History of the United States

by John Clark Ridpath

6. The British army remained at Philadelphia until June of 1778. The fleet of Admiral Howe lay in the Delaware. When the rumor came that the fleet of D'Estaing was approaching, the English admiral set sail for New York. On the 18th of June the British army evacuated Philadelphia and retreated across New Jersey. Washington occupied the city, and followed the retreating foe. At Monmouth the British were overtaken. On the morning of the 28th General Lee was ordered to attack the enemy. The American cavalry under La Fayette was driven back by Cornwallis. Lee ordered his line to retire to a stronger position; but the troops mistook the order and began a retreat. Washington met the fugitives and administered a severe rebuke to Lee. The fight continued until nightfall, and Washington anxiously waited for the morning. During the night, however, Clinton withdrew his forces and escaped.

Washington and Lee.

7. The loss of the Americans was two hundred and twenty-seven. The British left nearly three hundred dead on the field. On the day after the battle Washington received an insulting letter from Lee demanding an apology. Washington replied that his language had been warranted by the circumstances. Lee answered in a still more offensive manner, and was thereupon arrested, tried by a court-martial, and dismissed from his command for twelve months. He never reentered the service, and did not live to see his country's independence. The British forces were now concentrated at New York. Washington took up his headquarters at White Plains. D'Estaing repaired to Boston. Howe returned to New York.

Massacre of Wyoming.

8. The command of the British naval forces was now transferred to Admiral Byron. Early in October a band of incendiaries, led by Colonel Ferguson, burned the American ships at Little Egg Harbor. In the preceding July, Major John Butler, in command of sixteen hundred royalists, Canadians, and Indians, marched into the valley of Wyoming, Pennsylvania. The settlement was defenceless. On the approach of the tories and savages, a few militia, old men, and boys, rallied to protect their homes. A battle was fought, and the patriots were routed. The fugitives fled to a fort, which was crowded with women and children. Honorable terms were promised by Butler, and the garrison capitulated. On the 5th of July the gates were opened and the barbarians entered. Immediately they began to plunder and butcher. Nearly all the prisoners fell under the hatchet and the scalping-knife.

Massacre at Cherry Valley.

9. In November there was a similar massacre at Cherry Valley, New York. The invaders were led by Joseph Brandt, chief of the Mohawks, and Walter Butler, a son of Major John Butler. The people of Cherry Valley were driven from their homes; women and children were tomahawked and scalped; and forty prisoners dragged into captivity. To avenge these outrages, an expedition was sent against the savages on the Susquehanna; and they were made to feel the terrors of war.

George Rogers Clark in the West.

10. In the spring of 1778, Major George Rogers Clark, who three years previously had descended the Ohio River with a single companion, from Pittsburgh to the Falls of the Ohio, organized an expedition against the British posts on the Wabash and Mississippi rivers. All the country northwest of the river Ohio was at this time under British authority, but the scattered white inhabitants were nearly all French. The most important post was the town of Vincennes, in what was afterwards the Territory of Indiana. Major Clark gathered his forces on Corn Island, in the Ohio, between the present cities of Louisville and Jeffersonville. The regiment was made up of backwoods militiamen and hunters from Kentucky and the Upper Ohio Valley.