The city's shipyards turned out small war vessels of many types for the Pennsylvania Navy and the Continental service, including the thirty-gun frigate Delaware, launched in the spring of 1777. The State House Yard (now Independence Square) had became an artillery park—a dusty, rutted mud hole. Near the waterfront, a foundry to produce brass cannon opened in March 1777. John Adams told his seven-year-old son, Charles, that after visiting the new frigate Delaware, he “then went to the Foundery of brass Cannon. It is in Front street in Southwark, nearly opposite to the Sweeds Church.” Adams described the process to the boy: “Here is an Air furnace, in which they melt the Metal. There is a great deep Cavern dugg in the Ground in which they place the Mould into which they pour the melted Metal, and thus they cast the Gun in a perpendicular Position. Several brass six-pounders newly cast, were lying there, and several old ones, to be cast over.” Nor was this the only casting operation, for “there is another Man, one King, who lives in Front street, at the Corner of Norris's Alley, who casts Patterara's [Pedrero, a type of mortar] and Howitzers.”19 Several of these guns were now with the Continental Artillery, about to be paraded through town.
Wartime conditions had spawned major economic changes, not the least of which was profiteering from the demand for war materials and the resulting shortages, both real and contrived. Precious metals—gold, silver, and copper—were in such short supply that Congress issued paper currency. Its value was measured in Spanish silver dollars, not British sterling, for the dollars were the most common coins in circulation. The cannon cast at the brass foundry used whatever copper and tin could be had to make gunmetal, a specific type of bronze. This was similar to bell metal, another bronze that contained more tin. “Will not the Churches furnish their bells to make 24 pounders for the Randolph & the Delaware when they are to be employed against an enemy who mean to exterpate religion and every thing else valuable here?” Richard Henry Lee asked Robert Morris. “Should the enemy get possession of Philadelphia, they will surely strip the churches of their bells, as a perquisite for their chief Engineer, whereas, if they are lent to us, we shall repay in kind. I hope you will not suffer the enemy to have the honor of getting Philadelphia.”20
Lead was in very short supply. Before the war, most finished lead came from England in the form of bars or of sheets for roofing and fabrication into rain gutters, flashing, and downspouts. It was also used for clock weights and had been widely used for casement windows earlier in the century. The army desperately needed the metal for musket ammunition and buttons; proper regimental coats alone sported forty or so buttons made of pewter, which often contained a high proportion of lead. With an invasion under way and battle in the offing, the Supreme Executive Council announced in late August 1777, “The Congress by a Resolve of yesterday, having recommended to this Council that ‘the leaden Spouts in Philadelphia be taken down for the use of the Laboratory,’” the place where ammunition was fabricated, “it appearing to this Council to be a Salutary & necessary measure; therefore Resolved, That Evan Evans, Robert Allison & James Worrell, be appointed to take down all such Spouts accordingly, & make a just valuation thereof.”21
By early 1777, prices were skyrocketing as the value of paper Continental currency dropped. Officers on active service in the Continental Army found themselves in an economically ruinous situation. “The Expenses We are unavoidably put to, every Necessary bearing so exorbitant a price, makes our pay far short of what it ought to be,” Col. Percy Frazer told Polly in nearby Chester County that summer, “and I am determin'd not to hurt my Family by the Service, whilst Robbers, plunderers and Villains in Philada. and other places, are accumulating immense Fortunes in ease and safety.”22
The spirit of independence was flagging badly in the city. Capt. Alexander Graydon, a Philadelphian who had been taken prisoner at Long Island the year before, had returned home on parole in July. “I soon discovered that a material change had taken place during my absence from Pennsylvania,” he noted with much disgust, “and that the pulses of many that, at the time of my leaving it, had beaten high in the cause of Whiggism and liberty, were considerably lowered.” Alarmed by the shift, he wrote that “power, to use a language which had already ceased to be orthodox, and could therefore only be whispered, had fallen into low hands. The better sort were disgusted and weary of the war,” and Graydon astutely recognized the fact that “the instigators of revolutions are rarely those who are destined to conclude them, or profit by them.”
When fighting erupted in 1775, many Pennsylvanians responded to the call for defense. As the war to assert American rights as Englishmen turned into a war for independence, a large number withdrew their support, seeing the change as treasonous. Some, such as the Allen brothers—William, Andrew, and John, sons of William Allen Sr., one of the most prosperous and influential merchants in the city—became active Tories. William had led a Pennsylvania battalion in 1775 and early 1776 alongside Anthony Wayne; Andrew had been a delegate to Congress. Now both were with the British forces. “The great cause of schism among the Whigs had been the declaration of independence,” Graydon wrote. “Its adoption had, of course, rendered numbers malcontent; and thence, by a very natural transition, consigned them to the Tory ranks.” He lamented the rise of the “violent men” to positions of authority. “As to the Whigs, the very cause for which they contended was essentially that of freedom; and yet all the freedom it granted was, at the peril of tar and feathers, to think and act like themselves.”
The social effects of the Revolution were by no means universally applauded by the patriots of the “respectable” classes. “As Whiggism declined among the higher classes, it increased in the inferior; because they who composed them thereby obtained power and consequence,” Graydon continued. He noted with dismay that “uniforms and epaulets, with militia titles and paper money, making numbers of persons gentlemen who had never been so before, kept up every where throughout the country the spirit of opposition; and, if these were not real patriotism, they were very good substitutes for it.”
The regular Pennsylvania Line regiments were feeling it all too well; their ranks were barely one-third full. “Could there, in fact, be any comparison between the condition of a daily drudge in agricultural and mechanical labour, and that of a spruce militia-man living without work, and, at the same time, having plenty of continental dollars in his pocket!” Graydon exclaimed. “How could he be otherwise than well affected to such a cause!”23
As the army prepared to march, Washington ordered the four divisions with him—Greene's; Stephen's; Lincoln's, now commanded by Wayne; and Stirling's—to space the regiments properly and have their field artillery placed with them. The main artillery, or artillery park, was to march in between. The light dragoons were also to spread out, with orders specifically directing a spacing of 100, 150, or 200 yards between the various units. “I am induced to do this,” the commander in chief told John Hancock, “from the opinion of Several of my Officers and many Friends in Philadelphia, that it may have some influence on the minds of the disaffected there and those who are Dupes to their artifices and opinions.”24 Graydon commented, “As it had been given out, by the disaffected, that we were much weaker than, in truth, we were, the General thought it best to show both Whigs and Tories the real strength he possessed.”25
With the spacing, the line of march stretched for almost ten miles. “I like this Movement of the General, through the City,” John Adams commented. “[It] will make a good Impression upon the Minds of the timorous Whiggs for their Confirmation, upon the cunning Quakers for their Restraint and upon the rascally Tories for their Confusion.”26
There was a feeling among some that an invasion might be the best thing to clear the air in the city and its surrounding counties. “I really think that Providence has ordered this Country to be the Theatre of this Summers Campaign, in Favour of Us, for many Reasons,” John had told Abigail in early August. “1. It will make a final and entire Seperation of the Wheat from the Chaff, the Ore
from the Dross, the Whiggs from the Tories. 2. It will give a little Breath to you in N. England.” And most interesting, “3. If they should fail in their Attempt upon Philadelphia, it will give Lustre to our Arms and Disgrace to theirs,” something that could only benefit the cause. But Adams saw something deeper, a double silver lining: “If they succeed, it will cutt off this corrupted City, from the Body of the Country, and it will take all their Force to maintain it.”27
After a violent thunderstorm during the night and an early-morning shower, “which will spoil our Show, and wett the Army,” John Adams feared, the parade began. “Four regiments of Light Horse,” he wrote, “Four Grand Divisions of the Army—and the Artillery with the Mattrosses. They Marched Twelve deep, and yet took up above two Hours in passing by.” John went on to say, “Our soldiers have not yet, quite the Air of Soldiers. They dont hold up their Heads, quite erect, nor turn out their Toes, so exactly as they ought. They dont all of them cock their Hats—and such as do, dont all wear them the same Way.”28
The fifers and drummers had been instructed to mass in the center of each brigade; about 400 field musicians belonged to this force of just over 8,000 men. They were ordered to play a quick step, “but with such moderation that the men may step to it with ease; and without dancing along, or totally disregarding the music, as too often has been the case.”29 Viewing the parade from the State House, on Chesnut between Fifth Street and Sixth Street, Congressman Henry Marchant wrote that they “were upwards of two Hours in passing with a lively smart Step.”30
“I happened to be there at the time,” Captain Graydon recalled, “and, from the coffeehouse corner,” referring to Bradford's Old London Coffee House on the southwest corner of Front Street and Market Street, “saw our army, with the commander-in-chief at its head, pass down Front Street.” Lining the streets were thousands of spectators from all walks of life—Quaker merchants; Irish craftsmen and laborers; African “pepper-pot” women, who sold soup on the street corners; English cabinetmakers; German bakers; Welsh milkmaids. “The sight was highly interesting to persons of all descriptions,” Graydon continued, “and, among the many who, perhaps, equally disclaimed the epithet of Whig or Tory, Mr. Chew, from an upper window in the house of Mr. Turner, appeared a very anxious spectator.”31
Benjamin Chew had been the chief justice of Pennsylvania under the Proprietary Government. A native of Maryland, he had read law at the Middle Temple in London and was one of Philadelphia's most successful lawyers. His house on Third Street was one of the city's most elegant, and the Chews lived and entertained well. John Adams had attended a dinner there during the First Continental Congress and wrote a glowing description of the repast. With ten daughters and one son, the Chews were one of Philadelphia's leading families. Their stone country house, Cliveden, custom built ten years earlier at the upper end of Germantown, was one of the finest examples of mid-eighteenth-century architecture in America and boasted classical statuary on the grounds.
Like John Penn, Benjamin Chew had refused to take a stand on independence. The two men did not actively oppose the Whigs, but passively allowed events to take their course. Joseph Galloway, the former speaker of the Pennsylvania Assembly, had also tried to stay out of the fray the previous year by retiring to his country estate, Trevose, in Bucks County, but after receiving numerous threats and a box containing a noose and a bogus life-insurance policy, Galloway fled and joined the British forces. Chew and Penn continued to sit on the fence and were under surveillance as the theater of war approached the city. Soon they would be arrested without charge and detained at a remote location in New Jersey.
Many civilians had already left the city to get away from the epidemics of camp fever that had killed hundreds of soldiers in town the previous winter and threatened the inhabitants. One such refugee was Christopher Marshall, an elderly apothecary whose shop on Chesnut Street near Second had supplied medical kits to the Pennsylvania regiments. Marshall was on the Pennsylvania Board of War but moved to Lancaster in the spring of 1777 to get away from the disease and constant tension in Philadelphia. Lancaster, though also busy, was thought to be far enough inland so as not to be in any immediate danger.
Now, with word of the British fleet in the Chesapeake, Lancaster was in a panic. “The Waggons are all engaged here in order to Carry our Stores and Some to take the Baggage of the Prisoners from this place to Reading &c.,” Marshall wrote to his children on August 25, “as we were alarmed by Express the 23d of Hows fleet having Come up Chesepack bay and intend to land about 35 miles from here & to pay us a Visit.” He told them, “The English, Scotch & Irish prisoners being 2 or 300 were sent off yesterday afternoon under a Strong guard for Reading. the Hessing [Hessian] Prisoners are Mustering for the same purpose and its said will be sent off this day, so that our place is in a great fermentation.” As a precaution, “messengers are sent down to the Susquehania or to the Bay to keep a good look out in Order to give us timely Notice. Some of the Troops that had post here going down and recalled, the Militia are training So that God only knows how our Scituation may be.” He closed by telling them, “[I] shall be Exceeding glad when I shall have something more Agreeable to Communicate.”32
Forty miles southeast of Lancaster, the same morning that Marshall wrote to his children, Capt. John Henry of His Majesty's Armed Ship Vigilant entered in the ship's log, “At 6 the Admiral came on board & hoisted his flag at the Foretopmast head.”33 With the Vigilant and Roebuck in the lead, followed by flat-bottomed troop transports, the British sailed out of the Chesapeake Bay into the Elk River, heading for the landing at Elk Ferry on Turkey Point. Phase three of the campaign for Philadelphia had begun.
The Hessian Jägers, the British light infantry, and the British grenadiers formed the vanguard, commanded by Lord Cornwallis. They were personally led by the Howe brothers. From the Vigilant, “at 10 the Admiral and General went on Shore with the Army,” Captain Henry noted in the log.34 Admiral Howe, his brother, and the headquarters staff “went aboard the battery ship [Vigilant], which was in the lead,” von Münchhausen wrote, “where we landed at 10 o'clock in the morning without the slightest interference.”35
The Crown Forces began landing at Elk Ferry on Turkey Point, a rugged, thinly inhabited peninsula on the west side of the mouth of the Elk River. “Our landing here considering all things will surely throw the Senators of Carpenters Hall into some consternation,” James Parker wryly speculated about Congress's reaction to the news. “Their whole preparation was in the Delaware, where they surely must have done a great deal of injury to the fleet with fire rafts, floating batteries &c.”36
Captain Ewald remembered that the Jägers landed “amid boisterous shouts of joy and in the best order.” Von Münchhausen observed, “My General advanced with the jägers and light infantry for three miles, and then made a halt.”37 The Jägers immediately fanned out in the countryside to screen the landing and to scout. “The whole peninsula, or headland, was a real wilderness,” Ewald declared. “Just as we found the uncultivated vine, the sassafras tree, and wild melon in this region, so also was it full of different kinds of vermin. The woods, especially, were filled with snakes and toads.” Adding to the general discomfort, the crescendo of noise from crickets, cicadas, and katydids swelled to deafening as darkness fell, their choruses intensified by the August heat. “Each tree was full of big chafers,” the Jäger captain grumbled, “which made such a noise during the night that two men could not speak to each other and understand what was said.”38
“The Troops are healthy tho’ they were on Board Nine & forty days, the Passage tedious,” General Grant told General Harvey. “You may believe every Body on Board was most heartily tired of their Situation, we have hardly recovered the Use of our Legs & the Horses are not very firm upon theirs.”39 Though happy to get off the ship, Capt. Sir James Murray of the 57th was less than enthusiastic about the area. “Every place where one can walk fifty yards in a strait line, and without the necessity of waiting for a fair wind, must app
ear you would think an earthly paradise after a six week voyage,” he wrote scathingly, “but so very detestable is this part of the country that I was robbed of half the satisfaction I otherwise would have had in feeling myself upon terra firma.”40 Lt. Heinrich von Feilitzsch of the Anspach Jägers echoed the sentiment. “Here I must say that this region of Maryland does not appeal to me,” he remarked. “Compared with other provinces where we have been, this region is not well developed. A bare woods, here and there a small place with a house and a field, but where not a soul is to be seen. How desolate it is I will let another describe.”41
Capt.-Lt. John Peebles of the 42nd felt otherwise. “We land'd about 9 o'clock a little above the ferry & march'd about 3 miles up the west side of the River. The inhabitants almost all gone off & carried everything with them they could, a pretty Country & plentifull Crops.”42 Even the disgruntled Capt. Richard Fitzpatrick of the Guards found something to admire: “we do not live luxuriously, though in a country that has every appearance of plenty, and is more beautiful than can be conceived, wherever the woods are at all cleared.”43
Few civilians were to be seen. “The people (Irish presbiterians) are Chiefly [rebe]ls, who left their houses on the fleets Appearence,” James Parker observed. “Surprised no [doub]t to see such ships as the Roebuck, Apollo, Vigilant, sloops of [war &] large transports up Elk River.”44 Major Baurmeister of the Hessian staff commented, “Most of the inhabitants had fled from their homes, taking with them the best of their belongings; but they had also destroyed a great deal and driven their cattle into the woods.”45
“The country was desolate of inhabitants,” Lt. William Hale told his parents, “the men called to strengthen Washington, the women fled to avoid barbarities, which they imagined must be the natural attendants of a British Army.”46 Ensign Rüffer of the Hessian Regiment von Mirbach similarly noted, “In this stretch of land we have not seen any females because they were told by the rebels that the Hessians would have misused them in an unpleasant manner, so they have all fled.”47
The Philadelphia Campaign Page 17