Washington the Soldier

by Henry B. Carrington

The British Government having adopted a sound military policy, so soon as the object lessons of Lexington, Bunker Hill, and their expulsion from Boston unveiled their dull vision, did not fail to realize the necessity for an army strong enough to meet the full requirements of that policy. Forty regiments were assigned to the American service.[^[3]] But the militia of New England had already driven twenty battalions (half the number) from its coast. Washington was no careless observer of European conditions, nor of the straitened nature of the British army organization, however superior to rivals on the sea. His deliberate conviction, ever a rallying force to his faith in deepest peril, that Britain could never spare more than one more army as large as the garrison of Boston, was the result of almost literal insight of the practical resources at her command. Hence, that Government contracted with petty European principalities for seventeen thousand men, for immediate delivery. These men were impressed and paid wages by their own local princes who speculated on the greater sums to be paid them, per capita, by Great Britain. The former estimate of General Gage, at twenty thousand men, and his significant hint as to the need of more than that force, was no longer ridiculed; but forty thousand was decided to be the minimum number required for the immediate prosecution of the war. Taking into account the foreign troops, the British ministry estimated as available for the American service a total, on paper, of fifty-five thousand men. To this was to be added, upon their hopeful estimate, four thousand Canadians, Indians, and royalists. Allowing for every possible shrinkage, on account of weakened regiments and other contingencies, the effective force was officially placed at forty thousand men.

[3]. See Appendix for regiments designated.

Two facts are significant in connection with this specious estimate of the British army. If the drain of this forcible conscription upon the industry of Hesse-Cassel and Hanau had been applied to England and Wales, at that date, it would have raised an army of four hundred thousand men; and yet, Britain did not venture to draw from her own subjects, at home, for the defence of her own Crown.

Washington rightly conceived that the whole scheme would divide the sentiment of the British people, and that the success even of these mercenary troops, against their own blood in America, would prove no source of pride or congratulation. It was his intense love of English liberty, exhibited in its history, that undergirded his soul with sustaining faith in American liberty; and he read the hearts of the English people aright.

He did not wait long for its echo. The Duke of Richmond used this emphatic and prophetic utterance: “An army of foreigners is now to be introduced into the British dominion; not to protect them from invasion, not to deliver them from the ravages of a hostile army, but to assist one-half of the inhabitants in massacring the other. Unprovided with a sufficient number of troops for the cruel purpose; or, unable to prevail upon the natives of the country [England] to lend their hands to such a sanguinary business, Ministers have applied to those foreign princes who trade in human blood, and have hired mercenaries for the work of destruction.” His closing sentence foreshadowed the alliance of America with Louis XVI., of France. It reads thus: “The Colonies themselves, after our example, will apply to strangers for assistance.”

This British army was designed for four distinct, and as nearly as possible, concurrent, operations: one through Canada, down the Hudson River to Albany and New York, with divergent pressure upon New England and central New York; one to occupy Newport, R.I.; the third to control New York City and its related territory in New Jersey; and the fourth against representative centres at the South.

Reference has been made to the anxiety expressed by Washington as early as February, 1776, lest the siege of Boston might be protracted until Britain could invade the other colonies, particularly New York, with an overwhelming retentive force. As a fact, only surmised and not known by him for weeks, Sir Peter Parker and Earl Cornwallis were ready to start from Cork, Ireland, by the twentieth of January; but did not sail until the thirteenth of February, and then the transports and ships were so buffeted by storms, and driven back for refitting, as not to reach Wilmington, N.C., until the third day of May. Here, as before indicated, he was joined by General Clinton, and both had the suggestive lesson of American courage in their repulse by the brave Moultrie, at Charleston, on the twenty-eighth of June.

And now we are to consider Washington’s reception of the most formidable of these expeditions.

General Howe sailed from Halifax on the tenth of June with one hundred and twenty square-rigged vessels besides smaller craft; and on the fifth day of July the entire force, amounting to nine thousand two hundred men, was landed upon Staten Island, in the lower bay of New York. During the voyage two transports were captured by American privateers, and General Sir William Erskine, with a part of the seventy-first Highland Regiment, were made prisoners. The incident is worthy of notice as materially affecting the correspondence between Washington and General Howe, shortly after the event.

General Howe reached Sandy Hook in the despatch frigate “Greyhound,” on the twenty-fifth of June, and held a secret conference with Governor Tryon, on shipboard. His fleet first cast anchor at Gravesend Cove, July 1st, but after conference with Governor Tryon, he changed his purpose. He would be too near Washington. He wrote to Lord Germaine on July 8th as follows: “He declined to land, as being so near the front of the enemy’s works. It would be too hazardous, until the arrival of the troops with Commodore Holtham, daily expected. He was also waiting for the return of General Clinton, and deemed it best to defer the possession of Rhode Island until the arrival of the second embarkation from Europe, unless Carleton should penetrate early into this province [New York].” The letter thus closes: “As I must esteem an impression upon the enemy’s principal force collected in this quarter to be the first object of my attention, I shall hold it steadily in view without losing sight of those which may be only considered collateral.”