The Rifleman

by Oliver North

  Thursday and Friday, July 20th and 21st, 1775: The route on the turnpike from York to Bethlehem, Pennsylvania, is ninety-eight miles. But the road is now a three-inch-deep muddy quagmire. After conferring with the York Co. militia commander, Captain Morgan calls off the shooting competition and orders the men to “stay as dry as you can.” It’s the first time we have stayed in the same place more than one night on the march. It’s still raining as we bed down for the night.

  Saturday, July 22nd, 1775: The rain stopped before dawn. Captain Morgan told us to hustle packing up because even though it’s only thirty-five miles from York to Lancaster, crossing the Susquehanna by ferry was sure to take more time than he wanted. He was right.

  Based on information from the York County Committee of Safety, the Captain ordered us to head for the Keesey Ferry crossing from Accomac to Marietta on the eastern shore. According to the intelligence, the operator is known to be a Patriot and several other ferry operators are not.

  When we arrived at Accomac, the normally placid river was raging from two days of heavy rain and there was a long line of waiting crossers. Captain Morgan had a hasty conference with the flat-bottom pole boat operators. Money changed hands and we moved to the front of the line at about noon. Though uneventful, each crossing took over an hour and the sun was setting by the time we were back on the turnpike headed for Lancaster. It was nearly midnight when we stopped to bed-down in a farmer’s field for a few hours’ rest just south of Lancaster.

  Sunday, July 23rd, 1775: We broke camp at dawn and headed through town on the way to Reading, thirty-five miles up the turnpike. I had hoped to stay in Lancaster long enough to visit the William Henry Rifle factory to visit the man who made my long rifle, but after a brief “sharpshooter show” we were on our way in hopes of making it to Reading before dark.

  Monday, July 24th, 1775: Our thirty-five-mile trip to the western banks of the Schuylkill River across from Reading was the toughest hike yet. Though we arrived just as a tiny sliver of moon broke through the clouds overhead, the Captain and Lt. Humphrey convinced the ferry operators to pole us across the now placid stream even though it was well past their usual quitting time. The operators may have been Tories or Quakers because they charged us £3 for their efforts.

  Tuesday, July 25th, 1775: Before dawn, while the men were packing up, Capt. Morgan summoned all the officers and sergeants to gather ’round the rear of Wagon #1 where he tacked the maps showing our route from Reading, PA, to Cambridge. Pointing to the map he said, “We’re not quite halfway to Cambridge, ­Massachusetts, which is about 340 miles from here. We’ve been on the road for eleven days. If we’re going to get to General Washington’s Headquarters by the 6th of August—twelve days from now—we’re going to have to average about thirty miles a day. That means no more ‘sharpshooter shows’ for our boys. It also means we may need to buy a couple more draft horses to rotate them in the harnesses. Tell the men. Let’s go.”

  Wednesday, July 26th, 1775: Remarkably, we made forty miles yesterday and camped under a moonless, starlit sky for seven hours just south of Bethlehem, Pennsylvania. We were up early again this morning and moving in haste to get across the Delaware River at Easton. The Martin Ferries—six large flat-bottom boats—are the most efficient Ferry Service we have seen yet. By dark we made camp just south of Newtown, NJ, not far from the Sussex County Courthouse where we were quartered at a Trusted ­Courier station.

  Thursday and Friday, July 27th and 28th, 1775: The two-day, sixty-mile hike from Sussex Court House, New Jersey, to New Windsor, New York, was unremarkable but for the apparent novelty created by our linen leggin’s, hunting shirts, deerskin caps, leather belts holding close-quarter weapons of tomahawk and long knife, long rifles—and of course our speed of walking.

  Saturday, July 29th, 1774: It was a good thing we left at dawn for the short walk from the town of New Windsor to the Colden Ferry landing on the west bank of the Hudson River. Thankfully, the tide and winds were right for our west-to-east crossing of the nearly two-mile-wide river. We were all across and mustering in the town of Fishkill by shortly after noon.

  Captain Morgan and I crossed over early to meet with Captain Jacob Griffin, a Fishkill tavern owner and chairman of the Dutchess County “Committee of Observation.” Griffin was so much taken with the mission of our Rifle Company and our leader he invited to the gathering crowd a Mrs. Moira Flemming, the widow of a sea captain. She brought with her an obviously well-cared for, round leather case about a foot long. She opened it and announced, “Captain Morgan, this three-draw brass Dollond spyglass was made for my late husband in 1758. It extends to thirty-two inches in length. If he’d had it with him last year when his unarmed cargo vessel was attacked and sunk off Nova Scotia by a Royal Navy revenue cutter, he might well have seen the threat coming and avoided the enemy. I want you to have this and use it to kill as many of the accursed lobster-backs as possible.”

  At the end of her brief soliloquy, the crowd erupted with cheers and tears. Captain Morgan took the case, extended the tube to its full length and said, with emotion I had not yet heard in his voice, “I see his name engraved here and will every time I use it. I assure you, madam, your generous gift will be put to good use.”

  We departed Fishkill at a rapid pace and were more than halfway to Litchfield, Connecticut, before dark.

  Sunday, July 30th, 1775: We made our way through Litchfield and half the distance to Farmington, about forty miles total without incident by sunset today. The terrain is flatter and the roads are in better shape in Connecticut than most of the terrain we have covered. Amazingly, we have not had to wade through mud since the downpour in Pennsylvania.

  Monday, July 31st, 1775: The twelve-mile hike from Litchfield to Farmington went without incident but as we covered the ten miles to Hartford, Capt. Morgan began urging us to “pick up the pace” to get across the Connecticut river before nightfall. We arrived at the Hartford Ferry at dusk but with only one boat in service, it was well after dark before all our troops were at the bivouac Lt. Humphrey found for us on the north side of town.

  As soon as the men were bedded down, Capt. Morgan told me to assemble the officers behind the #1 wagon where he placed a lantern on the tailgate. The young waxing moon was still just a sliver in the east, and the captain’s countenance in the shimmering lantern light was as dramatic as anything I have yet seen.

  He spoke quietly, “We have a little more than 100 miles and five days to get to Gen. Washington’s Headquarters. Let the men rest until sunrise. Allow them to get some food and assemble at 8 o’clock so I can talk to the entire unit. Have them bring all their gear and sit down, facing south so the sun will not be in their eyes nor mine. You will stand behind them; do not sit. I want them to see you have their backs. Now, get some rest.”

  Tuesday, August 1st, 1775: The troops were there as ordered. This time he spoke in a tone that could be heard by all: “You have done well. We are almost where we are wanted. The next few days will be easy compared to the many miles behind us. But from this day forward you must be on alert.

  “Every night—starting tonight, we will set up camp in a perimeter, with the wagons and horses in the center. We will have no fewer than four men at a time on watch in four-hour shifts from sunset to sunrise—that means eight men per night since it’s summer. When the days get shorter, we will increase the number of watches.

  “Beginning tonight we will have a challenge and password that will change every night. If a person approaching our camp fails to give the proper password when you shout the challenge, tell him to ‘halt’ and blow one blast on the whistle I gave you when we left Virginia. If there is an attack, the signal for everyone to turn to will be three blasts on the whistle. When we get where we are going, there will be many more rules on things like field sanitation, and many more soldiers. I, and your officers standing behind you, insist on you obeying them. Are there any questions?”

  There was only
one: “Cap’n, sir. Where are we going?”

  The Captain smiled and said, “We’re going to join General Washington in Cambridge, Massachusetts. We’re going there to help him defeat our enemies, free our country, liberate our families, and create a new country. When we’re done with that, we will go home to our loving families, and you will have made world history.”

  We stopped for the night south of Dudley, Massachusetts. At dark, wagons were inside a perimeter of canvas tents, the first watch was set as ordered and every man knew the challenge: Apple; and the password: Butter.

  Wednesday, August 2nd, 1775: We passed through Dudley and held up for the night west of Framingham where we observed a supply train of quartermaster wagons headed south. Lt. Humphrey asked one of the mounted officers where they were heading and he replied “We’re Rhode Island Militia. We’re going home but we’ll be back if you need us.”

  At dark, the routine was apparently already becoming, routine. Wagons inside the perimeter; watch set; challenge: Virginia; password: Creeper.

  Thursday, August 3rd, 1755: We had an easy march today through Framingham, Weston, and were heading into Watertown, Massachusetts, when we were met by a gentleman who identified himself as Capt. Samuel Barnard, a Minuteman and member of the local Committee of Safety.

  As he has done so often on this long march, Capt. Morgan consulted a list he kept in his pocket and said, “Bring him to me.”

  The two of them spoke for a few minutes and the Captain turned to Lt. Humphrey and said, “Tell our company, Capt. Barnard is a hero of this revolt against tyranny. He has already fought the Redcoats. He has arranged for us to bivouac on a green less than a mile east of Watertown along the road to Cambridge. He says it has clean water and good forage for the horses.”

  Everything Captain Barnard said about the Watertown campsite was true. What he didn’t announce at first greeting, he told us on the way to the bivouac: “Dr. Joseph Warren, killed in the battle of Breed’s Hill on June 17th, was my best professor at Harvard Medical School. He was also for several years in correspondence with Mister, now General George Washington, Dr. Benjamin Rush, Dr. Benjamin Franklin, and others about how to prevent the deadly spread of smallpox which kills more soldiers in every war than enemy fire.

  “In General Washington’s last missive to my professor and friend, Dr. Warren, he wrote he had just undergone variolation—a process in which material from smallpox sores pustules of living victims is given to people who have never had smallpox. The inoculation process involves scratching the smallpox material into an arm or inhaling it through the nose. General Washington wrote he will also ensure any new units added to the rolls of the Continental Army must have had the treatment within a year or they shall be turned away immediately.

  “Capt. Morgan, yours is the first Continental unit to arrive here in Cambridge from outside the ‘New England Provinces’ since this edict was handed down. How do you wish to proceed?”

  Captain Morgan didn’t pause a second before saying, “We will all do whatever smallpox prevention General Washington wants tomorrow.” And we did.

  Sunday, August 6th, 1775: We spent Friday and Saturday, August 4th and 5th in smallpox Isolation on the Watertown Village green, waiting to see if there were any adverse reactions to the smallpox variolation procedure. There were none.

  This morning, Capt. Barnard arrived at our encampment with three horses in tow. He then escorted Capt. Morgan, Lt. Humphrey, and me to General Washington’s Headquarters on Cambridge Heights. General Washington was not there at the moment, but we were graciously welcomed by Brigadier General Horatio Gates, the Army’s new Adjutant General. He instructed one of his aides to take Capt. Morgan, Lt. Humphrey, Capt. Barnard, and me to “see the sights” and choose a place to billet our company not far from the British lines at Roxbury.

  We found a perfect spot. We were just a few hundred yards from an excellent “sniper hide.”

  Monday, August 7th, 1775: Captain Morgan was lying on his stomach in the wet grass, still as a stone, peering through his new spyglass into the haze rising from Boston Harbor. There were three of us—the Captain, Corporal Brendan Sullivan, the best Rifleman in our company, and me.

  Without moving his head, a twig or a blade of grass, the Captain put his trigger finger in his mouth then slowly held it in the air to test the wind. Without seeming to move his lips he whispered, “Sulley, the breeze is directly behind us. Do you see the officer on the gray horse, about 350 yards down the hill, beneath the maple tree?”

  “Yes sir, I have him in my sights.”

  “Good. Kill him.”

  Without taking my eyes off the target, I heard the muted click as Corporal Sullivan cocked the hammer on his rifle. He took a deep breath and started to exhale. The snap of the flint striking the powder pan on his rifle was followed an instant later by the crack of a bullet leaving the barrel with a flash and a puff of white smoke.

  The projectile struck the British officer in the throat. He suddenly dropped his reins and pitched backward out of the saddle. As he fell, the horse bolted, dragging the Redcoat by his right leg, caught in the stirrup.

  As four or five of the officer’s troops jumped up in an attempt to catch the terrified horse, Corporal Sullivan readied his second rifle for another shot. Captain Morgan shook his head and said, “Hold your fire. Good shooting. One is enough for this morning.”

  It was the first time I saw a person killed by another human. It would not be my last. It was my 17th birthday.

  Endnotes

  1.Royal Governor Dunmore’s hunting lodge, Porto Bello, is located on the banks of the York River and on the grounds of Camp Peary, a 9,000-acre U.S. Army facility that serves as a CIA training facility. Though listed on the National Register of Historic Places, access to Porto Bello is limited to those with “a need to know.”

  2.On 26 July 1775, Congress appointed Benjamin Franklin Continental Postmaster General with an annual salary of $1,000 and appropriated an additional $340 for a comptroller—with responsibility for hiring and firing postmasters to deliver mail and dispatches from Maine to Georgia.

  3.For reasons lost to history, Mr. Nelson omitted from his report on the great victories Colonels Arnold and Allen achieved at Ticonderoga and Crown Point were over garrisons totaling fewer than fifty British troops. Also unmentioned was the bickering between Arnold and Allen over who should get the credit for the conquests. Perhaps that’s because including either fact would have diminished the propaganda value for the Patriot cause.

  4.Unfortunately, Lord Dunmore was not yet done with Virginia. Throughout the remainder of 1775 he ordered dozens of mixed raiding parties consisting of Royal Navy, Royal Marines, and Tories ashore to plunder and burn “rebel” plantations, homes, fishing boats, and businesses along the James, York, and Potomac rivers, and the Chesapeake Bay. In nearly every case the raiders stole horses, cattle, even hogs—and killed the livestock they could not ride or carry back to their Royal Navy ships.

  The depredations continued unabated until December 1775 when Patriot Militiamen defending Norfolk soundly defeated a Dunmore raid force. The battle cost the former governor the loss of four Royal Marines and a dozen Tories with no Patriot losses. On New Year’s Day 1776, as Captain Daniel Morgan was being taken prisoner in Quebec, Lord Dunmore finally set sail for England.

  5.Now called Shepherdstown, WV.

  6.Now called Thurmont, MD.

  Chapter Eight

  1775: The Continental Army—

  From Defense to Offense

  Captain Morgan’s determination to be the first of the Rifle Companies Congress raised to arrive at General Washington’s Headquarters here in Cambridge, Massachusetts, has served us well. Our Captain was able to choose undisturbed terrain in defilade from British naval cannons in the waters below us, yet a short walk to overlook the British redoubts at Roxbury, just outside Boston. The site he chose here on the heig
hts has trees for shade, forage for our draft horses, a spring for water, our “field sanitation station” is downhill and downwind, and our Company Assembly Area is on dry, level ground. But all that may be about to change.

  Roxbury Heights, overlooking Boston

  Friday, August 11th, 1775

  Before dawn each day since we arrived, Captain Morgan has sent out at least three two-man sniper teams to engage British troops—preferably officers wearing epaulets on their shoulders. Our Riflemen fire from 50 to 100 yards behind Patriot lines. Every morning, at least one Redcoat was felled—often followed by loud cheers from the New England militiamen manning the American trenches, usually less than seventy-five yards from the British entrenchments.

  This morning, it was immediately evident that overnight the British have abandoned their forward Roxbury and Dorchester redoubts and re-built them further from the Continentals’ front lines. While we regarded this as consequence of our long-range rifle accuracy, it also means new American fortifications dug, closer to the new British entrenchments.

  Apparently, a contingent of Massachusetts and Connecticut militia officers complained, “The Virginia Riflemen are the only ones among us having any fun. Our troops are tired of digging new lines every few days.”

  Whether that’s what prompted Brigadier General Horatio Gates, General Washington’s Adjutant General, to issue new orders we don’t know but at noon today, General Gates’s aide delivered a message to Capt. Morgan:

  August 11th, 1775

  Continental Army HQ, Cambridge, Massachusetts

  Dear Captain Morgan:

  Please know Capt. Stephenson’s Rifle Company has arrived at Watertown and is now undergoing Smallpox variolation. His Rifle Company will soon be billeted near yours. Since your and his Virginia Rifle Companies are the first of the Ten Rifle Companies authorized by Congress to arrive, the Commander-in-Chief desires both Companies to Parade for His Excellency and our Senior Officers at Cambridge Headquarters at Noon on Monday, August 14th.