Tories

by Thomas B. Allen

  Galloway continually assured Howe that thousands of Loyalists were ready to spring to arms. Some did; 150 men or so joined such cavalry outfits as the Philadelphia Light Dragoons and the Chester County Light Dragoons.40 At least 255 men enlisted in the Queen’s American Rangers. A total of about fourteen hundred men joined Tory forces in the Philadelphia area. Another 400 or so enlisted in the West Jersey Volunteers, which had both infantry and cavalry units.41

  At Valley Forge, Washington was losing men while desperately trying to find food for those who stayed. After the Royal Navy took control of the Delaware River, Howe began getting most of his supplies via ships from New York. The British also foraged, buying provisions from farmers who defied Patriot threats against people who aided the enemy. British Regulars and armed Tories attacked Rebel foraging parties. Washington, who had a highly efficient intelligence system inside Philadelphia, usually knew when Howe was sending out foragers. But, because of desertions and fears of mutiny, Washington had to limit sorties against them.42

  The only good news at Valley Forge was the arrival in February 1778 of Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben, a former Prussian captain on the staff of Frederick the Great. Steuben was jobless in Paris when he was discovered by Ben Franklin, a recruiting officer as well as a diplomat. Steuben immediately impressed Washington.

  Steuben began by teaching the ragged, unruly men how to be soldiers who marched in formation and fired muskets on command. While his soldiers, under Steuben’s tutelage, began to coalesce into a fighting force, Washington made a new move to get food for his men. In January 1778, he turned to the commander of the local militia, Brig. Gen. John Lacey, a Quaker and, at twenty-five, the youngest Patriot general.43 Washington ordered Lacey to stop the “immense supplies” flowing to Philadelphia and to protect the meager provisions heading for Valley Forge.

  The “market people,” as the British suppliers were euphemistically known, included both committed Tories and apolitical war profiteers. With the addition of Tory infantry and cavalry units, Howe’s foraging expeditions became bigger and bolder and persistently eluded Lacey’s patrols. Many of the Tories pillaged from longtime neighbors and kidnapped others who were Rebel leaders. In one raid, twenty-six miles from Philadelphia, about forty Loyalists killed five militiamen, took thirty-two prisoners, and pillaged a wool mill, taking two thousand yards of cloth meant for Rebel uniforms.44

  Lacey did not have enough soldiers to stop the raids or the illegal trade. His frustration showed itself one day when his men stopped a farmer who was trying to smuggle a wagonload of produce to Philadelphia. The militiamen confiscated his goods and horse, tied thefarmer to a tree, and pelted him with his own eggs.45 By the end of March, Lacey was so angry that he proposed forcibly removing everyone in a wide swath of land between the Delaware and the Schuylkill rivers. Washington, who had enough problems with civilians in the area, rejected Lacey’s suggestion.46

  Galloway’s operatives, who had been carefully tracking Lacey’s operations, provided Howe with information to plan a major attack on the militiamen. Howe decided to send a combined force of Regulars and Loyalists led by Maj. John G. Simcoe, regimental commander of the Queen’s American Rangers.47

  A sign on an oddly shaped piece of wood marked the Crooked Billet Tavern on the old York road about sixteen miles north of Philadelphia. Here Lacey and four hundred militiamen were camped on the morning of May 1. They awakened to discover that they were surrounded and under attack. No matter where Lacey and his men turned they were targets for Simcoe’s infantrymen and cavalrymen.

  Survivors fled, firing as they ran, until Simcoe broke off the attack. Carrying away everything they could find in Lacey’s abandoned camp, Simcoe and his men returned to Philadelphia, where they sold their plunder and shared in the proceeds. On the battleground lay bodies of men who had been bayoneted, slashed by cutlasses, and burned. At least twenty-six militiamen were killed. Witnesses later swore in depositions that some militiamen had been killed after surrendering and that wounded men had been thrown to die into a burning stack of buckwheat straw.48

  A week after the Crooked Billet raid, General Howe learned that his request to be relieved had been accepted and he was to be replaced by Lt. Gen. Sir Henry Clinton. British officials in London believed that the Rebels’ new French allies might lead an attack on New York or that a French fleet might blockade the Delaware. So Clinton was ordered to evacuate Philadelphia and take his army to theoretically threatened New York.

  To bid farewell to Howe, André—poet, artist, actor, musician, impresario—produced what he called a mischianza, meaning “medley” or “mixture” in Italian. The extravaganza began on the afternoon of May 18, with the boom of cannon salutes as a fleet of “Galleys, Barges, & flat boats, finely decorated” slowly moved down the Delaware River. The vessels sailed past flag-festooned ships along the wharves. Shipboard bands played “God Save the King,” and cheers went up from ships and shore.

  At the landing of an old riverside fort, the gala fleet disembarked its passengers—officers in their full regimentals, ladies richly gowned. They walked in a stately procession between ranks of soldiers and lines of mounted dragoons, up a gentle hill to the abandoned mansion of Thomas Wharton, a wealthy Quaker merchant who had been exiled to Virginia as a Tory.49 The promenade ended at a large square of lawn flanked by triumphal arches and grandstands, where the ladies and officers sat. In the front row were seven beautiful young women wearing flowing, Turkish-style gowns. Each wore a jeweled turban of a different color.

  As André described his creation, “A band of knights, dressed in ancient habits of white and red silk, and mounted on gray horses, richly caparisoned in trappings of the same colors,” rode to the center of the lawn.50 The chief of the knights was accompanied by two young black slaves, “with sashes and drawers of blue and white silk, wearing large silver clasps round their necks and arms.” The white knights were champions for the seven young women, who included the lovely Peggy Shippen, one of André’s favorite belles. He played the role of herald, proclaiming that she and the other ladies “excel in wit, beauty, and every accomplishment.” If anyone doubted that, the herald declared, let him show it “by deeds of arms.”

  Another band of knights, dressed in black and orange, galloped up and accepted the herald’s challenge. In a reenactment of a medieval joust, the chiefs of the white knights and the black knights “engaged furiously in single combat.” After the jousting the revelers walked into the mansion to dance in a ballroom “filled with drooping festoons of flowers in their natural colors.”

  At ten o’clock all stood at the windows and gasped at fireworksbursting over the river. At midnight “large folding-doors, hitherto artfully concealed,” suddenly opened and revealed a huge dining hall built by British Army engineers as a temporary addition to the mansion. Bowing before the 430 guests were “twenty-four black slaves in Oriental dresses, with silver collars and bracelets.” (All the slaves in the cast were in fact slaves.)

  Suddenly from the grounds came a rattle of gunfire and a flare of flame. Guests were told that it was all part of the celebration. But the roll of a drum, signaling alarm, told all the dancing officers that an attack had begun. After a few tense moments the gunfire and the alarm ceased. Cavalrymen out of Valley Forge, staging their own mischievous mischianza, had sneaked to nearby redoubts, poured whale oil over timber barricades, set them afire, and galloped away. Sentries fired at them, but they all escaped.51 The party, interrupted by the short and mysterious absence of a few officers, went on until dawn.

  Andre’s flamboyant description of his production shocked many who read it in London. One newspaper called the fete “nauseous.” Philadelphia Quakers were also aghast, as was a former Quaker, Edward Shippen IV, Peggy’s father. He was one of many wealthy Philadelphians who, having decided to remain in the city, had tried to maintain a delicate political balance. A former royal judge and an Anglican convert, he talked like a Tory and lived like a Tory. And there was Peggy Shippen starring i
n the mischianza, which flagrantly displayed support of Howe and the British occupiers. The timing could not have been worse, for the British were about to evacuate the city, exposing people like Shippen to Rebel justice.52

  Aware of the Continental Army’s desertions and the Tory temptations to wavering Patriots, Congress decided that officers should declare their loyalty to the United States and, in a solemn oath, renounce George III, his heirs, and anyone who aided the king.53 At Valley Forge on May 30, Maj. Gen. Benedict Arnold was one of the officers who placed his hand upon a Bible, swore the oath, wrote hisname and rank on a small piece of paper with the “Oath of Allegiance” printed on it, and signed the paper.54

  Arnold, limping from his most recent wound, could not take a field command. From spies in Philadelphia, Washington had learned that the British Army was secretly preparing to pull out of the city. He offered Arnold a new assignment, which he accepted: military governor of Philadelphia, eastern Pennsylvania, and southern New Jersey, with headquarters in Philadelphia.55

  As the Royal Navy had often demonstrated, its ships could carry troops to their destination by sea better than their feet could on land. But General Clinton was overwhelmed by frightened Tories begging to be taken to the Tory stronghold of New York along with his army. The Tories did not want to face their Patriot neighbors after the British left. So Clinton decided he would take his troops to New York by land. The Tories—some five thousand men, women, and children—would, like their predecessors in Boston, flee by sea.56 Men dragged carts and wagons, “laden with dry goods and household furniture, … through the streets … to the wharves for want of horses.” Many of the possessions that reached the ships were thrown overboard by sailors making room for military supplies.57

  Supplies and ammunition that the army would have loaded onto ships now had to be moved overland. When Clinton began his march to New York on June 18, 1778, he needed more than fifteen hundred horse-drawn wagons, carrying not only supplies for an army on the march but also loot taken from Patriot homes. In one of those wagons were books, musical instruments, scientific apparatus, a portrait of Ben Franklin, and other loot taken by Captain André from Franklin’s home, where André had lived during the occupation of the city.58 Soon to be promoted to major, André would serve in New York on Clinton’s staff as his principal intelligence officer.

  Behind the wagon train and on its flanks were Loyalist units and Tory refugees who missed the ships to New York, adding themselves and their own plunder to a line of march about twelve miles long.59 Rebel militia cavalrymen followed the evacuees, snatching a few members of the Loyalist baggage guard and making them prisoners.

  As the train passed through New Jersey, tardy Tory refugees joined the march, many of them drawn to the protection of the Queen’s American Rangers.60

  On June 19 Washington’s new army, disciplined and confident, marched out of Valley Forge in pursuit of the British. Around sundown that day a small force under Major General Arnold entered Philadelphia to occupy it under military rule until the civilian government and Congress returned. Seated in a coach-and-four, Arnold rode up to the Penn Mansion, which had been Howe’s headquarters. Thousands of people cheered, this time for the Patriots. Howe’s men had left behind a city full of wrecked houses, gutted Presbyterian churches, and looted stores. Some grand homes had been left untouched, one of them belonging to the Shippen family.61

  Patriots hastily formed a municipal government, which confiscated the property of Galloway, the Allens, and other leading Loyalists. Eventually Rebel officials exiled the wives and children of Tory men who had left Philadelphia; women who defied the banishment were put in the workhouse until they could give security that they would leave the state and never return.62

  Rebel officials were empowered to collect from alleged Tories not only their weapons but even their shoes and stockings. A new ordinance authorized the seizure of the personal estates and effects of anyone who then or in the future joined Loyalist regiments or in any way aided “the King’s army.” College or academy faculty members, along with all schoolmasters, merchants, traders, lawyers, doctors, druggists, notaries, and clerks, could be fired and fined if they did not swear allegiance to the Patriots.63

  On the road to New York, Pennsylvania militiamen were shadowing Clinton, sending information back to General Washington. By June 26 the departing army had reached Monmouth Court House (now Freehold, New Jersey), about thirty-five miles from ships waiting toferry the troops and supplies from New Jersey across New York Bay to New York City. The soldiers camped around a road flanked by ravines and leading across a bridge to a stretch of swampy land. Beyond were high grounds and a better road that would speed up the march to the ships. Washington chose to strike before Howe’s men reached that road.

  When the two armies clashed, clouds of dust swirled through ninety-degree heat. Scattered units of British and American forces were spread across a battlefield that covered some twenty miles. Soldiers on both sides dropped from heat exhaustion. One of the Continental wings was commanded by Maj. Gen. Charles Lee, recently exchanged and back from his comfortable sojourn as a coddled captive in New York City. Lee had argued against Washington’s decision to fight Clinton on the march, suggesting that he be allowed to reach New York. But Washington had made up his mind, and he ordered Lee to pounce on the British rear guard, which was separated from the main force, on June 28.64

  Lee failed to fight. Instead he ordered a retreat. “Grating as this order was to our feelings,” Pvt. Joseph Plumb Martin later wrote, “we were obliged to comply.” Martin was sitting by the side of a road when an infuriated Washington rode up to Lee. Martin was close enough to Washington to hear him ask officers by whose order the troops were retreating. Washington rode off, and Martin believed he said, “Damn him!” Whatever his words, Martin thought Washington “seemed at the instant to be in a great passion.” He gathered Lafayette and other officers around him and started calmly giving new orders while, Martin later wrote, British cannon shells were “rending up the earth all around him.”65

  When Washington asked the bewildered retreating soldiers if they could fight, they answered him with three cheers. “His presence stopped the retreat,” Lafayette later wrote.66 The battle ended with both Americans and British settling down for a night of rest. Before dawn Clinton ordered the rejoining of the rear unit, the wagon train, and the rest of his troops, and the reconnected army slipped away on the road to New York. Washington did not attempt to attackhim again. Although the British successfully escaped, the Americans claimed a victory, marred by Lee’s order to retreat. Lee’s disobedience, along with his subsequent ranting to and about Washington, led to his being court-martialed. Lee’s behavior inspired a duel in which he was wounded. He was dismissed from the Continental Army; and, long after his lonely death, revelations surfaced about the strategic plan he had treacherously presented to General Howe.67

  In the spring of 1778, as better days were dawning at Valley Forge, Washington had received a routine letter from a young Pennsylvania officer reporting on legal matters concerning two civilian prisoners. After giving his equally routine reply, Washington spewed a surprising diatribe: “With respect to your future treatment of the Tories, the most effectual way of putting a stop to their traiterous practices, will be shooting some of the most notorious offenders wherever they can be found in flagrante delicto. This summary punishment inflicted on a few leading traitors will probably strike terror into others and deter them from exposing themselves to a similar fate.”68 Washington’s outrage was understandable. Tories and Tory sympathizers had been starving his soldiers while feeding the British occupiers of Philadelphia.

  A short time after suggesting that Tories be shot, Washington got news about the shadowy role that Tories and Indians were playing on the frontier. An officer, on home leave in Wilkes-Barre in northeastern Pennsylvania, learned that a combined force of armed Tories and Indians was planning an attack on a nearby settlement called Wyoming Valley, on the Susquehanna R
iver. He rushed to York, where Congress’s Board of War still had its headquarters, and asked that men be released to defend their homes. On June 19, as Washington was heading out of Valley Forge in pursuit of General Clinton, a member of the board wrote a letter to the commander in chief asking for the release of men from the threatened settlement.69

  Already, desperate men were heading for Wyoming Valley—somewith orders, some without, some led by officers who had resigned commissions, all moving faster than the letters and documents that were churning through the Continental Army and the Board of War.70 Washington approved the sending of the men to Wyoming Valley. But he knew that soon he would have to send far more to rescue the entire frontier.

  * The prestigious Queen’s American Rangers, the Second Battalion of the New Jersey Volunteers, and a detachment of the Royal Guides and Pioneers. See ToriesFightingForTheKing.com for information about Loyalist military units.

  14

  VENGEANCE IN THE VALLEYS

  ALONG THE NORTHERN FRONTIER, MAY 1778-MARCH 1782

  I have had a meeting with several of the principal Chiefs of the Seneca Nation… . There is just now a party of Senakies come in who have had an action with a number of Rebel forces on the Ohio, in which the Indians … took two prisoners & thirteen scalps.

  —Letter from Col. John Butler to Sir Guy Carleton1

  The war against the homes and farms of Pennsylvania’s Wyoming Valley was rooted in an episode during Burgoyne’s Saratoga campaign. Sir John Johnson’s frontier comrade in arms, Col. John Butler, had led the band of Indians and Tories who ambushed Brig. Gen. Nicholas Herkimer and his men in the ravine at Oriska. Governor Carleton, impressed by Butler’s performance, authorized him to raise a corps of eight companies of Tory Rangers “to serve with the Indians, as occasion shall require.”