Revolutionary Reader: Reminiscences and Indian Legends

by Sophie Lee Foster

The next month the British armed sloop Liberty, cruising in Narraganset Bay in search of contraband traders, needlessly annoyed all the coasting vessels that came in her way. Two Connecticut vessels suspected of smuggling were taken into Newport. A quarrel ensued between the captain of one of the vessels and the captain of the Liberty. The yankee captain was badly treated and his boat fired upon. The same evening the British captain went ashore, was captured by Newport citizens and compelled to summon all his crew ashore except the first officer. The people then boarded the Liberty, sent the officer on shore, then cast the cable and grounded the Liberty at the Point. There they cut away the masts, scuttled the vessel, carried the boats to the upper end of the town and burned them. This occurred July, 1769, and was "the first overt act of violence offered to the British authorities in America."

But armed vessels continued their molestations. The Rhode Island colony was not asleep but awaiting a favorable opportunity which came at last and the capture of the Gaspee was planned and accomplished. Rewards were offered for the apprehension of the perpetrators of this deed, but without effect. Some of Rhode Island's most honored citizens were engaged in the affair and some of the younger participants are said to have boasted of the deed before the smoke from the burning vessel had ceased to darken the sky. The capture of the Gaspee in June, 1772, was the first bold blow, in all the colonies for freedom. There was shed the first blood in the war for Independence. The Revolution had begun.

Then followed resolutions from Virginia that all the towns should unite for mutual protection. Rhode Island went a step farther and proposed a continental congress, and thus has the distinguished honor of making the first explicit movement for a general congress, and a few weeks later she was the first to appoint delegates to this congress.

The "Boston Port Bill" followed, and Massachusetts records tell of the money and supplies sent from Rhode Island to Boston's suffering people. England ordered that no more arms were to be sent to America. Rhode Island began at once to manufacture fire arms. Sixty heavy cannon were cast, and home-made muskets were furnished to the chartered military companies. When the day arrived upon which Congress had decreed that the use of tea should be suspended, three hundred pounds of tea were burned in Market Square, Providence, while the "Sons of Liberty" went through the town with a pot of black paint and a paint-brush and painted out the word "Tea" on every sign-board. This was February 1, 1775. The fight at Lexington followed on the 19th of April. Two weeks after this battle the Rhode Island assembly suspended Gov. Walton, the last colonial governor of Rhode Island. He repeatedly asked to be restored and was as often refused. At the end of six months he was deposed. This was a bold act, but men who could attack and capture a man-of-war were not afraid to depose from office one single man who was resolved to destroy them.

The British war-ship Rose was a constant menace to the vessels in Rhode Island waters. Altercations ensued. Captain Abraham Whipple, who headed the expedition to burn the Gaspee, discharged the first gun at any part of the British navy in the American Revolution. Two armed vessels were ordered for the protection of Rhode Island waters; and this was the beginning of the American navy.

Passing over much of interest we come to the last important act of Rhode Island colonial assembly: an act to abjure allegiance to the British crown. It was a declaration of independence and it was made on May 4, 1776, just two months before the Declaration of Independence, signed at Philadelphia. This act closed the colonial period and established Rhode Island as an independent state. The records of the assembly had always closed with "God save the King!" This was changed to "God save the United Colonies!" The smallest of the colonies had defied the empire of Great Britain and declared herself an independent state!

Dark days followed. The British army occupied Newport. By command of congress, Rhode Island had sent her two battalions to New York, thus rendering herself defenseless. The militia was organized to protect the sea-coast. I may not linger to tell of the capture of Gen. Prescott; of the unsuccessful attempt to dislodge the British, nor of the battle of Rhode Island, in which Col. Christopher Greene with his famous regiment of blacks distinguished himself, and which Lafayette afterwards declared was the best-planned battle of the war. For three years the English army held this fair island and left it a scene of desolation. Newport never recovered. Her commerce was destroyed. Her ships never returned.

Meanwhile momentous events were occurring at the seat of war. Philadelphia was threatened and the continental congress had been moved to Baltimore. Washington, with less than twenty-three hundred men, recrossed the Delaware at night. The men he placed in two divisions, one under General Greene, the other under Gen. Sullivan, and successfully attacked the Hessians at Trenton capturing nine hundred prisoners (Dec. 26th, 1776).

Washington recrossed the Delaware into Pennsylvania with his prisoners and spoils that very night. On January 1st, 1777, with 5,000 men he again crossed the Delaware and took post at Trenton. The next day Cornwallis appeared before Washington's position with a much larger forces. Only a creek separated the two armies. The Rhode Island brigade distinguished itself at the successful holding of the bridge and received the thanks of Washington. That night Washington withdrew, leaving his camp fires burning. Next morning, January 3rd, 1777, Cornwallis was amazed to find Washington gone and still more astounded, as he heard in the direction of Princeton the guns of the Americans, who won that day another decisive victory.

We must not dwell upon the record of Gen. Nathaniel Greene. His campaign in South Carolina was brilliant. He has been called the saviour of the South. It was he, a Rhode Island general, who, because of his military skill, stood second only to Washington.