Spies and Deserters

by Martin Ganzglass

  Suddenly, he heard shouts of alarm followed by two musket shots, screams of distress and then quiet. Dark shapes appeared on the road, ranks of troops moving quickly toward the stone farm house and barns. Light from lanterns shone through the windows and doors as some of the men hastily awoke and came outside, frantically trying to load their weapons. It was too late. The British infantry were upon them, bayonets at the ready, stabbing all who resisted.

  Bant watched in horror as six or seven dragoons stood halfdressed in front of a barn, their swords at their feet and called for quarter.

  “God damn you Rebels. Here is your quarter,” a Sergeant responded, plunging his bayonet into a dragoon’s chest. His men quickly cut down the others, herded more dragoons out of the barn and dispatched them in the same manner.

  Bant looked over at the A-frame where McNeil and the riflemen had been sleeping. He saw one or two dark shapes creep around the side and run the twenty or so yards to the split rail fence and disappear into the brush. The British rushed into the barn and brought out more than a dozen of the riflemen. In the light of a lantern, held high by an officer, Bant watched as they were slaughtered, one man pinned to the wooden shingles by a bayonet through his stomach. Even after the riflemen lay bleeding on the ground, the British continued to stab them until blood oozed from multiple wounds. An eerie silence followed the butchery, broken only by the coarse comments of the soldiers as they stripped the dead bodies of boots, swords, jackets and knives.

  From where he hid, Bant could make out a group of British officers on the porch of the farm house, one was giving orders to others and directing the few prisoners to be taken toward the road. Bant exhaled quietly and sighted on the officer’s forehead. Once he fired, he would have to run for they would see the muzzle flash and be quick to follow. The officer who appeared to be in charge obliged by turning more toward Bant, surveying his troops looting the bodies of the dead Americans. As he pointed toward his men, Bant fired. He saw, with satisfaction, the officer fall backward, his tri-corn dropping off his head. 3

  Bant sprinted to his left and up hill, away from the fenced corner of the yard, through an orchard, the bare branches grabbing at him as he passed by. He was startled to hear another rifle shot, a sharp bark rather than the deeper bang of a musket and then all was quiet again. He topped the hill, almost rolled down the other side, found himself alongside a shallow creek and walked in the ice cold water for thirty or forty yards, before clambering through dense shrubbery growing on the far bank. The moon broke through the clouds, illuminating a farmhouse on a distant hill. Bant determined to avoid any habitation and struck off further up the creek, keeping the brush between him and any possible pursuers. He finally stopped to reload. In the predawn quiet of the woodland, the noise of the ramrod sliding down the long barrel seemed exceedingly loud. He crept into the bushes and rested on his haunches, surrounded and hidden by the low dense brush, and listened, his breath condensing in short puffs in front of his face. Nothing. Good, he reasoned. If they were after him, there would be several of them and they would make noise.

  He took off his slouch hat and felt the gentle breeze on the back of his head. Bant was about to move when he heard the sound of branches being slowly parted. He froze, moving his rifle imperceptibly in the direction of the noise. A buck, with an eight point rack, edged down to the creek and lowered its head to drink. Bant remained motionless. The deer raised its head toward the hill between them and the orchard, its nose twitching. Then, seemingly unconcerned, and oblivious to the man with the rifle, so close but upwind, the buck melted silently into the shadows.

  At dawn, it took all of Bant’s courage to retrace his nighttime flight and return to the farm and barns. He waited in the grey light at the top of the orchard. A low mist clung to the yard, like a thin blanket covering the white, half naked bodies lying stiff in the morning cold. A thin wisp of smoke came from the chimney of the house, the only sign of life, until a man in shirtsleeves came out, drew a bucket of water from the well and retreated inside. Bant noticed there were no bodies on the porch. The British must have taken their dead officer with them.

  Cautiously, he descended through the orchard, pausing frequently to hide behind a gnarled apple tree trunk. Satisfied no British troops remained he continued on, his stomach knotted and tight, this time from fear. He crouched behind the split rail fence, steeling himself to examine the bodies, before slipping under the middle rail and treading quietly into the yard. Some of the dead Americans were lying on their backs. Stripped of their jackets, shirts and breeches, their skin was pale white, their torsos and thighs, slashed with numerous cuts, the blood caked and dried crimson on their wounds. The multiple lacerations bespoke the savagery of the slaughter. Bant examined each of them, looking for McNeil. He found the Lieutenant whose body was particularly gashed with perforations in his arms, chest, and abdomen, as if his rank warranted the excessive viciousness.

  Some of the men had died with fearful wide-eyed expressions. The faces of others were frozen in pain, or contorted in shock. Only a few seemed to be asleep, having succumbed to their wounds in peace. He could not bring himself to touch them, to close their eyes and mouths. They were stiff already, he reasoned. Looking at their faces, he saw again the faces of those militiamen hung by the British, the faces of those who still, two years later, populated his nightmares. He clasped his arms tightly around his shoulders to stop himself from shaking.

  He was obligated to look for McNeil. Their friendship compelled him to do so. Slowly he walked to the low barn, gagged, hesitated at the open door and entered. Four stripped bodies lay inside, three face down. Gingerly, Bant grabbed the hair and lifted the head of one and saw it was not McNeil. He did the same with the other two and then, his throat constricted, he dashed outside, gulping for breath. When he looked up, he saw the figure of McNeil, leaning against the split rail fence, waving to him.

  “No. No.” Bant screamed at the hallucination. “Leave me alone. There was nothing I could do. I could not help you,” he cried out between frantic sobs.

  McNeil walked toward him. “Bant. It is me. I am alive. I escaped.” Bant stood frozen as the apparition came closer. He felt McNeil’s callused hands grab his short curled ears and shake him. He smelled the real odor of gunpowder and sweat and saw the unshaven stubble on his chin. Bant collapsed at his friend’s feet. He clung tightly to McNeil’s legs, feeling his muscled calves and crying out over and over his friend’s name, relieved McNeil was real and not another horrific burden on Bant’s sanity.

  Together, they walked up to the farmhouse. “After the alarm, ours were the only two shots fired,” McNeil said. “I killed the other officer on the porch.” There were two dark patches of dried blood on the wooden floorboards and bits of bone and brain embedded in one of the supporting beams. “These Redcoats came with intent to bayonet the dragoons. Some local militia men must have guided them to this place.”

  The farmer opened the door, having heard their footsteps on the porch.

  “Please, I do not want any trouble,” he said holding up his arms palms toward them. “I did nothing more than host the dragoons. Please do not kill me.” By his accent, Bant guessed he was Dutch, a portly man in breeches too tight for his meaty thighs and torn stockings gone grey with use and washing.

  “We do not intend you any harm,” McNeil said. “We wish to wash and eat, bury our dead and leave,” he said as they brushed past the man. “Get us some food. Then shovels and help us move the dead to an appropriate place.”

  Once inside the kitchen, the man tapped his heel on the floor. A trap door opened and his wife and three children emerged from their hiding place. The oldest boy, who looked to be about ten, led Bant and McNeil to the well and pulled up a bucket of water. Back in the kitchen they sat silently, eating bread and cheese and drinking apple cider from a jug, while the children stood in the far corner openmouthed, staring at them.

  “There is a vale near the tannery, under a tree where the earth is soft and easy
to dig. You can bury your . . .” the man began to say ‘friends’ but after the first sound quickly blurted out “dead,” a little too loudly.

  “Get three shovels. You will help us,” McNeil said pushing his chair back. He put his tri-corn on, touched it as a gesture of respect to the man’s wife and thanked her for the food. He nudged Bant who muttered something, already dreading touching the dead bodies. “If you would,” McNeil said, turning in the doorway, “please give us some more bread, cheese and a few hunks of cured pork before we leave.”

  They dug a long trench, about two feet wide, fifteen feet in length and six feet deep. McNeil, to make it easier for Bant, always took the shoulders and left it for Bant to lift the feet, so he would not have to look directly at the faces of the dead soldiers, particularly the riflemen. It took them until the early afternoon to complete the mass grave, tamping down the newly turned soil and raking dead leaves, twigs and branches over the site. McNeil quietly uttered a prayer he had heard the Regimental Chaplain recite far too often during the bleak days at Valley Forge.

  “It would be thoughtful of you,” McNeil said to the man as they were leaving with the food in their haversacks, “to mark the graves when it is safe to do so.”

  “And when will that be,” the man replied angrily. “I am a farmer and must deal with all sorts of regulars and militias, each demanding something and threatening all manner of injury to me, my wife and little ones if I do not comply.”

  “We have just buried more than a score of our brother soldiers,” McNeil responded, “and have been fighting for more than two years. Do not talk to us of hardships. You will know when the time is ready to mark the graves. Do so when your conscience tells you.” He beckoned to Bant and the two of them proceeded down the road in the direction where the main body of militia and riflemen had been only two days ago.

  The Pluckemin Artillery Cantonment, several miles northwest of the Army’s main winter camp in Middlebrook, was constructed in the shape of a capital E, tipped on its side, with the spine of the letter huddled below a ridge line of the Wachung Mountains. The Officers’ barracks and repair shops for gunsmiths, wheelwrights, blacksmiths and carpenters were located on the spine. The barracks for the soldiers were the bottom line of the E. The top comprised a long line of sheds for wagons and storage.

  The shorter center line contained more barracks and the newly completed “Academy” - fifty feet long and thirty feet wide with its plastered arched ceiling topped by a cupola. There, the officers attended courses in mathematics and tactics. 4

  Adam paced back and forth outside the entrance hall to the Academy. The distance from Middlebrook was a severe hinderance for him. He rode poorly and did not own a horse. While wagons frequently went back and forth between the Cantonment and the winter camp, he was not at liberty to simply take leave. He was miserable and alone. Captain Holmes had been granted permission by General Knox to go to Boston. Ostensibly, it was to present a list of ordinance, powder, ball and shot that were needed. Adam knew it was a favor to allow Holmes to visit his wife, who had written their newborn son was sickly and she was beside herself with worry.

  The General had then left Pluckemin for Philadelphia to plead with Congress for funding to purchase more cannon and powder. He had taken Will with him as an aide-de-camp. Another favor, Adam thought, to enable Will and Elisabeth to be together. He had learned his lesson. These officers took care of themselves and left the enlisted men to suffer. With a sense of shame, he admitted his was an uncharitable thought. Will had always been his friend and he could rely on him. He was only absent now, at a most inopportune time.

  Adam needed to get to the winter camp and more specifically to see Sarah. After several weeks, General Washington and his wife had recently returned from Philadelphia. It seemed logical to him that with the General once again at Middlebrook, Sarah would be needed in the winter camp to cook for his official family. Unless Reverend Penrose had not lent her to the General, or sent someone else in her stead, or offered her to one of the Generals in New York, keeping watch on the British in New York City, or even sold her. His head was filled with these troubling anxious notions so when Captain Hadley emerged from the officers’ class, Adam had worked himself up into a frenzy of desperation.

  “Captain,” he called out and rushed up to Hadley as he came out of the hallway into the brisk February wind. “A word with you, please,” he said, angry with himself for using a begging tone. Hadley held his tri-corn on his head to prevent it blowing off and put his other arm around Adam’s shoulder.

  “What is it, Private Cooper? You seem distraught. Not bad news I hope.” Adam intended only to ask the Captain for some reason to send him to Middlebrook and stay there for a few days. Instead, his worries caused him to pour out his concerns about Sarah and his desperation to learn of her whereabouts. They emerged from the building and stood exposed to the wind, looking out over the artillery parked in neat rows, the muzzles of the light three, six and nine pounders and siege guns pointing out over the dusty fields below, the mortars and large brass howitzers’ stubby tubes directed skyward.

  “It took several days to assemble all these cannons at Pluckemin,” Hadley observed. “Teams of oxen and horses pulling them over rutted roads, stopping every few miles to grease the axles.” He clapped Adam on the back. “This very morning I mentioned to Colonel Sargent there was a scarcity of animal fat and if the weather holds and we begin maneuvers, the axles will lock up.” Adam waited expectantly. “The slaughterhouse is on the south side of the army’s camp. I will remind Colonel Sargent of our discussion this morning. For all eighteen companies of field artillery, I estimate our needs for animal fat will be great. It would take several wagons to haul the barrels to Pluckemin and a few days to render enough to meet our requirements. I assume you have no other duties that would prevent you from leaving once the orders and requisitions are issued?”

  “None, Captain. None at all,” Adam reassured him. “Well, then it is done. It will have to go through the Commissary of Military Stores for the proper authorizations. I anticipate no difficulties. Colonel Sargent and Frothingham, the Deputy Commissioner, know each other from Boston.” Hadley broke into a broad honest grin. “And that is where you and I first met, is it not? When we rescued Will Stoner from that mob ready to tar and feather him.”

  “That is true, Captain. I thank you for remembering and your help now.”

  “I expect a full report when you return. How your courtship has proceeded with the young lady.”

  “Yes, sir,” Adam replied, holding his thought that one is not allowed to court a slave.

  Two days later Adam rode one of four ox-drawn wagons into the Middlebrook encampment. Having presented their requisition at the slaughterhouse and been informed that butchering and feeding the army came first and rendering of the carcasses later, the men were released by the Sergeant in charge of the detail.

  Adam did not mind the light rain that was falling in the late afternoon. From the vantage point of the wagon, he had seen several of Washington’s Lifeguards, easily recognizable in their smart blue and buff uniforms with the distinctive white-plumed blue helmets instead of the traditional tri-corns. They were encamped at the entrance to a narrow road leading to a red brick Georgian house. There were newly constructed huts on the opposite side of the road, along with temporary open-sided shelters serving as makeshift stables for their horses.

  The Lifeguards welcomed Adam’s offer to help in their construction of more permanent stables, especially since he was skilled with a broad axe. He willingly fell to splitting the trunks of freshly cut oaks into slabs for the stable walls. He kept an eye out for people coming and going from the house, but by the end of the first day had not seen Sarah.

  The next day, he helped load a sled with firewood and offered to deliver it to the Wallace House which he had learned was the name of General Washington’s headquarters. Adjusting the leather straps across his chest, he dragged the load sled around the side of the brick buildi
ng to a newly constructed one-story kitchen and shed. Adam unloaded the logs, stacking them in rows, alternating between width and length, washed his hands in a bucket beside the well and opened the wooden door leading to the kitchen. It was almost mid-afternoon and he thought if Sarah were in the camp, she would be busy preparing the dinner meal.

  He saw her immediately. She was at the fireplace turning a large slab of beef on a spit, her hair spilling out from under her prim white cap, her apron begrimed with grease and charcoal. She stopped in midturn and cried out his name. He saw the surprised delight in her green eyes and the amusement of the other women preparing dinner for the General’s official family. Adam took the cloth from her hand and turned the iron spit handle, smelling the aroma of the roasting meat overpowering a faint hint of the soap she used for herself.

  “I am not able to see you until later, after the main meal is prepared, served and our other duties are completed,” she said loudly over the bustle of the small hot room.

  “If you permit me to turn the spit and thus be in your presence for even a little while, I can wait until the late evening if that is when it will be.”

  She rewarded him with a smile and set about her other duties. The male cook, whom Adam recalled was named Isaac, gruffly acknowledged Adam, who briefly stopped turning the spit to remove his wool jacket.

  “An additional hand is welcome as long as you do not interfere with our preparations,” Isaac said. Adam merely nodded in response and kept his eyes on Sarah.

  It was dark and cool when Sarah finally emerged from the kitchen, a shawl over her head spreading down on to the shoulders of her cloak. Adam liked the way it framed her face, accentuating her high cheekbones.

  “May we walk together,” Adam asked, inviting her to amble with him toward the main road.