The following description of Putnam was not intended for publication; but that lends it the highest interest. Judge Dana, a senator of the United States from Maine, was a grandson of Putnam, and remarks in his letter, 1818, that he had just been to visit his aunt Waldo, Gen. Putnam’s daughter; and then gives the following description of the general:—
“In his person, for height, about the middle size; very erect; thickset, muscular, and firm in every part. His countenance was open, strong, and animated; the features of his face large, well-proportioned to each other, and to his whole frame; his teeth fair and sound till death. His organs and senses were all exactly fitted for a warrior; he heard quickly, saw to an immense distance; and, though he sometimes stammered in conversation, his voice was remarkably heavy, strong, and commanding. Though facetious and dispassionate in private, when animated in the heat of battle, his countenance was fierce and terrible, and his voice like thunder. His whole manner was admirably calculated to inspire his soldiers with courage and confidence, and his enemy with terror. The faculties of his mind were not inferior to those of his body; his penetration was acute, his decision rapid, yet remarkably correct; and the more desperate his situation, the more collected and undaunted. With the courage of a lion, he had a heart that melted at the sight of distress; he could never witness suffering in any human being, without becoming a sufferer himself; even the operation of blood-letting has caused him to faint. In viewing the field of battle, his distress was exquisite, until he had afforded friend or foe all the relief in his power. Once after a battle, on examining a bullet-wound through the head of a favorite officer, Capt. Whiting, who died on the field, he fainted, and was taken up for dead. Martial music roused him to the highest pitch; while solemn, sacred music set him into tears. In his disposition he was open and generous, almost to a fault; he never disguised; and in the social relations of life he was never excelled.”
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One of the most magnificent monuments that ever bore the name of any man, and which will transmit the name of Warren, in grateful and glorious remembrance, down to the latest posterity, has been erected in Boston Harbor. Fort Warren, for strength, grandeur, and scientific perfection, is one of the masterpieces of military art; and it will be highly gratifying to all the countrymen of Col. Thayer,—that most amiable, scientific, and distinguished engineer, by whom it was constructed,—that his name will be for ever so honorably and deservedly associated with that of Warren. Both were born in the vicinity of Boston.
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If we may be excused for speaking from a very slight experience, we should say, there is no reason to suppose that any of Ward’s orders to his officers, on the occasion of the battle, were in writing. In 1814, when the British forces, freed from European service, were pouring into Canada, and apprehensions were entertained that they would make their way into our country, we joined the army under Gen. Izard, on the Champlain frontier, as one of the Massachusetts volunteers, and served in his staff through the campaign as topographical engineer. The general was soon ordered to the Niagara frontier, to save Gen. Brown from Drummond’s superior force, which we found posted on the north bank of the Chippewa River, and with very formidable fortifications along the southern shore likewise. Gen. Izard, finding that the enemy’s position was unassailable in front, was desirous of discovering whether the British fleet, with the large frigate they had been building, which was to give them the mastery over Commodore Chauncey, was out on Lake Ontario, so as to prevent him from getting on the enemy’s flank or rear. To gain this information, he ordered me, and not in writing, to go with a small detachment of infantry across the Niagara River in a boat, and proceed to the vicinity of Lake Ontario, to obtain the requisite information. That region was abandoned to the enemy, and deserted by all the Americans, excepting a few men who frequented it occasionally, to look after their property, though their fine crops were rotting on the ground. We embarked on the Canada side of the Niagara; and, as we neared the opposite shore, we were challenged by a body of musketeers demanding who we were. Neither party had any uniform, or other badge of nationality; and as they, being on terra firma, had us at a great disadvantage, my tactic was to gain time, while we were fast approaching the shore. But as I was only a soldier “by the book,” and very little of that, I was confounded with my situation. Having often pondered on Maj. André’s egregious indiscretion, in disclosing to his captors who he was, in place of claiming to be an American, which would have insured his safety, I was disposed to avoid his mistake, and pass our party off for English. But no simile goes on all-fours. In our case, had I guessed wrong as to their character, they would have responded with their guns. To gain time, I cried out, “Friends!” but that trick did not take; their muskets were levelled at us, and they swore they would fire, if we did not answer them directly. We were prepared for them, and I was compelled to show our colors. I cried out, “Americans!” when they hailed us, “Brothers!” to our great delight. We soon gained the information we were in pursuit of, and had the melancholy though magnificent view, with our glass, of the British fleet in the offing, on Lake Ontario. We reported these unpleasant tidings to Gen. Izard; and his whole plan of campaign was frustrated, and the war virtually over. The general, in his dilemma, consulted one of the most distinguished officers in the army, and as great a military genius probably as the world has produced,—young Col. M’Cree, of the engineers. On our arrival at Fort Erie, we found him in Gen. Brown’s staff; and he had really been the principal staff on which Brown had leaned to gain his brilliant success on the Niagara frontier. Gen. Izard was desirous of reaping the same advantage from M’Cree, who advised to a very ingenious and scientific expedient to extricate the general from his embarrassment. It was to construct a floating bridge at some distance above the enemy, on our side of the Chippewa, with one end fastened on our side, while the rest of the bridge was to be floated off into the river; and the other end, when the current had carried it to the opposite shore, to be attached there, for our army to pass over. But Gen. Brown, once relieved by Izard from Drummond’s superior force, seemed not at all disposed to assist him to gain any laurels in return. There was a marked jealousy and coldness between those officers, that precluded any joint enterprise of theirs from succeeding.
Brig.-Gen. Totten, now head of the engineer department, was a young engineer in Gen. Izard’s staff, and gained his first laurels at Plattsburgh. The forts he built there would have done him honor, even had he then gained his present high advancement. With the most unmanageable material, the sand of Plattsburgh, he contrived, with the aid of carpentry, to construct his forts with a skill, science, and ingenuity that would have rendered them impregnable, Gen. Izard declared, against the overwhelming force of Prevost, even if it had not been crippled by the naval victory of the gallant Com. M’Donough. When we left Plattsburgh for Fort Erie, Totten remained behind to test and fight his own works, which he did with great éclat. Winstanley, the gallant civil engineer, who bravely dared to prove his own light-house against as fierce an elemental strife as ever raged, fell a noble sacrifice to an inscrutable decree of Providence; but Totten, more fortunate, found his works were not to be subdued by man.
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The author thinks we are mistaken as to the number of cannon belonging to the corps of artillery at Cambridge. Our informants, in 1818, were Col. Popkin and Capt. Trevett, captains in the corps; and they are so well known yet, from their high character, and the public stations they held, that we need say no more of their testimony. Capt. Trevett will be recollected as the distinguished officer in the battle, and for a great number of years commander of the revenue cutter at Boston. Col. Popkin was born at Boston, of Welsh descent. He had been in Paddock’s corps, was a major in Greaton’s regiment, and in the battle of White Plains; in the engagements at Saratoga as Aid to Gen. Lincoln; afterwards lieutenant-colonel of artillery under Crane, and left the army at the peace a colonel. He was a custom-house officer under Gen. Lincoln, in 1789, and remained in office till his decease, 1827, aged eighty-four. He was father of the learned, beloved, and respected Professor John S. Popkin, of Harvard University, for more than half a century past dear to all the friends of that institution, and whose sermons would do honor to any man.
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