy were
learned. The infant manufactories of America received a strong impulse
from the agreements, and homemade articles, first worn from necessity,
became fashionable. The graduating class at Cambridge took their degrees
in homespun suits, in 1770.

For two years very little occurred to disturb the tranquillity of
Boston. The brutal attack of Robinson had deprived the patriots of the
services of James Otis, for insanity clouded his active mind and
terminated his public career. * But new men, equally patriotic stood

* James Otis, Jr., was the son of Colonel James Otis, of Barnstable,
Massachusetts, where he was born February 5th, 1725. He graduated at
Harvard College in 1743. He studied law with Mr. Gridley, then the first
lawyer in the province, and commenced the practice of his profession at
Plymouth at the age of twenty-one years. In 1761 he distinguished
himself by his plea in opposition to the Writs of Assistance. His
antagonist on that occasion was his law tutor, Mr. Gridley.

* Of his speech at that time John Adams said, "James Otis was a flame of
fire.... American independence was then and there born. Every man of an
immense crowded audience appeared to me to go away as I did ready to
take up arms against Writs of Assistance." Otis was elected to the
Legislature in 1762, and was a member of the Stamp Act Congress held at
New York in 1765. That year he wrote his celebrated pamphlet in defense
of colonial rights. He held the office of judge advocate, but in 1767
resigned, and renounced all offices under government, because of
encroachments upon the rights of the people. Brutally beaten by a
commissioner of customs in the autumn of 1769, he was obliged to retire
to his country residence. The injuries he received left their effects
upon his mind, and from that time his reason was shattered. The great
man, though in ruins, lived nearly thirteen years, when, on the 23d of
May, 1782, while standing in the door of Mr. Osgood's house in Andover,
he was killed by lightning. He had often expressed a desire to be thus
deprived of life when it should please God to call him. In a
commemorative ode, written at the time by the Hon. Thomas Dawes, the
following lines occur:

"Yes, when the glorious work which he begun Shall stand the most
complete beneath the sun--When peace shall come to crown the grand
design, His eyes shall live to see the work divine--The heavens shall
then his generous spirit claim, In storms as loud as his immortal fame.
Hark! the deep thunders echo round the skies! On wings of flame the
eternal errand flies; One chosen, charitable bolt is sped, And Otis
mingles with the glorious dead."

* Mr. Otis was a scholar as well as a statesman. Ho was complete master
of classical literature,* and no American at that time possessed more
extensive knowledge. He may bo justly ranked among the founders of our
republic, for he was truly the master of ceremonies in laying the
corner-stone. He lived to see the work nearly completed, and beheld the
wing of peace spread over the land.

* The following anecdote is related of Mr. Otis as illustrative of his
ready use of Latin even an ring moments of mental aberration. Men and
boys, heartless and thoughtless, would sometimes make themselves merry
at his expense when he was seen in the streets afflicted with lunacy. On
one occasion he was passing a crockery store, when a young man, who had
a knowledge of Latin, sprinkled some water upon him from a sprinkling-
pot with which he was wetting the floor of the second story, at the same
time saying, "It rains so much, I know not how much. Do you know?" Otis
immediately picked up a missile, and, hurling it through the window of
the crockery store, it smashing every thing in its way, exclaimed, "I
have broken so many, I know not how many. Do you know!"

James Otis.--The Boston Patriots.--Hutchinson made Governor.--His
asserted Independence of the Assemblies.

493ready to take his place. John Adams, then in the vigor of life, and
rapidly rising in public estimation, was chosen to fill his place in the
House of Representatives. He, Samuel Adams, John Hancock, Joseph Warren
(a young physician), Josiah Quincy, and Dr. Benjamin Church were the
leaders in private meetings, now beginning to be held, in whieh schemes
for public action were planned. These men were exceedingly vigilant, and
noticed every infringement of natural or chartered rights on the part of
government and its agents. In the House of Representatives they
originated almost every measure for the public good, and the people
esteemed them as the zealous guardians of their rights and privileges.
When Hutchinson removed the General Court to Cambridge, they protested,
contending that it March 31, 1770 could be held, legally, only at
Boston; and in all the struggles between the Assembly and the governor,
during his administration, these men were foremost in defense of popular
rights.

Lieutenant-governor Hutchinson received the appointment of governor in
the spring of 1771. About the same time Dr. Franklin was chosen agent
for Massachusetts, Dennis de Berdt being dead. When the Assembly
convened in May, the subject of taxing the May 25, 1771salaries of crown
officers, that of removing the General Court baek to Boston, and kindred
topics, produced considerable excitement in that body. Hutchinson told
them that he had been instructed not to give his consent to any act
taxing the income of the crown officers, and he positively refused to
adjourn the Assembly to Boston. The consequence was, that the Court was
prorogued without making any provision for the public expense.

The next year Parliament, by special aet, made the governors and judges
of the colonies quite independent of the colonial Assemblies for their
salaries; and Hutchinson 1772 informed the Massachusetts Assembly that
henceforth his salary would be paid by the crown. The Assembly at once
denounced the measure as a violation of the charter, and no better than
a standing bribe of six thousand six hundred and sixty-six dollars a
year from the crown to the governor. Other colonial Assemblies took
umbrage, and made similar denunciations, and again the public mind was
agitated.

Further Agitation in Boston.--Committees of Correspondence.--Letters of
Hutchinson and others.--Petition for their Removal

494In the midst of this effervescence a circumstance occurred which
augmented intensely the flame of rebellion burning in the hearts of the
people. By it Boston was thrown into a violent commotion, and it was
with great difficulty that the people were restrained from enacting anew
the violence against Hutchinson in 1765. In October a town meeting was
held, at which a large committee, composed of the popular leaders, was
appointed to draw up a statement of the rights of the colonies, and to
communicate and publish the same to the several towns of the province.
This paper contained a list of all the grievances which Massachusetts
had suffered since the accession of the reigning sovereign, and
condemned a plan, said to have been in agitation for a long time, to
establish bishops in America. It was the boldest exposition of the
grievances and rights of the colonies yet put forth, and, by its
suggestion, Committees of Correspondence, such as were soon afterward
organized in Virginia, were appointed in the several towns. * This paper
was republished by Franklin in London, January, 1773 "with a preface of
his own, and produced a great sensation. At the opening of the next
session of the Legislature Hutchinson denounced the Boston address as
seditious and traitorous, and violent discussions ensued.

Just at this moment, when the public mind was greatly inflamed against
Hutchinson, the Assembly received a communication from Dr. Franklin,
inclosing several letters written by Hutchinson and others to Thomas
Whately, a member of Parliament, then out of office, wherein they
vilified the character of several of the popular leaders, advised the
immediate adoption of coercive measures, and declared that there "must
be an abridgment of what are called English liberties." By what means
Franklin obtained possession of these letters is not certainly known,
for he was too honorable to divulge the names of parties concerned. ***
They were sent to the Rev. Dr. Cooper, of Boston, and by him handed to
Mr. Cushing, the Speaker of the Assembly. After having been shown
privately to leading men for several months, they were made public. The
town was at once in a violent ferment. A committee was appointed to wait
upon the governor, and demand an acknowledgment or denial of the
genuineness of the letters. He owned them as his, but declared that they
were quite confidential. This qualification was not considered
extenuating, and the Assembly adopted a petition to the king for the
removal of Governor Hutchinson and Lieutenant-governor Oliver, as public
slanderers, and enemies to the colony, and, as such, not to be
tolerated.

This petition was sent to Franklin, who was instructed to present it in
person, if possible. This request could not be granted. He sent the
petition to Lord Dartmouth, then at his country seat, who presented it
to the king. After considerable delay, Franklin was informed that his
majesty had referred it to his Privy Council. **** The publication of
the letters produced excitement in England, and Franklin, to defend
innocent parties, frankly took upon

* Dr. Gordon says (i., 207) that the system of Committees of
Correspondence originated with James Warren, who suggested them to
Samuel Adams while the latter was passing an evening with the former at
Plymouth. Adams, pleased with the suggestion, communicated it to the
leading patriots at the next secret caucus, and that powerful engine in
the Revolution was speedily put in motion. James Warren was an active
patriot. He was descended from one of the first settlers at Plymouth,
and was greatly esteemed for his personal worth. He was chosen a member
of the General Court of Massachusetts in 1760, and, though not a
brilliant orator, was a deep and original thinker. He was for many years
Speaker of the House of Representatives. At the close of the war he
retired from public duties, and died at Plymouth, November 27th, 1808,
aged eighty-two years. He was the husband of Mercy Warren, the
historian.

** The names of the several writers were Andrew Oliver, Charles Paxton,
Thomas Moffatt, Robert Auchmuty, Nathaniel Rogers, and George Rome. Mr.
Whately was dead when the letters were given to Franklin.

*** The late Dr. Hosack, of New York, in his memoir of Dr. Hugh
Williamson, published in 1823, asserts that the papers were put into
Franklin's hands by that gentleman, without any suggestion on his part.
Williamson obtained them by stratagem from the office of Mr. Whately,
brother of the late Thomas Whately, then dead. Mr. Whately suspected
that Lord Temple, Pitt's brother-in-law, who had asked permission to
examine the papers of Secretary Whately, was the man who abstracted
them, and placed them in Franklin's hands. Whately charged the act upon
Temple, and a duel was the result, in which the former was wounded. Of
this affair Franklin knew nothing until it was over. In justice to
others, he took the responsibility upon himself, as mentioned in the
text.

**** The Privy Council consists of the cabinet and thirty-five peers.

Franklin before the Privy Council.--Wedderburne's Abuse.--Franklin's
Vow.--New Taxation Scheme.--East India Company

495himself the whole responsibility of sending them to America, he was
accordinglyJanuary 29, 1774 summoned before the Council, where he
appeared without a legal adviser. Finding Wedderburne, the solicitor
general, retained as counsel for Hutchinson, Franklin asked and obtained
leave to have counsel also. He employed Mr. Dunning, one of the ablest
Constitutional lawyers of the day, and toward the close of February the
case was brought before the Privy Council.

The solicitor general made a bitter attack upon Franklin, accusing him
of dishonor in procuring private letters clandestinely, and charging him
with duplicity and wily intrigue. The philosophic statesman received
this tirade of abuse in silence, and without any apparent emotion, for
he was conscious that he had violated no rule of honor or integrity. The
accusations and pleadings of Wedderburne had their effect, however.

His abuse greatly pleased the peers, and the petition was dismissed as
"groundless, scandalous, and vexatious." A few days afterward Franklin
received a notice of his dismissal from the responsible and lucrative
office of postmaster general for the colonies. This was an act of spite
which recoiled fearfully upon ministers. **

Early in 1773 a new thought upon taxation made its advent into the brain
of Lord North. The East India Company, *** feeling the effects of the
colonial smuggling trade, and of the non importation agreements,
requested the government to take off the duty of three per cent, a pound
on their tea, levied in America. Already seventeen millions of pounds
had accumulated in their stores in England, and they offered to allow
government to retain six pence upon the pound as an exportation tariff,
if they would take off the three-pence duty. Here was a fair and
honorable opening not only to conciliate the colonies, but to procure,
without expense, double the amount of revenue. But the ministry, deluded
by false views of national honor, would not take advantage of this
excellent opportunity to heal the dissensions and disaffection in the
colonies, but stupidly favored the East India Company, and utterly

* Lord Dartmouth succeeded the Earl of Hillsborough in the office of
Secretary of State for the colonies and as head of the Board of Trade,
in 1772. Dartmouth was considered rather friendly to the colonies, and
he and Franklin had ever been on terms of amity.

** On returning to his lodgings that night, Franklin took off the suit
of clothes he had worn, and declared that he would never wear it again
until he should sign the degradation of England and the independence of
America. He kept his word, and more than ten years afterward, when, on
the 3d of September, 1783, he signed a definitive treaty of peace with
Great Britain, on the basis of absolute independence for America, he
wore the same suit of clothes for the first time after his vow was
uttered.

*** The East India Company, still in existence, is a joint-stock
company, originally established to carry on a trade by sea, between
England and the countries lying eastward of the Cape of Good Hope. It
was constituted by royal charter in 1600, and enjoyed the monopoly of
the trade in those remote regions until 1688, when another corporation
was chartered. The two united in 1702, and the monopoly thus granted to
them was continued, by successive acts of Parliament, until 1804. It
then received some important modifications, and the charter was renewed
for twenty years. In 1833 an act was passed extending the charter, but
abolishing the monopoly of the China trade, which the company had
enjoyed nearly two hundred and fifty years. This company planted the
British empire in India. It first established armed factories, and for
many years competed with the French for the trade and political
influence in the surrounding districts. Under the pretense of securing
honest trade, they subdued small territories, until Lord Clive, the
governor general of the company in India, by several victories,
established British power there, and obtained a sway over some of the
fairest portions of the Mogul empire. At the present time the British
Indian empire comprises the whole of Hindostan, from the Himalaya
Mountains to Cape Comorin, with a population of more than one hundred
and twenty millions! At the time under consideration the East India
Company was at the height of its success, commercial and political.

Tea Ships sail for America.--Preparation for their Reception at Boston.-
-Treatment of the Consignees.--Hand-bills and Placards.

496neglected the feelings of the Americans. It was a sacrifice of
principle to mammon which produced a damage that no subsequent act could
repair.

On the 10th of May a bill was passed, allowing the company to export tea
to Amer1773 on their own account, without paying export duty. Ships were
immediately laden with the article, and in a few weeks several large
vessels, bearing the proscribed plant, were crossing the Atlantic for
American ports. Agents or consignees were appointed in the several
colonies to receive it, and the ministry fondly imagined that they had
at last outwitted the vigilant patriots.

Information of this movement had been received in the colonies, and,
before the company's vessels arrived, preparations were made in the
chief cities to prevent the landing of the cargoes. Public meetings were
held, and the consignees were called upon to resign. In Boston the
consignees were known to the public; they were all friends of Governor
Hutchinson. Two were his sons, and one (Richard Clarke * ) was his
nephew. They were summoned to November 3, 1773 attend a meeting of the
Sons of Liberty, convened under Liberty Tree, and resign their
appointments, ** but they contemptuously refused to comply. This meeting
was announced by the town-crier in the streets, and by the ringing of
bells for an hour. About five hundred persons assembled at the tree,
from the top of which, fastened to a pole, a large flag was unfurled.
Two days afterward a legal town meeting was held, at which John Hancock
presided. *** They adopted as their own the sentiments of eight
resolutions passed at a public meeting in Philadelphia a month before,
and appointed a committee to wait upon the consignees and request them
to resign. These gentlemen equivocated, and the meeting voted their
answer "unsatisfactory and daringly affrontive." On the 18th November,
1773 other meeting was held, and a committee appointed again to wait
upon the consignees. Their answer this time was more explicit. "It is
out of our power to comply with the request of the town." In the evening
the house of Richard Clarke and his sons, in School Street, was
surrounded by a crowd. A pistol was fired among them from the dwelling,
and was responded to by the populace breaking the windows.

The meeting, on receiving the reply of the consignees, broke up without
uttering a word. This was ominous; the consignees were alarmed, for it
was evident that the people had determined to stop talking, and
henceforth to act. The governor called a meeting of the Council, and
asked advice respecting measures for preserving the peace. A petition
was presented by the consignees, asking leave to resign their
appointments into the hands of the governor

* John Singleton Copley, the eminent painter, and father of Lord
Lyndhurst, married a daughter of Richard Clarke. Both Copley and his
father-in-law became early refugee Loyalists, and fled to England, where
the latter was pall-bearer at Governor Hutchinson's funeral in 1780.

** The following is a copy of the hand-bill that advertised the meeting:

"To the Freemen of this and the neighboring Towns.

"Gentlemen--You are desired to meet at the Liberty Tree this day at
twelve o'clock at noon, then and there to hear the persons to whom the
tea shipped by the East India Company is consigned, make a public
resignation of their offices as consignees, upon oath; and also swear
that they will reship any teas that may be consigned to them by the said
company, by the first vessel sailing to London. O. C., Sec'y.

"Boston, November 3, 1773.

==> "Show me the man that dare take this down!"

The following hand-bill was also circulated about the same time:

"The true Sons of Liberty and supporters of the non-importation
agreement are determined to resent any or the least insult or menace
offered to any one or more of the several committees appointed by the
body at Faneuil Hall, and chastise any one or more of them as they
deserve; and will also support the printers in any thing the committee
shall desire them to print.

"==>As a warning to any one that shall affront as aforesaid, upon sure
information given, one of these advertisements will be posted up at the
door of the dwelling-house of the offender."

These placards, and others given in connection with the tea excitement,
I copied from originals preserved by the Massachusetts Historical
Society, in tome marked Proclamations.

** On the 12th the captain general of the province issued an order for
the Governor's Cadets (Bostonians) to stand ready to be called out for
the purpose of aiding the civil magistrates in keeping the peace. John
Hancock was colonel of this regiment.

Arrival of Tea Ships.---Proceedings in Boston.--Monster Meeting at the
"Old South."--Speech of Josiah Quincy

497and Council, and praying them to take measures for the safe landing
of the teas. The prayer was refused on the part of the Council, and the
consignees, for safety, withdrew to the castle..

While the Council was thus declining to interfere, one of the ships (the
Dartmouth. Cap tain Hall) came to anchor near the castle. A meeting of
the people of Boston and the neighboring towns was convened at Faneuil
Hall, * which being too small for the assembly, it adjourned to the Old
South Meeting-house. They resolved "that the tea shall November 29, 1773
not be landed; that no duty shall be paid; and that it shall be sent
back in the same bottom." They also voted "that Mr. Roch, the owner of
the vessel, be directed not to enter the tea at his peril; and that
Captain Hall be informed, and at his peril, not to suffer any of the tea
to be landed." The ship was ordered to be moored at Griffin's Wharf, **
and a guard of twenty-five men was appointed to watch her. The meeting
received a letter from the consignees, offering to store the teas until
they could write to England and receive instructions, but the people
were determined that the pernicious weed should not be landed. The offer
was rejected with disdain. The sheriff then read a proclamation by the
governor, ordering the meeting to disperse; it was received with hisses.
A resolution was then passed, ordering the vessels of Captains Coffin
and Bruce, then hourly expected with cargoes of tea, to be moored at
Griffin's Wharf; and, after solemnly agreeing to carry their resolves
into execution at any risk, and thanking their brethren from the
neighboring towns, the meeting was dissolved.

From that time until the 14th every movement on the part of the people
relating to the tea was in charge of the Boston Committee of
Correspondence. The December, 1773two vessels alluded to arrived, and
were moored at Griffin's Wharf, under charge of the volunteer guard, and
public order was well observed. On the 14th another meeting was held in
the Old South, *** when it was resolved to order Mr. Roch to apply
immediately for a clearance for his ship, and send her to sea. The
governor, in the mean while, had taken measures to prevent her sailing
out of the harbor. Under his direction, Admiral Montague fitted out two
armed vessels, which he stationed at the entrance of the harbor; and
Colonel Leslie, in command of the castle, received Hutchinson's written
orders not to allow any vessel to pass the guns of the fortress outward,
without a permission signed by himself.

On the 16th several thousand people (the largest meeting ever to that
time December, 1773 known in Boston) collected in the Old South and
vicinity. Samuel Phillips Savage, of Weston, presided. The youthful
Josiah Quincy was the principal speaker, and, with words almost of
prophecy, harangued-the multitude of eager and excited listeners. "It is
not, Mr. Moderator," he said, "the spirit that vapors within these walls
that must stand us in stead. The exertions of this day will call forth
events which will make a very different spirit necessary for our
salvation. Whoever supposes that shouts and hosannas will terminate the
trials of this day entertains a childish fancy. He must be grossly
ignorant of the importance and value of the prize for which we contend;
we must be equally ignorant of the power of those who have combined
against us; we must be blind to that malice, inveteracy, and insatiable
revenge which actuate our enemies, public and private, abroad and in

* The following is a copy of the hand-bill announcing the meeting. The
Dartmouth arrived on Sunday, and this placard was posted all over Boston
early on Monday morning:

* "Friends! Brethren! Countrymen!--That worst of plagues, the detested
Tea shipped for this port by the East India Company, is now arrived in
the Harbor; the Hour of Destruction, or manly opposition to the
Machinations of Tyranny, stares you in the Face; every Friend to his
Country, to himself, and to Posterity is now called upon to meet at
Faneuil Hall, at nino o'clock This Day (at which time the bells will
ring), in make united and successful resistance to this last, worst, and
most destructive measure of administration.

* "Boston, November 29,1773."

** This was a little south of Fort Hill, near the present Liverpool
Dock.

** The notice for the meeting was as follows: "Friends! Brethren!
Countrymen!--The perfidious arts of your restless enemies to render
ineffectual the resolutions of the body of the people, demand your
assembling at the Old South Meeting-house precisely at two o'clock this
day, at which time the bells will ring."

Close of Quincy's Speech.--Breaking up of the Meeting.--Destruction of
Tea in the Harbor.--Apathy of Government Officials.

498our bosoms, to hope that we shall end this controversy without the
sharpest, the sharpest conflicts--to flatter ourselves that popular
resolves, popular harangues, popular acclamations, and popular vapor
will vanquish our foes. Let us consider the issue. Let us look to the
end. Let us weigh and consider before we advance to those measures which
must bring on the most trying and terrible struggle this country ever
saw." *

When Mr. Quincy closed his harangue (about three o'clock in the
afternoon), the question was put, "Will you abide by your former
resolutions with respect to not suffering the tea to be landed?" The
vast assembly, as with one voice, gave an affirmative reply. Mr. Roch,
in the mean while, had been sent to the governor, who was at his country
house at Milton, a few miles from Boston, to request a permit for his
vessel to leave the harbor. A demand was also made upon the collector
for a clearance, but he refused until the tea should be landed. Roch
returned late in the afternoon with information that the governor
refused to grant a permit until a clearance should be exhibited. The
meeting was greatly excited; and, as twilight was approaching, a call
was made for candles. At that moment a person disguised like a Mohawk
Indian raised the war-whoop in the gallery of the Old South, which was
answered from without. Another voice in the gallery shouted, "Boston
Harbor a tea-pot tonight! Hurra for Griffin's Wharf!" A motion was
instantly made to adjourn, and the people, in great confusion, crowded
into the streets. Several persons in disguise were seen crossing Fort
Hill in the direction of Griffin's Wharf, and thitherward the populace
pressed.

Concert of action marked the operations at the wharf; a general system
of proceedings had doubtless been previously arranged. The number of
persons disguised as Indians was fifteen or twenty, but about sixty went
on board the vessels containing the tea. Before the work was over, it
was estimated that one hundred and forty were engaged. A man named
Lendall Pitts seems to have been recognized by the party as a sort of
commander-in-chief, and under his directions the Dartmouth was first
boarded, the hatches were taken up, and her cargo, consisting of one
hundred and fourteen chests of tea, was brought on deck, where the boxes
were broken open and their contents cast into the water. The other two
vessels (the _Eleanor_, Captain James Bruce, and the _Beaver_, Captain
Hezekiah Coffin) were next boarded, and all the tea they contained was
thrown into the harbor. The whole quantity thus destroyed within the
space of two hours was three hundred and forty-two chests.

It was an early hour on a clear, moonlight evening when this transaction
took place, and the British squadron was not more than a quarter of a
mile distant. British troops, too, were near, yet the whole proceeding
was uninterrupted. This apparent apathy on the part of government
officers can be accounted for only by the fact alluded to by the papers
of the time, that something far more serious was expected on the
occasion of an attempt to land the tea, and that the owners of the
vessels, as well as the public authorities, felt themselves

* Josiah Quincy was born in Boston, February 23d, 1744. As a student he
was remarkably persevering, and with unblemished reputation he graduated
at Harvard in 1763. He pursued legal studies under the celebrated
Oxenbridge Thacher, of Boston. The circumstances of the times turned his
thoughts to political topics, and he took sides with Otis, Adams, and
others, against the aggressive policy of Britain. As early as 1768 he
used this bold language: "Did the blood of the ancient Britons swell our
veins, did the spirit of our forefathers inhabit our breasts, should we
hesitate a moment in preferring death to a miserable existence in
bondage?" In 1770 be declared, "I wish to see my countrymen break off--
off forever! all social intercourse with those whose commerce
contaminates, whose luxuries poison, whose avarice is insatiable, and
whose unnatural oppressions are not to be borne." Mr. Quincy was
associated with John Adams in the defense of the perpetrators of the
"Boston massacre" in 1770, and did not by that defense alienate the good
opinion of the people. In February, 1771, he was obliged to go to the
south on account of a pulmonary complaint. At Charleston he formed an
acquaintance with Pinckney, Rutledge, and other patriots, and, returning
by land, conferred with other leading Whigs in the several colonies.
Continued ill health, and a desire to make himself acquainted with
English statesmen, induced him to make a voyage to England in 1774,
where he had personal interviews with most of the leading men. He
asserts that, while there, Colonel Barré, who had traveled in America,
assured him that such was the ignorance of the English people, two
thirds of them thought the Americans were all negroes! Becoming fully
acquainted with the feelings and intentions of the king and his
ministers, and hopeless of reconciliation, Mr. Quincy determined to
return and arouse his countrymen to action. He embarked for Boston, with
declining health, in March, and died when the vessel was in sight of
land, April 26th, 1775, aged thirty-one years.

East India Company the only Losers.--Quiet in Boston.--A Smuggler
punished.--Names of Members of the "Tea Party."

499placed under lasting obligations to the _rioters_ for extricating
them from a serious dilemma. * They certainly would have been worsted in
an attempt forcibly to land the tea. In the actual result the vessels
and other property were spared from injury; the people of Boston, having
carried their resolution into effect, were satisfied; the courage of the
civil and military officers was unimpeached, and the "national honor"
was not compromised.

None but the East India Company, whose property was destroyed, had
reason for complaint. As soon as the work of destruction was completed,
the active party marched in perfect order into the town, preceded by
drum and fife, dispersed to their homes, and t Boston, untarnished by
actual mob or riot, was never more tranquil than on that bright and
frosty December night.

A large proportion of those who were engaged in the destruction of the
tea were disguised, either by a sort of Indian costume or by blacking
their faces. Many, however, were fearless of consequences, and boldly
employed their hands without concealing their faces from the bright
light of the moon. The names of fifty-nine of the participators in the
act have been preserved, ***& but only one of the men, so far as is
known, is still living. This is David Kinnison, of Chicago, Illinois,
whose portrait and sign manual are here given. The engraving is from a
Daguerreotype from life, taken in August, 1848, when

* A "Bostonian," in his "Traits of the Tea Party," on the authority of
G. R. T. Hewes, one of the survivors, says that Admiral Montague was at
the house of a Tory named Coffin during the transaction, and that, when
the party marched from the wharf, he raised the window and said, "Well,
boys, you've had a fine, pleasant evening for your Indian caper, haven't
you? But mind, you have got to pay the fiddler yet!" "Oh, never mind!"
shouted Pitts, the leader; "never mind, squire! just come out here, if
you please, and we'll settle the bill in two minutes." The populace
raised a shout, the fifer struck up a lively air, and the admiral shut
the window in a hurry.

** Some, whose acquisitiveness overmatched their patriotism, were pretty
severely handled during the destruction of the cargoes. One Charles
O'Connor was detected filling his pockets and "the lining of his
doublet" with tea while assisting to throw the broken chests overboard.
He was completely stripped of his clothes and kicked ashore. A man was
found at South Boston a few days afterward, with part of a chest of tea,
which he had carried away from the harbor. He had sold some. They made
him give up the money, and then, taking the remainder of the chest, they
made a bonfire of it on the common, in front of Mr. Hancock's house.
Some of the tea is preserved at Harvard College.

*** The following is a list of those known to have been engaged in
destroying the tea: George R. T. Hewes,* Joseph Shed, John Crane, Josiah
Wheeler, Thomas Uranu, Adam Colson, Thomas Chase, S. Cooledge, Joseph
Payson, James Brewer, Thomas Bolter, Edward Proctor, Samuel Sloper,
Thomas Gerrish, Nathaniel Green, Thomas Mellville, Henry Purkett, *
Edward C. How, Ebenezer Stevens, Nicholas Campbell, John Russell, Thomas
Porter, William Hurdley, Benjamin Rice, Samuel Gore, Nathaniel Froth-
ingham, Moses Grant, Peter Slater.* James Starr, Abraham Tower, Isaac
Simpson,* Joseph Eayres, Joseph Lee, William Molineux, Paul Revere, John
Spurr, Thomas Moore, S. Howard, Mathew Loring, Thomas Spear, Daniel
Ingollson, Jonathan Hunnewell,* John Hooten,* Richard Hunnewell, William
Pierce,* William Russell, T. Gammell, Mr. M'Intosh,* Dr. Young, Mr.
Wyeth, Edward Dolbier, Mr. Martin, Samuel Peck, Lendall Pitts, Samuel
Sprague,* Benjamin Clarke, John Prince,* Richard Hunnewell, Jr., David
Kirnison.* Many of these were merely lads at the time.

* These were living in 1836. All are now in the grave. Mr. Kinnison died
in 1851, at the age of 115 years

Age of Mr. Kinnison.--Events of his Life.--Escape from Wounds during the
Wars.--Subsequent personal Injuries.

500the veteran was one hundred and eleven years and nine months old. He
was alive a few weeks since (January, 1850), in his one hundred and
fourteenth year. Through the kindness of a friend at Chicago, I procured
the Daguerreotype, and the following sketch of his life from his own
lips. The signature was written by the patriot upon the manuscript.

David Kinnison was born the 17th of November, 1736, in Old Kingston,
near Portsmouth, province of Maine. Soon afterward his parents removed
to Brentwood, and thence in a few years to Lebanon (Maine), at which
place he followed the business of farming until the commencement of the
Revolutionary war. He is descended from a long-lived race. His great-
grandfather, who came from England at an early day, and settled in
Maine, lived to a very advanced age; his grandfather attained the age of
one hundred and twelve years and ten days; his father died at the age of
one hundred and three years and nine months; his mother died while he
was young.

He has had four wives, neither of whom is now living; he had four
children by his first wife and eighteen by his second; none by the last
two. He was taught to read after he was sixty years of age, by his
granddaughter, and learned' to sign his name while a soldier of the
Revolution, which is all the writing he has ever accomplished.

He was one of seventeen inhabitants of Lebanon who, some time previous
to the "Tea Party," formed a club which held _secret_ meetings to
deliberate upon the grievances offered by the mother country. These
meetings were held at the tavern of one "Colonel Gooding," in a private
room hired for the occasion. The landlord, though a true American, was
not enlightened as to the object of their meeting. Similar clubs were
formed in Philadelphia, Boston, and the towns around. With these the
Lebanon Club kept up a correspondence. They (the Lebanon Club)
determined, whether assisted or not, to destroy the tea at all hazards.
They repaired to Boston, where they were joined by others; and twenty-
four, disguised as Indians, hastened on board, twelve armed with muskets
and bayonets, the rest with tomahawks and clubs, having first agreed,
whatever might be the result, to stand by each other to the last, and
that the first man who faltered should be knocked on the head and thrown
over with the tea. They expected to have a fight, and did not doubt that
an effort would be made for their arrest. "But" (in the language of the
old man) "we cared no more for our lives than three straws, and
determined to throw the tea overboard. We were all captains, and every
one commanded himself." They pledged themselves in no event, while it
should be dangerous to do so, to reveal the names of the party--a pledge
which was faithfully observed until the war of the Revolution was
brought to a successful issue.

Mr. Kinnison was in active service during the whole war, only returning
home once from the time of the destruction of the tea until peace had
been declared. He participated in the affair at Lexington, and, with his
father and two brothers, was at the battle of Bunker Hill, all four
escaping unhurt. He was within a few feet of Warren when that officer
fell. He was also engaged in the siege of Boston; the battles of Long
Island, White Plains, and Fort Washington; skirmishes on Staten Island,
the battles of Brandywine, Red Bank, and Germantown; and, lastly, in a
skirmish at Saratoga Springs, in which his company (scouts) were
surrounded and captured by about three hundred Mohawk Indians. He
remained a prisoner with them one year and seven months, about the end
of which time peace was declared. After the war he settled at Danville,
Vermont, and engaged in his old occupation of farming. He resided there
eight years, and then removed to Wells, in the state of Maine, where he
remained until the commencement of the last war with Great Britain. He
was in service during the whole of that war, and was in the battles of
Sackett's Harbor and Williamsburg. In the latter conflict he was badly
wounded in the hand by a grape-shot, the only injury which he received
in all his engagements.

Since the war he has lived at Lyme and at Sackett's Harbor, New York. At
Lyme, while engaged in felling a tree, he was struck down by a limb,
which fractured his skull and broke his collar-bone and two of his ribs.
While attending a "training" at Sackett's Harbor, one of the cannon,
having been loaded (as he says) "with rotten wood," was discharged. The
contents struck the end of a rail close by him with such force as to
carry it

No Knowledge of his Children.--His Person and Circumstances.--Speech at
a "Free Soil" Meeting.--G. R. T. Hewes.

501around, breaking and badly shattering both his legs midway between
his ankles and knees He was confined a long time by this wound, and,
when able again to walk, both legs had contracted permanent "fever
sores." His right hip has been drawn out of joint by rheumatism. A large
scar upon his forehead bears conclusive testimony of its having come in
contact with the heels of a horse. In his own language, he "has been
completely bunged up and stove in."

When last he heard of his children there were but seven of the twenty-
two living. These were scattered abroad, from Canada to the Rocky
Mountains. He has entirely lost all traces of them, and knows not that
any are still living.

Nearly five years ago he went to Chicago with the family of William
Mack, with whom he is now living. He is reduced to extreme poverty, and
depends solely upon his pension of ninety-six dollars per annum for
subsistence, most of which he pays for his board. Occasionally he is
assisted by private donations. Up to 1848 he has always made something
by labor. "The last season," says my informant, "he told me he gathered
one hundred bushels of corn, dug potatoes, made hay, and harvested oats.
But now he finds himself too infirm to labor, though he thinks he could
walk twenty miles in a day by '_starting early'_."

He has evidently been a very muscular man. Although not large, his frame
is one of great power. He boasts of "the strength of former years." Nine
years ago, he says, he lifted a barrel of rum into a wagon with ease.
His height is about five feet ten inches, with an expansive chest and
broad shoulders. He walks somewhat bent, but with as much vigor as many
almost half a century younger. His eye is usually somewhat dim, but,
when excited by the recollection of his past eventful life, it twinkles
and rolls in its socket with remarkable activity. His memory of recent
events is not retentive, while the stirring scenes through which he
passed in his youth appear to be mapped out upon his mind in unfading
colors. He is fond of martial music. The drum and fife of the recruiting
service, he says, "daily put new life into him."

"In fact," he says, "it's the sweetest music in the world. There's some
sense in the drum, and fife, and bugle, but these pianos and other such
trash I can't stand at all."

Many years ago he was troubled with partial deafness; his sight also
failed him somewhat, and he was compelled to use glasses. Of late years
both hearing and sight have returned to him as perfectly as he ever
possessed them. He is playful and cheerful in his disposition. "I have
seen him," says my informant, "for hours upon the side-walk with the
little children, entering with uncommon zest into their childish
pastimes. He relishes a joke, and often indulges in 'cracking one
himself.'"

At a public meeting, in the summer of 1848, of those opposed to the
extension of slavery, Mr. Ivinnison took the stand and addressed the
audience with marked effect. He declared that he fought for the "freedom
of all," that freedom ought to be given to the "black boys," and closed
by exhorting his audience to do all in their power to

ABOLISH SLAVERY.

The portrait of another member of the "Boston Tea Party," George Robert
Twelve Hewes, is preserved. I have copied it, by permission, from the
"Traits of the Tea Party, and Memoir of Hewes." He was born in Boston,
on the 5th of September, 1742. His early opportunities for acquiring
education were very small. To Mrs. Tin-

Character and Patriotism of Hewes.--His Death.--Excitement in Parliament
in Consequence of the Boston Tea Riot

502kum, wife of the town-crier, he was indebted for his knowledge of
reading and writing. Farming, fishing, and shoe-making seem to have been
the chief employment of his earlier years. In 1758 he attempted to
enlist in the army to serve against the French, but did not "pass muster
he was equally unsuccessful in attempts to join the navy, and then
resumed shoemaking. In the various disturbances in Boston from the time
of the passage of the Stamp Act, Hewes, who was both excitable and
patriotic, was generally concerned. He was among the foremost in the
destruction of the tea at Boston. When the Americans invested the city,
and many patriots were shut up under the vigilant eyes of the British
officers, Hewes was among them. He managed to escape, and entered the
naval service of the colonies as a privateer, in which he was somewhat
successful. Afterward he joined the army, and was stationed for a time
at West Point, under General M'Dougal. He was never in any land battle,
except with the _Cow Boys and Skinners_, as they were called, of the
_neutral ground_ of West Chester. After the Revolution he returned to
Boston, and again engaged in business upon the sea. He, like Kinnison,
was one of the thousands of that time utterly unknown to the world,
except within the small love-circle of family relationship and
neighborly regard; and even this present slight embalming of their
memory would not have occurred, had not the contingency of great
longevity distinguished them from other men. Although personally
unknown, their _deeds_ are felt in the political blessings we enjoy.
When the Bunker Hill Monument was completed and was dedicated, on the
17th of June, 1843, Mr. Hewes, then one hundred and one years old, was
there, and honored by all. Returning to the residence of his son, at
Richfield, in Otsego county, New York, some sixty miles west of the
Hudson, he soon went down into the grave, when more than a century old,
"a shock of corn fully ripe." The events of the 16th of December
produced a deep sensation throughout the British realm. They struck a
sympathetic chord in every colony, and even Canada, Halifax, and the
West Indies had no serious voice of censure for the Bostonians. But the
ministerial party here and the public in England were amazed at the
audacity of the American people; and the friends of the colonists in
Parliament were, for a moment, silent, for they had no excuse to make in
behalf of their transatlantic friends for destroying private property.
But with the intelligence of the event went an intimation that the town
of Boston was ready to pay the East India Company for the tea, and so
the question rested at once upon its original basis--the right of Great
Britain to tax the colonies. Ministers were bitterly indignant, and the
House of Lords was like a "seething caldron of impotent rage." The
alleged honesty of the Americans was entirely overlooked, and ministers
and their friends saw nothing but open rebellion in the Massachusetts
colony. Strange as it may appear, the king did not send a message to
Parliament on the subject until the 7th of March, several weeks after
the disturbances at Boston were known to government. Then he detailed
the proceedings, and his message was accompanied by a variety of papers,
consisting of letters from Hutchinson, Admiral Montague, and the
consignees of the tea; the dispatches of several colonial governors (for
menaces of similar violent measures had been uttered in other colonies);
and some of the most exciting manifestoes, hand-bills, and pamphlets put
forth by the Americans. The king, in his message, called upon Parliament
to devise means immediately to suppress these tumultuous proceedings in
the colonies.

On the receipt of the message and the accompanying papers in the House
of Commons, an address of thanks to the king, and of assurances that he
should be sustained in his efforts to preserve order in America, was
proposed. This proposition, with the message and papers, produced great
excitement, and the House became, according to Burke, "as hot as Faneuil
Hall or the Old South Meeting-house at Boston." The debate that ensued
was excessively stormy. Ministers and their supporters charged open
rebellion upon the colonies, while the opposition denounced, in the
strongest language which common courtesy could tolerate, the foolish,
unjust, and wicked course of the government. They reviewed the past; but
ministers, tacitly acknowledging past errors, objected to retrospection,
and earnestly pleaded for strict attention to the momentous present.
They asked whether the colonies were or were not longer to be considered
dependent upon Great Britain, and, if so, how far and in what

The Boston Port Bill proposed and adopted.--Debates in Parliament.--
Apparent Defection of Conway and Barré.--Burke

503manner. If it was decided not to give them up to independence, then
ministers were ready to act efficiently. This question they wished
settled as preliminary to further action. The appeal struck upon a
tender chord, and awakened national sympathies; the address was adopted
by an overwhelming majority, without a division.

Feeling his position strengthened by this vote, Lord North brought forth
the first of his vigorous schemes for subjugating the colonics and
punishing the town of Boston. On the 14th of March he offered a bill
which provided for the removal of customs, courts of justice, and
government officers of every kind from Boston to Salem; and that "the
1774 landing, discharging, and shipping of wares and merchandise at
Boston, or within the harbor thereof," should be discontinued. It
provided, also, that when the Bostonians should fully submit, the king
should have the power to open the port. * This was the famous _Boston
Port Bill_, an act which crushed the trade of the city, and brought the
greatest distress upon its inhabitants.

Lord North justified the harsh measure, by asserting that Boston was the
center of rebellious commotion in America, "the ringleader in every
riot, and set always the example which others followed." He thought that
to inflict a signal penalty upon that city would strike at the root of
the evil, and he referred to precedents where whole communities had been
punished for the crimes of some of their members. The most violent
language was used, by some of the supporters of the ministers, against
the Americans. "They are never actuated by decency or reason; they
always choose tarring and feathering as an argument," said Mr. Herbert.
Mr. Van, another ministerial supporter, denounced the people of Boston
as utterly unworthy of civilized forbearance. "They ought to have their
town knocked about their ears and destroyed!" he exclaimed, and
concluded his tirade of abuse by quoting the factious cry of old Roman
orators, "Delenda est Carthage." ** Mr. Rose Fuller proposed the
imposition of a fine; and even Barré and Conway, the undaunted friends
of America, approved of the measure as lenient, and affecting only a
single town. They voted for the bill, and for this apparent disaffection
the people of Boston removed their portraits from Faneuil Hall. But
Burke, who at that time began his series of splendid orations in favor
of American liberty, denounced the whole scheme as essentially unjust,
by confounding and pun-

* The celebrated Charles James Fox, son of Lord Holland, made his first
speech in Parliament on this bill. It was a strange beginning of his
brilliant career. He objected to the power vested in the British crown
to reopen the port of Boston. Neither party supported his suggestion.

** "Carthage must be destroyed." This phrase was often used by Roman
orators to excite the people to the utter destruction of Carthage, then
the rival of the great city. During the revolutionary mania among the
French this sentiment was often quoted as a threat against England.

*** Edmund Burke, one of England's greatest statesmen, was born in
Carlow, in Ireland, January 1st, 1730. He was educated at Dublin, and
took his bachelor's degree in 1749. In 1753, having been unsuccessful in
his application for the logic professorship at Glasgow, he went to
London and entered at the Middle Temple. He early employed his pen in
literature and his eloquence in politics. His first literary production
of note was an essay on the Vindication of Natural Society, in imitation
of Bolingbroke's style. In 1757 he published his essay on the Sublime
and Beautiful. In 1758 he and Dodswell commenced the Annual Register,
which acquired great celebrity. He accompanied Gerard (or Single Speech)
Hamilton to Ireland in 1761, and, by the interposition of that
gentleman, obtained a pension of fifteen hundred dollars on the Irish
Establishment. On his return he was introduced to the Marquis of
Rockingham, who made him his secretary, and procured his election to a
seat in the House of Commons. There he eloquently and efficiently
pleaded the cause of the Americans. On the downfall of North's
administration he became pay-master general, and obtained a seat in the
Council. His great speeches against Warren Hastings, when on trial
before the House of Commons, were such as the British Legislature had
never before heard. He retired from Parliament in 1794, on a pension of
six thousand dollars. During his political career he wrote much, and his
compositions rank among the purest of the British classics. He died on
the 8th of July, 1797, in the seventieth year of his age.

*** Goldsmith, in his Retaliation, * wrote the following epitaph for
Burke. It was written in 1776, when Burke was in the midst of his
career.

"Here lies our good Edmund, whose genius was such, We scarcely can
praise it or blame it too much; Who, born for the universe, narrow'd his
mind, And to party gave up what was meant for mankind. Though fraught
with all learning, yet straining his throat To persuade Tommy Townshendt
to lend him a vote; Who, too deep for his hearers, still went on
refining, And thought of convincing while they thought of dining. Though
equal to all things, for all things unfit: Too nice for a statesman, too
proud for a wit; For a patriot too cool; for a drudge, disobedient, And
too fond of the right to pursue the expedient. In short, 'twas his fate,
unemploy'd or in place, sir, To eat mutton cold and cut blocks with a
razor."

*** The history of this poem is a "curiosity of literature." Goldsmith
had peculiarities which attracted attention, and it was proposed, at a
club of literary men, of which he was a member, to write characters of
him in the shape of epitaphs. Dean Barnard, Cumberland, Garrick, and
others complied. Garrick wrote the following couplet:

"Here lies poor Goldsmith, for shortness call'd Noll; Who wrote like
Apollo, and talk'd like poor poll."

*** Goldsmith felt called upon for retaliation, and at the next meeting
produced the poem from which the following is an extract. It contained
epitaphs for several of the club, and he paid off his friend Garrick
with compound interest. These lines occur in Garrick's epitaph:

"Of praise a mere glutton, he swallow'd what came And the puff of a
dunce he mistook it for fame, Till his relish grew callous, almost to
disease; Who pepper'd the highest was surest to please." But he
generously added, "But let us be candid, and speak out our mind--If
dunces applauded, he paid them in kind."

* Afterward Lord Sydney.

Opposition in Parliament to the Boston Port Bill.--Passage of the Bill.-
-Goldsmith's "Retaliation."--Epitaph for Burke.

504ishing the innocent with the guilty. "It is wished, then," he said,
"to condemn the accused without a hearing, to punish indiscriminately
the innocent with the guilty! You will thus irrevocably alienate the
hearts of the colonies from the mother country. Before the adoption of
so violent a measure, the principal merchants of the kingdom should at
least be consulted. The bill is unjust, since it bears only upon the
city of Boston, while it is notorious that all America is in flames;
that the cities of Philadelphia, of New York, and all the maritime towns
of the continent, have exhibited the same disobedience. You are
contending for a matter which the Bostonians will not give up quietly.
They can not, by such means, be made to bow to the authority of
ministers; on the contrary, you will find their obstinacy confirmed and
their fury exasperated. The acts of resistance in their city have not
been confined to the populace alone, but men of the first rank and
opulent fortune in the place have openly countenanced them. One city in
proscription and the rest in rebellion can never be a remedial measure
for general disturbances. Have you considered whether you have troops
and ships sufficient to reduce the people of the whole American
continent to your devotion? It was the duty of your governor, and not of
men without arms, to suppress the tumults. If this officer has not
demanded the proper assistance from the military commanders, why punish
the innocent for the fault and the negligence of the officers of the
crown? The resistance is general in all parts of America; you must,
therefore, let it govern itself by its own internal policy, or make it
subservient to all your laws, by an exertion of all the forces of the
kingdom. These partial counsels are well suited to irritate, not
subjugate." Pownall, Johnstone (late Governor of Florida), Dodsworth,
Fox, and others followed Burke on the same side, but argument was of no
avail. Without a division, the bill passed by an almost unanimous vote,
and on the 31st of March it became a law by the royal assent.

Other oppressive Acts of Parliament--Madness of Ministers.--Warnings of
the Opposition unheeded.--The "Quebec Act"

505Another bill soon followed, "for better regulating the government of
Massachusetts Bay." It was tantamount to an abrogation of the charter of
that colony. It gave to the crown the appointment of counselors and
judges of the Supreme Court, and the nomination of all other officers,
military, executive, and judicial, was given to the governors,
independently of any approval by the Council. The sheriffs were
empowered to select jurors, a duty before performed by the select-men of
the towns. All town meetings, except for elections, were prohibited.
This bill, so manifestly hostile to the freedom of British subjects,
elicited a warm debate, and Burke and Barré opposed it with all their
might. "What can the Americans believe," said Burke, "but that England
wishes to despoil them of all liberty, of all franchise, and, by the
destruction of their charters, to reduce them to a state of the most
abject slavery?.... As the Americans are no less ardently attached to
liberty than the English themselves, can it ever be hoped that they will
submit to such exorbitant usurpation, to such portentous resolutions?"
Pownall warned ministers to pause. He alluded to that powerful engine,
the Committees of Correspondence, then unceasingly working in the
colonies, and assured ministers that their harsh measure would drive the
people to the calling of a general Congress, and perhaps a resort to
arms. All opposition was fruitless, and the bill passed the House by the
overwhelming majority of two hundred and thirty-nine against sixty-four.
Lord Shelburne and others vehemently denounced it in the Upper House,
and eleven peers signed a protest in seven long articles.

North had begun to work the lever of oppression so forcibly that it
seemed not easy for him to desist. A third bill was introduced, intended
to protect the servants of royApril 21, 1774alty in America against the
verdicts of colonial juries. It provided for the trial in England of all
persons charged in the colonies with murders committed in support of
government. It was suggested by a retrospect of the "Boston massacre,"
and was a most unjust and insulting comment upon the verdict in favor of
Captain Preston and his soldiers. It was more--it guarantied comparative
safety to those who might shoot a _rebel_ in the name of the king. This
measure was bitterly denounced by the opposition leaders. "This," said
Colonel Barré, "is, indeed, the most extraordinary resolution ever heard
in the Parliament of England. It offers new encouragement to military
insolence, already so insupportable.... By this law Americans are
deprived of a right which belongs to every human creature--that of
demanding justice before a tribunal of impartial judges. Even Captain
Preston, who, in their own city of Boston, had shed the blood of
citizens, found among them a fair trial and equitable judges." Alderman
Sawbridge was more bold and recriminating in his denunciations of the
measure. He called it "ridiculous and cruel asserted that it was meant
to enslave the Americans, and expressed an ardent hope that they would
not admit the execution of any of these destructive bills, but nobly
refuse them all. "If they do not," he said, "they are the most abject
slaves upon earth, and nothing the ministers can do is base enough for
them." Again remonstrance was vain, and the bill passed the House by a
majority of one hundred and twenty-seven to forty-four; in the Lords, by
forty-nine to twelve. Eight peers entered a strong protest against it.
It became a law by royal assent on the 20 th of May.

A fourth bill, for quartering troops in America, was also brought in,
and took the course of others. Rose Fuller, who generally supported
ministers, attempted to break the severity of the several enactments,
and produce a reconciliation with the colonics, by proposing a repeal of
the act imposing the duty on tea. His proposition was negatived by a
large majority. On the annunciation of the result, Mr. Fuller uttered
these remarkable words: "I will now take my leave of the whole plan; you
will commence your ruin from this day! I am sorry to say that not only
the House has fallen into this error, but the people approve of the
measure. The people, I am sorry to say, are misled. But a short time
will prove the evil tendency of this bill. If ever there was a nation
rushing headlong to ruin, it is this."

Evidently anticipating rebellion in America, and distrustful of the
loyalty of the newly-acquired colony of Quebec, or Canada, a fifth act
was brought forward by ministers, making great concessions to the Roman
Catholic population of that province. This law, known as

Proceedings in Massachusetts on Account of the Port Bill.--Recall of
Hutchinson.--Division of Sentiment. Quebec Act

506the Quebec Act, has already been noticed in detail on pages 156--7. *
Let us now turn our eyes back to the colonies, and observe the spirit of
the people of Boston on hearing of the plans maturing for their
enslavement and ruin.

Intelligence of the passage of the Boston Port Bill reached
Massachusetts in May. May 13 Already the Assembly had taken high, but
correct ground on the subject of the salaries of crown officers in the
colonies. In January that body resolved that it was incumbent upon the
judges to determine at once whether they would receive their salaries
direct from the crown, or depend therefor upon the votes of the
Assembly. Chief-justice Oliver was questioned upon this point, and
replied that he should hereafter look to the crown for the emoluments of
office. The Assembly then resolved, by a majority of sixty-nine to nine,
"That Peter Oliver hath, by his conduct, proved himself an enemy to the
Constitution of the province, and is become greatly obnoxious to the
good people of it; that he ought to be removed from the office of chief
justice; and that a remonstrance and petition to the governor and
Council, for his immediate removal, be prepared." They also resolved to
impeach the chief justice. The governor not only refused to remove him,
but declared the acts of the Assembly unconstitutional. **

Fortunately for Hutchinson's personal safety, but much to his chagrin,
his recall accompanied the Port Bill, and General Gage was appointed his
successor. Thus far, in all matters relative to the agitations in the
colonies, Gage had behaved so discreetly that he enjoyed a considerable
share of public confidence and esteem, and in proportion as the people
of Boston detested Hutchinson they were disposed to respect the new
governor. Hutchinson, deprived of the shield of delegated power, so much
feared the resentment of the Boston populace, that he retired to his
country house at Milton, where he remained in seclusion until a June l,
1774 favorable opportunity offered for him to leave the province. It is
an erroneous belief that the people were unanimous in opposition to
government and in support of republican views. For a while, when the
issue came, the parties were very nearly balanced in Boston; and during
the whole time of its occupancy by the British troops, until the
evacuation in 1776, a large portion of the inhabitants were loyal.
Before Hutchinson departed, one hundred and twenty merchants of Boston,
and many lawyers, magistrates, and principal gentlemen of that town, and
Salem, and Marblehead, signed an address to him, in which they expressed
entire approbation of his public conduct, and affectionate wishes for
his prosperity. These "addressors" were afterward obliged to recant.
Some who would not left the province, and were the earliest of the
_refugee Loyalists._

General Gage, doubtful what reception he should meet at Boston,
proceeded with great caution. Four additional regiments were ordered to
the rebellious town, but he went thither from New York unattended by any
military except his staff. On the day when he

* A fact not noticed in the former consideration of the Quebec Act is
worthy of record, as showing the actual despotic tendency of
Parliamentary enactments at that time. By a provision of the act in
question, the total revenue of the province of Canada was consigned, in
the first instance, to a warrant from the Lord of the Treasury, for the
purpose of pensioning judges during pleasure, and the support of a civil
list, totally unlimited. This first Lord of the Treasury, or prime
minister, was thus in actual possession of the whole revenue of the
province, and unrestrained in its expenditure, except by general
instructions to use it "to defray the expenses of the administration of
justice, and to support civil government in the colonies." Similar
despotic ingredients were profusely sprinkled throughout the whole batch
of measures brought forward by Lord North to rule the Americans. The
superficial observer is apt to consider the zeal of the Americans
against Parliamentary measures highly intemperate and sometimes
censurable, for apparently trifling causes aroused the most violent
action. But the colonists clearly perceived the huge monster of
despotism artfully covered under a fair guise, and what seemed but an
insect, magnified by the microscope of prejudice, they knew to be the
germ of a monster reality. The three per cent, duty on tea, considered
alone, was but a grain of sand as an obstacle to friendly feelings, but
the principle that slept there was a towering Alp.

** Peter Oliver, brother of Andrew Oliver, the stamp-master already
noticed, was born in 1713, and graduated at Harvard in 1730. He was
appointed judge of the Superior Court in 1756, and became chief justice
when his brother-in-law, Hutchinson, was appointed governor. He was
impeached by the Massachusetts Assembly in 1774. Judge Oliver soon
afterward went to England. He died at Birmingham in October, 1791, aged
nearly seventy-nine years.

Arrival of General Gage in Boston.--Meeting In Faneuil Hall.--Excitement
among the People--. Newspaper Devices.

507entered the harbor the town was greatly excited, news of the Port
Bill having just May 13, 1774 arrived. He landed at Long Wharf, and was
received with much respect by the immense crowd of people that met him.
He was entertained by the magistrates and others at a public dinner, and
on that evening Hutchinson was burned in effigy on the Common, in front
of John Hancock's mansion.

The next day a numerously attended town meeting, at which Samuel Adams
presided, was held in Faneuil Hall to consider the Port Bill. The people
were, indeed, at their "wits' end." The decree had gone forth to blight
the town; a governor, commissioned to execute the ministerial will, was
present, and soldiers were on their way to support his authority.

The meeting voted "That it is the opinion of the town that, if the other
colonies come into a joint resolution to stop all importation from, and
exportation to, Great Britain, and every part of the East Indies, till
the act be repealed, the same will prove the salvation of North America
and her liberties; and that the impolicy, injustice, inhumanity, and
cruelty of the act exceed all our powers of expression; we, therefore,
leave it to the just censure of others, and appeal to God and the
world." Paul Revere, an artist and mechanic of Boston, and one of the
most active patriots, was sent to New York and Philadelphia to invoke
sympathy and co-operation. A vast number of copies of the act, printed
with heavy black lines around it, and some of them having the sepulchral
device of skull and cross-bones rudely engraved as a head-piece, were
scattered over the country, and cried in cities and villages as the
"Barbarous, cruel, bloody, and inhuman murder!" ** The whole country was
inflamed, and every where the most lively sympathy for the people of
Boston was awakened. Orators at public gatherings, ministers in the
pulpits, and the newspaper press throughout the land, denounced the
oppression laid upon Boston as a type of what was in store for the whole
country Some of the newspapers placed at their head the significant
device used during the Stamp Act excitement, a serpent cut in ten
pieces, with the inscription "_Join or die! or "Unite or die!"_*** The
cause of Boston became the

* This is a substantial stone building, situated upon Beacon Street,
fronting the Common. It was erected by Thomas Hancock, an uncle of
Governor Hancock, in 1737. The present proprietor is a nephew of the
governor.

** The engraving is a fac-simile, one fourth the size of the original,
of a device upon one of these papers. Over the skull is a rude
resemblance of a crown, and beneath the bones that of the Cup of
Liberty, denoting that all was death and destruction between the crown
and liberty. This device is supposed to be the work of Paul Revere, who
engraved the pictures of the naval investment of Boston in 1768, and the
Boston Massacre in 1770. Revere was a very ingenious man, an active
patriot, and, as grand master of the Masonic fraternity in
Massachusetts, had extensive influence. Ho was a co-worker with Samuel
Adams, Joseph Warren, and other compatriots in setting the ball of the
Revolution in motion.

*** The cut upon the next page is a fac-simile of one of those
illustrations. I copied it from the Pennsylvania Journal, 1774, where it
appeared for nearly a year, or until the colonics were fairly united by
a Continental Congress. The loyal papers loudly condemned the use of the
device. A writer in Rivington's Royal Gazette, * who called it a
"scandalous and saucy reflection," was answered as follows by a
correspondent of the Journal:

*** "To the Author of the Lines in Mr. Rivington's Paper, on the Snake
depicted in some of the American Newspapers.

"That New England's abused, and by sons of sedition, Is granted without
either prayer or petition; And that is a scandalous, saucy reflection,
That merits the soundest, severest correction,' Is readily granted. 'How
came it to pass?' Because she is pester'd by snakes in the grass, Who,
by lying and cringing, and such like pretensions, Get places once
honor'd disgraced with pensions. And you, Mr. Pensioner, instead of
repentance (If I don't mistake you), have wrote your own sentence; For
by such snakes as this New England's abused, And the head of the
serpents, 'you know, must be bruised."

*** "New Jersey." Rivington was the "king's printer" in New York city.
His office was at the southeast corner of Pearl and Wall Streets. He had
the entire confidence of the British authorities, and held the "rebels"
in great contempt. He was a caustic writer, and his remarks were often
remembered with bitterness for years. The following anecdote is
illustrative of this fact:

*** Among those who cherished very hostile feelings toward Rivington was
that dare-devil, General Ethan Allen, of Vermont, who swore he would
"lick Rivington the very first opportunity he had." Rivington himself,
aware of his intentions, gave a most humorous description of his
interview with Allen, showing, at the same time, his exceeding
cleverness and tact, which may even at this day be profitable to his
editorial brethren. Rivington was a fine, portly-looking man, dressed in
the extreme of fashion--curled and powdered hair, claret-colored coat,
scarlet waistcoat trimmed with gold lace, buckskin breeches, and top
boots--and kept the very best society.

*** The clerk below stairs saw Allen coming at a distance. "I was
sitting," said Rivington, "after a good dinner, alone, with my bottle of
Madeira before me, when I heard an unusual noise in the street, and a
huzza from the boys. I was in the second story, and, stepping to the
window, saw a tall figure in tarnished regimentals, with a large cocked
hat and an enormous long sword, followed by a crowd of boys, who
occasionally cheered him with huzzas, of which he seemed insensible. He
came up to my door and stopped. I could see no more. My heart told me it
was Ethan Allen. I shut down my window, and retired behind my table and
bottle. 1 was certain the hour of reckoning had come. There was no
retreat. Mr. Staples, my clerk, came in paler than ever, and clasping
his hands, said, 'Master, he is come I' 'I know it.' 'He entered the
store, and asked "if James Rivington lived there." I answered, "Yes,
sir." "Is he at home?" "I will go and see, sir," I said; and now,
master, what is to be done? There he is in the store, and the boys
peeping at him from the street.' I had made up my mind. I looked at the
bottle of Madeira--possibly took a glass. 'Show him up,' said I; ' and
if such Madeira can not mollify him, he must be harder than adamant.'
There was a fearful moment of suspense. I heard him on the stairs, his
long sword clanking at every step. In he stalked. 'Is your name James
Rivington?' 'It is, sir, and no man could be more happy than I am to see
Colonel Ethan Allen.' 'Sir, I have come--' 'Not another word, my dear
colonel, until you have taken a seat and a glass of old Madeira.' 'But,
sir, I don't think it proper--' 'Not another word, colonel. Taste this
wine; I have had it in glass for ten years. Old wine, you know, unless
it is originally sound, never improves by age.' He took the glass,
swallowed the wine, smacked his lips, and shook his head approvingly.
'Sir, I come--' 'Not another word until you have taken another glass,
and then, my dear colonel, we will talk of old affairs, and I have some
droll events to detail.' In short, we finished two bottles of Madeira,
and parted as good friends as if we never had cause to be otherwise."

Real Weakness of the British Ministry.--Newspaper Poetry.--The Snake
Device.

508cause of all the colonies, and never were the British ministry really
weaker in their government relations to America than when Lord North was
forging, as he vainly thought, the fetters of majestic law to bind the
colonies indissolubly to the throne.

In honorable concession alone lay his real strength, but of these
precious locks the Delilah of haughty ambition had shorn him, and when
he attempted to put forth his power, he found himself "like other men,"
weak indeed!

General Gage at Boston.--Proceedings of the Massachusetts Assembly.--
Proposition for a General Congress

509

CHAPTER XXII.

Scene IV. In Boston, while the Regulars were flying from Lexington.

Lord Boston, surrounded by his Guards and a few Officers.

Lord Boston. If Colonel Smith succeeds in his embassy, and I think
there's no doubt of it, I shall have the pleasure this evening, I
expect, of having my friends Hancock and Adams's good company; I'll make
each of them a present of a pair of handsome iron ruffles, and Major
Provost shall provide a suitable entertainment for them in his
apartment.

Officer. Sure they'll not be so unpolite as to refuse your excellency's
kind invitation.

Lord Boston. Should they, Colonel Smith and Major Pitcairn have my
orders to make use of all their rhetoric and the persuasive eloquence of
British thunder.

Enters a messenger in haste.

I bring your excellency unwelcome tidings--

Lord Boston. For Heaven's sake! from what quarter?

Messenger. From Lexington plains.

Lord Boston. 'Tis impossible!

Messenger. Too true, sir.

Lord Boston. Say--what is it? Speak what you know.

Messenger. Colonel Smith is defeated and fast retreating.

Lord Boston. Good God! what does he say? Mercy on me!

Messenger. They're flying before the enemy.

Lord Boston. Britons turn their backs before the Rebels! the Rebels put
Britons to flight! Said you not so?

Messenger. They are routed, sir; they are flying this instant; the
provincials are numerous, and hourly gaining strength; they have nearly
surrounded our troops. A re-enforcement, sir, a timely succor, may save
the shattered remnant. Speedily! speedily, sir! or they're irretrievably
lost.

"The Fall of British Tyranny, or American Liberty triumphant." *

ENERAL GAGE soon became a tyrant in the eyes of the people of Boston.
However humane were his intentions, the execution of his commission
necessarily involved harsh and oppressive measures. Pursuant to the
provisions of the Port Bill, he proceeded, after the appointment of the
members of the Council (see note 1, next page), to transfer the
government June, 1774offices to Salem, and on the 31st of May the
Assembly held its final session in Boston. By proclamation, Gage
adjourned the House until the 7th of June, and ordered the next meeting
at Salem. Anticipating this measure, the House appointed two members of
the Assembly--Samuel Adams and James Warren--to act in the interim, as
the exigencies of the case might require. These, with a few others
already named, held private conferences, and arranged plans for the
public good. On the third evening after the adjournment of the Assembly,
their plans were matured. The suggestions of New York and other places,
as well as the hints thrown out by Pownall in the House of Commons
respecting a general Congress, were favorably considered. A plan was
arranged for a Continental Congress; they also matured measures for
making provisions for supplying funds and munitions of war, prepared an
address to the other colonies, inviting their co-operation in the
measure of a general Congress, and drew up a non-importation agreement.

If:

* This is a well-written drama, published by Styner and Cist,
Philadelphia, in 1776. Its sub-title is, "A tragi-Comedy of Five Acts,
as lately planned at the Royal Theatrum Pandemonium at St. James's. The
principal place of action, in America." It is dedicated "To Lord Boston
[General Gage], Lord Kidnapper [Dunmore, governor of Virginia], and the
innumerable and never-ending class of Macs and Donalds upon Donalds, and
the remnant of the gentlemen Officers, Actors, Merry Andrews, Strolling
Players, Pirates, and Buccaneers in America."

Boldness of the Patriots.--Attempt to Dissolve the Assembly.--The
"League."

June 17. 510These several propositions and plans were boldly laid before
the General Court when it June 7, 1774 reopened at Salem. The few
partisans of the crown in that Assembly were filled with amazement and
alarm at the boldness of the popular leaders; and as rank treason was
developed in the first acts of the majority, a partisan of government
determined, if possible, to put a stop to further rebellious
proceedings.

Feigning sudden illness, he was allowed to leave the Assembly. He went
immediately to the governor and acquainted him with the proceedings in
progress. ** Gage sent his secretary to dissolve the Assembly by
proclamation, but the patriots were too vigilant for him. The doors of
the Assembly were locked, and the keys were safely deposited in Samuel
Adams's pocket. The secretary read the proclamation on the stairs, but
it was unheeded by the patriots within.

They proceeded to adopt and sign a "Solemn League and Covenant," in
which all former non-importation agreements and cognate undertakings
were concentrated, and a committee was appointed to send the covenant,
as a circular, to every colony in America. *** They also adopted the
other plans matured by Adams and others, and a resolution that "a
meeting of committees, from the several colonies on this continent, is
highly expedient and necessary, to consult upon the present state of the
country, and the miseries to which we are and must be reduced by the
operation of certain acts of Parliament, and to deliberate and determine
on wise and proper measures to be recom-

* The political complexion of the new Council did not please Gage. He
exercised the prerogative given to him by the charter to the fullest
extent in rejecting thirteen of the elected counselors. The remainder
were not much more agreeable to him.

** General Gage was then residing at the house of Robert Hooper, Esq.,
in Danvers, about four miles from Salem.

***All who felt an attachment to the American cause were called upon to
sign it; and the covenanters were required to obligate themselves, in
the presence of God, to cease all commerce with England, dating from the
last of the ensuing month of August, until the late wicked acts of
Parliament should be repealed and the Massachusetts colony reinstated in
all its rights and privileges; to abstain from the use of any British
goods whatsoever; and to avoid all commerce or traffic with those who
refused to sign the League. Finally, it was covenanted that those who
refused to sign the League should be held up to public scorn and
indignation by the publication of their names. The articles of the
League were transmitted by circulars to all the other provinces, with
invitations to the inhabitants to affix their names thereto.
Philadelphia alone, as a city, did not accept the invitation to join in
such a measure, preferring to refer the matter to a general Congress,
and agreeing to execute faithfully all measures therein agreed upon.

**** A biographical sketch of this distinguished patriot will be found
among those of the signers of the Declaration of Independence printed in
the Supplement.

Appointment of Delegates to a Continental Congress.--Denunciation of the
"League."--Closing of the Port of Boston.

511mended to all the colonies for the recovery and re-establishment of
our just rights and liberties, civil and religious, and the restoration
of union and harmony between Great Britain and America, which is most
ardently desired by all good men." They designated the 1st of September
as the time, and Philadelphia as the place of meeting. Thomas Cushing,
the Speaker of the Assembly, James Bowdoin, many years a member of the
Council, Samuel Adams, John Adams, and Robert Treat Paine, were chosen
delegates. A treasurer was appointed, and the towns were called upon to
pay their respective shares of the sum of two thousand five hundred
dollars, voted to the delegates in payment of their expenses. The whole
business being ended, the Assembly adjourned indefinitely, and thus
ended the last session of the Assembly of Massachusetts Bay, under a
royal governor.

Gage was greatly irritated by the proceedings of the Assembly, and the
acts of the people of Boston in sustaining these traitorous measures. He
refused to receive the answer of the General Court to his address, and
issued a strong proclamation in denunciation of the _League_ as an
unlawful combination, hostile to the crown and Parliament, and ordering
the magistrates to apprehend and bring to trial all who should be guilty
of signing it. The people laughed at his proclamation, defied the pliant
magistrates, and signed the League by thousands. Uncompromising
hostility was aroused, and the arm of bold defiance was uplifted, even
in the midst of distress and the menaces of foreign bayonets.

At noon on the 1st of June the port of Boston was closed to all vessels
that wished to enter, and, after the 14th, all that remained were not
allowed to depart. The two 1774 regiments ordered to Boston by Gage had
arrived, and were encamped on the Common. Soon afterward, these being
re-enforced by several regiments from Halifax, Quebec, New York, and
Ireland, the town became an immense garrison. The utter prostration of
all business soon produced great distress in the city. The rich,
deprived of their rents, became straitened, and the poor, denied the
privilege of labor, were reduced to beggary. All classes felt the
scourge of the oppressor, yet the fortitude and forbearance of the
inhabitants were most remarkable. The sympathy of the people abroad was
commensurate with the sufferings of the patriots, and from every quarter
came expressions of friendship and substantial tokens of attachment to
the sufferers. The people of Georgia sent the Bostonians sixty-three
barrels of rice, and seven hundred and twenty dollars in specie. Wheat
and other grain were forwarded to them from different points; Schoharie,
in New York, alone sending five hundred and twenty-five bushels of
wheat. The city of London, in its corporate capacity, subscribed one
hundred and fifty thousand dollars for the relief of the poor of Boston.
The people of Marblehead and Salem offered the Boston merchants the free
use of wharves and stores, for they scorned to enrich themselves at the
expense of their oppressed neighbors. A committee was appointed in
Boston to receive and distribute donations, and, in the midst of martial
law, the suffering patriots were bold and unyielding.

General Gage was warned to relax the rigor of his military rule, or open
rebellion would ensue. He affected to disregard these warnings, yet he
employed precautionary measures. Boston is situated upon a peninsula, at
that time connected with the continent by a narrow strip of land called
the Neck. Convinced that hostilities must ensue unless the home
government should recede, and relying more upon soldiers than upon
conciliatory deeds, Gage moved in subserviency to this reliance, and
stationed a strong guard of armed men upon the Neck. He gave as a reason
for this measure the shallow pretext that he wished to prevent
desertions from his ranks. The people readily interpreted the meaning of
his movement, and saw at once that the patriots of Boston were to be cut
off from free communication with those in the country, and that arms and
ammunition were not to be transported from the city to the interior. For
the first time the free intercourse of New Englanders was interrupted,
and the lightning of rebellion, that had for years been curbed within
the hearts of the people, leaped forth in manifestations which alarmed
the hitherto haughty hirelings of royalty. The members of the new
Council, appointed by the governor under the act which changed, and
indeed abrogated, the charter of Massachusetts, who had accepted office,
were treated with disdain at every step, and a large proportion of them
were forced to resign.

Peaceable Resistance of the People.--Preparations for War.--Recantation
of the Hutchinson Addressors

512

The courts of justice were suspended; the attorneys who had issued writs
of citation were compelled to ask pardon in the public journals, and
promise not to expedite others until the laws should be revoked and the
charter re-established. The people occupied the seats of justice, that
no room might be left for judges. When invited to withdraw, they
answered that they recognized no other tribunals and no other
magistrates than such as were established by ancient laws and usage. **

Persuaded that war was inevitable, the people, throughout the province,
began to arm themselves and practice military tactics daily. Every where
the fife and drum were heard, and fathers and sons, encouraged by the
gentler sex, took lessons together in the art of war. The forge and
hammer were busy in making guns and swords, and every thing bore the
animated but gloomy impress of impending hostility. The zeal of true
patriots waxed warmer; the fears of the timid and lukewarm assumed the
features of courage; the avowed friends of government became alarmed,
and those _Addressors_, as they were called, who signed an address to
Hutchinson on his departure, were obliged to make public recantations in
the newspapers. *** Some of the Boston clergy (particularly Dr. Cooper,
the person who

* This picture is from an English print of the time. Then the principal
portion of the town was upon the eastern slope and flats. There were a
few houses upon the higher ground in the vicinity of Beacon Hill, around
the Common, among which was that of John Hancock. In this picture,
Beacon Hill is designated by the pole, which, with its barrel, is
noticed in a preceding chapter. The peninsula originally contained about
seven hundred acres. The hills have been razed and the earth carried
into the water, by which means the peninsula is so enlarged that it now
comprises about fourteen hundred acres.

** Otis's Botta, i., 124.

*** There were many persons of some significance who were willing, at
this stage of the controversy, to offer conciliatory measures, and they
even gave encouragement to General Gage and his government. One hundred
and twenty merchants and others of Boston signed an address to General
Gage, expressing a willingness to pay for the tea destroyed. It is
averred, also, that some of the wealthiest people of Boston actually
endeavored to raise money to pay the East India Company for the tea, but
the attempt failed. There were some others who protested against the
course of the Committee of Correspondence and the action of a large
portion of the ministers of the Gospel, who, they averred, were unduly
exciting the people, and urging them headlong toward ruin. But these
movements were productive only of mischief. They made the colonists more
determined, and deluded the home government with the false idea that the
most respectable portion of the people were averse to change or
revolution. The following is a copy of the recantation, signed by a
large number of the addressors: "Whereas we, the subscribers, did some
time since sign an address to Governor Hutchinson, which, though
prompted to by the best intentions, has, nevertheless, given great,
offense to our country; We do now declare, that we desire, so far from
designing, by that action, to show our acquiescence in those acts of
Parliament so universally and justly odious to all America, that, on the
contrary, we hoped we might, in that way, contribute to their repeal;
though now, to our sorrow, we find ourselves mistaken. And we do now
further declare, that we never intended the offense which this address
has occasioned; that, if we had foreseen such an event, we should never
have signed it; as it always has been and now is our wish to live in
harmony with our neighbors, and our serious determination is to promote,
to the utmost of our power, the liberty, the welfare, and happiness of
our country, which Is inseparably connected with our own." The Committee
of Correspondence declared the recantation satisfactory, and recommended
the signers of it as true friends to America.

Spirit of the American Press.--Zeal of the Committees of
Correspondence.--Their importance.--Fortification of Boston Neck.

513first received Hutchinson's letters from Franklin) were very active
in promoting hostility to the rulers, and the press exerted its power
with great industry and effect. *

The _Massachusetts Spy_ and the _Boston Gazette_ were the principal Whig
journals, and through the latter, Otis, Adams, Quincy, Warren, and
others communed with the public, in articles suited to the comprehension
of all. Epigrams, parables, sonnets, dialogues, and every form of
literary expression remarkable for point and terseness, filled these
journals. The following is a fair specimen of logic in rhyme, so
frequently employed at that day. I copied it from Anderson's
_Constitutional Gazette_, ** published in New York in 1775. That paper
was the uncompromising opponent of Rivington's (Tory) Gazette, published
in the same city.

"The Quarrel with America fairly Stated.

"Rudely forced to drink tea, Massachusetts in anger

Spills the tea on John Bull--John falls on to bang her;

Massachusetts, enraged, calls her neighbors to aid,

And give Master John a severe bastinade.

Now, good men of the law! pray, who is in fault,

The one who begun, or resents the assault?'

The Boston Committee of Correspondence were busy night and day preparing
the people of the province for energetic action, and it needed but a
slight offense to sound the battle cry and invoke the sword of rebellion
from its scabbard. **

Alarmed at the rebellious spirit manifested on all sides, Gage removed
the seat August, 1774 of government from Salem back to Boston, and began
to fortify the Neck. The work went on slowly at first, for British gold
could not buy Boston carpenters, and workmen had to be procured from
other places. The people viewed these warlike preparations with
indignation, which was heightened by an injudicious act of Gage in
sending a detach-

* There were five newspapers printed in Boston in 1774, as follows: the
Boston Past, on Monday morning, by Thomas and John Fleet; the Boston
News-Letter, by Margaret Draper (widow of Richard Draper) and Robert
Boyle; the Massachusetts Gazette awl Boston Post Boy and Advertiser, by
Mills and Hicks; the Boston Gazette and Country Journal, by Edes and
Gill; and the Massachusetts Spy, by Isaiah Thomas.--See Thomas's History
of Printing.

** Anderson was the father of Dr. Alexander Anderson of New York, the
earliest wood-engraver, as a distinct art, in America. Now (1855), at
the age of eighty years, he uses the graver with all the skill and vigor
of earlier manhood.

*** The committee of 1774 consisted of Samuel Adams, John Hancock, James
Bowdoin, John Adams, William Phillips, Joseph Warren, and Josiah Quincy.
The importance of these committees of correspondence may be understood
by the estimate placed upon them by a Tory writer over the signature of
Massachusettensis. "This," he said, "is the foulest, subtlest, and most
venomous serpent ever issued from the egg of sedition. It is the source
of the rebellion. I saw the small seed when it was implanted; it was a
grain of mustard. I have watched the plant until it has become a great
tree. The vilest reptiles that crawl upon the earth are concealed at the
root; the foulest birds of the air rest upon its branches. I now would
induce you to go to work immediately with axes and hatchets and cut it
down, for a two-fold reason: because it is a pest to society, and lest
it be felled suddenly by a stronger arm, and crush its thousands in its
fall."

Attempted Seizure of Arms and Ammunition at Cambridge.--Alarm concerning
Boston.--Convention in Boston

September l, 1774 ment 514of troops to seize a quantity of gunpowder
belonging to the province, stored at Charlestown and Cambridge. This act
greatly exasperated the people, and large numbers assembled at
Cambridge, determined upon attacking the troops in Boston. About the
same time, intelligence went abroad that the ships of war in Boston
harbor were bombarding the town and the regular troops were massacring
the people, sparing neither September 3. age nor sex. The news spread
rapidly, and the thrill of horror produced by the report was succeeded
by a cry of vengeance. In less than thirty-six hours the country for
more than one hundred and seventy miles in extent was aroused. From the
shores of Long Island to the green hills of Berkshire, "To arms! to
arms!" was the universal shout. Instantly, on every side, men of all
ages were seen cleansing and burnishing their weapons, furnishing
themselves with provisions and warlike stores, and preparing for an
immediate march; gentlemen of rank and fortune exhorting and encouraging
others by voice and example. The roads were soon crowded with armed men,
marching for Boston with great rapidity, but without noise or tumult.
Full thirty thousand men were under arms and speeding toward the town;
nor did they halt until well assured that the report was untrue. *

At a convention of delegates from the several towns in Suffolk county,
to which Boston belonged, held on the 6th of September, it was resolved
that no obedience was due to 1774 any part of the late acts of
Parliament. Collectors of taxes, and other officers holding public
money, were recommended to retain the funds in their hands until the old
charter was restored; that persons who had accepted seats in the Council
had violated the duty they owed to their country; that those who did not
resign by the 20th of September should be considered public enemies;
that the Quebec Act, establishing Romanism in Canada, was dangerous to
Protestantism and liberty, and that they were determined to act on the
defensive only so long as just reason required. They also recommended
the people to seize and keep as a hostage any servant of the crown who
might fall in their way, when they should hear of a patriot being
arrested for any political offense. They drew up an address to General
Gage, telling him frankly that they did not desire to commence
hostilities, but that they were determined not to submit to any of the
late acts of Parliament; they also complained loudly of the
fortifications upon the Neck.

Gage denounced the convention as treasonable, and, in reply to their
address, declared that he should take such measures for the safety of
his troops and the friends of government as he thought proper, at the
same time assuring them that the cannon placed in battery on the Neck
should not be used except to repel hostile proceedings. Unlike Governor
Carleton of Canada, he had no word of kindness or act of conciliation
for the patriots, ** and they, in turn, reviled the governor and set his
power at naught. Tarring and feathering and other violent acts became
common, and the Tories or friends of government in the surrounding
country were obliged to seek refuge in Boston. The eight military
companies in the town, composed of citizens, were mostly broken up. John
Hancock had been commander of a corps called the Governor's Independent
Cadets. General Gage had dismissed him, and the company, indignant at
the affront, appointed a committee, on the 14 th of August, to

* See Hinman's Historical Collections from Official Records, &c., of
Connecticut.

It was believed by some, that the rumor of the bombardment at Boston was
set afloat by some of the leading patriots, to show General Gage what
multitudes of people would rise up to crush his troops if he dared to
abuse his power by committing the least act of violence.

** The kindness which Governor Carleton manifested toward the American
prisoners captured at Quebec and the Cedars in 1776, did more to keep
down rebellion in that province than any severe measures could have
effected. Lamb says, that "in the spring of 1776. Governor Carleton
addressed the prisoners with such sweetness and good-humor as was
sufficient to melt every heart. 'My lads,' he said, 'why did you come to
disturb an honest man in his government that never did any harm to you
in his life? I never invaded your property, nor sent a single soldier to
disturb you. Come, my hoys, you are in a very distressing situation, and
not able to go home with any comfort. I must provide you with shoes,
stockings, and warm waistcoats. I must give you some victuals to carry
you home. Take care, my lads, that you do not come here again, lest I
should not treat you so kindly."--Lamb's Journal of the American War, p.
89, Dublin, 1809.

Revolutionary Town Meetings.--Order for Convening the Assembly
countermanded.--Meeting of the Assembly

515wait on the governor at Salem, and return him their standard,
disbanded themselves." *

The day before the meeting of the Suffolk convention, the general
Continental September, 1774 Congress met in Philadelphia, and as soon as
information of its firm proceedings reached Massachusetts, the patriots
assumed a bolder tone. Gage summoned the House of Representatives to
meet at Salem, to proceed to business according to the new order of
things under the late act of Parliament. Town meetings were held, but so
revolutionary were their proceedings, that Gage countermanded his order
for the Assembly. His right to countermand was denied, and most of the
members elect, to the number of ninety, met at Salem on the day
appointed. Gage, of course, was not there, and as nobody appeared to
open the court or administer the oaths, they resolved themselves into a
provincial Congress, adjourned to Concord, and there organized by
choosing John Hancock president, and

* I copy from the Massachusetts Spy of September, 1774, the following
lampoon in rhyme:

"A sample of gubernatorial eloquence, So lately exhibited to the company
of cadets of Your Colonel H--n--k, by neglect Has been deficient in
respect; As he my sovereign toe ne'er kissed, 'Twas proper he should be
dismissed; I never was and never will By mortal man be treated ill. I
never was nor ever can Be treated ill by mortal man. Oh had I but have
known before That temper of your factious corps, It should have been my
greatest pleasure To have prevented that bold measure. To meet with such
severe disgrace--My standard flung into my face! Disband yourselves I so
cursed stout! Oh had I, had I, turned you out!"

** This is given as a specimen of the fearlessness of the press at that
time, for it must be remembered that the Spy was printed in Boston, then
filled with armed troops employed to put down rising rebellion. Gage's
proclamations were paraphrased in rhyme, and otherwise ridiculed. One of
these, now before me, commences,

"Tom Gage's Proclamation, Or blustering Denunciation (Replete with
Defamation), Threatening Devastation And speedy Jugulation Of the New
English Nation, Who shall his pious ways shun." It closes with "Thus
graciously the war I wage, As witnesseth my hand--TOM GAGE. "By command
of Mother Carey. "Thomas Flucker, Secretary." *

*** A biographical sketch of Mr. Hancock will be found among those of
the signers of the Declaration of Independence, in the Supplement.
Flucker was Secretary of Massachusetts under Gage. Henry (afterward
general) Knox, of the Revolution.

Appointment of Committees of Safety and Supplies.--Appointment of
military Officers.--Spiking of Cannons

516Benjamin Lincoln, afterward a revolutionary general, secretary. A
committee, appointed to consider the state of the province, prepared an
address to Gage, which the Congress adopted, and then adjourned to
Cambridge, where another committee was sent to present the address to
the governor. In that address they protested against the fortification
of the Neck, and complained of the recent acts of Parliament, while they
expressed the warmest loyalty to the king and the government. Gage
replied, as he did to the Suffolk committee, that his military
preparations were made only in self-defense, and were justified by the
warlike demonstrations on every hand. He concluded by pronouncing their
Assembly illegal, and in contravention of the charter of the province,
and warned them to desist.

The denunciations of Gage had no other effect than to increase the zeal
of the patriots. The Provincial Congress proceeded to appoint a
Committee of Safety, at the head of which was John Hancock, giving it
power to call out the militia. A committee was appointed to provide
ammunition and stores, and the sum of sixty-six thousand dollars was
appropriOctober 26, 1774ated for the purpose. Provision was also made
for arming the people of the province. They appointed Henry Gardner
treasurer of the colony, under the title of _receiver general_, into
whose hands the constables and tax-collectors were directed to pay all
public moneys which they received. Jedediah Preble, Artemus Ward, and
Seth Pomeroy, were appointed general officers of the militia. * The
first did not accept the appointment, and Ward and Pomeroy alone entered
upon the duty of organizing the military. Ammunition and stores were
speedily collected at Concord, Woburn, and other places. Mills were
erected for making gunpowder; manufactories were set up for making arms,
and great encouragement was given to the production of saltpeter.

The Provincial Congress disavowed any intention to attack the British
troops, yet took measures to cut off their supplies from the country.
Gage issued a proclamaNovember 10tion, denouncing their proceedings, to
which no attention was paid; and as the recommendations of the
Provincial Congress had all the authority of law, he was unsupported
except by his troops, and a few officials and their friends in the city.
Apprehending that the people of Boston might point the cannons upon the
fortifications about the town upon himself and troops, he caused a party
of sailors to be landed by night from a ship of war in the harbor, who
spiked all the guns upon the battery at Fort Hill.

At a session of the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, convened on
the 23d of November, it was voted to enrol twelve thousand minute men--
volunteers pledged to be ready to enter the field at a minute's notice--
and an invitation was sent to Connecticut and Rhode Island to follow
this example, and increase the number of minute men to twenty thousand.
They elected the same delegates to the general Congress, to meet again
in May, 1775; appointed Colonel Thomas and Colonel Heath additional
generals; and adopted measures for the formation of a new Provincial
Congress, to meet early in the ensuing year. They then adjourned to
attend the general thanksgiving, held according to their own
appointment. ** When the year 1774 closed, the colonies were on the
verge of open insurrection. Let us turn for a moment to view the
progress of events in England.

When the colonial agents there observed the manifest improbability of a
reconciliation and the certainty of an appeal to arms, they were
exceedingly active in their efforts to mold the popular opinion in favor
of the colonies. The various addresses put forth by the

* For a sketeh of the life of General Ward, see ante, page 190. Pomeroy
was in the battle of Lake George, in 1755, and was the soldier of that
name whom Everett supposes to have shot Baron Dieskau. See page 109.

** This appointment was always made by the governor, as at the present
day, but the patriots had absolutely discarded his authority.

*.....daughter Lucy, in opposition to the wishes of her father, who
desired a more advantageous match for her. Knox was a young bookseller
in Boston, and Miss Flucker, who possessed considerable literary taste,
became acquainted with him while visiting his store to purchase articles
in his line. A sympathy of taste, feeling, and views produced mutual
esteem, which soon ripened into love. Her friends looked upon her as one
ruined in prospects of future social esteem and personal happiness, in
wedding one who had espoused the cause of rebellion; but many of those
very friends, when the great political change took place, were outcasts
and in poverty, while Lucy Knox was the center of tbe first social
circle in America.

Efforts of Franklin and others.--Counteraction by Adam Smith and
others.--Proceedings in Parliament

517Continental Congress were printed and industriously circulated. Dr.
Franklin and other friends of America traversed the manufacturing towns
in the north of England, and by personal communications enlightened the
people upon the important questions at issue. The inhabitants of those
districts were mostly Dissenters, looking upon the Church of England as
an oppressor; and, by parity of simple reasoning, its main pillar, the
throne, was regarded equally as an instrument of oppression. They were,
therefore, eager listeners to the truths respecting human rights which
the friends of republicanism uttered, and throughout Yorkshire,
Lancashire, Durham, and Northumberland, the people became much excited.

Ministers were alarmed, and concerted measures to counteract the effects
produced by these itinerant republicans. Adam Smith, the author of "The
Wealth of Nations," Wedderburne, the solicitor general, and other
friends of the ministry, wielded their pens vigorously; and, at their
solicitation, Dr. Roebuck, of Birmingham, a very popular man among the
manufacturing population, followed in the wake of Franklin and his
friends, and endeavored to apply a ministerial antidote to their
republican poison. In this he was measurably successful, and the
districts were quieted.

Parliament assembled on the 30th of November. The king informed them
that America was on the verge of open rebellion. When the usual address
to the king was proposed in the House of Commons, the opposition offered
an amendment, asking his majesty to lay before Parliament all letters,
orders, and instructions relating to American affairs, as well as all
the intelligence received from the colonies. Lord North opposed the
amendment, because it made the first advances toward a reconciliation,
and therefore was inconsistent with the dignity of the government! The
address was replete with assurances of support for the king and
ministers in all measures deemed necessary to maintain government in the
colonics, or, in other words, in drawing the sword, if necessary, to
bring the Americans to the feet of royal authority. A debate,
characterized by considerable bitterness, ensued, but the amendment was
rejected, and the loyal address was adopted by a vote of two hundred and
sixty-four against seventy-three. Similar action was had in the House of
Lords, and an address was carried by a vote of sixty-three to thirteen.
Nine peers signed a sensible protest, which concluded with these words:
"Whatever may be the mischievous designs or inconsiderate temerity which
leads others to this desperate course, we wish to be known as persons
who have ever disapproved of measures so pernicious in their past
effects and future tendencies; and who are not in haste, without inquiry
and information, to commit ourselves in declarations which may
precipitate our country into all the calamities of a civil war."

Franklin and his associates caused strong remonstrances and petitions to
be sent in from the northern manufacturing districts; and respectful
petitions were also sent in from London, Liverpool, Manchester, Bristol,
and other large towns, praying for a just and conciliatory course toward
America. These petitions were referred to an inactive committee--"a
committee of oblivion," Burke called it--while a few counter petitions,
procured by Roebuck, were acted upon immediately. Petitions from
Americans, and even one from Ja-

* Adam Smith was born at Kirkaldy, in Scotland, in 1723. At the age of
three years he was carried off by some gipsies, but soon afterward was
recovered. He was educated at Oxford, and was designed for the Church.
He became an infidel in religious views, and of course turned his
attention to other than clerical duties. He was the friend of Hume,
Gibbon, and several of the most distinguished infidel writers of France.
He wrote much, but the work on which his reputation rests is his
"Inquiry into the Nature and Cause of the Wealth of Nations," published
in 1771. It was for a long time the ablest work on political economy in
the English language. He died in 1790, as he had lived, a contemner of
Christianity.

Appearance of Pitt in Parliament.--His Speech on American Affairs.--His
conciliatory Proposition.

518maica, in favor of the colonies, were treated with disdain, and the
Americans had every reason to believe that government was anxious to
light up the flame of war, with the expectation of at once crushing the
spirit of independence in the West by a single tread of its iron heel of
power.

Parliament, which adjourned until after the Christmas holidays,
reassembled on the1775 20th of January. Greatly to the astonishment of
every one, Lord Chatham (Pitt) was in his place in the Upper House on
the following day. It was understood that he had washed his hands of
American affairs, and that he would probably not be seen in Parliament
during the session. It was a mistake, and the great statesman opened the
business of the session by proposing an address to the king, asking him
to "immediately dispatch orders to General Gage to remove his forces
from Boston as soon as the rigors of the season would permit."

"I wish, my lords," he said, "not to lose a day in this urgent, pressing
crisis. An hour now lost may produce years of calamity. For my part, I
will not desert, for a single moment, the conduct of this weighty
business. Unless nailed to my bed by extremity of sickness, I will give
it my unremitted attention. I will knock at the door of this sleeping
and confounded ministry, and will rouse them to a sense of their
impending danger. When I state the importance of the colonies to this
country, and the magnitude of danger from the present plan of
misadministration practiced against them, I desire not to be understood
to argue for a reciprocity of indulgence between England and America. I
contend not for indulgence, but justice to America; and I shall ever
contend that the Americans owe obedience to us in a limited degree."
After stating the points on which the supremacy of the mother country
was justly predicated, the great orator continued: "Resistance to your
acts was necessary as it was just; and your vain declarations of the
omnipotence of Parliament, and your imperious doctrines of the necessity
of submission, will be found equally incompetent to convince or to
enslave your fellow-subjects in America, who feel that tyranny, whether
ambitioned by an individual part of the Legislature or the bodies who
compose it, is equally intolerable to British subjects." He then drew a
picture of the condition of the troops in Boston, suffering from the
inclemencies of winter, insulted by the inhabitants, wasting away with
sickness and pining for action; and finally, after alluding to the
wisdom of the late Congress and the approval of their acts by the
people, he exclaimed, "I trust it is obvious to your lordships that all
attempts to impose servitude upon such men, to establish despotism over
such a mighty continental nation, must be vain--must be fatal. We shall
be forced ultimately to retract; let us retract while we can, not when
we must.... To conclude, my lords, if the ministers thus persevere in
misadvising and misleading the king, I will not say that they _can_
alienate the affections of his subjects from his crown, but I will
affirm that they will make the crown not worth his wearing. I will not
say that the king is betrayed, but I will pronounce that the kingdom is
undone."

Chatham's motion was negatived by a vote of sixty-eight to eighteen. Not
at all discouraged, he immediately presented a bill, in which it was
proposed to renounce the power of taxation, demand of the Americans an
acknowledgment of the supreme authority of Great Britain, and invite
them to contribute, voluntarily, a specified sum annually, to be
employed in meeting the charge on the national debt. This accomplished,
it proposed an immediate repeal of all the objectionable acts of
Parliament passed during the current reign, and then in force. * This,
of course, ministers regarded as a concession to the colonies quite as
injurious to national honor as any thing yet proposed, and more
humiliating, even, than Dr. Tucker's propositions, then attracting much
attention, that Parliament should, by solemn act, separate the colonies
from the parent government, and disallow any application for restoration
to the rights and privileges of British subjects, until, by humble
petition, they should

* These were ten in number: the Sugar Act, the two Quartering Acts, the
Tea Act, the Act suspending the New York Legislature (hereafter to be
noticed), the two Acts for the Trial in Great Britain of Offenses
committed in America, the Boston Port Bill, the Act for Regulating the
General Government of Massachusetts, and the Quebec Act

Virtual Declaration of War against the Colonists.--Warm Debates in
Parliament--Chatham and Franklin.--Gibbon and Fox.

519ask for pardon and reinstatement. * Chatham's proposition received
very little favor in the House of Lords, though loudly applauded by the
more intelligent people without, ** and it was negatived, on the motion
of the Earl of Sandwich to "reject the bill now and forever," by a vote
of sixty-one against thirty-two.

The ministry, governed by the ethics of the lion (without his
magnanimity), "might makes right," followed up their foolish rejection
of the olive branch, by proposing measures tantamount to an actual
declaration of war upon the American colonists, as rebels. On the 2d of
February, North proposed the first of a series of coercive measures. He
moved, in the Commons, for an address to the king, affirming that the
province of Massachusetts was in a state of rebellion; that Great
Britain would not relinquish an iota of her sovereign rule in the
colonies, and urging his majesty to take effectual measures for
enforcing obedience to the laws. The address concluded with the usual
resolution to support him with their "lives and fortunes."

On introducing the motion, North intimated that a part of his plan was
to materially increase the military forces in America, and to restrain
the entire commerce of New England with Great Britain, Ireland, and the
West Indies. Fox moved an amendment, censuring the ministry and praying
for their removal. Dunning and the great Thurlow engaged in the debate
on the side of the opposition, which became very warm. Fox's amendment
was negatived by a vote of three hundred and four against one hundred
and five, and North's motion prevailed by a majority of two hundred and
ninety-six to one hundred and six in the Commons, and in the Upper House
by eighty-seven to twenty-seven; nine peers protesting. ***

* Josiah Tucker, D.D., dean of Gloucester, was an able English divine,
and son of Abraham Tucker, author of The Light of Nature Pursued, a work
in nine octavo volumes. Dr. Tucker was a famous pamphleteer at the time
of our Revolution. He was the only friend of the British ministry who
wrote in favor of the independence of the colonics.

** The corporation of the city of London passed a vote of thanks to him,
and Franklin (to whom Chatham submitted the bill before offering it in
the Senate) sent forth an address to the people of England, and to his
own countrymen there, in which he portrayed the wickedness of rejecting
this plan of reconciliation, the only feasible one that had been offered
for years. Franklin and other agents asked to be examined at the bar of
the House of Commons touching the demands of the general Congress; but
even this courtesy, for it could be called nothing more, was roughly
denied.

*** Gibbon the historian, author of the Decline and Fall of the Roman
Empire, who had then a seat in Parliament, writing to his friend
Sheffield, said, "We voted an address of 'lives and fortunes,' declaring
Massachusetts Bay in a state of rebellion; more troops, but, I fear, not
enough, to go to America, to make an army of ten thousand men at Boston;
three generals, Howe, Clinton, and Burgoyne! In a few days we stop the
ports of New England. I can not write volumes, but I am more and more
convinced that, with firmness, all may go well; yet I something doubt.'"

*** Gibbon was very much disposed to take sides with the Americans, and
it is said that he publicly declared at Brooke's Coffee-house, that
"there was no salvation for England, unless six of the heads of the
cabinet council were cut off and laid upon the tables of the houses of
Parliament as examples." Gibbon had his price, and, within a fortnight
after the above expression was uttered, took office under that same
cabinet council, with a liberal salary and promise of a pension. His
mouth was thus stopped by the sugar-plums of patronage. So says Bailey,
author of "Records of Patriotism and Love of Country," page 169. Bailey
also gives the following poem, which he asserts was written by Fox:

"King George, in a fright, lest Gibbon should write The story of
Britain's disgrace, Thought no means more sure his pen to secure Than to
give the historian a place. But his caution is vain, 'tis the curse of
his reign That his projects should never succeed. Though he write not a
line, yet a cause of decline In the author's example we read. His book
well describes, how corruption and bribes Overthrew the great empire of
Rome; And his writings declare a degen'racy there, Which his conduct
exhibits at home."

The first volume of Gibbon's Rome was published in 1776, and the sixth
and last on his fifty-first birthday, in 1788. His bookseller, Mr.
Cadell, on that day gave him forty thousand dollars. Gibbon died in
January, 1794.

John Wilkes in Parliament His Character and Career.--Bill for destroying
the New England Fisheries.--A conciliatory Bill

520In the debate on this bill the celebrated John Wilkes, then a member
of Parliament, fora radical paper, who had given the government a world
of trouble during a portion of the first eight years of the reign of
George III., took a conspicuous part in favor of the Americans.

He declared that a proper resistance to wrong was _revolution_, and not
_rebellion,_ and intimated that if the Americans were successful, they
might, in after times, celebrate the revolution of 1775 as the English
did that of 1688. Earnest recommendations to pursue milder measures were
offered by the opposition, but without effect. It was voted that two
thousand additional sea men and one thousand four hundred soldiers
should be sent to America.

A few days afterward Lord North brought February 10, 1775 forth another
bill, providing for the destruction of the entire trade of the New
England colonies, and of their fisheries. ** It had a clause, excepting
those individuals from the curse who should produce a certificate from
their respective governors testifying to their general good conduct, and
who should acknowledge the supremacy of the British Parliament. In
addition to the opposition which the bill received in the Commons, the
merchants of London presented an earnest remonstrance against it, ***
and so did the Quakers in behalf of their brethren in Nantucket, but
without effect. It passed by a majority of one hundred and eighty to
fifty-eight. Fresh intelligence from America, represent-March 8,
adhesion to the Continental Congress, arrived at this juncture, and
another bill was speedily passed, in the form of an amendment, including
all the colonies in the Restraining Act, except New York and North
Carolina, where loyalty seemed to predominate.

While the Restraining Act was under consideration, North astonished all
parties by offering what he pretended to be a conciliatory bill. It
proposed that when the proper authorities, in any colony, should offer,
besides maintaining its own civil government, to raise

* This fearless political writer was born in 1727. He became a member of
Parliament in 1757. In the forty-fifth number of the "North Briton,"
published in 1763, he made a severe attack on government, for which he
was sent to the Tower. On account of a licentious essay on woman he was
afterward expelled from the House of Commons. Acquitted of the charge
for which he was committed to the Tower, he prosecuted Mr. Wood, the
Under Secretary, received five thousand dollars damages, and then went
to Paris. He returned to England in 1768, sent a letter of submission to
the king, and was soon afterward elected to a seat in Parliament for
Middlesex. The seat was successfully contested by another. He was then
elected alderman of London, and the same year obtained a verdict of
twenty thousand dollars against the Secretary of State for seizing his
papers. He was sheriff in 1771, and in 1774 was elected lord mayor, and
took his seat in Parliament for Middlesex. He was made Chamberlain of
London in 1779, and soon afterward retired from the field of party
polities. He died at his scat in the Isle of Wight in 1797, aged seventy
years. The likeness here given is copied from a medal struck in his
honor. The obverse side has a pyramid upon a pedestal, beside which
stands a figure of Time inscribing upon the pyramid the number 45. On
the pedestal are the words Magna Charta, and beneath, In memory of the
year MDCCLXVIII. Wilkes had a most forbidding countenance, but his
manners were pleasing. In his private character he was licentious, yet
his talents and energy employed upon the popular side made him the idol
of the people.

** According to testimony produced in Parliament, about 400 ships, 2000
fishing shallops, and 20,000 men were thus employed in the British
Newfoundland fisheries.

*** The people of New England were, at that time, indebted to the
merchants of London nearly five million dollars. With the destruction of
the trade of the colonists, all hope of collecting even a small share of
this sum would be lost.

Singular Position of Lord North.--His Triumph.--Action of the London
Merchants.--The moral Spectacle in the Colony

521a certain revenue and place it at the disposition of Parliament, it
would be proper to forbear imposing any tax, except for the regulation
of commerce. The ministerial party opposed it because it was
conciliatory, and the opposition were dissatisfied with it because it
proposed to abate but a single grievance, and was not specific. To his
great astonishment, the minister found himself in the midst of a cross-
fire from both parties; yet he stood his ground well, and adroitly
carried the proposition through. Although he acknowledged that it was
really a cheat with a fair exterior of honesty, and intended to sow
division in the councils of the colonies, heedless members of Parliament
gave it support, and the bill was passed by a vote of two hundred and
seventy-four to eighty-eight

On the heel of this bill Burke proposed a conciliatory plan, and five
days afterward Mr. Hartley offered a mild scheme, similar to Chatham's;
but they were March 22 negatived by large majorities. The "lord mayor,
aldermen, and livery of London," urged by the merchants, who were
smarting under the effects of the lash applied to the Americans,
addressed the king in condemnation of the late measures toward the
colonies. April 10, 1775 They were sternly rebuked by his majesty, who
expressed his astonishment that any of his subjects presumed to be
abettors of the rebels. It was obvious that

"King, Commons, and Lords were uniting amain

To cut down this guardian of ours,"

and Franklin, abandoning all hope of reconciliation, sailed for America.

For more than ten years the colonies had complained of wrongs,
petitioned for redress, and suffered insults. Forbearance was no longer
a virtue, and, turning their backs upon Great Britain, they prepared for
war. In this movement Massachusetts took the lead. The Provincial
Congress ordered the purchase of ammunition and stores for an army of
fifteen thousand men. They called upon the Congregational clergy to
preach liberty from their pulpits, and hearty responses were given. "The
towns, which had done so fearlessly and so thoroughly the preparatory
work of forming and concentrating political sentiment, came forward now
to complete their patriotic actions by voting money freely to arm,
equip, and discipline 'Alarm List Companies;' citizens of every calling
appeared in their ranks, to be a private in them was proclaimed by the
journals an honor; to be chosen to office in them, a mark of the highest
distinction. In Danvers, the deacon of the parish was elected captain of
the minute men, and the minister his lieutenant. The minute men were
trained often, the towns paying the expense; and the company, after its
field exercises, would sometimes repair to the meeting-house to hear a
patriotic sermon, or partake of an entertainment at the town-house,
where zealous sons of liberty would exhort them to prepare to fight
bravely for God and their country. Such was the discipline--so free from
a mercenary spirit, so full of inspiring influences--of the early
American soldiery. And thus an army, in fact, was in existence, ready at
a moment's call, for defensive purposes, to wheel its isolated platoons
into solid phalanxes, while it presented to an enemy only opportunity
for an inglorious foray upon its stores." *

Had the counsels of inflamed zeal and passion--inflamed by the most
cruel and insulting oppression--prevailed, blood would have been shed
before the close of 1774. Troops continued to arrive at Boston, ** and
the insolence of the soldiery increased with their numbers

* Frothingham's Siege of Boston, p. 42.

** In November, 1774, there were eleven regiments of British troops,
besides the artillery, in Boston. In December, 500 marines landed from
the Asia man-of-war, and, at the close of the month, all the troops
ordered from the Jerseys, New York, and Quebec had arrived. A guard of
150 men was stationed at the lines upon the Neck. The army was brigaded.
The first brigadier general was Earl Percy, Moncrief his brigade major;
the second general was Pigott, his major, Small; third general, Jones,
his major, Hutchinson, son of the late governor. The soldiers were in
high spirits, and the officers looked with contempt upon the martial
preparations of the people. "As to what you hear of their taking arms to
resist the force of England," wrote an officer, in November, 1774, "it
is mere bullying, and will go no further than words, whenever it comes
to blows, he that can run the fastest will think himself best off".
Believe me, any two regiments here ought to be decimated, if they did
not beat, in the field, the whole force of the Massachusetts province."

Carrying Ammunition out of the City.--Detection.--Hostile Movements of
Gage.--Counteraction of the Whigs

522and strength; but the Americans were determined that when collision,
which was inevitable, should take place, the first blow should be struck
by the British troops, and thus make government the aggressor. The
occasion was not long delayed. General Gage discovered that the patriots
were secretly conveying arms and ammunition out of Boston. In carts,
beneath loads of manure, cannon balls and muskets were carried out; and
powder, concealed in the panniers of the market-women, and cartridges in
candle-boxes, passed unsuspected by the guard upon the Neck. * On
discovering these movements, and learning that some brass cannon and
field-pieces were at Salem, Gage sent a detachment of troops to seize
them. They were repelled by the people under Colonel Timothy Pickering,
without bloodshed, as we have noticed on page 374. This movement aroused
the utmost vigilance throughout March, 1775 the country. At a special
session of the Connecticut Assembly, Colonel Wooster was commissioned a
major general, and Joseph Spencer and Israel Putnam were appointed
brigadiers. Elbridge Gerry, a merchant of Marblehead, and afterward a
signer of the Declaration of Independence, was at the head of the
Massachusetts Committee of Supply, and under his directions munitions of
war were rapidly accumulated, the chief deposit of which was at Concord,
about twenty miles from Boston. Meanwhile, Sewall, the attorney general
of the province, wrote a series of powerful articles, calling upon the
people to cease resistance; and, greatly to the alarm of the patriots
lest there should be defection in their strong-hold, Governor Trumbull,
of Connecticut, soon afterward offered to mediate between General Gage
and the people of Boston, for the sake of preventing hostilities.
Timothy Ruggles, president of the "Stamp Act Congress," got up counter
associations against those of the patriots, and a small number at
Marshfield and other places signed the agreement, calling themselves the
"Associated Loyalists." But John Adams promptly replied to Judge Sewall;
Governor Trumbull's apparent conservatism was soon understood to be but
a testimony against government, to prove that offers of reconciliation
had been made and rejected; the patriots made the "Associated Loyalists"
recant, and the republicans assumed a bolder tone than ever of defiance
and contempt.

When spring opened, Gage's force amounted to about three thousand five
hundred effective men. He determined, with this force, to nip the
rebellion in the bud, and his first active movement was an attempt to
seize or destroy the stores of the patriots at Concord, which were under
the charge of Colonel James Barrett. Officers in disguise were sent to
make sketches of the roads, and to ascertain the state of the towns.
Bodies of troops were occasionally marched into the country, and a
general system of reconnoissance around Boston was established. The
ever-vigilant patriots were awake to all these movements. A night-watch
was established at Concord, and every where the minute men were ready
with burnished muskets, fixed bayonets, and filled cartouches.

Early in April, many who had taken a prominent part in the revolutionary
proceedings at Boston, apprehending arrest, and probable transportation
to England for trial, left the town. ** Among those who remained was Dr.
Joseph Warren, and he kept the patriots continually advised of the
movements of Gage and his troops. Samuel Adams and John Hancock, who
were members of the Provincial Congress, were particularly obnoxious to
General Gage, and, as it appeared afterward, he had resolved to arrest
them on their return to the

* On the 18th of March the discovery was made, and the guard at the Neck
seized 13,425 musket cartridges and a quantity of balls. In doing this,
a teamster was severely handled. This circumstance, the oration of Dr.
Joseph Warren, in the "Old South," on the anniversary of the Massacre
(March 5th), the tarring and feathering of a citizen of Billerica,
charged with tempting a soldier to desert, and an assault upon the house
of John Hancock, greatly excited the people.

** "A daughter of liberty, unequally yoked in point of politics, sent
word by a trusty hand to Mr. Samuel Adams, residing, in company with Mr.
Hancock, at Lexington, that the troops were coming out in a few days.
Upon this, their friends in Boston were advised to move out their plate,
&e., and the Committee of Safety voted that all the ammunition be
deposited in nine different towns, and that other articles be lodged,
some in one place and some in another; so, as to the 15 medicine-chests,
2000 iron pots, 2000 bowls, 15,000 canteens, and 1000 tents; and that
the six companies of matrosses be stationed in different towns."--
Gordon, i., 309.

British Expedition to Concord.--Its Discovery by the Americans.--
Lexington aroused.--Midnight March of the Enemy.

1775 523city. Fortunately, they were persuaded to remain at Lexington,
at the house of the Reverend Jonas Clark.

On Tuesday night, the 18th of April, Gage sent eight hundred British
troops, light infantry and grenadiers, under Lieutenant-colonel Smith,
aided by Major Pitcairn, to destroy the stores at Concord. They embarked
at the Common, and, landing at Phipps's Farm, marched with great
secrecy, arresting every person they met on the way, to prevent
intelligence of their expedition being given.

They left Boston at about midnight, Gage supposing the movement to be a
profound secret; but the patriots had become aware of the expedition
early in the evening. As Lord Percy was crossing the Common, about nine
o'clock, he joined a group of persons, one of whom said, "The British
troops will miss their aim."

"What aim?" inquired Percy, who was Gage's confidant in the matter. "The
cannon at Concord," replied the man.

Percy hastened to inform Gage, and guards were immediately set at every
avenue leading from the town, to prevent persons from leaving it. Warren
and his friends had anticipated this, and left. Paul Revere and William
Dawes had just rowed across the river to Charlestown, with a message
from Warren to Hancock and Adams at Lexington. They were almost captured
at Charlestown Neck by the guard, but escaped, and reached Lexington,
thirteen miles northward of Boston, a little after midnight. A guard of
eight minute men was placed around Mr. Clark's house to protect Adams
and Hancock. The messengers made themselves known to these, but were
refused admission to the house, as orders had been not to allow the
inmates to be disturbed by noise. Noise!" said Revere; "you'll have
noise enough before long; the regulars are coming!" Hancock and Adams
were aroused, and their safety being regarded as of the utmost
importance, they were persuaded to retire to Woburn. Revere and Dawes
pushed on toward Concord to give the alarm there. One hundred and thirty
of the Lexington militia were collected at the meeting-house upon the
green by two o'clock in the morning, when the roll was called, and, the
air being chilly, they were dismissed with orders to remain within drum-
beat.

The midnight march of the British regulars was performed in silence,
and, as they supposed, in secret. But vigilant eyes were upon them.
Messrs. Gerry, Orne, and Lee, members of the Provincial Congress, were
at Menotomy (West Cambridge), and saw them passing; and, as they
approached Lexington, the sound of bells and guns warned them that their
expedition was known. **

Colonel Smith detached six companies under Major Pitcairn, with orders
to press on to

* This building was standing when I visited Lexington in 1848. It was
built by Thomas Hancock, Esq., of Boston, as a parsonage for his father,
the Reverend John Hancock, of Lexington, about 130 years ago. Mr.
Hancock was a minister at Lexington fifty-two years, and was succeeded
by the Reverend Jonas Clark, the occupant of the house at the time of
the skirmish at Lexington. Mr. Clark lived in the house fifty-two years.
The room in which the two patriots, Samuel Adams and John Hancock, were
sleeping on the night before the skirmish at Lexington, is retained in
its original condition. The wainscoting is of Carolina pine, and the
sides of the room are covered with a heavy paper, with dark figures,
pasted upon the boards in rectangular pieces about fourteen inches
square. In an adjoining room is one of those ancient fire-places,
ornamented with pictorial tiles, so rarely found in New England.

*** These three patriots had a narrow escape. They saw the head of the
column pass by. Just before the rear-guard had come up, a detachment was
sent to search the house where they were staying. They escaped to the
fields by a back door, where they kept in concealment until the house
was searched and the troops moved on.

The British Troops and Minute Men at Lexington.--Conduct of Major
Pitcairn.--Battle on Lexington Common

524Concord and secure the two bridges; at the same time he sent a
messenger to Boston for re-enforcements. Pitcairn advanced rapidly
toward Lexington by the light of a waning moon, capturing several
persons on the way. One, named Bowman, escaped, and, hasten ing on
horseback to Lexington, notified Captain Parker, commander of the minute
men, of the approach of the enemy. It was now between four and five
o'clock in the morning. The bells were rung, guns were fired, and the
drums were beaten. About one hundred of the militia were speedily
collected upon the green, armed with loaded muskets, but in much
confusion and alarm, for the number of the approaching regulars was
unknown.

In the gray of the early morning the scarlet uniforms of the troops
appeared, and an overwhelming force halted, within a few rods of the
meeting-house, and loaded their pieces. The militia, undismayed, stood
firm. They had been ordered not to draw a trigger until fired upon by
the enemy, and for a moment silence and hesitation prevailed, for
neither party seemed willing to become the aggressor. The parley with
judgment was but for a moment. Pitcairn and other officers galloped
forward, waving their swords over their heads, and followed by their
troops in double-quick time. They shouted, "Disperse, you villains! lay
down your arms! Why don't you disperse, you rebels? disperse!" In
rushing forward the troops became confused. As the patriots did not
instantly obey the command to lay down their arms, Pitcairn wheeled his
horse, and, waving his sword, gave orders to press forward and surround
the militia. At the same moment some random shots were fired by the
British, but without effect, which were promptly returned by the
Americans. Pitcairn then drew his pistol and discharged it, at the same
moment giving the word _fire!_ A general discharge of musketry ensued;
four patriots were killed, and the remainder were dispersed. Finding
themselves fired upon while retreating, several of them halted, and
returned the shots, and then secured themselves behind stone walls and
buildings. Three British soldiers, and Pitcairn's horse, were wounded,
while eight Americans were killed: four on the

* This is the picture alluded to on page 421, from the one drawn by
Earl, and engraved hy Doolittle in 1775. The largest building in the
picture is the meeting-house, and the officer on horseback in front of
it is Major Pitcairn. The figures in the foreground are the provincial
militia. The dwelling with the two chimneys, on the left (which is still
standing), was Buckman's Tavern. The position of the monument since
erected upon Lexington Green, is about where the provincials on the left
are seen dispersing. The merit of this picture consists in its
truthfulness in depicting the appearance of the spot at the time of the
engagement.

The Concord People aroused.--Assembling of the Militia.--Concord taken
Possession of by the Enemy.--Colonel Barrett.

525ground, near the spot where the monument stands, and four others
while escaping over the fences. *

As soon as the patriots dispersed, the detachment of regulars, joined by
Colonel Smith and his party, pushed on toward Concord, six miles
distant. Confident of success, the whole party were in high spirits. But
Concord had been aroused, and a formidable body of militia had collected
to receive the invaders. We have noticed that Revere and Dawes started
from Lexington to alarm the country toward Concord. They met Dr. Samuel
Prescott, and, while in conference with him, some British officers came
upon them. Revere and Dawes were made prisoners, but Prescott escaped
over a wall, and reached Concord about two in the morning. The bells
were rung, and before daylight the people were under arms.

When the guns at Lexington were heard in the morning, the Committee of
Safety, and the principal citizens of Concord, had assembled, and
arranged a plan of reception for the British troops. The military
operations were under the able management of

Colonel James Barrett, ** while the whole male population, and some
women, aided in removing the stores to a place of safety in distant
woods The militia of Lincoln and other places hastened to join those of
Concord, and the whole paraded on the Common. Guards were stationed at
the North and South Bridges, and in the center of the town, all under
the command of Captain Jonathan Farrar.

At about seven o'clock the British column was seen advancing on the
Lexington Road Some companies of militia that had marched down that road
returned in haste and reported the number of the British as three times
that of the Americans. These companies, with those in the town, fell
back to an eminence some eighty rods from the center of the village,
where they were joined by Colonel Barrett, and were formed into two
battalions. They had hardly formed, before the glittering of the
bayonets and flashing of the red uniforms of the British in the bright
morning sun were seen, but a quarter of a mile distant, rapidly
advancing. A short consultation was held. Some were for making a
desperate stand upon the spot, while others proposed a present retreat,
until reenforced by the neighboring militia. The latter council
prevailed, and the provincials retired to the high ground over the North
Bridge, about a mile from the Common.

The British troops entered Concord in two divisions one by the main
road, the other on the hill north of it. Colonel Smith and Major
Pitcairn, who had immediate command of the grenadiers and light
infantry, remained in the town, but detached six companies under Captain
Parsons to secure the bridges, prevent the militia from crossing them,
and to ferret out and destroy the secreted stores, information
concerning which had been given by Captain Beeman of Petersham, and
other Tories. Captain Lawrie, with three companies, was stationed on the
North Bridge, while Parsons, with the other three companies, marched to
destroy the stores at the residence of Colonel Barrett. Captain Pole,
with a party, took post at the South Bridge, and destroyed what few
stores were found in that vicinity; but so

* The names of the slain are recorded on the monument erected to their
memory on the green at Lexington. A picture of the monument and a copy
of the inscription may be found on page 553. Captain Jonas Parker was
among the slain. He had repeatedly said that he never would run from the
British. He was wounded at the first fire, but, continuing to discharge
his gun without retreating, was killed by a bayonet.

** Colonel Barrett had been a captain in the provincial army during the
French and Indian war. He was with Shirley at Oswego, and afterward
accompanied Abercrombie to Ticonderoga and Amherst to Crown Point.
Becoming aged, he resigned his commission. When the Massachusetts
militia were organized at the beginning of 1775, Captain Barrett was
solicited to take command of a regiment, but declined on account of his
age. "We don't want active service, we want your advice," said his
earnest townsmen. Thus urged, and actuated by patriotic zeal, he took
the command. Colonel Barrett died at about the close of the war. These
facts I obtained from his grandson, Major Barrett, eighty-seven years
old when I visited him in 1848.

Destruction of Property in Concord.--Rapid Augmentation of the Militia.-
-Preparations for Battle.--March toward the Bridge.

526diligently had the people worked in concealing the stores that the
object of the expedition was almost frustrated. The British broke open
about sixty barrels of flour in the center of the town, but nearly half
of that was subsequently saved.

They knocked off the trunnions of three iron twenty-four pound cannons,
burned sixteen new carriage wheels, and a few barrels of wooden
trenchers and spoons, cut down the liberty-pole and set the court-house
on fire. The flames were extinguished by a Mrs. Moulton, before much
damage was done. About five hundred pounds of balls were thrown into the
mill-pond and wells.

While the British were thus engaged, the number of the militia was
rapidly increasing by accessions of minute men from Carlisle,
Chelmsford, Weston, Littleton, and Acton, neighboring towns, and before
ten o'clock the force amounted to nearly four hundred men Joseph Hosmer,
acting as adjutant, formed them into proper line as fast as they arrived
on the field, westerly of the house since owned by Joseph Buttrick. Most
of the operations of the British, within the town, could be seen from
this point, and when the fires in the center of the village were lighted
the people were greatly excited. Many of the prominent citizens, and the
Committee of Safety, were with the militia, and, after a brief
consultation, and a stirring appeal from the brave Hosmer, it was
resolved to dislodge the enemy at the North Bridge. "I haven't a man
that's afraid to go," said the intrepid Captain Isaac Davis; and,
wheeling into marching order, they were joined by other companies, and
push ed forward toward the bridge, under the command of Major John
Buttrick, of Concord.

* This sketch is from the road leading to the village of Concord by the
way of the North Bridge. The house was erected about eighty years ago,
by Colonel Barrett, and is now owned by his kinsman, Prescott Barrett.

** This view, looking southeast, is from the road leading to the village
by the way of the North Bridge.

Battle at Concord Bridge.--Retreat of the British to the Village.--The
Scalping Story explained

527The Acton company, under Davis, was in front, followed by those of
Captains Brown, Miles, and Nathan Barrett, and by others whose
commanders' names are not recorded, in all nearly three hundred
effective men. They marched in double file, with trailed arms. The
British guard were on the west side of the river, but, on seeing the
Americans approaching, they crossed over, and commenced taking up the
planks of the bridge. Major Buttrick called to them to desist, and urged
his men forward to arrest the destruction of the bridge.

The enemy formed for action, and when the Americans were within a few
rods of the river, they were fired upon by some of the regulars. The
first shots were ineffectual, but others that followed were fatal. One
of the Acton company was wounded, * and Captain Isaac Davis and Abner
Hosmer, of the same company, were killed. "Fire, fellow-soldiers! for
God's sake, fire!" shouted Buttrick, on seeing his companions fall, and
immediately a full volley was given by the provincials. Three of the
British were killed, and several wounded and made prisoners. Some other
shots were fired, but in a few minutes Lawrie ordered a retreat, and the
provincials took possession of the bridge. Two of the British soldiers
killed were left on the ground, and were buried by the provincials.
Their graves are a few feet from the monument. Another, who was not yet
dead, was dispatched by a blow from a hatchet in the hands of a young
provincial who had more zeal than humanity. This circumstance gave rise
to the horrible story sent abroad by the British and Tories, that the
militia "killed and _scalped_ the prisoners that fell into their hands."
Colonel Smith, in the village, on hearing the firing at the bridge, sent
a re-enforcement. These met the retreating detachment of Lawrie, but,
observing the increasing force of the militia, wheeled, and joined in
the retreat. In the mean time, the party under Captain Parsons returned
from Colonel Barrett's, and were allowed by the provincials to cross the
river at the North Bridge, where the skirmish had just occurred,
unmolested. It may be asked why the militia did not cut them off, which
they might easily have done. It must be remembered that war had not been
declared, and that the people had been enjoined to make Great Britain
the aggressor, they acting only on the defensive. The militia at Concord
had not yet heard of the deaths at Lexington; _their_ volley that had
just slain three of the king's troops was fired purely in self-defense.
The point from which the sketch was made is upon an elevation a little
north of that where the militia assembled under Colonel Barrett. The
stream of water is the Concord, or Sudbury River. The site of the North
Bridge is at the monument seen in the eenter of the picture. The
monument stands upon the spot where the British were stationed, and in
the plain, directly across the river from the monument, is the place
where Davis and Hosmer, of the American militia, were killed. The house,
the roof and gable of which are seen in the distance, just on the left
of the largest tree, was the residence of the Reverend Dr. Ripley
(afterward a chaplain in the army) at the time of the skirmish. It is
upon the road leading to Concord village, which lies nearly half a mile
beyond.

* He was a fifer, named Blanchard. One of the Concord minute men, named
Brown, was also slightly wounded. The ball that wounded them passed
under the arm of Colonel Robinson, who, by request, accompanied Major
Buttrick.

** This plan I have copied from Frothingham's interesting work, History
of the Siege of Boston, p. 70.

* Explanation of the Plan.--1. Lexington Road; 2. Hills and high land
where the liberty pole stood; 3. Center of the town, and main body of
the British; 4. Road to the South Bridge; 5, 5, 5. Road to the North
Bridge and to Colonel Barnett's, two miles from the eenter of the town;
C. High ground a mile north of the meeting-house, where the militia
assembled; 7. Road along which they marched to dislodge the British at
North Bridge; 8. Spot where Davis and Hosmer fell; 9. Reverend Air.
Emerson's house; 10. Bridges and roads made in 1793, when the old roads
with dotted lines were discontinued; 11. The monument. The arrows show
the return of Captain Parsons, after the firing at the North Bridge; 12
is the plaee where re-enforcements met him.

Retreat of the Enemy from Concord.--Their Annoyance on the Road by the
Militia.--Re-enforcement from Boston.

528Observing the rapid augmentation of the militia, Colonel Smith
thought it prudent to return with his troops to Boston as speedily as
possible. A little after twelve o'clock they commenced their retreat
toward Lexington, the main column covered by strong flanking guards.
They soon perceived that the whole region was in arms, and minute men
were collecting from all points. The cautious counsels at Concord, not
to attack the enemy without further provocation, were disregarded, and
at Merriam's Corner, a company of provincials under Captain Brooks
(afterward the distinguished colonel at Saratoga, and Governor of
Massachusetts), secreted behind barns and fences, made a destructive
assault upon the retreating enemy. A volley was fired in return, but not
a militia-man was injured. This example was followed along the whole
line of march to Lexington, and the British were terribly galled all the
way. From every house, barn, and stone wall guns were fired with sure
aim, and many of the regulars were slain. At Hardy's Hill there was a
severe skirmish, and at almost every wooded defile numbers of the enemy
were picked off by the concealed marksmen. All military order among the
provincials was at an end, and each fought according to the dictates of
his own judgment. Some of them were killed by the flankers, who came
suddenly upon them behind the walls; but the number of the militia slain
was comparatively small. Colonel Smith was severely wounded in the leg
at Fiske's Hill, near Lexington; and near the battle ground of the
morning, at Lexington meetinghouse, several of the British soldiers were
shot. Greatly fatigued by the night's march and the day's adventures,
and worried on every side by the militia, that seemed, to use the
expression of one of their officers, "to drop from the clouds," the
whole body of eight hundred men, the flower of the British army at
Boston, must have surrendered to the provincials in an hour had not
relief arrived.

An express was sent from Lexington to General Gage, early in the
morning, acquainting him with the rising of the militia, and praying for
a strong re-enforcement. At nine o'clock three regiments of infantry,
and two divisions of marines, amounting to about nine hundred men, with
two field-pieces, under Lord Percy, left Boston and marched toward
Lexington. They passed through Roxbury, the bands playing Yankee Doodle
in derision, it being employed as a sort of "Rogue's March" when
offending soldiers were drummed out. * Vague

* Gordon relates that a shrewd boy in Roxbury made himself extremely
merry when he heard the tune of Yankee Doodle, and by his antics
attracted the attention of Lord Percy. He asked the boy why he was so
merry. "To think," said the lad, "how you will dance by-and-by to Chevy
Chase." Percy was often much influenced by presentiments, and the
remarks of the boy worried him all day. It may be asked why was Earl
Percy troubled, and what connection had the name of Chevy Chase with
him. The answer is in the fact that Percy was a son of the Duke of
Northumberland, a lineal descendant of Earl Percy, one of the heroes of
the battle of Chevy Chase, and who was there slain. There was great
rivalry between the houses of Percy and Douglas, the former an English
borderer and the latter a Scotch borderer. Percy was determined to have
a field fight with his rival, and so vowed publicly that he would "take
pleasure in the border woods three days, and slay the Douglas's deer."
Earl Douglas heard the vaunt. "Tell him," he said, "he will find one day
more than enough." Percy's aim was the armed encounter thus promised. He
appeared at Chevy Chase with his greyhounds and fifteen hundred chosen
archers. After taking his sport at the Douglas's expense, gazing on a
hundred dead fallow deer and harts, tasting wine and venisop cooked
under the greenwood tree, and saying the Douglas would not keep his
word, when

"Lo! yonder doth Earl Douglas come, His men in armor bright; Full twenty
hundred Scottish spears All marching in our sight. All men of pleasant
Tiviotdale, Fast by the River Tweed. 'O cease your sport!' Earl Percy
said, And take your bows with speed.' Soon after this, "The battle
closed on every side, No slackness there was found; And many a gallant
gentleman Lay gasping on the ground."

** The mail-clad leaders combated hand to hand, until the blood dropped
from them like rain. "Yield thee. Percy," cried Douglas, "I shall freely
pay thy ransom, and thy advancement shall be high with our Scottish
king."

"'No, Douglas,' quoth Earl Percy, then, 'Thy proffer I do scorn; I would
not yield to any Scot That ever yet was horn.'"

** Douglas almost immediately dropped, struck to the heart with an
arrow. "Fight on, my merry men," he cried with his dying breath. Percy
took his hand, and said, "Earl Douglas, I would give all my lands to
save thee." At that moment an arrow pierced Percy's heart, and both
leaders expired together.--See Knight's Old England, Scott's Castle
Dangerous, and the ballad of Chevy Chase.

Junction of the Troops of Percy and Smith.--Their harassed Retreat to
Charlestown--Skirmish at West Cambridge

529rumors of the skirmish at Lexington had reached the people there, and
this movement confirmed their worst fears. No sooner had the British
troops passed by, than the minute men assembled, and, along the whole
mareh, vigilant corps of militia were gathering, and hovered around the
little army of Percy, ready to strike a blow whenever it might be
effectual.

Percy's brigade met the wearied troops between two and three o'clock,
about half a mile from the Lexington meeting-house. He formed a hollow
square, planted his cannon for its defense on the high ground near
Munroe's Tavern, and received within it the worn-out companies of
Colonel Smith. Many of the soldiers fell upon the ground, completely
overcome. They "were so much exhausted with fatigue that they were
obliged to lie down for rest on the ground, their tongues hanging out of
their mouths, like those of dogs after a chase." * Percy dared not halt
long, for the woods were Swarming with minute men. After partaking of a
little refreshment and brief rest, the united forces resumed their march
toward Boston, marking their retreat by acts of vengeance, aside from
the more dignified use of ball and bayonet. Three houses, two shops, and
a barn, were laid in ashes in Lexington, and many buildings were
destroyed or defaced, and helpless persons abused on the route. But
prompt and terrible retribution instantly followed. As soon as Percy
renewed the retreat, the provincials again attacked his forces from
concealed points, until they arrived at West Cambridge, where a hot
skirmish ensued. General Heath and Dr. Warren were active in the field,
and in this foray Warren barely escaped with his life, a musket ball
having knocked a pin out of an ear-curl of his hair. The British kept
the militia at bay, and committed many atrocious acts. Percy tried to
restrain his soldiers, but in vain. Houses were plundered, property
destroyed, and several innocent persons were murdered. This conduct
greatly inflamed the militia, and

"Again the conflict glows with rage severe,

And fearless ranks in combat mix'd appear."

"Indignation and outraged humanity struggled on the one hand, veteran
discipline and desperation on the other." ** The contest was brief, and
the enemy, with their wounded, pressed on toward Boston. The Cambridge
bridge had been taken up, and they were obliged to go by the way of
Charlestown. They took the road that winds around Prospect Hill, while
the main body of the provincials, unawed by the field-pieces, hung close
upon their rear.

The situation of the British regulars was now critical, for their
ammunition was almost exhausted, and a strong force was marching upon
them from Roxbury, Dorchester, and Milton. Colonel Pickering, in the
mean time, with seven hundred of the Essex militia, threatened to cut
off their retreat to Charlestown. Another short but warm engagement
occurred at the base of Prospect Hill, but the regulars reached
Charlestown in safety. By eommand of General Heath the pursuit was now
suspended.

Throughout the day Charlestown had been in the greatest excitement. Dr.
Warren rode through in the morning, proclaiming the bloodshed at
Lexington. Many of the people had seized their muskets, and hastened to
the country to join their brethren. The schools were

* Stedman's History of the American War, i., 118. Stedman was a British
officer, and accompanied Earl Percy in this expedition. He highly
praises Percy, but says that Colonel Smith's conduct was much censured.

** Everett's Lexington Address.

British Encampment on Bunker Hill.--Quiet the next Day.--General Effect
of these Skirmishes.

530dismissed; the shops were closed; and when it was ascertained that
the British were retreating and must pass through the town, many of the
inhabitants prepared to leave and to carry with them their most valuable
effects. When the firing at Cambridge was heard, the people rushed
toward Charlestown Neck, to flee to the country. There they met the
retreating troops, and were obliged to fly back, panic-stricken, to
their houses. A report got abroad that the British were slaughtering
women and children in the streets. Terror every where prevailed, and a
large number of the defenseless people passed the night in the clay-pits
back of Breed's Hill. The alarm was false; not an individual was harmed
in Charlestown. Percy ordered the women and children into their houses,
and demanded nothing but refreshments for his troops. The main body
occupied Bunker Hill that night, and a strong line was formed upon
Charlestown Neck. A re-enforcement was sent over from Boston, guards
were stationed in various parts of the town, the wounded were conveyed
to the hospitals in the city, and that night all was quiet in the
neighborhood. General Pigot assumed command at Charlestown the next
morning, and before noon the crest-fallen troops returned to their
quarters in Boston. Thus ended the first act in the bloody tragedy of
the American Revolution. * During the day the British lost sixty-five
killed, one hundred and eighty wounded, and twenty-eight made prisoners;
in all two hundred and seventy-three. The provincials lost fifty-nine
killed, thirty-nine wounded, and five missing; in all one hundred and
three. **

The events of the 19th of April, 1775, were of vast importance,
considered in their relation to subsequent scenes and results. On that
day the life of the first British soldier, sent hither to oppress a
people panting for the privileges of freedom, was sacrificed--on that
day the first American, aroused by armed invasion to the necessity of
resistance, fell in defense of the dearest rights guaranteed to him by
the British Constitution ***--on that day "the scabbard" was indeed
"thrown away," **** and a war of seven years' duration began--and on
that day the jubilee trumpet was sounded, proclaiming "Liberty
throughout all the land unto all the inhabitants thereof." (v) The
events of that day formed the first disruption of the chrysalis of old
political systems, whence speedily came forth a noble and novel
creature, with eagle eye and expansive wings, destined speedily to soar
far above the creeping reptiles of despotism that brood amid the
crumbling relics of old dynasties. They formed the significant prelude
to that full diapason, whose thundering harmony, drawn forth by the
magic touch of the spirit of Freedom, filled the nations with wonder,
and ushered in the New Era so long predicted and so long hoped for.

The military events of the day, compared with the movements of armies in
the great contests of war at other times, were exceedingly insignificant
in themselves; but the temper shown by the provincials, and the
vulnerable character of the British soldiery, as exhibited in the
various skirmishes and in the retreat, had a great and abiding effect
upon the minds of both parties. The haughty boasts of English officers,
that three regiments might march unmolested throughout the continent,
and that the Americans were "sorry poltroons, their courage displayed to
its utmost in tarring and feathering individuals," were silenced, and
Gage, in alarm, called upon the ministry to send large re-enforcements.
The patriots, on the other hand, learned their strength when united;
that British troops were not invincible, and that the true spirit and
courage of men resolved on freedom animated and nerved

* Gordon, Stedman, Stiles, Ripley, Shattuck, Clarke, Frothingham, &c.

** The following officers and citizens of note were among the slain:
Justice Isaac Gardner, of Brookline; Captain Isaac Davis, of Acton;
Captain Jonathan Wilson, of Bedford; Lieutenant John Baron, and Sergeant
Elisha Mills, of Needham; and Deacon Josiah Haynes, of Sudbury. The
estimated value of property destroyed by the invaders is as follows: In
Concord, $1375; in Lexington, $8305; in Cambridge, $6010. A list of the
killed, wounded, and missing is given on page 532.

*** It will be seen hereafter that the first life sacrificed in defense
of liberty in America was upon the Alamance, in North Carolina, in 1771.
In that event, however, the militia were in open and armed rebellion
against the royal authority, and were the actual aggressors.

**** John Wilkes, in his speech in Parliament, already alluded to,
asked, significantly, "Who can tell whether, in consequence of this very
day's violent and mad address [to the king], the scabbard may not be
thrown away by them as well as by us?"

(v) Levit. xxv.. 10.

Unity of the American People.--Massachusetts Provincial Congress.--
Accounts of the Battles sent to England

531the militia. Britons were alarmed; Americans were elated. Individual
wrongs were adopted by the whole people as their own, and every man
slain at Lexington, Concord, and Menotomy or "West Cambridge, lived
again in the strong arms of a thousand determined patriots. In
Massachusetts, in particular, ties of consanguinity, property, marriage,
manners, religion, social circumstances, and general equality, made
whole communities weep over a single victim, and the hearts of the
people of the whole province were made to bleed when the first martyrs
in the cause of American Independence were laid in the grave. * Linked
with that grief was the buoyant sentiment expressed by Percival:

"O it is great for our country to die, where ranks are contending!

Bright is the wreath of our fame, glory awaits us for aye--

Glory that never is dim, shining on with light never ending--

Glory that never shall fade--never, o never! away.

"O then, how great for our country to die, in the front rank to perish!

Firm, with our breast to the foe, victory's shout in our ear.

Long they our statues shall crown, in songs our memory cherish;

We shall look forth from our heaven, pleased the sweet music to hear."

The Provincial Congress of Massachusetts was immediately summoned, and
met at Watertown, seven miles west of Boston, on the 22d of April. Dr.
Joseph Warren was chosen president, and Messrs. Gerry, Church, and
Cushing were appointed a commit 1775 tee to draw up a "narrative of the
massacre." ** A committee on depositions was also formed, and many
affidavits were taken at Lexington and Concord. When all necessary
information was collected, a communication, giving a minute account of
the whole affair, was drawn up and ordered to be sent to Arthur Lee, the
colonial agent in England. An address "To the Inhabitants of Great
Britain" was also prepared and sent April 25 with the other papers, and
was first published in the London Chronicle of May 30th, 1775. The
address was firm but respectful. While its signers asserted their
continued loyalty to the sovereign, and their readiness to "defend his
person, family, crown and dignity," they boldly exhibited their manhood
in declaring that they would no longer submit to the tyrannical rule of
a weak and wicked ministry. The Honorable Puchard Derby, of Salem, was
engaged by the committee to fit out his vessel as a packet, and take the
dispatches to London. He arrived there on the 29th of May, ten days
before Gage's dispatches reached government. The ministry were
confounded, and affected to disbelieve the statements that appeared in
the London Chronicle of the 30th; but, in a few days, they were obliged
to acknowledge the truth of the report. *

* In Lexington, Concord, Danvers, and West Cambridge, monuments have
been erected in memory of the slain. The two former will be noticed
presently, in connection with an engraving of each. The monument at West
Cambridge has been completed since my visit there in 1848. Beneath it
rest the remains of twelve persons who were killed in the skirmish
there. The names of only three are known: Jason Russel, Jason Winship,
and Jabez Wyman. The monument is a simple granite obelisk, nineteen feet
high The funds for its erection were furnished by the voluntary
contributions of the citizens of West Cambridge.

** The first accounts of the events at Lexington and Concord were
published in the newspapers and in handbills. One of the latter,
preserved in the library of the Massachusetts Historical Society, has
the figures of forty coffins at the head.

*** Dartmouth, the Secretary of State for the colonies, issued the
following card on the 30th: "A report having been spread, and an account
having been printed and published, of a skirmish between some of the
people in the province of Massachusetts Bay and a detachment of his
majesty's troops, it is proper to inform the public that no advice has,
as yet, been received in the American department of any such event."

*** Arthur Lee was in London, narrowly watching every movement of
government, and transmitting secret intelligence to the Committee of
Correspondence of Boston, and to his brother, Richard Henry Lee, member
of the Continental Congress. He was the agent of the Massachusetts
colony at that time, and issued the following card, over his proper
signature:

*** "As a doubt of the authenticity of the account from Salem, touching
an engagement between the king's troops and the provincials, in the
Massachusetts Bay, may arise from a paragraph in the Gazette of this
evening, I desire to inform all those who wish to see the original
affidavits which confirm that account, that they are deposited at the
Mansion House, with the Right Honorable the Lord Mayor, for their
inspection. Arthur Lee."

Excitement in London.--Government Lampooned.--List of the Names of the
first Martyrs.

532The dispatches of Gage were published on the 10th of June, and London
was almost as much excited as Boston. Gage's report confirmed every
important circumstance mentioned by the patriots, and the metropolis was
soon enlivened by placards, lampoons, and doggerel verse. The retreat of
the British from Lexington was regarded as a defeat and a flight, and at
every corner ministers heard revilings concerning "the great British
army at Boston that had been beaten by a flock of Yankees!".

* Note.--The following list of the names of the first martyrs in the
cause of American liberty, is given in the eighteenth volume of the
Massachusetts Historical Collections:

Lexington.--Killed: Jonas Parker, Robert Monroe, Samuel Hadley, Jonathan
Harrington, Jr., Isaac Muzzy, Caleb Harrington, John Brown, Jedediah
Moore, John Raymond, Nathaniel Wyman, 10. Wounded: John Robbins, Solomon
Pierce, John Tidd, Joseph Comee, Ebenezer Monroe, Jr., Thomas Winship,
Nathaniel Farmer, Prince Estabrook, Jedediah Monroe, Francis Brown, 10.

Concord.--Wounded: Charles Miles, Nathan Barrett, Abel Prescott, Jr.,
Jonas Brown, George Mer-iot, 5.

Cambridge.--Killed: William Marcy, Moses Richardson, John Hicks, Jason
Russell, Jabez Wyman, Jason Winship, 6. Wounded: Samuel Whittemore, 1.
Missing: Samuel Frost, Seth Russell, 2.

Needham.--Killed: John Bacon, Elisha Mills, Amos Mills, Nathaniel
Chamberlain, Jonathan Parker, 5. Wounded: Eleazer Kingsbury,----Tolman,
2.

Sudbury.--Killed: Josiah Haynes, Asahel Reed, 2. Wounded: Joshua Haynes,
Jr., 1.

Acton.--Killed: Isaac Davis, Abner Hosmer, James Hayward, 3. Wounded:
Luther Blanchard, 1.

Bedford.--Killed: Jonathan Wilson, 1. Wounded: Job Lane, 1.

Woburn.--Killed: Daniel Thompson, Asahel Porter, 2. Wounded: George
Reed, Jacob Bacon,---

Johnson, 3.

Medford.--Killed: Henry Putnam, William Polly, 2.

Charlestown.--Killed: James Miller, Edward Barber, 2.

Watertown.--Killed: Joseph Coolidge, 1.

Framingham.--Wounded: Daniel Hemminway, 1.

Dedham.--Killed: Elias Haven, 1. Wounded: Israel Everett, 1.

Stow.--Wounded: Daniel Conant, 1

Roxbury.--Missing: Elijah Seaver, 1.

Brookline.--Killed: Isaac Gardner, 1.

Billerica.--Wounded: John Nichols, Timothy Blanchard, 2.

Chelmsford.--Wounded: Aaron Chamberlain, Oliver Barron, 2.

Salem.--Killed: Benjamin Pierce, 1.

Newton.--Wounded: Noah Wiswell, 1.

Danvers.--Killed: Henry Jacobs, Samuel Cook, Ebenezer Goldthwait, George
Southwick, Benjamin Deland, Jotham Webb, Perley Putnam, 7. Wounded:
Nathan Putnam, Dennis Wallace, 2. Missing. Joseph Bell, 1.

Beverly.--Killed: Reuben Kerryme, 1. Wounded: Nathaniel Cleves, Samuel
Woodbury, William Dodge, 3.

Lynn.--Killed: Abednego Ramsdell, Daniel Townsend, William Flint, Thomas
Hadley, 4. Wounded: Joshua Felt, Timothy Monroe, 2. Missing: Josiah
Breed, 1. i>

Total: Killed, 49: Wounded, 39; Missing. 5=93.

Preparations for Raising an Army in Massachusetts.--Zeal of the
Committee of Safety.--Circular of the Provincial Congress

533

CHAPTER XXIII.

"A viceroy, I, like monarchs, stay

Safe in the town; let others guide the fray.

A life like mine is of no common worth;

'Twere wrong, by Heaven! that I should sally forth.

A random bullet, from a rifle sent,

Might pierce my heart, and ruin North's intent.= *****

Ye souls of fire, who burn for chief command,

Come! take my place in this disastrous land.

To wars like these I bid a long good night;

Let North and George themselves such battles fight."

Gage's Soliloquy, by Philip Freneau, 1775

"In their ragged regimentals

Stood the old Continentals,

Yielding not,

When the grenadiers were lunging,

And like hail fell the plunging

Cannon shot;

Where the files

Of the isles

From the smoky night encampment bore the banner of the rampant unicorn,

And grummer, grummer, grammar rolled the roll of the drummer, through
the morn.

Knickerbocker Magazine.

HE events of the 19th of April, like an electric shock, thrilled every
nerve through the heart-confederated American colonies, and all over the
land there was a cry _to arms_! In Massachusetts there was no more
hesitation. Who shall be the aggressor? was an answered question. Who
shall be the conqueror? was the great problem before them. It was for
Massachusetts to lead the van in the contest, and her people readily
stepped forth to the duty, knowing that the warm sympathy and generous
aid of the sister colonies were enlisted for the war. The reassembled
Provincial Congress voted to raise an army of thirteen thousand six
hundred men. The Committee of Safety labored day and night, with a zeal
worthy of the glorious cause in which they were engaged. Circulars were
sent out by both bodies, calling upon the people to form an army as
speedily as possible; and the other New England colonies were solicited
to forward as many troops as they could spare, * in order to

* The Provincial Congress of Massachusetts sent the following letter to
the several committees of safety in the province:

"In Congress at Watertown, April 30th, 1775.

"Gentlemen,--The barbarous Murders on our innocent Brethren on Wednesday
the 19th Instant, has made it absolutely necessary that we immediately
raise an army to defend our Wives and our Children from the butchering
Hands of an inhuman Soldiery, who, incensed at the Obstacles they meet
with in their bloody progress, and enraged at being repulsed from the
Field of Slaughter, will, without the least doubt, take the first
Opportunity in their Power to ravage this devoted Country with Fire and
Sword. We conjure you, therefore, that you give all Assistance possible
in forming an Army. Our all is at Stake. Death and Devastation are the
certain Consequences of Delay; every Moment is infinitely precious; an
Hour lost may deluge your Country in Blood, and entail perpetual Slavery
upon the few of your Posterity who may survive the Carnage. We beg and
entreat you, as you will answer it to your Country, to your own
Consciences, and, above all, as you will answer to God himself, that you
will hasten and encourage, by all possible Means, the Enlistment of Men
to form the Army, and send them forward to Head-quarters at Cambridge,
with that expedition which the vast Importance and instant Urgency of
the affair demands.

"Joseph Warren, _President_"

Army collected at Boston.--Organization of the Troops.--Preparations to
Besiege the City.--Issue of Paper Money.

534make up a united force of thirty thousand men. These official appeals
were scarcely necessary, for as soon as the intelligence of bloodshed
went abroad, the people had rushed toward Boston from all quarters, and
by the 21st it was estimated that twenty thousand April 1775 men were
collected in the neighborhood of that city. General Ward, by virtue =of
a previous appointment, took command on the 20th, and in the afternoon
held a council of war with the officers present. *

Of course all was confusion; for the people came, some with arms in
their hands, and some having none, with the inquiry marked on every
countenance, What can I do? A partial organization was effected, and
preparations were made to besiege Boston. Among those who hastened
thither was the veteran Putnam, then an old man of sixty years, who, it
is said, left his plow in the furrow, and in his working dress, mounted
one of his horses, and hastened toward Cambridge at the head of a large
body of Connecticut volunteers. Colonel (afterward general) John Stark
was also there, with a crowd of New Hampshire volunteers, and all were
active and ardent. In the course of a few days the troops were tolerably
well officered, their pay was agreed upon, and thirty thousand were
enrolled. But great numbers returned home; some to attend to pressing
private affairs, and others to make permanent arrangements to join the
army. The number was thus suddenly much reduced, and the important pass
of Boston Neck was defended for nine consecutive days and nights by only
six or seven hundred men under Colonel Robinson, of Dorchester. The
ranks were soon afterward well filled, and preparations for a regular
siege of the city commenced.

Cambridge was made the head-quarters, and a line of cantonments was
formed nearly twenty miles in extent, the left leaning upon the River
Mystic and the right upon Roxbury, thus completely inclosing the town.

On the 5th of May, the Provincial Congress resolved "that General Gage
has, by the late transactions and many other means, utterly disqualified
himself from serving this colony as governor, or in any other capacity;
and that, therefore, no obedience is in future due to him; but that, on
the contrary, he ought to be considered and guarded against as an
unnatural and inveterate enemy to the country." Previous to this
renunciation of allegiance, they had prepared for the payment of the
army, by authorizing the issue of bills of credit, or paper money, to
the amount of three hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars, in sums
small enough to be used as a circulating currency, and directed the
receiver general to borrow that amount, upon those notes,

* The officers who composed the council were Generals Ward, Heath, and
Whitcombe; Colonels Bridge,

Frye, James Prescott, William Prescott, Bullard, and Barrett; and
Lieutenant-colonels Spaulding, Nixon, Whitney, Mansfield and Wheelock.
Colonels Learned and Warner arrived the next day.

** This is a fac simile of the device on the back of one of the first of
the Massachusetts treasury notes or bills of credit. The literal
translation of the Latin inscription is "He seeks by the Sword calm
repose under the auspices of Freedom." In other words, to use a phrase
of the present time, they were determined "to conquer a peace." The face
of the bill has a neatly-engraved border of scroll-work; and on the left
of the brace where the names of the committee are signed, is a circle
with a ship within it. The following is a copy of one of the notes:

August 18,1775.

"Colony of the Massachusetts Bay,

"The Possessor of this Bill shall be paid by the Treasurer of this
colony, Twenty Four Shillings, Lawful Money, by the 18th day of August,
1778, which Bill shall be received for the aforesaid sum in all payments
at the Treasury and in all other Payments by order of the General
Assembly.

"Committee,

Gage's Restrictions.--Gloomy Prospects of the People of Boston.--
Arrangements with the Selectmen.--Perfidy of Gage.

535bearing an interest of six per cent. They also forwarded dispatches
to the general May 3, 1775 Congress which was to assemble on the 10th,
suggesting the necessity for making provision for a large army, to
oppose the expected troops from Great Britain.

While these transactions were taking place without Boston, General Gage
was pursuing a course of rigorous surveillance over the people within
the city. By his orders all April 19, 1775

intercourse with the country was cut off, and none were allowed to leave
the town without his permission first obtained. This measure exposed the
people to great distress, for their accustomed supply of provisions and
fuel was thus cut off. They at once felt all the horrors of civil war
gathering around them--visions of famine, rapine, and blood clouded
their thoughts, and all the miseries which gloomy anticipation delineate
began to be felt. Gage himself became uneasy. Boston was surrounded by
an exasperated multitude, armed and ready for combat at the least
provocation; and he was justly apprehensive that, should an assault
commence from without, the patriots within would rise upon his troops.
In this exigency he so far receded from his haughty demeanor toward the
municipal authorities as to seek an interview with the selectmen. It was
obtained, and he assured them that no violence should be done to the
town, provided the people would behave peaceably. A town meeting was
held on the 22d, and an agreement was entered into between the selectmen
and Gage, "That, upon the inhabitants in general lodging their arms in
Faneuil Hall, or any other convenient place, under the care of the
selectmen, marked with the names of the respective owners, all such
inhabitants that are inclined might leave the town, with their families
and effects, and those who remained might depend upon the protection of
the governor; and that the arms aforesaid, at a suitable time, should be
returned to the owners." * This measure was sanctioned by the Committee
of Safety sitting at Cambridge, and the arrangement was carried out in
good faith for a short time, until the removal became so general as to
alarm the Tories and the governor himself. ** The Tories, about this
time, were excessively loyal. Two hundred of them were enrolled as a
military corps under Timothy Ruggles, and, offering their services to
General Gage, were put on duty. They thought the arrangement Gage had
agreed to was unwise, for they apprehended that, when the patriots had
all left the town with their effects, they would not scruple to burn it.
They remonstrated with Gage, and their importunities and his own fears
became more potent than his sense of honor. Obstructions were thrown in
the way of removals, until, finally, passes were denied, or so framed
that families would have to be separated, and property left behind.
Gage, finally, would not allow women and children to leave Boston, but
kept them there as a sort of hostages, or pledges of good behavior on
the part of the patriots. This exhibition of bad faith disgusted and
exasperated the people as much as any of his previous acts.

* The following is a copy of one of the passes granted to the
inhabitants who left. It is copied from one preserved in the cabinet of
the Massachusetts Historical Society.

"Boston, May, 1775.

"Permit-----------------, together with his family, consisting of---
persons, and-------effects, to pass---------------, between sunrise and
sunset.

By order of his Excellency the Governor.

"No Arms nor Ammunition is allowed to pass."

** Under this arrangement. 1778 fire-arms, 634 pistols, 273 bayonets,
and 38 blunderbusses, were deposited with the selectmen. The same day
(April 27th) the Provincial Congress recommended to the inhabitants of
the sea-ports the removal of their effects, &c. Gordon, i., 336.

Benevolence of the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts.--Efforts of
other Colonies.--Organization of the Army.

May 1, 1775 The 536Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, in the mean
time, made provision for five thousand poor people expected from Boston,
who were unable to help themselves. Each town had a proportion allotted
to it, and thus much suffering was prevented, while the feelings of the
beneficiaries were tenderly respected by the declaration of the
resolution that they were not to be numbered with the town paupers. The
same provision was also made for the suffering inhabitants who remained
in Charlestown, unable to remove from the danger that menaced them. So
great were the alarm and distress in that thriving suburban village of
Boston, that it was almost deserted. Its population of two thousand
seven hundred was reduced to about two hundred.

While Massachusetts was thus exercising its patriotism and humanity,
preparatory to the approaching contest, the other colonies were alive
with zeal. The Rhode Island Assembly voted an army of observation of
fifteen hundred men, and appointed Nathaniel Apni Greene, a young iron
master, and a Quaker by birthright, but recently disowned because of his
military propensities, commander-in-chief, with the rank of brigadier.
His colonels were Varnum, Hitchcock, and Church. The Connecticut
Assembly voted to raise six regiments of a thousand men each; and
Wooster, Putnam, and Spencer, already April 26 commissioned as generals,
were each to have a regiment. The others were to be placed under the
command of Hinman, Waterbury, and Parsons. Already, as we have noticed,
New Hampshire volunteers had flocked to Cambridge, with the gallant
Stark, who was commissioned a colonel. Under the direction of the
Committee of Safety of that colony, they were supplied with necessaries
until the meeting of the Provincial Congress of their own province in
May. That body resolved to raise two thousand troops in addition May 17
those already in the field, and Nathan Folsom was appointed commander-
inchief, with the rank of brigadier. They were organized into three
regiments; and two additional regiments were placed under the command of
Stark and James Reed. The latter, and Enoch Poor, were commissioned
colonels. New Hampshire and Rhode Island both also issued bills of
credit. Although other colonies did not send soldiers to Boston, all,
with the exception of New York, approved of the action of the general
Continental Congress, and expressed the warmest sympathy for New
England.

On the 19th of May, the Provincial Congress of Massachusetts clothed the
Committee of Safety, then sitting at Cambridge, with full power to
regulate the movements of the gathering army. * General Ward, as we have
seen, was appointed captain general; John Thomas was made lieutenant
general; and Richard Gridley, the commissioned commander of an artillery
corps authorized to be raised, was appointed chief engineer, assisted by
Henry Knox, late commander of an artillery corps in Boston. To promote
rapid enlistments, a resolution had been previously adopted, promising a
captain's commission to every one who should raise a company of fifty-
nine men, and a colonel's commission to each who should raise a regiment
of ten companies. The form of the commissions of the several officers
was adopted, the pay of officers and soldiers was fixed, and other
provisions for organizing the army were arranged.

At the beginning of June the combined forces amounted to about sixteen
thousand men, ** really united only in respect to the common cause which
brought them together, for each colony had absolute control over its
respective troops. But by common consent, sanctioned by the several
colonial authorities, obedience was rendered to General Ward as captain
general. Ward, as well as Putnam, Thomas, Stark, Pomeroy, Prescott, and
Gridley, had been educated in the military art in the practical school
of the French and Indian war; and the militia that had assembled,
familiar with their names and deeds, placed the utmost confidence in
their skill and valor.

* The Committee of Safety consisted of John Hancock, Joseph Warren,
Benjamin Chureh, Benjamin White, Joseph Palmer, Richard Devens, Abraham
Watson, John Pigeon, Azor Orne, Benjamin Greenleaf, Nathan Cushing, and
Samuel Holten. Hancock was necessarily absent, being a delegate to the
Continental Congress.

** Massachusetts furnished 11,500; Connecticut, 2300; New Hampshire,
1200; and Rhode Island, 1000.

Increase of British Troops in Boston.--Arrival of experienced Officers.-
-Operations in the Vicinity.--American Military Works.

537The British force in Boston had increased, in the mean while, by
fresh arrivals from England and Ireland, to ten thousand men. The
Cerberus man-of-war arrived on the 25th of May, with Generals Howe, *
Clinton, and Burgoyne, three officers experienced in the military
tactics of Europe, but little prepared for service here. They were 1775
surprised at the aspect of affairs, and Gage was reproached for his
apparent supineness. ** However, unity of action was necessary, and the
new-comers heartily co-operated with Gage in his plans, such as they
were, for dispersing the rebel host that hemmed him in. He issued a
proclamation on the 12th of June, insulting in words and menacing in
tone. It declared martial law; pronounced those in arms and their
abettors "rebels, parricides of the Constitution," and offered a free
pardon to all who would forthwith return to their allegiance, except
John Hancock and Samuel Adams, who were outlawed, and for whose
apprehension as traitors a reward was offered. ** This proclamation, so
arrogant and insulting, served only to exasperate the people. In the
mean while, several skirmishes had occurred between parties of the
British regulars and the provincials, upon some of the cultivated
islands that dot the harbor of Boston. Each party were employed in
carrying off to their respective camps the live stock upon the islands,
and on one occasion quite a severe action occurred upon Hog Island,
which continued until late at night. One or two armed vessels in the
harbor were engaged in the foray. A considerable number of the
provincials were killed. Toward morning a British schooner got aground.
The Americans boarded her, stripped her of every thing valuable, and
returned to camp in triumph. In the course of these May 28, 1775
depredations the owners were completely despoiled; several hundred
cattle, sheep, and lambs having been carried off by both parties,
without leave or remuneration. **** In the attendant skirmishes the
Americans were generally most successful, and they served to initiate
the raw militia into the preliminary dangers of a battle.

But little progress had been made at this time, by the Americans, in
erecting fortifications. Some breast-works had been thrown up at
Cambridge, near the foot of Prospect Hill, and a small redoubt had been
formed at Roxbury. The right wing of the besieging army, under General
Thomas, was at Roxbury, consisting of four thousand Massachusetts
troops, including four artillery companies, with field-pieces and a few
heavy cannon. The Rhode Island forces, under Greene, were at Jamaica
Plains, and near there was a greater part of General Spencer's
Connecticut regiment. General Ward commanded the left wing at Cambridge,
which consisted of fifteen Massachusetts regiments, the battalion of
artillery under Gridley, and Putnam's regiment, with other Connecticut
troops. Most of the Connecticut forces were at Inman's farm. Paterson's
regiment was at the breast-work on Prospect Hill, and a large guard was
stationed at Lechmere's Point. Three companies of Gerrish's regi-

* General Howe was a brother of the young Lord Howe who was killed at
Ticonderoga in 1758. In the address of the Continental Congress to the
people of Ireland, adopted on the 28th of July, 1775, the addressers
say, "America is amazed to find the name of Howe in the catalogue of her
enemies. She loved his brother."

** The newly-arrived generals were so assured, before leaving England,
that they would have no occasion to draw the sword in support of
ministerial measures, that they had prepared to amuse themselves with
fishing and other diversions, instead of engaging in military service.
It seems that the whole affair of the 19th of April was kept a profound
secret from all his officers by Gage, except those immediately employed
in it and Lord Percy, until the skirmish had ensued at Lexington, and a
re-enforcement was called for. When General Haldimand, afterward
Governor General of Canada, who was with Gage, was asked how the sortie
happened, he said that the first he knew of it was from his barber, who
came to shave him.

*** It has been related that when John Hancock placed his bold signature
to the Declaration of Independence, on the 4th of July, 1776, he
remarked, "There! John Bull can read that name without spectacles. Now
let him double his reward!"

**** It was in reference to these expeditions on the part of the
British, that Freneau, the stirring song-writer of the Revolution, in
his "Gage's Soliloquy," thus wrote:

"Let others combat in the dusty field; Let petty captains scorn to live
or yield; I'll send my ships to neighboring isles, where stray
Unnumbered herds, and steal those herds away. I'll strike the women in
this town with awe, And make them tremble at my Martial Law."

Disposition of the American Troops.--Preparations for Blockading
Boston.--Charlestown and adjacent Grounds.

538ment were at Chelsea; Stark's regiment was at Medford, and Reid's at
Charlestown Neck, with sentinels reaching to Penny Ferry and Bunker
Hill.

It was made known to the Committee of Safety that General Gage had fixed
upon the night of the 18th of June to take possession of and fortify
Bunker Hill and Dorchester Heights. This brought matters to a crisis,
and measures were taken to perfect the blockade of Boston. The Committee
of Safety ordered Colonel Prescott, with a detachment of one thousand
men, including a company of artillery, with two field-pieces, to march
at night and throw up in-trenchments upon Bunker Hill, an eminence just
within the peninsula of Charlestown, and commanding the great northern
road from Boston, as well as a considerable portion of the town. To make
the relative position of the eminences upon the Charlestown peninsula
and the Neck, to Boston, more intelligible to the reader, I have copied
from Frothingham's _History of the Siege of Boston,_ by permission of
the author, the annexed sketch, communicated to him, in a manuscript of
1775, from Henry Stevens, Esq. I also quote from Mr. Frothingham's work
a description of the localities about Bunker Hill. The peninsula of
Charlestown is opposite the north part of Boston, and is about a mile in
length from north to south. Its greatest breadth, next to Boston, is
about half a mile. It is connected with the main land by a narrow
isthmus or neck. The Mystic River, half a mile wide, is on the east, and
the Charles River, here formed into a large bay, is on the west, a part
of which, by a dam stretching in the direction of Cobble Hill, is a
mill-pond. [See map, page 54.3 ] In 1775, an artificial causeway ****
was so low as to be frequent a ferry, where Charles River bridge is, and
with Malden by another, called Penny Ferry, where Malden Bridge now is.
Near the Neck, on the main land, was a large green, known as the Common.
Two roads ran by it: one in a westerly direction, as now, by Cobble Hill
(M'Lean Asylum), Prospect Hill, and Inman's Woods, to Cambridge Common;
the other in a northerly direction, by Plowed Hill (Mount Benedict) and
Winter Hill, to Medford--the direct road to West Cambridge not having
been laid out in 1775. Bunker Hill begins at the isthmus, and rises
gradually for about three hundred yards, forming a round, smooth hill,
sloping on two sides toward the water, and connected by a ridge of
ground on the south with the heights now known as Breed's Hill. This was
a well-known public place, the name, "Bunker Hill," being found in the
town records and in deeds from an early period. Not so with "Breed's
Hill," for it was not named in any description of streets previous to
1775, and appears to have been called after the owners of the pastures
into which it was divided, rather than by the common name of Breed's
Hill. Thus, Monument Square was called Russell's Pasture; Breed's
Pasture lay further south, and Green's Pasture was at the head of Green
Street. The easterly and westerly sides of this height were steep. On
the east, at its base, were brick-kilns, clay-pits, and much sloughy
land. On the west side, at the base, was the most settled part of the
town (v). Moulton's Point, a name coeval with the settlement of the
town, constituted the southeastern corner of the peninsula. A part of
this tract formed what is called Morton's Hill, and frequently
overflowed by the tides. The Bunker Hill was one hundred and
communication with Boston was by ten feet high, Breed's Hill sixty-two

* No. 1 is Bunker Hill; 2, Breed's Hill; 3, Moulton's Point; 4, a
causeway near the Neck, at the foot of Bunker Hill; 5, Charlestown, at
the foot of Breed's Hill. Charlestown Neck is on the extreme left.

Night March to Bunker and Breed's Hill.--A Fortification planned on
Bunker Hill.--British Vessels in Boston Harbor.

539feet, and Moulton's Hill *** thirty-five feet. The principal street
of the peninsula was Main Street, which extended from the Neck to the
ferry. A road ran over Bunker Hill, around Breed's Hill, to Moulton's
Point. The westerly portions of these eminences contained fine orchards.
*

A portion of the regiments of Prescott, ** Frye, and Bridge, and a
fatigue party of two hundred Connecticut troops with intrenching tools,
paraded in the Cambridge camp at six o'clock in the evening. They were
furnished with packs and blankets, and ordered June 16, 1775 to take
provisions for twenty-four hours. Samuel Gridley's company of artillery
joined them, and the Connecticut troops were placed under the command of
Thomas Knowlton, a captain in Putnam's regiment, who was afterward
killed in the battle on Harlem Heights. After an impressive prayer from
the lips of President Langdon, of Harvard College, Colonel Prescott and
Richard Gridley, preceded by two servants with dark lanterns, commenced
their march, at the head of the troops, for Charlestown. It was about
nine o'clock at night, the sky clear and starry, and the weather very
warm. Strict silence was enjoined, and the object of the expedition was
not known to the troops until they arrived at Charlestown Neck, where
they were joined by Major Brooks, of Bridge's regiment, and General
Putnam. A guard of ten men was placed in Charlestown, and the main body
marched over Bunker Hill. A council was held, to select the best place
for the proposed fortification. The order was explicit, to fortify
Bunker Hill; but Breed's Hill being nearer Boston, and appearing to be a
more eligible place, it was concluded to proceed to fortify it, and to
throw up works, also, on Bunker Hill, to cover a retreat, if necessary,
across Charlestown Neck. Colonel Gridley marked out the lines of the
proposed fortifications, and, at about midnight, the men, having thrown
off their packs and stacked their arms, began their perilous work--
perilous, because British sentinels and British ships-of-war were almost
within sound of their picks. ***

"No shout disturbed the night,

Before that fearful fight;

There was no boasting high--

No marshaling of men,

Who ne'er might meet again--

No cup was filled and quaffed to Victory!

* Frothingham, page 129.

** William Prescott was born at Groton, Massachusetts, in 1726. His
father was for some years a counselor of Massachusetts, and his mother
was a daughter of another counselor. He was a lieutenant of foot under
General Winslow, at the capture of Cape Breton, where he was
distinguished for his bravery. He inherited a large estate, and resided
at Pepperell while the Revolution was ripening. He had command of a
regiment of minute men, and when the news of the affair at Lexington
reached him, promptly marched thither at the head of as many as he could
collect. His known military talents caused him to be selected by General
Ward for the important duty of fortifying Bunker Hill; and in the
memorable engagement that occurred there on the 17th of June, 1775, he
was the chief in command, and was greatly distinguished by his bravery
and skill. That evening, although repulsed, and his troops greatly
fatigued and much dispirited, he solicited from the Committee of Safety
permission to make an attempt to retake the peninsula of Charlestown. It
was a movement too perilous, and the gallant soldier was obliged to
rest. He continued in the service through 1776, and served as a
volunteer under Gates until the surrender of Burgoyne in 1777. From 1786
until his death he was an acting magistrate in his native town. He died
in Pepperell on the 13th of October, 1795, aged sixty-nine. William H.
Prescott, of Boston, the eminent historian, is a grandson of Colonel
Prescott. He married a grand-daughter of Captain Linzee, who commanded
the sloop of war Falcon, that cannonaded the works on Breed's Hill on
the 17th of June, 1775. The swords then used by Colonel Prescott and
Captain Linzee, the respective grandfathers of the historian and his
wife, are now in Mr. Prescott's possession, and are crossed, in a
conspicuous place, in his valuable library at Boston.

*** The following are the names of the British vessels then in the
harbor of Boston, which took part in the battle that ensued: Somerset,
68 guns, 520 men, Captain Edward Le Cras; Cerberus, 36 guns, Captain
Chads; Glasgow, 24 guns, 130 men, Captain William Maltby; Lively, 20
guns, 130 men, Captain Thomas Bishop; Falcon, Captain Linzee; Symmetry,
transport, 18 nine pounders. Sec the British Annual Register for 1775.
The Falcon lay off Moulton's, or Morton's, Point; the Lively lay
opposite the present navy-yard; the Somerset was at the ferry; the
Glasgow was near Cragie's Bridge; and the Cerberus and several floating
batteries were within gunshot of the American works.--Frothingham.

Construction of the Redoubt on Breed's Hill.--Discovery of the Works by
the Enemy.--Surprise of the people of Boston.

540

No plumes were there,

No banners fair,

No trumpets breathed around;

Nor the drum's startling sound

Broke on the midnight air."

--John Neal.

Officers and men labored together with all their might, with pickaxes
and spades, and were cheered on in their work by the distant signals of
safety--"All's well!"--that came from the shipping, and the sentinels at
the foot of Copp's Hill.

It proclaimed that they were still undiscovered; and at every cry of
"All's well!" they plied their tools with increased vigor. When the day
dawned, at about four o'clock, they had thrown up in-trenchments six
feet high; and a strong redoubt, which was afterward the admiration of
the enemy, loomed up on the green height before the wondering eyes of
the astonished Britons like a work of magic. The British officers could
hardly be convinced that it was the result of a few hours' labor only,
but deemed it the work of days. Gage saw at once how foolish he had been
in not taking possession of this strong point, as advised, while it was
in his power to do so.

The fortification was first discovered at dawn, by the watchmen on board
the Lively. Without waiting for orders, the captain put springs upon his
cables, and opened a fire on the American works. The noise of the cannon
aroused the sleepers in Boston, and when the sun arose on that bright
morning, every eminence and roof in the city swarmed with people,
astonished at the strange apparition upon Breed's Hill. The shots from
the Lively did no harm, and, defended by their intrenchments, the
Americans plied their labor in strengthening their works within, until
called to lay aside the pick and shovel for gun and knapsack.

Admiral Graves, the naval commander at Boston, ordered the firing to
cease; but it was soon renewed, not only by the shipping, but from a
battery of six guns upon Copp's Hill in June 17, 1775 the city. Gage
summoned a council of war early in the morning. As it was evident that
the Americans were rapidly gaining strength, and that the safety of the
town was endangered, it was unanimously resolved to send out a force to
drive them from the peninsula of Charlestown and destroy their works on
the heights. It was decided, also, to make the attack in front, and
preparations were made accordingly. The drums beat to arms, and Boston
was soon in a tumult. Dragoons galloping, artillery trains rumbling, and
the marching and countermarching of the regulars and loyalists, together
with the clangor

* This plan is copied from an English drawing of the time, first
published in the London Gentleman's Magazine for 1775.

** Explanation.--A A represents the situation of two strong fences,
composed of stones and rails; a and b, two well-contrived flanks, so
arranged that their fires crossed within twenty yards of the face of the
redoubt; c, another well-arranged flank; d, a bastion, with its flanks e
and b; rn, a small portion of a trench, that extended from the eastern
side of the redoubt to a slough at the foot of the hill toward the
Mystic River. On the southeast side of the redoubt was a deep hollow.
Two cannons were placed in embrasures at the front of the redoubt, in
the two salient angles of which were large apple-trees.

*This redoubt was eight rods square. The Bunker Hill Monument now
occupies its center. The eastern side commanded an extensive field. On
the north side was an open passage-way, and the breastwork upon the
eastern side extended about one hundred yards north. This trench was
incomplete when the battle began. Between the south end of the breast-
work and the redoubt was a sally-port, protected by a blind, and on the
inside of the parapet were steps of wood and earth for the men to mount
and fire. Between the slough and the rail fence on the east was an open
space, and this was the weakest part of the lines. Such were the
American works of defense when the battle of the 17th of June commenced.

Cowardice of the Tories.--Crossing of a British Force from Boston to
Charlestown.--Bravery of Prescott--New England Flag.

541of the church bells, struck dismay into many a heart before stout in
the presence of British protectors. It is said that the danger which
surrounded the city converted many Tories into patriots; and the
selectmen, in the midst of that fearful commotion, received large
accessions to their list of professed friends from the ranks of the
timid loyalists.

Toward noon, between two and three thousand picked men, from the British
army, under the command of General Sir William Howe and General Pigot,
embarked in twenty-eight barges, part from the Long Wharf and some from
the North Battery, in Boston, and landed at Morton's, or Moulton's
Point, * beyond the eastern foot of Breed's Hill, covered by the guns of
the Falcon and other vessels.

"About two thousand were embarked to go

'Gainst the redoubt and formidable foe.

The Lively's, Falcon's, Fame's, and Glasgow's roar,

Covered their landing on the destined shore." **

The Americans had worked faithfully on their intrenchments all the
morning, and were greatly encouraged by the voice and example of
Prescott, who exposed himself, without care, to the random shots of the
battery on Copp's Hill. ***

He supposed, at first, that the enemy would not attack him, but, seeing
the movements in the city, he was convinced to the contrary, and
comforted his toiling troops with assurances of certain victory.
Confident of such a result himself, he would not at first send to
General Ward for a re-enforcement; but between nine and ten o'clock, by
advice of his officers, Major Brooks was dispatched to head-quarters for
that purpose. General Putnam had urged Ward early in the morning to send
fresh troops to relieve those on duty; but only a portion of Stark's
regiment was allowed to go, as the general apprehended that Cambridge
would be the principal point of attack. Convinced otherwise, by certain
intelligence, the remainder of Stark's regiment, and the whole of Reed's
corps, on the Neck, were ordered to re-enforce Prescott.

At twelve o'clock the men in the redoubt ceased work, sent off their
intrenching tools, took some refreshments, hoisted the New England flag,
and prepared to fight.

The intrenching tools were sent to Bunker Hill, where, under the
direction of General Putnam, the men began to throw up a breast-work.
Some of the more timid soldiers made the removal of the tools a pretext
for leaving the redoubt, and never returned.

It was between twelve and one o'clock when the Brit-

* This is written Morton, Moreton, and Moulton, by different authors.
Morton is the proper name.

** From "The American War," a poem in six books, published in London,
1786.

*** A soldier (Asa Pollard, of Billerica) who had ventured outside of
the redoubt, was killed by a cannon ball. The circumstance so alarmed
those within, that some of them left the hill. Prescott, to inspire his
men with confidence, walked leisurely around the works upon the parapet,
in full view of the British officers in Boston. Gage, who was
reconnoitering the works through a glass, saw his tall and commanding
form, and asked Counselor Willard, who stood near him, who it was.
Willard, recognizing his brother-inlaw, said, "That is Colonel
Prescott." "Will he fight?" inquired Gage. "Yes, sir," replied Willard;
"he is an old soldier, and will fight as long as a drop of blood remains
in his veins." "The works must be carried immediately," responded Gage,
as he turned upon his heel to give orders.--

**** This is copied from an old Dutch work, preserved in the library of
the New York Historical Society, containing pictures of the flags of all
nations. In the original, a divided sphere, representing the earth, is
in the quarter where I have placed the pine-tree. I have made the
alteration in the device, because in the flag raised upon the bastion of
the redoubt on Breed's Hill, the pine-tree occupied the place of the
sphere, the more ancient device. The question has been unsettled
respecting the flag used on that occasion, as cotemporary writers are
silent on the subject. An intelligent old lady (Mrs. Manning) whom I saw
between the Brandywine and Kennet Square, in Pennsylvania, informed me
that her father, who was in the battle, assisted in hoisting the
standard, and she had heard him speak of it as a "noble flag." The
ground was blue, and one corner was quartered by the red cross of St.
George, in one section of which was the pine-tree. This was the New
England flag, as given in the sketch. Doubtless there were many other
flags belonging to the several regiments. Botta says of Dr. Warren,
during the retreat, "Finding the corps he commanded hotly pursued by the
enemy, despising all danger, he stood alone before the ranks,
endeavoring to rally his troops, and encouraging them by his own
example. He reminded them of the mottoes inscribed on their ensigns, on
one side of which were these words, 'An appeal to Heaven,' and on the
other, 'Qui transtulit, sustinet,' meaning, that the same providence
that brought their ancestors through so many perils to a place of
refuge, would also deign to support their descendants." Botta often
exhibits more poetry than truth in his brilliant narrative. After the
battle under consideration, and while Putnam commanded on Prospect Hill,
a flag with the inscription above given was presented to him, and was
first unfurled on the 18th of July ensuing. The author of "The Veil
Removed" properly treats the assertion of Botta as a fiction, and
sarcastically remarks that, "instead of such a sentimental allusion to
Latin mottoes, the only command, when their ammunition was spent, must
have been Sauve qui peut, 'Save himself who can.' "Qui transtulit,
sustinet," is the motto in the seal of Connecticut.

Excitement in Cambridge.--Re-enforcements for both Parties.--Sufferings
of the Provincials.--Warren and Pomeroy.

542ish troops, consisting of the fifth, thirty-eighth, forty-third, and
fifty-second battalions of infantry, two companies of grenadiers, and
two of light-infantry, landed, their rich uniforms and arms flashing and
glittering in the noonday sun, making an imposing and formidable
display. General Howe reconnoitered the American works, and, while
waiting for re-enforcements, which he had solicited from Gage, allowed
his troops to dine. When the intelligence of the landing of the enemy
reached Cambridge, two miles distant, there was great excitement in the
camp and throughout the town. The drums beat to arms, the bells were
rung, and the people and military were speedily hurrying in every
direction. General Ward used his own regiment, and those of Paterson and
Gardner and a part of Bridge's, for the defense of Cambridge. The
remainder of the Massachusetts troops were ordered to Charlestown, and
thither General Putnam conducted those of Connecticut.

At about two o'clock the re-enforcement for Howe arrived, and landed at
the present navy-yard. It consisted of the forty-seventh battalion of
infantry, a battalion of marines, and some grenadiers and light
infantry. The whole force (about four thousand men) was commanded and
directed by the most skillful British officers then in Boston; * and
every man preparing to attack the undisciplined provincials was a
drilled soldier, and quite perfect in the art of war. It was an hour of
the deepest anxiety among the patriots on Breed's Hill. They had
observed the whole martial display, from the time of the embarkation
until the forming of the enemy's line for battle. For the Americans, as
yet, very little succor had arrived. Hunger and thirst annoyed them,
while the labors of the night and morning weighed them down with
excessive fatigue. Added to this was the dreadful suspicion that took
possession of their minds, when only feeble re-enforcements arrived,
that treachery had placed them there for the purpose of sacrifice. Yet
they could not doubt the patriotism of their principal officers, and
before the action commenced their suspicions were scattered to the winds
by the arrival of their beloved Dr. Warren and General Pomeroy. **
Warren, who was president of the Provincial Congress, then sitting at
Watertown, seven miles distant, informed of the landing of the enemy,
hastened toward Charlestown, though suffering from sickness and
exhaustion. He had been commissioned a major general four days before.
Putnam, who was at Cambridge, forwarding provisions and re-enforcements
to Charlestown, tried to dissuade him from going into the battle. Warren
was not to be diverted from his purpose, and mounting a horse, he sped
across the Neck and entered the redoubt, amid the loud cheers of the
provincials, just as Howe gave orders to advance. Colonel Prescott
offered, the command to Warren, as his superior, when the latter
replied, "I am come to fight as a volunteer, and feel honored in being
allowed to serve under so brave an officer."

While the British troops were forming, and preparing to march along the
Mystic River for the purpose of flanking the Americans and gaining their
rear, the artillery, with two field-pieces, and Captain Knowlton, with
the Connecticut troops, left the redoubt, took a

* The most distinguished British officers that accompanied General Howe
were General Pigot; Colonels Nesbit, Abercrombie, and Clark; Majors
Butler, Williams, Bruce, Spendlove, Smelt, Mitchell, Pitcairn, Short,
Small, and Lord Rawdon.

** General Pomeroy left Cambridge when he heard the first sound of the
cannon. The veteran borrowed a horse from General Ward, to ride to
Charlestown, but, observing that the guns of the Glasgow raked the Neck
by an enfilading fire, he was afraid to risk the borrowed animal.
Leaving him in charge of a sentry, he walked across the Neck, and, with
a borrowed musket, joined the troops at the rail fence as a volunteer.
He was well known, and a loud huzza welcomed him to the post of danger.

March of the British toward the Redoubt--Position of the American
Troops.--Cannonade of the Redoubt

543position near Bunker Hill, and formed a breast-work seven hundred
feet in length, which served an excellent purpose. A little in front of
a strong stone and rail fence, Knowlton built another, and between the
two was placed a quantity of new-mown grass. This apparently slight
breast-work formed a valuable defense to the provincials.

It was now three in the afternoon. The provincial troops were placed in
an attitude of defense, as the British column moved slowly forward to
the attack. Colonel Prescott and the original constructors of the
redoubt, except the Connecticut troops, were within the works. General
Warren also took post in the redoubt. Gridley and Callender's artillery
companies were between the breast-works and rail fence on the eastern
side. A few troops, recalled from Charlestown after the British landed,
and a part of Warner's company, lined the cart-way on the right of the
redoubt. The Connecticut and New Hampshire forces were at the rail fence
on the west of the redoubt; and three companies were stationed in the
Main Street at the foot of Breed's Hill.

Before General Howe moved from his first position, he sent out strong
flank guards, and directed his heavy artillery to play upon the American
line. At the same time a blue flag was displayed as a signal, and the
guns upon Copp's Hill, and the ships and floating batteries in the
river, poured a storm of round shot upon the redoubt. A furious
cannonade was opened at the same moment upon the right wing of the
provincial army at Roxbury, to prevent re-enforcements being sent by
General Thomas to Charlestown. Gridley * and Callender, with their
field-pieces, returned a feeble response to the heavy guns of the enemy.

Gridley's guns were soon disabled; while Callender, who alleged that his
cartridges were too large, withdrew to Bunker Hill. Putnam was there,
and ordered him back to his first position. He disobeyed, and nearly all
his men, more courageous than he, deserted him In the mean while,
Captain Walker, of Chelmsford, with fifty resolute men, marched down the
hill near Charlestown, and greatly annoyed the enemy's left flank.
Finding their posi-

* Captain Samuel Gridley was a son of Richard Gridley, the engineer. He
was quite inefficient, and had received his appointment solely in
compliment to his father.

The British Artillery.--Silence of the Americans.--Terrible Volleys from
the Redoubt.--Flight of the Enemy

544tion very perilous, they marched over to the Mystic, and did great
execution upon the right flank. Walker was there wounded and made
prisoner, but the greater part of his men succeeded in gaining the
redoubt.

Under cover of the discharges of artillery, the British army moved up
the slope of Breed's Hill toward the American works, in two divisions,
General Howe with the right wing, and General Pigot with the left. The
former was to penetrate the American lines at the rail fence; the latter
to storm the redoubt. They had not proceeded far before the firing of
their artillery ceased, in consequence of discovering that balls too
large for the field-pieces had been sent over from Boston. Howe ordered
the pieces to be loaded with grape; but they soon became useless, on
account of the miry ground at the base of the hill. Small arms and
bayonets now became their reliance.

Silently the British troops, burdened with heavy knapsacks, toiled up
the ascent toward the redoubt, in the heat of a bright summer's sun. All
was silent within the American intrenchments, and very few provincials
were to be seen by the approaching battalions; but within those breast-
works, and in reserve behind the hills, crouched fifteen hundred
determined men, ready, at a prescribed signal, to fall upon the foe. The
provincials had but a scanty supply of ammunition, and, to avoid wasting
it by ineffectual shots, Prescott gave orders not to fire until the
enemy were so near that the whites of their eyes could be seen. "Then,"
he said, "aim at their waistbands; and be sure to pick off the
commanders, known by their handsome coats!" The enemy were not so
sparing of their powder and ball, but when within gunshot of the
apparently deserted works, commenced a random firing. Prescott could
hardly restrain his men from responding, and a few did disobey his
orders and returned the fire. Putnam hastened to the spot, and
threatened to cut down the first man who should again disobey orders,
and quiet was restored. At length the enemy reached the prescribed
distance, when, waving his sword over his head, Prescott shouted "Fire!"
Terrible was the effect of the volley that ensued. Whole platoons of the
British regulars were laid upon the earth, like grass by the mower's
scythe. Other deadly volleys succeeded, and the enemy, disconcerted,
broke, and fled toward the water. The provincials, joyed at seeing the
regulars fly, wished to pursue them, and many leaped the rail fence for
the purpose; but the prudence of the American officers kept them in
check, and in a few minutes they were again within their works, prepared
to receive a second attack from the British troops, that were quickly
rallied by Howe. Colonel Prescott praised and encouraged his men, while
General Putnam rode to Bunker Hill to urge on re-enforcements. Many had
arrived at Charlestown Neck, but were deterred from crossing by the
enfilading fire of the Glasgow and two armed gondolas near the causeway.
Portions of regiments were scattered upon Bunker Hill and its vicinity,
and these General Putnam, by entreaties and commands, endeavored to
rally. Colonel Gerrish, who was very corpulent, became completely
exhausted by fatigue; and other officers, wholly unused to warfare,
coward-like kept at a respectful distance from danger. Few additional
troops could be brought to Breed's Hill before the second attack was
made.

The British troops, re-enforced by four hundred marines from Boston,
under Major Small, accompanied by Dr. Jeffries, the army surgeon,
advanced toward the redoubt in the same order as at first, General Howe
boldly leading the van, as he had promised. * It was a mournful march
over the dead bodies of scores of their fellow-soldiers; but with true
English courage they pressed onward, their artillery doing more damage
to the Americans than at the first assault. It had moved along the
narrow road between the tongue of land and Breed's Hill, and when within
a hundred yards of the rail fence, and on a line with the breast-works,
opened a galling fire, to cover the advance of the other assailants. In
the mean while, a carcass, and some hot shot, were thrown from Copp's
Hill into Charlestown,

* Clarke, an officer in the marines, relates that, just before
commencing the first march toward the redoubt, General Howe made a short
speech, in which he said, "If the enemy will not come out of their in-
trenchments, we must drive them out, at all events, otherwise the town
of Boston will be set on fire by them. I shall not desire one of you to
go a step further than where I go myself at your head."

Burning of Charlestown.--Second Repulse of the British.--Re-enforced by
Clinton.--Ammunition of the Americans exhausted.

545which set the village on fire. * The houses were chiefly of wood, and
in a short time nearly two hundred buildings were in flames, shrouding
in dense smoke the heights in the rear whereon the provincials were
posted. Beneath this veil the British hoped to rush unobserved up to the
breast-works, scale them, and drive the Americans out at the point of
the bayonet. At that moment a gentle breeze, which appeared to the
provincials like the breath of a guardian angel--the first zephyr that
had been felt on that sultry day--came from the west, and swept the
smoke away seaward, exposing to the full view of the Americans the
advancing columns of the enemy, who fired as they approached, but with
little execution. Colonels Brener, Nixon, and Buckminster were wounded,
and Major Moore was killed. As before, the Americans reserved their fire
until the British were within the prescribed distance, when they poured
forth their leaden hail with such sure aim and terrible effect that
whole ranks of officers and men were slain. General Howe was at the
head, and once he was left entirely alone, his aids and all about him
having perished. The British line recoiled, and gave way in several
parts, and it required the utmost exertion in all the remaining
officers, from the generals down to the subalterns, to repair the
disorder which this hot and unexpected fire had produced. ** All their
efforts were at first fruitless, and the troops retreated in great
disorder to the shore.

General Clinton, who had beheld the progress of the battle with
mortified pride, seeing the regulars repulsed a second time, crossed
over in a boat, followed by a small re-enforcement, and joined the
broken army as a volunteer. Some of the British officers remonstrated
against leading the men a third time to certain destruction; but others,
who had ridiculed American valor, and boasted loudly of British
invincibility, resolved on victory or death. The incautious loudness of
speech of a provincial, during the second attack, declaring that the
ammunition was nearly exhausted, gave the enemy encouraging and
important information. Howe immediately rallied his troops and formed
them for a third attack, but in a different way. The weakness of the
point between the breast-work and the rail fence had been discovered by
Howe, and thitherward he determined to lead the left wing with the
artillery, while a show of attack should be made at the rail fence on
the other side. His men were ordered to stand the fire of the
provincials, and then make a furious charge with bayonets.

So long were the enemy making preparations for a third attack, that the
provincials began to imagine that the second repulse was to be final.
They had time to refresh themselves a little, and recover from that
complete exhaustion which the labor of the day had produced. It was too
true that their ammunition was almost exhausted, and being obliged to
rely upon that for defense, as comparatively few of the muskets were
furnished with bayonets, they began to despair. The few remaining
cartridges within the redoubt were distributed by Prescott, and those
soldiers who were destitute of bayonets resolved to club their arms, and
use the breeches of their guns when their powder should be gone. The
loose stones in the redoubt were collected for use as missiles if
necessary, and all resolved to fight as long as a ray of hope appeared.

During this preparation on Breed's Hill, all was confusion elsewhere.
General Ward was at Cambridge, without sufficient staff officers to
convey his orders. Henry (afterward general) Knox was in the
reconnoitering service, as a volunteer, during the day, and upon his
reports Ward issued his orders. Late in the afternoon, the commanding
general dispatched his own, with Paterson's and Gardner's regiments, to
the field of action; but to the raw recruits the aspect of the narrow
Neck was terrible, swept as it was by the British

* A carcass is a hollow case formed of ribs of iron, covered with cloth,
or sometimes iron, with holes in it. Being filled with combustible
materials, it is thrown from a mortar into a besieged place, by which
means buildings are set on fire. The burning of Charlestown had been
resolved upon by Gage some time before, in the event of the Americans
taking possession of any of the hills belonging to it. "This resolution
was assigned by a near female relative of the general to a gentlewoman
with whom she had become acquainted at school, as a reason why the
other, upon obtaining a pass to quit Boston, should not tarry at her
father's (Mr. Cary's) house in Charlestown."--Dr. Gordon, i., 352.

** Stedman, i., 127.

Death of Colonel Gardner.--Third Attack of the British.--Storming of the
Redoubt.--Death of Warren and Pitcairn.

546cannon. Colonel Gardner succeeded in leading three hundred men to
Bunker Hill, where Putnam set them intrenching, but soon ordered them to
the lines. Gardner was advancing boldly at their head, when a musket
ball entered his groin and wounded him mortally. * His men were thrown
into confusion, and very few of them engaged in the combat that
followed, until the retreat commenced. Other regiments failed to reach
the lines. A part of Gerrish's regiment, led by Adjutant Christian
Febiger, a Danish officer, who afterward accompanied Arnold to Quebec,
and was distinguished at Stony Point, reached the lines just as the
action commenced, and effectually galled the British left wing. Putnam,
in the mean time, was using his utmost exertions to form the confused
troops on Bunker Hill, and get fresh corps with bayonets across the
Neck.

All was order and firmness at the redoubt on Breed's Hill, as the enemy
advanced. The artillery of the British swept the interior of the breast-
work from end to end, destroying many of the provincials, among whom was
Lieutenant Prescott, a nephew of the colonel commanding. The remainder
were driven within the redoubt, and the breast-work was abandoned. Each
shot of the provincials was true to its aim, and Colonel Abercrombie,
and Majors Williams and Speedlove fell. Howe was wounded in the foot,
but continued fighting at the head of his men. His boats were at Boston,
and retreat he could not. His troops pressed forward to the redoubt, now
nearly silent, for the provincials' last grains of powder were in their
guns. Only a ridge of earth separated the combatants, and the assailants
scaled it. The first that reached the parapet were repulsed by a shower
of stones. Major Pitcairn, who led the troops at Lexington, ascending
the parapet, cried out, "Now for the glory of the marines!" and was
immediately shot by a negro soldier. ** Again numbers of the enemy
leaped upon the parapet, while others assailed the redoubt on three
sides. Hand to hand the belligerents struggled, and the gun-stocks of
many of the provincials were shivered to pieces by the heavy blows they
were made to give. The enemy poured into the redoubt in such numbers
that Prescott, perceiving the folly of longer resistance, ordered a
retreat. Through the enemy's ranks the Americans hewed their way, many
of them walking backward, and dealing deadly blows with their musket-
stocks. Prescott and Warren were the last to leave the redoubt. Colonel
Gridley, the engineer, was wounded, and borne off safely. *** Prescott
received several thrusts from bayonets and rapiers in his clothing, but
escaped unhurt. Warren was the last man that left the works. He was a
short distance from the redoubt, on his way toward Bunker Hill, when a
musket ball passed through his head, killing him instantly. He was left
on the field, for all were flying in the greatest confusion, pursued by
the victors, who remorselessly bayoneted those who fell in their way.

Major Jackson had rallied Gardner's men upon Bunker Hill, and pressing
forward with

* I have before me a drama, bearing the autograph of General James
Abercrombie, entitled "The Battle of Bunker Hill; a dramatic piece in
five acts, in heroic measure: by a gentleman of Maryland." Printed at
Philadelphia, by Robert Bell, in 1776. Colonel Gardner is one of the
dramatis persona, and is made to say, at the moment of receiving the
wound,

"A musket ball, death-winged, hath pierced my groin, And widely oped the
swift current of my veins. Bear me, then, soldiers, to that hollow space
A little hence, just on the hill's decline. A surgeon there may stop the
gushing wound, And gain a short respite to life, that yet I may return,
and fight one half hour more. Then shall I die in peace, and to my God
Surrender up the spirit which he gave."

** Major Pitcairn was carried by his son to a boat, and conveyed to
Boston, where he soon died. He left eleven children. The British
government settled a pension of one thousand dollars a year upon his
widow.

*** Colonel Richard Gridley, the able engineer and brave soldier in this
battle, was born in Boston in 1721. He served as an engineer in the
reduction of Louisberg in 1745, and entered the British army as colonel
and chief engineer in 1755. He was engaged in the expedition to
Ticonderoga in 1756, and constructed Fort George, on Lake George. He
served under Amherst in 1758, and was with Wolfe, on the Plains of
Abraham, the following year. He was appointed ehief engineer of the
provincial army near Boston in 1775. He died at Stonghton, on the 20th
of June, 1796, aged seventy-five years______Curwen.

Confusion of the Americans.--Efforts of Putnam to Rally them.--Cessation
of the Battle.--The Loss.--Spectators of the Battle.

547three companies of Ward's, and Febiger's party of Gerrish's regiment,
poured a destructive fire upon the enemy between Breed's and Bunker
Hill, and bravely covered the retreat from the redoubt. The Americans at
the rail fence, under Stark, Reed, and Knowlton, re-enforced by Clark's,
Coit's, and Chester's Connecticut companies, and a few other troops,
maintained their ground, in the mean while, with great firmness, and
successfully resisted every attempt of the enemy to turn their flank.
This service was very valuable, for it saved the main body, retreating
from the redoubt, from being cut off. But when these saw their brethren,
with the chief commander, flying before the enemy, they too fled. Putnam
used every exertion to keep them firm. He commanded, pleaded, cursed and
swore like a madman, and was seen at every point in the van, trying to
rally the scattered corps, swearing that victory should crown the
Americans. * "Make a stand here," he exclaimed; "we can stop them yet!
In God's name, fire, and give them one shot more!" The gallant old
Pomeroy, also, with his shattered musket in his hand, implored them to
rally, but in vain. The whole body retreated across the Neck, where the
fire from the Glasgow and gondolas slew many of them. They left five of
their six field-pieces, and all their intrenching tools, upon Bunker
Hill, and they retreated to Winter Hill, Prospect Hill, and to
Cambridge. The British, greatly exhausted, and properly cautious, did
not follow, but contented themselves with taking possession of the
peninsula. Clinton advised an immediate attack upon Cambridge, but Howe
was too cautious or too timid to make the attempt. His troops lay upon
their arms all night on Bunker Hill, and the Americans did the same on
Prospect Hill, a mile distant. Two British field-pieces played upon
them, but without effect, and both sides feeling unwilling to renew the
action, hostilities ceased. The loss of the Americans in this engagement
was one hundred and fifteen killed and missing, three hundred and five
wounded, and thirty who were taken prisoners; in all four hundred and
fifty. The British loss is not positively known. Gage reported two
hundred and twenty-six killed, and eight hundred and twenty-eight
wounded; in all ten hundred and fifty-four. In this number are in eluded
eighty-nine officers. The Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, from the
best information they could obtain, reported the British loss at about
fifteen hundred. The battle, from Howe's first attack until the retreat,
occupied nearly two hours. The number of buildings consumed in
Charlestown, before midnight, was about four hundred; and the estimated
loss of property (most of the families, with their effects, having moved
out) was nearly six hundred thousand dollars.

The number engaged in this battle was small, yet cotemporary writers and
eye-witnesses represent it as one of the most determined and severe on
record. There was absolutely no victory in the case. The most
indomitable courage was displayed on both sides; and when the
provincials had retired but a short distance, so wearied and exhausted
were all that neither party desired more fighting, if we except Colonel
Prescott, who earnestly petitioned to be allowed to lead a fresh corps
that evening and retake Breed's Hill. It was a terrible day for Boston
and its vicinity, for almost every family had a representative in one of
the two armies. Fathers, husbands, sons, and brothers were in the
affray, and deep was the mental anguish of the women of the city, who,
from roofs, and steeples, and every elevation, gazed with streaming eyes
upon the carnage, for the battle raged in full view of thousands of
interested spectators in the town and upon the adjoining hills. ** In
contrast with the terrible scene were the cloudless sky and brilliant
sun.

* It is said that, for the foul profanity in which the brave old general
indulged on that occasion, he made a sincere confession, after the war,
before the church of which he was a member. "It was almost enough to
make an angel swear," he said, "to sec the cowards refuse to secure a
victory so nearly won!"

** "In other battles," said Daniel Webster, in an article published in
the North American Review for October, 1818, "the recollection of wives
and children has been used as an excitement to animate the warrior's
breast and to nerve his arm. Here was not a mere recollection, but an
actual presence of them, and other dear connections, hanging on the
skirts of the battle, anxious and agitated, feeling almost as if wounded
themselves by every blow of the enemy, and putting forth, as it were,
their own strength, and all the energy of their own throbbing bosoms,
into every gallant effort of their warring friends."

Reflections on the Battle.--Burgoyne's Opinion of the Conflict.--The
Character of Warren.

548

"The heavens, the calm pure heavens, were bright on high;

Earth laughed beneath in all its freshening green;

The free, blue streams sang as they wandered by;

And many a sunny glade and flowery scene

Gleamed out, like thoughts of youth, life's troubled years between,"

Willis Gaylord Clark.

while upon the green slopes, where flocks were quietly grazing but a few
hours before, War had reared its gory altars, and the earth was
saturated with the blood of its victims. Fearfully augmented was the
terror of the scene, when the black smoke arose from Charlestown on
lire, and enveloped the redoubt on the summit of Breed's Hill, which,
like the crater of a volcano, blazed and thundered in the midst of the
gloomy curtain that veiled it.

"Amazing scenes! what shuddering prospects rise!

What horrors glare beneath the angry skies!

The rapid flames o'er Charlestown's heights ascend;

To heaven they reach! urged by the boisterous wind.

The mournful crash of falling domes resound,

And tottering spires with sparkles reach the ground.

One general burst of ruin reigns o'er all;

The burning city thunders to its fall!

O'er mingled noises the vast ruin sounds,

Spectators weep! earth from her center groans!

Beneath prodigious unextinguished fires

Ill-fated Charlestown welters and expires."

Eulogium on Warren, 1781.

"It was," said Burgoyne, who, with Gage and other British officers, was
looking on from a secure place near Copp's Hill in Boston, "a
complication of horror and importance, beyond any thing that ever came
to my lot to witness. Sure I am that nothing ever can or has been more
dreadfully terrible than what was to be seen or heard at this time." But
it is profitless to dwell upon the gloomy scene. Time hath healed the
grief and heart-sickness that were born there; and art, in the hands of
busy men, has covered up forever all vestiges of the conflict.

Many gallant, many noble men perished on the peninsula upon that sad
day; but none was so widely and deeply lamented, because none was so
widely and truly loved, as the self-sacrificing and devoted Warren. He
was the impersonation of the spirit of generous and disinterested
patriotism that inspired the colonies. In every relation in life he was
a model of excellence. "Not all the havoc and devastation they have made
has wounded me like the death of Warren," wrote the wife of John Adams,
Ju]y 5, 1775 three weeks afterward.

"We want him in the Senate; we want him in his profession; we want him
in the field. We mourn for the citizen, the senator, the physician, and
the warrior."

General Howe estimated his influence, when he declared to Dr. Jeffries,
who recognized the body of

* Joseph Warren, son of a Massachusetts farmer, was born in Roxbury in
1740, and graduated at Harvard College in 1759. He studied the science
of medicine under Dr. Lloyd, and rapidly rose to the head, or, at least,
to the front rank of that profession in Boston. Sentiments of patriotism
seemed to form a part of his moral nature, and courage to avow them was
always prompting him to action. He became necessarily a politician, at a
time when all men were called upon to act in public matters, or be
looked upon as drones. He was one of the earliest members of the
association in Boston known as the Sons of Liberty, and from 1768 was
extremely efficient in fostering the spirit of rational liberty and
independence in the wide and influential circle in which he moved. His
mind, suggestive and daring, planned many measures, in secret caucus
with Adams and others, for resisting the encroachments of British power.
In 1771 he delivered the oration on the anniversary of the Boston
Massacre. He solicited the honor of performing a like duty on the 5th of
March, 1775, in consequence of a threat of some of the British officers
that they would take the life of any man who should dare to speak on
that occasion. The old South meeting-house was crowded on the appointed
day, and the aisles, stairs, and pulpit were filled with armed British
soldiers. The intrepid young orator entered a window by a ladder, back
of the pulpit, and, in the midst of a profound silence, commenced his
exordium in a firm tone of voice. His friends, though determined to
avenge any attempt at assassination, trembled for his safety. He dwelt
eloquently upon the early struggles of the New England people, their
faith and loyalty, and recounted, in sorrowful tones, the oppressions
that had been heaped upon them. Gradually he approached the scene on the
5th of March, and then portrayed it in such language and pathos of
expression, that even the stern soldiery that came to awe him wept at
his words. He stood there in the midst of that multitude, a striking
symbol of the revolt which he was leading, firm in the faith of that
sentiment, "Resistance to tyrants is obedience to God." Looking at him,
it might be said, as Magoon remarks, in classic quotation,

"Thou hast seen Mount Athos; While storms and tempests thunder at its
brows. And oceans beat their billows at its feet, It stands unmoved, and
glories in its height. Such is that haughty man; his towering soul, Mid
all the shocks and injuries of fortune, Rises superior, and looks down
on Caesar."

* When John Hancock went to the Continental Congress, Warren was elected
to fill his place as president of the Provincial Congress. Four days
previous to the action on Breed's Hill, that body gave him the
commission of major general, and he was the only officer of that rank
engaged in the conflict; yet he was without command, and fought as a
volunteer. "He fell," as Everett has beautifully expressed it, "with a
numerous band of kindred spirits--the gray-haired veteran, the stripling
in the flower of youth--who had stood side by side on that dreadful day,
and fell together, like the beauty of Israel in their high places!"
Warren's body was identified, on the morning after the battle, by Dr.
Jeffries, who was his intimate acquaintance. He was buried where he
fell, and the place was marked. After the evacuation of Boston in 1776,
his remains were disinterred, and, on the 8th of April, were carried in
procession from the Representatives' chamber to King's Chapel, and
buried with military and masonic honors. The Reverend Dr. Cooper offered
prayers, and Perez Morton pronounced an oration on the occasion.
"Warren's remains now rest beneath St. Paul's Church. He was Grand
Master of Freemasons for North America at the time of his death. A lodge
in Charlestown erected a monument to his memory in 1794, on the spot
where he fell. It was composed of a brick pedestal eight feet square,
rising ten feet from the ground, and supporting a Tuscan pillar of wood
eighteen feet high. This was surmounted by a gilt urn, bearing the
inscription "J.W., aged 35," entwined with masonic emblems. On the south
side of the pedestal was the following inscription: "Erected A.D.
MDCCXCIV., By King Solomon's Lodge of Free-masons, constituted in
Charlestown, 1783, In Memory of Major-general Joseph Warren and his
associates, who were slain on this memorable spot June 17,1775. * None
but they who set a just value upon the blessings of liberty are worthy
to enjoy her. In vain we toiled in vain we fought; we bled in vain, if
you, our offspring, want valor to repel the assault of her invaders.
Charlestown settled, 1628. Burned, 1775. Rebuilt, 1776." This monument
stood forty years, and then was removed to give place to the present
granite structure, known as Bunker Hill Monument. A beautiful model of
Warren's monument stands within the colossal obelisk, from which I made
the accompanying sketch.

** On the 8th of April, 1777, Congress, by resolution, ordered "that a
monument be erected to the memory of General Warren, in the town of
Boston, with the following inscription:

In honor of Joseph Warren, Major General of Massachusetts Bay. He
devoted his life to the liberties Of his country; And in bravely
defending them, fell An early victim, In the battle of Bunker Hill, June
17th, 1775. The Congress of the United States, As an acknowledgment of
his services, Have erected this monument to his memory.

Congress also ordered "that his eldest son be educated at the expense of
the United States."* The patriotic order for the erection of a monument
has never been obeyed.

The Energy, Boldness, and Patriotism of Warren.--Masonic Honors to his
Memory.--The old Monument on Breed's Hill

549Warren on the field the next day, that his death was worth, to the
British, five hundred of the provincial privates. Eulogy and song have
aided history in embalming his memory with the

Character of the Troops engaged in the Battle on Breed's Hill.--Monument
to Warren ordered by Congress.

550immortality that rests upon the spot where he fell. He was a hero in
the highest sense of the term, and so were Prescott and other
compatriots in the struggle; but all were not heroes who surrounded
them. Unused to war; some entirely ignorant of the sound of a cannon;
inferior, by two thirds, in number, and vastly so in discipline, to the
enemy, the wonder is that the provincials fought so well, not that so
many used their heels more expertly than their hands. Many officers,
chosen by the men whom they commanded, were totally unfitted in
knowledge and spirit for their stations, and a few exhibited the most
arrant cowardice. They were tried by court martial, and one was
cashiered for disobedience and for being a poltroon. * But they have all
passed away; let us draw the curtain of charity around their resting-
places, remembering that

"Hero motives, placed in judgment's scale,

Outweigh all actions where the heart is wrong."

Here let us close the volume of history for a time, and while the gentle
breeze is sweeping the dust and smoke of battle from Bunker Hill, ** and
the tumult of distress and alarm is subsiding in Boston, let us ride out
to Lexington and Concord, to visit those places consecrated by the blood
of the first patriot martyrs. We have had a long, but, I trust,
profitable consultation of the records of the past. I have endeavored to
point out for consideration the most prominent and important links in
the chain of events, wherein is remarkably manifested the spirit of true
liberty which finally wrought out the independence of these American
states. In brief outlines I have delineated the features of those
events, and traced the progress of the principles of freedom from the
little conventicles of despised and persecuted, but determined men,
toward the close of the sixteenth century, who assembled to assert the
most undoubted natural right, that of worshiping God as the conscience
of the creature shall dictate, to the uprising of nearly two millions of
the same people in origin and language, in defiance of the puissance of
the mightiest arm upon earth; and the assembling of a council in their
midst, of which the great Pitt was constrained to say, "I must declare
and avow that in all my reading and study--and it has been my favorite
study; I have read Thucydides, and have studied and admired the master
states of the world--that for solidity of reasoning, force of sagacity,
and wisdom of conclusion, under such a complication of circumstances, no
nation or body of men can stand in preference to the general Congress of
Philadelphia."

* This was Captain Callender. The court sentenced him to be cashiered,
and, in an order of July 7th, Washington declared him to be "dismissed
from all further service in the Continental army." Callender felt much
aggrieved, and, confronting the charge of cowardice, remained in the
army as a volunteer, and fought so bravely at the battle of Long Island,
the next year, that Washington commanded his sentence to be erased from
the orderly-book.

** This battle should properly be called the battle of Breed's Hill, for
there the great events of the day occurred. There was much fighting and
slaughter upon Bunker Hill, where Putnam chiefly commanded, but it was
not the main theater of action.

* Journals of Congress, iii., 98

Boston Common.--Trip to Concord.--Major Barrett--His Connection with the
Revolution.

551

CHAPTER XXIV.

           "How suddenly that straight and glittering shaft

Shot thwart the earth! in crown of living fire

Up comes the day! As if they conscious quaff'd

The sunny flood, hill, forest, city spire

Laugh in the waking light."

Richard H. Dana.

"War, fierce war, shall break their forces;

Nerves of Tory men shall fail;

Seeing Howe, with alter'd courses,

Bending to the Western gale.

Thus from every bay of ocean

Flying back with sails unfurl'd,

Toss'd with ever-troubled motion,

They shall quit this smiling world."

Military Song, 1776. *

T was a glorious October morning, mild and brilliant, when I left Boston
to visit Concord and Lexington. A gentle land-breeze during the night
had borne the clouds back to their ocean birth-place, and not a trace of
the storm was left except in the saturated earth. Health returned with
the clear sky, and I felt a rejuvenescence in every vein and muscle
when, at dawn, I strolled over the natural glory of Boston, its broad
and beautifully-arbored Common. I breakfasted at six, and at half past
seven left the station of the Fitchburg rail-way for Concord, seventeen
miles northwest of Boston. The country through which the road passed is
rough and broken, but thickly settled. I arrived at the Concord station,
about half a mile from the center of the village, before nine o'clock,
and procuring a conveyance, and an intelligent young man for a guide,
proceeded at once to visit the localities of interest in the vicinity.
We rode to the residence of Major James Barrett, a surviving grandson of
Colonel Barrett, about two miles north of the village, and near the
residence of his venerated October 1848 ancestor. Major Barrett was
eighty-seven years of age when I visited him, and his wife, with whom he
had lived nearly sixty years, was eighty. Like most of the few survivors
of the Revolution, they were remarkable for their mental and bodily
vigor. Both, I believe, still live. The old lady--a small, well-formed
woman--was as sprightly as a girl of twenty, and moved about the house
with the nimbleness of foot of a matron in the prime of life. I was
charmed with her vivacity, and the sunny radiance which it seemed to
shed throughout her household; and the half hour that I passed with that
venerable couple is a green spot in the memory.

Major Barrett was a lad of fourteen when the British incursion into
Concord took place. He was too young to bear a musket, but, with every
lad and woman in the vicinity, he labored in concealing the stores and
in making cartridges for those who went out to fight. With oxen and a
cart, himself, and others about his age, removed the stores deposited at
the house of his grandfather into the woods, and concealed them, a cart-
load in a place, under pine boughs. In such haste were they obliged to
act on the approach of the British

1850

* This song of forty-eight lines, by an anonymous writer, is entitled "A
Military Song, by the Army, on General Washington's victorious entry
into the town of Boston."

Concealment of Stores at Concord.--Concord Monument.--The Village.--Ride
to Lexington.

552from Lexington, that, when the cart was loaded, lads would march on
each side of the oxen and goad them into a trot. Thus all the stores
were effectually concealed, except some carriage-wheels. Perceiving the
enemy near, these were cut up and burned; so that Parsons found nothing
of value to destroy or carry away.

From Major Barrett's we rode to the monument erected at the site of the
old North Bridge, where the skirmish took place, and I sketched, on my
way, the residence of Colonel Barrett, depicted on page 526. The road
crosses the Concord River a little above the site of the North Bridge.
The monument stands a few rods westward of the road leading to the
village, and not far from the house of the Reverend Dr. Ripley, who gave
the ground for the purpose. The monument is constructed of granite from
Carlisle, and has an inscription upon a marble tablet inserted in the
eastern face of the pedestal. * The view is from the green shaded lane
which leads from the highway to the monument, looking westward. The two
trees standing, one upon each side, without the iron railing, were
saplings at the time of the battle; between them was the entrance to the
bridge. The monument is reared upon a mound of earth a few yards from
the left bank of the river. A little to the left, two rough, uninscribed
stones from the field mark the graves of the two British soldiers who
were killed and buried upon the spot.

We returned to the village at about noon, and started immediately for
Lexington, six miles eastward.

Concord is a pleasant little village, including within its borders about
one hundred dwellings. It lies upon the Concord River, one of the
tributaries of the Merrimac, near the junction of the Assabeth and
Sudbury Rivers. Its Indian name was Musketaquid. On account of the
peaceable manner in which it was obtained, by purchase, of the
aborigines, in 1635, it was named Concord. At the north end of the broad
street, or common, is the house of Colonel Daniel Shattuck, a part of
which, built in 1774, was used as one of the depositories of stores when
the British invasion took place. It has been so much altered, that a
view of it would have but little interest as representing a relic of the
past.

The road between Concord and Lexington passes through a hilly but
fertile country. It is easy for the traveler to conceive how terribly a
retreating army might be galled by the lire of a concealed enemy. Hills
and hillocks, some wooded, some bare, rise up every where, and formed
natural breast-works of protection to the skirmishers that hung upon the
flank and rear of Colonel Smith's troops. The road enters Lexington at
the green whereon the old meeting-house stood when the battle occurred.
The town is upon a fine rolling plain, and is becoming almost a suburban
residence for citizens of Boston. Workmen were inclosing the Green, and
laying out the grounds in handsome plats around the monument,

* The following is a copy of the inscription:

* Here, On the 19th of April, 1775, was made the first forcible
resistance to British Aggression. On the opposite bank stood the
American militia, and on this spot the first of the enemy fell in the
War of the Revolution, which gave Independence to these United States.
In gratitude to God, and in the love of Freedom, This Monument was
erected, A.D. 1836.

The Lexington Monument--The "Clark House" and its Associations.--
Tradition of the Surprise--Abijah Harrington.

553which stands a few yards from the street. It is upon a spacious
mound; its material is granite, and it has a marble tablet on the south
front of the pedestal, with a long inscription.' The design of the
monument is not at all graceful, and, being surrounded by tall trees, it
has a very "dumpy" appearance. The people are dissatisfied with it, and
doubtless, ere long, a more noble structure will mark the spot where the
curtain of the revolutionary drama was first lifted.

After making the drawings here given, I visited and made the sketch of
"Clark's House," printed on page 523.

There I found a remarkably intelligent old lady, Mrs. Margaret Chandler,
aged eighty-three years. She has been an occupant of the house, I
believe, ever since the Revolution, and has a perfect recollection of
the events of the period.

Her version of the escape of Hancock and Adams is a little different
from the published accounts, which I have adopted in the historical
sketch. She says that on the evening of the 18th of April, some British
officers, who had been informed where these patriots were, came to
Lexington, and inquired of a woman whom they met, for "Mr. Clark's
house." She pointed to the parsonage; but in a moment, suspecting their
design, she called to them and inquired if it was Clark's _tavern_ that
they were in search of. Uninformed whether it was a _tavern or a
parsonage_ where their intended victims were staying, and supposing the
former to be the most likely place, the officers replied, "Yes; Clark's
tavern."

"Oh," she said, "Clark's tavern is in that direction," pointing toward
East Lexington. As soon as they departed, the woman hastened to inform
the patriots of their danger, and they immediately arose and fled to
Woburn. Dorothy Quincy, the intended wife of Hancock, who was at Mr.
Clark's, accompanied them in their flight. Paul Revere soon afterward
arrived, and the events already narrated then occurred.

I next called upon the venerable Abijah Harrington, who was living in
the village. He was a lad of fourteen at the time of the engagement. Two
of his brothers were among the

* The following is a copy of the inscription: "Sacred to the Liberty and
the Rights of Mankind!!! The Freedom and Independence of America--sealed
and defended with the blood of her sons--This Monument is erected by the
Inhabitants of Lexington, under the patronage and at the expense of the
Commonwealth of Massachusetts, to the memory of their Fellow-citizens,
Ensign Robert Monroe, Messrs. Jonas Parker, Samuel Hadley, Jonathan
Harrington, Junr., Isaac Muzzy, Caleb Harrington, and John Brown, of
Lexington, and Asahel Porter, of Woburn, who fell on this Field, the
first victims of the Sword of British Tyranny and Oppression, on the
morning of the ever-memorable Nineteenth of April, An. Dom. 1775. The
Die was Cast!!! The blood of these Martyrs in the Cause of God and their
Country was the Cement of the Union of these States, then Colonies, and
gave the Spring to the Spirit, Firmness, and Resolution of their Fellow-
citizens. They rose as one man to revenge their Brethren's blood, and at
the point of the Sword to assert and defend their native Rights. They
nobly dared to be Free!!! The contest was long, bloody, and affecting.
Righteous Heaven approved the Solemn Appeal; Victory crowned their Arms,
and the Peace, Liberty, and Independence of the United States of America
was their glorious Reward. Built in the year 1799."

** This view is from the Concord Road, looking eastward, and shows a
portion of the inclosure of the Green. The distant building seen on the
right is the old "Buckman Tavern," delineated in Doolittle's engraving
on page 524. It now belongs to Mrs. Merriam, and exhibits many scars
made by the bullets on the morning of the skirmish.

Incidents of the Battle at Lexington.--Jonathan Harrington and his
Brother.--Anniversary Celebration at Concord in 1850.

554minute men, but escaped unhurt. Jonathan and Caleb Harrington, near
relatives, were killed The former was shot in front of his own house,
while his wife stood at the window in an agony of alarm. She saw her
husband fall, and then start up, the blood gushing from his breast. He
stretched out his arms toward her, and then fell again. Upon his hands
and knees he crawled toward his dwelling, and expired just as his wife
reached him.

Caleb Harrington was shot while running from the meeting-house. My
informant saw almost the whole of the battle, having been sent by his
mother to go near enough, and be safe, to obtain and convey to her
information respecting her other sons, who were with the minute men.

His relation of the incidents of the morning was substantially such as
history has recorded. He dwelt upon the subject with apparent delight,
for his memory of the scenes of his early years, around which cluster so
much of patriotism and glory, was clear and full. I would gladly have
listened until twilight to the voice of such experience, but time was
precious, and hastened to East Lexington, to visit his cousin, Jonathan
Harrington, an old man of ninety, who played the fife when the minute
men were marshaled on the Green upon that memorable April morning. He
was splitting fire-wood in his yard with a vigorous hand when I rode up;
and as he sat in his rocking-chair, while I sketched his placid
features, he appeared no older than a man of seventy. His brother, aged
eighty-eight, came in before my sketch was finished, and I could not but
gaze with wonder upon these strong old men, children of one mother, who
were almost grown to manhood when the first battle of our Revolution
occurred! Frugality and temperance, co-operating with industry, a
cheerful temper, and a good constitution, have lengthened their days,
and made their protracted years hopeful and happy. * The aged fifer
apologized for the rough appearance of his signature, which he kindly
wrote for me, and charged the tremulous motion of his hand to his labor
with the ax. How tenaciously we cling even to the appearance of vigor,
when the whole frame is tottering to its fall! Mr. Harrington opened the
ball of the Revolution with the shrill war-notes of the fife, and then
retired from the arena. He was not a soldier in the war, nor has his
life, passed in the quietude of rural pursuits, been distinguished
except by the glorious acts which constitute the sum of the achievements
of a good citizen.

I left Lexington at about three o'clock, and arrived at Cambridge at
half past four. It was a lovely autumnal afternoon. The trees and fields
were still green, for the frost had

* The seventy-fifth anniversary of the battles of Lexington and Concord
was celebrated at the latter place on the 19th of April, 1850. In the
procession was a carriage containing these venerable brothers, aged,
respectively, nearly ninety-one and ninety-three; Amos Baker, of
Lincoln, aged ninety-four; Thomas Hill, of Danvers, aged ninety-two; and
Dr. Preston, of Billerica, aged eighty-eight. The Honorable Edward
Everett, among others, made a speech on the occasion, in which he very
happily remarked, that "it pleased his heart to see those venerable men
beside him; and he was very much pleased to assist Mr. Jonathan
Harrington to put on his top coat a few minutes ago. In doing so, he was
ready to say, with the eminent man of old, 'Very pleasant art thou to
me, my brother Jonathan!'" He died in March, 1854.

Ride to Cambridge.--Early History of the Town.--Washington's Head-
quarters.

555not yet been busy with their foliage and blades. The road is
Macadamized the whole distance; and so thickly is it lined with houses,
that the village of East Lexington and Old Cambridge seem to embrace
each other in close union.

Cambridge is an old town, the first settlement there having been planted
in 1631, co-temporaneous with that of Boston. It was the original
intention of the settlers to make it the metropolis of Massachusetts,
and Governor Winthrop commenced the erection of his dwelling there. It
was called New Town, and in 1632 was palisaded. The Reverend Mr. Hooker,
one of the earliest settlers of Connecticut, was the first minister in
Cambridge. In 1636, the General Court provided for the erection of a
public school in New Town, and appropriated two thousand dollars for
that purpose. In 1638, the Reverend John Harvard, of Charlestown,
endowed the school with about four thousand dollars. This endowment
enabled them to exalt the academy into a college, and it was called
Harvard University in honor of its principal benefactor.

Cambridge has the distinction of being the place where the first
printing-press in America was established. Its proprietor was Nathen
Day, and the capital that purchased the materials was furnished by the
Reverend Mr. Glover. The first thing printed was the "Freeman's Oath,"
in 1636; the next was an almanac; and the next the Psalms, in meter. *
Old Cambridge (West Cambridge, or Menotomy, of the Revolution), the seat
of the University, is three miles from West Boston Bridge, which
connects Cambridge with Boston. Cambridgeport is about half way between
Old Cambridge and the bridge, and East Cambridge occupies Lechmere's
Point, a promontory fortified during the siege of Boston in 1775.

Arrived at Old Cambridge, I parted company with the vehicle and driver
that conveyed me from Concord to Lexington, and hither; and, as the day
was fast declining, I hastened to sketch the head-quarters of
Washington, an elegant and spacious edifice, standing in the midst of
shrubbery and stately elms, a little distance from the street, once the
highway from Harvard University to Waltham. At this mansion, and at
Winter Hill, Washington passed most of his time, after taking command of
the Continental army, until the evacuation of Boston in the following
spring.

Its present owner is Henry Wadsworth Longfellow, professor of modern
languages in Harvard University, and widely known in the world of
literature as one of the most gifted men of the age. It is a spot worthy
of the residence of an American bard so endowed, for the associations
which hallow it are linked with the noblest themes that ever awakened
the inspiration of a child of song.

"When the hours of Day are number'd,

And the voices of the Night

Wake the better soul that slumber'd

To a holy, calm delight;

Ere the evening lamps are lighted,

And, like phantoms grim and tall,

Shadows from the fitful fire-light

Dance upon the parlor wall,"

--Longfellow

* Records of Harvard College.

Description of Washington's Head-quarters at Cambridge.--Phillis, the
black Poet.--Washington's Letter to Phillis.

556then to the thoughtful dweller must come the spirit of the place and
hour to weave a gorgeous tapestry, rich with pictures, illustrative of
the heroic age of our young republic. My tarry was brief and busy, for
the sun was rapidly descending--it even touched the forest tops before I
finished the drawing--but the cordial reception and polite attentions
which J received from the proprietor, and his warm approval of, and
expressed interest for the success of my labors, occupy a space in
memory like that of a long, bright summer day.

This mansion stands upon the upper of two terraces, which are ascended
each by five stone steps. At each front corner of the house is a lofty
elm--mere saplings when Washington beheld them, but now stately and
patriarchal in appearance. Other elms, with flowers and shrubbery,
beautify the grounds around it; while within, iconoclastic innovation
has not been allowed to enter with its mallet and trowel to mar the work
of the ancient builder, and to cover with the vulgar stucco of modern
art the carved cornices and paneled wainscots that first enriched it. I
might give a long list of eminent persons whose former presence in those
spacious rooms adds interest to retrospection, but they are elsewhere
identified with scenes more personal and important. I can not refrain,
however, from noticing the visit of one, who, though a dark child of
Africa and a bond-woman, received the most polite attention from the
commander-in-chief. This was Phillis, a slave of Mr. Wheatley, of
Boston. She was brought from Africa when between seven and eight years
old. She seemed to acquire knowledge intuitively; became a poet of
considerable merit, and corresponded with such eminent persons as the
Countess of Huntingdon, Earl of Dartmouth, Reverend George Whitefield,
and others. Washington invited her to visit him at Cambridge, which she
did a few days before the British evacuated Boston; her master, among
others, having left the city by permission, and retired, with his
family, to Chelsea. She passed half an hour with the commander-in-chief,
from whom and his officers she received marked attention. *

* Phillis wrote a letter to General Washington in October, 1775, in
which she inclosed a poem eulogistic of his character. In February
following the general answered it. I give a copy of his letter, in
illustration of the excellence of the mind and heart of that great man,
always so kind and courteous to the most humble, even when pressed with
arduous public duties.

"Cambridge, February 28,1776.

"Miss Phillis,--Your favor of the 26th of October did not reach my hands
till the middle of December. Time enough, you will say, to have given an
answer ere this. Granted. But a variety of important occurrences,
continually interposing to distract the mind and withdraw the attention,
I hope wall apologize for the delay, and plead my excuse for the
seeming, but not real neglect. I thank you most sincerely for your
polite notice of me in the elegant lines you inclosed and however
undeserving I may be of such encomium and panegyric, the style and
manner exhibit a striking proof of your poetical talents; in honor of
which, and as a tribute justly due to you, I would have published the
poem, had I not been apprehensive that, while I only meant to give the
world this new instance of your genius, I might have incurred the
imputation of vanity. This, and nothing else, determined me not to give
it a place in the public prints. If you should ever come to Cambridge,
or near head-quarters, I shall be happy to see a person so favored by
the Muses, and to whom nature has been so liberal and beneficent in her
dispensations. I am, with great respect, your obedient, humble servant,
Geo. Washington." *

* "I have not been able to find," says Mr. Sparks, "among Washington's
papers, the letter and poem addressed to him." Her lines "On the Heath
of Whitfield," "Farewell to America," and kindred pieces, exhibit
considerable poetic talent. The following is a specimen of her verse,
written before she was twenty years of age. It is extracted from a poem
on "Imagination"

"Though winter frowns, to fancy's raptured eyes The fields may flourish
and gay scenes arise; The frozen deeps may break their iron bands, And
bid their waters murmur o'er their sands; Fair Flora may resume her
fragrant reign, And with her flowery riches deck the plain; Sylvanus may
diffuse his honors round, And all the forests may with leaves be
crown'd; Showers may descend, and dews their gems disclose, And nectar
sparkle on the blooming rose."

* in 1773, when she was at the age of nineteen, a volume of her poems
was published in London, dedicated to the Countess of Huntingdon. They
give evidence of quite extensive reading and remarkable tenacity of
memory, many of them abounding with fine allusions to freedom, her
favorite theme. After the death of her master, in 1776, she married a
man of her own color, but who was greatly her inferior. His name was
Peters. She died in Boston, in extreme poverty, on the 5th of December,
1781, aged nearly thirty-one years.

The "Riedesel House."--Description of the Place by the Baroness
Riedesel.--Attestation of the genuineness of Phillis's Poetry.

557A few rods above the residence of Professor Longfellow is the house
in which the Brunswick general, the Baron Riedesel, and his family were
quartered, during the stay of the captive army of Burgoyne in the
vicinity of Boston. I was not aware, when I visited Cambridge, that the
old mansion was still in existence; but, through the kindness of Mr.
Longfellow, I am able to present the features of its southern front,
with a description.

In style it is very much like that of Washington's head-quarters, and
the general appearance of the grounds around is similar. It is shaded by
noble linden-trees, and adorned with shrubbery, presenting to the eye
all the attractions noticed by the Baroness of Riedesel in her charming
Letters. ** Upon a window-pane on the west side of the house

* This is from a pencil sketch by Mr. Longfellow. I am also indebted to
him for the fae-simile of the autograph of the Baroness of Riedesel. It
will be perceived that the i is placed before the e in spelling the
name. I have heretofore given it with the e first, which is according to
the orthography in Burgoyne's State of the Expedition, &c., wherein I
supposed it was spelled correctly. This autograph shows it to be
erroneous. Mr. Longfellow's beautiful poem, "The Open Window," refers to
this mansion.

** She thus writes respecting her removal from a peasant's house on
Winter Hill to Cambridge, and her residence there: "We passed three
weeks in this place, and were then transferred to Cambridge, where we
were lodged in one of the best houses of the place, which belonged to
Royalists. Seven families, who were connected by relationship, or lived
in great intimacy, had here farms, gardens, and splendid mansions, and
not far off orchards, and the buildings were at a quarter of a mile
distant from each other. The owners had been in the habit of assembling
every afternoon in one or another of these houses, and of diverting
themselves with music or dancing, and lived in affluence, in good humor,
and without care, until this unfortunate war at once dispersed them, and
transformed all their houses into solitary abodes, except two, the
proprietors of which were also soon obliged to make their escape. "On
the 3d of June, 1778, I gave a ball and supper, in celebration of my
husband's birth-day. I had invited all our generals and officers, and
Mr. and Mrs. Carter. General Burgoyne sent us an apology, after he had
made us wait for him till eight o'clock. He had always some excuse for
not visiting us, until he was about departing for England, when he came
and made me many apologies, to which I made no other reply than that I
should be extremely sorry if he had put himself to any inconvenience for
our sake. The dance lasted long, and we had an excellent supper, to
which more than eighty persons sat down. Our yard and garden were
illuminated. The king's birth-day falling on the next day, it was
resolved that the company should not separate before his majesty's
health was drank; which was done, with feelings of the liveliest
attachment to his person and interests. Never, I believe, was 'God Save
the King' sung with more enthusiasm, or with feelings more sincere. Our
two eldest girls were brought into the room to sec the illumination. We
were all deeply moved, and proud to have the courage to display such
sentiments in the midst of our enemies. Even Mr. Carter* could not
forbear participating in our enthusiasm."--Letters and Memoirs relating
to the War of American Independence, and the Capture of the German
Troops at Saratoga: By Madame De Riedesel.

* The following curious attestation of the genuineness of the poems of
Phillis is printed in the preface to the volume. Many of the names will
be recognized as prominent in the Revolution. .

** "To the Public.--As it has been repeatedly suggested to the
publisher, by persons who have seen the manuscript, that numbers would
be ready to suspect they were not really the writings of Phillis, he has
procured the following attestation from the most respectable characters
in Boston, that none might have the least ground for disputing their
original: 'We, whose names are underwritten, do assure the world that
the poems specified in the following page were (as we verily believe)
written by Phillis, a young negro girl, who was, but a few years since,
brought an uncultivated barbarian from Africa, and has ever since been,
and now is, under the disadvantage of serving as a slave in a family in
this town. She has been examined by some of the best judges, and is
thought qualified to write them.

"'The Hon. Thomas Hubbard, The Hon. John Irving, The Hon. James Pitts,
The Hon. Harrison Gray, The Hon. James Bowdoin, John Hancock, Esq.,
Joseph Green, Esq., Richard Carey, Esq., His Excellency Thomas
Hutchinson, Governor The Hon. Andrew Oliver, Lieut. Governor The Rev.
Charles Chauncey, D.D., The Rev. Mather Byles, D.D., The Rev. Edward
Pemberton, D.D., The Rev. Andrew Eliot, D.D., The Rev. Samuel Cooper,
D.D., The Rev. Mr. Samuel Mather, The Rev. Mr. John Moorhead, Mr. John
Wheatley (her master!.'"

Autograph of Riedcsel.--The "Washington Elm."--Bunker Hill Monument.--
Desecration of the Spot

558may be seen the undoubted autograph of the accomplished general,
inscribed with a diamond point. It is an interesting memento, and is
preserved with great care. The annexed is a fac simile of it.

During the first moments of the soft evening twilight I sketched the
"Washington elm," one of the ancient _anakim_ of the primeval forest,
older, probably, by a half century or more, than the welcome of Samoset
to the white settlers. It stands upon Washington Street, near the
westerly corner of the Common, and is distinguished by the circumstance
that, beneath its broad shadow, General Washington first drew his sword
as commander-in-chief of the Continental army. (a) * Thin lines of
clouds, glowing in the light of the setting sun a July 3, 1775 like bars
of gold, streaked the western sky, and so prolonged the 1775-twilight by
reflection, that I had ample time to finish my drawing before the night
shadows dimmed the paper.

Early on the following morning I procured a chaise to visit Charlestown
and Dorchester Heights. I rode first to the former place, and climbed to
the summit of the great obelisk that stands upon the site of the redoubt
upon Breed's Hill. As I ascended the steps which lead from the street to
the smooth gravel-walks upon the eminence whereon the "Bunker Hill
Monument" stands, I experienced a feeling of disappointment and regret,
not easily to be expressed. Before me was the great memento, huge and
grand--all that patriotic reverence could wish--but the ditch scooped
out by Prescott's toilers on that starry night in June, and the mounds
that were upheaved to protect them from the shots of the astonished
Britons, were effaced, and no more vestiges remain of the handiwork of
those in whose honor and to whose memory this obelisk was raised, than
of Roman conquests in the shad ow of Trajan's Column--of the naval
battles of Nelson around his monument in Trafalgar Square, or of French
victories in the Place Vendôme. The fosse and the breast-works were all
quite prominent when the foundation stone of the monument was laid,

* This important event is recorded on page 564, where a picture of the
tree is given.

** This monument stands in the center of the grounds included within the
breast-works of the old redoubt on Breed's Hill. Its sides are precisely
parallel with those of the redoubt. It is built of Quincy granite, and
is two hundred and twenty-one feet in height. The foundation is composed
of six courses of stones, and extends twelve feet below the surface of
the ground and base of the shaft. The four sides of the foundation
extend about fifty feet horizontally. There are in the whole pile ninety
courses of stone, six of them below the surface of the ground, and
eighty-four above. The foundation is laid in lime mortar; the other
parts of the structure in lime mortar mixed with cinders, iron filings,
and Springfield hydraulic cement. The base of the obelisk is thirty feet
square; at the spring of the apex, fifteen feet. Inside of the shaft is
a round, hollow cone, the outside diameter of which, at the bottom, is
ten feet, and at the top, six feet. Around this inner shaft winds a
spiral flight of stone steps, two hundred and ninety-five in number. In
both the cone and shaft are numerous little apertures for the purposes
of ventilation and light. The observatory or chamber at the top of the
monument is seventeen feet in height and eleven feet in diameter. It has
four windows, one on each side, which are provided with iron shutters.
The cap-piece of the apex is a single stone, three feet six inches in
thickness and four feet square at its base. It weighs two and a half
tons. Almost fifty years had elapsed from the time of the battle before
a movement was made to erect a commemorative monument on Breed's Hill.
An association for the purpose was founded in 1824; and to give eclat to
the transaction, and to excite enthusiasm in favor of the work, General
La Fayette, then "the nation's guest," was invited to lay the corner-
stone. Accordingly, on the 17th of June, 1825, the fiftieth anniversary
of the battle, that revered patriot performed the interesting ceremony,
and the Honorable Daniel Webster pronounced an oration on the occasion,
in the midst of an immense concourse of people. Forty-survivors of the
battle were present; and on no occasion did La Fayette meet so many of
his fellow-soldiers in our Revolution as at that time. The plan of the
monument was not then decided upon; but one by Solomon Willard, of
Boston, having been approved, the present structure was commenced, in
1827, by James Savage, of the same city. In the course of a little more
than a year, the work was suspended on account of a want of funds, about
fifty-six thousand dollars having then been collected and expended. The
work was resumed in 1834, and again suspended, within a year, for the
same cause, about twenty thousand dollars more having been expended. In
1840, the ladies moved in the matter. A fair was announced to be held in
Boston, and every female in the United States was invited to contribute
some production of her own hands to the exhibition. The fair was held at
Faneuil Hall in September, 1840. The proceeds amounted to sufficient, in
connection with some private donations, to complete the structure, and
within a few weeks subsequently, a contract was made with Mr. Savage to
finish it for forty-three thousand dollars. The last stone of the apex
was raised at about six o'clock on the morning of the 23d of July, 1842.
Edward Carnes, Jr., of Charlestown, accompanied its ascent, waving the
American flag as he went up, while the interesting event was announced
to the surrounding country by the roar of cannon. On the 17th of June,
1843, the monument was dedicated, on which occasion the Honorable Daniel
Webster was again the orator, and vast was the audience of citizens and
military assembled there. The President of the United States (Mr.
Tyler), and his whole cabinet, were present. In the top of the monument
are two cannons, named, respectively', "Hancock" and "Adams," which
formerly belonged to the Ancient and Honorable Artillery Company. The
"Adams" was burst by them in firing a salute. The following is the
inscription upon the two guns:

"SACRED TO LIBERTY.

* "This is one of four cannons which constituted the whole train of
field-artillery possessed by the British colonies of North America at
the commencement of the war, on the 19th of April, 1775. This cannon and
its fellow, belonging to a number of citizens of Boston, were used in
many engagements during the war. The other two, the property of the
government of Massachusetts, were taken by the enemy "By order of the
United States in Congress assembled, May 19th, 1788."

* Mr. Carter was the son-in-law of General Schuyler. Remembering the
kindness which she had received from that gentleman while in Albany, the
baroness sought out Mr. and Mra. Carter (who were living in Boston) on
her arrival at Cambridge. "Mrs. Carter," ahe says, "resembled her
parents in mildness and goodness of heart, but her husband was
revengeful and false." The patriotic zeal of Mr. Carter had given rise
to foolish stories respecting him. "They seemed to feel much friendship
for us,' says Madame De Riedcsel; * though, at the same time, this
wicked Mr. Carter, in consequence of General Howe's having burned
several villages and small towns, suggested to his countrymen to cut off
our generals' heads, to pickle them, and to put them in small barrels,
and, as often as the English should again burn a village, to send them
one of these barrels; but that cruelty cwas not adopted."

Description of Bunker Hill Monument.--View from its Chamber. Its
Construction and Dedication.--"Hancock" and "Adams."

559and a little care, directed by good taste, might have preserved them
in their interesting state of half ruin until the passage of the present
century, or, at least, until the sublime centenary of the battle should
be celebrated. Could the visitor look upon the works of the patriots
themselves, associations a hundred-fold more interesting would crowd the
mind, for wonderfully suggestive of thought are the slightest relics of
the past when linked with noble deeds. A soft green-sward, as even as
the rind of a fair apple, and cut by eight straight gravel-walks,
diverging from the monument, is substituted by art for the venerated
irregularities made by the old mattock and spade. The spot is beautiful
to the eye untrained by appreciating affection for hallowed things;
nevertheless, there is palpable desecration that may hardly be forgiven.

The view from the top of the monument, for extent, variety, and beauty,
is certainly one of the finest in the world. A "York shilling" is
charged for the privilege of ascending the monument. The view from its
summit is "a shilling show" worth a thousand miles of travel to see.
Boston, its harbor, and the beautiful country around, mottled with
villages, are spread out like a vast painting, and on every side the eye
may rest upon localities of great historical interest. Cambridge,
Roxbury, Chelsea, Quincy, Medford, Marblehead, Dorchester, and other
places, where

View from Bunker Hill Monument.--The Past and the Present.--Dorchester
Heights.--Condition of the Fortifications

560

"The old Continentals,

In their ragged regimentals,

Falter'd not,"

and the numerous sites of small fortifications which the student of
history can readily call to mind. In the far distance, on the northwest,
rise the higher peaks of the White Mountains of New Hampshire; and on
the northeast, the peninsula of Nahant, and the more remote Cape Anne
may be seen. Wonders which present science and enterprise are developing
and forming are there exhibited in profusion. At one glance from this
lofty observatory may be seen seven rail-roads, * and many other avenues
connecting the city with the country; and ships from almost every region
of the globe dot the waters of the harbor. Could a tenant of the old
grave-yard on Copp's Hill, who lived a hundred years ago, when the
village upon Tri-mountain was fitting out its little armed flotillas
against the French in Acadia, or sending forth its few vessels of trade
along the neighboring coasts, or occasionally to cross the Atlantic,
come forth and stand beside us a moment, what a new and wonderful world
would be presented to his vision! A hundred years ago!

"Who peopled all the city streets

A hundred years ago?

Who fill'd the church with faces meek

A hundred years ago?"

They were men wise in their generation, but ignorant in practical
knowledge when compared with the present. In their wildest dreams,
incited by tales of wonder that spiced the literature of their times,
they never fancied any thing half so wonderful as our mighty dray horse,

"The black steam-engine! steed of iron power--

The wond'rous steed of the Arabian talc,

Launch'd on its course by pressure of a touch--

The war-horse of the Bible, with its neck

Grim, clothed with thunder, swallowing the way

In fierceness of its speed, and shouting out,

' Ha! ha!' ** A little water, and a grasp

Of wood, sufficient for its nerves of steel,

Shooting away, 'Ha! ha!' it shouts, as on

It gallops, dragging in its tireless path

Its load of fire."

Street.

I lingered in the chamber of the Bunker Hill monument as long as time
would allow, and descending, rode back to the city, crossed to South
Boston, and rambled for an hour among the remains of the fortifications
upon the heights of the peninsula of Dorchester. The present prominent
remains of fortifications are those of intrenchments cast up during the
war of 1812, and have no other connection with our subject than the
circumstance that they occupy the site of the works constructed there by
order of Washington. These were greatly reduced in altitude when the
engineers began the erection of the forts now in ruins, which are
properly preserved with a great deal of care. They occupy the summits of
two hills, which command Boston Neck on the left, the city of Boston in
front, and the harbor on the right. Southeast from the heights,
pleasantly situated among gentle hills, is the village of Dorchester, so
called in memory of a place in England of the same name, whence many of
its earliest settlers came. The stirring events which rendered
Dorchester Heights famous will be noticed presently.

I returned to Boston at about one o'clock, and passed the remainder of
the day in visiting places of interest within the city--the old South
meeting-house, Faneuil Hall, the Province House, and the Hancock House,
all delineated and described in preceding pages. I am

* When I visited Boston, in 1848, it was estimated that two hundred and
thirty trains of cars went daily over the roads to and from Boston, and
that more than six millions of passengers were conveyed in them during
the preceding year.

** Job, xxxix., 24, 25.

Mementos of John Hancock--The State House.--Chantrey's Washington.--
Copp's Hill.--The Mather Tomb

561indebted to John Hancock, Esq., nephew of the patriot, and present
proprietor and occupant of the "Hancock House," on Beacon Street, for
polite attentions while visiting his interesting mansion, and for
information concerning matters that have passed under the eye of his
experience of threescore years.

He has many mementoes of his eminent kinsman, and among them a
beautifully-executed miniature of him, painted in London, in 1761, while
he was there at the coronation of George III. He also owns the original
portrait of Governor Hancock, of which the engraving on page 515 is a
copy.

Near Mr. Hancock's residence is the State House, a noble structure upon
Beacon Hill, the corner-stone of which was laid in 1795, by Governor
Samuel Adams, assisted by Paul Revere, master of the Masonic grand
lodge. There I sketched the annexed picture of the colossal statue of
Washington, by Chantrey, which stands in the open center of the first
story; also the group of trophies from Bennington, that hang over the
door of the Senate chamber. * Under these trophies, in a gilt frame, is
a copy of the reply of the Massachusetts Assembly to General Stark's
letter, that accompanied the presentation of the trophies. It was
written fifty years ago.

After enjoying the view from the top of the State House a while, I
walked to Copp's Hill, a little east of Charlestown Bridge, at the north
end of the town, where I tarried until sunset in the ancient burying-
ground. The earliest name of this eminence was Snow Hill. It was
subsequently named after its owner, William Copp.3 It came into the
possession of the Ancient and

Honorable Artillery Company by mortgage, and when, in 1775, they were
forbidden by Gage to parade on the Common, they went to this, their own
ground, and drilled in defiance of his threats. The fort, or battery,
that was built there by the British, just before the battle of Bunker
Hill, stood near its southeast brow, adjoining the burying-ground. The
remains of many eminent men repose in that little cemetery. Close by the
entrance is the vault of the Mather family. It is covered by a plain,
oblong structure of brick, three feet high and about six feet long, upon
which is laid a heavy brown stone slab, with a tablet of slate, bearing
the names of the principal tenants below. *** Oct 7, I passed the
forenoon of the next day in the ms. rooms of the Massachusetts
Historical Society, where every facility was afforded me by Mr. Felt,
the librarian, for examining the assemblage of things curious collected
there. (v) The printed books and manuscripts, relating principally to
American his-

* See map on page 395.

** This is a picture of Chantrey's statue, which is made of Italian
marble, and cost fifteen thousand dollars.

*** On some of the old maps of Boston it is called Corpse Hill, the name
supposed to have been derived from the circumstance of a burying-ground
being there.

****The following is the inscription upon the slate tablet: "The
Reverend Doctors Increase, Cotton, and Samuel Mather were interred in
this vault.

"Increase died August 27, 1723, Æ. 84. Cotton "Feb. 13, 1727," 65.
Samuel "Jan. 27, 1785," 79." *

(v) This society was incorporated in February, 1794. The avowed object
of its organization is to collect, preserve, and communicate materials
for a complete history of this country, and an account of all valuable
efforts of human industry and ingenuity from the beginning of its
settlement. Between twenty and thirty octavo volumes of its
"Collections" have been published.

*The library of Dr. Samuel Mather was burned at Charlestown, when it was
destroyed by the British in 1775.

Collections of the Massachusetts Historical Society.--Colonial and other
Relics.--Departure from Boston.

562tory, are numerous, rare, and valuable. There is also a rich
depository of the autographs of the Pilgrim fathers and their immediate
descendants.

There are no less than twenty-five large folio volumes of valuable
manuscript letters and other documents; besides which are six thick
quarto manuscript volumes--a commentary on the holy Scriptures--in the
hand-writing of Cotton Mather. From an autograph letter of that singular
man the annexed fac-simile of his writing and signature is given.

Among the portraits in the cabinet of the society are those of Governor
Winslow, supposed to have been painted by Vandyke, Increase Mather, and
Peter Faneuil, the founder of Faneuil Hall.

I had the pleasure of meeting, at the rooms of the society, that
indefatigable antiquary, Dr. Webb, widely known as the American
correspondent of the "Danish Society of Northern Antiquarians" at
Copenhagen. He was sitting in the chair that once belonged to Governor
Winslow, writing upon the desk of the speaker of the colonial Assembly
of Massachusetts, around which the warm debates were carried on
concerning American liberty, from the time when James Otis denounced the
Writs of Assistance, until Governor Gage adjourned the Assembly to
Salem, in 1774.

Hallowed by such associations, the desk is an interesting relic. Dr.
Webb's familiarity with the collections of the society, and his kind
attentions, greatly facilitated my search among the six thousand
articles for things curious connected with my subject, and made my brief
visit far more profitable to myself than it would otherwise have been.
Among the relics preserved are the chair that belonged to Governor
Carver, very similar in its appearance to the ancient one delineated on
page 438; the sword of Miles Standish; the huge key of Port Royal gate;
a samp-pan, that belonged to Metacomet, or King Philip; and the sword
reputed to have been used by Captain Church when he cut off that
unfortunate sachem's head.

The dish is about twelve inches in diameter, wrought out of an elm knot
with great skill. The sword is very rude, and was doubtless made by a
blacksmith of the colony. The handle is a roughly-wrought piece of ash,
and the guard is made of a wrought-iron plate. The circumstances
connected with the death of Philip will be noticed hereafter.

I lingered in the rooms of the society, copying and sketching, with busy
hands, until after one o'clock. An urgent call beckoning me homeward, I
departed in the cars for Norwich and New-London between two and three
o'clock in the afternoon, regretting that my tarry in the city of the
Pilgrims was necessarily so brief, and that I was obliged to forego the
pleasures of a visit to the neighboring villages, all of which are
associated with events of the Revolution. Before departure let us revert
to the history of Boston subsequent to the battle of Bunker Hill. That
event was but the beginning of the stirring scenes of the siege, which
terminated in success for the Americans. *

* This desk is made of ash. The semicircular front is about three feet
in diameter The chair, which belonged to Governor Winslow, is of English
oak. It was made in 1614.

Appointment of a Commander-in-chief of the Continental Army.--
Washington's acceptance of the Office.--His Modesty.

563On the 15th of June, 1775, two days before the Bunker Hill battle,
the Continental Congress, in session in Philadelphia, resolved "That a
general be appointed to command all the Continental forces, raised or to
be raised for the defense of American liberty also, "That five hundred
dollars per month be allowed for the pay and expenses of the general." *
The most difficult question then to be decided was the choice of the man
for the responsible office. Military men of much experience were then in
the field at the head of the army be-leaguring Boston, and by the common
consent of the New England colonies General Artemus Ward was the
commander-in-ehief. It was conceded that he did not possess all the
requisites of a skillful and judicious commander, so essential for the
service; yet, it being doubtful how the New England people, and
particularly the soldiery, would relish the supercession of General Ward
by another, Congress was embarrassed respecting a choice. The apparent
difficulty was soon overcome by the management of the New England
delegation. The subject of the appointment had been informally discussed
two or three days before, and John Adams had proposed the adoption of
the provincial troops at Boston as a Continental Army. At the conclusion
of his remarks, he expressed his intention to propose a member from
Virginia for the office of generalissimo. All present understood the
person alluded to to be Colonel George Washington, whose commanding
military talents, as displayed in the service of Virginia, and his
capacity as a statesman, as exhibited in the Congress of 1774, had made
him exceedingly popular throughout the land. Acting upon this
suggestion, Thomas Johnson, a delegate from Maryland, nominated Colonel
Washington, and by a unanimous vote he was elected commander-in-chief.
On the opening of the session on the following morning, President
Hancock communicated to Washington, July 17, 1775 officially, a notice
of his appointment. He rose in his place, and signified his acceptance
in a brief and truly patriotic reply. ** Richard Henry Lee, Edward
Rutledge, and John Adams were appointed a committee to draught a
commission and instructions for the general; these were given to him
four days afterward. *** Four major generals, eight brig-

* Journals of Congress, i., Ill, 112.

** The following is a copy of his reply: "Mr. President,--Though I am
truly sensible of the high honor done me in this appointment, yet I feel
great distress, from a consciousness that my abilities and military
experience may not be equal to the extensive and important trust.
However, as the Congress desire it, I will enter upon the momentous
duty, and exert every power I possess in their service, and for the
support of the glorious cause. I beg they will accept my most cordial
thanks for this distinguished testimony of their approbation. But, lest
some unlucky event should happen unfavorable to my reputation, I beg it
may be remembered, by every gentleman in this room, that I this day
declare, with the utmost sincerity, I do not think myself equal to the
command I am honored with. As to pay, sir, I beg leave to assure the
Congress that, as no pecuniary consideration could have tempted me to
accept the arduous employment at the expense of my domestic ease and
happiness, I do not wish to make any profit from it. I will keep an
exact account of my expenses. Those, I doubt not, they will discharge,
and that is all I desire." His expressions of distrust in his own
ability to perform the duties imposed by the acceptance of the
appointment were heartfelt and sincere. In a letter to his wife, dated
the day after his appointment, he said, "You may believe me, my dear
Patsy [the familiar name of Martha], when I assure you, in the most
solemn manner, that, so far from seeking the appointment, I have used
every endeavor in my power to avoid it, not only from my unwillingness
to part with you and the family, but from a consciousness of its being a
trust too great for my capacity; and that I should enjoy more real
happiness in one month with you at home than I have the most distant
prospect of finding abroad, if my stay were to be seven times seven
years." Washington was at this time forty-three years of age.

*** His commission was in the following words: "To George Washington,
Esq.--We, reposing special trust and confidence in your patriotism,
valor, conduct, and fidelity, do, by these presents, constitute and
appoint you to be general and commander-inchief of the army of the
United Colonies, and of all the forces now raised, or to be raised by
them, and of all others who shall voluntarily offer their services, and
join the said army for the defense of American liberty, and for
repelling every hostile invasion thereof; and you are hereby vested with
full power and authority to act as you shall think for the good and
welfare of the service. And we do hereby strictly charge and require all
officers and soldiers under your command to be obedient to your orders,
and diligent in the exercise of their several duties. And we do also
enjoin and require you to be careful in executing the great trust
reposed in you, by causing strict discipline and order to bo observed in
the army, and that the soldiers be duly exercised, and provided with all
convenient necessaries. And you are to regulate your conduct in every
respect by the rules and discipline of war (as here given you), and
punctually to observe and follow such orders and directions, from time
to time, as you shall receive from this or a future Congress of these
United Colonies, or committee of Congress. This commission is to
continue in force until revoked by this or a future Congress. Signed,
John Hancock, President." The original of this commission, with other
relics of the illustrious chief, is carefully preserved in a glass case,
in a room of the Patent Office building at Washington City.

Departure of Washington for the Camp.--Reception at New York, Watertown,
and Cambridge.--Takes Command of the Army

1775

564adiers, and one adjutant general were appointed, * and the pay of the
several officers was agreed upon. **

Washington left Philadelphia for the camp at Cambridge on the 21st of
June, where he arrived on the 2d of July. He was every where greeted
with enthusiasm by crowds of people, and public bodies extended to him
all the deference due to his exalted rank. He arrived at New York on the
25th, escorted by a company of light horse from Philadelphia. Governor
Tryon arrived from England on the same day, and the same escort received
both the distinguished men. There Washington first heard of the battle
of Bunker Hill. He held a brief conference with General Schuyler, and
gave that officer directions concerning his future operations. Toward
evening, on the 26th, he left New York, under the escort of several
military companies, passed the night at Kingsbridge, at the upper end of
Manhattan or York Island, and the next morning, bidding adieu to the
Philadelphia light horse, pressed on toward Boston. He reached Watertown
on the morning of the 2d of July. The Provincial Congress of
Massachusetts, presided over by James Warren, was in session, and voted
him a congratulatory address. Major-general Lee, who accompanied him,
also received an address from that body. They arrived at Cambridge at
two o'clock in the afternoon, and Washington! established his head-
quarters at the house prepared for him, delineated on page 555.

On the morning of the 3d of July, at about nine o'clock, the troops at
Cambridge were drawn up in order upon the Common to receive the
commander-in-chief. Accompanied by the general officers of the army who
were present, Washington walked from his quarters to the great elm-tree
that now stands at the north end of the Common, and, under the shadow of
its broad covering, stepped a few paces in front, made some remarks,
drew his sword, and formally took command of the Continental army.

That was an auspicious act for America; and the love and reverence which
all felt for him on that occasion never waned during the eight long
years of the conflict. When he resigned that commission into the hands
of Congress at Annapolis, not a blot was visible upon the fair
escutcheon of his character; like Samuel, he could boldly "testify his
integrity" **** in all things.

* The names of these several officers are contained in a note on page
190.

** The pay of the several officers was as follows, per month: major
general, $166, and when acting in a separate department, $330; brigadier
general, $125; adjutant general, $125; commissary general, $80 quarter-
master general, $80; his deputy, $40; paymaster general, $100; his
deputy, $50; chief engineer, $60; three aids-de-camp for the general,
each, $33; his secretary, $66; commissary of the musters, $40.

*** The house seen in this sketch is one of the oldest in Cambridge,
having been built about 1750. I has been in the possession of the Moore
family about seventy-five years. Since I visited Cambridge I have been
informed that a Mrs. Moore was still living there, who, from the window
of that house, saw the ceremony of Washington taking command of the
army.

**** 1 Samuel, xii., 3

Council of War.--Character of the Army.--Punishments.--Riflemen. Number
of Troops in the Field.--A model Order.

565Washington called a council of war on the 9th. It was composed of the
major July 1775 generals and the brigadiers, and the object of the
council was to consult upon future operations. The eommander-in-chief
found himself at the head of an army composed of a mixed multitude of
men of every sort, from the honest and intelligent citizen, possessed of
property and station, to the ignorant knave, having nothing to lose, and
consequently every thing to gain. Organization had been effected in a
very slight degree, and thorough discipline was altogether unknown.
Intoxication, peculation, falsehood, disobedience, and disrespect were
prevalent, and the punishments which had been resorted to were quite
ineffectual to produce reform. * It was estimated by the Council that,
from the best information which could be obtained, the forces of the
enemy consisted of eleven thousand five hundred effective men, while the
Americans had only about fourteen thousand fit for duty. ** It was
unanimously decided by the Council to maintain the siege by
strengthening the posts around Boston, then held by the Americans, by
fortifications and recruits. It was also agreed that, if the troops
should be attacked and routed by the enemy, the places of rendezvous
should be Wales's Hill, in the rear of the Roxbury lines; and also that,
at the present, it was "inexpedient to fortify Dorchester Point, or to
oppose the enemy if he should attempt to take possession of it."

Some riflemen from Maryland, Virginia, and Western Pennsylvania,
enlisted under the orders of Congress, and led by Daniel Morgan, a man
of powerful frame and sterling courage, soon joined the camp. *** Upon
their breasts they wore the motto "Liberty or Death." A large proportion
of them were Irishmen, and were not very agreeable to the New
Englanders. Otho Williams, afterward greatly distinguished, was
lieutenant of one of the Maryland companies. Both these men rose to the
rank of brigadier.

The first care of the commander-in-chief was to organize the army. ****
He arranged it into three grand divisions, each division consisting of
two brigades, or twelve regiments, in

* These punishments consisted in pecuniary fines, standing in the
pillory, confinement in stocks, riding a wooden horse, whipping, and
drumming out of the regiment.

** The following return of the army was made to Adjutant-general Gates
on the 19th of July:

*** These men attracted much attention, and on account of their sure and
deadly aim, they became a terror to the British. Wonderful stories of
their exploits went to England, and one of the riflemen, who was carried
there a prisoner, was gazed at as a great curiosity.

**** The following general order was issued on the 4th of July, the day
after Washington took command of the army: "The Continental Congress
having now taken all the troops of the several colonies, which have been
raised, or which may be hereafter raised for the support and defense of
the liberties of America, into their pay and service, they are now the
troops of the United Provinces of North America; and it is hoped that
all distinction of colonies will be laid aside, so that one and the same
spirit may animate the whole, and the only contest be, who shall render,
on this great and trying occasion, the most essential service to the
great and common cause in which we are all engaged. It is required and
expected that exact discipline be observed, and due subordination
prevail through the whole army, as a failure in these most essential
points must necessarily produce extreme hazard, disorder, and confusion,
and end in shameful disappointment and disgrace. The general most
earnestly requires and expects a due observance of those articles of
war, established for the government of the army, which forbid profane
cursing, swearing, and drunkenness; and in like manner, he requires and
expects of all officers and soldiers, not engaged on actual duty, a
punctual attendance on divine service, to implore the blessings of
Heaven upon the means used for our safety and defense." This brief order
may be regarded as a model. In a few words, it evokes harmony, order,
the exercise of patriotism, morality, sobriety, and an humble reverence
for and reliance upon Divine Providence. It includes all the essential
elements of good government. These principles were the moral bonds of
union that kept the little Continental army together during the dreary
years of its struggle for the mastery.

Arrangement of the Army.--Location of the several Divisions.--Officers
of the same.--General Joseph Spencer.

566which the troops from the same colony, as far as practicable, were
brought together. The right wing, under Major-general Ward, consisted of
two brigades, commanded by Generals Thomas and Spencer, * and was
stationed at Roxbury and its southern dependencies. The left wing was
placed under the command of General Lee, and consisted of the brigades
of Sullivan and Greene.

The former was stationed upon Winter Hill; the latter upon Prospect
Hill. The center, stationed at Cambridge, was commanded by General
Putnam, and consisted of two brigades, one of which was commanded by
Heath, and the other by a senior officer, of less rank than that of
brigadier. Thomas Mifflin, who accompanied Washington from Philadelphia
as aid-de-camp, was made quarter-master general. Joseph Trum-

* Joseph Spencer served as a major and eolonel during the Seven Years'
War. He was a native of East Haddam, in Connecticut, where he was born
in 1714. He was with the Continental army in the expedition against
Rhode Island, in 1778, and assisted in Sullivan's retreat. He soon
afterward resigned his commission, and left the army, when he was chosen
to be a delegate in Congress from his native state. He died at East
Haddam in January, 1789, aged seventy-five years. General Seth Pomeroy,
who was appointed with Speneer and others, refused to serve, and Speneer
took rank next to Putnam in the army at Boston. This removed, in a
degree, the difficulty that was apprehended in settling the rank of some
of the officers. By this arrangement, General Thomas, who was Ward's
lieutenant general, was made the first brigadier.

Relative Position of the belligerent Armies.--American Fortifications.--
Emerson's Picture of the Camp.

567bull, a son of the patriot governor of Connecticut, was appointed
commissary general, and upon Joseph Reed, of Philadelphia, was bestowed
the post of secretary to the commander-in-chief. In the course of a few
months Reed returned to Philadelphia, and was succeeded in office by
Robert H. Harrison, a Maryland lawyer.

The relative position of the belligerent armies was, according to a
letter written by Washington to the President of Congress, on the 10th
of July, as follows: the British were strongly intrenched on Bunker
Hill, about half a mile from the chief place of action 1775 on the 17th
of June, with their sentries extending about one hundred and fifty yards
beyond the narrowest point of Charlestown Neck. Three British floating
batteries were in the Mystic River near Bunker Hill, and a twenty-gun
ship was anchored below the ferry-place between Boston and Charlestown.
They had a battery upon Copp's Hill in Boston, and the fortifications
upon the Neck, toward Roxbury, were strengthened. Until the 7th, the
British advance guards occupied Brown's Buildings, about a mile from
Roxbury meetinghouse. On that day a party from General Thomas's camp
surprised the guard, drove them in, and burned the houses. The bulk of
the army, commanded by General Howe, lay upon Bunker Hill; and the light
horse, and a corps of Tories, remained in Boston.

The Americans had thrown up intrenchments on Winter and Prospect Hills,
in full view of the British camp, which was only a mile distant. Strong
works were also thrown up at Roxbury, two hundred yards above the
meeting-house. Strong lines were made across from the Charlestown Road
to the Mystic River, and by connecting redoubts, there was a complete
line of defense from that river to Roxbury. *

A letter written by the Reverend William Emerson, a chaplain in the
army, a few days after Washington's arrival, gives the following life-
like picture of the camp: "New lords, new laws. The generals, Washington
and Lee, are upon the lines every day. New orders from his excellency
are read to the respective regiments every morning after prayers. The
strictest government is taking place, and great distinction is made
between officers and soldiers. Every one is made to know his place, and
keep in it, or to be tied up and receive thirty or forty lashes,
according to his crime. Thousands are at work every day from four till
eleven o'clock in the morning. It is surprising how much work has been
done. The lines are extended almost from Cambridge to the Mystic River;
so that very soon it will be morally impossible for the enemy to get
between the works, except in one place, which is supposed to be left
purposely unfortified, to entice the enemy out of their fortresses. Who
would have thought, twelve months past, that all Cambridge and
Charlestown would be covered over with American camps, and cut up into
forts and intrenchments, and all the lands, fields, and orchards laid
common--horses and cattle feeding in the choicest mowing land, whole
fields of corn eaten down to the ground, and large parks of well-
regulated locusts cut down for fire-wood and other public uses. This, I
must say, looks a little melancholy. My quarters are at the foot of the
famous Prospect Hill, where such preparations are made for the reception
of the enemy. It is very diverting to walk among the camps. They are as
different in their form as the owners are in their dress, and every tent
is a portraiture of the temper and taste of the persons who encamp in
it. Some are made of boards, and some of sail-cloth; some partly of one
and partly of the other. Again, others are made of stone or turf, brick
or brush. Some are thrown up in a hurry; others are curiously wrought
with doors and windows, done with wreaths and withes, in the manner of a
basket. Some are your proper tents and marquees, looking like the
regular camp of the enemy. In these are the Rhode Islanders, who are
furnished with tent equipage and every thing in the most exact English
style. However, I think this great variety rather a beauty than a
blemish in the army." **

"While Washington was organizing the Continental army, Congress was
active in the

* The reader will more clearly understand the relative position of the
hostile forces and their respective fortifications, by a careful
examination of the map on the preceding page. It shows the various works
thrown up during the summer and autumn of 1775, and at the beginning of
1776.

* Spark's Life and Writings of Washington (Appendix), iii., 491.

Action of Congress.--Treason of Dr. Church.--The New England Colonies.--
Franklin's Post-office Book.

568adoption of measures to strengthen his hands, and to organize civil
government. Acting upon the suggestion of the Provincial Congress of New
York, we have already observed June 23, 1775 (ante Page 316) that
Congress authorized the emission of bills of credit. Articles Of War
were agreed to on the 30th of June, and on the 6th of July a Declaration
was issued, setting forth the cause and necessity for taking up arms. A
firm but respectful petition to the king was drawn up by John Dickinson,
the author of "Letters of a Pennsylvania Farmer," &c., and adopted on
the 8th; and addresses to the inhabitants of Great Britain, Ireland,
Canada, and Jamaica, were adopted in the course of the month. The
Indians were not overlooked; it was important to secure their neutrality
at least; and three boards for Indian affairs were constituted: one for
the Six Nations and other northern tribes; a second for the Cherokees,
at the South; and a third for the intervening nations, on the borders of
Pennsylvania and Virginia. Already some Stockbridge Indians, from
Massachusetts, near the New-York line, the last remnant of the tribes of
Western New England, were in the camp at Boston; and Kirtland, the
missionary among the Six Nations of New York, was making overtures to
the Oneidas and the Mohawks. Congress also established a post-office
system of its own, extending in its operations from Falmouth (now
Portland, Maine) to Savannah, and westward to remote settlements. Dr.
Franklin was appointed post-master general. * An army hospital for the
accommodation of twenty thousand men was established. At its head was
placed Dr. Benjamin Church, of Boston, till this time a brave and
zealous compatriot of Warren and his associates. Soon after his
appointment he was detected in secret correspondence with Gage. He had
intrusted a letter, written in cipher, with his mistress, to be
forwarded to the British commander. It was found upon her; she was taken
to head-quarters, and there the contents of the letter were deciphered,
and the defection of Dr. Church established. He was found guilty, by a
court martial, of criminal correspondence with the enemy. Expulsion from
the House of Representatives of Massachusetts, and close confinement in
Norwich Jail, in Connecticut, by order of the general Congress, speedily
followed. His health failing, he was allowed to leave the country. He
sailed for the West Indies; but the vessel that bore him was never
afterward heard from. His place in the hospital was filled by Dr. John
Morgan, one of the founders of the Medical School in Philadelphia.
Church was the first traitor to the American cause.

The New England colonies, sustained by the presence of a strong army,
labored energetically in perfecting their civil governments. Connecticut
and Rhode Island, as we have observed, were always democratic, and
through the energy of Trumbull, the governor of the former, that colony
took an early, bold, and commanding stand for freedom. Nor was the
latter colony much behind her democratic colleague. Benning Wentworth,
governor of New Hampshire, having lost all political power, shut himself
up, for two months, in Fort William and Mary at Portsmouth, during which
time his house was pillaged by a mob. He prorogued the Assembly in July,
and then fled to Boston for safety. Massachusetts organized a House of
Representatives under the original charter; and as, according to the
provisions of that charter, the executive authority devolved upon the
Council in the absence of the governor and his lieutenant, that body,
chosen on the 21st of July, assumed such authority. Such continued to be
the government of the colony until the adoption of a state constitution
in 1780. A single executive committee was constituted, vested with all
the powers hitherto exercised by the several committees of
correspondence, inspection, and safety. This consolidation produced far
greater efficiency. Of the civil and military operations of other
colonies I shall write hereafter; for the present, let us view the
progress of events at Boston.

* In the General Post-office at Washington city I saw, several years
ago, the book in which Franklin kept his post-office accounts. It is a
common, half-bound folio, of three quires of coarse paper, and contained
all the entries for nearly two years. The first entry was November 17,
1776. Now more than fifteen hundred of the largest-sized ledgers are
required annually for the same purpose; the number of contractors and
other persons having accounts with the office being over thirty
thousand. There are about one hundred clerks employed in the department.

The belligerent Armies at Boston.--Skirmishes and other hostile
Movements.--Naval Operations on the Coast.--Navy Boards.

569During the remainder of the summer, and throughout the autumn, the
belligerents continually menaced each other, but neither appeared ready
for a general engagement. The British were awaiting re-enforcements, and
the Americans were too feeble in men, discipline, and munitions of war,
to make an assault with a prospect of success. Several skirmishes
occurred, and on two or three occasions a general battle was
apprehended.

The declaration of Congress, setting forth the causes and the necessity
for taking up arms, was read by President Langdon, * of Harvard, before
the army at Cambridge, on the 15th of July. On the 18th, it was read to
the division under General Thomas, at Roxbury, and also to the troops
under Putnam, upon Prospect Hill. At the close of the reading a cannon
was fired, three hearty cheers were given by the army, and the flag that
was presented to Putnam a few days before was unfurled. ** "The
Philistines on Bunker Hill," said the Essex Gazette, in its account of
the affair, "heard the shouts of the Israelites, and being very fearful,
paraded themselves in battle array." The 20th was observed as a day of
fasting by the whole army. On the 30th (Sunday), five hundred British
troops marched over Charlestown Neck, and built a slight breast-work; at
the same time a Brit ish floating battery was rowed up the Charles
River. Another party of troops sallied out toward Roxbury, drove in the
American sentinels, and set fire to a tavern. Frequent excursions were
made by both parties to the islands in the harbor, and skirmishes,
sometimes severe, were the consequences. These things kept the two
armies on the alert, and disciplined them in habits of vigilance.

British cruisers kept the New England coast, from Falmouth to New
London, in a state of continual alarm. They were out in every direction,
seeking plunder and endeavoring to supply the camp with fresh
provisions. Lieutenant Mowatt, commander of a British brig, made a
descent upon Gloucester, Cape Anne, and attempted to land. He was
repulsed, after he had thrown several bombs into the town without
serious effect. August 13. Stonington, in Connecticut, was bombarded for
a day; two men were killed, and September 30. the houses were much
shattered. In October, Mowatt was sent to Falmouth (now Portland, in
Maine), to obtain a supply of provisions from the inhabitants, and to
demand a surrender of their arms. They refused obedience, and boldly
defied him; whereupon, after giving time sufficient for the women and
children to leave the town, he bombarded and set it on fire. It
contained about five hundred buildings, and presently a large portion of
them were in flames. One hundred and thirty-nine houses, and two hundred
and seventy-eight stores and other buildings were destroyed; but the
resolute inhabitants October 7 maintained their ground, repulsed the
enemy, and prevented his landing. Bristol, on the east side of
Narragansett Bay, and other towns in the neighborhood, were visited in
like manner by the depredators. These wanton cruelties excited intense
indignation, and the American troops that environed Boston could hardly
be restrained from attacking the oppressors of their countrymen.

The Americans, as a countervailing measure, fitted out cruisers, and in
a short time each colony had a navy board. These privateers became very
formidable to the enemy, and the extent of British depredations along
the coast was greatly lessened. Washington sent out five or six armed
vessels to intercept supplies coming into the port of Boston, and some
important captures were made. Some of the American naval officers proved
very inefficient. Captain Manly, almost alone, at that time, sustained
the character of a bold and skillful commander, and he and his crew did
good service to the eause. They bravely maintained their position off
Boston Harbor, and in the course of a few weeks captured three valuable

* Reverend Samuel Langdon was a native of Boston, and graduated at
Harvard in 1740. He succeeded Mr. Locke as president of that
institution, in 1774. On account of a lack of urbanity, he was disliked
by the students, who made his situation so disagreeable that he resigned
the presidency in 1780. In 1781, at Hampton Fall, New Hampshire, he
resumed his ministerial labors, in which he continued faithful until his
death. This event occurred on the 29th of November, 1797, at the age of
seventy-four.

** This was the flag before alluded to, which bore on one side the motto
"An appeal to Heaven," and on the other "Qui transtulit, sustinet."

Capture of Ammunition.--Attempt to seize Manly.--Repulse of Linzee.--
Scarcity of Powder.--Expected Sortie.

570vessels, one of which was laden with heavy guns, mortars, and
intrenching tools--a valuable prize for the Americans at that time. Only
thirteen days before, Washington wrote to Congress, "I am in very great
want of powder, lead, mortars, indeed most sorts of military stores."
Captain Manly supplied him more promptly and bountifully than Congress
could do. The finest of the mortars was named Congress, and placed in
the artillery park at Cambridge.

Manly soon became a terror to the British, and the Falcon sloop-of-war,
Captain Linzee, was sent out to attempt to seize him. He was chased, in
company with a schooner, into Gloucester Harbor. The schooner was seized
by the enemy. Manly ran his brig ashore.

Linzee fired more than three hundred guns, and sent barges of armed men
to take the brig; but the crew and the neighboring militia behaved so
bravely that Linzee was repulsed, having lost nearly half his men.
Manly's vessel was got off without much damage, and was soon cruising
again beneath the pine-tree flag. *

1775 Early in August, Washington discovered that a great mistake had
been made in reporting to him the condition of the commissariat, in the
article of powder. "Our situation," he said, in a letter to Congress,
"in the article of powder, is much more alarming than I had the most
distant idea of."

"Instead of three hundred quarter-casks," wrote Reed, "we have but
thirty-two barrels."

Powder-mills were not yet in successful operation in the province, and
great uneasiness prevailed lest the enemy should become acquainted with
their poverty. Vessels were fitted out, on private account, to go to the
West Indies for a supply of powder. The Provincial Congress of
Massachusetts passed a law August 12prohibiting a waste of powder in
shooting birds or for sports of any kind, and every precaution was
adopted to husband the meager supply on hand.

Although Washington did not feel strong enough to make an assault upon
Boston, he was prepared to receive an attack from the enemy, and was
anxious for such an event. For weeks it had been rumored that the
British intended to make a sortie in full force; and, finally, the 25th
of August was designated as the day selected for the demonstration. It
was understood that Earl Percy was to have the command of Boston Neck,
where he expected to retrieve the honors which he lost in his retreat
from Lexington. In the mean while, the British were daily practicing the
maneuvers of embarking and debarking, and every movement indicated an
intention to make an effort to break up the circumvallating line of
provincials that hemmed them so closely in.

On Saturday night, the 26th of August, General Sullivan, with a fatigue
party of

1775 one thousand men, and a guard of two thousand four hundred,
marched, in imitation of the feat of Prescott's, to Plowed Hill (now
Mount Benedict), within point blank shot of

The Pine-tree Flag.2

* Bradford's History of Massachusetts, page 75.

** This engraving is a reduced copy of a vignette on a map of Boston,
published in Paris in 1776. The London Chronicle, an anti-ministerial
paper, in its issue for January, 1776, gives the following description
of the flag of an American cruiser that had been captured: "In the
Admiralty office is the flag of a provincial privateer. The field is
white bunting; on the middle is a green pine-tree, and upon the opposite
side is the motto, "Appeal to Heaven"

Fortifications on Plowed Hill.--Heavy Bombardment.--Condition of Troops
and People in Boston.

571the enemy's batteries on Bunker Hill, and before morning cast up such
intrenchments as afforded excellent protection against the cannons of
the British. Washington hoped this maneuver would bring on a general
action, and he rejoiced to hear the cannonade that opened upon the
American works in the morning, from Bunker Hill and a ship and two
floating batteries in the Mystic. More than three hundred shells were
thrown by the enemy on that occasion. * On account of the scarcity of
powder the cannonade was not returned. A nine pounder, planted on a
point at the Ten Hills Farm, played so effectually against the floating
batteries that one of them was sunk and the other silenced. The British
cannonade ceased at night. In the morning, troops were observed to be
drawn up on Bunker Hill, as if for marching. Washington now expected an
attack, and sent five thousand men to Plowed Hill ** and to the
Charlestown Road. It was a bold challenge for the enemy, but he
prudently refused to accept it. For several days he fired a few cannon
shots against the American works, but, perceiving them to be
ineffectual, he ceased all hostilities on the 10th of September. It was
about this time that the Continental army received seven hundred pounds
of powder from Rhode Island; "probably a part," says Gordon, "of what
had been brought from Africa." ***

The close investment of Boston by troops on land and privateers at sea
began to have a serious effect upon the officers, troops, and people in
the city. **** They had an abundance of salt provision, but, being
unaccustomed to such diet, many fell sick. Gage, doubtless, spoke in
sentiment, if not in words, as Freneau wrote:

"Three weeks, ye gods! nay, three long years it seems

Since roast beef I have touched, except in dreams.

In sleep, choice dishes to my view repair;

Waking, I gape, and champ the empty air.

Say, is it just that I, who rule these bands,

Should live on husks, like rakes in foreign lands?

Come, let us plan some project ere we sleep,

And drink destruction to the rebel sheep.

On neighboring isles uncounted cattle stray;

Fat beeves and swine--an ill-defended prey--

These are fit 'visions for my noonday dish;

These, if my soldiers act as I could wish,

In one short week would glad your maws and mine;

On mutton we will sup--on roast beef dine."

Midnight Musings; or, a Trip to Boston, 1775.

In daily apprehension of an attack from the provincials, and the chances
for escape hourly diminishing, they experienced all the despondency of a
doomed people. Gage was convinced that the first blow against American
freedom had been struck in the wrong place, and that the position of his
troops was wholly untenable. He had been re-enforced since the battle of
Bunker Hill, but the new-comers were a burden rather than an aid; for he
had the sagacity to perceive that twice the number of troops then under
his command were insufficient to effectually disperse the Continental
army, backed, as it was, by other thousands ready to step from the
furrow to the intrenchment when necessity should call. Idleness begat
vice, in various forms, in his camp, and inaction was as likely as the
weapons of his enemy to decimate his battalions. (v) Much annoyance to
the British officers was produced by the cir-

* During this cannonade, Adjutant Mumford, of Colonel Varnum's Rhode
Island regiment, and another soldier, had their heads shot off, and a
rifleman was mortally wounded.

** Bunker Hill, Plowed Hill, and Winter Hill are situated in a range
from east to west, each of them on or near the Mystic River.

*** Early in 1775, two vessels, laden with New England rum, sailed from
Newport to the coast of Africa. The rum was exchanged, at the British
forts, for powder; and so completely did this traffic strip the
fortresses of this article, that there was not an ounce remaining that
could be taken from the use of the garrisons. This maneuver produced a
seasonable supply for the provincials.

**** The number of inhabitants in Boston, on the 28th of July, was six
thousand seven hundred and fifty-three. The number of the troops was
thirteen thousand six hundred.

(v) Most of the soldiers were encamped on the Common, which was not, as
now, shaded by large trees, but exposed to the heat of the summer sun.
"It is not to be wondered," said a letter-writer, in August, "that the
fatigue of duty, bad accommodations, and the use of too much spirits,
should produce fever in the camp. The soldiers can not be kept from rum.
Six-pence will buy a quart of West India rum, and four-pence is the
price of a quart of New England rum. Even the sick and the wounded have
often nothing to eat but salt pork and fish."

American Hand-bills in the British Camp.--Opinions concerning the
Provincials.--Plan for relieving Boston

572culation of hand-bill addresses among the soldiers. They found their
way into the British camp; how, no one could tell. * They were secret
and powerful emissaries; for the soldiers pondered much, in their idle
moments, upon the plain truths which these circulars contained.

Every thing now betokened ruin to the royal cause. Even as early as the
25th of 1775 June, Gage said, in a letter to Dartmouth, when giving an
account of the battle of the 19th, "The trials we have had show the
rebels are not the despicable rabble too many have supposed them to be;
and I find it owing to a military spirit encouraged among them for a few
years past, joined with an uncommon degree of zeal and énthusiasm, that
they are not otherwise." Toward the close of July he wrote despairingly
to Lord Dartmouth. After averring that the rebellion was general, he
said, "This province began it--I might say this town; for here the arch
rebels formed their scheme long ago." He spoke of the disadvantageous
position of the troops, and suggested the propriety of transferring the
theater of operations to New York, where "the friends of government were
more numerous."

The few patriots who remained in Boston were objects of continual
suspicion, and subject to insults daily. They were charged with
sketching plans of the military works, telegraphing with the provincials
by signals from steeples, and various other acts, for which some were
thrown into prison. At length provisions became so scarce, and the
plundering expeditions sent out by Gage to procure fresh food were so
unsuccessful, ** that the commander determined to make arrangements for
the removal of a large number of the inhabitants from the town. It was
notified that James Urquhart, the town major, would receive the names
July 24, 1775 those who wished to leave. Within two days more than two
thousand names were handed in, notwithstanding there was a restriction
that no plate was to be carried away, and no more than five pounds in
cash by each person. Many people of property, who would gladly have
left, were unwilling to do so, for they knew that what property remained
would become a prey to the soldiery. Of those who departed, many women
quilted silver spoons into their garments. Coin was smuggled out of the
city in the same way. These refugees landed principally at Chelsea, and
scattering over the country, were all re-

* I saw one of these hand-bills among the Proclamations, &c., in the
Massachusetts Historical Society. It was an address to the soldiers who
were about embarking for America, and was printed in London. The writer,
in speaking of the course of the provincials, emphasizes, by italics,
printed in a single conspicuous line, the expression, "Before God and
man they are right!" On the back of this address is the following
endorsement, which was evidently printed in this country, the type and
ink being greatly inferior to the other. It alludes to the two camps:
the one on Prospect Hill, under Putnam; the other on Bunker Hill, under
Howe.

Prospect Hill. I. Seven dollars a month. II. Fresh provisions, and in
plenty. III. Health. IV. Freedom, ease, affluence, and a good farm.

Bunker Hill. I. Three-pence a day. II. Rotten salt pork. III. The
scurvy. IV. Slavery, beggary, and want.

** One of these, in August, was quite successful. In the neighborhood of
New London, a small British fleet obtained eighteen hundred sheep and
more than one hundred head of oxen. Frothingham (page 236) quotes a
letter from Gage to Lord Dartmouth, in which this important fact is
announced. This letter was published, and in the anti-ministerial London
Chronicle the following impromptu appeared:

"In days of yore the British troops Have taken warlike kings in battle;
But now, alas I their valor droops, For Gage takes naught but--harmless
cattle. "Britons, with grief your bosoms strike! Your faded laurels
loudly weep! Behold your heroes, Quixotte like, Driving a timid flock
of--sheep!"

Council of War.--Situation of the Army.--Washington's Complaints.--Gage
recalled.--His Life and Character.

573ceived with the open arms of hospitality every where, except a few
Tories who ventured to leave the city. These were treated with bitter
scorn, and there were many martyrs for opinion's sake. This measure was
a great relief to Gage; and the capture, about that time, of an American
vessel laden with fresh provisions, made food quite plentiful in the
city for a while.

The inactive and purely defensive policy pursued by both armies became
exceedingly onerous to Washington, and he resolved, if expedient, to
endeavor to put an end to it. Congress, too, became impatient, and
requested Washington to attack the enemy if he perceived any chance for
success. The commander-in-chief, accordingly, called a council of war on
the 11th of September. In view of the rapid approach of the time when
the term of 1775 enlistment of many of the troops would expire, and also
of the general unfavorable condition of the army, Washington desired to
make an immediate and simultaneous attack upon the city and the camp of
the enemy on Bunker Hill. But his officers dissented; and the decision
of the Council was "that it is not expedient to make the attempt at
present." Ten days afterward, Washington wrote a long letter to the
President of Congress, in which, after making a statement which implied
a charge of neglect on the part of that body, he drew a graphic picture
of the condition of the army. "But my situation," he said, "is
inexpressibly distressing, to see the winter fast approaching upon a
naked army, the time of their service within a few weeks of expiring,
and no provisions yet made for such important events. Added to these,
the military chest is totally exhausted; the paymaster has not a single
dollar in hand; the commissary general assures me that he has strained
his credit for the subsistence of the army to the utmost; the quarter-
master general is in precisely the same situation; and the greater part
of the troops are in a state not far from mutiny, upon a deduction from
their stated allowance. I know not to whom I am to impute this failure;
but I am of opinion that, if the evil is not immediately remedied, and
more punctuality observed in future, the army must absolutely break up."
Thus we perceive, that within three months after his appointment to the
chief command, Washington had cause to complain of the tardy movements
of the general Congress. Throughout the war, that body often pressed
like a dead weight upon the movements of the army, embarrassing it by
special instructions, and neglecting to give its co-operation when most
needed. It was only during the time when Washington was invested with
the powers of a military dictator, that his most brilliant military
achievements were accomplished.

It was in September that the expedition to Quebec, under Arnold, by the
way of the Kennebec, was planned. This important measure, and the
progress and result of the expedition, have already been noticed on
pages 190 to 194 inclusive.

Convinced of the inefficiency of Gage, and alarmed at the progress of
the rebellion, the king summoned that officer to England to make a
personal explanation of the state of affairs at Boston. Gage sailed on
the 10th of October, leaving affairs in the hands of General Howe. *
Before his departure, the Mandamus Council, a number of the prin-

* Thomas Gage, the last royal governor of Massachusetts, was a native of
England, and was an active officer during the Seven Years' War. He was
appointed Governor of Montreal in 1760, and, at the departure of Amherst
from America, in 1763, was commissioned commander-in-chief of the
British forces in America. He superseded Hutchinson as Governor of
Massachusetts, and had the misfortune to enter upon the duties of his
office at a time when it became necessary for him, as a faithful servant
of his king, to execute laws framed expressly for the infliction of
chastisement upon the people of the capital of the colony over which he
was placed. From that date his public acts are interwoven with the
history of the times. He possessed a naturally amiable disposition, and
his benevolence often outweighed his justice in the scale of duty. Under
other circumstances his name might have been sweet in the recollection
of the Americans; now it is identified with oppression and hatred of
freedom. He went to England in the autumn of 1775, where he died in
April, 1787. Gage expected to return to America and resume the command
of the army; but ministers determined otherwise, and appointed General
Howe in his place. The situation was offered to the veteran Oglethorpe,
the founder of Georgia, but as he would not accept the commission unless
he could go to the Americans with assurances from government that strict
justice should be done them, the post was assigned to Howe. This was a
tacit admission, on the part of ministers, that justice to the Americans
formed no part of their scheme.

Loyal Address to Gage.--Superiority of Howe.--Fortifications in Boston.-
-The "Old South" desecrated.--Officers frightened.

574cipal inhabitants of Boston, and several who had taken refuge in the
country, in all about seventy persons, addressed him in terms of loyal
affection, amounting to panegyric. It was certainly unmerited; for his
civil administration had been weak, and his military operations
exceedingly inefficient.

This was felt by all parties. His departure was popular with the army;
and the provincials, remembering the spirit displayed by General Howe in
the battle on Breed's Hill, anticipated a speedy collision. Howe was
superior to Gage in every particular, and possessed more caution, which
was generally founded upon logical deductions from fact. Governed by
that caution, he was quite as unwilling as Gage to attack the Americans.
He remembered the disparity in numbers on the 17th of June, and the
bravery of the provincials while fighting behind breast-works cast up in
a single night. He properly argued that an army of the same sort of men,
fifteen thousand strong, intrenched behind breast-works constructed by
the labor of weeks, was more than a match for even his disciplined
troops of like number, and prudently resolved to await expected re-
enforcements from Ireland before he should attempt to procure that
"elbow-room" which he coveted. * In the mean while, he strengthened his
defenses, and prepared to put his troops into comfortable winter
quarters. He built a strong fort on Bunker Hill, ** and employed six
hundred men in making additional fortifications upon Boston Neck. In the
neighborhood of the hay-market, at the south end of the city, many
buildings were pulled down, and works erected in their places. Strong
redoubts were raised upon the different eminences in Boston, and the old
South meeting-house was stripped of its pews and converted into a
riding-school for the disciplining of the cavalry. *** This last act
took place on the 19th of October, and the desecration greatly shocked
the feelings of the religious community. On October,1775 the 28th Howe
issued three proclamations, which created much indignation, and drew
forth retaliatory

* It is said that both officers and soldiers regarded the Americans with
a degree of superstitious fear, for many highly exaggerated tales of
their power had been related. Dr. Thatcher says (Journal, p. 38) that,
according to letters written by British officers from Boston, some of
them, while walking on Beacon Hill in the evening, soon after the
arrival of Gage, were frightened by noises in the air, which they took
to be the whizzing of bullets. They left the hill with great
precipitation, and reported that they were shot at with air-guns. The
whizzing noise which so much alarmed these valiant officers was no other
than the whizzing of bugs and beetles while flying in the air. Trumbull,
in his M'Fingall, thus alludes to this ludicrous circumstance:

"No more the British colonel runs From whizzing beetles as air-guns;
Thinks horn-bugs bullets, or, through fears, Mosquitoes takes for
musketeers; Nor 'scapes, as if you'd gain'd supplies From Beelzebub's
whole host of flies. No bug these warlike hearts appals; They better
know the sound of balls."

** This was a well-built redoubt. The parapet was from six to fifteen
feet broad; the ditch from fourteen to eighteen feet wide, and the
banquet about four feet broad. The galleries and parapet before them
were raised about twenty feet high, and the merlons at the six-gun
battery in the center were about twelve feet high, a a, two temporary
magazines; b b, barracks; c, guard-houses; di magazine; e, advanced
ditch; h h, bastions.

*** A Mr. Carter, quoted by Frothingham, writing on the 19th of October,
says, "We are now erecting redoubts on the eminences on Boston Common;
and a meeting-house, where sedition has been often preached, is clearing
out to be made a riding-school for the light dragoons." Gordon says, "In
clearing every thing away, a beautiful carved pew, with silk furniture,
formerly belonging to a deceased gentleman (Deacon Hubbard) in high
estimation, was taken down and carried to Mr. John Armory's house, by
the order of an officer, who applied the carved work to the erection of
a hog-stye."

Harsh Measures, and Retaliation.--Congress Committee at Head quarters.--
Little Navy organized.--Floating Batteries

575measures from Washington. The first forbade all persons leaving the
town without permission, under pain of military execution; the second
prohibited persons who were permitted to go from carrying with them more
than twenty-five dollars in cash, under pain of forfeiture--one half of
the amount to be paid to the informer; and the third ordered all the
inhabitants within the town to associate themselves into military
companies. Washington retaliated by ordering General Sullivan, who was
about departing for Portsmouth, New Hampshire, to seize all officers of
government unfriendly to the patriots. Similar orders were sent to
Governor Trumbull, of Connecticut, and Deputy-governor Cooke, of Rhode
Island.

While Howe was thus engaged, Washington was not idle. A committee of
Congress, consisting of Dr. Franklin, Thomas Lynch, and Benjamin
Harrison (father of the late President Harrison), arrived at head-
quarters on the 18th of October, to confer with the commander-in-chief
respecting future operations. Deputy-governor Griswold and Judge Wales,
of Connecticut; Deputy-governor Cooke, of Rhode Island; several members
of the Massachusetts Council, and the President of the Provincial
Congress of New Hampshire, were present at the conference, which lasted
several days, and such a system of operations was matured as was
satisfactory to General Washington. * A plan was agreed upon for an
entirely new organization of the army, which provided for the enlistment
of twenty-six regiments of eight companies each, besides riflemen and
artillery. Already measures had been adopted to organize a navy. As
early as June, Rhode Island had fitted out two armed vessels to protect
the waters of that colony; Connecticut, at about the same time, one or
two armed vessels; and, on the 26th of June, the Provincial Congress of
Massachusetts resolved to provide six armed vessels. None of the latter
had been got in readiness as late as the 12th of October, as appears by
a letter from Washington to the President of the Continental Congress.

Having received no instructions from Congress on the subject, Washington
took the responsibility, under his general delegated powers, of making
preparations to annoy the enemy by water. Agents were appointed to
superintend the construction of vessels, and to furnish supplies.
Captain Broughton, of Marblehead, received a naval commission from
Washington, dated September 2d, 1775, the first of the kind issued by
the Continental Congress through its authorized agent. Before the close
of October, six vessels of small size ** had been armed and manned, and
sent to cruise within the capes of Massachusetts Bay. Two strong
floating batteries were launched, armed, and manned in the Charles
River; and, on the 26th of October, they opened fire upon Boston that
produced great alarm and damaged several houses. The six schooners
commissioned by Wash-

1775

* While Dr. Franklin was at head-quarters, the Provincial Congress of
Massachusetts paid him the remaining moneys due him for services as
agent for the colony in England, amounting to nine thousand two hundred
and seventy dollars. Five hundred dollars had been sent to him from
London as a charitable donation for the relief of the Americans wounded
in the skirmishes at Lexington and Concord, and for the widows and
orphans of those who were killed. This sum he paid over to the proper
committee.

** The names of five of these vessels were Hannah, Harrison, Lee,
Washington, and Lynch. The six commanders were Broughton, Selman, Manly,
Martindale, Coit, and Adams.

*** I am indebted to the kindness of Peter Force, Esq., of Washington
city (editor of "The American Archives"), for this drawing of one of the
American floating batteries used in the siege of Boston. It is copied
from an English manuscript in his possession, and is now published for
the first time. I have never met with a description of those batteries,
and can judge of their construction only from the drawing. They appear
to have been made of strong planks, pierced, near the water-line, for
oars; along the sides, higher up, for light and musketry. A heavy gun
was placed in each end, and upon the top were four swivels. The ensign
was the pine-tree flag, according to Colonel Reed, who, in a letter from
Cambridge to Colonels Glover and Moylan, dated October 20th, 1775, said,
"Please to fix some particular color for a flag, and a signal by which
our vessels may know one another. What do you think of a flag with a
white ground, a tree in the middle, the motto 'Appeal to Heaven?' This
is the flag of our floating batteries."

Vessels of War authorized by Congress.--Letters of Marque and Reprisal.-
-Condition of the Army before Boston.

576ington, and the floating batteries, sailed under the pine-tree flag.
The Continental Congress  a October 13, 1775 authorized two vessels to
be fitted out and manned; (a) afterward two others, one  b October 30.
of twenty and one of thirty-six guns, were ordered. (b) On the 28th of
November, a code of naval regulations was adopted. On the 1st of
February following (1776), the navy, if so it might be properly called,
was formed into a new establishment, being composed of four vessels--the
Hancock, Captain Manly; the Warner, Captain Burke; the Lynch, Captain
Ayres; and the Harrison, Captain Dyer. Captain Manly was the commodore
of the little fleet. * In November, the Massachusetts Provincial
Congress issued letters of marque and reprisal, and established courts
of admiralty. Such was the embryo of the navy of the United States. A
more detailed account of the organization of the navy and its operations
during the Revolution, will occupy a chapter in another portion of this
work. I have mentioned here only so much as related to operations
connected with the siege of Boston.

The term of enlistment of many of the troops was now drawing to a close,
and Washington felt great apprehensions for the result. Nearly six
months had elapsed since the battle of Bunker Hill, yet nothing had been
done, decisively, to alter the relations in which the belligerents stood
toward each other. The people began to murmur, and the general Congress
fretted. New enlistments were accomplished tardily, and in December not
more than five thousand recruits had joined the army. It became
excessively weakened in numbers and spirit, and as the cold increased,
want of comfortable clothing and fuel became an almost insupportable
hardship. Many regiments were obliged to eat their provisions raw, for
the want of wood to cook them. Fences, and the fruit and shade trees for
more than a mile around the camp, were used for fuel. The various
privations in the camp produced frequent desertions. The Connecticut
troops demanded a bounty, and being refused, resolved to leave the camp
in a body on the 6th of December. Measures were taken to prevent the
movement, yet many went off and never returned. The commander-in-chief
was filled with the greatest anxiety. Still, he hopefully worked on in
preparation for action, either offensive or defensive. A strong
detachment under Putnam broke ground at Cobble Hill (now M'Lean Asylum);
the works on Lechmere's Point were strengthened, and a call that was
made upon the New England militia to supply the places of the troops
that left the army in its hour of peril, was nobly responded to.

At the close of the year most of the regiments were full; and about ten
thousand minute men, chiefly in Massachusetts, were held in ready
reserve to march when called upon. The camp was well supplied with
provisions; ** order was generally observed, and in the course of a
fortnight a wonderful change for the better was wrought. The ladies of
several of the officers arrived in camp; and the Christmas holidays were
spent at Cambridge quite agreeably, for hope gave joy to the occasion.
***

* Sparks's Life and Writings of Washington, iii., 516.

** The rations for the soldiers were as follows: corned beef and pork
four days in the week, salt fish one day, and fresh beef two days. Each
man had a pound and a half of beef, or eighteen ounces of pork a day;
one quart of strong beer, or nine gallons of molasses, to one hundred
men per week; six pounds of candles to one hundred men per week; six
ounces of butter, or nine ounces of hogs' lard per week; three pints of
beans or pease, per man, a week, or vegetables equivalent; one pound of
flour per day, and hard bread to be dealt out one day in the week.

*** Mrs. Washington arrived on the 11th of December, accompanied by her
son, John Parke Custis, and his wife. Some persons thought her in danger
at Mount Vernon, as Lord Dunmore was making the most determined hostile
movements against republicanism in Virginia. It was feared that he might
attempt to seize the person of Lady Washington, to be held as a hostage.
As the commander-in-chief could not leave the army, she was requested to
pass the winter with him at Cambridge. The expenses incurred by the
occasional visits of Mrs. Washington to the camp during the war were
charged to the government. Washington was careful to call attention to
this fact, and in the rendition of his accounts for settlement he refers
to it, and expresses a hope that the charges will be considered right,
inasmuch as he had not visited his home during his time of service, a
privilege which he was allowed by the terms of his appointment.

First unfurling of the Union flag.--Return of Colonel Knox, with heavy
artillery.

577

CHAPTER XXV.

"When Freedom, from her mountain height,

Unfurl'd her standard to the air,

She tore the azure robe of night,

And set the stars of glory there.

She mingled with its gorgeous dyes

The milky baldrie of the skies,

And striped its pure celestial white

With streakings of the morning light;

Then from his mansion in the sun

She call'd her eagle-bearer down,

And gave into his mighty hand

The symbol of her choseth land."

Joseph Rodman Drake.

N the first of January, 1776, the new Continental army was organized,
and on that day the Union FLAG OF THIRTEEN STRIPES was unfurled, for the
first time, in the American camp at Cambridge. On that day the king's
speech (of which I shall presently write) was received in Boston, and
copies of it were sent, by a flag, to Washington. The hoisting of the
Union ensign was hailed by Howe as a token of joy on the receipt of the
gracious speech, and of submission to the crown. *. This was a great
mistake, for at no time had Washington been more determined to attack
the king's troops, and to teach oppressors the solemn lesson that
"Resistance to tyranny is obedience to God."

After the arrival of Colonel Knox with military stores from the north,
whither he had been sent in November, the commander-in-chief resolved to
attack the enemy, either by a general assault, or by bombardment and
cannonade, notwithstanding the British force was then nearly equal to
his in numbers, and greatly superior in experience. Knox brought with
him from Fort George, on forty-two sleds, eight brass mortars, six iron
mortars, two iron howitzers, thirteen brass cannons, twenty-six iron
cannons, two thousand three hundred pounds of lead, and one

* Washington, in a letter to Joseph Reed, written on the 4th of January,
1776, said, "The speech I send you. A volume of them was sent out by the
Boston gentry, and, farcical enough, we gave great joy to them without
knowing or intending it; for on that day, the day which gave being to
the new army, but before the proclamation came to hand, we had hoisted
the Union flag, in compliment to the United Colonies. But behold! it was
received in Boston as a token of the deep impression the speech had made
upon us, and as a signal of submission. So we hear by a person out of
Boston last night. By this time, I presume, they begin to think it
strange that we have not made a formal surrender of our lines." The
principal flag hitherto used by the army was plain crimson. Referring to
the reception of the king's speech, the Annual Register (1776) says, "So
great was the rage and indignation [of the Americans], that they burned
the speech, changed their colors from a plain red ground which they had
hitherto used, to a flag with thirteen stripes, as a symbol of the
number and union of the colonies." The blue field in one corner, with
thirteen stars, was soon afterward adopted; and by a resolution of the
Continental Congress, already referred to, passed on the 14th of June,
1777,* this was made the national flag of the United States.

*This flag bore the device of the English Union, which distinguishes the
Royal standard of Great Britain. It is composed of the cross of St.
George, to denote England, and St. Andrew's cross, in the form of an X,
to denote Scotland. This device was placed in the corner of the Royal
Flag, after the accession of James the Sixth of Scotland to the throne
of England as James the First. A picture of this device may be seen on
page 321, Vol. It. It must be remembered that at thia time the American
Congress had not declared the colonies "free and independent" states,
and that even yet the Americans proffered their warmest loyalty to
British justice, when it should redress their grievances. The British
ensign was therefore not yet discarded, but it was used upon their
flags, as in this instance, with the field composed of thirteen stripes,
alternate red and white, as emblematic of the union of the thirteen
colonics in the struggle for freedom. Ten months before, "a Union flag
with a red field" was hoisted at New York, upon the Liberty-pole on the
"Common," bearing the inscription--"George Rex, and the Liberties of
America," and upon the other side, "No Popery." It was this British
Union, on the American flag, which caused the misapprehension of the
British in Boston, alluded to by Washington. It was a year and a half
later (and a year after the colonies were declared to be Independent
states), that, by official orders, "thirteen white stars upon a blue
field" was a device substituted for the British Union, and then the
"stripes and stars" became our national banner.

Plan of Attack on Boston.--Re-enforcement of the Army.--Council of War.-
-Number of the Troops.--Situation of Washington.

578barrel of flints. In the harbor of Boston the enemy had several
vessels of war, * and upon Bunker Hill his works were very strong.

Washington's plan depended, in its execution, upon the weather, as it
was intended to pass the troops over to Boston, from Cambridge, on the
ice, if it became strong enough. The Neck was too narrow and too well
fortified to allow him to hope for a successful effort to enter the town
by that way. The assault was to be made by the Americans in two
divisions, under Brigadiers Sullivan and Greene, the whole to be
commanded by Major-general Putnam. Circumstances prevented the execution
of the plan, and January passed by without any decisive movement on the
part of either army. The American forces, however, were daily
augmenting, and they were less annoyed by the British cannon than they
had been, for Howe was more sparing of powder than Gage. **

The Provincial Congress of Massachusetts, at its winter session,
organized the militia of the province anew. John Hancock, James Warren,
and Azor Orne were appointed major generals, and thirteen regiments were
formed. A new emission of paper money, to a large amount, was
authorized, and various measures were adopted to strengthen the
Continental army. Early in February, ten of the militia regiments
arrived in camp; large supplies of ammunition had been received; intense
cold had bridged the waters with ice, and Washington was disposed to
commence operations immediately and vigorously. He called a council
February, 1776 war on 16th, to whom he communicated the intelligence,
derived from careful returns, that the American army, including the
militia, then amounted to a little more than seventeen thousand men,
while that of the British did not much exceed five thousand fit for
duty. Many of them were sick with various diseases, and the small-pox
was making terrible havoc in the enemy's camp. *** Re-enforcements from
Ireland, Halifax, and New York were daily expected by Howe, and the
present appeared to be the proper moment to strike. But the council
again decided against attempting an assault, on account of the supposed
inadequacy of the undisciplined Americans for the task. They estimated
the British forces at a much higher figure; considered the fact that
they were double officered and possessed ample artillery, and that the
ships in the harbor would do great execution upon an army on the ice,
exposed to an enfilading fire. It was resolved, however, to bombard and
cannonade the town as soon as a supply of ammunition should arrive, and
that, in the mean time, Dorchester Heights and Noddle's Island (now East
Boston) should be taken possession of and fortified. The commander-in-
chief was disappointed at this decision, for he felt confident of
success himself. "I can not help acknowledging," he said, in a letter
February 18, 1776 to Congress, "that I have many disagreeable sensations
on account of my situation; for, to have the eyes of the whole Continent
fixed with anxious expectation of hearing of some great event, and to be
restrained in every military operation for the want of the necessary
means for carrying it on, is not very pleasing, especially as the means

* The Boyne, sixty-four guns; Preston, fifty guns; Scarborough, and
another sloop, one of twenty and the other of sixteen guns, and the
Mercury.

** From the burning of Charlestown to Christmas day, the enemy had fired
more than two thousand shot and shells, one half of the former being
twenty-four pounders. They hurled more than three hundred bombs at
Plowed Hill, and one hundred at Lochraere's Point. By the whole firing
on the Cambridge side they killed only seven men, and on the Roxbury
side just a dozen!--Gordon, i., 418.

*** Quite a number of people, sick with this loathsome disease, were
sent out of Boston; and General Howe was charged with the wicked design
of attempting thus to infect the American army with the malady.

* Journals, iii., 194.

Condition of the British Troops in Boston.--A Farce and its
Termination.--Bombardment of Boston.--Industry of the Patriots.

579used to conceal my weakness from the enemy conceal it also from our
friends, and add to their wonder." In the midst of these discouragements
Washington prepared for a bombardment.

The British troops in Boston were beginning to be quite contented with
their lot, and Howe felt almost as secure as if he was on the shores of
Old England. He wrote to Dartmouth that he was under no apprehension of
an attack from the rebels; and so confident were the Tories of the
triumph of British arms, that Cecan Brush, a conceited and sycophantic
Loyalist from New York, offered to raise a body of volunteers of three
January 19, 1776 hundred men, to "occupy the main posts on the
Connecticut River, and open a line of communication westward toward Lake
Champlain," after "the subduction of the main body of the rebel force."
* The enemy had also procured a plentiful supply of provisions, and the
winter, up to the 1st of February, was tolerably mild. "The bay is
open," wrote Colonel Moylan, from Roxbury. "Every thing thaws here
except Old Put. He is still as hard as ever, crying out, 'Powder!
powder! ye gods, give me powder!'" The British officers established a
theater; balls were held, and a subscription had been opened for a
masquerade, when Washington's operations suddenly dispelled their dream
of security, and called them to lay aside the "sock and buskin," the
domino, and the dancing-slipper, for the habiliments of real war. They
had got up a farce called "Boston Blockaded they were now called to
perform in the serio-comic drama of Boston bombarded, with appropriate
costume and scenery.

The design of Washington to fortify Dorchester Heights was kept a
profound secret, and, to divert the attention of Howe, the Americans
opened a severe bombardment and cannonade, on the night of the 2d of
March, from the several batteries at Lechmere's Point, Roxbury, Cobble
and Plowed Hills, and Lamb's Dam. Several houses in the city were
shattered, and six British soldiers killed. The fire was returned with
spirit, but with out serious effect. In the course of the bombardment,
the Americans burst the "Congress" thirteen inch mortar, another of the
same size, and three ten inch mortars.

On Sunday and Monday nights a similar cannonade was opened upon the
city. March 3,4, 1776 At seven o'clock on Monday evening, General
Thomas, with two thousand men, and intrenching tools, proceeded to take
possession of Dorchester Heights. A train of three hundred carts, laden
with fascines and hay, followed the troops. Within an hour, marching in
perfect silence, the detachment reached the heights. It was separated
into two divisions, and upon the two eminences already mentioned they
commenced throwing up breastworks. Bundles of hay were placed on the
town side of Dorchester Neck to break the rumble of the carts passing to
and fro, and as a defense against the guns of the enemy, if they should
be brought to bear upon the troops passing the Neck. Notwithstanding the
moon was shining brightly and the air was serene, the laborers were not
observed by the British sentinels. Under the direction of the veteran
Gridley, the engineer at Bunker Hill, they worked wisely and well. Never
was more work done in so short a time, and at dawn two forts were raised
sufficiently high to afford ample protection for the forces within. They
presented a formidable aspect to the alarmed Britons. Howe, overwhelmed
with astonishment, exclaimed, "I know not what I shall do. The rebels
have done more in one night than my whole army would have done in a
month." They had done more than merely raise embankments; cannons were
placed upon them, and they now completely commanded the town, placing
Britons and Tories in the utmost peril.

* Frothingham; from manuscripts in the office of the Secretary of State
of Massachusetts.

* This play was a burletta. The figure designed to represent Washington
enters with uncouth gait, wearing a large wig, a long, rusty sword, and
attended by a country servant with a rusty gun. While this farce was in
course of performance on the evening of the 8th of January (1776), a
sergeant entered suddenly, and exclaimed, "The Yankees are attacking our
works on Bunker Hill!" The audience thought this was part of the play,
and laughed immoderately at the idea; but they were soon undeceived by
the voice of the burly Howe shouting, "Officers, to your alarm-posts!"
The people dispersed in great confusion. The cause of the fright was the
fact that Majors Knowlton, Carey, had crossed the mill-dam from Cobble
Hill, and set fire to some houses in Charlestown occupied by British
soldiers. They burned fight dwellings, killed one man, and brought off
five prisoners.

Astonishment of the British.--Insecurity of the Fleet and Army.--
Preparations for Bombarding Boston.

580The morning on which these fortresses were revealed to the enemy was
the memorable 5th of March, the anniversary of the _Boston Massacre_. *
The associations connected with the day nerved the Americans to more
vigorous action, and they determined to celebrate and signalize the time
by an act of retributive vengeance. Howe saw and felt his danger; and
his anxiety was augmented when Admiral Shuldham assured him that the
British fleet in the harbor must be inevitably destroyed when the
Americans should get their heavy guns and mortars upon the heights. Nor
was the army in the city secure. It was therefore resolved to take
immediate measures to dislodge the provincials. Accordingly, two
thousand four hundred men were ordered to embark in transports,
rendezvous at Castle William, and, under the gallant Earl Percy, make an
attack that night upon the rebel works. * Washington was made acquainted
with this movement, and, supposing the attack was to be made
immediately, sent a re-enforcement of two thousand men to General
Thomas. Labor constantly plied its hands in strengthening the works. As
the hills on which the redoubts were reared were very steep, rows of
barrels, filled with loose earth, were placed outside the breastworks,
to be rolled down upon the attacking column so as to break their ranks;
a measure said to have been suggested by Mifflin. All was now in
readiness. It was a mild, sunny day. The neighboring heights were
crowded with people, expecting to see the bloody tragedy of Breed's Hill
acted again. Washington himself repaired to the intrenchments, and
encouraged the men by reminding them that it was the 5th of March. The
commander-in-chief and the troops were in high spirits, for they
believed the long-coveted conflict and victory to be near.

While these preparations were in progress on Dorchester Heights, four
thousand troops, in two divisions, under Generals Sullivan and Greene,
were parading at Cambridge, ready to be led by Putnam to an attack on
Boston when Thomas's batteries should give the signal. They were to
embark in boats in the Charles River, now clear of ice, under cover of
three floating batteries, and, assaulting the city at two prominent
points, to force their way to the works on the Neck, open the gates, and
let in the troops from Roxbury.

Both parties were ready for action in the afternoon; but a furious wind
that had arisen billowed the harbor, and rolled such a heavy surf upon
the shore where the boats of the enemy were obliged to land, that it was
unsafe to venture. During the night the rain came down in torrents, and
a terrible storm raged all the next day. Howe abandoned his plan, and
Washington, greatly disappointed, returned to his camp, leaving a strong
force to guard the works on Dorchester Heights.

The situation of Howe was now exceedingly critical. The fleet and army
were in peril, and the loyal inhabitants, greatly terrified, demanded
that sure protection which Howe had March 1776 so often confidently
promised. He called a council of officers on the 7th, when it was
resolved to save the army by evacuating the town. This resolution spread
great consternation among the Tories in the city, for they dreaded the
just indignation of the patriots when they should return. They saw the
power on which they had leaned as almost invincible growing weak, and
quailing before those whom it had affected to despise. They well knew
that severe retribution for miseries which they had been instrumental in
inflicting, surely awaited them, when British bayonets should leave the
peninsula and the excited patriots should return to their desolated
homes. The dangers of a perilous voyage to a strange land seemed far
less fearful than the indignation of the oppressed Americans, and the
Loyalists resolved to brave the former rather than the latter. They
began, therefore, to prepare for a speedy departure; merchandise,
household furniture, and private property of every kind were crowded on
board the ships. Howe had been advised by Dartmouth, in

* The day, usually observed in Boston, was now commemorated at
Watertown, notwithstanding the exciting events occurring in the city and
vicinity. The Reverend Peter Thacher delivered an oration on the
occasion.--Bradford, 94.

** Three weeks previously, suspecting that the Americans were about to
take possession of Dorchester Neck, Howe sent a detachment from Castle
William, under Lieutenant-colonel Leslie, and some grenadiers and light
infantry, under Major Musgrove, to destroy every house and other cover
on the peninsula. They passed over on the ice, executed their orders,
and took six of the American guard prisoners.

Condition of the Patriots in Boston.--Tacit Agreement to spare the
Town.--Cannonade renewed.--Commission to plunder.

581November, to evacuate Boston, but excused himself by pleading that
the shipping was inadequate. He was now obliged to leave with less, and,
in addition to his troops, take with him more than one thousand refugee
Loyalists, and their effects. Ammunition and warlike magazines of all
kinds were hurried on board the vessels; heavy artillery, that could not
be carried away, was dismounted, spiked, or thrown into the sea, and
some of the fortifications were demolished. The number of ships and
transports was about one hundred and fifty; but these were insufficient
for the conveyance of the multitude of troops and inhabitants, their
most valuable property, and the quantity of military stores to be
carried away. *

The few patriots who remained in Boston now felt great anxiety for the
fate of the town. They saw the preparations for departure, and were
persuaded that the enemy, smarting under the goadings of disappointed
pride and ambition, would perform some signal act of vengeance before
leaving--probably set fire to the city. ** Actuated by these surmises
(which were confirmed by the threat of Howe that he would destroy the
town if his army was molested in departing), and by the fearful array of
ships which the admiral had arranged around the city, a delegation of
the most influential citizens communicated with the British commander,
through General Robertson. The conference resulted in a promise, on the
part of Howe, that, if Washington would allow him to evacuate quietly,
the town should be spared. A communication to this effect, signed by
four leading men--John Scoliay, Timothy Newell, Thomas Marshall, and
Samuel Austin--was sent to the camp at Roxbury without any special
address. It was received by Colonel Learned, who carried it to
Washington. The commander-in-chief observed, that as it was an
unauthenticated paper, without an address, and not obligatory upon
General Howe, he would take no notice of it. Learned communicated this
answer to the persons through whom the address from Boston was received.
Although entirely non-committal, it was received as a favorable answer,
and both parties tacitly consented to the arrangement.

Washington, however, did not relax his vigilance, and continued his
preparations for an assault upon Boston if the enemy did not speedily
leave. A battery was placed near the water on Dorchester Neck on the
9th, to annoy the British shipping. On the same March 1776 night a
detachment marched to Nooks' Hill, a point near the city completely
commanding it, and planted a battery there. A fire imprudently kindled
revealed their labor in progress to the enemy. A severe cannonade was
immediately opened upon the patriots from the British batteries in the
city. This was a signal for a general discharge of cannons and mortars
from the various American batteries, and until dawn there was a
continual roar of heavy guns. More than eight hundred shot were fired
during the night. It was a fearful hour for the people of Boston, and
all the bright anticipations of a speedy termination of the dreadful
suspense in which for months they had lingered were clouded. But the
belligerents were willing to avoid bloodshed. Washington determined to
have possession of Boston at all events, but preferred to take it
peaceably; while Howe, too cautious to risk a general action, and
desirous of employing his forces in some quarter of the colonics where
better success might be promised, withheld his cannonade in the morning,
and hastened his preparations for evacuation.

And now a scene of great confusion ensued. Those who were about to leave
and could not carry their furniture with them, destroyed it; the
soldiers broke open and pillaged many stores; and Howe issued an order
to Crean Brush, ** who had fawned at his feet ever since the siege
began, to seize all clothing and dry goods not in possession of
Loyalists, and place

* General Howe's official account.

** Congress gave Washington instructions in the Autumn to destroy Boston
if it should be necessary to do so in order to dislodge the enemy. This
instruction was given with the full sanction of many patriots who owned
much property in the city. John Hancock, who was probably the largest
property holder in Boston, wrote to Washington, that, notwithstanding
such a measure would injure him greatly, he was anxious the thing should
be done, if it would benefit the cause. Never were men more devoted than
those who would be the greatest sufferers.

*** This order, which is dated March 10th, 1776, is in the office of the
Secretary of State of Massachusetts, and bears Howe's autograph.--
Frothingham.

Bad Conduct of the British Troops.--The Embarkation.--Entrance of the
Americans into the City.--The Refugees.

582them on board two brigantines in the harbor. This authorized plunder
caused great distress, for many of the inhabitants were completely
stripped. Shops and dwellings were broken open and plundered, and what
goods could not be carried away were wantonly destroyed.

These extremes were forbidden in general order the next day, but the
prohibition March 12. was little regarded.

On the 15th, the troops paraded to march to the vessels, the inhabitants
being ordered to remain in their houses until the army had embarked. An
easterly breeze sprang up, and the troops were detained until Sunday,
the 17th. In the mean while, they did much mischief by destroying and
defacing furniture, and throwing valuable goods into the river. They
acted more like demons than men, and had they not been governed by
officers possessed of some prudence and honor, and controlled by a fear
of the Americans, the town would doubtless have suffered all the horrors
of sack and pillage.

Early on Sunday morning, the embarkation of the British army and of the
Loyalists commenced. The garrison on Bunker Hill left it at about nine
o'clock. Washington observed these movements, and the troops in
Cambridge immediately paraded. Putnam with six regiments embarked in
boats on the Charles River, and landed at Sewall's Point. The sentinels
on Bunker Hill appeared to be at their posts, but, on approaching, they
were observed to be nothing but effigies; not a living creature was
within the British works. With a loud shout, that startled the
retreating Britons, the Americans entered and took possession. When this
was effected, the British and Tories had all left Boston, and the fleet
that was to convey them away was anchored in Nantasket Roads, where it
remained ten days. * A detachment of Americans entered the city, and
took possession of the works and the military stores that were left
behind. ** The gates on Boston Neck were unbarred, and General Ward,
with five thousand of the troops at Roxbury, entered in triumph, Ensign
Richards bearing the Union flag. General Putnam assumed the command of
the whole, and in the name of the _Thirteen United Colonies_ took
possession of all the forts and other defenses which the  a March 18,
1776 retreating Britons had left behind. (a) On the 20th, the main body
of the army, with Washington at the head, entered the city, amid the
joyous greetings of hundreds, who for ten months had suffered almost
every conceivable privation and insult. Their friends from the country
flocked in by hundreds, and joyful was the reunion of many families that
had been separated more than half a year. On the 28th, a thanksgiving
sermon was preached by the Reverend Dr. Elliot, from the words of
Isaiah, "Look upon Zion, the city of our solemnities: thine eye shall,
see Jerusalem a quiet habitation, a tabernacle that shall not be taken
down: not one of the stakes thereof shall be removed, neither shall any
of the cords thereof be broken." *** It was a discourse full of hope for
the future, and con-

* The whole effective British force that withdrew, including seamen, was
about eleven thousand. The Loyalists, classed as follows, were more than
one thousand in number: 132 who had held official stations; 18
clergymen; 105 persons from the country; 213 merchants; 382 farmers,
traders, and mechanics: total 924. These returned their names on their
arrival at Halifax, whither the fleet sailed. There were nearly two
hundred more whose names were not registered. It was a sorrowful flight
to most of them; for men of property left all behind, and almost every
one relied for daily food upon rations from the army stores. The troops,
in general, were glad to depart. Frothingham (page 312) quotes from a
letter written by a British officer while lying in the harbor. It is a
fair exhibition of the feelings of the troops: "Expect no more letters
from Boston; we have quitted that place. Washington played upon the town
for several days. A shell which burst while we were preparing to embark
did very great damage. Our men have suffered. We have one consolation
left. You know the proverbial expression, 'Neither Hell, Hull, nor
Halifax can afford worse shelter than Boston.' To fresh provision I have
for many months been quite an utter stranger. An egg was a rarity. The
next letter from Halifax."

** So crowded were the vessels with the Loyalists and their effects that
Howe was obliged to leave some of his magazines. The principal articles
which were left at Castle Island and Boston were 250 pieces of cannon,
great and small; four thirteen and a half inch mortars; 2500 chaldrons
of sea coal; 2500 bushels of wheat; 2300 bushels of barley; 600 bushels
of oats; 100 jars of oil, containing a barrel each, and 150 horses. Some
of the ordnance had been thrown into the water, but were recovered by
the Americans. In the hospital at Boston a large quantity of medicine
was left, in which it was discovered that white and yellow arsenic was
mixed! The object ean be easily guessed.--Gordon, ii., 32.

*** Isaiah, xxxiii., 20.

Condition of Boston after the Evacuation.--Troops sent to New York.--
Lingering of British Vessels.--Final Departure.

583firmed the strong faith of the hundreds of listeners in the final
triumph of liberty in America.

Sadness settled upon the minds of the people when the first outburst of
joyous feeling had subsided, for Boston, the beautiful city--the
metropolis of New England--was a desolation. Many of the finest houses
were greatly injured; shade-trees were cut down; churches were
disfigured; ornamental inclosures were broken or destroyed; and the
public buildings were shamefully defaced. The spacious old South
meeting-house, as we have seen, was changed into a riding-school; and in
the stove that was put up within the arena were burned, for kindling,
many rare books and manuscripts of Prince's fine library. The parsonage
house belonging to this society was pulled down for fuel. The old North
Chapel was demolished for the same purpose, and the large wooden steeple
of the West Church was converted to the same use. Liberty Tree, noticed
on page 466, vol. i., furnished fourteen cords of wood. Brattle Street
and Hollis Street churches were used for barracks, and Faneuil Hall was
converted into a neat theater. * A shot from the American lines, which
struck the tower of Brattle Street Church, was picked up, and
subsequently fastened at the point where it first struck, and there it
remains.

Ignorant of the destination of Howe, and supposing it to be New York,
Washington sent off five regiments, and a portion of the artillery,
under General Heath, for that March 13, 1776 city. They marched to New
London, where they embarked, and proceeded to New York through the
Sound. On the departure of the main body of the British fleet from
Nantasket Roads, Washington ordered the remainder of the army to New
York, except five regiments, which were left for the protection of
Boston, under General Ward. Sullivan marched on the 27th; another
brigade departed on the 1st of April; and the last brigade, under
Spencer, marched on the 4th. Washington, also, left Cambridge for New.
York on that day. April 4

A portion of the British fleet, consisting of five vessels, still
lingered in the harbor, and was subsequently joined by seven transports,
filled with Highlanders. The people of Boston were under great
apprehension of Howe's return. All classes of people assisted in
building a fortification on Noddles Island (now East Boston) and in
strengthening the other defenses. These operations were carried on under
the general direction of Colonel Gridley. In May, Captain Mugford, of
the schooner Franklin, a Continental cruiser, captured the British ship
Hope, bound for Boston, with stores, and fifteen hundred barrels of
powder. May 17 On the 19th, the Franklin and Lady Washington started on
a cruise, but got aground at Point Shirly. Thirteen armed boats from the
British vessels attacked them, and a sharp engagement ensued. Captain
Mugford, while fighting bravely, received a mortal wound. His last words
were those used nearly forty years afterward by Lawrence, "Don't give up
the ship! You will beat them off!" And so they did. The cruisers
escaped, and put to sea.

In June, General Lincoln proposed a plan for driving the British fleet
from the harbor. It was sanctioned by the Massachusetts Assembly, and
was put in execution on the 14th. He summoned the neighboring militia,
and, aided by some of General Ward's regular troops, took post on Moon
Island, Hoff's Neck, and at Point Anderton. A large force also collected
at Pettick's Island, and Hull; and a detachment with two eighteen
pounders and a thirteen inch mortar took post on Long Island. Shots were
first discharged at the enemy from the latter point. The fire was
briskly returned; but the commander, Commodore Banks, perceiving the
perilous situation of his little fleet, made signals for weighing
anchor. After blowing up the light-house, he spread his sails and went
to sea, leaving Boston harbor and vicinity entirely free from an enemy,
except in the few dissimulating Tories who lurked in secret places.
Through a reprehensible want of foresight, no British cruisers were left
in the vicinity to warn British ships of the departure of the troops and
fleet. The consequence was, that several store-ships-from England soon
afterward arrived, and, sailing into the harbor

* Frothingham, page 328.

Capture of Campbell and Store-ships.--Effect of the Evacuation of
Boston.--Medal awarded to Washington

584without suspicion, fell into the hands of the Americans. In this way,
Lieutenant-colonel Campbell and seven hundred men were made prisoners in
June.

The evacuation of Boston diffused great joy throughout the colonies, and
congratulatory addresses were received by Washington and his officers
from various legislative bodies, assemblages of citizens, and
individuals.

The Continental Congress received intelligence of the evacuation, by
express, on the 25th of March, and immediately, on motion of John Adams,
passed a vote of thanks to the commander-in-chief and the soldiers under
his command, and also ordered a gold medal to be struck and presented to
the general. John Adams, John Jay, and Stephen Hopkins were appointed a
committee to prepare a letter of thanks and a proper device for the
medal. *

The intelligence of this and other events at Boston within the preceding
ten months produced great excitement in England, and attracted the
attention of all Europe. The British Parliament exhibited violent
agitations, and party lines began to be drawn almost as definitely among
the English people, on American affairs, as in the colonies. In the
spring, strong measures had been proposed, and some were adopted, for
putting down the rebellion, and these had been met by counter action on
the part of the American Congress. ** During the summer, John Wilkes,
then Lord Mayor of London, and his party, raised a storm of indignation
against government in the English capital. He presented a violent
address to the king in the name of the livery of London,

* Journals of Congress, ii., 104.

** Congress issued a proclamation, declaring that "whatever punishment
shall be inflicted upon any persons in the power of their enemies for
favoring, aiding, or abetting the cause of American liberty, shall be
retaliated in the same kind, and in the same degree, upon those in their
power, who had favored, aided, or abetted, or shall favor, aid, or abet
the system of ministerial oppression." This made the Tories and the
British officers cautious in their proceedings toward patriots in their
power.

*** This drawing is the size of the medal. It was struck in Paris, from
a die cut by Duvivier. The device is a head of Washington, in profile,
with the Latin legend "Georgio Washington, supremo duci exercituum
adsertori libertatis comitia Americana;" "The American Congress to
George Washington, commander-in-chief of its armies, the assertors of
freedom." Reverse: troops advancing toward a town; others marching
toward the water; ships in view; General Washington in front, and
mounted, with his staff, whose attention he is directing to the
embarking enemy. The legend is "The enemy for the first time put to
flight." The exergue under the device--"Boston recovered, 17th March,
1776."

Denunciations by John Wilkes.--The King tensed.--Boldness of the Common
Council.--Governor Penn.--John Home Tooke

585in which it was asserted that it was plainly to be perceived that
government intended to establish arbitrary rule in America without the
sanction of the British Constitution, and that they were also determined
to uproot the Constitution at home, and to establish despotism upon the
ruins of English freedom. The address concluded by calling for an
instant dismissal of the ministers. The king was greatly irritated, and
refused to receive the address, unless presented in the corporate
capacity of "mayor, aldermen, livery," &c. This refusal Wilkes denounced
as a denial of the right of the city to petition the throne in any
respectful manner it pleased; "a right," he said, "which had been
respected even by the accursed race of Stuarts." Another address,
embodying a remonstrance and petition, was prepared, and inquiry was
made of the king whether he would receive it while sitting on the
throne, it being addressed by the city in its corporate capacity. The
king replied that he would receive it at his next levee, but not on the
throne. One of the sheriffs sent by Wilkes to ask the question of his
majesty, assured the king that the address would not be presented except
when he was sitting upon the throne. The king replied that it was his
prerogative to choose _where_ he would receive communications from his
subjects. The livery of London declared this answer to be a denial of
their rights, resolved that the address and remonstrance should be
printed in the newspapers, and that the city members in the House of
Commons should be instructed to move for "an impeachment of the evil
counselors who had planted popery and arbitrary power in America, and
were the advisers of a measure so dangerous to his majesty and to his
people as that of refusing to hear petitions." * The common council
adopted a somewhat more moderate address and remonstrance, which the
king received, but whether sitting upon the throne or at his levee is
not recorded. **

On the 23d of August, the government, informed of the events of the 17th
of June 1775at Charlestown, issued a proclamation for suppressing
rebellion, preventing seditious correspondences, et cetera. Wilkes, as
lord mayor, received orders to have this proclamation read in the usual
manner at the Royal Exchange. He refused full obedience, by causing it
to be read by an inferior officer, attended only by a common crier;
disallowing the officers the use of horses, and prohibiting the city
mace to be carried before them. The vast assembly that gathered to hear
the reading replied with a hiss of scorn.

A few days afterward the respectful petition of the Continental Congress
was laid before the king by Richard Penn. Earl Dartmouth soon informed
Penn that the king had resolved to take no notice of it; and again the
public mind was greatly agitated, particularly in London, at what was
denominated "another blow at British liberty." The strict silence of
ministers on the subject of this petition gave color to the charge that
they had a line of policy marked out, from which _no action_ of the
Americans could induce them to deviate short of absolute submission. The
Duke of Richmond determined to have this silence broken, and procured an
examination of Governor Penn before the House of Lords. That examination
brought to light many facts relative to the strength and union of the
colonics which ministers would gladly have concealed. It revealed the
truth that implicit obedience

* Pictorial History of England, v., 235.

** It was about this time that the celebrated John Horne Tooke, a
vigorous writer and active politician, was involved in a proceeding
which, in November, 1775, caused him to receive a sentence of
imprisonment for one year, pay a fine of one thousand dollars, and find
security for his good behavior for three years. His alleged crime was "a
libel upon the king's troops in America." The libel was contained in an
advertisement, signed by him, from the Constitutional Society (supposed
to be revolutionary in its character), respecting the Americans. That
society called the Lexington affair a "murder" and agreed that the sum
of five hundred dollars should be raised "to be applied to the relief of
the widows, orphans, and aged parents of our beloved American fellow-
subjects" who had preferred death to slavery. This was a set-off against
subscriptions then being raised in England for the widows and orphans of
the British soldiers who had perished. The sum raised by this society
was sent to Dr. Franklin, who, as we have seen, paid it over to the
proper committee, when he visited the army at Cambridge, in October,
under the direction of Congress. Out of the circumstance of Horne
Tooke's imprisonment arose his letter to Counselor Dunning, which formed
the basis of his subsequent philological work, The Diversions of Purley,
published in 1780.

Strength of the Americans.--Political Change in the London Common
Council.--Persecution of Stephen Sayre.

586to Congress was paid by all classes of men; that in Pennsylvania
alone there were twenty thousand effective men enrolled for military
service, and four thousand minute men; that the Pennsylvanians perfectly
understood the art of making gunpowder; that the art of casting cannon
had been carried to great perfection in the colonies; that small arms
were also manufactured in the best manner; * that the language of
Congress was the voice of the people; that the people considered the
petition as an olive branch; and that so much did the Americans rely
upon its effect, that if rejected, or treated with scorn, they would
abandon all hope of a reconciliation.

On the 11th of October an address, memorial, and petition, signed by
eleven hundred and seventy-one "gentlemen, merchants, and traders of
London," was laid before his majesty, in which it was charged that all
the troubles in America, and consequent injury to trade, arose from the
bad policy pursued by Parliament; and the new proposition which had just
leaked out, to employ foreign soldiers against the Americans, was
denounced in unmeasured terms. A counter petition, signed by nine
hundred and twenty citizens of London, was presented three days
afterward, in which the conduct of the colonists was severely censured.
This was followed by another on the same side, signed by ten hundred and
twenty-nine persons, including the livery of London, who, a few months
previously, under Wilkes, had spoken out so boldly against government.
This address glowed with loyalty to the king and indignation against the
_rebels!_ Like petitions from the provincial towns, procured by
ministerial agency, came in great numbers, and the government, feeling
strengthened at home, contemplated the adoption of more stringent
measures to be pursued in America. Suspected persons in England were
closely watched, and several were arraigned to answer various charges
against them. ** Lord North became the idol of the government party,
and, in addition to bein _feted_ by the nobility, and thoroughly
bespattered with fulsome adulation by corporate bodies and the
ministerial press, the University of Oxford had a medal struck in his
honor.

Parliament assembled on the 26th of October, much earlier than common,
on account of the prevalent disorders. The king, in his speech at the
opening, *** after mentioning the rebellious position of the American
colonies, expressed (as he had done before) his determination to act
decisively. He alleged that the course of government hitherto had been
moderate and forbearing! but now, as the rebellion seemed to be general,
and the ob-

* I have in my possession a musket manufactured here in 1774, that date
being engraved upon the breech. It is quite perfect in its construction.
It was found on the battle field of Hubbardton, in Vermont, and was in
the possession of the son of an American officer (Captain Barber) who
was in that action. See page 146, of this volume.

** On the 23d of October (1775), Stephen Sayre, a London banker, an
American by birth, was arrested on a charge of high treason, made
against him by a sergeant in the Guard (also a native of America), named
Richardson. He charged Sayre with having asserted that he and others
intended to seize the king on his way to Parliament, to take possession
of the town, and to overturn the present government. Sayre was known to
be a friend to the patriots, and on this charge Lord Rochford, one of
the secretaries of state, caused his papers to be seized and himself to
be arrested. Sayre was committed to the Tower, from which he was
released by Lord Mansfield, who granted a writ of habeas corpus. Sayre
was subsequently tried and acquitted. He prosecuted Lord Rochford for
seizing his papers, and the court awarded him a conditional verdict of
five thousand dollars damages. The conditions proved a bar to the
recovery of the money, and Sayre was obliged to suffer a heavy pecuniary
loss in costs, besides the personal indignity.

*** This is the speech alluded to in the beginning of this chapter,
which the British officers in Boston supposed had produced a
determination on the part of the Americans to submit

Tenor of the King's Speech.--His false-Hopes.--Warm Debates in
Parliament--Duke of Grafton in opposition.

587jects of the insurgents an independency of empire, they must be
treated as rebels. He informed Parliament that he had increased the
naval establishment, and greatly augmented the land forces, "yet in such
a maimer as to be least expensive or burdensome to the kingdom." This
was in reference to the employment of German troops, which I shall
presently notice. He professed a desire to temper his severity with
mercy, and for this purpose proposed the appointment of commissioners to
offer the olive branch of peace and pardon to all offenders among "the
unhappy and deluded multitude" who should sue for forgiveness, as well
as for whole communities or provinces. He also expressed a hope that his
friendly relations with other European governments would prevent any
interference on their part with his plans. *

The address of Parliament responsive to the king's speech was, of
course, but an echo of that document. It was firmly opposed by all the
old leaders of opposition, and the management of the summer campaign in
America was severely commented upon. Ministers were charged with placing
their sovereign in a most contemptible position before the world, and
with wresting from him the scepter of colonial power in the West. "They
have acted like fools in their late summer campaign," said Colonel
Barré. "The British army at Boston," he said, "is a mere wen--an
excrescence on the vast continent of America. Certain defeat awaits it.
Not the Earl of Chatham, nor Frederic the Great, nor even Alexander the
Great, ever gained so much in one campaign as ministers have lost."

"They have lost a whole continent," said Fox; and at the same time he
characterized North as "the blundering pilot who had brought the vessel
of state into its present difficulties."

"It is a horrible idea, that the Americans, our brethren, shall be
brought into submission to ministerial will by fleets and armies," said
General Conway; and other members were equally severe upon ministers. In
the Upper House, the Duke of Grafton, Lords Shelburne, Camden, Richmond,
Gower, and Cavendish, and the Marquis of Rockingham, took decided ground
against ministers. Chatham was very ill, and could not leave his country
seat. The Duke of Grafton, one of the minority, was bold in his
denunciations, and in the course of an able speech declared that he had
been greatly deceived in regard to the Americans, and that nothing short
of a total repeal of every act obnoxious to the colonists passed since
1763 could now restore peace. The Cabinet, of course, did not concur
with his grace, and he resigned the seals of office, and took a decided
stand with the opposition. ** Dr. Hinchcliffe, bishop of Peterborough,
followed Grafton, and also became identified with the opposition.
Thurlow and Wedderburne were North's chief supporters. The address was
carried in both houses by large majorities.

Burke again attempted to lead ministers into a path of common sense and
common justice, by proposing a conciliatory bill. It included a
proposition to repeal the November 16, 1775 Boston Port Bill; a promise
not to tax America; a general amnesty; and the calling of a Congress by
royal authority for the adjustment of remaining difficulties. North was
rather pleased with the proposition, for he foresaw heavy breakers ahead
in the course

* The king did not reckon wisely when he relied upon the implied or even
expressed promises of nonintervention on the part of other powers. He
had made application to all the maritime powers of Europe to prevent
their subjects from aiding the rebel colonics by sending them arms or
ammunition; and they all professed a friendship for England, while, at
the same time, she was the object of their bitterest jealousy and hate,
on account of her proud commercial eminence and political sway. The
court of Copenhagen (Denmark) had issued an edict on the 4th of October
against carrying warlike articles to America. The Dutch, soon afterward,
took similar action; the punishment for a violation of the edict being a
fine of only four hundred and fifty dollars, too small to make shipping
merchants long hesitate about the risk where such enormous profits were
promised. In fact, large quantities of gunpowder were soon afterward
shipped to America from the ports of Holland in glass bottles invoiced
"gin." France merely warned the people that what they did for the
Americans they must do upon their own risk, and not expect a release
from trouble, if they should get into any, by the French admiralty
courts. Spain flatly refused to issue any order.

** His office of Lord of the Privy Seal was given to Lord Dartmouth, and
the office of that nobleman was filled hy his opponent, Lord George
Germaine--"the proud, imperious, unpopular Sackville." Germaine had
taken an active part in favor of all the late coercive measures, and he
was considered the fit instrument to carry out the plans of government
toward the Americans, in the capacity of Colonial Secretary.

The Colonies placed under Martial Law.--Augmentation of the Army and
Navy.--Proposition to employ foreign Troops

588of the vessel of state; but he had abhorred concession, and this
appeared too much like it. A large majority voted against Burke's
proposition.

November 22 Lord North introduced a bill a few days afterward,
prohibiting all intercourse or trade with the colonies till they should
submit, and placing the whole country under martial law. This bill
included a clause, founded upon the suggestion in the king's speech, to
appoint resident commissioners, with discretionary powers to grant
pardons and effect indemnities. * The bill was passed by a majority of
one hundred and ninety-two to sixty-four in the Commons, and by seventy-
eight to nineteen in the House of Lords. Eight peers protested. It
became a law by royal assent on the 21st of December.

Having determined to employ sufficient force to put down the rebellion,
the next necessary step was to procure it. The Committee of Supply
proposed an augmentation of the navy to twenty-eight thousand men, and
that eighty ships should be employed on the American station: The land
forces necessary were estimated at twenty-five thousand men. The king,
as Elector of Hanover, controlled the troops of that little kingdom.
Five regiments of Hanoverian troops were sent to Gibraltar and Minorca,
to allow the garrisons of English troops there to be sent to America. It
was also proposed to organize the militia of the kingdom, so as to have
an efficient force at home while the regulars should go across the
Atlantic. For their support while in actual service it was proposed to
raise the land-tax to four shillings in the pound. This proposition
touched the pockets of the country members of Parliament, and cooled
their warlike ardor very sensibly.

The peace establishment at home being small, it was resolved, in
accordance with suggestions previously made, to employ foreign troops.
The king wrote an autograph letter to the States General of Holland,
soliciting them to dispose of their Scotch brigade for service against
the Americans. The request was nobly refused. A message was sent to the
Parliament of Ireland requesting a supply of troops; that body complied
by voting four thousand men for the American service. They servilely
agreed to send men to butcher their brethren and kinsmen for a
consideration; while the noble Hollanders, with a voice of rebuke,
dissented, and refused to allow their soldiers to fight the strugglers
for freedom, though strangers to them in blood and language. **

The king was more successful with some of the petty German princes. He
entered into a treaty with the Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, the Duke of
Brunswick, the Prince of Hesse, and the Prince of Waldeck, for seventeen
thousand men, to be employed in America. On the 29th of February, 1776,
Lord North moved "that these treaties be referred to the Committee of
Supply." A most vehement debate ensued in the House of Commons.
Ministers pleaded necessity and economy as excuses for such a measure.
"There was not time to fill the army with recruits, and hired soldiers
would be cheaper in the end, for, after the war, if native troops were
employed, there would be nearly thirty battalions to claim half pay."
Such were the ostensible reasons; the real object was, doubtless, not so
much economy, as the fear that native troops, especially raw recruits,
unused to the camp, might affiliate with the insurgents. The opposition
denounced the measure as not merely cruel toward the Americans, but
disgraceful to the English name; that England was degrading herself by
applying to petty German princes for succors against her own subjects;
and that nothing would so effectually bar the way for reconciliation
with the colonists as this barbarous prep-

* This bill became a law, and under that clause General Howe, and his
brother, Lord Howe, were appointed commissioners.

** can not forbear quoting the remarks of John Derk van der Chapelle, in
the Assembly of the States of Overyssel, against the proposition.
"Though not as principals, yet as auxiliaries our troops would be
employed in suppressing (what some please to call) a rebellion in the
American colonies; for which purpose I would rather see janisaries hired
than troops from a free state. In what an odious light must this
unnatural civil war appear to all Europe--a war in which even savages
(if credit can be given to newspaper information) refuse to engage. More
odious still would it appear for a people to take a part therein who
were themselves once slaves, bore that hateful name, but at last had
spirit to fight themselves free. But, above all, it must appear
superlatively detestable to me, who think the Americans worthy of every
man's esteem, and look upon them as a brave people, defending, in a
becoming, manly, and religious manner, those rights which, as men, they
derive from God, and not from the Legislature of Great Britain."

Reasons for employing German Troops.--Opposition to it in Parliament.--
Terms on which the Mercenaries were hired.

589aration to enslave them. It was also intimated that the soldiers to
be hired would desert as soon as they reached America; for their
countrymen were numerous in the colonies, were all patriots, and would
have great influence over them that they would accept land, sheathe
their swords, and leave the English soldiers to do the work which their
German masters sent them to perform. On the other hand, ministers
counted largely upon the valor of their hirelings, many of whom were
veterans, trained in the wars of Frederic the Great, and that it would
be only necessary for these blood-hounds to show themselves in America
to make the rebellious people lay down their arms and sue for pardon.
The opposition, actuated by a sincere concern for the fair fame of their
country, pleaded earnestly against the consummation of the bargain, and
used every laudable endeavor to arrest the incipient action. But
opposition was of little avail; North's motion for reference was carried
by a majority of two hundred and forty-two to eighty-eight.

Another warm debate ensued when the committee reported on the 4th of
March; 1776and in the House of Lords the Duke of Richmond moved not only
to countermand the order for the mercenaries to proceed to America, but
to cease hostilities altogether. The Earl of Coventry maintained that an
acknowledgment of the independence of the colonies was preferable to a
continuance of the war. "Look on the map of the globe," he said; "view
Great Britain and North America; compare their extent, consider the
soil, rivers, climate, and increasing population of the latter; nothing
but the most obstinate blindness and partiality can engender a serious
opinion that such a country will long continue under subjection to this.
The question is not, therefore, how we shall be able to realize a vain,
delusive scheme of dominion, but how we shall make it the interest of
the Americans to continue faithful allies and warm friends. Surely that
can never be effected by fleets and armies. Instead of meditating
conquest and exhausting our strength in an ineffectual struggle, we
should, wisely abandoning wild schemes of coercion, avail ourselves of
the only substantial benefit we can ever expect, the profits of an
extensive commerce, and the strong support of a firm and friendly
alliance and compact for mutual defense and assistance." ** This was the
language of wise and sagacious statesmanship--of just and honorable
principles--of wholesome and vigorous thought; yet it was denounced as
treasonable in its tendency, and encouraging to rebellion. The report
recommending the ratification of the bargain was adopted, and the
disgraceful and cruel act was consummated. The Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel
agreed to furnish twelve thousand one hundred and four men; the Duke of
Brunswick, four thousand and eighty-four; the Prince of Hesse, six
hundred and sixty-eight, and the Prince of Waldeck, six hundred and
seventy; making in all seventeen thousand five hundred and twenty-six
soldiers, including the officers. Perceiving the stern necessity which
compelled the British government to negotiate with them, these dealers
in fighting machines drove a hard bargain with Lord George Germaine and
Lord Barrington, making their price in accordance with the principle of
trade, where there is a small supply for a great demand. They asked and
received thirty-six dollars for each man, and in addition were to
receive a considerable subsidy. The whole amount paid by the British
government was seven hundred and seventy-five thousand dollars! The
British king also guarantied the dominions of these princes against
foreign attack. It was a capital bargain for the sellers; for, while
they pocketed the enormous poll-price for their troops, they were
released from the expense of their maintenance, and felt secure in their
absence. Early in the spring these mercenaries, with a considerable
number of troops from England and Ireland, sailed for America, under
convoy of a British fleet commanded by Admiral Lord Howe. ***The fierce
German

* It was estimated that, when the Revolution broke out, there were about
one hundred and fifty thousand German emigrants in the American
colonies, most of whom had taken sides with the patriots.

** Cavendish's Debates.

*** Admiral Howe, who was a man of fine feelings, hesitated long before
he would accept the command of the fleet destined to sail against his
fellow-subjects in America. In Parliament, a few days before he sailed,
he spoke with much warmth upon the horrors of civil war, and "declared
that he knew no struggle so painful as that between a soldier's duties
as an officer and a man. If left to his own choice, he should decline
serving; but if commanded, it beeame his duty, and he should not refuse
to obey." General Conway said a war with our fellow-subjects in America
differed very widely from a war with foreign nations, and that before an
officer drew his sword against his fellow-subjects he ought to examine
well his conscience whether the cause were just. Thurlow declared that
such sentiments, if once established as a doctrine, must tend to a
dissolution of all governments.--Pictorial History of England, v., 248.

Parliament alarmed by a Rumor.--French Emissary in Philadelphia.--
Official Announcement of the Evacuation of Boston.

590warriors--fierce, because brutish, unlettered, and trained to
bloodshed by the continental butchers--were first let loose upon the
patriots in the battle of Long Island, * and thenceforth the _Hessians_
bore a prominent part in many of the conflicts that ensued.

During the residue of the session of Parliament under consideration,
American affairs occupied a good portion of the time of the Legislature,
but nothing of great importance was done. The Duke of Grafton made an
unsuccessful attempt to have an address to the king adopted, requesting
that a proclamation might be issued to declare that if the colonists
should, within a reasonable time, show a willingness to treat with the
commissioners, or present a petition, hostilities should be suspended,
and their petition be received and respected. He assured the House that
both France and Spain were arming; and alarmed them by the assertion
that "two French gentlemen had been to America, had conferred with
Washington at his camp, and had since been to Philadelphia to confer
with Congress. ** The duke's proposition was negatived.

A very brief official announcement of the evacuation of Boston appeared
in the London Gazette of the 3d of May, 1776. *** Ministers endeavored
to conceal full intelligence of the transaction, and assumed a careless
air, as if the occurrence were of no moment. But Colonel Barré would not
allow them to rest quietly under the cloak of mystery, but moved in the
House of Commons for an address to his majesty, praying that copies of
the dispatches of General Howe and Admiral Shuldham might be laid before
the House. There, and in the House of Lords, the ministry were severely
handled. Lord North declared that the army was not compelled to abandon
Boston, when he well knew to the contrary; and Lord George Germaine's
explanation was weak and unsatisfactory. The thunders of Burke's
eloquent denunciations were opened against the government, and he
declared that "every measure which had been adopted or pursued was
directed to impoverish England and to emancipate America; and though in
twelve months nearly one thousand dollars a man had been

* I intended to defer a notice of these German troops (generally called
Hessians, because the greater portion came from Hesse and Hesse-Cassel)
until the battle of Long Island should be under consideration; but the
action relative to their employment occupies such a conspicuous place in
the proceedings of the session of Parliament, where the most decided
hostile measures against America were adopted, that here seemed the most
appropriate place to notice the subject in detail. See note 2, page 164,
vol. ii.

** Some time in the month of November, 1775, Congress was informed that
a foreigner was in Philadelphia who was desirous of making to them a
confidential communication. At first no notice was taken of it, but the
intimation having been several times repeated, a committee, consisting
of John Jay, Dr. Franklin, and Thomas Jefferson, was appointed to hear
what he had to say. They agreed to meet him in a room in Carpenters'
Hall, and, at the time appointed, they found him there--an elderly, lame
gentleman, and apparently a wounded French officer. He told them that
the French king was greatly pleased with the exertions for liberty which
the Americans were making; that he wished them success, and would,
whenever it should be necessary, manifest more openly his friendly
sentiments toward them. The committee requested to know his authority
for giving these assurances. He answered only by drawing his hand across
his throat, and saving, "Gentlemen, I shall take care of my head." They
then asked what demonstrations of friendship they might expect from the
King of France. "Gentlemen," he answered, "if you want arms, you shall
have them: if you want ammunition, you shall have it; if you want money,
you shall have it." The committee observed that these were important,
assurances, and again desired to know by what authority they were made.
"Gentlemen," said he, again drawing his hand across his throat, "I shall
take care of my head;" and this was the only answer they could obtain
from him. He was seen in Philadelphia no more.--See Life of John Jay,
written by his son, William Jay.

*** The official announcement in the Gazette was as follows: "General
Howe, commander-in-chief of his majesty's forces in North America,
having taken a resolution on the 7th of March to remove from Boston to
Halifax with the troops under his command, and such of the inhabitants,
with their effects, as were desirous to continue under the protection of
his majesty's forces; the embarkation was effected on the 17th of the
same month, with the greatest order and regularity, and without the
least interruption from the rebels When the packet came away, the first
division of transports was under sail, and the remainder were preparing
to follow in a few days, the admiral leaving behind as many men-of-war
as could be spared from the convoy for the security and protection of
such vessels as might be bound to Boston."

Royal Approval of Howe's Course.--Opinions of the People.--Position of
the Colonies.--Count Rumford. Fortifications.

591spent for salt beef and sour-krout, * the troops could not have
remained ten days longer if the heavens had not rained down manna and
quails."

The majority voted down every proposition to elicit full information
respecting operations in America, and on the 23d of May his majesty,
after expressing a hope "that his rebellious subjects would yet submit,"
prorogued Parliament.

The evacuation of Boston was approved by the king and his ministers, and
on the day when the announcement of the event was made in London, Lord
George Germaine May 3, 1776 wrote to Howe, deploring the miscarriage of
the general's dispatches for the ministers, **

praising his prudence, and assuring him that his conduct had "given the
fullest proofs of his majesty's wisdom and discernment in the choice of
so able and brave an officer to command his troops in America."

Thus ended the Siege of Boston, where the first decided triumph of
American arms over the finest troops of Great Britain was accomplished.
The departure of Howe was regarded in England as a flight; the patriots
viewed it as a victory for themselves. Confidence in their strength to
resist oppression was increased ten-fold by this event, and doubt of
final and absolute success was a stranger to their thoughts. "When the
siege of Boston commenced, the colonies were hesitating on the great
measures of war; were separated by local interests; were jealous of each
other's plans, and appeared on the field, each with its independent army
under its local colors. When the siege of Boston ended, the colonies had
drawn the sword and nearly cast away the scabbard. They had softened
their jealousy of each other; they had united in a political
association; and the Union flag of thirteen stripes waved over a
Continental army." ***

Few events of more importance than those at other large sea-port towns
occurred at Boston after the flight of the British army. The Americans
took good care to keep their fortifications in order, and a full
complement of men to garrison them sufficiently. **** This fact

* A Dutch or German dish, made of cabbage.

*** It appears that Howe sent dispatches to England on the 23d of
October, 1775. by the hands of Major Thompson, and those were the last
from him that reached the ministry before the army left Boston for
Halifax. Major Thompson was afterward the celebrated philosopher. Count
Rumford. He was a native of Woburn, in Massachusetts, and was born on
the 26th of March, 1753. He early evinced a taste for philosophy and the
mechanic arts, and obtained permission to attend the philosophical
lectures of Professor Winthrop at Cambridge. He afterward taught school
at Rumford (now Concord), New Hampshire, where he married a wealthy
young widow. In consequence of his adhesion to the British cause, he
left his family in the autumn of 1775, went to England, and became a
favorite of Lord George Germaine, who made him under secretary in the
Northern Department. Near the close of the Revolution he was sent to New
York, where he commanded a regiment of dragoons, and returning to
England, the king knighted him. He became acquainted with the minister
of the Duke of Bavaria, who induced him to go to Munich, where he became
active in public affairs. The duke raised him to a high military rank,
and made him a count of the empire. He added to his title the place of
his marriage, and became Count Rumford. He was in London in 1800, and
projected the Royal Institution of Great Britain. His wife, whom he
abandoned, died in 1794 in New Hampshire. Count Rumford died August
20th, 1814, aged sixty-one vears. His scientific discoveries have made
his name immortal. He bequeathed fifty thousand dollars to Harvard
College.

*** Frothingham, page 334.

**** With the exception of Dorchester, Bunker Hill, and Roxbury, I
believe there are few traces of the fortifications of the Revolution
that can be certainly identified; and so much altered has been the
fortress on Castle Island that it exhibits but little of the features of
1776. Every year the difficulty of properly locating the several forts
becomes greater, and therefore to preserve, in this work, a record of
those landmarks by which they may be identified, I condense from
Silliman's Journal for 1822 an interesting article on the subject which
was communicated by J. Finch, Esq., with such references as later
writers have made. A recurrence to the map on page 566, vol. i., will
assist the reader.

**** I. Breed's Hill and Bunker Hill.--These works were on the summits
and slopes of the hills, looking toward Boston. Bunker Hill Monument now
stands upon the spot where Prescott's redoubt was thrown up. II. Plowed
Hill.--This fort was upon the summit of the eminence, commanding the
Mystic River and the Penny Ferry. It was in a direct line from
Charlestown Neck to Winter Hill, further northward. III. Cobble or
Barrell's Hill.--In consequence of its strength, the fort on this hill
was called Putnam's impregnable fortress. This was on the north side of
Willis's Creek, in full view of Bunker and Breed's Hills, and commanding
the whole western portion of the peninsula of Charlestown. IV.
Lechmere's Point was strongly fortified at a spot one hundred yards from
West Boston Bridge There was a causeway across the marsh, and a line of
works along Willis's Creek to connect with those on Cobble Hill. V.
Winter Hill.--The works at this point, commanding the Mystic and the
country northward from Charlestown, were more extensive than any other
American fortification around Boston. There rested the left wing of the
army under General Lee, at the time of the siege of Boston. There was a
redoubt near, upon the Ten Hill Farm, that commanded the Mystic; and
between Winter and Prospect Hills was a re-doubt, where a quarry was
opened about the year 1819. This was called White House Redoubt, in the
rear of which, at a farm-house, Lee had his quarters. VI. Prospect Hill
has two eminences, both of which were strongly fortified, and connected
by a rampart and fosse, or ditch. These forts were destroyed in 1817.
There is an extensive view from this hill. VII. The Cambridge Lines,
situated upon Butler's Hill, consisted of six regular forts connected by
a strong intrenchment. These were in a state of excellent preservation
when Mr. Finch wrote. The Second Line of Defense might then be traced on
the College Green at Cambridge. VIII. A semicircular Battery, with three
embrasures, was situated on the northern shore of Charles River, near
its entrance into the bay. It was rather above the level of the marsh.
IX. Brookline Fort, on Sewall's Point, was very extensive. The ramparts
and irregular bastion, which commanded Charles River, were very strong.
The fort was nearly quadrangular. X. There was a battery on the southern
shore of Muddy River, with three embrasures. Westward of this position
was a redoubt; and between Stony Brook and Roxbury were three others.
XI. Roxbury.--There were strong fortifications at this point, erected
upon eminences which commanded Boston Neck, sometimes called Roxbury
Neck. About three quarters of a mile in advance of these redoubts were
The Roxbury Lines, situated northward of the town. There were two lines
of intrenchments, which extended quite across the peninsula; and the
ditch, filled at high water, made Boston an island. The works thrown up
by Gage when he fortified Boston Neck were near the present Dover
Street. Upon a higher eminence, in the rear of the Roxbury lines (at
present [[1850]] west of Highland Street, on land owned by the Honorable
B. F. Copeland), was Roxbury Fort,1 2 a strong quadrangular work, with
bastions appears to have been on the southwest side, near which was a
covered way and sally-port. I have nowhere seen a fortification of the
Revolution so well preserved as this, except the old quadrangular fort
or castle at Chambly, on Ground Plan of the Fort.3 the Sorel; and it is
to be hoped that patriotic reverence will so consecrate the ground on
which this relic lies, that unhallowed gain may never lay upon the old
ramparts the hand of demolition. The history of the construction of
Roxbury Fort is somewhat obscure. It is known to have been the first
regular work erected by the Americans when they nearly circumvallated
Boston. Tradition avers, that when the Rhode Island "Army of
Observation," which hastened toward Boston, under Greene, after the
skirmishes at Lexington and Concord, encamped at Jamaica Plains, a
detachment was sent forward and commenced this redoubt at Roxbury.
General Ward, who, by common consent, was captain-general of the
accumulating forces, ordered them to desist, as he was about to commence
a regular line of fortifications under the direction of Gridley. The
Rhode Islanders, acknowledging no authority but their own Provincial
Assembly, proceeded in their work; and when Washington took command of
the army, he regarded this fort as the best and most eligibly located of
all the works then in course of construction. During the siege of
Boston, Roxbury Fort was considered superior to all others for its
strength and its power to annoy the enemy. XII. Dorchester Heights.--The
ancient fortifications there are covered by the remains of those erected
in 1812, and have little interest except as showing the locality of the
forts of the Revolution. XIII. At Nook's Hill, near South Boston Bridge,
the last breast-work was thrown up by the American^ before the flight of
the British. It was the menacing appearance of this suddenly-erected
fort that caused Howe to hasten his departure. The engineers employed in
the construction of these works were Colonel Richard Gridley, chief;
Lieutenant-colonel Rufus Putnam, Captain Josiah Waters, Captain Baldwin,
o! Brookfield, and Captain Henry (afterward general) Knox, assistants.
These were the principal works erected and occupied by the Americans at
Boston. When Mr. Finch wrote in 1822, many of these were well preserved,
and he expressed a patriotic desire that they should remain so. But they
are gone, and art has covered up the relics that were left. But it is
not yet too late to carry out a portion of his recommendation, by which
to preserve the identity of some of the localities. "The laurel, planted
on the spot where Warren fell, would be an emblem of unfading honor; the
white birch and pine might adorn Prospect Hill: at Roxbury, the cedar
and the oak might yet retain their eminence; and upon the heights of
Dorchester we would plant the laurel, and the finest trees which adorn
the forest, because there was achieved a glorious victory, without the
sacrifice of life!"

* This view is from the southwest angle of the fort. In the foreground a
portion of the ramparts is seen. These are now overgrown, in part, with
shrubbery. On the right is seen the house of Mr. Benjamin Perkins, on
Highland Street, and extending across the picture, to the left, is the
side of the fort toward Boston, exhibiting prominent traces of the
embrasures for the cannons. It was a foggy day in autumn when I visited
the fort, in company with Frederic Kidder, Esq., of Boston, to whose
courtesy and antiquarian taste I am indebted for the knowledge of the
existence of this well-preserved fortification. No distant view could be
procured, and I was obliged to be content with the above sketch, made in
the intervals of "sun and shower." The bald rocks on which the fort
stands are huge bowlders of pudding-stone, and upon three sides these
form natural revetments, which would be difficult for an enemy to scale.
The embankments are from eight to fifteen feet in height, and within,
the terre-plein, on which the soldiers and cannons were placed, is quite
perfect.

** See map on page 566, vol. i.

*** This is a ground plan of the fort as it now appears. A is the
parade; B, the magazine; C, the sally-port D, the side toward Boston.

Boston Harbor.--Remains of the Revolutionary Fortifications around
Boston

592seemed to be well known to the enemy; for while Newport and the
places adjacent suffered from the naval operations of British vessels,
Boston Harbor was shunned by them. Some

The "Convention Troops."--Their Parole of Honor.--Picture of the
Captives.--Burgoyne in Boston

593of the Tories who went with Howe to Halifax returned, and cast
themselves upon the clemency of the new government. Those who possessed
influence that might be dangerous were immediately arrested and thrown
into prison, where they were confined for several months, until
satisfactory arrangements were made for their release.

Boston was the place whither the captured troops of Burgoyne were sent
in 1777, to embark for England on parole. * They entered Cambridge on
the 7th of November, during the prevalence of a severe northeast storm.
A graphic description of the appearance of the Hessians is given in a
letter from Mrs. Winthrop to Mrs. Warren, printed on page 82. Speaking
of the British portion of the captive army, the same writer says:

"Their baggage-wagons were drawn by poor half-starved horses; but to
bring up the rear was a noble-looking guard of American, brawny,
victorious yeomanry, who assisted in bring ing these sons of slavery to
terms. Some of our wagons, drawn by fat oxen, driven by joyous-looking
Yankees, closed the cavalcade. The generals and other officers went to
Bradish's, where they quarter at present. The privates trudged through
thick and thin to the hills, where we thought they were to be confined;
but what was our surprise when, in the morning, we beheld an inundation
of these disagreeable objects filling our streets." These captive troops
were quartered in some of the best private houses, and the students of
Harvard College were dismissed to make room for these foreign soldiers.
Alluding to this fact. Mrs. Winthrop writes, "Is there not a degree of
unkindness in loading poor Cambridge, almost ruined before this great
army seemed to be let loose upon us? ** Surprising that our general
[Gates], or any of our colonels, should insist on the first university
in America being disbanded for their genteel accommodation, and we, poor
oppressed people, seek an asylum in the woods against a piercing winter.
General Burgoyne dined on Sunday in Boston with General. He rode through
the town properly attended, down Court Street and through the Main
Street, and on his return walked to Charlestown ferry, followed by as
great a number of spectators as ever attended a pope." There must have
been a great contrast between the feelings of Burgoyne at that time and
when he walked the same streets two years before, a general covered with
fresh laurels won upon the Spanish Peninsula. *** The captive army were
sent to Charlottesville, in Virginia, at the beginning of 1779.

* I have before me the original paroles of honor, signed by all the
surviving officers of Burgoyne's captured army. They are the property of
J. Wingate Thornton, Esq., of Boston, who kindly placed them in my hands
for use. The paroles are dated at Cambridge, December 13th, 1777. One is
signed by 185 English officers, headed by Burgoyne; the other by 95
German officers, headed by Riedesel, the Brunswick general. Their names
may be found in the Supplement, page 672.

** This sudden influx menaced the country about Boston with famine, for
the five thousand prisoners of war had to be fed. Every article rapidly
rose in price; wood was sold at twenty-seven and a half dollars a cord.

*** When Burgoyne left Boston for England, General Phillips was left in
chief command of the captive troops, quartered on Prospect Hill. He was
a conceited, irritable person, and often his haughty pride made him
forget the relation in which he stood to the victorious Americans, whom
he had been taught to despise. On one occasion, one of his officers was
returning from Boston, with two females, to the British camp, and
refused to answer the challenge of the sentinel. He was shot dead, and
the act was justified by the rules of war. General Phillips was greatly
enraged, and wrote the following impudent letter to General Heath, the
commanding officer:

*** "Cambridge, June 17, 1778. "Murder and death have at length taken
place. An officer, riding out from the barracks on Prospect Hill, has
been shot by an American sentinel. I leave the horrors of that bloody
disposition, whieh has joined itself to rebellion in these colonies, to
the feelings of all Europe. I do not ask for justice, for I believe
every principle of it has fled from this province. I demand liberty to
send an officer to General Sir Henry Clinton, by way of the head-
quarters of General Washington. Wm. Phillips, Major General." This was
strange language for a prisoner of war to use toward his keeper! Before
the insulting note had been received by Heath, the sentry had been put
under guard to await the decision of a jury of inquest. Heath had also
written a polite note to Phillips, informing him of the fact. As I have
observed before, the haughty insolence of the British functionaries,
civil and military, toward the Americans, did more to engender hatred
and foster the rebellion than any other single eause. Phillips's conduct
is a fair picture, among many others, of the haughty bearing of the
Britons in authority. I have before me an autograph letter to General
Heath, written at about the same time, by Lieutenant Kingston,
Burgoyne's deputy adjutant general. It is marked by flippant insolence,
although a little more polite than Phillips's letter.

--Expedition against Penobscot. Its Failure.--General Phillips.--General
Wadsworth.--Close of the Chronicles of Boston.

594In July, 1779, the State of Massachusetts fitted out an expedition at
Boston to go against the British troops at Penobscot, a small town on
the east side of Penobscot River in Maine. The enemy were estimated to
be one thousand strong. Fifteen hundred men were ordered to be raised
for the expedition, but only about nine hundred were actually employed,
and some of these were pressed into the service. Some were conveyed
thither by a fleet, consisting of several sloops of war, carrying from
sixteen to twenty-eight guns, one of thirty-two guns, seven armed brigs,
and twenty-four other vessels, which served as transports. Other
portions of the militia marched from the lower counties of Maine.
Commodore Salstonstall commanded the fleet, and Generals Lovell and
Wadsworth led the land forces. A disagreement arose between the
commanders of the fleet and army, which greatly weakened the power of
the expedition It was agreed, however, to attack the enemy. The American
land force debarked, and rushed to the assault of the fort up a steep
declivity, in the face of a storm of shot from the enemy. The marines
did not come to their support, and a large naval re-enforcement for the
British arriving at that moment, the assailants were repulsed and forced
to abandon the expedition. The Americans destroyed many of their vessels
to prevent them from falling into the hands of the enemy, and in
scattered detachments, the troops, marines, and sailors, made their way
back to their homes, suffering great hardships in their route through
the almost unbroken wilderness. It was a most unfortunate affair The
General Court of Massachusetts instituted an inquiry, which resulted in
censuring the naval commander, and commending Lovell and Wadsworth. *

Here let us close the chronicles of Boston. Henceforth we shall only
refer to them incidentally, as the elucidation of prominent events
elsewhere shall make this necessary. We have seen the discontents of the
colonies ripen into open rebellion in this hot-bed of patriotism; we
have seen a Continental army organized, disciplined, and prepared for
action, and those yeomanry and artisans, drawn from the fields and
workshops, piling, with seeming Titan strength, huge fortifications
around a well-disciplined British army, and expelling it from one of the
most advantageous positions on the continent. Let us now proceed to
places where other scenes in the great drama were enacted.

* Peleg Wadsworth was a native of Massachusetts, and graduated at
Harvard College in 1769. After his unsuccessful attempt against the
British fort at Penobscot in 1779, where his bravery was acknowledged,
he was sent to command in the district of Maine, whither he took his
family. In February, 1781, a party of the enemy eaptured him in his own
house, and conveyed him to the British quarters at Bagaduce or Castin.
In company with Major Burton, he effected his escape from the fort in
June, crossed the Penobscot in a canoe, and traveled through the
wilderness to his home. Of his capture, sufferings, and escape, Dr.
Dwight has given a long and interesting account in the second volume of
his Travels in New England. For many years Wadsworth was a member of
Congress from Cumberland district. He died at Hiram, in Maine, in
November, 1829, aged eighty years. His son, Lieutenant Henry Wadsworth,
was blown up in a fire-ship in the harbor at Tripoli in September,
1804.--Allen's American Biography.

Departure from Boston.--Scenery on the Route.--Cochituate.--The
Quinebaug.--Tradition of Mashapaug.

595

CHAPTER XXVI.

"Day wanes; 'tis autumn's eventide again;

And, sinking on the blue hill's breast, the sun

Spreads the large bounty of his level blaze,

Lengthening the shades of mountains and tall trees,

And throwing blacker shadows o'er the sheet

Of the dark stream, in whose unruffled tide

Waver the bank-shrub and the graceful elm,

As the gray branches and their trembling leaves

Catch the soft whispers of the evening air."

George Lunt.

T was in the afternoon of a warm, bright day in October, that I left
Boston for Norwich and New London, upon the Thames, in Connecticut,
where I purposed to pass two or three days in visiting the interesting
localities in their respective neighborhoods. I journeyed upon the great
Western rail-way from Boston to Worcester, forty-four miles westward,
where the Norwich road branches off in the direction of Long Island
Sound, and courses down the beautiful valleys of the French and
Quinebaug Rivers. Every rood of the way is agreeably diversified. Hill
and mountain, lake and streamlet, farm-house and village, charmed the
eye with a kaleidoscope variety as our train thundered over the road at
the rate of thirty miles an hour. Yet memory can fix upon only a few
prominent points, and these appear to make the sum of all which the eye
gazed upon. Thus I remember the sweet Lake Cochituate, whose clear
waters now bless the city of Boston with limpid streams. I remember it
stretching away north from the rail-way, pierced with many green
headlands, and rippled by the wings of waterfowl. Thus, too, I remember
the beautiful little Mashapaug, * lying in a bowl of the wooded hills of
Killingly, sparkling in the slant rays of the evening sun as we swept by
and became lost among the rugged heights and dark forests at twilight.

The Quinebaug is dotted with pretty factory villages at almost every
rift in its course; and, as we halted a moment at the stations, the
serried lights of the mills, and the merry laughter of troops of girls
just released from labor, joyous as children bursting from school,
agreeably broke the monotony of an evening ride in a close car. We
reached the Shetucket Valley at about half past seven o'clock, and at
eight I was pleasantly housed at the Mer-

* This sheet of water is now known by the unpoetical name of Alexander's
Lake, from the circumstance that a Scotchman, named Neil Alexander,
settled there, and owned all the lands in the vicinity in the year 1720.
The Indians, who called it Mashapaug, had a curious tradition respecting
the origin of the lake. I quote from Barber's Historical Collections of
Connecticut, p. 431: "In ancient times, when the red men of this quarter
had long enjoyed prosperity, that is, when they had found plenty of game
in the woods and fish in the ponds and rivers, they at length fixed the
time for a general powwow--a sort of festival for eating, drinking,
smoking, singing, and dancing. The spot chosen for this purpose was a
sandy hill, or mountain, covered with tall pines, occupying the
situation where the lake now lies. The powwow lasted four days in
succession, and was to continue longer, had not the Great Spirit,
enraged at the licentiousness that prevailed there, resolved to punish
them. Accordingly, while the red people, in immense numbers, were
capering about on the summit of the mountain, it suddenly gave way
beneath them and sunk to a great depth, when the waters from below
rushed up and covered them all, except one good old squaw, who occupied
the peak which now bears the name of Loon's Island. Whether the
tradition is entitled to credit or not, we will do it justice by
affirming that in a clear day, when there is no wind, and the surface of
the lake is smooth, the huge trunks and leafless branches of gigantic
pines may be occasionally seen in the deepest part of the water, some of
them reaching almost to the surface, in such huge and fantastic forms as
to cause the beholder to startle!"

Arrival at Norwich.--A literary Friend.--Indian History of Norwich.--
Uncas and Miantonomoh.

596chants' Hotel in Norwich, a city beautifully situated at the
confluence of the Yantic and Shetucket Rivers, whose wedded waters here
form the broad and navigable Thames.

Early in the morning I started in search of celebrities, and had the
good fortune to meet with Edwin Williams, Esq., the widely-known author
of the "Statesman's Manual" and other standard works. Norwich is his
birth-place, and was his residence during his youth, and he is as
familiar with its history and topography as a husbandman is with that of
his farm. With such a guide, accompanied by his intelligent little son,
an earnest delver among the whys and wherefores in the mine of
knowledge, I anticipated a delightful journey of a day. Nor was I
disappointed; and the pleasures and profit of that day's ramble form one
of the brightest points in my interesting tour. I procured a span of
horses and a barouche to convey us to Lebanon, twelve miles northward,
the residence of Jonathan Trumbull, the patriot governor of Connecticut
during the Revolution. While the hostler is harnessing our team, let us
open the chronicles of Norwich and see what history has recorded there.

Like that of all the ancient New England towns, the Indian history of
Norwich, commencing with the advent of the English in that neighborhood
about 1643, is full of romance, and woos the pen to depict it; but its
relation to my subject is only incidental, and I must pass it by with
brief mention.

Norwich is in the midst of the ancient Mohegan country, and Mohegan was
its Indian name. Uncas was the chief of the tribe when the English first
settled at Hartford, and built a fort at Saybrook, at the mouth of the
Connecticut River. He formed a treaty of amity with the whites; and so
fair were his broad acres upon the head waters of the Pequot River, now
the Thames, that the sin of covetousness soon pervaded the hearts of the
Puritan settlers. Wawekus Hill, now in the center of Norwich, was a
famous observatory for his warriors, for eastward of them were the
powerful Narragansets, sworn enemies of the Mohegans, and governed by
the brave Miantonômoh, also a friend of the white men. In the spring of
1643 the flame of war was lighted between these powerful tribes, and
Miantonômoh led his warriors to an invasion of the Mohegan country. His
plans were secretly laid, and he hoped to take Uncas by surprise. For
this purpose six hundred of his bravest warriors were led stealthily, by
night marches, toward the head waters of the Pequot. At dawn, one
morning, they were discovered at the Shetucket Fords, near the mouth of
the Quinebaug, by some of the vigilant Mohegan scouts upon the Wawekus.
From the rocky nooks near the falls of the Yantic, a canoe, bearing a
messenger with the intelligence, shot down the Thames to Shantock Point,
where Uncas was strongly fortified. With three or four hundred of his
best warriors he marched to meet Miantonômoh. They confronted at the
Great Plains, a mile and a half below Norwich, on the west side of the
Thames. A fierce conflict ensued. The advantage gained by Uncas by
strategy * was maintained, and the Narragansets were put to flight,
closely pursued by the Mohegans. Through tangled woods and over rocky
ledges, across the Yantic, and over the high plain of Norwich toward the
Shetucket Fords, the pursued and pursuers swept like a blast. Two swift-
footed Mohegans pursued Miantonômoh with unwearied pertinacity, and
finally outstripped him, he being encumbered with a heavy corselet. They
impeded his progress, but did not attempt to seize him, that honor being
reserved for their chief. As soon as Uncas touched Miantonômoh, the
latter halted and sat down in silence. He was conducted in triumph to
Shantock, where Uncas treated him with generous kindness and respect.
The conflict had been brief, but thirty of the Narragansets were slain.
Among the prisoners were a brother of the captive king, and two sons of
Canonicus, his uncle Uncas, probably fearing that the Narragansets would
make an attempt to recapture their

* When Uncas saw the superior number of Miantonômoh's warriors, he sent
a messenger to that chief to say, in the name of Uncas, "Let us two
fight single-handed. If you kill me, my men shall be yours; if I kill
you, your men shall be mine." Miantonômoh, suspecting treachery,
disdainfully rejected the proposition. Uncas then fell on his face, a
signal previously agreed upon with his warriors, who, with bent bows,
rushed upon the Narragansets, who were carelessly awaiting the result of
the conference, and thus put them to flight.

Surrender of Miantonômoh to the English.--Unjust Decision.--Murder of
Miantonômoh.--Settlement of New London

597chief, sent him to Hartford, and surrendered him into the custody of
the English, agreeing to be governed in his future conduct toward his
prisoner by their advice. Miantonômoh was imprisoned until September,
when the commissioners of the United Colonies, at their meeting in
Boston, after debating the question whether it would be lawful to take
the life of Miantonômoh, referred his case to an ecclesiastical
tribunal, composed of five of the principal ministers of the colonies.
Their decision was in favor of handing him over to Uncas for _execution,
without torture_, within the dominions of that sachem. Delighted with
the verdict of his Christian allies, the equally savage Mohegan, with a
few trusty followers, con-, ducted Miantonômoh to the spot where he was
captured, and, while marching unsuspicious of present danger, a brother
of Uncas, at a sign from that chief, buried his hatchet in the head of
the royal prisoner. Uncas cut a piece of flesh from the shoulder of the
slain captive and ate it, saying, "It is very sweet; it makes my heart
strong." Satisfied revenge made it sweet; and no doubt his heart felt
stronger when he saw his powerful enemy lying dead at his feet. The
whole transaction was base treachery and ingratitude. Miantonômoh had
been the firm friend of the whites on Rhode Island, and his sentence was
a flagrant offense against the principles of common justice and
Christianity. He was buried where he was slain, and from these
circumstances the place has since been called the Sachem's Plain. *

The Narragansets, burning with revenge, and led by Pessacus, a brother
of Miantonomoh, invaded the Mohegan country in the spring of 1645.
Plantations were laid waste, and Uncas, with his principal warriors, was
driven into his strong fortress at Shantock. There he was closely
besieged, but found means to send a messenger to Captain Mason, the
destroyer of the Pequots, then commanding the fort at Saybrook. As in
duty bound, that officer sent succor to his ally, not in men, for they
were not needed, but in provisions. Thomas Leffingwell, a young man of
undaunted courage, paddled a canoe up the Pequot at night, laden with
many hundred weight of beef, corn, pease, &c., and deposited them safely
within the fort at Shantock. This timely relief was made known to the
besiegers by hoist ing a piece of beef upon a pole above the ramparts of
the fort. Unable to break down the fortress, the Narragansets raised the
siege and returned to their own country. This invasion was repeated, and
with almost fatal effect to Uncas. The English saved him, and, finally,
after nearly twenty years of strife, the hatchet was buried between
these tribes.

It was in the midst of these hostilities that the younger Winthrop and
others commenced a settlement at Pequot Harbor, now New London; and in
1659 Uncas and his two sons signed a deed at Say-brook, conveying a
tract of land, "lying at the head of the Great River," nine miles
square, to Thomas Leffingwell and others, for a value consideration of
about three hundred and fifty dollars. Leffingwell had thirty-five
associates, and there founded the city of Norwich, at the head of the
plain now known as the _old town, or up town._ It is not my province to
trace the progress of settlement, but simply to note the prominent
points

* The spot where Miantonômoh was buried is a little northward of the
village of-Greenville, on the west bank of the Shetucket, and about a
mile and a half from Norwich. A pile of stones was placed upon his
grave, and for many years a portion of his tribe came, in the season of
flowers, and mourned over his remains, each one adding a stone to the
tumulus. At length their visits ceased, and the voice of tradition being
seldom heard at that isolated spot, the proprietor of the land, ignorant
of the fact that the pile of stones was sepulchral and sacred to
patriotism, used them in the construction of the foundation of a barn.
On the 4th of July, 1841, the people of Greenville celebrated, by a
festival, the erection of a monument to Miantonômoh, on the spot where
he was slain. It is a block of granite eight feet high, and about five
feet square at the base, hearing the inscription Miantonômoh. 1643. I
did not visit the spot, but, from description, I think the initial
letter I, at the beginning of this chapter, is a fair representation of
it.

** Owaneko was a bold warrior in his youth, and was distinguished in
King Philip's War. In maturity, having lost the stimulus of war, "he
used to wander about with his blanket, metonep, and sandals, his gun,
and his squaw," says Miss Caulkins, "to beg in the neighboring towns,
quartering himself in the kitchens and outhouses of his white friends,
and presenting to strangers, or those who could not well understand his
imperfect English, a brief, which had been written for him by Mr.
Richard Bushnell. It was as follows

"'Oneco king, his queen doth bring To beg a little food; As they go
along their friends among To try how kind, how good. Some pork, some
beef, for their relief; And if you can't spare bread, She'll thank you
for your pudding, as they go a gooding, And carry it on her head.'"

Settlement of Norwich.--Mohegan Cemetery.--Uncas's Monument.--
Revolutionary Spirit.--Owaueko

1659.

598in the colonial history of a people who were among the earliest and
most ardent supporters of the Revolution. *

It was a charming spot where the Puritan settlers founded the city of
Norwich, a name given to it in honor of the English birth-place of some
of them. "Birds and animals of almost every species belonging to the
climate were numerous to an uncommon degree; and the hissing of snakes,
as well as the howling of wolves and bears must soon have become
familiar to their ears.

To complete the view, it may be added, that the streams swarmed with
fish and wild fowl; in the brooks and meadows were found the beaver and
the otter, and through the whole scene stalked at intervals the Indian
and the deer." ** The planting of this settlement greatly pleased Uncas,
but irritated the Narragansets; the former regarding it with pleasure,
as the latter did with anger, as a barrier to the meditated invasions of
the Mohegan country by the tribe of Miantonômoh. Uncas remained a firm
friend to the whites until his death, which occurred soon after the
close of King Philip's War, probably in 1683. He died at Mohegan
(Norwich), and was interred in the burial-ground of his family, situated
upon the high plain just above the falls of the Yantic. The royal
cemetery has been inclosed, and a granite monument erected therein to
the memory of the celebrated sachem.November 1, 1660 The first male
white child born in Norwich was Christopher Huntington, afterward
recorder of the town. The name of Huntington is intimately connected
with the whole history of that settlement, and is prominent in our
revolutionary annals. Several of that name were engaged in the army, and
one. Samuel Huntington, was President of Congress. Indeed, the whole
population seemed to be thoroughly imbued with the spirit of freedom,
and from the Stamp Act era until the close of the war for independence,
almost every patriotic measure adopted was an act of the town, not of
impromptu assemblages of the friends of liberty or of committees. ****
Like

* The reader is referred to a well-written volume of 360 pages, A
History of Norwich, Connecticut, from its Settlement in 1660, to
January, 1845: by Miss F. M. Caulkins. It is carefully compiled from the
town records, old newspapers, and well-authenticated traditions, many of
the latter being derived from then living witnesses of the scenes of the
Revolution. I am indebted to this valuable little work for much
interesting matter connected with Norwich.

** Miss Caulkins, page 40.

***This monument is on the south side of Prospect Street, and stands
within a shaded inclosure surrounded by a hedge of prim, upon the estate
of Judge Goddard. The obelisk is a single block of granite, and, with
the pedestal, is about twenty feet high. The monument was erected by the
citizens of Norwich. The foundation-stone was laid by President Jackson,
while visiting Norwich during his Eastern tour in 1832. Several small
tomb-stones of those of the royal line of Uncas are within the
inclosure. The name has now become extinct, the last Uncas having been
buried there about the beginning of the present century. A descendant of
Uncas, named Mazeon, was buried there in 1827, on which occasion the
wife of Judge Goddard (he being absent) invited the remnant of the
Mohegan tribe, then numbering about sixty, to partake of a cold
collation.

**** On the 7th of April, 1765, on the receipt of intelligence of the
passage of the Stamp Act, the people, in town-meeting assembled, voted
unanimously "that the town clerk shall proceed in his office as usual,
and the town will save him harmless from all damage that he may sustain
thereby."

Norwich Liberty Tree.--Celebration under it.--Honors to John Wilkes.--
Patriotic Town Meeting.--Benevolence of the People.

599those of Boston, the people of Norwich had their _Liberty Tree_,
under which public meetings were held in opposition to the Stamp Act. It
was brought from the forest, and erected in the center of the open
plain. Ingersoll, the stamp distributor for Connecticut, was burned in
effigy upon the high hill overlooking the plain, just above the site of
the old meetinghouse. The repeal of the Stamp Act was celebrated, on the
first anniversary of the event, on the 18th of March, 1767, with great
festivity, under _Liberty Tree_, which was decked with standards and
appropriate devices, and crowned with a Phrygian cap. A tent, or booth,
was erected under it, called a pavilion. Here, almost daily, people
assembled to hear news and encourage each other in the determination to
resist every kind of oppression. *

The inhabitants of Norwich entered heartily into the scheme of non-
importation from Great Britain. The pledge was generally signed, and
almost all were strictly faithful. On the 7th of June, 1768, an
entertainment was given at Peck's tavern, ** to celebrate the election
of John Wilkes to a seat in Parliament. Every thing was arranged in
excellent taste. All the table furniture, such as plates, bowls,
tureens, tumblers, and napkins, were marked "45," the number of the
_North Briton_, Wilkes's paper, that drew down upon his head the ire of
the British government, and, consequently, as a _persecuted patriot_,
obtained for him a seat in the House of Commons. The Tree of Liberty was
decorated with new banners and devices, among which was a flag inscribed
"No. 45, Wilkes and Liberty." Another celebration was held there in
September, avowedly to ridicule the commissioners of customs at Boston;
and in various ways the people manifested their defiance of British
power, where it wielded instruments of oppression. The margins of their
public records, for a series of years, were emblazoned with the words
Liberty! Liberty! Liberty! Every man was a self-constituted member of
the committee of vigilance, and none could drink tea, or use other
proscribed articles with impunity. Some who offended were forced
publicly to recant. The conduct of such persons was under the special
inspection of the Sons of Liberty, of whom Captain Joseph Trumbull,
eldest son of Governor Trumbull, was one of the most active.

On the 6th of June, 1774, a town meeting was held in Norwich, to take
into consideration "the melancholy state of affairs." Honorable Jabez
Huntington was chosen moderator; a series of resolutions, drawn up by
Captain Trumbull and Samuel Huntington, were adopted, *** and a standing
committee of correspondence, composed of some of the leading pa triots
of the town, was appointed. **** The people of Boston, in their
distress, consequent upon the closing of the port, (a) received
substantial testimonies of the sympathy of those of  a June 1 Norwich;
(v) and when the rumor which went abroad that the British soldiers were
massacring the people of Boston, reached Norwich, a multitude gathered
around the September 3, 1774 Liberty Tree, and the next morning (Sunday)
four hundred and sixty-four men,

* Miss Caulkins, page 208.

** This building, though somewhat altered, is yet standing on one side
of the green in the upper town, not far from the court-house. Belah
Peek, Esq., son of the proprietor of the house at that time, and then a
half-grown boy, was yet living. I met him upon the road, when returning
from Lebanon, sitting in his wagon as erect as most men at seventy. He
died toward the close of 1850, in the ninety-fifth year of his age.

*** One of these resolutions, looking favorably to a general Congress,
was as follows: "That we will, to the utmost of our abilities, assert
and defend the liberties and immunities of British America; and that we
will co-operate with our other brethren, in this and the other colonics,
in such reasonable measures as shall, in general Congress or otherwise,
be judged most proper to release us from burdens we now feel, and secure
from greater evils we fear will follow from the principles adopted by
the British Parliament respecting the town of Boston." This was one of
the earliest movements in the colonics favorable to a general Congress.

**** The committee consisted of Captain Jedediah Huntington, C.
Leffingwell, Dr. Theophilus Rogers, Captain William Hubbard, and Captain
Joseph Trumbull. Captain Huntington was afterward aid to General
Washington, and brigadier general in the Continental army.

*( v ) The inhabitants of Norwich sent cash, wheat, corn, and a flock of
three hundred and ninety sheep, for the relief of the suffering poor of
Boston. This liberality was greatly applauded in the public prints of
the day. A further instance of the liberal devotion of the people of
Norwich to the cause may be mentioned. The Connecticut Gazette for
January, 1778, published at New London, says, "On the last Sabbath of
December, 1777, a contribution was taken up in the several parishes of
Norwich for the benefit of the officer and soldiers who belonged to said
town, when they collected 386 pairs of stockings, 227 pairs of shoes,
118 shirts, 78 jackets, 48 pairs of overalls, 208 pairs of mittens, 11
buff caps, 15 pairs of breeches, 9 coats, 22 rifle frocks, 19
handkerchiefs, and £258 17s. 8d. [about $1295], which was forwarded to
the army. Also collected a quantity of pork, cheese, wheat, rye, Indian
corn, sugar, rice, flax, wood, &c., &c., to be distributed to the needy
families of the officers and soldiers. The whole amounted to the sum of
£1400," or about $7000.

March of Militia to Boston.--General Huntington.--The French Officers.--
Benjamin Huntington.

600a large proportion of them well mounted, started for the oppressed
city, under Major John Durkee. The report proved to be false; but the
following year, when the skirmish at Lexington inflamed all Anglo-
America, a large proportion of these same men hastened to Cambridge, and
Durkee and others were in the battle of Bunker Hill. * A company of one
hundred choice men, raised by Durkee in Norwich, marched thither under
Lieutenant Joshua Huntington, and were annexed to Putnam's brigade.

In the spring of 1776, the Continental army that left Boston for New
York after the British evacuation of the former place, passed through
Norwich to embark for New London.

There General Washington met Governor Trumbull by appointment, and both
dined together at the table of Colonel Jedediah Huntington. The dwelling
of that active patriot, pictured in the engraving, is well preserved in
its original character. It is in the present possession of his nieces,
the daughters of Colonel Ebenezer Huntington. Its roof at different
times sheltered several of the foreign officers--La Fayette, Steuben,
Pulaski, the Duke de Lauzun, and the Marquis de Chastellux.

While Lauzun's legion was cantoned at Lebanon, in the winter of 1780--
81, General Huntington invited that nobleman and his officers to a
banquet at his house. The noble and brilliant appearance of these men
when they rode into the town attracted great attention. After the dinner
was over, the whole party went into the yard, now adorned with flowering
shrubs, and gave three loud huzzas for liberty *

Our vehicle is at the door; let us take the reins and depart for
Lebanon.

Before leaving Norwich, we called upon Jonathan G. W. Trumbull, Esq., a
grandson of the patriot governor of that name, who kindly furnished us
with a letter of introduction to the oldest inhabitant" of Lebanon,
Captain Hubbard Dutton. Mr. Trumbull is a lineal descendant, through his
grandmother, of the Reverend John Robinson, the Puritan divine whose
flock were the Pilgrim Fathers. Among other relies, Mr. Trumbull showed
us a

* This was the Colonel Durkee engaged in affairs at Wyoming, and known
as "the bold Bean Hiller", See note, page 345,

** This pleasant mansion is situated in Old Norwich, or "up town," a few
rods eastward of that of Governor Huntington. The original owner,
Jedediah Huntington, was one of five sons of General Jabez Huntington,
who were in the Continental army 'at different times during the war. He
was born at Norwich, August 15, 1745, and graduated at Harvard College
in 1763. The address which he delivered upon that occasion was "the
first English oration ever heard upon the commencement boards" of that
institution. When opposition to British rule began, young Huntington was
aroused, and at once espoused the cause of the colonists. He was an
active Son of Liberty, and was one of the earliest captains of militia
in his native town. He raised a regiment, and with it joined the
Continental army in 1775. In 1777, Congress commissioned him a
brigadier, which office he held until the close of the war. Washington
highly esteemed him, and appointed him collector of the port of New
London in 1789. He resided there until his death, which occurred on the
25th of September, 1818. His first wife was daughter of Governor
Trumbull. She died at Dedham, while her husband was on his way to
Cambridge, in 1775. His second wife was sister to the late Bishop Moore
of Virginia. She died in 1831. Benjamin Huntington, of another family,
was the first mayor of Norwich, and was a representative in the
Continental Congress from 1784 to 1787 inclusive; also during
Washington's administration. His son Benjamin married a daughter of
General Jedediah Huntington, who became the mother of Huntington, our
distinguished artist. He was at one time one of the most eminent of New
York brokers. He died on the 3d of August, 1850, at the age of seventy-
three years.

A precious Heir-loom.--The Road to Lebanon.--Bozrah and Fitchville.--
Situation of Lebanon.--Governor Trumbull

601silver cup, with a richly-wrought handle, and bearing the initials I.
R., which belonged to Mr. Robinson. It is properly preserved as a most
precious heir-loom.

The road to Lebanon passes through a broken but fertile country, every
where thoroughly cultivated where tillage is practicable. We passed
through Old Norwich and over Bean Hill, but, mistaking the Colchester
road for the Lebanon turnpike, found ourselves at Fitchville, in Bozrah,
nearly two miles from our most direct way. * The ride along the high
banks of the winding Yantic, coursing in a deep bed among stately trees,
was ample compensation for the loss of time, and we had no inclination
to chide the road-fork that deceived us.

The gentle hills rise one above another toward Lebanon, until they are
lost in a high, rolling plain, on which the old town is situated. The
land throughout that region has ever been held in the highest estimation
for its fertility; and around Lebanon, the focus of Connecticut
patriotism and vigilance during the Revolution, cluster associations of
the deepest interest. Here was the residence of Governor Trumbull, whose
name and deeds are worthily associated with those of Washington, on the
records of our war for independence.

No man during that contest acted with more

* The origin of this name is a little amusing. A plain man, who lived
where Fitchville now is, was not remarkable for quoting Scripture
correctly. On one occasion, in quoting the passage from Isaiah, "Who is
this that cometh from Edom, with dyed garments from Bozrah," &c., he
stated that the Prophet Bozrah said thus and so. He was afterward called
the Prophet, and the place of his residence Bozrah. When the town was
incorporated, that name was given to it.--Barber, 302.

** Jonathan Trumbull was born at Lebanon, Connecticut, on the 10th of
June (O. S.), 1710. He graduated at Harvard in 1727, and commenced the
study of theology with the Reverend Solomon Williams, of Lebanon. The
death of an elder brother, who was engaged in a mercantile business with
his father at Lebanon, caused him to become a merchant instead of a
clergyman. At the age of twenty-three he was elected a member of the
Connecticut Assembly, where his business capacities raised him rapidly
in public estimation. He was elected lieutenant governor of the colony
in 1766, and by virtue of that office became chief justice of the
Superior Court. His first bold step in opposition to Great Britain was
in refusing to take the oath enjoined in 1768, which was an almost
unconditional submission to all the power claimed by Parliament; nor
would he be present when others, more timorous than he, took it. Because
of his firmness he was chosen governor of the colony in 1769, and he has
the proud distinction of being the only colonial governor at the
commencement of the Revolution who espoused the cause of the colonies.
He was considered the whin; leader in New England while the Adamses and
Hancock were legislating in the Continental Congress; and during the
whole contest no man was more implicitly relied upon as a firm,
consistent, and active friend of liberty than Governor Trumbull.
"General Washington relied on him," says Sparks, "as one of his main
pillars of support." In 1783, when peace for the colonies returned,
Governor Trumbull, then seventy-three years old, declined a re-election
to the office of governor, which he had held fourteen consecutive years.
He retired from public life, but did not live long to enjoy the quiet he
so much coveted in the bosom of his family. He was seized with a
malignant fever in August, 1785, and on the 17th of that month died. His
son was afterward Governor of Connecticut, and in 1849 his grandson
filled that responsible office. The Marquis de Chastellux, who came to
America with Rochambeau in 1780, has left behind him a charming, life-
like description of his sojourn here. He thus pleasantly alludes to
Governor Trumbull. "I have already painted Governor Trumbull. At present
you have only to represent to yourself this little old man, in the
antique dress of the first settlers in this colony, approaching a table
surrounded by twenty huzzar officers, and, without either disconcerting
himself or losing any thing of his formal stiffness, pronouncing, in a
loud voice, a long prayer in the form of a benedicite. Let it not be
imagined that he excites the laughter of his auditors; they are too well
trained; you must, on the contrary, figure to yourself twenty Amens,
issuing at once from the midst of forty mustaches, and you will have
some idea of the little scene."--Travels, i., 458.

Character and Services of Governor Trumbull.--His Dwelling and War
Office.--Settlement of Lebanon.--Lauzun.

602energy, or plied his talents and resources with more industry than
he. During the whole war, the responsible duties and services of
governor of the state rested upon him, yet he performed immense labors
in other departments of the field to which he was called,
notwithstanding he was more than threescore years old.

His correspondence was very extensive, and he sat in council no less
than one thousand days during the war. Washington never applied to him
for supplies of any kind without receiving an immediate response. It is
a fact worthy of record that, although Connecticut can not point to any
brilliant battle field within her borders, she furnished for that war
more troops and supplies than any other colony, except Massachusetts. If
the old _war office_ of Governor Trumbull, yet standing at Lebanon, had
a tongue to speak, it might tell of many a scheme elaborated there,
which, in its consummation, may have been the act that turned the scale
of destiny in favor of the Americans. There the illustrious owner
discussed with Washington, Franklin, Rochambeau, and others, the gravest
questions which then occupied the attention of two hemispheres.

Such a spot is like consecrated ground, and the shoes of irreverence
should never press the green-sward around it.

We dined at the upper end of the village, and then proceeded to visit
the relics of the era of the Revolution which remain. I have called
Lebanon an old town. A portion of the tract was pur chased about 1698,
of _Owaneko,_ the son of _Uncas_ There were several tracts purchased by
the whites in the vicinity, all of which were united in the year 1700.
The village is situated principally upon a street thirty rods wide, and
more than a mile in length. Several well-built houses erected before or
about the time of the Revolution yet remain. Among them is that of
Governor Trumbull. It is a substantial frame building, and is now (1849)
owned by Mrs. Eunice Mason, a widow eighty years of age. We were denied
the pleasure of an interview with her on account of her feeble health.
The house is on the west side of the street, near the road running
westward to Colchester. Sixty or seventy rods southwest from the
Trumbull House is the "barrack lot," the place where Lauzun's legion of
cavalry were encamped.2 His corps consisted of about five hundred
horsemen. Rocham-

* This was the building in which Governor Trumbull transacted his public
business. It formerly stood near his dwelling, but is now several rods
northwest of it, on the same side of the Common. For many years it was
occupied as a post-office. This sketch was taken from the open field in
the rear, looking north.

** The Duke de Lauzun was an accomplished, but exceedingly voluptuous
and unprincipled man. His personal beauty, talents, wit, wealth, and
bravery were passports to the friendship of men who abhorred his
profligacy. Why he espoused the cause of the Americans it is not easy to
determine, unless, surfeited with sensual indulgences, he was desirous
of engaging in new excitements, where he might regain the waning vigor
of his body. His conduct here made him very popular. After his return to
Europe he became acquainted with Talleyrand, and accompanied him on a
mission to England in 1792. There one of his familiar associates was the
Prince of Wales, afterward George IV. On the death of his uncle, the
Duke de Biron, Lauzun succeeded to the title. He became involved in the
stormy movements of the French Revolution, and being found guilty of
secretly favoring the Vendeans, was executed on the 31st of December,
1793. Two officers in his regiment in America, named Dillon, brothers,
also suffered death by the guillotine.

The Alden Tavern.--General Prescott horsewhipped there.--The Williams
House.--The Trumbull Vault

603beau was there, with five regiments, for about three weeks, in the
winter of 1780, and while he tarried Washington arrived, stayed a few
days, and reviewed the French troops. A French soldier was shot for
desertion, a few rods north of the "barrack lot."

Nearly opposite the Trumbull mansion is the old tavern kept during the
Revolution by Captain Alden. It is famous generally as a place of
rendezvous of the French officers, for drinking and playing, and more
particularly as the house where General Prescott, the British officer
who was captured on Rhode Island, stopped to dine, while on his way,
under an escort, to Washington's camp, and received a horsewhipping from
the landlord. *

Of the remarkable circumstances of Prescott's capture I shall hereafter
write. Mr. Wattles, the present proprietor of the old tavern, is a
descendant of Captain Alden. While making the annexed sketch we were
joined by Captain Dutton, the venerable citizen to whom we bore a letter
of introduction, but who was absent from home when we arrived in the
village. He has a distinct recollection of all the revolutionary events
about Lebanon and vicinity, and could direct us to every spot made
memorable by those events.

On the corner of the road leading from Lebanon to Windham is the house
once occupied by William Williams, one of the signers of the Declaration
of Independence. It has been slightly modified, but its general
appearance is the same as it was during the Revolution Its present
occupant is Mr. Sim-eon Peckam. A biographical sketch of Mr. Williams
will be found among those of the Signers, in another portion of this
work, and the most prominent events of his life are also noticed in his
epitaph, given on the next page.

We will pass on to the sacred inclosure containing the vault of the
Trumbull family. It is in a cemetery a little eastward of the village,
and near the Windham Road--a cemetery which probably contains the
remains of more distinguished men of the Revolution than any other in
the country. In the Trumbull tomb are the remains of two governors of
Connecticut, the first commissary general of the United States, and a
signer of the Declaration of Independence.

* While at table, Mrs. Alden brought on a dish of succotash (boiled
beans and corn), a dish much valued in America. Prescott, unused to such
food, exclaimed indignantly, "What! do you treat mo with the food of
hogs?" and taking the dish from the table, strewed the contents over the
floor. Captain Alden, being informed of this, soon entered With a
horsewhip, and flogged the general severely. After Prescott was
exchanged and restored to his command on Rhode Island, the inhabitants
of Newport deputed William Rotch, Dr. Tupper, and Timothy Folger to
negotiate some concerns with him in behalf of the town. They were for
some time refused admittance to his presence, but the doctor and Folger
finally entered the room. Prescott stormed with great violence, until
Folger was compelled to withdraw. After the doctor had announced his
business, and Prescott had become calm, the general said, "Was not my
treatment to Folger very uncivil?" "Yes," replied the doctor. '"Then,"
said Prescott, "I will tell you the reason; he looked so much like a d--
d Connecticut man that horsewhipped me, that I could not endure his
presence."--Thatcher's Journal, p. 175.

** The marble monument standing in front of the tomb is in memory of
William Williams, a signer of the Declaration of Independence, and bears
the following inscription: "The remains of the Honorable William
Williams are deposited in this tomb. Born April 8th, 1731; died the 2d
of August, 1811, in the 81st year of his age. A man eminent for his
virtues and piety. For more than 50 years he was constantly employed in
public life, and served in many of the most important offices in the
gift of his fellow-citizens. During the whole period of the
Revolutionary war, he was a firm, steady, and ardent friend of his
country, and in the darkest times risked his life and wealth in her
defense. In 1776 and 1777 he was a member of the American Congress, and
as such signed the Declaration of Independence. His public and private
virtues, his piety and benevolence, will long endear his memory to his
surviving friends; above all, he was a sincere Christian, and in his
last moments placed his hope, with an humble confidence, in his
Redeemer. He had the inexpressible satisfaction to look back upon a
long, honorable, and well-spent life." On the pedestal upon the top of
the tomb are the following inscriptions: "Sacred to the memory of
Jonathan Trumbull, Esq., who, unaided by birth or powerful connections,
but blessed with a noble and virtuous mind, arrived to the highest
station in government. His patriotism and firmness during 50 years'
employment in public life, and particularly in the very important part
he acted in the American Revolution, as Governor of Connecticut, the
faithful page of history will record. Full of years and honors, rich in
benevolence, and firm in the faith and hopes of Christianity, he died,
August 9, 1785, Ætates 75." "Sacred to the memory of Madam Faith
Trumbull, * the amiable lady of Governor Trumbull, born at Duxbury,
Mass., A.D. 1718. Happy and beloved in her connubial state, she lived a
virtuous, charitable, and Christian life at Lebanon, in Connecticut, and
died lamented by numerous friends A.D. 1780, aged 62 years." "Sacred to
the memory of Joseph Trumbull, eldest son of Governor Trumbull, and
first commissary general of the United States of America; a service to
whose perpetual cares and fatigues he fell a sacrifice A.D. 1778, aged
42 years. Full soon, indeed! may his person, his virtues, and even his
extensive benevolence be forgotten by his friends and fellow-men. But
blessed be God! for the Hope that in his presence he shall be remembered
forever." "To the memory of Jonathan Trumbull, Esq., ** late Governor of
the State of Connecticut. He was born March 26th, 1740, and died August
7th, 1809, aged 69 years. His remains were deposited with those of his
father."

* Her maiden name was Robinson, and she was a lineal descendant of the
Reverend Mr. Robinson, pastor at Leyden of many of the Pilgrim Fathers.

** Son of the first governor

Return to Norwich.--Destruction of the Yantic Falls.--Birth-place of
Arnold.--Inscription upon the Trumbull Monument.

604The day was waning when I finished my sketches, and bidding Lebanon
and its interesting associations adieu, we returned to Norwich, stopping
for a few minutes at the Sachem's Burial-ground, on the verge of the
city, to delineate the monument of Uncas, printed on page 30.

On the following morning, accompanied by Mr. Williams, and his son in a
light dearborn, I proceeded to visit the many points of historic
interest within and around Norwich. We went to the plain and the upper
town by the road that passes along the margin of the Yantic, to the once
romantic falls near the mouth of that river. The natural beauties of
this cascade were half hidden and defaced long ago by towering
factories; but the chief spoiler was _public improvement_, which, with
pick and powder-blast, hammer and trowel, has digged down the crown of
the waterfall, and bridged it by a rail-way viaduct. A curve of a few
rods might have spared the beautiful Yantic Falls; but what right has
Nature to intrude her charms in the way of the footsteps of Mammon?

I saw at the house of Mr. Trumbull, in Norwich, a fine picture of these
romantic falls, painted by the eminent artist John Trumbull, a son of
the patriot governor, before a layer of brick or the sound of an ax had
desecrated the spot. It was, indeed, a charming scene.

About half way between Norwich, city and the upper town, on the right or
south side of the road, was the birth-place of Benedict Arnold, depicted
in the annexed engraving. The view is from the road, looking southeast.
The house had had some slight additions to its size since Arnold played
in its garden in petticoats and bib, yet its general appearance was the
same as at that time. Several circumstances bord-

Arnold's early Years.--Attempt to commit Murder.--A Ringleader in
Mischief.--His Mother.--Scorching Acrostic.

605ering upon the marvelous, and viewed with a little superstition, gave
the house an unpleasant notoriety, and for many years it was untenanted,
because it was haunted! by what or whom rumor never deigned to reveal.
When I visited it, only two or three rooms were occupied, the others
being empty and locked. The room in which Arnold was born, in the
southwest corner of the second story, was occupied, and the people
seemed to be familiar with the traditions respecting the boyhood of that
distinguished man. Arnold was blessed with a mother (Hannah King, of
Norwich), who was, says her epitaph, "A pattern of patience, piety, and
virtue," but her lessons seem to have been fruitless of good effect upon
the headstrong boy. * He was wayward, disobedient, unscrupulous, and
violent--traits of character which finally worked his ruin. He even
attempted _murder_ while a young man residing at Norwich, by shooting a
youthful Frenchman, who paid court to Arnold's sister, Hannah, by whom
his love was reciprocated. Young Arnold disliked him, and finding
persuasion powerless on the mind of his sister to induce her to break
off her engagement with the foreigner, vowed vengeance upon him if he
ever caught him in the house again. The opportunity occurred, and Arnold
discharged a loaded pistol at him as he escaped from a window,
fortunately without effect. The young man left the place forever, and
Hannah Arnold lived the life of a maiden. Arnold and the Frenchman
afterward met at Honduras They fought a duel, in which the latter was
severely wounded.

When a mere boy, Arnold's courage was remarkable, and among his
playmates he was a perfect despot. A ringleader in every mischievous
sport, he often performed astonishing feats of daring. On a gala-day, he
set a field-piece upright, poured powder into it, and dropped from his
own hand a firebrand into the muzzle. On another occasion, at the head
of a number of boys, he rolled away some valuable casks from a ship-yard
at Chelsea, ** to make a thanksgiving bonfire. An officer, sent by the
owner to recover them, arrested the casks on their way. The stripling
Arnold was enraged, and, taking off his coat upon the spot, dared the
constable, a stout man, to fight him! Such was the boyhood of one of the
most intrepid generals of our Revolution--such was the early type of the
unscrupulous, violent man whose memory is black with the foulest
treason. *** We have met him in preceding

* Miss Caulkins publishes the following letter from Mrs. Arnold to
Benedict, while he was at school in Canterbury. It exhibits the
character of his mother in strong contrast with his own in after life.

*"Norwich, April 12,1754. "Dear Child,--I received yours of the 1st
instant, and was glad to hear that you was well. Pray, my dear, let your
first concern he to make your peace with God, as it is of all concerns
of the greatest importance. Keep a steady watch over your thoughts,
words, and actions. Be dutiful to superiors, obliging to equals, and
affable to inferiors, if any such there be. Always choose that your
companions he your betters, that by their good examples you may learn.
"From your affectionate mother, Hannah Arnold. "P.S.--I have sent you
50s. Use it prudently, as you are accountable to God and your father.
Your father and aunt join with me in love and service to Mr. Cogswell
and lady, and yourself. Your sister is from home."

** Chelsea is the old port of Norwich. The houses cluster chiefly at the
mouth of the Shetucket.

*** Oliver Arnold, a cousin of Benedict, and also a resident of Norwich,
was the reputed author of the following scorching acrostic, written
after the treason of his kinsman. It is bad poetry and worse sentiment.

"Born for a curse to virtue and mankind, Earth's broadest realm ne'er
knew so black a mind. Night's sable veil your crimes can never hide,
Each one so great, 'twould glut historic tide. Defunct, your cursed
memory will live, In all the glare that infamy can give. Curses of ages
will attend your name, Traitors alone will glory in your shame.
"Almighty vengeance sternly waits to roll Rivers of sulphur on your
treacherous soul; Nature looks shuddering back with conscious dread On
such a tarnish'd blot as she has made. Let hell receive you riveted in
chains, Doom'd to the hottest focus of its flames!"

*** The author of the above had a peculiar talent for making extempore
verses. Joel Barlow once met him in a book-store in New Haven, and asked
him for a specimen of his talent. Arnold immediately repeated the
following:

"You've proved yourself a sinful cre'tur.; You've murder'd Watts and
spoil'd the meter, You've tried the Word of God to alter, And for your
pains deserve a halter."

*** To understand the witty sarcasm of these lines, it must be
remembered that Barlow, at that time, was en joying much notoriety by a
publication of a revised and altered edition of Watts's Psalms and
Hymns.

Residence of Governor Huntington.--Unpublished Letter written by
Washington

606pages in his glorious career as a bold patriot; we shall meet him
again presently amid the scenes of his degradation.

Leaving the Arnold House, we rode to the upper town, and halted at the
spacious mansion of Charles Spaulding, Esq., formerly the residence of
Governor Samuel Huntington, who was also a signer of the Declaration of
Independence, and President of Congress. It was considered the finest
dwelling in Norwich when occupied by the governor, and now presents an
excellent specimen of the architecture of that era. Surrounded by shade-
trees and adorned with shrubbery, it is a summer residence to be coveted
by those who love spacious rooms and a quiet location. I saw in the
possession of Mrs. Spaulding an autograph letter of General Washington,
written to Governor Huntington, then President of Congress. It has never
been published, and as its purport is of an interesting public nature, I
give a copy of it here. *

"Sir.,

"I beg leave to introduce to your excellency Colonel Menonville, deputy
adjutant general to the French army. This gentleman, who is charged by
his excellency the Count de Rochambeau with matters respecting a
contract entered into by Dr. Franklin, in behalf of the United States,
for the supply of a quantity of provision, will, through your
excellency, lay his business generally before Congress.

"He will also, agreeably to the wishes of Count Rochambeau, make an
application for some heavy iron cannon for the use of the works at
Newport, which he understands were imported into New Hampshire for the
use of the seventy-four gun ship now upon the stocks. The brass
artillery at present in them are the artillery of siege, and must be
removed should the army remove. If there are such cannon in New
Hampshire, and there is no probability of their being soon wanted for
the purpose for which they were intended, I think a part of them can not
be better applied.

"I recommend Colonel Menonville to your excellency's personal attention
as a gentleman of peculiar merit.

"I have the honor to be, with great respect, your excellency's most
obedient and humble servant, Geo. Washington.

"His Excellency the President of Congress."

In the rear of the Huntington mansion is the cemetery of the first
Congregational society of Norwich. Within it lie the remains of many of
the early inhabitants of the town, and

* The only letter written by Washington at this date, and published in
his "Life and Writings" by Sparks, was addressed to the Count de
Rochambeau, on the subject of an expedition to Penobscot. See Sparks,
viii., 8.

Family Vault of Governor Huntington.--Tomb of General Jabcz Huntington.-
-His five Sons.--The old Burying-ground

607upon the steep southern slope of a hill is the family vault of
Governor Huntington. It is substantially built of brick. On the front,
over the entrance, is an inscribed marble tablet. *

The tomb is somewhat dilapidated, and the ground overgrown with
brambles. In the southern portion of the cemetery, separated from the
others by a stone fence, is the family vault of General Jabez
Huntington, ** formerly one of the leading men of Norwich, and
peculiarly honored in contributing five hardy sons to the Continental
army. Jedediah was a brigadier general; Andrew was a commissary; Joshua
and Ebenezer were colonels. Zachariah, the youngest, was still living
with his son, Thomas M. Huntington, Esq., a few rods north of the
residence of General Jedediah Huntington, pictured on page 32. We called
to see him, but indisposition prevented his receiving visitors. He was
then nearly eighty-six years of age. He was drafted in the militia in
1780, but saw little of active military service. ***

General Jabez Huntington's tomb, like that of the governor, is
constructed of brick, having an inscribed marble tablet in front; ****,
unlike the other, it was not covered with brambles, nor was there a
blade of grass upon the old graves that surround it. The ground had been
burned over to clear it of bushes and briers, and the ancient tomb-
stones were shamefully blackened by fire. A few yards from Huntington's
tomb is the more humble grave of Diah Manning, who was a drummer in the
Continental army. He was the jailer at Norwich during the French
Revolution. When Boyer, afterward President of Hayti, was brought to
Norwich, among other French prisoners, in 1797, he was treated with
great kindness by Manning. The prisoner did not forget it, and when
President of St. Domingo, he sent presents to Manning's family.

Leaving the ancient cemetery, we returned to the city, and called upon
the almost centenarian Captain Erastus Perkins, residing on Shetucket
Street. He is yet living (1850), in the ninety-ninth year of his age. We
found him quite strong in body and mind. Many scenes of his early years
are still vivid pictures in his memory, and he was able to reproduce
them with much interest. He said he distinctly remembered the
circumstance of quite a large body of men going from Norwich to New
Haven, in 1765, to assist in compelling In-

* The following is a copy of the inscription: "Samuel Huntington, Esq.,
Governor of Connecticut, having served his fellow-citizens in various
important offices, died the 5th day of January, A.D. 1796, in the 65th
year of his age." "His consort, Mrs. Martha Huntington, died June 4th,
A.D. 1794, in the 57th year of her age." A portrait and biographical
sketch of Governor Huntington will be found among those of the signers
of the Declaration of Independence, in another part of this work.

** Jabez Huntington was born in Norwich, in 1719. He graduated at Yale
College in 1741, and soon afterward entered into mercantile business. At
one time himself and sons owned and fitted ont at the port of Norwich
twenty vessels for the West India trade. In 1750 he was elected a member
of the Connecticut Assembly, was speaker for several years, and also a
member of the Council. He lost nearly half his property by the capture
of his vessels when the Revolution broke out. He was an ardent patriot,
a very active member of the Council of Safety, and held the office of
major general in the militia. He died at Norwich in 1786.

*** General Zachariah Huntington is no more. He died in June, 1850, at
the age of eighty-eight. Thus one after another of those whom I visited
has since gone to rest in the grave.

**** The following is a copy of the inscription: "The family tomb of the
Honorable Jabez Huntington, Esq., who died October 5, 1786, aged 67
years."

Captain Perkins.--Old Men of Norwich.--Greenville.--Tory Hill.--Letter
of General Williams

608gersoll, the stamp distributor, to resign his office. Captain Perkins
went to Roxbury in 1775, and was a sutler in Colonel Huntington's
regiment at the time of the battle of Bunker Hill. He was in New York
about two years ago, and pointed out the spot

1848 in Wall Street where he stood and saw Washington take the oath as
President of the United States, sixty-one years before. For many years
Captain Perkins was surveyor of the port of Norwich, and throughout a
long life has preserved the esteem of its citizens He is now the honored
head of five generations. * A few friends of his youth are still living
in Norwich, but most of that generation have long since departed. I was
informed by Dr. W. P. Eaton that, the day before I visited Norwich,
Captain Perkins and three other men were in his store, whose united ages
were three hundred and fifty-seven years--an average of eighty-nine!

Toward evening we strolled up the Shetucket to Greenville, visited the
extensive paper and cotton mills there, and returning, crossed, at
Chelsea, to the Preston side of the river, and ascended by a winding
road to the lofty summit of Tory Hill, so called from the circumstance
that it was the confiscated property of a Tory of the Revolution. A
magnificent prospect opens to the view from that bald, rocky pinnacle.
Southward was visible the dark line of Long Island Sound; on the west,
half hidden by groves, rolled the Thames; northward and eastward lay a
vast amphitheater of cultivated hills, and the valleys of the Yantic,
Quinebaug, and the Shetucket, and at our feet was Norwich city, in
crescent form, clasping a high, rocky promontory, like the rich setting
of a huge emerald, for in the midst rose the towering Wawekus, yet green
with the lingering foliage of summer. A more picturesque scene than this
grand observatory affords need not be sought for by the student and
lover of nature. There we lingered until the sun went down behind the
hills that skirt the great Mohegan Plain, and in the dim twilight we
made our way back to the city. Between eight and nine o'clock in the
evening I bade my kind friend Mr. Williams ** adieu, and left Nor-

* It is a rather singular faet that Captain Perkins and his wife were
both born on Sunday. Their first child was born on Sunday. They had one
born on every day of the week--the first on Sunday morning, and the last
on Saturday evening; and the head of each of the five generations of
which he is the eldest was born on Sunday.

** Mr. Edwin Williams, and his elder brother, Mr. Joseph Williams, of
Norwieh, are sons of General Joseph Williams, who, though a young man,
was an active patriot during the Revolutionary war. He was a merchant,
and, in connection with his partner, William Coit, whose daughter he
married, was engaged in fitting out armed vessels from Norwich and New
London. In one of these he made a voyage to the West Indies. The vessel
was pursued by a British armed ship, and an action ensued in whieh the
American vessel was the winner. General Williams spent much of the
latter portion of his life in organizing and disciplining the militia of
New London county; and until his death he was extensively engaged as a
shipping and importing merchant. He died in October, 1800, aged forty-
seven years. Mrs. Russell Hubbard, of Norwieh, daughter of General
Williams, permitted me to have a copy of a letter of his, written in
1776, from near New York, to his business partner, Mr. Coit. Young
Williams had accompanied the Connecticut Continental troops to New York,
taking with him a supply of articles adapted to the use of the army. He
was then only twenty-three years of age. The letter is interesting, as
exhibiting a feature in the business life of the day, and the perfect
coolness with which trade was earned on in the midst of the most
imminent peril. The letter is written on the blank leaf of an account
book.

** "New York, seven miles from the city, September 8,1776. Dear Sir,
"Ever since I wrote you by Mr. Walden we have been in confusion. The
enemy opened two batteries opposite to our fort at Hell Gate last
Saturday evening, and began cannonading and bombarding early on Sunday
morning. They fired several shot into the house where we kept our store.
We thought it prudent to move a little back, whieh we have done, but
have not got clear of their shot; they are flying about us continually.
We have about £140 in value on hand, besides money that I have purchased
since I came here with what was on hand before. "The enemy are now
landing on the island between Hell Gate and the main, and 'tis supposed
they mean to make a push for Kingsbridge, and cut us off from the main;
but I believe they ean not do it, as we are prepared for them at
Kingsbridge; but I make no doubt we shall soon have an engagement.
"Colonel Sergeant, Dr. Hamans, and I, have sent what money we have to
West Chester by Dr. Hamans's boy. I have sent about £150. It will not do
to move our stores till the regiment is obliged to go, as they can not
do without some necessaries here.

New London.--Its Settlement Fortifications.--The Harbor.--Revolutionary
Movements.

609wich, in the cars, for Allyn's Point, seven miles below, whence I
embarked for New London, eight miles further down the Thames, arriving
there at ten.

New London is pleasantly situated upon a rocky slope on the right bank
of the Thames, three miles from Long Island Sound, and one hundred and
thirty-four miles eastward of New York city. From the high ground in the
rear of the city, whereon many fine residences are built, a very
extensive view of the Sound and the surrounding country is obtained Its
earliest Indian name was Nameaug; but the first English settlers, John
Winthrop and others, called it Pequot, from the people who had inhabited
the country on the banks of the Pequot or Thames River. By an act of the
Assembly of Connecticut, in March, 1658, it was named New London, to
perpetuate in America the title of the capital of England. The river was
also named Thames, by the same authority and for a similar reason. The
harbor is one of the best in the United States. It is commanded by forts
Griswold and Trumbull, situated, the former upon its east bank, at
Groton, and the latter upon the west. The fortifications are upon the
sites of those of the same name which were erected there in the time of
the Revolution.

New London and Norwich were intimately associated in all political
matters when the controversy with Great Britain arose. The latter,
included within New London county, was regarded as the chief place;
while the former, being the port of entry, became the point of most
importance when British fleets and armies came to subdue the Americans.
From an early period the harbor of New London was a favorite resort lor
vessels navigating the Sound, on account of the depth of water and its
sheltered position. Here the brigantines and other vessels of the famous
buccaneers sometimes sought shelter from storms; and it is believed that
therein lay the vessel of the notorious Captain Kidd about the time when
his treasures were concealed on Gardiner's Island, on the opposite side
of the Sound. Great efforts were made by the commanders of British ships
to obtain possession of the city and harbor during the Revolution, and
for a long time a fleet of some thirty vessels hovered along the coast
in the vicinage, chiefly in Gardiner's Bay and the neighborhood of
Fisher's Island. But the vigilant authorities and people of Connecticut
kept them at bay. From the time of the Bunker Hill battle until the town
was burned by British troops, headed by the then traitor, Benedict
September c, Arnold, a strong military force was kept there, and every
attention was paid to 1781fortifying the harbor.

In 1774 the people of New London held a town meeting, and passed strong
resolutions in reference to the oppressive acts of the British
Parliament. After expressing their sincere loyalty to the king, they
resolved that "the cause of Boston is the common cause of all the North
American colonies that a union of all the colonies was of the greatest
importance; that they earnestly wished for, and would promote, the
assembling

* "I shall send Isaac * out to-day. If we are taken or killed, you can
send for the money I have sent out. I would not have this stop your
sending the goods I wrote for, as far as it will do to come by water.
"From your humble servant, "Joseph Williams. "P.S.--Commandant Serjeant
tells me he has just received intelligence that our Congress has
appointed a committee to wait on Lord Howe." **

* He was a brother of the writer of the letter, and was then about
fifteen vears old. He served his country during a greater portion of the
war, and was finally captured by the English and pressed into their
naval service, in which he lost a leg. So great was his hatred of the
English, that he engaged in the French marine service during the French
Revolution, in consequence of which he was tried for violating the
United States laws of neutrality, was found guilty, and fined and
imprisoned. He died a Preston, when about eighty years of age. General
Williams had two other brothers in the Continental army--Frederic, who
died or was killed in New York in 1776, and was buried in St. Paul's
church-yard; and Benjamin, who lost his life in the Jersey prison-ship,
in 1781, at the age of twenty-three.

** The conference of this committee with Lord Howe was held on the 11th
of September, 1776, at the house of Colonel Billop yet standing at the
southwest end of Staten Island. A drawing of the building will be found
on page 609, vol. ii.

Forts Griswold and Trumbull.--Prizes.--Clinton's Designs.--Arnold's
Expedition.--Naval Force of Connecticut.

610of a general Congress; and that they would religiously observe and
abide by the resolves of such a body. They also appointed a committee of
correspondence for the town. *

In 1775 the erection of two forts for the defense of the harbor of New
London was begun, one upon the rocky extremity of a peninsula on the
west side of the Thames, about a mile below the city, and the other upon
Groton Hill, on the opposite side of the harbor. The former, when
completed, was called Fort Trumbull, and the latter Fort Griswold.
Several vessels of the little naval armament of Connecticut were fitted
out at New London; and into that port a number of prizes captured by
American cruisers were taken, and their cargoes disposed of. ** In 1777,
a frigate of thirty-six guns, ordered by the Continental Congress to be
built in Connecticut, was constructed in the Thames, between New London
and Norwich, under the direction of Captain Joshua Huntington. Several
small armed vessels on private account sailed from this port, and
greatly annoyed the enemy upon the coast, capturing their provision
vessels, and injuring transports that happened to be separated from
convoys. These things so irritated the British commanders here, that New
London was marked for special vengeance, and Benedict Arnold was the
chosen instrument to execute it.

I have already alluded to the junction of the American and French armies
upon the Hudson, in the summer of 1781, and their departure for
Virginia--the original design of attacking New York city having been
abandoned, in consequence of the reception, by Clinton, of re-
enforcements from abroad, and the intelligence that the Count de Grasse
might not be expected from the West Indies in time for such an
operation. **** When Sir Henry Clinton be came certain of the
destination of the allied armies, and perceived that they were too far
on their way for him to hope to overtake them in pursuit, he dispatched
Arnold, who had just returned from a predatory expedition in Virginia,
to make like demonstrations upon the New England coast. Clinton's hoped-
for result of this measure was to deter Washington from his purpose of
pushing southward, or, at least, to make him weaken his army by sending
back detachments for the defense of the New England frontier upon the
Sound. But he failed to effect his purpose, and the expedition of Arnold
was fruitful only of misery for a few inhabitants, and of abundant
disgrace and contumely for the perpetrators of the outrage.

At daybreak on the morning of the 6th of September, 1781, a British
fleet, under Captain Beasly, consisting of twenty-four sail, bearing a
considerable land and marine force under the general command of Benedict
Arnold, appeared off the harbor of New London, having left the eastern
end of Long Island the evening previous. A large proportion of the land
forces consisted of Tories and some Hessians, the instruments employed
when any thing cruel

* This committee consisted of Richard Law, Gurdon Salstonstall,
Nathaniel Shaw, Jr., Samuel H. Parsons, and Guy Richards. The little
village of Groton, opposite, also held a town meeting the week previous,
and, after passing similar resolutions, appointed a committee of
correspondence.--See Hinman's Historical Collections, p. 52-56.

** This little sketch shows the relative position of the forts. Fort
Trumbull is seen on the left of the picture, and Fort Griswold, with the
Groton Monument, is on the extreme right.

*** The following are the names of the war-vessels in the service of the
State of Connecticut during the Revolution: Brigs Minerva, American,
Silliman; ship Oliver Cromwell; frigates Trumbull, Bourbon; schooners
Spy, Defense; sloops Dolphin, Mifflin, Resistance, Schuyler, Stark,
Young Cromwell, Confederacy. Count de Grasse, Tiger, Alliance, Phoenix;
and row-galleys Shark, Whiting, Crane, The Guilford, New Defense,
Putnam, and Revenge.

**** See page 436, vol. i.

Landing of the Enemy.--March toward New London.--Destruction of the
Town.--Property destroyed. "Fire Lands."

611was to be performed. * They landed in two divisions of about eight
hundred each: one on the east or Groton side of the Thames, commanded by
Lieutenant-colonel Eyre, and the other on the New London side, led by
the traitor general, who debarked in the cove at Brown's Farm, near the
light-house.

The militia hastened in small parties to oppose them, but were too few
to produce much effect other than wounding some of the enemy on their
march toward the town. The advance battery, situated about half way
between Fort Trumbull and the light-house, in which were eight pieces of
cannon, as well as the fort itself, was too feebly manned to offer
resistance, and the troops of each evacuated, and crossed over to the
stronger post of Fort Griswold, on Groton Hill. The city was thus left
exposed to the enemy, whose great weapon of destruction was the torch.
First, the stores upon the wharves were set on fire, and then the
dwellings on Mill Cove were consumed. Nearly the whole town was laid in
ashes, and several vessels were burned. *** Many inhabitants in
comfortable circumstances were now houseless and wanderers, reduced to
absolute beggary. None were permitted to save their furniture, and the
soldiery were allowed free scope for brutality and plunder. It is said
that Arnold stood in the belfry of a church,

* The division under Arnold consisted of the 38th regiment of regulars,
the Loyal Americans, the American Legion, refugees, and a detachment of
fifty Yagers. Colonel Eyre's was composed of the 40th and 54th
regiments, the third battalion of Jersey volunteers, and a detachment of
Yagers and artillery.

** This sketch is from the west side of the cove in which the troops
under Arnold landed. In the distance, on the extreme right, is the point
where the division under Eyre debarked, and near the center is seen the
monument on Groton Hill, near Fort Griswold. The shores of the cove are
sandy, but the projections which form them are bold promontories of
granite rock.

*** The buildings burned in this expedition were 65 dwelling-houses
containing 97 families, 31 stores, 18 shops, 20 barns, and 9 public and
other buildings, among which were the court-house, jail, and church; in
all 143. Fifteen vessels with the effects of the inhabitants escaped up
the river. The value of propel ty destroyed was estimated at $485,980.
This was the estimate of the committee which was appointed by the
General Assembly of Connecticut, after the war, to ascertain the amount
of loss sustained by the several towns in the state by conflagrations
during the predatory inroads of the enemy. In 1793, the Assembly granted
to the sufferers five hundred acres of land, lying within the precincts
of the Western Reserve, in Ohio, and now included in the counties of
Huron and Erie, and a small part of Ottawa. This tract is known as the
"Fire Lands." I have noticed on page 371, vol. i., the settlement, by
commissioners, who met at Trenton in 1782, of the question of
jurisdiction over the Valley of Wyoming, and that it was decided in
favor of Pennsylvania. Although Connecticut acquiesced in that decision,
that state still claimed a right to the country westward of
Pennsylvania, in extent north and south equal to its own limits in that
direction and indefinitely westward, according to the letter of its
charter. Connecticut, however, waived this claim by a sort of
compromise, in 1786, by ceding to the United States all the lands thus
included within its charter limits westward of Pennsylvania, except the
reservation of a tract one hundred and twenty miles in length, adjoining
that state. This tract w'as called the Western Reserve. After giving the
half million of acres to the sufferers of Danbury, Fairfield, Norwalk,
New Haven, and New London, the remainder was sold in 1795, and the
proceeds were used as a school fund, for the support of schools in the
state. Congress confirmed the title of Connecticut to the Reserve in
1800. It now forms a part of the State of Ohio, and is settled chiefly
by New England people.

Infamy of Arnold.--Attack on Fort Griswold.--Its Defense and Capture.--
Murder of Colonel Ledyard.

612while the town was burning, and looked upon the scene with the
apparent satisfaction of a Nero. Had he been content to be a traitor
merely, the extenuating circumstances that have been alleged in
connection with his treason might have left a feeling of commiseration
in the bosoms of the American people; but this murderous expedition
against the neighbors of his childhood and youth, and the wanton
destruction of a thriving town, almost in sight of the spire of the
church wherein he was baptized, present an act of malice too flagrant to
be overlooked even by "meek-eyed pity" or loving charity. It was his
last prominent blow against his country, and was such a climax to his
treachery, that Britons, who "accepted the treason, but despised the
traitor," shunned him as a monster of wickedness.

When the enemy landed, alarm-guns were fired; and before noon, while the
town was burning, the militia collected in large numbers. Perceiving his
peril, Arnold hastily retreated to his boats, closely pursued by the
armed inhabitants. Five of the enemy were killed, and about twenty
wounded. The Americans lost four killed, and ten or twelve wounded, some
of them mortally.

When Fort Trumbull was evacuated, Arnold sent an order to Lieutenant-
colonel Eyre to take immediate possession of Fort Griswold, in order to
prevent the American shipping from leaving the harbor and sailing up the
river. The militia hastily collected for the defense of the fort to the
number of one hundred and fifty-seven--so hastily that many of them were
destitute of weapons. Colonel William Ledyard was the commander of the
fortress. The enemy approached cautiously through the woods in the rear,
and captured a small advanced battery. Colonel Eyre then sent Captain
Beckwith, with a flag, to demand a surrender of the fort, which was
peremptorily refused. * An assault was begun; the American flag on the
southwest bastion was shot down, and an obstinate battle of about forty
minutes ensued, during which the British were repulsed, and were on the
point of fleeing back to their shipping. The attack was made on three
sides, the fort being square, with flanks. There was a battery between
the fort and the river, but the Americans could spare no men to work it.
The enemy displayed great coolness and bravery in forcing the pickets,
making their way into the fosse, and scaling the revetment, in the face
of a severe fire from the little garrison. When a sufficient number had
obtained entrance thus far, they forced their way through the feebly-
manned embrasures, and decided the conflict with bayonets, after a
desperate struggle with "the handful of determined patriots, many of
whom were armed only with pikes. The fort was surrendered
unconditionally. Colonel Eyre was wounded near the works, and died
within twelve hours afterward on ship-board. Major Montgomery was
pierced through with a spear, in the hands of a negro, and killed as he
mounted the parapet, and the command devolved upon Major Bromfield. The
whole loss of the British was two commissioned officers and forty-six
privates killed, and eight officers (most of whom afterward died), with
one hundred and thirty-nine non-commissioned officers and privates,
wounded. The Americans had not more than a dozen killed before the enemy
carried the fort. When that was effected, Colonel Ledyard ordered his
men to cease firing and to lay down their arms, relying upon the boasted
generosity of Britons for the cessation of bloodshed. But instead of
British regulars, led by honorable men, his little band was surrounded
by wolflike Tories, infernal in their malice, and cruel even to the
worst savagism, and also by the hired assassins, the German Yagers. They
kept up their fire and bayonet thrusts upon the unarmed patriots, and
opening the gates of the fort, let in blood-thirsty men that were
without, at the head of whom was Major Bromfield, a New Jersey Loyalist.
"Who commands this garrison?" shouted Bromfield, as he entered. Colonel
Ledyard, who was standing near, mildly replied, "I did, sir, but you do
now," at the same time handing his sword to the victor. The Tory
miscreant immediately murdered Ledyard by running him through the body
with the weapon he had just surrendered! ** The massacre continued in
all parts

* There were several hundreds of the people collected in the vicinity,
and an officer had been sent out to obtain re-enforcements. Upon these
Colonel Ledyard relied; but the officer became intoxicated, and the
expected aid did not arrive.

** Colonel Ledyard was a cousin of John Ledyard, the celebrated
traveler, who was a native of Groton

His niece, Fanny, mentioned in the text, was from Southold, Long Island,
and was then on a visit at the house of her uncle. The vest worn by
Colonel L. on that occasion (as I have already noticed) is preserved in
the cabinet of the Connecticut Historical Society.

Cruelties at Fort Griswold.--Fanny Ledyard.--Departure of the Enemy.--
Events in 1813.--Arnold's Dispatches.

613of the fort, until seventy men were killed, and thirty-five mortally
or dangerously wounded. * The enemy then plundered the fort and garrison
of every thing valuable. Their appetite for slaughter not being
appeased, they placed several of the wounded in a baggage-wagon, took it
to the brow of the hill on which the fort stands, and sent it down with
violence, intending thus to plunge the helpless sufferers into the
river. The distance was about one hundred rods, the ground very rough.
The jolting caused some of the wounded to expire, while the cries of
agony of the survivors were heard across the river, even in the midst of
the crackling noise of the burning town! The wagon was arrested in its
progress by an apple-tree, and thus the sufferers remained for more than
an hour, until their captors stretched them upon the beach, preparatory
to embarkation. Thirty-five of them were paroled and carried into a
house near by, where they passed the night in great distress, a burning
thirst being their chief tormentor. Although there was a pump in a well
of fine water within the fort, the wounded were not allowed a drop with
which to moisten their tongues, and the first they tasted was on the
following morning, when Fanny Ledyard, a niece of the murdered colonel,
came, like an angel of mercy, at dawn, with wine, and water, and
chocolate. She approached stealthily, for it was uncertain whether the
enemy had left. Fortunately, they had sailed during the night, carrying
away about forty of the inhabitants prisoners. ** Thus ended the most
ignoble and atrocious performance of the enemy during the war, and the
intelligence of it nerved the strong arms of the patriots in the
conflict at Yorktown, in Virginia, a few weeks later, which resulted in
the capture of the British army of the South under Cornwallis.

During the war between the United States and Great Britain, from 1812 to
1815, New London was several times menaced with invasion by the enemy.
In May, 1813, as Commodore

Decatur, then in command of the United States, with his prize, the
Macedonian, fitted out as an American frigate, was attempting to get to
sea, he was chased by a British squadron under Commodore Hardy, and
driven into New London, where he was blockaded for some time. On one
occasion the town and neighborhood were much alarmed on account of a
report that the enemy were about to bombard the place. A considerable
military force was stationed there, and preparations were made to repel
the invaders. The forts were well garrisoned with United States troops,
and the militia turned out in great numbers. The enemy, however, did not
attempt an attack, and, becoming wearied of watching Decatur, the
British squadron put to sea, soon followed by our gallant commodore.
Since that time no event has disturbed the repose or retarded the
progress of New London. The whaling business, and other commercial
pursuits, have poured wealth into its lap, and spread its pleasant
dwellings over more than thrice its ancient area.

The most prominent point of attraction to the visitor at New London is
the Groton Monument, on the eastern side of the Thames, which, standing
upon high ground, is a conspicuous object from every point of view in
the vicinity. I crossed the Thames early on the

* Arnold, in his dispatch to Sir Henry Clinton, gave the impression that
the killed were victims of honorable strife. Of course he knew better,
for his dispatch was written two days after the event, and every
circumstance must have been known by him. Hear him: "I have inclosed a
return of the killed and wounded, by which your excellency will observe
that our loss, though very considerable, is short of the enemy's, who
lost most of their officers, among whom was their commander, Colonel
Ledyard. Eighty-five men were found dead in Fort Griswold, and sixty
wounded, most of them mortally. Their loss on the opposite side (New
London) must have been considerable, but can not be ascertained."

** See Arnold's Dispatch to Sir H. Clinton; Gordon, iii., 249; Sparks's
Life of Arnold; The Connecticut Journal, 1781; Narrative of Stephen
Hempstead. Mr. Hempstead was a soldier in the garrison at the time of
the massacre, and was one of the wounded who were sent down the
declivity in the baggage-wagon, suffered during the night, and
experienced the loving kindness of Fanny Ledyard in the morning. His
narrative was communicated to the Missouri Republican in 1826, at which
time he was a resident of that state. Mr. Hempstead was a native of New
London, and entered the army in 1775. He was at Dorchester during the
siege of Boston, was in the battle of Long Island, and also in the
engagement on Harlem Heights, where he had two of his ribs broken by a
grape-shot.

The Groton Monument--Inscription upon it--Ascent of its Stair-case.--
View from the Top.

October 12, 1848614 morning after my arrival, and ascended to Fort
Griswold, now a dilapidated fortress, without ordnance or garrison, its
embankments breaking the regular outline of Groton Hill, now called
Mount Ledyard.

A little northward of the fort rises a granite monument, one hundred and
twenty-seven feet high, the foundation-stone of which is one hundred and
thirty feet above tide-water. It was erected in 1830, in memory of the
patriots who fell in the fort in 1781. Its pedestal, twenty-six feet
square, rises to the height of about twenty feet, and upon it is reared
an obelisk which is twenty-two feet square at the base, and twelve feet
at the top. It is ascended within by one hundred and sixty-eight stone
steps; and at the top is a strong iron railing for the protection of
visitors. Marble tablets with inscriptions are placed upon the
pedestal.2 The cost of its erection was eleven thousand dollars, which
amount was raised by a lottery authorized by the state for that purpose.

I paid the tribute-money of a "levy," or York shilling, to a tidy little
woman living in the stone building seen at the right of the monument,
which procured for me the ponderous key of the structure, and, locking
myself in, I ascended to the top, with the privilege of gazing and
wondering there as long as I pleased. It was a toilsome journey up that
winding staircase, for my muscles had scarcely forgotten a similar
draught upon their energies at Breed's Hill; but I was comforted by the
teachings of the new philosophy that the _spiral_ is the only true
ascent to a superior world of light, and beauty, and expansiveness of
vision and so I found it, for a most magnificent view burst upon the
sight as I made the last upward revolution and stood upon the dizzy
height. The broad, cultivated hills and valleys; the forests and groves
slightly variegated by the pencil of recent frost; the city and river at
my feet, with their busy men and numerous sails; the little villages
peeping from behind the hills and woodlands in every direction, and the
heaving Sound glittering in the southern horizon, were all basking in
the light of the morning sun, whose radiance, from that elevation,
seemed brighter than I had ever seen it. It was a charming scene for the
student of nature, and yet more charming for the student of the romance
of American history. At the

* This is a view from the southwest angle of old Fort Griswold, looking
northeast. The embankments of the fort are seen in the foreground; near
the figure is the well, the same mentioned by Mr. Hempstead in his
narrative; and just beyond this is the old entrance, or sally-port,
through which the enemy, under Bromfield, entered the fort.

** Over the entrance of the monument is the following inscription: This
Monument was erected under the patronage of the State of Connecticut,
A.D. 1830, and in the 55th year of the Independence of the U. S. A., In
memory of the brave Patriots who fell in the massacre at Fort Griswold,
near this spot, on the 6th of September, A.D. 1781, when the British
under the command of the traitor Benedict Arnold, burned the towns of
New London and Groton, and spread desolation and woe throughout this
region. On the south side of the pedestal, toward the fort, on a large
tablet, are the names of the eighty-five persons who were killed in the
fort, over which is the following: "Zebulon and Naphtali were a people
that jeoparded their lives until the death in the high places of the
field.--Judges, 5 chap., 18 verse."

*** See Swedenborg's Views of the Spiritual World, and Revelations of
Davis, the clairvoyant.

A Retrospect.--The Pequots.--English Expedition against them.--Attack on
their Fort--Pequot Hill.

615base of the monument were the ruined fortifications where patriot
blood flowed in abundance; and at a glance might be seen every locality
of interest connected with the burning of New London and the massacre at
Groton. Here was Fort Griswold; there were Fort Trumbull and the city;
and yonder, dwindling to the stature of a chessman, was the lighthouse,
by whose beacon the arch-traitor and his murderous bands were guided
into the harbor.

Let us turn back two centuries, and what do we behold from this lofty
observatory? The Thames is flowing in the midst of an unbroken forest,
its bosom rippled only by the zephyr, the waterfowl, or the bark canoe.
Here and there above the tree tops curls of blue smoke arise from the
wigwams of the savages, and a savory smell of venison and fish comes up
from the Groton shore. Around us spreads the broad fair land known as
the Pequot country, extending from the Nahantic, on the west, to the
dominion of the Narragansets--the Rhode Island line--on the east, and
northward it interlocks with that of the Mohegans, where Uncas, the
rebel sachem, afterward bore rule. * On yonder hill, a little southeast
from our point of view, crowned with the stately oak and thick-leaved
maple, is the royal residence of Sassacus, the prince of the Pequots.
Haughty and insolent, he scorns every overture of friendship from the
whites, and looks with contempt upon the rebellious doings of Uncas.
Near by is his strong fort upon the Mystic River, and around him stand
seven hundred warriors ready to do his bidding. The English are but a
handful, what has he to fear? Much, very much!

It is the season of flowers. The white sails of vessels flutter in
Narraganset Bay (now the harbor of Newport), and Captain Mason and
seventy-seven well-armed May 1637 men kneel upon their decks in
devotion, for it is the morning of the Christian Sabbath. On Tuesday
they land. Miantonômoh, the chief sachem, gives them audience, and a
free passport through his country. Nor is this all; with two hundred of
his tribe, Miantonômoh joins the English on their march of forty miles
through the wilderness toward the Mystic River; and the brave Niantics
and the rebellious Mohegans, led by Uncas, swell the ranks, until five
hundred savage "bowmen and spearmen" are in the train of Captain Mason.

It is a clear moonlight night. Sheltered by huge rocks on the shore of
the Mystic sleeps the little invading army, ** while the unsuspecting
Pequots in their fort near by are dancing and singing, filled with joy,
because they have seen the pinnaces of the English sail by without
stopping to do them harm, and believe that the Pale-faces dare not come
nigh them. Little do they think that the tiger is already crouching to
spring upon his prey! On that high hill, upon the right, is the Pequot
fort. *** It is early dawn, and the little army June 5, 1637is pressing
on silently up the wooded slope. The Narragansets and Niantics, seized
with fear, are lagging, while the eager English and Mohegans rush up to
the attack. **** All but a sentinel are in a deep sleep. Too late he
cries, "Owanux! Owanux!" "Englishmen! Englishmen!" The mounds are
scaled; the entrance is forced; the palisades are

* Uncas was of the royal blood of the Pequots, and a petty sachem under
Sassacus. When the English first settled in Connecticut, he was in open
rebellion against his prince. To save himself and be revenged on his
adversary, he sought and obtained the alliance of the English, and when
the Pequot nation was destroyed, Uncas became the powerful chief of that
tribe of Pequots called the Mohegans, from the circumstance of their
inhabiting the place called Mohegan, now Norwich. The Pequot country
comprised the present towns of Waterford, New London, and Montville, on
the west side of the Thames, and Groton, Stonington, and North
Stonington, on the east of that river. Windham, and a part of Tolland
county, on the north, was the Mohegan country.

** These are called Porter's Rocks, and are situated near Portersville,
on the west side of the Mystic. They are on the shore, about half a mile
south of the residence of Daniel Eldridge.--See Barber's Hist. Coll, of
Conn., p. 313.

*** This hill, eight miles northeast from New London, is known at the
present day by the name of Pequot Hill. It is a spot of much interest,
aside from the commanding view obtained from its summit, as the place
where the first regular conflict between the English and the natives of
New England took place. Such was the terror which this event infused
into the minds of the Indian tribes, that for nearly forty years they
refrained from open war with the whites, and the colonies prospered.

**** Sassacus was the terror of the New England coast tribes. A belief
that he was in the fort on Pequol Hill was the cause of the fear which
seized the Narragansets. "Sassacus is in the fort! Sassacus is all one
god!" said Miantonômoh; "nobody can kill him."

Destruction of the Fort.--Terrible Massacre.--Departure of the English.-
-Another Invasion.--Destruction of the Pequots.

616broken down; the mattings of the wigwams and the dry bushes and logs
of the fort are set on fire, and seven hundred men, women, and children,
perish in the flames or by the sword! It is a dreadful sight, this
slaughter of the strong, the beautiful, and the innocent; and yet, hear
the commander of the assailants impiously exclaiming, "God is above us!
He laughs his enemies and the enemies of the English to scorn, making
them as a fiery oven. Thus does the Lord judge among the heathen,
filling the place with dead bodies!" *

From the other fort near the Pequot (Thames), where dwells Sassacus,
three hundred warriors approach with horrid yells and bent bows. But the
English are too skillful, and too strongly armed with pike, and gun, and
metal corselet, for those bare-limbed warriors, and they are scattered
like chaff by the whirlwind of destruction. The English make their way
to Groton; and yonder, just in time to receive them, before the remnant
of the Pequots can rally and fall upon them, come their vessels around
the remote headland. With a fair breeze, many of the English sail for
Saybrook, making the air vocal with hymns of praise and thanksgiving.
Others, with the Narragansets, march through the wilderness to the
Connecticut River, and then, in happy reunion, warriors, soldiers,
ministers, and magistrates join in a festival of triumph! **

Stately and sullen sits Sassacus in his wigwam on yonder hill, as the
remnant of his warriors gather around him and relate the sad fortunes of
the day. They charge the whole terrible event to his haughtiness and
misconduct, and tearing their hair, and stamping on the ground, menace
him and his with destruction. But hark! the blast of a trumpet startles
them; from the head waters of the Mystic come two hundred armed settlers
from Massachusetts and Plymouth to seal the doom of the Pequots. Despair
takes possession of Sassacus and his followers, and burning their
wigwams and destroying their fort, they flee across the Pequot River
westward, pursued by the English. What terrible destruction is wrought
by the new invaders! Throughout the beautiful country bordering on the
Sound wigwams and corn-fields are destroyed, and helpless men, women,
and children are put to the sword. With Sassacus at their head, the
doomed Pequots fly like deer pursued by hounds, and take shelter in
Sasco Swamp, near Fairfield, where they all surrender to the English,
except the chief and a few men who escape to the Mohawks. The final blow
is struck which annihilated the once powerful Pequots, and the great
Sassacus, the last of his royal race in power except Uncas, falls by the
hand of an assassin, among the people who opened their protecting arms
to receive him. ***

The dark vision of cruelty melts away; smiling fields, and laden
orchards, and busy towns, the products of a more enlightened and
peaceful Christianity than that of two centuries back, are around me.
Russet corn-fields cover the hill--the royal seat of Sassacus--and in
the bright harbor where the little English pinnaces, filled with bloody
men, were just an-

* See Captain Mason's Brief History of the Pequot War, published in
Boston in 1738, from which the principal facts in this narrative are
drawn. It makes one shudder to read the blasphemous allusions to the
interposition of God in favor of the English which this narrative
contains, as if

"The poor Indian, whose untutor'd mind Sees God in clouds or hears him
in the wind,"

* was not an object of the care and love of the Deity. Happily, the time
is rapidly passing by when men believe that they are doing God service
by slaughtering, maiming, or in the least injuring with vengeful
feelings any of his creatures.

** The English lost only two men killed and sixteen wounded, while the
Indians lost nearly six hundred men and seventy wigwams.

*** The ostensible cause of this destructive war upon the Pequots was
the fact that in March of that year, Sassacus, jealous of the English,
had sent an expedition against the fort at Saybrook. The fort was
attacked, and three soldiers were killed. In April they murdered several
men and women at Wethersfield, carried away two girls, and destroyed
twenty cows. The English, urged by fear and interest, resolved to
chastise them, and terrible indeed was the infliction. "There did not
remain a sannup or a squaw, a warrior or a child of the Pequot name. A
nation had disappeared in a day!" The Mohegans, under Uncas, then became
the most powerful tribe in that region, and soon afterward, as we have
seen, they and the Narragansets, who assisted in the destruction of the
Pequots, began a series of long and cruel wars against each other.

Mrs. Anna Bailey.--Her Husband at Fort Griswold.--Her Mementoes and her
Polities.

617chored, spreads many a sail of peaceful commerce. The sun is near the
meridian; let us descend to the earth.

From the monument, after sketching the picture on page 46, I returned to
the village of Groton, on the river bank, and visited the patriarch-ess
of the place, Mrs. Anna Bailey, familiarly known as "Mother Bailey." Her
husband, Captain Elijah Bailey, who died a few weeks previous to my
visit, was appointed postmaster of the place by President Jefferson, and
held the office until his death, a lapse of forty years. He was a lad
about seventeen years old when New London was burned, and was in Fort
Griswold just previous to the attack of Colonel Eyre. Young Bailey and a
man named Williams were ordered by Led-yard to man a gun at the advanced
redoubt, a little southeast of the fort. They were directed, in the
event of not being able to maintain their ground, to retreat to the
fort. They soon, found it necessary to abandon their piece. Williams
fled to the fort and got within; but young Bailey, stopping to spike the
gun, lost so much time, that when he knocked at the gate it was close
barred, for the enemy were near. He leaped over the fence into a corn-
field, and there lay concealed until the battle and massacre in the fort
ended. "He was courting me at that very time, boy as he was," said Mrs.
Bailey, who related this circumstance to me. She was then a girl six
weeks older than her lover, and remembers every event of the "terrible
day." I was agreeably surprised on being introduced to Mrs. Bailey,
expecting to find a common, decrepit old woman. She sat reading her
Bible, and received me with a quiet ease of manner, and a pleasant
countenance, where, amid the wrinkles of old age, were lingering traces
of youthful beauty. I had been forewarned that, if I wished to find any
favor in her sight, I must not exhibit the least hue of Whiggery in
politics--a subject which engrosses much of her thoughts and
conversation. Her husband had been a Democrat of the old Jefferson
school; and she possessed locks of hair, white, sandy, and grizzled,
from the heads of Presidents Jackson and Van Buren, and of Colonel
Richard M. Johnson, all of whom had honored her house by personal
visits. With such precious mementoes, how could she be other than a
Democrat? Almost, the first words she uttered on my entrance were, "What
are Cass's prospects in New York?" Forewarned, forearmed, I summoned to
the support of my conscience all the possibilities in his favor, and
told her that Mr. Cass would doubtless be elected President--at any
rate, _he ought to be_. These words unlocked her kind feelings, and I
passed an hour very agreeably with her. Her mind was active, and she
related, in an interesting manner, many reminiscences of her youth and
womanhood, among which was the following, in which she was the chief
heroine. When the British squadron which drove Decatur into the harbor
of New London, in 1813, menaced the town with bombardment, the military
force that manned the forts were deficient in flannel for cannon
cartridges. All that could be found in New London was sent to the forts,
and a Mr. Latham, a neighbor of Mrs. Bailey, came to her at Groton
seeking for more. She started out and collected all the little
petticoats of children that she could find in town. "This is not half
enough," said Latham, on her return. "You

* While making this sketch, I remarked to Mrs. Bailey (and with
sincerity, too) that I saw in her features evidence that Captain Bailey
was a man of good taste. She immediately comprehended my meaning and the
compliment, and replied, with a coquettish smile, "I was never ashamed
of my face, and never mean to be." She lived happily with her husband
for seventy years. Since the above was put in type, she has died. Her
clothes took fire, and she was burned to death on the 10th of January,
1851, aged about 89

Mrs. Bailey's Patriotism.--Landing-place of Arnold.--Bishop Seabury's
Monument.--First Printing in Connecticut

618shall have mine too," said Mrs. B., as she cut with her scissors the
string that fastened it, and taking it off, gave it to Latham. He was
satisfied, and hastening to Fort Trumbull, that patriotic contribution
was soon made into cartridges. "It was a heavy new one, but I didn't
care for that," said the old lady, while her blue eyes sparkled at the
recollection. "All I wanted was to see it go through the Englishmen's
insides!" Some of Decatur's men declared that it was a shame to cut that
petticoat into cartridge patterns; they would rather see it fluttering
at the mast-head of the _United States or Macedonian_, as an ensign
under which to fight upon the broad ocean! This and other circumstances
make Mrs. Bailey a woman of history; and, pleading that excuse, I am
sure, if she shall be living when this page shall appear, that she will
pardon the liberty I have taken. I told her that the sketch of her which
she allowed me to take was intended for publication.

I recrossed the Thames to New London, and after an early dinner rode
down to the lighthouse, near which Arnold landed, and made the drawing
printed on page 43. Returning along the beach, I sketched the outlines
of Fort Trumbull and vicinity, seen on page 42, and toward evening
strolled through the two principal burial-grounds of the city. In the
ancient one, situated in the north part of the town, lie the remains of
many of the first settlers, in the other, lying upon a high slope,
westward of the center of the city, is a plain monument of Bishop
Seabury, whose name is conspicuous in our Revolutionary annals as that
of an unwavering Loyalist. I shall have occasion to notice his abduction
from West Chester county, and imprisonment in Connecticut, as well as
his general biography, when I write of the events at White Plains.

We will now bid adieu to New London, not forgetting, however, in our
parting words, to note the fact so honorable to its name and character,
that the first printing-press in Connecticut was established there,
according to Barber, forty-five years before printing was executed in
any other place in the colony. Thomas Short, who settled in New London
in 1709, was the printer, and from his press was issued _The Saybrook
Platform,_ ** in 1710, said to be the first book printed in the
province. Short died in 1711, and there being no printer in the colony,
the Assembly procured Timothy Green, a descendant of Samuel Green, of
Cambridge, the first printer in America, to settle at New London. Samuel
Green, the publisher of the "Connecticut Gazetteer" until 1845, the
oldest newspaper in the state, is a descendant of this colonial printer.

Business demanding my presence at home, I left New London at ten in the
evening, in the "Knickerbocker," and arrived in New York at nine the
following morning.

* The following is the inscription upon the slab: "Here lieth the body
of Samuel Seabury, D.D., bishop of Connecticut and Rhode Island, who
departed from this transitory scene February 25th, Anno Domini 1796, in
the 68th year of his age, and the 12th of his Episcopal consecration.
"Ingenuous without pride, learned without pedantry, good without
severity, he was duly qualified to discharge the duties of the Christian
and the bishop. In the pulpit he enforced religion; in his conduct he
exemplified it. The poor he assisted with his charity; the ignorant he
blessed with his instruction. The friend of men, he ever designed their
good; the enemy of vice, he ever opposed it. Christian! dost thou aspire
to happiness? Seabury has shown the way that leads to it."

** This was a Confession of Faith or Articles of Religion arranged in
1708--Yale College was first established at Saybrook, and fifteen
commencements were held there. To educate young men of talents and piety
for the ministry was the leading design of the institution. The
founders, desirous that the Churches should have a public standard or
Confession of Faith, according to which the instruction of the college
should be conducted, such articles were arranged and adopted after the
commencement at Saybrook in 1708. and from that circumstance were called
the Saybrook Platform. The standards of faith of the Congregational and
Presbyterian Churches are substantially the same as the Saybrook
Platform.

Voyage to Rhode Island.----Stonington.--Arrival at Providence

619

CHAPTER XXVII

"I've gazed upon thy golden cloud

Which shades thine emerald sod;

Thy hills, which Freedom's share hath plow'd,

Which nurse a race that have not bow'd

Their knee to aught but God.

And thou hast gems, ay, living pearls,

And flowers of Eden hue;

Thy loveliest are thy bright-eyed girls,

Of fairy forms and elfin curls,

And smiles like Hermon's dew.

They've hearts, like those they're born to wed,

Too proud to nurse a slave.

They'd scorn to share a monarch's bed,

And sooner lay their angel head

Deep in their humble grave."

Hugh Peters.

"Ye say they all have pass'd away,

That noble race and brave;

That their light canoes have vanish'd

From off the crested wave;

That mid the forests where they warr'd

There rings no hunter's shout;

But their name is on your waters,

Ye may not wash it out."

Mrs. Sigourney.

O the land of the Narragansets and Wampanoags--the land of Massasoit and
Philip, of Canonicus and Miantonornoh--the land of Roger Williams and
toleration--the Rhode Island and Providence plantations of colonial
times, I next turned my attention. On a clear frosty evening, the moon
in its wane and the winds hushed, I went up the Sound in the steam-boat
Vanderbilt. We passed through October 19, 1848 the turbulent eddies of
Hell Gate at twilight, and as we entered the broader expanse of water
beyond Fort Schuyler, heavy swells, that were upheaved by a gale the day
before, came rolling in from the ocean, and disturbed the anticipated
quiet of the evening voyage. It was to end at Stonington * at midnight,
so I paced the promenade deck in the biting night air to keep off sea-
sickness, and was successful. We landed at Stonington between twelve and
one o'clock, where we took cars for Providence, arriving there at three.
Refreshed by a few hours' sleep, and an early breakfast at the
"Franklin," I started upon a day's ramble with Mr. Peeks, of Providence,
who kindly offered to accompany me to memorable places around that
prosperous city. We first visited the most interesting, as well as one
of the most ancient, localities connected with the colonial history of
Rhode Island, the rock on which Roger Williams first landed upon its
shores. It is reached

* Stonington is a thriving town, situated upon an estuary of Long Island
Sound, and about midway between the mouths of the Mystic and Paweatuc
Rivers. It was settled by a few families about 1658. The first squatter
was William Cheeseborough, from Massachusetts, who pitched his tent
there in 1649. It has but little Revolutionary history except what was
common to other coast towns, where frequent alarms kept the people in
agitation. It suffered some from bombardment in 1813, by the squadron
under Sir Thomas Hardy, which drove Decatur into the harbor of New
London. The enemy was so warmly received, that Hardy weighed anchor, and
made no further attempts upon the coast of Connecticut.

Roger Williams's Rock.--"Water Lots."--Proposed Desecration.--Arrival of
Roger Williams.--His Character

620from the town by the broad avenue called Power Street, which extends
to the high bank of the Seekonk or Pawtucket River, and terminates
almost on a line with the famous rock, some sixty feet above high water
mark.

The town is rapidly extending toward the Seekonk, and the hand of
improvement was laying out broad, streets near its bank when I was
there. The channel of the Seekonk here is narrow, and at low tide broad
flats on either side are left bare. I was informed that a proposition
had been made to dig down the high banks and fill in the flats to the
edge of the channel, to make "desirable water lots," the "Roger
Williams' Rock" to be in the center of the public square, though at
least thirty feet below the surface! Mosheim informs us that when the
Jews attempted to rebuild Jerusalem, in the time of Julian, the workmen
were prevented from labor by the issuing of fire-balls from the earth
with a horrible noise, and that enterprise, undertaken in opposition to
the prophecy of Jesus, was abandoned ** Should mammon attempt the
desecrating labor of covering the time-honored rock on the shore of old
Seekonk, who can tell what indignant protests may not occur?

Here is a mossy spot upon the patriarch's back; let us sit down in the
warm sunlight and wind-sheltered nook, and glance at the record.

A few months after the arrival of Winthrop and his company at Boston,
and before Hooker and Cotton, afterward eminent ministers in the colony,
had sailed from England, there landed February 5, 1631 at Nantasket an
enlightened and ardent Puritan divine, young in years (for he was
thirty-one), but mature in judgment and those enlightened views of true
liberty of conscience, which distinguish the character of modern
theological jurisprudence from the intolerance of the seventeenth
century. He was a fugitive from English persecution; but his wrongs had
not clouded his accurate understanding. In the capacious recesses of his
mind he had resolved the nature of intolerance, and he alone had arrived
at the great principle which is its sole effectual remedy. He announced
his discovery under the simple proposition of sanctity of conscience.
The civil magistrate should restrain crime, but never control opinion;
should punish, guilt, but never violate the freedom of the soul. ***
This was a wonderful discovery in modern science; too wonderful for the
hierarchy of England, or the magistrates and ministers of the Puritan
colony of America. They could not comprehend

* This view is on the left bank of the Seekonk, looking south. The point
on which the figure stands is the famous rock, composed of a mass of
dark slate, and rising but little above the water at high tide. The high
banks are seen beyond, and on the extreme left is India Point, with the
rail-road bridge near the entrance of the river into Narraganset Bay.

** Mosheim's Church History (external), part i., chap, i., sec. xiv.

*** Bancroft, i., 367.

Narrow Views of the old Puritans.--Zeal of Roger Williams.--Disturbance
at Salem.--Williams arraigned for Treason.

621its beauty or utility; and as it had no affinity with their own
narrow views of the dignity of the human soul, they pronounced it
heresy, as soon as the discoverer began to make a practical development
of his principles. Yet they perceived, with a yearning affection for the
truth, that it would quench the fires of persecution, abrogate laws
making non-conformity a felony, abolish tithes, and all forced
contributions to the maintenance of religion, and protect all in that
freedom of conscience to worship God as the mind should dictate, for
which they had periled their lives and fortunes in the wilderness.
Still, its glory was too brilliant it dazzled their vision; the
understanding could not comprehend its beneficent scope; they looked
upon it with the jealous eye of over-cautiousness, and, true to the
impulses of human nature, what they could not _comprehend,_ they
_rejected._ This great apostle of toleration and intellectual liberty
was Roger Williams.

The New England Churches had not renounced the use of coercion in
religious matters, and Williams, so soon as his tolerant views were made
known, found himself regarded with suspicion by the civil and religious
authorities. Disappointed, yet resolutely determined to maintain his
principles, he withdrew to the settlement at Plymouth, where he remained
two years, and by his charity, virtues, and purity of life, won the
hearts of all. The people of Salem called him to be their minister, a
movement which made the court of Boston marvel. Being an object of
jealousy, and now having an opportunity to speak in the public ear, he
was in perpetual collision with the clergy. The magistrates insisted on
the presence of every man at public worship. Williams reprobated the
law. To compel men to unite with those of a different creed he regarded
as an open violation of their natural rights; to drag to public worship
the irreligious and unwilling seemed only like requiring hypocrisy. This
doctrine alarmed both magistrates and clergy, and they began to denounce
Williams. In proportion to the severity of their opposition his zeal was
kindled, and so earnest did he become in enforcing his tolerant views,
that intolerance and fanaticism marked his own course. He denounced King
James as a liar; declared that the settlers had no right to the lands
they occupied, these belonging to the aborigines; raised a tumult about
the red cross of St. George in the banner; (a) at last boldly denounced
the Churches of New England as anti-Christian, and actually
excommunicated such of his parishioners as held intercourse 1634 with
them. The vision of that great mind which saw general principles of
righteousness in a clear light, became clouded in his practical
endeavors to bring the power of those principles to bear upon society.
When weak and persecuted, the scope of his vision of intellectual
liberty and Christian charity embraced the earth; when in power and
strong, it contracted to the small orbit of his parish at Salem--himself
the central sun of light and goodness. Such is the tendency of all human
minds under like circumstances; and Roger Williams, great and good as he
was, was not an exception.

The magistrates were greatly irritated; some of Williams's language was
construed as treasonable and schismatic, and he was arraigned before the
General Court at Boston on this charge. There he stood alone in defense
of his noble principles; for his congregation, and even the wife of his
bosom, could not justify all his words and acts. Yet he was undaunted,
and declared himself "ready to be bound, and banished, and even to die
in New England," rather than renounce the truth whose light illuminated
his mind and conscience. He was allowed to speak for himself before the
court, and also to dispute upon religious points with the Reverend Mr.
Hooker. Every effort to "reduce him from his errors" was unavailing, and
the court, composed of all the ministers, proceeded to pass sentence
October, 1635 of banishment upon him. He was ordered to leave the
jurisdiction of the colony

* The preaching of Williams warmed the zeal of Endicott, then one of the
board of military commissioners for the colony, and afterward governor.
The banner of the train-bands at Salem had the cross of St. George
worked upon it. Endicott, determining to sweep away every vestige of
what he deemed popish or heathenish superstition, caused the cross to be
cut out of the banner. The people raised a tumult, and the court at
Boston, mercifully considering that Endicott's intentions were good,
though his act was rash, only "adjudged him worthy admonition, and to be
disabled for one year from bearing any public office."--Savage's
Winthrop, i., 158; Moore's Colonial Governors, i., 353.

Banishment of Roger Williams.--Flight to the Seekonk.--Landing at
Providence.--Commencement of a Settlement

622within six weeks. He obtained leave to remain until the rigors of
winter had passed, but, continuing active in promoting his peculiar
views, the court determined to ship him immediately for England. He was
ordered to Boston for the purpose of embarking. He refused obedience,
and, hearing that a warrant had been issued for his arrest, set out,
with a few followers, for the vast unexplored wilds of America, with an
ambitious determination to found a new colony, having for its foundation
the sublime doctrine of liberty of conscience in all its plenitude, and
the equality of opinions before the law. In the midst of deep snows and
bitter January, 1636 winds they journeyed toward Narraganset Bay. "For
fourteen weeks he was 1636. sorely tossed in a bitter season, not
knowing what bread or bed did mean." * He describes himself, in a letter
to Mason, "as plucked up by the roots, beset with losses, distractions,
miseries, hardships of sea and land, debts and wants." He at last found
refuge and hospitality from the Indian sachem Massasoit, whom he had
known at Plymouth; and in the spring, under a grant from that sachem,
commenced a settlement at Seekonk, ** on the east side of the Seekonk or
Pawtucket River, just within the limits of the Plymouth colony. Many of
the ministers in that colony wrote him friendly letters, for he was
personally beloved by all. Winslow, who was then governor, wrote a
letter to Williams, in which he claimed Seekonk as a part of the
Plymouth domain, and suggested his removal beyond the jurisdiction of
that colony to prevent difficulty. Williams heeded the advice of
Winslow,  June, 1636 and entering a canoe with five others, paddled down
the Seekonk almost to its mouth, and landed upon the west side of the
river, upon the bare rock, delineated on page 52. He crossed over to the
west side of the peninsula, and upon that shore, at the head of the bay,
commenced a new settlement. He obtained from Canonicus and Miantonômoh,
principal chiefs of the Narragansets, a grant of land for the purpose.
He named his new settlement Providence, "in commemoration of God's
providence to him in his distress."

"I desired," he said, "it might be for a shelter for persons distressed
for conscience." And so it became, for men of every creed there found
perfect freedom of thought. Although every rood of land belonged to
Williams, by right of deed from the Narraganset sachems, not a foot of
it did he reserve for himself. He practiced his holy precepts, and "gave
away his lands and other estates to them that he thought most in want,
until he gave away all." *** Nor was there any distinction made among
the settlers, "whether servants or strangers;" each had an equal voice
in the affairs of government, and the political foundation of the
settlement was a pure democracy. The Massachusetts people believed that
the fugitives "would have no magistrates," and must necessarily perish
politically, yet they thrived wonderfully. The impress of that first
system is yet seen upon the political character of Rhode Island, for "in
no state in the world, not even in the agricultural state of Vermont,
have the magistrates so little power, or the representatives of the
freemen so much." **** Such was the planting of the first and only
purely democratic colony in America; and its founder, though persecuted
and contemned, maintained, in the opinion of all good men, that high
character which Cotton Mather and others were constrained to award him,
as "one of the most distinguished men that ever lived, a most pious and
heavenly-minded soul." (v)

The Christian charity of Roger Williams was remarkably displayed soon
after his banishment from Massachusetts. In 1637, when the Pequots were
attempting to induce the Narragansets to join them in a general war upon
the whites, and particularly against the

* Massachusetts Historical Collections, i., 276.

** Seekonk is the Indian name for the wild or black goose with which the
waters in that region originally abounded. The town is the ancient
Rehoboth, first settled by William Blackstone, an English non-conformist
minister, a few months previous to the arrival here of Roger Williams.
Blackstone was the first white man who lived upon the peninsula of
Shawmut, where Boston now stands. Williams's plantation was on the
little Seekonk River, the navigable portion of which is really an arm of
Narraganset Bay. Although Williams was the real founder of Rhode Island,
Blackstone was the first white settler within its borders. He had no
sympathy with Williams, and continued his allegiance to Massachusetts,
though without its jurisdiction.

*** Backus's History of New England, i., 290.

**** Bancroft, i., 380.

(v) Callender's Historical Discourse.

Williams's Negotiations with the Indians.--Ingratitude of the
Massachusetts Colony.--March of the French Army to Providence.

623Massachusetts people, Mr. Williams informed the latter of the fact.
They solicited his mediation, and, forgetting the many injuries he had
received from those who now needed his favor, he set out on a stormy
day, in a poor canoe, upon the rough bay, and through many dangers
repaired to the cabin of Canonicus. The Pequots and Narragansets were
already assembled in council. The former threatened him with death, yet
he remained there three days and nights. "God wonderfully preserved me,"
he said, "and helped me to break in pieces the designs of the enemy, and
to finish the English league, by many travels and changes, with the
Narragansets and Mohegans against the Pequots." This alliance we noticed
in the last chapter. Notwithstanding this great service, the
Massachusetts court would not revoke Williams's sentence of banishment.

Let us now close the volume for a time, and visit other places of
historic interest.

Leaving the Seekonk, we walked to the site of the encampment of the
French army in the autumn of 1782, while on its march to Boston for
embarkation. It had remained in Virginia after the battle of Yorktown,
in the autumn of 1781, until the summer of 1782, when it joined
Washington and his army on the Hudson. The place of its encampment there
was near Peekskill. The order and discipline of this army, and its
uniform respect for property--the soldiers not even taking fruit from
the trees without leave--were remarkable, and on their march northward
Rochambeau and his officers received many congratulatory addresses. **
The army remained at Peekskill until October, when it commenced its
march for Boston, going by the way of Hartford and Providence. Count de
October 22, 1732 Rochambeau accompanied it to the latter place, where he
took his leave of the troops and returned to Washington's head-quarters.
The army had received orders to sail to the West Indies in the French
fleet of fifteen sail of the line and four frigates, then lying in the
harbor of Boston, in the event of the evacuation of New York or
Charleston by the British. The Baron de Viomenil was ordered to
accompany the troops as commander instead of Rochambeau. The latter,
with several other officers, returned from Rhode Island to Virginia, and
at Norfolk embarked for France.

* Roger Williams was born in Wales, in 1599, and was educated at Oxford.
He became a minister in the Church of England, but his views of
religious liberty made him a non-conformist, and he came to America.
Bold in the annunciation of his tenets respecting the perfect liberty of
mind and conscience, he was banished from Massachusetts, and planted a
colony at the head of Narraganset Bay, now the city of Providence. In
1639 he embraced the doctrines of the Baptists, and being baptized by
one of his brethren, he baptized ten others. Doubts as to the
correctness of his principles arose in his mind, and he finally
concluded that it would be wrong to perform the rite of baptism without
a revelation from Heaven. The Chureh which he had formed was accordingly
dissolved. He went to England in 1643, as agent for the colony, and
obtained a charter, with which he returned in September, 1644. This
charter was granted on the 14th of March, and included the shores and
islands of Narraganset Bay, west of Plymouth and south of Massachusetts,
and as far as the Pequot River and eountry, to be known as the
Providence Plantations. He landed at Boston, but was not molested on
account of being under sentence of banishment, for he brought with him
recommendatory letters from influential members of Parliament. He went
to England again for the colony in 1651, where he remained until 1654.
He was chosen president of the government on his return, which office he
held until 1657, when Benedict Arnold was appointed. In 1672 he held a
dispute with the Quakers for three days at Newport, of whieh he wrote an
account. * He died in April, 1683, aged eighty-four years.

** At Philadelphia, a deputation of Quakers waited upon Rochambeau, and
one of them, in behalf of the others, said, "General, it is not on
account of thy military qualities that we make thee this visit; those we
hold in little esteem; but thou art the friend of mankind, and thy army
conducts itself with the utmost order and discipline. It is this which
induces us to render thee our respects."

* The title of the pamphlet containing the account (which was published
in 167 G) was, "George Fox digged out of his Burrows," it being written
against Fox and Burrows, two eminent Quakers. An answer to it was
published in 1679, entitled "A New England Fire-brand Quenched."

The French Troops at Providence.--Site of the Encampment.--Remains.--
Departure of the French from Boston.

624The French troops arrived at Providence in November, and to give
color to the pretext that they marched eastward to go into winter
quarters, made excavations, in which to find protection from the cold,
instead of pitching their tents, as a moving army would do. The object
was to allow the expedition to the West Indies--where a brisk naval
warfare was in progress between the French and British--to remain a
secret even to the suspicions of the English. After remaining about a
fortnight at Providence the troops marched toward Boston, where they
arrived early in December. * On the 24th of that month the French fleet
sailed from Boston for St. Domingo, with all the troops except Lanzun's
legion, the army having been in the United States two and a half years.
**

The place of the encampment at Providence is in a field of cold, wet
land, rough and rocky, a mile and a half east-northeast from Market
Square in the city. It lies on the northeast side of Harrington's Lane,
at the head of Greene Lane, which latter runs parallel with Prospect
Street. We passed on our way along the brow of Prospect Hill, whence we
had a fine view of the city and surrounding country, including northward
the spires of Pawtucket, and southward the blue waters of Narraganset
Bay. The encampment was on the western slope of the northern termination
of Prospect Hill. Several shallow pits and heaps of stones, with some
charcoal intermingled (the remains of the temporary dwellings of the
French soldiers), are yet to be seen. It was a sheltered position, and
favorable for a The ground is full of small surface springs, which, with
the wash from the cultivated hills above, will soon obliterate every
trace of the encampment.

About a quarter of a mile westward of the camp ground is the "North
Burying-ground," belonging to the city. It has been beautified within a
few years by graveled foot-paths and carriage-ways, fine vaults,
handsome monuments and inclosures. Its location is such that it may be
made a beautiful cemetery, though small. Not far from the south entrance
is a marble monument about nine feet high, erected to the memory of
Stephen Hopkins, for a long time colonial governor of Rhode Island, and
one of the signers of the Declaration of Independence. On the southern
side of the obelisk is the name of Hopkins in large letters. The
inscriptions are upon three sides of the pedestal. ***

In the northeast part of the burial-ground is a granite ob-

* Soon after their arrival, Governor John Hancock and the Council gave a
public dinner to the commanding general, Viomenil, and his officers, and
to the commander of the fleet, Vaudreuil, and his officers.

** The Magnifique, a French seventy-four gun ship, one of the fleet,
having been lost in Boston Harbor by accident, Congress, in testimony of
their sense of the generosity of the French king, had resolved, more
than three months before (September 3), to present the America, a
seventy-four gun ship, to the French minister, the Chevalier de Luzerne,
for the service of his king.--See Journals of Congress, viii., 343.

*** The following are the inscriptions: North side.--"Sacred to the
memory of the illustrious Stephen Hopkins, of Revolutionary fame,
attested by his signature to the Declaration of our National
Independence. Great in council, from sagacity of mind; magnanimous in
sentiment, firm in purpose, and good as great, from benevolence of
heart, he stood in the first rank of statesmen and patriots. Self-
educated, yet among the most learned of men, his vast treasury of useful
knowledge, his great retentive and reflective powers, combined with his
social nature, made him the most interesting of companions in private
life." West side.--"His name is engraved on the immortal records of the
Revolution, and can never die. His titles to that distinction are
engraved on this monument, reared by the grateful admiration of his
native state in honor of her favorite son." South side.--Born March 7,
1707. Died July 13, 1785." A biography and portrait of this venerated
patriot will be found among those of the signers of the Declaration of
Independence, in another part of this work. The fac-simile of his
signature here given is a copy of his autograph in my possession,
attached to the commission of Captain Ephraim Wheaton, issued in June,
1761. Mr. Hopkins was then Governor of Rhode Island, and in that
capacity signed the instrument. It is attested by Henry Ward, secretary.
Mr. Ward was one of the delegates from Rhode Island to the "Stamp Act
Congress" in 1765. This signature of Hopkins exhibits the same
tremulousness of hand which is seen in that attached to the Declaration
of Independence, written fifteen years afterward, and is a proof, if
evidence were wanting, that it was not the effect of fear, but "shaking
palsy," that makes the patriot's sign-manual to our National Document
appear so suspiciously crooked.

Governor Cooke's Monument.--La Fayette's Head-quarters.--Roger
Williams's Spring.

625elisk erected to the memory of Nicholas Cooke, who was Governor of
Rhode Island from 1775 until 1778, and an active and efficient patriot
until his death, which occurred before the independence of his country
was secured by treaty.

His biography is briefly inscribed upon his monument in the following
words:

"Nicholas Cooke, born in Providence, February 3d, 1717; Died September
14th, 1782. Unanimously elected Governor of Rhode Island in 1775, he
remained in office during the darkest period of the American Revolution.
He merited and won the approbation of his fellow-citizens, and was
honored with the friendship and confidence of Washington."

This is the inscription upon the east side, immediately above which, in
raised letters, is the name Cooke. On the west is the following:

"Hannah Sabine, relict of Nicholas Cooke, born in Killingly,
Connecticut, March 13th, 1722; died in Providence, March 22d, 1792."
This monument is about twenty feet high, composed of a single block. The
sketch of it here given is from the cemetery, looking eastward, and
includes in the distance the French camp-ground just mentioned. The most
remote of the two fields seen between the trees on the right, is the one
wherein the remains of the encampment are to be seen.

On the road leading from the cemetery to the town is a brick building,
with a hip-roof, which La Fayette occupied as head-quarters, while in
Providence a short time in 1778 He had been sent by Washington with two
thousand men to assist Sullivan in the siege of Newport. The house is
well preserved, but changed somewhat in its external appearance On our
way into the town we passed along Benefit Street, on the east side of
which, in a vacant lot, upon the slope of a steep hill, near the mansion
of the father of Governor Dorr, is a living water-fountain, called
_Roger Williams's Spring_. Tradition asserts that here, in the cool
shade of sycamores (of which the huge trees that now overshadow it are
the sprouts), Williams first reposed after his journey, and that here
his first tent was pitched, at twilight, on a beautiful evening in June.
It is a pleasant spot now, even with the pent-up city around it; it must
then have been a delicious resting-place for the weary exile, for below
him were the bright waters of the Narraganset, beyond which arose the
gentle slopes and more lofty hills of the fair land of Canonicus, his
friend and protector.

* Mr. Cooke was deputy governor in 1775. When the Assembly, or House of
Magistrates of the colony, voted to raise an army of fifteen hundred
men, Joseph Wanton, then the Governor of Rhode Island, his deputy, and
others in the government, were opposed to the measure. The people were
displeased, yet Wanton, who had been chief magistrate since 1769, was
rechosen governor in May; but, failing to appear and take the prescribed
oath, the Assembly directed that the deputy governor should perform the
duties of chief magistrate. Mr. Cooke became convinced that the warlike
measures of the Assembly were correct, and entered heartily into all
their views. Wanton appeared in June, and demanded that the oath of
office should be administered to him, but, as he had not given
satisfaction to the Assembly, his request or demand was not complied
with.

Old Tavern in Providence.--Its Associations.--Destruction of Tea in
Market Square.--Rhode Island Historical Society

626Within the city, on the east side of Market Square, stands the old
tavern, with moss-grown roof, where many a grave and many a boisterous
meeting were held by the freemen of the Providence Plantations during
the Stamp Act excitement, and the earlier years of the of the people;
and many excited audiences have crowded Market Square, in front of it,
to listen to patriotic speeches.

The people ol Providence, and particularly the matrons and maidens,
cheerfully acquiesced in the demands made upon their self-denial by the
non-importation agreements, and foreign tea was discarded as if it had
been a poisonous drug. ** In 1773, when it was ascertained that the
ships of the East India Company, heavily laden with tea, were about to
sail for America, the people of Providence were among the first to
express their disapprobation; and on one occasion the town crier, with a
drum, patroled the streets in the evening, announcing that a bonfire of
_tea_ would be made in Market Square at ten o'clock at night, and
requesting those who possessed and repudiated the article to cast it
upon the heap. At the appointed hour the square was crowded, and the old
tavern front and its neighbors were brilliantly illuminated by the glow
of the burning tea, aided by other combustibles, while shouts long and
loud went up as one voice from the multitude. This was but a prelude to
the united and vigorous action of the people when the war notes from
Lexington aroused the country; and until the close of the contest
Providence was a "nest of rebels against the king."

I concluded the labors and pleasures of the day by making the above
sketch, and in the evening attended, by invitation, a meeting of the
Rhode Island Historical Society, over which Albert G. Greene, Esq.,
presided, the venerable president, John Howland, then ninety-one years
of age, being absent. Their rooms are in a small but convenient building
near Brown University, and contain about five thousand volumes of books
and pamphlets, many of them very rare. The meeting was one of much
interest, especially to Rhode Islanders, for Professor Gammel, of the
University, made a verbal communication on the subject of important
manuscripts concerning the early history of New England, which are in
the British colonial office. He imparted the gratifying intelligence
that J. Carter Brown, Esq., of Providence,

* This view is from the market, looking north. The building stands on
the east side of the square, and parallel with its front commences North
Main Street. In the yard on the right is a venerable horse-chestnut
tree, standing between the house and the Roger Williams' Bank. In former
times, a balcony extended across the front. The door that opened upon it
is still there, but the balcony is gone. The roof is completely
overgrown with moss, and every appearance of age marks it.

** On the 12th of June, 1769, twenty-nine young ladies, daughters of the
first citizens of Providence, met under the shade of the sycamores at
the Roger Williams' Spring, and there resolved not to drink any more tea
until the duty upon it should be taken off. They then adjourned to the
house of one of the company (Miss Coddington), where they partook of a
frugal repast, composed in part of the "delicious Hyperion," a tea of
domestic manufacture--See note on page 481. There the Sons of Liberty
met and planned their measures in opposition to the British ministry.

From the same balcony were read the proclamation announcing the
accession of George III. to the throne in 1760; the odious Stamp Act in
1765; the bill for its repeal in 1766; and the Declaration of
Independence in 1776. That balcony seemed to be the forum

Valuable Manuscripts.--A telescopic Peep at the Moon and Stars.--
Bryant's "Song of the Stars."--Voyage to Gaspeo Point

627with an enlightened liberality worthy of all praise, had made
arrangements to have all the manuscripts in question copied at his own
expense, under the direction of Mr. Stephens, the eminent agriculturist,
then in Europe. * The manuscripts relate to New England history, from
1634 to 1720, and consist of more than four hundred pieces, about two
hundred and fifty of which have special reference to the Rhode Island
and Providence Plantations. Among them is a minute account of all the
transactions relating to Captain Kidd, the noted pirate. Already two
thousand four hundred pages of copies, beautifully written by one hand,
on vellum foolscap, had been forwarded to Mr. Brown, a few of which were
exhibited by Professor Gammel.

Moon and stars were shining brightly when we left the Society's rooms,
and afforded a fine field of view through a large telescope that was
standing under the porch of the college. The professor having it in
charge kindly allowed me a glance at our celestial neighbors. The moon
was gibbous, and brilliant as molten silver appeared its ragged edges.
Saturn was visible, but the earth being upon the plane of its rings,
they could not be seen. Some double stars, even of the seventeenth
magnitude, were pointed out; and over the whole field of view, those
distant worlds, that appear like brilliant points to the unaided vision,
were seen glowing in all the beautiful colors of the emerald, the ruby,
the sapphire, and the topaz While gazing upon them, it seemed to me as
if

"Their silver voices in chorus rang,

And this was the song the bright ones sang.

"Away! away! through the wide, wide sky--

The fair blue fields that before us lie.

Each sun with the worlds that round it roll;

Each planet poised on her turning pole;

With her isles of green and her clouds of white,

And her waters that lie like fluid light.

"For the Source of Glory uncovers his face,

And the brightness o'erflows unbounded space;

And we drink, as we go, the luminous tides,

In our ruddy air and our blooming sides.

Lo! yonder the living splendors play;

Away on our joyous path, away!

"Glide on in your beauty, ye youthful spheres,

To weave the dance that measures the years.

Glide on in the glory and gladness sent

To the farthest wall of the firmament--

The boundless, visible smile of Him,

To the veil of whose brow our lamps are dim."

Bryant's "Song of the Stars."

On the morning of the 21st, I procured a sort of pinnace, and a boatman
to manage October, 1848it, and with a stiff, cold breeze from the
northwest, sailed down the Narraganset Bay ** to Gaspee Point, a place
famous in our Revolutionary annals as the scene of a daring act on the
part of the people of Rhode Island. The Point is on the west side of the
bay, about six miles below Providence, and consists, first, of a high
jutting bank, and then a sandy beach stretching into the bay, almost
uncovered at low tide, but completely submerged at high water. The bay
is here about two miles wide, and the low bare point extends at least
half a mile from the bank, its termination marked by a buoy. The
navigation of this section of the bay is dangerous on account of the
sand-bars, and also of submerged rocks, lying just below the surface at
low water. Two of them, in the vicinity of Field's Point, are marked by
strong stone towers about thirty feet high, both of which are

* Mr. Brown is a son of Nicholas Brown, whose liberal endowment of the
college at Providence, and active influence in its favor, caused the
faculty to give his name to the institution. It is called Brown
University.

** The northern portion of the bay is quite narrow, and from the
Pawtuxet to its head is generally called Providence River.

The Gaspee.--Conduct of her Commander.--Sketch of Gaspee Point--Governor
Wanton

628above Gaspee Point. The tide was ebbing when we arrived at the Point,
and anchoring our vessel, we sought to reach the shore in its little
skiff--a feat of no small difficulty on account of the shallowness of
the water. I waited nearly an hour for the ebbing tide to leave the
Point bare, before making my sketch.

The historical incident alluded to was the burning of the Gaspee, a
British armed schooner, in 1772. She first appeared in the waters of
Narraganset Bay in March, having been dispatched thither by the
commissioners of customs at Boston to prevent infractions of the revenue
laws, and to put a stop to the illicit trade which had been carried on
for a long time at Newport and Providence.

Her appearance disquieted the people, and her interference with the free
navigation of the bay irritated them. Deputy-governor Sessions, residing
at Providence, wrote in behalf of the people there to Governor Wanton *
at Newport, expressing his opinion that the commander of the Gaspee,
Lieutenant Duddington, had no legal warrant for his proceedings.
Governor Wanton immediately dispatched a written message, by the high
sheriff, to Duddington, in which he required that officer to produce his
commission without delay. This the lieutenant refused to do, and Wanton
made a second demand for his orders. Duddington, apparently shocked at
the idea that a colonial governor should claim the right to control, in
any degree, the movement of his majesty's officers, did not reply, but
sent Wanton's letters to Admiral Montague at Boston.

* Joseph Wanton was a native of Newport, Rhode Island. He graduated at
Harvard in 1751. In 1759 he was elected Governor of Rhode Island, which
office he held by re-election until 1775. when his opposition to the
views of the people, and his neglect to take the oath of office at the
proper time, made the Assembly declare his place vacant. His deputy,
Nicholas Cooke, performed the duties of governor. The confidence of the
people in his attachment to American liberty was doubtless shaken by his
appointment, under the great seal of England, to inquire into the affair
of the Gaspee. But in that he acted as a conscientious man, and there
was evidently a desire on his part that the incendiaries of that vessel
should not be known, although he labored with apparent zeal to discover
them. He was regarded as a Loyalist during the remainder of his life. He
died at Newport in 1782.

** This view is from the bank of the cove just below the Point, looking
northeast, showing its appearance at low water when the clam-fishers are
upon it. The buoy is seen beyond the extreme end of the Point on the
right. The bank is about fifteen feet high. In front of Pawtuxet, about
a mile above, are the remains of breast-works, thrown up during the war
of 1812. There are also breast-works at Field's Point, two miles below
Providence, where is a flag-staff There is the quarantine ground.

Montague's insolent--Letter. Wanton's Rejoinder.--Captain Lindsey's
Packet chased by the Gaspee.--Grounding of the Gaspee.

629That functionary, forgetting that the Governor of Rhode Island was
elected to office by the voice of a free people--that he was the chief
magistrate of a colony of free Englishmen, and not a creature of the
crown--wrote an insulting and blustering letter to Governor April 6,
1772 Wanton in defense of Duddington, and in reprehension of his
opponents. In it he used these insulting words: "I shall report your two
insolent letters to my officer [Duddington] to his majesty's secretaries
of state, and leave them to determine what right you have to demand a
sight of all orders I shall give to all officers of my squadron; and I
would advise you not to send your sheriff on board the king's ship again
on such ridiculous errands." To this letter Governor Wanton wrote a
spirited reply. "I am greatly May 8,1772 obliged," he said, "for the
promise of transmitting my letters to the secretaries of state. I am,
however, a little shocked at your impolite expression made use of upon
that occasion. In return for this good office, I shall also transmit
your letter to the Secretary of State, and leave to the king and his
ministers to determine on which side the charge of insolence lies. As to
your advice not to send a sheriff on board any of your squadron, please
to know, that I will send the sheriff of this colony at any time, and to
any place within the body of it, as I shall think fit." On the 20th of
May, Governor Wanton, pursuant to a vote of the Assembly, transmitted an
account of the matter to the Earl of Hillsborough; but, before any reply
could be received, the Gaspee became a wreck, under the following
circumstances:

On the 9th of June, 1772, Captain Lindsey left Newport for Providence,
in his packet * at about noon, the wind blowing from the South. ** The
Gaspee, whose commander did not discriminate between the well-known
packets and the strange vessels that came into the harbor, had often
fired upon the former, to compel their masters to take down their colors
in its presence--a haughty marine Gesler, requiring obeisance to its
imperial cap. As Captain Lindsey, on this occasion, kept his colors
flying, the Gaspee gave chase, and continued it as far as Namquit (now
Gaspee) Point. The tide was ebbing, but the bar was covered. As soon as
Lindsey doubled the Point, he stood to the westward Duddington,
commander of the Gaspee, eager to overtake the pursued, and ignorant of
the extent of the submerged Point from the shore, kept on a straight
course, and in a few minutes struck the sand. The fast ebbing tide soon
left his vessel hopelessly grounded. Captain Lindsey arrived at
Providence at sunset, and at once communicated the fact of the grounding
of the Gaspee to Mr. John Brown, one of the leading merchants of that
city. Knowing that the schooner could not be got off until flood-tide,
after midnight, Brown thought this a good opportunity to put an end to
the vexations caused by her presence. He ordered the preparation of
eight of the largest long-boats in the harbor, to be placed under the
general command of Captain Whipple, one of his most trusty ship-masters;
each boat to have five oars, the row-locks to be muffled, and the whole
put in readiness by half past eight in the evening, at Fenner's Wharf,
near the residence of the late Welcome Arnold. At dusk, a man named
Daniel Pearce passed along the Main Street, beating a drum, and
informing the inhabitants that the Gaspee lay aground on Namquit Point;
that she could not get off until three o'clock in the morning; and
inviting those who were willing to engage in her destruction to meet at
the house of James Sabine, afterward the residence of Welcome Arnold.
The boats left Providence between ten and eleven o'clock, filled with
sixty-four well-armed men, a sea captain in each boat acting as
steersman. They took with them a quantity of round paving-stones.
Between one and two in the morning they reached the Gaspee, when a June
9, 1772 sentinel on board hailed them. No answer being returned,
Duddington appeared in his shirt on the starboard gunwale, and waving
the boats off, fired a pistol at them. This

* This packet was called the Hannah, and sailed between New York and
Providence, touching at Newport.

** Cooper, in his Naval History, i., 81, says that the Hannah was
"favored by a fresh southerly breeze." The details here given are taken
chiefly from a statement by the late Colonel Ephraim Bowen, of
Providence, who was one of the party that attacked the Gaspee. Colonel
Bowen says the wind was from the North. The circumstances of the chase,
however, show that it must have been from the South.

Expedition against the Gaspee.--Her Destruction.--Efforts to discover
the Incendiaries.--The Commissioners,

630discharge was returned by a musket from one of the boats. *
Duddington was wounded in the groin, and carried below. The boats now
came alongside the schooner, and the men boarded her without much
opposition, the crew retreating below when their wounded commander was
carried down. A medical student among the Americans dressed Duddington's
wound, ** and he was carried on shore at Pawtuxet. The schooner's
company were ordered to collect their clothing and leave the vessel,
which they did; and all the effects of Lieutenant Duddington being
carefully placed in one of the American boats to be delivered to the
owner, the Gaspee was set on fire and at dawn blew up. ***

On being informed of this event, Governor Wanton issued a proclamation,
ordering diligent search for persons having a knowledge of the crime,
and offering a reward of five hundred dollars "for the discovery June 1
of the perpetrators of said villainy, to be paid immediately upon the
conviction of any one or more of them." Admiral Montague also made
endeavors to discover the incendiaries. Afterward the home government
offered a reward of five thousand dollars for the leader, and two
thousand five hundred dollars to any person who would discover the other
parties, with the promise of a pardon should the informer be an
accomplice. A commission of inquiry, under the great seal of England,
was established, which sat from the 4th until the 2 2d of January, 1773.
**** It then adjourned until the 26th of May, when it assembled and sat
until the 23d of June. But not a solitary clew to the identity of the
perpetrators could be obtained, notwithstanding so many of them were
known to the people. (v) The price of treachery on the part of any
accomplice would have been exile from home and country; and the
proffered reward was not adequate to such a sacrifice, even though weak
moral principles or strong acquisitiveness had been tempted into
compliance. The commissioners closed their labors on the 23d of June,
and further inquiry was not attempted. (vi)

* Thomas Bucklin, a young man about nineteen years of age, fired the
musket. He afterward assisted in dressing the wound which his bullet
inflicted.

** This was Dr. John Mawney. His kindness and attention to Duddington
excited the gratitude of that officer, who offered young Mawney a gold
stock-buckle; that being refused, a silver one was offered and accepted.

*** The principal actors in this affair were John Brown, Captain Abraham
Whipple, John B. Hopkins, Benjamin Dunn, Dr. John Mawney, Benjamin Page,
Joseph Bucklin, Turpin Smith, Ephraim Bowen, and Captain Joseph
Tillinghast. The names were, of course, all kept, secret at the time.

**** The commission consisted of Governor Joseph Wanton, of Rhode
Island; Daniel Horsmanden, chief justice of New York; Frederic Smyth,
chief justice of New Jersey; Peter Oliver, chief justice of
Massachusetts; and Robert Auchmuty, judge of the Vice-admiralty Court.

*(v) The drum was publicly beaten; the sixty-four boldly embarked on the
expedition without disguise; and it is asserted by Mr. John Howland
(still living), that on the morning after the affair, a young man, named
Justin Jacobs, paraded on the "Great Bridge," a place of much resort,
with Lieutenant Duddington's gold-laced beaver on his head, detailing
the particulars of the transaction to a circle around him.

*(vi) See Documentary History of the Destruction of the Gaspee, by the
Honorable William R. Staples; Providence, 1845. In a song written at the
time, and composed of fifty-eight lines of doggerel verse, is
ingeniously given the history of the affair. It closes with the
following allusion to the rewards offered:

"Now, for to find these people out. King George has offered very stout.
One thousand pounds to find out one That wounded William Duddington. One
thousand more he says he'll spare, For those who say the sheriff's were.
One thousand more there doth remain For to find out the leader's name;
Likewise five hundred pounds per man For any one of all the clan. But
let him try his utmost skill, I'm apt to think he never will Find out
any of those hearts of gold, Though he should offer fifty-fold."

Return to Providence.--Visit to Mr. John Howland.--His military Career
in the Revolution

631After finishing my sketch of Namquit, or Gaspee Point (page 60), we
embarked for Providence, the wind blowing a gale from the northwest. It
was with much difficulty that we managed our vessel; and before we
reached the harbor we were drenched with the spray that dashed over the
gunwale from the windward. In company with Mr. Weeden I visited the fine
library of the Athenium Association, * and afterward had the pleasure of
a brief interview, at his residence, with the venerable Mr. Howland,
president of the Historical Society. So clear and vigorous was his well-
cultivated mind, that I regretted the brevity of my visit, made
necessary by the near approach of the hour of departure of the steam-
packet, in which I was to proceed to Newport. Mr. Howland passed his
ninety-first birth-day a few days before I saw him. He was a soldier
early in the war for independence, having been drafted as a minute man
in the winter of 1775, to go to Newport. He was afterward attached to
the Rhode Island regiment under Colonel Lippincott, and joined the
Continental army under Washington at Kingsbridge, at the upper end of
York or Manhattan Island. He was in the retreat to White Plains in the
autumn of 1776, and was engaged in the skirmish at Chatterton's Hill. He
related an amusing circumstance which occurred during that retreat.
While the Americans halted upon Chatterton's Hill, the British, in close
pursuit, rested, for a short time, upon another eminence close by. An
Irishman, one of Colonel Lippincott's servants, who was called "Daddy
Hall," seemed quite uneasy on account of the presence of the enemy. Pie
had charge of the colonel's horse, and frequently exclaimed, "What are
we doing here? Why do we stop here? Why don't we go on? I don't believe
the colonel knows that the red-coated rascals are so near." Paymaster
Dexter,2 seeing the perturbation of the poor fellow, said, "Daddy Hall,
you're afraid! you're a trembling coward!" The Milesian's ire was
aroused at these words, and looking the paymaster in the face with a
scornful curl of his lips, he said, "Be jabers! no, Maisther Dexther,
I'm not afeerd more nor yez be; but faith! ye'll find yourself that one
good pair of heels is worth two of hands afore night; if ye don't, call
Daddy Hall a spalpeen." And so he did; for before sunset the Americans
were flying before their pursuers, more grateful to heels than hands for
safety.

Mr. Howland accompanied Washington in his retreat across New Jersey, and
was in the division of Cadwallader, at Bristol, which was to go over the
Delaware on the night when Washington crossed that river, and surprised
the Hessians at Trenton. The December 25, 1776 ice prevented; but they
crossed the next day, and were stationed at Crosswicks for a day or two.
Mr. Howland was among those at Trenton who were driven across the
Assanpink by the British on the evening of the 2d of January, the night
before the battle of Princeton. The bridge across the Assanpink was much
crowded, and Mr. Howland remembers having his arm scratched by one of
Washington's spurs as he passed

* Mr. Weeden was formerly librarian of the institution. It is situated
in a handsome building on the east side of Benefit Street, and contains
about five thousand volumes, among whieh is a copy of the great work on
Egypt, arranged under the superintendence of Denon, and published by
Napoleon at the expense of the government of France. This copy belonged
to Prince Polignac, the minister of Charles X. Many of the plates were
colored by his direction. It is a beautiful copy, bound in morocco.

** I was informed, after leaving Providence, that Mr. Dexter was yet
living in the northern part of the town, at the age of ninety-two years.

Departure for Newport.--Appearance of Rhode Island.--Old Tower at
Newport.--Mansion of Governor Gibbs

632by the commander in the crowd, who sat upon his white horse at the
south end of the bridge. He performed the dreary night march through the
snow toward Princeton, and was in the battle there on the following
morning. His term of service expired while the American army was at
Morristown, whither it went from Princeton. From Morristown, himself and
companions made their way on foot, through deep snows, back to
Providence, crossing the Hudson River at King's Ferry (Stony Point), and
the Connecticut at Hartford. Gladly would I have listened until sunset
to the narrative of his great experience, but the first bell of the
packet summoned me away.

I left Providence at three o'clock in the Perry, and arrived at Newport,
thirty miles distant, at about five, edified on the way by the
conversation of the venerable William Cranston, of Attlebury,
Massachusetts, then eighty-one years of age, who was a resident of
Newport during the Revolution. The bald appearance of Rhode Island,
relieved only by orchards, which showed like dark tufts of verdure in
the distance, with a few wind-mills and scattered farm-houses, formed a
singular and unfavorable feature in the view as we approached Newport;
while upon small islands and the main land appeared the ruins of forts
and batteries, indicating the military importance of the waters we were
navigating. This was

"Rhode Island, the land where the exile sought rest;

The Eden where wandered the Pilgrim oppress'd.

Thy name be immortal! here man was made free,

The oppress'd of all nations found refuge in thee.

"There Freedom's broad pinions our fathers unfurl'd,

An ensign to nations and hope to the world;

Here both Jew and Gentile have ever enjoy'd

The freedom of conscience in worshiping God."

Arthur. A. Ross.

The fair promises of a pleasant morrow, sweetly expressed by a bright
moonlight evening, October 22, 1848 were not realized, for at dawn heavy
rain-drops were pattering upon my window, and the wind was piping with
all the zeal of a sudden "sou'easter." I had intended to start early for
the neighborhood of Quaker Hill, toward the north end of the island, the
scene of conflict in 1778; but the storm frustrated my plans, and I
passed the day in visiting places of interest in the city and its
immediate vicinity. The object of greatest attraction to the visitor at
Newport is the Old Tower, or wind-mill, as it is sometimes called. It
stands within a vacant lot owned by Governor Gibbs, directly in front of
his fine old mansion, which was erected in 1720, and was then one of the
finest dwellings in the colony. It is a brick building, covered with red
cedar. The main object in the picture is a representation of the tower
as it appeared at the time of my visit. On the right of it is seen the
residence of Governor Gibbs, * surrounded by shade-trees and flowering
shrubs in abundance. I passed the stormy morning under its roof; and to
the proprietor I am indebted for much kindness during my visit at
Newport, and for valuable suggestions respecting the singular relic of
the past that stands upon his grounds, mute and mysterious as a mummy.
On the subject of its erection history and tradition are silent, and the
object of its construction is alike unknown and conjectural. It is a
huge cylinder, composed of unhewn stones--common granite, slate,
sandstone, and pudding-stone--cemented with coarse mortar, made of the
soil on which the structure stands, and shell lime. It rests upon eight
round columns, a little more than three feet in diameter, and ten feet
high from the ground to the spring of the arches. The wall is three feet
thick, and the whole edifice, at the present time, is twenty-four feet
high. The external diameter is twenty-three feet. Governor Gibbs
informed me that, on excavating at the base of one of the pillars, he
found the soil about four feet deep, lying upon a stratum of hard rock,
and that the foundation of the column, which rested upon this rock, was
composed of rough-hewn spheres of stone, the lower ones about four feet
in circumference. On the interior, a little above the arches, are small
square

* Mr. Gibbs was Governor of Rhode Island in 1819

Old Tower at Newport--Its former Appearance.--Attempt to destroy it--
Obscurity of its Origin

633niches, in depth about half the thickness of the wall, designed,
apparently, to receive floor-timbers. In several places within, as well
as upon the inner surface of some of the columns

are patches of stucco, which, like the mortar, is made of coarse sand
and shell lime, and as hard as the stones it covers. Governor Gibbs
remembers the appearance of the tower more than forty years ago, when it
was partially covered with the same hard stucco upon its exterior
surface. Doubtless it was originally covered within and without with
plaster, and the now rough columns, with mere indications of capitals
and bases of the Doric form, were handsomely wrought, the whole
structure exhibiting taste and beauty. During the possession of Rhode
Island by the British, in the Revolution, the tower was more perfect
than now, having a roof, and the walls were three or four feet higher
than at present. * The British used it for an ammunition magazine, and
when they evacuated the island, they attempted to demolish the old
"mill" by igniting a keg of powder within it! But the strong walls
resisted the Vandals, and the only damage the edifice sustained was the
loss of its roof and two or three feet of its upper masonry. Such is the
Old Tower at Newport at the present time. Its early history is yet
unwritten, and may forever remain so. **

* Governor Gibbs showed me a Continental bill of the denomination of
five dollars (not signed), which his son found in a crevice in the
tower.

** There has been much patient investigation, with a great deal of
speculation, concerning this ancient edifice, but no satisfactory
conclusion has yet been obtained. Of its existence prior to the English
emigration to America there is now but little doubt; and it is asserted
that the Indians, of whom Mr. Coddington and other early settlers upon
Aquitneck (now Rhode Island) solicited information concerning the
structure, had no tradition respecting its origin. Because it was called
a "mill" in some old documents, some have argued, or, rather, have
flippantly asserted, that it was built by the early English settlers for
a wind-mill. Thus Mr. Cooper disposes of the matter in his preface to
Red Rover. A little patient inquiry would have given him a different
conclusion; and if the structure is really ante-colonial, and perhaps
ante-Columbian, its history surely is worthy of investigation. That it
was converted into and used for a wind-mill by some of the early
settlers of Newport, there is no doubt, for it was easily convertible to
such use, although not by a favorable arrangement. The English
settlement upon the Island was commenced in 1636, at the north end, and
in 1639 the first house was erected on the site of Newport, by Nicholas
Easton. Mention is made in the colonial records of the erection of a
wind-mill by Peter Easton, in 1663, twenty-five years after the founding
of Newport; and this was evidently the first mill erected there, from
the fact that it was considered of sufficient importance to the colony
to induce the General Court to reward Mr. Easton for his enterprise, by
a grant of a tract of fine land, a mile in length, lying along what is
still known as Easton's Beack. That mill was a wooden structure, and
stood upon the land now occupied by the North Burying-ground, in the
upper suburbs of Newport. The land on which the Old Tower stands once
belonged to Governor Benedict Arnold, and in his will, bearing the date
of 1678, forty years after the settlement, he mentions the "stone mill,"
the tower having evidently been used for that purpose. Its form, its
great solidity, and its construction upon columns, forbid the idea that
it was originally erected for a mill; and certainly, if a common wind-
mill, made of timber, was so highly esteemed by the people, as we havs
seen, the construction of such an edifice, so superior to any dwelling
or church in the colony, would have received special attention from the
magistrates, and the historians of the day. And wherefore, for such a
purpose, were the foundation-stones wrought into spheres, and the whole
structure stuccoed within and without? When, in 1837, the Royal Society
of Northern Antiquaries of Copenhagen published the result of their ten
years' investigations concerning the discovery of America by the
Northmen in the tenth century, in a volume entitled "Antiquitates
Americana," the old "mill" at Newport, the rock inscription at Dighton,
in Massachusetts, and the discovery of skeletons, evidently of a race
different from the Indians, * elicited the earnest attention of
inquirers, as subjects in some way connected with those early
discoveries. Dr. Webb (whom I have mentioned as extending to me his
friendly services at the rooms of the Historical Society of
Massachusetts), who was then a resident of Providence, and secretary to
the Rhode Island Historical Society, opened a correspondence with
Charles C. Rafn, the secretary to the Royal Society of Copenhagen. Dr.
Webb employed Mr. Catherwood to make drawings of the "mill," and these,
with a particular account of the structure, he transmitted to Professor
Rafn. Here was opened for the society a new field of inquiry, the
products of which were published, with engravings from Mr. Catherwood's
drawings. According to Professor Rafn, the architecture of this building
is in the ante-Gothic style, which was common in the north and west of
Europe from the eighth to the twelfth century. "The circular form, the
low columns, their thickness in proportion to their distance from each
other, and the entire want of ornament," he says, "all point out this
epoch." He imagines that it was used for a baptistry, and accounts for
the absence of buildings of a similar character by the abundance of wood
in America. The brevity of the sojourn of the Northmen here was
doubtless another, and perhaps principal reason, why similar structures
were not erected. The fact that the navigators of Sweden, Norway, and
Iceland visited and explored the American coast as far as the shores of
Connecticut, and probably more southerly, during the tenth and eleventh
centuries (five hundred years before the voyages of Columbus), appears
to be too well attested to need further notice here. For the proofs, the
reader is referred to the interesting work alluded to, "Antiquitates
Americana." The inscription upon the rock at Diffton has given rise to
much speculation and to many theories. The rock lies upon the east side
of Taunton River, between high and low water marks, so that it is
covered and exposed at every ebb and flow of the tide. It is an
insulated mass of fine-grained granite, or grunstein, lying northwest
and southeast on the sands of the river. Its length is eleven feet, and
its height four and a half feet. It has a regular surface and nearly
smooth, whereon the inscription is carved. The inscription presents four
parts or divisions, and evidently refers to a combat. On the left is a
figure armed with a bow and arrow, and may represent an Indian. Next to
it is an inscription composed of Runic or Phoenician characters,
doubtless a history of the event there partially pictured. Further to
the right is a vessel, and on the extreme right are two figures,
differing from the one on the left, without bows and arrows, and
evidently connected with the vessel. These and the vessel doubtless
indicate them as voyagers from a distant land. ** Between the figures
and the boat are Runic or Phoenician characters. The question arises, By
whom was the inscription made? The Phoenician characters seem to be
proof that those ancient navigators visited the American coast and made
this record of combat with the Indians; and hence some reject the
opinion of others that the rock was inscribed by the hand of a
Scandinavian. When we remember that the Phoenicians were for many ages
in the undisputed possession of the traffic of the Baltic, around which
clustered the Scandinavian nations, and that Runic, or ancient German
inscriptions, in Phoenician characters, have been discovered in
abundance in all the countries formerly occupied by these nations, the
inference is plainly correct, that the Scandinavians received their
alphabet from the Phoenicians.* In the Journal des Debats of Paris, a
letter was published, dated Copenhagen, February 5, 1850, in which it is
mentioned that Dr. Pierre André Munch, professor at the University of
Christina, then in Copenhagen, had just presented to the Society of
Northern Antiquaries an extremely curious manuscript, in a state of
excellent preservation, which he discovered and obtained during his
voyage, in 1849, to the Orkney Isles. This manuscript, which the
professor refers to the ninth and tenth centuries, contains several
episodes, in the Latin language, on the history of Norway, presenting
some important facts, heretofore entirely unknown, which illustrate the
obscure ages that in Norway preceded the introduction of Christianity.
Dr. Munch also presented to the society several fae-similes of Runic
inscriptions, which he discovered in the Orkney Isles and in the north
of Scotland. It is probable these discoveries may cast some light upon
the obscure subject under consideration. In the record of the voyages to
America of the Northmen, a severe combat with the natives (skrellings)
is mentioned, and various circumstances show that in the vicinity of
this inscription the battle occurred. Is it not reasonable to infer that
those Scandinavians, acquainted with the Phoenician alphabet, made a
record of the battle upon the rock, by a mingling of alphabetical
characters and pictorial hieroglyphics? And may not the same people have
reared the Old Tower at Newport, in the vicinity, for a baptistry, with
a view of erecting a church, and making a permanent settlement there?
for it must be remembered that at that time those Northern nations were
nominal Christians. The records of their voyages were compiled by Bishop
Thorlack, of Iceland, a grandson of Snorre's, son of Gudrida, who was
born in Wineland, or Massachusetts, in 1008. The subject is one of great
interest, and worthy of further and more minute inquiries than have yet
been made.

* On this point consult Fehlegel's fourth lecture on The History of
Literature.

** The late Bertel Thorwalsden, the greatest sculptor of our time, was a
lineal descendant of Snorre.

* Dr. J. C. V. Smith, of Boston, has written an account of a remarkable
stone cemetery, discovered about fifty years ago on Rainsford Island, in
Boston Bay, which contained a skeleton and sword-hilt of iron. Dr. Webb
has also published an interesting account of a skeleton discovered at
Fall River, in Massachusetts, on or near which were found a bronze
breast-plate, bronze tubes belonging to a belt, &c., none of which
appear to be of Indian, or of comparatively modern European manufacture.
Drs. Smith and Webb both concluded that these skeletons were those of
Scandinavian voyagers.

** Kendall, in his Travels, published in 1809, describes this rock and
the inscription, and gives the following Indian tradition: "Some ages
past, a number of white men arrived in the river in a bird [sailing
vessel], when the white men took Indians into the bird as hostages. They
took fresh water for their consumption at a neighboring spring, and
while procuring it, the Indians fell upon and murdered some of them.
During the affray, thunder and lightning issued from the bird, and
frightened the Indians away. Their hostages, however, escaped." The
thunder and lightning spoken of evidently refers to fire-arms, and, if
the tradition is true, the occurrence must have taken place as late as
the latter part of the fourteenth century, for gunpowder, for warlike
purposes, was not used in Europe previous to 1350. In a representation
of the battle of Cressy (which was fought in 1343) upon a manuscript
Froissart, there are no pictures of fire-arms, and probably they were
not in common use at that time; yet there is a piece of ordnance at
Amberg, in Germany, on which is inscribed the year 1303. Roger Bacon,
who died in 1292, was acquainted with gunpowder, and the Chinese and
other Eastern nations were familiar with it long before that time.

First Wind-mill at Newport.--Inquiries respecting the Tower.--
"Antiquitates Americana."--Inscription on Dighton Rock.

634The rain ceased at ten o'clock, and a westerly wind dispersed the
clouds, but made the day unpleasant by its blustering breath.

I sketched the house on the corner of Spring and Peck-

Prescott's Head-quarters in Newport.--Old Cemetery.--Perry's Monument.--
Runic Inscriptions elsewhere.

635ham Streets, now owned by Mr. Joshua Sayre, which was occupied as his
city head-quarters by the petty tyrant, General Prescott, while he was
in command of the British troops on Rhode Island.

His acts will be noted presently. About noon I strolled up to the
cemetery in the northern part of the city, where lie the remains of a
great multitude of the early inhabitants of Newport. Workmen were
employed in regulating it, by placing the old grave-stones upright and
grave-stones upright, and painting them so as to bring out their half-
effaced inscriptions, and in beautifying the grounds in various ways.

There, beneath a broad slab of slate, repose the bodies of John and
William Cranston, father and son, who were governors of Rhode Island--
the former in 1679, the latter from 1698 to 1726. Near by is the tomb of
William Jefferay, who, tradition says, was one of the judges of Charles
I. It is covered by a large slab of gray-wacke, ornamented, or, rather,
disfigured, at the head, by a representation of a skull and cross-bones,
below which is a poetic epitaph. He died January 2d, 1675. On the top of
the slope on which a portion of the cemetery lies, is a granite obelisk,
erected to the memory of Commodore Perry, by the State of Rhode Island,
at a cost of three thousand dollars. It is formed of a single stone,
twenty-three feet in height, standing upon a square pedestal ten feet
high,

Tonomy Hill.--Hubbard's House and Mill.--Inscription on Perry's Monument

636having white marble tablets. It is inclosed by an iron railing, and
has an imposing appearance.*

About a mile and a half northward of Newport rises a bold, rocky
eminence, called "'Tonomy Hill (the first word being an abbreviation of
Miantonômoh), celebrated as the seat of the Narraganset sachem of that
name, and the commanding site of a small fort or redoubt during the war
of the Revolution.

Thitherward I made my way from the old cemetery, passing several wind-
mills that were working' merrily in the stiff breeze which swept over
the island from the west. The absence of streams of sufficient strength
to turn water-wheels is the cause of the retention of these ancient
mills, which give Rhode Island an Old England appearance. One of them,
standing near the junction of the main road and the lane leading up to
"'Tonomy Hill," is a patriarch among the others, for its sails revolved
when the Gaspee lorded over the waters of the Narraganset. It is
invested with associations of considerable interest. The mill and the
old house near by were owned by a man named Hubbard. When the British
took possession

* The inscriptions upon the monument are as follows: East side.--"Oliver
Hazard Perry. At the age of 27 years he achieved the victory of Lake
Erie, September 10, 1813." North side.--"Born in South Kingston, R. I.,
August 23d, 1785. Died at Port Spain, Trinidad, August 23d, 1819, aged
34 years." West side.--"His remains were conveyed to his native land in
a ship of war, according to a resolution of Congress, and were here
interred, December 4, 1826." South side--"Erected by the State of Rhode
Island."

** This view is from the north side of the hill, looking south. The wall
appearance is a steep precipice of huge masses of pudding-stone,
composed of pebbles and larger smooth stones, ranging in size from a pea
to a man's head. It is a very singular geological formation. In some
places the face is smooth, the stones and pebbles appearing as if they
had been cut with a knife while in a pasty or semi-fluid state. On the
top of this mound are traces of the breast-works that were thrown up,
not high, for the rocks formed a natural rampart, on all sides but one,
against an enemy. Here Miantonômoh had his fort, and here his councils
were held when he planned his expeditions against the Mohegans. The
observatory is a strong frame, covered with lattice-work. On the right
is seen the city of Newport in the distance.

*** The house and the mill are covered with shingles instead of clap-
boards. This view is from the lane, looking east. The ocean is seen in
the distance, on the left.

Oppression of the Whigs by Prescott.--View from 'Tonomy Hill.--Mrs.
Hutchinson and Sir Henry Vane.

637of Rhode Island, Prescott turned many of the families of the Whigs
(and there were but few others) out of their houses, to take shelter in
barns and other coverts, while his soldiers occupied their comfortable
dwellings. Mr. Hubbard and his family were thus driven from their house,
and compelled to live for nearly two years in their mill, while insolent
soldiery, ignorant and vile, occupied their rooms. The family of Mr.
Hubbard took possession of the house on the evening after the
evacuation, but all was desolation, the enemy having broken or carried
away every article the family had left there.

'Tonomy Hill is said to bo the highest land upon the island, except
Quaker Hill, toward the northern end. On its southern slope is the
mansion of Mr. Hazzard, where families from a distance have a pleasant
home during the warm season, while the younger fashionables are sporting
at the Ocean House on the shore. On the top of the hill Mr. Hazzard has
erected an observatory, seventy feet high, over a cellar which was dug
by the Indians, and in which is a living spring of water. The hill is
two hundred and seventy feet above the bay, and the top of the
observatory commands one of the most beautiful panoramic views in the
world. Stretching away northward was seen Narraganset Bay, broken by
islands and pierced by headlands, and at its remote extremity the spires
of Providence were glittering in the sun. On its western shore were
glimpses of Warwick, Greenwich, and Wick-ford, and on the east were seen
Warren and Bristol, and the top of Mount Hope, the throne of King
Philip. On the south and west were the city and harbor of Newport, the
island of Canonicut with its ruined fort, and the smaller islands in the
harbor, with the remains of fortifications. Beyond the city, looking
oceanward with a spy-glass over the ramparts of Fort Adams, was seen the
dim outline of Block Island, like a mist lying upon the waters There
rolled the dark and boundless Atlantic, with no limit but the blue
horizon, no object but a few sails. Turning the glass a little more
eastward, there was a faint apparition of Gayhead, on Martha's Vineyard,
and of some of the islands in Buzzard's Bay. The cultivated fields of
more than one half of Rhode Island, upon which I stood, were spread out
like a map around me, rich in Nature's bounties and historical
associations. From our lofty observatory, let us take a field survey
with the open chronicle before us.

We have seen Roger Williams expelled from Massachusetts because of
alleged heresy. The rulers of that colony had scarcely recovered their
equanimity, before similar difficulties arose from an unexpected
quarter. Mrs. Anne Hutchinson, a Lincolnshire lady of good birth,
education, and great energy of character, had been leavened by the
tolerant principles of Williams before he left, and assumed the right to
discuss religious dogmas and to detect the errors of the clergy. A
privilege had been granted to hearers, at the end of sermons, to ask
questions "wisely and sparingly." Mrs. Hutchinson put so many searching
questions upon abstruse points in theology, in a manner which convinced
the ministers that she well understood the subject, that they were
greatly annoyed. She held conferences at her own house every Sabbath
evening, which were fully attended, and her brother-in-law, a minister
named Wheelwright, who was of the same mind with her, drew crowds to his
chapel every Sunday. Henry Vane, a young man of splendid talents, heir
to a princely fortune, and son to Charles the First's chief secretary,
had just arrived in the colony, and took up his residence with the
Reverend Mr. Cotton, who treated Mrs. Hutchinson's views with
gentleness, if not with favor. Vane (afterward Sir Henry Vane) was
elected governor the following year, and being imbued with the spirit of
toleration, was on terms of intimacy with Mrs. Hutchinson. The ministers
were alarmed; their churches were thinned, while the chapel of Mr.
Wheelwright could not contain the hundreds that flocked to hear him. A
clamor was raised by the old party of ministers and their friends, and
the next year Mr. Winthrop was elected governor, and Vane soon afterward
returned to England.

A general synod of ministers now assembled at Salem, consisting of the
preachers,  August 30, 1637 deputies from the congregations, and
magistrates, and after a session of three weeks, marked by stormy
debates, unanimously passed sentence of censure against Mr. Wheelwright,
Mrs. Hutchinson, and their adherents. Continuing to hold her
conferences, Mrs. Hutchinson was ordered to leave the colony within six
months; and a similar command was

Persecution of Mrs. Hutchinson and her Friends.--Settlement of Rhode
Island.--Its first Constitution.--Royal Charter.

638given to Mr. Wheelwright, Mr. Aspinwall, and others. They, like the
Tories in the Revolution, were required to deliver up their arms. With
their departure ended the Antinomian strife in Massachusetts.
Wheelwright and his friends went to the banks of the Piscataqua, and
founded the town of Exeter at its head waters; but the larger number of
Mrs. Hutchinson's friends, led by John Clarke and William Coddington,
proceeded southward, designing to make a settlement on Long Island, or
with the Swedes on the Delaware. On their way through the wilderness
Roger Williams gave them a hearty welcome, and by his influence and the
name of Henry Vane as their friend, obtained for them from Miantonômoh,
chief of the Narragansets, a gift of the beautiful island of Aquitneck.
* A deed signed by Canonicus and Miantonômoh was given them in March,
1638. Naming the beautiful land the _Isle of Rhodes_, because they
fancied that it resembled the island of that name in the eastern
Mediterranean, they bound themselves as a community of freemen, by these
solemn words, to found a new state, appealing to the great Searcher of
Hearts for aid in the faithful performance of their promises:

"We, whose names are underwritten, do swear solemnly, in the presence of
the Great Jehovah, to incorporate ourselves into a body politic; and as
he shall help us, will submit our persons, lives, and estates unto the
Lord Jesus Christ, the King of kings and Lord of lords, and to all those
most perfect laws of his, given us in his most holy word of truth, to be
guided and judged thereby."

This was a simple declaration, but a broad and sure foundation upon
which to build a state. Mr. Clarke and eighteen others began their new
settlement at Pocasset (Portsmouth), on the north part of the island;
borrowed the forms of the administration of laws from the Jews; elected
Coddington "judge in the new Israel," and prospered greatly. Soon after
the arrival of these pioneers, Mrs. Hutchinson, with her children, made
her way through the wilderness to the settlement of Roger Williams, and
paddling down the Narraganset in a canoe, joined her friends on Rhode
Island. She had been left a widow, but blessed with affectionate
children. Her powerful mind continued active; young men from the
neighboring colony were converted to her doctrines, and so great became
her influence that "to the leaders of Massachusetts it gave cause of
suspicion of witchcraft," and they sought to ensnare her. Rhode Island
seemed no longer a place of safe refuge for her, and the whole family
removed into the territory of the Dutch, in the neighborhood of Albany.
The Indians and Keift, the Dutch governor, were then at enmity. The
former regarded all white people as enemies, and Mrs. Hutchinson and her
whole family, except one child, were murdered by the savages, and their
dwelling burned. **

So rapid was the increase of the Rhode Island settlement at Pocasset,
that another town was projected. Newport was founded in 1639. Settled by
persecuted men holding the same liberal views, the republic of Roger
Williams at Providence, and that upon Aquitneck, governed by no other
than the Divine laws of the Bible, felt themselves as one political
community, and were so regarded by the other colonies. Under the
pretense that the Providence and Rhode Island Plantations had no
charter, and were claimed by Plymouth and Massachusetts, they were
excluded from the confederacy that was formed in 1643. Perceiving the
disadvantages of an entire independency of the imperial government,
Roger Williams proceeded to England, and in March, 1644, through the
influence of his personal character, and of Henry Vane, obtained a free
charter of incorporation from Parliament, then waging a fierce war with
King Charles the First. The two plantations were united by it under the
same government, and the signet for the state was ordered to be a
"sheafe of arrows," with the motto "Amor vincet omnia"--_Love is all
powerful_.

In 1647, the General Assembly of the several towns met at Portsmouth,
and organized the government by the choice of a president and other
officers. They adopted a code of

* This Indian name of Rhode Island is variously spelled: Aquiday,
Aquitnet, and Aquitneck. It is a Narraganset word, signifying peaceable
isle.

** Bancroft, i., 388, 393. Winthrop, i., 296. Callender, Gorton, in
Hutchinson's History of Massachusetts, i., 73.

Toleration in Rhode Island.--Separation and Reunion of the Plantations.-
-Newport.--Destruction of the Sloop Liberty.

639laws by which entire freedom of thought in religious matters, as well
as a democracy in civil affairs, was guarantied. Churchmen, Roman
Catholics, Quakers, were all tolerated; and none were excluded from the
ballot-box on account of their religious opinions. Consequently, many
Quakers settled in Rhode Island, and they have ever formed a large and
influential class of the population.

The two plantations were separated for a brief time, when, in 1651, Mr.
Coddington was appointed by the supreme authority of England, Governor
of Rhode Island alone. The people, alarmed at the apparent danger of
having their freedom abridged by depriving them of the choice of their
own rulers, sent Roger Williams to England, who obtained a revocation of
the appointment. Mr. Coddington retired to private life, the Plantations
were reunited, and from that time until the Revolution they were
prosperous and happy, disturbed only by the alarms produced by King
Philip's War, to be noticed presently, and the distant conflicts with
the French and Indians during the first half of the eighteenth century.
A charter of incorporation was obtained in 1663 from Charles II., by
which the province was constituted a body politic, by the name of "The
Governor and Company of the Rhode Island and Providence Plantations in
New England, in America." Under this charter the state has been governed
until the present time. Rhode Island quietly submitted to the brief
usurpation of Andross, and its charter was undisturbed. On his
imprisonment, the people assembled at Newport, resumed their former
charter privileges, and re-elected the officers whom that petty tyrant
had displaced.

The fine harbor of Newport and its healthy location made that place one
of the most important sea-port towns on the American coast; * and soon
after the Revolution it was said that if New York continued to increase
as rapidly as it was then growing it would soon rival Newport in
commerce! The navies of all Europe might safely ride at anchor in its
deep and capacious harbor, and for a long time Newport was regarded as
the future commercial metropolis of the New World. During the wars with
the French, English and colonial privateers made Newport their chief
rendezvous. In the course of one year, more than twenty prizes, some of
them of great value, were sent into that harbor.

During all the occurrences preliminary and relative to the Revolution,
the people of Rhode Island, thoroughly imbued with the principles of
freedom, took a firm stand against British oppression, and were ever
bold in the annunciation and maintenance of their political views.
Indeed, Newport was the scene of the first overt aet of popular
resistance to royal authority other than the almost harmless measures of
opposition to the Stamp Act in 1765. This was the destruction of the
British armed sloop Liberty, which the commissioners of customs had sent
to Narraganset Bay on an errand similar to that of the Gaspee
subsequently. This vessel was boarded, her cable cut, and having drifted
to Goat Island, she was there scuttled and set on fire, after her stores
and armaments had been thrown July, 1769 overboard. **

* Dr. Benjamin Waterhouse, in an article published in the Boston
Intelligencer, in 1824, says, "The island of Rhode Island, from its
salubrity and surpassing beauty, before the Revolutionary war so sadly
defaced it, was the chosen resort of the rich and philosophie from
nearly all parts of the civilized world. In no spot of the thirteen, or,
rather, twelve colonies, was there concentrated more individual
opulence, learning, and liberal leisure." "In 1769," says Mr. Ross,
"Newport rivaled New York in foreign and domestic navigation. The
inhabitants of New Haven, New London, &c., depended entirely upon
Newport for a market to supply themselves with foreign goods, and here
they found a ready market for the produce of their own state."--See
Historical Discourse by Reverend Arthur A. Ross of Newport: 1838, page
29.

** A sloop and a brig belonging to Connecticut had been seized and
brought into Newport. The wearing apparel and sword of the captain of
the brig were put on board the Liberty, and going for them he was
violently assaulted. As his boat left the sloop a musket and brace of
pistols were discharged at him. This act greatly exasperated the people
of Newport. They demanded of Captain Reid, of the Liberty, that the man
who fired on Captain Packwood, of the brig, should be sent ashore. The
request was denied, or rather, a wrong man was sent each time, until the
populace determined not to bo trifled with longer. A number of them went
on board, cut her cables, and set her adrift, with the result mentioned
in the text. Her boats were dragged up the Long Wharf, thence to the
Parade, through Broad Street, at the head of which, on the Common, they
were burned. The "Newport Mercury," of July 31, 1769, contained this
announcement: "Last Saturday the sloop Liberty was floated by a high
tide, and drifted over to Goat Island, and is grounded near the north
end, near the place where the pirates were buried. What this
prognosticates we leave to the determination of astrologers." The same
paper observed, August 7, "Last Monday evening, just alter the storm of
rain, hail, and lightning, the sloop Liberty, which we mentioned in our
last as having drifted on Goat Island near where the pirates were
buried, was discovered to be on fire, and continued burning for several
days, until almost entirely consumed."--See Ross's Discourse.

Admiral Wallace in Narraganset Bay.--Disarming of the Tories.--Skirmish
in the Harbor.--Engagement at Sea.

October 7.640The first warlike menace made against Rhode Island was in
the autumn of 1775. We have already noticed the alacrity with which the
people armed and hastened toward Boston when they received intelligence
of the affair at Lexington. Admiral Wallace commanded a small British
fleet in the harbor of Newport during that summer, and the people became
convinced that it was his intention to carry off the live stock from the
lower end of the island, with which to supply the British army at
Boston. Accordingly, on a dark night in September, some of the
inhabitants went down and brought off about one thousand sheep and fifty
head of cattle. Three hundred minute men drove up to Newport a large
number more, and Wallace was foiled in his attempts at plunder. Enraged,
he threatened the town with destruction. He laid the people under
contributions to supply his fleet with provisions, and, to enforce the
demand, he cut off' their supplies of fuel and provisions from the main.
The inhabitants were greatly alarmed, and about one half of them left
the town, among whom were the principal merchants, with their families.
By consent of the state government and the Continental Congress, a
treaty was entered into. The people agreed to supply October l, 1775 the
fleet with beer and fresh provisions, and Wallace removed all
restrictions upon their movements. He then sailed up the bay to Bristol,
and demanded from the inhabitants there three hundred sheep. They
refused compliance, and the town was bombarded, the assault commencing
at about eight o'clock in the evening. The rain was pouring in torrents.
The house of Governor Bradford, with some others, was burned, and in the
midst of the darkness women and children fled to the open fields, beyond
the reach of the invaders' missiles, where they suffered dreadfully.
This Wallace was the same officer who was afterward sent up the Hudson
River to plunder and destroy, laying Kingston in ashes, and desolating
the farms of innocent men because they loved freedom better than tyranny
and misrule. * He was a commissioned pirate in the Narraganset Bay, and
for a month reveled in the wanton destruction of property. Every
American vessel that came into Newport harbor was captured and sent into
Boston. He burned and plundered the dwellings upon the beautiful island
of Providence, in the bay; and at the close of November passed over to
Canonicut, and destroyed all the buildings near the ferry.

These outrages aroused the vengeance of the people, and the few Tories
upon the island who favored the marauders were severely dealt with.
Washington, then at Boston, sent General Charles Lee, with some
riflemen, to their assistance. Lee arrested all the Tories he could
find, deprived them of their arms, and imposed upon them the severest
restrictions.

Wallace maintained possession of the harbor until the spring of 1776. On
the 6th of April, American troops, with two row-galleys, bearing two
eighteen pounders each, arrived from Providence. The British fleet was
then anchored about a mile above Newport. Two eighteen pounders, brought
by the provincial troops, were planted on shore in view of the enemy,
and without any works to protect them. These, commanded by Captain
Elliot, with the row-galleys, under Captain Grimes, promised Wallace
such great and immediate danger, that he weighed anchor and left the
harbor with his whole squadron without firing a shot. Soon afterward,
the Glasgow, of twenty-nine guns, came into the harbor and anchored near
Fort Island, having been severely handled in an engagement with Admiral
Hopkins off Block Island. ** Colonel Richmond, the same evening, ordered
several pieces of heavy artil-

* See page 388.

** This engagement occurred on the same day when Wallace left Newport.
Hopkins, with his little fleet, was on a cruise eastward, having left
the Capes of the Delaware in February, visiting the Bermudas, and was
now making his way toward Massachusetts Bay. On the 4th of April (1776)
he fell in with a British schooner on the east end of Long Island, and
took her. About one in the morning of the 6th he fell in with the
Glasgow, of twenty-nine guns and one hundred and fifty men. The American
brigantine Cabot, Captain Hopkins, Junior, and the Columbus, Captain
Whipple, raked her as she passed. The American brig Annadona and sloop
Providence were also in the engagement, yet the Glasgow escaped and fled
into Newport Harbor, whither Hopkins thought it not prudent to follow.
Of the American navy of the Revolution and its operations in general I
have given an account in the Supplement, page 637.

Continued Hostilities in Newport Harbor.--Privateers.--Arrival of a
large British Force.--Conduct of the Enemy

April 15.641lery to be brought to bear upon the Glasgow from Brenton's
Point, where a slight breastwork was thrown up. On the following morning
such a vigorous fire was opened from this battery upon the Glasgow and
another vessel, that they cut their cables and went to sea.

A few days after these events, the British ship of war Scarborough, of
twenty guns and two hundred and twenty-five men, and the Scymetar, of
eighteen guns and one hundred and forty men, came into the harbor with
two prize ships, and anchored a little south of Rose Island. The
Americans resolved to attempt the rescue of the prizes. The Washington
galley, Captain Hyers, attacked the Scarborough, and at the same time
Captain Grimes and his men, of the Spitfire galley, boarded one of the
prizes and took it. The guns upon the North Battery and upon Brenton's
Point were well manned, to give aid if necessary. The Scarborough
attempted to recapture her prize, and the other schooner in her custody
tried to get under the protecting wing of that vessel; but the hot
cannonade from the Washington and the North Battery arrested the
progress of both, and the schooner was captured and sent to Providence.
The Scarborough and Scymetar now came to anchor between Canonicut, and
Rose Island; but a battery upon the former, unknown to the enemy, poured
such a shower of well-directed balls upon them, that, finding no safe
place in the harbor, they determined to take refuge in the broad expanse
of the ocean. As they passed out of the harbor, they were terribly
galled by a cannonade from Brenton's Point and Castle Hill. * For eight
days War held a festival upon the waters of Newport Harbor, yet in all
that time the Americans did not lose a man, and had only one slightly
wounded!

The summer of 1776 was a season of comparative quiet for the people of
Rhode Island. They were active, however, in fitting out privateers, and
in preparations for future invasions. ** Early in the fall intelligence
reached them that the British fleet and army, which had been so roughly
received and effectually repulsed at Charleston, in South Carolina, were
on the way to take possession of Rhode Island. These forces arrived on
the 26th of December, the day on which Washington crossed the Delaware
and accomplished his brilliant achievement at Trenton. The squadron was
commanded by Sir Peter Parker, and the land forces, consisting of about
an equal number of British and Hessians, in all between eight and ten
thousand men, were commanded by General Clinton and Earl Percy. The
squadron sailed up on the west side of Canonicut, crossed the bay at the
north point of the island, and landed the troops in Middletown, about
four and a half miles above Newport. They were encamped upon the
southern slope of two hills (Gould's and Winter's), except a few who
landed at Coddington's Cove and marched into Newport. When the enemy
entered the harbor, there were two Rhode Island frigates (the Warren and
Providence) and several privateers at anchor. These, with the weak land
force, were insufficient to make a successful resistance, and the island
was left at the mercy of the invaders. *** The American frigates and
privateers fled up the bay to Providence, whence, taking advantage of a
northeast gale, and eluding the vigilance of the blockading squadron,
they escaped, and went to sea. A system of general plunder of the
inhabitants was immediately commenced by the troops, and, after one
week's encampment, the British soldiers were unceremoniously quartered
in the houses of the inhabitants, from ten to forty in each, according
to the size and convenience of the edifice. The beautiful Aquitneck, or
_Isle of Peace_, soon became the theater of discord, misery, and
desolation.

* These localities will be better understood by reference to the map of
Narraganset Bay on page 648.

** These privateers captured about seventy-five prizes (some of them
very valuable) during the season and sent them to Providence, New
London, and one or two other ports.

*** On hearing of the approach of the enemy, the people of the island
drove large quantities of sheep and cattle from it, crossing to the main
at Howland's Ferry.

Condition of Rhode Island in 1777.--Re-encampment of the British.--
General Prescott.--His Character.

642

CHAPTER XXVIII.

"The winds of March o'er Narraganset's Bay

Move in their strength; the waves with foam are white;

O'er Seckonk's tide the waving branches play;

The winds roar o'er resounding plain and height.

'Twixt sailing clouds, the sun's inconstant ray

But glances on the scene, then fades from sight.

The frequent showers dash from the passing clouds,

The hills are peeping through their wintery shrouds."

Durfee's "What Cheer?"

EAR after year the free dwellers upon Rhode Island had beheld a scene
like that described by the poet, and more cruel wintery storms, piling
their huge snow-drifts, had howled around their dwellings, but never in
their history had the March winds and April floods appeared to them so
cheerless and mournful as in the spring of 1777. They had cheerfully
brooked all the sufferings attendant upon a new settlement, and gladly
breasted the tempest on land or sea in pursuit of wealth or social
enjoyment, while freedom was their daily companion and solace: but now
the oppressor was in their midst; his iron heel was upon their necks;
their wives and daughters were exposed to the low ribaldry, profanity,
and insults of an ignorant and brutal soldiery; their peaceful dwellings
were made noisy barracks; their beautiful shade-trees, pleasant groves,
and broad forests were destroyed, and the huge right arm of general
plunder was plying its strength incessantly. Enslaved and impoverished,
the bright sun and warm south winds, harbingers of on-coming summer and
the joyous season of flowers, brought no solace to them, but were rather
a mockery. At home all was desolation; abroad all was doubt and gloom.

Early in May the British troops left the houses of the inhabitants and
returned to their camp. This was some relief, yet plunder and insolence
were rife. General Clinton, with nearly half of the invading army, soon
afterward left the island for New York, and the command of those who
remained to hold possession devolved upon Major-general Prescott,
infamous in the annals of that war as one of the meanest of petty
tyrants when in power, and of dastards when in danger. He had been
nurtured in the lap of aristocracy, and taught all its exclusive
precepts. Possessing a narrow mind, utterly untutored by benevolence or
charity; a judgment perverse in the extreme; a heart callous to the most
touching appeals of sympathy, but tender when avarice half opened its
lips to plead, he was a most unfit commander of a military guard over
people like those of Rhode Island, who could appreciate courtesy, and
who might be more easily conquered by kindness than by the bayonet. He
was a tyrant at heart, and, having the opportunity, he exercised a
tyrant's doubtful prerogatives. *

* Mr. Ross, in his Historical Discourse, mentions several circumstances
illustrative of Prescott's tyranny. His habit while walking the streets,
if he saw any of the inhabitants conversing together, was to shake his
cane at them, and say, "Disperse, ye rebels!" He was also in the habit,
when he met citizens in the streets, of commanding them to take off
their hats, and unless the order was instantly complied with, it was
enforced hy a rap of his cane. One evening, as he was passing out of
town to his country quarters, he overtook a Quaker, who did not doff his
hat. The general, who was on horseback, dashed up to him, pressed him
against a stone wall, knocked off his hat, and then put him under guard.
Prescott caused many citizens of Newport to be imprisoned, some of them
for months, without any assigned reason. Among others thus deprived of
liberty, was William Tripp, a very respectable citizen. He had a large
and interesting family, but the tyrant would not allow him to hold any
communication with them, either written or verbal The first intelligence
he received from them was by a letter, baked in a loaf of bread, which
was sent to him by his wife. In this way a correspondence was kept up
during his confinement of many months. During his incarceration, his
wife sought an audience with the general to intercede for the liberty of
her husband, or to obtain a personal interview with him. She applied to
a Captain Savage, through whom alone an interview with the general could
be obtained. She was directed to call the following day, when the savage
by name and nature, echoing his master's words, roughly denied her
petition for an interview with the general, and with fiendish exultation
informed her, as he shut the door violently in her face, that he
expected her husband would be hung as a rebel in less than a week! I was
informed that when Prescott took possession of his town quarters, he had
a fine sidewalk made for his accommodation some distance along Pelham
and up Spring Street, for which purpose he took the door-steps belonging
to other dwellings. The morning after the evacuation, the owners of the
steps hastened to Prescott's quarters, each to claim his door-stone. It
was an exciting scene, for sometimes two or three persons, not positive
in their identification, claimed the same stone. Prescott's fine
promenade soon disappeared, and like Miss Davidson's

"Forty old bachelors, some younger, some older, Each carrying a maiden
home on his shoulder,"

* the worthy citizens of Newport bore off their long-abased door-steps.

Bad Conduct of General Prescott.--Colonel Barton's Plan for capturing
him.--Biographical Sketch of Barton

643Incensed by the conduct of Prescott, the inhabitants devised several
schemes to rid themselves of the oppressor. None promised success, and
it was reserved for Lieutenant-colonel Barton, of Providence, * to
conceive and execute one of the boldest and most hazardous enterprises
undertaken during the war.

It was accomplished on the night of the 10th of July, 1777. At that time
General Prescott was quartered at the house of a Quaker named Overing,
about five miles above Newport, on the west road leading to the ferry,
at the north part of the island. Barton's plan was to cross Narraganset
Bay from the main, seize Prescott, and carry him to the American camp.
It was a very hazardous undertaking, for at that time there were three
British frigates, with their guard-boats, lying east of Prudence Island,
and almost in front of Prescott's quarters. With a few chosen men,
Colonel Barton embarked in four whale-boats, with muffled oars, at
Warwick Point, at nine o'clock in the evening, and passed unobserved
over to Rhode Island, between the islands of Prudence and Pa-

* William Barton was a native of Providence, Rhode Island. He was
appointed to the rank of lieutenant colonel in the militia of his state,
and held that position when he planned and executed the expedition for
the abduction of General Prescott. For that service Congress honored him
by the presentation of a sword, and also by a grant of land in Vermont.
By the transfer of some of this land he became entangled in the toils of
the law, and was imprisoned for debt in Vermont for many years, until
the visit of La Fayette to this country in 1825. That illustrious man,
hearing of the incarceration of Colonel Barton and its cause, liquidated
the claim against him, and restored his fellow-soldier to liberty. It
was a noble act, and significantly rebuked the Shylock who held the
patriot in bondage, and clamored for "the pound of flesh." This
circumstance drew from Whittier his glorious poem, 'The Prisoner for
Debt, in which he exclaims,

"What has the gray-hair'd prisoner done? Has murder staind his hands
with gore? Not so; his crime's a fouler one: God made the old man poor.
For this he shares a felon's cell. The fittest earthly type of hell! For
this, the boon for which he pour'd His young blood on the invader's
sword, And counted light the fearful cost--His blood-gain'd liberty is
lost. Down with the law that hinds him thus! Unworthy freemen, let it
find No refuge from the withering curse Of God and human kind! Open the
prisoner's living tomb, And usher from its brooding gloom The victims of
your savage code To the free sun and air of God! No longer dare, as
crime, to brand The chastening of the Almighty's hand!"

* Colonel Barton was wounded in the action at Bristol Ferry in 1778, and
was disabled from further service during the war. He died at Providence
in 1831, aged eighty-four years. The portrait here given is from a
painting of him executed soon after the close of the Revolution, and now
in possession of his son, John B. Barton, Esq., of Providence, who
kindly allowed me to make a copy.

Expedition to capture Prescott.--Prescott's Quarters.--A Sentinel
deceived.--Names of Barton's Men.

644tience. * They heard the cry, "All's well!" from the guard-boats of
the enemy, as they passed silently and unobserved, and landed in
Coddington's Cove, at the mouth of a small stream which passed by the
quarters of Prescott. Barton divided his men into several squads,
assigning to each its duty and station, and then, with the strictest
order and profound silence, they advanced toward the house.

The main portion of the expedition passed about midway between a British
guard-house and the encampment of a company of light horse, while the
remainder was to make a circuitous route to approach Prescott's quarters
from the rear, and secure the doors. As Barton and his men approached
the gate, a sentinel hailed them twice, and then demanded the
countersign. "We have no countersign to give," Barton said, and quickly
added, "Have you seen any deserters here to-night?" The sentinel was
misled by this question, supposing

* Mr. Barton, by request, furnished me with the following list of the
names of those who accompanied his father on the perilous expedition:

Officers.--Andrew Stanton, Eleazer Adams, Samuel Potter, John Wilcox.

Non-commissioned Officers.--Joshua Babcock and Samuel Phillips.
Privates.--Benjamin Pren, James Potter, Henry Fisher, James Parker,
Joseph Guild, Nathan Smith, Isaac Brown, Billington Crumb, James Haines,
Samuel Apis, Alderman Crank, Oliver Simmons, Jack Sherman, Joel Briggs,
Clark Packard, Samuel Cory, James Weaver, Clark Crandall, Sampson
George, Joseph Ralph, Jedediah Grenale, Richard Hare, Darius Wale,
Joseph Denis, William Bruff, Charles Hassett, Thomas Wilcox, Pardon
Cory, Jeremiah Thomas, John Hunt, Thomas Austin, Daniel Page (a
Narraganset Indian), Jack Sisson* (black), and ------ Howe, or Whiting,
boat-steerer.

** This house is on the east side of the west road, about a mile from
the bay. The view is from the road where the small stream crosses, after
leaving the pond seen in the picture. It is a beautiful summer
residence, the grounds around it being finely shaded by willows, elms,
and sycamores. The present occupant kindly showed me the room in which
Prescott was lying at the time of his capture. It is on the second
floor, at the southwest corner of the house, or on the right as seen in
the engraving. It is a well-built frame house, and was probably then the
most spacious mansion on the island out of Newport.

* In Allen's American Biography, the name of the black man is written
Prince, and he says that he died at Plymouth in 1821, aged seventy-eight
years. The name given by Mr. Barton must be correct, for he has the
original paper of his father.

Entrance to Prescott's Room.--Seizure of the General and his Aid-de-
camp.--Barton rewarded by Congress

645them to be friends, and was not undeceived until his musket was
seized, and himself bound and menaced with instant death if he made any
noise. The doors had been secured by the division from the rear, and
Barton entered the front passage boldly. Mr. Overton sat alone, reading,
the rest of the family being in bed. Barton inquired for General
Prescott's room. Overton pointed upward, signifying that it was directly
over the room in which they were standing. With four strong men, and
Sisson, a powerful negro who accompanied them, Barton ascended the
stairs and gently tried the door. It was locked; no time was to be lost
in parleying; the negro drew back a couple of paces, and using his head
for a battering-ram, burst open the door at the first effort. The
general, supposing the intruders to be robbers, sprang from his bed, and
seized his gold watch that was hanging upon the wall. Barton placed his
hand gently upon the general's shoulder, told him he was his prisoner,
and that perfect silence was now his only safety. Prescott begged time
to dress, but it being a hot July night, and time precious, Barton
refused acquiescence, feeling that it would not be cruel to take him
across the bay, where he could make his toilet with more care, at his
leisure. So, throwing his cloak around him, and placing him between two
armed men, the prisoner was hurried to the shore. In the mean time,
Major Barrington, Prescott's aid, hearing the noise in the general's
room, leaped from a window to escape, but was captured. He and the
sentinel were stationed in the center of the party. At about midnight
captors and prisoners landed at Warwick Point, where General Prescott
first broke the silence by saying to Colonel Barton,

"Sir, you have made a bold push to-night."

"We have been fortunate," coolly replied Barton. Captain Elliot was
there with a coach to convey the prisoners to Providence, where they
arrived at sunrise. Prescott was kindly treated by General Spencer and
July 11, 1777 other officers, and in the course of a few days was sent
to the head-quarters of Washington, at Middlebrook on the Raritan. On
his way the scene occurred in the Alden Tavern at Lebanon, mentioned on
page 603. Prescott was exchanged for General Charles Lee * in April
following, and soon afterward resumed his command of the British troops
on Rhode Island. This was the same Prescott who treated Colonel Ethan
Allen so cruelly when that officer was taken prisoner near Montreal in
the autumn of 1775.

On account of the bravery displayed and the importance of the service in
this expedition, Congress, having a "just sense of the gallant behavior
of Lieutenant-colonel Barton, and the brave officers and men of his
party, who distinguished their valor and address in making prisoner of
Major-general Prescott, of the British army, and Major William
Barrington, his aid-de-camp," ** voted Barton an elegant sword; and on
the 24th of December July 25, 1777 following, he was promoted to the
rank and pay of colonel in the Continental army.

General Sullivan was appointed to the command of the American troops in
Rhode Island in the spring of 1778, at about the time when Prescott
resumed his command of the enemy's forces. The latter, incensed and
mortified by his capture and imprisonment, determined to gratify his
thirst for revenge. Under pretense of an anticipated attack upon the
island, he sent a detachment of five hundred men up the bay on the 24th
of May, to destroy the American boats and other property that fell in
their way. At daylight the next morning they landed between Warren and
Bristol, and proceeded in two divisions to execute their orders. One
party, who proceeded to the Kickemuet River, destroyed seventy flat-
bottomed boats and a state galley; the other burned the meeting-house
and a number of dwellings at Warren, and plundered and abused the
inhabitants in various ways. The females were robbed of their shoe-
buckles, finger-rings, and other valuables, and live stock were driven
away for the use of the British army. They then proceeded to Bristol,
and fired

* General Lee had been eaptured at Baskingridge, in New Jersey, in
December, 1776, while passing from the Hudson to join Washington on the
Delaware.

** Journals of Congress, iii., 241.

*** Ibid., 459.

Predatory Excursions.--French Fleet for America.--Count d'Estaing.--
France and England.--Excitement in Parliament.

646the Episcopal church (mistaking it for a dissenters' meeting-house),
burned twenty-two dwellings, and earned off considerable plunder. A few
days afterward, another marauding party of a hundred and fifty burned
the mills at Tiverton, and attempted to set fire to and plunder the
town, but a resolute band of twenty-five men kept them at bay,
effectually disputing their passage across the bridge. Satisfied with
this great display of prowess and vengeance, Prescott refrained from
further hostile movements, until called upon to defend himself against
the combined attacks of an American army and a French fleet.

I have noticed on pages 86 and 87, _ante_, the treaty of alliance and
commerce concluded between the United States and France on the 6th of
February, 1778. * Pursuant to the stipulations of that treaty, a French
squadron for the American service was fitted out at Toulon, consisting
of twelve ships of the line, and four frigates of superior size. Count
d'Estaing, a brave and successful naval officer, was 1778 appointed to
the command, and on the 13th of

April the fleet sailed for America. Silas Deane, one of the American
commissioners, and M. Gerard, the first appointed French minister to the
United States, came passengers in the Languedoc, D'Estaing's flag-ship.
Authentic information of the sailing of this expedition reached the
British cabinet on the 4th of May. Some of the ministers being out of
town, a cabinet council was not held until the 6th, when it was
determined speedily to dispatch a powerful squadron, then at Portsmouth,
to America. On the 20th, Admirals Byron and Hyde Parker, with twenty-two
ships of the line, weighed anchor. Doubtful of the destination of
D'Estaing, and not knowing that Deane and Gerard were with him,
ministers countermanded the order for sailing, and the squadron,
overtaken by an express, returned to Plymouth, where it remained until
the 5th of June, when it again sailed under the command of Admiral Byron
alone. ***

The conduct of the French government, in thus openly giving aid, by
treaty and arms, to the revolted colonies, aroused the ire, not only of
ministers, but of the people of Great Britain, in whose bosoms the
embers of ancient feuds were not wholly extinct. In Parliament, which
was just on the eve of adjournment, ministers moved an appropriate
address to the king. The opposition proposed an amendment requesting his
majesty to dismiss the ministry! A furious debate arose, but the
original address was carried by a majority of two hundred and sixty-
three against one hundred and thirteen in the Commons, and an equally

* The French envoy, De Noailles (uncle of La Fayette's wife), delivered
a rescript to Lord Weymouth on the 17th of March, in which he informed
the British court of the treaty. While in it he professed in the name of
the government a desire to maintain amicable relations with Great
Britain, and declared that the "court of London" would find in his
communication "new proofs of his majesty's [Louis XVI.] constant and
sincere disposition for peace," he plainly warned it that his sovereign,
"being determined to protect effectually the lawful commerce of his
subjects, and to maintain the dignity of his flag, had, in consequence,
taken effectual measures, in concert with the Thirteen United and
Independent States of America." This note greatly incensed the British
ministry, for they considered it more than half ironical in language,
and intentionally insulting in spirit. Orders were issued for the
seizure of all French vessels in English ports A similar order was
issued by the French government. War thus actually commenced between the
two nations, though not formally declared.

** Charles Henry Count d'Estaing was a native of Auvergne, in France. He
was under the famous Count Lally, governor general of the French
possessions in the East Indies, in 1756. He was taken prisoner-by the
English, but escaped by breaking his parole. He was commander at the
taking of Grenada after his services in America. He became a member of
the Assembly of Notables in the French Revolution, and being suspected
of unfriendliness to the Terrorists, was guillotined on the 29th of
April, 1793.

*** Admiral Byron carried with him to Earl Howe, the naval commander on
the American coast, a permit for that officer to return to England,
pursuant to his own urgent request. Byron became his successor in the
chief command.

The King's Speech.--Boldness of the Opposition.--The British and French
Fleets.--Sandy Hook and Amboy Bay.

647decided majority in the Upper House. Parliament soon afterward
adjourned, and did not meet again until November, when the king, in his
speech at the opening, directed the attention of the Legislature to the
conduct of France. After speaking of the good faith of Great Britain,
and the quiet then prevailing in Europe, he said, "In a time of profound
peace, without pretense of provocation or color of complaint, the court
of France hath not forborne to disturb the public tranquillity, in
violation of the faith of treaties and the general rights of sovereigns;
at first by the clandestine supply of arms and other aid to my revolted
subjects in North America; afterward by avowing openly their support,
and entering into formal engagements with the leaders of the rebellion;
and at length by committing open hostilities and depredations on my
faithful subjects, and by an actual invasion of my dominions in America
and the West Indies." He alluded to the want of success in America, the
means that had been put forth to suppress the rebellion, the complete
failure of the commissioners to conclude a peace, and the evident
preparations for hostilities which Spain was making. He closed his
address by calling upon Parliament to put forth their utmost energies
which the crisis demanded, assuring them that his cordial co-operation
would always be extended, and informed them that he had called out the
militia for the defense of the country. In fact, the king carefully
avoided casting censure upon ministers for the late miscarriages in
America, and, by implication, fixed the blame upon the commanders in
that service. The address was warmly opposed in both houses, and in the
Commons the king was accused of falsehood--uttering "a false, unjust,
and illiberal slander on the commanders in the service of the crown;
loading them with a censure which ought to fall on ministers alone." Yet
ministers were still supported by pretty large majorities in both
houses, while the war-spirit, renewed by the French alliance, was hourly
increasing among the multitude without. *

After a voyage of eighty-seven days, the French squadron arrived on the
coast, and anchored at the entrance of Delaware Bay. Howe, with his
fleet, had July 8,1778 fortunately for himself, left the Delaware a few
days before, and was anchored off Sandy Hook, to co-operate with the
British land forces under Clinton, then proceeding from Philadelphia to
New York. ** On learning this fact, Deane and Gerard proceeded
immediately up the Delaware to Philadelphia, where Congress was then in
session. *** After communicating with that body, D'Estaing weighed
anchor and sailed for Sandy Hook. Howe was within the Hook, in Raritan
or Amboy Bay, **** whither D'Estaing could not with safety attempt to
follow him with his large vessels, on account of a sand-bar extending to
Staten Island from Sandy Hook. (v) He anchored near the Jersey shore,
not far from the mouth of the Shrewsbury River.

On the 22d of July, D'Estaing sailed with his squadron, at the urgent
request of Washington, to co-operate with General Sullivan, then
preparing to make an attempt 1778

* Lossing's "1776," p. 274.

** It was during this progress of the British army toward New York that
the Americans, under the immediate command of Washington, pursued and
overtook them near Monmouth court-house, in New Jersey, where a severe
battle occurred on the 28th of June, 1778.

*** Congress had sat at York, in Pennsylvania, from the time of the
entrance of the British into Philadelphia in the autumn of 1777, until
the 30th of June, 1778, after the evacuation of that city by the enemy
under Clinton.

**** Howe's fleet consisted of only six 64 gun ships, three of 50, and
two of 40, with some frigates and sloops. Several of D'Estaing's ships
were of great bulk and weight of metal, one carrying 90, another 80, and
six 74 guns each. Had D'Estaing arrived a little sooner, and caught
Howe's fleet in the Delaware, he might easily have captured or destroyed
it; and doubtless the land forces of the enemy would have shared the
fate of those under Burgoyne at Saratoga.

* (v) Sandy Hook, in form and extent, has been greatly changed since the
time in question. According to a map, in my possession, of the State of
New York, published under the direction of Governor Tryon, in 1779,
Sandy Hook was a low point, extending northward from the Highlands of
Ncversink or Navesink. The sandy bar on which the Ocean House, at the
mouth of the Ncversink River, now stands, forming a sound many miles in
extent, was not then in existence; and it was not until the sea made a
breach across the neck of Sandy Hook in 1778, that there was a passage
within it along the base of the Highlands from the Raritan or Amboy Bay.
Now the water is from thirty to forty feet in depth in the main ship
channel, immediately above the cast beacon on Sandy Hook, quite
sufficient to allow ships as heavy as D'Estaing's to enter.

General Spencer's Expedition against Rhode Island.--His Resignation.--
French Fleet off Newport.--American Land Forces

1778.648to expel the enemy from Rhode Island. In consequence of the
failure, on the part of General Spencer, to carry out the plan of an
expedition against the British on Rhode Island in 1777, Congress ordered
an inquiry into the cause. This expedition was arranged by General
Spencer at considerable expense, and with fair promises of success. The
Americans September, 1777 were stationed at Tiverton, near the present
stone bridge, and had actually embarked in their boats to cross over to
Rhode Island to surprise the enemy, when Spencer prudently countermanded
the order. He had ascertained that the British commander was apprised of
his intentions, and seeing no effort on the part of the enemy to oppose
his landing, apprehended some stratagem that might be fatal.

Such, indeed, was the fact. The British had determined to allow the
Americans to land and march some distance upon the island, when they
would cut off their retreat by destroying their boats, and thus make
them captives. General Spencer, indignant at the censure implied in the
proposed inquiry of Congress, resigned his commission, and General
Sullivan was appointed in his place. *

The French fleet appeared off the harbor of Newport on the 29th of July,
and the next morning, to the great joy of the inhabitants, the vessels
of the allies were anchored near Brenton's Reef, where General Sullivan
had a conference with the admiral, and a plan of operations was agreed
upon. One of the ships ran up the channel west of Canonicut, and
anchored at the north point of that island.

Washington had directed Sullivan to call upon Rhode Island,
Massachusetts, and Connecticut for five thousand militia. The call was
made, and promptly responded to. The Massachusetts militia marched under
John Hancock as general; ** and so great was the enthusiasm engendered
by the presence of the French squadron, that thousands of volunteers,
gentlemen and others, from Boston, Salem, Newburyport, Portsmouth, &c.,
engaged in the service. *** Two brigades of Continental infantry, under
La Fayette, were sent from the main army; and the whole force, ten
thousand strong, was arranged in two divisions, under the immediate
command of Generals Greene **** and La Fayette.

On the morning of the 5th of August, D'Es-

* Joseph Spencer was born at East Haddam, in Connecticut, in 1714. He
was a major in the colonial army in 1756, and was one of the first eight
brigadiers appointed by the Continental Congress in 1775. He was
appointed a major general in August, 1776, and in 1777 was in command of
the American forces on Rhode Island. After his resignation he was
elected a delegate to Congress from his native state. He died at East
Haddam in January, 1789, aged seventy-five years.

** Hildreth, iii., 252.

*** Gordon, ii., 369.

**** General Greene was then the quarter-master general of the
Continental army. His prudence, military skill, and the fact that he was
a Rhode Islander, induced Washington to dispatch him to that field of
operations at that time.

* (v) The letters upon the map indicate the position of the following
named objects: A, head-quarters of Prescott when he was captured; C D,
the two British lines across the island, the former extending from
'Tonomy Hill, H, and the latter crossing the slope near Rose Island,
near Newport; E, the American lines between Quaker and Turkey Hills and
Butts's Hill, at the north end of the island; F, the position of the
Americans, with their batteries, when preparing to attack the British
lines and waiting for D'Estaing; G, Barker's Hill, fortified by the
British; H, 'Tonomy Hill; 0, the west or Narraganset passage of the bay;
P, the middle; and Q, the east or Seaconet passage. The Bristol Ferry,
across which the Americans retreated, is named on the map. It was at the
narrowest place, a line to the right of the word Butts. There were
fortifications upon Gold, Rose, Goat, and Contour Islands, as well as
upon Canonicut, ruins of which are still visible. The short double lines
upon the map, immediately above the letter N in Newport, mark the site
of the present Fort Adams, the Castle Hill of the Revolution, and
opposite, upon a point of Canonicut, is the Dumplings Fort, or Fort
Canonicut, now a picturesque ruin.

Destruction of British Vessels.--Landing of Americans on Rhode Island.--
Naval Battle.--Great Storm.

649taing commenced operations. Two of his vessels approached to the
attack of four British frigates (the Orpheus, Lark, Juno, and Cerberus)
and some smaller vessels, lying near Prudence Island. Unable to fight
successfully or to escape, the enemy set fire to all these vessels, and
soon afterward sunk two others (the Flora and Falcon), to prevent their
falling into the hands of D'Estaing. Unfortunately, the American troops
were not quite prepared to co-operate with the French fleet. Although
Sullivan had every thing in readiness at Providence, a delay in the
arrival of troops prevented his departure for Rhode Island, and it was
nearly a week before he was prepared to make a descent upon it. This
delay was the occasion of great difficulty, and proved fatal to the
enterprise.

On the 10th, according to agreement, the whole American force, in two
August, 1778 divisions, crossed from Tiverton in eighty-six flat-
bottomed boats, * prepared under the direction of the energetic Major
Talbot, and landed on the north end of the island, where it was to be
joined by four thousand marines from the French squadron. The British
had just been re-enforced, and were about six thousand strong, under the
immediate command of Sir Robert Pigot. They abandoned their works on the
north part of the island when the Americans landed, and retired within
their strongly-intrenched lines about three miles above Newport.
Perceiving this movement, Sullivan ordered the Americans to advance,
without waiting for the landing of the French troops. They moved from
the ferry, and in the afternoon encamped upon the high ground known as
Quaker Hill, between ten and eleven miles north of Newport.

Within five days after D'Estaing left Sandy Hook, four British men-of-
war had arrived singly at New York. With this re-enforcement Howe
determined to proceed to the relief of his majesty's army on Rhode
Island. He appeared off Newport harbor with a August, 1778 fleet of
twenty-five sail on the afternoon of the 9th; and the next morning,
D'Estaing, instead of landing his marines according to agreement, spread
his sails to a favorable breeze, and sailed out of the harbor, under a
severe cannonade from the British batteries, to attack Admiral Howe. It
was about eight o'clock in the morning when the August 10, 1778 French
fleet went out into the open sea, and all that day the two naval
commanders contended for the weather-gage. ** This maneuvering prevented
an engagement. The next morning the wind had increased to a gale, and a
violent tempest, that raged for nearly forty-eight hours, *** separated
the belligerents. Two of the French ships were dismasted, and the
count's flag-ship lost her rudder and all her masts. In this condition
she was borne down upon by a British frigate under full sail, from which
she received a broadside, but with little damage. Another of the French
disabled vessels was attacked in the same way, the assailants sheering
off after firing a single broadside; but the junction of six sail of the
French squadron on the 14th prevented other attacks on the crippled
ships. On the 16th, the French seventy-four gun ship Cæsar and the
British fifty gun ship Iris had a

* These boats were capable of bearing one hundred men each. They were
fitted out with great dispatch, and Talbot, who directed the operations,
became so wearied by over-exertions, that he slept soundly, for a long
time, under one of them, while the hammers of the caulkers, who were at
work by candle-light, were rattling over his head.--Tuckerman's Life of
Talbot, p. 47.

** A ship is said to have the weather-gage when she is at the windward
of another vessel. In naval engagements, obtaining the weather-gage is
an important desideratum for the contending squadrons.

*** This storm is still spoken of by the older inhabitants of Newport as
"the great storm," accounts of which they had received from their
parents. So violent was the wind, that the spray was brought by it from
the ocean, and incrusted the windows in the town with salt.

State of the American Troops.--Refusal of the French to co-operate.--
They sail for Boston.--Protests

650severe engagement for an hour and a half, in which both vessels were
much injured. This ended the contest, and D'Estaing, with his disabled
vessels, appeared off the harbor of Newport on the 20th.

The Americans, greatly disappointed and chagrined by the abandonment of
them by their allies, nevertheless continued their preparations for
attack with vigor. They had suffered much from the gale and the rain. On
the night of the 12th, not a tent or marquee could be kept standing.
Several soldiers perished, many horses died, and all the powder
delivered to the troops was ruined by the rain. The troops were in a
deplorable state when the August, 1778 storm ceased on the 14th, yet
their courage and ardor were not abated. On the 15th, in expectation of
the speedy return of the French squadron, as promised by the admiral,
they marched forward in three divisions, took post within two miles of
the enemy's lines, commenced the erection of batteries, and soon
afterward opened a fire of balls and bombs upon the British works. * On
the night of the reappearance of D'Estaing, Generals Greene and La
Fayette proceeded to visit him on board his vessel, to consult upon
measures proper to be pursued. They urged the count to return with his
fleet into Newport harbor; for the British garrison, disappointed and
dispirited on account of not receiving provision and ammunition from
Howe, would doubtless surrender without resistance. D'Estaing was
disposed to comply, but his officers insisted upon his adherence to the
instructions of his government to put into Boston harbor for repairs in
the event of injuries being sustained by his vessels. Such injuries had
been sustained in the late gale and partial engagement, and, overruled
by his officers, he refused compliance, sailed for Boston, and left the
Americans to take care of themselves. ** Greene and La Fayette returned
on the night of the 21st with a report of the resolution of the French
admiral, and the next day Generals Sullivan and Hancock sent letters of
remonstrance to him. A protest against the count's taking the fleet to
Boston, signed by all the general officers except La Fayette, was sent
to him, declaring such a measure derogatory to the honor of France,
contrary to the intentions of its monarch, destructive to the welfare of
the United States, and highly injurious to the alliance formed between
the two nations. *** D'Estaing affected to be offended at this protest,
and returned August 23, 1778 a spirited answer, just as he weighed
anchor for Boston, which drew from Sullivan a sarcastic reflection, in
general orders, the following morning. *** From Boston the count wrote
an explanatory and vindicatory letter to Congress, in which he
complained of the protest and of Sullivan's ungenerous innuendoes. The
whole matter was finally amicably adjusted.

Disgusted at what they deemed the perfidy of the French commander, and
despairing

* General Sullivan quartered about five miles from Newport, at what is
now called the Gibb's Farm La Fayette quartered on the east side of the
island, at what was then called the Boiler Garden Farm; and Greene had
his quarters in Middletown, on the farm now owned by Colonel Richard K.
Randolph.--Ross's Historical Discourse, page 53.

** It is asserted that D'Estaing was disliked by his officers, not on
account of personal considerations, but from the fact that he had been a
land officer, and they considered it an affront that he was placed over
them. They therefore cast every impediment in his way, where
opportunities were presented in which he might gain personal
distinction. In the case in question, all his officers insisted upon his
proceeding to Boston, and entered into a formal protest against his
remaining at Newport.

*** This protest was signed by John Sullivan, Nathaniel Greene, John
Hancock, J. Glover, Ezekiel Cornell, William Whipple, John Tyler,
Solomon Lovell, and John Fitzconnel.

**** "The general can not help," said Sullivan, in his orders,
"lamenting the sudden and unexpected departure of the French fleet, as
he finds it has a tendency to discourage some who placed great
dependence upon the assistance of it, though he can by no means suppose
the army or any part of it endangered by this movement." Sullivan was
doubtless correct in his opinion, intimated in the last clause, that the
French alliance was of little advantage to the Americans, as will be
hereafter seen. This same Admiral d'Estaing subsequently abandoned the
Americans at the South, at a most critical juncture, under pretense that
he must seek _safe winter quarters_, although it was then only in the
month of October! The English and Americans were both duped by "his
most-Christian majesty" of France; and, as I have elsewhere said, a
balance-sheet of favors connected with the alliance will show not the
least preponderance of service in favor of the French, unless the result
of the more vigorous action of the Americans, caused by the hopes of
success from that alliance, shall be taken into the account.

Retreat of the Americans to Butts's Hill.--Battle of Quaker Hill.--Scene
of the Engagement.--Loss of the Belligerents.

651of success, between two and three thousand of the American volunteers
left for home on the 24th and 25th. The American force was thus reduced
to about the number of that of the enemy. Under these circumstances, an
assault upon the British lines was deemed hazardous, and a retreat
prudent. La Fayette was dispatched to Boston, to solicit the return of
D'Estaing to Newport, but he could only get a promise from that officer
to march his troops by land to aid the Americans in the siege, if
requested. It was too late for such a movement.

On the night of the 28th, the Americans commenced a retreat with great
August, 1778 order and secrecy, and arrived at the high grounds at the
north end of the island, with all their artillery and stores, at three
the next morning. Their retreat having been discovered by the enemy, a
pursuit was undertaken. The Americans had fortified an eminence called
Butts's Hill, about twelve miles from Newport. Here they made a stand,
and at daylight called a council of war. General Greene proposed to
march back and meet the enemy on the west road, then approaching in
detachments, and consisting only of the Hessian chasseurs and two
Anspach regiments under Lossberg. On the east road was

General Smith, with two regiments and two flank companies. To the former
were opposed the light troops of Lieutenant-colonel Laurens, and to the
latter those of Colonel Henry B. Livingston. Greene's advice was
overruled, and the enemy were allowed to collect in force upon the two
eminences called respectively Quaker and Turkey Hill. * A large
detachment of the enemy marched very near to the American left, but were
repulsed by Glover, and driven back to Quaker Hill. About nine o'clock
the British opened a severe cannonade upon the Americans from the two
hills, which was returned from Butts's Hill with spirit. Skirmishes
continued between advanced parties until near ten, when two British
sloops of war and other armed vessels, having gained the right flank of
the Americans, began a fire upon that point simultaneously with a
furious attack there by the land forces of the enemy. This attempt to
gain the rear of the Americans, and cut off a retreat, brought on an
almost general action, in which from twelve to fifteen hundred of the
patriots were at one time engaged. The enemy's line was finally broken,
after a severe engagement, in attempts to take the redoubt on the
American right, and they were driven back in great confusion to Turkey
Hill, leaving many of their dead and wounded in the low grounds between
the contending armies, where the hottest of the battle occurred. This
was between two and three o'clock in the afternoon of a very sultry day,
and a number on both sides perished from the effects of the heat and
fatigue. A cannonade was kept up by both parties until sunset, when the
battle ceased. The skirmishing and more general action continued seven
hours without intermission, and the most indomitable courage was evinced
by both parties. The Americans had thirty killed, one hundred and
thirty-two wounded, and forty-

* The three eminences, Butts's, Quaker, and Turkey Hill, are seen in the
picture, the former on the left, its slopes covered with the American
tents, Quaker Hill in the center, and Turkey Hill on the right. The
house in the fore-ground, on the right, belonged to a Mr. Brindley, now
near the site of the residence of Mr. Anthony.

Evacuation of Rhode Island by the Americans.--Return of La Fayette from
Boston.--Expedition against New Bedford.

652four missing. The British lost, in killed and wounded, two hundred
and ten, and twelve missing.

So nearly matched were the belligerents, that both willingly rested in
their respective camps during the night, and the next morning each
seemed reluctant to renew the battle Sullivan had good cause to refrain
from another engagement, for at break of day a messenger arrived from
Providence, informing him that Howe had again sailed for Newport, was
seen off Block Island the day before, and probably, before night, would
be in August, 29 Newport harbor. * Under these circumstances, Sullivan
thought it prudent to evacuate Rhode Island, a measure concurred in by
his officers. There were difficulties in the way, for the first
indications of a retreat on the part of the Americans would bring the
repulsed enemy upon them in full force. The sentinels of the two armies
were only four hundred yards apart, and the greatest caution was
necessary to prevent information of Sullivan's design from reaching Sir
Robert Pigot. Fortunately, Butts's Hill concealed all movements in the
rear of the American camp. During the day, a number of tents were
brought forward by the Americans and pitched in sight of the enemy, and
the whole army were employed in fortifying the camp. This was intended
to deceive the British, and was success-ful. At the same time, and,
indeed, during the engagement of the previous day, the heavy baggage and
stores were falling back and crossing Bristol ferry to the main. At dark
the August 30, 1778 tents were struck, fires were lighted in front at
various points, the light troops,

with the baggage, marched down to the ferry, and before midnight the
whole American army had crossed in flat-bottomed boats to the main, in
good order, and without the loss of a man. During the retreat, La
Fayette arrived from Boston, whither, as we have seen, he had been sent
to persuade D'Estaing to proceed with his squadron to Newport again. He
was greatly mortified at being absent during the engagement. **
Anticipating that a battle would take place, he traveled from Rhode
Island to Boston, nearly seventy miles, in a little more than seven
hours, and returned in six and a half. *** Although denied the laurels
which he might have won in battle, he participated in the honors of a
successful retreat.

The evacuation of Rhode Island was a mortifying circumstance to General
Sullivan, for Newport had been almost within his grasp, and nothing
could have saved the British army

* The fleet of Lord Howe had on board Sir Henry Clinton, with four
thousand troops destined for Rhode Island; but on approaching Newport,
and hearing of the retreat of Sullivan (for the fleet did not arrive
until the 31st, the day after) and the sailing of the disabled French
squadron to Boston, Howe changed his course, and sailed for the latter
port, where he arrived on the 1st of September. Perceiving no chance of
success in attacking D'Estaing, Howe prudently withdrew, after throwing
the town of Boston into the greatest consternation, and, with the
disappointed Sir Henry Clinton, sailed for New York. On the way, Clinton
ordered his marauding officer, General Grey, to land with the troops at
New Bedford, on the west side of the Acushnet River, and proceed to
destroy the shipping in the harbor. They landed upon Clark's Neck, at
the mouth of the river, and between six o'clock in the evening on the
5th of September and twelve the next day, destroyed about seventy sail
of vessels, many of them prizes taken by American privateers, and
several small craft; burned the magazine, wharves, stores, warehouses,
vessels on the stocks, all the buildings at M'Pherson's wharf, the
principal part of the houses at the head of the river, and the mills and
houses at Fairhaven, opposite. The amount of property destroyed was
estimated at $323,266. Grey and his troops then embarked, and proceeded
to Martha's Vineyard, where they destroyed several vessels, and made a
requisition for the militia arms, the public money, three hundred oxen,
and ten thousand sheep. The defenseless inhabitants were obliged to
comply with the requisition, and the marauders returned to New York with
a plentiful supply of provisions for the British army.

** La Fayette had advised a retreat from Newport six days before. On the
24th he gave his opinion in writing, as follows: "I do not approve of
continuing the siege. The time of the militia is out, and they will not
longer sacrifice their private interests to the common cause. A retreat
is the wisest step." Writing to Washington after the retreat, he
expressed his mortification, and said, "That there has been an action
fought where I could have been, and was not, will seem as extraordinary
to you as it seems to myself." He arrived while the army was retreating,
and brought off the rear guard and pickets in the best manner. His
feelings were soothed by the resolutions of Congress, adopted on the
19th of September, thanking General Sullivan and those under his command
for their conduct in the action and retreat, and specially requesting
the president to inform the marquis of their due sense of his personal
sacrifice in going to Boston, and his gallantry in conducting the
pickets and out-sentries in the evacuation.--Journals of Congress, iv.,
378.

*** Gordon, ii., 376.

Murmurings against the French.--Evacuation of Rhode Island by the
British.--Severe Winter.--Sir Robert Pigot

653from capitulation had D'Estaing co-operated. Policy, at that time,
dictated the course of Congress in withholding the voice of censure, but
the people unhesitatingly charged the failure of the expedition upon the
bad conduct of the French. The retreat was approved of by Congress, in a
resolution adopted on the 9th of September. It was not unanimously
agreed to, and an unsuccessful attempt was made to reconsider it. With
this event 1778 closed the Eastern campaign, neither party in the
contest having gained any thing. *

The British held possession of Rhode Island until the autumn of 1779,
when Sir Henry Clinton, desirous of making a further demonstration at
the South, and apprehending an attack upon New York from the combined
forces of the American and French, supposed to have been concerted
between Washington and D'Estaing, dispatched a number of transports to
bring off the troops from Newport to strengthen his position at head-
quarters. They embarked on the 25th of October, leaving Rhode Island in-
possession of the Americans, after an occupation of three years by the
enemy. During their stay, they had 1779 desolated the island. Only a
single tree of the ancient forest is left, a majestic sycamore, standing
near the bank of the Seaconet channel, on the eastern side of the
island. When they left, they burned the barracks at Fort Adams and the
light-house upon Beavertail Point.

They also carried away with them the town records. These were greatly
injured by being submerged in the vessel that bore them, which was sunk
at Hell Gate. They were recovered and sent back to Newport, but were of
little service afterward. This event produced some embarrassment in
respect to property, but they were as nothing compared to the sufferings
of the impoverished inhabitants when they returned to their mutilated
dwellings and desolated farms. The winter of 1779--80 was a terrible one
for the people of Rhode Island. **

It is proper to remark, that after Sir Robert Pigot superseded Prescott
in command of the British forces in Rhode Island, the people were
greatly relieved of the annoyances they had been subject to under the
rule of the latter. Private property was respected, plunder ceased, the
people were treated with respect, and, when the evacuation took place,
no violence marked the departure of the enemy. General Gates was then at
Providence with a small force, and kept a vigilant eye upon the
movements of the British, **** anticipating predatory excursions along
the coast; but General Pigot

* Washington, in a letter to Brigadier-general Nelson of Virginia,
written on the 20th of August, says: "It is not a little pleasing nor
less wonderful to contemplate that, after two years' maneuvering, and
undergoing the strangest vicissitudes that perhaps ever attended any one
contest since the creation, both armies are brought back to the very
point they set out from, and that the offending party in the beginning
is now reduced to the use of the spade and pickaxes for defense. The
hand of Providence has been so conspicuous in all this, that he must be
worse than an infidel that lacks faith, and more wicked, that has not
gratitude enough to acknowledge his obligations."--Sparks's Life and
Writings of Washington, vi., 36.

** This was the severest winter ever experienced in America. Narraganset
Bay was frozen over; and the reader will remember the faet already
mentioned, that the Bay of New York was so firmly bridged that troops
and heavy field-pieces crossed from the city to Staten Island. The
British having destroyed the trees on Rhode Island, fuel was very
scarce. It was sold in Newport for twenty dollars a cord. Food, also,
was very scarce; corn sold at four silver dollars a bushel, and potatoes
at two dollars. A tax of ten thousand dollars was levied for the relief
of the poor, and Tiverton and neighboring towns contributed generously
to their aid.--Ross's Historical Discourse, p. 59.

*** This tree stands, solitary and peerless, within a few rods of the
water. It is upon the land of Mr. Thomas R. Hazzard, and between his
fine mansion and the river. It is thirty-two feet in circumference
within twelve inches of the ground. It is yet vigorous, though storms
have riven some of its topmost branches. When I made the sketch it was
leafless, the autumn winds having defoliated it.

**** During the occupation of the island by the British, after the
retreat of Sullivan, Gates was in constant receipt of intelligence
respecting the movements of the enemy, by means of secret letters and a
sort of telegraphic communication. Lieutenant Seth Chapin employed a
woman, residing in Newport, to write down every thing of importance, and
conceal the letter in a hole in a certain rock. By setting up poles, as
if to dry clothes, and by other signals agreed upon, the lieutenant was
informed of the presence of a letter in the secret post-office, and of
perfect safety in coming to receive it. He would then row across from
the opposite shore of Little Compton, get the packet, and send it off to
Gates. After the evacuation, the lieutenant and his aids received one
thousand five hundred dollars, Continental money, for their services,
the whole amount being worth then only about seventy dollars in specie.

Return of La Fayette to France.--His Zeal and Success.--Washington
appointed Lieutenant-general by the French King

654was no marauder, and scorned to do, even under command, what Tryon,
Wallace, and Grey seemed to take great delight in.

Early in the summer of 1779 the Marquis de La Fayette obtained leave of
absence for one year, and returned to France. But this absence was not a
season of idleness among his old associates, or of forgetfulness of the
Americans on the part of La Fayette. On the contrary, the chief design
of his visit to his native country was to enlist the sympathies of his
people and government more warmly in the cause of the Americans, and to
procure for them more substantial aid than they had hitherto received.
After passing a few days with his beautiful and much loved wife, he
addressed a long letter to the Count de Vergennes, one of the French
ministers, on the subject of furnishing an army, well-appointed in every
particular, to fight in America. In making such a request, a soul less
ardent and hopeful than the youthful general's would not have perceived
the least probability of success. He was acting without instructions
from the American Congress, or even its sanction or the full approval of
Washington. It seemed but too recently that French and American troops
were battling in opposition in the Western World, to hope that they
would freely commingle, though Britons were still the foes of the
French. La Fayette, however, understood French character better than
Washington and Congress did, and he knew that success would attend the
measure. "He had that interior conviction which no argument or authority
could subdue, that the proposed expedition was practicable and'
expedient, and he succeeded in imparting his enthusiasm to the
ministers." * He was only twenty-two years old, and held a subordinate
rank in the army of his king; he, therefore, had no expectation of being
commander of any force that might be sent; his efforts were
disinterested. ** Nothing could divert him from his object, and, with a
joyful heart, he returned to America the following spring, bearing to
the patriots the glad tidings that a French squadron, with an May, 1780
army of more than four thousand men, admirably officered and equipped,
and conveying money for the United States Treasury, was about to sail
for our shores. The marquis also brought a commission from Louis XVI.
for Washington, appointing him lieutenant general of the armies of
France, and vice-admiral of its fleets. This was a wise measure, and
operated, as intended, to prevent difficulties that might arise
respecting official etiquette. It was stipulated that the French should
be considered as auxiliaries, and always cede the post of honor to the
Americans. Lieutenant-general the Count de Rochambeau, the commander of
the French expedition, was to place himself under the American
commander-inchief, and on all occasions the authority of Washington was
to be respected as supreme. This arrangement secured the best
understanding between the two armies while the allies remained in
America. ***

* Everett's Eulogy on La Fayette.

** At the request of Count de Vergennes, La Fayette drew up a statement
containing a detailed plan of the proposed expedition. It is a paper of
great interest, and exhibits genius of the highest order, of which a
general of threescore might be proud. The number and disposition of the
troops, the character of the officers proper to accompany them, the
appointments of the fleet and army, the time of embarkation, proper
place for landing, and the probable service to which the fleet and army
would be called, were all laid out with a minuteness and clearness of
detail which seemed to indicate almost an intuitive knowledge of the
future. The whole expedition was arranged in accordance with the plan of
the marquis.

*** This arrangement was conceived by La Fayette, and he made it a
fundamental point. Not content with soliciting troops for America, La
Fayette requested large supplies of clothing, guns, and ammunition for
the Republican army. They were promised, but only a part were sent. Such
was the importunity of La Fayette, and such the disinterested enthusiasm
with which he represented the wants and claims of his Republican
friends, that the old Count Maurepas, who was then prime minister, said
one day in the Council,

"It is fortunate for the king that La Fayette does not take it into his
head to strip Versailles of its furniture, to send to his dear
Americans, as his majesty would be unable to refuse it." La Fayette
purchased, on his own account, a large quantity of swords and other
military equipages, which he brought with him and presented to the
officers of the light infantry whom he commanded during the campaign.--
See Appendix to vol. vii. of Sparks's Life and Writings of Washington,
where will be found interesting documents relating to this expedition.

Good Tidings brought by La Fayette.--Their effect.--Arrival of the
Allies.--Encampment at Newport.

655Great was the joy of the American Congress produced by the tidings
brought by La Fayette, and assurance possessed the minds of that
assembly that the next campaign would secure peace and independence to
the States. Although policy forbade giving publicity to the fact that
aid from abroad was near at hand, sufficient information leaked out to
diffuse among the people pleasant hopes for the future. The return of La
Fayette was hailed with delight. Congress, by resolution, (a) testified
their satisfaction at his return, and  a May 15,1780 accepted with
pleasure a tender of the further services of so gallant and meritorious
an officer. * Three days afterward Congress resolved that bills be
immediately drawn on Dr. Franklin for twenty-five thousand dollars, and
on Mr. Jay for the same amount, payable at sixty days' sight; and that
the money be applied solely to the bringing of the army into the field,
and forwarding them supplies in such a manner as the exigency and nature
of the service shall require. Also, that the States of Virginia,
Maryland, Delaware, Pennsylvania, New Jersey, New York, Connecticut,
Rhode Island, Massachusetts Bay, and New Hampshire, he most earnestly
called upon to pay into the Continental treasury, within thirty days,
ten millions of dollars. It was also resolved that the Legislatures,
from New Hampshire to Virginia, be requested to invest their executive
authority, or some other persons, with such powers as would enable them,
on the application of the committee at the head-quarters of the army, to
draw forth the resources of the state. ** The Carolinas and Georgia were
exempt from the requisition, because they were then bearing the heavy
burden of an active campaign within their own limits. Congress thus
began to prepare for the most energetic co-operation with the allies
when they should arrive.

The French fleet, under the command of Admiral de Ternay, sailed from
Brest early in April, and appeared off the coast of Virginia on the 4th
of July. ** On the evening of the 10th it entered Newport harbor, on
which occasion the town was brilliantly illuminated, and every
demonstration of joy was made by the inhabitants. General Heath, then in
command on Rhode Island, was present to receive Rochambeau and his
troops on landing, and to put them in possession of the batteries upon
the island. On the 24th, the General Assembly, then in session,
presented complimentary addresses to Rochambeau and Ternay; and General
Washington, having heard of their arrival, recommended, in general
orders at his camp in the Hudson Highlands, to the officers of the
American army, to wear cockades of black and white--the ground being of
the first color, and the relief of the second--as a compliment to, and a
symbol of friendship and affection for their allies. **** The American
cockade, at that time, was black; the French white.

As soon as intelligence was received of the arrival of the allies, La
Fayette set out for Newport, under instructions from Washington, to
concert measures with Rochambeau for future operations. The French
troops were pleasantly encamped southeast of Newport, but they were not
suffered to remain quiet. When intelligence of the sailing of Ternay
from Brest reached the British cabinet, they dispatched Admiral Graves,
with six ships of the line, to re-enforce Admiral Arbuthnot, the
successor of Byron, then commanding the squadron on the American coast.
Graves arrived at New York three days after Ternay entered New-1780.

* Journals of Congress, vi., 49. While in France, La Fayette was
presented with an elegant sword, prepared there under the directions of
Franklin, by order of Congress. Franklin sent it to the marquis from
Passy, by his grandson. An account of this sword, and drawings will be
found on page 119, vol. ii.

** Journals of Congress, vi., 50, 51.

*** The fleet consisted of two ships of eighty guns each, one of
seventy-four, four of sixty-four, two frigates cf forty, a cutter of
twenty, a hospital-ship, pierced for sixty-four, a bomb-ship, and
thirty-two transports. The land forces consisted of four regiments, a
battalion of artillery, and the legion of the Duke de Lauzun, amounting
in all to about six thousand men.

**** Thacher, p. 200. Gordon, iii., 65.

British Blockade of Narraganset Bay.--Clinton's Expedition.--Death of
Temay.--Washington in Newport

July 13, 1780656port harbor. The English fleet, now stronger than the
French, proceeded immediately to attempt a blockade of the latter in
Narraganset Bay. On the 19th, four British ships, the advance sail of
the fleet rendezvousing at Block Island, appeared off Newport. The next
morning, as soon as the wind would permit, three French frigates went in
pursuit of them, but, falling in with nine or ten ships of the enemy
that were approaching, made sail for the harbor, under full chase.

Intelligence was received that General Clinton, lately returned to New
York from the South, was preparing to proceed in person, with a large
part of his army, to attack Rhode Island. Menaced by sea and land,
General Heath called earnestly upon Rhode Island, Massachusetts, and
Connecticut for troops, and his requisition was promptly complied with,
so promptly, that, before any enemy appeared, the allied forces felt
quite competent to oppose the largest army that Clinton could possibly
bring into the field. Sir Henry actually sailed from New York with eight
thousand troops, but proceeded no further than Huntington Bay, in Long
Island Sound. Informed there of the fortified position of the French at
Newport, the rapid gathering of the militia, and the approach of
Washington toward New York City, Clinton abandoned the expedition and
returned to his head-quarters.

While these events were taking place on our coast, the French and
English fleets were striving for the mastery in the West Indies. The
former was commanded by Admiral de Guichen, the latter by Admiral
Rodney. It was the understanding when Ternay and Rochambeau left France,
that they were to be joined at Rhode Island by the squadron of De
Guichen. Events unforeseen prevented this junction. The arrival of
Rodney at St. Lucie, and subsequent maneuvers and encounters, detained
De Guichen in the West Indies until July; and five days before Ternay
arrived at Newport, De Guichen left St. Domingo July 5 for Europe his
ships having suffered greatly in the engagements, and the land troops
which they carried having been terribly diminished by sickness. The
failure of this co-operation, the great number of invalids among the
French troops at Newport, and the expectation of an attack there, or an
attempt to blockade the squadron, made it inexpedient to break up the
encampment on Rhode Island and attempt any operations at a distance. It
was concluded to pass the winter there. Lauzun and his legion, as we
have seen, were cantoned at Lebanon, in Connecticut. Three thousand five
hundred militia were kept under arms at Newport, to assist in guarding
the French squadron, and the allies became a burden, rather than an aid,
to the Americans. The conference between Washington and Rochambeau, and
the final departure of the French troops in 1781, to form a junction
with the American army on the Hudson, have been noticed on page 436.

The Chevalier de Ternay died at Newport soon after the arrival of the
fleet, and was buried with distinguished honors in Trinity Church-yard,
where a slab was afterward erected March, 1781 to his memory. Admiral de
Barras succeeded him in command early in the following Spring, about
which time Washington arrived at Newport, and held a conference with
Rochambeau. The town was illuminated on the occasion of his visit, and
from that time until the departure of the allies, quiet prevailed on
Rhode Island. Active military operations ceased there, and, until the
close of the war, the people were undisturbed, except by occasional
menaces from English vessels in pursuit of American privateers, of which
a large number hailed from Narraganset Bay, or made its waters their
place of refuge when in danger upon the coast. * Newport suffered
terribly during the war. Its population of eleven thousand in 1774, was
reduced to about six thousand in 1782; and, according to an

* It is believed that Newport furnished more seamen for the naval
service of the United States during the Revolution than any other port
on the continent, except Boston. At least one thousand men were shipped
for service in the navy from that port, one half of whom fell into the
hands of the enemy and died in prison-ships. The naval commanders in the
war who belonged to Rhode Island were John Grimes, Benjamin Pierce,
Joseph Gardiner, William Dennis, James Godfred, Remembrance Simmons,
Thomas Stacy, Oliver Read, Captain Bently, Samuel Jeffers, John
Coggeshall, William Finch, Captain Jaques, James Phillips, Ezekiel
Burroughs, John Murphy, Isaac Frabor, William Ladd, Joseph Sheffield,
and Captain Gazzec. These either sailed from Newport previous to its
possession by the enemy, or subsequently from other ports of New
England.--Ross, page 62. Silas Talbot, also, belonged to Rhode Island.

Property destroyed in Newport.--Ride to Butte's Hill.--Hospitality.--
Fort on Butts's Hill.--View of the Battle-ground.

657estimate of a committee of the General Assembly, appointed for the
purpose, the value of private property destroyed was six hundred and
twenty-four thousand dollars, silver money.

The sun has gone down behind Conannicut and the hills of the Narraganset
country; the broad sails of the wind-mills are still; the voices of the
milkers come up from the neighboring farm-yard, and twilight is
spreading its mysterious veil over the bay, the islands, and the ocean.
Let us descend from our observatory on the hill of Miantonômoh and
return to the city, and in the morning visit the places hallowed by
events just viewed in the speculum of history.

The morning of the 23d was cold and blustering; the ground was hard
frozen; October, 1848 ice covered the surface of the pools, and the
north wind was as keen as the breath of December. I started early in a
light rockaway for the battle-ground at the north end of the island,
making a brief call on the way (or, rather, out of the way) upon Mr.
Nathaniel Greene, a grandson of the eminent general of the Revolution
who bore that name. He resides about three miles above Newport, and
kindly furnished me with explicit directions respecting the localities I
was about to visit. About a mile north of his estate I came to the head-
quarters of Prescott, printed on page 76, which I sketched in haste, for
my fingers were too soon benumbed with cold to hold the pencil expertly.
Twelve miles from Newport I came to the residence of Mr. Anthony, which
is, I believe, the "Brindley House" in the picture on page 83. An
introductory line from his brother, David Anthony, Esq., was a key to
his generous hospitality; and after accompanying me to the top of
Butts's Hill, and pointing out the places of interest included in the
view from its summit, he kindly invited me to dine with him when my
sketching should be finished, an invitation heartily accepted, for a
ride of twelve miles in the cold morning air was a whetstone to my
usually good appetite.

The remains of the old fort on Butts's Hill, the embankments and fosse,
with traces of the hastily-constructed ravelins, are well preserved.
Even the ruts made by the carriage-wheels of the cannons, at the
embrasures (for the ordnance was composed of field-pieces), were
visible. The banks, in some places, are twenty feet high, measuring from
the bottom of the fossé. Fortunately for the antiquary, the works were
constructed chiefly upon a rocky ledge, and the plow can win no treasure
there; the banks were earth, and afford no quarry for wall builders, and
so the elements alone have lowered the ramparts and filled the ditches.
Southward from this eminence, I had a fine view of Quaker and Turkey
Hills--indeed, of the whole battle-ground. Sitting upon the exterior
slope of the southern parapet, and sheltered from the wind by a clump of
bushes and the remains of one of the bastions, I sketched the above
view, which includes all the essential portions of the field of
conflict. The eminence in the center, on which stands a 'wind-mill, is
Quaker Hill; that on the right is Turkey Hill, on the northern slope of
which is seen the west road. In the hollow at the foot of these hills
the hottest of the battle was waged. On the left is seen the little
village of Newton, beyond which is the Eastern or Seaconet Channel,
stretching away to the ocean, and bounded on the left by the cultivated
slopes of Little Compton. The undulations in the foreground are the
embankments of the fort.

North View from Butts's Hill.--The Narraganset Country.--Masaasoit and
his Sons.--King Philip.

658Northward the view is more extensive, and in some respects more
interesting. The houses near the center of the picture mark the site of
the old Bristol ferry, over which the Americans, under Sullivan,
retreated to the main land.

A little to the left, lying upon the cast shore of the Narraganset, was
Bristol; beyond was a glimpse of Warren; and in the far distance,
directly over the steam-boat seen in the picture, the church spires of
Providence were visible. On the right the high promontory of Mount Hope
loomed up; and turning eastward, beyond the limits of the sketch, stood
Tiverton and its old stone bridge, already mentioned. I could find no
sheltered nook in making the sketch; upon the bleak summit of the hill I
plied the pencil, until I could hold it no longer; but the drawing was
finished.

From this eminence the vision takes in some of the most interesting
portions of the Narraganset country and of the domains of Massasoit, the
fast friend of the English. There were old Pocasset and Pokanoket, and,
more conspicuous and interesting than all, was Mount Hope, the royal
seat of King Philip, the last of the Wampanoags. It is too cold to turn
the leaves of the chronicle here; let us wrap our cloaks around us, and,
while gazing upon the beautiful land over which that great sachem held
sway, read the records upon the tablets of memory, brief but
interesting, concerning "King Philip's War."

"'Tis good to muse on nations pass'd away

Forever from the land we call our own;

Nations as proud and mighty in their day,

Who deem'd that everlasting was their throne.

An age went by, and they no more were known!

Sublimer sadness will the mind control,

Listening time's deep and melancholy moan;

And meaner griefs will less disturb the soul;

And human pride falls low at human grandeur's goal."

Robert C. Sands.

We have observed how Massasoit, the sagamore of the Wampanoags, whose
dominions extended from Narraganset Bay to that of Massachusetts,
presenting the hand of friendship and protection to the white settlers,
remained faithful while he lived. His residence was near Warren, on the
east side of the Narraganset; and so greatly was his friendship prized
by the Pilgrim Fathers, that Winslow and others made a long journey to
visit him when  a March, 1623 dangerously ill. (a ) Recovering, he
entered into a solemn league of friendship with the whites, and
faithfully observed it until his death, which occurred thirty-two b 1655
years afterward. (b) Alexander, his eldest son, succeeded him, and gave
promise of equal attachment to the whites; but his rule was short; he
died two years after the death of his father, and his brother *
Pometacom or Metacomet, better known as King Philip, became the head of
his nation. He was a bold, powerful-minded warrior, and al-

* Bancroft and Hildreth say nephew. Earlier historians disagree. Prince
and Trumbull say he was grandson to Massasoit, and Hutchinson and
Belknap call him his son. Governor Prince, it is said, named Alexander
and Philip after the great Macedonians, in compliment to Massasoit,
indicating his idea of their character as warriors. They were doubtless
sons of Massasoit.

Jealousy of King Philip.--Treaties with the Whites.--Curtailment of his
Domains.--His chief Captains.--John Eliot.

1662.659ready his keen perception gave him uneasiness respecting the
fate of his race.

Year after year the progress of settlement had curtailed the broad
domains of the Wampanoags, until now they possessed little more than the
narrow tongues of land at Pocanoket and Poeas-set, now Bristol and
Tiverton yet Philip renewed the treaties made with Massasoit, and kept
them faithfully a dozen years; but spreading settlements, reducing his
domains acre by acre, breaking up his hunting-grounds, diminishing the
abundance of his fisheries, and menacing his nation with the fate of the
landless, stirred up his savage patriotism, and made him resolve to
sever the ties that bound him, with fatal alliance, to his enemies. His
residence was at Mount Hope; and there, in the solitude of the primeval
forest, he ealled his warriors around him and planned with consummate
skill, an alliance of all the New England tribes against the European
intruders. *

For years the pious Eliot *** had been preaching the gospel among the
New England tribes;

* The number of Indians in New England at that time has been variously
estimated. Dr. Trumbull, in his History of the United States (i., 36),
supposes that there were thirty-six thousand in all, one third of whom
were warriors. Hutchinson (i., 406) estimates the fighting men of the
Narragansets alone at two thousand. Hinckley says the number of Indians
in Plymouth county in 1685, ten years after Philip's war, was four
thousand. Church, in his History of King Philip's War, published in
Boston in 1716, estimated the number of Indian warriors in New England,
in the commencement of that war, at ten thousand. Bancroft (ii., 94)
says there were probably fifty thousand whites and hardly twenty-five
thousand Indians in New England, west of the Piscataqua; while east of
that stream, in Maine, were about four thousand whites and more than
that number of red men.

** I copied this and the annexed marks of Philip's chief captains, from
an original mortgage given by the sachem, to Constant Southworth, on
land four miles square, lying south of Taunton. The mortgage is dated
October 1, 1672. It was drawn up by Thomas Leonard, and is signed by
himself, Constant Southworth, and Hugh Cole. It was acknowledged before,
and signed by, John Alden. * This interesting document is in the
possession of that intelligent antiquary, S. G. Drake, Esq., of Boston,
to whose kindness I am indebted for these signatures. No. 1 is the sign
of Munashum, alias Nimrod; No. 2, of Wonckom-pawhan; No. 3, of Captain
Annawan, the "next man to Philip," or his chief warrior.

*** John Eliot, usually called the Apostle of the Indians, was minister
of Roxbury, Massachusetts. He was born in Essex county, England, in
1604, and came to America in 1631. Educated thoroughly at Cambridge
University, he soon obtained great influence among the settlers. Touched
by the ignorance of the Indians respecting spiritual things, his heart
yearned to do them good, and for many years he labored assiduously among
them, with great success. He founded, at Natick, the first Indian church
in America, in 1660. The next year he published the New Testament in the
Indian language, and in a few years the whole Bible and other books. He
died May 20th, 1690, aged about eighty-six. The venerable apostle was
buried in the Ministers' Tomb ** in the first burying-ground at Roxbury,
which is situated on the east side of the great avenue across the Neck
to Boston. The residence of Eliot was opposite the house of Governor
Thomas Dudley, on the other side of the brook. Dudley's mansion was
taken down in 1775, and a redoubt was erected upon the spot. The site is
now occupied by the Universalist church. Reverend Dr. Putnam, of
Roxbury, is the fifth pastoral successor of the apostle in the first
church. The remains of his predecessors all lie in the Ministers' Tomb.
The commissioners of the Forest Hills Cemetery have designated the
heights on its western border as the Eliot Hills, and there the citizens
of Roxbury are about to erect a beautiful monument to the memory of the
apostle, Daniel Gookin, whose signature is given above, was the friend
of, and a zealous co-worker with, Mr. Eliot. He came to Virginia, from
England, in 1621. He went to Massachusetts with his family in 1644, and
settled in Cambridge. He was soon called to fill civil and military
offices, and in 1652 was appointed superintendent of the Indians. This
office he held until his death, in 1687, at the age of seventy-five
years. Gookin wrote an historical account of the New England Indians,
and was the firm friend of the red man through life. His remains are in
the old burying-ground at Cambridge. Lieutenant Gookin of our
Revolutionary army was his lineal descendant.

* Alden was a passenger in the May Flower, and one of the immortal
forty-one who signed the instrument of civil government, given on pages
437 and 438, vol. I, of this work, where also is the signature of
Southworth.

** In 1724-5, a citizen of Roxbury, named William Bowen, was made
prisoner by the Turks. The people of his town raised a sum of money
sufficient for his ransom. Before it could be applied they received
intelligence of his det±. The money was then appropriated to the
building of a tomb for the ministers of the church.

Enlightenment of the Indians.--Sassamon.--Rising of the New England
Tribes.--Daniel Gookin.

660no pains were spared to teach them to read and write; and in a short
time a larger proportion of the Massachusetts Indians could do so than,
recently, of the inhabitants of "Russia. * Churches were gathered among
the natives; and when Philip lifted the hatchet, there were four hundred
"praying Indians," as the converts were called, who were firmly attached
to the whites; yet Christianity hardly spread beyond the Indians on Cape
Cod, Martha's Vineyard, and Nantucket, and the seven feeble villages
around Boston. Philip, like Red Jacket of our days, opposed meddling
with the religion of his fathers, and, two years before the war, boldly
and openly, at the head of seven hundred warriors, boasted of his own
and their attachment to the ancient belief.

A "praying Indian" named John Sassamon, who had been educated at
Cambridge, and employed as a teacher, had fled to Philip on account of
some misdemeanor, and became a sort of secretary to the sachem. Being
persuaded to return to the whites, he accused Philip of meditated
treason. For this he was waylaid by the savages, and slain. Three of
Philip's men, suspected of the murder, were tried by a jury of half
English and half Indians, convicted, and hanged. The evidence on which
they were convicted was slender, and the Wampanoags were greatly
irritated. Philip was cautious; his warriors were impetuous. Overruled
by their importunities, and goaded by a remembrance of the wrongs and
humiliations he had suffered from the English, ** he trampled solemn
treaties beneath his feet, and lighted the flame of war. Messengers were
sent to other tribes, to arouse them to co-operation, and, with all the
power of Indian eloquence, Metacomet exhorted his followers to curse the
white men, and swear eternal hostility to the pale faces.

"Away! away! I will not hear

Of aught but death or vengeance now;

By the eternal skies I swear

My knee shall never learn to bow!

I will not hear a word of peace,

Nor clasp in friendly grasp a hand

Link'd to the pale-brow'd stranger race,

That work the ruin of our land.

* Bancroft, ii., 94.

** In 1671, Philip was suspected of secret plottings against the
English, and, notwithstanding his asseverations to the contrary, was
ordered to give up his fire-arms to the whites. This was a fortunate
occurrence for the English; for, had the Indians possessed those arms in
the war that ensued, their defeat would have been doubtful.

Philip's Appeal.--Condition of the Indians.--Commencement of
Hostilities.--Canonchet.--Mather's Magnalia.

661

"Before their coming, we had ranged

Our forests and our uplands free;

Still let us keep unsold, unchanged,

The heritage of Liberty.

As free as roll the chainless streams,

Still let us roam our ancient woods;

As free as break the morning beams,

That light our mountain solitudes.

"Touch not the hand they stretch to you;

The falsely-profferd cup put by;

Will you believe a coward true?

Or taste the poison'd draught, to die?

Their friendship is a lurking snare;

Their honor but an idle breath;

Their smile the smile that traitors wear;

Their love is hate, their life is death.

"And till your last white foe shall kneel,

And in his coward pangs expire--

Sleep--but to dream of brand and steel;

Wake--but to deal in blood and fire."

C. Sherry.

Although fierce and determined when once aroused, no doubt Philip was
hurried into this war against his best judgment and feelings, for his
sagacity must have forewarned him of failure. The English were well
armed and provisioned; the Indians had few guns, and their subsistence
was precarious. "Phrensy prompted their rising. It was but the storm in
which the ancient inhabitants of the land were to vanish away. They rose
without hope, and therefore they fought without mercy. For them as a
nation there was no to-morrow."

Bancroft has given a condensed, yet perspicuous and brilliant narrative
of this war. "The minds of the English," he says, "were appalled by the
horrors of the impending conflict, and superstition indulged in its wild
inventions. At the time of the eclipse of the moon, you might have seen
the figure of an Indian scalp imprinted on the center of its disk. The
perfect form of an Indian bow appeared in the sky. The sighing of the
wind was like the whistling of bullets. Some distinctly heard invisible
troops of horses gallop through the air, while others formed the
prophecy of calamities in the howling of the wolves. **

"At the very beginning of danger, the colonists exerted their wonted
energy. Volunteers from Massachusetts joined the troops from Plymouth,
and, within a week from the commencement of hostilities, the insulated
Pokanokets were driven from Mount Hope, and January 29, 1675 in less
than a month Philip was a fugitive among the Nipmucks, the interior
tribes of Massachusetts. The little army of the colonists then entered
the territory of the Narragansets, and from the reluctant tribe extorted
a treaty of neutrality, with a promise to give up every hostile Indian.
Victory seemed promptly assured; but it was only the commencement of
horrors. Canonchet, the chief sachem of the Narragansets, was the son of
Miantonômoh; and could he forget his father's wrongs? And would the
tribes of New England permit the nation that had first given a welcome
to the English to perish unavenged? Desolation extended along the whole
frontier. Banished from his patrimony,

* Bancroft, ii., 101.

** Cotton Mather, in his Magnalia, ii., 486, says, "Yea, and now we
speak of things ominous, we may add, some time before this [the
execution of three Indians for the murder of Sassamon], in a clear,
still, sunshiny morning, there were divers persons who heard in the air,
on the southeast of them, a great gun go off, and presently thereupon
the report of small guns, like musket shot, very thick discharging, as
if there had been a battle. This was at a time when there was nothing
visible done in any part of the colony to occasion such noises; but that
which most of all astonished them was the flying of bullets, which came
singing over their heads [beetles? See page 574, vol. i.], and seemed
very near to them; after which the sound of drums, passing along
westward, was very audible; and on the same day, in Plymouth colony, in
several places, invisible troops of horse were heard riding to and fro."
No credence is to be attached to this book of Mather's.

Indian Method of Warfare.--Destruction of New England Villages.--
Terrible Retaliation by the Whites.

662where the Pilgrims found a friend, and from his cabin, which had
sheltered the exiles, Philip and his warriors spread through the
country, arousing their brethren to a warfare of extermination.

"The war, on the part of the Indians, was one of ambush and surprise.
They never once met the English in open field; but always, even if
eight-fold in number, fled timorously before infantry. But they were
secret as beasts of prey, skillful marksmen, and in part provided with
fire-arms, fleet of foot, conversant with all the paths of the forest,
patient of fatigue, mad with passion for rapine, vengeance, and
destruction, retreating into swamps for their fastnesses, or hiding in
the green-wood thickets, where the leaves muffled the eyes of the
pursuers. By the rapidity of their descent, they seemed omnipotent among
the scattered villages, which they ravaged like a passing storm; and for
a full year they kept all New England in a state of terror and
excitement. The exploring party was waylaid and cut off, and the mangled
carcasses and disjointed limbs of the dead were hung upon the trees to
terrify pursuers. The laborer in the field, the reapers as they went
forth to harvest, men as they went to mill, the shepherd's boy among the
sheep, were shot down by skulking foes, whose approach was invisible.
Who can tell the heavy hours of woman? The mother, if left alone in the
house, feared the tomahawk for herself and children; on the sudden
attack, the husband would fly with one child, the wife with another, and
perhaps only one escape; the village cavalcade, making its way to
meeting on Sunday, in files on horseback, the farmer holding the bridle
in one hand and a child in the other, his wife seated on a pillion.
behind him, it may be with a child in her lap, as was the fashion of
those days, could not proceed safely; but, at the moment when least
expected, bullets would whiz among them, discharged with fatal aim from
an ambuscade by the wayside. The red men hung upon the skirts of the
English villages 'like the lightning on the edge of the clouds.'

"What need of repeating the same tale of horrors? Brookfield was set on
a August 12 fire, (a) rescued only to be abandoned. Deerfield was
burned. (b) Hadley b September 11 surprised during a time of religious
service, * was saved only by the daring of Goffe, the regicide, now
bowed with years, a heavenly messenger of rescue, who darted from his
hiding-place, rallied the disheartened, and, having achieved a safe
defense, sank away in his retirement, to be no more seen. The plains of
Northfield were wet with the blood of  a September 23 Beers (a) and
twenty of his valiant associates. Lathrop's company of young men, the
very flower of Essex, culled out of the towns of that county, were  b
September 28. butchered; (b) hardly a white man escaped; and the little
stream whose channel became red with their life currents, is called
Bloody Brook to this day."

The Narragansets played false to the white men, and in winter sheltered
the foe that wasted their settlements. It was resolved to treat them as
enemies, and through the deep snows of December, a thousand men, levied
by the united colonies, marched to the great fort of the tribe. ** Its
feeble palisades quickly yielded, and fire and sword soon "swept away
the humble glories of the Narragansets. Their winter stores, their
wigwams, and all the little comforts of savage life, were destroyed; and
more, their old men, their women, their babes, perished by hundreds in
the fire." ** It was a terrible blow for the Indians. Cold, hunger, and
disease followed, and were the powerful allies of the English in the
decimation of the tribe. Yet Canonchet did not despair, and he fought
gallantly, until, being taken prisoner by the English, he was put to
death.

In the spring, the spirit of revenge and retaliation began its work.
Weymouth, Groton, Medfield, Lancaster, and Marlborough, in
Massachusetts, were laid in ashes;

* See page 420, of this vol.

** The fort was situated upon an island containing four or five acres,
imbosomed in a swamp. The island was encompassed by high and strong
palisades, with abatis outside, and there three thousand of the
Narragansets were collected to pass the winter. This swamp is a short
distance southwest of Kingston village, in the township of Kingston,
Washington county, Rhode Island. The Stonington and Providence rail-way
passes along the northern verge of the swamp.

*** Bancroft, ii., 105.

Decimation of the Indians.--Strifes among them.--Philip a Fugitive.--His
Death.--His Son.--Captain Church.

663Warwick and Providence, in Rhode Island, were burned; and every where
the isolated dwellings of adventurous settlers were laid waste. But as
the season advanced, and more remote tribes came not to re-enforce them,
the Indians, wasted and dispirited, abandoned all hopes of success.
Strifes arose among them. The Connecticut Indians charged their
misfortunes upon Philip, and so did the Narragansets. The cords of
alliance were severed. Some surrendered to avoid starvation; other
tribes wandered off and joined those of Canada; while Captain Church,
the most famous of the English partisan warriors, went out to hunt and
destroy the fugitives. * During the year, between two and three thousand
Indians were killed or submitted. Philip was chased from one hiding-
place to another; and although he had vainly sought the aid of the
Mohawks, and knew that hope was at an end, his proud spirit would not
listen to words of peace; he cleft the head of a warrior who ventured to
propose it. At length, after an absence of a year, he resolved, as it
were, to meet his destiny. He returned to the beautiful land where his
forefathers slept, the cradle of August, 1676 his infancy, and the
nestling-place of his tribe. Once be escaped narrowly, leaving his wife
and only son prisoners. This bereavement crushed him. "My heart breaks,"
cried the chieftain, in the agony of his grief; "now I am ready to die."
His own followers now began to plot against him, to make better terms
for themselves. In a few days he was shot by a faithless Indian, and
Captain Church cut off his head with his own sword. The captive orphan
was transported to an island of the ocean. So perished the princes of
the Pokanokets. Sad to them had been their acquaintance with
civilization. The first ship that came on their coast kidnapped men of
their kindred; and now the harmless boy, who had been cherished as an
only child and the future sachem of their tribes--the last of the family
of Massasoit--was sold into bondage, to toil as a slave under the suns
of Bermuda. ** Of the once prosperous Narragansets of old, the chief
tribe of New England, hardly one hundred remained. The sword, famine,
fire, and sickness had swept them from the earth. "During the whole war
the Mohegans remained faithful to the English, and not a drop of blood
was shed on the happy soil of Connecticut. So much the greater was the
loss in the adjacent colonies. Twelve or thirteen towns were destroyed.
The disbursements and losses equaled in value half a million of dollars-
-an enormous sum for the few of that day. More than six hundred men,
chiefly young men, the flower of the country, of whom any mother might
have been proud, perished in the field. As many as six hundred houses
were burned. Of the able-bodied men in the colony, one in twenty had
fallen; and one family in twenty had been burned out. The loss of lives
and property was, in proportion

* Benjamin Church was born at Duxbury, in 1639. He was the first white
settler at Seaconnet, or Little Compton. He was the most active and
noted combatant of the Indians during King Philip's war, and when Philip
was slain, Church cut off his head with his own hands. The sword with
which he performed the act is in the cabinet of the Massachusetts
Historical Society (see page 562, ante). In 1689, Church was
commissioned by President Hinckley, of Plymouth, and the governors of
Maine and Massachusetts, commander-in-chief of a force sent against the
Eastern Indians. He continued making expeditions against them until
1704. In his old age he was corpulent. A fall from his horse was the
cause of his death, which occurred at Little Compton, January 17, 1718,
at the age of seventy-seven years. Under his direction his son prepared
a history of the Indian wars, which was published in 1716.

** The disposal of this child was a subject of much deliberation.
Several of the elders were urgent to put him to death. It was finally
resolved to be merciful, and send him to Bermuda, to be sold into
slavery. Such was the fate of many Indians, a fate to them worse than
death. During the war the government of Plymouth gave thirty shillings
for every head of an Indian killed in battle, and Philip's brought the
same price. Their living bodies brought a high price in Bermuda, and
probably more living Indian heads went thither than dead ones to the
market at Plymouth. Witamo, the squaw sachem of Pocasset, shared in the
disasters of Philip. She was drowned while crossing a river in her
flight. Her body was recovered, and the head cut off and stuck upon a
pole at Taunton, amid the jeers of the whites and the tears of the
captive Indians. The body of Philip was beheaded and quartered,
according to the sentence of the English law against traitors. One of
his hands was given to the Indian who had shot him, and on the day
appointed for a public thanksgiving, his head was carried in triumph
into Plymouth. What a mockery of Christianity! Men, guilty of gross
injustice to a race that had befriended them, lifting their hands toward
heaven reeking with the blood of those they had injured, and singing Te
Deum Laudamus, or praising God for his providential care! No Providence
for the poor Indian, because he had neither cunning, skill, nor
gunpowder!

Sufferings of the Colonists.--A Happy Change.--Capture of the Pigot by
Talbot

664to numbers, as distressing as in the Revolutionary war. There was
scarce a family from which Death had not selected a victim." * Thus
ended the first general Indian war in New England. Righteousness,
sitting upon the throne of judgment, has long since decided the question
of equity; and we, viewing the scene at a distance, can not fail to
discern the true verdict against the avaricious white man.

Those dark days of distress and crime are passed away forever. The
splendors of an October sun, which then shed a radiance over the forests
and the waters, beautiful as now, no longer light up the ambuscade of
the red men, or the hiding-places of the pale-faces lurking for blood.
From the bald eminence on which I stand, the land of Philip and
Canonchet, of Witamo and Miantonômoh, and the broad waters where they
sported in peace, are spread out to the eye beautiful as the "Happy
Valley," and upon the whole domain rest the beneficent influences of
love, harmony, righteousness, and peace. Let us, then, endeavor to
forget the gloomy past, and leave upon memory only the bright vision of
the present.

The vision was bright indeed, but it was the sheen of the glacier. The
unclouded sun and the uncurbed north wind wrestled for the mastery. The
latter was the victor, and, until I was warmed at the table of Mr.
Anthony, I could not fully comprehend the charms which I had beheld
while half frozen among the mounds of the old fortress on the hill.

I returned to Newport by the way of Vaucluse, on the eastern road, where
I sketched the great sycamore pictured on page 653, which is standing
upon the bank of the Seaconnet or Eastern Channel. Near the mouth of
this passage, a little below Vaucluse, occurred one of those events,
characterized by skill and personal bravery, which make up a large
portion of the history of our war for independence. In order to close up
this channel, when the French fleet appeared off Newport, the British
converted a strong vessel of two hundred tuns into a galley, and named
it _Pigot_, in honor of the commander on Rhode Island. Its upper deck
was removed, and on its lower deck were placed twelve eight-pounders,
which belonged to the Flora, that was sunk in Newport harbor, and also
ten swivels. Thus armed, she was a formidable floating battery. Major
Silas Talbot, whose exploits had already won the expressed approbation
of Congress, proposed an expedition to capture or destroy this vessel,
for it effectually broke up the local trade of that section. General
Sullivan regarded his scheme as impracticable, but finally consented to
give Talbot permission to make the attempt. A draft of men for the
purpose was allowed, and with sixty resolute, patriots, Talbot sailed
from Providence in a coasting sloop called the _Hawk_, which he had
fitted out for the purpose. Armed with only three three-pounders,
besides the small arms of his men, he sailed by the British forts at
Bristol Ferry, and anchored within a few miles of the _Pigot_. Procuring
a horse on shore, he rode down the east bank and reconnoitered. The
galley presented a formidable appearance, yet the major was not daunted.
At nine o'clock in the evening, favored with a fair wind, and
accompanied by Lieutenant Helm, of Rhode Island, and a small re-
enforcement, Talbot hoisted the anchor of the _Hawk_ and with a kedge-
anchor lashed to the jib-boom to tear the nettings of the _Pigot_, he
bore down upon 1778 that vessel. It was a very dark night in October.
Under bare poles he drifted past Fogland Ferry fort without being
discovered, when he hoisted sail and ran partly under the stem of the
galley. The sentinels hailed him, but, returning no answer, a volley of
musketry was discharged at the _Hawk_ without effect. The anchor tore
the nettings and grappled the fore-shrouds of the _Pigot,_ enabling the
assailants to make a free passage to her deck. With loud shouts, the
Americans poured from the _Hawk_, and drove every man of the _Pigot_
into the hold, except the commander, who fought desperately alone, with
no other mail than shirt and drawers, until he perceived that resistance
was useless. The _Pigot_ was surrendered, with the officers and crew.
Her cables were coiled over the hatchways, to secure the prisoners
below, and, weighing anchor, Talbot, with his prize, entered the harbor
of Stonington the next day. This bold adventure was greatly applauded,
and, on the 14th of November following, Congress complimented Talbot and
his men, and presented him with

* Bancroft, ii., 108, 109.

Promotion of Talbot.--Departure from Newport.--Adieu to New England.--
Halleck's "Connecticut."

665a commission of lieutenant colonel in the army of the United States.
* He was afterward transferred to the navy, in which service we shall
meet him again.

I reached Newport at four o'clock, and at sunset was on board the
_Empire State_, a noble Sound steam-boat (which was partially destroyed
by fire a few weeks afterward), bound for New York.

We passed old Fort Canonicut and Fort Adams, and out of the harbor at
twilight; and at dark, leaving the Beaver-tail light behind, we were
breasting the moon-lit waves of the ocean toward Point Judith. I now
bade a final adieu to New England, to visit other scenes hallowed by the
struggle of our fathers for liberty.

Often since has the recollection of my visit there come up in memory
like a pleasant dream; and never can I forget the universal kindness
which I received during my brief tarry among the people of the East.

"They love their land because it is their own,

And scorn to give aught other reason why;

Would shake hands with a king upon his throne,

And think it kindness to his majesty;

A stubborn race, fearing and flattering none.

Such are they nurtured, such they live and die,

All, but a few apostates, who are meddling

With merchandise, pounds, shillings, pence, and peddling;

"Or, wandering through the Southern countries, teaching

The ABC from Webster's spelling-book;

Gallant and godly, making love and preaching,

And gaining, by what they call 'hook and crook,'

And what the moralists call overreaching,

A decent living. The Virginians look

Upon them with as favorable eyes

As Gabriel on the Devil in Paradise.

"But these are but their outcasts. View them near,

At home, where all their worth and pride are placed;

And there their hospitable fires burn clear,

And there the lowliest farm-house hearth is graced

With manly hearts; in piety sincere;

Faithful in love, in honor stern and chaste,

In friendship warm and true, in danger brave,

Beloved in life, and sainted in the grave."

Halleck's "Connecticut."

* See Tuckerman's Life of Talbot; Journals of Congress, iv., 471.

The Hudson Highlands.--Newburgh.--The Indian Summer.--Its character

666

CHAPTER XXIX.

"By wooded bluff we steal, by leaning lawn,

By palace, village, cot, a sweet surprise

At every turn the vision breaks upon;

Till to our wondering and uplifted eyes

The Highland rocks and hills in solemn grandeur rise.

"Nor clouds in heaven, nor billows in the deep,

More graceful shapes did ever heave or roll;

Nor came such pictures to a painter's sleep,

Nor beam'd such visions on a poet's soul!

The pent-up flood, impatient of control,

In ages past here broke its granite bound,

Then to the sea in broad meanders stole,

While ponderous ruin strew'd the broken ground,

And these gigantic hills forever closed around."

Theodore S. Fay.

VERY place made memorable by Revolutionary events has an interest in the
mind and heart of the American, and claims the homage of regard from the
lover of freedom, wheresoever he may have inspired his first breath. But
there are a few localities so thickly clustered with associations of
deep interest, that they appear like fuglemen in the march of events
which attract the historian's notice. Prominent among these are the
Highlands, upon the Hudson, from Haverstraw to Newburgh, the scenes of
councils, battles, sieges, triumphs and treason, in all of which seemed
to be involved for the moment, the fate of American liberty. Thitherward
I journeyed at the commencement of our beautiful Indian summer, * the
season

"When first the frost

Turns into beauty all October's charms;

When the dread fever quits us; when the storms

Of the wild equinox, with all its wet,

Has left the land as the first deluge left it,

With a bright bow of many colors hung

Upon the forest tops,"

Brainerd.

and rambled for a week among those ancient hills and the historic
grounds adjacent. I arrived at Newburgh on the morning of the 25th of
October. The town is pleasantly situated upon the steep western bank of
the Hudson, sixty miles from New York, and in the midst of some of the
finest scenery in the world, enhanced in interest to the student of
history by the associations which hallow it. In the southern suburbs of
the village, on the brow of the hill, stands the gray old fabric called
"The Hasbrouck House," memorable

* The week or ten days of warm, balmy weather in autumn, immediately
preceding the advent of winter storms, when, as Irving says of Sleepy
Hollow, a "drowsy, dreamy influence seems to hang over the land and
pervade the very atmosphere," appears to be peculiar to the United
States, and has attracted the attention of travelers and philosophers.
It is called Indian summer, because it occurs at a season when the
natives gathered in their crops of maize or Indian corn. The atmosphere
is smoky, and so mellows the sunlight that every object wears the livery
of repose, like the landscapes of Southern Italy. The cause of the
warmth and other peculiarities of this season is an unexplained
question. It is the season when the fallen leaves of our vast forests
begin to decay. As decadence is slow combustion, may not the heat
evolved in the process produce the effects noticed?

The "Hasbrouck House" and Vicinity.--Its interior construction.--
Purchased hy the State.--Ceremonies at its Dedication.

as the head-quarters of Washington at the close of the Revolution.

667From the rickety piazza or _stoop_ on the river front may be seen the
historic grounds of Fish-kill, New Windsor, Plumb Point, Pollopel's
Island, and the Beacon Hills; and through the mighty gateway in the
Highlands, whose posts are Breakneck and Butter Hills, in altitude
fifteen hundred feet, appear glimpses of distant West Point and the
amphitheater of mountains which surround it. Let us take a peep within
the venerable mansion; and as the morning sun is shining pleasantly upon
the porch, we will there sit down, and glance over the pages of the old
clasped volume, the _vade mecum_ and Mentor of our journey.

The front door opens into a large square room, which was used by
Washington for his public audiences, and as a dining hall. It is
remarkable for the fact that it has seven doors, and only one window. Of
the two doors on the left in the picture, the nearest one to the
spectator was the entrance to the chief's sitting-room; the other, to
his bed-room. There is no plaster ceiling above; the heavy beams, nine
inches wide and fourteen deep, completely exposed, give it a strong as
well as antique appearance. Properly taken care of,

* This view is from the northeast, comprising the north gable and east
or river front. The house is substantially built of stone, and is now
(1850) just one hundred years old. This remark applies only to the
portion containing the large room with seven doors, and the two bed-
rooms on the north of it. This portion was built in 1750. Afterward a
kitchen was built on the south end, and in 1770 an addition was made to
it, on the west side, of the same length and height of the old part. The
dates of the first and last additions are cut in the stones of the
building. The fire-place in the large room is very spacious, "in which,"
says Mr. Eager, "a small bullock might have been turned upon a spit." *
The house has been in the possession of the Hasbrouck family (one of the
oldest of the Huguenot families in the county) from the time of its
erection until recently, when it was purchased by the State of New York
for the purpose of preserving it as a relic of the Revolution. It is
placed in charge of the trustees of the village of Newburgh, who are
required to expend a certain amount in repairs, ornamenting the grounds,
&e. The family residing in the house is employed for the purpose of
receiving and attending visitors. The house has been thoroughly repaired
since the above sketch was made, under the direction of an advisory
committee for its restoration and the embellishment of the grounds. Some
of the modern alterations within have been changed, and the whole
appearance of the edifice is now as much like that of the era of the
Revolution as it is possible to make it. Interesting ceremonies were had
upon the occasion of its dedication, on the 4th of July, 1850. There was
a civic and military procession. The ceremonies on the green before the
house were opened with prayer by Reverend Doctor Johnson, and an address
by J. J. Monell, Esq., of Newburgh. While a choir was singing the
following last stanza of a beautiful ode, written by Mrs. Monell,

"With a prayer your faith expressing, Raise our country's flag on high;
Here, where rests a nation's blessing, Stars and stripes shall float for
aye! Mutely telling Stirring tales of days gone hy,"

major-general Scott, who was present, hoisted the American flag upon a
lofty staff" erected near. The Declaration of Independence was read by
Honorable F. J. Betts, after which Honorable J. W. Edmonds pronounced an
oration, marked by evidences of much historic research. Henceforth this
venerated relic belongs to the people of New York; and doubtless its
cabinet of Revolutionary remains, already begun, will be augmented by
frequent donations, until a museum of rare interest shall be collected
there.

* History of Orange County.

Washington's Dining-hall.--Anecdote concerning it.--Lady Washington's
Gardening.--Settlement of Newburgh.

668this relic of the Revolution may remain another century. The timbers
are sound, the walls massive, and the roof and weather-boards were well
preserved.

Lady Washington was a resident of the "Hasbrouck House" during the
summer of 1783, and, in gratification of her taste for gardening, a
large space in front of the house was cultivated by her. Mr. Eager, the
historian of Orange county, informed me that within his remembrance the
brick borders of her flower-beds remained. Washington, with his lady,
left there about the middle of August, to attend upon Congress, then in
session at Princeton, New Jersey, leaving the portion of the Continental
army then in service under the command of General Knox. The commander-
in-chief did not return to Newburgh, but made his head-quarters, for a
few days in November, at West Point, from whence he re-November 25, 1783
paired to New York and took possession of that city on its evacuation by
the British troops.

Orange county was among the first settled portions of the State of New
York. It was organized in 1683; its name was given in honor of William,
prince of Orange, afterward King of England. The first permanent
settlers in the county were Germans, and their original location was in
the present town of Newburgh, at a place called by the Indians Quassaic,
on a creek of that name, a little below the village. They obtained a
patent from Queen Anne, in 1719, for twenty-one hundred and ninety
acres, extending north from the Quassaic Creek, and proceeded to lay out
a village which they called New Burgh or New

* In the December number of the New York Mirror for 1834, is an
interesting account of this old building, by Gulian C. Verplanck, Esq.
He relates the following anecdote connected with this room, which he
received from Colonel Nicholas Fish, father of the late governor of the
State of New York. Just before La Fayette's death, himself and the
American minister, with several of his countrymen, were invited to dine
at the house of that distinguished Frenchman, Marbois, who was the
French secretary of legation here during the Revolution. At the supper
hour the company were shown into a room which contrasted quite oddly
with the Parisian elegance of the other apartments where they had spent
the evening. A low boarded, painted ceiling, with large beams, a single
small, uncurtained window, with numerous small doors, as well as the
general style of the whole, gave, at first, the idea of the kitchen, or
largest room of a Dutch or Belgian farm-house. On a long rough table was
a repast, just as little in keeping with the refined kitchens of Paris
as the room was with its architecture. It consisted of a large dish of
meat, uncouth-looking pastry, and wine in decanters and bottles,
accompanied by glasses and silver mugs, such as indicated other habits
and tastes than those of modern Paris. "Do you know where we now are?"
said the host to La Fayette and his companions. They paused for a few
minutes in surprise. They had seen something like this before, but when
and where? "Ah! the seven doors and one window," said La Fayette, "and
the silver camp-goblets, such as the marshals of France used in my
youth! We are at Washington's head-quarters on the Hudson, fifty years
ago!" The view here given is from the west door of the dining-hall,
looking out of the east door upon the Hudson, the green fields of
Fishkill, and the North Beacon of the Highlands, whereon the Americans
lighted watch-fires when occasion demanded it. The fire-place on the
right is within the area of the room, having a heavy hewn stone for a
back-log. The visitor may stand there, and look up the broad-mouthed
chimney to the sky above.

First Settlements in Orange County.--Indian Wars.--Sufferings of the
People.--Attack on Minisink.

669Town. Five hundred acres were reserved as glebe land, and under
favorable auspices the village of Newburgh was founded. The Germans in
time became dissatisfied, sold out their patent and dispersed, some
going to Pennsylvania, and others to the Mohawk country. Some English,
Irish, New Englanders, and a few Huguenots from Ulster filled their
places, and flourishing settlements were soon planted along the river,
or upon the rich bottoms of the water-courses. They also spread
interiorly, and Goshen, Minisink, Wawarsing, and other thriving towns
started up in the midst of the red men. The ante-revolutionary history
of this section of the state is full of stirring incidents, for the wily
Indian, properly suspicious of the pale faces, was ever on the alert to
do them damage; and the privations, alarms, and sufferings of those who
opened the fertile bosom of the country to the sun and rain, and spread
broad acres of cultivation where the deer grazed in shady solitudes,
compose a web of romance wonderful indeed. And when the Revolution broke
out, and the savages of the Mohawk Valley and of Western New York were
let loose upon the remote settlements, the people of Orange county were
intense sufferers, particularly those upon its frontier settlements, in
the direction of the wilderness. The Tories and their savage associates
spread terror in every direction, and in Wawarsing and vicinity many
patriots and their families were the victims of ambuscade or open
attack. But I will not repeat a tale of horror such as we have already
considered in viewing the history of the Mohawk Valley. The atrocities
committed in Orange county were but a counterpart in character and
horror of the former. * Strong houses were barricaded and used as forts;
the people went armed by day, and slept armed at night; and almost
hourly murder and rapine stalked boldly abroad. It was a time of darkest
misery; and not until the Indian power of the West was "broken, and the
Tories failed to receive their aid, was the district blessed with quiet.

The invasion of Minisink, * alluded to in a former chapter, was one of
those prominent links in the chain of Indian and Tory depredations, that
I may not pass it over with only brief mention. Here let us consider it.
There were very few engaged in the battle that ensued, yet that few
fought with wonderful valor, and suffered a terrible slaughter.

Count Pulaski and his legion of cavalry were stationed, during a part of
the winter of 1778--9, at Minisink. In February, he was ordered to South
Carolina, to join the army under Lincoln. The settlement was thus left
wholly unprotected, which being perceived by Brant, the accomplished
Mohawk warrior, he resolved to make a descent upon it. During the night
of the 19th of July, at the head of sixty Indians, and twenty-seven
Tories, disguised as savages, he stole upon the little town, and before
the people were aroused 1779 from their slumbers he had fired several
dwellings. With no means for defense, the inhabitants sought safety in
flight to the mountains, leaving their pretty village and all their
worldly goods a spoil to the invaders. Their small stockade fort, a
mill, and twelve houses and barns were burned, several persons were
killed, some taken prisoners, the orchards and plantations were laid
waste, cattle were driven away, and booty of every kind was carried to
Grassy Brook, on the Delaware, a few miles above the mouth of the
Lackawaxen, where the chief had left the main body of his warriors. When
intelligence of this invasion reached Goshen, Doctor Tusten, colonel of
the local militia, issued orders to the officers of his regiment to meet
him at Minisink the next day, with as many volunteers as they could
muster. The call was promptly responded to, and one hundred and forty-
nine hardy men were gathered around Tusten the following morning. Many
of these were principal gentlemen of the vicinity. A council was held,
and it was unanimously determined to pursue the invaders.

* For details of the trials of the settlers, and the atrocities
committed by the Indians and Tories in this section, see a pamphlet
published at Rondout, entitled "The Indians; or, Narratives of
Massacres, &c., in Wawarsing and its Vicinity during the American
Revolution."

** Minisink was one of the most ancient settlements in Orange county. It
was in existence as a white settlement as early as 1669, when a severe
battle was fought with the Indians on the 22d of July, ninety years, to
a day, previous to the conflict in question. From that time until the
Revolution it was often the scene of strife with the red men, and almost
every dell, and rock, and ancient tree has its local tradition. The
place of the ancient settlement is situated about ten miles northwest of
Goshen, among the Shawangunk Mountains, between the Wallkill and the
Navasink Valleys.

Intemperate zeal of the Volunteers.--Unwise Decision.--Battle of
Minisink.--Its Location.--The Massacre

670Colonel Tusten, who well knew the skill, prowess, caution, and
craftiness of Brant, opposed the measure, as a hazardous undertaking
with so small a force. He was overruled, and the debates of the council
were cut short by Major Meeker, who mounted his horse, flourished his
sword, and shouted, "Let the _brave_ men follow me; the _cowards_ may
stay behind!" These words ignited the assembly, and the line of march
was immediately formed. They traveled seventeen miles, and then encamped
for the night. The next morning, Colonel Hathorn, of the Warwick
militia, with a small re-enforcement, joined them. He was Tusten's
senior officer, and took the command. They resumed their march at
sunrise, and at Half-way Brook came upon the Indian encampment of the
previous night; the smoldering watch-fires were still smoking. The
number of these fires indicated a large savage force, and the two
colonels, with the more prudent of the company, advocated, in council, a
return, rather than further pursuit. But excited bravado overcame
prudence, and a large majority determined to pursue the Indians; the
minority yielded, and the march was resumed.

A scouting party, under Captain Tyler, was sent forward upon the Indian
trail. The pursuers were discovered, and a bullet from an unseen foe
slew the captain. There was momentary alarm; but the volunteers pressed
eagerly onward, and at nine in the morning they hovered upon the high
hills overlooking the Delaware near the mouth of the Lackawaxen.

The enemy were in full view below, marching in the direction of a
fording-place. Hathorn determined to intercept them there, and disposed
his men accordingly. The intervening hills hid the belligerents from
each other. Brant had watched the movements of his pursuers, and
comprehending Hathorn's design, he wheeled his column, and threading a
deep and narrow ravine which the whites had crossed, brought his whole
force in the rear of the Americans. Here he formed an ambuscade, and
deliberately selected his battle ground.

The volunteers were surprised and disappointed at not finding the enemy
where they expected to, and were marching back when they discovered some
of the Indians. One of them, mounted on a horse stolen at Minisink, was
shot by a militia-man. This was a signal for action, and the firing soon
became general. It was a long and bloody conflict. The Indians were
greatly superior in numbers, and a detachment of Hathorn's troops,
consisting of one third of the whole, became separated from the rest at
the commencement of the engagement. Closer and closer the savages
pressed upon the whites, until they were hemmed within the circumference
of an acre of ground, upon a rocky hill that sloped on all sides. The
ammunition of the militia was stinted, and they were careful not to fire
at random and without aim. Their shots were deadly, and many a red man
was slain. The conflict began July 22, 1779 at eleven o'clock, and
continued until the going down of the sun, on that long July day. At
twilight the battle was yet undecided, but the ammunition of the whites
being exhausted, a party of the enemy attacked and broke their hollow
square at one corner. The survivors of the conflict attempted to
retreat. Behind a ledge of rocks, Doctor Tusten had been dressing the
wounds of the injured during the day. There were seventeen men under his
care when the retreat commenced. The Indians fell upon them furiously,
and all, with the Doctor, were slain. Several who attempted to escape by
swimming across the Delaware were shot by the Indians; and of the whole
number that went forth, only about thirty returned to relate the
dreadful scenes of the day. * This massacre of the wounded is one of the
darkest stains upon the memory of Brant, whose honor and humanity were
often more conspicuous than that of his Tory allies. He made a weak
defense of his conduct by asserting that he offered the Americans good
treatment if they would surrender;

* The place of conflict is about two miles from the northern bank of the
Delaware, and the same distance below the Lechauachsin or Lackawaxen
River. It is about three miles from the Barryville station, on the New
York and Erie rail-road. The battle ground and the adjacent region
continue in the same wild state as of old, and over the rocky knolls and
tangled ravines where the Indians and the Goshen militia fought, wild
deer roam in abundance, and a panther occasionally leaps upon its prey.
The place is too rocky for cultivation, and must ever remain a
wilderness. At the Mohackamack Fork (now Port Jervis, on the Delaware)
was a small settlement, and a block-house, called Jersey Fort.

Brant's Defense.--Effect of the Massacre.--Salvation of Major Wood.--
Interment of the Remains of the Slain.--Monument

671that he warned them of the fierceness of the thirst for blood that
actuated his warriors, and that he could not answer for their conduct
after the first shot should be fired; and that his humane proposition
was answered by a bullet from an American musket, which pierced his
belt. *

Goshen and the surrounding country was filled with the voice of
mourning, for the flower of the youth and mature manhood of that region
was slain. The massacre made thirty-three widows in the Presbyterian
congregation at Goshen. At the recital, a shudder ran throughout the
land, and gave keenness to the blade and fierceness to the torch which,
a few weeks afterward, desolated the Indian paradise in the country of
the Senecas and Cayngas.

Orange county labored much and suffered much in the cause of freedom.
Newburgh and New Windsor, within it, having been the chosen quarters of
Washington at different times, from December, 1780, until the conclusion
of peace in 1783, and a portion of that time the chief cantonment of the
American army, the county is a conspicuous point in the history of the
war. At the close of 1780, the army was cantoned at three points: at
Morristown, and at Pompton, in New Jersey, and at Phillipstown, in the
Hudson Highlands. Washington established his head-quarters at

* During the battle, Major Wood, of Goshen, made a masonic sign, by
accident, which Brant, who was a Free-mason, perceived and heeded.
Wood's life was spared, and as a prisoner he was treated kindly, until
the Mohawk chief perceived that he was not a Mason. Then, with withering
scorn, Brant looked upon Wood, believing that he had obtained the
masonic sign which he used, by deception. It was purely an accident on
the part of Wood. When released, he hastened to become a member of the
fraternity by whose instrumentality his life had been spared. The house
in which Major Wood lived is yet standing (though much altered), at the
foot of the hill north of the rail-way station at Goshen. The house of
Roger Townsend, who was among the slain, is also standing, and well
preserved. It is in the southern part of the village. The Farmers' Hall
Academy, an old brick building, two stories high, and now used for a
district school-house, is an object of some interest to the visitor at
Goshen, from the circumstance that there Noah Webster, our great
lexicographer, once taught school. An old gentleman of the village
informed me that he had often seen him at twilight on a summer's evening
in the grove on the hill northward of the rail-way station, gathering up
the manuscripts which he had been preparing in a retired spot, after
school hours.

** In 1822, the citizens of Orange county collected the bones of those
slain in the battle of Minisink, which had been left forty-three years
upon the field of strife, and caused them to be buried near the center
of the green at the foot of the main street of the village. On that
occasion there was a great gathering of people, estimated at fifteen
thousand in number. The cadets from West Point were there, under the
command of the late General Worth, then a major. The corner-stone was
laid by General Hathorn, one of the survivors of the battle, then eighty
years of age. He accompanied the act with a short and feeling address. A
funeral oration was pronounced by the Reverend James R. Wilson, now of
Newburgh. Over these remains a marble monument was erected. It stands
upon three courses of brown freestone, and a stone pavement a few feet
square, designed to be surrounded by an iron railing. In consequence of
neglecting to erect the railing, the monument has suffered much from the
prevailing spirit of vandalism which I have already noticed. Its corners
are broken, the inscriptions are mutilated, and the people of Goshen are
made to feel many regrets for useless delay in giving that interesting
memorial a protection. On the east side of the pedestal is the following
inscription:

* "Erected by the inhabitants of Orange county, 22d July, 1822. Sacred
to the memory of their fellow-citizens who fell at the battle of
Minisink, 22d July, 1779." Upon the other three sides of the pedestal
are the following names of the slain: "Benjamin Tusten, colonel;
Bezaleel Tyler, Samuel Jones, John Little, John Duncan, Benjamin Vail,
captains; John Wood, lieutenant; Nathaniel Finch, adju'ant; Ephraim
Mastin, Ephraim Middaugh, ensigns; Gabriel Wisner, Esq., Stephen Mead,
Mathias Terwilliger, Joshua Lockwood, Ephraim Fergerson, Roger Townsend,
Samuel Knapp, James Knapp, Benjamin Bennet, William Barker, Jonathan
Pierce, James Little, Joseph Norris, Gilbert Vail, Abraham Shepperd,
Joel Decker, Nathan Wade, Simon Wait,------Tallmadge, Jacob Dunning,
John Carpenter, David Barney, Jonathan Haskell, Abraham Williams, James
Mosher. Isaac Ward, Baltus Nierpos, Gamaliel Bailey, Moses Thomas,
Eleazer Owens, Adam Emitter, Samuel Little, Benjamin Dunning, Samuel
Reed."

Cantonment of the Army near Newburgh.--Head-quarters of the Officers.--
Nicola's Proposition to Washington.

1782.

672New Windsor in December, 1780, where he remained until June, 1781,
when the French, who had quartered during the winter at Newport and
Lebanon, formed a junction with the Americans on the Hudson. In April,
1782, he established his head-quarters at Newburgh, two miles above the
village of New Windsor, where he continued most of the time until
November, 1783, when the Continental army was disbanded.

For a short time in the autumn of 1782, while the head-quarters of
Washington were at Newburgh, the main portion of the army was encamped
at Verplanck's Point, in pursuance of an engagement with Rochambeau to
form a junction of the American and French forces at that place, on the
return of the latter from Virginia. The allies marched eastward late in
autumn, when the American army crossed the Hudson at West Point,
traversed the mountains, and arrived in the township of New Windsor on
the 28th of November, where it was hutted for the winter. The main
portion of the army was encamped in the neighborhood of Snake Hill; of
this we will write presently. Washington continued his head-quarters at
the stone house at Newburgh; Generals Knox and Greene, who had the
immediate command of the chief forces and of the artillery, were
quartered at the house of John Ellison (now Captain Charles Morton's),
in the vicinity of the main camp near Snake Hill; Gates and St. Clair,
with the hospital stores, were at Edmonston's, at The Square; La Fayette
was at William Ellison's, near by; and the Baron Steuben was at the
house of Samuel Verplanck, on the Fishkill side of the river.

At Newburgh occurred one of the most painful events in the military life
of Washington. For a long time the discontents among the officers and
soldiers in the army respecting the arrearages of their pay and their
future prospects, had been increasing, and in the spring of 1783 became
alarmingly manifest. Complaints were frequently made to the commander-
in-chief. Feeling the justice of these complaints, his sympathy was
fully alive to the interests of his companions in arms. Colonel Nicola,
an experienced officer, and a gentleman possessed of much weight of
character, was usually the medium for communicating to him, verbally,
their complaints, wishes, and fears. In May, Colonel Nicola addressed a
letter to Washington, the tenor of which struck harshly upon the
tenderest chord in that great man's feelings. After some general remarks
on the deplorable condition of the army, and the little hope they could
have of being properly rewarded by Congress, the colonel entered into a
political disquisition on the different forms of government, and came to
the conclusion that republics are, of all others, the least susceptible
of stability, and the least capable of securing the rights, freedom, and
power of individuals. He therefore inferred that America could never
become prosperous under such a form of government, and that the English
government was nearer perfection than any other. He then proceeded to
express his opinion that such a government would be the choice of the
people, after due consideration, and added, "In this case it will, I
believe, be uncontroverted, that the same abilities which have led us
through difficulties apparently insurmountable by human power to victory
and glory--those qualities, that have merited and obtained the universal
esteem and veneration of an army--would be most likely to conduct and
direct us in the smoother paths of peace. Some people have so connected
the idea of tyranny and monarchy as to find it very difficult to
separate them. It may, therefore, be requisite to give the head of such
a constitution as I propose some title apparently more moderate; but, if
all other things were once adjusted, I believe strong arguments might be
produced for admitting the title of king, which I conceive would be
attended with some national advantage." How amazingly Colonel Nicola,
and those officers and civilians (and they, doubtless, were not a few)
whom he represented, misapprehended the true character of Washington,
may be readily inferred from the prompt and severe rebuke which they
received from his hand. The commander-in-chief replied as follows:

Washington's Letter of Rebuke to Nicola.--Patriotism of the Chief.--
Discontents in the Army.--Memorial to Congress.

673"Sir,--With a mixture of great surprise and astonishment, I have read
with attention the sentiments you have submitted to my perusal. Be
assured, sir, no occurrence in the course of this war has given me more
painful sensations than your information of there being such ideas
existing in the army as you have expressed, and which I must view with
abhorrence and reprehend with severity. For the present, the
communication of them will rest in my own bosom, unless some further
agitation of the matter shall make a disclosure necessary.

I am much at a loss to conceive what part of my conduct could have given
encouragement to an address which to me seems big with the greatest
mischiefs that can befall my country. If I am not deceived in the
knowledge of myself, you could not have found a person to whom your
schemes are more disagreeable. At the same time, in justice to my own
feelings, I must add, that no man possesses a more serious wish to see
ample justice done to the army than I do; and, as far as my power and
influence, in a constitutional way, extend, they shall be employed to
the utmost of my abilities to effect it, should there be any occasion.
Let me conjure you, then, if you have any regard for your country,
concern for yourself or posterity, or respect for me, to banish these
thoughts from your mind, and never communicate, as from yourself or any
one else, a sentiment of the like nature. I am, &c." .

In this affair the disinterested patriotism of Washington shone with its
brightest luster. At the head of a victorious army; beloved and
venerated by it and by the people; with personal influence unbounded,
and with power in possession for consummating almost any political
scheme not apparently derogatory to good government, he receives from an
officer whom he greatly esteems, and who speaks for himself and others,
an offer of the scepter of supreme rule and the crown of royalty! What a
bribe! Yet he does not hesitate for a moment; he does not stop to
revolve in his mind any ideas of advantage in the proposed scheme, but
at once rebukes the author sternly but kindly, and impresses his signet
of strongest disapprobation upon the proposal. History can not present a
parallel.

The apprehensions which this event produced in the mind of Washington,
though allayed for a while, were painfully revived a few months later.
The same circumstances of present hardship and gloomy prospects that
disturbed the army when Nicola addressed Washington, not only continued
to exist, but reasons for discontent daily increased. After the return
of the army from Verplanck's Point, and their settlement in winter
quarters in the neighborhood of Newburgh and New Windsor, the officers
and soldiers had leisure to reflect upon their situation and prospects.
Expecting a dissolution of the Revolutionary government when peace
should be established, and a thorough reorganization of civil and
military affairs, they apprehended great difficulties and losses in the
adjustment of their claims, particularly those appertaining to the long
arrearages of their pay. They were aware of the poverty of the treasury
and the inefficiency of the existing government in commanding resources
for its replenishment; a condition arising from the disposition of
individual states to deny the right of Congress to ask for pecuniary aid
from their respective treasuries in satisfying public creditors. This
actual state of things, and no apparent security for a future adjustment
of their claims, caused great excitement and uneasiness among the
officers and soldiers, and in December they addressed a memorial to
Congress on the subject of 1782 their grievances. ** A committee,
composed of General M'Dougal, Colonel Ogden, and Colonel Brooks, were
appointed to carry the memorial to Philadelphia, lay it before Congress,
and explain its import. Congress appointed a committee, consisting of a
delegate from each state, to consider the memorial. The committee
reported, and, on the 25th of January, Congress passed a series of
resolutions, which were not very satisfactory. In

* Sparks's Life and Writings of Washington, viii., 300, 302.
Washington's letter to Colonel Nicola is dated at Newburgh, 22d May,
1782.

** This memorial comprehended five different articles: 1. Present pay;
2. A settlement of the accounts of the arrearages of pay, and security
for what was due; 3. A commutation of the half-pay authorized by
different resolutions of Congress, for an equivalent in gross; 4. A
settlement of the accounts of deficiencies of rations and compensation;
5. A settlement of the accounts of deficiencies of clothing and
compensation

Resolutions of Congress respecting Claims.--The Army still
dissatisfied.--Action of the Officers.--Major Armstrong.

674regard to present pay, the superintendent of finance was directed to
make "such payment and in such measure as he shall think proper," as
soon as the state of public finances would permit. In relation to
arrearages and the settlement of accounts, it was resolved "that the
several states be called upon to complete, without delay, the
settlements with their respective lines of the army, up to the 1st day
of August, 1783, and that the superintendent of finance be directed to
take such measures as shall appear to him most proper for effecting the
settlement from that period."

Concerning security for what should be found due on such settlement,
Congress declared, by resolution, that they would "make every effort in
their power to obtain from the respective states substantial funds,
adequate to the object of funding the whole debt of the United States,
and will enter upon an immediate and full consideration of the nature of
such funds, and the most likely mode of obtaining them." * In these
resolutions, Congress, feeble in actual power and resources, made no
definite promises of present relief or future justice; and when General
Knox, who had been appointed by the army to correspond with their
committee, reported the facts, the discontent February 8, 1783 tent and
dissatisfaction was quite as great as before the action of Congress.
Some thought it necessary to further make known their sentiments and
enforce their claims, and to this end it was deemed advisable to act
with energy. A plan was arranged among a few "for assembling the
officers, not in mass, but by representation; and for passing a series
of resolutions, which, in the hands of their committee, and of their
auxiliaries in Congress, would furnish a new and powerful lever" of
operation. Major John Armstrong, ** General Gates's aid-de-camp, a young
officer of six-and-

* Journals of Congress, viii., 82. The remainder of the report was
referred to a committee consisting of Messrs. Mann, Osgood, Fitzsimmons,
Gervais, Hamilton, and Wilson.

** John Armstrong was born at Carlisle, in Pennsylvania, on the 25th of
November, 1758. He was the youngest of two sons of General John
Armstrong, of Carlisle, distinguished by his services in the French and
Indian war in 1756. In 1775, at the most critical period of the American
Revolution, young Armstrong, then a student of Princeton College, joined
the army as a volunteer in Potter's Pennsylvania regiment. He was soon
after appointed aid-de-camp by General Hugh Mercer, and remained with
him till the connection was severed on the bloody field of Princeton by
the death of his chief. He subsequently occupied the same position in
the family of Major-general Gates, and served through the campaign which
ended in the capture of Burgoyne. In 1780 he was made adjutant general
of the Southern army, but falling sick of fever on the Pedee, was
succeeded by Colonel Otho Williams, a short time previous to the defeat
at Camden. Resuming his place as aid, he remained with General Gates
till the close of the war. He was the author of the celebrated Newburgh
Addresses, the object of which has been greatly misrepresented, and very
generally misunderstood. They were intended to awaken in Congress and
the States a sense of justice toward its creditors, particularly toward
the army, then about to be disbanded without requital for its services,
toils, and sufferings. General Washington, in 1797, bore testimony to
the patriotic motives of the author. Armstrong's first civil
appointments were those of Secretary of the State of Pennsylvania, and
adjutant general, under Dickenson's and Franklin's administrations;
posts which he continued to occupy till 1787, when he was chosen a
member of the old Congress. In the autumn of the same year, he was
appointed by Congress one of the three judges for the Western Territory;
this appointment he declined, and having married, in 1789, a sister of
Chancellor Livingston, of New York, removed to that state. Here he
purchased a farm, and devoted himself to agricultural pursuits; and,
though offered by President Washington, in 1793, the place of United
States supervisor of the collection of internal revenue in the State of
New York, he declined this and other invitations to public office,
until, in the year 1800, he was elected United States senator by an
almost unanimous vote of both houses of the Legislature. Having resigned
in 1802, he was again elected in 1803, and, the year following,
appointed by Mr. Jefferson minister plenipotentiary to France; which
post, at a very critical period of our relations with that country, he
filled with distinguished ability for more than six years, discharging
incidentally the functions of a separate mission to Spain with which he
was invested. In 1812 he was appointed a brigadier general in the United
States army, and commanded in the city of New York until called by Mr.
Madison, in 1813, to the War Department. This office he accepted with
reluctance, and with little anticipation of success to our arms. In
effecting salutary changes in the army, by substituting young and able
officers for the old ones who had held subordinate stations in the army
of the Revolution, he made many enemies. The capture of the city of
Washington in 1814 led to his retirement from office. Public opinion
held him responsible for this misfortune, but, as documentary history
has shown, without justice. No man took office with purer motives, or
retired from it with a better claim to have faithfully discharged its
duties. General Armstrong died at his residence at Red Hook, N. Y., on
the 1st of April, 1843, in the eighty-fifth year of his age. He was
among the remarkable men of a remarkable generation. The productions of
his pen entitle him to rank with the ablest writers of his time and
country. These consist of a voluminous correspondence, diplomatic and
military; a valuable treatise on agriculture, the result of some
experience and much reading; and "Notices of the War of 1812," a work
written with great vigor of style. The portrait of General Armstrong,
printed on the preceding page, is from a painting in possession of his
daughter, Mrs. William B. Astor, drawn from life by John Wesley Jarvis.

Meeting of Officers privately called.--Anonymous Address to the Army.--
Dangerous Tendency of its Recommendations.

675twenty, and possessing much ability, was chosen to write an address
to the army suited to the subject; and this, with an anonymous
notification of a meeting of the officers, was circulated privately. *
The address exhibits superior talents, and was calculated to make a deep
impression upon the minds of the malcontents. Referring to his personal
feelings, and his sacrifices for his country, the writer plays upon the
sensibilities of his readers, and prepares their minds for a
relinquishment of their faith in the justice of their country, already
weakened by circumstances. "Faith," he says, "has its limits as well as
temper, and there are points beyond which neither can be stretched
without sinking into cowardice or plunging into credulity. This, my
friends, I conceive to be your situation; hurried to the verge of both,
another step would ruin you forever. To be tame and unprovoked, when
injuries press hard upon you, is more than weakness; but to look up for
kinder usage, without one manly effort of your own, would fix your
character, and show the world how richly you deserved the chains you
broke." He then takes a review of the past and present--their wrongs and
their complaints--their petitions and the denials of redress--and then
says, "If this, then, be your treatment while the swords you wear are
necessary for the defense of America, what have you to expect from
peace, when your voice shall sink, and your strength dissipate by
division; when those very swords, the instruments and companions of your
glory, shall be taken from your sides, and no remaining mark of military
distinction left but your wants, infirmities, and scars? Can you, then,
consent to be the only sufferers by the Revolution, and, retiring from
the field, grow old in poverty, wretchedness, and contempt? Can you
consent to wade through the vile mire of dependency, and owe the
miserable remnant of that life to charity, which has hitherto been spent
in honor? If you can, go, and carry with you the jest of Tories and the
scorn of Whigs; the ridicule, and, what is worse, the pity of the world!
Go, starve, and be forgotten."

The writer now changes from appeal to advice. "I would advise you,
therefore," he says, "to come to some final opinion upon what you can
bear and what you will suffer. If your determination be in proportion to
your wrongs, carry your appeal from the justice to the fears of
government. Change the milk-and-water style of your last memorial;
assume

* This notice was circulated on the 10th of March, 1783. It was in
manuscript, as well as the anonymous address that followed. The
originals were carried by a major, who was a deputy inspector under
Baron Steuben, to the office of Barber, the adjutant general, where,
every morning, aids-de-camp, majors of brigades, and adjutants of
regiments were assembled, all of whom, who chose to do so, took copies
and circulated them. Among the transcribers was the adjutant of the
commander-in-chief's guard, who probably furnished him with the copies
that were transmitted to Congress. The following is a copy of the
anonymous notification:

"A meeting of the field officers is requested at the Public Building on
Tuesday next at eleven o'clock. A commissioned officer from each company
is expected, and a delegate from the medical staff. The object of this
convention is to consider the late letter of our representatives in
Philadelphia, and what measures (if any) should be adopted to obtain
that redress of grievances which they seem to have solicited in vain."

Bold Tone of the Address.--Similar Opinions held by Hamilton.--
Washington's Counteraction.--Second anonymous Address

676a bolder tone, decent, but lively, spirited, and determined; and
suspect the man who would advise to more moderation and longer
forbearance. * Let two or three men who can feel as well as write, be
appointed to draw up _your last remonstrance_--for I would no longer
give it the suing, soft, unsuccessful epithet of _memorial_." He advises
them to talk boldly to Congress, and to warn that body that the
slightest mark of indignity from them now would operate like the grave,
to part them and the army forever; "that in any political event, the
army has its alternative. If peace, that nothing shall separate you from
your arms but death; if war, that, courting the auspices and inviting
the direction of your illustrious leader you will retire to some
unsettled country, smile in your turn, 'and mock when their fear cometh
on.' Let it represent, also, that should they comply with the request of
your late memorial, it would make you more happy, and them more
respectable."

A copy of these papers was put into the hands of the commander-in-chief
on the day of their circulation, and he wisely determined to guide and
control the proceedings thus begun, rather than to check and discourage
them by any act of severity. In general orders the March 11, 1783 next
morning, he referred to the anonymous papers and the meeting. He
expressed his disapprobation of the whole proceeding as disorderly; at
the same time, he requested that the general and field officers, with
one officer from each company, and a proper representation of the staff
of the army, should assemble at twelve o'clock on Saturday the 15th, at
the New Building (at which the other meeting was called), for the
purpose of hearing the report of the committee of the army to Congress.
He requested the senior officer in rank (General Gates) to preside at
the meeting. On the appearance of this order, the writer of the
anonymous address put forth another, rather more subdued in its tone, in
which he sought to convince the officers that Washington approved of the
scheme, the time of meeting only being changed. The design of this
interpretation the commander-in-chief took care to frustrate, by
conversing personally and individually with those officers in whose good
sense and integrity he had confidence. He impressed their minds with a
sense of the danger that must attend any rash act at such a crisis,
inculcated moderation, and exerted all

* This sentence, particularly alluded to by Washington in his address to
the officers, was the one which drew down upon the head of the writer
the fiercest anathemas of public opinion, and he alone has been held
responsible for the suggestion that the army should use its power to
intimidate Congress. Such a conclusion is unwarrantable. It is not
likely that a young man of twenty-six, acting in the capacity of aid,
should, without the promptings of men of greater experience who
surrounded him, propose so bold a measure. It is well known, too, that
many officers, whose patriotism was never suspected, were privy to the
preparation of the address, and suggested many of its sentiments; and
there ean be no reasonable doubt that General Gates was a prominent
actor. Nor was the idea confined to that particular time and place.
General Hamilton, one of the purest patriots of the Revolution, wrote to
Washington from Philadelphia, a month before (February 7, 1783), on the
subject of the grievances of the army, in which he held similar
language. After referring to the deplorable condition of the finances,
the prevailing opinion in the army "that the disposition to recompense
their services will cease with the necessity for them," and lamenting
"that appearances afford too much ground for their distrust," he held
the following language: "It becomes a serious inquiry, What is the true
line of policy? The claims of the army, urged with moderation but with
firmness, may operate on those weak minds which are influenced by their
apprehensions more than by their judgments, so as to produce a
concurrence in the measures which the exigencies of affairs demand. They
may add weight to the applications of Congress to the several states. So
far, a useful turn may be given to them."* What was this but "carrying
their appeal from the justice to the fears of government?" Hamilton
further remarked, that the difficulty would be "to keep a complaining
and suffering army within the bounds of moderation;" and advised
Washington not to discountenance their endeavors to procure redress,
but, "by the intervention of confidential and prudent persons, to take
the direction of them." Hamilton was at that time a member of Congress.
In a letter to him, written on the 12th of March, Washington remarked
that all was tranquillity in the camp until after the arrival from
Philadelphia of "a certain gentleman" (General Walter Stewart), and
intimated that the discontents in the army were made active by members
of Congress, who wished to see the delinquent states thus forced to do
justice. Hamilton, in reply, admitted that he had urged the propriety
"of uniting the influence of the public creditors" (of whom the soldiers
were the most meritorious) "and the army, to prevail upon the states to
enter into their views." ** But, while Hamilton held these views, he
deprecated the idea of the army turning its power against the civil
government. "There would be no chance of success," he said, "without
having recourse to means that would reverse our Revolution." ***

* See the Life of Hamilton, by his son, John C. Hamilton, ii., 47.

** Ibid., it.. 71.

*** Ibid., ii., 158.

Meeting called by Washington.--Major Burnet's Recollections.--
Washington's Address to the Officers.

677his powers of argument to appease their discontents. They were thus
prepared to deliberate in the proposed convention without passion, and
under a deep sense of the responsibilities which rested upon them as
patriots and leaders.

The meeting was held pursuant to "Washington's orders. There was a full
attendance of officers, and deep solemnity pervaded the assembly when
the commander-in-chief stepped forward upon the platform to read an
address which he had prepared for the occasion. * This address, so
compact in construction of language; so dignified and patriotic; so
mild, yet so severe, and, withal, so vitally important in its relation
to the well-being of the unfolding republic and the best interests of
human freedom, I here give entire, in a foot-note, for a mere synopsis
can not do it justice. **

* Major Robert Burnet, of Little Britain, Orange county, who was one of
the officers present, informed me that the most profound silence
pervaded the assembly when Washington arose to read his address. As he
put on his spectacles, * he said, "You see, gentlemen, that I have not
only grown gray but blind in your service." This simple remark, under
such circumstances, had a powerful effect upon the assemblage.
Humphreys, in his Life of Putnam, mentions this circumstance; so, also,
does Mr. Hamilton, in the Life of his father.

** "Gentlemen,--By an anonymous summons, an attempt has been made to
convene you together; how inconsistent with the rules of propriety, how
unmilitary, and how subversive of all order and discipline, let the good
sense of the army decide. In the moment of this summons, another
anonymous production was sent into circulation, addressed more to the
feelings and passions than to the reason and judgment of the army. The
author of the piece is entitled to much credit for the goodness of his
pen, and I could wish he had as much credit for the rectitude of his
heart; for, as men see through different optics, and are induced by the
reflecting faculties of the mind to use different means to attain the
same end, the author of the address should have had more charity than to
mark for suspicion the man who should recommend moderation and longer
forbearance; or, in other words, who should not think as he thinks, and
act as he advises. "But he had another plan in view, in which candor and
liberality of sentiment, regard to justice, and love of country have no
part; and he was right to insinuate the darkest suspicion to effect the
blackest design. That the address is drawn with great art, and is
designed to answer the most insidious purposes, that it is calculated to
impress the mind with an idea of premeditated injustice in the sovereign
power of the United States, and rouse all those resentments which must
unavoidably flow from such a belief; that the secret mover of this
scheme, whoever he may be, intended to take advantage of the passions
while they were warmed by the recollection of past distresses, without
giving time for cool, deliberate thinking, and that composure of mind
which is so necessary to give dignity and stability to measures, is
rendered too obvious, by the mode of conducting the business, to need
other proofs than a reference to the proceedings. "Thus much, gentlemen,
I have thought it incumbent on me to observe to you, to show upon what
principles I opposed the irregular and hasty meeting which was proposed
to have been held on Tuesday last, and not because I wanted a
disposition to give you every opportunity, consistent with your own
honor and the dignity of the army, to make known your grievances. If my
conduct heretofore has not evinced to you that I have been a faithful
friend to the army, my declaration of it at this time would be equally
unavailing and improper. But, as I was among the first who embarked in
the cause of our common country; as I have never left your side one
moment, but when called from you on public duty; as I have been the
constant companion and witness of your distresses, and not among the
last to feel and acknowledge your merits; as I have ever considered my
own military reputation as inseparably connected with that of the army;
as my heart has ever expanded with joy when I have heard its praises,
and my indignation has arisen when the mouth of detraction has been
opened against it, it can scarcely be supposed, at this last stage of
the war, that I am indifferent to its interests. But how are they to be
promoted? The way is plain, says the anonymous addresser. "If war
continues, remove into the unsettled country; there establish
yourselves, and leave an ungrateful country to defend itself." But who
are they to defend? Our wives, our children, our farms, and other
property which we leave behind us? or, in this state of hostile
separation, are we to take the two first (the latter can not be
removed), to perish in a wilderness, with hunger, cold, and nakedness?
"If peace takes place, never sheathe your swords," says he, "until you
have obtained full and ample justice. This dreadful alternative of
either deserting our country in the extremest hour of her distress, or
turning our arms against it--which is the apparent object--unless
Congress can be compelled into instant compliance, has something so
shocking in it, that humanity revolts at the idea. My God! what can this
writer have in view by recommending such measures? Can he be a friend to
the army? Can he be a friend to this country? Rather, is he not an
insidious foe? some emissary, perhaps, from New York, plotting the ruin
of both, by sowing the seeds of discord and separation between the civil
and military powers of the Continent? And what a compliment does he pay
to our understandings, when he recommends measures, in either
alternative, impracticable in their nature? "But, here, gentlemen, I
will drop the curtain, because it would be as imprudent in me to assign
my reasons for this opinion, as it would be insulting to your conception
to suppose you stood in need of them. A moment's reflection will
convince every dispassionate mind of the physical impossibility of
carrying either proposal into execution. There might, gentlemen, be an
impropriety in my taking notice, in this address to you, of an anonymous
production; but the manner in which that performance has been introduced
to the army, the effect it was intended to have, together with some
other circumstances, will amply justify my observations on the tendency
of that writing. "With respect to the advice given by the author, to
suspect the man who shall recommend moderate measures and longer
forbearance, I spurn it, as every man, who regards that liberty and
reveres that justice for which we contend, undoubtedly must; for, if men
are to be precluded from offering their sentiments on a matter which may
involve the most serious and alarming consequences that can invite the
consideration of mankind, reason is of no use to us. The freedom of
speech may be taken away, and dumb and silent we may be led, like sheep,
to the slaughter. I can not, injustice to my own belief, and what I have
great reason to conceive is the intention of Congress, conclude this
address, without giving it as my decided opinion that that honorable
body entertains exalted sentiments of the services of the army, and,
from a full conviction of its merits and sufferings, will do it complete
justice; that their endeavors to discover and establish funds for this
purpose have been unwearied, and will not cease till they have
succeeded, I have not a doubt. But, like all other large bodies, where
there is a variety of different interests to reconcile, their
determinations are slow. Why, then, should we distrust them, and, in
consequence of that distrust, adopt measures which may cast a shade over
that glory which has been so justly acquired, and tarnish the reputation
of an army which is celebrated through all Europe for its fortitude and
patriotism? And for what is this done? To bring the object we seek
nearer? No; most certainly, in my opinion, it will cast it at a greater
distance. For myself (and I take no merit in giving the assurance, being
induced to it from principles of gratitude, veracity, and justice, a
grateful sense of the confidence you have ever placed in me), a
recollection of the cheerful assistance and prompt obedience I have
experienced from you under every vicissitude of fortune, and the sincere
affection I feel for an army I have so long had the honor to command,
will oblige me to declare, in this public and solemn manner, that in the
attainment of complete justice for all your toils and dangers, and in
the gratification of every wish, so far as may be done consistently with
the great duty I owe my country, and those powers we are bound to
respect, you may freely command my services to the utmost extent of my
abilities. "While I give you these assurances, and pledge myself in the
most unequivocal manner to exert whatever ability I am possessed of in
your favor, let me entreat you, gentlemen, on your part, not to take any
measures, which, viewed in the calm light of reason, will lessen the
dignity and sully the glory you have hitherto maintained. Let me request
you to rely on the plighted faith of your country, and place a full
confidence in the purity of the intentions of Congress, that, previous
to your dissolution as an army, they will cause all your accounts to be
fairly liquidated, as directed in the resolutions which were published
to you two days ago, and that they will adopt the most effectual
measures in their power to render ample justice to you for your faithful
and meritorious services. And let me conjure you, in the name of our
common country, as you value your own sacred honor, as you respect the
rights of humanity, and as you regard the military and national
character of America, to express your utmost horror and detestation of
the man who wishes, under any specious pretenses, to overturn the
liberties of our country, and who wickedly attempts to open the flood-
gates of civil discord, and deluge our rising empire in blood. "By thus
determining and thus acting, you will pursue the plain and direct road
to the attainment of your wishes; you will defeat the insidious designs
of our enemies, who are compelled to resort from open force to secret
artifice; you will give one more distinguished proof of unexampled
patriotism and patient virtue rising superior to the pressure of the
most complicated sufferings; and you will, by the dignity of your
conduct, afford occasion for posterity to say, when speaking of the
glorious example you have exhibited to mankind, 'Had this day been
wanting, the world had never seen the last stage of perfection to which
human nature is capable of attaining.'--Journals of Congress, viii.,
180-183.

* It is said that the identical spectacles used by Washington during the
Revolution are now (1850) in the possession of an aged lady, named
Marsh, who resides in Detroit, Michigan. They came to her from a
deceased relative, who exchanged spectacles with the general. "They are
of a heavy silver frame," says the Detroit Advertiser, "with very large,
round glasses, and apparently constructed after the style we have been
accustomed to see, in the books, upon the nose of Red Riding Hood's
grandmother.'

Washington's Address.--Action of the Meeting of Officers.--A strong
Resolution

678After reading the address, Washington retired without uttering a
word, leaving the officers to deliberate without restraint. Their
conference was brief; their deliberations short. They passed
resolutions, by unanimous vote, thanking their chief for the course he
had pursued; expressing their unabated attachment to his person and
their country; declaring their unshaken confidence in the good faith of
Congress, and their determination to bear with patience their
grievances, until in due time they should be redressed.

One of the resolutions is expressed in the following strong language:

"Resolved unanimously, That the officers of the American army view with
abhorrence and reject with disdain the infamous propositions contained
in a late anonymous address to the officers of the army, and resent with
indignation the secret attempts of some unknown persons to collect the
officers together in a manner totally subversive of all discipline and
good order." At that time the author of the anonymous addresses was
unknown except to a few; and for forty years there was no certainty in
the publie mind that Major Armstrong was the writer. That he was
generally suspected of being the author, among those who were acquainted
with his abilities, is evident from a letter to him written by Colonel
Timothy Pickering, in after years, in which he says, that so certain was
he, at the time, of the identity of the author, that he endorsed the
copy of the address which he received, "Written by Major John Armstrong,
Jr." An article appeared in the January number of the United States
Magazine for 1823, in which the author, understood to be General
Armstrong, avowed himself the writer of the Newburgh Addresses. The
article in question contains a history of the event we have been just
considering, and defends the course of the writer on that occasion with
the plea that apparent urgent necessity justified the act. Subsequent
events proved the writer to be mistaken in his views, and his
proposition to be highly dangerous to the common good. General Armstrong
has, consequently, been greatly censured, and his patriotism has been
questioned by writers and speakers who have judged him by results
instead of by the circumstances in which he was placed. I can see no
reason to doubt the purity of his motives and the sincerity of his
patriotism. Other men, as we have noticed in a preceding note, who were
far above suspicion, held similar views. Unfortunately for his
reputation, in this particular, he was the aid-de-camp and confident of
Gates, whose ambition had made him a plotter against Washington. In
faet, the commander-in-chief plainly alluded to Gates, when, writing to
Hamilton concerning the scheme, he said that some believed it to be "the
illegitimate offspring of a person in the army."

It appears that the first president was made acquainted with the
authorship of these addresses toward the close of his seeond
administration, some fourteen years after they were penned. His estimate
of the motives of the writer may be understood by the following letter,
addressed to Armstrong:

"Philadelphia, February 23d, 1797.

"Sir,--Believing that there may be times and occasions on whieh my
opinion of the anonymous letters and the author, as delivered to the
army in the year 1783, may be turned to some personal and malignant
purpose, I do hereby declare, that I did not, at the time of writing my
address, regard you as the author of said letters; and further, that I
have since had sufficient reason for believing that the object of the
author was just, honorable, and friendly to the eountry, though the
means suggested by him were certainly liable to much misunderstanding
and abuse.

"I am, sir, with great regard, your most obedient servant, George
Washington."

Record of Proceedings sent to Congress.--Washington's Opinion of
Armstrong's Motives.--His farewell Address

679signed by General Gates, as president of the meeting; and on the
18th, WashingtonMarch, 1783ton, in general orders, expressed his entire
satisfaction. All the papers relating to the affair were transmitted to
Congress, and entered at length upon their Journals. *

It was in this old building at Newburgh, on the porch of which we are
sitting, that Washington wrote his address to the officers, on the
occasion just considered; and here, also, he penned his admirable
circular letter addressed to the governors of all the states, on
disbanding the army. This was his last official communication with these
functionaries. June 8. 1783 "This letter," says Sparks, "is remarkable
for its ability, the deep interest it manifests for the officers and
soldiers who had fought the battles of their country, the soundness of
its principles, and the wisdom of its counsels. Four great points he
aims to enforce, as essential in guiding the deliberations of every
public body, and as claiming the serious attention of every citizen,
namely, an indissoluble union of the states; a sacred regard to public
justice; the adoption of a proper military peace establishment; ** and a
pacific and friendly disposition among the people of the states which
should induce them to forget local prejudices, and incline them to
mutual concessions for the advantage of the community. These he calls
the pillars by which alone independence and national character can be
supported. On each of these topics he remarks at considerable length,
with a felicity of style and cogency of reasoning in all respects worthy
of the subject. No public address could have been better adapted to the
state of the times; and coming from such a source, its influence on the
minds of the people must have been effectual and most salutary." *** The
Legislatures that were then in session passed resolves highly
commendatory of the public acts of the commander-in-ehief; and he
received letters from several of the governors, expressing their thanks
and gratitude for his long and successful services in the cause of his
country.

Many of the troops now went home on furlough, and Washington, having
leisure, pro-

* Journals of Congress, vol. viii.

** Washington proposed the establishment of a military academy at West
Point as early as April, 1783 His proposition will be hereafter noticed.

*** Sparks's Life and Writings of Washington, i., 395.

Washington's Tour to the Northern Battle Fields.--Called to Princeton.--
A Statue ordered by Congress.--General Clinton

680ceeded up the Hudson with Governor Clinton to visit the principal
fields of military operations at the north. He passed over the battle
ground at Stillwater, with Generals Schuyler and Gansevoort, and
extended his journey as far northward as Ticonderoga and Crown Point,
and westward to Fort Schuyler (now Rome), on the Mohawk. He returned to
Newburgh after an absence of nineteen days, where he found a letter from
the President of Congress requesting his attendance upon that body, then
in session at Princeton, in New Jersey. While he was awaiting the
convalescence of Mrs. Washington, and preparing to go, Congress
conferred upon the chief the distinguished honor of voting, unanimously,
that an equestrian statue of him should be executed by the best artist
in Europe, under the direction of the minister of the United States at
the court of Versailles, and erected at the place where the residence of
Congress should be established. * Like other similar memorials
authorized by Congress to be made in honor of their servants, this
statue has never been constructed.

Upon the lawn before us, now covered with the matted and dull-green
grass of autumn, Washington parted with many of his subalterns and
soldiers forever, on the day he left the August 18, 1783 army to attend
upon Congress at Princeton. It was an affecting prelude to the final
parting with his official companions in arms at Fraunce's tavern, in New
York, a few months subsequently, and furnishes a noble subject for the
pencil of art. The scenery is beautiful and grand, and here I would fain
loiter all the day, musing upon the events which hallow the spot; but
the sun has climbed high toward meridian, and I must hasten away to
adjacent localities, all of which are full of interest.

I left Newburgh toward noon, and rode down to New Windsor, two miles
below, along a fine sandy road upon the beach. The little village, once
the rival of Newburgh, is nestled in a pleasant nook near the confluence
of Chambers's Creek with the Hudson, on the western rim of the bay. Its
sheltered position and fertile acres wooed the exploring emigrants from
Ireland, who were seeking a place whereon to pitch their tents on the
banks of the Hudson, and here some of them sat down. Among them was
Charles Clinton; and at a place called Little Britain, a few miles
interior, were born his four sons; two of whom, James and George, were
distinguished men of the Revolution. The former was a major general in
the army, and the latter a brigadier, and Governor of New York during
the contest.

New Windsor claims the distinction of being the birth-place of Governor
Dewitt Clinton, a son of General James Clinton;

* The following is a description of the proposed statue, as given in the
resolution of Congress adopted on the 7th of August, 1783: "Resolved,
That the statue be of bronze: the general to be represented in a Roman
dress, holding a truncheon in his right hand, and his head encircled
with a laurel wreath. The statue to be supported by a marble pedestal,
on which are to be represented, in basso relievo, the following
principal events of the war, in which General Washington commanded in
person, viz., the evacuation of Boston; the capture of the Hessians at
Trenton; the battle of Princeton; the action of Monmouth; and the
surrender of York. On the upper part of the front of the pedestal to be
engraved as follows: The United States in Congress assembled, ordered
this statue to be erected in the year of our Lord 1783, in honor of
George Washington, the illustrious commander-in-chief of the armies of
the United States of America, during the war which vindicated and
secured their liberty, sovereignty, and independence."

** A biographical sketch of General Clinton may be found on page 272,
ante, and also a brief notice of his father on page 255

A very little Maiden.--Her Dignity.--Plum Point--Fortifications there.--
An Acrostic.

681but evidence is adduced to prove that a violent snow storm, which
detained his mother at "the Fort," in Deerpark, the residence of her
brother, deprived the village of the intended honor. * Although denied
the distinction of the paternity of a great man, it can boast the
residence, for a time, of one of the smallest of women, beautiful,
witty, and good. The name of this "pretty, charming little creature" was
Anna Brewster; her height, in womanhood, three feet; her symmetry of
form perfect; her face sweet and intelligent; her mind active and pure;
her extraction truly noble, for her ancestor was Elder Brewster, of the
May Flower. Too little to be wooed, too wise to be won, she was loved
and admired by every body. She lived a charming maiden until she was
seventy-five years old, when she died. Fifty years before, a rustic
poet, inspired by her charms during an evening passed in her company,
portrayed her character in verse. **

Mrs. Washington, pleased with the sprightly little maiden, invited her,
on one occasion, to visit her at head-quarters while the chief was at
New Windsor, *** but she declined, believing it to be curiosity rather
than respect that prompted the invitation. It was a mistake; but she had
through life such a dignified self-respect, that it repelled undue
familiarity, and closed all opportunities for the indulgence of prying
curiosity.

From New Windsor I rode to Plum Island, or Plum Point, the fine estate
of Philip A. Verplanek, Esq. At high tide, this alluvial height, which
rises about one hundred and twenty feet above the Hudson, is an island,
approached by a narrow causeway from the main, which bridges a rivulet,
with a heavy stone arch. Murderer's Creek washes its southwestern
border, and a marsh and rivulet inclose it upon the land side. Upon a
broad, level table-land of some thirty-five acres in extent, stands the
mansion of Mr. Verplanck, noted for the beauty and grandeur of the
scenery which encompasses it. Accompanied by the proprietor, I strolled
down the winding pathway to the base of the steep river bank, where,
overgrown by a new forest, are well-preserved remains of a
fortification, erected there

* See Eager's History of Orange County, page 630.

** His poetic effort produced the following ACROSTIC

A pretty, charming little creature, N eat and complete in every feature,
N ow at New Windsor may be acen, A ll beauteous in her air and mien. B
irth and power, wealth and fame, R ise not to view when her we name: E
very virtue in her shine, W isely nice, but not o'er fine. S he has a
soul that's great, 'tie said, T hough small's the body of this maid: E
'en though the casket is but small, R eason proclaims the jewel's all.

October 8, 1791.

*** Washington established his head-quarters at New Windsor village,
first on the 23d of June, 1779, and again toward the close of 1780,
where he remained till the summer of 1781. He lived at a plain Dutch
house, long since decayed and demolished. In that humble tenement Lady
Washington entertained the most distinguished officers and their ladies,
as well as the more obscure who sought her friendship. On leaving New
Windsor in June, 1781, Washington established his quarters, for a short
time, at Peekskill.

**** This view is from the interior of the redoubt looking eastward upon
the river. In the distance is seen Pollopel's Island, near the upper
entrance to the Highlands, beyond which rise the lofty Beacon Hills,
whereon alarm-fires often gleamed during the war.

Redoubt on Plum Point.--Chevaux-de-frise.--Anecdote.--Head-quarters of
Greene and Knox

682partly at an early period of the war, and partly when the American
army was in the vicinity. It was a redoubt, with a battery of fourteen
guns, and was designed to cover strong _chevaux-de-frise_ and other
obstructions placed in the river, and extending from the flat below
Murderer's Creek to Pollopel's Island. * It would also rake the river
channel at the opening in the Highlands. The _chevaux-de-frise_ were
constructed under the superintendence of Captain Thomas Machin, in the
summer of 1778. Had they and the strong redoubt on Plum Point been in
existence a year sooner, the marauding expedition of Vaughan and
Wallace, up the Hudson, could not have occurred. The remains of this
battery, the old Continental road, and the cinders of the forges, extend
along the river bank several hundred feet. The embrasures are also very
prominent.

Mr. Verplanck pointed out the remains of the cellar of a log-house,
which stood a little above the battery, and belonged to a man named
M'Evers, long before the Revolution. M'Evers was a Scotchman, and when
about to emigrate to America, he asked his servant, Mike, if he would
accompany him. Mike, who was faithful, and much attached to his master,
at once consented to go, saying, in illustration of the force of his
love, "Indeed, gude mon, I'll follow ye to the gates o' hell, if ye gang
there yersel'." The voyage was long and tempestuous, and instead of
entering New York harbor by the Narrows, the vessel sailed through Long
Island Sound and the East River. At the whirlpool called _Hellgate_, the
ship struck upon the _Hog's Back_ with a terrible crash. The passengers,
in affright, rushed upon deck, and none was more appalled than Mike. The
vessel arrived safely in New York, gardener on Plum Point.

A pleasant ride of about three miles westward from Plum Point placed me
at the residence of Charles E. Morton, Esq., a picturesque old mansion
on the south side of the New Windsor road. It was built about 1735 ** by
John Ellison, one of the first settlers in New Windsor. The material is
stone, and its dormer windows and spacious and irregular roof give it
the appearance of a large cottage in rural England. A living stream
passes through a rocky glen within a few yards of it. Just below is the
old mill, erected more than a hundred years ago by the first proprietor;
nor has the monotonous music of its stones and hopper yet ceased.

This old mansion was the head-quarters of Generals Greene and Knox while
Washington was domiciled at the Hasbrouck House in Newburgh, and it was
from hence that the com-

* According to a survey made by Henry Wisner and Gilbert Livingston in
the autumn of 1776, the channel of the river, wherein these chevaux-de-
frise were placed, was about fifty feet deep, and eighty chains, or
about five thousand two hundred and eighty feet broad. The channel east
of Pollopel's Island was not deep enough for the passage of ships of
war.

** One of the fire-places has a cast-iron back, on which, in raised
letters, is the date 1734.

*** This view is from the turnpike road, looking southeast. The water in
front is a mill-pond, over the dam of which passes a foot-bridge. The
mill is hidden by the trees in the ravine below. This side was
originally the rear of the house, the old Goshen road passing upon the
other side. The old front is a story and a half high. Captain Morton,
the proprietor, is a son of the late General Jacob Morton, of New York
city.

Ball at the Quarters of Greene and Knox.--Signatures of young Ladies.--
Washington on Dancing.--The Square.

683mander-in-chief, accompanied by those generals, after taking some
refreshments, rode to the "New Building," to attend the meeting of
officers convened by Washington on account of the anonymous addresses
just considered. Here the accomplished Lucy Knox gave her choice
_soirées_, graced by the presence of Mrs. Washington, and other ladies
of taste and refinement with which that region abounded; and here, if
tradition is truthful, Washington opened a ball on one occasion, having
for his partner Maria Colden, then one of the pretty belles of Orange
county. *

I dined with Mr. Morton in the old drawing-room, which, with the other
apartments, is preserved by him, with scrupulous care, in the original
style. The ceilings are high, and the wainscoting displays architectural
taste. The heavy window-sashes, with their small squares of glass,
remain; very few of the panes have been broken and replaced since the
Revolution. On one of them, inscribed by a diamond, are the names of
three young ladies of the "olden time" (Sally Janson, Gitty Winkoop, and
Maria Colden), one of whom was the reputed partner of Washington at the
ball. May not these names have been written on that occasion?

Believing it probable, I copied the signatures, and present them here
for the gratification of the curious and the sentimental.

In October, 1777, the vicinage we are now considering was the scene of
much commotion.

Forts Clinton and Montgomery, amoung the Hudson Highlands, fell beneath
one heavy blow, suddenly and artfully dealt by a British force from New
York, and the smitten October 6, 1777 garrisons were scattered like
frightened sheep upon the mountains; not, however, until they had
disputed the possession of the fortresses with the besiegers long and
desperately. General James Clinton and his brother George were in
command of the fortresses, and escaped up the river. At a place
afterward called _Washington Square_, ** about four

* I was informed by the venerable Mrs. Hamilton that Washington never
danced. He often attended balls by invitation, and sometimes walked the
figures, but she never saw him attempt to dance. Probably no lady of
that day, if we except Mrs. Knox, was more often at parties and social
gatherings with Washington than Mrs. Hamilton. It may not be
inappropriate here to give a copy of a letter on the subject of dancing,
written by Washington a short time before his death. It was in reply to
an invitation from a committee of gentlemen of Alexandria to attend the
dancing assemblies at that place. I copied it from the original in the
Alexandria Museum.

* "To Messrs. Jonathan Swift, George Doncale, William Newton, Robert
Young, Charles Alexander, Jr., James H. Hoole, Managers..

* "Mount Vernon, 12th November, 1799.

* "Gentlemen,--Mrs. Washington and myself have been honored with your
polite invitation to the assemblies of Alexandria this winter, and thank
you for this mark of your attention. But, alas! our dancing days are no
more. We wish, however, all those who have a relish for so agreeable and
innocent an amusement all the pleasure the season will afford them; and
I am, gentlemen,

* "Your most obedient and obliged humble servant,

* "Geo. Washington."

* "The Square" is a small district of country, and so called from the
fact that the public roads ran in such a direction as to form a diamond-
shaped inclosure, as seen in the diagram, in which a is the road to
Newburgh; b, to Goshen; c, to Little Britain; and d, to New Windsor. 1
denotes the house of Mrs Falls; 2, the quarters of St. Clair and Gates;*
and, 3, the quarters of La Fayette.

* There are two ancient houses at this angle of "The Square," but I
could not ascertain which was occupied by those officers. It is
probable, however, that the one on the northwest aide of the road, which
is supposed to have been Edmonston's, was the one.

A Spy in the American Camp.--Dispatch in a silver Bullet.--Name and Fate
of the Spy

684miles west of the village of New "Windsor, Governor Clinton
established his head-quarters at the house of a Mrs. Falls, and there
the dispersed troops were collected, preparatory to their marching for
the defense of Kingston.

At about noon on the 10th of October,1777 a horseman, apparently in
great haste, approached the disordered camp. The sentinel on duty
challenged him, when he replied, I am a friend, and wish to see General
Clinton." The horseman was a messenger, bearing a secret dispatch from
Sir Henry Clinton to Burgoyne, the latter being then hedged round by the
Americans at Saratoga. The messenger supposed the American forces in the
Highlands to be utterly broken and destroyed, and having never heard of
a general Clinton ** in the patriot army, he believed himself to be
among his friends. He was conducted to Clinton's quarters, and, when
ushered into his presence, he perceived his mistake. "I am lost!" he
exclaimed, in a half subdued voice, and immediately cast something into
his mouth and swallowed it. Suspicion was aroused, and he was arrested.
Dr. Moses Higby, who was then residing near Mrs. Falls's, was summoned.
He administered to the prisoner a powerful dose of tartar emetic, which
soon brought from his stomach a silver bullet of an oval form. Though
closely watched, the prisoner succeeded in swallowing it a second time.
He now refused the emetic, but yielded when Governor Clinton threatened
to hang him upon a tree and search his stomach by the aid of the
surgeon's knife. The bullet again appeared. It was a curiously-wrought
hollow sphere, fastened together in the center by a compound screw.
Within it was found a piece of thin paper, on which was written the
following note: ***

"Fort Montgomery, October 8,1777.

"_Nous y voici,_ **** and nothing now between us and Gates. I sincerely
hope this little success of ours may facilitate your operations. In
answer to your letter of the 28th of September, by C. C., (v) I shall
only say, I can not presume to order, or even advise, for reasons
obvious. I heartily wish you success.

"Faithfully yours, H. Clinton.

"Gen. Burgoyne."

The prisoner's guilt was clear; _out of his own mouth_ he was condemned.
Governor Clinton soon afterward marched to Esopus, or Kingston, taking
the spy with him. At Hurley, a few miles from Kingston, he was tried,
condemned, and hanged upon an apple-tree near the old church, while the
village of Esopus was in flames, lighted by the marauding enemy. (vi)

* This house, now (1850) owned by Mr. Samuel Moore, is a frame
building*, and stands on the right side of the New Windsor road, at the
southeastern angle of "The Square." It is surrounded by locust and large
balm-of-Gilead trees. There Major Armstrong wrote the famous Newburgh
Addresses, and there those in the secret held their private conferences.

** The British officers in this country adhered pertinaciously to the
resolution of not dignifying the rebel officers with their assumed
titles. They were called Mr. Washington, Mr. Clinton, Mr. Greene, &c. It
is amusing to look over the Tory newspapers of the day, particularly
Rivington's Gazette, and observe the flippant and attempted witty manner
in which the American generalissimo was styled Mister Washington.

*** Letter of Governor Clinton to the Council of Safety, dated "Head-
quarters, Mrs. Falls's, 11th October, 1777."

**** "Here we are." I copied this note from a transcript in the
handwriting of Governor Clinton, which is among the manuscripts of
General Gates in the library of the New York Historical Society. It is
endorsed "Sir Henry Clinton to J. Burgoyne, 8th of October, 1777, found
in a silver bullet." That identical bullet was, a few years ago, in the
possession of the late General James Tallmadge, executor of the will of
Governor George Clinton. It is now the property of one of Clinton's
descendants.

* (v) Captain Campbell. See page 79, vol. i.

* (vi) The name of the spy was Daniel Taylor. He was a sergeant in the
British service. The father of the late Judge Woodward, of the Supreme
Court of the State of New York, acted as judge-advocate on the occasion.
On page 389, ante, I have alluded to this occurrence, and remarked that
Kingston was the place of the execution of the spy. Hurley was then
included in the township of Kingston.

Site and probable Form of the Temple.--View from it.--The Camp Ground
and Vicinity.

685Leaving Mr. Morton's, I proceeded to visit the site of the "New
Building," or Temple, as it was called, where the meeting of officers
was held.

It is in a field now belonging to Mr. William M'Gill (formerly to the
late Jabez Atwood), upon a commanding eminence about one hundred rods
east of the road to Newburgh, and two miles northward of Morton's. The
day was foggy and drizzly, and the distant scenery was entirely hidden
from view; but, on a second visit, upon a bright summer day, with some
Newburgh friends, I enjoyed the magnificent prospect to be obtained from
that observatory.

On the southeast loomed the lofty Highlands, cleft by the Hudson; North
and South Beacons, and Butter Hill, rising above their hundred lesser
companions, were grouped in a picture of magnificence and beauty.
Glittering in meridian sunlight were the white houses of Cornwall and
Canterbury; and far up the slopes of the mountains, stretching westward
to Woodcock Hill, yellow grain-fields and acres of green maize
variegated the landscape. In the far distance, on the northwest, was the
upper Shawan-gunk range, and an occasional glimpse was caught of the
blue high peaks of the Catskills, sixty miles northward. Across the
meadows westward we could distinctly trace the line of the old causeway,
constructed while the army was encamped there; and in the groves which
skirt the slopes (whither we soon afterward went) we found the remains
of several huts that were built for the use of the soldiers.

The _Temple_ was a large, temporary structure, erected by command of
Washington for the several purposes of a chapel for the army, a lodge-
room for the fraternity of Free-masons which existed

* This view is from the site of the Temple, looking southeast. In the
distance is seen the opening of the Highlands into Newburgh Bay. On the
right is Butter Hill, and near it is the village of Cornwall. The form
and appearance of the Temple was drawn from the description given by
Major Burnet, and doubtless has a general resemblance to the original.

** This is from a painting by Tice, in my possession. The land on which
the encampment on the west side of the meadow was, is now owned chiefly
by Gilbert Tompkins and Nathaniel Moore. This view is from the land of
Mr. Tompkins, looking east-southeast. On the slopes seen in the
foreground, and on the margin of the meadow beyond, Van Cortlandt's New
York regiment, and the Maryland and Virginia troops were encamped. On
the east side of the meadow, upon the most distant elevation in the
middle ground, the New England troops were stationed. On the slope
toward the right of that elevation stood the Temple. In the distance is
seen the upper entrance of the Hudson into the Highlands. The meadow was
formerly ealled Beaver Dam Swamp, from the circumstance that beavers
constructed dams at the lower extremity, causing the waters to overflow
the low grounds. The Americans built a causeway across, and a stone
dike, or levee, on the west side, to protect their parade. I saw the
remains of this causeway; its site is marked by the light lino across
the flat. About a quarter of a mile north of the site of the Temple is
an ancient stone house, seen in the picture, the only dwelling near in
the time of the war. It was built by Samuel P. Brewster in 1768, as
appears from an inscribed stone in the front wall. It was owned by a Mr.
Moore. Its present occupant is Francis Weyant.

The Temple as described by Major Burnet.--Two living Patriots.--Visit to
Major Burnet.

686among the officers, and for public meetings of various kinds. When
erected, it was called _The Temple of Virtue_; when dedicated, the
suffix was properly omitted, and it was named simply _The Temple_. The
orgies held on the occasion of its dedication disrobed it of its mantle
of purity. It was described to me by Major Burnet, who is still living
(1851) in the neighborhood, as a structure of rough-hewn logs, oblong
square in form, one story in height, a door in the middle, many windows,
and a broad roof. The windows were square, unglazed, and about the size
of ordinary port-holes in a man-of-war. There was a small gallery, or
raised platform, at one end, for speakers and presiding officers. We
traced, near an old apple-tree in Mr. M'Gill's field, evident lines of
the foundation of the building. It must have been some eighty feet long
and forty wide. On the crown of the hill northward are traces of fire-
places, and there, at the beginning of the present century, a long
building was standing. Some have supposed this to have been the Temple;
it was only the barracks for the New England troops stationed there. In
a few years those faint land-marks and that old apple-tree will be no
more seen.

The spot is consecrated by one of the loftiest exhibitions of true
patriotism with which our Revolutionary history abounds. There love of
country, and devotion to exalted principles, achieved a wonderful
triumph over the seductive power of self-love and individual interest,
goaded into rebellion against higher motives by the lash of apparent
injustice and personal suffering. It is, indeed, a hallowed spot; and if
the old stone house at Newburgh is worthy of the fostering regard of the
state because it was the head-quarters of the beloved Washington, surely
the site of the Temple, where he achieved his most glorious victory,
deserves some monument to perpetuate the memory of its place and
associations.

At Little Britain, a few miles from the _Temple_, and within a quarter
of a mile of each other, reside two of the sons of Orange county, who
loved and served Washington and their country in the war for
independence. These are Robert Burnet and Usual Knapp. Of the once long
list of Revolutionary pensioners in Orange county, these only remain,
honored living witnesses of the prowess of those who wrestled
successfully for freedom. I left the Temple field on the occasion of my
first visit with the intention of seeing these patriot fathers, but
missing the proper road, and the night shadows coming thickly with the
fog and rain, I made my way back to Newburgh.

Kind friends afterward procured likenesses and autographs of both for
me. * Better than this, I subsequently enjoyed the pleasure of a
personal interview with Major Burnet at his residence. It was on the
occasion of my second visit to the camp ground. At dark, on that August
i, sultry day, we made our way up a green lane, flanked by venerable
willows--a few 1850-cast down by a recent tornado--and sat down in the
spacious hall of the old soldier's man-

* I am indebted to Mr. Charles U. Cushman, of Newburgh, for a
daguerreotype, from life, of Major Burnet, from which the picture above
was copied. The likeness of Mr. Knapp is from an excellent painting of
the almost centenarian's head, by Mr. Charles W. Tice, an accomplished
self-taught artist of Newburgh, who kindly furnished me with a copy for
my use.

Public Life of Major Burnet and Sergeant Knapp.--Washington's Letter to
Greene.

687sion. He had just retired to his bed-room, but soon appeared,
standing before us as erect and manly as if in the prime of his life,
although then in his ninetieth year.

The father of Major Burnet was a Scotchman, his mother a native of
Ireland. He was a lieutenant in Captain Stevens's company, and commanded
Redoubt No. 3, at West Point, at the time of Arnold's defection. He
afterward attained to the rank of major in the service, and was one of
the delegates who attended the meeting of officers at the Temple. * He
continued in the army, under the immediate command of the chief, until
the disbanding of the forces in 1783. When the Americans marched into
the city of New York as the British evacuated it, he commanded the rear
guard. He told me that he remembered November 25, 1783 distinctly the
dignified appearance of Washington, when, with Governor Clinton and
other civil and military officers, he stood in front of an old stone
house, ** about two miles below Kingsbridge, while the troops, with
uncovered heads, passed by. He saw Cunningham, the wicked provost-
marshal at New York, strongly guarded by his friends, in the march to
the place of embarkation, while the exasperated populace were eager to
seize and punish him according to his deservings.

Major Burnet was also present when Washington finally parted with his
officers at Fraunce's *** tavern, in New York. How could the heart do
otherwise than beat quick and strong with deep feeling, while conversing
face to face with one who grasped the hand of the chief on that
occasion, so pathetically described by Marshall and others! The lips of
the patriot quivered with emotion while speaking of that scene, and I
perceived my own eye dimmed with the rheum of sympathetic sentiment.
Major Burnet has seen, what few men in modern times have beheld, the
living representatives of seven generations of his kindred: his great-
grandfather, grandfather, father, himself, his chilerward he served
under General Wooster in the skirmish at Ridgefield. (v) When La Fayette

* Washington, in a letter to General Greene, dated "Newburgh, 6th
February, 1782," refers to Mr. Burnet as follows: "I intended to write
you a long letter on sundry matters; but Major Burnet came unexpectedly
at a time when I was preparing for the celebration of the day, and was
just going to a review of the troops previous to the feu de joie. * As
he is impatient, from an apprehension that the sleighing may fail, and
as he can give you the occurrences of this quarter more in detail than I
have time to do, I will refer you to him."

** This stone house is yet standing. A drawing of it may bo found in
another part of this work. It has other interesting reminiscences.

*** This tavern, now (1850) the Broad Street Hotel, is well preserved.
It stands on the corner of Broad and Pearl Streets. A drawing of it may
be found on page 633, vol. ii.

**** Died Dec. 1, 1854, aged 92 years and 9 months. See page 408.

* The anniversary of the signing of the treaty of alliance between the
United States and France is here alluded to. It was late when we said
farewell to Major Burnet--too late to visit his neighbor, Mr. Knapp, who
was ninety-one years of age, and quite feeble. From another I learned
the principal events of his public life, and obtained his autograph, a
facsimile of which is here given, with his portrait. Mr. Knapp was born
in Connecticut, in 1759. He joined the army when about eighteen years of
age. His first experience in warfare was in the battle at White Plains;
aft-

The Commander-in-chief's Guard.--Its Organization, Character, and
Uniform.--Its Officers

688enrolled his corps of-light infantry, Mr. Knapp became a member, and
with them fought in the battle at Monmouth, in June, 1778. * He was soon
afterward chosen a member of the _Commander-in-chief's Guard_, and
served faithfully as a sergeant therein for more than two years.

He left the service in 1782, bearing the approbation of Washington. He
is believed to be the only surviving member of that well-disciplined
corps of the Revolution, Washington's Life Guard. **

Although feeble in body, I was informed that his mind was

* Many of the muskets which belonged to that corps are now preserved in
the Relic Room of the Headquarters at Newburgh. La Fayette purchased
them with his own money in France, and presented them to his favorite
corps.

** The Commander-in-chiefs Guard, commonly called The Life Guard, was a
distinct corps of superior men, attached to the person of the commander-
in-chief, but never spared in battle. It was organized in 1776, soon
after the siege of Boston, while the American army was encamped upon
York or Manhattan Island, near the city of New York., r It consisted of
a major's command--one hundred and eighty men. Caleb Gibbs, of Rhode
Island, was its first chief, and bore the title of captain commandant.
He held that office until the close of 1779, when he was succeeded by
William Colfax, one of his lieutenants. Gibbs's lieutenants were Henry
P. Livingston, of New York, William Colfax, of New Jersey, and Benjamin
Goymes, of Virginia. Colonel Nicholas, of Virginia, was a lieutenant
under Colfax. The latter officer remained in command of the corps until
the disbanding of the army in 1783. The terms of enlistment into the
Guard were the same as those into any other corps of the regular army,
except in the matter of qualification. They were selected with special
reference to their physical, moral, and intellectual character; and it
was considered a mark of peculiar distinction to belong to the
Commander-in-chief's Guard. From George W. P. Custis, Esq., of Arlington
House, Virginia, I learned many particulars respecting this corps. Mr.
Custis is a grandson of Lady Washington, and the adopted son of the
general. He was acquainted with several of the officers and privates of
the Guard, distinctly remembers their uniform, and is familiar with
their history. He owns a flag which once belonged to the Guard. It is
now in the museum at Alexandria, on the Potomac, where I sketched the
annexed representation of it. The flag is white silk, on which the
device is neatly painted. One of the Guard is seen holding a horse, and
is in the act of receiving a flag from the Genius of Liberty, who is
personified as a woman leaning upon the Union shield, near which is the
American eagle. The motto of the corps, "Conquer or Die," is upon a
ribbon. The uniform of the Guard consisted of a blue coat with white
facings, white waistcoat and breeches, black half gaiters, a cocked hat
with a blue and white feather. They carried muskets, and occasionally
side arms.

* The corps varied in numbers at different periods. At first it
consisted of one hundred and eighty men. During the winter of 1779-80,
when the American army under Washington was cantoned at Morristown, in
close proximity to the enemy, it was increased to two hundred and fifty.
In the spring it was reduced to its original number; and in 1783, the
last year of service, it consisted of only sixty-four non-commissioned
officers and privates. Care was always taken to have all the states,
from which the Continental army was supplied with troops, represented in
this corps. Peter Force, Esq., of Washington City, kindly allowed me to
copy the names of the Guard, contained in an original Return in his
possession, bearing the date of March 2, 1783. It is signed by Colfax,
and on the back is an endorsement in the handwriting of Washington, a
fac simile of which is given on the next page. I found in the archives
of the State Department another Return, dated June 4th, 1783. ** It is
one of the last Returns made to the commander-in-chief, for the army was
disbanded soon afterward. The roll is precisely the same as that in
possession of Mr. Foree, with the exception of the omission of the names
of John Dent, corporal, and Samuel Wortman, private, in the June Return.
Dennis Moriarty, who was a corporal in March, appears as a private in
June. The latter Return is signed by Colfax, with his certification that
"The above list includes the whole of the Guard." It is endorsed,
"Return of the non-commissioned officers and privates in the Commander-
in-chiefs Guard, who are engaged to serve during the war."

I have been thus particular respecting this corps, because history is
almost silent upon the subject, and because the living witnesses, now
almost extinct, will take with them the unwritten records of the Guard
into the oblivion of the grave.

* Massachusetts.--John Phillips, sergeant; John Derrick, corporal; Isaac
Manning, fifer; Joseph Vinci, John Barton, Joel Crosby, privates.

* Rhode Island.--Davia Brown, sergeant; Randall Smith, Reuben Thompson,
William Tanner, Solomon Daley, privates. Connecticut.--Elihu Hancock,
corporal; Dinn Manning [see notice of him on page 607], drum major;
Jared Goodrich and Frederic Park Jifers; Peter Holt, Jedediah Brown,
Leri Dean, James Dady, Henry Wallace, Elijah Lawrence, privates.

* New York.--John Robinson, Jacob Schriver, Edward Wiley, John Cole,
privates.

* New Jersey.--Jonathan Moore, Benjamin Eaton, Stephen Hatfield, Lewis
Campbell, Samuel Bailey, William Martin, Laban Landor, Robert Blair,
Benjamin Bunuel, privates; John Fenton, drummer.

* Pennsylvania.--William Hunter and John Arnold, sergeants; Enoch Wills,
corporal; Cornelius Wilson, drummer; Charles Dougherty, William
Karnahan, Robert Findley, John Dowlhar, John Pallon, Hugh Cull, James
Hughes, John Finch, Donu Moriarty, John Montgomery, Daniel Hymer, Thomas
Forrest, William Kennesaey, Adam Foulz, George Fisher, privates.
Maryland.--Edward Weed, Jeremiah Driskel, Thomas Gillen, privates.

* Virginia.--Reaps Mitchell, sergeant; Lewis Flemister, William Coram,
William Pace, Joseph Timberlake, privates.

* I copied these signatures from the original oaths of allegiance,
signed at Valley Forge, in the spring of 1778, by each officer of the
Continental army, and of the militia then in service there. These oaths
are carefully preserved in the archives of the State Department at
Washington City.

Sergeant Knapp.--Return to Newburgh.--Departure for Fishkill.-- Return
of the Commander-in-chief's Guard

689quite active and clear respecting the war-scenes of his youth. He
delights "to fight his battles o'er again," and is pleased when,

"With cherub smile, the prattling boy,

Who on the vet'ran's breast reclines.

Has thrown aside the favorite toy,

And round his tender finger twines

Those scattered locks, that, with the flight

Of ninety years are snowy white;

And, as a tear arrests his view,

He cries, 'Grandpa, what wounded you?' "

Hannah F. Gould.

Broad flashes of sheet lightning, and rumbling thunder, on the van of an
approaching shower, made us use the whip freely when we left the dark
lane of the patriot. We reached Newburgh at eleven o'clock, wearied and
supperless, the tempest close upon us, but in time to escape a
drenching. This, be it remembered, was on the occasion of my second
visit to the camp ground in New Windsor, in the fervid summer time. Let
us resume our narrative of the autumnal tour.

The mist and clouds were gone the next morning. At six o'clock I crossed
October 26, 1848 the Hudson to Fishkill landing, and at half past seven
breakfasted at the village, five miles eastward. The air was a little
frosty, but as soon as the sun appeared above the hills, the warm breath
and soft light of the Indian summer spread their genial influence over
the face of nature, and awakened corresponding delight in the heart and
mind of the traveler. The country through which the highway passes is
exceedingly picturesque. It skirts the deep, rich valleys of Matteawan
and Glenham, where flows a clear stream from a distant mountain lake and
bubbling spring,1 turning, in its course, many mill-wheels and thousands
of spindles set up along its banks. On the south the lofty range of the
eastern Highlands, rocky and abrupt near their summits, come down with
gentle declivities, and mingle their rugged forms with the green
undulations of the valley. Up their steep slopes, cultivated

* The chief sources of this beautiful stream are "Whaley's Pond,
situated high among the broken hills of the eastern Highlands, on the
borders of Pawlings, and a spring at the loot of the mountains in the
Clove in Beekman.

Fishkill Village.--The "Wharton House."--Enoch Crosby.--The "Spy
Unmasked."

690fields have crept like ivy upon some gray old tower; and there,
tinted with all the glories of autumn, they seemed to hang in the soft
morning sunlight like rich gobelins in the chamber of royalty.

Fishkill village lies pleasantly in the lap of a plain near the foot of
the mountains, and is a place of much interest to the student of our
history. Securely sheltered by high mountains from invasion from below,
and surrounded by a fertile country, it was chosen as a place of safe
depository for military stores; for the confinement of Tory prisoners
and others captured by strategy or in partisan skirmishes upon the
Neutral Ground, in West Chester;

and, for a while, as the place of encampment of a portion of the
Continental army, and the quiet deliberations of the state Legislature.

* The barracks were about half a mile south of the village, extending
along the line of the road, to the foot of the mountains. The
headquarters of the officers were at Mr. Van Wyck's, then the property
of a Mr. Wharton. From this circumstance it is known as "The Wharton
House." The burial-place of the soldiers is at the foot of the
mountains, where a road of Isaac Van Wyck, branches eastward from the
turnpike. This vicinity is the scene of many of the most thrilling
events portrayed by Cooper in his "Spy; a _Tale of the Neutral Ground_."
In the Wharton House, Enoch Crosby, the alleged reality of the
novelist's fictitious Harvey Birch, was subjected to a mock trial by the
Committee of Safety, and then confined in irons in the old Dutch church
in the village Crosby engaged in the "secret service" of his country in
the autumn of 1776, and eminent were his personal achievements in making
revelations to his Whig friends of the movements and plans of the
Tories. At that period, secret enemies were more to be feared than open
foes among these, in West Chester and the southern portions of Dutchess,
Crosby mingled freely, for a long time, without incurring their
distrust. While on one of his excursions, he solicited lodgings for the
night at the house of a woman who proved to be a Tory. From her he
learned that a company of Loyalists were forming in the neighborhood to
march to

* The Marquis de Chastellux, who visited Fishkill in the autumn of 1780,
says, in his interesting narrative, "This town, in which there are not
more than fifty houses in the space of two miles, has been long the
principal depot of the American army. It is there they have placed their
magazines, their hospitals, their work-shops, &c.; but all these form a
town of themselves, composed of handsome large barracks, built in the
wood at the foot of the mountains; for the Americans, like the Romans in
many respects, have hardly any other winter quarters than wooden towns
or barricaded camps, which may be compared to the hiemalia of the
Romans."--Travels in North America, i., 54. The war-sword of Washington,
carefully preserved in a glass case in the National Museum at Washington
City, was manufactured by J. Bailey, in Fishkill, and bears his name.
His shop was yet in existence when I was there, but used as a stable. It
was demolished in 1849. A drawing of the sword, and of the stall which
Franklin bequeathed to Washington, may be found in another part of this
work.

** This picture is from a sketch from life by Captain H. L. Barnum, the
author of a small, thin volume, entitled The Spy Unmasked, dedicated to
James Fennimore Cooper, Esq. It contains the memoirs of Enoch Crosby,
who, the author asserts, was the original of Mr. Cooper's "Harvey
Birch." The narratives were taken from Crosby's own lips, in short-hand,
by Captain Barnum. Attempts have been made to cast discredit upon the
work; but Doctor White, of Fishkill, who kindly accompanied me to the
localities in that vicinity, assured me that his father, an aged man
still living, was well acquainted with Crosby, and says the narrative of
Barnum is substantially correct. Enoch Crosby was a native of Harwich,
Barnstable county, in Massachusetts, where he was born on the 4th of
January, 1750. During his infancy his parents went to the State of New
York, and settled in Southeast, in Dutchess (now Putnam) county. In the
midst of the noble and picturesque scenery of that region his childhood
was passed. He learned the trade of a shoemaker. When the Revolution
broke out, he laid aside his lapstone and last, and shouldered a musket.
He was then residing at Danbury, and was one of the hundred men before
mentioned, who, in 1775, marched to Lake Champlain, and were engaged in
the battles in that quarter until Quebec was stormed. After his return,
Crosby remained quiet for a while, and then became engaged in the
"secret service." He caused many Tory companies to fall into the hands
of the Whigs, and on such occasions he was usually captured, suffered
imprisonment, but was generally allowed to escape. At length his
successful exits from durance excited the suspicion of the Tories, and
Crosby, deeming it unsafe to mingle with them longer, joined the
detachment of the Continental army under Heath, then stationed in the
Highlands. When his term of service expired, he returned to Southeast,
where he cultivated a small farm, until his death in 1834. Captain
Barnum asserts that the plan of Cooper's Spy was conceived at the house
of John Jay, at Bedford, in West Chester county. Mr. Jay was one of the
Committee of Safety who employed Crosby, and was necessarily acquainted
with his exploits. Crosby was a witness at a court in New York city in
1827, and was recognized by an old gentleman, who introduced him to the
audience as the original of "Harvey Birch."* The fact became noised
abroad. The Spy, dramatized, was then in course of performance at one of
the theaters; Crosby was invited to attend; his acceptance was
announced; and that evening a crowded audience greeted the old soldier.
Our gifted countrywoman, Miss Anne C. Lynch, has written thus
doubtingly,

"On a Picture of Harvey Birch. "I know not if thy noble worth My
country's annals enliven, For in her brief, bright history, I have not
read thy name. "I know not if thou e'er didst live, Save in the vivid
thought Of him who chronicled thy life, With silent suffering fraught.
"Yet in thy history I see Full many a great soul's lot. Who joins the
martyr-army's ranks. That the world knoweth not."

Exploits of Enoch Crosby.--Incidents of his Life.--Ancient Dutch Church.
Fishkill Village.

691New York and join the British army. He became excessively loyal, and,
agreeing to enlist with them, he obtained the unbounded confidence of
the captain, who revealed to him all his plans. That night, when all was
quiet, Crosby left his bed stealthily, hastened to "White Plains, where
the Committee of Safety resided, * communicated the secrets of the
expedition to them, and was back to his lodgings, unobserved, before
daylight.

At Crosby's suggestion, a meeting of the company was held the following
evening, and while in session, the house was surrounded by a band of
Whigs, sent for the purpose by the Committee of Safety, and the inmates
were all made prisoners. They were conveyed to Fishkill, and confined in
manacles in the old stone church, one of the relies of the Revolution
yet remaining. The Committee of Safety, who had come up to try them,
were at the Wharton House. After an examination, the prisoners were all
remanded to prison, Crosby among the

* The Committee of Safety then consisted of Messrs. Jay, Platt, Duer,
and Sackett, distinguished patriots during the Revolution.

** This is from a pencil sketch by Miss Newlin, taken from the yard,
looking southwest, the same point of view from whence I made a drawing,
less pleasing to myself than the one kindly furnished me by the fail
artist. The church is built of rough-hewn stone, stuccoed on three
sides.

* In a monthly historical work, published at Concord, New Hampshire, in
1823, by Jacob B. Moore, Esq., late librarian of the Mew York Historical
Society, is a brief biographical sketch of David Gray, who was a "spy"
of the "Neutral Ground." The writer says, "The incidents of his life
correspond in many particulars with the character of Harvey Birch, in
the popular novel of the 'Spy.'" This was written six years before the
publication of "The Spy Unmasked."

Escape of Crosby.--His Exploits at Teller's Point.--A very old Man and
rejected Lover.--Trinity Church.

692rest. By apparent accident he was left alone with the committee a few
minutes, and a plan of escape was devised. He effected it through a
window at the northwest corner of the church, which was hidden by a
willow. On reaching the ground, he divested himself of his loose
manacles; and with the speed of a deer he rushed by the sentinels, and
escaped unhurt to a swamp, followed by three or four bullets, fired at
random in the gloom. He was made a prisoner, with Tories, twice
afterward, but managed to escape.

Several British and Hessian soldiers were at one time prisoners in the
old stone church. The former were captured by stratagem at Teller's
Point, near the mouth of the Croton River; the latter were stragglers,
who fell in with a party of Loyalists near Yonkers, on the Neutral
Ground. The British soldiers were captured by Crosby and a few men who
composed part of a detachment under Colonel Van Cortlandt, then
stationed on the east side of the Hudson to watch operations upon the
Neutral Ground. While they were near Teller's Point, a British sloop of
war sailed up the river and cast anchor in the channel opposite. Crosby
and six others proceeded to the Point, five of whom, with himself,
concealed themselves in the bushes; the other, dressed in infantry
uniform, paraded the beach. The officers on the vessel observed him, and
eleven men were dispatched in a boat to capture him. When the Englishmen
landed, the American took to his heels. Unsuspicious of danger, they
followed, when Crosby and his five men, making a noise in the bushes as
if half a regiment was there, rushed out and bade the enemy surrender.
Deceived and alarmed, they complied without firing a shot. The next day
they were prisoners in the stone church in Fishkill.

Before visiting the Wharton House, I called upon the Reverend Mr. Kip,
the pastor of the old church. He kindly allowed me to examine the
records of the society, which, until a late period, were made in the
Dutch language. They extend back to 1730, at whieh time, and for many
years afterward, the church at Fishkill and another at Poughkeepsie were
united, with the title of "The Parish Church at Fishkill and
Poughkeepsie." I could find no account of the building of the church,
but there is reason to believe that it was erected about the year 1725.
Mr. Kip showed me a silver tankard, belonging to the communion-service
of the church, which was presented to the society by Samuel Verplanek,
Esq., chiefly for the purpose of commemorating, by an inscription upon
it, a resident Norwegian, who died at the extraordinary age of six score
and eight years. *

I passed half an hour at the Wharton House, and, returning to the
village, sketched the old English church (now called Trinity) by the
way. It stands upon the west side of the road, in the suburbs of the
village, and in form is about the same as it was when it was used as an
hospital for the

* The following is a copy of the inscription: "Presented by Samuel
Verplanek, Esq., to the First Reformed Dutch Church in the town of
Fishkill, to commemorate Mr. Englebert Huff, by birth a Norwegian, in
his lifetime attached to the life guards of the Prince of Orange,
afterward King William III. of England. He resided for a number of years
in this country, and died, with unblemished reputation, at Fishkill,
21st of March, 1765, aged 128 years." It is related of Huff, that when
he was a hundred and twenty years old he made love to a pretty girl of
twenty. She already had an accepted lover of her own age, and of course
rejected the suit of the Nestor. The old suitor was indignant at the
refusal. He thought he had the best right to claim the heart and hand of
the maiden, for he had a hundred years more experience than "the foolish
boy," and knew better how to treat a wife than the interfering
stripling.

** This picture is also from a pencil sketch by Miss Newlin.

Printing of the first Constitution of the State of New York.--Head
quarters of Baron Steuben.--Anecdote of the Baron.

693sick, and as a meeting-place of the flying Legislature of New York,
when it adjourned from White Plains to Fishkill. According to the
records, the session here commenced on the 3d of September, 1776. A few
years since, while digging a grave in the yard, the sexton discovered a
skeleton, with bits of scarlet cloth and a brass button, the remains,
doubtless, of a British soldier, who was buried in his uniform.

An interesting bibliographic fact, connected with Fishkill, was
communicated to me by Gulian C. Verplanck, Esq. I have already noticed
the harassing circumstances under which the first republican
Constitution of the State of New York was elaborated, discussed, and
adopted the Legislature retiring before the approach of British
bayonets, first to Harlem, then to Kingsbridge, Yonkers, White Plains,
Fishkill, and Kingston. "The _Constitution of the State of New York,"_
says Mr. Verplanck, "was printed in 1777, and was the first, as well as
the most important book, ever printed in the state. The people could
find but one press in their domain with which to print this work of
their representatives. It was done at Fishkill, by Samuel Loudon, who
had been a Whig editor and printer in the city of New York, and who had
retired with his press to Fishkill, where was the chief deposit of
stores, hospitals, &c., of the northern army of the United States." **
Mr. Verplanck possesses a copy of this precious piece of American
typography. They have become almost as scarce as the Sibylline Books,
and quite as relatively valuable, for the principles therein embodied
foreshadowed the destiny of the commonwealth. Unlike Tarquin the Proud,
the possessor values it above all price.

I left the village toward noon, and, taking a more northerly route for
the ferry, visited the residence of the late Judge Verplanck, situated
in a beautiful, isolated spot, about a mile from the east bank of the
Hudson, and two miles northeast of Fishkill landing. It is approached
from the highway by a winding carriage track which traverses a broad,
undulating lawn, shaded by venerable trees. The old mansion is ol stone,
a story and a half high, with dormer windows, and in the style of the
best class of Dutch-built houses erected one hundred years ago. It was
owned by Samuel Verplanck, Esq., during the Revolution. An' addition,
two stories high, has been erected at the north end. I sketched only the
ancient edifice. This house is remarkable, in connection with my
subject, as the head-quarters of the Baron Steuben when the American
army was encamped in the vicinity of Newburgh, *** and also as the place
wherein the celebrated _Society of the Cincinnati_ was organized in
1783. The meeting for that purpose was held in the large square room on
the north side of the passage. **** The room is carefully preserved in
its original style.

* See page 387, this volume.

** I have a public document, printed there by Loudon, in 1776.

*** An anecdote illustrative of Steuben's generous character is related,
the scene of which was at Newburgh, at the time of the disbanding of the
army. Colonel Cochrane, whom I have mentioned in a former chapter, was
standing in the street, penniless, when Steuben tried to comfort him hy
saying that better times would come. "For myself," said the brave
officer, "I can stand it; but my wife and daughters are in the garret of
that wretched tavern, and I have nowhere to carry them, nor even money
to remove them." The baron's generous heart was touched, and, though
poor himself, he hastened to the family of Cochrane, poured the whole
contents of his purse upon the table, and left as suddenly as he had
entered. As he was walking toward the wharf, a wounded negro soldier
came up to him, bitterly lamenting that he had no means with which to
get to New York. The baron borrowed a dollar, and handing it to the
negro, hailed a sloop and put him on board. "God Almighty bless you,
baron!" said the negro, as his benefactor I walked away. Many similar
acts hallow the memory of the Baron Steuben.

**** The following record of the proceedings at the final meeting of the
convention I copied from the original manuscript in the possession of
Peter Force, Esq., of Washington City, and print it here as an
interesting scrap in the history of the closing scenes of the
Revolution.

**** "Cantonment of the American Army, 19th June, 1783.

**** "At a meeting of the general officers, and the gentlemen delegated
by the respective regiments,"as a convention for establishing the
Society of the Cincinnati, held by the request of the president, at
which were present Major-general Baron de Steuben, president; Major-
general Howe, Major-general Knox, Brigadier-general Paterson, Brigadier-
general Hand, Brigadier-general Huntington, Brigadier-general Putnam,
Colonel Webb, Lieutenant-colonel Huntington, Major Pettengill,
Lieutenant Whiting, Colonel H. Jackson, Captain Shaw, Lieutenant-colonel
Hull, Lieutenant-colonel Maxwell, and Colonel Cortlandt, General Baron
de Steuben acquainted the convention that he had, agreeably to their
request at the last meeting, transmitted to his excellency the Chevalier
de la Luzerne, minister plenipotentiary from the court of France, a copy
of the institution of the Society of the Cincinnati, with their vote
respecting his excellency and the other characters therein mentioned,
and that his excellency had returned an answer declaring his acceptance
of the same, and expressing the grateful sense he entertains of the
honor conferred on himself and the other gentlemen of the French nation
by this act of the convention.

**** "Resolved, That the letter of the Chevalier de la Luzerne be
recorded in the proceedings of this day, and deposited in the archives
of the society, as a testimony of the high sense this convention
entertain of the honor done to the society by his becoming a member
thereof.

**** (Here follows the letter.)

**** "The baron having also communicated a letter from Major l'Enfant,
inclosing a design for the medal and order containing the emblems of the
institution,

**** "Resolved, That the bald eagle, carrying the emblems on its breast,
be established as the order of the society, and that the ideas of Major
l'Enfant respecting it and the manner of its being worn by the mem-Ders,
as expressed in his letter, hereto annexed, be adopted. That the order
be of the same size, and in every other respect conformable to the said
design, which for that purpose is certified by the Baron de Steuben,
president of this convention, and to be deposited in the archives of the
society, as the original from which all copies are to be made. Also that
silver medals, not exceeding the size of a Spanish milled dollar, with
the emblems, as designed by Major l'Enfant and certified by the
president, be given to each and every member of the society, together
with a diploma, on parchment, whereon shall be impressed the exact
figures of the order and medal, as above mentioned, any thing in the
original institution respecting gold medals to the contrary
notwithstanding.

**** (Here follows Major l'Enfant's letter.)

**** "Resolved, That the thanks of this convention be transmitted by the
president to Major l'Enfant for his care and ingenuity in preparing the
aforementioned designs, and that he be acquainted that they cheerfully
embrace his offer of assistance, and request a continuance of his
attention in carrying the designs into execution, for which purpose the
president is desired to correspond with him.

**** "Resolved, That his excellency the commander-in-chief be requested
to officiate as president general, until the first general meeting, to
be held in May next. "That a treasurer general and a secretary general
be balloted for, to officiate in like manner.

**** "The ballots being taken, Major-general M'Dougall was^elected
treasurer general, and Major-general Knox secretary general, who are
hereby requested to accept said appointments.

**** "Resolved, That all the proceedings of this convention, including
the institution of the society, be recorded from the original papers in
his possession by Captain Shaw, who at the first meeting was requested
to act as secretary, and that the same, signed by the president and
secretary, together with the original papers, be given into the hands of
Major-general Knox, secretary general to the society, and that Captain
North, aid-de-camp to the Baron de Steuben, and acting secretary to him
as president, sign the said records.

**** "The dissolution of a very considerable part of the army, since the
last meeting of this convention, having rendered the attendance of some
of its members impracticable, and the necessity for some temporary
arrangements, previous to the first meeting of the general society,
being so strikingly obvious, the convention found itself constrained to
make those before mentioned, which they have done with the utmost
diffidence of themselves, and relying entirely on the candor of their
constituents to make allowance for the measure.

**** "The principal objects of its appointment being thus accomplished,
the members of this convention think fit to dissolve the same, and it is
hereby dissolved accordingly. "Steuben, Major General, President."

The Society of the Cincinnati.--Final Proceedings in the Organization of
the Institution

694"While contemplating a final separation of the officers of the army,"
says Doctor Thacher, "the tenderest feelings of the heart had their
afflicting operation. It was at the suggestion of General Knox, and with
the acquiescence of the commander-in-chief, that an expedient was
devised by which a hope was entertained that their long-cherished
friendship and social intercourse might be perpetuated, and that at
future periods they might annually communicate, and revive a
recollection of the bonds by which they were connected." *. Pursuant to
these suggestions, the officers held a meeting. A committee, consisting
of Generals

* Military Journal p. 317.

Plan and Name of the Society of the Cincinnati.--The Constitution.--
Opposition of Judge Burke and others.

695Knox. Hand, and Huntington, and Captain Shaw, was appointed to revise
the proposals for the institution. Another meeting was held on the 13th
of May, at the quarters of Steuben (Verplanck's), when the committee
reported. A plan, in the following words, was adopted, * and the society
was duly organized:

"It having pleased the Supreme Governor of the universe, in the
disposition of human affairs, to cause the separation of the colonies of
North America from the domination of. Great Britain, and, after a bloody
conflict of eight years, to establish them free, independent, and
sovereign states, connected by alliances, founded on reciprocal
advantages, with some of the greatest princes and powers of the earth:

"To perpetuate, therefore, as well the remembrance of this vast event,
as the mutual friendships which have been formed under the pressure of
common danger, and in many instances cemented by the blood of the
parties, the officers of the American army do hereby, in the most solemn
manner, associate, constitute, and combine themselves into one society
of friends, to endure so long as they shall endure, or any of their
eldest male posterity, and in failure thereof, the collateral branches,
who may be judged worthy of becoming its supporters and members. **

"The officers of the American army, having generally been taken from the
citizens of America, possess high veneration for the character of that
illustrious Roman, Lucius Quin-tius Cincinnatus, and being resolved to
follow his example, by returning to their citizenship, they think they
may with propriety denominate themselves the Society of the Cincinnati.

"The following principles shall be immutable, and form the basis of the
Society of the Cincinnati:

"An incessant attention to preserve inviolate those exalted rights and
liberties of human nature for which they have fought and bled, and
without which the high rank of a rational being is a curse instead of a
blessing.

"An unalterable determination to promote and cherish, between the
respective states, that unison and national honor so essentially
necessary to their happiness and the future dignity of the American
empire.

"To render permanent the cordial affection subsisting among the
officers, this spirit will dictate brotherly kindness in all things, and
particularly extend to the most substantial acts of beneficence,
according to the ability of the society, toward those officers and their
families who unfortunately may be under the necessity of receiving it.

"The general society will, for the sake of frequent communications, be
divided into state societies, and these again into such districts as
shall be directed by the state society.

"The societies of the districts to meet as often as shall be agreed on
by the state society; those of the state on the 4th day of July
annually, or oftener if they shall find it expedient; and the general
society on the first Monday in May annually, so long as they shall deem
it necessary, and afterward at least once in every three years.

* This document, according to Colonel Timothy Pickering, was drawn up by
Captain Shaw, who was the secretary of the committee.

** This clause gave considerable alarm to the more rigid Whigs, because
of the recognition of the right of primogeniture in membership
succession. Judge Ædanus Burke, of South Carolina, attacked it with much
vehemence, as an incipient order of nobility, and an attempt to
establish the pretensions of the military to rank above the mass of
citizens. The objection was groundless, for no civil, military,
political, or social prerogative was claimed. On the other hand, the
King of Sweden (Gustavus Adolphus III.) declined permitting the few
officers in the French army who were his subjects to wear the order of
the Cincinnati, on the ground that the institution had a republican
tendency not suited to his government. On this subject, Washington, in a
letter to Rochambeau, written in August, 1784. said, "Considering how
recently the King of Sweden has changed the form of the government of
that country, it is not so much to be wondered at that his fears should
get the better of his liberality as to any thing which might have the
semblance of republicanism; but when it is further considered how few of
his nation had, or could have, a right to the order, I think he might
have suffered his complaisance to have overcome them."--See Sparks's
Life and Writings of Washington, ix., 56.

Certificate of Membership of the Cincinnati.--The Design and Engraving.-
-Alteration of the Plate.

696"At each meeting, the principles of the institution will be fully
considered, and the best measures to promote them adopted.

"The state societies will consist of all the members residing in each
state respectively, and any member removing from one state to another is
to be considered in all respects as belonging to the society of the
state in which he shall actually reside. *

* This clause is omitted by Dr. Thacher and others. I find it in a
manuscript copy of the Constitution of the society, and records of the
proceedings at its formation, among the papers of Colonel Richard
Varick, in the handwriting of General William North.

** This engraving is a fac simile of a certificate, about one fourth the
size of the original, which is thirteen inches and a half in breadth,
and twenty inches in length. Tire originals are printed on fine vellum.
The plate was engraved in France by J. J. le Veau, from a drawing by
Aug. le Belle. I am indebted to the late James G. Wilson, son of Ensign
Wilson, named in the certificate, for the use of the original in making
this copy. The former was engraved on copper; this is engraved on wood.
The design represents American liberty as a strong man armed, bearing in
one hand the Union flag, and in the other a naked sword. Beneath his
feet are British flags, and a broken spear, shield, and chain. Hovering
by his side is the eagle, our national emblem, from whose talons the
lightning of destruction is flashing upon the British lion. Britannia,
with the crown falling from her head, is hastening toward a boat to
escape to a fleet, which denotes the departure of British power from our
shores. Upon a cloud, on the right, is an angel blowing a trumpet, from
which flutters a loose scroll. Upon the scroll are the sentences,
"Independence declared, A.D. 1776. Treaty of alliance with France
declared, A.D. 1778. Peace! independence obtained, A.D. 1783."

** Upon the medallion on the right is a device representing Cincinnatus
at his plow, a ship on the sea, and a walled town in the distance. Over
his head is a flying angel, holding a ribbon inscribed "Reward of
virtue." Below is a heart, with the words "Be thou perpetual." Upon the
rim is the legend, "Society of the Cincinnati, instituted 1783." The
device upon the medallion on the left is Cincinnatus with his family,
near his house. He is receiving a sword and shield from three senators;
an army is seen in the distance. Upon the rim are the words "He abandons
every thing to serve his country" (referring to Cincinnatus).

* There is a fact connected with this sentence worthy of notice. In the
earlier impressions from the plate, taken previous to the year 1785, the
sentence is Palam nuntiata libertas, not libertatis. Some person, who
doubtless supposed the original word to be incorrect, caused the letters
t i s to be crowded into the space occupied by the final s in libertas.
I have the authority of one of our most learned Latin critics, to whom
the question was submitted, for saying that the original word was
correct, and that the alteration renders the sentence ungrammatical and
totally incorrect, thereby destroying its meaning. Do any of our
historical antiquaries know by whose authority the alteration was made?

The Order of the Society.--The successive Presidents General.--Departure
for West Point.

697"The state societies to have a president, vice-president, secretary,
treasurer, and assistant treasurer, to be chosen annually by a majority
of votes at the stated meeting.

"In order to obtain funds which may be respectable, and assist the
unfortunate, each officer shall deliver to the treasurer of the state
society one month's pay, which shall remain forever to the use of the
state society. The interest only of which, if necessary, to be
appropriated to the relief of the unfortunate.

"The society shall have an _order,_ by which its members shall be known
and distinguished, which shall be a medal of gold, of a proper size to
receive the emblems, and be suspended by a deep blue ribbon, two inches
wide, edged with white, descriptive of the union of America with
France."

I am indebted to the kindness of Colonel Joseph "Warren Scott, of New
Brunswick, New Jersey, now (1850) the president of the society of that
state, for the following information respecting the successive
presidents general of the institution.

General Washington was the first president general, and continued in
office until his death, in December, 1799. In May, 1800, General
Alexander Hamilton was elected as his successor. He was killed in a duel
with Aaron Burr in 1804, and, at the next general meeting, General
Charles Cotesworth Pinckney, of South Carolina, was elected as his
successor.

He died in August, 1825. At a special meeting of the society, held at
Philadelphia in November, 1826, Major-general Thomas Pinckney was
elected president general.1 At his death, Colonel Aaron Ogden, of New
Jersey, was elected to fill his place. He held the office until his
decease in April, 1838, when General Morgan Lewis, of New York, became
his successor. General Lewis died on the 7th of May, 1844, in his
ninetieth year, and the venerable Major Popham, also of New York, was
elected as his successor at the general meeting in November following.
Major Popham died in the summer of 1848, and, at the meeting in November
of that year, General Dearborn, the present incumbent, was elected to
supply the vacancy. Such is the brief history of a society over which
the venerated Washington first presided.

I left the interesting mansion wherein the society was organized at
noon, and reached Newburgh in time to dine and embark at half past one
for West Point, eight miles below.

* "At that meeting," says Colonel Scott, in a letter to me dated July 9,
1850, "delegates attended from Massachusetts, Rhode Island, Connecticut,
New York, New Jersey, Maryland, and South Carolina. Colonel Ogden and
myself were delegates from New Jersey. At that meeting it was
ascertained that all the officers of the society but one had departed
this life. The survivor was Major Jackson, of Pennsylvania. These
communications were given and received in sadness, and a respectful and
affectionate notice was taken of those who had left us forever."

** This was drawn from an original in the possession of Edward Phalon,
Esq., of New York. The engraving is the exact size of the original. The
leaves of the sprigs of laurel are of gold, and green enamel; the head
and tail of the eagle gold, and white enamel; and the sky in the center
device blue enamel. The device and motto are the same as upon the
medallion on the right of the certificate.

West Point and its Associations.--Mrs. Faugeres.--Sufferings of Mrs.
Bleeckor

698

CHAPTER XXX.

"What though no cloister gray nor ivyed column

Along these cliffs their somber ruins rear;

What though no frowning tower nor temple solemn

Of despots tell, and superstition here;

What though that moldering fort's fast-crumbling walls

Did ne'er inclose a baron's bannered halls,

"Its sinking arches once gave back as proud

An echo to the war-blown clarion's peal--

As gallant hearts its battlements did crowd

As ever beat beneath a breast of steel,

When herald's trump on knighthood's haughtiest day

Called forth chivalric hosts to battle-fray."

C. F. Hoffmax

"Low sunk between the Alleghanian hills

For many a league the sullen waters glide,

And the deep murmur of the crowded tide

With pleasing awe the wondering voyager fills.

On the green summit of yon lofty clift

A peaceful runnel gurgles clear and slow,

Then down the craggy steep-side dashing swift,

Tumultuous falls in the white surge below."

Margaretta V. Faugeres.

N the midst of wild mountain scenery, picturesque but not magnificent
when compared with the White Mountains of New Hampshire, the Adirondack
and Catskill range in New York, or the Alleghanies in Western
Pennsylvania and Virginia, is a bold promontory called West Point,
rising more than one hundred and fifty feet above the waters of the
Hudson, its top a perfectly level and fertile plateau, and every rood
hallowed by associations of the deepest interest. West Point! What a
world of thrilling reminiscences has the utterance of that name brought
to ten thousand memories in times past, now, alas! nearly all slumbering
in the dreamless sleep of the dead! How does it awaken the generous
emotions of patriotic reverence for the men, and things, and times of
the Revolution, in the bosoms of th*e present generation! Nor is it by
the associations alone that the traveler is moved with strong emotions
when approaching West Point; the stranger, indifferent to our history
and of all but the present, feels a glow of admira-

* Mrs. Faugeres was the grand-daughter of Brandt Schuyler, and daughter
of Mrs. Anne Eliza Bleeeker, one of the notable sufferers from the
invasion of Burgoyne in 1777. Mrs. Bleecker was then living, with her
husband, about eighteen miles from Albany. Mr. Bleecker went to that
city to make arrangements for moving his family thither. While absent,
Mrs. Bleeeker heard of the approach of Burgoyne and his horde of
savages, and, leading her eldest child by the hand, and bearing her
youngest in her arms, she started on foot for Albany. After a wearisome
journey of a day, and a night passed in a wretched garret, she started
forward with her precious charge, and soon met her husband, with whom
she returned to the city. Her babe died a few days afterward, and within
a month her mother expired in her arms, at Red Hook, in Dutchess county.
Her husband was afterward captured by a party of Tories. This event, and
his sudden restoration when she thought him dead, so overpowered her,
that her constitution sunk beneath the shocks, and she died in the
autumn of 1783. Margaretta (afterward Mrs. Faugeres) was the "sweet
sister" alluded to in the following lines, extracted from a poem written
by Mrs. Bleecker on the death of her child:

"Rich in my children, on my arms I bore My living treasures from the
scalper's power. When I sat down to rest beneath some shade, On the soft
grass how innocent she play'd, While her sweet sister from the fragrant
wild Collects the flowers to please my precious child."

Scenery around West Point--The Military Establishment.--Wood's
Monument.--Interesting Relics.

699tion as he courses along the sinuous channel of the river or climbs
the rough hills that embosom it. The inspiration of nature then takes
possession of his heart and mind, and

"When he treads

The roek-encumbered crest, and feels the strange

And wild tumultuous throbbings of his heart,

Its every chord vibrating with the touch

Of the high power that reigns supreme o'er all,

He well may deem that lips of angel-forms

Have breathed to him the holy melody

That fills his o'erfraught heart."

Bayard Taylor.

The high plain is reached by a carriage-way that winds up the bank from
the landing; the visitor overlooking, in the passage, on the right, the
little village of Camptown, which comprises the barracks of United
States soldiers and a few dwellings of persons not immediately connected
with the military works. On the left, near the summit, is "the Artillery
Laboratory," and near by, upon a little hillock, is an obelisk erected
to the memory of Lieutenant-colonel Wood. * On the edge of the cliff,
overlooking the steam boat landing, is a spacious hotel, where I booked
myself as a boarder for a day or two. A more delightful spot,
particularly in summer, for a weary traveler or a professed lounger, can
not easily be found, than the broad piazza of that public dwelling
presents. Breezy in the hottest weather, and always enlivened by
pleasant company, the sojourner need not step from beneath its shadow to
view a most wonderful variety of pleasing objects in nature and art.
Upon the grassy plain before him are buildings of the military
establishment--the Academic Halls, the Philosophical and Library
buildings, the Observatory, the Chapel, the Hospital, the Barracks and
Mess Hall of the cadets, and the beautifully shaded dwellings of the
officers and professors that skirt the western side of the plateau at
the base of the hills. On the parade the cadets, in neat uniform,
exhibit their various exercises, and an excellent band of music delights
the ear. Lifting the eyes to the westward, the lofty summit of Mount
Independence, crested by the gray ruins of Fort Putnam, and beyond it
the loftier apex of Redoubt Hill, are seen. Turning a little northward,
Old Cro' Nest and Butter Hill break the horizon nearly half way to the
zenith; and directly north, over Martelaer's Roek or Constitution
Island, through the magnificent cleft in the chain of hills through
which the Hudson flows, is seen the bright waters of Newburgh Bay, the
village glittering in the sunbeams, and the beautiful, cultivated slopes
of Dutchess and Orange. The scenery at the eastward is better
comprehended and more extensive as seen from Fort Putnam, whither we
shall presently climb.

I passed the remainder of the afternoon among the celebrities clustered
around October 26, 1848 the plain. I first visited the Artillery
Laboratory, where are deposited several interesting trophies and relics
of the Revolution. In the center of the court is a group of great
interest, consisting of a large brass mortar, mounted, which was taken
from the English when Wayne captured Stony Point; two small brass
mortars, taken from Burgoyne at Saratoga, and a portion of the famous
chain whieh the Americans stretched across the river at West Point to
obstruct the passage of the vessels of the enemy. The large mortar

* The following is the inscription on this monument: "To the memory of
Lieutenant-eolonel E. D. Wood, of the corps of engineers, who fell while
leading n charge at the sortie of Fort Erie, Upper Canada, 17th of
September, 1814, in the 31st year of his age. He was exemplary as a
Christian, and distinguished as a soldier. A pupil of this institution,
* he died an honor to his country. This memorial was erected by his
friend and commander, Major-general Jacob Brown."

* Military Academy at West Point.

Size of the Mortars and Chain.--Position of the Chain in the River.--
Other Relics.--Koseiuszko's Monument

700has a caliber of ten and a half inches; the smaller ones, of four
inches and three quarters. The former is emblazoned with the English
coat of arms, beneath which is engraved _"Aschaleh, fecit_, 1741."

There are twelve links, two clevises, and a portion of a link of the
great chain remaining. The links are made of iron bars, two and a half
inches square, average in length a little over two feet, and weigh about
one hundred and forty pounds each. The chain was stretched across the
river at the narrowest point between the rocks just below the steam-boat
landing, and Constitution Island opposite. It was fixed to huge blocks
on each shore, and under the cover of batteries on both sides of the
river. The remains of these are still visible. "It is buoyed up," says
Doctor Thacher, writing in 1780, "by very large logs of about sixteen
feet long, pointed at the ends, to lessen their opposition to the force
of the current at flood and ebb tide. The logs are placed at short
distances from each other, the chain carried over them, and made fast to
each by staples. There are also a number of anchors dropped at proper
distances, with cables made fast to the chain, to give it greater
stability." * The history of this chain will be noted presently.

Near this group is a cannon, by the premature discharge of which, in
1817, a cadet named Lowe was killed. There is a beautiful monument
erected to his memory in the cemetery of the institution. I observed
several long French cannons, inscribed with various dates; and among
others, two brass field-pieces, of British manufacture, bearing the
monogram of the king, "G R.," and the inscription "_W. Bowen, fecit_,
1755." These were presented to General Greene by order of Congress, as
an inscription among the military emblems avers. **

At the northeast corner of the plain, a little eastward of the hotel,
are mounds denoting the ramparts of old Fort Clinton. Among these mounds
stands the monument erected to the memory of Kosciuszko. It is made of
white marble, and is a conspicuous object to travelers upon the river.
On one side of the pedestal, in large letters, is the name Kosci-

* Military Journal, page 211.

** The inscription is as follows: "Taken from the British army, and
presented, by order of the United States in Congress assembled, to
Major-general Greene, as a monument * of their high sense of the wisdom,
fortitude, and military talents which distinguished his command in the
Southern department, and of the eminent services which, amid complicated
dangers and difficulties, he performed for his country. October ye 18th,
1783."

* To the dishonor of our country, it must be said that these two brazen
cannons form the only "monument" ever made to the memory of that great
commander. Savannah, in Georgia, has a ward and a square bearing his
name, and in the center of the latter in the foundation stone of an
intended monument to his memory. This and the corner-stone of a monument
to Pulaski were laid by La Fayette in 1825. For a further notice of this
matter, See page 514, vol. ii

Kosciuszko's Garden.--Other Localities.--Fort Arnold.--Fort Putnam.

701üszko; and on the other is the brief inscription, "_Erected by the
Corps of Cadets,_ 1828." The monument was completed in 1829, at a cost
of five thousand dollars.

A drawing of it forms a portion of the vignette of the map printed on
page 137. From this monument the view of the river and adjacent scenery,
especially at the northward, is very fine, and should never be
unobserved by the visitor.

Emerging from the remains of Fort Clinton, the path, traversing the
margin of the cliff, passes the ruins of a battery, and descends, at a
narrow gorge between huge rocks, to a flight of wooden steps. These
terminate at the bottom upon a grassy terrace a few feet wide, over
which hangs a shelving cliff covered with shrubbery. This is called
Kosciuszko's Garden, from the circumstance of its having been a favorite
resort of that officer while stationed there as engineer for a time
during the Revolution. In the center of the terrace is a marble basin,
from the bottom of which bubbles up a tiny fountain of pure water. It is
said that the remains of a fountain constructed by Kosciuszko was
discovered in 1802, when it was removed, and the marble bowl which now
receives the jet was placed there.

It is a beautiful and romantic spot, shaded by a weeping willow and
other trees, and having seats provided for those who wish to linger.
Upon a smooth spot, high upon the rocks and half overgrown with moss,
are slight indications of written characters. Tradition says it is the
remains of the name of Kosciuszko, inscribed by his own hand; but I
doubt the report, for he possessed too much common sense to be guilty of
such folly as the mutilated benches around the fountain exhibit; his
name was already upon the tablet of Polish history, and his then present
deeds were marking it deep upon that of our war for independence.

The sun had gone down behind the hills when I ascended from the garden
to the plain. The cadets were performing their evening parade, and, as
the last rays left Bear Hill and the Sugar Loaf, the evening gun and the
tattoo summoned them to quarters. During the twilight hour, I strolled
down the road along the river bank, half a mile beyond the barracks, to
Mr. Kingsley's Classical School, situated upon a commanding eminence
above the road leading to Buttermilk Falls. Near his residence was a
strong redoubt, called Fort Arnold, one of the outposts of West Point in
the Revolution. I was informed that the remains are well preserved; but
it was too dark to distinguish an artificial mound from a natural
hillock, and I hastened back to my lodgings.

Unwilling to wait until the late hour of eight for breakfast the next
morning, I arose at dawn, and before sunrise I stood among the ruins of
Fort Putnam, on the pinnacle of Mount Independence, nearly five hundred
feet above the river.

I had waked

From a long sleep of many changing dreams,

And now in the fresh forest air I stood

View from the Ruins of Fort Putnam.--Names of the Highland Peaks.--
Drake's "Culprit Fan

702

Nerved to another day of wandering.

The sky bent round

The awful domes of a most mighty temple,

Built by Omnipotent hands for nothing less

Than infinite worship. Here I stood in silence;

I had no words to tell the mingled thoughts

Of wonder and of joy that then came o'er me

Even with a whirlwind's rush."

James G. Percival.

Around me were strewn mementoes of the Revolution. My feet pressed the
russet turf upon the ramparts of a ruined fort. Eastward, behind which
were glowing the splendors of approaching day, stretched a range of
broken hills, on whose every pinnacle the vigilant patriots planted
batteries and built watch-fires. At their feet, upon a fertile terrace
almost a mile in breadth, was the "Beverly House," from which Arnold
escaped to the Vulture; old Phillipstown, around which a portion of the
Revolutionary army was cantoned in 1781, * and intermediate localities,
all rich with local traditions and historic associations. On the left,
over Constitution Island, arose the smoke of the furnaces and forges at
Cold Spring, a thriving village at the river terminus of a mountain
furrow that slopes down from the eastern hills. A little beyond, and
beneath the frowning crags of Mount Taurus, ** appeared "Under Cliff,"
the country seat of George P. Morris, Esq., lying like a pearl by the
side of a sleeping giant, and just visible in the fading shadows of the
mountains. Nowhere in our broad land is there a more romantic nook, or
more appropriate spot for the residence of an American song-writer than
this,

"Where Hudson's waves o'er silvery sands

Winds through the hills afar,

And Cro' Nest like a monarch stands

Crown'd with a single star."

Morris.

Hark! the sunrise gun on the plain below hath spoken! How eagerly its
loud voice is caught up by echo and carried from hill to hill! The Sugar
Loaf answers to Redoubt Mountain, and Anthony's Nose to Bear Mountain
and the Dunderberg, and then there is only a soft whisper floating away
over the waters of the Haverstraw. The reveille is beating; the shrill
notes of the fife, and the stirring music of the cornet-players, come up
and fill the soul with a martial spirit consonant with the place and its
memories. Here, then, let us sit down upon the lip of this rock-
fountain, within the ruins of the fort, and commune a while with the old
chronicler.

The importance of fortifying the Hudson River at its narrow passes among
the High-

* It was here that the general inoculation of the soldiers of the
Continental army was performed by Doctors Cochrane, Thacher, Munson, and
others, as mentioned on page 307, vol. i.

** This, in plain English and common parlance, is Bull Hill. I feel very
much disposed to quarrel with my countrymen for their want of taste in
giving names to localities. They have discarded the beautiful
"heathenish" names of the Indian verbal geographies, and often
substituted the most commonplace and inappropriate title that human
ingenuity, directed earthward, could invent--Bull Hill! Crow's Nest!
Butter Hill!! Ever blessed be the name and memory of Joseph Rodman
Drake, whose genius has clothed these Highland cones, despite their
vulgar names, with a degree of classic interest, by thus summoning there
with the herald voice of imagination,

"Ouphe and goblin! imp and sprite! Elf of eve and starry fay! Ye that
love the moon's soft light, Hither, hither wend your way. Twine ye in a
jocund ring; Sing and trip it merrily; Hand to hand and wing to wing,
Round the wild witch-hazel tree!" The Culprit Fat, canto xxxvi. *

* This beautiful poem was written con amort, during a brief ramble of
the author among the Hudson Highlands

Fortifications in the Highlands ordered.--Action of the New York
Assembly.--Fort Constitution.

703lands was suggested to the Continental Congress by the Provincial
Assembly of New York at an early period of the war. On the 10th of
October, 1775, the former directed the latter to proceed to make such
fortifications as they should deem best. *

On the l8th of November, Congress resolved to appoint a commander for
the fortress, with the rank of colonel, and recommended the New York
Assembly, or Convention, to empower him to raise a body of two hundred
militia from the counties of Dutchess, Orange, and Ulster, and a company
of artillery from New York city, to garrison them. The Convention was
also recommended to forward from Kingsbridge such ordnance as they
should think proper. ***

That body had already taken action. On the 18th of August, a committee
was appointed to superintend the erection of forts and batteries in the
vicinity of "West Point. **** They employed Bernard Romans, an English
engineer (who, at that time, held the same office in the British army),
to construct the works; and Martelaer's Roek (now Constitution Island),
opposite West Point, was the chosen spot for the principal
fortification. Romans commenced operations on the 29th of August, and on
the 12th of October he applied to Congress for a commission, with the
rank and pay of colonel.

It was this application which caused the action of Congress on the 18th
of November. In the mean while, Romans and his employers quarreled, and
the commission was never granted; the work was soon afterward completed
by others. The fort was named _Constitution,_ and the island has since
borne that title. (v) The fort and its outworks were quite extensive,
though the main fortress was built chiefly of perishable materials, on
account of the apparent necessity for its speedy erection. The whole
cost was about twenty-five thousand dollars.

The remains of the fort and surrounding batteries are scattered over the
island. Near the highest point on the western end are the

* Journals of Congress, i., 199.

** This little sketch is a view of the remains of the casemates, or
vaults, of Fort Putnam. There were nine originally, but only six remain
in a state of fair preservation. They were built of brick and covered
with stone; were twelve feet wide and eighteen feet deep, with an arched
roof twelve feet high. Each one had a fire-place, and they seem to have
been used for the purposes of barracks, batteries, and magazines. In the
center of the fort is a spring, that bubbles up in a rocky basin. The
whole interior is very rough, it being the pinnacle of a bald, rocky
elevation.

*** Journals of Congress, i., 223.

**** The committee consisted of Isaac Sears, John Berrien, Colonel
Edward Fleming, Anthony Rutger, and Christopher Atiller. Fleming and
Rutger declined the appointment, and Captain Samuel Bayard and Captain
William Bedlow were appointed in their places.

* (v) This island belonged to the widow of Captain Ogilvie, of the
British army, and her children, during the Revolution, as appears by a
correspondence between the New York Committee of Safety and Colonel
Beverly Robinson. The committee supposed that the island belonged to
Robinson, and applied to him for its purchase. In his reply, he
mentioned the fact of its belonging to Mrs. Ogilvie, and added, "Was it
mine, the publie should be extremely welcome to it. The building of the
fort there can be no disadvantage to the small quantity of arable land
on the island." Robinson afterward chose the royal side of the political
question, and held the commission of a colonel in the British army.

* (vi) This plan of Fort Constitution is from Romans's report to the
Committee of Safety of New York, on the 14th of September, 1775, and
published in the American Archives, iii., 735.

* Explanation.--a, guard-room and store-house; b, barracks; c, block-
house and main guard; d, magazine; e, the gateway; 1, a battery of four
four-pounders; 2, three twelve-pounders; 3, three twelve-pounders and
one nine-pounder; 4, five eighteen-pounders; 5, four twelve-pounders; 6,
three eighteen-pounders; 7 and 8. one each, nine and twelve-pounder; 9,
one four-pounder.

New Forts in the Highlands proposed.--West Point selected.--Radiêre and
other Engineers from France

704well-preserved remains of the magazine, the form of which is given in
the annexed diagram. It is upon a high rock, accessible only on one
side. The whole wall is quite perfect, except at the doorway, D, where a
considerable portion has fallen down and blocked up the entrance.

After the capture of Forts Clinton and Montgomery, near the lower
entrance to the Highlands, in 1777, and the abandonment of Fort
Constitution by the Americans a few days afterward, public attention was
directed to the importance of other and stronger fortifications in that
vicinity. On the 5th of November, Congress appointed General Gates to
command in the Highlands, or rather that post was connected with the
Northern department. Gates was made president of the Board of War about
that time, and never entered upon the prescribed duties in the
Highlands.

Anxious to have those passes strongly guarded, Washington requested
General Putnam to bestow his most serious attention upon that important
December 2, 1777subject. He also wrote to Governor Clinton, at the same
time, desiring him to take the immediate supervision of the work; but
his legislative duties, then many and pressing, made it difficult for
him to comply. Clinton expressed his willingness to devote as much time
as possible to the matter, and also made many valuable suggestions
respecting the proposed fortifications. He mentioned West Point as the
most eligible site for a strong fort.

Duty calling General Putnam to Connecticut, and General Parsons not
feeling himself authorized to progress with the works, but little was
done until the arrival of General a 1778. M'Dougal, who took command on
the 20th of March following. (a) In the mean  (b) January, while,
several officers examined various localities in the neighborhood, (b)
and all were in favor of erecting a strong fort on West Point, except La
Radière, a French engineer. *

A committee of the New York Legislature, after surveying several sites,
unanimously recommended West Point as the most eligible. Works were
accordingly commenced there, under the direction of Kosciuszko, who had
been appointed to succeed Radière in the Highlands, his skill being
quite equal, and his manners more acceptable to the people. Kosciuszko
arrived on the 20 th of March, and the works were pushed toward
completion with much spirit. The principal redoubt, constructed chiefly
of logs and earth, was completed before May, and named Fort Clinton. It
was six hundred yards around within the walls. The embankments were
twenty-one feet at base, and fourteen feet high. There were barracks and
1773.

* The American commissioners in France were instructed by Congress to
procure some good engineers for the Continental army. Franklin and Deane
contracted with four officers of this description, who had served in
such capacity, under commissions, in the French army, namely, Duportail,
Laumoy, Radiere, and Gouvion. These officers came to the United States
with the knowledge and approbation of the French government, and were
the only ones engaged by the express authority of Congress. The
Chevalier Duportail was appointed colonel of engineers, Laumoy and
Radière lieutenant colonels, and Gouvion major, was afterward promoted
to a brie dière to colonels, and Gouvion to dière died in the service at
the beginning of 1780. See Journals of Congress, iii., 224, 322, 403.

** This view is from a print published in the New York Magazine for
1790. It was taken from Constitution Island. On the left is seen a
portion of old Fort Constitution. The great chain, four hundred and
fifty yards in length, and covered by a strong battery, is seen
stretched across the river, immediately below Fort Clinton, the
structure on the high point. In the distance, on the left, two mountain
summits are seen, crowned with fortifications. These were the North and
Middle Redoubts. Upon the range of the Sugar Loaf Mountain, higher than
these, and hidden, in the view, by Fort Clinton, was another redoubt,
called the South Battery. The view on page 708 I sketched from the same
spot whence this was taken.

West Point in 1780.--Construction of the great Chain.--History of the
Work.--Map of West Point

705huts for about six hundred men. * The cliff on which Fort Clinton was
erected rises one hundred and eighty-eight feet above the river, and is
more elevated than the plain in the rear.

The only accessible point from the river was at the house and dock, on
the water's edge seen in the engraving. That point is now a little above
the steam-boat landing. This weak point was well defended by palisades

To defend Fort Clinton, and more thoroughly to secure the river against
the passage of an enemy's fleet, it was thought advisable to fortify the
heights in the neighborhood. The foundation of a strong fort was
accordingly laid on Mount Independence, and, when completed, it was
named _Putnam_, in honor of the commander of the post. On eminences
south of it. Forts Webb, Wyllys, and other redoubts were constructed;
and at the close of 1779, West Point was the strongest military post in
America. In addition to the batteries that stood menacingly upon the
hill tops, the river was obstructed by an enormous iron chain, the form
and size of which is noted on page 132. The iron of which this chain was
constructed was wrought from ore of equal parts, from the Stirling and
Long Mines, in Orange county. The chain was manufactured by Peter
Townshend, of Chester, at the Stirling Iron Works, in the same county,
which were situated about twenty-five miles back of West Point. ** The
general superintendent of the work, as engineer, was Captain Thomas
Machin, who afterward assisted in the engineering operations at York-

* Note.--This map exhibits all of the most important localities at West
Point during the Revolution and at the present time. It will be seen
that the Hudson River rail-road crosses the cove and Constitution Island
a little eastward of the ruins of the main fortress, on that side of the
river. The island is owned by Henry W. Warner, Esq., and upon the
eminence where the ravelins of the fort were spread is his beautiful
country seat, called "Wood Crag," The kitchen part of his mansion is a
portion of the barracks erected there in the autumn of 1775.

* Letter of General Putnam to the commander-in-chief, January, 1778. In
this letter, Putnam gives, a few words, a picture of the terrible
privations which the soldiers in the Highlands were enduring, while
those at Valley Forge were also suffering intensely. "Dubois's
regiment," he says, "is unfit to be ordered on duty, there being not one
blanket in the regiment. Very few have either a shoe or a shirt, and
most of them have neither stockings, breeches, or overalls. Several
companies of enlisted artificers are in the same situation, and unable
to work in the field.

** The Stirling Works are still in operation. They are situated on the
outlet of Stirling Pond, about five miles southwest of the Sloatsburg
station, on the Erie rail-way. They are owned by descendants of Peter
Townshend, and have now been in operation about one hundred years,
having been established in 1751, by Lord Stirling (the Revolutionary
general) and others.

The Chain weakened by Arnold.--Importance of West Point.--Establishment
of the Military Academy there.

706town, when Cornwallis was captured. The chain was completed about the
middle of April, 1778, and on the 1st of May it was stretched across the
river and secured. *

When Benedict Arnold was arranging his plans to deliver West Point and
its dependencies into the hands of the enemy, this chain became a
special object of his attention; and it is related that, a few days
before the discovery of his treason, he wrote a letter to André, in a
disguised hand and manner, informing him that he had weakened the
obstructions in the river by ordering a link of the chain to be taken
out and carried to the smith, under a pretense that it needed repairs.
He assured his employer that the link would not be returned to its place
before the forts should be in possession of the enemy. Of the treason of
Arnold I shall write presently.

West Point was considered the keystone of the country during the
Revolution, and there a large quantity of powder, and other munitions of
war and military stores, were collected. These considerations combined,
made its possession a matter of great importance to the enemy, and hence
it was selected by Arnold as the prize which his treason would give as a
bribe. When peace returned, it was regarded as one of the most important
military posts in the country, and the plateau upon the point was
purchased by the United States government. Repairs were commenced on
Fort Putnam in 1794, but little was done. Not being included in the
government purchase, the owner of the land on which the fort stood felt
at liberty to appropriate its material to his private use, and for years
the work of demolition was carried on with a Vandal spirit exercised
only by the ignorant or avaricious. It was not arrested until Congress
purchased the Gridly Farm (see the map), on which the fort stood, in
1824, when the work had become almost a total ruin.

The Military Academy at West Point was established by an act of
Congress, which became a law on the 16th of March, 1802. Such an
institution, at that place, was proposed by Washington to Congress in
1793; and earlier than this, even before the war of the Revolution had
closed, he suggested the establishment of a military school there. **
But little progress was made in the matter until 1812, when, by an act
of Congress, a corps of engineers and of professors were organized, and
the school was endowed with the most attractive features of a literary
institution, mingled with that of the military character. From that
period until the present, the academy has been increasing in importance,
in a military point of view. Over three thousand young men have been
educated there, and, under the superintendence of Major Delafield, who
was appointed commandant in 1838, it continues to flourish. The value of
the instruction received there was made very manifest during the late
war with Mexico; a large portion of the most skillful officers of our
army, in that conflict, being graduates of this academy.

The bell is ringing for breakfast; let us close the record and descend
to the plain.

* Gordon and other early writers have promulgated the erroneous opinion
that this chain was constructed in 1777, and was destroyed by the
British fleet that passed up the Hudson and burned Kingston in October
of that year. Misled by these authorities, I have published the same
error in my Seventeen Hundred and Seventy-six. Documentary evidence,
which is far more reliable than the best tradition, shows that the chain
was constructed in the spring of 1778. Colonel Timothy Pickering,
accompanied by Captain Machin, arrived at the house of Mr. Townshend
late on a Saturday night in March of that year, to engage him to make
the chain. Townshend readily agreed to construct it; and in a violent
snow-storm, amid the darkness of the night, the parties set out for the
Stirling Iron Works. At daylight on Sunday morning the forges were in
operation. New England teamsters carried the links, as fast as they were
finished, to West Point, and in the space of six weeks the whole chain
was completed. It weighed one hundred and eighty tons.

** In the spring of 1783, Washington communicated a request to all his
principal officers, then in camp at Newburgh, and also to Governor
Clinton, to give him their views in reference to a peace establishment,
which must soon be organized. They complied, and, from their several
letters, Washington compiled a communication to Congress, extending to
twenty-five folio pages. In that communication, the commander-in-chief
opposed the proposition of several officers to establish military
academies at the different arsenals in the United States, and
recommended the founding of one at West Point. For his proposed plan in
outline. See Washington's Life and Writings, viii., p. 417, 418.

Forts Webb, Wyllys, and Putnam.--Visit to Constitution Island.--Remains
of Fort Constitution.

707The winding road from Fort Putnam to the plain is well wrought along
the mountain Bide, but quite steep in many places. A little south of it,
and near the upper road leading to the stone quarries and Mr.
Kingsley's, are the ruins of Fort Webb, a strong redoubt, built upon a
rocky eminence, and designed as an advanced defense of Fort Putnam.

A short distance below this, on another eminence, are the remains of
Fort Wyllys, a still stronger fortification. I visited these before
returning to the hotel, and from the broken ramparts of Fort Webb
sketched this distant view of Fort Putnam.

After a late breakfast, I procured the service of a waterman to convey
me in his skill' to Constitution island, and from thence down to
Buttermilk Falls, * two miles below West Point. I directed him to come
for me at the island within an hour and a half, but, either forgetting
his engagement or serving another customer, it was almost noon before I
saw him, when my patience as well as curiosity was quite exhausted I had
rambled over the island, making such sketches as I desired, and for
nearly an hour i sat upon a smooth bowlder by the margin of the river,
near the remains of the redoubt made to cover and defend the great chain
at the island end. On the southeast side of a small marshy cove,
clasping a rough rock, a good portion of the heavy walls of Fort
Constitution remain. The outworks are traceable several rods back into
the stinted forest. The sketch on the next page is from the upper edge
of the cove, and includes, on the left, a view of the re-

* These falls derive their name, from the milky appearance of the water
as it rushes in a white foam over the rocks in a series of cascades.

Buttermilk Falls.--A venerable Boatman.--Beverly Dock and Robinson
House.--Arnold's Willow.

708mains of the redoubt across the river, the site of Fort Clinton, the
chain, and Kosciuszko's monument, and, in the distance, Fort Hill, in
the neighborhood of Ardenia and the Robinson House.

From Constitution Island we proceeded along under the high cliffs of
West Point to Buttermilk Falls. There was a strong breeze from the south
that tossed our little craft about like an egg-shell, and my cloak was
well moistened with the spray before reaching the landing. There, in a
little cottage, overhung by a huge cliff that seemed ready to tumble
down, lived-a boatman, named Havens, seventy-nine years old. For more
than fifty years himself and wife have lived there under the rocks and
within the chorus of the cascades. He was too young to remember the
stirring scenes of the Revolution, but immediate subsequent events were
fresh in his recollection. He was engaged in removing powder from Fort
Clinton, at West Point, when the Clermont, Fulton's experiment boat,
with its bare paddles, went up the river, exciting the greatest wonder
in its course.

After I had passed a half hour pleasantly with this good old couple, the
veteran prepared his little boat and rowed me across to "Beverly Dock"
(the place from whence Arnold escaped in his barge to the Vulture),
where he agreed to await my return from a visit to the Robinson House,
three quarters of a mile distant. The path lay along the border of a
marsh and up a steep hill, the route which tradition avers Arnold took
in his flight. Two of the old willow trees, called "Arnold's willows,"
were yet standing on the edge of the morass, riven and half decayed.

The Robinson House, formerly owned by Colonel Beverly Robinson, is
situated upon a fertile plateau at the foot of Sugar Loaf

Mountain, one of the eastern ranges of the Highlands, which rises in
conical form to an elevation of eight hundred feet above the plain. This
mansion, spacious for the times, is at present occupied by Lieutenant
Thomas Arden, graduate of West Point, who, with taste, preserves every
part of it in its original character. The lowest building, on the left,
was the farm-house, attached to the other two which formed the family
mansion. Here Colonel Robinson lived in quiet, but not in retirement,
for his house had

* This house, the property of Richard D. Arden, Esq. (father of the
proprietor), is now called Beverly, the Christian name of Colonel
Robinson. The dock built by Colonel R., and yet partially in existence,
is Beverly Dock. The fine estate of Mr. Arden he has named Ardenia. This
view is from the lawn on the south side of the house. The highest part,
on the right, was the portion occupied by Arnold. On the extreme right
is an ancient cherry-tree, which doubtless bore fruit during the
Revolution. This mansion was the country residence of Colonel Beverly
Robinson, who married a daughter of Frederic Phillipse, the owner of an
immense landed estate on the Hudson. Colonel Robinson was a son of John
Robinson, who was president of the Council of Virginia on the retirement
of Governor Gooch in 1731 He was a major in the British army under Wolfe
at the storming of Quebec in 1759. He emigrated to New York, and became
very wealthy by his marriage. The mansion here delineated was his
residence when the war of the Revolution broke out, and, loving quiet,
he refrained from engaging in the exciting events of the day. He was
opposed to the course of the ministry during the few years preceding the
war, joined heartily in carrying out the spirit of the non-importation
agreements, but, opposed to any separation of the colonies from the
parent country, he took sides with the Loyalists when the Declaration of
Independence was promulgated. He removed to New York, and there raised a
military corps called the Loyal American Regiment, of which he was
commissioned the colonel. His son, Beverly, was commissioned its
lieutenant colonel. It is supposed that he was Arnold's correspondent
and confidant in his preliminary acts of treason, and that the
intentions of the traitor were known to him before any intimation of
them was made to Sir Henry Clinton. Robinson figures publicly in that
affair, and his country mansion was the head-quarters of the recusant
general while arranging the crowning acts of his treachery. At the
conclusion of the war, Colonel Robinson and a portion of his family went
to England, where he remained until his death, which occurred at
Thornburn in 1792, at the age of 69 years. His wife died in 1822, at the
age of 94. Colonel Robinson and Washington were personal friends before
the war, and it is asserted that, at the house of the former, the
Virginian colonel, while on his way to Boston in 1756, to consult
General Shirley on military affairs, saw and "fell in love" with Miss
Mary Phillipse, a sister of Mrs. Robinson. It is also said that
Washington made a proposition of marriage to her, but she refused him,
telling him frankly that she loved another. The favored suitor was Roger
Morris, one of Washington's companions in arms in the battle of the
Great Meadows, where Braddock was killed. Morris was that general's aid-
de-camp. A portrait of this lady may be found on page 626, vol. ii. The
miniature from which this likeness of Colonel Robinson was copied is in
the possession of his grandson, Beverly Robinson, Esq., of New York. It
was painted by Mr. Plott in 1785, when Colonel Robinson was sixty-two
years old. The letter from which I copied his signature was written in
1786. The last surviving son of Colonel Robinson (Sir Frederick Philipse
Robinson), died at his residence, at Brighton, England, on the 1st of
January, 1852, at the age of 87 years.

Arnold in Philadelphia.--His Extravagance.--Marriage with Miss Shippen.-
-Memoir of Beverly Robinson.

709too wide a reputation for hospitality to be often without a guest
beneath its roof. There Generals Putnam and Parsons made their head-
quarters in 1778-9. Dr. Dwight, then a chaplain in the army, and
residing there, speaks of it as a most delightful spot, "surrounded by
valuable gardens, fields, and orchards, yielding every thing which will
grow in this climate." But the event which gives the most historic
importance to this place was the treason of Arnold, which we will here
consider.

When the British evacuated Philadelphia in the spring of 1778, Arnold
(whose leg, wounded at the battle of Stillwater the previous autumn, was
not yet healed) was appointed by Washington military governor of the
city, having in command a small detachment of troops. After remaining a
month in Philadelphia, Arnold conceived the project of quitting the army
and engaging in the naval service. He applied to Washington for advice
in the matter, expressing his desire to be appointed to a command in the
navy, and alleging the state of his wounds as a reason for desiring less
active service than the army, yet a service more fitted to his genius
than the inactive one he was then engaged in. Washington answered him
with caution, and declined offering an opinion. As no further movement
was made in the matter, it is probable that the idea originated with
Arnold alone; and, as he could not engage the countenance of Washington,
he abandoned it.

Fond of show, and feeling the importance of his station, Arnold now
began to live in a style of splendor and extravagance which his income
would not allow, and his pecuniary embarrassments, already becoming
troublesome to him, were soon fearfully augmented. The future was all
dark, for he saw no honorable means for delivering himself from the
dilemma. No doubt, dreams of rich prizes filled his mind while
contemplating a command in the navy, but these

Arnold's Residence and Style of Living.--His fraudulent Healings.--
Charge of Malfeasance preferred against him

710being dissipated, he saw the web of difficulty gathering more closely
and firmly around him. He had recently married Miss Margaret Shippen,
daughter of Edward Shippen, one of the disaffected or Tory residents of
Philadelphia. She was much younger than he, and he loved her with
passionate fondness--a love deserved by her virtues and solidity of
understanding. In addition to these advantages, she was beautiful in
person and engaging in her manners. When the British troops entered
Philadelphia, a few months previously, her friends had given them a
cordial welcome; therefore the marriage of Arnold with a member of such
a family excited great surprise, and some uneasiness on the part of the
patriots. "But he was pledged to the republic by so many services
rendered and benefits received, that, on reflection, the alliance gave
umbrage to no one." *

Arnold resided in the spacious mansion that once belonged to William
Penn, ** and there he lived in a style of luxury rivaled by no resident
in Philadelphia. He kept a coach-and-four, servants in livery, and gave
splendid banquets. Rather than retrench his expenses and live within his
means, he chose to procure money by a system of fraud, and prostitution
of his official power, *** which brought him into collision with the
people, and with the president and Council of Pennsylvania. The latter
preferred a series of charges against him, all implying a willful abuse
of power and criminal acts. These were laid before Congress. A
committee, to whom all such charges were referred, acquitted him of
criminal designs. The whole subject was referred anew to a joint
committee of Congress, and the Assembly and Council of Pennsylvania.
After proceeding in their duties for a while, it was thought expedient
to hand the whole matter over to Washington, to be submitted to a
military tribunal. Four of the charges only were deemed cognizable by a
court martial, and these were transmitted to Washington. Arnold had
previously presented to Congress large claims against the government, on
account of money which he alleged he had expended for the public service
in Canada. A part of his claim was disallowed; and it was generally
believed, that he attempted to cheat the government by false financial
statements.

Arnold was greatly irritated by the course pursued by Congress and the
Pennsylvania Assembly, and complained, probably not without cause (for
party spirit was never more rife in the national Legislature than at
that time), of injustice and partiality on the part of

* American Register, 1817, ii., 31.

** A view of this mansion, which is still standing, may be found on page
95, vol. ii.

*** Under pretense of supplying the wants of the army, Arnold forbade
the shop-keepers to sell or buy; he then put goods at the disposal of
his agents, and caused them to be sold at enormous profits, the greater
proportion of which he put into his own purse. "At one moment he
prostituted his authority to enrich his accomplices; at the next,
squabbled with them about the division of the prey." His transactions in
this way involved the enormous amount of one hundred and forty thousand
dollars.

**** Benedict Arnold was born in Norwich, Connecticut, on the 2d of
January, 1740. He was a descendant of Benedict Arnold, one of the early
governors of Rhode Island. He was bred an apothecary, under the brothers
Lathrop of Norwich, who were so much pleased with him as a young man of
genius and enterprise, that they gave him two thousand dollars to
commence business with. From 1763 to 1767, he combined the business of
druggist and bookseller in New Haven. Being in command of a volunteer
company there when the war broke out, he marched to Cambridge, and
thenceforth his career is identified with some of the bravest exploits
of the Revolution, until his defection in 1780. In preceding chapters
his course and character have been incidentally noticed, and it is
unnecessary to repeat them here. On going over to the enemy, he received
the commission of brigadier general in the British army, together with
the price of his treason. After the war he went to England, where he
chiefly resided until his death. He was engaged in trade in St. John's,
New Brunswick, from 1786 till 1793. He was fraudulent in his dealings,
and became so unpopular, that in 1792 he was hung in effigy by a mob. He
left St. John's for the West Indies in 1794, but, finding a French fleet
there, and fearing a detention by them, the allies of America, he sailed
for England. He died in Gloucester Place, London, June 14th, 1801, at
the age of sixty-one. His wife died at the same place, on the 14th of
June, 1804, aged forty-three. Arnold had three children by his first
wife, and four by his second, all boys.

Arnold ordered to be tried by a Court Martial.--His Trial, Verdict, and
Punishment.--Its Effects.

711the former, in throwing aside the report of their own committee, by
which he had been acquitted, and listening to the proposals of men who,
he said, were moved by personal enmity, and had practiced unworthy
artifices to cause delay. After the lapse of three months, the Council
of Pennsylvania were not ready for the trial, and requested it to be put
off, with the plea that they had not collected all their evidence.
Arnold considered this a subterfuge, and plainly told all parties so. He
was anxious to have the matter settled, for he was unemployed; for on
the 18th of March, 1779, after the committee of Congress had reported on
the charges preferred hy the Council of Pennsylvania, he had resigned
his commission. He was vexed that Congress, instead of calling up and
sanctioning the first report, should yield to the solicitations of his
enemies for a military trial. *

The day fixed for the trial was the 1st of June; the place, Washington's
head-quarters at Middlebrook. The movements of the British prevented the
trial being held, and it was deferred until the 20th of December, (a)
when the court assembled for the purpose, at Morristown. ** The trial
commenced, and continued, with slight interruptions, until the 26th of
January, (b) when the verdict was rendered. Arnold made an elaborate
1779 defense, in the course of which he magnified his services, asserted
his entire innocence of the criminal charges made against him, cast
reproach, by imputation, upon some1780 of the purest men in the army,
and solemnly proclaimed his patriotic attachment to his country. "The
boastfulness and malignity of these declarations," says Sparks, "are
obvious enough; but their consummate hypocrisy can be understood only by
knowing the fact that, at the moment they were uttered, he had been
eight months in secret correspondence with the enemy, and was prepared,
if not resolved, when the first opportunity should offer, to desert and
destroy his country."

Arnold was acquitted of two of the four charges; the other two were
sustained in part. The court sentenced him to the mildest form of
punishment, a simple reprimand by the commander-in-chief. *** Washington
carried the sentence into execution with all possible delicacy; **** but
Arnold's pride was too deeply wounded, or, it may be, his treasonable
schemes were too far ripened, to allow him to take advantage of the
favorable moment to regain the confidence of his countrymen and
vindicate his character. He had expected from the court a triumphant
vindication of his honor; he was prepared, in the event of an
unfavorable verdict, to seek revenge at any hazard.

* Sparks's Life and Treason of Arnold, 131, 133.

** Arnold continued to reside in Philadelphia after resigning his
command. No longer afraid of his power, the people testified their
detestation of his character by various indignities. One day he was
assaulted in the streets by the populace. He complained to Congress, and
asked a guard of twenty men to be placed around his residence. Congress
declined to interfere, and this added another to the list of his alleged
grievances. In the mean while, Arnold devised several schemes by which
to relieve himself of his pecuniary embarrassments. He proposed to form
a settlement in Western New York for the officers and soldiers who had
served under him. He also conceived the idea of joining some of the
Indian tribes, and, uniting many of them in one, become a great and
powerful chief among them.

*** Colonel Philip Van Cortlandt, of West Chester county, recorded the
following in his diary: "General Arnold being under arrest for improper
conduct in Philadelphia while he commanded there, I was chosen one of
the court martial, Major-general Howe, president. There were also in
that court four officers who had been at Ticonderoga when Colonel Hazen
was called on for trial, &c. We were for cashiering Arnold, but the
majority overruled, and he was finally sentenced to be reprimanded by
the commander-in-chief. Had all the court known Arnold's former conduct
as well as myself, he would have been dismissed the service."

**** "When Arnold was brought before him," says M. de Marbois, "he
kindly addressed him, saying, 'Our profession is the chastest of all.
Even the shadow of a fault tarnishes the luster of our finest
achievements. The least inadvertence may rob us of the public favor, so
hard to be acquired. I reprimand you for having forgotten that, in
proportion as you had rendered yourself formidable to our enemies, you
should have been guarded and temperate in your deportment toward your
fellow-citizens. Exhibit anew those noble qualities which have placed
you on the list of our most valued commanders. I will myself furnish
you, as far as it may be in my power, with opportunities of regaining
the esteem of your country.'"

Arnold's Interview with Luzerne.--His Wife and Major André.--Sympathy of
Schuyler and Livingston.

712In manifest treason there was great danger, and, before proceeding to
any overt acts of that nature, Arnold tried other schemes to accomplish
his desire of obtaining money to meet the claims of his creditors and
the daily demands of his extravagant style of living. He apparently
acquiesced in the sentence of the court martial, and tried to get
Congress to adjust his accounts by allowing his extravagant claims. This
he could not accomplish, and he applied to M. de Luzerne, the French
minister, who succeeded Gerard, for a loan, promising a faithful
adherence to the king and country of the embassador. Luzerne admired the
military talents of Arnold, and treated him with great respect; but he
refused the loan, and administered a kind though keen rebuke to the
applicant for thus covertly seeking a bribe. * He talked kindly to
Arnold, reasoned soundly, and counseled him wisely. But words had no
weight without the added specific gravity of gold, and he left the
French minister with mingled indignation, mortification, and shame. From
that hour he doubtless resolved to sell the liberties of his country for
a price.

Hitherto the intimacy and correspondence of Arnold with officers of the
British army had been without definite aim, and apparently incidental.
His marriage with the daughter of Mr. Shippen (who was afterward chief
justice of Pennsylvania) was no doubt a link of the greatest importance
in the chain of his treasonable operations. That family was disaffected
to the American cause. Shippen's youngest daughter, then eighteen years
of age, remarkable, as we have observed, for her beauty, gayety, and
general attractions, had been admired and flattered by the British
officers, and was a leading personage in the splendid _fete_ called the
_Mischianza_, which was given in honor of Sir William Howe when he was
about leaving the army for Europe. She was intimate with Major Andre,
and corresponded with him after the British army had retired to New
York. This was the girl who, attracted by the station, equipage, and
brilliant display of Arnold, gave him her hand; this was the girl he
loved so passionately. From that moment he was peculiarly exposed to the
influence of the enemies of his country, and they, no doubt, kept alive
the feelings of discontent which disturbed him after his first rupture
with the authorities of Pennsylvania. His wife may not have been his
confidant; but through her intimacy with Major Andre his correspondence
with Sir Henry Clinton was effected. Whether she was cognizant of the
contents of the letters of her husband is not known; probably she was
not.

West Point was an object of covetous desire to Sir Henry Clinton. Arnold
knew that almost any amount of money and honors would be given to the
man who should be instrumental in placing that post in the hands of the
enemy. He resolved, therefore, to make this the subject of barter for
British gold. Hitherto he had pleaded the bad state of his wounds in
justification of comparative inaction; now they healed rapidly. Though
he could not endure the fatigues of active service on horseback, he
thought he might fulfill the duties of commander at West Point. Hitherto
he was sullen and indifferent; now his patriotism was aroused afresh,
and he was eager to rejoin his old companions in arms. He was ready to
make the sacrifice of domestic ease for an opportunity to again serve
his bleeding country. With language of such import he addressed his
friends in Congress, particularly General Schuyler, and others who he
knew had influence with Washington. He intimated to Schuyler his
partiality for the post at West Point. He also prevailed upon Robert R.
Livingston, then a member of Congress from New York, to write to
Washington and suggest the expe-

* M. de Marbois, who was the secretary of the French legation, has
preserved a vivid picture of this interview in his account of the
treason of Arnold, an excellent translation of which may be found in the
American Register, 1817. He says Luzerne listened to Arnold's discourse
with pain, but he answered with frankness. You desire of me a service,"
he said, "which it would be easy for me to render, but which would
degrade us both. When the envoy of a foreign power gives, or, if you
will, lends money, it is ordinarily to corrupt those who receive it, and
to make them the creatures of the sovereign whom he serves; or, rather,
he corrupts without persuading; he buys and does not secure. But the
firm league entered into between the king and the United States is the
work of justice and the wisest policy. It has for its basis a reciprocal
interest and good will. In the mission with which I am charged, my true
glory consists in fulfilling it without intrigue or cabal, without
resorting to any secret practices, and by the force alone of the
condition of the alliance."

Arnold's Visit to the American Camp.--Washington Deceived by him.--
Obtains the Command at West Point.

713diency of giving Arnold the command of that station. Livingston
cheerfully complied, but his letter had no appearance of being suggested
by Arnold himself. Scarcely had Livingston's letter reached the camp,
before Arnold appeared there in person. Under pretense of having private
business in Connecticut, he passed through the camp, to pay his respects
to the commander-in-chief. He made no allusion to his desire for an
appointment to the command of West Point, and pursued his journey. On
his return, he again called upon Washington at his quarters, and then
suggested that, on joining the army, the command of that post would be
best suited to his feelings and the state of his health. Washington was
a little surprised that the impetuous Arnold should be willing to take
command where there was no prospect of active operations. His surprise,
however, had no mixture of suspicion Arnold visited and inspected all
the fortifications, in company with General Robert Howe and then
returned to Philadelphia.

Having resolved to join the army, Arnold applied to Congress for
arrearages of pay, to enable him to furnish himself with a horse and
equipage. Whether his application was successful no record explains. He
reached the camp on the last day of July, while the army was crossing
the Hudson from the west side, at King's Ferry (Verplanck's Point).

On the arrival of the French at Newport, Sir Henry Clinton made an
effort to attack them before they could land and fortify themselves. The
result we have already considered. This movement caused Washington, who
was encamped between Haverstraw and Tappan, to cross the river, with the
intention of attacking New York in the absence of Clinton. Arnold met
Washington on horseback, just as the last division was crossing over,
and asked if any place had been assigned to him. The commander-in-chief
replied that he was to take command of the left wing, the post of honor.
Arnold was disappointed, and perceiving it, Washington promised to meet
him at his quarters, and have further conversation on the subject. He
found Arnold's heart set upon the command of West Point. He was unable
to account for this strange inconsistency with his previous ambition to
serve in the most conspicuous place. Still he had no suspicion of wrong,
and he complied with Arnold's request. The instructions which gave him
command of "that post and its dependencies, in which all are included
from Fishkill to King's Ferry," * were dated at Peekskill on the 3d of
August, 1780. Arnold repaired immediately to the Highlands, and
established his quarters at Colonel Robinson's house. Sir Henry Clinton
having abandoned his expedition against the French at'= Newport, the
American army retraced its steps, and, crossing the Hudson, marched down
to Tappan and encamped, where it remained for several weeks. General
Greene commanded the right wing, and Lord Stirling the left; six
battalions of light infantry, stationed in advance, were commanded by La
Fayette.

Thus far Arnold's plans had worked admirably. He had now been in
correspondence with Sir Henry Clinton for eighteen months, ** both
parties always writing over fictitious names, and, for a great portion
of the time, without a knowledge, on the part of the British commander,
of the name and character of the person with whom he was in
communication. Arnold corresponded with Clinton through the hands of
Major Andre. Writing in a dis-

* Sparks's Life and Writings of Washington, viii., 139.

** It is not positively known how early Arnold's correspondence with
officers of the British army commenced, or at what precise period he
first conceived the idea of betraying his country. The translator of the
Marquis de Chastellux's Travels in North America, an English gentleman
of distinction, and a resident here during our Revolution, says (i.,
page 97), "There is every reason to believe that Arnold's treachery took
its date from his connection with Lieutenant Hele, killed afterward on
board the Formidable, in the West Indies, and who was undoubtedly a very
active and industrious spy at Philadelphia in the winter of 1778,
whither he was sent for that purpose in a pretended flag of truce, which
being wrecked in the Delaware, he was made prisoner by Congress, a
subject of much discussion between them and the commander at New York.
That the intended plot was known in England, and great hopes built upon
it long before it was to take place, is certain. General Mathews and
other officers, who returned in the autumn of 1780, being often heard to
declare 'that it was all over with the rebels; that they were about to
receive an irreparable blow, the news of which would soon arrive, &c.,
&c.' Their silence, from the moment in which they received an account of
the failure of the plot and the discovery of the traitor, evidently
pointed out the object of their allusions."

Correspondence of Arnold and André.--Proposed Plan of the British to
gain Possession of West Point.

714guised hand, he clothed his meaning in the ambiguous style of a
commercial correspondence, and affixed to his letters the signature of
Gustavus. Andre signed his John Anderson. He was an aid-de-camp of the
commander-in-chief of the British forces, and was afterward the adjutant
general of the British army.

He enjoyed the unbounded confidence of Sir Henry Clinton, and to him,
when the name and station of Arnold became known, was intrusted the
delicate task of consummating the bargain with the traitor. Even while
the name of Arnold was yet concealed, Clinton was confident that his
secret correspondent was an officer of high rank in the American army;
and before Arnold was tried by a court martial, the British general was
convinced that he was the man. That trial lessened his value in the
estimation of Clinton; but when Arnold obtained the command of West
Point, the affair assumed greater magnitude and importance.

The general plan of operations agreed upon for placing West Point in
possession of the enemy was, for Sir Henry Clinton to send a strong
force up the Hudson at the moment when the combined French and American
armies should make an expected movement against New York. This movement
was really a part of Washington's plan for the autumn campaign, and Sir
Henry Clinton was informed of it by Arnold. It was concluded that West
Point and its dependencies would be the depositories of a great portion
of the stores and ammunition of the allied armies. It was rumored that
the French were to land on Long Island, and approach New York in that
direction, while Washington was to march with the main army of the
Americans to invade York Island at Kingsbridge. At this juncture, a
flotilla under Rodney, bearing a strong land force, was to proceed up
the Hudson to

* This is a portion of a concluding sentence of a letter from André to
Colonel Sheldon, which will be mentioned presently.

André appointed to confer with Arnold.--An Interview proposed by the
Traitor.--Letter to Colonel Sheldon.

715the Highlands, when Arnold, under pretense of a weak garrison, should
surrender the post and its dependencies into the hands of the enemy. In
this event, Washington must have retreated from Kingsbridge, and the
French on Long Island would probably have fallen into the hands of the
British. With a view to these operations, the British troops were so
posted that they could be put in motion at the shortest notice; while
vessels, properly manned, were kept in readiness on the Hudson River.

It was now necessary that Clinton should be certified of the identity of
General Arnold and his hidden correspondent, in order that he might make
himself secure against a counterplot. A personal conference was
proposed, and Arnold insisted that the officer sent to confer with him
should be Adjutant-general Major Andre. * Clinton, on his part, had
already fixed upon Andre as the proper person to hold the conference. It
must be borne in mind that Andre did not seek the service, though, when
engaged in it, he used his best endeavors, as in duty bound, to carry
out its objects.

As money was the grand lure that made Arnold a traitor, he felt it
necessary to have an understanding respecting the reward which he was to
obtain. Under date of August 1780 30th, he wrote to Andre in the feigned
hand and style alluded to, and said, referring to himself in the third
person, "He is still of opinion that his first proposal is by no means
unreasonable, and makes no doubt, when he has a conference with you,
that you will close with it. He expects, when you meet, that you will be
fully authorized from your house; that the risks and profits of the
copartnership may be fully understood. _A speculation of this kind might
be easily made with ready money_." Clinton understood this hint, and
Andre was authorized to negotiate on that point.

Arnold's first plan was to have the interview at his own quarters in the
Highlands, Andre to be represented as a person devoted to the American
interest, and possessing ample means for procuring intelligence from the
enemy. This was a safe ground for Arnold to proceed upon, for the
employment of secret agents to procure intelligence was well known. **
He dispatched a letter to André informing him of this arrangement, and
assuring him that if he could make his way safely to the American
outposts above White Plains, he would find no obstructions thereafter.
Colonel Sheldon was then in command of a detachment of cavalry stationed
on the east side of the Hudson. His head-quarters, with a part of the
detachment, was at Salem, and those of his lieutenant (Colonel Jameson)
and of Major Tallmadge, with the remainder of the corps, were at North
Castle. Arnold gave Sheldon notice that he expected a person from New
York, with whom he would have an interview at the colonel's quarters, to
make important arrangements for receiving early intelligence from the
enemy. He requested Sheldon, in the event of the stranger's arrival, to
send information of the fact to his quarters at the Robinson House.
Arnold's plan was not entirely agreeable to Andre, for he was not
disposed to go within the American lines and assume the odious character
of a spy. He accordingly wrote the following letter to Colonel Sheldon,
signed John Anderson, which, he knew, would be placed in Arnold's hands.
It proposed a meeting at Dobbs's Ferry, upon the Neutral Ground. "I am
told that my name is made known to you, and that I may hope your
indulgence in permitting me to meet a friend near your outposts. I will
endeavor to obtain permission to go out with a flag, which will be sent
to Dobbs's Ferry on Monday next, the 11th instant, at twelve o'clock,
when I shall be happy to meet September, 1780

Mr. G--------. Should I not be allowed to go, the officer who is to
command the escort--between whom and myself no distinction need be made-
-can speak in the affair.

* Sir Henry Clinton's letter to Lord George Germain.

** In this connection it may be mentioned, that when Arnold was about to
proceed to the Highlands, he went to La Fayette, and requested him to
give him the names of spies which the marquis had in his employ in-New
York, suggesting that intelligence from them might often reach him more
expeditiously by the way of West Point. La Fayette objected, saying that
he was in honor bound not to reveal the names of spies to any person.
The object which Arnold had in view became subsequently obvious.

Effect of Andrè's Letter to Sheldon.--Arnold's attempted Interview with
André.--His Letter to Washington.--Joshua H. Smith

716Let me entreat you, sir, to favor a matter so interesting to the
parties concerned, and which is of so private a nature that the public
on neither side can be injured by it." This letter puzzled Colonel
Sheldon, for he had never heard the name of John Anderson, nor had
Arnold intimated any thing concerning an escort. He supposed, however,
that it was from the person expected by Arnold. He therefore inclosed it
to the general, telling him that he (Sheldon) was too unwell to go to
Dobbs's Ferry, and expressing a hope that Arnold would meet Anderson
there himself. Andrè's letter puzzled Arnold too, for he found it
difficult to explain its meaning very plausibly to Colonel Sheldon. But
the traitor contrived, with consummate skill, to prevent the mystery
having any importance in the mind of that officer.

Arnold left his quarters on the 10th, went down the river in his barge
to King's Ferry, and passed the night at the house of Joshua Hett Smith,
near Haverstraw, * who afterward acted a conspicuous part in the work of
treason, he being, as is supposed, the dupe of Arnold. Early in the
morning the traitor proceeded toward Dobbs's Ferry, where Andre and
Colonel Beverly Robinson had arrived. As Arnold approached that point,
not having a flag, he was fired upon by the British gun-boats stationed
near, and closely pursued. He escaped to the opposite side of the river,
and the conference was necessarily postponed. Having gone down the river
openly in his barge, Arnold deemed it necessary to make some explanation
to General Washington, and accordingly he wrote a letter to him, in
which, after mentioning several important matters connected with the
command at West Point, he incidentally stated that he had come down the
river to establish signals as near the enemy's lines as possible, by
which he might receive information of any movements of a fleet or troops
up the Hudson. This letter was

* This house is yet standing. A drawing of it is presented on page 152.
It is about two miles and a half below Stony Point, on the right side of
the road leading to Haverstraw.

* There has ever been a difference of opinion concerning the true
character of Smith; some supposing him to have been a Tory, and acting
with a full knowledge of Arnold's instructions; others believing him to
have been the traitor's dupe. Leake, in his Life of John Lamb (p. 256),
says that Arnold often visited Smith to while away tedious hours; and
that Colonel Lamb, while in command at West Point, was frequently
invited to visit him, but invariably declined, notwithstanding Mrs.
Smith and Mrs. Lamb were nearly related. Colonel Lamb said he knew Smith
to be a Tory, and he would not visit his own father in a similar
category. There is evidence that he was a Whig. See William Smith's
letter on page 724.

* This map includes the Hudson River and its shores from Dobbs's Ferry
to West Point, and exhibits a chart of the whole scene of Arnold's
treason, and of the route, capture, and execution of the unfortunate
Andre. The thin lines upon the map indicate the public roads. By a
reference to it, in perusing the narrative, the reader will have a clear
understanding of the matter.

Further arrangements for an Interview.--Arnold's Correspondence with
Beverly Robinson.--Washington on his Journey

717dated at "Dobbs's Ferry, September 11th," and on that night he
returned to his quarters at the Robinson House.

It was now necessary to make arrangements for another interview. No time
was to be lost; no precautionary measure was to be neglected. Arnold
knew that Washington was preparing to go to Hartford, to hold a
conference with the newly-arrived French officers, and that the proper
time to consummate his plans would be during the absence of the
commander-in-chief. As Washington would cross the Hudson at King's
Ferry, it was very necessary, too, that no movement should be made until
his departure that might excite his suspicions.

Two days after Arnold returned to his quarters, he found means to send a
September 13, 1780 communication to Andre, which, as usual, was couched
in commercial language. He cautioned André not to reveal any thing to
Colonel Sheldon. "I have no confidant," he said; "I have made one too
many already, who has prevented some profitable speculation." He
informed André that a person would meet him on the west side of Dobbs's
Ferry, on Wednesday, the 20th instant, and that he would conduct him to
a place of safety, where the writer would meet him. "It will be
necessary," he said, "for you to be in disguise. I can not be more
explicit at present. Meet me, if possible. You may rest assured that, if
there is no danger in passing your lines, you will be perfectly safe
where I propose a meeting." Arnold also wrote to Major Tallmadge, at
North Castle, instructing him, if a person by the name of John Anderson
should arrive at his station, to send him without delay to head-
quarters, escorted by two dragoons.

Sir Henry Clinton, who was as anxious as Arnold to press the matter
forward, had sent Colonel Robinson up the river on board the Vulture,
with orders to proceed as high as Teller's Point. Robinson and Arnold
seem to have had some general correspondence previous to this time, and
it is believed (as I have mentioned on a preceding page) that the former
was made acquainted with the treasonable designs of the latter some time
before the subject was brought explicitly before Sir Henry Clinton. As
Arnold was occupying Colonel Robinson's confiscated mansion, a good
opportunity was afforded him to write to the general without exciting
suspicion, making the burden of his letters the subject of a restoration
of his property. This medium of communication was now adopted to inform
General Arnold that Robinson was on board the Vulture. Robinson wrote to
General Putnam, pretending a belief that he was in the Highlands, and
requesting an interview with him on the subject of his property. This
letter was covered by one addressed to Arnold, requesting him to hand
the inclosed to General Putnam, or, if that officer had gone away, to
return it by the bearer. "In case General Putnam shall be absent," he
said, "I am persuaded, from the humane and generous character you bear,
that you will grant me the favor asked." These letters were sent, by a
flag, to Verplanck's Point, the Vulture then lying about six miles
below. On the very day that Washington commenced his journey to
Hartford, Arnold September 18 had come down to the Point, a few hours
before the arrival of the chief at the ferry on the opposite shore, and
received and read Colonel Robinson's letter. He mentioned the contents
to Colonel Lamb and others, with all the frankness of conscious
integrity. The commander-in-chief and his suite crossed the river in
Arnold's barge * soon afterward, and the latter accompanied them to
Peekskill. Arnold frankly laid the letter before Washing-

* Sparks (American Biography, vol. iii., from which a large portion of
these details are drawn) says that two incidents occurred during this
passage across the river, which, though almost unnoticed at the time,
afterward, when the treachery was known, assumed some importance. The
Vulture was in full view, and while Washington was looking at it through
a glass, and speaking in a low tone to one of his officers, Arnold was
observed to appear uneasy. Another incident was remembered. There was a
daily expectation of the arrival of a French squadron on the coast,
under Count de Guichen. La Fayette, alluding to the frequent
communications by water between New York and the posts on the Hudson,
said to Arnold, "General, since you have a correspondence with the
enemy, you must ascertain, as soon as possible, what has become of
Guichen." Arnold was disconcerted, and demanded what he meant; but
immediately controlling himself, and the boat just then reaching the
shore, nothing more was said. No doubt, for a moment, Arnold thought his
plot was discovered.--Page 186.

Washington again deceived by Arnold's Duplicity.--Smith employed to
bring André from the Vulture.--His Difficulties.

718ton, and asked his advice. His reply was, that the civil authority
alone could act in the matter, and he did not approve of a personal
interview with Robinson. This frankness on the part of Arnold
effectually prevented all suspicion, and Washington proceeded to
Hartford, confident in the integrity of the commandant of West Point.

Arnold dared not, after receiving this opinion from Washington, so far
disregard it as to meet Robinson, but it gave him an opportunity to use
the name of the commander-in-chief in his reply, which he openly
dispatched by an officer in a flag-boat to the Vulture. He September,
1780 informed Colonel Robinson that on the night of the 20th he should
send a person on board the Vulture, who would be furnished with a boat
and a flag of truce; and in a postscript he added, "I expect General
Washington to lodge here on Saturday next, and I will lay before him any
matter you may wish to communicate." This was an ingenuous and safe way
of informing the enemy at what time the commander-in-chief would return
from Hartford.

Arnold's communication was sent to Sir Henry Clinton, and the next
morning André proceeded to Dobbs's Ferry, positively instructed by his
general not to change his dress, go within the American lines, receive
papers, or in any other way act in the character of a spy. It was
supposed that Arnold himself would visit the Vulture; but he had
arranged a plan for effecting a meeting involving less personal hazard.
Joshua Hett Smith, just mentioned, who lived about two miles below Stony
Point, had been employed by General Robert Howe, when in command of West
Point, to procure intelligence from New York. Smith occupied a very
respectable station in society, and could command more valuable aid, in
the business in question, than any other person. To him Arnold went with
a proposition to assist him in his undertaking, without, as Smith
alleged, revealing to him his real intentions. He flattered him with
expressions of the highest confidence and regard, and informed him that
he was expecting a person of consequence from New York with valuable
intelligence from the enemy, and he wanted Smith's service in bringing
him within the American lines. While at Smith's on this business, Arnold
was joined by his wife with her infant child, who had come on from
Philadelphia. There she remained all night, and the next morning her
husband went with her, in his barge, to head-quarters.

Arnold made his arrangements with Smith to have his meeting with André
(whom he had resolved should be brought on shore from the Vulture) take
place at his house, in the event of the conference being protracted.
Smith, accordingly, took his family to Fishkill to visit some friends,
and returning, halted at the Robinson House, and arranged with Arnold a
plan of operations. The general gave him the customary pass for a flag
of truce, sent an order to Major Kierse, at Stony Point, to supply Smith
with a boat whenever he should want one, and directed Smith to proceed
to the Vulture the following night and bring on shore the person who was
expected to be there. Smith failed in his endeavors to make the
arrangements, and did not visit the Vulture at the time he was directed
to. Samuel Colquhon, one of his tenants, to whom he applied for
assistance as boatman, refused to go. Smith sent Colquhon to Arnold with
a letter, informing him of his failure. The messenger, by riding all
night, reached the Robinson House at dawn. Early in the forenoon,
September 21. Arnold himself went down the river to Verplanck's Point,
and thence to Smith's house. At Verplanck's, Colonel Livingston handed
him a letter which he had just received for him from Captain Sutherland
of the Vulture. It was a remonstrance against an alleged violation of
the rules of war by a party on Teller's Point. * The letter was in the
handwriting of André, though signed by Sutherland. Arnold at once
perceived the main object of this secretaryship to be, to inform him
that André was on board the Vulture.

Arnold now hastened to make arrangements to bring André ashore. He
ordered a skiff

* A flag of truce was exhibited at Teller's Point, inviting, as was
supposed, a pacific intercourse with the ship. A boat, with another
flag, was sent off, but as soon as it approached the shore it was fired
upon by several armed men who were concealed in the bushes. On account
of this outrage, Captain Sutherland sent a letter of remonstrance to
Colonel Livingston, "the commandant at Verplanck's Point." The letter
was dated "morning of the 21st of September."

Refusal of the Colquhons to accompany Smith.--Final Compliance.--Landing
of André and his first Interview with Arnold.

719to be sent to a certain place in Haverstraw Creek, and then proceeded
to Smith's house. Every thing was made ready, except procuring two
boatmen, and this was found a difficult matter. The voyage promised many
perils, for American guard-boats were stationed at various places on the
river. These, however, had been ordered not to interfere with Smith and
his party. Samuel Colquhon and his brother Joseph were again solicited
to accompany Smith, but both positively refused at first to go; they
yielded only when Arnold himself threatened them with punishment. At
near midnight the three men pushed off from shore with muffled oars. It
was a serene, starry night; not a ripple was upon the Hudson, not a leaf
was stirred by the breeze. Silently the little boat approached the
Vulture, and when near, the sentinel on deck hailed them. After making
some explanations and receiving some rough words, Smith was allowed to
go on board. In the cabin he found Beverly Robinson and Captain
Sutherland. These officers and Major Andre were the only persons in the
ship who were privy to the transactions in progress. Smith bore a sealed
letter from Arnold to Beverly Robinson, in which the traitor said, "This
will be delivered to you by Mr Smith, who will conduct you to a place of
safety. Neither Mr. Smith nor any other person shall be made acquainted
with your proposals. If they (which I doubt not) are of such a nature
that I can officially take notice of them, I shall do it with pleasure.
I take it for granted that Colonel Robinson will not propose any thing
that is not for the interest of the United States as well as himself."
This language was a guard against evil consequences in the event of the
letter falling into other hands. Smith had also two passes, signed by
Arnold, which Robinson well understood to be intended to communicate the
idea that the writer expected André to come on shore, and to secure the
boat from detention by the water-guard. *

Major Andre was introduced to Smith, and both descended into the boat.
They landed at the foot of a great hill, called Long Clove Mountain, on
the western shore of the Hudson, about two miles below Haverstraw. This
place had been designated by Arnold for the meeting, and thither he had
repaired from Smith's house. Arnold was concealed in the thick bushes,
and to the same place Smith conducted Andre. They were left alone, and
for the first time the conspirators heard each other's voice; for the
first time Arnold's lips uttered audibly the words of treason. There, in
the gloom of night, concealed from all human cognizance, they discussed
their dark plans, and plotted the utter ruin of the patriot cause. When,
at the twilight of an autumn day, I stood upon that spot, in the shadow
of the high hills, and the night gathering its veil over the waters and
the fields, a superstitious dread crept over me lest the sentence of
_anathema, maranatha_, should make the spot as unstable as the earth
whereon rested the tents of the rebellious Korah, Dathan, and Abiram.

The hour of dawn approached, and the conference was yet in progress.
Smith came, and warned them of the necessity for haste. There was much
yet to do, and André reluctantly consented to mount the horse rode by
Arnold's servant, and accompany the general to Smith's house, nearly
four miles distant. ** It was yet dark, and the voice of a sentinel,
near

* These passes, which are still in existence, are as follows:

"Head-quarters, Robinson House, September 20, 1780.

"Permission is given to Joshua Smith, Esquire, a gentleman, Mr. John
Anderson, who is with him, and his two servants, to pass and repass the
guards near King's Ferry at all times.

"B. Arnold, M. Gen'l."

"Head-quarters, Robinson House, September 21, 1780.

"Permission is granted to Joshua Smith, Esq., to go to Dobbs's Ferry
with three Men and a Boy with a Flag to carry some Letters of a private
Nature for Gentlemen in New York, and to Return immediately.

"B. Arnold, M. Gen'l.

"N.B.--He has permission to go at such hours and times as the tide and
his business suits.

"B. A."

** The fact that Arnold had provided a spare horse (for there was no
necessity for a servant to accompany him to the place of meeting), is
evidence that he expected a longer conference than the remainder of the
night would afford. Furthermore, convicted as Arnold is of innate
wickedness, it may not be unjust to suppose that he was prepared, after
getting Andre within the American lines, to perform any act of dishonor
to extort a high price for his treason, or to shield himself from harm
if circumstances should demand it.

Arrival of the Conspirators at Smith's House.--The Vulture fired upon.--
Plan of Operations arranged.--Colonel Livingston.

720the village of Haverstraw, gave André the first intimation that he
was within the American lines. He felt his danger, but it was too late
to recede. His uniform was effectually concealed by a long blue surtout,
yet the real danger that environed him, he being within the enemy's
lines without a flag or pass, made him exceedingly uneasy.

They arrived at Smith's house at dawn, and, at that moment they heard a
cannonade in the direction of the Vulture.

Colonel Livingston had been informed that the vessel lay so near the
shore as to be within cannon shot. Accordingly, during the night, he
sent a party with cannon from Verplanck's Point, and at dawn, from
Teller's Point, they opened a fire upon the Vulture, of such severity
that the vessel hoisted her anchors and dropped farther down the river.
** This movement André beheld with anxiety; September 22, 1780 but, when
the firing ceased, his spirits revived. During that morning the whole
plot was arranged and the day for its consummation fixed. André was to
return to New York, and the British troops, already embarked under the
pretext of an expedition to the Chesapeake, were to be ready to ascend
the river at a moment's warning. Arnold was to weaken the various posts
at West, Point by dispersing the garrison. When the British should
appear, he was to send out detachments among the mountain gorges, under
pretense of meeting the enemy, as they approached, at a distance from
the works. As we have noticed, a link from the great chain at
Constitution Island was to be removed. The river would be left free for
the passage of vessels, and the garrison, so scattered, could not act in
force; thus the enemy could take possession with very little resistance.
All the

* This view is from the slope in front of the house. The main building
is of stone; the wings are wood. The piazza in front of the main
building, and the balustrades upon the top, are the only modern
additions; otherwise the house appears the same as when Arnold and Andre
were there. It stands upon a slope of Treason Hill, a few rods west of
the road leading from Stony Point to Haverstraw, and about half way
between the two places. It was in a room in the second story that the
conspirators remained during the day of their arrival. The present owner
of the house and grounds is Mr. William C. Houseman.

** Colonel Livingston, on perceiving the position of the Vulture,
conceived a plan for destroying her. He asked Arnold for two pieces of
heavy cannon for the purpose, but the general eluded the proposal on
frivolous pretenses, so that Livingston's detachment could bring only
one four-pounder to bear upon her. He had obtained some ammunition from
Colonel Lamb, from West Point, who sent it rather grudgingly, and with
an expressed wish that there might not be a wanton waste of it. "Firing
at a ship with a fourpounder," he said, "is, in my opinion, a waste of
powder." Little did he think what an important bearing that cannonade
was to have upon the destinies of America. It was that which drove the
Vulture from her moorings, and was one of the causes of the fatal
detention of Andre at Smith's house. The Vulture was so much injured
that, had she not got off with the flood, she must have struck. Colonel
Livingston saw Arnold pass Verplanck's in his barge when he escaped to
the Vulture; and he afterward declared that he had such suspicion of him
that, had his guard-boats been near, he would have gone after him
instantly, and demanded his destination and errand. Henry Livingston,
who commanded at Stony Point at the time of Arnold's treason, was born
at the Livingston Manor, in Columbia county, New York, January 19th,
1752. He married in Canada at an early age, and while residing there
became familiar with the French language. He was among the first who
took up arms against Great Britain. He accompanied Montgomery to St.
John's, Montreal, and Quebec. He assisted in the capture of the fort at
Chambly, and otherwise distinguished himself in that campaign. He was a
lieutenant colonel in the army at Stillwater, and was present at the
capture of Burgoyne. At the close of the war he was made a brigadier
general, and throughout a long life maintained the highest confidence
and respect of his countrymen. The Marquis de Chastellux, who
breakfasted with him at Verplanck's Point on one occasion, says of him,
in his Journal (i., 94), "This is a very amiable and well-informed young
man." He died at his residence, Columbia county, May 26th, 1823, at the
age of seventy-one years.

The Papers taken from Andre's Boot.--"Artillery Orders."--Forces at West
Point--Villefranche's Estimate.

721plans being arranged, Arnold supplied Andre with papers explanatory
of the military condition of West Point and its dependencies. * These he
requested him to place between his

* These documents, with five of the passes given by Arnold on this
occasion, are now preserved in the Library of the Stale of New York, at
Albany, having been purchased from the family of a lineal descendant of
Governor George Clinton. They were in my custody a few weeks, when I had
the opportunity of comparing the following copies, previously made, with
the originals, and found them correct. These manuscripts, though
somewhat worn, are quite perfect. Those written upon one side of the
paper only have been pasted upon thicker paper for preservation. The
others yet exhibit the wrinkles made by Andre's foot in his boot. The
following are true copies of the several papers:

"West Point, September 5th, 1780.

"Artillery Orders.--The following disposition of the corps is to take
place in Case of an alarm:

"Capt. Dannills with his Comp'y at Fort Putnam, and to detach an Officer
with 12 men to Wyllys's Redoubt, a Non Commissioned Officer with 3 men
to Webb's Redoubt, and the like number to Redoubt No. 4.

"Capt. Thomas and Company to repair to Fort Arnold.

"Captain Simmons and Company to remain at the North and South Redoubts,
at the East side of the River, until further Orders.

"Lieutenant Barber, with 20 men of Capt. Jackson's Company, will repair
to Constitution Island; the remainder of the Company, with Lieut.
Mason's, will repair to Arnold.

"Capt. Lieut. George and Lieut. Blake, with 20 men of Captain
Treadwell's Company, will Repair to Redoubt No. 1 and 2; the remainder
of the Company will be sent to Fort Arnold.

"Late Jones's Company, with Lieut. Fisk, to repair to the South Battery.

"The Chain Battery, Sherburn's Redoubt, and the Brass Field pieces, will
be manned from Fort Arnold as Occation may require.

"The Commissary and Conductor of Military stores will in turn wait upon
the Commanding Officer of Artillery for Orders.

"The artificers in the garrison (agreeable to former Orders) will repair
to Fort Arnold, and there receive further Orders from the Command'g
Officer of Artillery.

"S. Bauman, Major Comm't Artillery."

This document gave the British full information of what would be the
disposition of the Americans on the occasion; and as Sir Henry Clinton
and many of his officers were acquainted with the ground, they would
know at what particular points to make their attacks. This and the
following document are in Arnold's handwriting:

"Estimate of Forces at Wst Point and its Dependencies, September 13,
1780.

"A brigade of Massachusetts Militia, and two regiments of Rank and File
New Hampshire, Inclusive of 166 Batteaux Men at Verplanck's and Stony
Points........................................... 992

"On command and Extra Service at Fishkills, New Windsor, &c.,
&c., who may be called in
occasionally...........................................................
............................. 852

"3 regiments of Connecticut Militia, under the com'd of Colonel Wells,
on the lines near N. Castle 488

"A detachment of New York levies on the
lines.......................................................... 115

Militia, 2447

"Colonel Lamb's
Regiment...................................................... 167

"Colonel Livingston's, at Verplank and Stoney
Pts............................. 80

Continent: 247

"Colonel Sheldon's Dragoons, on the lines, about one half
mounted................................. 142

"Batteaux Men and
Artificers.............................................................
.............. 250

Total, 3086."

"N.B.--The Artillery Men are not Included in the above Estimate."

Return of the Ordnance in the different Forts at West Point.--Arnold's
Description of the Works.

722stockings and feet, and in the event of accident, to destroy them. He
then gave him a pass, a fac simile of which is printed on the next page,
and bidding Andre adieu, Arnold went

The following table is in the handwriting of Bauman, Major Commandant of
Artillery:

The following description of the works at West Point and its
dependencies is in the handwriting of Arnold, endorsed "Remarks on Works
at West Point, a copy to be transmitted to his Excellency General
Washington. Sep'r. 1780."

"Fort Arnold is built of Dry Fascines and Wood, is in a ruinous
condition, incompleat, and subject to take Fire from Shells or
Carcasses.

"Fort Putnam, Stone, Wanting great repairs, the wall on the East side
broke down, and rebuilding From the Foundation; at the West and South
side have been a Chevaux-de-Frise, on the West side broke in many
Places. The East side open; two Bomb Proofs and Provision Magazine in
the Fort, and Slight Wooden Barrack.--A commanding piece of ground 500
yards West, between the Fort and No. 4--or Rocky Hill.

"Fort Webb, built of Fascines and Wood, a slight Work, very dry, and
liable to be set on fire, as the approaches are very easy, without
defenses, save a slight Abattis.

"Fort Wyllys, built of stone 5 feet high, the Work above plank filled
with Earth, the stone work 15 feet, the Earth 9 feet thick.--No Bomb
Proofs, the Batteries without the Fort.

"Redoubt No. 1. On the South side wood 9 feet thick, the Wt. North and
East sides 4 feet thick, no cannon in the works, a slight and single
Abattis, no ditch or Pickett. Cannon on two Batteries. No Bomb Proofs.

"Redoubt No. 2. The same as No. 1. No Bomb Proofs.

"Redoubt No. 3, a slight Wood Work 3 Feet thick, very Dry, no Bomb
Proofs, a single Abattis, the work easily set on fire--no cannon.

"Redoubt No. 4, a Wooden work about 10 feet high and fore or five feet
thick, the West side faced with a stone wall 8 feet high and four thick.
No Bomb Proof, two six pounders, a slight Abattis, a commanding piece of
ground 500 yards Wt.

"The North Redoubt, on the East side, built of stone 4 feet high; above
the Stone, wood filled in with Earth, Very Dry, no Ditch, a Bomb Proof,
three Batteries without the Fort, a poor Abattis, a Rising piece of
ground 500 yards So., the approaches Under Cover to within 20 yards.--
The Work easily fired with Faggots diptd in Pitch, &c.

"South Redoubt, much the same as the North, a Commanding piece of ground
500 yards due East--3 Batteries without the Fort."

The "Artillery Orders" of September 5, 1780; the estimate of forces at
West Point; estimate of men to man the works, by Villefranche; the
"Return" of Bauman; the description of the works at West Point and
vicinity, and a copy of a council of war held at Washington's quarters,
September 6, 1780, are the papers which were taken from Andre's
stocking. The latter document, which set forth the weakness, wants, and
gloomy prospects of the American army, was a statement made by
Washington to the council. It is too long for insertion here. Preserved
among these papers are five passes, signed by Arnold; a memorandum,
which, from its ambiguity, is unintelligible, * and the following letter
from Joshua Smith to his brother Thomas, after his arrest on suspicion
of being an accomplice with Arnold:

"Robinson House, Sept. 25th, 1780.

"'Dear Brother,--I am here a prisoner, and am therefore unable to attend
in person. I would be obliged to you if you would deliver to Captain
Cairns, of Lee's Dragoons, a British uniform Coat, which you will find
in one of the drawers in the room above stairs.f I would be happy to see
you. Remember me to your family.

"I am affectionately yours,

I have before me three interesting MS. letters, written by Smith and his
two brothers, at about this time. The first is from the Tory Chief
Justice Smith, of New York, to his brother Thomas; the second is from
Thomas to Governor Clinton, covering the one from Judge Smith; and the
third is from Joshua H. Smith, written in the jail at Goshen. See Note *
on page 752.

"New York, 12th October, 1180.

"Dear Sir,--You will naturally suppose us in great anxiety for our
brother Joshua, though General Arnold assured us that he knew nothing of
his designs, and that he has written to General Washington more than
once asserting his, and the innocence of several others still more
likely to be suspected, from their connections with him, while in his
confidence. Joshua meets with a faithful reward from his old friends.
God Almighty protect him. I hope his relations, at least, have not
deserted him in his afflictions. Our last accounts were, that he was
still in the hands of the army, which appears strange to all here that
have just views of civil liberty, or know any thing of Thomas Smith,
Esq., that that model for a Constitution poor Joshua helped to frame at
Kingston as an improvement upon that under which we were all born.

"Your friends here would be all well, if they thought you were so. Our
sister, Livingston, has spent several weeks with us, and will return
sooner than we wish.

"Your son's health seems at length to be established, and he seems
inclined to winter in South Carolina. I have suspended iny assent to the
voyage till I know your opinion; which ought to come soon, to avoid the
danger of a winter voyage.

"Commend me to all friends. I add no more, from an attention to your
condition in an angry and suspicious hour. God preserve you and yours
through the storm, which I hope is nearly over.

"Ever most affectionately yours, William Smith."

"16th October, 1780.

"Dear Sir,---The inclosed was this moment delivered me by Mrs. Hoffman,
who came out in a Flag via Elizabeth Town, as I wish to receive no
letters from my brother but such as are subject to public inspection. I
have taken the liberty to inclose it for your perusal. The situation in
which the unhappy affair of my brother Joshua has placed me and all the
family, calls for the greatest care to avoid suspicion. I am yours, with
esteem and affection, Thomas Smith.

"His Excellency Governor Clinton.

"P.S. I should be glad, if your house at Windsor is not engaged, to hire
it, as I am determined to quit this place."

"Goshen, Orange County, 19th Nov., 1180.

"Sir,--In pursuance of a warrant of the Commissioners of Conspiracy, I
was on the 12th day of this instant committed to the close custody of
the sheriff of this County. My long and severe confinement before and
during my trial by the court-martial has greatly impaired my health, and
I find my constitution much shattered. I have been subject to repeated
attacks of a bilious colic and an intermittent fever; and am advised
that a close confinement will soon terminate my existence, unless I can
be permitted to use some exercise. I have, therefore, to request some
indulgence on this head, in compassion to my distressed situation.

"As I have never been officially acquainted with the sentence of the
court-martial, I have also to request your Excellency to favor me with a
copy of it by Major Hatfield, and thereby much oblige,

"Your Excellency's most obedient and distressed humble servant,

"His Excellency George Clinton, Esq., &c., Ac. "JOSHUA H. SMITH."

** This was Major Andrê's coat, which that officer exchanged with Smith
for a citizen's dress-coat, as mentioned in the text.

*** Sec page 387 of this volume. .

Arnold's Pass.--Smith's Refusal to take André back to the Vulture.--His
insufficient Excuse.

723up the river, in his own barge, to head-quarters, fully believing
that no obstacle now interposed to frustrate his wicked scheme. Andre
passed the remainder of the day alone, and

as soon as evening came, he applied to Smith to take him back to the
Vulture. Smith positively refused to go, and pleaded illness from ague
as an excuse. If he quaked, it was probably not from ague, but from
fear, wrought by the firing upon the Vulture; for he offered to ride
half the night with Andre, on horseback, if he would take a land route.
Having no other means of reaching the vessel, André was obliged to yield
to the force of circumstances. He con-

Andrè's Exchange of Coats.--He and Smith cross the Hudson.--Smith's
Letter to his Brother.--Ambiguous Memorandum.

724sented to cross King's Ferry to Verplanck's Point, and make his way
back to New York by land. He had been prevailed upon by Arnold, in the
event of his taking a land route (which had been talked of), to exchange
his military coat for a citizen's dress. This act, and the receiving of
papers from Arnold, were contrary to the express orders of Sir Henry
Clinton, but André was obliged to be governed by the unforeseen
circumstances in which he was placed. Smith agreed to attend him on the
way as far as the lower outposts of the American lines. September, 1780
A little before sunset, on the evening of the 22d, accompanied by a
negro servant, they crossed King's Ferry. At dusk, they passed through
the works at Verplanck's

Point, and turned their faces toward White Plains. While they are
pursuing their route toward the Neutral Ground, let us consider events
at the Robinson House, and then resume our own journey. We shall
overtake the travelers presently, when the concluding portion of the
narrative of Arnold's treason will be given.

Arnold's Composure in Presence of his Aids.--Washington's Return from
Hartford.--His Approach to Arnold's Quarters.

725

CHAPTER XXXI.

"Here onward swept thy waves,

When tones, now silent, mingled with their sound,

And the wide shore was vocal with the song

Of hunter chief or lover's gentle strain.

Those pass'd away--forgotten as they pass'd;

But holier recollections dwell with thee.

Here hath immortal Freedom built her proud

And solemn monuments. The mighty dust

Of heroes in her cause of glory fallen,

Hath mingled with the soil, and hallow'd it.

Thy waters in their brilliant path have seen

The desperate strife that won a rescued world,

The deeds of men who live in grateful hearts,

And hymn'd their requiem."

Elizabeth F. Ellet.

ITH such consummate art had General Arnold managed his scheme of
villainy thus far, that not a suspicion of his defection was abroad. He
returned to his quarters at the Robinson House, as we have observed,
toward evening, and after passing a half hour with his wife and child,
and one or two domestics, he conversed freely with his aids-de-camp,
Majors Varick * and Franks, concerning the important information he was
expecting to receive from New York, through a distinguished channel
which he had just opened.

This was on the 22d; the 24th was the day fixed upon for the ascent of
the river by the September, 1780 British, and the surrender of West
Point into the hands of the enemy. Yet, with all this guilt upon his
soul, Arnold was composed, and the day on which his treason was to be
consummated, no change was observed in his usual deportment.

Washington returned from Hartford on the 24th, by the upper route,
through Dutchess county to Fishkill, and thence along the land road by
Philip town. Soon after leaving Fishkill, he met Luzerne, the French
minister, with his suite, on his way to visit Rochambeau. That gentleman
induced the commander-in-chief to turn back and pass the night with him
at Fishkill. Washington and his suite were in the saddle before dawn,
for he was anxious to reach Arnold's quarters by

* Richard Varick, who, before the close of the war, was promoted to
colonel, was a sterling patriot. He admired Arnold as a soldier; and
when that officer's defection became known, Variek was almost insane for
a day or two, so utterly contrary to the whole life of Arnold appeared
the fact. Varick beeame one of Washington's military family near the
close of the war, as his recording secretary. He was mayor of the city
of New York from 1791 to 1801. On the death of John Jay, he was elected
president of the American Bible Society, which office he held until his
death, which occurred at Jersey City, July 30th, 1831, at the age of
seventy-nine years.

Washington's Delay in reaching Arnold's Quarters.--Announcement of
Andrê's Arrest.--Flight of Arnold.--His Wife and Son.

726breakfast time, and they had eighteen miles to ride. The men, with
the baggage, started earlier, and conveyed a notice to Arnold of
Washington's intention to breakfast with him. When opposite West Point,
the commander-in-chief turned his horse down a lane toward the river. La
Fayette, perceiving it, said, "General, you are going in a wrong
direction; you know Mrs. Arnold is waiting breakfast for us, and that
road will take us out of the way." Washington answered, good-naturedly,
"Ah, I know you young men are all in love with Mrs. Arnold, and wish to
get where she is as soon as possible. You may go and take your breakfast
with her, and tell her not to wait for me, for I must ride down and
examine the redoubts on this side of the river, * and will be there in a
short time." The officers, however, did not leave him, except two aids-
de-camp, who rode on, at the general's request, to make known the cause
of the delay.

Breakfast was waiting when the officers arrived, and as soon as it was
ascertained that the commander-in-chief and the other gentlemen would
not be there, Arnold, his family, and the aids-de-camp sat down to
breakfast. Arnold appeared somewhat moody. The enemy had not appeared
according to arrangements, and Washington had returned at least two days
sooner than he anticipated. While they were at table, Lieutenant Allen
came with a letter for Arnold. The general broke the seal hastily, for
he knew by the superscription that it was from Colonel Jameson,
stationed at one of the outposts below. The letter was, indeed, from
that officer; but, instead of conveying the expected intelligence that
the enemy were moving up the river, it informed him that _Major Andre,
of the British army, was a prisoner in his custody!_ ** Arnold's
presence of mind did not forsake him, and, although agitated, his
emotion was not sufficiently manifest to excite the suspicion of those
around him. He informed the aids-de-camp that his immediate attendance
was required at West Point, and desired them to say to General
Washington, when he arrived, that he was unexpectedly called over the
river, and would soon return. He ordered a horse to be made ready, and
then leaving the table, he went up to Mrs. Arnold's chamber, and sent
for her. ****

There was no time to be lost, for another messenger might speedily
arrive with evidence of his treason. In brief and hurried words he told
her that they must instantly part, perhaps forever, for his life
depended on reaching the enemy's lines without detection. Horror-
stricken, the poor young creature, but one year a mother and not two a
bride, swooned and sunk senseless upon the floor. Arnold dared not call
for assistance, but kissing, with lips blasted by words of guilt and
treason, his boy, then sweetly sleeping in angel innocence and purity,
(v) he rushed from the room, mounted a horse belonging

* These redoubts were upon the point, near the rail-way tunnel above
Garrison's Landing.

** This letter was written on the 23d, two days before. The
circumstances of the arrest of André are detailed on page 752 to 758
inclusive.

*** This is a view of the room in the Robinson House in which Arnold was
at breakfast when he received Colonel Jameson's letter announcing the
arrest of Andre. It is preserved in its original style, which is quite
antique. The ceiling is low; the heavy beams are bare; the fire-place
surrounded with neat panel-work, without a mantel-shelf. The door on the
right opens into a small room which Arnold used as an office; the
windows on the left open upon the garden and lawn on the south, from
whence I made the sketch of the house printed on page 708.

**** This chamber is also preserved in its original character. Even the
panel-work over the fire-place has been left unpainted since the
Revolution, in order to preserve some inscriptions made upon it with a
knife. There is carved in bold letters, "G. Wallis, Lieut. VI. Mass.
Reg't."

* (v) This was the only child of Arnold by his second wife, born in the
United States. His name was James Robertson. He entered the British
army, and rose to the rank of colonel of engineers. He was stationed at
Bermuda from 1816 to 1818, and from the last-named year until 1823 was
at Halifax, and the commanding officer of engineers in Nova Scotia and
New Brunswick. While thus in command, he was at St. John's, and, on
going into the house built by his father, in King Street (which is still
standing), wept like a child. His wife was a Miss Goodrich, of the Isle
of Wight. He is a small man, his eyes of remarkable sharpness, and in
features bears a striking resemblance to his father. A gentleman who has
been in service with him, and is intimately acquainted with him, speaks
of him in terms of high commendation, and relates that he expressed a
desire to visit the United States. Since the accession of Queen
Victoria, he has been one of her majesty's aids-de-camp. In 1841, he was
transferred from the engineer's corps, and is now (1846) a major
general, and a knight of the royal Hanoverian Guelphic order.--See
Sabine's Biographical Sketches of American Loyalists.

Arnold's Passage to the Vulture.--Treatment of his Oarsmen.--
Washington's visit to West Point.--Discovery of the Treason.

727to one of the aids of Washington, and hastened toward the river, not
by the winding road that led to the "Beverly Dock," but along a by-way
down a steep hill, which is yet called _Arnold's Path._ At the dock he
entered his barge, and directed the six oarsmen to push out into the
middle of the stream, and pull for Teller's Point. *

Arnold's oarsmen, unconscious of the nature of the general's errand, had
their muscles strengthened by a promise of two gallons of rum, and the
barge glided with unusual speed. He told them he was going on board the
Vulture with a flag, and was obliged to make all possible haste, as he
wished to return in time to meet General Washington at his quarters.
When he passed Verplanck's Point, he displayed a white handkerchief,
which, as a signal of amity, answered for both Colonel Livingston at the
Point, and Captain Sutherland of the Vulture, which lay in sight a few
miles below. They reached the Vulture without interruption, and, after
having introduced himself to Captain Sutherland, Arnold sent for the
coxswain, and informed him that he and his oarsmen were prisoners. They
indignantly asserted their freedom to depart, alleging truly, as they
supposed, that they had come on board under the protection of a flag.
Arnold coolly replied that they must remain on board. Captain Sutherland
would not interfere with Arnold's commands, but, despising his meanness,
he gave the coxswain a parole to go on shore and get such things as he
wanted. This was done, and, when the Vulture arrived in New York, Sir
Henry Clinton set them all at liberty. In this transaction, the inherent
meanness of Arnold's spirit was conspicuous, and made the British
officers regard him with scorn as a reptile unworthy of that esteem
which a high-souled traitor--a traitor because of great personal wrongs-
-might claim.

Washington arrived at Robinson's house shortly after Arnold had left.
Informed that he had gone to West Point, the commander-in-chief took a
hasty breakfast, and concluded not to wait, but go directly over and
meet Arnold there. Hamilton remained behind, and it was arranged that
the general and his suite should return to dinner. While crossing the
river in a barge, Washington expressed his expectation that they would
be greeted with a salute, as General Arnold was at the Point; but, to
his surprise, all was silent when they approached the landing-place.
Colonel Lamb, the commanding officer, who came strolling down a winding
path, was much confused when he saw the barge touch the shore. He
apologized to Washington for the apparent neglect of courtesy, alleging
his entire ignorance of his intended visit. The general was surprised,
and said, "Sir, is not General Arnold here?" "No, sir," replied Colonel
Lamb, "he has not been here these two days, nor have

I heard from him within that time." This awakened the suspicions of
Washington. He proceeded, however, to inspect the several works at West
Point, and at about noon returned to the Beverly Dock, from whence he
had departed.

While ascending from the river, Hamilton was seen approaching with
hurried step and anxious countenance. He conversed with Washington in a
low tone, and returned with him into the house, where he laid several
papers, the damning evidence of Arnold's guilt, before him. These
consisted of the documents given in a preceding chapter, which Arnold
had placed in Andre's hands. They were accompanied by a letter from
Colonel Jameson, and one from André himself. Jameson, uninformed of the
return of Washington from Hartford, had dispatched a messenger thither,
with the papers, to the commander-in-chief. After rid-

* The coxswain on the occasion was James Larvey. The aged Beverly
Garrison, whom I saw at Fort Montgomery, knew him well. He said Larvey
always declared that, had he been aware of Arnold's intention, he would
have steered to Verplanck's Point, even if the traitor had threatened to
blow his brains out.

Washington's presence of Mind.--Condition of Mrs. Arnold.--Attempts to
"head" the Traitor.--His Letters from the Vulture.

728ing almost to Danbury, the messenger heard of the return of
Washington by the upper road, and, hastening back, took the nearest
route to West Point through Lower Salem, where André was in custody. He
thus became the bearer of Andre's letter to Washington. * He arrived at
the Robinson House four hours after the departure of Arnold, and placed
the papers in the hands of Hamilton.

Washington called in Knox and La Fayette for counsel. "Whom can we trust
now?" said the chief, with calmness, while the deepest feeling of sorrow
was evidently at work in his bosom. The condition of Mrs. Arnold, who
was quite frantic with grief and distress in another room, awakened his
liveliest sympathies. He believed her innocent of all previous knowledge
of her husband's treasonable designs, and this gave keenness to the pang
which her sorrows created." Yet he maintained his self-possession, and
calmly said, when dinner was announced, "Come, gentlemen, since Mrs.
Arnold is unwell, and the general is absent, let us sit down without
ceremony."

As soon as the contents of the papers were made known, Washington
dispatched Hamilton on horseback to Verplanck's Point, that preparations
might be made there to stop the traitor. But Arnold had got nearly six
hours' the start of him, the tide was ebbing, and the six strong
oarsmen, prompted by expected reward, had pulled with vigor. When
Hamilton arrived at the Point, a flag of truce was approaching from the
Vulture to that post. The bearer brought a letter from Arnold to
Washington, which Hamilton forwarded to the commander-in-chief, and then
wrote to General Greene at Tappan, advising him to take precautionary
measures to prevent any movement of the enemy in carrying out the
traitor's projects. The failure of the plot was not known to Sir Henry
Clinton until the arrival of the Vulture at New York the next morning,
and then he had no disposition to venture an attack upon the Americans
in the Highlands, now thoroughly awake to the danger that had
threatened.

Arnold's letter to Washington was written to secure protection for his
wife and child. "I have no favor to ask for myself," he said; "I have
too often experienced the ingratitude of my country to attempt it; but,
from the known humanity of your excellency, I am induced to ask your
protection for Mrs. Arnold from every insult and injury that a mistaken
vengeance of my countrymen may expose her to. It ought to fall only on
me. She is as good and innocent as an angel, and is incapable of doing
wrong." In this letter Arnold avowed his love for his country, and
declared that that sentiment actuated him in his present

* This letter of Andre's is a model of frankness, and exhibits the
highest regard for truth and honor. After revealing his name and
character, and relating the circumstances under which he was lured
within the American lines without his knowledge or consent, and
mentioning his capture, he says, "Thus, as I have had the honor to
relate, was I betrayed (being adjutant general of the British army) into
the vile condition of an enemy in disguise within your posts." He
disavowed any intention of being a spy, and asked, as a favor, that he
should not be branded as such, he "being involuntarily an impostor." He
further requested the privilege of sending an open letter to Sir Henry
Clinton, and another to a friend, for linen; and concluded by intimating
that there were several American prisoners who were taken at Charleston
for whom he might be exchanged.

** "She, for a considerable time," says Hamilton, in a vivid description
of the scene, "entirely lost herself. The general went up to see her.
She upbraided him with being in a plot to murder her child. One moment
she raved; another, she melted into tears. Sometimes she pressed her
infant to her bosom, and lamented its fate, occasioned by the imprudence
of its father, in a manner that would have pierced insensibility itself.
All the sweetness of beauty, all the loveliness of innocence, all the
tenderness of a wife, and all the fondness of a mother, showed
themselves in her appearance and conduct. We have every reason to
believe that she was entirely unacquainted with the plan, and that the
first knowledge of it was when Arnold went to tell her he must banish
himself from his country and from her forever. She instantly fell into
convulsions, and he left her in that situation." Mr. Leake, the
biographer of Colonel John Lamb, basing his opinion upon information
received from Arnold's sister Hannah, in 1801, regards this scene as
only a trick to deceive, and believes that Arnold's wife was the chief
instrument in bringing about the defection of her husband. Hannah Arnold
averred that the traitor's wife received a pension from the Queen of
England during her life.--See Life of John Lamb, by Isaac Q. Leake, p.
270. I can not but regard the inference of Mr. Leake as untenable. It
was certainly consoling to the feelings of Hannah Arnold to believe that
the influence of another, and not his own base principles, was the
source of the defection and disgrace of her brother.

Beverly Robinson's Letter to Washington.--The Army at Tappan put in
Motion.--André ordered to West Point

729conduct. "In short," says Sparks, "the malignant spirit, impudence,
and blunted moral feeling shown in this letter were consistent with his
character. Attachment to his wife was the only redeeming quality which
seemed not to be extinguished." *

Washington also received a letter from Beverly Robinson, dated on board
the Vulture, demanding, in mild terms, the release of André, claiming it
as equitable, he being on shore with a flag of truce at the request of
General Arnold. Robinson attempted to influence the mind of the chief by
referring to their former friendship, but the letter had not the least
effect upon Washington's firmness of purpose. He was ignorant of the
extent of defection, and his thoughts and efforts were first directed to
measures of security. He had a most delicate task to perform. He might
suspect the innocent, and give his confidence to the unworthy. He
resolved, as the least dangerous course, to confide unreservedly in all
his officers, and this resolution, promptly acted upon, had a very
salutary effect. **

Washington sent orders to General Greene, directing him to put the left
wing of the army, near Tappan, in motion as soon as possible, and march
toward King's Ferry. It was midnight when the express reached Greene's
quarters; before dawn the whole division was upon the march. The
commander-in-chief also dispatched a letter to Colonel Jameson,
directing him to send Andre to Robinson's house under a strong guard.
This messenger also reached his destination at Lower Salem, at midnight.
Andre was aroused, and, although the rain was falling fast, and the
night was exceedingly dark, a guard, under Major Tallmadge, set off with
the prisoner immediately. They rode all night, and arrived at Robinson's
house at dawn on the 26th. André was taken over to West Point the same
September, 1780 evening, and on the morning of the 28th was conveyed,
under a strong escort of cavalry, to Tappan, where he was tried and
convicted as a spy. This event will be noticed in connection with the
details of his capture. For the present, my tour leads me to the
consideration of other important transactions within cannon-echo of the
_Sugar Loaf_, at whose base we are standing, and up whose steep sides I
was desirous of climbing, to view the prospect so glowingly depicted by
the pen of Dr. Dwight; *** but recollecting that the venerable boatman
was awaiting my return, I exchanged a hasty adieu with Lieutenant Arden,
and hastened back to the Beverly Dock by way of _Arnold's, Path_. There
I found the old waterman quietly

* Inclosed in the letter to Washington was one for Mrs. Arnold, who,
when thus made acquainted of her husband's safety, became more quiet.
She was treated with great tenderness by Washington, and was soon
afterward sent to New York under an escort, and joined her husband. Her
affection survived his honor, and through all his subsequent career she
exemplified the character of a true woman's love, which often "Clings
like ivy to a worthless thing."

** The position of Colonel Livingston at Verplanck's Point, with some
circumstances that appeared suspicious, made him liable to be
distrusted, for it might fairly be presumed that he was directly or
indirectly concerned in Arnold's movements. By a brief letter,
Washington ordered Livingston to come to head-quarters immediately.
Conscious of his integrity, that officer promptly obeyed, but he
expected his conduct would be subjected to a strict investigation.
Washington made no inquiries. He told him that he had more explicit
orders to give than he could well communicate by letter, and that was
the object of calling him to the Highlands. "It is a source of
gratification to me," said the commander-in-chief, "that the post was in
the hands of an officer so devoted as yourself to the cause of your
country." Washington's confidence, was not misplaced, for there was not
a purer patriot in that war than Henry Livingston.

*** Dwight's Travels in New England.

**** This view is taken from the Hudson River rail-road, looking north.
The dock, covered with cord wood, is seen near the point on the left. It
is at the termination of a marsh, near the point of a bold, rocky
promontory, through which is a deep rock cutting for the road. The
distant hills on the extreme left are on the west side of the Hudson;
and through the gorge formed for the road may be seen the military
edifices of West Point.

Buttermilk Falls.--Ride to Fort Montgomery.--Mrs. Rose.--A speculating
Daughter.

730fishing, and apparently unconscious that two hours had elapsed since
we parted. He locked his oars, and in a few minutes we were at the foot
of Buttermilk Falls. I clambered up the steep, rough road under the
cliff, to the village, dined at a late hour upon cold mutton and stale
bread, and in a light wagon, procured with difficulty for the occasion,
set off, with a boy driver, for Fort Montgomery, about four miles below.
For half the distance the road (which is the old military one of the
Revolution) was smooth; the residue of the way was as rough as rocks and
gulleys could make it. On every side huge bowlders, many of them ten
feet in diameter, lie scattered over the bare flat rocks, like fruit
shaken from a tree in autumn. They become more numerous toward the base
of the steep mountain range on the west, where they lie in vast masses,
like mighty pebbles rolled up by the waves upon the shore. Here the
geologist has a wonderful page spread out for his contemplation.

Within a short distance of Fort Montgomery, we turned up a rough
mountain road to visit an old lady named Rebecca Rose, eighty years of
age, who lived close by Fort Montgomery at the time it was taken by the
enemy. I found her upon a bed of sickness, too feeble then to converse,
but at a subsequent visit she was well and communicative. She was a
child only seven or eight years old, and has no distinct recollection of
events at the taking of the forts, except her care and anxiety in
concealing her rag babies in a sap trough, while her parents were hiding
their property in the woods. Her father was a tanner and shoemaker, in
the employ of the garrison at the two forts. The British tried to
frighten him into the performance of the duty of a guide for them, by
twice hauling him up to an apple-tree with a halter around his neck. He
resolutely defied them, and they passed on. From the cottage of Mrs.
Rose, among the hills, is one of the most magnificent views of rock and
forest, cliff and river, imaginable; overlooking Forts Montgomery and
Clinton, the Race flanked by Anthony's Nose and the Dunderberg, and the
fertile hills of West Chester in the distance.

Near Mrs. Rose lived an old soldier who was wounded at the siege of Fort
Montgomery. I found him living with his daughter, a little plump widow
of fifty, in a cottage beside a clear stream that comes leaping down
from the hills. He was a private in Captain De Vere's company, Colonel
Dubois's regiment, and was bayoneted in the thigh when the enemy made
their way over the ramparts of Fort Montgomery and fought the garrison
hand to hand. Although nearly ninety years old, he was vigorous and
talked sensibly. I asked the privilege of sketching his portrait, which
he readily granted, and I was about unlocking my port-folio for the
purpose, when his daughter, resting upon a broom handle, and assuming
the shrewd look of a speculator, inquired, "What'll ye give?" "For
what?" I inquired. "For daddy's likeness," she answered. Unacquainted
with the market value of such commodities, and being doubtful as to the
present sample possessing much intrinsic worth, I made the indefinite
offer of "What is right."

"No, no," she said, tuning her voice to a higher key, and beginning to
sweep the floor vigorously, "you sha'n't look at him till you tell me
what you'll give. We've been cheated enough a'ready. Two scamps come
along here last week, and told my darter they'd make a likeness on her
for their breakfasts, and they on'y guv her a 'nasty piece of black
paper, that had a nose no more like sis's than that tea-pot spout. No,
sir; give me a half a dollar, or clear out quick!" The more fortunate
silhouettists had evidently ruined my prospects for a gratuitous sitting
of the old soldier; and feeling very doubtful whether the demanded half
dollar, if paid, would add a mite to his comforts, I respectfully
declined giving the price. The filial regard of the dear woman was
terribly shocked, and she called me a cheat and other hard names. I
shook hands with the old "Continentaler" as I rose to depart, and
turning quietly to the dame, who was yet sweeping around the room in a
towering passion, invited her to sit for her portrait! This produced a
climax; she seized the broom by the brush; I saved my head by closing
the door between us. I walked off unscathed and much amused, in the
midst of a perfect

Sites of Forts Clinton and Montgomery.--Lake Sinnipink.--Beverly
Garrison.

731shower of grape-shot from her tongue-battery, compelled to content
myself with a pen and ink sketch of the hornet instead of the one I had
asked for.

We descended the hills, and proceeded to the site of Fort Montgomery, a
rough promontory on the north side of Peploap's, or Poplopen's, Kill. *
It terminates in a steep cliff at the mouth of the stream, and was an
admirable situation for a strong fortress to command the river. Almost
the entire line of the fortifications may be traced upon the brow of the
cliff, which is rocky, and bare of every thing but stinted grass and
dwarf cedars. More than half way down to the water's edge are the
remains of the two-gun-battery which was placed there to cover the chain
and chevaux de frise which were stretched across the river from the
upper side of Poplopen's Kill to Anthony's Nose.

We crossed to the southern side of the stream, and clambered up a
winding and romantic pathway among cedars, chestnuts, and sassafras, to
the high table land whereon stood Fort Clinton, within rifle shot of
Fort Montgomery. A fine mansion, belonging to Mrs. Pell, with cultivated
grounds around it, occupy the area within the ravelins of the old fort.
The banks of the fortress have been leveled, its fossé filled up, and
not a vestige of it remains. About a quarter of a mile west of Mrs.
Pell's is Lake Sinnipink, a small sheet of crystal water, surrounded by
the primitive forest, and as wild in its accompaniments as when the
Indian cast his bait in its deep waters.

From its western rim rises the highest peak of Bear Mountain to an
altitude of more than a thousand feet. The lake itself is one hundred
and twenty-three feet above the river.

Near the north end of Lake Sinnipink, on the river slope of the hills,
stands the cottage of the aged Beverly Garrison, a hale old man of
eighty-seven years. He was a stout lad of fourteen when the forts were
taken. His father, who worked a great deal for Beverly Robinson, and
admired him, named this boy in honor of that gentleman. When the British
approached the

* This kill, or creek, is the dividing line between the towns of Monroe
and Cornwall, in Orange county. Its correct orthography is uncertain.
Upon a map of the State of New York made in 1779 it is called Cop-lap's
Kill; in the British plan of the engagements there, of which the map
given on page 166 is a copy, it is spelled Peploap's; Romans, who was
engaged in the construction of the forts, wrote it Pooploop's.

** This view is from an eminence near the mountain road, about three
quarters of a mile in the rear of Fort Montgomery. In the distance, the
cultivated slopes of West Chester, between Peekskill and Ver-planck's
Point, are seen. On the left is the high, rocky promontory called
Anthony's Nose; on the right is the Dunderberg, with a portion of
Beveridge's Island; the buildings in the center of the picture, owned by
Mrs. Pells indicate the site of Fort Clinton; toward the right is seen
the deep ravine through which flows Poplopen's Creek, and on the extreme
right, partly hidden by the tree in the foreground, and fronting the
river, is the site of Fort Montgomery. The scenery from this point of
view is indeed magnificent This picture is from a pencil sketch by Tice,
who accompanied me to the spot.

*** This view is from the outlet of the lake, within a few rods of the
spot where a large number of the Americans and British were slain in a
preliminary skirmish on the afternoon when the forts were taken. The
bodies were thrown into the lake, and from that circumstance it was
afterward called Bloody Pond.

Mr. Garrison's Recollections.--"Captain Molly."--Character of Forts
Clinton and Montgomery.--Chevaux de frise.

732forts, Beverly and his father, who was wagon-master at Fort
Montgomery, were ordered to take a large iron cannon to the outworks on
the neck of the promontory. While thus engaged, they were made
prisoners; but Beverly, being a boy, was allowed his liberty.

He told me that he was standing on the ramparts of Fort Montgomery on
the morning when Arnold passed by, in his barge, fleeing to the Vulture,
and that he recognized the general, as well as Larvey, his coxswain. He
also informed me that a Tory, named Brom Springster, piloted the enemy
over the Dunderberg to the forts. Brom afterward became a prisoner to
the patriots, but his life was spared on condition that he should pilot
Wayne on his expedition over the same rugged hills to attack Stony
Point. Mr. Garrison remembered the famous Irish woman called _Captain
Molly_, the wife of a cannon-ier, who worked a field-piece at the battle
of Monmouth, on the death of her husband. She generally dressed in the
petticoats of her sex, with an artilleryman's coat over. She was in Fort
Clinton, with her husband, when it was attacked. When the Americans
retreated from the fort, as the enemy scaled the ramparts, her husband
dropped his match and fled. Molly caught it up, touched off the piece,
and then scampered off. It was the last gun fired by the Americans in
the fort. Mrs. Rose (just mentioned) remembers her as _Dirty Kate_,
living between Fort Montgomery and Buttermilk Falls, at the close of the
war, where she died a horrible death from the effects of a syphilitic
disease. I shall have occasion to refer to this bold camp-follower, whom
Washington honored with a sergeant's commission for her bravery on the
field of Monmouth, nearly nine months afterward, when reviewing the
events of that battle.

Here, by the clear spring which bubbles up near the cottage of the old
patriot, and in the shadow of Bear Mountain, behind which the sun is
declining, let us glance at the Revolutionary history of this region.

Forts Clinton and Montgomery were included in the Highland
fortifications ordered to be constructed in 1775--6. These, like Fort
Constitution, were commenced by Bernard Romans, assisted by skillful
French engineers, and were finally completed under the superintendence
of Captain Thomas Machin. Fort Montgomery was of sufficient size to
accommodate eight hundred men; Fort Clinton was only about half as
large.

They were built of stones and earth, and were completed in the spring of
1776. Pursuant to a recommendation of Romans, made the previous autumn,
preparations were made to place obstructions in the river from the mouth
of Poplopen's, or Peploap's Kill, to Anthony's Nose, opposite. These
obstructions, which were not completed until the autumn of 1777, just
before the forts were attacked, consisted of a very strong boom, and
heavy iron chain. * The latter, eighteen in length, was hundred feet
buoyed up by heavy spars, connected by iron links, and also by large
rafts of timber. It was believed that these obstructions, covered by the
guns of the fort, and accompanied by several armed vessels, would be
sufficient to effectually prevent the enemy from ascending the river.
The result, however, was otherwise.

* Generals Knox and Greene visited Fort Montgomery in the spring of
1777, in company with Generals Wayne, M'Dougal, and Clinton. They made a
joint report to Washington, in which they recommended the completion of
the obstructions substantially as they were afterward done. The boom and
the chevaux de frise so obstructed the current of the river (here very
strong), that the water was raised two or three feet above them, and
pressed upon them heavily. Twice the chain was parted by this pressure:
first, a swivel, which came from Ticonderoga, was broken; and the second
time a clevis, which was made at Poughkeepsie, gave way.

Condition of the British Forces.--Putnam's intended Expedition.--Sir
Henry Clinton's Stratagem.--Landing of British Troops.

733When Burgoyne found himself environed with difficulties at Saratoga,
and perceived the rapid augmentation of the American army under Gates,
he dispatched messengers to Sir Henry Clinton, then commanding at New
York in the absence of General Howe, * urging him to make a diversion in
his favor, and join him, if possible, with a force sufficient to scatter
the half-disciplined provincials. Clinton was eager to comply; but a re-
enforcement of troops from Europe, expected for several weeks, was still
delayed. This force, amounting to almost two thousand men, under General
Robertson, arrived at the beginning of October. Having sailed in Dutch
bottoms, they were three months on the voyage. The 1777 first battle of
Stillwater had now been fought, and the second was nigh at hand. Putnam
was in the Highlands, with fifteen hundred men; his head-quarters were
at Peekskill. Washington had drawn upon Putnam, toward the close of
September, for twenty-five hundred troops, to aid in defending
Philadelphia and the works on the Delaware, then menaced by the enemy.
** Their places were supplied by militia of New York and Connecticut;
but, apprehending no hostile movement up the Hudson, Putnam had
discharged about one thousand of them, leaving his effective force only
fifteen hundred strong. Forts Clinton and Montgomery, commanded by the
brothers James and George Clinton, were feebly garrisoned; in both
fortresses there were not more than six hundred men, chiefly militia
from Dutchess and Ulster. There was a fortification near Peekskill,
called Fort Independence, which was also feebly garrisoned; in fact, the
Highland posts were almost defenseless against a respectable
demonstration on the part of the enemy.

On the arrival of re-enforcements, Sir Henry Clinton prepared for an
expedition up the Hudson, partly for the purpose of destroying American
stores at Peekskill, but chiefly to make a diversion in favor of
Burgoyne. On Saturday evening, the 4th of October, he proceeded up the
river in flat boats and transports, with about five thousand men, 1777
and landed at Tarrytown, nearly thirty miles from New York. ** This was
a feint to deceive General Putnam into the belief that Peekskill was his
destination. To strengthen this belief, and to divert Putnam's attention
from the Highland forts, Clinton proceeded on Sunday, with three
thousand troops, to Verplanck's Point, eight miles below Peekskill,
where he debarked. General Putnam fell back, on his approach, to the
high ground in the rear of Peekskill, and sent a messenger to Governor
Clinton, desiring him to send to his aid as many troops as he could
spare from the forts. The militia in the vicinity rallied around Putnam,
and he had about two thousand men, on the afternoon of the 5th, to
dispute the progress of the enemy up the Hudson, either by land or
water. Sir Henry Clinton perceived that his stratagem was successful,
and the next morning, under cover of a fog, he passed two thousand of
his troops over to Stony Point, whence they made their way among the
tangled defiles and lofty crags of the Dunderberg to Forts Clinton and
Montgomery, twelve miles distant. The transports were anchored near
Stony Point, and the corps of Loyalists, under Colonels Bayard and
Fanning, remained at Verplanck's Point. A detachment was left near Stony
Point, to guard the pass and preserve a communication with the fleet.
Three frigates, the Tartar, Preston, and Mercury, proceeded up the river
to a position between what is now known as Caldwell's Landing and Fort
Independence, and within cannon-shot of the latter.

Governor Clinton received advices on Sunday night of the arrival of the
enemy's ships and transports at Tarrytown, and, on Monday morning, a
scouting party of one hundred

* General Howe was now in Pennsylvania. His army was encamped at
Germantown, and being in possession of Philadelphia, he had established
his headquarters in that city.

** When this requisition was made, Putnam was preparing a plan for
attacking the enemy at four different points: Staten Island. Long
Island, Paulus's Hook, and New York. He relied upon the militia of
Connecticut, New York, and New Jersey, to accomplish his designs.
Fortunately, Washington made his requisition in time to prevent what
must have proved a disastrous expedition.

*** Colonel Luddington was posted at Tarrytown with about five hundred
militia. Clinton sent a flag with a peremptory summons for them to
surrender themselves prisoners of war. While parleying with the flag the
enemy endeavored to surround the militia, which Luddington perceiving,
he ordered a retreat. The British then returned to their shipping.

Governor Clinton informed of the Landing of the British.--A
reconnoitering Party.--Skirmish near Doodletown.

734men under Major Logan, which he had sent to the Dunderberg to watch
the motions of the enemy, returned with information that about forty
boats, filled with troops, had landed near Stony Point. Another party of
thirty men was sent out upon the mountain road leading from Fort Clinton
to Haverstraw; and at a place called Doodletown, three miles south from
the fort, they fell in with the advanced guard of the approaching
British. The Americans were ordered to surrender, but refused, when the
enemy fired upon them. They returned the fire with spirit, and retreated
to the fort without losing a man.

The design of the enemy was now apparent. It was past noon, and no
intelligence had been received from Putnam. Clinton had dispatched a
messenger to that officer, requesting him to send him a strong

* This view is from Peekskill landing, looking up the river. On the left
is the Dunderberg, or Thunder Mountain, over which the troops marched to
Forts Clinton and Montgomery. The dark spot on the brink of the river,
upon the extreme left, shows the place of the coffer-dam made by the
deluded seekers after Captain Kidd's treasure. At the water's edge, on
the right, is seen the grading of the Hudson River railroad, in course
of construction when the sketch was made. The dark mountain on the right
is Anthony's Nose. Intermediately, and projecting far into the river, is
a high, sandy bluff, on which stood Fort Independence. Further on is
Beveridge's Island; and in the extreme distance, behind the flag-staff,
is seen Bear Mountain. Between the point of Fort Independence and the
rock cutting of the rail-road is the mouth of the Peek's Kill, or Peek's
Creek. The Plan of the attack here given is copied from the narrative of
Stedman, a British officer, and appears to be mainly correct. The reader
may correct the slight errors by the text.

Treachery of a Messenger.--Putnam deceived.--Skirmish near Fort
Montgomery.--Forts ordered to be Surrendered.

735re-enforcement to defend the forts. The messenger, whose name was
Waterbury, treacherously delayed his journey, and the next day deserted
to the enemy. In the mean while, Putnam, astonished at hearing nothing
further from the enemy, rode to reconnoiter, and did not return to his
head-quarters, near Continental Village, until after the firing was
heard on the other side of the river. Colonel Humphreys, who was alone
at head-quarters when the firing began, urged Colonel Wyllys, the senior
officer in camp, to send all the men not on duty to Fort Montgomery. *
He immediately complied, but it was too late. It was twilight before
they reached the river, and the enemy had then accomplished their
purpose.

The British army, piloted by a Tory, traversed the Dunderberg in a
single column, and at its northern base separated into two divisions.
One division, under Lieutenant-colonel Campbell, consisting of nine
hundred men, was destined for the attack on Fort Montgomery; the other,
under the immediate command of Sir Henry Clinton, and consisting of an
equal number, was to storm Fort Clinton. There was a large body of
Hessians in each division. Governor Clinton, on hearing of the attack
upon his scouts near Doodletown, sent out a detachment of more than one
hundred men, under Colonels Bruyn and M'Claghrey, ** with a brass field-
piece and sixty men, to an advantageous post on the road to Orange
furnace. As the enemy approached, another detachment of one hundred men
was sent to the same point, but they were pressed back by the bayonets
of a superior force, and retreated to a twelve-pounder in the rear,
leaving their guns (which they spiked) in possession of the assailants.
With the second cannon they did great execution, until it bursted, when
they retreated to Fort Montgomery, followed by Emerick's corps of
chasseurs, a corps of Loyalists and New York volunteers, and the fifty-
second and fifty-seventh British regiments, under Campbell. The pursued
kept up a galling fire with small-arms while on their retreat, and slew
many of the enemy.

Sir Henry Clinton, in the mean while, made his way toward Fort Clinton
with much difficulty, for upon a narrow pass between the Sinnipink Lake
at the foot of Bear Mountain and the high river bank was a strong
_abatis_. ** This was overcome after much hard fighting, and at about
four o'clock both forts were invested by the enemy. Sir Henry Clinton
sent a flag, with a summons for both garrisons to surrender prisoners of
war within five minutes, or they would all be put to the sword.
Lieutenant-colonel Livingston was sent by Governor Clinton to receive
the flag, and to inform the enemy that the Americans were determined to
defend the forts to the last extremity. The action was immediately
renewed

* See Humphreys's Life of Putnam. This detachment seems to have been
mistaken by Stedman for the whole army under Putnam, for on his map, at
the top, he says, "General Putnam with 2000 men endeavoring to cross the
river."

** In connection with a notice of Colonel M'Claghrey, who was made a
prisoner at the capture of the fort, Mr. Eager, in his History of Orange
County, makes a slight error. He says he was taken to New York, and
confined in the Hospital. In the room above him, he affirms, was Colonel
Ethan Allen, who had been a prisoner in the hands of the British since
the autumn of 1775. The floor between them was full of wide cracks,
through one of which M'Claghrcy, who had heard of the capture of
Burgoyne, passed a scrap of paper to Allen, on which he had written the
information. Allen immediately went to his window, and called out to
some British officers passing in the street, "Burgoyne has marched to
Boston to the tune of Yankee Doodle." "For this and other offenses, we
believe," says Mr. Eager, "Allen was sent to England in chains." Quite
the contrary. He was sent to England in irons two years before, and had
returned to New York, where he was admitted to his parole. In January,
1777, he was ordered to reside on Long Island; and in August following
he was sent to the provost jail, where he remained until exchanged in
May, 1778.

*** These abatis were placed on the margin of the outlet of Lake
Sinipink, near its center, the place from which the view on page 731 was
sketched.

Attack on Forts Clinton and Montgomery.--Flight of the Americans.--
Destruction of Vessels and the Chevaux de frise.

736with great vigor on both sides. The British vessels under Commodore
(afterward Admiral) Hotham approached within cannon shot of the forts,
and opened a desultory fire upon them, and on some American vessels
lying above the _chevaux de frise_. * At the same time, Count Grabowski,
a brave Pole, and Lord Rawdon, led the grenadiers to the charge on Fort
Montgomery. The battle continued until twilight, when the superior
number of the assailants obliged the patriots at both forts to give way,
and attempt a scattered retreat or escape. It was a cloudy evening, and
the darkness came on suddenly. This favored the Americans in their
flight, and a large proportion of those who escaped the slaughter of the
battle made their way to the neighboring mountains in safety.

The brothers who commanded the forts escaped. General James Clinton was
severely wounded in the thigh by a bayonet, but escaped to the
mountains, and reached his residence in Orange county, sixteen miles
distant, the next day, where he was joined by his brother George, and
about two hundred of the survivors of the battle. Lieutenant-colonels
Livingston, Bruyn, and Claghery, and Majors Hamilton and Logan, were
made prisoners. The loss of the Americans in killed, wounded, and
prisoners, was about three hundred; that of the British about one
hundred and forty in killed and wounded, among whom were Colonel
Campbell and Count Grabowski. **

Above the boom the Americans had two frigates, two galleys, and an armed
sloop. On the fall of the forts, the crews of these vessels spread their
sails, and, slipping their cables, attempted to escape up the river, but
the wind was adverse, and they were obliged to abandon them. They set
them on fire when they left, to prevent their falling into the hands of
the enemy. "The flames suddenly broke forth, and, as every sail was set,
the vessels soon became magnificent pyramids of fire. The reflection on
the steep face of the opposite mountain, and the long train of ruddy
light which shone upon the water for a prodigious distance, had a
wonderful effect; while the ear was awfully filled with the continued
echoes from the rocky shores, as the flames gradually reached the loaded
cannons. The whole was sublimely terminated by the explosions, which
left all again in darkness." *** Early in the morning October 1777 the
obstructions in the river, which had cost the Americans a quarter of a
million of dollars, Continental money, were destroyed by the British
fleet. Fort Constitution, opposite West Point, was abandoned, passage up
the Hudson. Vaughan and Wallace marauding expedition, and, as we have
before noticed, burned Kingston, or Esopus. It was deemed too late to
assist Burgoyne by a junction with him, for on that very day the second
battle of Stillwater, so disastrous to that commander, was fought; ten
days afterward he and his whole army were captives. Yet the fall of the
Highland forts was a serious blow to the Americans, for quite a large
quantity of ordnance and ammunition was collected there. ****

* An account in the Annual Register for 1778 says that the British
galleys approached so near the forts that the men could touch the walls
with their oars! Both forts were upon a precipice more than one hundred
feet above the water, rather beyond the reach of oars of ordinary
length.

** Count Grabowski fell at the foot of the ramparts of Fort Montgomery,
pierced by three bullets. He gave his sword to a grenadier, with a
request that he would convey it to Lord Rawdon, with the assurance of
the owner that he died as a brave soldier ought to.--Stedman, i., 362. A
pile of stones still marks the burial-place of the count.

*** Stedman, i., 364.

**** The Americans lost 67 cannons in the forts, and over 30 in the
vessels, making a total of more than 100 pieces. Also, 54 casks, 11 half
barrels, and 12,236 pounds of loose powder, exclusive of what was in the
vessels. There were also 1852 cannon cartridges, and 57,396 for muskets.
Also, 9530 round cannon shot, 886 double-headed, 2483 grape and case,
and 36 cwt. of langridge; 1279 pounds of musket balls, 116 pounds of
buck shot, and 5400 flints. In addition to these were stores of various
kinds, such as gun-carriages, port-fires, tools, &c., in great plenty.

Evening Voyage in a Fisherman's Shallop.--Anthony's Nose.--Peekskill.--
Situation of the Village

737It was almost sunset when I left the ruins of Fort Montgomery to seek
for a waterman to carry me to Peekskill, on the east side of the river,
four miles distant. The regular ferryman was absent on duty, and after
considerable search, I procured, with difficulty, the services of a
fisherman to bear me to the distant village. We embarked at twilight--a
glorious Indian summer twilight--the river as calm as a lake of the
valley.

"The Dunderberg sat silently beneath

The snowy clouds, that Form'd a vapory wreath

Above its peak. The Hudson swept along

Its mighty waters--oh! had I a pen

Endued with master gifts and genius, then

Might I aspire to tell its praise in song."

Thomas MacKellar.

The boat was a scaly affair, and the piscatory odor was not very
agreeable; nevertheless. I had no alternative, and, turning my eyes and
nose toward the glowing heavens, I tried to imagine myself in a rose-
scented caique in the Golden Horn. I had half succeeded, when three or
four loud explosions, that shook the broad mountains and awoke an
hundred echoes, broke the charm, and notified me that I was in a
fisherman's shallop, and a little too near for safety to St. Anthony's
Nose, * where the constructors of the Hudson River rail-road, then
working day and night, were blasting an orifice through that nasal
feature of the Highlands. We sheered off toward the Dunderberg, and,
shooting across Peekskill Bay, with the tide flowing strongly down its
eastern rim, I landed in time for a warm supper at the "Atlantic."

Early on the morning of the 27th I made the sketch from Peekskill
landing October, 1848 printed on page 166, and then walked up to the
village on the slopes and hills, by a steep winding way that overlooks a
deep ravine, wherein several iron founderies are nestled. The town is
romantically situated among the hills, and from some of its more
prominent points of view there are magnificent prospects of the river
and Highland scenery in the vicinity. Here, spreading out south and east
for miles around, was the ancient manor of Cortlandt,3 stretching along
and far above the whole eastern shore of Haverstraw Bay, and extending
back to the Connecticut line. The manor house, near the mouth of the
Croton River, is yet standing. Within Peekskill village, opposite the
West Chester County Bank, is the old Bird-sail residence, a part of
which, as seen in the picture upon the next page, is a grocery store.
This building was erected by Daniel Birdsall, one of the founders of the
village. His store was the first one erected there. *** The owner and
occupant, when I visited it, was a son of

* This is a high rocky promontory, rising to an altitude of twelve
hundred and eighty feet above the level of the river, and situated
directly opposite Fort Montgomery. The origin of its name is uncertain.
The late proprietor of the land, General Pierre Van Cortlandt, says,
that before the Revolution, as Captain Anthony Hogans, the possessor of
a remarkable nose, was sailing near the place, in his vessel, his mate
looked rather quizzically first at the hill, and then at the captain's
nose. The captain comprehended the silent allusion, and said, "Does that
look like my nose? If it does, call it Anthony's Nose, if you please."
The story got abroad on shore, and it has since borne that name.
Washington Irving, in his authentic history of New York, by Diedrich
Knickerbocker, gives it an earlier origin. He says that while the fiery-
nosed Anthony Van Corlear, the trumpeter of one of the Dutch governors,
was standing one morning upon the deck of an exploring vessel, while
passing this promontory, a ray of the sun, darting over the peak, struck
the broad side of the trumpeter's nose, and, glancing off into the
water, killed a sturgeon! What else could the hill be called, under the
circumstances, but Anthony's Nose?

** The Courtlandts, or Van Courtlandts, are descended from a noble
Russian family. The orthography, in the Dutch language, is properly
korte-landt, meaning short land, a term expressing the peculiar form of
the ancient duchy of Courland in Russia. This domain constituted a
portion of Livonia, but was conquered by the Teutonic knights in 1561,
and subsequently became a fief of Poland. It remained a short time
independent, under its own dukes, after the fall of that power, but in
1795 it was united to Russia. The dukes of Courland were represented in
1610 by the Right Honorable Steven Van Cortlandt, then residing at
Cortlandt, in South Holland. He was the father of Oloff Stevenson Van
Cortlandt, the first lord of the manor, of that name, on the Hudson.

*** The first settlement at Peekskill commenced one mile north of the
present village, near the head waters of the creek. The name is derived
from John Peck, one of the early Dutch navigators, who, mistaking the
creek for the course of the river, ran his yacht ashore where the first
settlement was commenced. The settlement of the present village was
commenced in 1764.--Bolton's History of West Chester, i., 63.

The Birdsall House.--An Octogenarian.--Oak Hill.--Van Cortlandt House.--
Philip Van Cortlandt

738the first owner, and was then eighty years of age. His lady, many
years his junior, kindly showed me the different apartments made
memorable by the presence and occupancy of distinguished men in the
Revolution.

It was occupied by Washington when the head-quarters of the army were
there; and the rooms are pointed out which were used by the chief and La
Fayette as sleeping apartments. Chairs, a table, and an old clock which
has told the hours for more than eighty years, are still there; and in
the parlor where Whitefield once preached, I sat and sketched one of the
pieces of this venerable furniture. This old mansion, projecting into
and marring the regularity of the street, is an eyesore to the
villagers, and when the present owner shall depart, no doubt this relic
will be removed by the desecrating hand of improvement.

On leaving the Birdsall House, I proceeded to visit another octogenarian
named Sparks, whose boyhood and long life have been passed in Peekskill.
I found him sitting in the sun, upon his stoop, reading a newspaper
without glasses, and his little grandson, a fair-haired child, playing
at his feet. For an hour I sat and listened to his tales of the olden
times, and of scenes his eyes had witnessed. He had often seen
Washington and his suite at the Birdsall House, and well remembers
Putnam, Heath, M'Dougall, and other officers whose quarters were at
Peekskill. He never became a soldier, and saw only one battle during the
war. That occurred near the Van Cortlandt House, two miles east of
Peekskill, between some American pickets at the foot of Gallows Hill,
and a picket guard of the enemy at the base of the eminences opposite.
They were too near each other to keep quiet, and a skirmish at length
ensued. "They made a great smoke and noise," said Mr. Sparks, "but
nobody was hurt except by fright." Pointing to a huge oak standing near
the Peekskill Academy on Oak Hill, and in full view of our resting-
place, he related the circumstance of the execution of a British spy,
named Daniel Strang, upon that tree. He was a Tory, and was found
lurking about the American army at Peekskill with enlisting orders sewed
up in his clothes. I left the vigorous old man to enjoy the warm
sunlight and his newspaper alone, and procuring a conveyance, rode out
to Van Cortlandt's house; the church-yard, where rest the remains of one
of Andre's captors; Gallows Hill, famous as the camping-ground of Putnam
for a short period during the Revolution, and to Continental Village,
the scene of one of Tryon's marauding expeditions.

Van Cortlandt's house is situated in the midst of one of the fine
estates of that family.' It is a brick mansion, and was erected in 1773.
It stands in the center of a pleasant lawn, shaded by locust trees, on
the north side of the post-road. It was occupied by Washington, for a
brief space, as head-quarters; and there the Van Cortlandt family
resided in safety,

* General Philip Van Cortlandt was the last possessor of the manor
house, near Croton, by entail. He was born in the city of New York on
the 1st of September, 1749, and was reared at the manor house. At
nineteen, he commenced business as a land surveyor, but when the
Revolution broke out, agreeing in sentiment with his father, Honorable
Pierre Van Cortlandt, he joined the Republican army. His Tory relatives
tried to dissuade him from his purpose, and Governor Tryon forwarded him
a major's commission in the Cortlandt militia. He tore it in pieces, and
accepted a lieutenant colonel's commission in the Continental army. He
was appointed a colonel in 1776, and in that capacity served at the
battles of Stillwater. He also served against the Indians on the New
York frontier in 1778, and in 1779-80 was a member of the court martial
convened for the trial of Arnold. He commanded a regiment of militia
under La Fayette in 1781, and for his gallant conduct at the siege of
Yorktown he was promoted to a brigadier's command. Seven hundred of the
British and Hessian prisoners of war were afterward intrusted to his
care while on their march from Charlottesville to Fredericktown, in
Maryland. He was for sixteen years a member of Congress, but in 1811
declined a re-election. General Van Cortlandt accompanied La Fayette in
his tour through the United States in 1824. He died at the manor house,
at Croton, November 21st, 1831, at the age of eighty-two. With him
expired the property entail.

The Cortlandt Manor House.--Paulding's Monument, and St. Peter's
Church.--Gallows Hill.

739while desolation was rife around them. When I visited the mansion,
General Pierre Van Cortlandt, the late owner (brother of General Philip
Van Cortlandt, of the manor October, 1848 house), had been dead but a
few months. Many of the family portraits were yet there, some of them
more than one hundred years old. They have since been removed to the old
manor house at Croton. The mansion which we are considering was occupied
for a while by General M'Dougall's advanced guard, when the British took
possession of Peekskill in March, 1777, an event that will be noticed
presently. The old oak tree is standing in a field a little eastward of
the house, which was used for the purpose of a military whipping-post
during the encampment there. It is green and vigorous, and so regular
are its branches, that, when in full foliage, its form, above the trunk,
is a perfect sphere.

Upon a knoll, a little eastward of Van Cortlandt's house, is an ancient
wooden church, erected in 1767 for worship, according to the rituals of
the Church of England. Within its grave-yard, which spreads over the
knoll westward, is the monument erected to the memory of John Paulding,
one of the captors of Andre, by the corporation of the city of New York.
The monument is constructed of West Chester marble, in the most simple
form, consisting of a pedestal surmounted by a cone. It is massive, and
so constructed as to last for ages. The base of the pedestal covers a
square of seven feet, and is surrounded by a strong iron railing. The
height is about thirteen feet. One side of the monument exhibits a
representation, in low relief, of the face of the medal voted by
Congress to each of the captors of Andre; the other side exhibits the
reverse of the medal. The main inscription is upon the western panel of
the pedestal. **

From the old church-yard I rode to the summit of Gallows Hill, a lofty
ridge on the north, and bared of trees by the hand of cultivation. It is
famous as a portion of the campground of the division of the American
army under Putnam in 1777, and also as the place where a spy was
executed, from which circumstance the hill derives its name. Leaving my
vehicle at the gate of a farm-house by the road side, I crossed the
fields to the place designated by tradition as the spot where the old
chestnut-tree stood, near which the spy was hanged. It is about one
hundred rods west of the road, on the southeastern slope of the hill,
and is marked by a huge bowlder lying upon the surface, by the side of
which is the decayed trunk

* The site of this church and the grave-yard was a gift of Andrew
Johnson, of Perth Amboy, New Jersey. The parish was called St. Peter's;
and this and the parish of St. Philip, in the Highlands, were endowed
with two hundred acres of land by Colonel Beverly Robinson.

** The following are the inscriptions: North side.--"Here repose the
mortal remains of John Paulding, who died on the 18th day of February,
1818, in the 60th year of his age." West side.--"On the morning of the
23d of September, 1780, accompanied by two young farmers of the county
of West Chester (whose names will one day be recorded on their own
deserved monuments), he intercepted the British spy, Andre. Poor
himself, he disdained to acquire wealth by the sacrifice of his country.
Rejecting the temptation of great rewards, he conveyed his prisoner to
the American camp; and, by this act of noble self-denial, the treason of
Arnold was detected; the designs of the enemy baffled: West Point and
the American Army saved; and these United States, now by the grace of
God Free and Independent, rescued from most imminent peril." South
side.--"The Corporation of the city of New York erected this tomb as a
memorial sacred to PUBLIC GRATITUDE." The monument was erected in 1827;
the cone was placed on the pedestal on the 22d of November of that year,
in the presence of a large concourse of citizens, who were addressed by
William Paulding, then Mayor of New York. A copy of the medal presented
to the captors of Andre may be found on page 773

Execution place of a Spy.--Putnam's laconic Letter.--View from Gallows
Hill.--Relative importance of Peekskill

740of a chestnut, as seen in the picture, * said to be a sprout of the
memorable tree. The the spy was Edmund Palmer. He was an athletic young
man, connected by nature and affection with some of the most respectable
families in West Chester, and had a wife and children.

He was arrested on suspicion, and enlisting papers, signed by Governor
Tryon, were found upon his person. It was also ascertained that he was a
lieutenant in a Tory company. These and other unfavorable circumstances
made it clear that he was a spy, and on that charge he was tried, found
guilty, and condemned to be hung. His young wife pleaded for his life,
but the dictates of the stern policy of war made Putnam inexorable. Sir
Henry Clinton sent a flag to the American commander, claiming Palmer as
a British officer, and menacing the Republicans with his severest wrath
if he was not delivered up. Putnam's sense of duty was as deaf to the
menaces of the one as to the tears of the other, and he sent to Clinton
the following laconic reply:

"Head-quarters, 7th August, 1777.

"Sir,--Edmund Palmer, an officer in the enemy's service, was taken as a
spy, lurking within our lines. He has been tried as a spy, condemned as
a spy, and shall be executed as a spy; and the flag is ordered to depart
immediately. Israel Putnam.

"P.S.--He has been accordingly executed."

From the top of Gallows Hill there is a glorious prospect of the
surrounding country, particularly southward, in which direction the eye
takes in glimpses of Peekskill village, the river and its rocky shores
on the west, and the fertile estates of West Chester as far as the high
grounds of Tarrytown. On the southeast of the ridge is the beautiful
undulating Peekskill Hollow, and on the north, between it and the rough
turrets of the Highland towers, is scooped the Canopus Valley, deep and
rich, wherein is nestled Continental Village, the scene of one of
Tryon's desolating expeditions. We are upon historic ground; let us open
the chronicle for a few moments.

In view of the relative position of the belligerent armies at the
opening of 1777, Peekskill was regarded by the commander-in-chief as a
very important post. Believing that the chief design of the next
campaign would be, on the part of the enemy, to accomplish a junction of
the forces under Sir William Howe at New York and an army preparing in
Canada March 12, 1777 for invasion, Washington wrote, in a letter to
General Schuyler, as follows:

"On these considerations, I can not help thinking much too large a part
of our force is directed to Ticonderoga. Peekskill appears to me a much
more proper place, where, if the troops are drawn together, they will be
advantageously situated to give support to any of the Eastern or Middle
States. Should the enemy's design be to penetrate the country up the
North River, they will be well posted to oppose them; should they
attempt to penetrate into New England, they will be well stationed to
cover it; if they move westward, the Eastern and Southern troops can
easily form a junction; and besides, it will oblige the enemy to have a
much stronger garrison at New York." ** With these views, the commander-
in-chief determined to collect a respectable force at Peekskill. This
was done as speedily as possible, and General Heath, of Massachusetts,
was placed in command. This officer was obliged to return to his state,
and the command devolved upon General M'Dougall. ***

* Near this bowlder a gallows, rudely constructed of logs, was erected,
on which the spy was hung. It remained there for several years
afterward, an object of superstitious dread to the country people who
were obliged to pass it in the night.

** Sparks's Washington, iv., 359.

*** Alexander M'Dougall was the son of a Scotchman from the Lowlands,
who came to America about twenty years before the Revolution broke out,
and commenced business in the city of New York. The date of his birth is
not known. He became a zealous Whig during the years immediately
preceding the Revolution, and when the war broke out he joined the army.
In August, 1776, he was appointed a brigadier, and in October, 1777, he
was promoted to the rank of major general. He commanded in the action
near White Plains, and was in the battle at Germantown in the autumn of
1777. In 1781 he was elected to a seat in the Continental Congress, and
was afterward a member of the New York State Senate. He died June 8,
1786.

Stratagem of Sir William Howe.--Invasion of Peekskill.--Destruction of
Stores.--Destruction of Continental Village

741Cattle and military stores, in large quantities, were collected at
Peekskill and in the vicinity; and the post, not being very strongly
manned, attracted the attention of the enemy. Sir William Howe projected
a scheme to capture or destroy them. Stratagem was a part of his plan.
He caused a conversation on the subject to be held in the hearing of an
American officer who had been captured at Fort Washington, in which it
was arranged that an excursion was to be made into the country by three
divisions: one to go up the Sound and land at Mamaroneck, another to
march up the center road by Kingsbridge, and a third to go up the Hudson
and land at Tarrytown. The officer was soon afterward released, and
escorted with a flag to the American lines. The object was to have him
report the conversation, and thus draw off General M'Dougall's attention
from the real point of attack. M'Dougall had only two hundred and fifty
effective men, too few to attempt opposition. He immediately commenced
sending his stores to Forts Clinton and Montgomery for safety, but
before he had accomplished his design, ten sail of British vessels
appeared off Tarrytown, and two went up to Haverstraw Bay, at a point
twelve miles below Peekskill. March 22, 1777 The next day the whole
fleet anchored in Peekskill Bay; and at one o'clock, five hundred men,
in eight flat-boats, under the command of Colonel Bird, landed at Lent's
Cove, on the south side of the bay. They had four pieces of light
artillery, drawn by the sailors. General M'Dougall retreated to Gallows
Hill and vicinity, giving directions for destroying such stores as could
not be removed. At the same time, he sent a dispatch to Lieutenant-
colonel Willett, at Fort Constitution, to leave a subaltern's command
there, and hasten to his assistance. The British held possession of the
town until next day, when a detachment advanced toward the Highlands.
These were attacked by Colonel Willett, and a smart skirmish ensued. The
detachment retreated back to the main body of the enemy, and in the
evening, favored by the light of the moon, they all embarked and sailed
down the river. Their object, the destruction of the stores, was
partially accomplished, but not by their own hands. They had nine of
their number killed in the skirmish with Willett, and four at the verge
of the creek, while attempting to burn some boats. The Americans had one
man killed by a cannon shot. * Two or three houses were burned, and
about forty sheep, furnished by the Tories, were carried off.

Near the banks of Canopus Creek, and overlooked by Gallows Hill, is
Continental Village. It is about three miles from Peekskill, at the main
entrance to the Highland passes northward. There, in 1777, were
constructed barracks sufficient to accommodate two thousand men. A large
number of cattle, and a great quantity of military stores under the
charge of Major Campbell, were collected there. Two small redoubts were
erected on the high ground, for the double purpose of protecting the
public property and guarding the mountain road. Hither, on the morning
of the 9th of October, three days after the capture of Forts Clinton and
Montgomery, General Tryon was detached with Emerick's 1777 chasseurs and
other Germans, with a three-pounder, to destroy the settlement. He
accomplished the object most effectually. The barracks, and nearly every
house in the little village, together with the public stores, were
consumed, and many of the cattle were slaughtered. The inhabitants fled
to the hills, while the few troops that were left when Putnam and the
main force retired to Fishkill on the fall of the mountain fortresses,
were compelled to fly for safety. In a few hours the smiling little
valley was a scene of utter desolation. ** Gen-

* General M'Dougall's MS. Letter of March 29, 1777, quoted by Sparks.

** The feelings of Tryon toward the Republicans may be learned from a
letter of his, written a few weeks after this transaction, in reply to
one of remonstrance on the part of General Parsons. "I have," he says,
"the candor enough to assure you, as much as I abhor every principle of
inhumanity or ungenerous conduct, I should, were I in more authority,
burn every committee-man's house within my reach, as I deem those agents
the wicked instruments of the continued calamities of this country; and
in order sooner to purge this country of them, I am willing to give
twenty-five dollars for every acting committee-man who shall be
delivered up to the king's troops."

Peekskill possessed by the Americans.--The Soldier's Spring.--
Verplanck's Point.--Hudson and the Indians.

742eral Parsons * marched down from Fishkill with two thousand men a few
days afterward, and took possession of Peekskill. From that time it was
the scene of no stirring military events, other than those incident to
the brief encampment of regiments or divisions of the American army.

After sketching the only prominent object on the site of poor Palmer's
gallows, I resumed the reins, and, when part way down the northern slope
of the ridge, turned up a green lane near the Soldier's Spring ** to the
farm-house of Mr. Lent, to inquire for an aged couple of that name.
Informed that they lived at a little village called Oregon, a mile and a
half distant, I returned to Peekskill Hollow, and proceeded thither. My
journey was fruitless of information. They were, indeed, a venerable
pair; one aged eighty-four, and the other eighty-three years.

After dinner at Peekskill, I rode down to Verplanck's Point, eight miles
below. *** It was October 27, 1848 a lovely afternoon; a fine road amid
ever-varying scenery, and every rock, and knoll, and estuary of the
river clustered over with historic associations, made the journey of an
hour one of great pleasure and interest. Verplanck's Point is the
termination of a peninsula of gently rolling land, gradually ascending
from the neck toward the shore, where it ends in a bluff, from thirty to
fifty feet high. Here, during the memorable season of land and town
speculation, when the water-lot mania emulated that of the tulip and
1836 the South Sea games, a large village was mapped out, and one or two
fine mansions were erected. The bubble burst, and many fertile acres
there, where corn and potatoes once yielded a profit to the cultivator,
are scarred and made barren by intersecting streets, not _de_populated,
but _un_populated, save by the beetle and grasshopper. On the brow of

* In allusion to this and kindred expeditions, Trumbull makes Malcom
say,

"Behold, like whelps of Britain's lion, Our warriors, Clinton, Vaughan,
and Tryon, March forth with patriotic joy To ravish, plunder, and
destroy. Great gen'rals, foremost in their nation, The journeymen of
Desolation! Like Sampson's foxes, each assails, Let loose with fire-
brands in their tails, And spreads destruction more forlorn Than they
among Philistines' corn." ----M'Fingal, Canto iv.

* Samuel Holden Parsons was a native of Connecticut, and one of a
committee of correspondence in that state before the commencement of the
war. He was appointed a brigadier general by Congress in August, 1776,
and served his country faithfully during the contest. Under his
direction, the successful expedition of Colonel Meigs against the enemy
at Sag Harbor, on Long Island, in 1777, was sent out. He was appointed a
commissioner to negotiate with the Western Indians in 1785. In 1787, he
was appointed one of the judges of the Northwestern Territory. He was
drowned in the Ohio, in December, 1789.

**This is a little fountain bubbling up by the road side, and named The
Soldier's Spring, from the circumstance that an American soldier, while
retreating before the enemy, stooped at the fountain to quench his
thirst. While so doing, a cannon ball, that struck the hills above him,
glanced obliquely, hit and shattered his thigh, and left him dying
beside the clear waters. He was conveyed in a wagon that passed soon
afterward, to Fishkill, where he expired.

*** This was the point off which Henry Hudson's vessel, the Half Moon,
came first to anchor after leaving the mouth of the river. The Highland
Indians, filled with wonder, came flocking to the ship in boats, but
their curiosity ended in a tragedy. One of them, overcome by
acquisitiveness, crawled up the rudder, entered the cabin window, and
stole a pillow and a few articles of wearing apparel. The mate saw the
thief pulling his bark for land, and shot at and killed him. The ship's
boat was sent for the stolen articles, and when one of the natives, who
had leaped into the water, caught hold of the side of the shallop, his
hand was cut off by a sword, and he was drowned. This was the first
blood shed by these voyagers. Intelligence of this spread over the
country, and the Indians hated the white man, afterward, intensely. The
exceedingly tortuous creek which traverses the marsh southward of
Verplanck's Point was called, by the Indians, Meahagh, and this was the
name which they gave to the peninsula. It was purchased of the Indians
by Stephanus Van Cortlandt in 1683. From him it passed into the
possession of his son Johannes, whose only daughter and heiress,
Gertrude, married Philip Verplanck, from whom it acquired its present
appellation.

Fortifications at Verplanck's Point.--Capture of Fort Fayette. --
Surrender of the Garrison.

743the Point, near the western extremity, and overlooking the water, a
small fortification, called Fort Fayette, was erected It was an eligible
site for a fort; and, in connection with the fortress on the rocky
promontory opposite, was capable of being made a formidable defense at
this, the lower gate of the Hudson Highlands.

These two promontories make the river quite narrow, and, if well
fortified, might defy the passage of any number of hostile vessels. *
The site of Fort Fayette is distinctly traceable in the orchard upon the
high grounds in the rear of Mr. Bleakly's store upon the wharf. The
mounds and fossé of the main fort, as it was enlarged and strengthened
by the British, and also the embankments of the smaller outworks, are
quite prominent in many places.

The small forts at Verplanck's and Stony Points were captured by the
enemy commanded by Sir Henry Clinton in person, on the 1st of June,
1779. The garrison of Stony Point consisted of only about forty men, and
that at Verplanck's of seventy men, commanded by Captain Armstrong. As
these forts secured a free communication between the troops of New
England and those of the central and southern portions of the
confederacy, Clinton determined to dislodge the Americans therefrom.
Accordingly, on the 30th of May, he sailed up the river with a strong
force, accompanied by General Vaughan; the flotilla was commanded by
Admiral Collier. They landed in two divisions on the morning of the
31st, the one under Vaughan, on the east side, eight miles below
Verplanck's, and May-1779 the other under Clinton, on the west side, a
little above Haverstraw. The garrison at Stony Point retired to the
Highlands on the approach of the enemy, and the fort changed masters
without bloodshed. The next morning, the guns of the captured fortress,
and the cannons and mortars dragged up during the night, were pointed
toward Fort Fayette opposite, and a heavy cannonade was opened upon it.
Unable to make a respectable resistance to this assault, and attacked in
the rear by Vaughan's division, the little garrison surrendered
themselves prisoners of war. ** The loss of these forts was greatly
lamented by Washington,

* This map shows the relative position of Verplanek's and Stony Points,
and of the forts in the time of the Revolution. A represents the
position and form of the fort on Stony Point; B, General Wayne's right
column, and C his left column, when he stormed the ramparts and fort;
and D shows the site of Fort Fayette, on the east side of the river.

** The following were the terms of capitulation:

"On the glacis of Fort Fayette, June 1st, 1779.

"His excellency Sir Henry Clinton and Commodore Sir George Collier grant
to the garrison of Fort La Fayette terms of safety to the persons and
property (contained in the fort) of the garrison, they surrendering
themselves prisoners of war. The officers shall be permitted to wear
their side-arms.

"John Andre, Aid-de-camp."

Disposition of the American Troops on the Hudson.--Preparations for
attacking Stony Point--The Negro Spy.

744and his first care was to make an effort to recover them, for West
Point was now in danger. The main body of the American army was moved
from Middlebrook toward the Highlands, and Washington established his
quarters at Smith's Clove, far in the rear of Haverstraw. *

Sir Henry Clinton gave orders for the immediate strengthening of the
forts, and to guard the detachments left for the purpose, he descended
the river with his army only as far as Phillipsburgh, now Yonkers.

On the 23d of June, Washington established his headquarters at New
Windsor, leaving General Putnam in command of the main army at Smith's
Clove. General M'Dougall was transferred to the command at West Point;
the garrisons at Constitution Island, and at the redoubts opposite West
Point, were strengthened; the road to Fish-kill was well guarded, and
three brigades were placed under the command of General Heath, who had
lately been ordered from Boston. On the 1st of July, General Wayne was
appointed to the command of the light infantry of the line, and was
stationed in the vicinity of the Dunderberg, between Fort Montgomery and
the main army at the Clove. The British had now greatly enlarged and
strengthened the two forts in question, well supplied them with
ammunition and stores, and had them strongly garrisoned. The force at
Stony Point consisted of the seventeenth regiment of foot, the grenadier
companies of the seventy-first, and some artillery; the whole under the
command of Lieutenant-colonel Johnson of the seventh. The garrison at
Verplanck's was commanded by Lieutenant-colonel Webster, and was quite
equal in force to that at Stony Point. Several small British vessels of
war were anchored in the bay within close cannon shot of the forts. Such
was the situation of the two armies, when the attack of the Americans
under Wayne and Howe upon Stony Point and Verplanck's Point was planned
and executed by order of Washington 1779 On the morning of the 15th of
July, all the Massachusetts light infantry were marched to the quarters
of Wayne at Sandy Beach, fourteen miles from Stony Point. At meridian on
that exceedingly sultry day, the whole body moved through narrow
defiles, over rough crags, and across deep morasses, in single file, and
at eight in the evening rendezvoused a mile and a half below Stony
Point. There they remained until General Wayne and several officers
returned from reconnoitering the works of the enemy, when they were
formed into column, and moved silently forward under the guidance of a
negro slave belonging to a Captain Lamb who resided in the neighborhood.
***

The position of the fortress was such that it seemed almost impregnable.
Situated upon a huge rocky bluff, an island at high water, and always
inaccessible dry-shod, except across

* Smith's Clove extends northward from the Ramapo Valley, not far from
Turner's station on the Erie rail-road.

** This sketch presents a rear view of the old embankments of the fort,
and of the light-house, whieh is seen by all travelers upon the river,
just before entering the Highlands. The beacon stands exactly in the
center of the fort, upon the site of the magazine. There was a covered
way toward the water on the north side of the hill, and about twenty
yards in the rear are some prominent remains of the ravelins which
extended across the point.

*** Mr. Tenyek, the old ferryman at Stony Point, informed me that he
knew this negro well. His name was Pompey, and for his services on that
night his master gave him a horse to ride, and never exacted any labor
from him afterward. Pompey's master was a warm Whig, and himself was a
shrewd negro. Soon after the enemy took possession of the Point, Pompey
ventured to go to the fort with strawberries to sell. He was kindly
received; and as the season advanced, and berries and cherries beeame
plentiful, he carried on an extensive traffic with the garrison, and
beeame a favorite with the officers, who had no suspicion that he was
regularly reporting every thing to his Whig master. Finally, Pompey
informed them that his master would not allow him to come with fruit in
the daytime, for it was hoeing-corn season. Unwilling to lose their
supply of luxuries, the officers gave Pompey the countersign regularly,
so that he could pass the sentinels in the evening. He thus possessed a
knowledge of the countersign on the night of the attack, and made good
use of it. That countersign was, "The fort's our own," and this was the
watch-word of the Americans when they scaled the ramparts.

Condition of Stony Point.--Wayne's Proposition to Storm it.--Biography
of Wayne.--His Monument.

745a narrow causeway in the rear, it was strongly defended by outworks
and a double row of abatis. Upon three sides of the rock were the waters
of the Hudson, and on the fourth was a morass, deep and dangerous. But
Wayne was not easily deterred by obstacles; and tradition avers, that
while conversing with Washington on the subject of this expedition, he
remarked, with emphasis, "General, I'll storm hell if you will only plan
it."

He possessed the true fire of the flint, and was always governed by the
maxim, "Where there's a will there's a way."

He resolved to storm the fort at all hazards, and only waited for the
ebbing of the tide, and the deep first slumber of the garrison, to move
toward the fortress.

* Anthony Wayne was born in the township of Eastown, in Chester county,
Pennsylvania, on the 1st of January, 1745. He was educated in
Philadelphia, and having studied mathematics with care, he opened a
surveyor's office in his native town. He was sent to Nova Scotia in
1765, to locate a grant of land from the crown to several gentlemen in
Pennsylvania. They made Wayne superintendent of the settlement. This
post he held until 1767, when he returned home, married a young lady in
Philadelphia, and resumed his profession as surveyor. In 1773, he was
appointed a representative to the general Assembly of his state. He
quitted the council for the field in 1775, where he was appointed a
colonel in the Continental army, and went to Canada with General Thomas.
At the close of the campaign there in 1776, he was promoted to brigadier
general. He was with the commander-in chief at Brandywine, Germantown,
and Monmouth, in all of which engagements he was distinguished for his
valor. The capture of Stony Point raised him to the highest mark in the
admiration of his countrymen. In 1781, he went with the Pennsylvania
line to the South, and in Virginia co-operated with La Fayette. After
the capture of Cornwallis, he was sent to conduct the war in Georgia,
and was very successful. As a reward for his services, the Legislature
of Georgia made him a present of a valuable farm. He was a member of the
Pennsylvania Convention that ratified the Federal Constitution. In 1792,
he succeeded St. Clair in the command of the army to be employed against
the Western Indians, and gained a great victory over them in the battle
of the Miamis, in August, 1794. He concluded a treaty with the Indians
in August, 1795. While engaged in the public service, and returning home
from the West, he was seized with the gout, and died in a hut at Presque
Isle, in December, 1796, aged fifty-one years. He was buried, at his own
request, under the flag-staff of the fort, on the shore of Lake Erie,
from whence his remains were conveyed in 1809, by his son, Colonel Isaac
Wayne, to Radnor chureh-yard, in Delaware county. The venerable church,
near which the body of the hero lies, was erected in 1717.

* The Pennsylvania State Society of the Cincinnati caused a handsome
monument of white marble to be erected over his remains, upon which are
the following inscriptions: North front.--Major-general Anthony Wayne
was born at Waynesborough,* in Chester county, State of Pennsylvania,
A.D. 1745. After a life of honor and usefulness, he died in December,
1796, at a military post on the shore of Lake Erie, commander-inchief of
the army of the United States. His military achievements are consecrated
in the history of his country and in the hearts of his countrymen. His
remains are here interred." South front.--"In honor of the distinguished
military services of Major-general Anthony Wayne, and as an affectionate
tribute of respect to his memory, this stone was erected by his
companions in arras, the Pennsylvania State Society of the Cincinnati,
July 4, A.D. 1809, thirty-fourth anniversary of the independence of the
United States of America; an event which constitutes the most
appropriate eulogium of an American soldier and patriot."

* This is an error. His birth-place was about a mile and a quarter south
of the Paoli tavern

Approach of the Americans to Stony Point.--Capture of Sentinels.--
Storming of the Fort

746It was half past eleven o'clock at night when the Americans commenced
their silent march toward the fort. All the dogs in the neighborhood had
been killed the day before, that their barking might not give notice of
strangers near. The negro, with two strong men disguised as farmers,
advanced alone.

The countersign was given to the first sentinel, on the high ground west
of the morass, and while he was conversing with Pompey, the men seized
and gagged him. The silence of the sentinel at the causeway was secured
in the same manner, and as soon as the tide ebbed sufficiently, the
whole of Wayne's little army, except a detachment of three hundred men
under General Muhlenburg, who remained in the rear as a reserve, crossed
the morass to the foot of the western declivity of the promontory,
unobserved by the enemy. The troops were now divided into two columns;
the van of the right, consisting of one hundred and fifty volunteers,
under Lieutenant-colonel De Fleury, and that of the left, of one hundred
volunteers, under Major Stewart, each with unloaded muskets and fixed
bayonets. An _avant-guard_ of twenty picked men for each company, under
Lieutenants Gibbon and Knox, preceded them, to remove the _abatis_ and
other obstructions. These vans composed the forlorn hope on that
memorable night.

At a little past midnight the advanced parties moved silently to the
charge, one company on the southern, and the other toward the northern
portion of the height. They were followed by the two main divisions; the
right, composed of the regiments of Febiger and Meigs, being led by
General Wayne in person. The left was composed of Colonel Butler's
regiment, and two companies under Major Murfey. The Americans were
undiscovered until within pistol shot of the pickets upon the heights,
when a skirmish ensued between the sentinels and the advanced guards.
The pickets fired several shots, but the Americans, true to orders,
relied entirely upon the bayonet, and pressed forward with vigor. The
garrison was aroused from their slumbers, and instantly the deep silence
of the night was broken by the roll of the drum, the loud cry _To arms!
to arms!_ the rattle of musketry from the ramparts and behind the
_abatis_, and the roar of cannon, charged with the deadly grape-shot,
from the embrasures. ** In the face of this terrible storm, the
Americans forced their way, at

* This view shows a large portion of the morass, and the place where the
assaulting party divided and prepared for an attack upon the fort, which
was situated where the light-house is seen. The place of the causeway is
on the left, denoted by the cattle. When I made this sketch it was quite
high water, and the morass, there about one hundred feet wide, was
almost covered. There was another place near the river shore, on the
right, where the Point was accessible at times. It is distinguished in
the sketeh by the narrow strip of land extending nearly across the mouth
of the morass. Upon this the enemy had dug pits and placed sharpened
stakes within them, so that, had the Americans attempted to reach the
Point by that way many would have been impaled. The position of the
Americans in the attack, and of the outworks and the abatis, will be
better understood by a reference to the map on a preceding page.

** Major (afterward General) Hull says in his Memoir, "At about half
past eleven o'clock, the two columns commenced their march in platoons.
The beach was more than two feet deep with water, and before the right
column reached it we were fired on by the out-guards, which gave the
alarm to the garrison. We were now directly under the fort, and, closing
in a solid column, ascended the hill, which was almost perpendicular.
When about half way up, our course was impeded by two strong rows of
abatis, which the forlorn hope had not been able entirely to remove. The
column proceeded silently on, and, clearing away the abatis, passed to
the breast-work, cut and tore away the pickets, cleared the chevaux de
frise at the sally-port, mounted the parapet, and entered the fort at
the point of the bayonet. Our column on the other side entered the fort
at the same time. Each of our men had a white paper in his hat, which in
the darkness distinguished him from the enemy; and the watch-word was,
'The fort's our own!'" Some authors have asserted that bomb-shells were
thrown by the British, but such, probably, was not the fact. No official
account that I have seen mentions the use of shells.

Wayne wounded.--His Bravery.--Surrender of the Fort--Wayne's laconic
Dispatch.

747the point of the bayonet, through every obstacle, until the van of
each column met in the center of the works, where each arrived at the
same time.' At the inner _abatis_, Wayne was struck upon the head by a
musket ball, which brought him upon his knees. His two brave aids,
Fishbow and Archer, raised him to his feet, and carried him gallantly
through the works. Believing himself mortally wounded, the general
exclaimed, as he arose, "March on! carry me into the fort, for I will
die at the head of my column!" But the wound was not very severe, and he
was able to join in the loud huzzas that arose when the two columns met
as victors within the fort. Colonel De Fleury first entered the works,
and struck the British standard with his own hands. The garrison
surrendered at discretion as prisoners of war, and that brilliant
achievement was rendered the more glorious for the clemency which the
victors exercised toward the vanquished. Not a life was taken after the
flag was struck and the garrison had pleaded for quarters. Wayne had but
fifteen killed and eighty-three wounded; the British had sixty-three
killed; ** and Johnson, the commander, with five hundred and forty-three
officers and men, were made prisoners. The ships of the enemy lying in
the river in front of Stony Point slipped their cables and moved down to
a place of security. Before daylight, Wayne sent to the commander-in-
chief the brief but comprehensive reply, of which a fac simile is here
given:

* Wayne's official dispatch, dated at Stony Point, July 17, 1779.

** This is the number given in the American account. Colonel Johnson, in
his official dispatch, says he had only twenty killed.

Fort Fayette Cannonaded.--Relieved by Sir Henry Clinton.--Galley with
Ordnance sunk at Caldwell's.

748At dawn the next morning the cannons of the captured fort were turned
upon the enemy's works at Verplanck's Point under Colonel Webster, and a
desultory bombardment was kept up during the day. Major-general Robert
Howe had been sent to attack Fort Fayette, but on account of delays, and
some misconceptions of Washington's orders, he did not make the attack
in time to dislodge the garrison. News of Webster's critical situation
and the capture of Stony Point was speedily communicated to Sir Henry
Clinton, and he immediately sent relief to the menaced garrison at
Verplanck's. Howe withdrew, and the enterprise was abandoned.

Washington, clearly perceiving the danger of attempting to retain the
post at Stony Point with so few troops as could be employed in the
service, concluded to order an evacuation, and a destruction of the
works after the ordnance and stores should be removed. This was
accordingly done on the night of the eighteenth. All that was originally
intended July, 1779. was accomplished, namely, the destruction of the
works and the seizure of the artillery and stores. A large portion of
the heavy ordnance was placed upon a galley to be conveyed to West
Point. As soon as the vessel moved, a cannonade from Verplanck's and the
British shipping was commenced upon it. A heavy shot from the Vulture
struck it below water-mark, and the galley went down at the point just
above Caldwell's Landing, where speculation recently made credulity seek
for treasures in a sunken vessel alleged to have belonged to the famous
Captain Kidd. If, as asserted, a cannon was drawn up from a vessel lying
at the bottom of the river there, it was doubtless one of the pieces
taken from Stony Point, and the "ship's timbers" there discovered are
the remains of the old galley. The "treasures," if secured, would be of
little worth in these "piping times of peace."

The British repossessed themselves of Stony Point on the 20th, but they
had little of value left them but the eligible site for a fortification.

The storming and capture of Stony Point, regarded as an exhibition of
skill and indomitable courage, was one of the most brilliant events of
the war. General Wayne, the leader

* This is a representation of the medal, the size of the original. On
one side 3s a device representing an Indian queen crowned, a quiver on
her back, and wearing a short apron of feathers. A mantle hangs from her
waist behind, the upper end of which appears as if passed through the
girdle of her apron, and hangs gracefully by her left side. With her
right hand she is presenting a wreath to General Wayne; in her left she
is holding up a mural crown toward his head. At her feet, on the left,
an alligator is lying. The American shield is resting against the
animal. Over the figure is the legend "Antonio Wayne Duci Exercitus,"
and beneath, "Comitia Americana "The American Congress to General
Anthony Wayne. On the reverse is a fort on the top of a hill; the
British flag flying; troops in single file advancing up the hill, and a
large number lying at the bottom. Artillery are seen in the foreground,
and six vessels in the river. The inscription is, "Stony Point
expugnatum, xv. Jul. mdcclxxix. "Stony Point captured, July 15, 1779."

Medal awarded to Wayne.--His Popularity.--Medal awarded to Colonel De
Fleury

749of the enterprise, was every where greeted with rapturous applause. *
Congress testified their grateful sense of his services by a vote of
thanks "for his brave, prudent, and soldierly conduct." It was also
resolved that a medal of gold, emblematical of this action, should be
struck, and presented to General Wayne. Thanks were also presented by
Congress to Lieutenant-colonel De Fleury ** and Major Stewart, and a
medal of silver was ordered to be struck and presented to each.

The conduct of Lieutenants Gibbon and Knox was warmly applauded, and
brevets of captain was given to each, and to Mr. Archer, the volunteer
aid of Wayne, who was the bearer of the general's letter to Washington
on the occasion. Pursuant to the recommendation of the commander-in-
chief, and in fulfillment of promises made by Wayne before the assault,
with the concurrence of Washington, Congress resolved, "That the value
of the military stores taken at Stony Point be ascertained and divided
among the gallant

* General Charles Lee, who was not on the most friendly terms with
Wayne, wrote to him, saying, "I do most seriously declare that your
assault of Stony Point is not only the most brilliant, in my opinion,
throughout the whole course of the war, on either side, but that it is
the most brilliant I am acquainted with in history; the assault of
Schiveidnitz, by Marshal Laudon, I think inferior to it." Dr. Rush
wrote, saving, "Our streets rang for many days with nothing but the name
of General Wayne. You are remembered constantly next to our good and
great Washington, over our claret and Madeira. You have established the
national character of our country; you have taught our enemies that
bravery, humanity, and magnanimity are the national virtues of the
Americans."

** De Fleury was descended from Hercule Andre de Fleury, a French
nobleman, who was the preceptor of the grandson of Louis XIV. during the
latter years of the life of that monarch. He was afterward made cardinal
and prime minister. The subject of our sketch came to America soon after
the news of the revolt reached France. Washington received him kindly,
obtained for him a commission, and he proved to be a brave and worthy
soldier. Educated as an engineer, his talents were brought into
requisition here. In that capacity he was acting at the time of the
engagement at Fort Mifflin, on the Delaware. He was at the battle of
Brandywine, and for his gallantry there Congress gave him a horse. He
returned to France soon after the capture of Stony Point.

*** This is a representation of the medal, the size of the original. The
device is a helmeted soldier, standing against the ruins of a fort. His
right hand is extended, holding a sword upright; the staff of a stand of
colors is grasped by his left; the colors are under his feet, and he is
trampling upon them. The legend is, "A memorial and reward of valor and
daring. The American Republic has bestowed (this medal) on Colonel D. de
Fleury, a native of France, the first over the walls (of the enemy)." On
the reverse are two water batteries, three guns each; a fort on a hill,
with a flag flying; a river in front, and six vessels before the fort.
The legend is, "Mountains, morasses, foes, overcome." Exergue, "Stony
Point stormed, 15th of July, 1779."

*** This identical silver medal was found by a boy while digging in a
garden at Princeton, New Jersey, toward the close of April, 1850, and
was deposited in the bank at that place for the inspection of the
curious. How the medal came there is uncertain. Do Fleury returned to
France before the medal was struck, and it probably was never in his
possession. Congress was afterward in session at Princeton, and the
medal may have been lost by the secretary, in whose custody it properly
belonged until delivered to the recipient of the honor.

Promised Rewards for the bravest Men.--Division of the Spoils among the
Troops.--Medal awarded to Major Stewart

750troops by whom it was reduced, in such manner and proportions as the
commander-in-chief shall prescribe." *

* See Journals of Congress, v., 226, 227. The following rewards were
promised: To the first man who entered the enemy's works, five hundred
dollars; to the second, four hundred; to the third, three hundred; to
the fourth, two hundred; to the fifth, one hundred: being fifteen
hundred dollars in the aggregate. The ordnance and other stores were
estimated at one hundred and fifty-eight thousand six hundred and forty
dollars in value, whieh amount was divided among the troops in
proportion of officers and privates.--Sparks's Washington, vi., 540.

** This represents the medal the size of the original. The device is
America personified by an Indian queen, who is presenting a palm branch
to Major Stewart. A quiver is at her back; her left hand is resting on
the American shield, and at her feet is an alligator crouchant. The
legend is, "The American Congress to Major John Stewart." On the reverse
is a fortress on an eminence. In the foreground an officer is cheering
on his men, who are following him over abatis with charged bayonets, the
enemy flying. Troops in single file are ascending to the fort on one
side; others are advancing from the shore; ships are in sight. The
inscription is, "Stony Point attacked 15th of July, 1779."

** I believe there is no biography of Major Stewart extant. Professor
Wyatt, in his Memoirs of American Generals, Commodores, &c., says he was
killed by a fall from his horse, near Charleston, South Carolina.

** Lieutenant James Gibbon, who commanded one of the "forlorn hopes,"
was finally promoted to major. He died at Richmond, Virginia, on the
first of July, 1834, in the seventy-seventh year of his age. His remains
were interred with military honors.

King's Ferry.--Jolly old Waterman.--Stony Point.--Evening walk toward
Haverstraw

751

CHAPTER XXXII.

"From Cain to Catiline, the world hath known

Her traitors--vaunted votaries of crime--

Caligula and Nero sat alone

Upon the pinnacle of vice sublime;

But they were moved by hate, or wish to climb

The rugged steeps of Fame, in letters bold

To write their names upon the scroll of Time;

Therefore their crimes some virtue did enfold--

But Arnold! thine had none--'twas all for sordid gold!"

Estelle Anna Lewis.

HE localities more immediately associated with the brief career of Andre
during his hapless connection with Arnold, now commands our attention,
for toward Haverstraw I next journeyed. It was three o'clock in the
afternoon when I crossed the ferry at Verplanck's Point in a small row-
boat This was the old King's Ferry of the Revolution, where the good
Washington so often crossed, and where battalion after battalion of
troops, royal, French, and American, at various times spanned the Hudson
with their long lines of flat-boats, for it was the main crossing-place
of armies moving between the Eastern and Middle States. It was here,
too, that a portion of the forces of Burgoyne crossed the Hudson when on
their march from Massachusetts to Virginia.

The landing-place on the Stony Point side, in former times, was in the
cove at the opening of the marsh, on the north of the promontory; now
the western terminus of the ferry is a little above, at the cottage of
Mr Tenyck, the jolly old ferryman, who has plied the oar there, almost
without intermission, ever since 1784. He was sitting upon his door-
stone when his son moored the boat at its rock-fastening; and, as we
ascended the bank, the old man held up a bottle of whisky, and proffered
a draught as a pledge of welcome to the "millionth man" that had crossed
his ferry. Preferring milk to whisky, I sat down under the rich-leaved
branches of a maple, and regaled myself with that healthful beverage.
While the veteran and two of his neighbors were enjoying the aqua vitæ.

I sketched the old King's Ferry sign-board, with its device, which was
nailed to a sapling near, and then, accompanied by the old man and his
companions, started for a ramble over the rough site of the fort on
Stony Point. Upon its ancient mounds I sat and listened for an hour to
the adventurous tales of the octogenarian, until the long shadows of the
mountains warned me that the day was fast waning, when I hastened to
make the drawings upon pages 744 and 746. At sunset, accompanied by one
of the men as bearer of my light baggage, I started on foot for the
neighborhood of Haverstraw. The road passes through a truly romantic
region, made so by nature, history, and tradition. I stopped often to
view the beautiful river prospect on the southeast, while the outlines
of the distant shores were imperceptibly fading as the twilight came on.
At dusk we passed an acre of ground, lying by the roadside on the right,
which was given

"God's Acre."--Benson's Tavern.--Interview with a Builder of Stony Point
Fort.--View from Smith's House

752many years ago for a neighborhood burial-place. Its numerous white
slabs proclaimed an already populous city of the dead, and ere long
another generous hand should donate an acre near for the same purpose.

"I like that ancient Saxon phrase which calls

The burial-ground God's Acre! It is just.

It consecrates each grave within its walls,

And breathes a benison o'er the sleeping dust.

God's Acre! Yes, that blessed name imparts

Comfort to those who in the grave have sown

The seed that they had garner'd in their hearts,

Their bread of life, alas! no more their own."

Longfellow.

It was quite dark when we reached the tavern of Mr. Benson, near
Sampsonville, about three miles below Stony Point. Haverstraw was two
miles distant, and, wearied with the rambles of the day, I halted at
Benson's until morning. After an early breakfast I proceeded to the foot
of Torn Mountain, a little northwest of Haverstraw, to visit a man named
Allison, who was eighty-eight years old. I had been informed of his
vigor of body and mind, and was much disappointed on finding him in bed,
feeble and sinking from the effects of a fall. Our conversation was
brief, but his short communications were interesting. He was a young man
of eighteen when the fort at Stony Point was built, and assisted in
carrying material for its construction from the main. In company with
many others in the neighborhood not allowed to join in Wayne's
expedition, he hung upon the rear of the little army on that eventful
night; and when the shout of victory arose from the fort, his voice was
among the loudest in the echo that was sent back by the yeomanry
gathered upon the neighboring hills. He gave me a minute account of the
movements of the Americans before crossing the morass, and told me of a
black walnut-tree still standing by the roadside between Haverstraw and
Stony Point, under which the negro, Pompey, took charge, as pilot, of
Wayne's assaulting force. I had intended, on leaving Mr. Allison, to go
down near the river bank, where Arnold and Andre met; but the hour was
approaching at which I had promised myself to return to Verplanck's
Point, so I postponed my visit to this interesting spot until a
subsequent date.

On my return toward Stony Point, I tarried at and sketched Smith's
House, delineated on page 720. It is in the present possession of
William C. Houseman, whose good taste has adorned the grounds around it
with fine shrubbery. It is located upon the brow of an eminence, known,
for obvious reasons, as Treason Hill, and commands an extensive view of
the Hudson and the country beyond.1 From the window in the second story,
where, tradition avers, Andre looked with anxious eyes for the
appearance of the Vulture, I made the drawing printed on the opposite
page. Between the foreground and the river is seen the broad alluvial
flat in the rear of Haverstraw, and on the brink of the water is the
village. The headland on the left is Teller's Point, and the highest
ground on the extreme right is Torn Mountain, extending down to the
verge of Haverstraw Bay, where it is called

* The Marquis de Chastellux, in his Travels in North America (i., 98,
99), says, "My thoughts were occupied with Arnold and his treason when
my road brought me to Smith's farm-house, where he had his interview
with André, and formed his horrid plot.... Smith, who was more than
suspected, but not convicted of being a party in the plot, is still in
prison, * where the law protects him against justice. But his home seems
to have experienced the only chastisement of which it was susceptible;
it is punished by solitude; and is, in fact, so deserted, that there is
not a single person to take care of it, although it is the mansion of a
large farm."

* Joshua Hett Smith, implicated in Arnold's treason, was a brother of
the Tory chief justice, William Smith, and a man of considerable
influence. The part which he had acted with Arnold made him strongly
suspected of known participation in his guilt. He was arrested at
Fishkill, in Dutchess county, and was taken to the Robinson House a few
hours previous to the arrival of André. There Smith was tried by a
military court and acquitted. He was soon afterward arrested by the
civil authority of the state, and committed to the jail at Goshen,
Orange county, whence he escaped, and made his way through the country,
in the disguise of a woman, to New York. He went to England with the
British army at the close of the war, and in 1808 published a book in
London, entitled An Authentic Narrative of the Causes which led to the
Death of Major Andre; a work of very little reliable authority, and
filled with abuse of Washington and other American officers. Smith died
in New York in 1818.

Ancient black Walnut-tree.--Tarrytown.--Cow-boys and Skinners.--Neutral
Ground.--Place where André was Captured.

753the Hook Mountain. The vessel in the river denotes the place where
the Vulture lay at anchor.

Half a mile above the Smith House, on the right of the road to Stony
Point, is the huge black walnut-tree mentioned by Mr. Allison.

I procured a branch from it, large and straight enough for a _maul-
stick,_ and then plodded on in the warm sun, to the ferry. The old
waterman, though nearly eighty years of age, rowed his boat across with
a vigorous hand, and at one o'clock I left Verplanck's for Tarrytown, a
village on the eastern bank of the Hudson, twenty-seven miles above New
York, and memorable as the place where Major Andre was captured.

The village of Tarrytown lies scattered over the river front of the
Greenburgh Hills, ana presents a handsome appearance from the water. It
is upon the site of an Indian village called Alipconck, which, in the
Delaware language, signifies the _Place of Elms_. The Dutch, who settled
there about 1680, called the place Tarwe Town, or "wheat town," probably
from the abundant culture of that grain in the vicinity. * The salubrity
of its climate, and the commanding river view in front, has always made
it a desirable place of residence. During the Revolution it was the
theater of many stormy scenes, consisting chiefly of skirmishes between
the lawless bands of marauders known by the distinctive appellation of
_Cow-boys and Skinners_. ** These infested the Neutral Grounds in West
Chester, and made it a political and social hell for the dwellers. Many
left it, and allowed their lands to become a waste, rather than remain
in the midst of perpetual torments.

The place where Andre was captured is upon the turnpike on the northeast
verge of the village, three quarters of a mile from the river, and near
the academy of Mr. Newman. A few yards south of the academy, a small
stream crosses the road and runs through a deep ravine riverward. The
marshy and thickly-wooded glen into which it poured was known as Wiley's
Swamp. A little south of this stream, on the west side of the road, is a
dwarf cedar, near which (indicated, in the picture, by the spot where
the figure sits) are the remains of a tree, said to be that of the
stately white-wood under whose shadow the captors of Andre caused him to
strip, and then made the momentous discovery of the papers in his

* Bolton. Irving, in his Legend of Sleepy Hollow, says, "This name was
given, we are told, in former days, by the good housewives of the
adjacent country, from the inveterate propensity of their husbands to
linger about the village tavern on market days."

** The party called Cow-boys were mostly Refugees belonging to the
British side, and engaged in plundering the people near the lines of
their cattle and driving them to New York. Their vocation suggested
their name. The Skinners generally professed attachment to the American
cause, and lived chiefly within the patriot lines; but they were of easy
virtue, and were really more detested by the Americans than their avowed
enemies, the Cow-boys. They were treacherous, rapacious, and often
brutal. One day they would be engaged in broils and skirmishes with the
Cow-boys; the next day they would be in league with them in plundering
their own friends as well as enemies. Oftentimes a sham skirmish would
take place between them near the British lines; the Skinners were always
victorious, and then they would go boldly into the interior with their
booty, pretending it had been captured from the enemy while attempting
to smuggle it across the lines. The proceeds of sales were divided
between the parties. See Sparks's Life of Arnold, 218-21 inclusive.

*** The Neutral Ground, thirty miles in extent along the Hudson, and
embracing nearly all West Chester county, was a populous and highly
cultivated region, lying between the American and British lines. Being
within neither, it was called the Neutral Ground. The inhabitants
suffered dreadfully during the war, for they were sure to be plundered
and abused by one party or the other. If they took the oath of fidelity
to the American cause, the Cow-boys were sure to plunder them; if they
did not, the Skinners would call them Tories, seize their property, and
have it confiscated by the state.

Journey of André and Smith to Crompond.--Vigilance of Captain Boyd.--
Andrè's Uneasiness.

September 22. 1780.754stocking. * By a spring in the grove, just over
the fence on the left, the young men were card-playing when their victim
approached. We will not anticipate the history in the description, but
here resume the narrative of events connected with Andrè's capture and
trial, from the time we left him and Smith to pursue their journey from
Verplanck's Point toward the Neutral Ground.

It was after dark when Andre and Smith left Verplanck's Point. They took
the road toward White Plains, and met with no interruption until hailed
by a sentinel near Crompond, a little village eight miles from
Verplanck's Point. ** He belonged to a party under Captain Boyd. That
vigilant officer made many and searching inquiries of the travelers, and
would not be satisfied that all was right until he procured a light and
examined the pass from Arnold, which they assured him they possessed.
During the investigation Andre was uneasy, but the pass being in
explicit terms, and known to be genuine, Captain Boyd was readily
persuaded that all was correct. The captain apologized for the
strictness of his scrutiny, and manifested much concern for their safety
on account of the prevalence of Cow-boys, in the neighborhood. He
advised them to remain till morning; but Smith assured him that their
business was urgent, and it was necessary for them to proceed
immediately toward White Plains. The captain magnified the dangers to
which they were exposed, and Smith, taking counsel of his fears, was
disposed to tarry. Andre was differently inclined, and it was a long
time before he could be persuaded to turn back and take lodging at the
cottage of Andreas Miller. The travelers slept in the same bed, and,
according to Smith's account, it was a weary and restless night for
Andre. He was up at dawn, and at an early hour they were again in the
saddle. As they approached Pine's Bridge, and Andre was assured that
they were beyond patrolling parties, his taciturnity and gloom were
exchanged for garrulity and cheerfulness, and he conversed in an almost
playful manner upon poetry, the arts, literature, and common topics.
Near Pine's Bridge *** they parted company, after partaking of a frugal
breakfast with Mrs. Sarah Underhill, whose grandson, I believe, still
owns the house. Smith proceeded to Fishkill by the way of the

* "This tree towered like a giant," says Irving, in his Sketch Book,
"above all the other trees of the neighborhood, and formed a kind of
landmark. Its limbs were gnarled and fantastic, large enough to form
trunks for ordinary trees, twisting down almost to the earth, and rising
again into the air." The trunk was twenty-six feet in circumference, and
forty-one feet in length. It was struck by lightning on the same day
that intelligence of Arnold's death arrived at Tarrytown, a coincidence
which many thought remarkable.

** Here, at the parsonage, the Yorktown Committee of Public Safety met;
and members of the Provincial Congress assembled there to grant
commissions to officers. Colonel Robertson, who commanded a regiment of
Loyalists, was ordered to destroy that post; and, piloted thither by a
Tory named Caleb Morgan, he burned the parsonage in the autumn of 1776.

*** This bridge, situated in the southeast corner of Yorktown, spanned
the Croton River. At this place the great dam connected with the Croton
aqueduct is situated, and the present bridge crosses the lake above it,
a little eastward of the Revolutionary structure. Here the Americans
generally kept a strong guard, as it was the chief point of
communication between the lines.

Volunteer Expedition against the Cow-boys.--Arrest of Major André.--
Discovery of Papers in his Stockings.

755Robinson House, where he pleased Arnold by communicating the
particulars of the journey and the place where he left Andre. It is not
at all probable that Smith, at this time, was acquainted with the real
name and mission of Andre, for he knee him only as Mr. Anderson.

André, being told that the Cow-boys, were more numerous on the Tarrytown
road, took that direction, contrary to the advice of Smith and others,
for these marauders were his friends, and from them he had nothing to
fear.

On the morning when Andre crossed Pine's Bridge, a little band of seven
volunteers went out near Tarrytown to prevent cattle being driven to New
York, and to arrest any suspicious characters who might travel that way.
John Verks (who was living in the town of Mount Pleasant in 1848)
proposed the expedition the day before, and first enlisted John
Paulding, John Dean, * James Romer, and Abraham Williams. They were at
North Salem, and Paulding procured a permit from the officer commanding
there, at the same time persuading his friend, Isaac Van Wart, to
accompany them. On their way toward Tarrytown they were joined by David
Williams. They slept in a hay barrack at Pleasantville that night, and
the next morning early they arrived near Tarrytown. Four of the party
agreed to watch the road from a hill above, while Paulding, Van Wart,
and David Williams were to lie concealed in the bushes by the stream
near the post-road. Such was the position of the parties when Andre
approached. The circumstances of the capture are minutely narrated in
the testimony of Paulding and Williams, given at the trial of Smith,
eleven days afterward. The testimony was written down by the judge-
advocate on that occasion, from whose manuscript Mr. Sparks copied it,
as follows: ** "Myself, Isaac Van Wart, and David Williams were lying by
the side of the road about half a mile above Tarrytown, and about
fifteen miles above Kingsbridge, on Saturday morning, between nine and
ten o'clock, the 23d of September. We had lain there about an hour and a
half, as near as I can recollect, and saw several persons we were
acquainted with, whom we let pass. Presently, one of the young men who
were with me said, 'There comes a gentleman-like looking man, who
appears to be well dressed, and has boots on, and whom you had better
step out and stop, if you don't know him.' On that I got up, and
presented my firelock at the breast of the person, and told him to
stand, and then I asked him which way he was going. 'Gentlemen,' said
he, 'I hope you belong to our party.' I asked him what party. He said,
'The Lower Party.' Upon that I told him I did. *** Then he said, 'I am a
British officer, out in the country on particular business, and I hope
you will not detain me a minute,' and, to show that he was a British
officer, he pulled out his watch. Upon which I told him to dismount. He
then said, 'My God! I must do any thing to get along,' and seemed to
make a kind of laugh of it, and pulled out General Arnold's pass, which
was to John Anderson, to pass all guards to White Plains and below. Upon
that he dismounted. Said he, 'Gentlemen, you had best let me go, or you
will bring yourselves into trouble, for your stopping me will detain the
general's business;' and said he was going to Dobbs's Ferry to meet a
person there and get intelligence for General Arnold. Upon that I told
him I hoped he would not be offended; that we did not mean to take any
thing from him; and I told

* While strolling among the ancient graves in the Sleepy Hollow church-
yard, a little north of Tarrytown, at the time of my visit there, I was
joined by an elderly gentleman, a son of Mr. Dean. He pointed out a
brown freestone at the head of his father's grave, on which is the
following inscription: "In memory of John Dean. He was born September
15th. A.D. 1755, and died April 4th, A.D. 1817, aged 61 years, 6 months,
and 20 days.

"A tender father, a friend sincere, A tender husband slumbers here; Then
let us hope his soul is given A blest and sure reward in heaven." By his
side is the grave of his father, Who was buried eighty years ago.

** See Sparks's Life and Treason of Arnold, Am. Biog., iii., 223-226.

*** "Paulding had effected his escape," says Bolton (i., 224), "only
three days previously, from the New York Sugar House, in the dress of a
German Yager. General Van Cortlandt says that Paulding wore this dress
on the day of the capture, which tended to deceive Andre, and led him to
exclaim, 'Thank God! I am once more among friends.'"

Deposition of David Williams.--Strange Conduct of Colonel Jameson.--His
Letter to General Arnold.

756him there were many bad people on the road, and I did not know but
perhaps he might be one."

When further questioned, Paulding replied, that he asked the person his
name, who told him it was John Anderson; and that, when Anderson
produced General Arnold's pass, he should have let him go, if he had not
before called himself a British officer. Paulding also said, that when
the person pulled out his watch, he understood it as a signal that he
was a British officer, and not that he meant to offer it to him as a
present.

All these particulars were substantially confirmed by David Williams,
whose testimony-in regard to the searching of Andre, being more minute
than Paulding's, is here inserted.

"We took him into the bushes," said Williams, "and ordered him to pull
off his clothes, which he did; but, on searching him narrowly, we could
not find any sort of writings. We told him to pull off his boots, which
he seemed to be indifferent about; but we got one boot off, and searched
in that boot, and could find nothing. But we found there were some
papers in the bottom of his stocking next to his foot; on which we made
him pull his stocking off, and found three papers wrapped up. Mr.
Paulding looked at the contents, and said he was a spy. We then made him
pull off his other boot, and there we found three more papers at the
bottom of his foot within his stocking.

"Upon this we made him dress himself, and I asked him what he would give
us to let him go. He said he would give us any sum of money. I asked him
whether he would give us his horse, saddle, bridle, watch, and one
hundred guineas. He said 'Yes,' and told us he would direct them to any
place, even if it was that very spot, so that we could get them. I asked
him whether he would not give us more. He said he would give us any
quantity of dry goods, or any sum of money, and bring it to any place
that we might pitch upon, so that we might get it. Mr. Paulding
answered, 'No, if you would give us ten thousand guineas, you should not
stir one step.' I then asked the person who had called himself John
Anderson if he would not get away if it lay in his power. He answered,
'Yes, I would.' I told him I did not intend he should. While taking him
along, we asked him a few questions, and we stopped under a shade. He
begged us not to ask him questions, and said when he came to any
commander he would reveal all.

"He was dressed in a blue over-coat, and a tight body-coat, that was of
a kind of claret color, though a rather deeper red than claret. The
button-holes were laced with gold tinsel, and the buttons drawn over
with the same kind of lace. He had on a round hat, and nankeen waistcoat
and breeches, with a flannel waistcoat and drawers, boots, and thread
stockings."

Andre was conducted to North Castle, the nearest military post, and
there, with all the papers found upon his person, he was delivered up to
Lieutenant-colonel Jameson, the officer in command. With an obtuseness
of perception most extraordinary and unaccountable, Jameson resolved to
send the prisoner immediately to Arnold! He knew a portion of the papers
to be in the undisguised handwriting of General Arnold, and it is most
extraordinary that the circumstances under which they were found should
not have awakened a suspicion of the fidelity of that officer.
Washington afterward said, in allusion to Jameson's conduct, that,
either on account of his "egregious folly or bewildered conception, he
seemed lost in astonishment, and not to know what he was doing." There
can be no doubt of the purity of his intentions, but who can respect his
judgment? He penned a letter to Arnold, saying that he sent a certain
Mr. Anderson forward under the charge of Lieutenant Allen and a guard,
who had been taken while on his way to New York. "He had a passport,"
said Jameson, "signed in your name, and a parcel of papers, taken from
under Colonel Jameson's Head-quarters.

* This is a view of the out-buildings of Mr. Sands, at North Castle,
situated a few yards from his residence. The lowest building, on the
left, is the dwelling, now attached to the barn of Mr. Sands, which,
Jameson used as his head-quarters. In that building André was kept
guarded until sent to West Point.

Better Judgment of Colonel Tallmadge.--Major André at Sheldon's Head-
quarters.--Andrè's Letter to Washington.

757Major Benjamin Tallmadge, next in command to Jameson, was on duty
below White Plains on that day, and did not return until evening. When
informed of the September 23, 1780 circumstances, he was filled with
astonishment at the folly of Jameson, and boldly expressed his
suspicions of Arnold's fidelity. He offered to take upon himself the
entire responsibility of proceeding on that ground, if Jameson would
allow it. The latter refused to sanction any action that should imply a
distrust of Arnold. Tallmadge then earnestly besought him to have the
prisoner brought back. To this he reluctantly consented, but insisted
that his letter to Arnold should be forwarded, and that the general
should be informed why the prisoner was not sent on. This was the letter
which Arnold received in time to allow him to make his escape to the
Vulture.

Jameson sent an express after Lieutenant Allen, with orders to conduct
his prisoner back to head-quarters at North Castle. As soon as Tallmadge
saw him, and observed his manner and gait while pacing the room, he was
convinced that he was a military man; and, joining this belief with
other circumstances, * his suspicions of Arnold's treachery were fully
confirmed to his own mind. He partially imbued Jameson with the same
opinions, and that officer agreed, with Tallmadge, that it was advisable
to keep their prisoner in close custody until orders should be received
from Arnold or Washington. Andre was accordingly removed, under an
escort commanded by Major Tallmadge, to Colonel Sheldon's quarters at
North Salem, as a more secure place. They arrived there at about eight
in the morning. Andre was introduced to Mr. Bronson, who was attached to
Sheldon's regiment, and that gentleman kindly offered to share his
little room with the prisoner. Learning that the papers found on his
person had been sent to General Washington, he wrote, in Bronson's room,
a letter to the American chief, in which he frankly avowed his name and
rank, and briefly related the circumstances connected with his present
situation. This letter he handed to Major Tallmadge to read, who was
greatly astonished to find that the prisoner in his custody was the
adjutant general of the British army. The letter was sealed and sent to
Washington. From that hour the prisoner's mind seemed relieved. **

* Eight or nine days previous to the capture, Major Tallmadge received a
letter from Arnold of similar import to the one Colonel Sheldon received
from him, in which he requested, if a man by the name of Anderson should
come within the lines, to have him sent to head-quarters with two
horsemen. This incident was strongly in favor of Tallmadge's suspicions.

** The following is a copy of the letter:

"Salem, September 24th, 1780.

"Sir,--What I have as yet said concerning myself was in the justifiable
attempt to be extricated. I am too little accustomed to duplicity to
have succeeded.

"I beg your excellency will be persuaded that no alteration in the
temper of my mind, or apprehension for my safety, induces me to take the
step of addressing you, but that it is to rescue myself from an
imputation of having assumed a mean character for treacherous purposes
or self-interest; a conduct incompatible with the principles that
actuate me, as well as with my condition in life. It is to vindicate my
fame that I speak, and not to solicit security. The person in your
possession is Major John André, adjutant general to the British army.

"The influence of one commander in the army of his adversary is an
advantage taken in war. A correspondence for this purpose I held, as
confidential (in the present instance), with his excellency Sir Henry
Clinton. To favor it, I agreed to meet, upon ground not within the posts
of either army, a person who was to give me intelligence. I came up in
the Vulture man-of-war for this effect, and was fetched by a boat from
the ship to the beach. Being here, I was told that the approach of day
would prevent my return, and that I must be concealed until the next
night. I was in my regimentals, and had fairly risked my person.

"Against my stipulations, my intention, and without my knowledge
beforehand, I was conducted within one of your posts. Your excellency
may conceive my sensation on this occasion, and must imagine how much
more must I have been affected by a refusal to reconduct me back the
next night as I had been brought. Thus become a prisoner, I had to
concert my escape. I quitted my uniform, and was passed another way in
the night, without the American posts, to neutral ground, and informed I
was beyond all armed parties, and left to press for New York. I was
taken at Tarrytown by some volunteers. Thus, as I have had the honor to
relate, was I betrayed (being adjutant general of the British army) into
the vile condition of an enemy in disguise within your posts.

"Having avowed myself a British officer, I have nothing to reveal but
what relates to myself, which is true on the honor of an officer and a
gentleman. The request I have to make to your excellency, and I am
conscious I address myself well, is, that in any rigor policy may
dictate, a decency of conduct toward me may mark that, though
unfortunate, I am branded with nothing dishonorable, as no motive could
be mine but the service of my king, and as I was involuntarily an
impostor. Another request is, that I may be permitted to write an open
letter to Sir Henry Clinton, and another to a friend for clothes and
linen.

"I take the liberty to mention the condition of some gentlemen at
Charleston, who, being either on parole or under protection, were
engaged in a conspiracy against us. Though their situation is not
similar, they are objects who may be set in exchange for me, or are
persons whom the treatment I receive might affect. It is no less, sir,
in a confidence of the generosity of your mind, than on account of your
superior station, that I have chosen to importune you with this letter.

"I have the honor to be, with great respect, sir, your excellency's most
obedient and most humble servant,

"John Andre, Adjutant General

André taken to West Point and thence to Tappan.--His Disclosures to
Tallmadge.--His Case and Hale's compared

758Pursuant to an order from General Washington, Andre was conducted to
West Point, September, 1780 where he remained until the morning of the
28th, when he was conveyed in a barge to Stony Point, and from thence
conducted, under a strong escort, to Tap-pan, about two miles westward
of the present Piermont, the Hudson Hiver terminus of the New York and
Erie rail-road. Major Tallmadge, who commanded the escort, and rode by
Andre's side all the way, has left, in a communication to Mr. Sparks, an
interesting account of the events of that day's march. As he and Andre
were about the same age, and held the same rank in the respective
armies, they agreed on a cartel, by the terms of which each one was
permitted to put any question to the other not involving a third person.
In the course of conversation, thus made as unreserved as possible,
Andre informed Tallmadge that he was to have taken a part in the attack
on West Point, if Arnold's plan had succeeded, and that the only reward
he asked was the military glory to be won by such service to his king.
He had been promised, however, the rank and pay of a brigadier general
if he had succeeded. In reply to Andre's earnest inquiries respecting
the probable result of his capture, Tallmadge frankly reminded him of
the character and fate of the unfortunate Captain Hale. "But you surely
do not consider his case and mine alike?" said Andre. "Yes, precisely
similar," replied Major Tallmadge, "and similar will be your fate."
Andre became troubled in spirit, and from that time until the hour of
his execution his most poignant sorrow arose from the reflection that he
was branded with the odious name of a spy. *

As soon as Washington had completed all necessary arrangements for the
security of West Point, he hastened to the army at Tappan. The next day
after his ar-September 29 summoned a board of general officers, and
directed them to examine into the case of Major André and report the
result. He also directed them to give their opinion as to the light in
which the prisoner ought to be regarded, and the punishment that should
be inflicted. We shall visit Tappan presently, and then the events in
the last scene of this drama shall be rehearsed; for the present, let us
stroll about Tarrytown during the remainder of this pleasant afternoon.

After sketching a view of the spot where Andre was captured, I walked to
the famous old Dutch church of Sleepy Hollow, standing by the side of
the post-road, about a mile northward. I can not better describe its
location than by quoting the language of Mr. Irving concerning it. "The
sequestered situation of the church," he says, "seems always to have
made it a favorite haunt of troubled spirits. It stands on a knoll,
surrounded by locust-trees and lofty elms, from among which its decent
white-washed walls shine modestly forth, like Christian purity beaming
through the shades of retirement. A gentle Ancient Dutch Church.* slope
descends to it from a silver sheet of water,

* See Sparks's Amer. Biog., iii., 255-259.

** This view is from the church-yard, looking southwest. The porch seen
on the right fronts upon the highway, and is a modern addition, the
ancient entrance being on the south side. This is believed to be the
oldest church in existence in this state, having been erected, according
to an inscription upon a stone tablet upon its front, by Vredryck
Flypsen (Frederic Philips) and Catharine his wife, in 1699. It is built
of brick and stone, the former having been imported from Holland for the
express purpose. The old flag-shaped vane, with the initials of the
founder cut out of it, yet turns upon its steeple, and in the little
tower hangs the ancient bell, bearing this inscription: "If God be for
us, who can be against us!" The pulpit and communion-table were imported
from Holland; the latter alone has escaped the ruthless hand of modern
improvement.

Bridge over Sleepy Hollow Creek.--Ichabod Crane and the Headless
Horseman.--Castle Philipse.--Tarrytown Cemetery

759bordered by high trees, between which peeps may be caught of the blue
hills of the Hudson.

To look upon its grass-grown yard, where the sunbeams seem to sleep so
quietly, one would think that there, at least, the dead might rest in
peace. On one side of the church extends a woody dell, along which laves
a large brook among broken rocks and trunks of fallen trees.

Over a deep black part of the stream, not far from the church, was
formerly thrown a wooden bridge. The road that led to it, and the bridge
itself, were thickly shaded by overhanging trees, which cast a gloom
about it, even in the daytime, but occasioned a fearful darkness at
night." *

It was at this bridge, in the dark glen near the church, that poor
Ichabod Crane had his terrible encounter with the headless horseman of
Sleepy Hollow. The road still "leads through a sandy hollow, shaded by
trees for about a quarter of a mile," but "the bridge famous in goblin
story" is no more. The present structure is a few yards westward of the
site of the old one; and although not so shaded in cavernous gloom, is
quite as romantic in its situation. From its planks there is a fine view
of Castle Philipse, as the ancient manor house of Frederic Philipse was
called, from the circumstance of its being originally fortified against
the Indians. It is a spacious and substantial stone building, and near
it is the old mill, whose wheel turned in the same place during the
Revolution. The dam forms a pleasant little lake extending back almost
to the bridge.

Upon the slopes and the brow of the hill eastward of the old church is
the Tarrytown cemetery, extending down to the ancient burial-ground. It
is susceptible of being made one of the most attractive burial-places in
this country, for, aside from the beauties of nature there spread out,
associations of the deepest interest give a charm to the spot. The
Receiving Tomb, constructed of light stone, is near the top of the hill;
and around it for many

* Legend of Sleepy Hollow.

** Ichabod, according to Irving, in the Legend, returning from a late
evening tarry with Katrina Van Tassel, on his lean steed Gunpowder, was
chased by a huge horseman, without a head, from the Andre tree to the
bridge. "He saw the walls of the church dimly gleaming under the trees
beyond. He recollected the place where Brom Bones's ghostly competitor
had disappeared. 'If I can but reach that bridge,' thought Ichabod, 'I
am safe.' Just then he heard the black steed panting and blowing close
behind him; he even fancied that he felt his hot breath. Another
convulsive kick in the ribs, and old Gunpowder sprang upon the bridge;
he thundered over the resounding planks; he gained the opposite side;
and now Ichabod cast a look behind, to see if his pursuer should vanish,
according to rule, in a flash of fire and brimstone. Just then he saw
the goblin rising in his stirrups, and in the very act of hurling his
head at him. Ichabod endeavored to dodge the horrible missile, but too
late; it encountered his cranium with a terrible crash; he was tumbled
headlong into the dust, and Gunpowder, the black steed, and the goblin
rider, passed like a whirlwind." A shattered pumpkin was found on the
road the next day, but Ichabod had gone to parts unknown. Brom Bones,
his rival, soon afterward led the pretty Katrina to the altar. The good
country people always maintained that Ichabod was spirited away by the
headless horseman, who was the ghost of a Hessian soldier, whose body,
deprived of its caput by a cannon-ball, was sleeping in the church-yard
near.

Greenburgh or the Nepera. Van Wart's Monument.--Sunny side, the
Residence of Washington Irving

760rods, where the hand of improvement had not yet effaced them, might
be seen vestiges of a small fortification, thrown up there during the
war.

I passed the night at Tarrytown, and the next morning rode out to the
beautiful Saw-mill Valley, to visit the burial-ground at Greenburgh,
wherein repose the remains of Isaac Van Wart, one of the captors of
Andre. The ground is attached to the Presbyterian church, and is near
the lovely Nepera, or Saw-mill River. Over the remains of the patriot is
a handsome marble monument, erected to his memory by the citizens of
West Chester county, in 1829.

Its completion was celebrated by a large concourse of people assembled
there on the 11th of June of that year.

General Aaron Ward, of Sing Sing, was the orator on the occasion. Mr.
Van Wart was an efficient officer of that church for many years, and
acted as chorister up to the time of his death. On returning to
Tarrytown, I rode down to Sunny side, the residence of Washington
Irving, situated upon the river bank, about two miles below. It is
reached from the post-road by a winding carriage-way, that cleaves rich
cultivated fields and pleasant woodlands. Desirous of passing an hour at
Dobbs's Ferry, and of crossing the Hudson at Tappan in season to visit
places of note there, I enjoyed the friendly greeting of the gifted
proprietor but a few moments, and then pursued my journey. I
subsequently visited Sunny-side, and made the sketch given on the
opposite page. It was in leafy June, and a lovelier day never smiled
upon the Hudson and its green banks. Close by Mr. Irving's residence, a
prospective village * had recently burst into existence, almost as
suddenly as the leaves had unfolded from the buds in the adjacent
groves; and a rail-way station, with its bustle and noise, was upon the
river margin, within bird-call of the once secluded Wolfert's Roost. I
strolled along the iron way to a stile, over which I clambered, and,
ascending the bank by a shaded pathway, was soon seated in the elegant
little parlor at _Sunnyside_, where the kindest courtesy makes the
stranger-visitor feel that he is indeed upon the sunny side of humanity,
and in the warmest glow of that generous feeling which illumines every
pen-stroke of Geoffrey Crayon. Beautified and enriched by the hand of
nature, hallowed by the voice of traditionary history speaking out from
the old walls and umbrageous trees, and consecrated by the presence of
true genius, Sunnyside has a charm for the American mind as bewitching
and

* Dearman; afterward altered to Irvington.

** The following are the inscriptions upon this monument: North side.--
"Here repose the mortal remains of Isaac Van Wart, an elder in the
Greenburgh church, who died on the 23d of May, 1828, in the 69th year of
his age. Having lived the life, he died the death, of the Christian."
South side.--"The citizens of the county of West Chester erected this
tomb in testimony of the high sense they entertained for the virtuous
and patriotic conduct of their fellow-citizen, as a memorial sacred to
public gratitude." East side.--"Vincit, Amor Patriae. Nearly half a
century before this monument was built, the con script fathers of
America had, in the Senate chamber, voted that Isaac Van Wart was a
faithful patriot, one in whom the love of country was invincible, and
this tomb bears testimony that the record is true." West side.--
"Fidelity. On the 23d of September, 1780, Isaac Van Wart, accompanied by
John Paulding and David Williams, all farmers of the county of West
Chester, intercepted Major Andre, on his return from the American lines
in the character of a spy, and, notwithstanding the large bribes offered
them for his release, nobly disdained to sacrifice their country for
gold, secured and carried him to the commanding officer of the district,
whereby the dangerous and traitorous conspiracy of Arnold was brought to
light, the insidious designs of the enemy baffled, the American army
saved, and our beloved country free."

View of Sunnyside, the ancient "Wolfert's Roost"--Jacob Van Tassel

761classic as were the groves where Orpheus piped and Sappho sang to the
Acadians of old. As I sat beneath a spreading cedar sketching the unique
villa, and scolded without stint by a querulous matronly cat-bird on one
side and a vixen jenny-wren on the other, and observed the "lord of the
manor" leading a little fair-haired grand-nephew to the river brink in
search of daisies and butter-cups, I could not repress the thoughts so
beautifully expressed in his own little story of _The Wife_: "I can wish
you no better lot than to have a wife and children. If you are
prosperous, they are to share your prosperity; if otherwise, they are to
comfort you.... Though all abroad is darkness and humiliation, yet there
is still a little world of love at home [for the husband] of which he is
the monarch." *

The residence of Mr. Irving is upon the site of the famous "Wolfert's
Roost" of the olden time. It w'as built by Wolfert Beker, an ancient
burgher of the town, and afterward came into the possession of Jacob Van
Tassel, one of the "race of hard-headed, hard-handed, stout-hearted
Dutchmen, descended of the primitive Netherlanders." Van Tassel was the
owner when the Revolution broke out, and was a stanch Whig. His house
was in the midst of the debatable region called the Neutral Ground, and
in the broad waters of the Tappan Sea ** in front, British vessels were
almost constantly anchored. The Republican propensities of Van Tassel
were well known, and as the Roost was a place of general ren-

* Sketch Book.

** Tappaan Zee, or Tappan Sea, was the name given by the Dutch to the
expansion of the Hudson at this place.

"The Roost" a Castle.--Its Garrison.--Attack upon, and Defense of "the
Roost."--Dobbs's Ferry.

762dezvous for the American water-guards * and land-scouts, he was made
liable to attacks from the enemy. He pierced his old mansion with
musketry loop-holes, and took other measures for defense. His garrison,
_per se_, consisted of his stout-hearted wife and a redoubtable sister,
Nochie Van Wurmer, a match, as he said, for the "stoutest man in the
country."

His ordnance was a goose gun "of unparalleled longitude," capable of
doing great execution. He was in league with many ardent Whigs in his
vicinity, who had sworn eternal hostility to the Cow-boys and Skinners
who infested the region, and the Roost was their head-quarters. Van
Tassel frequently joined his companions in distant expeditions. On one
of these occasions, while far away from his castle, an armed vessel came
to anchor off the Roost. The garrison consisted of only Jacob's spouse,
his sister Nochie, a blooming daughter, and a brawny negro woman. A
boatfull of armed men put off from the vessel toward the Roost. The
garrison flew to arms. The goose gun, unfortunately, was with its owner.
Broomsticks, shovels, and other missiles were seized, and a vigorous
defense was made; but, alas it was all in vain. The house was sacked,
plundered, and burned; and as the marauders were about departing, they
seized the pretty "Laney Van Tassel, the beauty of the Roost," and
endeavored to bear her to the boat. Mother, aunt, and Dinah flew to the
rescue, and a fierce struggle ensued all the way to the water's edge. A
voice from the frigate ordered the spoilers to leave the prize behind,
"and the heroine of the Roost escaped with a mere rumpling of the
feathers." ** Soon after this event Van Tassel fell into the hands of
the enemy, was sent to New York, and there remained a prisoner until
near the close of the war. *** His house was rebuilt upon the ruins of
the Roost and that phoenix, modified and enlarged, is the present
mansion at Sunnyside.

From Mr. Irving's I rode down to Dobbs's Ferry, two or three miles
below. This is a small village, lying pleasantly upon the river slope,
and along a ravine of the Greenburgh

Hills, at the mouth of the Wysquaqua Creek. It derives its name from the
ancient family of Dobbs, who owned the property here, and first
established a ferry. It is a place memorable 1698 in the annals of the
Revolution, not for sanguinary battles, but for the relative importance
of its location in the movements of armies. Upon the high bank
immediately above the rail-way station at the lower landing are remains
of the first fort erected there. It was built at the beginning of 1776,
and in October of that year Colonel Sargent strongly garrisoned it, by
order of General Heath. (v) Several other strong redoubts were thrown

* The water-guards were resolute men, well armed with muskets, and
skillful with the oar, who, in small vessels technically called whale-
boats (sharp, canoe-shaped boats), lurked in the coves and behind the
headlands of the river, to obtain information of the approach or
position of vessels of the enemy. With muffled oars, they often
reconnoitered the British ships at night, and sometimes cut off boats
that ventured from them toward the shore.

** Knickerbocker Magazine.

*** There were a number of the Van Tassels living in the vicinity of the
Greenburgh church. In November, 1777, a party of Chasseurs, under
Captain Emerick, went up from Kingsbridge, surprised the Van Tassels,
burned their houses, stripped the women and children of their clothing,
and carried off Peter and Cornelius Van Tassel prisoners. In retaliation
for the outrage, the patriots fitted out an expedition at Tarry-town
under the command of Abraham Martlingh, which proceeded down the river
in boats, passed the water-guards of the enemy in safety, landed a
little below Spuyten Devil Creek, set fire to General Oliver de Lancey's
house, and returned without losing a man. General De Lancey was a most
active and bitter Loyalist. He will come under our observation in a
conspicuous manner hereafter. See page 624, vol. ii.

**** The garrison consisted of five hundred infantry, forty light horse,
a company of artillery, with two twelve-pounders under Captain Horton,
and Captain Crafts with a howitzer.

* (v) This view is from the bank immediately above the rail-way station,
looking northwest. In the foreground is seen the wagon-road, passing by,
on an arch of masonry, over the rail-way. On the left is the wharf.
Toward the right, in the distance, is seen the long pier and village of
Piermont; and at the extreme right, in the distance, is the mountain
near the foot of which Andrè and Arnold first met. Piermont is the port
of Tappan, the place where Andre was executed. The sketch here presented
was made when I visited Dobbs's Ferry in the autumn of 1849, after the
rail-way was finished.

Old Fort at Dobbs's Ferry.--The Livingston Mansion.--Rendezvous of the
British.--The Palisades.--Tappan.

763up in the vicinity, remains of which are still visible. One, a little
southwest of the residence of Mr. Stephen Archer (the ancient mansion of
Van Brugh Livingston), appears to have been equally strong with the one
just mentioned.

A few rods north of this mansion, in a locust grove, on the west of the
post-road, are very prominent re mains of a strong redoubt. They
extended through the adjoining garden, but there the mounds have been
leveled and the fossé filled up. These forts commanded the ferry to
Paramus (now Sneeden's) landing on the Jersey shore, and also the
passage of the river. They often greatly annoyed the British shipping
while passing and repassing.

In this vicinity the British portion of the enemy rendezvoused after the
battle of White Plains, (a) before marching against Fort Washington; (b)
and at Hastings, one mile below, a British force of six thousand men,
under Cornwallis, embarked in boats, and, crossing over to Paramus,
marched to the attack of Fort Lee, and then commenced the pursuit of
Washington and his broken army through the Jerseys. Here, in January,
1777, the division of the American army under Lincoln was encamped for a
brief space. Here was the spot selected by Arnold for his first
conference with Andre in 1780; and here, on the night of the 3d of
August, 1781, while the American army lay in the neighborhood, and the
chief's head-quarters were at the Livingston mansion, a skirmish ensued
between some guard-boats of the enemy and the little garrison of the
fort on the river bank.

a October 28, 1776.

b November 16.

November 18.

After viewing the remains of the old forts, and passing a pleasant half
hour with Mr Archer (a member of the society of Friends) upon the shaded
porch of the Livingston Mansion, I crossed the Hudson in a small boat to
Sneeden's, and proceeded on foot to Tappan, a distance of about two
miles, where I arrived in time to sketch the head-quarters of
Washington, printed on page 196, and to visit the place of Andre's
execution.

Tappan village lies in the bosom of a fertile, rolling valley, not far
from the head of the deep gorge which terminates on the Hudson at
Piermont. Southwest of the village is a lofty ridge, on which the
American army lay encamped. Upon its gentle slope toward the road to old
Tappan, Major André was executed. Travelers passing up the Hudson, and
viewing with astonishment the mighty amorphous wall of the _Palisades_,
along the western shore, have no idea of the beauty and fertility of the
country in the rear. The Palisades, so bare and precipitous in front,
present a heavily-wooded slope in the rear, reaching down into a plain
of great fertility. This plain extends, with a slight variance from a
level, from Tappan to Bergen Point, a distance of twenty-seven miles,
and is watered by the Hackensack and its tributaries. It was a country
noted for the abundance of its forage at the time of the Revolution, and
was an eligible place for an army to encamp. After visiting the
interesting localities in the neighborhood, I walked to Piermont, about
two miles distant, where I arrived in time to embark in the boat of the
Erie Rail-road Company, at eight o'clock, for New York. Though "wearied
and worn" with the day's ramble, let us turn to history a while before
retiring to rest.

Tappan, lying upon one of the great lines of communication from the
East, by way of

* This is a view from the lawn on the north side. It is embowered in
trees and shrubbery, and is one of the most pleasantly-located mansions
in the country, overlooking interesting portions of the Hudson River.
Within its walls many of the leading men of the Revolution were
entertained. It was the head-quarters of Washington, when he abandoned
an attempt to capture New York city, changed his plans, and marched his
whole army to Virginia to capture Cornwallis. There, at the close of the
war, Washington, Governor Clinton, and General Sir Guy Carleton, and
their respective suites, met to make arrangements for the evacuation of
the city of New York by the British. Washington and Clinton came down
the river from West Point in a barge: Carleton ascended in a frigate.
Four companies of American Infantry performed the duty of guards on that
occasion.

Massacre of Baylor's Corps at Tappan.--The "76 Stone House," where André
was confined.--Washington's Headquarters

764King's Ferry, was made a place of considerable importance as a
camping-ground; its position among the hills, and yet contiguous to the
river, being very favorable. When, in September, 1778, Cornwallis had
possession of the Hudson portion of New Jersey, foraging parties were
sent in this direction, as well as scouts, to ascertain the condition of
the posts at West Point. General Knyphausen, with a large force, was at
the same time on the east side of the Hudson, at Dobbs's Ferry, and
Washington believed that an expedition up the river was intended.
Lieutenant-colonel Baylor, with a regiment of light horse, was sent to
watch the movements of the enemy, and to intercept their scouts and
foragers. He made his head-quarters at old Tappan, and there lay in a
state of such unsoldierly insecurity, that Cornwallis was led to form a
plan for taking his whole corps by surprise. ** General Grey, September
27, 1778 with some light infantry and other troops, was sent, at night,
to approach Tappan on the west, while a corps from Knyphausen's division
was to approach from the east, and thus surround and capture not only
the sleepers in Baylor's camp, but a body of militia, under Wayne, who
were stationed near. Some deserters from the enemy gave the militia
timely warning; but Baylor's troops, who lay unarmed in barns, ** were
not apprised of the proximity of the enemy. At midnight, Grey approached
silently, cut off a sergeant's patrol of twelve men without noise, and
completely surprised the troop of horse. Unarmed, and in the power of
the enemy, they asked for quarter, but this was inhumanly refused by
Grey, who, like Tryon, was a famous marauder during the war. *** On this
occasion he gave special orders not to grant any quarter. Many of the
soldiers were bayoneted in cold blood. Out of one hundred and four
persons, sixty-seven were killed or wounded. Colonel Baylor was wounded
and made prisoner, and seventy horses were butchered.

The event of the most importance which occurred at Tappan was the trial
and execution of Major Andre. He was confined, while there, in the old
stone mansion, now 1850 occupied as a tavern, and called the "76 Stone
House." Its whole appearance has been materially changed. The room
wherein the unfortunate prisoner was confined, and which was kept with
care in its original condition more than half a century, has been
enlarged and _improved_ for the purposes _of a ball-room!_ I was there a
few years ago, when the then owner was committing the sacrilege, and he
boasted, with great satisfaction, that he had received a "whole dollar
for the old lock that fastened up Major Andrew!" Sentiment does not obey
the laws of trade--it seems to cheapen with a decrease of supply. The
sign-board is now the only evidence that there is any on hand at the "76
Stone House." The trial took place in the old Dutch church, which was
torn down in 1836. Upon its site another and larger one of brick has
been erected. It stands within a few yards of the house where Andre was
confined. Washington's head-quarters were in the old stone building now
occupied by Samuel S Verbryck, situated near the road from Sneeden's
Landing, within a few rods of its junction with the main street

* Gordon, ii., 391.

** The encampment, on the night in question, was about two and a half
miles southwest of Tappan village, near the Hackensack River.

*** General Grey, on account of his common practice of ordering the men
under his command to take the flints out of their muskets, that they
might be confined to the use of the bayonet, acquired the name of the
no-flint general.

**** This view is from the yard, near the well. The date of its erection
(1700) is made by a peculiar arrangement of the bricks in the front
wall. In the large room called "Washington's quarters" the fireplace is
surrounded by Dutch pictorial tiles illustrative of Scripture scenes.
Indeed, the whole house remains in precisely the same condition, except
what the elements have changed externally, as it was when the chief
occupied it. When I visited it, Mrs. Verbryck's sister, an old lady of
eighty, was there. She said she remembered sitting often upon
Washington's knee. She was then ten years old.

Court of Inquiry in Andre's Case.--The Prisoner's Conduct.--Names of
those who composed the Court.--Judge Laurence.

1760.765of the village. It was then owned by John de Windt, a native of
St. Thomas's, West Indies, and grandfather of Mrs. Verbryck, who now
resides there.

I have mentioned that, on the arrival of Washington at Tappan, he
ordered a court of inquiry. This court, consisting of fourteen general
officers, * was convened at Tappan on the 29th of September, and on that
day Major Andre was arraigned before it and examined. John Laurance, **
afterward a distinguished legislator and jurist, was judge advocate.
Andre made a plain statement of the facts we have been considering;
acknowledged and confirmed the truthfulness of his statements in his
letter to General Washington from Salem; confessed that he came ashore
from the Vulture _in the night, and without a flag_; and answered the
query of the Board, whether he had any thing further to say respecting
the charges preferred against him, by remarking, "I leave them to
operate with the Board, persuaded that you will do me justice."

He was remanded to prison, and, after a long and careful deliberation,
the Board reported, "That Major André, adjutant general of the British
army, ought to be considered as a spy from the enemy, and that,
agreeably to the law and usage of nations, it is their opinion he ought
to suffer death." On the next day Washington signified his approval of
the decision as follows:

* The following are the names of the officers who composed the court
martial on that occasion: Major-generals Greene, Stirling, St. Clair, La
Fayette, R. Howe, and the Baron Steuben; and Brigadiers Parsons, James
Clinton, Knox, Glover, Paterson, Hand, Huntington, and Stark. General
Greene was president of the board, and John Laurance judge-advocate
general.

** Mr. Laurance was a native of Cornwall, England, where he was born in
1750. He held the rank of colonel in the Continental army, and was
highly esteemed by the commander-in-ehief. Colonel Laurance was a
representative for New York in the first Congress held after the
adoption of the Federal Constitution, and retained a seat therein during
President Washington's first administration. On his retiring from
office, Washington appointed him a judge of the District Court of New
York. He was elected to the United States Senate in 1796, and served
four years, when he resigned his seat and retired to private life. He
died at No. 356 Broadway, New York, in November, 1810, in the sixtieth
year of his age. Judge Laurance married a daughter of General Alexander
M'Dougall, of the Continental army, who, with Sears. Willett, Lamb, and
others, early and earnestly opposed the British government in its
aggressive acts. An interesting sketeh of the public life of Judge
Laurance, from the pen of Edwin Williams, Esq., was published in a New
York journal in February, 1851.

*** This is a fac simile of a pencil sketeh which I received from London
with the drawing of Andre's monument in Westminster Abbey, printed on
page 767. I do not know from what picture the artist copied, but,
considering the channel through which I received it, I think it may be
relied on as a correct profile.

*** John André was a native of London, where he was born in 1751. His
parents were from Geneva, in Switzerland, and at that place he was
educated. He returned to London before he was eighteen years of age, and
entered the counting-house of a respectable merchant, where he continued
nearly four years. Possessing a literary taste and promising genius, he
became acquainted with several of the writers of the day, among whom was
Miss Anna Seward, the daughter of a clergyman in Litchfield. Miss Seward
had a cousin named Honora Sneyd, a charming girl of whom Andre became
enamored. * His attachment was reciprocated by the young lady, and they
made an engagement for marriage. The father of the girl interposed his
authority against the match, and the marriage was prevented. Four years
afterward, Honora was wedded to Richard Lovell Edgeworth, ** father of
the late Maria Edgeworth, the novelist, by a former wife. Until that
event occurred, Andre had cherished the hope that some propitious
circumstance might effect their reunion. The portal of hope was now
closed, and, turning from commercial pursuits, he resolved to seek
relief from the bitter associations of his home amid the turmoils of
war. He entered the army which came to America in 1775. He was taken
prisoner at St. John's, on the Sorel, when that post was captured by
Montgomery, and was sent to Lancaster, in Pennsylvania. In a letter
written to a friend from that place, he said, "I have been taken
prisoner by the Americans, and stripped of every thing except the
picture of Honora, which I concealed in my mouth. Preserving that, I yet
think myself fortunate." This picture had been delineated by his own
hand from the living features of his beloved, at the time of his first
acquaintance with her at Buxton, in 1769. The bravery and talents of
Andre secured for him the affectionate regards of his commander, Sir
Henry Clinton, and he raised him to the duty of adjutant general of the
British army in America, with the rank of major. His future career was
full of brilliant promises, when Arnold, the wily serpent, crept into
the paradise of his purity and peace, and destroyed him. He was not yet
thirty years old when he suffered the death of a spy. Major Andre
possessed a graceful and handsome person, with rare mental
accomplishments. He was passionately fond of the fine arts, and his
journal, kept during his life in America, was enriched by many drawings
of such objects of interest as attracted his attention. While here, he
wrote several poetical pieces for the loyal newspapers; and it is a
singular fact that the last canto of his satirical poem, called The Cow
Chase, was published in Rivington's Royal Gazette, in New York, on the
23d of September, 1780, the day of his capture. It ends with the
following stanza:

"And now I've closed my epic strain, I tremble as I show it, Lest this
same warrio-drover, Wayne, Should ever catch the poet!"  ***

*** His memory has been embalmed in verse by his friend, Miss Seward;
**** and his king testified his admiration of his character and genius
by the erection of a beautiful monument to his honor in Westminster
Abbey, near the Poets' Corner. The monument is in relief against the
wall, and is about seven and a half feet in height. It is composed of a
sarcophagus, elevated on a molded paneled base and plinth, and was
executed in statuary marble by P. M. Van Gelder, from a design by Robert
Adam. On the front of the sarcophagus is a basso relievo, in which is
represented General Washington and officers in a tent at the moment when
the chief had received the report of the court of inquiry; at the same
time a messenger has arrived with the letter from André to Washington,
petitioning for a soldier's death (see page 770). On the right is a
guard of Continental soldiers, and the tree on which Andre was executed.
Two men are preparing the prisoner for execution, while at the foot of
the tree, Mercy, accompanied by Innocence, is bewailing his fate. On the
top of the sarcophagus is the British lion, and the figure of Britannia,
who is lamenting the fate of the accomplished youth. Upon a panel is the
following inscription: "Sacred to the memory of Major John André, who,
raised hy his merit at an early period of life to the rank of adjutant
general of the British forces in America, and employed in an important
but hazardous enterprise, fell a sacrifice to his zeal for his king and
country, on the 2d of October, A.D. 1780, universally beloved and
esteemed by the army in which he served, and lamented even by his Foes.
His gracious sovereign, King George the Third, has caused this monument
to be erected." On the base of the pedestal upon which the sarcophagus
rests has subsequently been inscribed the following: "The remains of
Major John André were, on the 10th of August, 1821, removed from Tappan
by James Buchanan, Esq., his majesty's consul at Now York, under
instructions from his Royal Highness, the Duke or York; and with the
permission of the Dean and Chapter, finally deposited in a grave
contiguous to this monument, on the 28th of November, 1821." *

*** The king settled a pension upon the family of Andre; and, to wipe
out the imputed stain produced by his death as a spy, the honor of
knighthood was conferred upon his brother. A certified copy of Andre's
will is in the office of the Surrogate of New York. It is dated at
Staten Island, 7th of June, 1777, and signed "John André, captain in the
26th regiment of foot." The date of probate is October 12, 1780, ten
days after his execution. The will is sworn to October 9, 1781, before
Carey Ludlow, Esq., then Surrogate of New York. By his will, Andre gave
the bulk of his property to his three sisters (Maria, Anna Marguerite,
and Louisa) and his brother, each $3500, on condition that they pay to
his mother, Mary Louise Andre, each $50 a year. Anna Marguerite Andre--
"the tuneful Anna," as Miss Seward called her--his last surviving
sister, lived a maiden, and died in London in 1848, at the age of ninety
years. Andrô's watch was sold for the benefit of his captors. It was
bought by Colonel William S. Smith, of the Continental army, for thirty
guineas, and, through General Robertson, he generously transmitted it to
Andrô's family. His commission was sold by Sir Henry Clinton for the
benefit of his mother and sisters.

Washington's Approval of the Decision of the Court.--Memoir of André.--
Honora Sneyd.--Mr. Edgeworth.--Miss Seward.

766"Head-quarters, September 30,1780. "The commander-in-chief approves
of the opinion of the Board of general officers respecting Major Andre,
and orders that the execution of Major Andre take place to-morrow at
five o'clock P.M."

* Miss Seward, in her poem entitled "The Anniversary," thus alludes to
her cousin:

"Why fled ye all so fast, ye happy hours, That saw Honora's eyes adorn
these bowers! These darling bowers that much she loved to hail, The
spires she called The Ladies of the Vale!"

** Mr. Edgeworth was educated partly at Trinity College, Dublin, and
partly at Oxford. Before he was twenty, he ran off with Miss Elers, a
young lady of Oxford, to whom he was married at Gretna Green. He
embarked in a life of gayety and dissipation. In 1770 he succeeded to
his Irish property. During a visit to Litchfield soon afterward, he saw
Honora Sneyd, loved her, and married her after the death of his wife.
Honora died six years afterward of consumption, when he married her
sister.--Chambers's Cyclopedia of English Literature, ii" 568.

** This satirical poem was written at General Clinton's head-quarters,
now No. 1 Broadway, New York. It is not a little singular that Wayne
commanded the division of the army at Tappan when André was executed.

*** In Ainsworth's Magazine of a recent date I find the following record
of A dream realized: "Major André, the circumstances of whose lamented
death are too well known to make it necessary for me to detail them
here, was a friend of Miss Seward's, and, previously to his embarkation
for America, he made a journey into Derbyshire to pay her a visit, and
it was arranged that they should ride over to see the wonders of the
Peak, and introduce André to Newton, her minstrel, as she called him,
and to Mr. Cunningham, the curate, who was also a poet.

** "While these two gentlemen were awaiting the arrival of their guests,
of whose intentions they had been apprised, Mr. Cunningham mentioned to
Newton that, on the preceding night, he had a very extraordinary dream,
which he could not get out of his head. He had fancied himself in a
forest; the place was strange to him; and, while looking about, he
perceived a horseman approaching at great speed, who had scarcely
reached the spot where the dreamer stood, when three men rushed out of
the thicket, and, seizing his bridle, hurried him away, after closely
searching his person. The countenance of the stranger being very
interesting, the sympathy felt by the sleeper for his apparent
misfortune awoke him; but he presently fell asleep again, and dreamed
that he was standing near a great city, among thousands of people, and
that he saw the same person he had seen seized in the wood brought out
and suspended to a gallows. When André and Miss Seward arrived, he was
horror-struck to perceive that his new acquaintance was the antitype of
the man in the dream."

Andre's Death-warrant.--His Will.--Disposition of his Remains.--His
Monument.

767The youth, candor, and gentlemanly bearing of Andre during the trying
scenes of his examination made a deep impression upon the court; and had
the decision of those officers been in consonance with the ir feelings
instead of their judgments and the stern necessities imposed by the
expedients of war, he would not have suffered death.

When the decision of the court was made known to him, the heroic
firmness of his mind challenged the admiration of all. He exhibited no
fear of death, but the _manner_ was a subject that gave him uneasiness;
he wished to die as a _soldier_, not as a _spy._ Tender of the feelings
of his commander, he obtained permission of Washington to write to Sir
Henry Clinton,

September 29.

for the purpose of assuring him that the dilemma in which he found
himself was not attributable to the duty required of him by his general.
In that letter he implied a presentiment of his fate, and said, "I have
a mother and two sisters, to whom the value of my commission would be an
object, as the loss of Grenada has much effected their income." * There
could be no question among military men as to the _equity_ of Andre's
sentence, and

* Colonel Hamilton, who was the bearer of the request from André to
Washington asking his permission to send this open letter to Clinton,
observes, in an account which he gave to Colonel Laurens, that Andre
seemed to foresee the result of the proceedings in which he was
concerned. "There is only one thing which disturbs my tranquillity," he
said to Hamilton. "Sir Henry Clinton has been too good to me; he has
been lavish of his kindness; I am bound to him by too many obligations,
and love him too well, to bear the thought that he should reproach
himself, or others should reproach him, on the supposition of my having
conceived myself obliged, by his instructions, to run the risk I did. I
would not for the world leave a sting in his mind that should imbitter
his future days."

Equity of Andrè's Sentence.--Efforts to Save him.--Embassy of Colonel
Ogden.--Washington Vilified

768yet there was a general desire on the part of the Americans to save
his life. Washington was deeply impressed with this feeling, and was
ready to employ any measure to effect it consistent with his public
duty. *

The only mode to save Andre was to exchange him for Arnold and hold the
traitor responsible for all the acts of his victim. This could hardly be
expected, for Sir Henry Clinton was a man of nice honor; nor would the
American commander make a formal proposition of this kind. It was,
however, determined that an opportunity for such an arrangement should
be offered, and a plan for that purpose was conceived. Washington placed
a packet of papers, directed to Sir Henry Clinton, in the hands of a
trusty officer of the New Jersey line, Captain Aaron Ogden, containing
an official account of the trial of André, the decision of the Board of
inquiry, and the letter written by Andre to his general. Ogden was
directed to go to General La Fayette for further instructions, after he
should arrange his escort of men, known for their tried fidelity. La
Fayette was in command of the light infantry, stationed nearest to the
British lines. He instructed Ogden to travel so slowly, that when he
should reach Paulus's Hook (now Jersey City), it might be so late that
he would be invited to stay all night. He was then to communicate to the
commandant of the post, as if incidentally, the idea of an exchange of
Andre for Arnold. Every thing occurred as was an-

* Never was a sympathy more real, or feeling more genuine, than that
exhibited by the American officers on this occasion; and yet the
prejudiced M'Farland, after quoting from a letter of La Fayette to his
wife, in which he expressed his sympathy for André, says, "Some of the
American generals, too, lamented., but kept twisting the rope that was
to hang him and then falsely adds, "There are accounts which say that
the deep sympathy and regret was all a farce, and that Andre, who was a
wit and a poet, was most cordially hated by the Americans on account of
some witticisms and satirical verses at their expense."--Pictorial
History of the Reign of George III., i., 434.

* The London General Evening Post for November 14th, 1780, in an article
abusive of Washington, gives a pretended account of Andrè's "last
words," in which the unfortunate man is made to say, "Remember that I
die as becomes a British officer, while the manner of my death must
reflect disgrace on your commander." André uttered no sentiment like
this. Miss Seward, his early friend, on reading this account, wrote thus
in her "Monody on Major André:"

"Oh Washington! I thought thee great and good, Nor knew thy Nero-thirst
for guiltless blood! Severe to use the pow'r that Fortune gave, Thou
cool, determin'd murderer of the brave! Lost to each fairer virtue, that
inspires The genuine fervor of the patriot fires! And you, the base
abettors of the doom, That sunk his blooming honors in the tomb, Th'
opprobrious tomb your harden'd hearts decreed While all he asked was as
the brave to bleed!"

* Aaron Ogden was born the 3d of December, 1756, at Elizabethtown, New
Jersey. He graduated at Princeton in 1773. He was nurtured in the love
of Whig principles, and took an active part in the early struggles of
the patriots. In the winter of 1775-6, he was one of a party who boarded
and captured a vessel lying off Sandy Hook, named Blue Mountain Valley,
and carried her safely into Elizabethport. Mr. Ogden received an
appointment in the first New Jersey regiment in the spring of 1777, and
continued in the service until the close of the war. He was in the
battle of Brandywine in the autumn of 1777; was brigade major in a
portion of the advanced corps of General Lee at Monmouth in the summer
of 1778, and served as assistant aid-de-camp to Lord Stirling during
that memorable day. He was aid-de-camp to General Maxwell in the
expedition of Sullivan against the Indians in 1779, and was in the
battle at Springfield, in New Jersey, in 1780, where he had a horse shot
under him. On the resignation of Maxwell, Ogden was appointed to a
captaincy of light infantry under La Fayette, and was serving in that
capacity when called upon to perform the delicate service mentioned in
the text. He afterward accompanied La Fayette in his memorable campaign
in Virginia in 1781. At the siege of Yorktown, Captain Ogden and his
company gallantly stormed the left redoubt of the enemy, for which he
was "honored with the peculiar approbation of Washington." He applied
himself to the study of the law after the war, and rose rapidly in his
profession. He was appointed one of the electors of president and vice-
president in 1800, a stale senator in 1801, and in 1812 he was elected
governor of New Jersey. He died in April, 1839, at the age of eighty-
three years.

Proposition to Exchange Andre lor Arnold declined.--A Deputation from
the British General.

769ticipated. The commandant received Ogden courteously, sent the packet
across the river, asked him to stay all night, and in the course of the
evening André became the subject of conversation. Ogden, in reply to the
commandant's question, "Is there no way to spare Andre's life?" assured
him that, if Sir Henry Clinton would give up Arnold, Andre might be
saved. He informed him, however, that he had no assurance to that effect
from Washington, but that he had reason to know that such an arrangement
might be effected. The commandant immediately left the company, crossed
the river, and had an interview with Clinton. Sir Henry promptly refused
compliance, for honor would not allow the surrender of a man who had
deserted from the Americans and openly espoused the cause of the king.
This decision was communicated to Ogden, and he prepared to return to
the camp. At dawn, on mustering his men, a sergeant was missing--he had
deserted to the enemy during the night. No time could be lost in
searching for the deserter, and Ogden returned to Tappan without him. *
October 1, 1780

Great was the distress of Sir Henry Clinton on reading Washington's
dispatch and the letter of Andre. He immediately summoned a council of
officers, and it was resolved that a deputation of three persons should
proceed to the nearest American outpost, open a communication with
Washington, and, presenting proofs of the innocence of Andre, endeavor
to procure his release. Toward noon on the 1st of October, General
Robertson, Andrew Elliott, and William Smith, the deputation appointed
by Clinton, accompanied by Beverly Robinson as a witness in the case,
arrived at Dobbs's Ferry, in the Greyhound schooner, with a flag of
truce. A request for a parley had been sent by Clinton to Washington, by
Captain Ogden, in the morning. General Greene was deputed by the chief
to act in his behalf, and he was already at the ferry when the Greyhound
came to anchor. General Robertson, with great courtesy of manner and
flattering words, opened the conference, and was proceeding to discuss
the subject at issue, when Greene politely interrupted him by saying,
"Let us understand our position. I meet you only as a private gentleman,
not as an officer, for the case of an acknowledged spy admits of no
discussion." With this understanding the conference proceeded; but
Robertson produced nothing new calculated to change Greene's opinion
respecting the justice of the sentence of the prisoner. A letter from
Arnold to Washington, which had been kept in reserve, was now produced
and read. The deputies believed that this would have the desired effect,
and kept it back until verbal arguments should fail. Had their words
been full of persuasion and convincing facts, this letter, so
hypocritical, malignant, and impudent, would have scattered all
favorable impressions in the mind of Greene to the winds. The traitor
menaced Washington with dreadful retaliation if André should be slain,
and in prospective charged upon the commander-in-chief the guilt of
causing torrents of blood to flow. ** "It is hardly possible," says
Sparks, "that this letter could have been read by Sir Henry Clinton,
although written at his request, with

* The desertion of the sergeant was arranged by Washington, without the
knowledge of Ogden. The object was to obtain information of much
importance. A paper had been intercepted in which was found the name of
General St. Clair, so relatively connected with other particulars as to
excite a suspicion that he was concerned in Arnold's treason. The
intelligent sergeant soon ascertained that there were no grounds for
such suspicion, and that the paper in question was designed by the enemy
to fall into Washington's hands, and excite jealousy and ill feelings
among the American officers. The papers were traced to a British
emissary named Brown. The sergeant found means to convey this
intelligence to Washington.

** "If, after this just and candid representation of Major Andre's
case," wrote Arnold, "the board of general officers adhere to their
former opinion, I shall suppose it dictated by passion and resentment;
and if that gentleman should suffer the severity of their sentence, I
shall think myself bound by every tie of duty and honor to retaliate on
such unhappy persons of your army as may fall in my power, that the
respect due to flags and the law of nations may be better understood and
observed."

** What could have been more injudicious than holding such language to
Washington, under the circumstances? and as to the "respect due to
flags," the traitor well know that in no part of the transaction had
Andre been under such protection.

Result of the Efforts to Save André.--His Letter to Washington asking to
be Shot.--Willis's Paraphrase.

770a view of operating on the judgment and clemency of Washington. Could
any language written by an individual have a more opposite tendency?
Disgust and contempt were the only emotions it could excite; and it was
at least an evidence that neither the understanding or the heart of the
writer had been improved by his political change. Hitherto he had
discovered acuteness and mental resources, but in this act his folly was
commensurate with his wickedness." *

The conference ended at sunset, and Greene returned to Tappan. Robertson
expressed his confidence in Greene's candor in communicating the
substance of their discussion to Washington; informed him that he should
remain on board the Greyhound all night, and expressed a hope that in
the morning he might take Major Andre back with him, or at least bear to
his general an assurance of his ultimate safety. At an early hour the
next morning October 2, 1780 the commissioners received a note from
Greene, stating that the opinion and decision of Washington were
unchanged, and that the prisoner would be executed that day. Robertson
was overwhelmed with astonishment and grief. He had written to Clinton
the evening before, expressing his belief that Andre was safe. The wish
was father to the thought, for he had no reasonable warrant for such a
conclusion, except in the known clemency of General Washington.
Reluctant to return without some word of consoling hope for Clinton,
Robertson wrote a letter to Washington, recapitulating the points
discussed at the conference; but it was of no avail. No new fact was
presented; no new phase was exhibited. Sir Henry Clinton also wrote a
long letter to Washington, offering some important prisoners in
exchange; but it was too late. Let us turn from the contemplation of
their noble efforts to save the prisoner, to the victim himself.

I have said that Andre had no fear of death, but the _manner_ was a
subject that disturbed him. When the sentence of the Board was
communicated to him, he evinced no surprise or evident emotion; he only
remarked, that, since he was to die, there was still a choice in the
mode, which would make a material difference in his feelings. He was
anxious to be shot--to die the death of a soldier--and for this
privilege he importuned Washington, in a letter written the day before
his execution. ** He pleaded with a touching yet manly earnestness for
this boon, but it could not be granted by the customs of war. Unwilling
to wound his feelings by a positive refusal, no answer was returned
either to his verbal solicitation or his letter, and he was left the
consoling hope that his wish might possibly be gratified.

The 1st of October, at five o'clock in the afternoon, had been fixed for
the time of his

* Life of Arnold, Amer. Biog., iii., 275.

** The following is a copy of his letter: the original is at
Charlottesville, Virginia.

"Sir,--Buoyed above the terror of death by the consciousness of a life
devoted to honorable pursuits, and stained with no action that can give
me remorse, I trust that the request I make to your excellency at this
serious period, and which is to soften my last moments, will not be
rejected. Sympathy toward a soldier will surely induce your excellency,
and a military tribunal, to adapt the mode of my death to the feelings
of a man of honor. Let me hope, sir, that if aught in my character
impresses you with esteem toward me, if aught in my misfortunes marks me
as the victim of policy and not of resentment, I shall experience the
operation of these feelings in your breast by being informed that I am
not to die on a gibbet.

"I have the honor to be, your excellency's most obedient and most humble
servant,

"John André."

** This letter has been thus beautifully paraphrased in verse by N. P.
Willis:

"It is not the fear of death That damps my brow; It is not for another
breath I ask thee now; I can die with a lip unstirr'd, And a quiet
heart--Let but this prayer be heard Ere I depart. 'I can give up my
mother's look--My sister's kiss; I can think of love--yet brook A death
like this! I can give up the young fame I burn'd to win; All--but the
spotless name I glory in. "Thine is the power to give, Thine to deny,
Joy for the hour I live, Calmness to die. By all the brave should
cherish. By my dying breath, I ask that I may perish By a soldier's
death."

Andre's Composure of Mind.--Pen-and-ink Sketch of himself--Name of his
Executioner.

771execution, but, in consequence of the protracted conference at
Dobbs's Ferry, it was postponed until the next day. Andre had procured
his military suit, and in calmness counted

the speeding hours of his life, talking with self-possession to those
who visited him, and even indulging in the practice of his favorite
accomplishment. On the morning of the day fixed for his execution, he
sketched with a pen a likeness of himself, sitting by a table, October,
1780 of which a fac simile is here given. The original is now in the
_Trumbull Gallery_ at Yale College. It will be seen that there is a
strong resemblance in the features of this sketch to those in the
portrait on page 197.

Major Andre was executed at Tappan, at twelve o'clock, on the 2d of
October, 1780. ** Doctor Thacher, then a surgeon in the Continental
army, and present on the occasion, has left the following account in his
Journal: "Major Andre is no more among the living. I have just witnessed
his exit. It was a tragical scene of the deepest interest.... The

* I copied this fac simile from one in Sparks's Life and Treason of
Arnold, where is given the following extract from a letter, written by
Ebenezer Baldwin to the president of Yale College, and dated at New
Haven, August 8th, 1832: "It affords me pleasure, as agent of Mr. Jabcz
L. Tomlinson, of Stratford, and of Mr. Nathan Beers [sec page 431, this
volume, for a notice of Mr. Beers], of this city, to request your
acceptance of the accompanying miniature of Major John André. It is his
likeness, seated at a table, in his guard-room, and drawn by himself,
with a pen, on the morning of the day fixed for his execution. Mr.
Tomlinson informs me that a respite was granted until the next day, and
that this miniature was in the mean time presented to him (then acting
as officer of the guard) by Major André himself. Mr. Tomlinson was
present when the sketch was made, and says it w-as drawn without the aid
of a [looking] glass. The sketch subsequently passed into the hands of
Mr. Beers, a fellow-officer of Mr. Tomlinson, on the station, and from
thence was transferred to me. It has been in my possession several
years."

** His executioner was a Tory named Strickland, who resided in the
Ramapo Valley. He was in confinement at Tappan, and was set at liberty
on condition that he should perform the office of hangman. Benjamin
Abbot, a drum-major, who died at Nashua, New Hampshire, in June, 1851,
at the age of 92 years, played the dead march on that occasion.

Dr. Thacher's Account of Andrè's Execution.--Feelings of the
Spectators.--The Place of his Death and Burial

772principal guard-officer, who was constantly in the room with the
prisoner, relates, that when the hour of execution was announced to him
in the morning, he received it without emotion, and, while all present
were affected with silent gloom, he retained a firm countenance, with
calmness and composure of mind.

Observing his servant enter his room in tears, he exclaimed, 'Leave me,
until you can show yourself more manly.' His breakfast being sent to him
from the table of General Washington, which had been done every day of
his confinement, he partook of it as usual, and, having shaved and
dressed himself, he placed his hat on the table, and cheerfully said to
the guard-officers, 'I am ready at any moment, gentlemen, to wait on
you.' The fatal hour having arrived, a large detachment of troops was
paraded, and an immense concourse of people assembled. Almost all our
general and field officers, excepting his excellency * and his staff,
were present on horseback. Melancholy and gloom pervaded all ranks, and
the scene was awfully affecting. I was so near, during the solemn march
to the fatal spot, as to observe every movement, and to participate in
every emotion the melancholy scene was calculated to produce. Major
Andre walked from the stone house in which he had been confined between
two of our subaltern officers, arm-in-arm. The eyes of the immense
multitude were fixed on him, who, rising superior to the fears of death,
appeared as if conscious of the dignified deportment he displayed. He
betrayed no want of fortitude, but retained a complacent smile on his
countenance, and politely bowed to several gentlemen whom he knew, which
was respectfully returned. It was his earnest desire to be shot, as
being the mode of death most conformable to the feelings of a military
man, and he had indulged the hope that his request would be granted. At
the moment, therefore, when suddenly he came in view of the gallows, he
involuntarily started backward and made a pause. 'Why this emotion,
sir?' said an officer by his side. Instantly recovering his composure,
he said, 'I am reconciled to my death, but I detest the mode.' While
waiting, and standing near the gallows, I observed some degree of
trepidation--placing his foot on a stone and rolling it over, and
choking in his throat as if attempting to swallow. So soon, however, as
he perceived that things were in readiness, he stepped quickly into the
wagon, and at this moment he appeared to shrink; but, instantly
elevating his head with firmness, he said, 'It will be but a momentary
pang;' and, taking from his pocket two white handkerchiefs, the provost
marshal, with one, loosely pinioned his arms, and with the other the
victim, after taking off his hat and stock, bandaged his own eyes with
perfect firmness, which melted the hearts and moistened the cheeks not
only of his servant, but of the throng of spectators. The rope being
appended to the gallows, he slipped the noose over his head, and
adjusted it to his neck, without the assistance of the awkward
executioner. Colonel Scam-mel now informed him that he had an
opportunity to speak, if he desired it. He raised the

* It is said that Washington never saw Major Andre, having avoided a
personal interview with him from the beginning.

** The place of Andre's execution is now designated by a stone, lying on
the right of a lane which runs from the highway from Tappan village to
old Tappan, on the westerly side of a large peach orchard owned by Dr.
Bartow, about a quarter of a mile from Washington's head-quarters. The
stone is a small bowlder, on the upper surface of which is inscribed
"André executed Oct. 2d, 1780." It is about three feet in length. This
stone was placed there and inscribed in 1847, by a patriotic merchant of
New York. A more elegant and durable monument should be erected upon the
spot.

The Captors, of André rewarded.--Disinterment of Andre's Remains.--
Honored by the Duke of York

773handkerchief from his eyes, and said, 'I pray you to bear me witness
that I meet my fate like a brave man.' The wagon being now removed from
under him, he was suspended, and instantly expired. It proved, indeed,
'but a momentary pang.' He was dressed in his royal regimentals and
boots. His remains, in the same dress, were placed in an ordinary
coffin, and interred at the foot of the gallows * and the spot was
consecrated by the tears of thousands. Thus died, in the bloom of life,
the accomplished Major André, the pride of the royal army, and the
valued friend of Sir Henry Clinton." **

The captors of Andre (Paulding, Williams, *** and Van Wart), were nobly
rewarded by Congress for their fidelity. In a letter to the president of
Congress, Washington said, October 7,1780 "Their conduct merits our
warmest esteem; and I beg leave to add, that I think the public would do
well to allow them a handsome gratuity. They have prevented, in all
probability, our suffering one of the severest strokes that could have
been meditated against us." Pursuant to this recommendation, Congress
adopted a resolution November, 1780 expressive of the public sense of
the virtuous and patriotic conduct of the "three young volunteer
militia-men," and ordered "that each of them receive annually, out of
the public treasury, two hundred dollars in specie, or an equivalent in
the current money of these states during life, and that the Board of War
procure for each of them a silver medal, on one side of which shall be a
shield with this inscription; Fidelity; and on the other the following
motto: 'the love of country conquers,' and forward them to the
commander-in-chief, who is requested to present the same, with a copy of
this resolution and the thanks of Congress, for their fidelity, and the
eminent service

* In a subsequent publication by Doctor Thacher, entitled Observations
relating to the Execution of Major Andre, he says that the regimentals
of that officer were given to his servant. His remains were taken up in
1831 by Mr. Buchanan, the British consul at New York, removed to
England, and deposited near his monument in Westminster Abbey. As no
metallic buttons were found in his grave, it is evident he had been
stripped of his regimentals before burial. He was interred in an open
field then belonging to a Mr. Mabie.

* Mr. Buchanan published an interesting account of the disinterment in
1831. It was done by command of the Duke of York. On opening the grave,
the moldering coffin was found about three feet below the surface. The
roots of a peach-tree, which some sympathizing hand had planted at the
head of his grave, had twined like a net-work around the young hero's
skull. A leather string, which he had used for tying his hair, was
perfect; this Mr. Buchanan sent to Andre's surviving sisters. While a
prisoner after his capture at St. John's in 1775, Andre parted with his
watch. This was also obtained and sent to his sisters. Two small cedars
were growing by the grave. A portion of one of these was sent to England
with the remains, and Mr. Buchanan suggested to the duke the propriety
of having a snuff-box made of some of the wood, as a present for the
Reverend Mr. Demarest, of Tappan, who greatly assisted the consul in the
disinterment. The duke had an elegant box made, lined with gold, and
inscribed "From his royal highness the Duke of York to the Reverend Mr.
Demarest." Mr. Buchanan received a silver inkstand, inscribed "The
surviving sisters of Major Andre to James Buchanan, Esq., his majesty's
consul, New York." They also sent a silver cup, with a similar
inscription, to Mr. Demarest,

** Military Journal, p. 222, 223.

*** David Williams was born in Tarrytown, October 21st, 1754. He entered
the army in 1775, was under Montgomery at St. John's and Quebec, and
continued in the militia service until 1779. He took an active part
against the Cow-boys and Skinners on the Neutral Ground. He was not in
regular service when he joined in the expedition the day before the
capture of André. After the war he married a Miss Benedict, and settled
in Schoharie county. He died at Broome, in that county, on the 2d day of
August, 1831, at the age of seventy-seven. His remains were interred,
with military honors, at Livingstonville, in the presence of a large
concourse of citizens. His widow, I believe, is yet living with her son
at Broome, at the age of ninety-four. Ten years after the death of her
husband, she obtained a continuance of his pension, which had been
stopped at his death, receiving $2000 at once. Congress has been
repeatedly petitioned for an appropriation to erect a monument to
Williams, but without success. See Simms's Schoharie County.

Desire to secure Arnold.--A Plan to Abduct him.--Its Execution committed
to Major Henry Lee.

774they have rendered their country." * The medals were afterward given
to the three individuals by Washington himself, at head-quarters, and
the captors enjoyed the annuity during their lives. **

Commensurate with the strong feeling of sympathy evinced for Andre was
the sentiment of indignant hatred and disgust of Arnold, and it was the
ardent desire of Washington and his compatriots to obtain possession of
the person of the arch-traitor and punish him as his wickedness
deserved. Various plans were arranged, secret and open, to capture him,
and several expeditions were formed for that avowed object. One, while
the army was yet at Tappan, and the tears of sympathy for poor Andre
were hardly dry upon the cheeks of the soldiers, was almost successful.
It was known only to Washington, Major Henry Lee, and Sergeant Champe,
the latter the principal actor in the movement.

Washington had learned that Arnold's quarters in New York were next door
to those of Sir Henry Clinton (now No. 3 Broadway), and that he seemed
to feel so secure with his new friends that his usual caution was but
little exercised. The chief conceived a plan for abducting the traitor
and bringing him to the American camp. The principal difficulty appeared
to be to procure the proper instruments for such an enterprise. Recent
events had made the commander-in-chief suspicious, for he knew not where
smaller traitors might be lurking. He sent for Major Henry Lee, the
commandant of a brave legion of cavalry; a man in whose patriotism,
prudence, and judgment he knew he could confide. Already he had
intrusted to this officer the delicate service of ascertaining the truth
of many flying rumors that other officers of high rank were likely to
follow Arnold's example. To him Washington disclosed his wishes. "I have
sent for you, Major Lee," he said, "in the expectation that you have in
your corps individuals capable and willing to undertake an
indispensable, delicate, and hazardous project. Whoever comes forward on
this occasion will lay me under great obligations personally, and in
behalf of the United States I will reward him amply. No time is to be
lost; he must proceed, if possible, to-night." The nature of the service
was disclosed to Lee, and he promptly replied to his commander that he
had no doubt his legion contained many men daring enough to undertake
any enterprise, however perilous; but for the service required there was
needed a combination of talent rarely found in the same individual. ***
Lee suggested a plan which was highly approved of by Washing-

* Journals of Congress, vi., 154.

** In 1817, Mr. Paulding applied to Congress for an augmentation of his
annuity. Major Tallmadge, who was then a member of the House of
Representatives, strongly opposed the prayer of the petitioner, on the
ground that he and his companions had been more than compensated for the
real patriotism which they exercised on the occasion of making Major
Andre a prisoner. The statements of Andre, at the time, impressed
Tallmadge with the belief that the plunder of a traveler was their first
incentive to arrest his progress, and that, could they have been
certified of their prisoner's ability to perform his promises of large
pay for his release, they would not have detained him. Andre solemnly
asserted that they first ripped up the housings of his saddle and the
cape of his coat, in search of money, but finding none, one of the party
said, "He may have it [money] in his boots." The discovery of the papers
there concealed gave them the first idea that he might be a spy. Major
André was of opinion that if he could have given them a small sum in
specie at first, they would have let him pass; but he only had a small
amount in Continental bills, which was given him by Smith. While we may
not claim entire purity of intent on the part of the captors when they
first arrested the progress of Andre, we can not doubt the strength of
their patriotism to withstand the lure of large bribes after they
discovered his real character. For particulars on this point, see a
small volume, entitled Vindication of the Captors of Major Andre,
published in New York in 1817; also Walsh's American Register, vol. ii.,
1817. In this volume of the Register may be found a translation of
Marbois's Complot du Arnold.

*** In addition to the capture of Arnold, the emissary was to be
commissioned to ferret out information touching the alleged defection of
other officers of the Continental army. Already, as we have noticed, a
sergeant under the command of Captain Ogden had been employed for such a
purpose, and satisfied Washington of the innocence of one general
officer who was accused!

Sergeant Champe.--His Sense of Honor.--Consents to attempt the Abduction
of Arnold.--His Desertion favored by Lee.

775ton. He named Champe, the sergeant major of his cavalry, as every way
well qualified for the service, but he was afraid his sense of personal
honor would not allow him to take the first step in the perilous
expedition--desertion--for he was anxiously awaiting a vacancy in the
corps to receive a promised commission. *

Lee sent instantly for Champe, communicated to him the wishes of
Washington, and depicted, with all the earnestness and eloquence of
which he was master, the glory that awaited him, if successful. Champe
listened with the deepest attention, his countenance evincing the
greatest excitement of feeling. He expressed himself charmed with the
plan, and its proposed beneficial results; declared that he was ready to
embark in any enterprise for his country's good, however perilous, which
did not involve his honor; but the idea of desertion to the enemy, and
hypocritically espousing the cause of the king, were obstacles in his
way too grave to be disregarded, and he prayed to be excused. Lee
combated these scruples with every argument calculated to impress the
heart of a brave soldier. He spoke of the personal honor which success
promised; the honor of the corps to which he belonged; the great service
which he would perform for his beloved eommander-in-ehief, and the
plaudits of his countrymen. He told him that desertion, by request of
his general, for a laudable purpose, earned with it no dishonor, and
that the stain upon his character would remain only until prudence
should allow the publication of the facts. After long persuasion, the
sergeant major consented to undertake the mission, and preparations were
immediately made.

Washington had already drawn up instructions. These were read to Champe,
and he carefully noted their import in such a way that their true
meaning could not be understood by another. He was to deliver letters to
two individuals in New York, unknown to each other, who had long been in
the confidence of the general. He was to procure such aid in bringing
Arnold away as his judgment should dictate; and he was strictly enjoined
to forbear killing the traitor under any circumstances. ** These
preliminaries being settled, the difficulties that lay in his way
between the camp and the enemy's outposts at Paulus's Hook, were next
considered. There were many pickets and patrols in the way, and
straggling parties of American irregulars often ventured almost to
Bergen Point in search of booty or an adventure. Major Lee could offer
the sergeant no aid against these dangers, lest he should be involved in
the charge of favoring his desertion, and Champe was left to his own
resources. All that Lee could do was to delay pursuit as long as
possible, after it should be ascertained that the sergeant major had
deserted.

At eleven o'clock at night, Champe took his cloak, valise, and orderly-
book, October 20, 1780 mounted his horse secretly, and with three
guineas in his pocket, which were given him by Lee, "put himself on
fortune." Lee immediately went to bed, but not to sleep. Within half an
hour, Captain Carnes, the officer of the day, came to him in haste, and
informed him that one of the patrols had fallen in with a dragoon, who,
on being challenged, put spurs to his horse and escaped. Lee complained
of fatigue and drowsiness, pretended to be half asleep, and thus
detained the captain some minutes before he seemed fairly to understand
the object of that officer's visit. He ridiculed the idea that one of
his own dragoons had deserted, for such an event had occurred but once
during the whole war. The captain was not to be convinced by such
arguments, but immediately mustering the whole squadron of horse, by
Lee's reluctant order, satisfied both himself and his commander that
_one_ had deserted, and that he was no less a personage than Champe, the
sergeant major, who had decamped with his arms, baggage, and orderly-
book. Captain Carnes ordered an

* John Champe was a Virginian. "He was-a native of Loudon county," says
Lee, in his Memoirs, "and at this time twenty-three or twenty-four years
of age; enlisted in 1776; rather above the common size; full of bone and
muscle; with a saturnine countenance, grave, thoughtful, and taciturn,
of tried courage and inflexible perseverance, and as likely to reject an
overture, coupled with ignominy, as any officer in the corps."--Memoirs,
p. 272.

** Lee made an arrangement with Mr. Baldwin, of Newark, to aid Champe.
With him the sergeant was to have daily intercourse, as if by accident,
and through him Lee was to receive communications from his sergeant
major. He agreed to pay Baldwin, if successful, one hundred guineas,
five hundred acres of land, and three negroes.

Pursuit of Champe.--His Skill in eluding his Pursuers.--He Escapes to a
British Galley.--Sir Henry Clinton deceived

776immediate pursuit. Lee made as much delay in the preparation as
possible, and when all was ready, he ordered a change in the command,
giving it to Lieutenant Middleton, a young man whose tenderness of
disposition would cause him to treat Champe leniently, if he should be
overtaken. By parleying and other delays, Champe got an hour the start
of his pursuers.

It was a bright starry night, and past twelve o'clock, when Middleton
and his party took the saddle and spurred after the deserter. A fall of
rain at sunset had effaced all tracks in the road, and thus favored the
pursuit, for the single foot-prints of the dragoon's horse were easily
traced and recognized. * Often, before dawn, when coming to a fork or a
cross-road, a trooper would dismount to examine the track. Ascending an
eminence at sunrise near the "Three Pigeons," ** a tavern a few miles
north of the village of Bergen, they descried from its summit the
deserting sergeant, not more than half a mile in advance. The pursuers
were discovered by Champe at the same moment, and both parties spurred
onward with all their might. They were all well acquainted with the
roads in the vicinity. There was a short cut through the woods to the
bridge below Bergen, which left the great road a little below the Three
Pigeons. There Middleton divided his party, sending a detachment by the
short road to secure the bridge, while himself and the others pursued
Champe to Bergen. He now felt sure of capturing the deserter, for he
could not reach Paulus's Hook without crossing the bridge in question.
The two divisions met at the bridge, but, to their great astonishment,
Champe had eluded their vigilance, and was not to be found. He, too, was
acquainted with the short cut, and shrewdly considered that his pursuers
would avail themselves of it. He therefore wisely determined to abandon
his design of going to the British post at Paulus's Hook, and seek
refuge on board one of two of the king's galleys which were lying in the
bay in front of the little settlement of Communipaw, about a mile from
Bergen.

Middleton retired hastily from the bridge to Bergen, and inquired if a
dragoon had been seen there that morning. He was answered in the
affirmative, but no one knew which way he went from the village. The
beaten track no longer gave a legible imprint of his horse's shoes, and
for a moment his pursuers were foiled. The trail was soon discovered on
the road leading to Bergen. The pursuit was vigorously renewed, and in a
few moments Champe was discovered near the water's edge, making signals
to the British galleys. He had lashed his valise, containing his clothes
and orderly-book, upon his back. When Middleton was within a few hundred
yards of him, Champe leaped from his horse, cast away the scabbard of
his sword, and with the naked blade in his hand, he sped across the
marsh, plunged into the deep waters of the bay, and called to the
galleys for help. A boat filled with strong oarsmen responded to his
call, and he was soon on board the galley, with all the evidences of the
sincerity of his desertion in his possession. The captain of the galley
gave him a letter to Sir Henry Clinton, in which the scene just
mentioned was described, and before night the sergeant was safely
quartered in New York.

Middleton recovered the horse, cloak, and scabbard belonging to Champe,
and returned to Tappan. Lee was grieved when he saw the supposed
evidence that poor Champe was slain; but equally great was his joy when
he learned from Middleton that the sergeant had escaped safely on board
one of the enemy's galleys. Four days afterward Lee received a letter
from Champe, in a disguised hand, and without signature, informing him
of the occurrence just narrated.

Champe was sent by Clinton, for interrogation, to his adjutant general.
The faithfulness of the legion to which he had hitherto been attached
was well known in the British army, and this desertion was regarded as
an important sign of increasing defection among the Americans. This
opinion Champe fostered by adroit answers to questions proposed, Sir
Henry Clinton also questioned him closely; and so sincere seemed to be
the sergeant's desire to serve the king, that he won the entire
confidence of the British general. Clinton

* The horses of Lee's legion were all shod by a farrier attached to the
corps, and every shoe, alike in form, had a private mark put upon it. By
this means the foot-prints of Champe's horse were recognized, and the
course of the deserter made obvious to his pursuers. There is now a
hamlet of that name there, situated on the high road from Haekensack to
Hoboken.

Champe sent to Arnold.--Joins his Legion.--Preparations for carrying off
the Traitor.

777gave Champe a couple of guineas, and recommended him to call upon
General Arnold, who was engaged in raising an American legion, to be
composed of Loyalists and deserters. This was exactly the course to
which Champe had hoped events would tend. Arnold received him
courteously, and assigned him quarters among his recruiting sergeants.
The traitor asked him to join his legion, but Champe begged to be
excused, on the plea that if caught by the rebels, he would surely be
hanged; but promised Arnold that, if he changed his mind, he would
certainly join his legion.

Champe found means to deliver the two letters before mentioned, and five
days after his arrival in New York, he made arrangements with one of
"Washington's October 23, 1789 correspondents to assist him in abducting
Arnold, and then communicated the facts to Major Lee. * He enlisted in
the traitor's legion, so as to have free intercourse with him, and
ascertain his night habits and pursuits. In the rear of Arnold's
quarters was a garden, extending down to the water's edge. ** Champe
ascertained that it was Arnold's habit to return to his quarters at
about midnight, and that previous to going to bed he always visited the
garden. Adjoining the garden was a dark alley leading to the street.
These circumstances were favorable to Champe's plans. He had arranged
with two accomplices (one of whom was to have a boat in readiness) to
seize and gag Arnold, on a certain night, in his garden, convey him to
the alley, and from thence, through the most unfrequented streets, to
the river. In case of detection while carrying the traitor, they were to
represent him as a drunken soldier whom they were conveying to the
guard-house. Once in the boat, they might pass in safety to Hoboken.

Champe carefully removed some of the palings between the garden and the
alley, and replaced them so slightly that they might again be removed
without noise. When all was arranged, he wrote to Lee, and appointed the
third subsequent night for the November 5, 1780 delivery of the traitor
on the Jersey shore. On that evening, Lee and a small party left the
camp, with three accoutered horses--one for Arnold, one for the
sergeant, and one for his associate--and at midnight concealed
themselves at an appointed place in the woods at Hoboken. Hour after
hour passed, and the dawn came, but Champe and his prisoner did not
arrive. Lee and his party returned to camp greatly disappointed. A few
days afterward he received a letter from his sergeant, explaining the
cause of his failure, and an assurance that present success was
hopeless. On the very day when Champe was to execute his plan, Arnold
changed his quarters, to superintend the embarkation of troops for an
expedition southward, to be commanded by himself. *** In this expedition
the American le-

* In this first communication he assured Lee that his inquiries
concerning the alleged defection of other American officers were
satisfactory, and that no such defection existed.

** Arnold's quarters were at No. 3 Broadway, adjoining those of Sir
Henry Clinton. The house is yet standing, and is represented, with
Clinton's quarters, on page 592, of volume ii. The garden extended along
the street to the northern boundary of the Atlantic Hotel, No. 5, where
the dark alley, mentioned in the text, divided it from the premises No.
9, now known as the Atlantic Garden. The shore of the liver was formerly
a few yards west of Greenwich Street, West Street being all "made
ground."

*** Arnold received, as the price of his desertion from the Americans
and attempted betrayal of the liberties of his country into the hands of
the enemy, a commission as colonel, with a brevet rank of brigadier, in
the British army, and the sum of nearly fifty thousand dollars. It may
be mentioned, for the information of those unskilled in the
technicalities of the military service, that the term brevet is used to
a commission giving nominal rank higher than that for which pay is
received. A brevet major serves and draws pay as a captain, and a brevet
brigadier as colonel. Arnold was lower in office, both actual and
nominal, among his new friends than he had been in the American army.
But large bribes of gold was a salvo to that nice sense of honor for
which he had so often wrangled. He was heartily despised by the British
officers, and he was frequently insulted without possessing the power to
show his resentment. Many anecdotes illustrative of this point have been
related. It is said that, on one occasion, a British statesman, as he
rose to make a speech in the House of Commons, saw Arnold in the
gallery. "Mr. Speaker," he said, "I will not speak while that man
(pointing toward Arnold) is in the house." George the Third introduced
Arnold to Earl Balcarras, one of Burgoyne's officers at Bemis's Heights.
"I know General Arnold and abominate traitors," was the quick reply of
the earl, as he refused his hand and turned on his heel. When Talleyrand
was about to come to America, he was informed that an American gentleman
was in an adjoining room. He sought an interview, and asked for letters
to his friends in America. "I was born in America, lived there till the
prime of my life, but alas! I can call no man in America my friend,"
replied the stranger. That stranger Arnold.

Champe foiled.--Taken by Arnold to Virginia.--Escapes and rejoins his
Legion in the Carolinas.--Ramapo Valley.

778gion was to be employed, and poor Champe, who had enlisted in it to
carry out his plans, was in a sad dilemma. Instead of crossing the
Hudson that night, with the traitor his prisoner, he found himself on
board of a British transport, and that traitor his commander! December
16, 1780 The expedition sailed, and Champe was landed on the shores of
Virginia. He sought opportunities to escape, but found none, until after
the junction with Cornwallis at Petersburg, where he deserted. He passed
up toward the mountains, and into the friendly districts of North
Carolina. Finally, he joined the legion of Major Lee, just after it had
passed the Congarec in pursuit of Lord Rawdon. Great was the surprise of
his old comrades when they saw him, and it was increased at the cordial
reception which the deserter received at the hands of Lee. His story was
soon told, and four-fold greater than before his desertion was the love
and admiration of his corps for him. They felt proud of him, and his
promotion would have been hailed by general acclamation. Knowing that he
would immediately be hanged if caught by the enemy, he was discharged
from service. The commander-in-chief munificently rewarded him; and
seventeen years afterward, when President Adams appointed Washington to
the chief command of the armies of the United States, then preparing to
defend the country from the threatened hostility of the French, the
chief sent to Colonel Lee for information concerning Champe, being
determined to bring him forward in the capacity of a captain of
infantry. But the gallant soldier had removed to Kentucky, and was
asleep in the soil. *

A few months after my visit to Tappan, I made another tour to the
vicinity.. I passed two days in the romantic valley of the Ramapo,
through which the New York and Erie rail-way courses. Every rocky nook,
sparkling water-course, and shaded glen in that wild valley has a
legendary charm. It is a ravine sixteen miles in extent, opening wide
toward the fertile fields of Orange county. It was a region peculiarly
distinguished by wild and daring adventure during the Revolution, and,
at times, as important military ground. There the marauding Cow-boys
made their rendezvous; and from its dark coverts, Claudius Smith, the
merciless freebooter, and his three sons, with their followers, sallied
out and plundered the surrounding country. ** Along the sinuous Ramapo
Creek, before the war of the Revolution broke out, and while the ancient
tribe of the Ramapaughs yet chased the deer on the rugged hills which
skirt the valley, iron-forges were established, and the hammer-peal of
spreading civilization echoed from the neighboring crags. Not far
distant from its waters the great chain which was stretched across the
Hudson at West Point was wrought; *** and the remains of one of the
Ramapo forges, built at the close of the war, now form a picturesque
ruin on the margin of the rail-way. **** A few miles below it, Ramapo
village, with its extensive machinery, sends up a per-

* See Lee's Memoirs of the War in the Southern Department of the United
States, from page 270 to 284 The reader, by observing the dates of his
correspondence with Washington, will perceive that Lee has con founded
the effort of Ogden to save André by having Arnold given up, and the
desertion of his sergeant, with the expedition of Sergeant Champe. In
his account of Champe's maneuver, he makes the salvation of André a
leading incentive to efforts to capture Arnold; but André was executed
on the 2d of October, whereas Champe did not desert until the 20th of
the same month.

** Claudius Smith was a large, fine-looking man, of strong mind, and a
desperado of the darkest dye. Himself and gang were a terror to Orange
county for a long time, and tempting rewards were offered for his
apprehension. He was finally captured near Oyster Bay, on Long Island,
and taken to Goshen, where he was chained to the jail floor, and a
strong guard placed over him. He was hung in the village on the 22d of
January, 1779, with Gordon and De la Mar--the former convicted of horse-
stealing, and the latter of burglary. Smith's residence was in the lower
part of the present village of Monroe, on the Erie railway. Several
murders were afterward committed by Smith's son Richard, in revenge for
the hanging of his father; and for a while the Whigs in that region
suffered more from the desperate Cow-boys than before the death of their
great leader. For a detailed account of transactions connected with
Claudius Smith, see Eager's History of Orange County, p. 550-564.

*** See page 700.

**** This ruin is situated about half way between the Sloatsburgh
station and Monroe works. The forge was built in 1783--4. by Solomon
Townshend, of New York, to make bar-iron and anchors, and was named the
Augusta Works. A sketch of the ruin forms a pretty frontispiece to The
Salamander (or Hugo, as it is now called), a legend of the Ramapo
Valley, by Mrs. Elizabeth Oakes Smith. The historic anecdote related in
the introduction to this charming legend. I also heard from the lips of
the "venerable Mr. P-------- through whose kindness I was enabled to
visit the "Hopper House." The relics of the Revolution are pleasingly
grouped in the introduction referred to.

Ramapo Village. Mr. Pierson.--Movements of the two Armies in 1777.--
Washington's Perplexities.

779petual hymn of industry from the wilderness. This village, now
containing a population of three hundred, * is owned by the Piersons,
the elder having established iron-works there fifty years ago. Jeremiah
II. Pierson, the original proprietor, is yet living there at the age of
eighty-four, and to the kind hospitality of himself and family I am
indebted for October, 1850 much of the pleasures and profit of my visit
to the Ramapo Valley. God has taken his eyesight from him, but
mercifully vouchsafes good health, sound mind, sunny cheerfulness, and
the surroundings of a happy family. I listened with interest to a
narrative of his clear recollections of the past, and the traditions
gathered from his scattered neighbors when he first sat down there in
the almost wilderness. Not twenty years had elapsed since the war closed
when he erected his forges, and the _sufferers_ were living in small
groups all around him. They have all passed away, and volumes of
unwritten traditionary history are buried with them.

The American army under Washington was encamped in the vicinity of
Ramapo for a few days in July, 1777. The head-quarters of Washington had
been at Morristown during the previous winter and spring. Believing it
prudent to act on the defensive, he had waited anxiously for Sir William
Howe, who was quartered in New York city, to make some decided movement.
Summer approached, and yet the British commander gave no intimations
respecting his designs for a campaign. It was believed that he would
either make a demonstration against the strong posts in the Highlands,
or attempt a passage of the Delaware and a seizure of Philadelphia.
Washington's position at Morristown was an eligible one for acting
promptly and efficiently when Howe should move either way.

General Howe had a considerable force stationed at New Brunswick. This
force was augmented early in May, and Washington received information
that they had begun to build a portable bridge there, so constructed
that it might be laid upon flat boats. Believing this to be a
preparation for crossing the Delaware, Washington collected the new
levies from Virginia and the Middle States, at Morristown, and ordered
those from the eastward to assemble at Peekskill. Toward the close of
May, the American army moved from Morristown, and encamped upon the
heights of Middlebrook, in a very strong position, 1777 and commanding
the country from New Brunswick to the Delaware. The maneuvers of
detachments of the two armies in this vicinity in June (a) are noticed
on page 331,  a 1777vol. i. The British finally crossed over to Staten
Island from Amboy (b) on the  b 1777 bridge which they had constructed
at New Brunswick, and entirely evacuated the Jerseys.

The next day Washington received intelligence of the approach of
Burgoyne from Canada, and at the same time spies and deserters from New
York informed him that a fleet of large vessels and transports were
preparing in the harbor of that city. The commander-in-chief was greatly
perplexed. At first it appeared probable that Howe was preparing to sail
with his army southward, go up the Delaware, and attack Philadelphia by
land and by water; but the intelligence that Washington continued to
receive from the North made it appear more probable that a junction with
Burgoyne, and the consequent possession of the Hudson River, by which
the patriots of the Eastern and Middle States would be separated, and a
free communication with Canada be established, would engage the efforts
of Sir William Howe. The possession of the Hudson River had been a
prominent object from the beginning of the war.

* When the large cotton factory (the spindles of which are now idle) and
the screw factory of Mr. Pierson were in operation here, the village
contained about seven hundred inhabitants. The whole valley of the
Ramapo has but three or four owners. Many thousand acres belong to the
Townsends; the Lorillard family own another immense tract; Mr. M'Farland
another; the Sloats have considerable possessions, and the lower part
belongs to the Piersons.

March of the American Army toward the Highlands.--Howe's Destination
determined.--The Clove.

780Washington remained at Middlebrook with the main division of the
army, anxiously awaiting the movements of the enemy, until toward the
middle of July. He dispatched two regiments to Peekskill, on the Hudson,
and had his whole army in readiness to march in that direction, if
circumstances should require.

When it was certainly known that the British army had actually embarked
on board the fleet, Washington moved slowly toward the Highlands by way
of Morristown, Ramapo, * and the Clove. *** He encamped in the latter
place on the 15th, eleven miles above the _Ramapo Pass_ (of which I
shall presently July, 1777 write) and immediately sent forward Lord
Stirling, with a division, to Peekskill. He established his head-
quarters at Ramapo on the 23d; but so much was that region infested with
Cow-boys and other Tories, that it was with great difficulty that he
could obtain correct information from a distance. *** Northward from the
present Ramapo village rises a range of lofty hills, upon the highest
summit of which is upreared a huge mass of granite, shaped like a mighty
dome, the top covered with trees. From this eminence, five hundred feet
above the village, a small portion of New York Bay, Staten Island, and
the ocean near Sandy Hook, may be distinctly seen on a clear day, the
distance being about thirty-five miles. To this observatory, it is said,
Washington was piloted, and with his glass saw a portion of the fleet of
the enemy near Sandy Hook. The Weehawken Hill obstructed a full view of
New York Harbor, and the commander-in-chief was uncertain whether the
whole fleet had dropped down to the Hook; but, on returning to his
quarters at Ramapo, he received positive information that the British
fleet had gone to sea. Convinced that Philadelphia was the destination
of Howe, Washington recalled Stirling's division from Peekskill, broke
up his encampment in the Clove, and the army pursued various routes
toward the Delaware. The battle of Brandywine, and other events in the
vicinity of Philadelphia, which June 1,1779. occurred soon afterward,
will be noticed in subsequent chapters.

On the return of Commodore Sir George Collier and General Matthews from
a marauding expedition to Virginia, at the close of May, 1779, they
sailed up the Hudson River to attack the forts in the Highlands. This
expedition, as we have noticed on page 175, was under the command of Sir
Henry Clinton. As soon as Washington was advised of this movement, he
drew his troops from their cantonments in New Jersey, and, by rapid
marches, reached the Clove on the 7th with five brigades and two
Carolina regiments. He pressed forward to Smith's Clove, whence there
were mountain passes to the forts in the Highlands, and there he
encamped. Small detachments for observation and protection to couriers
were stationed at different points from the encampment

* Ramapo, or Romopoek, was a small settlement on the Ramapo River, about
five miles south of the present Suffern's Station on the New York and
Erie rail-way, and within the province of New Jersey. It was nearly
seven miles below the present village of Ramapo, founded by Mr. Pierson.

** The Clove here mentioned was chiefly the Ramapo Valley extending to
Smith's Clove, which continues northward from the former, in the
vicinity of Turner's Station, on the New York and Erie rail-road, far in
the rear of Haverstraw and Stony Point. Through this clove, by the way
of Ramapo, was the best route for an army from New Windsor into the
upper part of New Jersey. The main division of the Continental army was
again encamped in the Clove in 1779, when General Wayne captured Stony
Point.

*** "I can not give you any certain account of General Howe's intended
operations," wrote Washington to General Schuyler. "His conduct is
puzzling and embarrassing beyond measure. So are the informations which
I get. At one time the ships are standing up toward the North River; in
a little while they are going up the Sound; and in an hour after they
are going out of the Hook. I think in a day or two we must know
something of his intentions."

**** This view is from the verge of the dam above the Ramapo works, near
the rail-way, looking northeast. The eminence is called Torn Rock, from
its ragged appearance on its southeastern side. There is a deep fissure
in a portion of the bare rock, from which comes up a sound like the
ticking of a watch, caused by the water which percolates through the
scams in the granite. A tradition was long current that Washington lost
his watch in the fissure, and that, by some miraculous power, it
continued to tick!

The Ramapo Pass. March of the allied Armies to Virginia.--Clinton
Deceived by Washington's Letters.

781southward to old Ramapo, and strong intrenchments were thrown up at
the Pass, a narrow gorge about half a mile below the present Ramapo
village. The passage between the hills here is only wide enough for the
stream, the rail-way, a. wagon-road, and a narrow strip ol meadow-land.

The hills on each side rise abrupt and rocky. It was a place almost as
easy to fortify and guard as the pass of old Thermopylae The ditch and
bank from the wagon-road eastward are yet quite prominent. Large trees
have overgrown them, and with care these mementoes of the past may be
long preserved.

While the army was encamped at Smith's Clove, the successful expedition
of General Wayne against Stony Point was accomplished. This success, the
subsequent evacuation of that post and of Verplanek's Point by the
British, and the necessity for sending re-enforcements to General
Lincoln at the South, caused the camp in the Clove to be broken up early
in the autumn. The main portion of the army went into winter quarters at
Morristown, where the eommander-in-chief established himself, and strong
detachments were stationed at different points among the Highlands.

Once again, and for the last time, the Ramapo Valley became the
temporary theater of military operations. It was in the summer of 1781,
when the allied armies took up their line of march for Virginia to
achieve the defeat of Cornwallis. They had conjoined upon the Hudson for
the purpose of making an attack upon the head-quarters of the British
army in the city of New York. The failure of Count De Grasse, commander
of a French fleet then in the West Indies, to co-operate with the land
forces, made Washington abandon this project, and turn his attention to
the military operations at the South. To prevent obstacles being thrown
in his way by Sir Henry Clinton, or re-enforcements being sent to
Cornwallis, Washington kept up the appearance of a meditated attack upon
New York.

The two armies, which had remained nearly six weeks in the vicinity of
Dobbs's Ferry, crossed the Hudson at Verplanck's Point, and marched by
different routes to Trenton, under the general command of Lincoln; some
passing through the Ramapo Valley and the Pass to Morristown, and others
taking the upper route above the Ringwood Iron-works. The French took
the river route, by Tappan and the Hackensack Valley, to Newark and
Perth Amboy. At the latter place they built ovens, constructed boats,
collected forage, and made other movements indicative of preparations to
commence an attack, first upon the British posts on Staten Island, and
then upon New York. Previous to the passage of the Hudson, Washington
had caused deceptive letters to be written and put in the way of being
intercepted, ** all of which deceived Sir Henry Clinton into the belief
that an attack upon New

* This view is from the road, looking north toward the village of
Ramapo. The remains of the intrenchments are seen along the right in the
foreground. On the left, in the distance, is seen a glimpse of the hills
on the other side of the narrow valley.

** One of the bearers of these letters was a young Baptist clergyman,
named Montagnie, an ardent Whig, who was directed by Washington to carry
a dispatch to Morristown. He directed the messenger to cross the river
at King's Ferry, proceed by Haverstraw to the Ramapo Clove, and through
the Pass to Morristown. Montagnie, knowing the Ramapo Pass to be in
possession of the Cow-boys and other friends of the enemy, ventured to
suggest to the commander-in-chief that the upper road would be the
safest. "I shall be taken," he said, "if I go through the Clove." "Your
duty, young man, is not to talk, but to obey!" replied Washington,
sternly, enforcing his words by a vigorous stamp of his foot. Montagnie
proceeded as directed, and, near the Ramapo Pass, was caught. A few days
afterward he was sent to New York, where he was confined in the Sugar
House, one of the famous provost prisons in the city. The day after his
arrival, the contents of the dispatches taken from him were published in
Rivington's Gazette with great parade, for they indicated a plan of an
attack upon the city. The enemy was alarmed thereby, and active
preparations were put in motion for receiving the besiegers. Montagnie
now perceived why he was so positively instructed to go through the
Ramapo Pass, where himself and dispatches were quite sure to be seized.
When they appeared in Rivington's Gazette, the allied armies were far on
their way to the Delaware. Montagnie admired the wisdom of Washington,
but disliked himself to be the victim. Mr. Pierson, from whom I obtained
the narrative, received it from the lips of Montagnie himself. Upon this
incident Mrs. Elizabeth Oakes Smith (who also received the narrative
from Mr. P.) founded her interesting prize tale called the Ramapo Pass.
She also mentions it in her introduction to The Salamander.

The "Hopper House."--Patriotism of the Owner.--Interesting Relics.--
Burr's Head-quarters.

782York city was the grand object of the Americans. The allied armies
had crossed the Delaware, and were far on their way toward the head of
Elk, before the British commander was fully aware of their destination.

About four miles south of the Ramapo Pass, and three from Suffern's
Station, on the road to Morristown, is the "Hopper House," where
Washington made his head-quarters from the 2d until the 18th of
September, 1780. The mansion was owned by -------- Hopper, one of the
most active Whigs of the day. He was often employed by Washington in the
secret service, and frequently visited his friends in New York city
while the enemy had possession of it. On such occasions, he obtained
much valuable information respecting the strength of the enemy, without
incurring suspicion, as he never committed a word to paper. The remains
of the patriot rest beneath a small marble monument, in a family
cemetery, upon a grassy knoll by the road side, not far from the
mansion.

This is the house wherein those letters of Washington, beginning with
"Head-quarters, Bergen county," were written; it being in New Jersey,
about two miles from the New York line. It was here that he received the
news of the defeat of Gates at the disastrous battle near Camden, on the
16th of August, 1780; and from hence he set out on his journey to
Hartford, on Monday, the 18th of September,1780 to meet the French
officers in council, the time when Arnold attempted to surrender West
Point into the hands of the enemy. The venerable widow of Mr. Hopper
resided there until her death in 1849, when she had reached the ninety-
ninth year of her life. Her daughter, who was often dandled on the knee
of Washington, is still living, but was absent on the day of my visit,
and I was denied the gratification of viewing those relics of the
Revolution which are preserved in the house with much care. **

Close by Suffern's Station is an old building coeval with the original
Hopper house. It was the head-quarters of Lieutenant-colonel Aaron Burr,
while stationed there in command of Malcolm's regiment in September,
1777. It has been sometimes erroneously called the head-quarters of
Washington. While encamped here for the purpose of guarding the Ram-

* This view is from the road, looking northeast. The low part, on the
left, is a portion of the old mansion of the Revolution, which contained
the dining-hall. It was a long stone building. A part of it has been
taken down, and the present more spacious edifice, of brick, was erected
soon after the war.

** Mrs. Smith, in her introduction to The Salamander, makes mention of
the centenarian, and of these relics. "The ancient matron," she says,
"has none of the garrulity of old age; on the contrary, as she adverted
to past scenes, a quiet stateliness grew upon her, in beautiful harmony
with the subject. Rarely will another behold the sight, so pleasing to
ourselves, of five generations, each and all in perfect health and
intelligence, under the same roof-tree. She spoke of this with evident
satisfaction, and of the length of lime her ancestors had been upon the
soil; in truth, we had never felt more sensibly the honorableness of
Gray hairs.......We were shown the bed and furniture, remaining as when
he [Washington] used them, for the room is kept carefully locked, and
only shown as a particular gratification to those interested in all that
concerns the man of men. Here were the dark chintz hangings beneath
which he had slept; the quaint furniture; old walnut cabinets, dark,
massive, and richly carved; a Dutch Bible, mounted with silver, with
clasps and chain of same material, each bearing the stamp of antiquity,
yet all in perfect preservation; largo China bowls; antique mugs;
paintings upon glass of cherished members of the Orange family. These
and other objects of interest remain as at that day."

Colonel Aaron Burr at Sufferns.--Confusion of the Militia.--Night Attack
upon the British Pickets near Hackensack.

783apo Pass, Colonel Burr performed an exploit which was long remembered
in the neighborhood.

He received intelligence that the enemy were in considerable force at
Hackensack, and advancing into the country. Leaving a guard to protect
the camp, Burr marched with the remainder of his effective men to
Paramus, a distance of sixteen miles, in the direction of Hackensack.
They arrived there at sunset, and found the militia of the district
gathered in great confusion in the woods, ordered them to sleep until he
should awaken them, and then went alone to reconnoiter. A little before
daylight he returned, aroused his men, and directed them to follow him,
without speaking a word or firing a gun until ordered, on pain of death.

Having arranged them in order, Burr marched forward with thirty picked
men, and at ten o'clock at night approached the pickets of the enemy.
When within three miles of Hackensack, Burr led his men upon the enemy
before they had time to take up their arms. Leading them unobserved
between the sentinels, until within a few yards of the picket-guard, he
gave the word _Fire!_ His men rushed forward. A few prisoners and some
spoil was carried off by the Americans, without the loss of a man on
their part. Burr sent an order to Paramus by an express for all the
troops to move, and to rally the country. This success inspirited the
militia, and they flocked in great numbers to the standard of Burr. The
enemy, thoroughly frightened, retreated in haste to Paulus's Hook
(Jersey City), leaving behind them a greater portion of the plunder
which they had collected.

We will now leave the Ramapo, and, saying farewell to the Hudson and its
associations, wend our way toward the sunny South.

END OF VOLUME I.

ANALYTICAL INDEX--VOLUME ONE.

Aaron, Little, Mohawk Chief, Notice of, 269.

Abercrombie, Colonel, killed at Hattie of Bunker Hill, 546.

Abercrombie, General James-Expedition to Lake Champlain in 1758, 112;
Investment of Fort Ticondoroga, 118; Biographical Sketch of, 119.

Abraham, Plains of, described-Battle of, 187.

Ackland, Major, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Ackland, Lady Harriet, Courage and Fortitude of, 66, 67.

Acts-Showing despotic Tendency of parliamentary Measures, 156, 157, 506;
Treasonable (apparently), of Vermonters, in 1780, 168; First of
Oppression, 454, 455; Stamp Act, originated by Grenville, and passed by
Parliament in 1765, 463; Repealed in 1766, 472; Oppressive, 474; Quebec
Act, passed in 1774, 505; Obnoxious to Americans prior to Revolution,
Titles of, 518.

Adams, John, defends Captain Preston, 491; Appointed on Committee to
draught Commission of and Instructions for Washington, 563.

Adams, Major, Notice of, 327.

Adams, Samuel, biographical Sketch of (see Biography of Signers of
Declaration of Independence, Appendix)-Boldness ef, 477; Apprised of
expected Arrival of British Troops at Lexington, 522; Retires to Woburn
for Safety, 523.

Address, Tory, 250.

Addressors to Hutchinson, Recantation of, 512.

Agent, Secret, sent to Canada in 1774, 122; Sent to America in 1761,
459.

Agnew, General, Expedition to Danbury, 402.

Agreements, Non-importation.470, 484, 488.

Albany, early History of,30 Described by Kalm in 1749, 301; Incorporated
a City in 1686, 302; Seat of Power during the Revolution-Mansion of
General Schuyler-Head quarters for Officers in 1777, 304.

Aldeu, Colonel Ichabod, at Battle of Cherry Valley, 268.

Allen. Colonel Ethan, Expedition to Ticonderoga, 123; Interview with
Delaplace-His Order to surrender obeyed-Trouble with Arnold about
Command, 125; Expedition against St.John's-Preparations to oppose
Carleton on Lake Champlain in 1775, 154; Letters to Congress relative,
to Difficulties in Vermont, 168; Proposed Attack on Montreal, 179;
Biographical Sketch of-Captured at Montreal-Brutal Treatment of, by
Prescott, 180; At Wyoming in 1787, 375; Anecdote of 508.

Allen, Family, Massacre of, 100.

Allen, Ira, biographical Sketch of, 161.

Allen, Reverend Mr., bellicose Ardor of 396.

Almanac, Bickerstaff's, Explanation of Frontispiece of, 486.

Alsop, John, Delegate to first Continental Congress, 383.

America, early Notions concerning, by Europeans,19 Discovery of, by
Columbus,25 Origin of the Name, 29.

Amerigo Vespucci, Voyages of to America; Biographical Sketch of,28
Publishes the first Account of Discoveries of America, 29.

Ancram, Major, Speech of, at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 248.

Anderson, Dr. Alexander, Notice of, 513.

Anderson, Senior, Quotation from, 513.

Andross, Sir Edmund, first Governor General of Connecticut-Demanded and
refused Charter-Tyranny of-Proceeds to Hartford with Soldiers-Charter
placed before him, 434; Arrested and sent to England for Trial, 435,
451; Arrives at Boston with Title of Governor General, empowered to take
away Charters from Colonies-Flees from the Fort, 451.

Andrustown, Destruction of, 255.

Anecdote of Sir William Johnson and Mohawk Sachem, 106; Colonel Stone
and Mr. Forman, 229; Colonel Harper and Indian Peter, 237; Sir William
Johnson and Servant Girl.287 Dutch Magistrate and Yankee Peddler, 292;
Colonel Hamilton and Judge Ford when a Boy, 315; Timothy Meeker and
Standing Army, 325; Old Indian at Wind Gap, Pennsylvania, 338; Colonel
Dyer in Satire of " Lawyers and Bull-frogs,"347 Mrs. Finch at Forty
Fort, 362; Dutchman and Hay Rake at Rondout, 390; Of Battle nf
Bennington, 398; Hamilton and Holcomb in Expedition to Danbury, 403;
Arnold and Coon, a Tory, 409; Gotfe and Fencing Master, 419; George
Grenville christened-'Gentle Shepherd," 462: James Otis, Jun" and Clerk
with Water-pot, 493; Admiral Montague and Pitts, 499; Ethan Allen and
James Rivington, 508; Yankee Doodle and Chevy Chase.528 Colonel Prescott
at Battle of Bunker Hill, 541; General Putnam after Battle of Bunker
Hill 547;

Angell, Colonel, at Battle of Springfield, 323.

Anstruther, Colonel, at Battle of Stillwater, 55

Anti-rentism in New York, 391.

Arbuthnot, Admiral, off Block Island in 1781, 436.

Arkansas explored by De Soto in 1540, 31.

Armstrong, Colonel John, Expedition to Wyoming, 373.

Army, British, relative Position of, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,51
Condition of, after Battle of Stillwater,57 Melancholy Condition of,
after second Battle of Stillwater,73 Deserters from, at Stillwater,75
Humiliating Review of, at Saratoga,81 Royal Highland Regiment of Quebec,
how Raised, 159: Takes Fort Ontario in 1758, 219; Condition of, after
Battle of Bnnker Hill, 571.

Army, Continental, Condition of, under Schuyler,39 Position at Cohoes in
1771,41 Condition of, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,47 Condition of,
after Battle of Stillwater,57 Attacked by Indians at Moses's Creek, 101;
Condition of, in 1775, 127; Re-enforcements for the Lake Posts in 1775,
155; At Point Levi, in Canada, 195; Small-pox in, at Quebec, 202; Small-
pox in, at Morristown and Hudson Highlands-Encampment of, at Morristown,
in 1777, 307; Encampment of at same Place in 1779-80, 309; Sufferings
of, from severity of Winter of 1780, 310; Organization of, previous to
Battle of Bunker Hill, 536; Washington appointed Commander-inChief in
1770, 503; Punishments of, in 1775-Model Order of565 Condition of, near
Boston, at close of 1775, 576.

Arnold, Benedict, Maneuvers of, at Stillwater,52 Testimony of Historians
concerning,55 Varick's Letter concerning-Gates's Treatment of-Rupture
with Gates-Application to join Washington, 56-Bravery of, at Battle of
Stillwater-Wounded,63 Joins Allen at Castleton-Disputes about Rank, 124;
Trouble with Arnold about Command at Ticonderoga, 125; Recommended by
Washington, 136; Expedition against St.John's-Preparations to oppose
General Carleton on Lake Champlain, 154; Place of first Naval Battle-
Wounded at Isle Aux Noix.162 Bravery of, on the Congress Galley, 165;
Formerly a Dealer in Horses, 195; Summons to surrender at Quebec, 196;
Junction with Montgomery, 197; Operations after Montgomery's Death-
Wounded, 199; Promoted at Quebec, 201; Describes the Blackness of the
Character of St. Leger, 251; Return to Stillwater from Siege of Fort
Schuyler, 252; At Expedition to Danbury, 402; At Ridgefield in 1777,
408; Bravery of-Narrow Escape of-Anecdote of, and Tory, Coon, 409;
Presented with a Horse by Congress for valiant Deeds, 410; Residence of,
in New Haven-Patriotism at New Haven, 421; March of his Company to
Cambridge-A Druggist and Bookseller at New Haven, 422; Mrs. Margaret
(first Wife), Grave, Notice of, 429; Mrs. Margaret (second Wife), Notice
of, 430; Associates with Tories in Philadelphia-Disaffection, 430;
Attempts to surrender West Point in absence of Washington, 435.

Assembly, Rhode Island, authorize Army of Observation previous to Battle
of Bunker Hill, 536.

Associations, Non-importation, in Boston in 1765, 469, 481.

Atlantis, Plato's Account of, 19.

Atyataronghta, Colonel Louis, at Battle of Klock's Field, 281.

Austin, Reverend David, plants Elms at New Haven, 428.

Autograph of Christopher Columbus,18 Philip Schuyler, 38 > Burgoyne and
Gates,79 Silas Deane,85 Isaac Rice, 122; Arthur St. Clair, 132; Ethan
Allen, 180; Richard Montgomery, 200; Amherst, 213; Catharine Cochran,
223; Sir John Johnson, 232; Peter Gansevoort, 240; Colonel Marinus
Willed244 Joseph Brant-Teyendagages, or Little Hendrick-Kanadagea, or
Hans-Great Hendrick-Daniel, 256; Walter Butler, 270; John Sullivan, 272;
John Butler, 285; John Johnson, 286; Jacob Dievendorff, 293; Governor
William Livingston.330 Colonel Zebulon Butler, 355; Colonel Timothy
Pickering, 374; John Stark, 394; Joel Barlow, 405; Joseph Dibble, 406;
David Wooster, 408; David Humphreys, 429; Nathan B431; Pilgrim Fathers,
438; Elisha Hutchinson-Timothy Thornton, 452; Thomas Hutchinson, 468;
John Dickinson, 476; James Otis, 492: David Kinnison, 499; G. R. T.
Hewes, 501; Samuel Adams, 510; Colonel James Barrett, 525; Joseph
Warren, 548; Jonathan Harrington. 554-, Baroness Reidesel, 558; Cotton
Mather, 562; General Gage, 573.

Aztecs, Notice of, 10.

Bailey, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Bailey, Quotation from, 519.

Baker. Amos, Notice of, 554.

Balcarras, Earl of, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Barber, Colonel Francis, biographical Sketch of, 324.

Barlow, Joel, biographical Sketch of-Quotation from, 404.

Barras, Count, prevented from meeting Washington at Wethersfield, 436.

Barré, Colonel Isaac, biographical Sketch of, 463; Predictions of Result
of Stamp Act-Warnings to the People, 483.

Barrett, Colonel James, at Battle of Lexington-Biographical Sketch of,
525.

Barrett, Major James, Connection with Revolution, 551.

Batteries, American floating, 575,

Battle ground of Bemis's Heights, 45, 46,47 Stillwater,53 Saratoga,
77,80 Bloody Run,94 Sabbath-day Point-Lake George and Lake Champlain,
115; Ticonderoga, 118, 127; Near Fort Anne, 141; Hubbardton, 144.146
Site of Arnold's Naval Battle, Lake Champlain, 162, 163, 164; Plains of
Abraham, 187; Near Fort Schuyler, 240, 249; Oriskany, 245; Springfield,
322; Monocasy Island, 356; Van Schaick's Mills, 3111; Bennington, 395,
396; Ridgefield, 409; West Bridge and Milford Hill,423; Lexington, 524;
Concord, 526, 527; Charlestown and Vicinity, 538; Breed's Hill, 540,
543; Boston and Vicinity, 566; Bunker Hill, 574.

Battle of Bemis's Heights, Saratoga, or Stillwater (First)-Condition of
the Northern Army,47 Reverses of the British in Mohawk Valley-Perplexity
of Burgoyne-Advance of Gates to Stillwater,48 These three Battles
identical,51 Approach of the two Armies-Engagement between Advance
Corps-Maneuvers of Arnold and Fraser,52 Approach of a British
enforcement under Phillips-Battle-ground described-Lull in the Battle,53
Renewal of the Battle-Loss sustained by the two Armies-Number of Troops
engaged,54 Burgoyne's Encampment on West Bank of the Hudson-Poverty of
the American Commissariat,57 Fortifications of the two Camps-Junction of
Lincoln with the Army at Berais's Heights-Relative Position of the
Armies,58 Effect of the Battle on the People-Diminution of Burgoyne's
Army and Increase of Gates's-Condition ot the Enemy, 59.

Second Battle-Hostile Movements of the British-Preparations of the
Americans for second Battle of Stillwater, 60: Bravery of both Annies-
Quick and hold Movements of Morgan-Impetuosity of Arnold,61 General
Fraser killed by Murphy-Censure of Morgan-Panic among the British,62
Bravery of Arnold, 61,63 Wounded-Assault on the German Works,63 Retreat
of the Germans and Close of the Buttle-Preparations of Burgoyne to
Retreat-The Killed and Wounded,64 Burgoyne's Request and Gates's
Generosity,67 Commencement of Burgoyne's Retreat toward Saratoga-
Anticipated by Gates.72 Melancholy Condition of the. British Army-
Gates's Kindness to the Invalids-Burning of Schuyler's Mills and
Mansion,73 Situation of Fellows's Detachment-Conduct of American
Militia-Burgoyne's Attempt to retreat,74 Unsuccessful Stratagem of
Burgoyne-Perilous Situation of two American Brigades-Deserters from the
British Army,75 Retreat of Americans to their Camp-Perplexity of
Burgoyne-A scattered Retreat proposed,76 Relative Position of the two
Camps-Exposed Condition of the British-Burgoyne determines to
surrender,77 His Proposition-Terms proposed by Gates-Terms finally
agreed upon,78 Message to Burgoyne from General Clinton-Disposition of
Burgoyne to withhold his Signature-Laying down of Arms,79 Place where
the British laid down Arms-First personal Meeting of Gates and Burgoyne,
SO; Humiliating Review of the British Prisoners-Burgoyne surrenders his
Sword-Spoils of Victory-Yankee Doodle,81 Relative Condition and Prospect
of the Americans before the Capture of Burgoyne-Effect of that Event,
83. .

Battle of Bennington-Terror and Flight of Indians-Victory of the
Americans-Second Attack.397 Pursuit of the Enemy-Loss-Popularity of
Stark, 398.

Battle of Bunker and Breed's Hills-Disposition of American Troops-
Preparations for blockading Boston, 538; Night March to Battle-ground-
Plan of Fortifications-British Vessels in Harbor, 539; Construction of
Redoubt on Breed's Hill-Discovery of Works by Enemy, 540; Cowardice of
the Tories-British Cross from Boston to Charlestown-Bravery of Prescott,
541; Excitement in Cambridge-Re-enforcements for both Parties-Sufferings
of Provincials, 542; March of British toward Redoubt-Position of
American Troops-Cannonade of Redouht, 543; Ascent of Redoubt by British
Artillery-Silence of Americans-Terrible Volleys from Redouht-Flight of
Enemy, 544; Burning of Charlestown-Second Repulse of British-Re enforced
by Clinton-Ammunition of Americans exhausted, 545; Death of Colonel
Gardner-Third Attack of British-Storming of Redoubt-Death of Warren and
Pitcairn, 546; Confusion of Americans-Efforts of Putnam to rally them-
Cessation of Battle-Loss-Spectators of the Scene, 547; Reflections-
Burgoyne's Opinion of the Conflict, 548-Character of Troops engaged in
Conflict, 550.

Battle of Cherry Valley-Approach of Butler and Brant-Warning to Alden-
Capture of American Scouts, 268; Deduction of the Settlement-Treatment
of Prisoners-Brutality of Butler and Humanity of Brant, 269.

Battle of Conewawah, 274.

Battle near Fort Ann, 138; Ambush of French and Indians-Desperate Fight-
Capture of Putnam, 140; Humanity of his Captor-Preparation for Torture-
Interposition of Molang,

Battle of Fort Keyser, 280.

Battle of Fort Niagara in 1759-Landing of Prideaux, 224; Attack and
Stratagem of the French-The Latter routed by the British-French and
Indians made Prisoners-Indian Tales of Atrocity, 225.

Battle of Fort Stanwix (see Battles of Fort Schuyler and Oriskany), 240.

Battle of Huhbardton,39 Retreat and surrender of Hale-His Excuse-
Censured for Cowardice, 145; Battle-ground described, 144, 146; Defeat
of Americans-Death of Colonel Francis, 146.

Battle of Johnstown in 1781, 290.

Battle of Block's Field, 281.

Battle, Last, in Mohawk Valley, 291.

Battle of Lake George in 1755-Death of Dieskau-Weakness of British
Commanders-The Six Nations-Hendrick's Rebuke, 109.

Battle of Lexington and Concord-Approach of British discovered by
Patriots-Lexington aroused-Midnight March of Enemy, 523; Citizens
alarmed by Bells, Guns, and Drums-Militia called on the Green-Skirmish
ensues-Captain Parker and seven other Patriots killed, 524; People of
Concord in Arms-Assembling of Militia-Town invested by British, 525;
Destruction of Property-Rapid Augmentation of Militia-Preparations for
Battle, 526; Conflict at Concord Bridge-Captain Davis and Abner Hosmer
killed-Patriots victorious-Retreat of Enemy to Village, 527; Colonel
Smith returns to Boston with his Troops-Assaulted on the Way by
Patriots-Many Regulars slain-Skirmish at Hardy's Hill, 528; Skirmish at
West Cambridge and Prospect Hill, 529; General Effect of these
Skirmishes-Names of Officers and Citizens of Not* slain, 530, 553;
Account of this Battle sent to England at first doubted, 531.

Battle of Little Beardstown. 276.

Battle of Muford Hill in 1779-Death of Campbell, 423; Entrance of Enemy
into Now Haven-Dr. Daggett and his Treatment-Landing of Tryon, 424;
Conduct of the. Enemy-People flee to East Rock-Evacuation of the
British, 425.

Battle near Montreal-Capture of Allen-Brutality of Prescott-Harsh
Treatment of Prisoners, 180; Movements of Montgomery-Mutiny in his Camp-
Flight and Capture of Prescott, 181; Return Home of the disaffected,
182.

Battle of Montmorenci-Junction of the English Division-Wolfe
disheartened-Camp broken up, 186.

Battle, Naval, on Lake Champlain, in 1776.163 Escape of the Americans
through the British Line-Chased by the Enemy-Another Battle, 164;
Bravery of Arnold on the Congress Galley-Desperate Resistance-Retreat to
Crown Point-Effect of the Battle, 165.

Battle of New Dorlach, 294.

Battle of Oswego in 1755-Shirley's Preparations at Albany-Montcalm's
approach-Attack on the Works, 218; Surrender of the Forts and Garrison
to Montcalm-His Courtesy-Destruction of the Forts, 219.

Battle of Oswego in 1814-Attack, 220; Result of the Battle-Number killed
and wounded, 221.

Battle of Plattsburgh, Remains of-Incidents, 166.

Battle of Quebec-Ascent of the English-Preparation for Battle, 187;
Bravery and Death of Wolfe-Death of Montcalm, 188; American Army at
Point Levi-Alarm of the Canadians-Passage of the Army, 195; Arnold's
Troops-Expected Aid of Arnold from within the City-His formal Summons to
surrender, 196; Junction of Montgomery and Arnold-Ineffectual Efforts
against the Town-Mutiny in the Camp-Plan of Assault, 197; Montgomery's
approach to Cape Diamond-Opposing Battery-His Attack and Death.198
Arnold's Operations-Wounded Assailants led by Morgan-Severe Fight-
Capture of Dearborn, 199; Loss of Americans at Quebec-Recovery and
Burial of Montgomery's Body-Courtesy of Carleton, 200; Promotion of
Arnold-Blockade of Quebec-Honor to the Memory of Montgomery, 201; Small
pox in the Army-Preparations to Storm Quebec-Arrival and Death of
General Thomas, 201.

Battle of Schoharie-Arrival of Regulars-Escape of Butler-Treachery of
Indian Chief, Great Tree, 267.

Battle of Springfield-Invasion by Knyphausen-Clinton's Designs-Plan of
the Battle, 322; Washington deceived by Clinton-Second Invasion under
Knyphausen-Disposition of opposing Troops-Engagement,.323; Partial
Retreat of Americans-Burning of the Town-Retreat of the Enemy, 324.

Battle of St.John's in 1775-Approach of the Americans, 169, Advance of
Montgomery-Mutiny in American Camp, 170; Attack upon, and surrender of
Fort Chambly-Repulse of Carleton at Longueuil-Surrender of St. John's,
171; The Spoils of Victory, 171, 172; Insubordination in American Camp-
Retreat of Americans out of Canada, 172-Rendezvous of Burgoyne's Army at
St.John's, 173.

Battle of Ticonderoga in 1776-Investment of the Fort by Abercrombie-
Bravery of Lord Howe, 118; Fight with the French-Death of Howe-Attack
and Defeat of the English, 119; Investment by Burgoyne-Material of his
Army-Weakness of the Garrison, 132; Outposts undefended, 133; Council of
War in American Camp-The British on Mount Defiance, 131; Retreat of
Americans to Mount Independence-Im-prudence of Fermoy-Pursuit by the
Enemy, 135; Destruction of American Vessels at Skenesborough-Flight of
Americans toward Fort Ann, 138.

Battle at Wind mill Point in 1838-Preparations for Action-Evacuation of
Ogdensburgh and Prescott-Colonel Worth sent to maintain Neutrality with
United States-The British repulsed-Defeat of the Patriots, 211.

3attle of Wyoming. 1778-Preparations-Forces of the Enemy, 354;
Disposition of the Belligerents for Battle-Speech of Colonel Z. Butler-
Attack, 355; Denison's Orders mistaken-Retreat of Americans-Scene at
Monocasy Island, 356; Escape of Butler and Denison-Cruelties of the
Indians-Scene at Queen Esther's Rock, 357; Cruelties of Queen Esther-
Scenes at Forty Fort-Negotiations for Surrender-Escape of Colonel Z.
Butler, 358; Surrender of the Fort-Conduct of Tories-Bad Faith of
Indians-Treaty, 359; Flight of the People over the Pocono-Incidents of
the Flight-Providential Aid of Mr. Hollenback-Preservation of Papers,

360 ; Picture of the Flight-Bad Faith of Invaders-Story of the Fugitives
published at Poughkeepsie-Errors of History, 361; Departure of Invaders
from the Valley-Indian Cruelties-Arrival of Succor-Butler's Expedition
against Indians, 362; Return of Settlers-Continued Alarm-Murder of
Slocum-Sullivan's Expedition-The Valley a Scene of War, Blood, and
Suffering, 363.

Battles of Fort Schuyler and Oriskany-Appointment of General Gansevoort,
240; Intelligence of Spencer the Spy-Rumored Preparations for Invasion-
Effect on the Whigs-Approach of Johnson and St. Leger, 241; Investiture
of Fort Schuyler-Ingenious Flag-Arrival of St. Leger-His pompous
Manifesto, 242; Siege of Fort Schuyler-Movements of Indians-General
Herkimer and the Militia, 243; Advance to Oriskany-Sortie from Fort
Schuyler under Colonel Willet, 244; Dispersion of Johnson's Camp-Capture
of Stores and other Valuables, 245: Indian Ambush-Surprise of Herkimer
and his Troops-Wounded-His Coolness-Desperate Battle, 246; Intermission
in the Battle-Its Resumption-Unsuccessful Stratagem of Colonel Butler-
Enemy routed-Mutual Losses, 247; Capture of Billenger and Fry-Messengers
sent by St. Leger-Their Threats, Persuasions, and Falsehoods, 248; Reply
of Colonel Willett-St. Leger's written Demand of Surrender-Gansevoort's
Reply, 249; A Tory Address-Continuation of the Siege-Adventure of
Willett and Stockwell-Gansevoort's Resolution, 250; IIon-Yost Schuyler
taken Prisoner-His successful Mission to St. Leger's Camp-Arnold's
Proclamation-Alarm of the Indians.251 Flight of St. Leger's Forces to
Oswego-The Spoils-Amusement of Indians-End of the Siege, 252.

Baume, F" Copy of Dispatch of, 391; Expedition to Bennington-Indian
Allies-Skirmish near Cambridge, 392.

Beacon, on Beacon Hill, Boston, Notice of, 451.

Beauhamois, orders Burnet to desist from erecting Fort at Oswego, 216.

Beaumarchais, biographical Sketch of-Sent to London to confer with Lee.
86.

Becraft, Tory, Castigation of, 278.

Bedell, Colonel, Notice of, 207.

Beers, Mr., Murdered at New Haven by British, 425.

Beers, Nathan, Notice of, 431.

Bemis's Heights, Origin of Name-Topography-View from-Head-quarters of
Revolutionary Officers,45 Localities in Vicinity of-Willard's
Mountain,47 Fortifications-Their present Appearance-Preparations for
Battle, 49.

Benedict. Eli, Expedition to Danbury, 402.

Benjamin, Park, Quotation from, 214.

Bennett, Honorable Ziba, 370.

Bennington, Battle-ground described, 396, 399.

Benson, Egbert, first Attorney General of State of New York, 387.

Bernard, Governor Sir Francis, suspected of encouraging Stamp Act, 466;
Copy of Proclamation to Gentlemen assembled in Faneuil Hall, 480;
Petition for removal of, 483; Departure for England-Biographical Sketch
of. 484.

Betts, Captain Stephen, Skirmish with Tryon's Troops at Grum-mon's Hill
in 1779. 414.

Bettys, Joseph, biographical Notice of, 164.

Big Snake, Notice of. 105.

Bill. Canada, Opposition to. in Parliament, 156; Passed in 1774, 157;
Boston Port, passed in 1774, 504; For destroying New England Fisheries,
passed in 1775-Conciliatory, 520.

Billenger, Colonel, made Prisoner at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 248.

Billings, Captain, Killed, 312.

Biographical Sketch of Abercrombie, General James, 119; Adams, Samuel
(.see Biography of Signers of Declaration of Independence, Appendix)-
Allen, Colonel Ethan, 180; Allen, Ira, 161; Barré, Colonel Isaac, 463;
Barrett, Colonel James, 525; Bernard, Governor, 484; Bettys, Joseph,
164; Bradford, William, 444; Bradstreet, Colonel, 215; Brainerd,
Reverend David, 336; Breut, Joseph, 256; Brown, Colonel, 280; Bur-goyne,
General,37 Burke. Edmund, 503; Butler, Colonel John, 285; Butler,
Colonel Zebulon, 355; Caldwell, Reverend James, 326; Clinton. Charles,
255; Clinton, General, 272; Cochran, Dr..221 Columbus, Christopher,18
Dayton, Colonel Elias, 323; Dean, James, 273; Denison, Colonel Nathan,

361 ; Dickinson, John, 476; Dickenson, Reverend Jonathan, 326; Durkee,
Colonel, 345; Francis, Colonel, 324; Gage, General Thomas, 573;
Gansevoort, Colonel Peter, 240; George 111., 457; Gibbon. Edward.519
Grafton, Duke of, 482; Grenville, George, 460* Gridley, Colonel Richard,
546; Hancock, John (see Biography of Signers of Declaration of
Independence, Appendix)-Hand, General, 274; Hewes, G. R. T., 502; Howe,
Loid, 119; Hull, Major,55; Humphreys, Colonel.429 Hutchinson, Governor,
467; Isabella of Castile and Leon,22 Jenner, Edward.307 J-n. Mrs.,88
Johnson, John, 285; Johnson, Sir William, 232, 287; Kinnison, David,
500; Kirkland, Samuel, 234; Knyphausen, General Baron, 321; Kosciuszko,
Thaddeus,48 Langdon, Governor, 393; Lee. Ann, 383; Livingston,
Governor.330 Livingston, Colonel Henry A., 385; Minor, Charles, 240:
Montcalm, Marquis De, 188; Montgomery, Richard, 200; Montour, Catharine
(Queen Esther), 357; Munson, Dr., 308; Murphy, Timothy,62 Nixon,
General,76 North, Lord, 483; Oliver, Judge, 506; Otis, James, 493;
Pickering, Colonel Timothy, 374; Prescott, Colonel William, 539; Queen
Esther (Catharine Montour), 357; Quincy, Josiah, 498; Rogers, Major,
116; St. Clair, General Arthur, 132; St.Veran, Joseph De, 188; Smith,
Adam, 517; Spencer, General Joseph, 566; Standish, Miles, 445; Stark,
John, 394; Sullivan, General, 272; Thomas, General.202 Trumbull, John,
401; Ward, Artemas, 190; Warner, Colonel Seth, 153; Warren, Dr. Joseph,
548; Warren, James, 494; Warren, Mrs. Mercy, 464; Whitefield, Reverend
George, 336; Wilkes, John, 520; Willett, Colonel, 244; Winslow, Edward,
445; Wolfe, General, 188; Wooster, General, 408; Yest, Francois, 175;
Zinzendorf, Count, 342.

Bishop, Caricature of attempt to Land in America, 459.

Bloody Pond, 107.

Bloody Run, Tragedy of, 94.

Board of Trade and Plantations in 1696, 453.

Bokum, Professor, Quotation from, 299.

Bolingbroke, Lord, elopes to America with German Girl, 329

Bombardment of American Works by British from Bunker Hill in 1775, 571.

Boscawen, Admiral, sails from Halifax in 1758, 119.

Boston, Origin and Names of, 445; Settlement of, 446; Firs* Forts in-
Erection of monumental Column on Beacon Hill, 451; First open Resistance
resolved upon against the Crown, 459; Arrival of Stamps in 1765-Riot-
Effigies burned, 466, 469; Destruction ot Liberty Tree and other
Property

467 ; Attack on Hutchiuson's House-Character of Rioters,

468 ; Proceedings relative to Stamp Act-Non importation Associations
formed, 469; Rejoicings on Repeal of Stamp Act-Release of Prisoners for
Debt-Pyramid on the Common-Liberality of Hancock, 473; Province House,
474; Confinement of Tide waiter, Kirke-Seizure of Sloop Liberty-
Excitement of the People-Public Meeting called at Faneuil Hall, 478;
Convention proposed, 479; Convention held in Faneuil Hall-Arrival of
British Troops, 480; Military Display-Exasperation of the People-Non-
importation Associations formed, 481; Daughters of Liberty hold Meeting-
Arrival of General Gage-Dissolution of Assemblies, 483; Bickerstaffs
Almanack, 486; Assault on Mr. Otis, 487; Patriotism of Women and Boys,
488; Murder of Boy Snyder-Pardon ot the Murderer-Riot, 489; Attack of
Mob on the Soldiers-Attucks, Gray, and Caldwell shot, 490; Intense
Excitement-Old South Church-Delegation of Patriots before the Governor-
Removal of Troops-Trial of Captain Preston, 491; Soldiers defended by
John Adams and Quincy-Result of the Trial, 492; Patriots in 1770-
Hutchiuson made Governor-Asserted Independence of Assemblies, 493;
Preparation for Reception of Tea Ships-Treatment of Consignees-Handbills
and Placards issued, 496; Arrival of Tea Ships-Monster Meeting at Old
South-Speech of Josiah Quincy, 497; Destruction of Tea in the Harbor,
498; Quietude of the Town-Punishment of Smuggler-Names of Members of Tea
Party, 499; Port Bill proposed and adopted, 503; Arrival of General Gage
in 1774-Meeting in Faneuil Hall to consider Port Bill-Excitement of the
People, 507; Boldness of Patriots, 510; Closing of the Port, 511; Courts
of Justice suspended on Eve of Revolution, 512; Topography of, 512, 513,
551, 561, 566, 574; Peaceable Resistance of People on Eve of Revolution-
Spirit of the Press-Names of Boston Newspapers in 1774-Fortification of
the " Neck"-Committee of Correspondence in 1774-Names of, 513; Arrival
of British Troops from the Jerseys, New York, and Quebec-Number of
British Troops stationed at, 521; Arrival of Patriots from all Quarters
after Battle of Lexington-Organization of Troops under General Ward-
Preparations to besiege the City-Neck defended by Colonel Robinson, 534;
Gloomy Prospects of People-All Intercourse with the Country cut off by
Gage-Surrounded by exasperated Patriots-Interview of Gage with the
Select men-His Perfidy.535 Operations in Vicinity of, after Battle of
Lexington, 537; Preparations for Blockading, 538; British Men-of-war at,
after Battle of Lexington, 539; Common, 551; Number of yearly
Passengers, 560; State House-Copp's Hill-Statute of Washington-Mather's
Vault, 561; Belligerent Armies and Skirmishes at-After Battle of Bunker
Hill-Condition of British Troops after Battle of Bunker Hill-Railroads-
Population in 1775, 571; Plan of Relieving-Departure of Women of, with
Spoons and Specie quilted into Garments, 572; Desecration of Old South.
574.

Boudinot, Elias, Tomb of, 326.

Boundary Line established between Canada and United States in 1842, 167.

Bounty offered American Recruits at Morristown, 312.

Boyd, Lieutenant, reconnoitres Beard's Town-Beheaded, 276.

Boys, Patriotism of, in Revolution, 296, 488, 512.

Bradford, William, biographical Sketch of. 444.

Bradstreet, Colonel John, biographical Sketch of-Captures Fort Frontenac
in 1758, 215.

Bragaw, Bergen, Notice of, 333.

Brainerd, Quotation from, 227.

Brainerd, Reverend David, biographical Sketch of, 336.

Brant, Joseph, Interview with General Herkimer at Ogkwaga, near
Susquehanna, 238; Withdraws Warriors from Susquehanna, and joins Butler
and Johnson, 239; Approaches Oneida Lake with Butler, Claus, and
Johnson, 241; At Siege of Fort Schuyler, 244; Destroys German Flats in
1778, 255; Biographical Sketch of, 256; Destroys Springfield, at Head of
Otsego Lake, in 1778, 266; Humanity of-Challenged by M'Kean, 270; In
Western New York, 274; At Battle of Block's Field, 281; Captures Vrooman
at Fort Schuyler, 282; His Hatchet-marks at Johnstown, 286; Attempts to
cut off Settlement of Cherry Valley-Deceived by Boys, 296; Not engaged
in Invasion of Wyoming-Campbell's Injustice toward, 354.

Brant, Molly, Notice of, 287.

Brener, Colonel, wounded at Battle of Bunker Hill, 545.

Breyman, Colonel, at Battle of Bemia's Heights,50 At Battle of
Bennington, 394.

Bricketts at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Bridge, Suspension, over Niagara River, 228.

Brock, General Sir Isaac, Death and Monument of, 226.

Brooks, Major, at Battle of Bemis'a Heights,50 At Battle of Bunker Hill,
539, 541.

Brown, Captain Christian, overpowered at Battle of Schoharie, 267.

Brown, Colonel John, at Battle of Bemis'a Heights,50 Successful
Expedition against British Posts between Lakes George and Champlain,
114; Biographical Sketch of, 280.

Brush, Colonel, at Battle of Bennington, 394.

Bryant, Quotation from, 88, 284.

Buckingham, Quotation from, 228.

Buckley, Mra., Treatment of, by Tryon, 427.

Buckminster, wounded at Battle of Bunker Hill, 545.

Bunker Hill, Topography of, 538, 540,543; Battle of, 543; Names of
British Officers killed at, 545; Monument-Description, Construction, and
Dedication of, 558, 559; Scenery from, 560.

Burgoyne, General, biographical Sketch of-Intrusted with Command of
British Forces,37 Arrives at Quebec-Receives Aid from Sir Guy Carleton-
Congregates Forces at St.John's,38 Victorious from St.John's to Crown
Point-Prepares to besiege Ticonderoga,39 His Force augmented-Advances to
Fort Anne-Reaches Fort Edward,40 Perplexity in Mohawk Valley,48 March to
Saratoga and Stillwater,51 Narrow Escape of,55 Diminution of his Army at
Stillwater,59 Preparations to retreat,64 Retreat toward Saratoga from
Stillwater-Anticipated by Gates,72; Attempts to retreat to Fort
Edward,74 Stratagem unsuccessful,75 Perplexity-Determines to surrender,
77: Proposition,78 Message to Clinton-Disposition to withhold Signature-
British Forces ground their arms,79 Introduction to Gatt,80 Surrender of
Sword at Saratoga,81 Investment of Ticonderoga, 132; Proclamation, 133;
Interview with Indians at Bouquet River, 160; Rendezvous at St.John's,
173; Arrival at Boston after Battle of Lexington, 537; Opinion of Battle
of Bunker Hill, 548.

Burke, Captain, Continental Navy, 576.

Burke, Edmund, in House of Commons in 1776, 471; Picture of Pitt's
Cabinet, 475; Orations in behalf of American Liberty-Biographical Sketch
of, 503; Goldsmith's Epitaph of, 504.

Burnet, Governor, erects Fort at Oswego in 1727, 216; Appointed Chief
Magistrate of Massachusetts in 1728, 454.

Burr, Aaron, with Arnold on his Way to Quebec, 194.

Burr, Thaddeus, and Wife, Notice of, 425.

Bute, Earl of, Influence of, 457; Character of, 458; Resignation of,
468,

Butler, Colonel John, at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 244; Recruits Tory
Refugees on St. Lawrence River, 264; Breaks into Valley of Wyoming in
1778, 267; Residence, of, in Mohawk Valley-Biographical Sketch of, 285;
Detachment of, at Tioga Point in 1778, 352; Headquarters of, at
Wintermoot's Fort, at Wyoming, 1778, 353; Demands Surrender of Forty
Fort, 354.

Butler, Colonel, in Encampment at Morristown, 313.

Butler. Walter N., made Prisoner, 250; Imprisoned at Albany in 1777-
Escapes-Commands Detachment of Rangers in Expedition against Tryon
County In 1778, 267; Marches with Brant toward Cherry Valley, 268;
Character-Slain by Oneidas in 1781, 270; Incursion into Mohawk Valley,
290; Retreat to Canada-Death of, 291.

Butler, Colonel William, takes Post at Schoharie in 1778, 267.

Butler, Colonel Zebulon, sent to destroy Indians at Cayuga Lake, 278;
Notice of, 340, 346, 348; In Expedition to Wyoming in 1775, 348, 362;
Sends Messengers to learn Intentions of Savages, 349; Deceived by Indian
Messenger John-Writes Letter to Roger Sherman, 350; Made Commander-in-
chief at Wyoming in 1778, 353; Escape to Wilkesbarre Fort, 357;

Escape from Wyoming in 1778, 358; Speeeh of-Biographical Sketch of, 355;
Residence and Grave of, 367.

Butterfield, Major, Notice of, 207.

Cabot, John, Voyage to North America,28 True Discoverer of North
America, 29.

Cabot, Sebastian, Explores Coast North of Albemarle Sound,27 Reaches
Shores of Brazil and Rio de la Plata, 28.

Cairn, Scotch Canadian, 209.

Caldwell, Mrs., Murder of, 325; Monument of, at Elizabethtown, 326.

Caldwell, Reverend James, Notice of, 324; Biographical Sketeh of-
Monument of, 326; Murder of-Execution of Murderer-Funeral-Orphan Family
of. 327.

California, ancient Inhabitants of, 16.

Callender, Captain, dismissed from Service for Cowardice-Reinstated by
Washington for Bravery, 550.

Cambridge, attempted Seizure of Arms at, 514; Head-quarters of American
Army after Battle"'of Lexington, 534; Early History of-Washington's
Head-quarters, 555; Washington Elm, 558, 564; Topography of, 566.

Campaign, British, Preparations for, in 1777,36 Instructions of Lord
George Germain, 37.

Campbell, Honorable James S., Notice of Captivity of, 296.

Campbell, Honorable William W., Notice of, 296.

Campbell, Colonel Samuel, directs attention of La Fayette to Forts in
Schoharie Valley, 265.

Campbell, Major, Monument of, near New Haven-Grave of-Death of, 423.

Campbell, Mrs., Captured by Indians, 269.

Campbell, Thomas, Errors in "Gertrude of Wyoming"-Injustice toward
Brant, 354; Quotation from, 354, 307, Allusion to his Poem, 364.

Canada, Inhabitants of, addressed by American Congress-Secret Agent sent
to, 122; Report, 123; Bill for more effectual Provision for Government
introduced into Parliament in 1774-Opposition-Denunciations of Barré,
156; Passage-Effect of Measure in Colonies-Boldness of Orators and
Press, 157; Cessation of French Dominion in, in 1760, 179; Patriots (so
called) of 1837, 210.

Canadians, French, Superstition of, 173; Rural Occupations of, 173, 174.

Canajoharie, Settlement of, invaded by Tories and Indians in 1780, 262;
Female Presence of Mind-Burning of Church-Indians deceived-Tardiness of
Colonel Wemple, 263.

Cape of Good Hope discovered by Vasco de Gama, 26.

Cannon, Mrs., massacred by Indians, 269.

Caravel, Spanish, Description of, 23.

Carcass, defined, 545.

Carey, Mr., makes Cannon of Pepperidge Log, 347.

Carleton, Sir Guy, Governor of Canada,38 Attempts to seduce Bishop of
Quebec, 158; Notice of, 181; Courtesy to Mrs. Montgomery, 200; Kindness
to American Prisoners at Quebec in 1776, 514.

Carleton, Colonel Guy, Spy in Schoharie Valley, 265.

Carolina, North, explored by Verrazzani, 32.

Carolina, South, discovered by D'Aillon, 30.

Cartier, Expedition up the St. Lawrence, 32.

Carver, Governor John, Notice and Death of, 444.

Castle, Genesee, Destruction of, 277.

Catharinestown, Destruction of, 275.

Cauglmawaga, Notice of-Old Church, 233; Burned in 1780, 280; Description
of, 285.

Cave, Indian, Notice of, 105.

Celebration at Chemung on Return of Genesee Valley Expedition in 1779,
278.

Cemetery, at New Haven, 429; Indian, near Plymouth, 443.

Censors, Board of, in Pennsylvania, 373.

Chair, Pilgrim, 438.

Chandler, Mrs. Margaret, Account of Escape of Hancock and Adams from
Lexington, 553.

Chantrey, his Statue of Washington in State House, Boston, 553.

Charles II., Notice of, 434.

Charlotte, Queen of George III.-Character of, 458.

Charlestown, Topography of, 538, 540, 543, 506, 571; Burning of, in
1775, 545.

Charter, Connecticut, Notice of, 439.

Charter Oak, at Hartford, Notice of, 434.

Chastellux, Marquis De, conféra with Washington at Hartford 435.-

Chatham, Earl of, Speech of, in Parliament,84 Receives Earl dom, 475;
Unexpected Appearance in Parliament on Eve of Revolution-Speech on
American Affairs-Conciliatory Proposition, 518.

Cherry Valley, Whig Meeting at, in 1775, 233; Battle of, 268 269, Notice
of-Residence of Judge Campbell, 296; Description of, 297.

Chimney Point, Lake Champlain, first settled by French in 1731, 150.

Christie, Colonel, Notice of, 226.

Church, Dr. Benjamin, appointed Surgeon of Army Hospital in 1775-
Imprisoned for Treason-Banished from the Country-First Traitor to
American Cause, 568.

Church, Old Caughnawaga.233 Old South, Boston-Described-Headquarters of
British Soldiers in Revolution, 490; Desecrated by British Troop». 574.

Cilley at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Circular Letter of Massachusetts in 1765, 464; Of Lord Hillsborough,
484.

Clark, Willis Gaylord, Quotation from, 418, 548.

Clarke, Sir Francis, Death of, 63.

Classic Localities, 34.

Claus, Colonel Daniel, Notice of-In Command of Indians at Oswego, 241,
287.

Clergymen, Action of, 512; Congregational, preach Liberty in
Massachusetts, 521.

Clinton, General Sir Henry, sends Message to Burgoyne at Saratoga,79
Sails for Charleston in 1779, 309; Arrival of, from the South in 1780-
Designs on Washington at Short Hills, 322; Operations in New Jersey in
1778, 332; Sends marauding Expedition up Hudson River in 1777, 388;
Arrives at Boston after Battle of Lexington, 537; At Battle of Bunker
Hill, 545; Advises Attack on Cambridge, 547.

Clinton, Governor George, Expedition to Tryon County, 280; Pursues Sir
John Johnson to Ticonderoga, 290; President of New York State Convention
in 1788, 384; First Governor of State of New York, 387.

Clinton, General Janies, biographical Sketch of-Expedition to Western
New York against Indians in 1779, 272.

Clinton, Charles, biographical Sketch of, 255.

Clinton, De Witt, proposed Monument to, 259.

Clyde, Colonel, Notice of, 262.

Coal Mines at Carbondale, fatal Accident in, in 1846, 377; Exploration
and Description of, 378.

Cochran, Colonel Robert, in Command at Fort Edward,74 Adventures of-
Grave of-Sent to Canada as Spy, 102; In Command, as Major, at Fort
Schuyler, 256.

Cochran, Dr. John, biographical Sketch of, 221.

Cochran, Major, Notice of, 221; Death of, 222.

Cochran, Mrs. C. R., 223.

Code, American Naval, adopted in 1775, 576.

Colburn, Colonel, at Battle of Stillwater, 55.

Colfax, General William, at Morristown, 310.

College, Yale, Notice of, 431; Harvard, endowment of, 555.

Colonies American, State of, just previous to Revolution, 349; Moral
Spectacle of, on Eve of Revolution, 521.

Colonies, New England, Union of.433 Conjunction of New Haven and
Connecticut in 1665-Charter of Connecticut granted by Charles II., 434.

Colonists, American, Affairs of, in 1775, 122; Forbearance of, before
Revolution-Consistent Course of Delegates in Congress-Various Addresses
of second Congress, 126; Military Preparations by Congress-Army of-
Spirit of, 127.

Columbus, Christopher, biographical Sketch of,18 Grounds of Belief in
Existence of America,19 Departure from Palos,23 Mutiny among his Crew,24
Discovery of America,25 Landing in South America-Return to Europe-Honors
conferred on him-Imprisonment-Release-Subsequent Discoveries-Death, 26.

commissioners, Names of, at Convention at Albany in 1754, 303; At
Trenton in 1782, to adjust Difficulties between Connecticut and
Pennsylvania, 371; Appointed by Pennsylvania to investigate Affairs of
Settlers in Wyoming, 371, 375; Of Customs, 475.

Committee, Boston, of Correspondence in 1774-Names of, 513; Of Safety
and Supplies appointed by Massachusetts Provincial Congress, 516; Names
of-Empowered to regulate Movements of gathering Army previous to Battle
of Bunker Hill, 536; Appointed to draught Commission of and Instruction
for Commander-in-chief of the American Army, 563; Of Congress arrive at
Cambridge and confer with Washington respecting future Operations, 575.

Company, Susquehanna, Notice of, 343; Delaware, Notice of-Purchase Lands
of Indians on Delaware River, 344; Establish Democratic Government in
1771, 347.

Compo, Landing of British at, in 1777, 402.

Concord, Skirmish at, in 1775, 190; Provincial Congress meets at, in
1774, 515; Battle-ground of-Topography, 527; Concealment of Stores at-
Monument-Village of, 552; Celebration at, in 1850, 554.

Congress, Continental, Factions in,42 Ratification of agreement with
British Government for return of Burgoyne,82 Secret Committee of, for
obtaining Aid from France after Battle of Saratoga,86 Address to People
of Canada, 122; Holds Session at Baltimore in 1777, 307; Issues Bills,
317, 318; First authorizes Coinage of Money, 318; Adopts Resolutions
urging Pennsylvania and Connecticut to cease Hostilities in 1775-
Resolutions unheeded, 348; Recommends Committees of Vigilance in 1775-
Resolutions of, in 1778, to raise Soldiers in Westmoreland, 352;
Censures Stark for Insubordination, 394; Promotes him for valiant Deeds,
398; Adopts Resolution to erect Monument in Memory of General Wooster,
406; Action of, concerning brilliant Achievements of Arnold at
Danbury.410 Appointment of Delegates from Massachusetts to, in 1774,
510; Wisdom and Sagacity of, descanted on by Pitt-Orders Monument to be
erected in Memory of General Warren, and that his eldest Son be educated
at Expense of United States, in 1775, 550; Establishes Postoffice System
in 1775-Also, Army Hospital-Adapts Measures to strengthen Army and
organize Civil Government in 1775, 568. '

Congress first Continental, Assembles at Philadelphia in 1774,

126; Address of, to People of Great Britain, Canada, and Ireland, 157.

Congress, second Continental, Assembles at Philadelphia in 1775, 125;
Consistent Course of Delegates-Various Addresses, 126; Military
Preparations, 127; Tardiness in supplying Men and Munitions, 133;
Suspends St. Clair-Appoints Gates to succeed Schuyler, 136; Sends
Committee of Inquiry to Lake Champlain in 1775,155; Appoints Washington
Commander-in-chief of American Forces in 1775, 190; Message of, to
Shawnees to secure Neutrality in 1778, 264; Directs Washington to attack
Enemy, 573.

Congress, General, proposed in Massachusetts in 1774, 509.

Congress, Provincial, of New York, changes Name to "Convention of
Representatives of State of New York" in 1776-Assembles at White Plains
in 1776-Approves Declaration of Independence, 386.

Congress, Provincial, of Massachusetts, assembles at Concord in 1774,
515; Votes to enroll twelve Thousand Minute-men in 1774-Invites
Connecticut and Rhode Island to follow Example, 516; Orders purchase of
Ammunition and Stores, 521; Assembles at Watertown in 1775, 531; Votes
to increase American Forces-Issues Circular Letter to Committees of
Safety of Province, 533; Issues Paper Money-Resolves that Gage is
unqualified to longer serve as Governor, &e., 534; Benevolence of, 536;
Passes Law prohibiting Waste of Gun powder for Sporting, 570.

Congress Stamp Act, 1765, 522.

Connecticut, Assembly of, proposes to adjust Difficulties with
Pennsylvania in 1771, and sends Colonel Dyer as Agent to England, 347;
First Meeting-house in-First Court held in-First Government organized-
Criminal Code based on Jewish Laws, 433; Conjunction with New Haven-
Charter of, granted by Charles IL-Charter of, annulled by James 11. in
1685-Sir Edmund Andross appointed first Governor General-Demands and is
refused Charter-Charter laid before him-Seized and concealed in Oak Tree
by Wadsworth, 434; Charter still in full Force in Opinion of Jurists,
435; Historical Society, Notice of-Relics in Collection of, 437, 438,
439; Assembly appoints Military Officers in 1775,522; Assembly votes to
raise six Regiments previous to Battle of Bunker Hill, 536.

Connecticut Farms, burning of, 322.

Constitution, Federal, similar Plan of, proposed by Franklin, Coxe, and
Penn, 303; Conventions relative to Adoption of, 382,384; Vindicated by
Jay, Hamilton, and Madison in " Federalist,"384 Names of Committee for
draughting and reporting, 386."Constitutional Courant," Head-piece of,
curious Device, 468, 508.

Convention at Saratoga for Release of Burgoyne, 82.

Convention, Colonial, at Albany in 1754, for renewal of Treaties with
Six Nations-Names of Delegates of, 303; At Hartford in 1779, 321; At New
York in 1765-Adopts Declaration of Rights-Petition to King and Memorial
to Parliament, 465.

Convention, New York State, held at Poughkeepsie in 1788, 382, 383, 384;
Of Representatives of State of New York at White Plains, Harlaam,
Fishkill, and Kingston, in 1777, 387.

Convention held in Boston in 1768, 480; At Boston in 1774, resolve that
no Obedience is due to late Acts of Parliament, 514.

Cook at Battle of Stillwater, 51.

Cook, Colonel, at Expedition to Danbury, 403.

Coon, Tory, Anecdote of, and Benedict Arnold, 409.

Cornelius, Lewis, Dimensions and Weight of, 380.

Corn Planter, Seneca Chief, Address to President at Philadelphia in
1792-Early Temperance Lecturer.277 Supplanted by Red Jacket-On Incursion
into Schoharie County, 279.

Cortereal. Gaspar, Voyage of, to North America-Kidnaps and sells Indians
to Portuguese as Slaves, 29.

Cortez, Fernando, 30.

Colton, Reverend John, Compliments to, 446.

Council of Six Nations of Indians in Genesee Valley in 1779, 276; Of
Indians at Albany in 1754,303; Of Indians at Easton with provincial
Governors in 1758, 336, 344; At Fort Stanwix in 1768, 344.

Council of War at Forty Fort in 1778, 353; At Boston after Battle of
Lexington-Names of Officers, 534; Summoned by Gage on Morning of Battle
of Bunker Hill, 540; Called by Washington at Cambridge, 1775, 565, 573.

Courts-martial of Schuyler and St. Clair, 136; General Enos, 192.

Courts of Vice Admiralty established throughout Colonies in 1696, 453.

Cow Boys and Skinners, Notice of, 502.

Cowper, Quotation from, 336.

Cox, Colonel, at Unadilla, 238; At Siege of Fort Schuyler, 243; Killed,
246.

Coxe, Daniel, Letter of, to Joseph Galloway, 320.

Cradles of Liberty, May Flower, 440; Faneuil Hall, 479.

Crane, General, Tomb of. 326.

Crown Point, Capture of, in 1758, 120; Captured by Green Mountain Boys
in 1775, 153.

Cruisers, American, fitted out in 1775, 569.

Currytown, Attack on, by Doxstader-Captives, 294.

Cushing, Thomas, Chairman of Convention in Boston in 1768, 479.

Cushman, Reverend Robert, Notice of, 433.

Cuyler, Colonel, at Battle of Klock's Field, 281.

Daggett, Reverend Dr. Naphthali, biographical Sketch of-Inhumanly
treated by the British at New Haven, 424.

Dana, Anderson, Notice of 360.

Dana, Richard H., Quotation from, 360.

Danbury, Connecticut, Washington's Army at, in 1778, 33^; Original
Proprietors of, 400; Tryon's Expedition to, in 1777, 401; Burned by
British in 1777, 404.

Dartmouth, Lord, placed at Head of Board of Trade in 1772, 495; Card of
531.

Davenport, Reverend Mr., Notice of, 419.

Davis, Captain, at Battle of Springfield in 1780, 324.

Davis, Captain Isaac, at Battle of Concord in 1775, 525.

Dawes, Honorable Thomas, Quotation from, 493.

Dayton, Colonel S., at Fort Stanwix, 236.

Dayton, Colonel Elias, at Battle of Springfield-Biographical Sketch
of323 Tomb of, 326.

Dean, James, biographical Sketch of 273.

Deane, Silas, biographical Sketch of. 85.

Dearborn, Major, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Dearborn, Lieutenant, sent to destroy Indians in 1779, 278.

Debt, National, of England,95 American, Foreign and Domestic, in 1777-
81, 319.

Declaration of Independence-Manner received in Mohawk Valley, 236.

De Gourges, Expedition to Florida-Avenges the Death of Huguenots upon
the Spaniards, 32.

De Grove, H., Notice of, 400.

Delaney, James, President of Convention at Albany in 1754, 303.

Denison, Colonel Nathan, Notice of, 348; Biographical Sketch of, 361.

Derby, Honorable Richard, fits out Vessels to bear Dispatches to Loudon
in 1775, 531.

De Salle at Mouth of Niagara River in 1725, 224.

De Soto, Fernando, Expedition to Florida in 1538,30 Expedition up the
Mississippi in 1540-Death of, 31.

D'Estang, Count, arrives at Sandy Hook with French Fleet in 1778, 331.

Devices on Continental Money, 317; on Newspaper Heads, 507, 508.

De Witt. Levi, Notice of, 290.

Diamond Island, Lake George, 109; A Military Dépôt under Burgoyne, 114.

Dibble, Joseph, Notice of, 406.

Dickenson, John, biographical Sketch of, 476; Honors to, 477; Draws up
Petition to the King, 568.

Dickinson, General, at Battle of Springfield, 323.

Dickinson. Reverend Jonathan, biographical Sketch of, 326.

Dieskau, Death of, 109.

Dievendorff Jacob. Notice of. 293, 295.

Dillenback, Captain, assailed by Johnson's Greens, 248.

Dixwell, Colonel, English Regicide, concealed at New Haven in 1638, 419,
120; Monument of 420.

Dome Island, shelter for Putnam's Men, 114.

Doolittle. Amos, copper-plate Engraver, Notice of, 317

Dorchester Heights, Topography of 560, 566.

Dorrance, Colonel, at Wyoming, 353.

Doty, Mrs. Jane, Recollections of, 333.

Douw, Volkert P., appointed Commissioner by Congress to attend Indian
Council at Johnstown in 1778, 265. "

Doxstader attacks Currytown, 293.

Duane, James, appointed Special Commissioner on Indian Council at
Johnstown, 265; Delegate to first Continental Congress, 383.

Du Bois, Colonel, at Battle of Klock's Field, 281.

Dudley, Governor, Quotation from, 447.

Dunlap, Reverend Mr., Notice of 269.

Dupuys, Sieur, forms Settlements near Syracuse in 1655-Escapes from
hostile Indians to Montreal. 229.

Durkee, Captain Robert, in Command at Wyoming in 1776-At Skirmish on
Millstone River in 1777, 351; Refused Permission to return Home to
Wyoming. 356.

Durkee, Colonel John, biographical Sketch of-At Wyoming Valley, 345.

Dutch, used stamped Paper prior to Stamp Act, 461.

Dwight. Dr. Timothy, Notice of270 Pastor at Greenfield Hill in 1779-His
Poem "Greenfield Hill,"417 His Description of Fairfield, 425.

Dyer, Captain, in Continental Navy, 576.

Dyer, Colonel Eliphalet, sent to England to adjust Difficulties in
Wyoming Valley-Anecdote of, about " Lawyers and Bullfrogs," 347.

East India Company, its Object and Extent, 495.

Easton, Pennsylvania, Notice of, 335.

Edwards, Gilbert, Notice of, 321.

Effigies burned in Boston on Account of Stamp Act, 466, 469.

Elderkin. Jedediah, Notice of, 345; Anecdote of, in " Lawyers and Bull-
frogs," 347.

Elizabeth Port, its Fortification-Ancient Tavern-Wharf, 328.

Elizabethtown, Notice of, 326; Washington's Army at, in 1778, 332.

Elliot, Joseph, Notice of, 358.

Elliot, Tory, 264.

Emerson, Reverend William, Letter of, describing Washington's Camp at
Cambridge in 1775, 567.

Encampment of American Army at Middlebrook and Pluckeinin in 1778, 332.

Encampment of American Army at Morristown in 1777-Spirit and Condition
of Continental Army-Place of Quarters-Free masonry-Inoculation of the
Army, 307; Proclamation of the Brothers Howe-Disappointment of the
People-Washington's Counter Proclamation, 308; Opposition to
Washington's Policy-Ills Independence and Sagacity. 309.

Encampment of American Army at Morristown in 1779-80, 309; Life guard
and their Duties-Pulaski and his Cavalry-Effect of Alarm Guns, 310;
Sufferings and Fortitude of the Army-Secret Expedition of Stirling-
Extreme Cold-Death of Miralles, 311; Mutiny-Excuses for the Movement-
Injustice toward the Soldiers-Policy and Success of Wayne, 312;
Adjustment of Difficulties-Emissaries of Clinton-Patriotism of the
Mutineers-Fate of the Emissaries, 313; Mutiny of the New Jersey Line-
Prompt Action of Washington-Success of Howe, 314.

Encampment of British on Bunker Hill, 530.

Encampment of Hessians near Bennington in 1777, 396.

Encampment of Washington at Cambridge in 1775, 567.

Engravers of the Revolution, Notice of, 317, 421.

Episcopacy designed for America, 459; Opposition to, 460.

Epitaph for Colonel Scammel, 431; Burke-Goldsmith, 504.

Erskine, Sir William, in Expedition to Danbury, 402; In Skirmish at
Compo, 410.

Esopus the Capital of New York in 1777, 388.

Evacuation of New Haven in 1779, 425.

Everett, Honorable Edward, Speech at Concord in 1850, 554.

Ewing, Colonel, Letter of, about Discovery of Frances Slocum, 368.

Expedition, Foraging, under Baume, to Bennington-Instructions from
Burgoyne-Indian Allies-Skirmish near Cambridge, 392; Measure for
defending new Hampshire-Lang-don's Patriotism-Praising of Troops, 393;
Stark's Refusal to accompany Lincoln-Censure of Congress-Result-
Movements to oppose Baume, 394; Preparations for Battle-Disposition of
the British Troops-Errors and Difficulties in Correction.395 Skirmishing
in the Rain-Hessian Encampment-Stark's Promise and Fulfillment, 396.

Expedition to Canada under Arnold in 1775,90 Voyage up the Kennebec-Dead
River-Return of Enos to Cambridge without Orders-His Trial and
Acquittal, 192; Perilous Voyage down tbe Chaudière-Narrow Escape-Timely
Relief lor the Troops, 193; Manifesto of Washington to Arnold-Joined by
Indians Natanis and Sabatis-Arrival at Point Levi-Incidents of the
March, 194. >

Expedition to Currytown, under Captain Gross, in 1781-Battle at New
Dorlach, 294; Death of Captain M'Kim-Prisoners, 295.

Expedition of Governor Tryon to Danbury in 1777-Object-Landing of the
British at Compo-Rising of the Militia-Character of the People, 402;
March of British into Danbury-Head-quarters of Officers, 403; Imprudence
of some Citizens-Retaliation of British-Burning of the Village, 404;
Estimated Damage, 405; British attacked by Wooster-Return Fire-Death of
Wooster-Approach of Arnold.408 Barricade at Ridgefield-Bravery of
Arnold-Narrow Escape-March to Compo, 409; Skirmish with Erskine-
Connecticut Militia-Action of Congress concerning Arnold, 410.

Expedition to Easton against Six Nations in 1779, under Sullivan, 336.

Expedition against German Flats in 1778, 225.

Expedition, marauding, up the Hudson, sent by Sir Henry Clinton, in
1777-Landing at Kingston, Rhinebeck Flats, and other Places-Burning
Houses-Destruction of other Property, 388.

Expedition to Horseneck Landing in 1779, under Tryon-Skirmish at
Greenwich between British advance Guards and Putnam's Scouts-Defeat of
Americans-Escape of Putnam-Tryon plunders the Inhabitants, and retreats
to Rye and King's Bridge, 412.

Expedition against Indians in Western New York in 1779, under Sullivan,
272; Capture and Execution of Hare and Newberry-Information from General
Schuyler-Damming Otsego Lake-Its Effects, 273; March of Sullivan's
Forces-Fortifications of the Enemy-Battle, 274; Effect of the Artillery-
Retreat of the Enemy-Destruction of Catherinestown and other Villages
and Plantations, 275; Approach to Genesee-Council of Indian Villages-
Battle-Capture and Torture of Lieutenant Boyd.276 Destruction of Genesee
and surrounding Country-Picture of the Desolation-Washington receives
the Name of Anna ta kau-lcs (Town Destroyer), 277; Return of invading
Army-Arrival at Wyoming-Oneidas driven from Home, 278.

Expedition against Indians in the Ohio Valley, under M'Intosh in 1778,
264.

Expedition against Indians in Onondaga Valley in 1779, under General
Clinton-Destruction of Towns, 270; Alarm of the Oneidas, 271.

Expedition against the Five Nations of Indians in 1696, under Frontenac,
216.

Expedition against Indians at Oswegatchie in 1779, under Clinton-Attack
on Cobelskill-Scalping Parties, 271.

Expedition against Indians in Wyoming Valley in 1778, under Butler, 362.

Expedition against Indians in Wyoming Valley in 1779, under Sullivan,
363. .

Expedition to Lexington and Concord under Colonel Smith and Major
Pitcairn-Lexington in Arms-Midnight March of British, 523; Approach to
Lexington-Citizens alarmed by Bells, Guns, and Drums-Militia called to
the Green-Skirmish-Eight Patriots killed, 524; Patriots disperse-People
of Concord aroused-Assembling of Militia-Town invested by British, 525;
Destruction of Property-Rapid Augmentation of Militia-Preparations for
Action, 526; Battle at Concord Bridge-Retreat of British to Village-
Scalping Story explained, 527; Retreat of Enemy from Concord-Annoyance
on Road by Militia, 528; Junction of Troops of Percy and Smith-Retreat
to Charlestown-Skirmishes at West Cambridge and Prospect Hill, 529.

Expedition against Montreal, under Winthrop, in 1689-Failure, 451.

Expedition, Naval, off Sandy Hook in 1776, under Dayton and Alexander,
328; Capture of British Provision Ship. 329. Expedition, Naval, against
Niagara in 1755, under Governor Shirley, 217.

Expedition to New Haven, under Tryon, in 1779-Landing of Troops, 422;
Alarm-Bravery of Militia-Battle on Milford Hill-Death of Campbell, 423;
Entrance of Enemy-Treatment of Dr. Daggett-Landing of Tryon, 424;
Conduct of Enemy-People on East Rock-Evacuation by British, 425.
Expedition against New York, under Washington, in 1781-Conference with
the French at Wethersfield-Plans of Procedure-Junction of Armies near
Dobb's Ferry-Ineffectual Attempts upon New York-Enterprise abandoned-
Washington and Forces proceed to Yorktown, 436.

Expedition, marauding, to Norwalk, under Tryon, in 1779-Destruction of
the Village-Conduct of Tryon, 414. Expedition to Staten Island in 1780,
under Lord Stirling, 311. Expedition to Ticonderoga in pursuit of
Johnson in 1781, under Clinton and Van Schaick, 290.

Expedition to Tryon County in 1780, under Clinton and Van Rensselaer-
Dispatch of Orders to Colonel Brown, at Fort Paris-Engagement at Fort
Keyser-Death of Brown, 280; Pursuit of Johnson by Van Rensselaer-
Inaction of the latter-Battle of Klock's Field-Capture of Tories, 281;
Pursuit of Johnson and Brant-Conduct of Van Rensselaer-Capture of
Vrooman and his Party-Threatened Invasion, 282; Gloomy Prospect in the
Mohawk Country-Patriotism of Colonel Willett-His Command of Tryon
Militia, 283. Expedition to Wyoming Valley in 1775. under Plunket-
Repulsed by the Yankees-Council of War-Enterprise abandoned, 348.

Expedition to Wyoming in 1784, under Armstrong, 373. Expenditures of
British Government on Account of America prior to Revolution, 456.

Fairfield-Origin of Name, 416; Described by Dr. Dwight-Destruction of,
425; Tryon's Apology-Extent of Destruction, 426; Treatment of Mrs.
Buckley-Interference of General Silliman-Humphrey's Elegy on Burning of,
427; Tryon's Retreat to Huntington, Long Island, 428.

Falls, Cohoes',described,35 Montmorenci, 203; St. Ann's Rapids, in River
St. Lawrence, described, 206; Cedar Rapids, 207; Niagara, 227.

Fanaticism in New England. 449. _

Faneuil Hall described-Burned in 1761-Enlarged in 1805, 479; Meeting
held in, to consider Port Bill in 1774, 507. Faneuil, Peter, Founder of
Faneuil Hall, 1479.

Farrar, Captain Jonathan, at Battle of Lexington, 525.

Febiger, Adjutant Christian, at Battle of Bunker Hill, 546."Federalist,"
Notice of, 384.

Fellows, General, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,50 Situation of his
Detachment, 74. _

Fermoy. Gen. De, Imprudence of, at Mount Independence, 135. Feu de Joie.
Toast at. in Sullivan's Army, 270.

Finances of Revolutionary Government-Emission of Bills of Credit, 316;
Continental paper Money-Form of Bills-Devices and Mottoes, 317; New
emissions of Bills-Counterfeits issued by Topics-First coined Money,
318; Depreciation of paper Money-Confusion in Trade-Foreign and domestic
Debt-Value of Bills in Specie, 319; Laws passed making paper Money legal
Tender-Washington's Deprecation of the. Law-Its large Issues encourage
Tories, 320; General Greene charged with enriching himself at public
Expense-Excitement throughout the Country-Riot at Philadelphia-
Convention at Hartford, 321.

Finch, Mr., Prisoner at Wyoming, 361.

Fish, Jabez. Notice of, 360.

Fisheries. New England, Bill for Destroying, 520.

Fitch, Governor Thomas, Notice of, 414.

Flag, American, Devices of, 192; ingenious, 242; American, wanted by
Indians for Decoy.350 Pine Tree, described, 570, 576; Continental
Marine. 576.

Fleet, Formation of. on Lake Champlain, 163; British, Arrives oft' Sandy
Hook in 1778, 331: Of Admiral Howe returns from Newport to New York in
1778, 332; British, arrive off Norwalk Islands in 1777, 402; French,
blockaded in Narragansett Bay by British.435 British, off Block Island
in 1781, 436.

Florida discovered by Ponce De Leon,29 Invaded by De Soto, 30.

Flucker, Thomas, Notice of, 515.

Fonda. Major Jolies, Notice of, 280.

Foot, Ezra, Notice of, 407.

Ford, Honorable Gabriel. Notice of, 306, 314, 315.

Ford, Mrs., House of, Head quarters of Washington, Hamilton, and
Tilghman, 310.

Forman, Judge, Anecdote of, 229.

Fortifications at Van Schaick's Island, 36,41 Fort Schuyler or Fort
Stanwix, 38, 231, 237; Mount Hope and Mount Defiance,39 At Haver's
Island.41 At Bemis's Heights,49 At Stillwater,58 Fort Hardy,71 Of
Burgoyne's Camp, Remains of,89 Fort Edward, 93,95 Fort Miller,94 Terms
in, defined,96 Fort William Henry-Fort George, 108; Fort William Henry,
Destruction of-Fort Gage-Fort George, Ruins of.112 Fort Ticonderoga or
Carillon, 115.118; Fort Howe, 115; On Island of Cape Breton, 119; At
Crown Point, 120; At Mount Independence, 133; Fort Ann-Present
Appearance of, 139; Fort St. Frederick, 150; Crown Point Description and
present Appearance of, 151; At Isle Aux Noix-Near Plattsburgh, 166; At
Rouse's Point, 167; At St. John's, 169, 172; At Chambly, 171,174, 289;
At Mouth of Sorel River, 183; At Cape Diamond, near Quebec, 198; At
Cedar Rapids, 207; Fort Wellington, near Wind-mill Point, on the St.
Lawrence, 210; Near Ogdensburgh, 212; Fort Frontenac, on the St.
Lawrence, Captured by Colonel Bradstreet in 1758, 215; At Oswego, 216,
217, 220; Fort Ontario, 217; Fort Niagara, 216, 224; Forts Stanwix,
Newport, and Ball, 231; Fort Johnson, 232; Fort Dayton, on German Flats,
243; Fort Schuyler, Topography of, 249; Destroyed by Fire and Flood in
1781, 252, 282; Fort Herkimer or Fort Dayton, 254; Fort Herkimer,
Topography of, 255; Fort Plain, Plan and Description of, 261; Fort
Clyde-Fort Plank, 262; In Schoharie Valley, 265, 279, 280; In Cherry
Valley, 268; Middle Fort, 279; Lower Fort-Fort Hunter, in Mohawk Valley,
280, 290; Fort Paris, in Stone Arabia, 280; Fort Rensselaer, in Mohawk
Valley, 283; Fort M'Kean, 295; Fort Orange (now Albany), 301; Fort
Nonsense, 306; Fort Lee, 307; Forty Fort and Fort Wintermoot, in Valley
of Wyoming, 340, 351; Fort Durkee, 345; Fort Wyoming, 346; Fort Jenkins,
at Wyoming, 351; Names and Position of all Forts in Wyoming, 353; Forty
Fort, Site of, 365; Fort Dickinson, Wyoming, 373; Fitch's Point, 413:
Fort Hale or Little Fort, on Black Rock, New Haven, 424, 425; Old Forts
in, at Boston, 451; Fort Independence, Boston Harbor, 478; Of Boston
Neck, 513; In Vicinity of Boston after Battle of Lexington, 537, 560,
567, 571; On Breed's Hill, 540: At Boston.574 On Bunker Hill, 539; On
Plowed Hill, 571; At Lechmere Point, 555; At Portsmouth. New Hampshire,
568.

Forty Fort, 358, 365.

Fox, Charles James, first Speech of, in Parliament on Boston Port Bill,
503; Satirizes George III., 519. _ __

France acknowledges Independence of United States in 1778, 87.

Francis, Colonel, killed at Battle of Hubbardton, 146.

Franklin, Dr. Benjamin, Christening of, 114; Matures Plan for Convention
at Albany in 1754, 303; Invents Stove in 1742, Advocates Stamp Act in
Congress at Albany in 1754, 461; Advice to Ingersoll, 466; Republishes
Letters of "Pennsylvania Farmer" in London and Paris, 476; Chosen Agent
for Massachusetts, 493; Publishes Letters of Hutchinson and others in
London, 494; Summoned before Privy Council-Vow on dismissal as Post-
master General, 495; Visits Dissenters in North of England to enlist
them in American Cause, 517; Sends forth Address to People of England
and others, 519; Sails for America, abandoning all Hope of
Reconciliation, 521; Appointed by Congress Post master General in 1775-
Post-office Account-book, 568; Receives Balance due for Services as
Colonial Agent in England-Pays five Hundred Dollars as charitable
Donation for Relief of wounded at Lexington and Concord, and Widows and
Orphans of the killed, 575.

Franklin, Colonel John, invests Wilkesbarre Fort in 1784.372 Drives
Commissioners from Valley of Wyoming-Arrested for Treason, 375;
Discharged, 376.

Fraser, General, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,50 Death of,52 Account of
Death of, by Baroness Reidesel-Place of Death of-Last Request of
granted,65 Burial of-Humanity of Americans toward,66 Burial-place of,
70.

Free-masonry at Morristown, 307.

Freneau. Philip, Quotations from, 37, 43, 533. 537, 571.

Frey, Major, captured at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 248. _ _

Frontenac. Count Louis, Expedition against Five Nations in 1696, 216.

Frost, Captain, at Darien in 1781, 414.

Fulton, Robert, first Steam boat on Hudson-Price of Passage of, 35.

Gage, General Thomas, Notice of, 478, 480, 483; Arrives in Boston in
1774, 507; Becomes a Tyrant in the Eyes of Bostonians.509 Attempts to
seize Arms and Ammunition at Cambridge in 1774, 514; Sends Expedition
against Concord in 1775, 523; Restrictions and Perfidy of, in Boston
after Battle of Lexington.535 Soliloquy of.537 Summons Council of War on
Morning of Battle of Bunker Hill, 540; Burus

Charlestown with Carcass, 545; Recalled to make Explanation to King
George after Battle of Bunker Hill-Biographical Sketch of, 573.

Gall, General, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Gansevoort, Colonel Peter, appointed to Command Fort Schuyler-
Biographical Sketch of, 240; Letters to General Schuyler imploring Aid,
241; In Expedition against Onondagas, 270.

Gardinier, Captain, at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 247.

Gardner, Henry, appointed Receiver General of Massachusetts in 1774,
516.

Gardner, Colonel, at Battle of Bunker Hill-Death of, dramatized, 546.

Garrick's Couplet on Goldsmith, 504.

Garth, General, Notice of, 427, 428.

Gates, General, superseded by Schuyler,38 Withdrawal,39 Supersedes
Schuyler-Arrival at Van Schaick's Island,42 Quarters at Bemis's
Heights,47 Advances to Stillwater,48 Increase of Army at Stillwater,59
Kindness to British Invalids at Stillwater,73 Terms proposed to
Burgoyne,78 Introduction to Burgoyne,80 Awarded Gold Medal,84 Letter to
Burgoyne relative to Massacre of Women and Children, 100; Letter to
Burgoyne in 1777, 389.

Geake, Samuel, Notice of, 2-12.

Genesee Valley, Destruction of, its Towns and Property in 1779, 277.

Genesee River, Notice of, 224.

George II., Death of, announced to his Heir, 457.

George 111., Accession of, 456; Biographical Sketch of, 457; Satirized
by Fox, 519.

Gerard, M., Minister from France, succeeded by Luzerne, 311.

German Flats, Origin of Name, 253; Stone Church at, 254; Expedition
against-Destruction of Settlement by Brant in 1778, 255; Rencounter at,
between Wordsworth and Indians, 298.

Gerrish, Colonel, at Battle of Bunker Hill, 544.

Gerry, Elbridge, at Head of Massachusetts Committee of Supply, 522.

Getman, Captain, at Schell's Bush, 299,

Gibbon, Edward, takes Sides with Americans on Eve of Revolution-
Biographical Sketch of. 519.

Gi-en-gwa-tah, Seneca Chief, at Battle of Wyoming, 354.

Girty, Simon, Tory, 264.

Glen's Falls, Scenery and Incidents of, 105.

Glover at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Gnadenhutten, Destruction of, 343.

Gotfe, General, English Regicide, concealed at New Haven, 419, 420.

Goldsmith, Oliver, Extracts from "Retaliation"-Epitaph for Burke, 504.

Gore, Governor Christopher, wounded in Riot at Boston when Boy, 489.

Gould, Colonel, Death of, 409.

Government, British, caricatured, 158.

Grafton, Duke of, Augustus Henry-Policy of-Biographical Sketch of, 482.

Grasshopper, Field-piece, Notice of, 279.

Grave of M Richardson Stoddard, 148; Ethan Allen, 161; Near Fort
Jenkins, Wyoming, of Victims scalped, 353; Colonel Zebulon Butler, 367;
Huguenots at Kingston, 389; General Wooster-Its Marks obliterated, 406;
Colonel Humphreys at New Haven-Major Campbell, 424; Arnold's Wife, 429;
Vault of Mather Family, 561.

Graves, Admiral, in Command of British Fleet at Battle of Bunker Hill,
540.

Great Tree, Seneca Chief, Treachery of, at Schoharie, 267.

Greene, General, charged with enriching himself at public Expense, 321;
In Command at Springfield in 1700.323 Headquarters near Middlebrook,
with Washington, in 1778, 332; At Bunker Hill, 566.

Greenland and Iceland, mild Climate of, in former Times, 21.

Green Mountain Boys. Regiment of, at Ticonderoga, 155; Captured Crown
Point in 1775, 153.

Greenfield Hill, Notice of, 417.

Gregg, Captain, Adventure of, 252.

Gregg, Colonel, at Battle of Bennington, 394.

Grenville, George, biographical Sketch of-Originator of Stamp Act, 460;
Speech of, 471.

Gridley, Captain Samuel, at Battle of Bunker Hill, 539, 543.

Gridley, Colonel Richard, wounded at Battle of Bunker Hill-Biographical
Sketch of, 546.

Gross, Captain, Expedition to Currytown, 294.

Grummon's Hill described, 415.

Gunn, Abel, Notice of, 384.

Guy, Park, 234.

Haddin, Lieutenant, at Battle of Stillwater, 54.

Haldimand, Sir Frederick, Threat of, executed against the Oneidas in
1779, 278.

Hale, Captain Nathan, Notice of, 425.

Hale, Colonel, at Battle of Stillwater,51 at Battle of Hubbard-ton-
Censured for Cowardice-Death of, 145..

Halleck, Quotation from, 337, 364.

Hamilton, Brigadier General (English), at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Hamilton, General Alexander, Anecdote of, 315; Advocate of the
Constitution-Suppresses Doctors' Mob in New York, 384.

Hamilton, Gerard (Single-speech Hamilton), Notice of, 476.

Hamilton, Mr., Anecdote of, at Expedition to Danbury, 403.

Hamilton, Mrs. (Miss Schuyler), Notice of, 315.

llammell, Major, Notice of, 242.

Hammond, Lebbeus, Notice of, 358, 370.

Hand bills issued at Boston, 496, 507, 572.

Hancock, John, Liberality of, 473; Member of Boston Committee of
Correspondence in 1774, 513; Captain of Governor's Independent Cadets-
Dismissal from, by Gage, 514; Chosen President of Provincial Congress at
Concord in 1774, 515; Biographical Sketch of (see Biography of Signers
of Declaration of Independence, Appendix)-Retires to Woburn for Safety,
523; Anecdote of, on signing Declaration of Independence, 537; Mementoes
of, 561; On Committee to draught Instructions for and Commission of
General Washington, 563.

Hancock, John, Nephew of the Patriot, Notice of, 561.

Hand, General Edward, biographical Sketch of-In Sullivan's Expedition,
274. ^

Han Yerry, Oneida Sachem, Notice of, 278.

Hare, Capture and Execution of, 273.

Hardenburg, Lieutenant, in Expedition against Oswegatchie,

Harnage, Major, at Battle of Stillwater, 55.

Harper, Captain Alexander, Capture of, by Tories and Indians,

2/8. Harper, Colonel John, sent to Oghkwaga-Returns to Harpers-field,
237; Destroys Schoyere in 1779,275; In Mohawk Valley, 289.

Harrington, Jonathan, Caleb, and Abijah. Notice of, 553, 554.

Harrison, Robert H., succeeds Joseph Reed as Secretary to Washington,
567.

Hartford, Convention at, in 1779, 321, 432; First Settlement of-
Organized as one of the United Colonies of New England in 1643, 433;
Incidents of, 434, 435.

Hartley, Colonel, at Wyoming, 363.

Harvard, Reverend John, endows University bearing his own Name in 1638,
555.

Haynes, John, first Governor of Connecticut, 433.

Head quarters of Revolutionary Officers at Bemis's Heights in 1777,45 Of
Officers of Northern Army at Albany, 304; Of Washington at Morristown,
306, 309, 310; At New Windsor, on the Hudson, 313; At White Plains in
1778, 331; At Fredericksburgh-Middlebrook, 332; Of Steuben at
Middlebrook in 1779, 333; Of Colonel Butler at Wintermoot's Fort in
1778, 353; Of Agnew and Erskiue on Expedition to Danbury in 1777, 403;
Of Putnam at Reading in 1779, 411; At Fairfield, 427; At Cambridge in
1775, 555. 556.

Heath, General, in Command of Hudson Highlands in 1777, 307; Receives
his Appointment in 1775, 516; At Battle of Bunker Hill, 566.

Hendrick, Mohawk Sachem, Notice of-Anecdote of, 106; His Eloquence, 107;
Rebuke to Governor Delaney, 109.

Henry, Patrick, Eloquence and Revolutions of, against Stamp Act in 1765,
466.

Henry, Judge, Notice of-In Expedition to Canada in 1775,198.

Herkimer, Abraham and George, appointed to shoot Brant's Attendants,
238.

Herkimer, General, sent to Oshkwaga-Interview with Brant, 238; At Siege
of Fort Schuyler.245 Wounded, 246; Residence of-His Grave, 260;
Incidents of his Death, 261.

Herrick, Colonel, at Battle of Bennington, 397.

Hessians, Origin of Name of-At Battle of Stillwater,51 Ludicrous
Appearance of, after the Surrender of Saratoga-Advent into Cambridge-
Kindness of the People toward,82 Encampment of, near Bennington in 1777,
396.'

Hewett, Captain, at Wyoming, 353.

Howes, George R. T" Member of " Boston Tea Party"-His Character-
Patriotism-Death, 509.

Hill, George, Quotation from, 485.

Hill, Thomas, Notice of, 554.

Hillhouse, Captain, at Battle of Milford Hill, 423.

Hillhouse, Honorable James, plants Elms at New Haven, 428.

Hillsborough, Earl of, circular Letter to Colonies, 484.

Historians, Local, of Central New Y'ork, 292.

Historical Society of Connecticut, Relics in Collection of, 437, 438,
439; Of Massachusetts, Relics in Collection of. 562.

History, early, of America,15 Testimony of. relative to Benedict
Arnold,55 Of Skenesborough or Whitehall, 137; Of Montreal, 178; Of
Quebec, 183,184; Of Syracuse, 229; True Aim of, 248; Of German Flats,
253; Of Tryon County, 292; Of Albany, 301; Of Wyoming, 340; Of Kingston,
385, 386; Of the Huguenots, 386; Of Salem, 416; Of New Haven.418 Of
Puritans, 440; Of Boston, 445; Of Quakers, 450; Of Cambridge, 555.

Hobart, John Sloss, one of the first Judges of New Y'ork Supreme Court
in 1777, 367.

Holcomb, Luther, at Expedition to Danbury, 403.

Holderness, Lord, Notice of, 302.

Hollenback, Mr., Notice of, 360.

Hompasch. Baron, Daughter of, elopes to America with Boling-broke, 329.

Honeywood, Quotation from, 485.

Hooker, Reverend Thomas, Notice of, 433.

Hoosick Falls, Description of, 391.

House, Reidesel, at Saratoga,89 Block, Fort Plain, 262; Butler. in
Mohawk Valley, 285; Sir John Johnson (Hall), 286; Mansion of General
Schuyler. Albany, 304; Washington and Schuyler's Head-quarters,
Morristown, 315; Mathews, 323; Old Tavern, Elizabethport, 328; Liberty
Hall-Elizabethtown Point, 329; Steuben's Head-quarters, Middle-brook.333
Wintermoot's Fort, 351; Red, 375; Van Kleek, Poughkeepsie, 383;
Livingston, near Poughkeepsie, 385; Constitution, Kingston, New York,
387; Putnam's Head-quarters, Reading, Connecticut, 411; Buckley,
Norwalk, 416, 426; Residence of Arnold in New Haven.421 First Meeting,
in Connecticut, 433; Webb, Wethersfield, 436; Province, Boston, 474;
Faueuil Hall, Boston, 479; Old South Meeting, Boston, described, 490;
Hancock, Boston, 507; Clark, Lexington, Massachusetts, 523, 553;
Barrett, Concord, Massachusetts, 526; Washington's Headquarters,
Cambridge, 555; Reidesel, Cambridge, 557.

Howe, Lord Viscount George, Expedition of, under Abercrombie, 112;
Bravery of, at Ticonderoga, 118; His Death-Biographical Sketch of, 119.

Howe, Admiral, Return of Fleet of, from Newport to New York in 1778,
332; Arrives off Sandy Hook in 1776, 386.

Howe, General Robert, ordered to Pompton by Washington to quell
Rebellion in 1781, 314.

Howe. General Sir William, Duplicity of, concerning the Troops of
Burgoyne,82 Sent with his Brother Richard on Commission to American
Congress in 1777-Their Proclamation, 308; Kits out Expedition to
Danbury, 402; Arrival of, at Boston in 1775, after Battle of Lexington,
537; In Command at Battle of Bunker Hill, 541; llis Esteem of Dr.
Warren, 548; Left in Command of Boston on recalling of Gage, 573; Issues
Proclamations exciting Indignation of Washington, 574.

Hubhardton, first Settlement of-Battle-ground of, 144; Battlefield of,
described, 146.

Hubley, Colonel, Notice of, 278.

Huddlestone, Spy, Execution of, 384.

Hudson River, Steam-boats of,35 Difficulty in crossing, in 1777

Hudson, Hendrick, explores North River in 1609, 300.

Huguenots, Colony of, destroyed by Spaniards, in Florida, in 1564,32
History of, 386; Graves of, at Kingston, New York, 389.

Hull, Major, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,50 Biographical Sketch of, 55.

Huntington, Colonel, in Expedition to Danbury, 403.

Humphreys, Colonel David. Quotation from, 427, 428; Soldier-poet of the
Revolution, 428,431; Biographical Sketch of-His Monument, 429.

Hurd, Nathaniel, copper-plate Engraver, Notice of, 317.

Hutchinson, Thomas, biographical Sketch of-His House attacked, 467; His
other Property attacked in Boston in 1765, 468; appointed Governor of
Massachusetts in 1771, 493.

Immigrants. Pilgrim, Influx of, in 1634, 448;

Incursion of Sir John Johnson into Schoharie Country in 1780-Attack on
Schoharie Forts-Boldness of Murphy, 279; Johnson's March to Fort Hunter-
Destruction of Property, 280.

Incursion of Sir John Johnson with Indians and Tories into Mohawk Valley
in 1780, 288; Captures Sammons's Family-Destroys their Dwelling-
Cruelties and Crimes of Invaders-Recovery of hidden Plate-Retreat to
Canada, 289.

Incursion of Ross and Butler into Mohawk Valley in 1781-Action of
Willett-Battle at Johnstown-Adventures of Sammons, 290: Retreat of
British-Flight on West Canada Creek-Death of Walter Butler-Last Battle
near the Mohawk, 291.

Independence of United States acknowledged by France in

1778. 87. Independents or Separatists, 441.

Indians, American-Aztecs,16 Bahama,25 Origin and Name of,26 At Battle of
Still water,59 Hendrick, the Mohawk Sachem, Account of-Anecdote of, 106;
Eloquence of, 107; Six Nations, described.109 In Ambush, near Fort Ann,
140; Mo-lang rescues Putnam from, 141; War-Feast of, on Bouquet River,
159; Interview of, with Burgoyne at Bouquet River-Speech of an Iroquois,
160; Jealousy of, near Montreal in 1760, 178; Norridgewockor Abenakes,
191: Natanisand Sabatis,join Arnold's Expedition to Canada, 194;
Massacre of Sherburne's Corps, near Cedar Rapids-Caughnawagas-The seven
Nations of Canada-Brant, 208; St. Regis Village, 210; Five Nations of
New York attacked by Frontenac in 1696, 216; War Feast, under Brant, at
Oswego in 1777, 219; Capture at Fort Niagara in 1759, 225; Onondagas-
Hostility toward Dupuys, near Syracuse, 229; Massacre French and
Spanish, near Oswego, in 1669, 230; Councils of, in Mohawk Valley, 234;
In Valley of Charlotte River, 237; Council of Six Nations at Oswego to
form Alliance against Bostonians-Seduced by Promises of Rewards by Guy
Johnson-Their Coalescence, 239; At Siege of Fort Schuyler, 242;
Amusement of, 252; Incursion of Oneidas into Unadilla Settlement-Five
Nations, Division of, according to Colden, 256; Caughnawagas and other
Tribes threaten Destruction of all the Settlements in Mohawk and
Schoharie Valleys in 1778-Oneidas and Tuscaroras neutral-Faithful to
their Pledge-Fidelity of White Eyes, 264; Council of, at Johnstown-
Disposition of different Nations, 265; Treachery of Great Tree, 267;
Onondagas, Expedition against, in 1779, 270; Council of Six Nations

Genesee Valley, 1769,276; Of Genesee Valley-Com Planter, Notice of-
Address to President at Philadelphia-An early Temperance Lecturer, 277;
Attack on Schoharie Settlements in 1780-Rendezvous, 279; Colonel Lewis
Atyataronghta, an Oneida Warrior, at Battle of Klock's Field, 281;
Method of Scalping, 293; Plunder and Burn Currytown, 294; Scalp Mary
Miller, 295; Skirmish with Captain Woodworth at German Flats, 298; Six
Nations, Convention of, at Albany, in 1754, 303; Council of, at Easton,
Pennsylvania, in 1758, Diplomatist, at Easton, Pennsylvania, 336;
Anecdote of Old Indian at Wind Gap, Pennsylvania, 338; Early Tribes of
Wyoming Valley, Notice of, 341; Jealous of Count Zinzendorf-Attempt to
murder him, 342; Quarrel between Shawnees and Delawares about
Grasshopper, 343; Speech of Messenger John in Wyoming Valley in 1775,
349; Brant not engaged in Invasion of Wyoming, 354; Of Esopus, massacre
and capture Whites in 1663-Driven back to Mountains by Crygier, 386;
Skirmish near Cambridge, 392; Panic and Flight of, at Battle of
Bennington, in 1777, 397; Pequots and other Connecticut Indians, 416;
Destruction of Pequots, near Fairfield, in 1637, 417; War of Pequots in
1637, 433; Attack on Pilgrims in 1620, 443; Defy Pilgrims, 444: Measures
adopted by Congress for securing Neutrality in 1775,568.

Inglis, Reverend Charles, writes Letter to Joseph Galloway in Cipher,
320.

Inman Family, at Battle of Wyoming, 366.

Irishmen, enlistment of, in American Army in 1775, 565.

Isabella of Castile and Leon, biographical Sketch of,22 Aids Columbus.
23.

Islands, Thousand, in River St. Lawrence, 214; In Boston Harbor,
Skirmishes at, after Battle of Lexington, 537.

Isle Aux Noix, proposed attack of British on French, 152; Fortified,
162; Historic Associations of, 167.

Jackson, Colonel, at Battle of Stillwater. 51: At Battle of Springfield,
324.

Jarvis, Stephen, in Expedition to Danbury, 402.

Jay, John, Delegate to first Continental Congress, 383; Advocate of
Constitution-Wounded by Stone in Doctor's Mob. New Y'ork.384 Chairman of
Committee for draughting and reporting State Constitution in 1776, 386;
First Chief Justice of State of New York, 387.

Jeffries, Dr., at Battle of Bunker Hill, 544.

Jenner, biographical Sketch of, 307.

Johnson, Sir John, strengthens Johnson Hall by Scotch Highlanders, 235;
Perfidy of, toward Schuyler-Flight from Canshnawaga, 236; In Command of
Indians at Oswego.241 At Siege of Tort Schuyler, 245; Recruits Tory
Refugees on St. Lawrence, 264; In Western New York, 274; Incursion of,
into Schoharie Country-Attack on Schoharie Forts, 279; March of, to Fort
Hunter, 280; Flight toward Onondaga Lake-Escape to Canada by Oswego,
282; Flight toward Canada-Invasion of Mohawk Valley in 1780, 288;
Retreats from Johnstown-Recovers buried Plate, and conveys it to
Montreal, 289; Flight to Canada, 290.

Johnson, Lady of Sir John, conveyed to Albany and kept as Hostage, 236.
?

Johnson, Sir William, Anecdote of, and Mohawk Sachem, 106; Attack on his
Camp in 1755, 108; Captures French and Indians at Fort Niagara in
1759,225; Biographical Sketch of-Scat of-Dark Deeds of, in Mohawk
Valley-Effect of his Movements on People-Formation of Parties, 232;
Indian Diploma-Amusements-Death. 268.

Johnson, Guy, Residence of, in Mohawk Valley, 234; Summons Grand Council
of Six Nations at Oswego, 239.

Johnson, Captain Edward, quaint Sayings of, 448.

Johnson Greens, 236, 241, 244, 246.

Johnson, Thomas, nominates Washington for Commander-in-chief, 563.

Johnstone, Reverend Mr., of Johnstone Settlement, 237.

Johnstown. Battle of, in 1781. 290.

Jones, Major, at Battle of Stillwater, 54.

Jones, Lieutenant David, retirement to Canada in consequence of Murder
of Jane McRea, 100.

Junius, Letters of-Joint Authorship attributed to Colonel Barré, Marquis
of Landsdowne, and Counselor Dunning, 463.

Kalm's Description of Albany in 1749, 301.

Kean, John, Notice of, 329.

Keats, Quotation from, 44.

Kimble's Mountain, 306.

Kine-pox, Discovery of. by Jenner-Introduction of, by Lady Montague, in
172], 307.

Kingston, New York, Place of holding Legislature in 1777, 358;
Description and early History of, 385; Indian Troubles-Asylum for
Huguenots, 366; Place of holding Convention of Representatives of State
of New York, and of draughting and reporting Constitution of State in
1777, 387; Burning of, 368; Scene of Execution of Tories in Revolution,
389; Scenery near-Birth-place of Vanderlyn the Painter, 390.

Kingston, Lieutenant, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50

Kingston, Upper Canada, Notice of, 214.

Kinnison. David, only Survivor of Boston Tea Party, 499; Life and
Adventures of, 500; Speech at Free Soil Meeting in 1643, 501.

, Kirke, Tide-waiter-Confinement in Sloop Liberty, 478

Kirkland. Samuel, biographical Sketch of, 234.

Klock, Colonel Jacob, at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 245; Descent of Son of,
upon Palatine, 298.

Knapp, Benjamin, Notice of 403.

Knickerbocker Magazine, Quotation from, 533.

Knowlton, Captain Thomas, at Battle of Bunker Hill, 539.

Knox, General Henry, Head-quarters of, near Middlebrook, with
Washington, in 1778, 332; At Battle of Bunker Hill, 545.

Knyphanaen, General Baron, biographical Sketch of, 321; Invasion of
Elizabethtown and Springfield, 322.

Kosciusko, biographical Sketch of, 48.

Labrador, Discovery of, by Cabot, 27.

La Fayette, Marquis De, accompanies Commissioner Duane to Indian Council
at Johnstown in 1778-Mans Forts of Schoharie Creek, 265; Escorted by
Revolutionary Dragoons in 1825, 413; At Laying of Corner Stone of Bunker
Hill Monument, 559.

Lake George, Discovery and Description of, 108; Scene of Massacre in
1757, 110.

Lake, Silver-bottomed, fabled, near Syracuse, 230.

Lamb, Colonel John, Notice of, 459.

Lands, Grants of, extending to Pacific, 123, 343, 399; New Hampshire
Grants declared Free and Independent in 1777, 168.

Langdon, Governor John, biographical Sketch of, 393.

Langdon, Dr., Notice of, 459.

Langdon, President, Notice of, 539; Reads Declaration of Congress before
Army at Cambridge in 1775, 569.

Latimer, at Battle of Stillwater, 51.

Laws, peculiar, in Connecticut, 433.

League and Covenant entered into by Massachusetts Assembly in 1774, 510.

Leamington, Reverend Mr., Tory, left Norwalk with Tryon, 414.

Learned, General, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,49 At Siege of Fort
Schuyler, 250.

Lee, Ann, Founder of Shaking Quakers in America-Biographical Sketch of,
383.

Lee, Dr. Arthur, biographical Sketch of,85 Card of, 531.

Lee, Major General Henry, at Battle of Springfield, 323; Accompanies
Washington to Cambridge, 564.

Lee, Richard Henry, appointed on Committee to draught Instructions for
and Commission of Washington, 563.

Legends of Indian Maiden, of Bear Tribe, at Little Falls, 258.

Legislature, New York, Held at Kingston and Poughkeepsie in 1778, 382.

Leslie, Captain William, Notice of, 332.

Letters of Louis XVI. to Charles IV. of Spain,87 Of Junius, 463; Of
Pennsylvania Farmer, 476; Of Marque and Reprisal issued by Provincial
Congress of Massachusetts, 576; Of Washington to female Slave, Phillis,
556; Of Reverend William Emerson, describing Washington's Camp, 567.

Levi, M., Attempts to recapture Quebec, 189.

Lexington, Skirmish at, in 1775, 190; Topography of, 552; Monument-Clark
House and its Associations, 553; Incidents of Battle, 554

Liberty, Sons of, Origin of Name, 463; Places of Meeting in Boston, 478,
479; American Cradles of, 440, 479; Daughters of, in Boston, Meeting of,
in 1769, 482; Massachusetts Song of, 487.

Liberty Hall near Elizabethtown, 329.

Lincoln, Benjamin, appointed Secretary of Provincial Congress at Concord
in 1774, 516.

Lincoln, General, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50,58 At Diamond Island
and Ticonderoga, 114; At Manchester in 1777, 394.

Linzee, Captain, of British Sloop of War Falcon, repulsed by Captain
Manly, 570.

Lipe, Johannes, House of, 263.

Little, Captain, at Battle of Springfield, 323.

Little Falls, described, 253, 257; Rocks at, present Appearance of-
Cyclopean Architecture, 257; Attack on, by Indians in 1780, 259.

Livingston, Henry A., Notice of, 385.

Livingston, Colonel Henry, at Battle of Stillwater,51 At Siege of Fort
Schuyler, 250.

Livingston, Governor William, former Residence of, near Elizabethtown-
Notice of-Property purchased by Lord Boling-broke, 329; Biographical
Sketch of-Spirit of his Daughters, 330; Writes against Episcopacy in
America, 460.

Livingston, James, at Battle of Stillwater, 51.

Livingston, Philip, Delegate to first Continental Congress, 383.

Livingston, Robert R., Advocate of Federal Constitution, 384; First
Chancelor of State of New York, 387.

Lockwood, Lambert, at Expedition to Danbury, 403.

Longfellow, Quotation from, 555.

London, Lord, appointed Commander-in-chief of British Forces in North
America in 1757-Anecdote of, related by Franklin, 110.

Louis XVI., Letter of, to Charles IV. of Spain, urging Co-operation in
American Cause, 87.

Louisburgh, Siege and Capture of, in 1758, 120.

Lovelace, Thomas, Capture and Execution of, 92.

Low, Isaac, Delegate to first Continental Congress, 383.

Luther, Hymn of, 299.

Luzerne, Chevalier De, arrives from France, 311; Named after 374.

Lyman, General, at Battle of Lake George, 109.

Magellan reaches Pacific Ocean, 16.

Mahew, Reverend Jonathan, Sermon of, against Stamp Act, 467.

Mallory, Edward, Notice of, 365.

Manifesto, pompous, of St. Leger on Arrival at Fort Schuyler in 1777,
242.

Manly, Captain, bravely captures three British Vessels in Boston Harbor,
569; Conflict with Sloop of War Falcon. 570.

Manor, Livingston-Burning of Houses at, in 1777, 388; Of Rensselaer or
Rensselaerwyck, 390.

Manufactures, American domestic, at Newport before Revolution, 470.

Marriage, romantic, at Niagara Falls, 228; Of Mint Master's Daughter-
Curious Account of, 449.

Marshall, Captain, Death of, 478.

"Massachusettensis," Signature of Tory Writer, 513.

Massachusetts, early Patriotism of, 304; Old Map of Bay ot, 446;
Circular Letter of, to all the Colonies, 477; Assembly, Proceedings of,
on account of Port Bill in 1774, 506, 509; Gage attempts to Dissolve
Assembly-Solemn League and Covenant of Assembly, 510; Last Adjournment
of Massachusetts Assembly under Royalty, 511; Prepares for War on Eve of
Revolution, 512; Assembly resolve themselves into Provincial Congress-
Organize at Concord, 515; Military first organized by Ward and Pomeroy,
516; Provincial Congress orders Purchase of Ammunition and Stores in
1775-Alarmist Companies formed by Citizens-British Troops Arrive, 521;
Unity of People after Battle of Lexington-Provincial Congress summoned
at Watertown, 531; Benevolence of Provincial Congress, 536; Relics in
Collection of, Historical Society, 562.572 Organizes House of
Representatives under original Charter in 1775, 568; Provincial Congress
passes Law prohibiting Waste of Powder by Sporting in 1775, 570; Pays
Franklin Money due for Services as Colonial Agent in England, 575.

Massachusetts Spy, 515.

Mather, Cotton, Tomb of, 561; Letter and Autograph of, 562.

Mather, Dr. Samuel, Tomb of-Library of burned by British at Charlestown
in 1775, 561.

Mather, Increase, Tomb of, 561; Portrait of, 562.

Mather, Reverend Moses, Notice of, 414.

Mathews, General, dispatched to Elizabethtown Point in 1780, 322.

Mathews, Mrs., Notice of, 323.

Maxwell, General, in Sullivan's Expedition, 274.

May Flower, Emigrants in-First Birth among-Copy of Compact signed and
entered into previous to Landing, 437; Fac eimile of Handwriting of
Pilgrims, 438; Described as Cradle of American Liberty, 440; Arrival at
Cape Cod Bay, 442.

M'Crea, Jane, Murder of, 48,96 Biographical Sketch of,97 Account of-
Death of,99 Reinterment and Grave of, 101.

M'Donald, Captain, in Western New York, 274.

M'Donald, Colonel John, Monument of, 226.

M'Donald, Donald, attempts to burn Shell's Block-house, 299.

M'Kean, Captain Robert, sent to reconnoitre Brant's Encampment at
Oghkwaga in 1778-Letter to Brant from Cherry Valley, 266; Challenges
Brant, 270; At Battle of Klock's Field, 281; Ordered to Currytown, 294;
Death of, 295.

M'Kee, Tory, Notice of, 264.

M'Lellan, Quotation from, 195.

M'Lellan, Lieutenant, in Expedition against Oswegatchie in 1779, 271.

M'Neil, Mrs., abduction of, by Indians, 98

M'Pherson killed at Siege of Quebec, 201.

Mead, General, Ebenezer, Notice of, 411.

Meeker, Timothy, at Battle of Springfield, 324; Idea of Standing Army,
325.

Mellon, Colonel, at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 242.

Merchants, Club of American, suggest Stamp Act in 1739, 461; Of Boston
express Willingness to pay for Tea destroyed, 512; London, rebuked by
George III. lor favoring American Cause, 521.

Mexico, City of, founded, 16.

Middlebrook, Encampment of American Army at, in 1778,79 Howe's
Stratagem-Skirmishes-Encampment of seven Brigades of American Army at,
331; Washington's Army at, in 1778, 332.

Mifflin, Thomas, appointed by Washington Quarter-master General, 566.

Milford, Pennsylvania, Notice of, 380.

Miller, Quotation from, 136.

Miller, Mary, scalped by Indians, 295.

Minor, Charles, Historian of Wyoming-Quotation from, 340: Letter to
Colonel Stone relative to Invasion of Wyoming, 350.

Miralles, M. Juan De, accompanies Luzerne from France-Death of, 311.

Mississippi River ascended by De Soto in 1542, 31.

Mohawk River, Difficulty in Crossing, 41.

Mohawk Valley, early Hostilities in, 231; Seeds of Rebellion implanted
by Stamp Act-Effect of political Movements upon People-Formation of
Parties-incidents prior to Revolution, 232; Violence of Loyalists-
Assault upon Sammons--Meeting at Cherry Valley-Baronial Hall fortified
by Colonel John Johnson, 233; Attempted Removal of Kirkland-Hostile
Movements of the Johnsons-Indian Councils, 234; Alarm of People-Congress
orders Schuyler to seize Military Stores, 235; Disarming of Tories at
Johnson Hall-Perfidy of Johnson-Flight, 236; Repairs at Fort Stanwix-
Brant at Oghk-waga-Hostile Movements-Expeditions of Herkimer and Colonel
Harper, 237; Conference with Brant-Frankness-Herkimer's precautionary
Measure-Haughty Bearing of Brant, 238; Breaking up of Council-Grand
Council at Oswego-Seduction of Indians-Coalescence with English, 239;
Gloomy Prospects of, in 1781,283; Description of, 284; Last Battle of,
291.

Mol an g rescues Putnam, 141.

Money, Continental-Form of Bills-Devices and Mottoes, 317;, Plans for
Redemption-Counterfeits of, by Tories, 318; Depreciation of-Value of, in
Specie, 319; Paper, Value of, in 1778, 352.

Money first coined by United States-Fac Simile of, 318; First coined in
New England in 1652, 449; First Paper, issued in New England in 1690,
451; Paper, issued by Massachusetts in 1775, 534.

Money Digging at Mount Independence, 148; At Crown Point, 152.

Monkton. General, Landing of, near Montmorenci, 185.

Monocasy Island, Notice of, 356.

Montcalm, Marquis De, Louis Joseph De St. Veran, appointed Successor to
Dieskau-Attempt to capture Fort William Henry-Return to Ticonderoga,
110; Second Attack on Fort William Henry-Surrender of Garrison-Perfidy
of French and Indians, 111; Position of Army at Quebec, 185; Death and
Burial place of-Biographical Sketch of.188 Monument of, 205; Approaches
Oswego in 1756-Attack on the Works, 218; Victorious-Courtesy, 219.

Montgomery, General Richard, captures Fort St. John's-Death of, 162; At
Battle of St. John's, 170; March upon Montreal-Mutiny in Camp, 181;
Approach to Cape Diamond-Attack upon British-Death of, 198; Biographical
Sketch of, 200; Tomb of. 201.

Montmorenci, Battle of, 186; Falls of, described, 203.

Montour, Catharine, biographical Sketch of-Captivity with Indians-
Accompanies Delegates of Six Nations to Philadelphia, 357.

Montreal, first Settlements of, 178; Captured by English in 1760, 179.

Montressor, Colonel, Notice of, 191.

Monument of Brock and M'Donald, 226; Proposed, in Memory of De Witt
Clinton, 259; Caldwell's, at Elizabethtown, 326; Near Troy, in Memory of
Battle of Wyoming, 365; Proposed by Congress in Memory of General
Wooster, 406; Colonel Dixwell at New Haven, 420; Major Campbell, near
Milford Hill.423 Colonel David Humphreys at New llaven, 429; Dr. Joseph
Warren on Breed's Hill, 549; At Concord in Memory of the Slain, 531,
552, 553; At Lexington, 531, 553; At Danvers, 531; Bunker Ilill, 558.

Mooers, Benjamin, Notice of, 165.

Moore, Major, killed at Battle of Bunker Hill, 545.

Moravian Missionaries, Notice of, 343.

Morgan, Colonel Daniel, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,50 Censure of, at
Battle of Stillwater,62 Joins Camp at Cambridge, 565.

Morgan, John, succeeds Church as Surgeon to Army Hospital in 1775, 568.

Morgan, James, murders Reverend James Caldwell, 327.

Morgan, General Lewis, at Battle of Klock's field, 281; Ordered to
Currytown, 294; Death of, 295.

Morris, George P., Quotation from, 382, 480.

Morris, Robert, Notice of, 321.

Morris, Lieutenant, at Battle of Stillwater, 52.

Morristown, New Jersey, Notice of-Fort Nonsense-Headquarters of
Washington-Encampment at, in 1777, 306, 310; Room occupied by
Washington, 315.

Mottoes on Continental Money, 317: At Celebration of Pluckemin in 1778,
334, 335; On Newspaper Head, 508; On Pine Tree Flag. 570, 576.

Moulton, Mrs., extinguishes flames of Concord Court-house, fired by
British in Î775, 526.

Mount Defiance, Ascent of, 130; View from, 131.

Mount Independence, Assent and Topography of, 147.

Mowatt. Lieutenant. Descent of, upon Cape Ann with British Brig of War-
Sent to Portland to obtain Supplies, 569.

Mumford, Adjutant, killed at Battle of Bunker Hill, 571,

Munson, Dr. Eneas, Letter of, relative to Vaccination, 307; Senior,
Biographical Sketch of, 308; Notice of, 430.

Murphy, Timothy, biographical Sketch of-Account of his killing General
Fraser,62 Notice of.267 Escapes from Indians in Western New York, 276;
Boldness of, at Schoharie, 279.

Mutiny among Washington's Troops in New Jersey, 312, 314; In Regiment of
Colonel Van Rensselaer, near Hoosick Four Corners, in 1781, relative to
New Hampshire Grants-General Gansevoort directs Colonels Yates, Van
Vechten, and Van Rensselaer to quell Disturbance-Troops raised for the
Exigency, 399; End of Insurrection, 400.

Myers, Mrs., Notice of-Incidents of her Life-Escape of her Father and
Brother from Indians, 370.

Narvaez's Expedition to Florida and Mexico in 1528-Perishes in Storm at
Sea, 30.

Navy, American Colonial, Boards formed in 1775, 569; First Organization
of, in 1775, 575; Code of, adopted-Augmentation of, in 1776, 576.

Naval Battle on Lake Champlain in 1776, 163, 164; Operations against
Niagara, under Shirley, in 1755, 217; Expedition fitted out at
Elizabethtown Point in 1776, 328; Operations of British on Coast after
the Battle of Bunker Hill, 569; Manly's Engagement off Cape Ann in 1775,
570.

Neal, John, Quotation from, 539.

Newark, Notice of-Associations of, 305.

Newberry, Capture and Execution of, 273.

New Dorlach (Sharon Springs), Battle of, 294.

New England-Its Associations, 432; Origin of Name, 433; Bounds and
Extent of original Territory, 434; People of, aroused to Arms in 1774,
514; Fisheries of, Bill proposed to destroy, 520;-F)ag of, at Battle of
Bunker Hill, 541; Colonies sustain and perfect their civil Government
during the Revolution, 568.

Newfoundland discovered by Cabot in 1498, 27.

New llaven, Settlement of-East Rock-Red Rock, 418; Organic Law of New
Haven Colony-Regicides, 419; Strenuously opposes Proceedings of Stamp
Act, 420; Early Patriots of, 421; Landing of Tryon's Troops at, in 1779,
422.

Newport blockaded by the British in 1780-French Fleet at, 435; Domestic
Manufactures of, prior to Revolution, 470.

Newspaper Press, political Importance of, during Revolution, 476, 485;
Devices, 507, 508; Poetry, 508.

Newspapers, American, during Revolution-Anderson's Constitutional
Gazette-Boston News Letter-Boston Post, 513; Boston Journal of the
Times, 480; Boston Gazette and Country Journal, 513; Essex Gazette, 467;
Federalist, 384; Massachusetts Gazette and Boston Post Boy and
Advertiser, 513; Massachusetts Spy, 513, 515; New England Ensigne, 449;
New York Mercury, 460, 470; Pennsylvania Journal, 507; Rivington's
Political Register, 459; Royal Gazette, 508.

Newspaper, English, London Chronicle, Notice of, 570.

New York, State of, organized at first Session of Legislature at
Kingston in 1777-Election for Members of Legislature held in all
Counties except New York, Kings, Queens, and Suffolk-Names of State
Officers elected, 387.

Niagara Falls, Incidents and Topography of, 328; River, Events of, in
War of 1812, 226; Suspension Bridge, 228.

Nichols, Colonel, at Battle of Bennington, 397.

Niemcewicz, Count, Notice of, 329.

Nixon, General John, at Battle of Stillwater,51 Biographical Sketch
of,76 wounded at Battle of Bunker Hill, 545.

North-men, early Voyages of, to North America, 17.

Norridgewock Falls. Notice of, 191.

North, Lord Frederick, Earl of Guilford, Policy of, relative to Battle
of Saratoga,85 Biographical Sketch of, 483.

Norwalk described, 413; Destroyed bv the British in 1779, 414.

Oak, Charter, at Hartford, 434.

Officers, Public, Insolence of, 474; Names of, at Battle of Bunker Hill,
542; American, Salaries of, in 1775, 564; Genera], under Washington-
Stations of, near Boston in 1775, 566.

Ogden, Captain Amos, in Wyoming Valley-Attacked by Yankees, 345.

Ogden, Moses, Grave of, 326.

Ogden, New Jersey Tory, Notice of, 313.

Ogden, Nathan, killed by Speddy, 346.

Ogdensburgh attacked by the British in 1812, 213.

Oghkwaga, Indians at, in 1777, 237.

Oliver, Peter, biographical Sketch of, 506.

Oriskany, Description and View of, Battle-ground, 245.

Osborn, Levi, Founder of Osbornites, 405.

Oswald, Colonel, Notice of, 409.

Oswegatchie, Fort, captured by the English in 1760, 212; Expedition
against, under M'Lellan and Hardenburgh, in 1779, 271.

Oswego, Topography of, 215,217,220, 221; Attempt to capture, hy Willett,
in 1783-Attack upon, in 1814, 220.

Otis, James, Jun., patriotic Efforts of, 459; Liberality of, 474;
Boldness of, 477; Abuse of, 487; Assaulted by Robinson-Recovers Damages
by Law, 488; Biographical Sketch of, 492; Anecdote of-Killed by
Lightning, 493.

Paine, Robert T., conducts Prosecution of Preston for Murder, 492.

Paine, Thomas, Quotation from, 457.

Palmer, William P., Quotation from, 298.

Paris, Colonel, at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 243. ,

Parker, Captain Jonas, killed at Battle of Lexington, 525.

Parker, Capture and Execution of, in Western New York in 1779, 276.

Parliament, British, Proceedings of, relative to Burgoyne,84 Opposition
in House of Commons relative to Burgoyne's Defeat,85 Introduces Bill for
the more effectual Provision for the Government of the Province of
Quebec in 1774, 156; Discuss Right of Taxing Americana, 461; Passage of
Stamp Act, 463; Apathy of, after its Passage, 470; Repeal of Stamp Act,
472; Proceedings in, on Eve of Revolution, 517; Warm Debates in, in
1775, 519.

Paterson at Battle of Bunker Hill, 545; At Battle of Bemis's Heights,
49.

Patriots, American-Soundness of their Principles-Not to be bribed, 479;
Boldness of, in Boston in 1774, 510; Secretly convey Arms and Ammunition
out of Boston in 1775-Detection and seizure of. on Boston Neck, 522;
Names of, slain and wounded at Battle of Lexington and Concord, 532.

Patroon, Killian Van Rensselaer, 391.

Peck, Reverend Dr., Wife of, 370.

Penn, Governor John, entered Protest against the boundary Section of the
Canada Bill in 1771, 156; Refusal of, to treat with Susquehanna Company
in 1769, 345; Calls of, to General Gage for Troops from New York in
1769, 346.

Penn, Governor Richard, refuses to negotiate with Connecticut, 347.

Pennsylvania applies to Congress to appoint Commission relative to
Dispute in Wyoming in 1782-Appeal unheeded-Appoints three Commissioners
to repair to the Valley, 371.

Pennymites, civil commotion with Yankees at Wyoming Valley in 1770, 345,
346.

Percival, James G., Quotations from, 292, 531.

Percy, Lord, Anecdote of, while marching toward Lexington, 528.

Petrie, Dr., medical Adviser of General Herkimer, 260.

Philadelphia, second Continental Congress held at, in 1775, 125; Riot
at. in 1779, 32 L.

Phillips, Major General, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Phillis (Wheatley), Female Slave and Poet, Letter of Washington to-
Biographical Sketch of-Quotation from, 556.

Phipps, Sir William, attempts to besiege Quebec in 1789, 451.

Pickering. Colonel Timothy, biographical Sketch of, 374; Appointed
Commissioner to Wyoming Valley in 1787-Repulsed by Franklin, 375;
Escapes to Philadelphia-Returns to Wyoming-Abduction and Treatment, 376.

Pierpont, Reverend John, Quotation from, 447.

Pigot, General, in Command at Battle of Bunker Hill, 541.

Pine Robbers (a Band of Tories), Notice of, 332.

Pitcairn in Expedition to Concord in 1775, 523; Shot by Negro Soldier-
His Widow pensioned by British Government, 546.

Pitt, William, Notice of, 457; Resigns his Ministry, 458; Marble Statue
of, in New York City, 472; Created Earl of Chatham in 1766,475;
Unexpected Appearance in Parliament on Eve of Revolution-Speech on
American affairs-Conciliatory Proposition, 518.

Platt, Judge Zephaniah, Notice of, 165.

Pledge, Form of, to sustain Continental Congress by Patriots of New York
in 1775. 384.

Pluckemin, Notice of-Washington's Army at, in 1778, 332; Celebration at,
in 1779. 33).

Plunkett. Colonel, Expedition to Wyoming in 1775, 348.

Plymouth, Massachusetts, Landing of Pilgrims at-Rock-First Sabbath at,
443; Founded in 1620, 444.

Pokono Mountain, Notice of, 339.

Pollard, Asa, killed at Battle of Bunker Hill, 541.

Pomeroy, Seth, appointed Commander of Massachusetts Militia, 516; At
Battle of Bunker Hill, 542.

Ponce De Leon, Voyage to the Bahamas in Search of the fabled "Fountain
of Youth" in 1512-Reaches Florida,29 Killed by Indians, 30.

Poor, General, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,49 In Sullivan's Expedition
to Wyoming, 274.

Port Bill, Boston, adopted and passed in 1774, 504.

Poughkeepsie, Origin of Name-Meeting of Legislature at, in 1778-State
Convention at, 382.

Powell, General, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Powder, Scarcity of, after Battle of Bunker Hill-Private Vessels sent to
West Indies for Supply, 570; Seasonable Supply of from Africa, 571.

Pownal, Governor, Notice of482 Remarks of, concerning Spirit of American
Patriots, 483; Statement of, in Parliament, 484.

Pratt, Chief Justice (afterward Lord Camden), Position of, on Passage of
Stamp Act, 472.

Prescott, Colonel William, at Battle of Bunker Ilill-His Bravery-
Biographical Sketch of, 539; Anecdote of, 541.

Prescott, Dr. Samuel, at Battle of Lexington, 525.

Prescott. Genera], at Battle of Montreal in 1775-His Brutality toward
Allen-Harsh Treatment to American Prisoners, 180; His Flight and
Capture, 181.

Prescott, Lieutenant, at Battle of Bunker Hill, 546.

Prescott, William H., Notice of, 539.

Preston, Captain, tried for Murder of Attucks, Gray, and Caldwell, 491.

Preston, Dr., Notice of, 554.

Press, American Newspaper, 507, 508, 513. 515.

Prideaux, General, at Crown Point in 1758, 120.

Pringle, Captain, Naval Command of, on Lake Champlain in 1775, 162.

Prisoners' Island. Lake Champlain, Escape of Prisoners from, 117;
Prescott's Brutality toward, 180; American Prisoners at Cedar Rapids
released by General Carleton, 209.

Privateering in 1775, 329.

Privateers, American, formidable to British in 1775, 569.

Privy Council, a Cabinet of thirty-five Peers, 494.

Protestant Colony in Florida destroyed by Spaniards in 1564, 32.

Provisions, Fresh, Scarcity of, in British Army in Boston in 1775, 571.

Pulaski, Count, at Morristown in 1780, 310.

Pulpit, Curious, at German Flats, 254.

Puritans, Origin of-Bishops Hooper and Rogers-Henry VIII.-Elizabeth-
Puritan Boldness, 440; Position of Elizabeth-The Separatists-
Persecutions-Puritans in Parliament-James L-Exile of Puritan Ministers,
441; Character of Puritan Pilgrims-Preparations for sailing to America-
Departure from Delfthaven-The May Flower, 442; Exploration of the
American Coast-Attacked by Indians-First Sabbath in New England-Landing
of, on Plymouth Rock in 1620,443; Founding of Plymouth-Destitution and
Sickness-Death of Carver-Election of Bradford-Defiance of Indians, 444;
Condition of the Colony-Further Emigration from England-Winslow-Old
Colony Seal-Standish-Settlement of Weymouth in 1622-Shawmut, 445;
Settlement of Endicott and others at Salem-Arrival of Winthrop-Founding
of Boston in 1630-Progress of free Principles, 446; The Puritan
Character-Witchcraft-English Law-Delusion, and its Effects in New
England, 447; Religious Character of the Puritans-Mildness of their
Laws-The representative System-Influx of Immigrants, 448; Trade of the
Colony-First coined Money-Marriage of Mint Master's Daughter-Conduct of
so-called Quakers-Punishment, 449.

Putnam, Garret, Notice of, 288.

Putnam, General Israel, daring Feats of, 94,96 At Ticonderoga in 1758,
118; Near Fort Ann-Perilous Situation of-Capture of, by French and
Indians, 140; Humanity of his Captor, 141; On Lake Champlain-Attack upon
French and Indians near Fort Ann, 143; Feat of, at Fort Oswcgatchie,
212; Controls Cantonments between Princeton and the Hudson in 1777, 307;
Head quarters of, at Reading, Connecticut, in 1779-Speech of-Encampment
at West Greenwich or Horse-neck, 411; Once a Tavern-keeper-His Sign-
Letter relative to License of Public Houses, 439; At Battle of Bunker
Hill, 541, 566; Anecdote of, 547.

Putnam's Hill, Notice of, 413.

Quakers, Origin, Peculiarities, and Sufferings of, in America, 450.

Quebec, Bishop of, Carleton's Attempt to seduce-Consistency of the
Prelate, 158; Early Settlement, Growth, and Topography of, 183, 184;
Capitulation of--Levi's Attempt to recapture-llis Retreat, 189;
Description of, 204; Historical Localities at, 205; Passage of Quebec
Act in 1774, 505; Shows despotic Tendency of parliamentary Enactments ot
the Times, 506, 156, 157.

Queen Esther (Catharine Montour), biographical Sketch of, 357.

Quincy, Josiah, defends Captain Preston, 492: Speech in Boston in 1773,
497; biographical Sketch of, 498.

Quo Warranto Writs defined, 434.

Rail-roads of Boston, Number of annual Passengers on, 560.

Ralle, Father, Notice of-Killed by Indians. 191.

Ransom, Captain, in Command at Wyoming in 1776, 350; At Skirmish on
Millstone River in 1777, 351.

Rations of Continental Soldiers, 576.

Raymond, Nathaniel, Notiee of, 415.

Read, Colonel John, Notice of, 411.

Red Jacket at Battle of Chemung-Despised by Brant, 279.

Red River descended by De Soto, 31.

Reed, Joseph, Secretary to Washington. 567.

Regicides, Tomb-stones of, at New Haven, 420.

Relics of Pilgrims-Chest, Pot, and Key from May Flower, 437; Chopping-
knife and Chair, 438; Governor Carver's Chair-Governor Winslow's Chair-
Sword of Miles Standish-Key of Port Royal Gate-King Philip's Samp Pan,
562.

Relics of Revolution-Halbert, 47: Tomahawks,64 Coins, Skull, 10.3;
Washington's Pouch and Puff-ball for hair powder, 166; Earthen Pipe at
Oriskany, 246; Silver Spoon presented to Mrs. Ford, 314; Carpet at Judge
Ford's, Morristown, 315; Tavern, and Franklin Stove at Elizabethport,
328; Treaty Table at Wyoming.359 Grave stone of Abraham De Witt at
Kingston, 389; Drum, Musket, Sword, and Cap from Bennington in Senate
Chamber at Boston, 395; Cannon-ball lodged in Post at Ridgefield, 411;
Buckly House, Norwalk, Connecticut, 416; Putnam's Tavern Sign-Mrs.
Washington's Ottoman, 439; Statue nf William Pitt in New Y'ork City,
472; Desk nf Speaker of Massachusetts Colonial Assembly, 562;
Washington's Original Commission from Congress at Patent Office in
Washington, 564; Franklin's Post-office Book at General Post office in
Washington, 568; Hand-bill in Massachusetts Historical Society, 572.

Rescindera in Massachusetts Assembly in 1768, 477.

Resolutions of Continental Congress for emission of Bills, 316.317
Urging Pennsylvania and Connecticut to cease Hostilities in 1775-
Unheeded, 348; Adopted at Wilkesbarre in 1777, 350; To erect Monument in
Memory of General Wooster 406.

Revenue Laws, enforcement of, in 1762, 460.

Revere, Pan], copper-plate Engraver, 317; Artistic Devices of, 507; Sent
as Messenger to Lexington in 1775, 523.

Revolution, American, Events preceding, 349; First Step toward
Absolutism-Democratic Colonies-Board of Trade-Courts of Vice Admiralty-
Commercial Restrictions.453

First Act of Oppression-Colonial Claims to right of Representation-Right
acknowledged-Burnet appointed Chief Magistrate of Massachusetts, 454;
Wisdom of Robert Walpole-Restraining Acts-Royalty and Patriotism of
Colonies-Heavy voluntary Taxation, 455; Designs of British Ministry-
Expenditures of British Government on Account of America-Accession of
George 111., 456; Death of George II. announced to the Heir-Influence of
Earl of Bute-Cool Treatment of Pitt, 457; Character of Bute, Influences
the King-Discontents-Resignation of Pitt, 458; Secret Agents sent to
America-Writs of Assistance-Opposition of Bostonians-Episcopacy designed
for America, 459; Enforcement of Revenue Laws-Resignation of Bute-
Succeeded by Grenville-Opposition to Episcopacy, 460; Stamp Act
proposed-Right to tax Americans asserted-Postponement of Action, 461;
Opposition to Taxation by the Colonies-Instructions to their Agents-
Stamp Act introduced in Parliament-Advocated by Townshend, 462-Barré's
Speech rebuking Townshend-His Defense of Americans-Effect of his Speech-
Passage of Stamp Act, 463; Excitement in America-A Congress proposed-
Circular Letter of Massachusetts to Colonial Assemblies in America, 464;
Assembling of Convention in New York-Defection of Ruggles and 'Ogden-
Adoption of Declaration of Rights-Petition to the King, and Memorial to
both Houses of Parliament-Appointment of Stamp Masters, 465; Franklin's
Advice to Ingersoll-Arrival of the Stamps-Patrick Henry's Resolutions-
Outbreak in Boston-Effigies hung on Liberty Tree, 466; Destruction of
private Property-Attack on Hutchinson's House-Destruction of Liberty
Tree, 467; Destruction of Hutchinson's Property-Character of Rioters.468
Proceedings in Boston relative to Stamp Act-Grenville and Huske burned
in Effigy on Liberty Tree-Effect of Stamp Act-Non-importation
Associations formed, 469; Non-importation Agreements-Rockingham made
Prime Minister-Apathy in Parliament-Domestic Manufactures, 470; Meeting
of Parliament-Speeches of Pitt and Grenville-Boldness of Pitt-
Proposition to repeal Stamp Act, 471; Position of Lord Camden-Repeal of
Stamp Act-Causes of Repeal-Rejoicings in England and America, 472;
Release of Prisoners for Debt-Erection of Pyramid on Boston Common-
Liberality of Hancock, 473; Liberality of Otis and others-New Clause in
Mutiny Act-Insolence of Public Officers.474 Pitt created Lord Chatham-
Picture of his Cabinet by Burke-New Scheme of Taxation-Commissioners of
Customs, 475, Fresh Excitement in the Colonies-Increasing Importance of
Newspapers-Letters of a Pennsylvania Farmer, 476; Honors to John
Dickinson-Circular Letter of Massachusetts-Boldness of Otis and Samuel
Adams, 477; Treatment of a Tide-waiter-Seizure of Sloop " Liberty"-
Excitement of People-Public Meeting in Boston, 478; Attempted Bribery of
Patriots-Soundness of their Principles-Proposed Convention in Boston,
479; Governor Bernard's Proclamation-Meeting of Convention-Arrival of
British Troops at Boston-Origin of Yankee Doodle.480 Landing of the
Troops-Imposing Military and Naval Display-Exasperation of the People,
481; Policy of Duke of Grafton-Speech of King, and Response-Proposed re-
enactment of a Statute of Henry VIII, 482; Policy of Lord North-Warnings
of Colonel Barré-General Gage in Boston-No Co-operation-Dissolution of
Assemblies-Petition for Removal of Bernard, 483; Bernard's Departure for
England-Effect of non-importation Agreement-Hillsborough's circular
Letter, 484; Secret Workings of the Spirit of Liberty-Brief Review-
Alternative of the Colonies-Newspaper Press, 485; Bickerstaff's Boston
Almanack-Explanation of its Frontispiece-Revival of Terms "Whig" and
"Tory,"486 Abuse of Otis-Massachusetts Song of Liberty, 487; Evasion of
non importation Agreements-Tea proscribed-Spirit of Women and Boys, 488;
Fracas at Lillie's Door-Death of Boy Snyder-Its Effect on Public Mind-
Pardon of the Murderer-Riot in Boston, 489; Attack of Mob on Soldiers-
Discharge of Musketry-Three Citizens killed-Terrible Excitement, 490;
Delegation of Patriots before the Governor-Boldness of second Committee-
Removal of Troops-Trial of Captain Preston for Murder, 491; Defense of
Soldiers by Adams and Quincy-Result of Trial-New Ministerial
Proposition-Effects on Colonies, 492; Boston Patriots-Hutchinson made
Governor-Asserted Independence of the Assemblies, 493; Further Agitation
in Boston-Committees of Correspondence-Letters of Hutchinson and others-
Petition for their Removal, 494; Franklin summoned before Privy Council
in England-Abused by Wedderburne-Franklin's Vow-New Taxation-Proposition
of East India Company, 495: Tea Ships sail for America-Preparations for
their Reception at Boston-Treatment of Consignees-Hand-bills and
Placards issued, 496; Arrival of Tea Ships-Monster Meeting in Old South-
Speech of Quincy, Breaking up of the Meeting-Destruction of Tea in
Boston Harbor-Apathy of Government Officials, 498; East India Company
the only Losers-Quiet in Boston-Punishment of a Smuggler-Names of.
Members of Tea Party-The only Survivor of, 499: Excitement in Parliament
in consequence of Boston Tea Riot, 502; Boston Port Bill proposed and
adopted-Debates in Parliament-Apparent Defection of Conway and Barré-
Burke begins his series of Orations in favor of American Liberty, 503;
Opposition in Parliament to Boston Port Bill-Its Passage, 504; Other
oppressive Acts of Parliament-Madness of Ministers-Warnings of
Opposition unheeded-Passage of Quebec Act. 505; Proceedings in
Massachusetts on account of Port Bill-Recall of Hutchinson-Division of
Sentiment.506 Arrival of General Gage in Boston-Meeting in Faneuil Hall
to consider Tort Bill-Excitement among Bostonians-Newspaper Devices,
507; Weakness of British Ministry, 508; Tragi Comedy, "Fall of British
Tyranny, or American Liberty Triumphant," represents Scene in Boston
while Regulars were flying from Lexington-Proceedings of Massachusetts
Assembly-Proposition for a General Congress, 509; Boldness of Patriots-
Attempt to dissolve Assembly-.Solemn League and Covenant of Patriots in
Boston, 510; Appointment of Delegates to Continental Congress-
Denunciation of League-Closing of Port of Boston, 511.

Revolution in England in 1688, 451.

Rhinebeck Flats invaded by British in 1777, 388.

Rhode Island Assembly authorize Army of Observation previous to Battle
of Bunker Hill, 536.

Rice, Isaac, at Ticonderoga, 121.

Rice, Lieutenant, challenged hy Church at Ticonderoga, 130.

Richardson found Guilty ot murdering Boy Snyder-Pardoned by the King,
489.

Riedesel, Baron De, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50

Riedesel, Baroness De, at Battle of Stillwater,55 Narrative of Battle of
Saratoga, 89: Her Reception by General Schuyler,91 Quotation from, 557;
Autograph of, 558.

Riedesel Family, Residence of, at Cambridge, 557.

Rio de la Plata discovered by Cabot. 28.

Riot at Philadelphia in 1779, 321; Doctors' Mob in New York in 1787,
384; In Boston in 1765, in consequence of Stamp Act-Destruction of
Property, 467; Character of Rioters, 468; In Boston in 1770-Attack of
Mob on Soldiers-Discharge of Musketry-Three Citizens killed, 490.

Ripley', Reverend Dr., gives Ground for Monument at Concord, 552.

Rivington, James, King's Printer in New York, Notice of-Anecdote of, and
Ethan Allen, 50.8.

Robinson, Colonel, at Battle of Concord, 527.

Robinson, Commissioner, Assault on Otis, 488.

Robinson, Reverend John, exiled Pastor of Pilgrims at Leyden, 438, 441.

Rochambeau, Count De, Conference with Washington, 435.

Rock, Williams's, 106; Rogers's, 116; Putnam's, 142; Split Rock, below
Crown Point159 Thunder-struck, 175; Brant's, 297; Washington's, near
Middlebrook, 333; At Plainfield, 334; Dial or Campbell's Rock, 353;
Queen Esther, 357; Prospect-Bloody, 376; East, New Haven, 417; Savin's,
at Orange, Connecticut, 422; Forefathers', at Plymouth, 443.

Rockingham, Charles, Marquis of, made Prime Minister, 470.

Rogers, Major, biographical Sketch of, 116; Near Fort Ann, 140; On Lake
Champlain, 143; Narrow Escape of, at Rogers's Slide, 557.

Rome, Notice of, 231.

Rondout Creek, Origin of Name, 385; Scenery near, 390.

Rosenkrans, Reverend Abraham, 254.

Ross, Major, Incursion of, into Mohawk Valley in 1781, 290.

Rowley, Colonel, at Battle of Johnstown, 290.

Ruggles, Timothy, President of Stamp Act Congress-Gets up Counter
Associations, called "Associated Loyalists," 522.

Rush, Dr. Benjamin, Notice of, 332.

Rutledge, Edward, appointed on Committee to draught Commission of, and
Instructions for General Washington, 563.

Sabbath-day Point, Skirmish at, in 1756-Summer Residence of Abercrombie
in 1758, 115; Skirmish at, in 1776, 116.

Salary of Washington, 563; Of American Officers, 564.

Salem, Massachusetts, Settlement of, in 1628, 446; Revolutionary town
Meetings at, in 1774, 515; Arrival of Gage's Troops to seize Cannon-
Repelled by Pickering, 522.

Salt, Manufacture of, near Onondaga Lake, 231.

Sammons, Frederick and Jacob, Adventures of, 290.

Sammons, Jacob, Assault upon, in Mohawk Valley, 233.

Sammons, Sampson, Notice of, 288; Capture of his Family-Burning of his
House, 289.

Sammons, Thomas, Notice of, 289.

Sandeman, Founder of Sandemanians. 405.

San Salvador. Discovery of, hy Columbus in 1492, 25.

Saratoga, Heights of, 69,72 Surrender of Burgoyne at, 81.

Scalping Story at Battle of Lexington explained, 527.

Scammel, Colonel, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,50 Notice of-Shot-Epitaph
of, 430.

Shell, John Christian, Notice of-Builds a Block-house at Shell's Bush,
299; Death of, 300.

Schenectady burned by Canadians and Indians in 1691-Formerly principal
Seat of Mohawks, 302.

Schoharie Settlements attacked by Indians in 1780, 279.

Schuyler, IIon-Yost. Notice of, 251; Death of, 252.

Schuyler, General Philip, in command of the northern Division of the
Continental Army in 1777,36 Biographical Sketch of,38 Returns Home on
account of Insubordination in his Army,39 Retreat to the Mohawk-Proposed
Relief to the Valley,40 Volunteers for Relief of Fort Schuyler-Position
of his Forces at Cohoes-Preparations to oppose Burgoyne-Appeal to the
Eastern States,41 Superseded by Gates-

Hie noble Conduct,42 Acquittal of Blame, 136; Attempted Abduction by
Waltermeyer, 222; Robbery of his House, 223; Receives Orders from
Congress to seize military Stores in Mohawk Valley, 235; Ordered to
repair Old Fort Stanwix, 236; Treaty with Indians at German Flats in
1777, 238; Appointed Commissioner by Congress to attend Indian Council
at Johnstown in 1778, 265; Mansion of, at Albany.304; Headquarters at
Morristown with Washington, 315; Receives Directions from Washington at
New York in 1775, 564.

Schuylerville, Arrival at,71 Scenery »t, 72.

Scott, General Winfield, Notice of, 226.

Seal, Old Colony (Plymouth), 445.

Sears, David, Notice of, 466.

Seeker, Dr., Archbishop of Canterbury, proposes to establish Episcopacy
in America in 1748, 457."Separatists" (Independents), 441.

Shades of Death (Dismal Swamp), Pocono Mountains, Scene of unparalleled
Sufferings of Women and Children in 1778, 360.

Shakers, founded in America by Ann Lee in 1774, 383.

Shattuck, Colonel Daniel, Notice of, 552.

Sharon Springs, Battle of, in 1781, 294; Notice of-Analysis of Waters
of, 295.

Sheep, Saxony, introduced into Hoosick in 1820; Increase of, in 1845,
400.

Shelly, Quotation from, 34, 240.

Sherburne, Major Henry, massacre of his Troops at Cedar Rapids, 208.

Sheshequin (Queen Esther's Plantation), Notice of, 358.

Shirley, Governor, naval Expedition against Niagara in 1755, 217;
Preparations at Albany to re-enforce Oswego in 1756,218.

Sholes's Landing, Scenery of, 149.

Shrieve, Colonel, at Battle of Springfield, 323.

Sigourney, Mrs., Quotation from, 443.

Silliman, General, at Expedition to Danbury, 402; At Destruction of
Fairfield, 427.

Silliman, Professor Benjamin, Visit to Wyoming, 365.

Sitz, Peter, Bearer of Dispatches to Cherry Valley, 297.

Skene. Major, Jun., Capture of, 137; Notice of, 393.

Skenesborough, historical Notice of, 137.

Skinner, General, Notice of, 166.

'.Skinners" and " Cow Boys," Notice of, 502.

Skirmish at Sabbath-day Point in 1756, 115; Ditto, in 1776,116; Of Major
Sherburne with Indians near Cedar Rapids-Arnold's attempt to release the
Prisoners-Menaces of the Indians-Letter from Sherburne, 208;
Dishonorable Conduct of British Commander-Washington's Opinion-Final
Adjustment, 209; On West Canada Creek in 1781, 291; Of Captain Woodworth
and Indians at German Flats, 298; At Shell's Bush-Descent of Tories upon
Shell's Block house-Furious Engagement-Capture of M'Donald, 299; Death
of Shell and his Son-Cessation of Hostilities, 300; Captain Ogden and
Yankees in 1770,345; Near Cambridge, 392; Colonel Baume and Americans at
Walloomscoick, 396; At Saugatuck Bridge in 1777, 409; At Compo with Sir
William Erskine, 410; At Rye Neck between British and Putnam's Scouts,
412; Near Grummon's Hill, 414; Near Hew Haven in 1779,424; At Lexington,
524; At Concord Bridge, 527; At Hardy's Hill, 528; At West Cambridge and
Prospect Hill.529 With British on Islands in Boston Harbor after Battle
of Lexington, 537; Near Boston after Battle of Bunker Hill, 569.

Sleight. John, Notice of, 390.

Slocum, Frances, Capture and Discovery of, 368; Interview with her white
Kindred-Her Narrative-Condition-Nantes of her Children-Exempted from
Removal with the Miamies-Congress grants her a Tract of Land, 369.

Slocum, Jonathan. Murder of, at Wyoming, 363.

Slocum, Joseph, and Family, Sufferers at Wyoming-Abduction of his Sister
Frances, 367.

Slocum. Mrs., Presentiment of, 368.

Sloop Liberty, seizure of, in Boston in 1767, 478.

Small, Captain, at Shell's Bush, 299.

Small, Major, at Battle of Bunker Hill, 544.

Small pox appears in American Camp in 1777-Alleged Vaccination in the
Army refuted, 307.

Smith, Adam, Author of?* Wealth of Nations," active in writing against
American Cause-Biographical Sketch of, 517.

Smith, Captain, killed near Catskill, 267.

Smith, Captain John, gives Name to New England, 433.

Smith, Colonel, in Expedition to Concord in 1775, 523.

Smith, Ebenezer, Notice of, 415.

Smith's Cove, Washington's Army at, in 1777, 332.

Snake, curious Device of (Head-piece of Constitutional Courant), 468,
508.

Snyder, Christopher (Boy), first Martyr in Cause of American Liberty.
489.

Sorel or Richelieu River described, 174.

Spaulding, Captain, at Wyoming, 353, 362.

Speddy, William, tried for Murder of Ogden, 346.

Specht, General, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50

Speedlove. Major, killed at Battle of Bunker Hill, 546.

Spencer, General Joseph, at Battle of Bunker Hill-Biographical Sketch
of. 566.

Spencer, Thomas, sent to Canada as a Spy in 1777,

Spinner, Reverend John P., of German Flats, 284.

Spoils of War taken by Colonel Gansevoortin 1777. 252.

Springfield, at Head of Oswego Lake, destroyed by Brant in 1778, 266.

Springfield, New Jersey, burning of, in 1780, 32*1.

Springs. Salt, near Onondaga Lake, 231.

Staats, Abraham, Notice of. 331.

Stacia, Colonel, at Battle of Cherry Valley in 1778, 268.

Stamp Act, Excitement of, produced in Mohawk Valley-Political Movements
of the People-Formation of Parties, 232, Violence of Loyalists-Assault
upon Sammons-Meeting at Cherry Valley, 233; Attempted Removal of
Kirkland-Hostile Movements of the Johnsons-Indian Councils, 234;
Treatment of Stamp-master at New Haven-Joy on Repeal of Act, 421, 435;
Proposed Postponement of Action-Derived from the Dutch, 461; Suggested
by a Club of American Merchants in 1739-Approved by Franklin in
Continental Congress at Albany in 1754-Also, by Mr. Huske in Parliament,
in 1764, 461; Passage of the Act, 463; Appointment of Stamp-masters,
465; Arrival of the Stamps, 466; Effect in Boston, 469; Repeal of, 472;
Rejoicing in Boston off Repeal of the Act, 473.

Standish, Miles, biographical Sketch of. 445.

Stark, General John, biographical Sketch of-Refuses to Accompany Lincoln
to the Hudson River-Censured by Congress-Proceeds to Battle at
Bennington, 394; Presents Trophies to Massachusetts, 395; Laconic Speech
at Battle of Bennington, 397; Popularity after Battle of Bennington-
Promoted by Congress for Bravery, 398; At Battle of Bunker Hill, 541.

Stark, Lieutenant, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,49 Vigilance of. at Fort
William Henry, 110.

Starr, Major, Notice of, 403.

Staten Island, secret Expedition of Lord Stirling to, 311.

Steam-boats on the Hudson, 35.

Steamer Clermont, Fulton's, described,35 Maid of the Mist. 228.

Steele, John, Notice of, 433.

Steuben, Baron, Notice of, 311; Head quarters near Middle-brook in 1778,
332; Receives gold Medal from King of Prussia, 333.

Stewart, Colonel, in Encampment at Morristown in 1781, 313.

Stewart, Lazarus, at Wyoming Valley in 1770, 345.

Stillwater, first Battle of, in 1777,51 Second Battle of, 60. (See
Bemis's Heights and Saratoga.)

Stirling, Lord, secret Expedition to Staten Island in 1780, 311.

Stockwell, Lieutenant, at Siege of Fort Schuyler in 1777, 250.

Stoddard, M. Richardson, Grave of, at Mount Independence, 148.

Stone, ancient Monumental, exhumed near Pompey Hill, 230.

Stone, Colonel William L., Anecdote of, 229; In Error with regard to
Brant, 238.

Street, Alfred B., Quotations from, 33, 104, 380.

St. Anthony's Nose, Notice of. 282.

St. Clair, General Arthur, Retreat from Ticonderoga to Fort Edward in
1777-Pursued by tbe British,39 Biographical Sketch of, 132; Acquitted of
Blame, 136.

St. John, Peter, made Prisoner in 1779, 414; Quotation from, 415.

St. John's, Expedition of Allen and Arnold against, in 1775,154;
Captured by Montgomery, 162; Rendezvous for Troops in the Revolutionary
War. 168.

St. Lawrence and its Islands, 214.

St. Lawrence, Gulf of, discovered by Cartier in 1523, 32.

St. Leger, Colonel Barry, Expedition up St. Lawrence and Lake Ontario
with Rangers in 1777,38 In Mohawk Valley,40 His Forces disperse,41
Approaches Oneida Lake, 241; Letter to Burgoyne relative to Loss of Fort
Schuyler, 247; Character of, described by Arnold, 251; Retreat from
Oriskany, 252. '

St. Regis, Incidents of, 210.

Sturgis, Captain, Notice of, 427.

Swain, Charles, Quotation from, 415.

Swartwout, Captain Abraham, at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 242.

Sullivan, General John, biographical Sketch of-Expedition against
Indians in Western New York in 1779.272 Rendezvous of, in 1778, 336; At
Battle of Bunker Hill, 566; At In-trenchments near Bunker Hill, 570.

Sword, Pilgrim Robinson's, at New Haven, 438.

Symonds, Colonel, at Battle of Bennington, 396.

Syracuse, early History of-Region about-Settled by Dupuys in 1655-
Hostility of the Indians-Stratagem of the French, 229; Settlements of
French and Spaniards in 1669-Evidence of earlier Explorations by
Europeans, 230.

Tallmadge, Colonel Benjamin, arrives at Fairfield in 1779, 427.

Taxation, heavy voluntary, 455; New Scheme of, 475.

Tea proscribed, 488; Destruction of. in Boston Harbor, 498.

Tea Party, Boston, Names of Members of, 499.

Teedyuscung, Indian Diplomatist in Council at Easton in 1758, 336; Death
of, 344.

Tenbroeck at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 50.

Ten Hills' Farm, Cannon planted on, 571.

Ternay, Chevalier De, in Command of French Fleet at Newport, 435.

Thacher, Dr. James, at Hudson Highlands, 307; Allusion to Inoculation in
American Army, 308; Quotations from 308, 310, 311, 312, 574.

Thomas, Colonel John, Death of-Biographical Sketch of, 202; Appointed
General in 1775, 516; At Battle of Bunker Hill, 543, 566.

Ticonderoga, Topography of, 115, 118; Capture of, in 1758, 120;
Expedition of Ethan Allen to-Plan formed in Connecticut to capture, 123;
Arnold joins Allen at Castleton-Dispute about Rank-Surprise of
Garrison.124 Interview he-tween Allen and Delaplaee-Allen's Orders to
surrender obeyed-Trouble, with Arnold about Command, 125; Ruins of, 127;
Present Appearance and Condition of, 128; Invested by Burgoyne-Weakness
of the Garrison, 132; Invested by British, 134; Retreat of Americans
from, to Mount Independence, 135.

Tories, active and passive,92 Violence of, in Mohawk Valley in 1775,
233; Disarming of, at Johnson Hall, 236; Gort and Platto, 288; Descent
of, upon Shell's Bush, 299; Pine Robbers, Notice of, 332; Tories and
Indians invade Wyoming, 350; Execution of. at Kingston, 389.

Tory, Elliot, 264; Ogden of New Jersey, 313; Writing in Cipher in 1779,
320; Guides, Benedict and Jarvis, 402, 407; Joseph Dibble, Notice of,
406; Student in Yale College, 431; Tory and Whig, revival of Terms, 486;
Writer under Signature Massachusettensis, 513.-

Townshend, Charles, in Parliament in 1765, 462.

Treason, Acts of, proposed to be tried under Statute of Henry VIII.,
482.

Treaty of Amnesty with France after Battle of Saratoga,86 General
Schuyler with Indians at German Flats, 238; Between Colonel Denison and
Continentals at Wyoming in 1778, 358.

Treaty Table at Forty Fort, Notice of, 359, 365.

Tree, Balm of Gilead, at Fort Edward,95 Jane M'Crea,97 Apple, at
Springfield, New Jersey, 322; Charter Oak, at Hartford, 434; Liberty, in
Boston, 466, 467; Washington Elm, at Cambridge, 558, 564.

Trees, Elm, of New Haven planted by Austin and Hillhouse, 428.

Troops, British, Landing of. near New Haven, 422; Arrival of, in Boston,
under Colonels Dalrymple and Carr, 480; Removal, 491; Number of,
stationed at Boston on Eve of Revolution, 521; Increase of, in Boston
after Battle of Lexington, 537; Condition of, in Boston in 1775, 571.

Trumbull, John, LL.D., Quotation from, 374, 401; Biographical Sketch of-
Poem, M'Fingall, 401.

Trumbull, Governor Jonathan, offers to mediate between General Gage and
Bostonians in 1775, 522.

Trumbull, Joseph, appointed Commissary General by Washington in 1775,
567.

Tryon County (now Montgomery), Notice of, 232; Armed Settlers of, 266.

Tryon, Governor William, Expedition to Danbury in 1777, 401; Expedition
to Horse-neck Landing, 411; Landing of, at Norwalk in 1779, 414, 416;
Expedition to New Haven in 1779, 422; Head-quarters at Fairfield, 427;
Arrival at New York from England in 1775, 522.

Tucker, Reverend Josiah and Reverend Abraham, Notice of, 519.

United States, relative Position of, to Governments of Europe,86
Independence of, acknowledged by France in 1778,87 Foreign and domestic
Debt of, in 1777-81, 319.

University, Harvard, Endowment of, 555.

Van Courtlandt at Battle of Stillwater, 51.

Van Courtlandt, Pierre, first President of Senate of New York, 387.

Vanderburg, Colonel, Notice of, 436.

Van Norden, Mrs. Polly, Notice of, 332.

Van Rensselaer, General Robert, Expedition to Tryon County, 280; Pursues
Johnson-His Inaction, 281; Abandons pursuit-Dispatches Messenger to
Captain Vrooman at Fort Schuyler, 282.

Van Rensselaer, General Stephen, Notice of, 226.

Van Rensselaer, Colonel Solomon, Notice of, 226.

Van Rensselaer, William, Notice of, 391.

Van Schaick, Colonel, at Cherry Valley, 237; In Expedition against
Onondagas, 270; Pursues Sir John Johnson to Ticonderoga, 290.

Van Schaiek's Mill, 391.

Van Slyk, Captain, killed at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 246.

Van Swearingen, Captain, at Battle of Stillwater, 52.

Van Veehten, Colonel, at Battle of Bemis's Heights, 71.

Varnum, Colonel, at Battle of Bunker Hill, 571.

Varrick, Colonel, at Battle of Stillwater-Rupture with Arnold, 56.

Vasco De Gama reaches India via Cape of Good Hope, 26.

Vasquez D'Aillon, Lucas, reaches Combahee River in South Carolina-
Kidnaps Natives with Intention of selling them as Slaves, 30.

Veeder, Colonel, at Currytown, 295.

Vergennes, Count De, Policy of, relative to extending Aid to Americans,
86.

Vermont demands Separation from the Union-Declared Free and Independent
in 1777, under the Name of New Connecticut, 168.

Verrazani, John, Expedition to North America, 31.

Vespucci, Elena, applies to Congress for Grant of Land, 28;

Vessels of War, Confiance and Saratoga, 143; Constructed on Lake
Champlain-Royal Savage, 163; Congress Galley, commanded by Arnold-
Carleton, Inflexible, and Maria on Lake Champlain, 164; Camilla and
Scorpio, 422; Romney, in Boston, 478; Fleet of Eight, arrive in Boston
in 1768, 480; Arrival of the Cerberus, at Boston after Battle of
Lexington, 537; Names of, at Boston alter Battle of Lexington, 539;
Names of, authorized by Congress in 1775.576 British Sloop Falcon
attempts to seize Captain Manly, 570; Names of, first constructed for
Continental Navy, 575.

Visit of the Author to Places on the Hudson River,34 Albany-Troy,35
Cohoes Falls-Van Schaick's Island,36 Waterford,43 Bemis's Heights-
Saratoga, 44,89 Schuylerville-Dovegat, 88 Fort Edward,94 Rogers's
Island, 102; Glenn's Falls, 104; "Big Snake" and "Indian Cave,"105
Caldwell-Lake George, 108; Ruins of Fort George, 112; Rogers's Rock-
Prisoner's Island, 116; Ticonderoga, 118, 121, 136; Whitehall or
Skenesborough, 137, 142; Fort Anne Village, 139; Putnam's Rock, 142;
Battle ground of Hubbardton, 145; Sholes's Landing, 144, 149; Lake
Champlain-Mount Independence, 147; Chimney Point, 150; Crown Point, 151;
Split Rock, 159; Burlington, Vermont-Grave of Ethan Allen, 161 Rousse's
Point-Isle Aux Noix, 167; St.John's, 168; Chambly, 174; Longueuil, 175,
182; Montreal, 177; Sorel-River St. Lawrence-Quebee, 183; Falls of
Montmorenei-Point Levi, 203; Plains of Abraham, 204; Lachine-St. Ann's
Rapids, 206; Cedars Rapids, 207; Scotch Canadian Cairn, 209; St. Regis-
Ogdensburgh, 210; Kingston, Upper Canada, 214; Oswego, 215; Genesee and
Niagara Rivers, 224; Niagara Falls, 227; Suspension Bridge, 228;
Syracuse, 229; Rome-Mohawk Valley-Fort Stanwix (Rome), 231; Battleground
of Oriskany, 243; Whitesboro'-Utica-Little Falls-German Flats, 253; Fort
Plain, 261; Mohawk Valley-Fulton ville-Fonda, 284; Caughnawaga-
Johnstown, 285; Canajoharie-Currytown, 2112; Sharon Springs, 295; Cherry
Valley.296 Albany, 300; Newark-Morristown, 305; Springfield, New Jersey,
322; Elizabethtown, 326; Elizabethtown Point, 327; Middlebrook, 331,
332; Camp ground near Middlebrook-Washington's Rock, 333; Somerville-
Easton, Pennsylvania, 335; Pokono Mountain-Valley of Wyoming, 339, 370;
Wilkesbarre, 340, 370; Toby's Eddy, 343; Kingston and Forty Fort, 364;
Monument to the Martyrs of Wyoming, 365; Carbondale, Pennsylvania, Coal
Mines, 377; Milford-Sawkill, 380; Port Jervis; Neversink Valley, 381;
Poughkeepsie, 382; Kingston, New York, 385; Hoosick Valley-Bennington
Battle-ground, 391, 398; Walloomscoiek Valley, 398 Bennington, 399;
Housatonie Valley-Danbury, 400; Ridgefield, 407, 412; Putnam's Hill,
412; Norwalk, 413; Gregory's Point-Grummon's Hill,414; Fairfield, 416:
Greenfield Hill-New Haven-East Rock, 417, 428; Westbridge and Milford
Hill, near New Haven, 423, 428; Yale College, 431; Hartford, 432;
Boston, 439, 561; Concord, 551; Lexington, 552; Cambridge, 555; Bunker
Hill Monument, 558; Dorchester Heights, 560; Massachusetts Historical
Society, 561.

Visscher, Colonel, at Siege of Fort Schuyler, 245.

Volunteers from New Hampshire join Army at Cambridge previous to Battle
of Bunker Hill, 536.

Vrooman, Captain, in Command of Fort Schuyler-Captured by Brant-Taken to
Canada as Prisoner by Johnson, 282.

Wagner directed to shoot Brant, 238.

Wales's Hill, Roxbury, Massachusetts, Notice of, 565.

Walker, Captain, at Battle of Springfield in 1780, 323; At Battle of
Bunker Hill, 543.

Walloomscoiek, Orthography and Signification of, 398.

Walloomscoiek River, Notiee of, 395.

Walpole, Sir Robert, enlightened Views of, in regard to Taxation, 454.

Wampum described, 302.

War between England and France in 1756 ("Seven Years' War"),95 Civil,
between Yankees and Pennymites in Valley of Wyoming, 1769-Erection of
Forts-Capture of Durkee-Surrender of Ogden, 345; Treatment of Ogden-
Nathan Ogden killed by Speddy-Another Attack on Yankees-Pennymites
expelled-New Fortifications, 346; Hostilities cease in 1771, 347;
Revival of the War in 1782-Decree of Trenton Its Effect-Injustice toward
Yankees-Inaction of Congress, 371; Great Deluge-Danger and Distress of
Inhabitants-Reappearance of the Soldiers-Renewal of Hostilities, 372;
Armstrong's Expedition-Stratagem-Change in publie Sentiment-Censors hold
Septennial Meeting-Appeal for Relief.373 New Difficulties-Commissioners
repulsed by Franklin-His Arrest for Treason, 375; Discharged-Pickering's
escape to Philadelphia-Returns to the Valley-Abducted-Difficulties
cease, and the Vale ever after a Picture of Prosperity and Repose.376
King Philip's, in 1675, 420; Virtual Declaration of, against the
Americans in 1775, 519.

Ward, General Artemas, appointed temporary Commander-inchief in 1775,
190; Biographical Sketch of, 516; At Battle of Bunker Hill, 541, 556.

Warner, Colonel Seth, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,49 Biographical
Sketch of, 153; At Battle of Bennington, 393, 394.

Warren, James, Biographical Sketch of, 494.

Warren. Dr. Joseph, Oration» of, in Boston Old South Church, 522;
Presides in Provincial Congress of Massachusetts in

1775, 531, 564; At Battle of Bunker Hill.542 Killed, 546; Biographical
Sketeh of, 548; Masonic Honors to his Memory-Monument on Breed's Hill,
549.

Warren, Mrs. Mercy, Quotation from, 487; Biographical Sketch of 464.

Washington, General George. Manifesto of, issued at Middle-brook in
1777, 133; Recommends Arnold, 136; Visit to Boston in 1789, 143;
Appointed Commander-in-chief of Continental Forces in 1775-Takes Command
of Army at Cambridge-His Generals-Sends Arnold on Expedition to Canada,
190; Manifesto to Arnold, 194; Censure of Butterfield and Bedell, 207;
Opinion in regard to Convention of British at Cedar Rapids, 209; Head
quarters at Morristown, 306; Establishes Cantonments from Princeton to
the Hudson, under control of Putnam. 307: Proclamation of, counter to
that of Brothers Howe, 308; Opposition to his Policy-His Independence
and Sagacity-Leaves Head-quarters at Morristown, and proceeds to
Middlebrook.309 Head-quarters of, at New Windsor, on the Hudson-Holds
Council of War to quell Rebellion at Princeton, 313; Recognition of Ford
at Mount Vernon-Illustration of his Character, 314; Prohibits Gambling-
His religious Toleration, 315; Deprecation of paper Money as legal
Tender, 320; Deceived by Clinton at Short Hills, 323; Head quarters of
at White Plains in 1778, 331; First Conference with Rochambeau and
Ternay at Newport in 1780-Returns to Camp at West Point-Second
Conference with Rochambeau at Wethersfield, 435; Conference at Webb
House, Wethersfield, to Concert plan of Campaign in 1781-Menaces New
York-Abandons Siege-Proceeds with Forces to Yorktown-Extract from Diary,
436; Headquarters at Cambridge, 555; Letter of to Poet Slave, Phillis,
556; Chantrey's Statue of in State House, Boston, 561; Appointed
Commander-in-chief of American Forces in 1775-Acceptance and Reply-
Salary of-Modesty, 563; Leaves Philadelphia for Cambridge-Reception at
New York. Watertown, and Cambridge-Takes Command of Army, 504; Calls
Council of War-Organizes Army-Issues general Order, 565; Sends armed
Vessels to intercept British Supplies from Boston, 569; Sends Forces to
Plowed Hill and Charlestown Road, 571; Writes President of Congress,
charging that body with Neglect-Camp on Bunker Hill-Calls Council of
War, 573; Proclamations of Howe-Retaliates by ordering Sullivan and
others to seize all Officers of Government unfriendly to Patriots, 575;
Renders Account to Government for Expenses incurred by Lady Washington
in visiting Camp during War-Explanation, 576.

Washington, Lady, with her Husband at Head-quarters, near Middlebrook,
in 1778, 332; Arrival at Cambridge in 1775. 576. Waterbury, Colonel, at
Expedition to Danbury in 1777, 402. Water Gap, Pennsylvania, Notice of,
338.

Watts, Major, at Siege of Fort Schuyler in 1777, 244.

Wayne, General, in Command of Pennsylvania Troops in 1781, 312.

Webb, Colonel, at Battle of Springfield, 324.

Webb, General. Perfidy and Cowardice of, 110.

Webb, Dr., Notiee of, 562. .

Webster, Daniel, Orations at Bunker Hill Monument, 1825, 1843, 559.

Weed, David, Notiee of, 402.

Wells, Charles F., Notiee of, 365.

Wells, Eleazer, Notiee of, 286.

Wemple, Colonel, Notice of. 263.

Wentworth, Governor Banning, Flight to Boston for Safety in 1775. 568.

Wesson, Colonel, at Battle of Stillwater,51 At Siege of Fort Schuyler in
1777, 242.

West Point, Washington's Army at, in 1778, 332.

Weymouth, Massachusetts. Settlement of, in 1622, 445. Whalley, General,
English Regicide, concealed at New Haven, 419."Whig" and " Tory." Origin
of,71 Renewal of Terms, 486. Whigs. Meeting of, at Cherry Valley in
1775, 233.

Whipple, William, at Battle of Bemis's Heights,49 At Battle of
Bennington, 393.

White Eyes. Indian Chief, Fidelity of, 264.

Whitefield. Reverend George, biographical Sketch of, 336; Acquaints Dr.
Langdon with Secret of attempt to establish Episcopacy in America, 489.

Whitehall the Theater of hostile Preparations in 1812, 139. Whittier, J.
G., Quotation from. 150, 432.

Wilcox, Quotation from, 253, 305, 306.

Wilkes, John, biographical Sketch of, 520.

Wilkinson. General James, at Battle of Stillwater,56 Biographical Sketch
of-Speeeh before Congress, 84.

Willard, Counselor, at Battle of Bunker Hill, 541.

Willett. Colonel Marinus, joins the Garrison of Fort Schuyler, 242, 244;
Biographical Notiee of, 244; Volunteers to he ji Messenger, 250; Left in
Command of the Garrison, 252; Patriotism in Mohawk Valley-His Command of
Tryon County Militia, 283; At Fort Hunter, Mohawk Valley, 290; Sends
Expedition, to Currytown, 294.

Williams, Colonel Ephraim,. Rock where shot, 106; Biographical Sketch
of, 107.

Williams, Colonel, at Battle of Bennington, 394.

Williams, Major, killed at Battle of Bunker Hill, 546.

Williams, Otho H" Notice of, 565.

Willie, Walter, Notice of, 302.

Willis, Quotation from, 113.

Wilson cruelly treated by Indians-Speeeh of Indian Messenger John, 349.

Wind Gap, Pennsylvania, Notice of, 338.

Windmill Point. Post of Canada Patriots in 1837, 210.

Windsor, Connecticut, Notice of, 436.

Wine, Madeira, Seizure of, in Boston in 1767, 478.

Winslow. Edward, Biographical Sketch of, 445,

Wintermoot's Fort, 351.

Winthrop, Governor John, Arrival of, in New England, 416, Expedition to
Montreal, 451.

Witchcraft in New England, 447.

Woodworth, Captain Ephraim, at Battle of Stillwater, 58. Woodworth,
Captain Solomon, Skirmish of, with Indians at German Flats, 298.

Wolcott at Battle ol Bemis's Heights. 50.

Wolfe, Genera] James, Appointment of, in 1758,120; Approach of. to
Quebec, 184; Death of-Biographical Sketeh of, 188; Monument of, 189,
205.

Women, Patriotism in Revolution, 352, 488, 512.

Wool, General, Notice of, 226. _

Woolsey, Major, at Middle Fort, Schoharie, 279.

Wooster, General David, at Expedition to Danbury, 402; Honor conferred
on, by Congress, unheeded-Marks of Grave obliterated, 406; Attacks
British at Danbury-Killed-Biographical Sketch of, 408. . .

Wordsworth, Captain, Conceals Charter of Connecticut in Oak Tree at
Hartford, 435.

Wormwood, Lieutenant, sent to Cherry Valley-Killed, 297. Writs, Quo
Warranto, defined, 434; Of Assistance, 459.

Wyllys, Honorable Samuel, Owner ot Charter Oak, 435. Wyoming Valley-
Flight of the People over the Pocono-Incidents of the Flight-
Providential Aid of Hollenbaek-Preservation of Papers.360 Picture of the
Flight-Bad Faith of Invaders, 361; Their Departure from the Valley-
Indian Cruelties-Arrival of Succor-Expedition against the Indians, 362;
Return of Settlers-Continued Alarm-Murder of Sloeuh-Sullivan's
Expedition-The Valley a Scene of War, Blond, and Suffering, 363; Efforts
to erect a Monument-Ladies form Luzerne Monumental Association-Success,
366; Residence and Grave ol Colonel Z. Butler-History of Slocum Family-
Abduction of Frances Slocum, 367; Singular Discovery of her, 368;
Interview with White Kindred-Narrative and Condition-Names of her
Children, 369; A Sabbath at Wyoming-Incidents of Life ol Mrs. Myers-
Escape of her Father and Brother from Indians, 370; Revival of Civil
War-Decree of Trenton-Its Effect-Injustice toward the Yankees-Inaction
ot Congress, 371; Great Deluge-Danger and Distress of Inhabitants-
Reappearance of Soldiers-Renewal of Hostilities.372 Armstrong's
Expedition-Stratagem-Change of Public Sentiment-Censors-Appeal lor
Relief, 373; Organization of Luzerne County-New Difficulties-
Commissioners repulsed by Franklin-His Arrest for Treason-Visited by
Colonel Ethan Allen, 375; Discharged-Pickering's Escape to Philadelphia-
Returns to the Valley-Abduction and Treatment-Difficulties cease, and
the Vale ever after a Picture of Repose and Prosperity, 376. Wyoming.
Authors on-Campbell, 341, 364: Minor, 340, 341, 350, 352, 357, 361. 362,
363, 365, 367, 376; Colonel Stone, 350, 354: Mallory, 365; Wells, 365;
Silliman, 365; Stone, 376; Gordon, Chapman, 376.

Wyoming, Description and Incidents of, 340;341 Purchase of, from
Indians, 344; Civil War at, in 1769-71, 345; Democratic Government
established in 1771, 347; Under Protection of Connecticut in 1771-Enjoys
Peace until 1775-Hostilities renewed by Northumberland Militia-
Inhabitants petition Congress for Redress, 348; Identified with General
History of the Union-Exposed Position, 349; Alarm at. in 1778-Condition
of Settlement-Apathy of Congress-Patriotism of Women, 352; Approach of
Indians and Tories-Preparations for Defense-Council of War-Position ot
Forts, 353; Decision of People-Preparations for Battle-Forces of the
Enemy-Campbell's Injustice to Brant, 354; Disposition of Belligerents
lor Battle-Speech of Colonel Z Butler-Attack, 355; Battle-Order of
Denison mistaken-Retreat of Americans-Scenes of Blood at Monocasy
Island.356 Escape of Butler and Denison-Cruelties-of Indians-Scene at
Esther's Rock, 357; Cruelties of Queen Esther (Catharine Montour)-Scenes
at Forty Fort-Negotiations for Surrender-Escape of Colonel Z.
Butler,.358; Surrender of the Fort-Treaty Table-Conduct of Tories-Bad
Faith of Indians. 359

Yale College, Notice of-Political Character of, in Revolution. 431.

Yankee Doodle, Origin of, 81, 480; Played at Surrender of Burgoyne,81;
Played in Lord Percy's Regiment at Roxbury, 528; Yankee Lumberman,
Anecdote of, 371.

Yankees and Pennymites, Hostilities between, 345; Injustice toward
Yankees in Valley of Wyoming in 1783, 371.

Yates. Robert, one of first Judges of N. Y. Supreme Court, 387 Yest,
François, biographical Sketeh and Reminiscences of, 175.

Zinzendorf, Count Nicholas L., biographical Sketch of-First Explorer in
Wyoming Valley-Adventures with Indians, 342, In His Camp ground, 343.In
His Campground, 343.





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