Washington

by Douglas Southall Freeman

  With more of sympathy for André than Washington permitted himself to feel, the country shared in other respects the emotions aroused in the Commander-in-Chief by Arnold’s treason. Dismay turned quickly to wrath. Consternation sobered into amazed gratitude for providential deliverance. The response of one element of the public was less reverent. Some asked, Was there any connection between Arnold’s plot and Lee’s behavior during the Jersey retreat? In Philadelphia, Boston, and other towns, paraders hanged the traitor in effigy and in branding him displayed half consciously their own loyalty to the Revolution. Congress, in the words of James Lovell, was “mighty shocked,” though it was admitted that those Delegates who had examined Arnold’s accounts were not unprepared for disclosure of his business. Many “scandalous transactions,” wrote President Samuel Huntington, were “brought to light that were before concealed.” Arnold’s name was erased from the roster of generals; his infamy was left to time.

  Full investigation confirmed initial evidence and failed to show the involvement with Arnold of any person other than Joshua Hett Smith—who was brought to trial before a general court-martial September 30 and acquitted for lack of evidence, but he was arrested soon afterward by the New York Commissioners of Conspiracy and was imprisoned at Goshen until he escaped May 22, 1781, and went to New York City. American spies in New York and at nearby stations were alarmed and for a time afraid to employ their usual channels of communication but they escaped arrest, thanks to the earlier frustration by Howe of Arnold’s efforts to ascertain their names. In the conviction that Arnold had no partner in perfidy, Washington was anxious that suspicions should not be indulged. When he heard from the Board of War that a notorious informer, whom he suspected of being a double spy, had alleged that Howe was in British pay, he protested: “It will be the policy of the enemy to distract us as much as possible by sowing jealousies, and if we swallow the bait, no character will be safe; there will be nothing but mutual distrust.”

  While the country still was engaged in the discussion of Arnold’s crime, Washington disposed his troops to protect West Point and find subsistence in districts that had not been swept bare. So far as the northern and middle States were concerned, he felt he had written finis to an “inactive campaign,” throughout which the Army had “lived upon expedients” that no longer availed. He believed a far different task faced the forces in the South. “I have little doubt,” he told James Duane, “should we not gain a naval superiority, that Sir Henry Clinton will detach to the southward to extend his conquests.”

  Almost every development of the succeeding weeks of wretchedness bore out the warnings Washington had given. The British manifestly were reenforcing their Carolina contingents. Intelligence from New York was to the effect that Gen. Alexander Leslie was leaving that base with 2500 to 3000 men. The States below the Potomac must raise more men. If Virginia and the Carolinas were to supply recruits, they must have faith in victory. After what had happened at Camden, Gates could not hope to possess the confidence of the people. The simplest way that Congressmen could devise of getting rid of him was to order a court of inquiry into his conduct and direct Washington to put some one else at the head of the Southern Army until the court had acted. Delegates of the three southernmost States immediately asked the assignment of Greene, whom Washington undoubtedly would have selected on his own motion as the most resourceful, skilled general officer he could recommend. Greene, than at West Point, accepted the command, though with a sober understanding of the complexities of his task. Washington encouraged his lieutenant and gave him two of the best of his supporting officers, Steuben and Harry Lee. To Gates Washington sent word that the court would be held, if practicable, where and when it best suited the convenience of the defendant.

  Thereafter a continuing question was whether troops could be sent from the main Army to Greene. By the end of October Washington had good news: At King’s Mountain, South Carolina, on October 7 frontier militiamen overwhelmed a mixed British force, chiefly Loyalists. As this advantage might be offset by the British troops who had left New York, Washington thought it wise to consult his council of war on further detachment to Greene. A majority of the Generals replied with an unqualified “No” and urged, in answer to another question, that the Army be placed forthwith in winter quarters that would cover West Point.

  The troops by that time needed shelter and everything else. Washington had all his old administrative problems. Conditions never seemed to get better; experience never was applied; each autumn found him threatened with the calamities his men barely had survived the previous winter. Scarcely a week passed that the Army did not have to do without meat one day or even two. Soon there might not be men to eat even the little that could be wrung from embittered farmers. A stripped military chest and a despised currency would not purchase the reenlistment of short-term soldiers or support the intolerable expense of militia. Many of the troops were half-naked in spite of a large accumulation of uniforms in foreign ports. The old restlessness and the ugly jealousies were reawakened angrily. Knox was outraged by the promotion of William Smallwood to Major General. Hamilton also was restive. When Colonel Scammell resigned as Adjutant General, in order to resume field command, Greene and Lafayette sent their endorsement of Hamilton for that post, but before Washington received it he chose Edward Hand. While the appointment was logical, Hamilton may not have been reconciled to it. He now had married a daughter of Philip Schuyler and was thirsting to win fame in the field.

  Washington’s daily service continued the same old story, in detail different but in theme so repetitious, so disheartening that it was enough to make a man wonder whether the country deserved to be free! One hope only of larger American effort was held out to Washington. On October 4 he had written John Mathews: “. . . I most firmly believe that the independence of the United States never will be established till there is an Army on foot for the war—that if we are to rely on occasional or annual levies we must sink under the expense, and ruin must follow.” This appeal did not fail completely. A plan of reorganization was adopted October 3—too late to fill the ranks by January 1 but not too late to effect some improvement. The infantry regiments were to be enlisted “for and during the war” and supplemented, if necessary, by one-year drafted recruits. Several important reforms were instituted in the artillery and the mounted forces; but the most substantial gain, in Washington’s judgment, was the provision that the dismissed officers of the consolidated regiments and all officers “who should continue in the service to the end of the war” were to “be entitled to half pay during life.” With the beginning of November, Washington announced the new organization of the Army on a basis of long-term enlistment, adoption of which in 1776, he said privately, would have ended the war before the autumn of 1780.

  Washington’s immediate problems of strategy were not eased in the least by military developments. British troops established a base at Portsmouth, Virginia, and then mysteriously evacuated it. Preparations were being made at New York as if Clinton were determined to strengthen still further his southern forces. Greene received gratifying welcomes in Philadelphia and Richmond; but the farther southward he went, the more he realized the feebleness of the resources with which he hoped to conduct a partisan war until larger forces could be collected. Although it was suggested in Congress that Washington’s presence in the South would do more than anything else to assure help for Greene, the Commander-in-Chief felt that in the absence of orders from Congress to this effect, he should remain where he was.

  To winter quarters, then! There was no alternative. With the men apportioned in camps from West Point to Morristown, Washington fixed his own “dreary station,” as he styled it, at New Windsor where Martha joined him. Whatever was procured for the Army was requisitioned or impressed. By the middle of December Washington had to confess a doubt whether there was money enough in the entire Army to pay the cost of an express to Rhode Island. At Headquarters no funds, even for table expense, had been received in nearly t
wo months. Greene’s dispatches told of like poverty. Greene was resolute but in need of encouragement as well as of money. Washington could give the one but not the other. By December 27 Washington’s information was that another British fleet had left New York on the nineteenth with 2000 to 2500 troops—and that superiority at sea still hung on the second division which was to leave Brest in a short time. The year’s end was gloomy; the beginning of 1781 was of the same pattern. The patience of the soldiers had worn out.

  About noon on January 3 Maj. Benjamin Fishbourne drew up at Headquarters and handed Washington a letter from General Wayne that began:

  The most general and unhappy mutiny took place in the Pennsylvania line about 9 o’clock last night. It yet subsists; a great proportion of the troops, with some artillery, are marching toward Philadelphia. Every exertion has been made by the officers to divide them in their determination to revolt; it has succeeded in a temporary manner with near one half; how long it will last, God knows. . . .

  Wayne’s dispatch described an affrighting state of affairs at Mount Kemble, near Morristown. The men had risen between 9 and 10 P.M. on the first, had seized field pieces and boldly resisted commanders who tried to restore order. One captain had been killed; several officers had been wounded. The mutineers then scoured the parade with their fire and marched away about eleven o’clock. Wayne and his subordinates retreated southward ahead of the column and kept between the troops and the British. The men said boldly they intended to proceed to Philadelphia, a threat Wayne took so seriously that he had sent warnings to Congress to leave the city.

  The appalling reality was undisguised, defiant mutiny: was it to be general? Had the end come? Nothing further came that day from Wayne except confirmation of the news Fishbourne had brought; the Army around New Windsor remained quiet and apparently had not heard of the uprising. The British had not stirred, either, though, of course, the enemy would try to entice the mutineers. The night, too, was quiet. By morning of the fourth Washington concluded reluctantly that he should not attempt to go forthwith to Philadelphia or to the camp of the mutineers. By the time he could reach the scene of trouble the Pennsylvanians either would have joined the enemy or would be negotiating with a committee of Congress. To appear before the mutineers and demand that they submit to discipline without the means of compelling them to do so might impair discipline still more. Orders that could not be enforced should not be given.

  In all his stern disciplinary experience as a soldier Washington had never known precisely the sort of nerve-racking suspense he now had to endure, suspense concerning both the course of the mutineers and the response of the other troops. The only sure way to prevent the spread of trouble was to relieve hunger and neglect. If there was any hope, it was in New England. He wrote the Governors of the States east of the Hudson “it is vain to think that an Army can be kept together much longer, under such a variety of sufferings as ours has experienced.” Unless three months’ pay were forthcoming “in money that will be of some value” to the troops and ways and means were found of clothing the men better and feeding them regularly, then, said Washington, “the worst that can befall us may be expected.” This was all Washington could do—and it was ridiculously inadequate when the mutineers were said to be continuing their march towards Philadelphia.

  During the evening of the sixth, Washington received a dispatch of January 4 with details of what had occurred after Wayne had sent the initial reports of the uprising. Wayne had opened negotiations with the mutinous Line, which had appointed a committee of sergeants to act for it. These NCOs asked Wayne which were the classes of men admitted to have a just title to discharge. The General’s reply was that he had sent a plea that the Council of the State name representatives to confer with the soldiers and decide that subject. This arrangement was agreeable to the sergeants, who handed Wayne a list of their demands—that discharges be granted those entitled to them, arrearages of pay and of clothing be made up, and participants in the revolt be exempt from punishment.

  For good or for ill, the civil authorities had intervened. They had a right to do so. When they acted, Washington ceased employing the military arm. A just settlement might reconcile the mutineers to renewed service; but the proposals of the men seemed exorbitant, and a civil settlement was almost certain to go beyond anything that military discipline could allow. These perplexities had to be faced. A day’s reflection brought Washington nearer the state of mind that would interpret liberally the scope of a “fair” settlement. He so wrote Wayne on the eighth. An expression of complete confidence in the negotiators ended the letter. Nothing was firm, nothing certain—except the resolution of a few leaders.

  Was resolution to be destroyed by torturing suspense? Must Washington and men of like mind remain helpless and idle at New Windsor while the mutineers made a bargain with the enemy or wrung from the Council of Pennsylvania terms that would require the discharge of hundreds from an Army already cut in half? Were the days of December 1776 back again? It must not be so! Active risk was better than passive ruin! Now, on the tenth, letters from St. Clair, Lafayette and John Laurens threw him back on his conviction that a strong hand must be employed against men who could march to the British lines if they did not receive the concessions they demanded. He would proceed to West Point, confer with his general officers, and if they thought he still could rely on the troops, he would pick one thousand men and hasten to Trenton. Then, if need be, he would move against the mutineers.

  Almost at the moment Washington left his quarters for West Point he received news that Clinton had sent an emissary to the Pennsylvania troops with generous promises of welcome, pay and provisions. The committee of sergeants was said to have delivered him and his guide to General Wayne. Besides, Washington learned, a committee of Congress was in touch with the Pennsylvania troops. This put a more hopeful face on the crisis, but it did not induce Washington to abandon his plan for a council at West Point. When they assembled, the Generals expressed the belief their men could be relied upon, though there was some wavering over the proposal to detach one thousand troops in five temporary battalions. Washington ordered this and made ready to move towards the Delaware.

  A new difficulty arose overnight: The report that the mutineers had delivered Clinton’s agent to Wayne proved to be false. They still held the man and, as Washington saw it, “they seem to say, if you do not grant our terms we can obtain them elsewhere.” Wayne, however, indicated that parleys between the mutineers and the Pennsylvania authorities were progressing, substantially on the basis of the troops’ demands. If, in these circumstances, American regiments were thrown between Trenton and the British lines, this might appear to the mutineers as a show of force and might prompt them to join the enemy.

  Washington remained prudently skeptical, but he did not move the detachment which might or might not be willing to fire on the mutineers. Then, one dispatch after another told of small, hopeful developments—that the British emissary and his guide had been turned over to American authorities, that the whole affair was apt to be settled, that the British “spies” had been condemned to die, and that a settlement was expected in a short time. In the evening of the fifteenth a report arrived from Sullivan, with an opening paragraph that read thus:

  We are happy to inform your Excellency that the terms offered to the Pennsylvania troops are at length finally, and, as we believe, cordially and satisfactorily agreed on; and tomorrow we expect the Pennsylvania Line will be arranged in its former order. Constitutionally, no concession has been granted them that the critical situation of our affairs did not warrant and justice dictate.

  Washington had expected a settlement that would thin the ranks and weaken discipline; precisely how bad was the bargain? The demand of the mutineers had been the discharge of those who had served three years, though enlistment had been for “three years or the war.” Had the settlement been a surrender to the men on this point? It developed that if a mutineer’s military papers were not available for verif
ication, he was to be discharged by the Pennsylvania commissioners if he made oath that he had enlisted for a specific period that had expired. As the records of the regiments were fragmentary, this made the continuance of the Pennsylvania Line dependent, primarily, on the individual soldier’s sense of honor. Washington believed that the Pennsylvania authorities had made the best bargain they could, but he felt that the arrangement would “not only sub-vent the Pennsylvania Line but have a very pernicious influence on the whole Army.” It was, he thought, a result of the sort to be expected where the intervention of the civil authorities made it impossible to restore discipline by military measures.

  “It is somewhat extraordinary,” Washington observed to his French colleague at Newport, “that these men, however lost to a sense of duty, had so far retained that of honor, as to reject the most advantageous propositions from the enemy.” Washington went on: “The rest of our Army (the Jersey troops excepted) being chiefly composed of natives, I would flatter myself, will continue to struggle under the same difficulties they have hitherto endured, which I cannot help remarking seem to reach the bounds of human patience.” This was written on January 20, 1781, when Washington had no reason, so far as it is known, for regarding the parenthetical reference to “the Jersey troops” otherwise than as a casual statement of fact. The very next day, he found himself a vindicated prophet of evil: Col. Israel Shreve reported that some of those identical Jersey soldiers, then in camp at Pompton, had mutinied and were marching towards Trenton.

  Were all the Jersey troops involved? Was this a movement that was to spread from one command to another until the Army was destroyed? The decision of Washington did not wait on details. This time there must be no negotiations by civil authority, no temporizing, no compromise. If the best soldiers in the Army would stand by him, he would march with them and quell the mutiny. As quickly as dispatches could be drafted and copied they were signed and sent out. Heath at West Point was to pick five or six hundred of the “most robust and best clothed” men of that garrison and place them under proper officers at once. Washington himself would be at the Point the next morning to inspect them. The next day Washington placed Robert Howe in command of the detachment. Instructions were explicit: