Washington's Immortals

by Patrick K. O'Donnell

Still, the men continued to hold the fort. On November 14, the forty-eighth day of the siege, General Greene wrote to Washington, who was several miles away with the main army, “The flag was flying at Fort Mifflin at sunset this evening.” Despite the approach of winter, the British were preparing for a major assault, without ever letting up on their daily artillery barrage. In his message, Greene added that the cannon fire had been “very severe” during the day and that the British navy was “attempting to get up a two-and-thirty-gun frigate into firing range.” To make the ship lighter and thus able to get farther upriver, the sailors removed the guns and placed them in a following sloop. However, luckily for the Americans, the wind and tide prevented the ship from approaching.

  During the Americans’ stout defense of Fort Mifflin, they received welcome news of a great victory at Saratoga. In the summer of 1777, the British had put a bold plan into motion. British strategists believed that the southern colonies were mostly loyal to the Crown and that the northern colonies were the seat of the rebellion. They thought they could stamp out the Revolution by sending down General John Burgoyne, a veteran of the Seven Years’ War and an accomplished playwright who was currently in Montreal. Burgoyne and his seven thousand troops were to march south to seize Fort Ticonderoga in northern New York and eventually meet up with two other British forces near Albany, thus severing the northern colonies from their southern brethren.

  Although Burgoyne captured Ticonderoga easily enough, he found further progress difficult. The area near the fort was filled with swamps and forests, and the Americans took every opportunity to slow down the Redcoats. The Patriots destroyed bridges, left fallen trees on the roads, and otherwise sabotaged Burgoyne’s force as well as they could. At the same time, the Americans went on a recruiting spree, calling up thousands of militiamen to join Major General Horatio Gates near Saratoga, New York. As a retired British soldier, Gates was well acquainted with the Cornwallis family. In fact, Charles Cornwallis’s uncle Edward was one of Gates’s early mentors. Gates had also served with Washington in the French and Indian War. Frustrated with the British army and lacking the money necessary to advance his career, he sold his commission as a major and bought a plantation in Virginia. He volunteered to serve in the Patriot army as soon as war broke out.

  By the time Burgoyne made it to Saratoga in September, Gates had amassed a force of more than seven thousand men. The British general attacked and won a tactical victory because he remained in possession of the battlefield, but he suffered heavy casualties. Exhausted, Burgoyne chose to dig in and wait to link up with Howe—a union that would never occur. On October 7, 1777, at the Battle of Bemis Heights, the Americans captured a portion of the British defenses. Inspired by the victory, more militia streamed into Gates’s camp, swelling his force to nearly twenty thousand in positions surrounding much of the British army. Burgoyne attempted a fighting retreat north, but the British situation was hopeless. “Gentleman Johnny,” as Burgoyne was known, retreated to Schuylerville, the site of the first Battle of Saratoga. In a wine cellar, he met with his officers for a council of war. Baroness von Riedesel, who accompanied her husband, one of Burgoyne’s principal battle commanders, recalled that Burgoyne spent the night singing and getting drunk while “amusing himself in the company of the wife of his commissary,” his mistress. Above the merriment, the sounds of war still reverberated in the dank cellar. A British officer whose arm had been blown off by a cannonball wailed, and his shrieks “doubly gruesome . . . re-echoed in the cellar.”

  After several rounds of negotiation, Burgoyne and his men agreed to an armistice of sorts. In order to allow the British to save face, the document was called “The Convention of Saratoga,” rather than a surrender or a treaty. Under the terms of the agreement, Burgoyne and his men would lay down their arms and would no longer fight against the Revolution. In return, the Americans agreed to allow them to return to England.

  As the Americans played “Yankee Doodle,” Burgoyne formally surrendered on October 17. Defiant to the end, many of the king’s soliders broke their musket stocks in two as a final sign of resistance. But the cocksure Brits weren’t headed home. Congress reneged on the terms of the surrender. Instead of going to England, Burgoyne’s defeated army of more than six thousand troops headed south into captivity.25

  25. Howe secretly planned on sending the Hessians to Britain and retaining his British troops in America. Ironically, the march south and captivity were so poorly administered by the Americans that many of Burgoyne’s troops escaped imprisonment and rejoined the British army.

  Saratoga changed everything. For the Americans, the victory gave them the hope of ultimately defeating the British. More important, it also convinced the French that the revolutionaries had a chance to succeed. Playing to French stereotypes of Americans by donning a fur cap (while living in a mansion with a cellar stocked with a thousand bottles of French wine), Benjamin Franklin had been meeting with French officials. Eventually, he convinced them to ally with the American cause. Several months after the decisive victory at Saratoga, France signed two separate treaties with the United States: one that gave French goods most-favored-nation status in America and one spelling out the terms of a military alliance between the two countries. Each country agreed not to sue for peace with Britain without the consent of the other. The French also agreed not to seize any British territory in North America or Bermuda except any islands in or near the Gulf of Mexico that they might choose to attack. Initially, the treaty was defensive and allowed France to go to war at its choosing. But England declared war on France first a few days after the treaty was signed.

  The alliance gave the Americans three things they desperately needed if they were to have a hope of winning their war: loans, troops, and naval support. From the British perspective, the French alliance transformed the Revolution from an attempt to suppress a colonial uprising into a global war. The British needed to defend not only the thirteen colonies, but Canada, the West Indies, and possibly even the British homeland itself from their French archrivals. Almost immediately, British troops began to leave North America to defend the rest of the Empire from France’s military might.

  When word of the treaties reached Washington, he was overjoyed. Although Washington preferred not to be touched, his friend Lafayette immediately embraced the general and kissed him on both cheeks in the usual French fashion. Washington wrote to Congress, “I believe no event was ever received with more heartfelt joy.” And the army held a day of celebration in honor of the treaty.

  Inevitably, the British did finally overcome the natural and artificial barriers that held them back and brought their vessels within firing range of Fort Mifflin on November 15. One Patriot soldier recalled, “This morning about 8 oClock the Enemy made a furious attack, by the River & land—the Ships came as near to the Fort as posable [possible] in the Main Channel.” A fierce artillery battle ensued. The Marylanders and other Continentals on the island put up a valiant fight but were ultimately outgunned. “Mud Island was shot to pieces by the British ships,” said one of the Hessian officers. “There was a ferocious cannonade, all their mounted batteries, cannons of the largest caliber, were not only dismounted, but buried in the rubble.” He added, “Blood, brains, arms, legs, everything lay about.” Several of the officers were killed, and several were wounded, including the intrepid de Fleury, who had been knocked out by a falling timber.

  Around midmorning, the Americans decided to signal that they needed assistance. An artillery sergeant lowered the fort’s flag, intending to raise a signal flag in its place. As the colors drew closer to the ground, the British cannon stopped firing and the troops began to cheer, believing that the Americans intended to surrender. But the Patriot officers weren’t ready to capitulate yet. “Up with the flag!” they all shouted. The sergeant obeyed, returning the flag to the top of the mast that served as a pole. The firing resumed on both sides, and as the sergeant stepped away, “he was cut in two by a
cannon shot.” By this time, “the fort exhibited a picture of desolation,” wrote Martin. “The whole area of the fort was as completely ploughed as a field. The buildings of every kind hanging in broken fragments. . . . If ever destruction was complete, it was here.”

  Faced with the unrelenting loss of life and a fort disintegrating around them, the Patriots chose to evacuate. On the morning of November 16, under the cover of darkness, they rowed off Mud Island. Upon their departure, they left two items of note. First, as a final act of defiance, they did not lower their colors. “We left our flag flying when we left the island,” recalled Martin. Second, a rebel soldier who had previously deserted from the German mercenaries supporting the British stayed behind. Münchhausen believed he “hid himself in order to desert to our lines.” However, Martin attributed his staying to “having taken too large a dose of ‘the good creature [alcohol].’” He added, “The British took him to Philadelphia, where, not being known by them, he engaged again in their service, received two or three guineas bounty, [and] drew a British uniform.” But the two-time “deserter” didn’t stay in British service. Once the Redcoats provided him with clothing and a little money, he deserted again and made his way to the Patriot camp at Valley Forge.

  As the British took possession of the fort, a grisly scene awaited them. One of the Redcoat officers reported, “Colonel Osborn took possession of the island the following morning and found nothing but a charred camp and bloodstains.” The Patriots had torched all of their buildings before departing, leaving only the commandant’s house standing—and it was little more than a ruin. “The house of the commandant has so many holes that more than one thousand can be counted, and the floors are as blown up as when a herd of swine had been there.”

  The British “hauled down the Rebel Flag and hoisted an English Jack.” They then immediately set to work repairing the damage that their six-week barrage had done. A light, “trifling snow” fell as they worked, just a taste of the cold winter ahead.

  Chapter 20

  Valley Forge

  and Wilmington

  In a scene repeated by thousands of men that winter, Joseph Plumb Martin winced as he placed his foot on the hard, frozen ruts of the dirt path he was following. Mile after mile, the stiff cowhide of his makeshift moccasins slowly ground through the skin on his ankles until every step was torture. Martin had made the rough shoes himself a few days earlier when his original pair fell apart on the trek to Valley Forge, Pennsylvania. Every morning, his feet and ankles hurt so much from the previous day that he could barely stand to put the moccasins back on. Yet he did so—and bore the pain of each excruciating step—because the other option was much worse. “The only alternative I had,” wrote Martin, “was to endure this inconvenience or to go barefoot, as hundreds of my companions had to, till they might be tracked by their blood upon the rough frozen ground.”

  While the shoes lasted, they protected Martin’s feet from the icy ground, but eventually, his ersatz footwear wore out. With no supplies for making new ones, Martin joined the rest of the Continental Army, which he described as “not only starved but naked.” He added, “The greatest part were not only shirtless and barefoot, but destitute of all other clothing, especially blankets.” Yet like the rest of the army, Martin continued marching, even when he began leaving bloody footprints behind him in the snow.

  The torturous trek to Valley Forge marked the end of a long winding down. Since the capture of Mud Island on November 15, 1777, both armies had boldly remained largely inactive. During the period, some skirmishing took place, including the defense of Edge Hill (also known as the Battle of White Marsh), in which the Maryland militia won praise from George Washington, but British commander Willliam Howe seemed content to go into winter quarters rather than go on the offensive.

  Unfortunately, when Washington’s army arrived at its winter camp in Valley Forge, the problems that plagued it on the march only grew worse. The bitter cold, combined with the lack of supplies, caused innumerable cases of frostbite, hunger, and disease. Typhus, pneumonia, dysentery, and scurvy swept through the American camps, with as much as 30 percent of the army afflicted with one illness or another at any one time. The surgeons kept busy amputating limbs that had turned black from cold. The food was incredibly meager, often consisting of nothing more than “fire cakes,” flour and water heated on hot stones. One physician with the army summed it up this way:

  Poor food—hard lodging—cold weather—fatigue—nasty clothes—nasty cookery—vomit half my time—smoke out of my senses—the devil’s in it—I can’t endure it. . . . There comes a bowl of beef soup—full of burnt leaves and dirt, sickish enough to make a Hector spew. . . . There comes a soldier, his bare feet are seen through his worn-out shoes, his legs nearly naked from the tattered remains of an only pair of stockings; his breeches not sufficient to cover his nakedness; his shirt hanging in strings; his hair disheveled; his face meager; his whole appearance pictures a person forsaken and discouraged.

  Disgusted by the heart-wrenching, miserable conditions his troops endured, Washington did everything in his power to provide for his men. He pressed Congress to name Nathanael Greene as quartermaster general, and fired off numerous letters begging for food and clothing. In one, he predicted that “three or four days bad weather would prove our destruction,” and explained that men had no soap, no shoes, very little clothing. Many couldn’t even sleep because, as they had no blankets, they were forced to crouch near the fire at night. The general also expressed tremendous admiration for the men who were willing to undergo such deprivations. “Naked and starving as they are,” he wrote, “we cannot enough admire the incomparable patience and fidelity of the soldiery.”

  Marylander John Boudy, who, unlike most of the men from his state, was briefly at Valley Forge, recalled, “Our army suffered excessively being destitute of clothing and provisions—so difficult were provisions to be procured, that they had to be collected by force.” He added that he was sometimes part of foraging parties, which had “to make excursions forty and fifty miles and sometimes further, to collect provisions.”

  By the end of the terrible winter, nearly two thousand American soldiers perished.

  Many of the Marylanders escaped the tragic fate of those at Valley Forge. Washington sent John Eager Howard and the bulk of the Maryland troops to Wilmington, Delaware. Wintering in town was far less difficult than wintering in the valley. William Smallwood and Mordecai Gist stayed in the Foulke house, where sixteen-year-old Sally Wister lived. She confided in her diary that she liked the looks of then twenty-nine-year-old Gist. She described him as “a smart widower,” adding, “He’s very pretty; a charming person.” To a friend, she described his eyes as “exceptional; very stern; and he so rolls them about that mine always fall under them” and concluded, “He bears the character of a brave officer.” For his part, Gist seemed more interested in a Miss Fostinam, writing to a friend that he wished to dance a minuet with her at the local tavern, but “I have been unhappily disappointed in my design.” Despite being unlucky in love, Gist wrote to another friend, “I have the pleasure to Inform You that I share with the rest of my Brother soldiers, a tolerable state of Health. . . . my Spirits neither depressed nor elevated. . . . My time glides smoothly on, and each revolving Sun Shines out to make me happier in the defence of Virtue and my Country than the Haughty Tyrant that sits upon his Throne but to Enslave his subjects.”

  Gist did not agree with Washington’s choice of Valley Forge as winter quarters, writing that it allowed the enemy to forage and harass the Continental Army at will and subjected the men to damp huts and disease. Ultimately, Gist did not have to endure the same suffering as most of his men during that bitter winter; he returned to Baltimore to recruit new men for the Maryland regiments. In Baltimore he quickly wed Mary Sterrett, sister to Lieutenant William Sterrett, an officer in the Maryland Line who was one of Gist’s close friends. Apparently, Gist succumbed to love and romance
, even though months earlier he had warned Jack Steward, “The enchanting pleasures of Venus can never stand in the competition with gods like Mars when the Soldier has Virtue enough to remember his Country.”

  The monotony and boredom of quarters in Wilmington brought their own set of challenges. The soldiers spent a great deal of time waiting, with little to do. Tempers began to fray, and fights broke out among the troops. Although normally coolheaded, John Eager Howard was involved in an altercation that resulted in a court-martial. He was charged “1st with wounding Capt. Lieut. Duffy with his Sward; 2d Abetting a riot in Camp; and 3d in front of his Men at his request assembled attempting the life of Capt. with a loaded firelock and fixed Bayonet being utterly subversive of Good Order and Discipline.” The court acquitted Howard on the first and third charges. On the second, it ruled that “however Justifiable the Motives were by which Major Howard was first actuated his Conduct in that End was such as tended rather to promote than suppress a riot.” Howard received a reprimand, as did Duffy, who was also found guilty of abetting a riot. After the incident, Howard reverted to his typical calm manner, but Duffy continued to be a problem. Years later, the army discharged him for “Scandalous and Infamous behavior unbecoming the Character of an officer . . . Being drunk; Rioting in the street; Abusing a French soldier; And acting in a seditious and disorderly manner.”

  One source of solace for the officers of the Maryland Line during the long winter was the unshakable Margaret Jane Ramsay. Her husband, Nathaniel, had been recently promoted to the rank of colonel, and the couple maintained a log hut in Valley Forge with some of the other Maryland officers (even though the bulk of the Marylanders wintered in Wilmington). Mrs. Ramsay played the role of hostess and entertained with refreshments such as coffee. Her brother remarked, “Maryland officers in the camp spent many agreeable hours sometimes accompanied by officers in other corps.” The bonds of friendship forged in battle were strengthened during these times of shared sacrifice.