Origins_Revolution

by Mark Henrikson

  “The question is, should we?” Valnor asked.

  “Not only should we, we must,” Washington insisted. “We won a great victory here in Boston, and that has the fence sitters beginning to believe our cause can win. We must maintain that momentum, not tuck tail and run as the British seize one of the largest cities on this continent without a challenge. Good God man, where is your courage?”

  Valnor looked to the map once more at all the British army markers. “Do we know how many men they have in that area?”

  “Our best estimate is 30,000 soldiers.”

  “Does that include the marines and sailors aboard those ships?” Valnor asked.

  “We’re not sure,” Washington admitted.

  “We only have 12,000 men,” Valnor cautioned. “They outnumber us almost three to one.”

  “Almost, and that is exactly my point,” Washington jumped in. “Throughout recorded history military maxim dictates, and has proven out time and again, that an invading force must have a three to one numerical advantage to succeed. They don’t. They only have two and a half. We can hold them, especially if I choose a proper defensible ground.”

  Valnor did not know where to begin with his counter argument. This was not a simple greater than, less than math equation. “Even if your logic holds, that is a slim margin for error. What if they have more men than your spies estimate? They may have more men aboard the boats, and what about their ships themselves? Those boats carry a lot of cannons that are relocated with ease for optimum fire on the river waters.”

  “The cannons you delivered to this army can hold off their navy,” Washington countered. “We proved that when we forced them to abandon Boston.”

  Valnor felt like banging his head against the nearest wall at how simple-minded the man’s thinking was on this matter. He still had one argument that might make his case. “Those are British regulars, trained professional soldiers. Our men have hearts of gold, but they are not soldiers, merely enthusiastic men carrying weapons on their shoulders. They cannot stand muzzle to muzzle across a battlefield with the British.”

  “We beat them back into the confines of Boston because we surprised them. We behaved as a nimble, unpredictable adversary firing at them from all directions under confusing conditions. We then outmaneuvered and surprised them again by relocating the cannons from Fort Ticonderoga. Being agile and deceptive is the key to victory. If we stand toe to toe with the British to defend New York, there will be no surprise or unpredictable element involved. It will be a simple slug fest, one we will lose - badly,” Valnor concluded and hoped his words were enough. They were not.

  “I will not give up one of our cities without a fight, let alone our largest city!” General Washington shouted with an emphatic slam of his fist on the table. He then glared at Valnor with fire in his eyes. “Will you help me do that or not?”

  Why oh why did this man have to steal command of this army away from me, Valnor thought to himself. Direct control was so much easier to work with than attempting to influence the decisions of others. In this case, there was nothing left to do. Valnor recently pulled off a miracle by working his way back into General Washington’s trusted inner circle. He feared that uttering one more word of dissent would render him banned for life from that circle. He needed to play along with this plan, no matter how desperate and foolhardy its nature.

  “I serve at your pleasure, general. I offer my counsel when asked, but will follow your order when given,” Valnor declared in his most loyal tone and a slight bow of his head in deference.

  “I expect no less. The order is this army will move to defend New York City. Get the word out, we will leave tomorrow at daybreak.”

  The march from Boston to New York took two weeks to traverse the hundred and fifty miles. Valnor did have to give credit where it was due. When their forces arrived near the outskirts of the city, General Washington took great care in deploying his troops on the tip of Manhattan and across the East River on Long Island’s Brooklyn Heights. It was a superbly defensible position, and now the Continental Army stood fast and dared the British commanders to try to drive them from the gates of the Hudson River.

  The difficulty was that the British did not have to attack in order to be victorious. They only needed to encircle the army and squeeze them until supplies ran out. It was a tactical situation that perhaps only Valnor’s mentor, Captain Hastelloy, could reverse and prevail. Unfortunately, Hastelloy’s tactical genius was nowhere to be found.

  Valnor knew that his abilities in war favored the grander strategic picture. He adhered to the writings of Sun Tzu that ‘Every battle is won before it’s ever fought.’ Valnor had far more faith in his ability to put all the right pieces into proper place ahead of time, rather than trusting that some tactical move inspired during the heat of battle would come to him and save the day.

  Hastelloy was a master of both, but not Valnor. All he knew was that in this situation, the strategic picture was all wrong. General Washington did not see it though. He only looked one move ahead at the carnage his men could inflict on the British if they assaulted his favorable position.

  The colonial army fortified the three main passes through the Brooklyn Heights to reach them by land: the Gowanus Road farthest to the west, the Flatbush Road in the center, and Bedford Road farthest to the east. All three gave a superb opportunity for them to inflict heavy casualties on the British at numerous choke points.

  What Washington did not see was that the Colonial Army also sat facing the enemy with its back pinned against the river with the British navy closing in. The general did not consider three moves ahead how the British could encircle his army and eventually break its will to fight without a shot fired.

  No amount of words would convince Washington to move his army out of harm’s way, which meant Valnor needed to make a more convincing case - nonverbally. That opportunity came during the final days of August.

  While Valnor was correct in reporting to the general that three passes required defending, he failed to report the existence of a little known path, one he might generously describe as a rugged trail, farther to the east.

  “Why do you keep looking that way?” Valnor asked one of his men tasked with guarding the eastern most section of Bedford Road. “If the British come tonight, they are going to come from that direction,” Valnor said while pointing north.

  “Over there, I think I see a faint trail along the base of the bluffs,” the soldier observed in the dwindling light of the late hour.

  “Christ, Jenkins, you’ve got eyes like an eagle. I hope your newborn son inherits that skill from you,” Valnor replied with a dismissive wave of his hand in an easterly direction. “I think I see what you’re talking about, but it doesn’t look like…whatever it is…has been cleared or used for years. I wouldn’t worry about that. It’s not like the English are going to be able to march more than a handful of scouts over that terrain.”

  “I don’t know, sir. I grant you that it looks rugged, but it might not take much to clear it for a marching column. I think we should give it a closer look,” the young man said as he grabbed his musket and began walking that way.

  “Not so fast,” Valnor ordered. “General Washington has reason to believe an attack on our center will come soon. That’s why he repositioned so many men from this side of the line. He needs every man left here to hold this position, not go traipsing around in the woods on a wild goose chase. The general is counting on us to remain in position.”

  “You stay here then and I’ll investigate it on my own,” Jenkins said as he continued his brisk pace to the east.

  “Return to your station,” Valnor barked in his most commanding tone hoping that military discipline would win out over youthful curiosity.

  “Oh look, I’m already lost in the woods,” Jenkins announced as he kept moving east. “Maybe this other trail I see will show me a way out.”

  The insubordinate response caused Valnor to breathe a heavy sigh at the lack of discip
line this army still displayed before grabbing his own musket and jogging after the youth. Sooner or later, it was going to wind up getting someone killed.

  Valnor picked up his pace to a full run when he realized the good progress Jenkins was making. He needed to catch him before the young man could verify his suspicions about the trail. It was Valnor’s little secret, and it needed to remain that way.

  “Sir, this is definitely a vulnerability,” Jenkins declared when he finally reached the trail, which was significantly wider than it appeared from a distance. “We need to report this to the general.”

  Valnor reached the path a few seconds later and had no choice but to nod his head in agreement at the obvious conclusion. “Yes, well spotted. Now return to your post and I’ll go on to headquarters to relay this new information.”

  The second Valnor heard the word ‘new’ escape his lips, he knew it was a mistake. He must have put an inflection into that utterance to put the very observant Jenkins on edge.

  “You knew this path was here all alon,g didn’t you? You knew it could be used as an approach,” Jenkins accused with an enraged index finger leveled at Valnor’s face. “Are you a traitor? Did you line your pockets with British coins informing them of this passage?”

  “Not yet,” Valnor said in a pleasant, disarming voice while his hands snapped into action. He snatched Jenkins’ extended hand just below the wrist with one hand, and above the vulnerable joint with the other. He wrenched his top hand counterclockwise to bring his opponent’s elbow above the wrist.

  At that point, Jenkins obeyed his body’s natural instinct and followed the twisting motion to avoid his wrist snapping like a twig. This threw him off balance and in that moment, Valnor yanked downward with his other hand while turning at the waist and dropping to one knee. The added centripetal force ripped Jenkins clean off his feet to land on his back with Valnor kneeling over him.

  Valnor replaced his weight from one knee to the other and drilled it into his opponent’s throat and let gravity do the rest. A barely audible gurgling sound rose from the new father’s throat, but he feared it would ring loud and clear in his head for years to come.

  “I’m sorry,” Valnor managed to say as he looked into Jenkins’ dying eyes. He knew that look of complete terror would play a reprising role in his dreams to accompany the soft gurgling sound. Still, he performed his duty and did what was necessary to preserve his revolution, even if that meant killing one of the young men fighting for that cause.

  When the last tremor escaped the body, Valnor got back to his feet and looked about to see if anyone heard the commotion. A faint rustle from the bushes a hundred feet up ahead piqued his attention. He dashed over to the thicket and parted the shrubs. Among the foliage, he found a ten year old boy trembling with fear.

  “How much of that did you see, boy?”

  “All…all of it, sir,” came a whisper.

  “Damn it! I told your father that he needed to make his way to the British camp and relay my message to General Clinton about this path. Him, a grown man and not some innocent boy,” Valnor complained as he lifted the youth out of the bushes and onto the path. “Come on, I’ll escort you the rest of the way. Us loyalists need to stick together these days.”

  “What…what about him?” the boy asked, looking back at the lifeless body of Jenkins.

  “He is the first of what I expect to be many casualties from this conflict,” Valnor said while redirecting the boy’s gaze away from the murder scene and down the path toward the British lines. “When the British learn of this Jamaica Pass of yours, the rebels will be wiped out, and your family and I will be rich. Now, off we go.”

  **********

  The next morning, a frantic rider came barreling into General Washington’s command tent with his officers assembled, “The British have broken through on the eastern flank. It looks like they blazed a trail through the dense woods overnight. Right now they are at the base of the Heights and massing for a charge!”

  “What, how?” the general asked of no one in particular.

  “Does it matter?” Valnor countered. “Our defenses are about to be overrun. Our entire strategy revolved around inflicting enough casualties on the British before they reached the Heights to make them turn back. That cannot happen now. We must withdraw.”

  “And relinquish the city to the British? Never,” Washington declared. “If we give up here, the people will never trust in our chances to win this rebellion.”

  “When we are defeated on this island, and that is exactly what will happen if we stay, there will be no more rebellion,” Valnor fired back. “This army must survive. As long as it does, the Patriot cause has teeth and that is what’s important.”

  “And then what do we do with that set of teeth?” the general demanded, with several on his staff lending their agreement, “run from the next fight? Surrender more cities?”

  “Then we bleed them dry,” Valnor declared with a vindictive pride bolstering his pronouncement. “The British war machine is the most effective on earth. We all know this as fact. They will kick our tails across the battlefield every time in a stand up fight.”

  “That same war machine is also extremely inefficient,” Valnor elaborated further. “It’s cumbersome, profoundly expensive to maintain, and is deployed thousands of miles from their source of supply and chain of command.”

  “If we survive, move, counterpunch when opportunity allows, and persist as a thorn in their side long enough, then we will win this rebellion. Not on the field of battle so much as among the empty chests of gold back in the London treasury. We will make it too expensive to hang onto our American colonies,” Valnor concluded.

  The tent fell into dead silence for several minutes before the anxious rider spoke up. “General, the British are here and coming soon. What should we do?”

  “We will hold the Heights with a light contingent while our main force retreats across the East River. Then we live to fight another day,” Washington said with a resentful eye finding Valnor.

  Chapter 34: Look At Us Now

  GeoRge Washington sat alone in his command tent, staring at his maps with his dour mood growing darker by the minute. No matter how hard he tried, how many different ways he approached the problem, he saw no solution. They were on the run from a much larger and better trained army than his own. Their eventual encirclement and surrender had the feel of inevitability about it.

  “General,” a scout said to announce his presence in the tent. “I have action reports from the field.”

  “What news?” Washington asked with a glimmer of hope.

  “Nothing good I’m afraid. Forts Washington and Lee have both been overrun by the British and their pursuit continues.”

  Washington drew a deep breath and let it out slowly in place of the angry words that every fiber of his being demanded he shout. “Thank you, lieutenant. That will be all.”

  “There is one last thing,” the young officer said with hesitation. “That other matter you asked me to look into.”

  “Yes.”

  The lieutenant fidgeted with a piece of paper in his hands for a moment before handing it over to the general with an apologetic tilt of his head. “I’m sorry, sir. It was as you suspected.”

  “Fetch Colonel Hamilton to my tent, immediately,” General Washington managed to order with his voice still under control.

  The young officer turned on his heels and left the tent to carry out his orders while Washington read the note. When his eyes reached the final period in the message, his rage boiled over. He swung his arm across one of the maps and sent several British army markers flying. “God damn that man!”

  He never swore, in fact he routinely dressed down his own officers for their use of foul language, but this moment truly warranted its use.

  Several minutes later, the man Washington should have known better than to trust stepped into the tent. “You asked to see me, sir?”

  “You!” the general growled with all the resent
ment he could force into the word. He flung the piece of paper at his chest and went on with an accusing finger leveled at the colonel. “You gave the order to reposition my men away from our eastern flank so we would not spot their advance until it was too late. You’re the reason we are on the run and soon to be cornered. I should never have trusted you again. I should have known you were working your own agenda once more.”

  The officer attempted to get a word in edgewise, but Washington was having none of it. His blood was up. “What is it this time? Are you attempting to ruin my reputation so command of the army can be yours as originally intended? The problem with that little gem of an idea is that soon there will be no army left because of your treason. What do you have to say for yourself before I have you hanged?”

  The colonel seemed remarkably calm for a man facing death as he gave his measured reply, “The order was given to strengthen our center, the place where all of our intelligences informed us the attack would come. It was the right tactical decision.”

  “It exposed our flank and allowed the British to drive us from our fortifications, and New York City at large,” Washington countered.

  “Nobody knew that passage was there,” the colonel insisted. “Still, I view that little gift as fortune smiling upon us. The army was cornered in New York. You were too slow to recognize that fact. You would not listen to sound reason, so fate forced your hand.”

  “Fate or you?” Washington accused.

  “The army is still intact. If you want to lay that result at my feet, then I will accept it as an act of patriotism,” Colonel Hamilton declared with unflinching confidence.

  Washington knew it was Hamilton. He may lack the proper proof, but the man’s words and demeanor were all but an admission. That prompted him to start rummaging through a set of papers on his desk in the corner.

  When he found the elusive document he sought, Washington turned and flung it at the colonel. “After our victory in Boston, the Continental Congress felt so confident in this army that they drafted and signed this Declaration of Independence from England. Now, half a year later, I’m sure every man who put his name at the bottom of this document regrets his decision.”