To Try Men's Souls - George Washington 1

by Newt Gingrich

  Though outnumbered at the point of battle, his men had spent the last two months digging in, ringing their positions with bastions, moats, trenches, deadfalls, and revetments.

  It had taken only minutes for the disciplined lines of British and the dreaded Hessians to roust them out.

  Monongahela had been an utter disaster, but this was different. Monongahela had been a surprise, at least for the general and the troops of the line fighting in an alien land. Brooklyn was supposed to be free men, defending their land, in an open fight——and they had fled, all of them. Briefly, the Maryland line blocked the way, gaining time for thousands to escape while sacrificing themselves. When they were surrounded and attempted to honorably surrender, the Hessians had shown their true mettle and slaughtered prisoners and wounded by the score.

  The memory of that slaughter would never leave this army, he thought, these shivering ranks deployed along the road, waiting for the last of their comrades to cross. Would the memory at dawn drive them forward with a fury, or cause them to turn in panic when the first shots were fired? He hoped for the former, but feared it might very well be the latter, especially if the Hessians were forewarned and aroused, as it seemed they must be after all the hours of delay. If the enemy was deployed for battle and waiting for his exhausted men to stagger into the fighting ground, then another disaster and slaughter would ensue.

  “Clear this damn boat away!”

  Glover, nearly losing his footing as he leaned over perilously, was helping to push a boat off. Its cargo, a single artillery piece, had been lifted by a couple of dozen men and manhandled out of the boat and was now being rolled up the icy slope. Its crew and some infantry drafted to help were slipping in the mud, cursing, one man yelling out loudly as his foot went under a wheel. Fortunately for him the ground was so soft that as the wheel passed over him he was able to stand up, hop about, then gingerly try to put weight on the injured member. From the looks of it, the bones were not broken as he limped off. Normally such an event would have triggered some laughter among the soldiers, but not now. Everyone was too cold, too miserable to take much notice of the suffering of another.

  “Bring the next one in. Hurry now, you sons of Massachusetts!”

  Glover again. God bless him.

  As darkness descended on the night of August 29, the army on Long Island appeared to be lost . . . except he still had Glover and his men.

  The Maryland line had gone down to bloody defeat, barely a third of its men escaping the trap; the rest of the troops had been routed. Much to his shame, some of the best from Virginia had cast aside their muskets and run. There had been barely a corporal’s guard left that would stand and fight.

  As twilight deepened, he had stood defiant, expecting death, but it had not come. Either the British were incompetent, or, as so often happened in war, they had not realized how close they were to true and total victory. Howe had not advanced the last mile to crush the rebel troops huddled along the banks of the East River. The trap seemed sealed, and the Revolution would die at dawn.

  He had skipped all courtesies and small talk and took up the issue at hand, going straight to the point with the Marblehead fisherman.

  “Glover, can you get us out of here tonight?”

  It had been raining hard for the better part of a day, what Glover and his men called a “nor’easter” and the Marblehead man smiled that the plan they had considered as a final act of desperation was about to be played out.

  Glover turned to face into the wind sweeping down the East River.

  “Better tonight than tomorrow,” was his laconic reply.

  “Why, sir?”

  “This storm will pass, wind back around to the southwest, and they’ll be behind us, that’s for certain.”

  And as he spoke he gestured down toward the vast anchorage below Manhattan where dozens of Royal Ships could at times be seen through the curtains of rain.

  “Surprised they haven’t run up already,” Glover continued, “wind, tide, that’s all that’s holding ’em back.”

  “Or Providence,” Washington replied, voice barely heard.

  “It’ll take more than a night though,” Glover continued. “Can get the wounded out, maybe some of the officers before dawn, but then . . .”

  His voice had trailed off, gaze fixed, impassive.

  An oath had nearly exploded at the implication of Glover’s words, but he had held himself in check.

  “My staff and I will take the last boat out, sir, the very last boat, after the entire army has been seen to first.”

  Glover did not flinch.

  “Well, sir. Like I said, the first wave of boats across, I take the wounded. If you insist, sir, on staying, that is your wish,” he paused for a moment, “your Excellency. But when they finally figure out that we’re slipping the noose and if my men and I are on the far side of the river . . . Well, sir, after it is all over, I guess I’ll see you in hell when my end finally comes, because there is no way that I will be able to venture back to you here on this side of earth if the Royal Navy decides to stop us.”

  There was something about the tone of the man that had made him smile and, uncharacteristically extend his hand.

  “Then I’ll see you in hell. The wounded and the troops go first.”

  Glover nodded and started to turn away.

  “Pray for fog, sir.”

  “What?”

  “Storm like this, sometimes when it breaks, it comes with wind and if it backs around to a westerly, it’ll fill their sails and the frigates will come up this river to make sure the back door is bolted shut and we are dead if caught on the water.”

  As he spoke he pointed southward, to where the armada of the English laid at anchor. Why they had not sent ships up to bottle the East River was a mystery, though with what little he knew of sea-going affairs, the vicious tides that swept the waterway between Brooklyn and Manhattan, combined with this driving storm most likely played a factor.

  “Sometimes though,” and Glover spoke softly, as if he was a superstitious mariner and was afraid he’d “jink the weather,” by uttering a hope. “Well sometimes, sir, after a blow like this the wind settles and we get a regular pea soup fog, If so, they won’t venture their ships of war in this treacherous stretch of river in the dark. They might put out patrol boats, but not the frigates if a fog sets in.”

  “Then we pray for that,” Washington replied softly.

  The storm continued to rage even as the first of the wounded were carried aboard the absurd “fleet” of Glover, made up of every scow, rowboat, and piece of wood that Glover could scrounge up. The more grieviously wounded were bluntly told that if they could not stifle their cries they would be gagged or left behind. Aware of the fate that awaited them from the Hessians if left behind, none complained. The knives of the surgeons on the farther shore held far less terror for them.

  The boats had set out in single file, Glover leading the way, oars dipping silently, men pulling slowly, angling them against the racing tide once clear of the dock. A hundred feet out they were lost to view, swallowed up by the storm.

  Washington nodded to Greene, who with a stage whisper passed the word for the first regiment of his command to come down to the dock. As the men passed, sergeants with hooded lanterns checked to ensure that weapons were not loaded, tin cups discarded, anything that could make a noise secured. The men were told again and again not even to whisper once aboard the boats.

  Long minutes passed. He had stood at the dock, heart racing, expecting at any second for an alarm to be raised, shouts, signal guns of the frigates firing off, and then the screams of men dying as the small flotilla of flimsy boats was torn apart by the concentrated fire of a hundred or more of the ships’ guns arrayed to block escape.

  He tried to judge the time needed for them to row across to Manhattan, a distance of four hundred yards or so, disembark, and then come back through the storm.

  How men such as Glover could navigate it was beyond his understand
ing. He had sought solace in the thought that if roles were reversed and he was guiding the fisherman through a trackless forest at night, then all the signs he knew and registered, the direction of the wind, moss on the side of trees, scents on the air, the fact that one could actually smell another man concealed dozens of yards away if the wind was right, would be lost on a man from Marblehead.

  The thought fled. They were not in the Ohio Valley, but trapped on the shore of Long Island, and a watchful enemy on the water was blocking their way.

  “Is that him?” Greene hissed softly.

  Something moved in the shadows, emerged, taking form. Glover was standing in the bow of a boat holding a coil of rope, a dozen rowers working slow but steady, barely a sound as oars dropped, pulled, were lifted, and then pulled again.

  The end of the rope snaked out, one of Glover’s dockmen taking it, helping to guide him in.

  “My God, he did it,” one of the waiting infantry announced. Greene turned on him. “And by God, I’ll personally run through the next man that speaks or even breaks wind,” he hissed.

  Glover leapt from the bow of the boat to the dock, more boats emerging behind him.

  “Can’t promise we’ll be so lucky next time,” he announced laconically, turning a watchful eye as one boat after another materialized out of the fog. Greene silently urged his men to board each boat as it slipped up to the dock. Once filled, each cast off, turned about, and disappeared into the fog.

  Glover had stood by Washington’s side, neither of them saying a word for long minutes as the next wave went across. They had stood silent as more men filed down to the long dock. Orders were given to cast aside anything that might make a noise, weapons to be cleared; if a man spoke or cried out he was to be gagged or run through.

  The orders did not need to be given now. An hour ago most had assumed themselves to be dead or prisoners by dawn. There was a faint glimmer of hope and none had needed to be told that the folly of a single man could dash the hopes of the entire army.

  Unable to hide his anxiety, he had opened and closed his watch half a dozen times before the lead boat reappeared. Nearly thirty minutes for one trip across and back. He ran the numbers and calculations in his head as he counted off the men loading up.

  “At least twenty crossings to get them all out,” Washington had whispered to Glover. “There won’t be enough time. Dawn will be upon us long before then. You must pick up the pace.”

  “I’d best get back into it,” Glover replied. He jumped onto the lead boat, which was preparing to cast off.

  “Since you’re the last to go, I guess it will be in hell next time I see you, sir.”

  He said nothing. Glover, standing in the bow, disappeared into the storm.

  It was a short hike back to his headquarters atop the Brooklyn Heights, where an anxious staff awaited him.

  Orders had already been passed. Wounded first, then all those huddled behind the lines. All artillery to be abandoned, guns spiked, even horses to be left behind. Frustratingly, tragically, those men still holding the forward picket lines, the men with the stomach to stand it, would be the next to last to go. Ordered to hold position, keep fires burning, act as though they were five times or more than their actual numbers. If there were enough time left to get them out, they were to stoke up the campfires, and then quickly slip off and race for the dock.

  Their chances had been slim at best.

  He had gone forward, walking part of the line, forcing a smile, offering the pickets reassurance that all was going smoothly and they would soon be relieved and safe across the river, resolving that the moment the ships in the harbor did raise the alarm he would stay with these gallant few to face the charge that Howe would surely unleash once he learned of the attempt to escape.

  For that matter, he still had not quite accepted that Howe had proved so passive on this night. Surely the British would attack long before dawn to vanquish the Americans.

  He was certain that luck, or the “will of Providence” did turn, the wind abating, stars beginning to appear in the midnight heavens.

  By two in the morning the storm was definitely on the wane, clouds scudding by overhead, the world around him becoming clear, picket fires of the enemy line visible. And then he had sensed it, the approach of first twilight.

  At home, or even on the Ohio, the first indication of it would be the song of birds, a lone voice waking, followed by another and another. The sky would still be dark but one could sense the ever so gradual shift into light, a peaceful interlude when perhaps half awake one could sigh and decide to lie abed for a few more minutes. But not now. The pickets around him looked to the fog-shrouded sky, a few whispering nervously or gazing over at him, but none daring to speak. One man had opened the lock of his musket, dusted out the powder, torn open a new cartridge, and put fresh powder in and closed the frizzen, grasping his weapon tightly.

  Standing on the bluffs looking down to dock, he could clearly see the long serpentine column, waiting to board, the men growing anxious. He stood silent, looking up at the heavens, silently praying with fervor . . . and the prayer was answered. Fog began to drift up, mist clinging to the ground, the howling of the wind but an hour earlier replaced by silence. With each passing minute the mist grew, rising, a sea-like fog that enveloped the bluffs of Brooklyn, and then seemed to spill down the slopes, greeting a fog forming on the waters.

  And there was no wind . . . just a deep autumnal chill, the cold air touching the waters and the rain-soaked land. The dawn came, not with a sunrise that revealed all, and brought annihilation, with only half his army across, but in a gray creeping blanket.

  More and yet more men were pulled from the line. So tight had been the secrecy that those who had stood on the front line did not even know they were being evacuated until they were sent to the dock, told to be silent and toss aside anything that made noise.

  It was finally an hour past dawn, and if anything the world was darker, a uniform dull gray and still he stood, waiting; his cap, soaked clean through from the rain, now hung heavy, chilling him.

  “General Washington?” One of his young adjutants, breathing hard, had came up behind him.

  “Sir, the last of the troops are crossing now. Word is being passed along the line for the pickets to fall back to the dock.”

  “Thank God” was all he could say.

  The men standing about him needed no urging. Several ran to the smoldering campfires, throwing on the last of the wood, stoking them up.

  A distant voice had echoed . . . from the British camp. “Damn rebels, better warm up now. We’ll be putting you in the ground this dawn.”

  To not reply might cause alarm. Taunts between the lines at night were part of war.

  A sergeant had looked to Washington, who nodded.

  “It’ll be you in the ground, you damn lobsterback. The only place I’ll be lying is next to your wife, after you’re dead.”

  “You son of a bitch.”

  The sergeant had laughed, several around him joining in, even as they turned and, with heads lowered, began to run down the slope toward the river.

  He had forced himself to walk slowly, even as the men raced by. They had stood gallantly throughout the night, but now, with rescue so near, there was an edge of panic to them. And the fog was beginning to lift. What had been indistinguishable shadows but ten feet away, only minutes before, now could be seen as men thirty or fifty feet away.

  The dock had been packed with men, and yet more were streaming down the hill.

  Boats were pushing off, moving faster, others coming in; order was beginning to break down, with men beginning to shove to get to the fore.

  “All of you,” Washington had hissed. “Stand easy!”

  They had turned to look back at him.

  “Show your courage, lads. Mr. Glover will not leave a one of you behind. Now show your courage.”

  The panic was stilled, though the men continued to look about anxiously, some toward the river, others towa
rd the heights, expecting at any second to see the advancing enemy.

  More boats appeared. They could be seen from fifty or more yards away now, emerging out of the fog. Men piled in. He caught a glimpse of Knox, head lowered, obviously crestfallen over the abandonment of so many of his precious guns.

  Boats were cast off, and then, suddenly, the dock was nearly empty. He had gazed about. Abandoned equipment——knapsacks, canteens, cups, more than a few muskets, an overturned artillery piece——littered the shore. Dozens of horses had milled about looking forlorn as if sensing they were being abandoned. Someone had suggested that their throats be cut so as not to leave them to the enemy, but that suggestion had met with no reply; he could never have given such an order. The enemy had more than enough horses anyhow, and such wanton killing was repugnant to any who loved them. He was leaving his own mount behind, and hoping that a proper gentlemen would get him.

  Two boats then had emerged out of the fog. As he gazed at them, his heart stilled. Above the mist he could see a ship’s mast in the river.

  Glover had been in the lead boat.

  “Quickly!” Glover had hissed. “They can see us, by God.”

  He had needed no urging, climbing into the boat, Billy Lee and the last few stragglers joining him, and the boat cast off.

  “Pull hard,” Glover said.

  He realized at this instant that though the night had been for him nerve-wracking, for Glover and his men it had been utterly exhausting. He could see the fatigue in their drawn faces, straining with each pull of the oar. A man slipped, an oar splashed, Glover hissed a curse. The exhausted rower did not bother to look back as he hunched over and resumed the beat.

  They were nearly to midstream river when he saw it——and could barely suppress a gasp of surprise. The stern of a British patrol boat clearly silhouetted in the gray mist of dawn, a lantern hanging over the aft railing, and what appeared to be the outline of a man who was resting against the steering oar. To the other side, the bowsprit of another boat jutted out; voices echoed; someone was relieving himself in the river. A bell rang, startling him; then others rang, up and down the river.