"Old Put" the patriot

by Frederick A. Ober

Israel Putnam.

From a painting by Trumbull.

The arrival of the vast fleet, the subsequent landing of an army of nearly twenty-five thousand men, and the warlike preparations which the British were feverishly making looking to the capture of the city, did not alarm Old Put, with his total force of scarcely seventeen thousand. He went on as calmly and as determinedly as though himself commander of the larger army, for the hero of Bunker Hill never anticipated defeat. He always fought to the last, after making every needful preparation for whatever event, and at New York, although the chances were all against him, he did his utmost to bring about success. He had fortified Governor's Island and Red Hook in order to prevent the enemy's ships of war from ascending the Hudson; he now sank several old hulks in the channel for the same purpose; but, notwithstanding, two war-vessels succeeded in getting up the North River, which they afterward descended, without injury to themselves.

It having been recommended by Congress that "fire-rafts be prepared and sent among the enemy's shipping," Putnam acted in accordance with the suggestion by fitting out fourteen fire-ships for the purpose, though nothing was accomplished with them. Still persistent in his endeavors to drive off the enemy, he adopted the invention of David Bushnell, a native of his own State, which the inventor called the "great American Turtle," and which, in fact, was a submarine torpedo, probably the first one thus used in warfare. It was to be guided by one man, and that man was to have been Bushnell himself; but, unfortunately, he fell sick, and the "turtle" boat with its infernal machine was entrusted to a Connecticut sergeant named "Bije" Shipman, who promised to row the "submarine"—diminutive prototype of all those which have committed such destruction since—down the bay and attach the torpedo to the bottom of the British admiral's ship. He reached the ship without being observed—strange to say—and attempted to attach the torpedo; but the attaching screw struck against an iron plate and caused great delay. Coming up to get a breath of fresh air, "Bije" was seen and fired upon by a sentinel, and at once rowed away as fast as his oars could carry him. The torpedo, the explosion of which was regulated by clockwork operating on a gun-lock, actually exploded about half an hour after, sending up a great geyser of water, which frightened the British admiral so that he gave orders to up anchor and seek another mooring-place.

The Yankee navigator of the submarine declared that when he struck the iron plate he got "narvous," and couldn't affix the screw properly; but that if he had had a fresh "cud of terbacker," he would have been all right and the admiral's ship would have gone "a-kiting" into the air. The attempt was not repeated, for some reason or other, probably because the British got wary and kept farther away from shore. The next year, however, inventor Bushnell succeeded in blowing up a British schooner with his torpedo; but neither he nor quaint "Bije" Shipman ever received the credit that was their due, the latter being one of the forgotten heroes of the Revolution.

About this time the Putnam family entertained as guest the pretty daughter of a British officer, Major James Moncrieffe, the same one to whom, at the siege of Boston, "Old Put" had sent a present of provisions, even though they were opposed as enemies. This young lady was received by the family with affection, presented to General and Mrs. Washington, and afterward provided with a pass through the lines and sent to her father, accompanied by a letter of which (as she wittily said to a friend) "the bad orthography was amply compensated for by the magnanimity of the man who wrote it." Here is the letter: "Ginrale Putnam's compliments to Major Moncrieffe, has made him a present of a fine daughter, if he don't lick [like] her he must send her back again, and he will provide her with a good twig [Whig] husband."

General Putnam's humor, like his generosity, was never-failing; but, as "Josh Billings" once remarked of himself, "he was a bad speller" to the end of his life. But he could spell f-i-g-h-t as well as anybody; and what is more, he could forgive his enemies, not only after the fight was over, but while it was going on—as witness his generous actions on many occasions.

Though kept busy as a bee from morning to night, yet General Putnam found life in New York irksome, and was glad enough when ordered by Washington over to Long Island, to command at Brooklyn Heights and to supersede Sullivan, who had superseded Greene, then sick with fever, who had planned and erected the fortifications on the island. It was perhaps this "lightning change" of commanders that was responsible for the bitter defeat of the Americans in that encounter known as the "Battle of Long Island." By the third week of August, when this battle took place, the British were near New York with more than three hundred ships and thirty thousand troops, including those of Clinton, Cornwallis, and Howe. The last named was in command, and on the 22d of August he landed twenty thousand troops, including five thousand hireling Hessians, at Gravesend Bay, with the intention of flanking the Americans out of their positions at Flatbush and the Heights and then advancing across the island to East River and New York.