First of Men

by Ferling, John;

  General Washington was able to relish Howe’s failure for only about a week before a dispatch rider reached headquarters with alarming news. Fort Ticonderoga had fallen to a British army led by Burgoyne.21 Never before had the threat been so great that Howe and the Canadian army might be able to unite along the Hudson River, severing all ties between the New England states and their compatriots to the south.

  The campaign that resulted in the collapse of that bastion actually had begun the previous autumn. Following the debacle under Sullivan in June 1776, the American army had retreated south of the Canadian border, abandoning the rotten, tumbledown fort at Crown Point at the head of Lake Champlain, and had taken up residence at Ticonderoga. A brilliant delaying action during the previous fall—under the oversight of Colonel Arnold—had stymied an immediate British invasion, but by the summer of 1777 the king’s forces again were ready to march. John Burgoyne, who earlier that year had been placed in command of Britain’s Canadian army, led the invasion army, and with initial success. He envisioned a protracted siege of Ticonderoga, but the Americans abandoned the bastion without a fight. By the time Washington learned of Burgoyne’s easy victory, the redcoat army was deep in the New York wilderness, headed for Albany and the Hudson River. When London learned of Burgoyne’s achievement, the ministry promoted its hero, while the king was said to have reacted to the news by rushing gleefully into the queen’s bedchamber shouting, “I have beat them! I have beat all the Americans!”22

  Not quite. Indeed, if anyone noticed, Burgoyne was on his own in the wilds of New York, in command of an expedition that, as events ultimately would demonstrate, was badly flawed. Burgoyne had neglected to equip his army with a proper supply of transport vehicles and horses, an oversight that perhaps arose because he failed to grasp the reality of campaigning in America. Even more reflective of Burgoyne’s ignorance of America was his decision to eschew passage via Lake George in favor of a wilderness land route. Moreover, although he soon learned that he would be outnumbered by his American adversary, he pushed on. And that Burgoyne would have to face a numerically superior foe was due, of course, to the muddled nature of Britain’s plans for 1777. In March Germain had stressed the need for Burgoyne and Howe to rendezvous their forces. In May, however, Germain seemed to endorse Howe’s fourth strategic plan for that year (the one that called for his army to sail for Philadelphia), although he implied that his acceptance was conditioned on Sir William’s ability to complete operations in Pennsylvania in time to cooperate with Burgoyne. Inasmuch as Howe could not know before late June that his plan for 1777 had been condoned, and considering the characteristically languid manner in which the general did things, Germain’s reference to a junction of Burgoyne’s army with Howe’s army smacks less of a resolute order than of an attempt by the secretary—and an empty one at that—to protect his political backside. At any rate Howe did not interpret it as a command. By mid-July, a week after learning of the seizure of Ticonderoga, he began loading his army onto vessels of the British navy. Unless Washington moved north to assist against Burgoyne, Howe was headed for Philadelphia.23

  Washington’s initial reaction to the news from the North was disbelief. Like Burgoyne, he had expected a long siege of Ticonderoga, if the British could even get into position for that tact. But what if the news was correct? The militia must be called out in force, he suggested, and he proposed General Arnold as a commander for these men. “He is active, judicious and brave, and an Officer in whom the Militia will repose great confidence,” he added. Presuming the news surely would cause Howe to abandon all intentions of trying to take Philadelphia, Washington additionally planned to unite his army with the Continental units already stationed in the Highlands.24

  The day after he learned of Ticonderoga’s collapse, the American commander had his army on the move—headed north. The army traveled for five days. On the second day of the trek he received definitive word of the fortress’s surrender, but it was another forty-eight hours before he learned that Arthur St. Clair’s army had not been captured in battle, that, in fact, there had been no battle. A cold fury moving his hand, Washington sought to discover what had occurred. “The evacuation ... is an event of Chagrine and Surprise, not apprehended, nor within the compass of my reasoning,” he told Schuyler, and he hinted broadly of court martial proceedings. Five days into his march Washington received more perplexing news. Howe’s army was boarding naval craft off Staten Island. Washington ordered an abrupt halt to the march. What was Howe’s destination? The American commander still suspected that Howe would go north. General Howe “certainly ought in good policy to endeavor to Cooperate with Genl. Burgoyne,” he reasoned, but until he knew in which direction Howe had sailed he would advance no further. A day passed, then another, then several. Eight days after being informed of Howe’s embarkation, he learned that his adversary had sailed, though he still could only guess at the redcoats’ destination. Initially, all signs pointed toward a northern campaign, and he detached some units for that sector; then it appeared that Howe was en route to Philadelphia, and he dispatched some of his force in that direction. Three more days passed, by which time the evidence seemed clear that Pennsylvania was Howe’s destination. Washington hesitantly moved south, convinced that it was too preposterous to be true that Howe really was “abandoning Genl. Burgoyne.” But it was true. By late July the British fleet had been sighted below Delaware Bay; now Washington and his army stepped up their march, the hot, weary soldiers once again traversing the Delaware, crossing at the very spot the commander had selected for his Christmas Night sortie half a year before.25

  However, just when it seemed that the three-week-old mystery of Howe’s intentions had been solved, the British fleet of some two hundred sixty vessels turned from the entrance to Delaware Bay and promptly disappeared. What could that mean? Had Howe’s southward voyage merely been a “deep feint” to throw the American army off guard? Was he indeed going back to Burgoyne? Was he sailing for the Carolina or Georgia coast? What a “very irksome State of Suspense,” Washington complained. Three additional weeks of uncertainty lay ahead. But despite the aggravation caused by Howe’s tergiversation, the British commander was being considerably less foxy than Washington assumed. All along he had been undecided over whether to approach Philadelphia from the Delaware Bay or the Chesapeake Bay. When the fleet reached the Delaware Capes, Howe chose to enter that estuary, only to discover shortly that Washington had crossed at Trenton and was in a position to contest a landing south of Philadelphia. In addition, the Americans had prepared strong defenses along the river south of the city; and, besides, to land in the vicinity of Wilmington would preclude Howe’s ability to close Washington’s safety hatch across the Susquehanna and on to the West. Howe considered all these factors, then he ordered the fleet to turn for the Chesapeake.26

  Washington set up camp midway between Trenton and Philadelphia. And he waited “in the most perfect ignorance, and disagreeable state of Suspence,” thinking all the while that the unseen armada was returning to the North or sailing for Charleston. He was not inactive, however. While his weary army rested, he inspected the gun emplacements and fortifications south of Philadelphia, looked in on the construction of booby traps in the Delaware River, and prepared his intelligence network. By the third week in August Washington was certain that all this work had been in vain, for if Howe had been headed for the Chesapeake he should already have arrived. (Actually, unfavorable winds off the Virginia Capes had delayed the flotilla.) That morning the commander summoned a council of war to consider the options. Everyone agreed that Charleston must be Howe’s objective, and all agreed, too, that a protracted summer march from Pennsylvania to South Carolina would debilitate the army; therefore, the officers voted unanimously to return to New York, there to resist Burgoyne’s invasion or to fall on the meager force of defenders left on Manhattan Island.27

  Everything was set for a 5:00 march the next morning when a courier galloped into camp. The missing fleet had been s
ighted—in the Chesapeake. At last Howe’s intention was clear.28 The battle for Philadelphia which had been expected as early as the previous December at last was about to begin.

  Within thirty-six hours General Washington was prepared to move his army between Philadelphia and the Chesapeake, passing through the capital city en route. Most congressmen had never seen Washington’s army, and the general carefully oversaw even the most minute aspects of the parade. He arranged the organization of the march, ordered the officers to be especially vigilant for any sign of straggling or loafing, had the men wash their clothes and/or uniforms and insert a green sprig (emblematic of hope, he said) in their hats, and made it very clear that he did not want any of the female camp followers to be seen with the army from the moment the Continentals entered one side of town until they exited from the other side. It was a public-relations pageant, and a generally successful one at that. Stationed at the head of the army, Washington’s steed briskly cantered into town early on the morning of August 29, a bright, delightfully cool day following a night of heavy thunderstorms. It took two hours for the army to file past, a slow, steady caravan of soldiery doing what it was supposed to do—buck up morale on the home front. They marched with “a lively smart step,” one congressman thought, while John Adams concluded that the units were well provided for and “tolerably disciplined.” Adams additionally noted the warriors lack of precision, their absence of jauntiness, of pride, all of which led him to judge that “our soldiers have not yet quite the Air of Soldiers.”29

  By mid-morning the following day the American army was south of Philadelphia, about fifty miles from Head of Elk, the point at the top of Chesapeake Bay where the British flotilla was just landing. As Howe’s men filed off the creaking, yawing vessels for the welcome earth, it was clear that his army was not in good shape. The navy’s square-rigged accommodations had been home to these landlubbers for almost nine weeks. Jammed like sardines into their floating lodgings, the men, all garbed in heavy wool uniforms, had sweltered and baked in the merciless American summer, respites from the murderous heat coming only when perilous storms flayed their craft. Some men were ill from the moment the armada had weighed anchor back in New York, and many were too weak to think about fighting for the next few days. If the men fared poorly, the horses had a worse time; scores of the beasts had perished or were thrown overboard for lack of water to give them when the anticipated short voyage persisted seemingly without end. The cruise would have been worthwhile had it been necessary or had it presented Howe with a strategic edge. But the whole notion of a campaign against Philadelphia made little sense, especially when another British force was descending from Canada. Howe once had possessed Boston and he presently held New York, yet the occupation of these cities had done nothing to shorten the war. There was little doubt that he could take Philadelphia, but he might have to pay a stiff price to get it, and when he got it what would he have accomplished? Moreover, if after two years of war, not to mention the supposed suppression of the rebellion in New Jersey during the previous autumn, the only safe way of getting from New York to Philadelphia was via an arduous naval expedition, it should have dawned on Howe—or London—that the war was not proceeding very well. Besides, once Howe landed at Head of Elk he still was no closer to Philadelphia than he had been in June when he sallied out to New Brunswick.30 Only now the summer was almost over.

  Although plagued by a thousand and one details that required attention in order to prepare for the British advance, Washington’s concentration frequently was diverted by reports on the course of the war in other theaters. Not all the news was good, and as usual much of the bad news concerned irascible and fallible General Sullivan. His problems with Sullivan had begun early that year. The New Hampshire officer had exploded when he learned that he had not received command of Ticonderoga, and he had written Washington an angry, petulant letter. Out of patience, Washington had responded in as ill-tempered and direct a manner as he dared: “No other officer of rank, in the whole army,” he began, “has so often conceived himself neglected, Slighted, and ill treated, as you have done, and none I am sure has had less cause than yourself to entertain such Ideas.” You are haunted by imaginary demons, the commander went on, suspicions that only spoil your own happiness and cause torment for others. Washington’s sharp retort quieted Sullivan, and thereafter the two had little contact until after Howe moved into New Jersey in June; when that foray ended Washington left Sullivan posted in Jersey, south of New York, while he moved well to the south toward Philadelphia. Sullivan’s orders were to remain in this central location, from which he could move north or south depending on Howe’s intentions; in addition, he was to endeavor to discover the size of the redcoat force left behind by Howe in New York. In mid-August Washington received dismaying news. Sullivan, apparently without explicit orders, had launched a raid on the British and Loyalists on Staten Island. The raid failed, and American casualties loomed near 150. Once again that “little tincture of vanity ... which now and then leads him into some embarassment,” and to which Washington had attested a year earlier, had led Sullivan astray. Curiously, however, Washington seems not to have been angry, although he did order an inquiry into the causes of the failure. Maybe his bland reaction was due to an awareness that the overweening pride that propelled Sullivan was not unlike his own; or, perhaps, in the wake of the Ticonderoga affair he may have found it inexpedient to criticize an officer with the gumption to act.31

  From further north more felicitous news trickled into headquarters that month. The exaggerated fears that had followed the news of the loss of Ticonderoga soon proved unfounded. A month after the collapse of that bastion, Burgoyne had advanced only about thirty miles, less than half the distance between Albany and Ticonderoga. It already had been an arduous trek for the redcoats, a journey through primeval forests and interminable swamps, a march made more difficult by Schuyler’s axemen who worked assiduously to fell ponderous trees in the path of the advancing army. Nor did Burgoyne make matters easy for himself. At times it seemed as though he had brought along everyone in Canada. Women, children, dogs, cats, a 138-piece artillery train, and a never-ending baggage caravan (Burgoyne’s wardrobe and stock of wine alone took up thirty wagons) slogged beside the six thousand soldiers. Nor was Burgoyne helped by Congress’s decision to appoint a more resolute commander of its northern army. On August 1 Schuyler finally was recalled and—when Washington begged off naming his successor—Congress selected Horatio Gates as the new head of the Northern Department.

  Early in August Burgoyne began to experience problems. His initial difficulty arose from a bare pantry, cleaned out by his distended retinue. He was compelled to pause, and to detach a force of German mercenaries to Bennington, Vermont, in search of victuals, footwear, and horses. Burgoyne’s first disaster resulted. More than nine hundred men never returned from the food–gathering foray, all the victims of New England militia under General John Stark of New Hampshire. Soon, too, it was clear that Burgoyne faced still another problem. The several hundred Loyalists and Indians under Barry St. Leger had been contained by swarms of New York militia in the Mohawk Valley; they would not be joining the main invasion army. And that was only the beginning. Undermanned now, Burgoyne next learned that Gates was in possession of favorable terrain astride the British army’s route. Burgoyne was in real trouble. In fact, on the day the British fleet reached Head of Elk, General Washington was able to report to his troops on a “signal victory obtained at the northward” by Gates, and by September 1 the commander was able to believe with some confidence that he might not have to fear the invasion from Canada.32

  Late in August Howe was on Pennsylvania soil, moving ever so slowly toward Philadelphia with an army of 16,500 men, his advance delayed by a lack of maps, a want of horses, and the necessity to forage along the way. Washington, meanwhile, set up headquarters in Wilmington, and for the next two weeks he watched Howe’s leisurely, at times erratic, progress. On the 5th the commander published a ringi
ng speech to his men, a pronouncement in which he suggested that a great victory might break Britain’s will to resist and could definitely “free the land from rapine, devastations and burnings, and female innocence from brutal lust and violence.” Two days later Washington stripped his army of all items that might encumber a hasty retreat; other than their arms, the men could carry only one shirt, one blanket, and one coat, while the officers could keep those items as well as “three or four shifts of under clothes.” In another forty-eight hours he had his army in place on the sloping terrain to the east of Brandywine Creek.33

  With about eleven thousand men at his disposal, the commander’s tactics were simple. Washington envisioned a general engagement, granting Howe his best shot at the American army since Brooklyn a year before. Washington stationed Maryland militia units below Howe’s right, a force that could nip at the British rear; Pennsylvania militia were posted at the most southerly ford across the Brandywine, the crossing that he believed Howe was least likely to use. Greene was given command of the center at Chad’s Ford, while he put Sullivan, who had joined him following the Staten Island raid, in charge of his right wing up the creek at Brinton’s Ford. Why did Washington place Sullivan, whose record was anything but spotless and who at the moment was awaiting an inquiry into his most recent failure, in command of nearly half the American army, a half that was on one of the flanks to boot? The commander had few other options. He could have taken charge of one portion of the army himself, leaving the remainder to Greene; but his custom was to farm out such duty, freeing himself to observe the overall flow of events. Or, he could have placed someone subordinate to Sullivan in command, perhaps using the pending inquiry as his excuse. That tack had political liabilities, however, for Sullivan’s friends in Congress were certain to howl; in addition, such a move might antagonize many officers, a corps of hypersensitive men—as, indeed, Washington had been in the 1750s—when it came to rank and seniority. To replace Sullivan, moreover, was to invite that temperamental officer to resign, an eventuality that Washington apparently did not wish to face. Therefore, he put Sullivan in command of one wing, but he placed him in charge of a sector that he believed to be safe, for his intelligence service had advised him that the British could not possibly cross the Brandywine except at Chad’s Ford, and he had put the more trustworthy Greene in control there.