One-Night Stands with American History
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THE SUBMARINE: AN AMERICAN INVENTION
The first war submarine in history was not built by the Germans in World War I, but by the Americans in the Revolution. The vessel, dubbed the Turtle, was the invention of David Bushnell, a Yale graduate. It consisted of a wood frame, several small windows, and a hand-driven propeller. Big enough for only a single person, it reached speeds of up to three miles an hour and could stay submerged for approximately thirty minutes. On the outside was an egg-shaped time bomb equipped with an iron screw for penetrating the hulls of enemy ships.
The Turtle was used only once during the Revolution. In August 1776, operated by First Sergeant Ezra Lee, it was launched in New York Harbor to attack the British Eagle, a sixty-four-gun warship commanded by Admiral Howe. Unfortunately, though Lee successfully maneuvered the submarine to the side of the man-of-war, he was unable to attach the bomb to the ship’s copper-sheathed frame. The failure doomed the prospects of submarine warfare. Although George Washington was enthusiastic about submarines and had even helped finance the Turtle, the Continental Congress refused to provide any funding.
SOURCES: John Oliver, History of American Technology (New York: Ronald Press, 1956), pp. 100–101; Roger Burlingame, March of the Iron Men (New York: Scribner’s, 1938), pp. 146–48.
SECRET HISTORY OF THE BATTLE OF TRENTON
On the day after Christmas, 1776, a loyalist spy appeared at the headquarters of Hessian commander Colonel Johann Rall with an urgent message. The spy had learned that George Washington and his small Continental army had secretly crossed the Delaware River that morning and were advancing on Trenton, where the Hessians were encamped. He attempted to enter Rall’s headquarters, but was stopped and told to write down his message. The colonel had left strict orders that no one was to disturb his liquor or cards.
A porter took the message into the house and handed it to the Hessian colonel. But rather than interrupt his deal, Rall thrust the note, unread, into his pocket. By the time his deal was over, the message that could have had an important effect on the course of the Revolution had been completely forgotten.
The colonel would regret his orders. He was still playing cards when the guards of the camp began discharging their muskets in a futile attempt to stop Washington’s army. The patriots’ attack had come as a complete surprise. Without time to organize or rally, the entire Hessian army was captured. The colonists had gained their first major victory of the Revolutionary War.
During the battle Colonel Rall fell mortally wounded. As he lay dying, he swore that if he had read the loyalist’s message the revolutionaries would never have taken either his army or his life.
SOURCE: George W. Stimpson, Nuggets of Knowledge (New York: A. L. Burt, 1934), p. 141.
A BRITISH SOLDIER DECIDES NOT TO KILL WASHINGTON
Several days before the Battle of Brandywine Creek, in September 1777, George Washington and a French officer reconnoitered the area of land and water that stretched between the American camp at Chadd’s Ford and the British camp at Kennett Square, four miles away. George Washington always preferred doing his own reconnaissance, especially in a case such as this, where only a few paltry maps of the region were available. Of course, it was dangerous for the commander of the American army to take to unprotected fields, but Washington was the kind of man who willingly took risks when he had to. At times he was downright reckless. A few days before, on another reconnoitering mission, he slept in a house that a friend suspected was filled with British sympathizers.
As he traveled about, Washington seemed completely oblivious to the threat of attack. He took few precautions and galloped everywhere. At one point, following the Frenchman, he rode into a clearing in the woods—where he would be an easy target for even the worst rifleman.
Unfortunately, hiding nearby was a band of four British sharpshooters who had thrown themselves to the ground at the sound of approaching horses. The leader of the soldiers was one Patrick Ferguson, a master marksman, who had invented a deadly accurate rifle that weighed only seven and a half pounds. Ferguson was on his very first campaign, having convinced the government, after an amazing performance before King George III, of the usefulness of sharpshooters.
When the Frenchman and Washington rode up, Ferguson saw a golden opportunity to prove the worth of his outfit. Obviously the pair were important. One was wearing hussar, the other a buff and blue uniform and “a remarkable large cocked hat,” as Ferguson later noted. Instantly Ferguson notified his men “to steal near to them and fire at them.” But as his men readied, Ferguson peremptorily withdrew his order. He had suddenly decided it would be better to capture the stately pair than to kill them. Without hesitating, he shouted out to the Frenchman, who was nearer, ordering him to dismount. The Frenchman ignored the command, however, and called out a warning to his friend in buff and blue. Washington promptly wheeled his horse around and made off, with the Frenchman close behind. The two men then sped back to the American lines, safe and unharmed.
During the Battle of Brandywine, Ferguson was wounded in the elbow of his shooting arm and sent to a hospital. There he told of his encounter with the two enemy officers and aroused curiosity as to the identity of the escaped men, whom he described in detail. One morning, as Ferguson subsequently recalled, a surgeon, “who had been dressing the wounded rebel Officers, came in and told us that they had been informing him that General Washington was all that day with the light troops, and only attended by a French Officer in Hussar dress, he himself dressed and mounted in every point as described.”
Ferguson afterwards remarked, “As I was within that distance at which in the quickest firing, I could have lodged half a dozen of balls in or about him before he was out of my reach, I had only to determine; but it was not pleasant to fire at the back of an unoffending individual who was acquitting himself coolly of his duty, and so I left him alone.”
In 1779, Ferguson lost his life in a battle he might well have prevented from ever taking place had he, on September 7, 1777, killed the commander of the American army.
SOURCE: Reginald Hargreaves, “The Man Who Almost Shot Washington,” American Heritage, December 1955, pp. 62–65.
ETHAN ALLEN AT CHURCH
“Allen was in church one Sunday with a number of friends listening to a very high Calvinistic minister (exact stature not recorded). The text chosen was, ‘Many shall strive to enter in, but shall not be able,’ and the preacher premised his remarks by observing that the grace of God was certainly sufficient to include one person out of ten. ‘Secondly’ disclosed the fact that not one in twenty would attempt to avail himself of salvation. At ‘thirdly’ it came out that but one man in fifty was really an object of Divine solicitude. ‘Fourthly’ was announced and the estimate of elect now reduced to great correctness, the sad conclusion being drawn that but one of eighty—when Allen [famous as an atheist] seized his hat and evacuated the pew, ‘I’m off, boys; any one of you may take my chance.’”
SOURCE: Harper’s Magazine, July 1875, p. 308.
AMERICA’S FIRST PRESIDENT
The first president of the United States was not George Washington. In 1781, Maryland finally signed the Articles of Confederation, and the union among the thirteen states became an actuality. John Hanson, the man who signed for Maryland, was immediately elected president of the assembly. His formal title was “President of the United States in Congress Assembled.”
Even George Washington himself addressed Hanson as “President of the United States.” When Washington won his great victory at Yorktown, Hanson sent the general a letter of congratulation. Washington reciprocated at once, addressing his letter to the “President of the United States.”
SOURCE: David Wallechinsky and Irving Wallace, The People’s Almanac (Garden City, N.Y.: Doubleday, 1975), p. 261.
THE BEST BIRD FOR THE JOB
The bald eagle became America’s national symbol when it was placed on the Great Seal in 1782. One member of Congress who did not support the winning selection was B
enjamin Franklin. The eagle, he claimed, was too common a bird to be a national symbol. Later, he elaborated on his views in a letter to his daughter:
“For my part, I wish the bald eagle had not been chosen as the representative of our country; he is a bird of bad moral character; he does not get his living honestly; you may have seen him perched on some dead tree, where, too lazy to fish for himself, he watches the labor of the fishing hawk [waiting to steal that bird’s food].”
Franklin thought a more uniquely American bird should have been selected by the Continental Congress. His choice, the turkey.
SOURCE: George W. Stimpson, Nuggets of Knowledge (New York: A. L. Burt, 1934), p. 315.
WOMAN SUFFRAGE IN THE EIGHTEENTH CENTURY
The passage of the Nineteenth Amendment in 1920 gave every American woman the right to vote. Until then women were allowed to vote in only a dozen states. But the amendment was not as revolutionary as it seemed. Women in New Jersey had been granted the right to vote as early as 1776. At that time a new constitution was adopted which gave the suffrage to any free person worth more than fifty pounds. If a woman met the financial qualification, she could vote. The men who framed the constitution had not expected women to take advantage of the vote and were not trying to make the state more democratic. But their constitution inadvertently did open up the system to women—at least women who possessed more than fifty pounds.
At first few women availed themselves of the opportunity to cast a ballot. The constitutional loophole seemed harmless enough. So harmless, as a matter of fact, that it was retained when a new constitution was written in 1797. But the next few years saw women deciding closely contested elections. In 1807 the New Jersey legislature rescinded woman suffrage.
For sixty-one years woman suffrage lay dead. Then suddenly, in Wyoming Territory, the corpse sprang to life. Without controversy a measure granting women full rights passed the upper house of the legislature. But in the lower house the bill faced stern opposition. Men there were hard and down-to-earth, opposed to the high sentiments of the “uppers.” They ridiculed the bill, added outrageous amendments, and considered not voting on it until July 4, 1870—when the legislature would no longer be in session. Finally, however, they passed the bill, by the not overwhelming majority of six to four. Of course, the members did not really want women voting. But since they were all Democrats, they decided it would be politically advantageous to let the governor, a Republican, who was known to oppose woman suffrage, veto the bill. He, then, and not they, would be blamed for defeating women’s rights.
But Republican governor John Campbell would not be done in so easily. Though a young man and new to the state, he had a hound dog’s nose for a dirty plot. On December 10, 1869, he signed the suffrage bill.
SOURCES: Kirk H. Porter, A History of Suffrage in the United States (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1918), pp. 136, 254; Lynne Cheney, “It All Began in Wyoming,” American Heritage, April 1973, pp. 62–65.
WASHINGTON COLLAGE
• George Washington introduced the jackass to America.
• Washington’s family motto was “Exitus acta probat” (the end justifies the means).
• When he died, Washington provided in his will for the emancipation of his slaves on the death of Martha, his wife. Washington was the only member of the Virginia dynasty to free all of his slaves.
• Washington was one of the richest men in America. At his death his holdings were worth about half a million dollars and included: 33,000 acres of land in Virginia, Kentucky, Maryland, New York, Pennsylvania, Washington, D.C., and the Northwest Territory; $25,000 worth of stocks; 640 sheep; 329 cows; 42 mules; and 20 workhorses.
THINGS NAMED AFTER GEORGE WASHINGTON
1 state
7 mountains
8 streams
10 lakes
33 counties
9 colleges
121 towns and villages
SOURCE: Marcus Cunliffe, George Washington (New York: Mentor, 1958), p. 16.
MAKING IT ILLEGAL TO ATTACK THE UNITED STATES WITH MORE THAN THREE THOUSAND TROOPS
At the Constitutional Convention a member moved that “the standing army be restricted to no more than five thousand men.” When George Washington heard this, he turned to a friend and remarked that the resolution was fine with him—so long as the convention agreed to an amendment prohibiting armies from invading the United States with more than three thousand troops.
SOURCE: Paul Wilstach, Patriots Off Their Pedestals (Indianapolis: Bobbs-Merrill, 1927), p. 29.
MYSTERY AT WASHINGTON’S INAUGURATION
The image of George Washington standing erect, hand on Bible, as he recites the oath of office at his first inauguration at Federal Hall in New York City is a familiar one. But what was the weather like at the inauguration? Was it a clear day or rainy? The simple answer is that no one knows. Despite the importance of Washington’s inauguration and public interest in the event, not one person at the time bothered to record the weather. Until the nineteenth century, oddly enough, Americans almost never commented on the weather when describing public events.
The first mention of the weather in New York on April 30, 1789, did not come until sixty-five years later, when Rufus Griswold, who wasn’t even born until after the event, published Washington Irving’s reminiscence of the historic occasion. According to Griswold, Irving remembered in 1854 that at eight o’clock on the morning of the inauguration the skies had been cloudy, but that by nine, when the ceremony began, the sun shone brightly.
Besides Irving, only one other eyewitness ever specifically noted the inaugural weather: Mary Hunt Palmer, the daughter of a prominent general, who in 1789 was fourteen years old. She provided her reminiscences at age eighty-three in 1858.
Mary Palmer’s story was startlingly different from Irving’s. She too remembered clouds, but her clouds were larger, darker, and more forbidding. Moreover, her clouds never disappeared, but brought down on the city a drenching rain. “It never rained faster,” she recalled, “than it did that day.” The rain was so heavy, actually, that George Washington had to carry an umbrella as he proceeded up the street to be sworn in.
Who is to be believed? Historically speaking, no one knows.
SOURCE: Charles Warren, Odd Byways in American History (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1942), pp. 92–101.
WASHINGTON PAPERS GIVEN AWAY
Today a single letter written by George Washington can bring several thousand dollars. But when he died, just about anyone could obtain a sample of Washington’s correspondence. The President’s nephew, Bushrod Washington, who had control of the papers, simply could not resist giving them away. This tradition was carried on by Jared Sparks, the first editor of a published version of the papers. His twelve volumes were only a version because Sparks edited out of the papers all words or sentiments that did not seem in keeping with the great man. Though Sparks had only been given temporary custody of the letters, he did not hesitate to mutilate them, to snip a sentence here and a signature there to satisfy the request of some autograph hunter. In 1861, Sparks confessed to Richard Henry Dana Jr., that he could not furnish Dana with an autographed letter of the first president. “I have had many such,” he wrote, “but the collectors have long ago exhausted my stock. The best I can do is to enclose a very small specimen of his handwriting.”
SOURCE: Ralph K. Andrist, ed., The Founding Fathers: George Washington (New York: Newsweek, 1972), pp. 6–7.
PARSON WEEMS TELLS A STORY ABOUT GEORGE WASHINGTON
“One day [George Washington’s father] went into the garden, and prepared a little bed of finely pulverized earth, on which he wrote George’s name at full, in large letters—then strewing in plenty of cabbage seed, he covered them up, and smoothed all over nicely with the roller.—This bed he purposely prepared close alongside of a gooseberry walk, which happening at this time to be well hung with ripe fruit, knew would be honoured with George’s visits pretty regularly every day. Not many m
ornings had passed away before in came George, with eyes wild rolling, and his little cheeks ready to burst with great news.
“‘O Pa! come here! come here!’
“‘What’s the matter, my son? what’s the matter?’
“‘O come here, I tell you, Pa: come here! and I’ll shew you such a sight as you never saw in all your life time.’
“The old gentleman suspecting what George would be at, gave him his hand, which he seized with great eagerness, and tugging him along through the garden, led him point blank to the bed whereon was inscribed, in large letters, and in all the freshness of newly sprung plants, the full name of
GEORGE WASHINGTON
“‘There, Pa?’ said George, quite in an ecstasy of astonishment, ‘did you ever see such a sight in all your life time?’
“‘Why it seems like a curious affair, sure enough, George!’
“‘But, Pa, who did make it there? who did make it there?’
“‘It grew there by chance, I suppose, my son.’
“‘By chance, Pa! O no! no! it never did grow there by chance, Pa. Indeed that it never did!’
“‘High! why not, my son?’
“‘Why, Pa, did you ever see any body’s name in a plant bed before?’
“‘Well, but George, such a thing might happen, though you never saw it before.’
“‘Yes, Pa; but I did never see the little plants grow up so as to make one single letter of my name before. Now, how could they grow up so as to make all the letters of my name! and then standing one after another, to spell my name so exactly!—and all so neat and even too, at top and bottom!! Oh Pa, you must not say chance did all this. Indeed somebody did it; and I dare say now, Pa, you did it just to scare me, because I am your little boy.’
“His father smiled; and said, ‘Well George, you have guessed right. I indeed did it; but not to scare you, my son; but to learn you a great thing I wish you to understand. I want, my son, to introduce you to your true Father.’”