“I remember that Lord North’s answers were dry, unyielding, in the spirit of unconditional submission, and betrayed an absolute indifference to the occurrence of a rupture. And he said to the mediators distinctly, at last, that a rebellion was not to be deprecated on the part of Great Britain; that the confiscations it would produce, would provide for many of their friends.”
The idea that the feeble Americans, scattered along a coast more than a thousand miles in extent, without a fortress, a vessel of war, or a regiment of regular troops, could withstand the fleets and armies of Great Britain, was never entertained for a moment. Indeed, as we now contemplate the fearful odds, it causes one’s heart to throb, and we cannot but be amazed at the courage which our patriotic fathers displayed.
It was a common boast in England, that one regiment of British regulars could march from Boston to Charleston, and sweep all opposition before them. A band of ten wolves can put a flock of ten thousand sheep to flight. It was quite a pleasant thought, to the haughty court, that one or two ships of war, and two or three regiments could be sent across the Atlantic, seize and hang Washington, Franklin, Adams, Jefferson, and others of our leading patriots, and confiscate the property of hundreds of others, for the enrichment of the favorites of the crown.
“There will be no fighting;” these deluded men said, “it will be a mere holiday excursion. The turbulent and foolhardy Americans will be brought to their senses, and, like whipped spaniels, will fawn upon the hand which has chastised them.”
The voyage across the Atlantic occupied six weeks. In the evening twilight of the 5th of May, the ship dropped anchor in the Delaware, opposite Philadelphia. Franklin landed, and walked alone through the darkened streets towards his home. It is difficult to imagine the emotions with which his heart must have been agitated in that hour. Ten years had elapsed since he left his home. In the meantime his wife had reared another dwelling, in Market street, and there she had died. He had left his daughter Sarah, a child of twelve years. He was to find her a matron surrounded by her babes.
Cordially Franklin was welcomed home. The whole country resounded with the praises he so richly merited. The morning after his arrival he was unanimously chosen by the Assembly, then in session, as a member of the Continental Congress, which was to meet on the 10th of the month, in that city. Sixteen days before Franklin’s arrival the memorable conflicts of Lexington and Concord had taken place. Probably never were men more astounded, than were the members of the British cabinet, in learning that the British regulars had been defeated, routed and put to precipitate flight by American farmers with their fowling-pieces. In this heroic conflict, whose echoes reverberated around the world, the Americans lost in killed and wounded eighty-three. The British lost two hundred and seventy-three. Franklin wrote to his friend Edmund Burke,
“Gen. Gage’s troops made a most vigorous retreat—twenty miles in three hours—scarce to be paralleled in history. The feeble Americans, who pelted them all the way, could scarce keep up with them.”
On the 10th of May Congress met. There were still two parties, one in favor of renewed attempts at conciliation, before drawing the sword and throwing away the scabbard; the other felt that the powers of conciliation were exhausted, and that nothing now remained, but the arbitrament of war.
George Washington was chosen, by the Assembly, Commander-in-Chief of the American forces. On the 17th of June the battle of Bunker Hill was fought. Mr. John Dickinson trembled in view of his great wealth. His wife entreated him to withdraw from the conflict. Piteously she urged the considerations, that he would be hung, his wife left a widow, and his children beggared and rendered infamous. He succeeded in passing a resolution in favor of a second petition to the king, which he drew up, and which the Tory Governor Richard Penn was to present. John Adams, who was weary of having his country continue in the attitude of a suppliant kneeling at the foot of the throne, opposed this petition, as a “measure of imbecility.”