by Ted Bell
When the path finally topped out at a clearing, Nick was presented with a panoramic view of the entire battlefield spread out below. The tiny village of Yorktown, situated at the end of a peninsula jutting into the York River, was surrounded by British fortifications. The few houses left, mostly built of wood, were not grand, and the streets were very narrow. Beyond the river and an unbroken emerald green forest, he could see the broad blue Chesapeake Bay.
He reined in his horse. Lafayette was waiting patiently, surveying the scene below with the same spyglass he’d used aboard Revenge.
“Have a closer look,” Lafayette said, barely able to contain his excitement at what he’d seen. He passed Nick the glass. Cornwallis had taken his stand at the tip of a peninsula. His only hope of escape was now the sea, and those hopes would be dashed with the timely arrival of Admiral de Grasse and the French fleet.
Below them lay the great field of battle itself. In the far distance, a few small British warships anchored in the York River. On the shore, the small town of York, now completely encircled by British fortifications. The earthworks, Nick guessed, were about twenty feet thick and a dozen feet high.
Outside the main fort was a system of redoubts. These were very small defensive emplacements linked by trenches. The trenches and redoubts were meant to protect British soldiers and artillery, forming a defensive perimeter outside the main lines of defense. To Nick, these redoubts looked hastily built, earthworks and timber, although one large star-shaped redoubt on the right flank looked sturdy enough.
Nothing was foreordained. Success hinged upon so many factors: meticulous planning, mistakes, weather, and the commonplace unpredictability of warfare.
The British artillery fire was louder now, followed by tiny puffs of reddish dirt, explosions that certainly looked harmless enough at this distance. But Nick knew a ball could take off a man’s limbs and even his head. And that the mortar shells now bursting above were sending red-hot shards of deadly metal flying through the air, shredding flesh and bone. Thick with shot, ball, and shell, this battlefield was no place for the weakhearted.
In the near distance, he could see the many large tents, or marquees as they were called, of the allied commands, brightly colored regimental flags snapping in the breeze atop their tent-poles. To Nick’s left, the solid white flags of France stood out amongst the endless ranks of French troops in their white uniforms, marching in tight formation, precise in their movements.
In the center, between the French and the American positions, stood a large striped marquee, probably Washington’s. It stood behind a ten-gun battery of heavy artillery, barrels all trained on the British garrison. Their mission, in addition to enemy bombardment, was to protect the Commander-in-Chief at all costs.
“You see below you the order of battle, Nick,” Lafayette said. “The army’s left wing, deployed south, southwest, and west of Yorktown, constitutes the entire French Army of seven infantry regiments, plus artillery and cavalry. When our fresh troops arrive today, we will have 8,600 French soldiers under arms. To the right is the Continental Army, 8,280 men, full complement. A fine sight, is it not?”
“Where is your command, sir?” Nick asked.
“With the Continentals, of course. See the three large marquees on the northwest side, to the far right? Those are the division commanders. The forward tent, closest to the enemy lines, belongs to General Benjamin Lincoln, Washington’s second-in-command. The middle marquee is my own Light Infantry headquarters, and behind us stands that of Thomas Nelson, former governor of Virginia, who has forsaken the creature comforts of his palace at Williamsburg for the glories of this historic battlefield.”
“The army has been digging trenches, too, I see,” Nick said. There were scores of blue-coated Continentals in the trenches, firing muskets over the parapet at the British re-doubts, then ducking down inside the trenches to reload.
“Yes. Every night, hordes of diggers, miners, and sappers, who plant the explosives, dig new trenches parallel to the British lines, each one closer to the British garrison than the one before. The final trench, when complete, will be only eight hundred yards from the enemy’s defenses.
“The men work through the night in absolute silence. And thanks to all the rain, the soil is damp and loamy. Makes for easier digging. The dirt removed is used to create earthworks on the enemy side of the trench. Then reinforced with timber and sharpened protruding stakes of timber called fraising.
“Every trench is four feet deep and ten feet wide. Deep enough to protect the men from enemy fire, and large enough to handle carriages with siege cannon and ammunition. Eventually, parapets will be mounted atop all of the earth-works, made of tight bundles of twigs, to provide additional protection. An elementary component of siege warfare, Nick,” Lafayette said, ending his lesson.
“Looks like the French are copying the Continentals’ trenches over on their left side of the battlefield,” Nick said, pointing out freshly dug trenches full of troops in white uniforms to his left.
Lafayette smiled at the boy’s naiveté. “Hardly copying, Nick. The ancient art of the siege is essentially an exercise in engineering, which happens to be one of the Continental army’s major weaknesses. Fortunately, the French Army includes the best military engineers in the world. We have been perfecting the art of siege warfare for well over five centuries. And soon both allied armies will be breathing fire down Cornwallis’s fat English neck.”
First came the rising smoke, then the sound of another fusillade of artillery from inside the British compound, cannonballs flying and eight-inch shells bursting overhead. Nick was surprised to see no answering volley from the allies, and could not help but wonder why the battle was so one-sided.
“They fire their cannon and mortar, but we don’t return it, sir. Why?” Nick asked.
“General Washington’s orders. We’ll not fire a single cannon until every last one of our guns is in place. We are still awaiting the vital siege guns carried aboard Admiral de Grasse’s fleet. Should we fire an isolated cannon now, the enemy would simply concentrate on that one and destroy it. No, we shall not fire a shot until every battery is ready to open up at precisely the same moment.”
“Makes sense.”
“Indeed. He does that quite a lot.”
“Look!” Nick cried, “The white steed! The General is arriving at his headquarters.”
Nick sensed a great commotion rising up the hill from below. Washington, astride a fresh war horse, arrived in front of his marquee to the sound of beating drums, flying flags, and the shouts and cheers of his men.
As Nick watched, the long column of allied troops split in half and took diverging roads: the French to join their comrades already encamped on the left side of the battlefield, the Continentals going to the right.
“We should be off, Nick. The General is to hold a briefing for all division commanders in his tent in one half hour.”
“After you, sir,” Nick said, but Lafayette never heard him. He was already galloping down the hill through the scraggly woods, hellbent for leather, as if he had a date with destiny. Which, after all, Lafayette, as well as every man at Yorktown, truly did.
49
WHISTLING BRITISH CANNONBALLS
Nick’s first five days as Lafayette’s youngest aide-de-camp were notable for two very different reasons. One, he found himself constantly scurrying back and forth across the battlefield, racing on foot but frequently on horseback, between the headquarters and staff marquee of General George Washington, his own Light Infantry headquarters, and every other divisional headquarters, French or American, behind the allied lines. Nick soon knew why he’d been given Chief. The little paint was resolutely calm under fire.
Every one of the wax-sealed dispatches, he was told, was of “vital importance.” Most were marked MOST URGENT.
Sleeping little, he soon pushed himself to exhaustion, riding Chief hard day and night through the scrim of haze and smoke rising from the hundreds of smoldering campfires in a
nd around Yorktown.
And, two, scarcely a minute went by when he and his horse weren’t dodging whistling British cannonballs. He kept a running count. There were about forty balls an hour during daylight hours, the number dropping to ten or less after darkness fell. But the thunderous roar of artillery never ceased, ever. At night, the British mortar shells would arc overhead, trailing a long tail of fire, and explode in a hailstorm of lethal shrapnel.
And still, to Nick’s puzzlement and dismay, the Americans did not return the favor.
One fine morning, Nick was standing outside Washing-ton’s headquarters, awaiting the General’s reply to yet another disheartening dispatch from Lafayette. These daily updates were regarding the still unknown whereabouts of Admiral de Grasse. As usual on these occasions, the General’s noble face gave evidence of the war between hope and despair raging inside him as he tore open the seal.
The hardest part of Nick’s job was seeing the pain of disappointment in Washington’s eyes each day when he opened yet another disappointing dispatch. If only Nick could tell the General that his worries and fears were unfounded, that the pirate armada had been soundly routed and—but of course he could not.
As Washington handed Nick his hastily scrawled reply, an amazing thing happened. A British cannonball slammed into the earth not three feet from where Nick and the famous General stood. It showered them both with dirt, with Nick taking the brunt of it. Nick was naturally terrified at the near miss, but Washington just laughed it off and said, “Nicholas, you should take that ball home with you and show your friends what a brave boy you are.”
Nick opened his mouth to reply and discovered it was full of rich, dark Virginia soil.
Day after day, Nick watched the French and American army engineers raising their artillery batteries. Building earthen walls to surround the guns, they next cut embrasures, or openings, through which the artillery officers pointed the muzzles of their guns at the enemy. They also flattened and firmed the earth, excavating it if necessary, to receive the French-designed heurtoirs, which were heavy wooden artillery platforms, where the siege guns would be mounted and carefully aimed.
As for Cornwallis and the British Army, rumors were that they grew increasingly desperate, fearing that none of the much-promised help from Major General Clinton in New York was on the way. No supplies, no powder or ammunition, no food or forage for horses. And, most important, no last-minute escape to the sea, should the battle turn against them.
The noose was tightening, Nick McIver knew, but it would not be secure until de Grasse arrived. And this was the precarious situation that bedeviled them all and haunted General Washington’s every waking moment. Even Nick was anxious. After all, who was to say a powerful hurricane had not made a mockery of all their efforts?
The previous afternoon, Nick had overheard a British infantry deserter from inside the enemy garrison give an eyewitness account of their plight. He was telling staff officers at Washington’s headquarters that the situation inside was appalling. The men were working day and night strengthening the lines with little time even to eat the wormy biscuits, all that remained of their food. Just that morning, Cornwallis had ordered four hundred horses shot for want of forage. They’d been thrown into the York River, but their bloated corpses had soon washed ashore and the smell was overwhelming.
Sickness, either smallpox or camp fever, was rampant. This was especially true among the Negro soldiers and slaves, and the dead or dying were everywhere throughout the town. Cornwallis was banishing those who could still walk, hoping the deadly infections would spread within the American camp. Fever, he said, was every bit as lethal as a bullet.
Inside Washington’s command, the mood was tense. This involved the daily expectation of the arrival of Admiral de Grasse’s fleet. Lafayette had assured Washington he had ordered a swift frigate to sail southward from Saint Augustine on the Florida coast in hopes of intercepting de Grasse, and warning him of the pirate armada waiting in ambush.
Despite his overwhelming disbelief that the American swift frigate would reach the French fleet in time, Washington clung to the distant notion of success. He maintained a constant demeanor of confidence around his aides. All of whom well knew that without the arrival of de Grasse, there was always the chance Cornwallis could slip the ever-tightening noose. His troops could yet escape aboard British warships, known even now to be en route southward from the port at New York to effect their rescue.
As the days passed, even Lafayette grew anxious. Where was the great fleet he and Nicholas had so miraculously saved? According to schedules on the charts Nick had stolen, de Grasse should certainly have arrived by now. Had he encountered some great storm at sea that had delayed or even, God forbid, destroyed the fleet? Nick, equally alarmed, attempted to allay Lafayette’s fears, but the Marquis said until he saw that fleet sailing up the Chesapeake Bay, he would not rest easy.
One morning, after a week of unremitting rain, the day dawned blue and clear. Washington, much invigorated by the climatic change, immediately ordered that the trenches be “enlivened” with colors flying and drums beating. He assigned an entire division to rapidly carry out his orders. The divisional and regimental colors were to be planted atop the parapets, and every division would fly the motto: Manus haec inimica tyrannis.
“ ‘This hand an enemy to tyrants,’ ” Lafayette had told Nick when asked what the Latin expression meant. He then handed the boy a sealed missive marked MOST URGENT and told him to deliver it posthaste to General Washington personally. There was a small smile lurking about the French-man’s eyes when he handed over the dispatch. Nick, as he leaped into the saddle and charged across the battlefield toward Washington’s headquarters, could not help but hope his satchel contained the good news they were all desperately hoping for. Of course, such high hopes had been been dashed before. Always best to assume the worst, he reminded himself.
Arriving at headquarters, Nick was surprised to find that Washington had ordered his battlefield command desk moved outside his marquee. The General clearly wanted the sunshine and fresh air after the suffocating days inside the damp tent. As usual, the boy arrived out of breath and stood before the great man, huffing and puffing for some moments before he could speak.
“Excellency, I bring news from General Lafayette,” Nick said, placing the wax-sealed dispatch before Washington. The General’s face went dark and glum as if bad weather had entered his mind.
“I scarcely wish to read it,” he murmured, hurriedly breaking the seal. “How much longer are we to be left dangling by this infernal French thread?”
He scanned Lafayette’s elegant scrawl quickly, moving his lips as he softly spoke the words written there. At first, his expression was one of disbelief, but it was quickly dispersed as the light of pure joy flooded his eyes. Tears threatened but were immediately vanquished. “It’s the hand of Providence,” he said quietly to Nick. “A miracle. The only possible explanation for it, I tell you.”
“May I ask what has happened?” Nick said, hoping he was not being impertinent.
“De Grasse has arrived!” Washington cried, leaping to his feet and shouting. “The fleet is even now stationed at Lynnhaven Bay in the Chesapeake, guarding the entrance to the York and James Rivers. Twenty-eight ships of the line and four frigates! That will give the Royal Navy’s Captains something to think about should they dare approach us.”
Rochambeau stepped outside the tent just as Washington flung his hat high into the air.
“Do my ears deceive me?” the French commander asked his friend and ally.
“They do not, sir!” Washington exclaimed. The two men, who had had their differences, now regarded each other for a moment, and then embraced warmly, clapping each other on the back and exchanging words of almost rapturous joy. To Nick, it looked as if the two old soldiers might leap into the air or begin dancing an Irish jig at any moment. He stood transfixed, watching them. The grave importance of this moment in history was not lost on him.
/> Without Kate’s stalwart bravery while kidnapped at Port Royal, without Lafayette’s willingness to embrace Nick’s improbable tale of the Tempus Machina and act decisively on it, these momentous few seconds of history might never have occurred. And the England he knew and loved would be no more.
As more and more staff officers emerged from the tent and joined in the common revelry, General Washington disengaged himself for a moment and took Nick aside. “Your commanding officer, Nicholas, my dear friend Lafayette, has done our great cause an inestimable service.”
“Do you wish me to return with that message, sir?”
“No, Nicholas. Lafayette has informed me that he is heading down to Trebell’s Landing, several miles southwest of Yorktown. There, he intends to supervise the unloading of numerous transport vessels from the French fleet. Then he will commence the transport to Yorktown of what he believes and I will concede is a most welcome shipment. Do you know what he means by that, young Master McIver?”
“No, sir.”
“It’s the siege guns, for all love!” Washington cried. “Do you hear that, mon Général?” he said to Rochambeau. “In a matter of hours we shall at long last have the means with which to seal Lord Cornwallis’s much-deserved fate! May the Lord bless us all this happy and long-awaited hour.”
The possibility of Cornwallis’s escape, which had haunted General Washington’s every waking moment for months, was finally over. And America’s guns would soon answer the British artillery, roaring in anger.
50
THIS IS A HERO, NICK THOUGHT
Washington’s hour was at hand.
The two opposing armies shivered under an unexpected chill throughout the night of October 8. But things would get very much warmer the next day, of that Nicholas McIver was certain as he finally found sleep beneath his thin woolen blanket. For the first time in recent memory, the British guns had fallen silent. “Conserving their powder for the morrow,” one of the young Light Infantry soldiers had told him around the campfire supper.