Former Governor Lippitt was the next speaker, introduced by the Chairman as follows: “One of our invited guests, representing the Society of the Cincinnati, is obliged to go to a neighboring city within the next hour to deliver an address, and we will not have the pleasure of his company at our luncheon or the benefit of any words from him afterwards. I will therefore introduce him at once.
“As General Sullivan was one of the original members of the Society of the Cincinnati, it is singularly fitting that we call on an honored Rhode Islander, whose father as well as himself has served the state as Governor, and whose devotion to the history and affairs of the commonwealth has given him a well deserved position as an authority on his subject.
“It gives me great pleasure to introduce Hon. Charles Warren Lippitt, ex-Governor of Rhode Island.”
“Mr. Chairman, Members of the American Irish Historical Society, Ladies and Gentlemen: I feel surprised at finding myself somewhat unexpectedly in this position, but will try to aid in honoring this occasion.
“Veneration for General Sullivan, for his services on the Island of Rhode Island, and for his noble victory, has always been mine. That he was of Irish extraction, and that his ancestors, like those of all the rest of us who are not descended from Indians, emigrated from a home land to this new country in the western hemisphere, is well known. My descent is from the English, with a strain of the French and the German races rather than from the Irish. No one in any way familiar with American history can hesitate an instant in according to the Hibernians the honor of many noble actions and the respect due to sacrifice of untold value, in every emergency of our common country.
“General Sullivan came of a sturdy race. His father was born during the siege of Limerick, away back in 1691, of such good stock that he outlived the century and did not pass away until 1796, at the age of one hundred and five. It was his son that gave so much of his life and energy, his intelligence and ability, to the cause of American freedom. That he served with distinction in the Continental Army goes without question. That he was at Trenton the night before Christmas and aided in the defeat and capture of that hated Hessian contingent that had been marauding up and down New Jersey is also an established fact. It is equally true that with the three Rhode Island regiments, forming a material part of Washington’s army, he braved the elements in that historic night march from Trenton to Princeton, fought the next morning in the battle of Princeton, and successfully assisted in driving Cornwallis out of New Jersey. It was the crisis of the Revolution. In that time of stress and doubt John Sullivan, the descendant of an Irishman, like so many others of his race, stood shoulder to shoulder with the descendants of the English and the French in securing for us and the millions that have inhabited this land the priceless privileges of liberty.
“His course in the Genesee Valley and the very proper punishment he administered to the savages who committed the horrible massacre at Wyoming has been eloquently traced. His campaign in Rhode Island has, perhaps, been studied in rather more detail in this neighborhood than in other parts of the country.
“History records and practically every American schoolboy can tell how the Americans fought at the battle of Bunker Hill. Wherever the Revolution is known there is an intimate knowledge of that great conflict. We all of us glory in its story, and remember with gratitude and sympathy the bravery of those untrained patriots who administered such a fearful blow to British power and prestige.
“Compare for a moment the battle on Rhode Island and the results secured by Sullivan’s generalship with the circumstances and the issue on that hill near Boston. The loss of the English at Bunker Hill was 1,054 men, that of the Americans 449. Until the British entered the redoubt, the Americans fought behind entrenchments. In the third attack the British captured the redoubt, drove the Americans from the hill, and retained undisputed control of the battlefield.
“In the campaign on Rhode Island the inability of the French to control the sea obliged the Americans to retire to Butts Hill. In the valley separating it from Quaker, Turkey and Anthony hills, immediately south, a battle was fought, not behind entrenchments, but in the broad open, where each army had equal advantages and success was won by brilliant tactics and skill and spirit in using weapons. In the retreat and in the battle between the nearby Rhode Island hills, the English lost 1,023 and the Americans 211. After repulsing two vigorously and pertinaciously pressed charges of the English army, the Americans were obliged in the early afternoon to face a last violent onset that almost broke the right wing of Sullivan’s army under the immediate command of General Greene. Jackson’s regiment connected with Colonel Livingston’s detachment, that had contested during the early morning the British advance up the island, after a needed rest on the north side of Butts hill were marched around the rear of the army, by Sullivan’s direction, to the extreme right of General Greene’s command. The British and Hessians charged down the slope of Anthony hill and were met in the valley by Greene’s somewhat exhausted forces. It was the final struggle for victory. At this critical moment Colonel Livingston led Jackson’s regiment, using the cold steel, in a fierce onslaught against the enemy’s flank that gave the British the final blow and sent them scurrying up the slope of Anthony hill to their entrenchments on the top. The Americans, closely following the flying foe, captured Brady’s battery as an evidence of their victory.