Brave, popular “Old Put” might be the man to boost morale, but he had neither the experience nor the temperament to direct so large a force under such conditions and was thus a poor choice, as Washington seems to have realized almost at once.
Putnam and six battalions crossed to Brooklyn early the next day, a Sunday, causing a great stir. “Scarcely were religious services finished,” wrote Abner Benedict, “when strains of martial music were heard from the ferry, and not long after column after column came winding up the Heights toward the fort…. The general was received with loud cheers, and his presence inspired universal confidence.”
The day’s orders from Sullivan deplored the disorder and unsoldierly behavior displayed in the camps on the eve of battle. Yet soldiers were here, there, and everywhere, strolling about as if on holiday, some of them miles from the lines. “Carts and horses driving every way among the army,” wrote Philip Fithian. “Men marching out and coming in…. Small arms and field pieces continually firing. All in tumult.”
The contrast between such disorder and flagrant disregard for authority and the perfectly orchestrated landing by Howe’s troops could not have been more pronounced.
Arriving at Brooklyn, Washington was outraged by what he saw, and in a letter written later in the day, he lectured Old Put as he might the greenest lieutenant. All “irregularities” must cease at once. “The distinction between a well regulated army and a mob is the good order and discipline of the first, and the licentious and disorderly behavior of the latter.”
Seeing things as they were, not as he would wish they were, was known to be one of Washington’s salient strengths, and having witnessed firsthand the “loose, disorderly, and unsoldierlike” state of things among the troops at Brooklyn, and knowing how outnumbered they were by the enemy, he might have ordered an immediate withdrawal back to New York while there was still time. But he did not, nor is there any evidence that such a move was even considered.
In New York all the while, more than half the army, including many of his best troops and best officers, like Henry Knox, waited in anxious expectation of an attack there. “We expect the fleet up every tide if the wind serves,” wrote a Connecticut colonel, William Douglas.
That same Sunday another 5,000 Hessians crossed the Narrows from Staten Island bringing Howe’s total forces on Long Island to 20,000.
WASHINGTON RETURNED AGAIN to Brooklyn early the following day, August 26, to confer still again with his commanders and appraise the defenses and deployment of troops. Almost certainly he rode beyond Brooklyn to the Heights of Gowan, where from the ridge line he could have seen the white tents of the British spread across the plain at Flatlands. (“General Washington, with a number of general officers went down to view the motion of the enemy,” reads one account.) With his telescope, he could well have watched Howe’s troops on their daily parade.
The plan was for General Putnam to direct the entire defense from the fortifications on Brooklyn Heights. Generals Sullivan and Stirling and their troops were to be positioned well forward on the “out work” of the wooded ridge, to cover the few main roads or passes through that long, natural barrier.
The Gowanus Road was on the far right, near the Narrows. The Flatbush Road was at the center and thought to be the way the British would come. A third, the Bedford Road, was off to the left. All three were comparatively narrow cuts through the ridge and thus “easily defensible.”
The ridge of hills and woods was all that separated the two armies but was seen by the Americans as the ideal forward line of defense, and so to their decided advantage. Joseph Reed, doubtless reflecting Washington’s view, deemed it “very important.” The fight when it came would surely come there, in the woods, where, it was agreed, Americans fought best.
Stirling was responsible for the Gowanus Road on the right, where about 500 troops were posted. Sullivan had command of both the Flatbush Road at the center, where 1,000 were deployed, and the Bedford Road, on the left flank, where another 800 or so were positioned under Colonel Samuel Miles of Pennsylvania. In the absence of uniforms, every man was to put a sprig of green in his hat as identification.
Washington’s specific order to Putnam, who knew almost nothing about Long Island, having visited there only occasionally, was to position his best troops forward and “at all hazards prevent the enemy’s passing the wood and approaching the works.”
As things stood, a force of fewer than 3,000 soldiers, nearly all of whom had had no experience in battle, were expected to hold a ridge four miles long, while the rest, another 6,000, remained within the Brooklyn forts. In all, the outposts stretched six miles. The terrain was so rugged that units had trouble communicating, and so thickly wooded that in places men were blind to any movement beyond a hundred feet.
Had there been American cavalry to serve as “eyes and ears,” or had there been reliable intelligence, the defenders might have had a better chance. But there was neither. The Continental Army had no cavalry. Congress had not considered cavalry necessary, nor had Washington asked for any. And however adamant he was about the value of spies, as circumstances were, he had none.
Nor in the five days since the British landing had anyone been stationed at a fourth, lesser-known pass on the far left, three miles east of the Bedford Road. The Jamaica Pass, as it was called, was narrower even than the others, and thus the easiest to defend. Yet nothing had been said in any of the orders of Sullivan, or Putnam, or Washington expressing concern about the Jamaica Pass or the need to post sufficient troops there.
Having looked things over and conferred with his commanders, Washington approved the plan, including, presumably, a last-minute idea of having the Jamaica Pass patrolled by five young militia officers who had horses.
Washington returned to New York that evening convinced at last that the British would make their “grand push” against Brooklyn. Or so he wrote to John Hancock. To General Heath he also wrote that by the “present appearance of things” the enemy would make their “capital impression” on Long Island. But then, as if still unable to make up his mind, he cautioned yet again that it might all be “only a feint to draw over our troops to that quarter, in order to weaken us here.”
His army, he knew, was ill prepared for what was to come. There was more sickness in the ranks than at any time before. Only a few of his officers had ever faced an enemy on the field of battle. He himself had never commanded an army in battle. His responsibilities, the never-ending “load of business,” weighed heavily. The same uncertainties that had vexed him in his first days of command at New York vexed him still. The enemy could not delay much longer. The time for warm-weather campaigning, “the season for action,” was fast waning, yet even now he consoled himself with the hope that he had a few more days before the enemy would strike.
It had been a long, anxious day, and in the privacy of his quarters in the Mortier house, Washington turned his mind—turned for relief it would seem—to thoughts of home. Alone at his desk, he wrote a long letter to his manager at Mount Vernon, Lund Washington, filled with thoughts on the marketing of flour and specific directions concerning work on additions to the house. For much of the letter it was as though he had nothing else on his mind.
I wish most ardently you could get the north end of the house covered in this fall, if you should be obliged to send all over Virginia, Maryland, and Pennsylvania for nails to do it with. Unless this is done it will throw everything exceedingly backward—retard the design of planting trees…besides keeping the house in a disagreeable littered situation. It is equally my wish to have the chimneys run up. In short I would wish to have the whole closed in (if you were even to hire many workmen of different kinds to accomplish it).
Of the war he wrote that a few more days would likely “bring matters to an issue one way or other.” If he did not think the struggle just, nothing on earth could “compensate [for] the loss of all my domestic happiness and requite me for the load of business which constantly presses upon and depriv
es me of every enjoyment.”
What he may have written to his wife Martha that night, or at any point in the course of events to come, is unknown, since she later destroyed all but three of his letters to her, and these survived only by accident. His sleep that night was to be abbreviated, yet the most he would have for days.
GENERAL HENRY CLINTON, not an impressive man in looks or manner, had thus far in the war done little to show that appearances could be deceiving, and that he had, as he knew, marked intelligence and ability. For more than a year he had fared poorly in the service of his King. At Boston, he and William Howe had been continuously at odds, and he had failed most grievously (in his mind) to convince Howe to seize Dorchester Heights before the rebels did. Sent off to South Carolina, he had failed in his mission there. An attack on Fort Sullivan at Charleston in June had been such a humiliating defeat for the British that the campaign had to be abandoned, and largely because Clinton had been too cautious. Then, returning to New York, he had seen all his arguments for an invasion up the Hudson rejected out of hand by Howe.
Clinton knew his failings. He knew he could be difficult, inclined to “speak too freely,” that he was touchy and that in discussion his excessive zeal often worked to his disadvantage.
On paper, however, Henry Clinton could be bold and convincing, and he had returned from Charleston greatly changed in outlook. His defeat had convinced him that the war should be waged not to conquer territory but to destroy the rebel army by outflanking it whenever or wherever possible, if not by water, then on land. As a strategist, he knew well how to use a map. “Look at the map,” he would proclaim.
Soon after the landing at Gravesend, accompanied by another general, Sir William Erskine, and Lord Rawdon, Clinton had ridden off to reconnoiter the rebel defenses and the few passes through the wooded Heights of Gowan. Told by Loyalist farmers of the little-used Jamaica Pass beyond the Bedford Road, and that it appeared to be unguarded, the three British officers continued on to find that what they had been told was true.
Clinton immediately drew up a plan. This time, however, instead of going to Howe to make the case himself, he asked General Erskine to take what he had written to the headquarters at Flatlands. It read as follows:
The position which the rebels occupy in our front may be turned by a gorge about six miles from us, through a country in which cavalry may make the avant garde. That, once possessed, gives us the island; and in a mile or two further we shall be on the communications with their works at Brooklyn. The corps which attempts to turn this flank must be in very great force, for reasons too obvious to require detailing. The attack should begin on the enemy’s right by signal; and a share [should be] taken in it even by the fleet, which (as the tide will then suit) may get under way and make every demonstration of forcing by the enemy’s batteries in the East River, without, however, committing themselves. The efforts to be made by the army will be along the dos d’ane at the points of Flatbush, New Utrecht, etc. These [are] the principle [attacks]; many other small ones to cooperate. They should all be vigorous but not too obstinately persisted in, except that which is designed to turn the left of the rebels, which should be pushed as far as it will go. The moment this corps gets possession of the pass above Howard’s House [Howard’s Tavern], the rebels must quit directly or be ruined. I beg leave also to propose that this corps may begin to move at nightfall, so that everything may be [ready] at its ground by daybreak.
Several days passed. Then on August 26, the same day Washington spent looking things over at Brooklyn, Clinton was sent for and told by Howe that the attack would be made entirely according to his plan and to be prepared to march that night.
General Grant, with two brigades, was to make a “spirited” early-morning diversion close to the Narrows, striking at the enemy’s right. General Leopold Philipp von Heister’s Hessians, another 4,000 men, would move out from Flatbush to keep the Americans occupied at the center. In the meantime, the main body of the army would move under the cover of dark to be in position at daybreak.
Clinton was to command the advance guard on the night march, General Howe following with the rest of the main force, numbering in all 10,000 men.
IF ASKED TO DESCRIBE the common soldiers of the King’s army, the redcoats now falling in and dressing their ranks in the gathering dusk at Flatlands, most of the American soldiers who lay in wait for them would probably have said they were hardened, battle-scarred veterans, the sweepings of the London and Liverpool slums, debtors, drunks, common criminals and the like, who had been bullied and beaten into mindless obedience. It was the common American view. The truth was something else.
That the rank-and-file British regular was far better trained, better disciplined, better equipped, and more regularly paid than his American counterpart was beyond question, as the commanders on both sides well appreciated. Further, the redcoats were in far better health over all. Proper sanitation was part of British army life, and discipline in this regard was as strictly enforced as any aspect of the daily routine. Even after their long summer encampment on Staten Island, the British troops, as their officers noted repeatedly, were in excellent health, in striking contrast to the reports of rampant illness among the rebels.
In an effort to explain why the “provincials” would, in their own climate, be so afflicted with “putrid disorders,” while his Majesty’s troops, who were foreign to the climate, would enjoy near perfect health, the London Chronicle said the difference was the great cleanliness of the regulars.
Among the regular troops every private soldier is obliged to put on a clean shirt twice, perhaps three times a week, according to the season and climate; and there are a certain number of officers appointed every day to see that each man washes his own linen, if he had not a woman to do it for him.
While the dregs of society did indeed count among the King’s troops, the great majority were young countrymen from rural England, Scotland, and Ireland. They were farmers, unskilled laborers, and tradesmen—blacksmiths, cordwainers, carpenters, bakers, hatters, locksmiths, and weavers—who had been recruited, not pressed into service, drawn by the promise of clothing, food, and steady, if meager, pay, along with a chance at adventure, perhaps even a touch of glory. In their rural or small-town origins they were not greatly different from their American counterparts.
The average British regular was in his late twenties, or about five years older than the average American soldier, but the average regular had served five or six years in the army, or five or six times longer than the average volunteer under Washington. To the British rank-and-file there was nothing novel about being a soldier. The harsh life was their way of life. They carried themselves like soldiers. They had rules, regulations, and traditions down pat. They were proud to serve in His Majesty’s army, proud of the uniform, and fiercely proud of and loyal to their regiments.
On a day such as this, on the eve of battle, they would have given close attention to all the particulars of their arms and accoutrements, and each man to his own appearance. Most would be freshly shaved and their uniforms made as presentable as possible. On the move, seen from a distance, they looked glorious in their red coats and crossbelts, marching rank on rank, their huge regimental battle flags flying at the front atop ten-foot poles. Seen up close, however, the red coats, waist-length in front, longer at the back, were often faded and out at the elbows. Cuffs were frayed, knees patched, stockings or marching gaiters often torn beyond mending, try as each man would to look the part.
And with the pride in who and what they were went a very real contempt for, even hatred of, their American foes, whom they saw as cowards and traitors.
But by no means were they all battle-scarred veterans. Some of the older soldiers and officers were veterans of the killing fields of Europe during the Seven Years’ War, or the French and Indian War in America, or had survived the retreat from Concord or the Battle of Bunker Hill. The rest, the great majority of the British forces on Long Island, including the Germans,
knew only the drill and routine of army life. For as long as the average soldier in Howe’s ranks had been in service, it had been longer still, more than ten years, since Britain had last waged war. For most of the redcoats, soldiers and young officers, like nearly all of the Americans, the battle to come was to be their first.
BY NIGHTFALL EVERYTHING WAS READY. At nine came the order to move out. Clinton led a crack brigade of light infantry with fixed bayonets. Cornwallis followed with eight reserve battalions and fourteen pieces of artillery. They in turn were followed by Generals Howe and Percy with another six battalions, more artillery, and baggage wagons. The column of 10,000 stretched more than two miles. At the head of the advance guard rode two mounted officers, Captains William Glanville Evelyn and Oliver DeLancey, Jr., and three Loyalist farmers who knew the way.
The white tents at Flatlands were left standing, campfires burning, all to appear as though nothing were happening.
The night was unseasonably cool. The long column moved with utmost silence and extremely slowly. An exhausted Scottish officer who had had several sleepless nights on duty, described the march as one of the worst he had known and endless. “We dragged on at the most tedious pace,” wrote Sir James Murray, “halting every minute just long enough to drop asleep, and to be disturbed again in order to proceed twenty yards in the same manner.”
By agreeing to Clinton’s plan—by committing a force of such numbers to a night march through unknown country, led like the blind by three local farmers who might or might not be all they professed—William Howe was putting his army at extreme risk. In the event of discovery or sudden, surprise attack by the enemy, his stretched-out column could be chopped to pieces. If all went as planned, the maneuver would look like little more than a classic turning of the enemy’s flank, but it took no great stretch of imagination to picture the unforeseen circumstances, the vagaries of chance that could play havoc.
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