Washington's General

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Washington's General Page 31

by Terry Golway


  This reversal of American misfortunes in the South had been achieved with minimal resources, which Washington himself acknowledged in a letter to Greene dated June 1. “The difficulties which you daily encounter and surmount with your small force add not a little to your reputation,” Washington wrote. Those words brightened Greene’s day.

  The victory at Cowpens, the race to the Dan, the strategic victory of Guilford Court House, the invasion of the lower South, the brilliant successes of the southern militia–all achieved with a ragamuffin army–won for Nathanael Greene the reputation he had dreamed of as a rebellious Quaker schoolboy. He had won nothing, and yet, he had defeated everything that the British and fortune had thrown at him. He was realistic enough to know that he had been beaten time and again; he was shrewd enough to know that the defeats didn’t matter. He told his old friend Jeremiah Wadsworth:

  Our army has been frequently beaten and like a Stock Fish grows the better for it. Lord Cornwallis, who is the modern Hannibal, has rambled through [a] great part of the Southern States, and his Tour has [sacrificed] a great number of Men without reaping any solid Advantages from it, except that of distressing the poor Inhabitants.

  With his legendary ability to hear with astonishing clarity the most muffled criticism, Greene noted that the painter and patriot John Trumbull had criticized him for being unable to conduct a “timely retreat.” But what would people like Trumbull say now? Greene told Wadsworth:

  I hope I have convinced the World to the contrary; for there are few Generals that [have] run oftener, or more lustilly, than I have done. But I have taken care not to run too far; and commonly have run as fast forward as backward, to convince our Enemy that we were like a Crab that could run either way.

  Greene hardly needed to defend himself, even with at least a hint of humor. His campaign had few critics; indeed, Lafayette told him: “Your popularity is now to the Highest pitch. You are the general every Body [speaks] of, and every one prides in your Maneuvres.”

  Caty Greene, restless in Rhode Island, was eager to join her husband in the South. Her husband was determined to keep her away.

  Even in his new camp in the High Hills of the Santee, where the Americans enjoyed water, shade, and a respite from fighting, Greene knew that the South was no place for a civilian who didn’t have to be there. Caty Greene had been at his side during the bitter winter camps in Valley Forge and Morristown; she, along with Martha Washington, Lucy Knox, and others had seen firsthand the suffering and deprivation of war. But the South in the summer of 1781 was very different from the North of winter camp. Tories and patriots continued to assail each other with the special ferocity of a civil war. Even though Greene’s army had forced the surrender of enemy forts and had persuaded Rawdon to withdraw to Charleston, the roads, swamps, and forests of the Carolinas and Georgia held dangers Caty could not imagine.

  In a letter to his wife, Greene told her what to expect on the long journey from Rhode Island to South Carolina, which “would require a guard to secure you from the insults and villiany of the Tories.” He continued:

  South Carolina and Georgia have been the seat, and are still, of a hot and bloody war. Therefore you would have had no resting place in this country. . . . Besides, the hot season of the year would have made sad havock with your slender constitution. It is true our separation has been long and my wishes are equally strong with yours for a happy meeting. . . .

  I wish I was there with you, free from the bustle of the World and the miseries of war. My nature recoils at the horrid scenes which this Country affords, and longs for a peaceful retirement where love and softer pleasures are to be found. Here, turn which way you will, you hear nothing but the mournful widow, and the plaints of the fatherless Child; and behold nothing but houses desolated, and plantations laid waste. Ruin is in every form, and misery in every shape.

  Caty remained in Rhode Island.

  In Virginia, the marquis de Lafayette was in the midst of a campaign that was as bloody and dangerous as Greene’s camp in South Carolina was peaceful and safe. Even as the British in the Deep South were retreating from the interior, Cornwallis and Tarleton were on the loose in George Washington’s home state. Civil administration collapsed, and it seemed possible that after Greene’s successes in the lower South, Virginia might well fall under British occupation.

  The embattled state was technically part of Greene’s Southern Department, but he was nearly powerless over these events hundreds of miles away. He desperately wished to help Lafayette, who had become a friend despite their difference in age–and despite Greene’s public criticism of foreign-born Continental officers. The Frenchman won Greene’s affection in much the same way young Sammy Ward had years earlier: he eagerly sought out Greene’s advice and deferred to him as a wise and experienced mentor. That surely was the best way to Greene’s often insecure heart. Lafayette made it clear he was not a threat to his elder’s seniority, referring to himself as “Your Lieutenant” and taking care to note that under Greene’s command he was becoming “So wise a Man.”

  In the summer of 1781, the British were on the verge of smashing the Frenchman and foiling Greene’s strategic victories in the Carolinas and Georgia. If Cornwallis, Arnold, and more British reinforcements under General William Phillips crushed resistance in Virginia, they could march their combined force into North Carolina and possibly restore, yet again, the lower South to British rule. Greene knew how much was at stake in Virginia and again contemplated leaving the Carolinas to take personal command in that state. In the end, however, he helped his friend Lafayette in the only way he could: Though he desperately needed reinforcements for his own troops, he chose not to move Continentals from Virginia to the Carolinas. And he stayed in constant touch with Lafayette, advising him to avoid, “if possible, a general action.”

  Lafayette followed Greene’s advice–and made sure Greene knew it–but in early July, he found himself perilously close to the general action Greene had told him to avoid. Cornwallis and his seven thousand troops had lured the Americans into battle near Green Spring by offering as bait what appeared to be only the British rear guard. In fact, the entire British army lay in wait. Lafayette was able to withdraw in good order, but it was a close call.

  A month later, Cornwallis marched to Yorktown. With its access to the sea, he thought it would make a fine new base from which to continue the war in Virginia.

  On August 21, Washington and Rochambeau left New York and marched their troops south, toward Yorktown.

  Nathanael Greene’s men had rested and fortified themselves for six weeks in the High Hills of the Santee. Now, Greene believed, they were ready to resume the war. Reinforcements in the form of a few hundred Continentals and local militiamen increased Greene’s little army to a little more than two thousand. The British had continued to suffer in the lowlands after venturing out of Charleston following Rawdon’s departure. Greene received reports indicating that the British regulars, equal in number to the Americans and now under the command of Rawdon’s successor, Alexander Stewart, were ill and demoralized. If Greene attacked, he could force Stewart back into Charleston, leaving Greene ready to face Cornwallis–never far from Greene’s strategic calculations–if His Lordship somehow slipped out of Virginia and marched south.

  Although the two opposing camps were separated by less than twenty miles, Greene could not march directly toward Stewart, for summer rains made river crossings difficult. So Greene marched north toward Camden and then south toward Stewart’s camp, near the village of Eutaw Springs along the Santee River, northwest of Charleston. The British were camped nearby in an open area.

  The American march was leisurely and undetected. As it was under way, Lafayette sent a letter to Greene with unbelievable news from Virginia: The French fleet, he reported, had sailed safely into Chesapeake Bay, isolating Cornwallis from the sea. And Washington and Rochambeau were on their way!

  Greene ordered his troops to cook one day’s provisions and allowed them a gill of ru
m on September 7. They were seven miles from the British position near Eutaw Springs. At four o’clock the following morning, the men roused themselves from sleep, lined up in one of four columns, and marched toward the enemy.

  Greene placed his militiamen, troops from North and South Carolina, in the front, along with Lighthorse Harry Lee’s legion. Francis Marion and Andrew Pickens were with the militia up front. Behind the militia were Greene’s Continentals, including some men in the Maryland and Virginia regiments who had been marching with him since the winter. The order of battle by now was familiar: militia up front, with orders to fire and fall back, with the more reliable Continentals behind them.

  The British didn’t realize that Greene was so close, a tribute to the American general’s careful planning. Stewart later noted that Greene’s troops patrolled the “by-paths and passes through the different swamps,” making intelligence work difficult. Civilians in the area kept quiet, too, although they must have seen Greene and his men marching toward the British camp.

  On the morning of September 8, Stewart dispatched more than a hundred British troops under the command of Major John Coffin to investigate a rumor, spread by two deserters, that American troops were nearby. They soon discovered that the rumor was true–Greene’s entire army was only some four miles away. Stewart scrambled to get a skirmish line forward to hold off the advancing Americans closing in from the east.

  Greene’s troops moved through a thick forest, which at least offered the comfort of shade as the day grew hotter. British skirmishers put up mild resistance before retreating, and Greene pressed forward. Both sides saluted each other with artillery fire until Greene’s men were ready to assail Stewart’s line.

  A “most tremendous fire began on both sides from right to left,” Greene later wrote. But the “tremendous fire” did not inspire flight among the American militia. With Marion on the right and Pickens on the left, the Carolina militia stood fast and fired disciplined volleys. Ten, twelve, fifteen, as many as seventeen times the American militia loaded their weapons and fired, taking and absorbing casualties. Suddenly, the British left, made up of the 63rd and 64th regiments, moved forward to counterattack with fixed bayonets. The militia on the American right faltered, but Greene brought up Continentals from North Carolina to bolster the line. These troops, under the command of Jethro Sumner, were among Greene’s most inexperienced Continentals. They had joined Greene during his summer respite in the High Hills of the Santee.

  Facing British fire for the first time, the North Carolinians did not disappoint their commander. They stood, fired, and advanced, yielding nothing when the British regulars fired back. Lee’s cavalry swung into position to turn the British left flank, prompting Stewart to reinforce his endangered line with Coffin’s cavalry. As Greene monitored the fierce fighting on his right, he “could hardly tell which to admire most, the gallantry of [the] Officers or the bravery of the Troops. They kept up a heavy and well-directed fire, and the Enemy returned it with equal spirit, for they really fought worthy of a better cause.”

  Greene had saved his most experienced troops for the decisive moment, and now it was upon him. The British were showing signs of reforming in the center, and the North Carolina Continentals were on the verge of falling back. Waiting for such a moment were the Maryland and Virginia Continentals. Bloodshed and carnage were not new to these veterans; they had seen what steel and shell did to human flesh. Joined by some Delaware troops, they moved forward. As they did, the British left and center began to collapse. Redcoats and Tory militia turned and fled toward their encampment near the village of Eutaw Springs. Only the British right, led by Major John Majoribanks, stood its ground.

  The Americans pursued the retreating British through their camp, but there Greene’s men halted, for they could not help but notice that the camp was well stocked with rum, food, and other supplies. They had been fighting for hours on a brutally hot day, and victory seemed certain–and so the militia and even some of the more disciplined Continentals paused to rest and to celebrate. There were few officers to shame them back to their duties, for the loyalist militia had successfully adopted the patriot tactic of picking off officers to create even more chaos on the battlefield. Sixty out of a hundred American officers would become casualties on this day, and of Greene’s top six commanders, only Lee and Otho Williams would emerge unscathed.

  Greene was unaware of the terrible breakdown in discipline and could hardly have anticipated it. The militia had been superb, the Continentals efficient and brave. They had seen the backs of British soldiers, not a familiar sight. But, living amid the deprivation that was the lot of an American soldier, they could not resist temptation.

  Greene still was engaged in battle. The American left was pushing hard against Major Marjoribanks’s skillful resistance. Hoping to make the rout complete, Greene ordered William Washington’s cavalry to circle around the American left and finish off Marjoribanks, whose men were gathered in a thicket of trees. But Washington’s men met with disaster; they charged without waiting for infantry support, and a volley of deadly fire from the British right killed or wounded many officers. Washington himself was wounded and captured.

  At the far end of the British camp was a sturdy brick mansion. Some of the fleeing loyalist militia took cover inside, outracing Greene’s men who tried to occupy the house before it fell into British hands. The loyalists slammed the door just before the Americans got there, leaving behind several British officers who were immediately taken prisoner and used as shields as the Americans withdrew in the face of enemy guns pointing from the house’s windows.

  The Americans brought forward artillery, but the cannonballs did little damage. As the loyalists inside fired on the besieging Americans, Major Marjoribanks’s men, having quietly fallen back toward their camp, launched a counteroffensive, overtaking the American guns, and then surprising the American troops who were drinking rum in the British camp.

  Greene’s men had been fighting for four hours, and they were now either exhausted and dehydrated or drunk and useless. In addition, their ammunition was running low. The British, on the other hand, were rallying around the stone house defenders. Greene considered and then rejected an all-out assault on the position, believing that he could ill afford more casualties. The day had been bloody enough.

  Once again, Greene ordered his men to pull back from the British position. He was not conceding defeat, for he believed the British could not hold the stone house for very long and would be forced to withdraw. The Americans marched seven miles back to their own camp in a state of exhaustion and covered with sweat and grime. They left behind nearly a hundred and forty of their colleagues, dead and lying under the blazing sun. As for the wounded, some three hundred and seventy-five men, they gathered them up and transported them back on litters.

  The British had suffered heavy losses: about eighty-five killed, three hundred and fifty-one wounded, and an amazingly high number of missing, some two hundred and fifty-seven, most of them taken as prisoners.

  Given his sensitivity to criticism and his own sense of martial pride, Greene could not bear to admit that he once again had left the field in British hands. He stated that although the bulk of his army had retreated, he had “left on the field of action” a “strong” picket force to keep watch over Stewart, softening the impression that he had left the field entirely. He told Lafayette that he had “obtained a complete victory,” and he claimed that despite being “greatly out numbered”–that certainly was not true–he had taken five hundred prisoners, which would have amounted to about a quarter of Stewart’s army. More plausible was Greene’s simple characterization of the Battle of Eutaw Springs. It was, he said to Lafayette, “a most bloody battle.”

  Bloody it was. And it was also the last full-scale battle of the Revolution.

  As Greene suspected, Stewart and his men did not remain near Eutaw Springs very long. Having sustained enormous casualties–the number of British dead, wounded, and missing was close t
o seven hundred from a force of about two thousand–they began limping back to Charleston on September 9, even as the field still smoldered and some of the wounded still cried out for water. Greene and his army attempted to pursue them, but he called off the chase after hearing that they had been reinforced. The Americans returned to camp in the High Hills of the Santee.

  The British rejected Greene’s notion that he had won a tactical victory at Eutaw Springs. Stewart, in fact, said Greene lied about leaving a picket force on the battlefield. The Americans, however, eagerly accepted the general’s version of events. In a sense, both the British and Americans were right–not surprising given the ambiguous character of the war in the South. It was true that Greene had withdrawn from the field, not the sort of tactic associated with victorious generals. But it was also true that Greene had inflicted intolerable punishment on the British, and that they themselves were forced to withdraw after holding the battlefield. A British officer named Lieutenant Frederick Mackenzie noted of Greene that “the more he is beaten, the farther he advances in the end.” With just a whiff of contempt, Mackenzie said that Greene had been “indefatigable in collecting troops and leading them to be defeated.”

  Whether or not Greene won the Battle of Eutaw Springs, there is no disputing the toll he inflicted on Britain’s southern strategy. The interior of the Deep South, while still plagued by hostilities between Tory and patriot, was no longer in British hands. Even before Eutaw Springs, Benjamin Rush, a member of Congress who had once been critical of Greene, told the general, “The South Carolina refugees in [Philadelphia] drink [to] your health every day” because “they view you as one of their deliverers from the tyranny of Britain.”

 

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