George Washington

by Stephen Brumwell

  46. See Charles Patrick Neimeyer, America Goes to War: A Social History of the Continental Army (New York, 1996), pp. 134–35; Caroline Cox, A Proper Sense of Honor: Service and Sacrifice in George Washington’s Army (Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 2004), pp. 94–96.

  47. GW to Lund Washington, September 30, 1776, in PWRW, 6, p. 441–42.

  48. Tatum, ed., Journal of Serle, p. 107.

  49. Ibid., pp. 107–108.

  50. Mackesy, War for America, pp. 95–96.

  51. Gruber, Howe Brothers, pp. 124–26.

  52. See Council-of-War, October 16, 1776, in PWRW, 6, p. 576; also Freeman, Washington, 4, pp. 217–20.

  53. General Orders, Head Quarters, Harlem Heights, October 21, 1776, in PWRW, 7, p. 1.

  54. Rawdon to Lord Huntingdon, November 3, 1776, cited in Nelson, Francis Rawdon-Hastings, p. 51.

  55. Gruber, Howe Brothers, p. 133.

  56. Howe to Germain, New York, November 30, 1776, in K. G. Davies, ed., Documents of the American Revolution, 21 vols. (Shannon, 1972–81), 12, p. 259.

  57. Council-of-War, White Plains, November 6, 1776; GW to Hancock, November 6, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 92, 96–98.

  58. GW to Greene, November 8, 1776, and Greene to GW, November 9, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 115–16, 120.

  59. Instructions to Major General Charles Lee, White Plains, November 10, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 133–35.

  60. GW to Hancock, November 14, 1776, in PWRW, 7, p. 154.

  61. See Colonel Magaw to Greene, November 15, 1776, and Greene to GW, “4 o’clock,” November 15, 1776, in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 1, pp. 350–51.

  62. Greene to Henry Knox, November 17, 1776, in ibid., p. 352.

  63. Grant to Edward Harvey, November 22, 1776, cited in Mccullough, 1776, p. 244.

  64. GW to John Augustine Washington, November 19, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 103–104.

  65. Ira D. Gruber, ed., John Peebles’ American War, 1776–1782 (Stroud, Gloucestershire, 1998), p. 63.

  66. See National Archives, WO/34/41, fol. 122: Amherst to Bouquet, New York, August 25, 1763.

  67. A. French, ed., The Diary of Frederick Mackenzie, 2 vols. (Cambridge, Massachusetts, 1930), 1, pp. 111–12.

  68. Tatum, ed., Journal of Serle, pp. 88, 106.

  69. GW to Hancock, November 19–21, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 182–83.

  70. GW to Lee, November 21, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 193–94.

  71. Reed to Lee, November 21, 1776, in Lee Papers, 2, pp. 293–94.

  72. GW to Hancock, November 23, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 196 and 197, note 2.

  73. Heath to GW, November 24, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 205–206.

  74. GW to Hancock, November 30, 1776, in PWRW, 7, p. 233.

  75. Lee to Reed, November 24, 1776, in Lee Papers, 2, pp. 305–306; GW to Reed, November 30, 1776, in PWRW, 7, p. 237.

  76. Mackesy, War for America, p. 97.

  77. GW to Hancock, “Decr 1st 1776 ½ after 7. P. M.,” and to Colonel Richard Humpton, December 1, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 245, 248.

  78. Lee to GW, November 30, 1776, and GW to Lee, December 1, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 235, 249.

  79. Howe to Germain, December 20, 1776, in Davies, ed. Documents of the American Revolution, 12, p. 266; Captain Johann Ewald, Diary of the American War, trans. and ed. Joseph P. Tustin (New Haven, Connecticut, 1979), pp. 24–25.

  80. GW to Hancock, December 5, 8, and 9, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 262–64, 273, 283; and to Brigadier-General William Maxwell, December 8, 1776, in PWRW, 7, p. 278–79.

  81. Lee to GW (two letters), December 8, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 276–77.

  82. GW to Lee, December 10, 1776; GW to Lund Washington, December 17, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 288, 290.

  83. Alden, General Charles Lee, pp. 158–61.

  84. Lee to Gates, December 13, 1776, in Lee Papers, 2, p. 348.

  85. JCC, 6, p. 1027.

  86. GW to Hancock, December 20, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 382–83; Greene to Hancock, December 21, in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 1, 372–74.

  87. GW to Samuel Washington, December 18, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 370–71.

  88. Rush to Congressman Richard Henry Lee, December 21, 1776, in Butterfield, ed., Letters of Rush, 1, p. 121.

  89. GW to Lund Washington, December 17, in PWRW, 7, p. 291.

  8: Victory or Death

  1. Mackesy, War for America, pp. 109–12.

  2. R. Atwood, The Hessians: Mercenaries from Hessen-Kassel in the American Revolution (Cambridge, 1980), pp. 88–89.

  3. GW to Major General Gates, December 14, 1776, and Robert Morris to GW, December 21, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 333, 404.

  4. Nelson, General James Grant, p. 108.

  5. Reed to GW, December 22, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 415–16.

  6. GW to Reed, December 23, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 423–24.

  7. Ewald, Diary of the American War, pp. 42, 44.

  8. Ibid., p. 39.

  9. See Jac Weller, “Guns of Destiny: Field Artillery in the Trenton-Princeton Campaign, December 25, 1776 to January 3, 1777,” in Military Affairs, 20 (1956), pp. 1–15: 7.

  10. General Orders, December 25, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 434–36. For the plan of attack and Washington’s most detailed account of the entire Trenton operation, see GW to Hancock, December 27, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 454–56.

  11. See GW to Cadwalader, December 24 and 25, 1776, in PWRW, 7, pp. 425, 439.

  12. David Hackett Fischer, Washington’s Crossing (New York, 2004), pp. 203–205.

  13. “General Joseph Reed’s Narrative of the Movements of the American Army in the neighborhood of Trenton in the winter of 1776–1777,” in PMHB, 8 (1884), pp. 391–402: 393; Corner, ed., Autobiography of Rush, p. 125.

  14. GW to Hancock, December 27, 1776, in PWRW, 7, p. 454.

  15. Corner, ed., Autobiography of Rush, pp. 124–25.

  16. “Elisha Bostwick’s Memoirs,” in WMQ (1949), p. 102.

  17. “Joseph Reed’s Narrative,” in PMHB (1884), p. 398. On this episode see also Mccullough, 1776, p. 279; and Fischer, Washington’s Crossing, pp. 231–33.

  18. “Elisha Bostwick’s Memoirs,” in WMQ (1949), p. 102.

  19. See Monroe’s “Autobiography,” extracted in Daniel Preston, ed., The Papers of James Monroe, Volume II: Selected Correspondence and Papers, 1776–1794 (Westport, Connecticut, 2006), p. 2.

  20. Weller, “Guns of Destiny,” Military Affairs (1956), p. 1.

  21. Greene to Catherine Greene, December 30, 1776, in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 1, p. 377.

  22. Tatum, ed., Journal of Serle, p. 163; Ewald, Diary of the American War, p. 44.

  23. General Orders, Head Quarters, Newtown, Pennsylvania, December 27, 1776, in PWRW, 7, p. 448.

  24. “The Battle of Princeton, by ‘Sergeant R,’” in PMHB, 20 (1896), pp. 515–19: 515–16. This account was originally published on March 24, 1832 in The Phoenix, Wellsborough, Pennsylvania. The identification of the author as Sergeant Nathaniel Root rests upon very close similarities in the account of “Sergeant R” and Root’s Revolutionary War pension application of August 1832. These are established in The Battle of Princeton Mapping Project: Report of Military Terrain Analysis and Battle Narrative (West Chester, Pennsylvania, 2010), Appendix I: Items 111–12, pp. 1–6. I am greatly indebted to Dr. Will Tatum of the David Library at Washington’s Crossing, Pennsylvania, for alerting me to this important research project, which sheds fresh light on several aspects of the battle.

  25. Isaac J. Greenwood, ed., The Revolutionary Services of John Greenwood of Boston and New York, 1775–1783 (New York, 1922), pp. 43–45, 48.

  26. Greene to Christopher Greene, January 20, 1777, in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 2, p. 9; JCC, 6, pp. 1043–46; GW to Executive Committee of Congress, and to Hancock, January 1, 1777, in PWRW, 7, pp. 500, 503–504.

  27. “Joseph Reed’s Narrative,” in PMHB (1884), pp. 400–401; Corner, ed., Autobiography of Rush, pp. 126–27.

  28. Washington to Hancock, January 5, 1777, in PWRW, 7, pp. 519–21.

 
29. Fischer, Washington’s Crossing, pp. 281–83; Ewald, Diary of the American War, p. 48.

  30. Wilkinson, Memoirs, 1, p. 138; “Extract of a letter from an officer of distinction [John Cadwalader] in General Washington’s Army, dated Pluckemin, Jan 5, 1777” in PMHB (1884), pp. 310–12: 310.

  31. Alfred Hoyt Bill, The Campaign of Princeton 1776–1777 (Princeton, New Jersey, 1948), p. 88.

  32. St. Clair’s recollection is contained within an account of his disastrous defeat by the Ohio Indians in 1791. See A Narrative of the manner in which the Campaign against the Indians . . . was conducted, under the command of Major-General St. Clair (Philadelphia, 1812), p. 242; see also Wilkinson, Memoirs, 1, pp. 139–40.

  33. Bill, Campaign of Princeton, pp. 90–92; GW to Hancock, January 5, 1777, in PWRW, 7, p. 521.

  34. Ewald, Diary of the American War, p. 49.

  35. Caesar Rodney, ed., The Diary of Captain Thomas Rodney, 1776–1777 (Wilmington, Delaware, 1888), p. 32.

  36. Ibid.

  37. “The Good Soldier White,” in American Heritage, 7, no. 4 (June 1956), pp. 73–79: 78; see also Robert E. Lee, Blackbeard the Pirate: A Reappraisal of His Life and Times (Winston-Salem, North Carolina, 1974), p. 12.

  38. Wilkinson, Memoirs, 1, p. 142.

  39. See especially Battle of Princeton Mapping Project, tables 2–3, pp. 38–42, giving detailed orders of battle.

  40. “Battle of Princeton, by ‘Sergeant R,’” PMHB (1896), p. 517; “George Inman’s Narrative of the Revolution,” in PMHB, 7 (1883), pp. 237–48: 240.

  41. “Battle of Princeton, ‘By Sergeant R,’” PMHB (1896), p. 517; “Letter from an officer of distinction,” PMHB (1884), p. 311; Wilkinson, Memoirs, 1, pp. 145–46.

  42. Ibid., pp. 148–49.

  43. For British criticism of the 55th and 40th Foot, see especially the information supplied by an eyewitness, Andrew Wardrop (the surgeon of the 17th Foot) and reported by John Belsches to Lord Leven, Edinburgh, May 21, 1777, in Marianne M. Gilchrist, ed., “Captain Hon. William Leslie (1751–77). His Life, Letters and Commemoration,” in David G. Chandler, ed., Military Miscellany II: Manuscripts from Marlborough’s Wars, the American War of Independence and the Boer War (Stroud, Gloucestershire, 2005), pp. 133–96: 172.

  44. Greene to Paine, January 9, 1777, in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 2, p. 3.

  45. See “Letter of James Read, of Philadelphia, 1777,” in PMHB, 16 (1892), pp. 456–66: 466; and letter of Shaw, from Morristown, New Jersey, cited in William S. Stryker, The Battles of Princeton and Trenton (Boston, 1898), p. 481.

  46. Greene to Paine, January 9, 1777, and to Christopher Greene, January 20, 1777, in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 2, pp. 3, 8.

  47. “An Officer of the Army [Captain William Hall, 28th Foot],” The History of the Civil War in America (London, 1780), 1, pp. 245–46, cited in Battle of Princeton Mapping Project, Appendix II, Item 2, p. 2; J. W. Fortescue, A History of the British Army: Volume III, 1763–1793 (London, 1903), p. 205; Gruber, Howe Brothers, pp. 154, 157.

  48. For the implications of Howe’s “fixation” upon Washington and Pennsylvania, see especially Conway, War of American Independence, pp. 88–89.

  49. “Battle of Princeton, By ‘Sergeant R,’” PMHB (1896), p. 519; GW to the New York Convention, February 10, 1777, in PWRW, 8, pp. 299–300.

  50. Gruber, ed., Peebles’ American War, pp. 95–98, 102.

  51. John Adams to Nathanael Greene, May 9, 1777, in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 2, pp. 74–75.

  52. GW to Hancock, Morristown, May 12, 1777, in PWRW, 9, pp. 396–97.

  53. Samuel Adams to Greene, May 12, 1777; and Greene to Adams, May 28, 1777, in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 2, pp. 77–78, 100.

  54. Council-of-War, Basking Ridge, New Jersey, May 2, 1777, in PWRW, 9, p. 324.

  55. GW to John Hancock; Stephen to GW; and GW to Stephen, all May 12, 1777, in PWRW, 9, pp. 396, 404–406.

  56. GW to Heath, February 3, 1777, in PWRW, 8, p. 229.

  57. GW to Pennsylvania Supreme Executive Council, July 9, 1777, in PWRW, 10, p. 233.

  58. GW to John Augustine Washington, August 5–9, 1777, in PWRW, 10, pp. 514–15.

  59. GW to Israel Putnam, August 22, 1777, in PWRW, 11, p. 46.

  60. General Orders, headquarters, Wilmington, September 5. 1777, in PWRW, 11, pp. 147–48.

  61. See Lieutenant Colonel James Ross to GW, “Sept 11, ’77, Great Valley Road, Eleven O’clock A.M.”; and Major General Sullivan to GW, Brintons Ford, September 11, 1777, in PWRW, 11, pp. 196–97. In following the confusing sequence of events at Brandywine, the detailed Editorial Note (ibid., pp. 187–95) is most helpful.

  62. “The Actions at Brandywine and Paoli described by a British Officer,” in PMHB, 29 (1905), pp. 368–69: 368.

  63. GW to Hancock, “12 o’Clock at Night,” September 11, 1777, in PWRW, 11, p. 200.

  64. Greene’s role is briefly described in a letter written ten months later. See Greene to Henry Marchant, July 25, 1778, in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 2, p. 471.

  65. “George Inman’s Narrative,” in PMHB (1883), p. 241.

  66. GW to Hancock, September 23, 1777, in PWRW, 11, p. 301.

  67. “The Actions at Brandywine and Paoli,” in PMHB (1905), p. 369. For a thoughtful analysis of this controversial episode, see Armstrong Starkey, “Paoli to Stony Point: Military Ethics and Weaponry during the American Revolution,” in Journal of Military History, 58 (1994), pp. 7–27.

  68. GW to Hancock September 23, 1777, in PWRW, 11, pp. 301–302.

  69. Proceedings of a Council of General Officers, headquarters at Pennibeckers Mills, September 28, 1777, in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 2, pp. 167–69; GW to Hancock, October 5, 1777, PWRW, 11, p. 393.

  70. General Orders for attacking Germantown, October 3, 1777, in PWRW, 11, pp. 375–76.

  71. GW to Howe, October 6, 1777, in PWRW, 11, p. 410. If Howe acknowledged the return of his dog, which was identified as his property by its collar, his letter has not been found.

  72. GW to Hancock, October 5 and 7, 1777, in PWRW, 11, pp. 393–95, 416–17. My brief account of Germantown draws heavily upon the excellent editorial notes in Showman, ed., Papers of Greene, 2, pp. 171–77.

  73. Gruber, ed., Peebles’ American War, p. 140.

  74. JCC, 9, p. 785.

  75. Major André’s Journal: Operations of the British Army under Lieutenant-Generals Sir William Howe and Sir Henry Clinton, June 1777 to November 1778 (Tarrytown, New York, 1930), p. 57.

  76. In February 1781, Peebles noted that heavy drinking was “constantly the custom”: at dinner “above two bottles of Madeira or port is generally the quantity that most people carry off.” See Gruber, ed., Peebles’ American War, p. 429; Corner, ed., Autobiography of Rush, p. 157; Rush to John Adams, October 31, 1777, in Butterfield, ed., Letters of Rush, 1, p. 164.

  77. For the court of inquiry on Stephen, see General Orders, headquarters, Whitpain Township, October 25, 1777, in PWRW, 11, pp. 605–606; for his court-martial and dismissal, see General Orders, HQ, White Marsh, November 20, 1777, in PWRW, 12, pp. 327–28.

  78. Ewald, Diary of the American War, p. 96.

  79. See E. C. Joslin, A. R. Litherland, and B. T. Simpkin, British Battles and Medals (London, 1988), p. 16.

  80. Clinton, American Rebellion, pp. 80–81.

  81 GW to John Augustine Washington, August 5, 1777, in PWRW, 10, p. 515.

  82. Washington to Benjamin Harrison, August 19, 1777, in PWRW, 11, p. 4. For the French cannon captured at Brandywine, see Major André’s Journal, p. 47.

  83. “Memoir of 1776” in Stanley J. Idzerda, ed., Lafayette in the Age of the American Revolution: Selected Letters and Papers, 1776–1790, 5 vols. (Ithaca, New York, 1977–83), 1, pp. 8–9, 11, 90, 100. On the relationship between Washington and Lafayette, see especially Rasmussen and Tilton, George Washington: The Man Behind the Myths, pp. 138–39.

  84. General Orders, headquarters, “Towamensing,” October 15, 1777, in PWRW, 11, pp. 512–13
.

  85. GW to Carter, October 27, 1777, in PWRW, 12, p. 27.

  86. GW to Gates, October 30, 1777, in PWRW, 12, pp. 59–60.

  87. Circular to the General Officers, October 26, 1777, and Council-of-War, October 29, 1777, in PWRW, 12, pp. 2–3, 46–48.

  88. See Brigadier General John Cadwalader’s Plan for Attacking Philadelphia (ca. November 24, 1777) and the opinions on it sent to Washington by Generals Greene (November 24), Armstrong, Duportail, Irvine, Kalb, Maxwell, Paterson, Poor, Scott, Smallwood, Stirling, Sullivan, Wayne, and Woodford (November 25) and Knox (November 26), in PWRW, 12, pp. 371–73, 379–80, 383–84, 387–88, 391–94, 396–404, 414–17.

  89. Ewald, Diary of the American War, p. 108; Armstrong Starkey, “War and Culture, a Case Study: The Enlightenment and the Conduct of the British Army in America, 1755–1781,” in War and Society, 8 (1990), pp. 1–28: 13–14.

  90. Major André’s Journal, pp. 67–70.

  91. General Orders, headquarters at the Gulph, December 17, 1777, in PWRW, 12, pp. 620–21.

  9: Treason of the Blackest Dye

  1. GW to Henry Laurens, December 23, 1777, in PWRW, 12, pp. 683–85.

  2. Joseph Plumb Martin, A Narrative of a Revolutionary Soldier: Some of the Adventures, Dangers, and Sufferings of Joseph Plumb Martin (new ed., New York, 2001), p. 88; “Memoir of 1779” in Idzerda, ed., Lafayette in the Age of the American Revolution, 1, p. 170.

  3. GW to the Board of War, January 2–3, 1778, in PWRW, 13, p. 112.

  4. See GW to Lieutenant Colonel James Innes, January 2, and GW to a Continental Congress Camp Committee, January 29, 1778, in PWRW, 13, pp. 116 and 116–17 (note 1), 379–80; Martin, Narrative of a Revolutionary Soldier, pp. 53–54; GW to Lund Washington, February 28, 1778, in PWRW, 13, p. 699; Martin and Lender, A Respectable Army, pp. 88–92. For a revealing regional case study of recruitment, see Michael A. McDonnell, “‘Fit for Common Service?’ Class, Race, and Recruitment in Revolutionary Virginia,” in John Resch and Walter Sargent, eds., War and Society in the American Revolution: Mobilization and Home Fronts (DeKalb, Illinois, 2007), pp. 103–131.

  5. Scholarship on the composition of the Continental Army is extensive and ongoing, but for useful overviews see Charles Patrick Neimeyer, America Goes to War: A Social History of the Continental Army (New York, 1996), and Martin and Lender, A Respectable Army, especially pp. 69–77, 87–99. Another study, which places greater emphasis upon ideology as a motivator for the rank and file, is Charles Royster, A Revolutionary People at War: The Continental Army and the American Character, 1775–1783 (Chapel Hill, North Carolina, 1979), especially pp. 373–78.