Cannons for the Cause

by Martin Ganzglass

  “Ahh, stop your complaining, Lazarus Palmer,” a stout older teamster snapped. “Tis found money. No one ever paid me to stay at home waiting for the spring thaw. What would you be earning on your farm in the dead of winter? Sitting at home carving neck yokes for your oxen or a washing stick for your wife?”

  Will listened to more of their idle talk before walking away from the fire to relieve himself. The deep snow soaked his stockings and fell into his shoes. He took his hatchet from his leather bag, shook the snow from a few low-hanging pine branches and lopped them off. He dragged them back to his sled, swept some of the snow from the ground and leaned the broader limbs against the wagon to form a shelter. He restoked his fire with some bark he had peeled from a nearby pitch pine and lay down on the remaining cut branches that did little to shield him from the frozen ground. Wrapping Elisabeth’s scarf over his head, with his blanket pulled over him, he drifted off to sleep.

  He awoke in the early dawn, to the promise of a frigid but clear sunny day. The hair on the back of his head was covered with frost and his feet were numb and frozen. He rose, moving his legs to get the circulation going. Using the still red embers he rebuilt the fire, warming his hands over the newly blossoming flames. He melted a little of the lard over the fire and coated his split fingers and raw knuckles with it, thinking they would be bloody again by mid-morning. Cold as he was, his spirits were high, rekindled by the certainty he indeed was on his own, free from his father’s control, with limitless possibilities stretching into the snowy wilderness leading him to Boston and a reunion with Johan.

  Nat found him hitching the horses to the sled. Will smiled to see him. “The snow is so deep off the road, it is coming in over the top of my boots,” Nat said stamping his feet. He noticed the cracked thin leather and torn seams of his friend’s low shoes. “Will,” he exclaimed. “We must get you some proper boots. These will be rotted through before we get to Cambridge.”

  “I pay it no mind,” Will said, not wanting to admit to Nat his toes were already frozen. A pair of high leather boots would keep his calves dry and warm, he thought. “I have straw inside them and besides, I am out of the snow on the wagon seat,” he replied.

  “Not today. The road ahead, if you can call it a road, is much more forbidding. There are many steep slopes up and down. The Colonel and I turned back when the snow reached up to our horses’ bellies.” He pulled his round hat tighter on his head as the early morning wind picked up.

  “The Colonel’s plan is to have the lighter loads smooth the way. Your sled is the first of the one and two tonners. We will stop often and cut trees to slow the wagons and sleds from sliding backwards on the up slopes.” He did not have to add that, on the downside, a runaway two-ton load would crush the teamster and his horses.

  “My intention,” he continued, “is when necessity demands, to use drag chains, ropes and block and tackle affixed to trees. I need you, when we stop for an ascent or descent, to work an axe with vigor. We must keep all hands employed to move the heavier loads along.” Will nodded, not sure what was expected of him, except to work hard.

  The descent before the first incline was moderate. The road smoothed out by the sleds bearing the three and six pounders had flattened the surface, making it icy and treacherous in places. Will kept his team in check and halted his sled at the dip before the rise. He dismounted, walked along the length of his team, clicking his tongue and patting them as he passed. He surveyed the rising slope. Even with the studded metal runners, it would be difficult for the horses to prevent the sled from sliding backwards. He stopped at Big Red and scratched the horse’s chin and jaw.

  “We can do this,” he said to the horse although it was more for his own reassurance.

  “Will. We need you,” Nat shouted.

  Nat had organized the Continentals and some of the teamsters from the following wagons and sleds into work crews. They set off through the snow banks toward the nearest trees. Will’s contingent was divided by the Sergeant in charge into pairs. The soldier opposite Will began swinging his axe in short, quick strokes, hacking small chips from the trunk. Will gauged the heft of his axe to satisfy himself the head outweighed the bit. It had a good feel and balance. He placed his hands on the long straight handle and began to swing the blade methodically in an accurate arc, quickly cutting a deep notch. When he was more than half way, mindful of the direction of the fall, he motioned for the soldier to step to the side.

  After trimming the larger branches, the crews dragged the fallen trees back through the snow to the road. Will’s upper body was clammy with sweat from the exertion while his feet, from soles to calves, were numb from the cold. He headed back to the road through the deep, heavy snow, lifting his legs high and ploughing ahead. The other crews let him lead, following in the narrow path made by his dragging a tree behind him. No matter, he thought. Someone has to do it and if this meant the cannons would reach General Washington sooner, he was ready to do his share and more.

  Back on the road, when a dozen trees had been stacked and further trimmed, Nat took Will aside. Even with his thick blue cloak, Holmes was shivering. “It is worse when one stands still in this bitter wind,” he said, as Will moved his arms around, trying not to stiffen up.

  “You are first to haul a heavy gun up this hill,” Nat instructed. “We will be along side and place the logs behind the rear runners. I hope we shall not need ropes or block and tackle to pull this cannon to the top. It would delay us significantly.” He looked up at Will. “If by your example, you do it, others will know it is possible with their lighter loads.”

  “I will do my best.”

  Will mounted the sled, stood up and called to Big Red and the mare to move, flicking the whip across the haunches of the nearest two spans. The heavily loaded sled creaked as the eight horses hauled it out of the deeper snow and onto the road. Will felt the deep, biting chill of the wind freezing his damp linen shirt to his body. He wrapped the blanket tighter around his shoulders and thought quickly but longingly of Elisabeth. He wished she were sitting next to him, warm, cuddly and smelling of lavender. He urged the horses forward.

  It was a slow ponderous uphill haul. Midway up, thirty yards from the top, the sled perceptibly slowed, the horses straining in their traces against the weight.

  “Nat,” Will shouted. “Hurry or we will slide backwards.” He stood up in the sled and flicked the whip over the last four horses. He knew Big Red and the mare would pull on their own, causing the two behind them to do so as well. Nat with some of the Continentals alongside, threw the logs behind the runners. Slowly, they gained another few feet with the horses struggling for traction. Anxious to maintain any forward momentum, Nat still on the left side, yelled for those behind the sled to use some of the trees as lever poles.

  “Put your shoulders into it, men,” he shouted. The sled inched up the icy slope. Will glanced at the decreasing distance to the summit and pressed the eight horses on.

  “Pull, Big Red,” he shouted into the wind. “Pull hard.” The horses put their heads down, their chest muscles straining against the leather traces, their hooves biting into the frozen ground beneath them. Will glanced at the distance to the summit, calculating it was almost time to hold the horses back from charging down the other side. He tugged the reins in his left hand as they crested and the team headed into a drift. The sled came to rest, just off the road. Will’s arms ached from the strain and the cold wind at the summit knotted his stretched muscles. He dismounted and walked forward to Big Red and the mare. He stood between them, staring ahead at the hill sloping steeply down before him.

  Nat shouted halloo and signaled to the driver on the sled ahead of them at the top of the next hill. The man waved back. Three Continentals, the red trim of their blue jackets clearly visible from the distance, unloaded chains, ropes, block and tackle from the sled and carried them to the bottom of the hill, leaving them in a tangled pile.

  Nat walked down the steep incline with the Sergeant and some of the tea
msters. He unraveled the ropes, left the ends lying part way up the far side and trudged back toward Will’s sled laying the lines out as he came back up the slope. The others followed carrying the chains and block and tackle.

  Nat muttered to Will, his words lost in the strong wind blowing across the summit. “Never coiled a rope or wound a chain in their entire sorry lives,” he said more loudly as he assessed the nearby trees. “Now with the ropes laid out from here to beyond the dip we have the proper length measured to restrain the sled.”

  Nat sent the men to retrieve the ends of the ropes lying past the bottom of the descent. He selected a thick evergreen several feet below the summit and wound one rope low, several times around trunk. He did the same thing with the second rope on the other side of the road. Carrying both ends, Nat knelt down, cleared the snow from the rear of Will’s sled with his bare hands, found the thick rear oak crossbar and attached each rope to it.

  Will squatted on his haunches, leaning on the runner, and watched over Nat’s shoulder.

  “A fisherman’s bend hitch for the bar,” Nat explained, nodding toward the knot he had dexterously finished. ‘It will not slip,” he said, grunting as he tested it.

  But the ropes can snap, Will thought.

  Nat seemed to read his mind. “Do not worry, Will. The ropes will hold. I can vouchsafe for that. Once wound around those stout trees, the men will have enough purchase to hold you back,” he said with confidence.

  Will watched Nat attach the chains to the same crossbar. “Sergeant,” Nat called. “I need your men to chain those logs into bundles, six or seven of the shorter ones together and stack them behind this sled.”

  “What for,” the Sergeant replied, without moving.

  Nat ignored his surly tone. “We need them to serve as a drag, as a ship’s anchor, slowing the descent of this two tonner,” he said matterof-factly. He watched the men carefully as they struggled to get the logs lined up and fastened with chains at each end. Will looked dubiously at the chained together logs and shook his head.

  “Nat. The logs will roll down on to the back of the sled. I do not see how they can be of help.”

  The untrimmed stubs of the branches will catch and accumulate the snow, slowing the sled’s forward momentum,” Nat explained. “And there will be iron spikes in the links. You will see.”

  Nat tested each bundle. He ran the six-foot long chains from the sled’s crossbar to the first two bundled logs so they lay horizontally behind the sled. The other two bundles were chained to the first pair another six feet behind them. He hammered thick metal spikes randomly into the links of the chains connecting the two pairs and from the foremost pair of logs to the sled. “These will serve better than the studs on the runners,” he said, standing up and brushing the snow from his knees.

  “You men carry the remaining poles alongside and, upon my command, be quick to throw them under the front curve of the runners,” Nat ordered. “Sergeant, when we reach the bottom and I wave my hat, untie the ropes and walk them down.”

  Nat waited until the men, with their poles were in position. “Ready Will?”

  Will nodded and swallowed hard. He called out to Big Red and the mare and flicked the reins on the hind quarters of the two closest horses. The sled began a slow descent of the snow covered hill. He knew the horses would not go straight down the middle of the road. Instinctively, they would slant first to one side and then the other, weaving their way down the slope. He had to prevent them from going too far either way and running the cannon off the road. Crossing back over the icy flattened middle of the track was the treacherous part. The sled could hit a frozen patch and by its sheer weight slide out of control either straight down on the horses or slip in a different direction, pulling Will and the team of eight over. Will tightened his grip on the reins and carefully watched the road for ice.

  He couldn’t look back to see how the chained logs were working but tensed to hear any noise of them breaking loose and crashing into the back of the sled. If that happened or the ropes broke, he would urge the horses ahead as fast as they could go. Hopefully, he would be able to keep them on the road and the far upward slope would eventually slow the two-ton load behind him. If that failed, he would have to leap off the sled far enough to the side to avoid being crushed. He felt the presence of the huge cannon behind him, an ominous black iron beast with its fat rounded breech eager to crush his spine.

  A third of the way down the steep slope, the sled began to slip sideways as it passed over an icy patch. Will shouted a warning and tightened the reins pulling the horses back. Nat jumped forward jamming the long pole against the edge of the runner as a lever. Quickly others ran to join him. Together, pushing against the runner, they managed to straighten out the sled so it was once again directly behind Will’s team.

  He heard a bump behind him and panicked, unable to turn around.

  “One of my log anchors hit the same frozen snow,” Nat called out. “They are holding, Will.”

  The sled was nearing the bottom of the incline. Despite the straining of the team, the men holding on to the ropes at the top and logs dragging behind, they were picking up speed because of the steepness of the slope. Will stood up, his legs spread wide for stability. The frigid wind was at his back. He braced himself and pulled on the reins as hard as he could.

  “Big Red,” he shouted. “Hold back, hold back.”

  The horse pricked up his ears at his voice. Will imagined Big Red’s massive chest muscles and front legs straining against the pressure behind him, his head up, his haunches tightening to hold against the weight. They were still going too fast down the icy incline. They were less than twenty yards from the bottom. Big Red and the mare slanted toward the deeper snow on the right.

  Will decided to chance it. He let up on the reins and pulled back on the left one. Big Red and the mare took the slack and turned toward the center. The sled, released from the eight horses slowing it down, raced forward the remaining yards, and plunged part way up the incline before the weight of the cannon cancelled their forward momentum and the sled came to a halt.

  Will lowered himself on to the wooden seat, his forearm and upper thigh muscles burning from the exertion. Out of the corner of his eye, he saw Nat waving to the men to release the ropes at the summit. Will dismounted. His legs were wobbly. He walked up and down the length of his team, patting each horse. When he reached Big Red, the horse lowered his head and Will buried his face in the red mane and stroked his nose.

  “The anchors held,” Nat said, holding out his clenched fist. “Not all of the spikes did.” He opened his fingers to reveal one of them sheared off a few inches below its flattened head. “Most are broken,” he said. “We have more in the boxes on a wagon toward the rear. I will have them brought forward.”

  Will stood with the mare and Big Red, preferring to hold the team steady from the front while Nat and his crew detached the drag chains. The horses shielded Will from the wind that was now blowing harder. It would mean a colder ascent of the next slope. After what seemed to Will a very short time, he was back on the sled, the eight horses straining to pull the load, the men alternately blocking the sled from sliding back, and leveraging and pushing it from behind. The uphill was not as steep as the downside leading toward it. They made the summit without having to resort to ropes or block and tackle.

  In this manner, the entire train covered barely three miles the second day and four the third, the heavier cannons slowing the entire convoy’s progress. There was no other way. They needed manpower for each steep slope, in both ascent and descent, as well as for righting the wagons or sleds that slid off the road and had to be hauled back before the Colonel would let that segment of the train proceed.

  After three exhausting days, with a plodding sameness, Will thought the only difference was that the nights were getting colder and the snow deeper. He deliberately avoided the New Yorkers. They reminded him of the part of the journey with his father. He preferred the company of the Massachus
etts men. A few of them had been to Boston, and some evenings the talk turned to Boston and the blockade. None of them had been at Lexington or Concord. But they repeated accounts they had heard in the inns and taverns from those who swore they were there. Will was an avid but discerning listener. He knew these were embellished campfire tales. When they got to General Washington’s camp, he vowed to seek out the real veterans of those battles and learn firsthand from them.

  Will had overcome his earlier embarrassment with Nat and slept with the Massachusetts teamsters at night, on freshly cut evergreen boughs, the men curled spoon-like in crescent clumps to take advantage of their common body heat. When he awoke in the morning, cramped and stiff, the smell of unwashed wagoners filled his nostrils.

  In the late afternoon of the fourth day, in the January winter darkness, they descended an especially precipitous slope. Part of the train was already camped on a relatively flat plain between two frozen ponds. Gaunt, bare dead trees stood like macabre sentinels, their grey trunks rising from their icy graves. That night, however, when he joined the Massachusetts teamsters around their fire, the talk was uglier and nastier. The older farmers were angry their duties included more than driving. They were exhausted from cutting and dragging trees through waist high snow, serving as work crews and walking alongside the sleds and wagons when they should be driving their own teams. They found fault with every facet of Knox’s leadership.

  “It is certain that he is not eating the same sparse rations we are,” Lazarus Palmer said, biting into a piece of hard bread. Some crumbs stuck to his frozen beard. “My God, look at the man. Sleek and fat as the day we met him in Great Barrington,” he said making a gesture with his hand to illustrate the Colonel’s large belly.