The American Revolution

It was seriously feared by many patriotic Tories, like Hutchinson, that if the political connection between the colonies and the mother country were to be severed, the new American republics would either tear themselves to pieces in petty and ignominious warfare, like the states of ancient Greece, or else would sink into the position of tools for France or Spain. The history of the thirty years after Yorktown showed that these were not imaginary dangers. The drift toward anarchy, from which we began to be rescued in 1787, was unmistakable; and after 1793 the determination of France to make a tool of the United States became for some years a disturbing and demoralizing element in the political situation. But as we look at these events retrospectively, the conclusion to which we are driven is just opposite to that which was entertained by the Tories. Dread of impending anarchy brought into existence our Federal Constitution in 1787, and nothing short of that would have done it. But for the acute distress entailed by the lack of any stronger government than the Continental Congress, the American people would have been no more willing to enter into a strict Federal Union in 1787 than they had been in 1754. Instead of bringing anarchy, the separation from Great Britain, by threatening anarchy, brought more perfect union. In order that American problems should be worked out successfully, independence was necessary.

It is to be regretted that the attainment of that independence must needs have been surrounded with the bitter memories inseparable from warfare. In such a political atmosphere as that of the ancient Greek world it need not have been so. The Greek colony, save in two or three exceptional cases, enjoyed complete autonomy. Corinth did not undertake to legislate for Syracuse; but the Syracusan did not therefore cease to regard Corinthians as his fellow-countrymen. The conceptions of allegiance and territorial sovereignty, which grew to maturity under the feudal system, made such relations between colony and mother state impossible in the eighteenth century. Autonomy could not be taken for granted, but must be won with the sword.

But while, under the circumstances, a war was inevitable, it is only gross ignorance of history that would find in such a war any justification for lack of cordiality between the people of the United Kingdom and the people of the United States. As already observed, it was not a war between the two peoples, but between two principles. The principle of statecraft against which Washington fought no longer exists among either British or Americans; it is as extinct as the dinosaurs. In all good work that nations can do in the world, the British people are our best allies; and one of the most encouraging symptoms of the advancement of civilization in recent years is the fact that a grave question, which in earlier times and between other nations would doubtless have led to bloodshed, has been amicably adjusted by arbitration. The memory of what was accomplished in 1872 at Geneva is a prouder memory than Saratoga or Yorktown. From such an auspicious beginning, it is not unlikely that a system may soon be developed whereby all international questions that can arise among English-speaking people shall admit of settlement by peaceable discussion. It would be one of the most notable things ever done for the welfare of mankind, and it is hoped that the closing years of our century may be made forever illustrious by such an achievement.

Transcriptions

Transcription of the text of paper pricesSTAMP-OFFICE, Lincoln’s-Inn, 1765

A TABLE

Of the Prices of Parchment and Paper for the Service of America.

Paper for Printing

Transcription of the text of Notice BOSTON, September, 27, 1774-

GENTLEMEN,

The committees of correspondence of this and several of the neighbouring towns, having taken into consideration the vast importance of withholding from the troops now here, labour, straw, timber, slitwork, boards, and in short every article excepting provisions necessary for their subsistance; and being under a necessity from their conduct of considering them as real enemies, we are fully satisfied that it is our bounden duty to withhold from them everything but what meer humanity requires; and therefore we must beg your close and serious attention to the inclosed resolves which were passed unanimously; and as unanimity in all our measures in this day of severe trial, is of the utmost consequence, we do earnestly recommend your co-operation in this measure, as conducive to the good of the whole.

We are,Your Friends and Fellow Countrymen,Signed by Order of the joint Committee,William Cooper, ClerkTranscription of the text of King’s ProclamationBy the KING,A PROCLAMATIONFor suppressing Rebellion and Sedition

GEORGE R.

Whereas many of Our Subjects in divers Parts of Our Colonies and Plantations in North America, misled by dangerous and ill-designing Men, and forgetting the Allegiance which they owe to the Power that has protected and sustained them, after various disorderly Acts committed in Disturbance of the Publick Peace, to the Obstruction of lawful Commerce, and to the Oppression of Our loyal Subjects carrying on the same, have at length proceeded to an open and avowed Rebellion, by arraying themselves in hostile Manner to withstand the Execution of the Law, and traitorously preparing, ordering, and levying War against Us. And whereas there is Reason to apprehend that such Rebellion hath been much promoted and encouraged by the traitorous Correspondence, Counsels, and Comfort of divers wicked and desperate Persons within this Realm: To the End therefore that none of Our Subjects may neglect or violate their Duty through Ignorance thereof, or through any Doubt of the Protection which the Law will afford to their Loyalty and Zeal; We have thought fit, by and with the Advice of Our Privy Council, to issue this Our Royal Proclamation, hereby declaring that not only all Our Officers Civil and Military are obliged to exert their utmost Endeavours to suppress such Rebellion, and to bring the Traitors to Justice; but that all Our Subjects of this Realm and the Dominions thereunto belonging are bound by Law to be aiding and assisting in the Suppression of such Rebellion, and to disclose and make known all traitorous Conspiracies and Attempts against Us, Our Crown and Dignity; And We do accordingly strictly charge and command all Our Officers as well Civil as Military, and all other Our obedient and loyal Subjects, to use their utmost Endeavours to withstand and suppress such Rebellion, and to disclose and make known all Treasons and traitorous Conspiracies which they shall know to be against Us, Our Crown and Dignity; and for that Purpose, that they transmit to One of Our Principal Secretaries of State, or other proper Officer, due and full Information of all Persons who shall be found carrying on Correspondence with, or in any Manner or Degree aiding or abetting the Persons now in open Arms and Rebellion against Our Government within any of Our Colonies and Plantations in North America, in order to bring to condign Punishment the Authors, Perpetrators, and Abettors of such traitorous Designs.

Given at Our Court at St. James’s, the Twenty-third day of August, One thousand seven hundred and seventy-five, in the Fifteenth Year of Our Reign.

God save the KingLONDON:Printed by Charles Eyre and William Strahan, Printers to theKing’s most Excellent Majesty. 1775Transcription of A Page from “COMMON SENSE”

The Sun never shined on a cause of greater worth. ’Tis not the affair of a City, a County, a Province or a Kingdom; but of a Continent – of at least one eight part of the habitable Globe. ’Tis not the concern of a day, a year, or an age; posterity are virtually involved in the contest, and will be more or less affected even to the end of time by the proceedings now. Now Is the seed-time of Continental union, faith and honor. The least fracture now, will be like a name engraved with the point of a pin on the tender rind of a young oak; the wound will enlarge with the tree, and posterity read it in full grown characters.

By referring the matter from argument to arms, a new æra for politics is struck – a new method of thinking hath arisen. All plans, proposals, &c. prior to the 19th of April, i. e. to the commencement of hostilities, are like the almanacks of the last year; which tho’ proper then, are superseded and useless now. Whatever was advanced by the advocates on either side of the question then, terminated in one and the same point, viz. a union with Great-Britain; the only difference between the parties, was the method of effecting it; the one proposing force, the other friendship: but it hath so far happened that the first hath failed, and the second hath withdrawn her influence.

As much hath been said of the advantages of reconciliation, which like an agreeable dream, hath passed away, and left us as we were, it is but right that we should examine the contrary side of the argument, and enquire into some of the many material injuries which these Colonies sustain, and always will sustain, by being connected with, and dependant on Great-Britain. – To examine that connection and dependance, on the principles of nature and common sense, to see what we have to trust to if separated, and what we are to expect if dependant.

Transcription of the text of Clark’s Letter

Colonel Clarks Compliments to Mr Hamilton and begs leave to inform him that Col. Clark will not agree to any other Terms than that of Mr Hamilton’s Surendering himself and Garrison, Prisoners at Discretion.

If Mr Hamilton is Desirous of a Conferance with Col. Clark he will meet him at the Church with Captn Helms.

Feb 24th 1779 Geo Clark

1

See my Critical Period of American History, chap. i.

2

In his account of the American Revolution, Mr. Lecky inclines to the Tory side, but he is eminently fair and candid.

3

On the pedestal of this statue, which stands in front of the North Bridge at Concord, is engraved the following quotation from Emerson’s “Concord Hymn: " —

By the rude bridge that arched the flood,Their flag to April’s breeze unfurled,Here once the embattled farmers stood,And fired the shot heard round the world.

The poet’s grandfather, Rev. William Emerson, watched the fight from a window of the Old Manse.

4

It was in this church on March 23, 1775, that Patrick Henry made the famous speech in which he said, “It is too late to retire from the contest. There is no retreat but in submission and slavery. The war is inevitable, and let it come! The next gale that sweeps from the north will bring to our ears the clash of resounding arms! I know not what course others may take, but as for me, give me liberty or give me death.”

5

In the letter, of which a facsimile is here given, Allen gives the date of the capture of Ticonderoga as the 11th, but a minute survey of the contemporary newspaper and other sources of information makes it clear that this must be a slip of the pen. In his personal “Narrative,” Allen gives the date correctly as the 10th.

6

This sketch was made on the spot for Lord Rawdon, who was then on Gage’s staff. The spire in the foreground is that of the Old West Church, where Jonathan Mayhew preached; it stood on the site since occupied by Dr. Bartol’s church on Cambridge Street, now a branch of the Boston Public Library. Its position in the picture shows that the sketcher stood on Beacon Hill, 138 feet above the water. The first hill to the right of the spire, on the further side of the river, is Bunker Hill, 110 feet high. The summit of Breed’s Hill, 62 feet high, where Prescott’s redoubt stood, is nearly hidden by the flames of burning Charlestown. At a sale of the effects of the Marquis of Hastings, descendant of Lord Rawdon, this sketch was bought by my friend Dr. Thomas Addis Emmet.

7

[Of a family always prominent in Rhode Island, he had early come to be the most admired and respected citizen of the colony. His father, a narrow-minded Quaker, though rich in lands, mills, and iron forges, was adverse to education, and kept his son at work in the forges. But the son had an intense thirst for knowledge, and, without neglecting his duties, he bought books and became well versed in history, philosophy, and general literature.]

8

The first stage was the change from the solid red of the British ensign to the alternate red and white stripes, as seen in the flag on the right, which typified the thirteen confederated colonies. After allegiance to the British crown had been thrown off, the union of red St. George and white St. Andrew crosses upon the blue corner became inappropriate, and in June, 1777, Congress substituted the circle of thirteen white stars on a blue ground, to signify the rise of a new constellation of states.

9

Jonathan Trumbull, Governor of Connecticut, was a graduate of Harvard in 1737, in the same class with Hutchinson. Washington used to call him “Brother Jonathan.” He was father of John Trumbull, the famous painter.

10

This view is taken from the Hudson river, and shows Fort George at the extreme right. The street facing upon the river was Greenwich Street, from which the descent to the water was abrupt. The cliff-like look of the banks has since been destroyed by the addition of new land sloping gently down to the water level at West Street. The church most conspicuous in the picture is the old Trinity, which was burned in 1776.

11

This is a contemporary view of the road by which Howe advanced upon Sullivan’s rear.

12

I leave this as I wrote it in June, 1883. Since then another version of the facts has been suggested by W. L. Stone in Appleton’s Cyclopædia of American Biography. In this version, Mr. Jones sends a party of Indians under the half-breed Duluth to escort Miss McCrea to the camp, where they are to be married by Mr. Brudenell, the chaplain. It is to be quite a fine little wedding, and the Baroness Riedesel and Lady Harriet Ackland are to be among the spectators. Before Duluth reaches Mrs. McNeil’s house, the Wyandot Panther (here known by the name of a different beast, Le Loup) with his party attacks the house and carries off the two ladies. The Panther’s party meets Duluth’s near the spring. Duluth insists upon taking Jenny with him, and high words ensue between him and the Panther, until the latter, in a towering rage, draws his pistol and shoots the girl. This version, if correct, goes some way toward reconciling the legend with the observed facts.

13

This contemporary British caricature represents the new allies, “Noble Pair of Brothers,” George III. and an Indian chief, seated together at their cannibal banquet. It expresses the lively disgust with which the employment of Indians was regarded in England.

14

In the spring of 1776 Lee had written to Edward Rutledge: “By the eternal God! If you do not declare yourselves independent, you deserve to be slaves!” In several such letters Lee had fairly bellowed for independence.

15

Things seemed to be getting into somewhat the condition contemplated in the satirical print of “The Man in the Moon,” which appeared as frontispiece to a tract published in London in 1776, entitled “A Plea of the Colonies on the Charges brought against them by Lord Mansfield and others.” The Man in the Moon is George III. looking through a telescope held by his Tory chief justice, whose sleeve shows the Scotch plaid of Clan Murray. He looks upon a reversed and topsy-turvy world, in which New York (whose true latitude is nearly the same as that of Naples) appears farther north than London, and America is east of Europe. The American coast is covered with vast armies, and the whole British fleet is on its way thither, leaving England exposed to the attack of a French host gathered at Dunkirk. Meanwhile the Gallic cock crows lustily, and the sketchy outline of Great Britain indicates that the artist supposes the island “may be so far wasted before the year 1800, that people will hardly know where the nation resided that was once so formidable.” See Tracts 985, Harvard University Library.

16

“This episode appears to me the most criminal in the whole reign of George III., and in my own judgment it is as criminal as any of those acts which led Charles I. to the scaffold.” Lecky, History of England in the Eighteenth Century, vol. iv. p. 83.

17

As usual in such cases, there is a great diversity of testimony as to what was said. In my first edition I gave the familiar story of which there is a meagre version in Bancroft and a much fuller one in Irving: “What is the meaning of all this?” etc.; but I suspect that story is much too literary. It is not likely that any such conversation occurred at such a moment. A young sergeant, Jacob Morton, was standing close by when Washington met Lee. This Morton, who afterward became a major, was noted for accuracy and precision of statement. In 1840 he gave his account of the affair to Mr. Harrison Robertson, of Charlottesville, Virginia; and in 1895 Mr. Robertson kindly wrote out for me his recollection of that account. According to Morton, Washington simply shouted, “My God! General Lee, what are you about?” This has the earmark of truth. Another account, traceable to Lafayette and likewise probable, says that as Washington swept furiously past and away, he ejaculated with bitter emphasis, “Damned poltroon!”

18

Such was Steuben’s own testimony on the court-martial. Lee was so enraged by it as to make reflections upon Steuben which presently called forth a challenge from that gentleman. (Lee Papers, iii. 96, 253.) It is to be regretted that we have not the reply in which Lee declined the encounter. There is a reference to it in a letter from Alexander Hamilton to Baron von Steuben, a fortnight after the challenge: “I have read your letter to Lee with pleasure. It was conceived in terms which the offence merited, and, if he had any feeling, must have been felt by him. Considering the pointedness and severity of your expressions, his answer was certainly a very modest one, and proved that he had not a violent appetite for so close a tête-à-tête as you seemed disposed to insist upon. His evasions, if known to the world, would do him very little honour.” Upon what grounds Lee refused to fight with Steuben, it is hard to surmise; for within another week we find him engaged in a duel with Colonel Laurens, as will presently be mentioned in the text.

19

Washington’s Writings, ed. Ford, vii. 90.

20

“I never saw the General to so much advantage… A general rout, dismay, and disgrace would have attended the whole army in any other hands but his. By his own good sense and fortitude he turned the fate of the day… He did not hug himself at a distance, and leave an Arnold to win laurels for him; but by his own presence he brought order out of confusion, animated his troops, and led them to success." —Hamilton to Boudinot, 5 July, 1778. Observe the well-timed sneer at Gates. Boudinot answers, “The General I always revered and loved ever since I knew him, but in this instance he rose superior to himself. Every lip dwells on his praise, for even his pretended friends (for none dare to acknowledge themselves his enemies) are obliged to croak it forth." —Boudinot to Hamilton, 8 July, 1778.

21

He has been sometimes described incorrectly as a half-breed, and even as a son of Sir William Johnson. His father was a Mohawk, of the Wolf clan, and son of one of the five chiefs who visited the court of Queen Anne in 1710. The name is sometimes wrongly written “Brandt.” The Indian name is pronounced as if written “Thayendanauga,” with accent on penult. Brant was not a sachem. His eminence was personal, not official. See Morgan, League of the Iroquois, p. 103.

22

It has been shown that on this occasion Thayendanegea did what he could to restrain the ferocity of his savage followers. See Stone’s Life of Brant, i. 379-381. It has more lately been proved that Thayendanegea commanded only his own Mohawks at Cherry Valley, and the atrocities were committed chiefly by Senecas under the command of Sayenqueraghta. See Molly Brant’s letter in Hayden’s The Massacre of Wyoming, Wilkes-Barré, 1895, p. xxiv.

23

Cannon were wheeled on the solid ice from Staten Island to the city. See Stone’s Life of Brant, ii. 54.

24

In a paper read before the Maryland Historical Society. See, also, his Logan and Cresap, Albany, 1867. The story is well told by Mr. Theodore Roosevelt, in his admirable book, The Winning of the West, New York, 1889. Though I leave the present chapter mainly as it was written in 1883, I have, in revising it for publication, derived one or two valuable hints from Mr. Roosevelt’s work.

25

This point has been well elucidated by Mr. Roosevelt in his Winning of the West, vol. i. pp. 240, 306.

26

See my Critical Period of American History, chap. i.

27

“The conduct of the Americans upon this occasion was highly meritorious: for they would have been fully justified in putting the garrison to the sword: not one man of which was put to death but in fair combat.” Stedman’s History of the American War, London, 1794, vol. ii. p. 145. This remark seems to bear unconscious testimony to the somewhat higher degree of humanity which American civilization had reached as compared with civilization in Europe. According to the usage inherited from the so-called ages of chivalry, it was deemed proper to massacre a captured garrison as a “punishment” calculated to deter commanders from wasting lives in trying to defend indefensible places. In the thirteenth article of the international agreement proposed in the Brussels Conference of 1874, such slaughter is called “murder,” and is strictly prohibited; it would not now be tolerated by public opinion anywhere in Europe outside of Turkey. In our Revolutionary War the garrison of Fort Washington was threatened with slaughter by General Howe, but the threat was not carried out. (See above, vol. i. p. 230.) At the capture of Fort Griswold, Sept. 6, 1781, the massacre of the surrendered garrison has always been rightly regarded as a foul blot upon the British record. Mr. Lecky more than once recognizes the humanity of the Americans, and pronounces them superior in this respect to the British. (History of England in the Eighteenth Century, iv. 145, and elsewhere.) Care must be taken, however, in the interests of historic truth, not to press this opinion too far. A great deal of fustian has been written about the “barbarities” of the British soldiers in the Revolutionary War. John Adams compared those honourable and kindly gentlemen, the brothers Howe, with such wretches as Borgia and Alva, and suggested that “medals in gold, silver, and copper ought to be struck in commemoration of the shocking cruelties, the brutal barbarities, and the diabolical impieties of this war; and these should be contrasted with the kindness, tenderness, humanity, and philanthropy which have marked the conduct of Americans toward their prisoners.” (Familiar Letters of John Adams and his Wife, p. 266.) The spirit of this quotation pervades the late George Bancroft’s narrative of the Revolution, and fills it with a carping animosity that is simply silly. In point of fact there was no strongly marked difference between British and Americans in respect of humanity. Much has been said about the horrors of the British prison-ships in New York harbour and elsewhere (see Greene’s Historical View, p. 351); but the horrors of the old Newgate prison near Granby, in my native state of Connecticut, were even worse (see Phelps’s History of the Newgate Prison), and the prisons of Massachusetts were not much better. Honest men unable to pay their debts were thrown into these frightful dungeons and treated as brutally as ever the British treated their prisoners of war.