The Ambitious Madame Bonaparte

by Chatlien, Ruth Hull

  “No, darling. There is trouble, and we will be safer there.”

  Bo sat up. “Are the British coming?”

  “Not yet. They are still in Washington, but—” Betsy hesitated, then realized it would be impossible to keep the truth from him. “Grandfather thinks the capital may have fallen.”

  “Oh.” He made no move to get out of bed.

  “Please get up and put on your clothes.”

  “Not until you leave the room, Mama.”

  Betsy raised her eyebrows at this sign that he was acquiring an adult sense of modesty. “Hurry. If you are not downstairs in five minutes, I will send up your uncle Edward.”

  When they reached the South Street house half an hour later, it seemed deserted. “Where is everyone?” Betsy asked.

  “Watching from the roof of the back building.”

  “May I go too, Mama?”

  “Yes.” They walked through to the rear staircase and climbed to the third floor. Then they went to the end of the hall and ascended the ladder to an open trapdoor. Betsy insisted on going first to keep Bo from rushing onto the dark roof, which was flat with a low parapet.

  Once on the roof, she moved to where her father and brothers stood near one corner and gazed to the southwest. An angry orange glare lit the horizon. “Merciful heavens! Is that fire?”

  Patterson lowered his telescope and handed it to Edward. “Yes. Washington is burning.”

  Bo crept up beside her and grasped her skirt as he had when he was very little. “Mama, did the British soldiers do that?”

  “So it would seem,” she said, putting an arm around his shoulder.

  “Do you think they shot President Madison?”

  “I don’t see why they would. They did not shoot Napoleon, and he had been at war with them for twenty years.” To her father, she said, “Where is Caroline?”

  “In bed. She has had a cold all summer.”

  Betsy frowned. Her sister had worn herself out during the prolonged stint of nursing their mother, and Betsy feared this “cold” might be the onset of something more serious.

  Glancing to where her brothers stood, Betsy saw the telescope being passed from one to the other. Octavius called, “Come on, Bo.”

  “Mama?”

  “Go ahead, but stay back from the edge.”

  As Bo moved away, Betsy asked her father, “Have they torched the entire city?”

  “No, the blaze seems concentrated in three or four spots. Probably the public buildings.”

  At the thought of the President’s Mansion, Betsy felt hatred well up inside her. “Why should the British wreak such destruction? They did not burn Paris when they overthrew Napoleon.”

  “Reports have come in that they seek retaliation for the burning of Port Dover, but I think it more than that. They mean to punish us for presuming to claim our independence.”

  Just like you, she thought bitterly. You have never forgiven me for not being submissive.

  She walked over to her brothers and asked for the glass. Staring through it, she saw what her father meant about the glow emanating from a few places. As she watched, a tongue of flame leapt toward the sky. Bo crept to her side and wrapped the fabric of her skirt around his fist. Betsy realized that the destruction of the city that was his second home was upsetting him. She longed to hug him, but she refrained from embarrassing him in front of his uncles. “You should go back to bed.”

  “Not yet, Mama. I want to see what happens.”

  Even though she knew it was unlikely they would receive any word that night, Betsy gave him permission to remain. After an hour, she went downstairs to make tea and sandwiches. As Betsy found a loaf of bread in the pantry, she heard a door open and close. A moment later, the new housekeeper entered the kitchen. “What are you doing, madam?”

  Providence Summers was twenty-four, with blonde hair, a freckled face, and a buxom figure. She was married to a captain who was often away at sea. Although Betsy suspected that her father had bedded the woman, she had decided to ignore the situation since he was now a widower. “The British are burning Washington, and my family are on the roof watching,” Betsy said as she sliced the bread. “They want some refreshment, but I did not like to disturb your rest.”

  “I always hear when someone is in my kitchen.”

  Laying down the knife, Betsy looked at her. “Your kitchen?”

  Providence flushed but did not answer.

  “Since you are up, get the cheese and make sandwiches while I brew tea.”

  Fifteen minutes later, Betsy carried a tray of food to her father and brothers, who ate gratefully. Toward dawn, a violent thunderstorm chased the family inside. As Betsy tucked Bo into bed, he asked, “Are the British going to burn our house?”

  “I hope not, but no one can say what will happen in a war.”

  He frowned. “I wish I had a pistol so I could protect you.”

  “Heavens, Bo, you are much too young for such things. If things grow dangerous here, we can go to your uncle John in Virginia.”

  His scowl grew fiercer. “I am not a baby anymore.”

  “I know, but you are not a man yet either.” Betsy stroked his smooth cheek. “Allow me to be your mother a little longer.”

  That coaxed a grudging smile from him. “You will always be my mama. I will never leave you the way my father did.”

  His declaration brought tears to Betsy’s eyes. “Thank you. Now please try to sleep.”

  A FEW DAYS later, news reached Baltimore that the government had returned to Washington to begin rebuilding. Fire had gutted the President’s Mansion, but the soot-blackened stone walls still stood. More importantly, Betsy was relieved to learn that both Mr. and Mrs. Madison were safe. Dolley Madison had even become a national hero because she saved Gilbert Stuart’s full-length portrait of George Washington.

  Survivors straggled back to Baltimore from Bladensburg, the crossroads town where the British army routed the forces blocking the approach to Washington. The Americans had retreated in a panic that demoralized the entire country. Some men on Baltimore’s Committee of Vigilance and Safety proposed capitulating to the British without a fight and negotiating to save as much of the city as possible, but John Eager Howard, a colonel in the Revolutionary War, declared that he had four sons in the army and would not disgrace his country with surrender. His resolve shifted the mood toward defense.

  According to the papers, one reason the lines collapsed at Bladensburg was that the troops had been placed too haphazardly to support each other when attacked. If Baltimore was to be saved, someone with military experience needed to oversee its defense. The committee asked Samuel Smith to take charge and obtained the governor’s sanction for their choice. That appointment insulted the governor’s nephew, General Winder, but Baltimore did not care.

  After that, Aunt Nancy often brought the Pattersons war news that she gained from living with the Smiths. One night over supper, she described Samuel Smith’s plan to defend the city. The Patapsco River was a tilted Y, with the upper Northwest Branch leading to Baltimore and Ferry Branch leading west. An arrowhead-shaped peninsula called Locust Point separated the two, and at its tip stood star-shaped Fort McHenry. The fort was vulnerable because its artillery had a maximum range of 2,800 yards, while the British bomb ships could hurl mortars half again as far. If ships slipped past the fort up Northwest Branch, they could send boats right into Baltimore Harbor and land troops in the heart of the city. If ships made it up Ferry Branch to Ridgely’s Cove, troops could march overland to attack the city from the west. Smith had decided that if the British fleet came, he would sink ships across the entrance to both branches. As Betsy listened to her brothers analyze that plan, she watched her son’s rapt face and tried to reassure herself that his safety was in capable hands.

  Edward pointed out that another possible line of approach was overland from North Point, the spit of land where the Patapsco River met the bay. By landing there, the British could avoid Fort McHenry and march northwest
to Baltimore. But Uncle Smith had thought of that too, Aunt Nancy said. To block that route, he had ordered the creation of fortifications along the ridge of Hampstead Hill east of the city. In the weeks that followed, Baltimore citizens turned out by the hundreds to dig trenches and throw up earthworks along a three-mile line stretching to the water’s edge.

  Nine-year-old Bo begged his mother to be allowed to dig, but Betsy refused. However, both Octavius and Henry spent time upon the earthworks. They reported that those Baltimoreans who could not fight donated money, bricks, kettles, whiskey, salted fish, and even jars of preserves. The burning of Washington, rather than breaking the American spirit, had fired the entire country with the will to fight. When Samuel Smith put out the call for more militia, volunteers poured in from all directions.

  Two weeks of work brought the city’s defenses to readiness. To everyone’s surprise, the British delayed their attack. Immediately after the fall of Washington, they took Alexandria—which put up no resistance and shamefully handed over ships and great stores of supplies. After a three-day occupation, the British fleet sailed back down the Potomac, anchored off the mouth of the river, and hovered there.

  On Sunday, September 11, the prearranged warning of three cannon shots interrupted church services. All afternoon, soldiers reported for duty, while wagons laden with women, children, and household goods streamed from the city, going west on Market Street or north on Charles. Betsy decided it was too dangerous to join the panicked exodus, so she moved back to her father’s house where she would have male protectors.

  On Monday, the Telegraph warned that the British had a new weapon called Congreve rockets, gunpowder-filled iron cylinders tipped with conical warheads holding explosives or incendiary material. They could fly for two miles, but their trajectories were erratic. The article advised Baltimoreans to keep buckets of water at the ready in their homes.

  Later that morning, runners brought the news that the British had landed nearly 5,000 marines and soldiers at North Point and were marching toward the city. The American defenders, General John Stricker and 3,000 men, were waiting at a narrow funnel of land between Bear Creek and Bread and Cheese Creek. For hours, the city heard nothing but distant guns. Then about suppertime, wagons bearing the dead and wounded reached Baltimore. Under the relentless pressure of a disciplined advance, Stricker’s men had given way—but only after holding off a numerically superior force for two hours. Even in retreat, they did not yield to terror. Instead they fell back to Smith’s defenses on Hampstead Hill and took their places on the line.

  Meanwhile, British ships approached Fort McHenry—slowly because of the shallow, sandbar-filled river—and discovered that sunken hulks prevented them from taking Northwest Branch. Throughout the day, more ships arrived until a force of sixteen ships and numerous smaller vessels clustered just beyond the fort. That night it started to rain.

  About 7:00 AM on September 13, the attack on Fort McHenry began. Despite the storm, Betsy and her family climbed to the roof to stare southeast toward Locust Point. Betsy protected herself with an umbrella, but the men and boys stood exposed to the lashing rain. Patterson used the telescope and reported that the giant 30-foot-by-42-foot flag commissioned by the fort’s commander, Major Armistead, flew over the fort.

  Even in the heavy weather, Betsy could hear explosions—not as loud as the warning shot fired at Texel but still enough to make her jump. The bombardment turned into a ceaseless onslaught; every few seconds, a British ship fired at the fort. Edward said that in addition to Congreve rockets, the British were hurling mortars. For three hours, the fort’s guns answered, but about ten o’clock the American artillery fell silent. Patterson, who held the telescope, said he thought the British ships had moved out of range.

  Heading toward the trap door to go inside, Betsy spotted Bo standing with his uncles, and her blood turned cold with a premonition of danger. She cursed herself for not realizing earlier how likely it was that they would come under the power of British invaders. The surname she and her child bore would not endear them to such conquerors.

  Betsy called Bo and, when he reached her side, hugged him fiercely. Then she said, “Please go tell Mrs. Summers to make tea.”

  As soon as he was gone, she approached her father. “Sir, I must speak with you.”

  He lowered the telescope and glanced at her quizzically.

  “I have made a dreadful error. I should have left Baltimore. Please may I have one of your carriages so that Bo and I can escape?”

  “Are you mad? A lone woman and child fleeing during an invasion? The horses would be stolen from you, and you would suffer indignities of the worst kind.”

  “But could you not send Edward or George with me?”

  “That is quite impossible. I need them here to protect my property if the army comes.”

  Betsy tightened the grip on her umbrella handle. “Do you not think it more important to protect your grandson?”

  “Why should he be in more danger than the rest of us? Betsy, I know he is your only child, but try to view the situation with a sense of proportion.”

  He turned back to scan the horizon, but Betsy grasped his arm. “Father, please, listen to me. My son is in more danger than anyone else in Baltimore. He is a Bonaparte.”

  Patterson lowered the glass and snapped his head toward her. Then he growled, “Nonsense, he is a little boy. The British do not make war against children.”

  “How can you be so certain? Bonaparte is the most hated name in England. Have you never heard of rogue soldiers committing atrocities?”

  Her father collapsed the telescope with a sharp click. “You are letting your inflated sense of rank get the best of you. Nothing will happen to you or Bo even if the city falls.”

  Tears filled Betsy’s eyes. “I am not willing to risk his life on your say-so just because you are loath to leave your property without an extra guard.”

  Patterson glared at Betsy. “Control your waspish tongue. You know I love the boy and would not expose him to harm. He will be safer here under the protection of his male relatives than fleeing upon the open road with his hysterical mother.”

  Turning sharply, Betsy hurried to the trap door and descended to the third floor, where she ran into an unoccupied room and flung herself on the unmade bed to cry. She had a terrifying vision of Bo being taunted by a room full of soldiers until he responded angrily and was punished for it. All the country knew the story of General Andrew Jackson, the hero of Horseshoe Bend. As a boy courier captured during the Revolutionary War, he had received a saber blow to the face for refusing to clean a British officer’s boots.

  Hearing footsteps, Betsy sat up and saw Edward in the doorway. He came to sit beside her. “Betsy, I will not let anything happen to Bo. If the British break through our defenses, I will take my horse, put him on the saddle before me, and race out of town.”

  “Thank you,” she said and leaned her head against Edward’s shoulder.

  Bo found them there a minute later. “What are you doing, Mama?”

  Betsy forced a smile. “The rained soaked my clothes, so I came down to change.”

  “But why are you in here?” He glanced around at the boxes stacked in the bedroom, which had not been used since Joseph left for Europe.

  “Oh—” She waved her hand airily. “I have not been in this room for so long, I wanted to see it.”

  Bo surveyed the room again and shrugged. “May I go up on the roof?”

  “Only for a little while. I do not want you to catch cold.”

  As Bo and Edward climbed the ladder, Betsy descended to the second floor. On her way to her bedroom, she heard violent coughing behind Caroline’s door. Betsy knocked and entered the room. To her horror, she saw Caroline leaning over her washbowl and spitting up blood.

  “Caro!” Betsy hurried to her sister’s side and held her shoulders until the spasm had passed. Then she gently lay Caroline back on her pillow. “How long has this been going on?”

  Carol
ine turned her face away. “I have had the cough for a year or more, but the first time I saw blood was a month ago.”

  “Why has Father not sent for the doctor?”

  “Because he does not know.”

  Betsy grabbed her sister’s shoulders again. “Look at me. Why have you not told him?”

  With a sigh, Caroline met Betsy’s gaze. “Because it will not do any good. We both saw what happened with Margaret. The doctors know nothing about how to treat consumption.”

  “Oh, darling.” Betsy smoothed damp tendrils from her forehead. Caroline was pale with dark shadows beneath her eyes. When she was healthy, she had the most beautiful skin and hair Betsy had ever seen, and Betsy had looked forward to introducing her to society. Now she feared that Caroline was more likely to leave her for the grave than the altar. “You must try to get well.”

  Caroline smiled wanly. “I have always admired you, Betsy, but I don’t have your strength.”

  “Much good it has done me.”

  “It kept you from being crushed by events that would have destroyed me.”

  Taking her sister’s hand, Betsy remembered how Caroline used to trail after her as a very young child. “I refuse to give up on you. When this crisis with the British is passed, I will tell Father the truth about your condition.”

  Caroline looked away. “If you wish, but I am certain it is too late.”

  “Nevertheless, we must do what we can.” Betsy rose. “Now rest.”

  She walked into the hall, gently shut the door, and leaned her forehead against the wall. “Lord God, how much sorrow do you expect me to bear?” she whispered.

  THE ALL-DAY BOMBARDMENT left Betsy with a pounding headache. As the rain continued into the afternoon, everyone came indoors, but after darkness fell, curiosity drove them back to the roof. Gazing toward the fort, Betsy saw red streaks of light that Edward said were Congreve rockets and orange balls of fire from mortars that exploded short of their target.

  “How will we know who wins?” she asked.

  “As long as the British continue to bombard the fort, we know it has not surrendered,” Patterson said, not bothering to lower the telescope.