Lord Dunmore told his troops, before the action at the Great Bridge, that if they fell into the hands of the “shirt-men,” they would be scalped.
To the honour of the “shirt-men,” it should be observed, that they treated the British prisoners with great kindness—a kindness which was felt and gratefully acknowledged.
Henry Flanders (Arranged)
AT VALLEY FORGE
Through the battles of Iron Hill, of Brandywine, of Germantown, and of Monmouth, John Marshall bore himself bravely. And through the dreary privations, the hunger, and the nakedness of that ghastly Winter at Valley Forge, his patient endurance and his cheeriness bespoke the very sweetest temper that ever man was blessed with.
So long as any lived to speak, men would tell how he was loved by the soldiers and by his brother officers; how he was the arbiter of their differences and the composer of their disputes. And when called to act, as he often was, as Judge Advocate, he exercised that peculiar and delicate judgment required of him, who is not only the prosecutor but the protector of the accused.
It was in the duties of this office that he first met and came to know well the two men, whom of all others on earth he most admired and loved, and whose impress he bore through his life—Washington and Hamilton.
William Henry Rawle (Arranged)
SILVER HEELS
Young John Marshall surpassed in athletics, any man in the Army. When the soldiers were idle at their quarters, it was usual for the officers to engage in a game of quoits or in jumping and racing. Then he would throw a quoit farther, and beat at a race any other. He was the only man, who with a running jump, could clear a stick laid on the heads of two men as tall as himself.