Washington the Soldier

by Henry B. Carrington

The Report of Washington upon this action thus honors the brave defenders of Fort Mifflin: “The defence will always reflect the highest honor upon the officers and men of the garrison. The works were entirely beat down; every piece of cannon was dismounted, and one of the enemy’s ships came so near that she threw grenades from her tops into the fort, and killed men upon the platforms, before they quitted the island.”

On the eighteenth, General Cornwallis landed at Billingsport in force, and Washington sent General Greene to take command of the troops in New Jersey and check his progress; but the demonstration was so formidable that the garrison evacuated the works. The Americans, unable to save their galleys, set fire to them near Gloucester Point; and the British fleet gained the freedom of the Delaware River.

During this movement, Lafayette, intrusted with a detachment of troops by General Greene, had several skirmishes with the enemy, and on the first of December was assigned to command of the division left without a commander by the dismissal of Stephen. While Cornwallis was on this detached service, four general officers of Washington’s army against eleven dissenting voted to attack General Howe. The incident, occurring at such a period, is noteworthy.

Late in October, the American army advanced from Perkiomy to White Marsh; General Varnum’s Rhode Island Brigade, twelve hundred strong, reported for duty, as well as about a thousand additional troops from Pennsylvania, Maryland and Virginia. Generals Gates and Putnam still retained troops for their semi-independent commands; and General Gates, in particular, only grudgingly sent such as were peremptorily ordered to report to Washington. It was not until Colonel Hamilton, Aide-de-camp, visited him in person, that Gates sent the troops which were absolutely indispensable at army headquarters, and as absolutely useless at Albany. His ostentatious proclamation of his military success over Burgoyne, and his criticism of the tardiness and non-efficiency of his Commander-in-Chief, began to expose his renewed aspirations to succeed to the chief command.

On the fourth of December, General Howe with a force of fourteen thousand men, accompanied by Generals Knyphausen and Cornwallis, advanced to Chestnut Hill, within three miles of the right of the American army, and slight skirmishing ensued. On the seventh, the British troops left Chestnut Hill, and took a position at Edge Hill near the American left. Morgan, just arrived from the northern army, and the Maryland militia under Colonel Mordecai Gist (subsequently Brigadier-General) had a sharp skirmish with Cornwallis, losing forty-four men and indicting an equal loss upon the enemy. Major-General Gray and the Queen’s Rangers indicted a loss of about fifty men upon an advance post of the American left; and when night came on, the British pickets were within a half mile of the American lines, where battle was awaited with satisfaction and hopeful expectancy. But on the morning of the eighth, the British camp disappeared, for Howe had suddenly returned to Philadelphia.

Howe’s Report, dated December 13th, reads as follows: “Upon the presumption that a forward movement might tempt the enemy, after receiving such a reënforcement [reported afterwards as four thousand men], to give battle for the recovery of this place [Philadelphia]; or, that a vulnerable part might be found to admit of an attack upon their camp; the army marched out on the night of the fourth instant.” It was afterwards learned that Howe had full knowledge of the jealous spirit then existing towards Washington, and that several of his generals favored an attack upon Philadelphia, against his better judgment. Washington, in noticing Howe’s movement, says: “I sincerely wish that they had made the attack; as the issue, in all probability, from the disposition of our troops and the strong position of our camp, would have been fortunate and happy. At the same time, I must add, that reason, prudence, and every principle of policy, forbid us quitting our post to attack them. Nothing but success would have justified the measure; and this could not be expected from their position.”

The army of Washington, nominally eleven thousand strong, had, says Baron De Kalb, but seven thousand effective men for duty, so general was the sickness, from extreme cold and the want of sufficient clothing and other necessaries of a campaign. And yet, under these conditions, Congress placed in responsible positions those officers who were most officiously antagonistic to the American Commander-in-Chief. On the sixth of November, Gates had been made President of the Board of War. Mifflin, withdrawn from duty as Quartermaster-General, was also placed upon the Board, retaining his full rank. On the twenty-eighth of December, Congress appointed Conway Major-General and Inspector-General, and placed him in communication with the Board of War, to act independently of the Commander-in-Chief. Lee, then a prisoner of war, through letters addressed to Gates, Mifflin, Wayne and Conway, united with them in concerted purpose to oppose the policy of Washington, and to dictate his action; and more than this, there was a strong influence brought to bear upon Congress to force Washington’s resignation, or removal from command.

Washington, however, established his headquarters at Valley Forge, twenty-one miles from Philadelphia; and on the nineteenth of December announced his winter quarters by a formal order. On the same day he sent General Smallwood to Wilmington, to occupy the country south of Philadelphia and cut off supplies for that city and its garrison. McDougall was established at Peekskill. Putnam was on the shore of Long Island Sound until the middle of December, when he was ordered back to the Highlands. The absence of General Mifflin from the army, and his total neglect of duty as Quartermaster-General, in which he had once been so efficient, “caused,” says Washington, “the want of two days’ supply of provisions, and thereby cost an opportunity scarcely ever offered, of taking an advantage of the enemy.”

It was an hour of deep distress to Washington, when, on the twenty-third day of December, 1777, he felt compelled to advise Congress of the condition of his army: “The numbers had been reduced since the fourth of the month, only three weeks, two thousand men, from hardship and exposure. Two thousand eight hundred and ninety-eight were unfit for duty, because barefoot and otherwise naked. Only eight thousand two hundred men were present for duty.” He added: “We have not more than three months in which to prepare a great deal of business. If we let them slip, or waste, we shall be laboring under the same difficulties in the next campaign as we have in this, to rectify mistakes and bring things to order. Military arrangements and movements, in consequence, like the mechanism of a clock, will be imperfect and disordered by the want of any part.” The concluding clause, italicized, illustrates one of his peculiar characteristics—never to slight the humblest man or agency in his country’s service, and never to count any duty too small to be done well.