But he did not tarry long. While Howe and his fleet were in the bay, he kept his men at work demolishing the British defences against the land, and strengthening the forts which looked seaward, and he was continually on his guard against the blow which Howe might deliver. But when the British had sailed away to the north-east, Washington himself, on the 4th of April, set off for New York.
Howe had nevertheless left vessels at Nantasket Roads, to intercept the troop-ships and stores which were on their way to him. In this he was partly successful, for seven ship-loads of Highlanders were by this means saved from Yankee prisons. But even while the evacuation was in progress British vessels were captured in the harbor, and now in sight of the squadron and its Highlanders was taken the richest store-ship that had yet fallen into American hands. There was a brisk fight, also, between an American schooner, aground on Shirley Point, and thirteen boat-loads of men from the war-ships. The boats were beaten off, but the British had accomplished the death of the captain of the schooner, America's first naval hero, Mugford of Marblehead.
At length a determined effort was made to drive away the squadron. The militia was called out, and artillery was carried to islands down the harbor. There was a brief cannonade between the Americans and the fleet. Then the British commander, finding his anchorage no longer safe, blew up the lighthouse and followed Howe to Halifax. This was on the second anniversary of the enforcement of the Port Bill. Two days later the remainder of the Highlanders, unsuspiciously entering the harbor, fell into the hands of the Americans.[165]
The British resentment aroused by this last mischance was mild compared with the general indignation which burst on Howe's head at his conduct of the defence of Boston, and his hurried evacuation. The ministry announced the departure from Boston in the briefest fashion, but were forced to explain and excuse it in both the Commons and the Lords. "The General thought proper to shift his position," explained the Earl of Suffolk to the Lords, "in order, in the first place, to protect Halifax."[166] But the defence was riddled, Howe's general weakness was exposed, his neglect to fortify Dorchester was pointed out, and the English Whigs acutely reasoned that he must have had a virtual agreement with Washington to purchase the safety of the fleet and army at the price of immunity to the town. Newspapers and pamphleteers took up the subject, and Howe was eventually forced to ask for an inquiry into his conduct of the siege. To his dying day he was severely criticised for his generalship in America, and especially at Boston.
Of the other British military leaders, not one was successful. Gage was never again given a command. Burgoyne returned to Boston only as a prisoner. Clinton for a time commanded in America, but he was recalled.
As for the master whom these generals served, the king who was the cause of the war, his failure was complete. George III lost not only his revolted colonies, but also the dearer prize for which he fought, personal government. When at last peace was signed, the Americans had gained independence, and the English people had finally established the supremacy of Parliament. The king might reign, but he could no longer govern.
The fate of the Tories cannot detain us long, painful as it was. Some few returned to America after the war, and made again places for themselves. Among these was Judge Curwen. Some went to England, where they were out of their element. Dependent for the most part on the bounty of the crown, they lived in hope of a change of fortune. They longed for their homes, and sickened for a sight of the New England country, to them the most beautiful on earth. Many of them were too old to begin life anew: by the end of the war it was recorded that, of the Massachusetts Tory leaders, forty-five died in England. One of these was Hutchinson, upon whose life the best comment is the concluding sentence of Sabine's brief biography: "I forget, in his melancholy end, all else."
But numbers of the Tories remained in Canada. Doubtless many were discouraged from going to England by the reports of the condition of those already there. "As to your coming here," wrote Governor Wentworth from London to a friend in New Brunswick, "or any other Loyalist that can get clams and potatoes in America, they would most certainly regret making bad worse."[167] On such advice as this many, indeed most, of the refugees remained in Canada, and after the war, in which many of them fought, were of great service in building up that country. Nova Scotia and New Brunswick received the larger number of them; they became leaders of the bar, judges, physicians, prominent office-holders. It is not to be denied that among them were suffering and misery; they had lost much and had to begin again from the bottom, and many succumbed to the difficulties of the new life. After the war attempt was made to gain from the United States compensation for their losses; but the new country was unable even to recompense those who had suffered in its cause. The loyalists therefore looked to Britain for help, and in some measure found it, in pensions, grants of money, and holdings of land.
There is much to regret in this emigration, which took from New England such numbers of men and women of good blood and gentle breeding. For the Tories were largely of the better class, many of them had been educated at Harvard, and they represented an element which no community can afford to lose. Some of the difficulties of the new commonwealths were due to the loss of the conservative balance-wheel; some further troubles beset them from the bitterness of feeling in the new colonists across the border. This has now died away, but boundary and fisheries disputes long brought out the hostility latent in the descendants of the Tories.
So much for the losers in the fight. Of the winners, no American needs to be more than reminded of their fame and their successes. At the siege Washington made his first claim to fame. He proved his tenacity, his mastery of men, and the greatness of his resolution and daring. Some of his generals followed him in his success, some were failures. Lee attempted treachery, but was finally discarded by both sides. Gates endeavored to displace Washington, but ruined himself in the attempt. But most of Washington's other generals were able men. Greene proved himself to be a military genius second only to Washington. Knox, the sole Bostonian on Washington's staff, commanded the artillery throughout the war.