CHAPTER II.

THE CONFLICT PRECIPITATED.

BY JUSTIN WINSOR,

_The Editor_.

"YOU must be firm, resolute, and cautious; but discover no marks

of timidity", wrote one from London to James Bowdoin, February 20,

1774.[324] Firm, resolute, cautious, but bold! This was the impelling

spirit of the hour. Hutchinson was at the same time writing to

Dartmouth that anarchy was likely to increase, till point after

point was carried, and every tie of allegiance was severed.[325]

Indications were increasing that the conflict of argument and the

burst of political passion were before long to give way to the trial

of force, and to the inevitable severing of friends which a resort to

arms would entail. All this was prefigured on the first of June, 1774,

when Hutchinson, bearing with him the addresses of his admirers,[326]

left his house on Milton Hill forever, and walked along the road,

bidding his neighbors good-bye at their gates; when, as he approached

Dorchester Neck, he got into his carriage, which had followed him, and

was driven to the point, where he took boat, was conveyed to a frigate,

and in a short time was passing out by Boston light, leaving behind the

line of ships at their moorings, which, with shotted guns, marked the

beginning of the Boston blockade. That severing of friends and that

threat of war was at that moment, away off in Virginia, accompanied

by the tolling of bells out of sympathy for Boston. The Massachusetts

yeomanry had not yet openly seized the musket, but their tribune, Sam.

Adams, a few days later, turned the key upon the governor's secretary

in Salem, when that officer was sent to dissolve the assembly. It was

then that Adams and his associates proceeded to pass votes, with no

intention of submitting them to the executive approval,—the beginning

of the end, which we have seen Hutchinson but a few months before had

anticipated. Between the upper and the nether mill-stone, between the

patriots of Massachusetts and the Tories of Parliament, the charter

of William and Mary was rapidly crushed. Parliament determined that

all power should come from them, and the province leaders determined

otherwise. So the distribution of authority provided under the charter

ceased. The rival powers in and around Boston could not long abstain

from force. Each watched the other, in the hopes of a pretext to be

beforehand, without being the aggressor.

[Illustration]

On the first of July, 1774, when Hutchinson, in London, was convincing

the king that the ministry's aggressive measure was going to bring the

recalcitrant Bostonians to terms, Admiral Graves, in his flag-ship,

was entering Boston harbor, and new regiments soon followed in their

transports. Presently one could count thirty ships of war at their

moorings before the town, and the morning drum-beats summoned to the

roll-call strong garrisons at Castle William, in Boston itself, and

at Salem, now the capital. It was known that arms were stopped, if

any one tried to carry them from Boston; and it soon became evident

to Gage that it was best to concentrate his force, for he removed his

headquarters from Danvers[327] to Boston, and thither his two regiments

followed him. Perhaps he had heard of the enthusiasm of a certain young

officer, whom he had seen twenty years before, saving all that was

saved, on Braddock's bloody day; and how, surviving for the present

crisis, he had just declared, in distant Virginia, that he was ready

to raise, subsist, and march a thousand men to Boston. Gage must have

known George Washington quite as well as the Bostonians did, who were,

it is to be feared, better prepared on their part to look upon Israel

Putnam, as he marched into town from Connecticut with a drove of sheep

for the hungered populace, as a greater hero than the Virginian colonel.

September came in, and it did not look as if the conflict could be put

off longer.[328] On the first of that month Gage sent a detachment to

the Powder House beyond Quarry Hill, in the present Somerville, and it

brought away ammunition and cannon and took them to the castle.

[Illustration: NOTICE OF THE COMMITTEE OF CORRESPONDENCE.

From an original in the volume of _Proclamations_, etc., in the library

of the Mass. Hist. Society.]

News of the inroad spread, and on the next day crowds gathered

in Cambridge with arms in their hands. They assembled before

Lieutenant-Governor Oliver's house[329] and forced him to resign.

Joseph Warren, in Boston, heard of the tumult and hastened to the spot.

His influence prevailed, and the sun went down without the shedding of

blood. It was ominous, however, to Gage, and he set to work rebuilding

the old lines across Boston Neck, and constructing barracks. He soon

encountered difficulties. Somehow laborers could not be hired, nor

provisions be bought. Somehow his freight-barges sunk, his carts of

straw got on fire, his wagons were sloughed; and somehow, with all his

vigilance, a few young men made up for the loss of the powder-house

pieces by stealthily carrying off by night some cannon from

Boston,[330] besides some others from an old battery in Charlestown.

It was soon found that the men on the Neck lines needed protection,

and Admiral Graves tried to send up a sloop of war into the South bay

to enfilade the road from Roxbury, if occasion came; but her draught

was too much, and so he employed an armed schooner. By November the

works were finished. Warren thought them as formidable as Gage could

make them, but the old Louisbourg soldiers laughed at them and called

them mud walls.

Meanwhile, in October, the military spirit was taking shape throughout

the province. On the 5th the legislative assembly, which had met at

Salem on Gage's call, though he sought to outlaw them by rescinding

(September 28) his precept, had declared his attempted revocation

without warrant in law, and had resolved itself into a provincial

congress. The body then adjourned to meet in Concord, where, under

John Hancock's presidency, they appointed a Committee of Safety

to act as the executive of the province, and chose three general

officers,—Preble,[331] Ward, and Pomeroy. The militia was organized,

and minute-men were everywhere forming into companies. Gordon tells how

the country was astir with preparations. Connecticut was not far behind

in ordering her militia to be officered, and in directing her towns to

double their stock of ammunition, while she voted to issue £15,000 in

paper money,—the first of the war.

"An armed truce", wrote Benjamin Church, "is the sole tenure by which

the inhabitants of Boston possess life, liberty, and property." Away

from Boston, the towns made common cause. "Liberty and Union" was to

be read on a flag flying in Taunton. When news of these and similar

events reached England, Lord North told Hutchinson that, for aught he

could see, it must come to violence, with consequent subjection for the

province.[332] When such tidings reached Virginia it found her officers

just sheathing their swords after their conflict with the Indians in

the mountains, and resolving next to turn their weapons against the

oppressors of America. Gage, in Boston, whom Warren really felt to

be honest and desirous of an accommodation, was awaking to a juster

measure of the task of the ministry, which might, he said, require

20,000 troops to begin with. As he pondered on such views, he might

have heard, on the evening of the 9th of November, 1774, the ringing

of the bells which greeted the return of Sam. Adams and his colleagues

from the Philadelphia congress. Shortly after the middle of the month

the British in Boston went into winter quarters.[333] So November

passed;—the Committee of Safety had arranged to raise and support

an army, and the recommendation of the Continental Congress had been

approved.

December came. Boston was not yet burned, as some in London believed it

was when Quincy heard them laying wagers in the coffee-houses,[334] and

if Sam. Adams was not the first politician in the world, as others told

the same ardent young Bostonian, he was sharing conspicuous honors at

home, with his distant kinsman, John Adams. The latter, as Novanglus,

in his public controversy with the unknown Massachusettensis, was just

attracting renewed attention. But that sturdy patriot, while he was

arguing in public, was comforting himself in private by reckoning that

Massachusetts could put 25,000 men in the field in a week; and New

England, he counted, had 200,000 fighting men, "not exact soldiers",

he confessed, "but all used to arms."[335] Tidings were coming in

which told how this warlike spirit might be tested. Governor Wanton,

of Rhode Island, had spirited away from the reach of the British naval

officers forty-four cannon, which were at Newport. Paul Revere had

gone down to Portsmouth and harangued the Sons of Liberty, till they

invaded Fort William and Mary and (December 14, 1774) carried off the

powder and cannon.[336] From Maryland, where they had lately been

burning a tea-ship,[337] the word was that its convention had ordered

the militia to be enrolled. From Pennsylvania it appeared that Thomas

Mifflin was conspicuous among the Quakers in advocating the measure

of non-intercourse. From South Carolina the news was halting. Could

her rice-planters succeed in getting their product excepted from such

a plan? They did. Gage had some time before[338] written to Dartmouth

that they were as mad in the southern Charlestown as in northern

Boston; and when one of their Tory parsons had intimated that clowns

should not meddle with politics, they had been as fiery as they could

have been in Massachusetts.[339] Gordon, of Jamaica Plain, in appending

notes to a sermon which he had just preached on the Provincial

Thanksgiving of December 15, 1774, refers to the brave lead of Virginia

in the present time, as nine years before she had been foremost in

the stamp-act time.[340] Governor Dunmore was reporting to Dartmouth

(December, 1774) that every county in Virginia was arming a company of

men, to be ready as occasion required.

John Adams, at Philadelphia, read to Patrick Henry from a paper of

Joseph Hawley, that the result of the action of the ministry rendered

it necessary to fight. "I am of that man's opinion", replied the

ardent Virginian.[341] With the new year (1775) that opinion was

becoming widespread. _Ames' Almanac_ (1775), published in Boston, was

printing, for almost every family in New England to read, "a method for

making gunpowder", so that every person "may easily supply himself with

a sufficiency of that commodity." Day by day news came to Boston from

every direction of the indorsement of Congress, and of the wild-fire

speed of the dispersion of the military spirit. Those who remembered

the 40,000 men who marched towards Boston at the time of the D'Anville

scare, thirty years before, said the enthusiasm then was nothing like

the present. Somehow Gage began to feel more confident. He had in

January 3,500 men in his Boston garrison, and almost as many more were

expected, and he did not hesitate to send (January 23) Captain Balfour

and a hundred men, with two cannon, to Marshfield, to protect the two

hundred loyalists there, who had signed the articles by which Timothy

Ruggles was hoping to band the friends of government together, and the

reports which Balfour sent back seemed to satisfy the governor that the

measure was effective.[342]

On the first of February, 1775, the second provincial congress

assembled at Cambridge, and they soon issued a solemn address to

the people, deprecating a rupture, but counselling preparations for

it.[343] It was not then known that Gage had won over Dr. Church, and

that through this professing patriot the British headquarters in Boston

were informed of the doings of congress. Church's defection encouraged

the tories, and on the 6th, handbills appeared in Boston, reminding the

patriots of the fate of Wat Tyler.[344] A few days later Cambridge was

alarmed by the report that troops were coming out of Boston to disperse

them; but the day passed without the proof of it. The Committee of

Safety were anxious, for they knew that the other colonies and their

friends in England were fearful that the conflict would be precipitated

without the consent of congress; and the authority of congress was

now so dominant that its cognizance of such measures was essential to

the continuance of the sympathy with Massachusetts which now existed.

No one at this time was more solicitous for this prudent measure than

Joseph Hawley, and no one in Massachusetts had a steadier head. On the

18th Peter Oliver wrote from Boston to London: "Great preparations on

both sides for an engagement, and the sooner it comes the better."[345]

"Every day, every hour widens the breach!" wrote Warren to Arthur Lee,

two days later.[346] Already the provincial congress had conferred

on the Committee of Safety (February 9) the power to assemble the

militia, and John Thomas and William Heath had been added to the

general officers. The committee, on the 21st, had voted to buy supplies

for 15,000 men, including twenty hogsheads of rum. On the same day Sam.

Adams and Warren signed a letter to the friends of liberty in Canada,

and secret messengers were already passing that way. Presently, on the

26th, the impending conflict was once more averted.

Colonel David Mason, of Salem, had been commissioned by the Committee

of Safety as an engineer, and was now at work in that town mounting

some old cannon which had been taken from the French. Gage heard of it,

and by his orders a transport appeared at Marblehead, with about 300

men under Lieutenant-Colonel Leslie, who rapidly landed and marched

his men to Salem. Their purpose was seasonably divined; the town was

aroused, and, in the presence of a mob, the commander thought it safer

to turn upon his steps.[347] A British officer, Colonel Smith, with

one John Howe, was at about the same time sent out in disguise to

scour the country towards Worcester, and pick up news for Gage;[348]

and two others, Brown and Bernière, were a few weeks later prowling

about Concord.[349] The patriots did not scour for news. It came in

like the wind,—now of county meetings, now of drills, now of Colonel

Washington's ardor in Virginia, and now of Judge Drayton's charge to

the grand jury in Carolina.

[Illustration: ROADS OF ROXBURY AND BEYOND.

Sketched from a MS. map in the library of Congress, which is apparently

one of the maps made by Gage's secret parties of observation.]

Early in March came the anniversary of the Boston massacre. Two days

before, Judge Auchmuty, in Boston, wrote to Hutchinson: "I don't see

any reason to expect peace and order until the fatal experiment of arms

is tried.... Bloodshed and desolation seem inevitable."[350] While this

tory was writing thus, the patriots, in a spirit that somewhat belied

their professed wish to avoid a conflict, were arranging for a public

commemoration of the massacre. It could have been omitted without any

detriment to the cause, and to observe it could easily have begotten

trouble amid the inflamed passions of both sides. "We may possibly be

attacked in our trenches", said Sam. Adams. It little conduced to peace

that Joseph Warren was selected to deliver the address, which, as the

fifth came on Sunday, was delivered on Monday, the sixth. The concourse

of people suggested to Warren to enter the Old South meeting-house,

where the crowd was assembled, by a ladder put against a window in

the rear of the pulpit. Forty British officers were present, and the

moderator offered them front seats, and some of the officers placed

themselves on the pulpit stairs. A contemporary story says that it was

a set purpose of the officers to break up the meeting,[351] and that

one of them took an egg in his pocket, to be thrown at the speaker for

a signal. This man tripped as he entered the building, and the egg

was broken before its time. Another officer, below the desk, held up

some bullets in his open palm as Warren warmed in his eloquence. The

speaker quietly dropped his handkerchief on the leaden menace, and went

on. So the meeting came to an end, with no outbreak; though there was

some hissing and pounding of canes when the vote of thanks was put.

As the crowd came out of the meeting-house there was an apprehensive

moment,[352] for the Forty-third Regiment chanced to be passing, with

beating drums, and for an instant the outcome was uncertain.[353]

Gage had suffered the commemoration to pass without recognition, but

ten days later his officers made the event the subject of a provoking

burlesque, when Dr. Thomas Bolton delivered from the balcony of the

British Coffee House in King Street a mock oration in ridicule of

Warren, Hancock, and Adams.[354] There was no knowing what purpose this

ridicule might mask; and a committee of the patriots, mostly mechanics,

were constantly following the progress of events, meeting secretly

at the Green Dragon[355] for consultation, and setting watches at

Charlestown, Cambridge, and Roxbury, to give warning if there were any

signs that the royal troops were preparing to move from the town.

On the 22d March, 1775, the provincial congress assembled again at

Concord, and set to work in organizing their army, and in devising

an address to the Mohawks, with the purpose of securing them to the

patriot side. They also prepared to use the Stockbridge Indians as

mediators with their neighbors, who were already tampered with, as was

believed or alleged, by emissaries from Canada. It was already known

that the people of the New Hampshire Grants were preparing to seize

Ticonderoga as soon as the war-cloud should burst.

[Illustration: BETWEEN BOSTON AND MARLBOROUGH.

Sketched from a MS. map in the library of Congress, which is seemingly

the original or copy of the map made by one of Gage's secret parties

sent to observe the country.]

News sped rapidly by relays of riders. It was not long after Patrick

Henry had said in Virginia, "We must fight; an appeal to arms and

to the God of hosts is all that is left for us",[356] before the

words were familiar in Massachusetts, and John Adams, who knew, said

that Virginia was planting wheat instead of tobacco. At Providence

they were burning tea in the streets, and men went about erasing the

advertisements of the obnoxious herb from the shop-windows. Everywhere

they were quoting the incendiary speech of John Wilkes, the lord mayor

of London, whose retorts upon the ministry were relished as they were

read in the public prints. As if to test whether March should pass

without bloodshed,[357] Gage on the 30th sent Earl Percy out of town

with a brigade, in light marching order, and he went four miles, to

Jamaica Plain, and returned. The minute-men gathered in the neighboring

towns, but no encounter took place.[358]

So April came, with the rattle of the musket still unheard. On the

second day two vessels arrived at Marblehead, bringing tidings that

Parliament had pledged its support to the king and his ministers, and

that more troops were coming. On the 8th a committee reported to the

provincial congress on an armed alliance of the New England colonies,

and messengers were sent to the adjacent governments.[359] Connecticut

responded with equipping six regiments; New Hampshire organized her

forces as a part "of the New England army", and Rhode Island voted to

equip fifteen hundred men. In Virginia it looked for a while as if

the appeal to arms would not be long delayed, for Dunmore fulminated

against their convention; and he even threatened to turn the slaves

against their masters, and he did seize the powder at Williamsburg, of

which the province had small store at best. Calmer counsels prevailed,

and the armed men who had gathered at Fredericksburg dispersed to

reassemble at call.

* * * * *

The contest meanwhile had been precipitated in Massachusetts. The rumor

had already gone to England that it was close at hand. Hutchinson,

in London, on the 10th, when writing to his son in Boston, had said:

"Before this reaches you it will be determined;" and while tidings

of the actual conflict was on the way, Hutchinson learned in London

that Pownall had been prepared by letters from Boston for something

startling.[360] The circle of sympathizers with America were in this

suspense while Franklin was on the ocean, hither bound, and, if we may

believe Strahan, he had left England in a rancorous state of mind,

causing men to wonder what he intended on arriving, whether to turn

general and fight, or to bolster in other ways the spirits of the

rebels.[361] When he arrived the fight had begun.

On the 15th of April the provincial congress had adjourned. On the

16th, Isaiah Thomas spirited his press out of Boston and took it to

Worcester, where, in a little more than a fortnight, the _Massachusetts

Spy_ reappeared.[362] Families, impressed with the forebodings of

the sky, were moving out of town. Samuel Adams and Hancock had been

persuaded to retire to Lexington,[363] to be beyond the grasp of Gage,

who was shortly expected to order the arrest of the patriots, for which

he had had instructions since March 18th.[364] The Boston committee

of observation was watchful. It had noticed that on the 14th the

"Somerset" frigate had changed her moorings to a position intermediate

between Boston and Charlestown, and on the 15th the transports were

hauled near the men-of-war. Notice of these signs was sent to Hancock

and Adams, and preparations were begun for removing a part of the

stores at Concord. When, during the afternoon of the 18th, some of the

precious cannon were trundled into Groton, her minute-men gathered

for a night march to Concord. During that same day Gage sent out from

Boston some officers to patrol the roads towards Concord, and intercept

the patriot messengers, and to discover, if possible, the lurking-place

of Adams and Hancock. In the evening it was observed in Boston that

troops were marching across the Common to the inner bay. William Dawes

was at once dispatched to Concord by way of Roxbury, for the patriot

watch had not been without information before the troops actually

moved. Gordon tells us that they got a warning from a "daughter of

liberty unequally yoked in point of politics", and as Gage's wife was

a daughter of Peter Kemble, of New Jersey, it has been surmised that

the informer may have been one very near to headquarters.[365] Paul

Revere immediately caused the preconcerted signal-light to be set in

a church-tower at the north end of Boston, and crossing the river in

a boat, he mounted a horse on the Charlestown side and started on his

famous midnight ride. It was none too soon. At eleven o'clock eight

hundred men, under Lieutenant-Colonel Smith, were passing over the

back bay in boats to Lechmere Point. Here they landed at half past two

in the morning, and the moon at this hour was well up. They marched

quietly and rapidly, but not unobserved, and when they approached

Lexington Green they found drawn up there a company of minute-men.

Smith had become alarmed when, as he was advancing, he found the

country aroused in every direction, and sent back for reinforcements.

Earl Percy, with the succor, was by some stupidity[366] delayed, and

did not get off from Boston till between nine and ten the next morning,

and he then took the circuitous route by Roxbury and Cambridge.

The critical moment on Lexington Green had then long passed. Major

Pitcairn, who commanded Smith's advance-guard, would not or could

not prevent that fatal volley in the early morning light, by which

several of the small body of provincials were killed before they broke,

while, by a scattering return fire, one or two of the British were

wounded.[367] Smith, without being aware that Hancock and Adams were at

the moment within sound of his musketry, and just then being conducted

farther from his reach, waited while his troops gave three cheers, and

then resumed his march, passing on towards Concord. The provincials

gathered their dead and wounded, and managed as the British passed on

to pick up a few stragglers, the first prisoners of the war.[368]

On the redcoats went as the day broadened.[369] They followed the road

much as it runs to-day, though in places steeps and impediments are

now avoided by a better grade. Their march went by the spots which the

genius of Hawthorne and Emerson have converted into shrines. In the

centre of Concord they halted, while the gathering provincials, who

had retired before them, watched the smoke of devastation. Smith had

detailed two detachments to find and destroy stores. One of these,

sent to Colonel Barrett's, beyond the North Bridge, had some success,

and while it was absent the provincials, now increased in numbers from

the neighboring towns, approached a guard which had been left at the

bridge. Here the British fired at the Americans across the stream, and

the volley being returned, a few were killed on both sides, before the

British guard retreated upon the main body, whither they were soon

followed by the other detachment which was out. Smith took two hours to

gather wagons for his wounded and make preparations for his retreat,

which had now become imperative, for the militia were seen swarming on

the hills.[370] When Smith started he threw out a flanking party on his

left, which followed a ridge running parallel to his march; but when

the sloping of the land compelled the flankers to descend to the level

of the road, the British lost the advantage which the ridge gave them,

and the minute-men, who now began to strike the British line of march

at every angle, waylaid them at cross-roads, and dropped an incessant

fire upon them from copse, hill, and stone wall, until the retreating

troops, impeded with their wounded, and leaving many of their dying

and dead, huddled along the road like sheep beset by dogs. Just on the

easterly outskirts of Lexington they met Percy, whose ranks opened

and received the fugitives; and Stedman, the British historian who

was with Percy, tells us how the weary men hung out their tongues as

they cumbered the ground during their halt. It was near two o'clock,

and Percy planted his cannon to keep his assailants at bay, while his

troops, now about eighteen hundred in number, rested and refreshed

themselves. Before this, his baggage train, which had been delayed in

crossing the bridge from Brighton to Cambridge so as to fall far behind

his hastening column, had been captured, with its guard, by a crowd

of old men some distance below, at Menotomy.[371] When Percy limbered

his pieces and his troops fell again into column, the hovering militia

renewed the assault. As pursuer and pursued crossed West Cambridge

plain the action was sharp. Percy did not dare attempt to turn towards

the boats which Smith had left at Lechmere Point, and any intention he

may have had of halting at Cambridge and fortifying was long vanished.

So he pursued the road which led towards Charlestown Neck. Several

hundred militiamen, who had come up from Essex County,[372] were nearly

in time at Winter Hill to cut the British off in their precipitate

retreat, and "God knows", said Washington, when he learned the facts,

"it could not have been more so." Percy, however, slipped by, and as

darkness was coming on, the fire of the pursuers began to slacken

as they approached Bunker Hill. Here, with the royal ships covering

their flanks, the British halted, and, facing about, formed a line and

prepared to make a stand. General Heath, who during the latter part

of the day had been on the ground, drew off his militia, and at the

foot of Prospect Hill held the first council of war of the now actual

hostilities. Warren, early in the day hastening from Boston across the

river, had galloped towards the scene of conflict. When he encountered

Percy's column on its way out, he seems to have evaded it and joined

General Heath, then taking cross-roads to intercept the pursuing

militia. Heath took the command of the provincials soon after Percy

resumed his march. From this time Warren, as chairman of the committee

in Boston, kept near Heath, for counsel if need be, and Heath says that

on the West Cambridge plain a musket-ball struck a pin from Warren's

earlock.

No one could tell what would happen next, after this suddenly

improvised army had begun to rendezvous that night in Cambridge. As the

straggling parties, in bivouac and in what shelter they could find,

compared experiences and counted the missing, messengers were hurrying

in every direction with the tidings of the war at last begun![373]

On the 20th of April there was much to do beside picking up the dead

that may have been left over night along the road from Concord. The

Committee of Safety[374] were summoning all the towns to send their

armed men to Cambridge.[375] Warren was writing to Gage to beg better

facilities for getting the women and children, with family effects,

out of Boston.[376] These were busy days for that ardent patriot. The

militia were beginning to pour in, and Warren must do the chief work in

reducing the mob to order. Congress comes to Watertown, and Warren, in

the absence of Hancock, must preside. He bids God-speed to Samuel Adams

and John Hancock[377] as they start for the Continental Congress. He

hears with a sinking heart of the vessel which arrived at Gloucester

on the 26th, bringing the body of Josiah Quincy, so lately warm that,

when the tidings reached Cambridge of his death, Warren supposed he had

lived to get ashore.[378]

[Illustration: HEATH'S ACCOUNT OF THE FIGHT AT MENOTOMY.

From a slip of paper in the _Heath Papers_, vol. i. no. 71.]

[Illustration

After a copperplate in _An Impartial Hist. of the War in America_,

Boston, 1784, vol. iii. The background is much the same as that of

a portrait of Washington in the same work, and the print, issued in

Boston, where Heath was well known, shows what kind of effigies then

passed current. A portrait of Heath by H. Williams has been engraved by

J. R. Smith. (_Catal. Cab. Mass. Hist. Soc._, p. 46.) There is extant

a likeness owned by Mrs. Gardner Brewer, of Boston. Cf. _Mem. Hist.

of Boston_, iii. 183. Heath was born in Roxbury, March 2, 1737, and

died Jan. 24, 1814. His service was constant during the war, though

his deeds were not brilliant. He seems conspicuously to have acquired

the regard of Washington; though Bancroft calls him vain, honest, and

incompetent. His papers are in the Mass. Hist. Soc. Cabinet.]

Another day Warren is busy carrying out the behests of the Committee

of Safety respecting their scant artillery. At another time he is

encouraging wagoners to go into Boston to bring out the friends of

the cause and their property; but it was not so easy to get Gage's

permission, and as the tories made a plea that these Boston patriots

were necessary hostages, obstacles were thrown in the way.[379] There

were rumors, too, of an intention of the royal troops once more to

raid upon the country. Only two days after the 19th of April, Ipswich

was wild with such rumors, and the alarm spread to the New Hampshire

line[380] and beyond.[381]

The patriots at Cambridge were not pleased when they found that the

Connecticut assembly had sent a committee to bear a letter from

Governor Trumbull (April 28) and to confer with Gage.[382] There was a

feeling that the time had passed for such things, and Warren wrote (May

2) a letter beseeching the sister colony to stand by Massachusetts,

which elicited from Trumbull a response sufficiently assuring.[383]

[Illustration: Ethan Allen]

Already there was a proposition warlike enough from a Connecticut

captain who had just led his company to Cambridge, and was now urging

the seizure of Ticonderoga and its stores. The proposition was timely.

During the previous winter the patriots had learned that the British

government was intending to separate the colonies by securing the line

of the Hudson.[384] Accordingly the instigator of this counter-movement

was ordered, May 3d, to carry it out, and Benedict Arnold makes his

first appearance in American history. Meanwhile, however, acting upon

hints which Arnold had already dropped before leaving Connecticut, or

perhaps anticipating such hints, some gentlemen in that colony, joining

with others of Pittsfield, in Massachusetts, had gone to Bennington,

where, on the day before Arnold was commissioned, they had been joined

by Col. Ethan Allen. Thus the plan which Arnold had at heart was likely

to be carried out before he could arrive from Cambridge. A few days

later the command of the force which had gathered naturally fell to

Allen as having the largest personal following, and this following was

loyal enough to their leader to threaten to abandon the enterprise if

Arnold, who arrived very soon, should press his rights to the command.

By a sort of compromise, Allen and Arnold now shared amicably the

leadership. Less than a hundred men had reached the neighborhood of

the fort on the morning of May 10, when, in the early dawn, the two

leaders, overpowering the sentinels at the sally-port, reached the

parade-ground with their men, and forced an immediate surrender from

the commandant, still in his night-clothes. Fifty men and nearly two

hundred cannon, and many military stores, were thus promptly and easily

secured. More than a hundred other pieces were added, when, on the

12th, Colonel Seth Warner,[385] with a coöperating detachment, seized

the post at Crown Point, and shortly afterwards Bernard Romans took

possession of Fort George.[386]

[Illustration: RUINS OF TICONDEROGA, 1818.

From a plate in the _Analectic Magazine_ (Philadelphia, 1818). Cf.

views in Lossing's _Field-Book_, and _Harper's Monthly_ (vii. p. 170);

Von Hellwald's _America_, pp. 134, 135.]

On the 14th some of Arnold's belated men reached him with a captured

schooner, which Arnold immediately put to use in conveying a force

by which he surprised the fort at St. John's, on the Sorel, and then

returned to Ticonderoga.[387]

* * * * *

Meanwhile the provincials had begun to use the spade in Cambridge,

and here and there a breastwork appeared.[388] On the 5th of May the

provincial congress pronounced Gage "an unnatural and inveterate

enemy",[389] and issued a precept for a new congress to convene.

[Illustration: ROXBURY LINES.

Follows a contemporary pen-and-ink sketch, showing the American lines

as seen from the British lines on Boston Neck. The original is in the

library of Congress.]

The military anxiety was increasing. Thomas had but 700 men at Roxbury,

which he tried to magnify in the British eyes by marching them in and

out of sight, so as to make the same men serve the appearance of many

more. On the 8th of May there was an alarm that the royal troops were

coming out, and the militia of the near towns were summoned.[390] To

put on an air of confidence, a few days later (May 13), Putnam, from

Cambridge, marched with 2,200 men into Charlestown and out again,

without being molested, though part of the time within range of the

enemy's guns. It was the military assertion of the idea, which the day

before the Watertown congress had expressed, of governing themselves.

"It is astonishing how they have duped the whole continent", wrote

Gage to Dartmouth,[391] and perhaps he had not heard even then of the

last victory of opinion down in Georgia, where parishes of New England

descent were forcing issues with their neighbors.

The Committee of Safety now resolved to remove the live-stock from

the islands in Boston Harbor; and Gage, on his part, determined on

securing some hay on Grape Island, near Weymouth. These counter-forays

led to fighting, and for some weeks the harbor was alive with

skirmishing.[392] Meanwhile the Massachusetts congress had urged

Connecticut to let Arnold bring some of the cannon captured on

Lake Champlain to Cambridge,[393] and the day before the brush

occurred at Grape Island they had delivered (May 20) a commission

as commander-in-chief of the Massachusetts troops to Artemas Ward.

In Boston the remaining loyalists were soon cheered by advices

promising large reinforcements, which they now confidently began to

expect,[394] and the feeling grew apace among the beleaguerers that

a better organization and a closer dependence of the colonies among

themselves were necessary to meet the impending dangers. Dr. Langdon,

the president of Harvard College, in the election sermon[395] on the

day when the new provincial congress met (May 31), had recognized

the general obedience which was already paid to the advice of the

Continental Congress. There were not a few who remembered how, twenty

years before, the young Virginian, Colonel George Washington, had come

to Boston, and who recalled the good impression he had made. They had

heard lately of the active interest and sympathy with the patriots'

cause which he was manifesting among his neighbors in that colony. On

the 4th of May, Elbridge Gerry, with the approval of Warren, wrote to

the Massachusetts delegates at Philadelphia, that they would "rejoice

to see this way the beloved Colonel Washington" as generalissimo.[396]

This was the feeling, while the army which lay about Boston was a mere

inchoate mass, far from equal to the task which they had undertaken;

but brave words did much; brave spirits did more; and John Adams

was writing from Philadelphia that one "would burst to see whole

companies of armed Quakers in that city, in uniforms, going through

the manual."[397] The tories in Boston looked on with mingled fear and

confidence. "We are daily threatened", wrote Chief-justice Oliver from

Boston (June 10), "with an attack by fire-rafts, whale-boats, and what

not."[398]

[Illustration: WARREN'S LAST NOTE.

The original is among the Heath Papers (Mass. Hist. Soc.), and is given

in fac-simile in Frothingham's _Warren_, p. 506; and reduced (as above)

in G. A. Coolidge's _Brochure of Bunker Hill_, p. 34.]

One of the new British generals now lent his literary skill to his

commanding general, for Burgoyne was a playwright and had an easy way

of vaporing, which was quite apparent in Gage's proclamation of June

12,[399] to warn the rebellious and infatuated multitudes, and to hold

out forgiveness to all but Samuel Adams and John Hancock.[400] The

provincial congress, through Warren, prepared a counter-manifesto, but

events were rushing too speedily to leave time for its publication. On

the very day of issuing his proclamation Gage wrote to Dartmouth that

he was intending to attack the rebels, "which every day becomes more

necessary."[401]

[Illustration: NOTICE TO THE MILITIA.

After an original in the volume of _Proclamations_ in the library of

the Mass. Hist. Society.]

On the 14th Warren was made the second major-general of the

Massachusetts forces, and his active spirit gave encouragement, since

the inalertness of Ward was creating much concern. Early in the

morning of the 17th Warren left Watertown, and the provincial congress

convened without him, but they knew the emergency. A broadside exists

of this day, in which they call upon the neighboring militia to hold

themselves in readiness. In the anxious hours of this, St. Botolph's

day,[402] with all eyes on Boston, the Continental Congress had chosen

Washington to be their military chief,[403] and had adopted the forces

which were about to show that Boston was not besieged idly. It took

time then for Cambridge to know what was happening in Philadelphia;

but the assembled legislators at Watertown might well hope for what had

really happened, when, as the fateful day wore on, messengers arrived,

declaring that the Continental funds were to be used to help supply

this beggared army, and that all the aspirations of its provincial

congress to set up a civil government of their own had met the approval

of the continent.[404]

Now to look at the military situation. Already John Thomas, a physician

of Kingston, had been made second in command under Ward; and Richard

Gridley, an old Louisbourg artilleryman, had been made chief engineer.

As yet the New England colonies were the only ones which had sent

their armed men to the scene. The Massachusetts men had taken post

mostly at Cambridge, near the college; and here, as the days went on,

came also a Connecticut regiment under Israel Putnam, who had left

his plough in its furrow. So, as June began, there had assembled on

this side of Boston between seven and eight thousand men, eager, but

poorly equipped, and with a small supply of powder. On the Roxbury

side, fronting the British lines on Boston Neck, there were about four

thousand Massachusetts men, under John Thomas, supported by a camp

a little farther out, at Jamaica Plain, to which Joseph Spencer had

come with another Connecticut regiment, and Nathanael Greene, with a

body of Rhode Islanders. Thomas had some field-pieces and a few heavy

cannon, and his force constituted the army's right wing. Its left wing

was upon the Mystick at Medford, and near Charlestown Neck, and here

were the New Hampshire men, and among their officers the old Indian

fighter, John Stark, was conspicuous. Three companies of Massachusetts

men constituted the extreme left at Chelsea. So, as the summer came

on, perhaps about 16,000 men in all were encamped as a fragile army

besieging Boston. General Ward exercised by sufferance a superior

authority over all, though as yet no colony but New Hampshire had

instructed its troops to yield him obedience. As Massachusetts claimed

three quarters of the entire force thus drawn together, the assumption

of chief command by her first officer was natural enough in a common

cause.

The force which this sixteen thousand loosely organized men dared to

hold imprisoned in Boston was a well-compacted army of somewhere from

five to ten thousand men, for it is difficult amid conflicting reports

to determine confidently a fixed number. On the 25th of May Gage had

been joined by a reinforcement, accompanied by three other general

officers,—Burgoyne, Clinton, and Howe.

The council of war at Cambridge was meanwhile directing new works

to be constructed, strengthening and stretching their lines of

circumvallation. Its opinions were divided on the question of

occupying so exposed a position as the most prominent eminence on

the peninsula of Charlestown, the defence of which might bring on a

general engagement, which their stock of powder could not support. On

the 13th of June the American commanders had secretly learned that

Gage intended on the 18th to take possession of Dorchester Heights, the

present South Boston. There was but one counter-move to make, and that

was to seize in anticipation the summit of the ridgy height which began

at Charlestown Neck and extended, in varying outline, to the seaward

end of the peninsula,—an eminence known as Bunker Hill. On the 16th of

June, a council of war, held in the house near Cambridge common, known

then as the Hastings and later as the Holmes House,[405] decided, upon

the recommendation of the Committee of Safety, to occupy Bunker Hill at

once.

[Illustration: ORDER OF THE COMMITTEE OF SAFETY.

This has before appeared in G. A. Coolidge's _Brochure of Bunker Hill_,

1875.]

That evening about 1,200 men, of whom 200 were from Connecticut under

Thomas Knowlton, the whole being under the command of Colonel William

Prescott, first listened to a prayer of the president of the college,

and then marched, with their intrenching tools, in the darkness, to

Charlestown Neck.

[Illustration]

Here the purpose was for the first time disclosed to the men. They

resumed their march, going up the slope of the hill before them, while

Nutting's company and a few Connecticut men were sent along the shore

opposite Boston, to patrol it. The highest summit of the hill was the

one first reached; but, after a consultation, it was decided to proceed

to a lower one, more nearly before Boston. Here Richard Gridley marked

out a redoubt, and at midnight the men took their spades and began

to throw up the breastworks. Putnam, who seems to have accompanied

Prescott, now returned to Cambridge, and while the men worked busily,

Prescott sent an additional patrol to the river, and twice went down

himself, to be satisfied, as he heard the "All's well" of the watch on

the men-of-war moored opposite, that no noise of the intrenching tools

had reached the enemy. Soon after the first glimmer of dawn on the

17th, the sailors on the ships discovered the embankments, now about

six feet high, when one of the vessels, the "Lively", at once opened

fire upon them. This lasted only till Admiral Graves could send orders

to cease, but was shortly renewed from the ships and from the batteries

on Copp's Hill, in Boston, as soon as the British generals comprehended

the situation. Prescott's men meanwhile kept at their work. One man

was soon killed by a cannon-ball. The commander and others walked the

parapet, encouraging their men, and Willard, one of the councillors

who stood by Gage as they surveyed the hill through their glasses,

recognized the Pepperell colonel, and told the British general what

sort of man he had got to encounter. A promise had been given to

Prescott that in the morning a relief and refreshments would be sent

from Cambridge; but nothing came to the hungry men, as they still

worked. Ward, who heard the firing, yielded to Putnam's persuasion

to send reinforcement, only so far as to despatch a part of Stark's

regiment, for he feared that Gage would seem to prepare to assault

in Charlestown, while his intention might be to attack in Cambridge.

Finally, about ten o'clock, Major John Brooks[406] reached headquarters

with a request from Prescott for help and food. Richard Devens pressed

Ward to comply, and at eleven the rest of the New Hampshire men were

ordered to march.

[Illustration]

Meanwhile, as the tide rose, some floating batteries were sent up the

stream to take the works in flank, and later, to rake the Neck. A few

stray shots were returned from a single field-piece in the redoubt,

one of whose balls passed over Burgoyne's head, as he tells us, while

he was watching at Copp's Hill. Putnam came again from Cambridge,

and induced Prescott to send off a large number of his men with the

intrenching tools, and under Putnam's direction this detail soon began

to use them in throwing up earthworks on the higher summit in the

rear,—labor wasted, as it turned out.

[Illustration]

As the day wore on, Gage held a council of war, and it was determined

not to land troops at the Neck and attack in rear, as Clinton urged,

but to assault in front. This decision was long the ground of severe

criticism upon Gage, and ruined his military reputation. The ships

were put into better positions, and redoubled their fire. By noon

the British troops in Boston were marching to the wharves, where

they embarked in boats, and, under the command of General Howe, they

rowed to Moulton's or Morton's Point, where the landing was quickly

made.[407] Howe drew up his men on the rising ground which makes the

least of the three heights of the peninsula, and anticipating sharp

work, sent back the boats for more men.

Prescott observed all this from the hill, but looked longingly up the

peninsula for his own reinforcements. A few wagons came, not with men,

but with beer, though nothing adequate even of this. The feeling began

to spread among the men on the hill that they had been treacherously

left to their fate; but they got encouragement from a few brave souls

who came straggling in from Cambridge. Pomeroy, the French war veteran,

was one. James Otis, wreck as he was, came.[408] So did Warren, whose

presence the men recognized by a cheer, and, major-general as he

was, he came to fight under Colonel Prescott. Putnam, too, had again

returned, and was seen riding about the field in a restless way, with

a word of encouragement here and there, and pointing out to a few

reinforcements now arriving where best to go.

[Illustration]

Prescott's eye, observing Howe's dispositions, saw he was aiming to

advance along the Mystick and take the redoubt in reverse. So Knowlton,

with two field-pieces and the Connecticut troops, were sent down the

hill towards the Mystick, where they began to make a line of defence of

a low stone wall, which was topped by a two-rail fence. Stark and Reed,

with the New Hampshire regiments, diminished somewhat by details which

Putnam had taken from them to help the work in the trenches on the

higher hill, soon came up and ranged their men in a line with Knowlton.

There was, however, an interval between this part of the field and

the breastwork and redoubt, which offered a chance for the enemy to

intervene and break the line. An attempt was made to prepare for such a

contingency by grouping the few guns which they had at this point. New

troops, in small numbers, continued to come up, and they were placed in

position as best they could be to keep the line strong in all parts as

it sloped away from the crowning redoubt towards either river.

[Illustration]

It was nearing three o'clock when the British boats returned from

Boston; and when their troops landed Howe had about 3,000 men in array.

He pushed his guns forward and got them in position to play upon the

American field-pieces, and soon drove them away, while at the same

time some skirmishing took place on the British flanks, whose main

body was now advancing in a measured step in two columns: one led by

Howe against the rail-fence, the other by Pigot against the redoubt.

The assault was become one of infantry only, for the British guns

were soon mired in some soft ground, and the balls in reserve had

proved of an over-calibre.[409] Pigot's front got near the redoubt

before the Americans poured in their fire, which was deadly enough to

send the staggered column wildly back. At the same time, along the

Mystick Howe's advance was met by the American field-pieces, some

of which had been drawn to the rail-fence. Their musketry fire was

reserved, as at the redoubt, and when it belched upon the deployed

enemy it produced the same effect. So there was a recoil all along the

British line. In the respite before they advanced again, Putnam tried

to rally some troops in the rear, and to get others across the Neck,

which the raking fire of the British vessels was now keeping pretty

clear of passers.[410] But there was not time to do much, for Howe

was soon again advancing, his artillery helping him more this time;

and to add to the terror of the scene, he had sent word to Boston

to set Charlestown on fire by shells, and the conflagration had now

begun.[411] The smoke did not conceal the British advance,[412] and

Prescott and Stark kept their men quiet till the enemy were near enough

to make every shot tell. The result was as during the first attack. The

royal troops struggled bravely; but all along the line they wavered,

and then retreated more precipitately than before.

There was a longer interval before Howe again advanced, and Prescott

used it in making such a disposition of his men as would be best in a

hand-to-hand fight, for neither adequate reinforcements nor supplies

had reached him, and his powder was nearly gone. There was a good

deal of confusion and uncertainty in the rear, all along the road to

Cambridge. Ward had ordered a plenty of troops forward, but few reached

the peninsula at all, or in any shape for service. Putnam did what he

could to bring order out of confusion; but his restless and brandishing

method, and his eagerness to finish the works on Bunker Hill, were not

conducive to such results as a quiet energy best produces. The brave

men at the front must still do the work left for them, with such chance

assistance as came.

Howe was rallying his men for a third assault. Major Small had landed

400 marines, to make up in part for the losses. Clinton had seen how

confused the troops were as he looked across the river with his glass,

and had hurried over from Boston to render Howe help as a volunteer

aid. The British general determined now to concentrate his attack

upon the works on the crown of the hill, making only a demonstration

against the rail-fence. He brought his artillery to bear in a way that

scoured the breastwork which flanked the redoubt, and then he attacked.

His column reserved their fire and relied on the bayonet. They met

the American fire bravely, but soon perceived that it slackened; and

surmising that the American powder was failing, they took new courage.

Those of the defenders who had ammunition mowed down the assailants

as they mounted the breastworks, Major Pitcairn among them;[413]

but as soon as Prescott saw the defence was hopeless, he ordered a

retreat, and friend and foe mingled together as they surged out of the

sally-port amid the clouds of dust which the trampling raised, for a

scorching sun had baked the new-turned soil. It was now, while the

confused mass of beings rocked along down the rear slope of the hill,

that Warren fell, shot through the head. No one among the Americans

knew certainly that he was dead, as they left him. The British stopped

to form and deliver fire, and there was thus time for a gap to open

between the pursuers and the pursued. The New Hampshire men and others

at the rail-fence, seeing that the redoubt was lost, tenaciously faced

the enemy long enough to prevent Prescott's men from being cut off,

and then stubbornly fell back. Some fresh troops which had come up

endeavored to check the British as they reached the slope which led

to the intrenchments that Putnam had been so solicitous about; but

the British wave had now acquired an impulse which carried it bravely

up the hill; and Putnam, skirring about, was not able to make anybody

stand to defend the unfinished works. So down the westerly slope of

the higher summit to the Neck the provincials fled, and the British

followed. The vessels poured in their fire anew as the huddled runaways

crossed the low land, and not till they got beyond the Neck was there

any effectual movement by fresh troops to cover the retreat. General

Howe fired a few cannon shot after them, as he mustered his forces on

the hill. It was now about five o'clock. There was time in the long

summer's day to advance upon Cambridge, but Howe rejected Clinton's

advice to that end, and began, with other troops which had been sent to

him from Boston, to throw up breastworks on the inland crown of Bunker

Hill. Thus spading for their defence, the British passed the night,

while the Americans lay on their arms on Winter and Prospect hills, or

straggled back to Cambridge. There was no disposition on either side to

renew the fight.

Prescott did not conceal his indignation at not having been better

supported, when he made his report at Ward's headquarters. He knew

he had fought well; but neither he nor his contemporaries understood

at the time how a physical defeat might be a moral victory. Not

knowing this, there was little else than mortification over the

result,—indeed, on both sides. A wild daring had brought the battle

on, and something like bravado had led the British general into a

foolhardy direct assault, while more skilful plans, availing of their

ships, might have accomplished more without the heavy loss which they

had endured.[414] The British folly was increased by the way in which

they allowed the provincials to make the first great fight of the war a

political force throughout the continent.

[Illustration: TRYON'S SEAL AND AUTOGRAPH.

From a plate in Valentine's _N. Y. City Manual_, 1851, p. 420.]

The general opinion seems to be that the Americans had about 1,500 men

engaged at one time, and that from three to four thousand at different

times took some part in it.[415] The British had probably about the

same numbers in all, but were in excess of the Americans at all times

while engaged.[416] The conflict with small arms lasted about ninety

minutes.

On the morning of the 18th of June (Sunday) the British renewed the

cannonading along their lines, as if to cover some movement, but

nothing came of it, and each side used the shovel busily on the

intrenchments. A shower in the afternoon stopped the firing.

* * * * *

[Illustration]

There was a dilemma in New York a few days later. Governor Tryon, who

had been in England, was already in the harbor ready to land on his

return, and Washington was approaching through Jersey on his way to

Boston. It was determined by the city authorities to address and extend

courtesies to both. The American general chanced to be ahead, and got

the parade and fair words first. Tryon disembarked a few hours later,

and received the same tributes.[417]

It was Sunday, June 25, when Washington reached New York. He found the

town excited over the recent battle, the news of which he had met a few

hours out of Philadelphia.[418]

[Illustration: WASHINGTON'S HEADS OF LETTER, JULY 10, 1775.

This is about half of the whole as given in fac-simile in Wilkinson's

_Memoirs_, i. p. 855. The original is now among the Reed-Washington

letters in the Carter-Brown library. It was the basis of Washington's

first formal official letter to the president of Congress, which, as

written out by Joseph Reed, is given in Sparks' _Washington_, iii. p.

17. It shows the degree of attention which the general bestowed on his

minutes for his secretary's use.

Washington, on his first arrival, had taken temporary quarters in the

house of the president of the college, known now as the Wadsworth house

(_Mem. Hist. Boston_, iii. 107; Gay's _Pop. Hist. U. S._, iii. 408),

till the finest house in the town, one of a succession of mansions on

the road to Watertown, was made ready for his use. These houses, which

had all been deserted by their Tory owners, gave the name of Tory Row

to this part of Cambridge. The one assigned to Washington's use was

a Vassall house, later, however, known as the Craigie house, when it

became the property of Andrew Craigie, from whose family it passed to

the ownership of Longfellow, who died in it. Sparks lived in it when

he edited _Washington's Writings_. It is familiar in engravings. Cf.

_Mem. Hist. Boston_, iii. p. 113, with a note on various views of

it; and for its associations, see Samuel Longfellow's _Life of H. W.

Longfellow_; Irving's _Washington_, ii. p. 11; Greene's _Hist. View

of the Amer. Rev._, p. 220; _Manhattan Mag._, i. 119; Mrs. Lamb's

_Homes of America_; Gay's _Pop. Hist. U. S._, iii. 415. Among the other

buildings of Revolutionary associations still standing in Cambridge

are the Brattle house, the headquarters of Mifflin; the Vassall house,

where Dr. Church was confined; the house where Jonathan Sewall lived,

later occupied by General Riedesel; the Oliver house, now owned by

James Russell Lowell; the "Bishop's Palace", where Burgoyne was

quartered; and Christ Church, where Washington attended service (view

in _Mass. Mag._, 1792, and compare Nicholas Hoppin's discourses, Nov.

22, 1857, and Oct. 15, 1861). For more of the historical associations

of these Cambridge sites, see the _Harvard Book_; Drake's _Landmarks

of Middlesex_; the Cambridge _Centennial Memorial_ (1875); William

J. Stillman's _Poetic Localities of Cambridge_ (Boston, 1876); T.C.

Amory's _Old and New Cambridge_; an illustrated paper in _Harper's

Monthly_, Jan., 1876, another by Alexander Mackenzie, in the _Atlantic

Monthly_, July, 1875; _Mass. Hist. Soc. Proc._, June, 1858, and Sept.,

1872; and the book edited by Arthur Gilman, _Theatrum Majorum, The

Cambridge of 1776_, which has an eclectic diary (by Mary W. Greely) of

the siege, purporting to be that of one Dorothy Dudley.]

[Illustration]

Among the letters now passing through New York was one upon that

battle, addressed to the President of Congress, which Washington

took the liberty of opening for his own guidance. After instructing

Schuyler, who was to be left in charge of the forces in New York, to

keep watch upon Tryon[419] and Guy Johnson,[420] Washington the next

day (26th) started for Cambridge. On the 2d of July Washington reached

Watertown, and on the 3d, under a tree still standing,[421] he took

command of the army, which thus passed, in effect, under Continental

control, numbering at the time nearly 15,000 men fit for duty.[422]

To brigade this army, rectify the circumvallating lines, watch the

constant skirmishes, and assign the new bodies of troops arriving to

places in the works, was the labor to which Washington devoted himself

at once. On the 9th of July he held his first council of war,[423] and

on the 10th he addressed his first letter to Congress, describing the

condition of the siege as he had found it.

[Illustration]

To guard against surprise, and replenish the magazines, required

constant diligence, and the supply of powder never ceased to be a cause

of anxiety in the one camp, while the diminishing stock of provisions

produced almost as much concern in Boston. The beleaguered British,

however, got some relief from the exodus of the Boston people, which

the stress of want forced the royal commander to permit.[424] So the

summer was made up of anxious moments. The independent husbandmen

of New England made but intractable raw recruits, and Washington,

who had expected to find discipline equal to that which the social

distinctions of the South gave to the masses there, was disappointed,

and did not wholly conceal his disgust.[425] He grew, however, to

discern that campaigns could produce that discipline as well, if not

better, than a life of civil subservience. Recruits came in from the

South, and when some of the Northern officers saw the kind of men that

Morgan and others brought as riflemen from Virginia, their comment was

scarcely less austere. "The army would be as well off without them",

said Thomas, who, next to Washington, was the best disciplinarian

in the camp. Of the generals, Lee was, however, by much the most

conspicuous. There was a glamour about the current rumors of his

soldierly experience that obscured what might have been told of his

questionable character.[426] His eccentricities were the camp talk,

and rather served to magnify his presence, while it proved dangerous

to perambulate the lines with him and his crowd of dogs, since the

exhibition tempted the enemy to drop their shells in that spot.[427]

Early in July a trumpeter approached the American lines bringing a

letter from General Burgoyne to General Lee, and the camp straightway

proceeded to invest the strange general with political importance.

Burgoyne and Lee were old campaigners together, and Lee, before he

left Philadelphia, had written a stirring letter to the British

general on the bad prospects of the ministerial policy. The letter

which now came was a reply, and proposed a conference on Boston Neck,

to which Congress advised Lee not to accede, and the momentary ripple

subsided.[428]

In August there was some correspondence with Gage respecting the

treatment of prisoners, in which Washington appears to the better

advantage.[429] The correspondence of the American general during

the summer constantly dwells upon the scarcity of powder, though for

prudence' sake he veils his expressions as much as he can. His own

troops and even Congress had no conception of his want, and while

Washington hardly dared fire a salute because of the powder it would

take, Richard Henry Lee, from Philadelphia, was urging him to plant

batteries at the mouth of Boston harbor, and keep the enemy's vessels

from coming in and going out.[430] Governor Cooke, of Rhode Island,

who was doing his best to get powder from Bermuda, was compelled to

keep the secret too. Apparently Washington did not let his brigade

commanders know the whole truth.[431] Under these circumstances

Washington had no courage to attack, and Gage, on his part, was content

to keep his men from deserting as best he could.

During September the threatening manœuvres of the British cruisers

along the Connecticut coast[432] kept Governor Trumbull from sending

what powder he had, and there was little hope, when Washington called a

council of war on the 11th, that anything would come of it. There had

been just then some internal manifestations not very reassuring.[433]

A letter which Dr. Benjamin Church had tried to get to the British

in Newport harbor had been intercepted, and its cypher interpreted.

There was no expressed defection made clear by it, but suspicions were

aroused, and Church, being arrested, was summoned before the congress

at Watertown, where he made a speech protesting his innocence, but

scarcely quieting the suspicions. He was put under control, and removed

from the neighborhood of the army.[434]

There was scarce less gratification in the camp at Cambridge in getting

rid of their doubtful associate than was experienced in Boston in

getting a release from their sluggish general. The ministry had saved

that soldier's pride as much as they could in desiring to have him

nearer at hand for counsel;[435] and the sympathetic loyalists whom he

had befriended paid him their compliments in an address. Gage finally,

on October 10, issued his last order, turning over the command to

Howe.[436]

In the middle of October, the burning of Falmouth, the modern Portland,

in Maine, seemed to make it clear that the war was to be conducted

ruthlessly on the British part. Captain Mowatt, with a small fleet,

had entered the harbor and set the town on fire, and to those who

communicated with him it was said that he announced his doings to

be but the beginning of a course of such outrages. When the news

reached Washington, he dispatched Sullivan to Portsmouth, with orders

to resist as far as he could any similar demonstration there.[437]

What a modern British historian[438] has called a "wanton and cruel

deed" seems to have been but the hasty misjudgment of an inferior

officer, without orders to warrant the act, and the ministry promptly

disowned the responsibility.[439] During October, also, a committee of

Congress,[440] visiting Washington's camp, could see for themselves

the troubles of their heroic commander. They had not yet heard in

Philadelphia the roar of hostile guns,—a sensation they might now

experience. They could share Washington's perplexities as the new

enlistments halted upon the expiration of the old,[441] and perhaps

join in some of his kindly merriment when Phillis Wheatley, the

negress, addressed his Excellency in no very bad verses.[442]

[Illustration: HANDBILL.] [443]

[Illustration: FROM BEACON HILL, 1775, No. 1. (_Looking towards

Dorchester Heights._)]

[NOTE.—This and the three companion sketches are drawn from a

panoramic view in colors, now in the Cabinet of the Mass. Hist. Soc.,

of which a much reduced heliotype is given in the _Mem. Hist. Boston_,

iii. 80. This view is a copy by Lieutenant Woodd of the Royal Welsh

Fusiliers, from the original by Lieutenant Williams, of the same

regiment, which is preserved in the King's Library (Brit. Museum). Cf.

_Mass. Hist. Soc. Proc._, iv. 397, 424; _Mem. Hist. Boston_, iii. 80.

The foreground on the left is the summit of Beacon Hill, not far

from the spot where the State House now stands, though at a level

considerably higher than the present one. Two of the guns now standing

on Cambridge Common were taken from the dock in Boston after the

British evacuated it, and they resemble the cannon here sketched, and

one of them may possibly be that identical gun. The spire at the left

would seem to be that of the First Church, which stood on the present

Washington Street nearly opposite the head of State Street. (Cf. view

of it in _Memorial History of Boston_, ii. 219.) The spire next to the

right must have been that of the Old South Church. That on the extreme

right would seem to be the steeple of the New South (Church Green) in

Summer Street, now disappeared.]

[Illustration: FROM BEACON HILL, 1775, No. 2. (_Looking towards

Roxbury._)

In No. 2 the Hancock House is in the foreground. The earliest sketch

of this house is a very small one, making part of the Price-Faneuil

View of Boston (1743), and its presence in which and other data led

to the suspicion that this 1743 view was from an old plate, which had

been originally cut twenty years earlier, and this was subsequently

proven. Cf. _Mass. Hist. Soc. Proc._, xviii. 68; xxi. 249. The earliest

enlarged view of the house is in the _Mass. Mag._, 1789. Cf. _Mem.

Hist. Bost._, iii. 202. An oil painting, belonging to Mrs. F. E. Bacon,

is on deposit in the halls of the Bostonian Society, where, also, are

some interior views of the house.

The British encampments on Boston Common are indicated in the

foreground at the left. The parallel lines (8) show the neck connecting

Boston with Roxbury. The meeting-house (10) on the distant land is that

of the First Religious Parish in Roxbury, on the site now occupied by

the church near the Norfolk Home. The American fort just beyond (at 11)

was on a rocky summit, where now the stand-pipe of the Cochituate Water

Works is placed.]

[Illustration: FROM BEACON HILL, 1775, No. 3. (_Looking towards

Brookline and the outlet of Charles River._)

No. 3 shows in the foreground the most westerly of the three summits of

Beacon Hill (Louisbourg Square—though much lower, the hill having been

cut down—represents its present site), and the rope walks. There is a

similar water-color drawing among the Peter Force maps and views in the

library of Congress.

The inward curve of the nearer shore on the right of the picture

represents the area now including Cambridge Street and the territory

north of it, below Blossom Street, covering the approaches to the

bridge now leading to Cambridge, the oldest parts of which near the

College are shown at 16; while at 17 we have the American encampments

at Prospect Hill, the modern Somerville. The American works between the

College and Charles River seem to be intended by 15. The mouth of the

river is seemingly indicated by the point of land just below the number

14, which apparently stands for the Brookline fort and its connections,

in the modern Longwood. Between the man in the foreground and the

somewhat abrupt eminence beyond him, was a depression in the outline of

the ridge, not far from the head of the present Anderson Street.]

[Illustration: FROM BEACON HILL, 1775, No. 4. (_Looking towards

Charlestown._)

No. 4 has the Old West Church in the foreground, where Jonathan Mayhew

preached. Its spire was subsequently taken down by the British to

prevent its use as a signal station for the friends of the provincials.

It stood till 1806, when the present edifice was built. (Drake's

_Landmarks_, 374.)

This picture is substantially duplicated on another page, in the Rawdon

view, sketched during the continuance of the battle of Bunker Hill. The

Mount Pisca (Pisgah) at 19 the present Prospect Hill in Somerville.

The lines of Winter Hill and Ploughed Hill would be in the direction

of 20. At 27 is a glimpse of the Mystick River seen beyond Charlestown

Neck, the armed British transport at 16 commanding the road over that

neck. At 22 are the new works of the British, begun after the battle

of Bunker Hill, and shown in the contemporary plan of the Charlestown

peninsula, given on another page, while the British encampment is on

the inner slope of the hill, at 23. Below, and along the shore (24,

24), are indicated the ruins of Charlestown, while the figures 25 mark

the position of the redoubt which was defended by Colonel Prescott and

his men. The house on the hither shore, below the transport, marks

nearly the spot where the present bridge to East Cambridge begins. In

the foreground on the extreme right are somewhat vague indications of

the dam inclosing the mill-pond, in which the present Haymarket Square

occupies a central position.]

Perhaps they may have had the grim satisfaction of riding to distant

parts of the lines in Thomas Hutchinson's coach, kept now for the

general's use, if we may believe the refugee himself.[444]

A little later, Josiah Quincy, who from his house at Braintree could

look out upon the harbor, had been urging Washington to block the

channel, and thus imprison the British ships there at anchor, and

prevent the coming of others. Washington appreciated the motives of

that ardent patriot, but he would have liked better the cannon and

powder that would have rendered the plan feasible.[445] At all events,

the possible chances of the plan made not a very pleasant prospect

for Howe, who had already set his mind—as, indeed, the ministry had

already advised[446]—upon evacuating the town; but his ships were as

yet not sufficient for the task, and hardly sufficient to protect his

supply-boats from the improvised navy which Washington had been for

some time commissioning.[447]

John Adams, in Philadelphia, was getting uneasy over the apparent

inaction of Washington, and wrote in November (1775) to Mercy Warren

that Mrs. Washington was going to Cambridge,[448] and he hoped she

might prove to have ambition enough for her husband's glory to

give occasion to the Lord to have mercy on the souls of Howe and

Burgoyne![449]

The left wing of the beleaguering army was now pushed forward and

occupied Cobble Hill, the site of the present McLean Asylum, and the

two armies watched each other at closer quarters than before, the

almost foolhardy Americans feeling increased confidence when the

fortunate captain of an ordnance brig gave them a supply of munitions.

In December, Massachusetts and New Hampshire[450] promptly supplied the

loss of Connecticut and Rhode Island troops, who were not to be induced

to prolong their enlistments. Washington was cheered with this alacrity

of a portion, at least, of the New England yeomen, and he suffered as

many as he could of those who had come hastily to the camp in the

spring to go home on brief furloughs to make winter provision for their

families. Before the year was out, Congress had authorized Washington

to destroy Boston if he found it necessary. The British general was,

on his part, organizing in that town a Royal Regiment of Highland

Emigrants,[451] and other loyalist battalions, putting Ruggles,

Forrest, and Gorham in command of them.[452]

On the first of January, 1776, the federal flag, with its thirteen

stripes and British Union,[453] was first raised over the American

camp, and their council of war was inspirited to determine upon an

attack, as soon as the chances of success seemed favorable; but the

prudent ones trusted rather to Howe's evacuating through his straits

for provisions, and held back from the final decision. It was not

forgotten that 2,000 men were still without firelocks, and there was

not much powder in the magazines. The total environing army scarce

numbered ten thousand men fit for duty, and they were stretched out in

a long circumvallation, while the enemy could mass at least half that

number on any one point, and had a fleet to sustain them. Howe had not

shown a much more active spirit than Gage had displayed, and there was

a feeling in the British camp that he was too timid for the task,[454]

and there could not have been much hopefulness in seeing so much better

a general as Clinton sent off in January with several regiments, to

join other forces and a fleet on the coast of North Carolina.[455]

Washington meanwhile kept up a show of activity, and when, on the

evening of January 8, he sent Knowlton on a marauding scout into

Charlestown, there was a little flutter of excitement in Boston for

fear it foreboded more serious work, and the British officers were

hastily summoned to their posts from the play-house, where they were

diverting themselves,[456]—the play on this particular occasion being

something they had planned, and called _The Boston Blockade_.

* * * * *

As early as the middle of June, 1775, General Wooster, with some

Connecticut troops, had by invitation of Congress marched to the

neighborhood of New York, to be prepared for any demonstration from

British ships which might attempt to land troops, for the British naval

power was and continued to be supreme in the harbor till Washington

occupied the city.

[Illustration: NOTE.—This broadside, and the opposite one, are given

in fac-similes from copies in the Massachusetts Historical Society's

library, and they pertain to theatrical performances given by the

British officers in Boston during the siege.]

[Illustration]

Before Clinton had left Boston, Washington, under Lee's urgency, had

decided to possess New York, and the plan, which was submitted to

John Adams, as representing the Congress, met with that gentleman's

approval.[457] Lee was accordingly sent into Connecticut to organize

such a force as he could for advancing on that city.[458] He kept

Washington informed of his success in these preliminaries, and finally

reached New York himself on February 4,[459] and here he remained till

it was ascertained that Clinton was proceeding to the South, where

he was instructed to follow that general and confront him as best he

could, as we shall presently see.[460]

The chief event of February, 1776, was the arrival of the cannon

captured at Ticonderoga, and the placing them in the siege batteries

along the American lines, for Washington had dispatched Knox to bring

these much needed cannon to him. John Adams records meeting them on

their way at Framingham, January 25;[461] and when the train of fifty

pieces and other munitions reached the lines, there was something less

of anxiety than there had been before.[462] The army, however, was

still deficient in small arms, and Washington wrote urgently to the New

York authorities for assistance of that kind.[463]

By the first of March powder had been obtained in considerable

quantities, and Washington opened a bombardment from all parts of his

lines, which was deemed necessary to conceal a projected movement.

During the night of March 4-5, General Thomas, from the Roxbury

lines,[464] with 2,500 men, took possession of Dorchester Heights.[465]

It was moonlight, but the men worked on without discovery, and by

morning had thrown up a cover. Both armies now laid plans for battle.

[Illustration: BOSTON.

After a photograph of a view in the British Museum. Cf. similar views

in _Moore's Diary of the Amer. Rev._, i. 97; _Mem. Hist. Boston_,

iii. p. 156; Lossing's _Field-Book_; Grant's _British Battles_, ii.

138. The house in the left foreground is the house built by Governor

Shirley. It is still standing, but much changed. See a view of it in

the frontispiece of _Mem. Hist. Boston_, vol. ii.

There is a view of the town and harbor in the _Pennsylvania Mag._,

June, 1773; and others of a later date are in the _Columbian Mag._,

Dec., 1787; _Mass. Mag._, June, 1791. Cf. Winsor's _Readers' Handbook

of the Amer. Rev._, p. 66, for other views and descriptions.]

[Illustration: BOSTON CASTLE.

After a photograph of a view in the British Museum.]

Howe determined to attack the Heights by a front and flank assault.

Washington reinforced Thomas, and planned at the same time to move

on Boston by boats across the back bay. The British dropped down on

transports to the Castle, but a long storm delayed the projected

movement. This so effectually gave the Americans time to increase

their defences that the British general saw that to evacuate the town

was the least of all likely evils. As he began to show signs of such

a movement, the Americans began to speculate upon their significance.

Heath, at least, was fearful that the appearances were only a cloak

to cover an intention to land suddenly somewhere between Cambridge

and Squantum.[466] But the genuineness of Howe's intention gradually

became apparent, as, indeed, evacuation with him was a necessity,

while Admiral Shuldam also saw that his fleet, too, was immediately

imperilled from the newly raised works on Dorchester Heights. So Howe

had scarce an alternative but to give a tacit consent to a plan of the

selectmen of Boston for him to leave the town uninjured, if his troops

were suffered to embark undisturbed. Washington entered upon no formal

agreement to that end, but acquiesced silently as Howe had done.[467]

There was still some cannonading as Washington pushed his batteries

nearer Boston on the Dorchester side, at Nook's Hill, teaching Howe

the necessity of increased expedition. By early light on the 17th of

March it was discovered that Howe had begun to embark his troops,

and by nine o'clock the last boat had pushed off, completing a roll,

including seamen, fit for duty, of about 11,000 men, with about a

thousand refugees.[468] The Continentals were alert, and their advanced

guards promptly entered the British works on the several sides. The

enemy's ships fell down the harbor unmolested; but that night they

blew up Castle William, and the vessels gathered together in Nantasket

Roads. Here they remained for ten days, causing Washington not a little

anxiety; and he wrote to Quincy, at Braintree, to have all the roads

from the landings patrolled, lest the British should send spies into

the country.[469] On the 27th, all but a few armed vessels, intended

to warn off belated succor,[470] had disappeared in the direction of

Halifax.[471]

Ward was left with five regiments to hold the town and its

neighborhood,[472] while Colonel Gridley, "whom I have been taught to

view", said Washington, "as one of the greatest engineers of the age",

was directed to fortify the sea approaches.[473]

[Illustration: OCCUPATION OF BOSTON.

After an original in the collection of _Proclamations_ in the library

of the Mass. Hist. Society. Cf. _Mem. Hist. Boston_, iii. p. 181;

Sparks's _Washington_, iii. 322; Niles's _Principles and Acts_ (1876),

p. 127. Curwen records, when the proclamation reached London, that its

prohibition of plunder "was a source of comfort."]

Washington gradually moved his remaining army to New York, not without

apprehension at one time that he would have to direct them to Rhode

Island, for a fog had befooled some people in Newport into sending

him a message that the British fleet was in the offing there. He left

Cambridge himself April 4th, not for Virginia, as some good people

imagined he would do, out of loyalty to his province,[474] but to

defend as he could the line of the Hudson, of which signs were already

accumulating that it was the game for each side to secure. A few of

the enemy's ships still hung about Nantasket Roads, and some desultory

fighting occurred in the harbor.[475] The British, however, failed to

prevent some important captures of munition vessels being made. It was

not till June that General Lincoln, with a militia force, brought guns

to bear upon the still lingering enemy, when they sailed away, and

Boston was at last free of a hostile force.

It is now necessary to follow two other movements, which had been begun

while the siege of Boston was in progress, the one to the north, and

the other to the south.

The exploits of Allen and Arnold at Ticonderoga, already related, had

invited further conquests; but the Continental Congress hesitated to

take any steps which might seem to carry war across the line till

the Canadians had the opportunity of casting in their lot with their

neighbors. On the 1st of June, 1775, Congress had distinctly avowed

this purpose of restraint; and they well needed to be cautious, for

the Canadian French had not forgotten the bitter aspersions on their

religion which Congress had, with little compunction, launched upon its

professors, under the irritation of the Quebec Act. Still their rulers

were aliens, and the traditional hatred of centuries between races

is not easily kept in abeyance. Ethan Allen was more eager to avail

himself of this than Congress was to have him; but the march of events

converted the legislators, and the opportunity which Allen grieved to

see lost was not so easily regained when Congress at last authorized

the northern invasion. Arnold and Allen had each aimed to secure the

command of such an expedition, the one by appealing to the Continental

Congress, the other by representations to that of New York. Allen had

also gone in person to Philadelphia, and he and his Green Mountain

Boys were not without influence upon Congress, in their quaint and

somewhat rough ways, as their exuberant patriotism later made the New

York authorities forget their riotous opposition to the policy which

that province had been endeavoring to enforce in the New Hampshire

Grants. Connecticut had already sent forward troops to Ticonderoga to

hold that post till Congress should decide upon some definite action;

and at the end of June, 1775, orders reached Schuyler which he might

readily interpret as authorizing him, if the Canadians did not object,

to advance upon Canada.[476] He soon started to assume command, but

speedily found matters unpromising. The Johnsons were arming the

Indians up the Mohawk and beyond in a way that boded no good, and they

had entered into compacts with the British commanders in Canada. Arnold

had been at Ticonderoga, and had quarrelled with Hinman, the commander

of the Connecticut troops. Schuyler heard much of the Green Mountain

Boys, but he only knew them as the lawless people of the Grants, and

soon learned that Allen and Warner had themselves set to quarrelling.

Presently, however, Allen reported at Ticonderoga for special service,

as he had been cast off by his own people. Another volunteer, Major

John Brown, was sent by Schuyler into Canada for information.

Schuyler's position was a trying one. He had few troops of his own

province. The Connecticut troops were too lax in discipline to suit his

ideas of military propriety, and his temperament had little to induce

him to make concessions to the exigencies of the conditions.[477] With

the best heart he could, he tried to organize his force for an advance,

and assisted, in Indian conferences at Albany, to disarm, as far as he

might, the Mohawks of their hostility.

In August the news from Canada began to be alarming. Richard

Montgomery, an Irish officer who had some years before left the army

to settle on the Hudson and marry, was now one of the new brigadiers.

He urged Schuyler to advance and anticipate the movement now said to

be intended by Carleton, the English general commanding in Canada. At

this juncture Schuyler got word from Washington that a coöperating

expedition would be dispatched by way of the Kennebec, which, if

everything went well, might unite with Schuyler's before Quebec.

Montgomery had already started from Ticonderoga, and it was not till

the foot of Lake Champlain had been reached that Schuyler overtook

him, and, with an effective force of about 1,000 men, he now prepared,

on the 6th of September, to advance upon St. Johns. The demonstration

caused a little bloodshed, but, getting information which deceived

him, he fell back to the Isle-aux-Noix, and prepared to hold it

against a counter attack, and to prevent any vessel of the enemy

penetrating to the lake. The outlook for a while was not auspicious.

Malaria made sad inroads among the men, and of those who were left on

duty, insubordination and lack of discipline, and perhaps a shade of

treachery, impaired their efficiency. Schuyler was prostrate on his

bed, and Montgomery was forced to unmilitary expedients because of the

temper of his troops. Schuyler's disorder seeming to have permanently

mastered him, he resigned the command to Montgomery and returned up

the lake. He had, at least, the satisfaction of meeting reinforcements

pushing down to the main body. Before these arrived Montgomery had

begun the siege of St. Johns, and he was pressing it, when Ethan Allen,

whom Montgomery was expecting to join him, met with Brown, and these

two planned an attack on Montreal. It was attempted, but Brown and

his men failed to coöperate, and Allen and those he had with him were

finally captured.[478] When the Canadians heard that the redoubtable

Green Mountain leader was in irons on board an English vessel bound for

Halifax,[479] a great deal was done towards awakening them from that

spell of neutrality upon which the American campaign so much depended

for success.

So Montgomery continued to keep his lines about St. Johns with great

discouragement. He met every embarrassment which a hastily improvised

and undisciplined mass of men could impose upon a man who was of high

spirit and knew what soldierly discipline ought to be. A gleam of hope

at last came. He detached a party to attack Fort Chamblée, further

down the Sorel, and it succeeded (October 18), and he was thus enabled

to replenish his store of ammunition, which was by this time running

low.[480] So Montgomery was enabled to press the siege of St. Johns

with renewed vigor. When Wooster, the veteran Connecticut general,

joined him with the troops of that colony, there was some apprehension

that the younger Montgomery might find it difficult to maintain his

higher rank against the rather too independent spirit of the old

fighter.[481] No disturbance, however, occurred, and both worked

seemingly in union of spirit. Every effort of Carleton to relieve the

British commander at St. Johns failing, that officer surrendered the

post, and, on November 3d, Montgomery took possession.

* * * * *

We may turn now to the expedition that Washington had promised to

dispatch from Cambridge, and which had been thought of as early as May.

Benedict Arnold had hurried from Crown Point to lay his grievances

before the commander-in-chief. It seemed to Washington worth while

to assuage his passions and to profit by his dashing valor, for he

had by this time become convinced that Howe had no intention of

venturing beyond his lines. So Arnold was commissioned Colonel, and

given command of the new expedition, and the satisfied leader saw

gathering about him various quick spirits, better recognized later.

Such was Morgan, who led some Virginia riflemen, and Aaron Burr, who

sprang to the occasion as a volunteer.[482] Washington provided

Arnold with explicit instructions, and with an address to circulate

among the Canadians.[483] About eleven hundred men proceeded from

Cambridge to Newburyport, whence, by vessel and bateaux, they reached

Fort Western (Augusta, Maine), towards the end of September. Here the

expeditionary force plunged into the wilderness, up the Kennebec,

environed with perils and the burdens of labor. Suffering and nerving

against vexations and weariness that grew worse as they went on, they

saw the sick and disheartened fall out, and found their rear companies

deserting for want of food.[484] Those that were steadfast were forced

to eat moccasins and anything. On they struggled to the ridge of land

which marked the summit of the water-shed between the Atlantic and the

St. Lawrence. Then began the descent of the Chaudière, perilous amid

the rush of its waters, which overturned their boats, and sent much

of what stores they had left on a headlong drive down the stream. At

last the open country was reached, and Arnold stopped to refresh the

survivors. He dispatched Burr to see if he could find Montgomery,[485]

and, making the most of the friendly assistance of the neighboring

inhabitants, Arnold advanced to Point Levi, and began to make

preparations for crossing the St. Lawrence. The city of Quebec looked

across the basin in amazement on a stout little army, of whose coming,

however, they had had an intimation; while Arnold's men were hard at

work making or finding canoes and scaling-ladders.

Meanwhile where was Montgomery, whom Burr, disguised as a priest, and

speaking French or Latin as required, was seeking up the river? He had

got possession of Montreal without a blow, and sending Colonel Easton

down to the mouth of the Sorel, that officer intercepted the little

flotilla with which Carleton was trying to reach Quebec, and captured

all of the fugitives except Carleton himself, who escaped in a disguise

by night. The news of Arnold, which Burr at last brought to Montgomery,

made that general more anxious than ever to push on to Quebec, but the

expiration of the enlistments of some of his men much perplexed him,

and he was obliged to make many promises to hold his army together.

Before Montgomery could reach him, Arnold had in the night taken about

550 men across the river, and ascending at Wolfe's Cove, he had paraded

them before the walls and demanded a surrender. The garrison was small,

and in part doubtful, and the inhabitants were more than doubtful, but

the lieutenant-governor, Cramahé, with his stanchest troops, the Royal

Scotch, overawed the rest, and kept the gates closed. The vaporing

Arnold had been known in the past within the town as a horse-jockey,

and his promise as a general, with his shivering crowd, did not greatly

impress those whom he had somewhat farcically beleaguered. In a day or

two Arnold became frightened and drew off his men, strengthened now a

little by others who had crossed the river. Unmolested he went up the

river, to keep within reach of Montgomery, perceiving as he went up

the banks the succor for Quebec which Carleton, having picked up men

here and there, was bringing down by water.

[Illustration: Guy Carleton

From the _Political Mag._, iii. 351. Cf. Jones's _Campaign for the

Conquest of Canada_, p. 112; _Mag. of Amer. Hist._, June, 1883, p.

409; Moore's _Diary of the Revolution_, p. 454; B. Sulte's _Hist. des

Canadiens français_ (as Lord Dorchester, to which rank Carleton was

subsequently raised).]

By the 1st of December, Montgomery, with three armed schooners and only

300 men, reached Arnold at Point-aux-Trembles. The united forces now

turned their faces towards Quebec, less than a thousand in all, with a

body of two hundred Canadians, under Colonel James Livingston, acting

in conjunction; and on the 5th were before the town. Carleton haughtily

scorned all advances of Montgomery to communicate with him, and devoted

himself to overawing the town, quite content that the rigors of winter

should alone attack the invaders. While the Americans were making some

show of planting siege-batteries, plans for assault were in reality

maturing, and a stormy night was awaited to carry them out. It came on

the night before the last day of the year. While two feints were to be

made on the upper plain, the main assaults were to be along the banks

of the St. Charles and the St. Lawrence, from opposite sides, with a

view to joining and gaining the upper town from the lower. Montgomery

led the attack beneath Cape Diamond on the St. Lawrence side, and while

in advance with a small vanguard, and unsuspecting that his approach

was discovered, he was opened upon with grape, and fell, with others

about him.[486] His death was the end of the assault on that side.

Arnold was at first successful in carrying the barriers opposed to

him, but was soon severely wounded and taken to the rear. Morgan, who

succeeded to the command, was pressing their advantage, when Carleton,

relieved by Montgomery's failure, and by the discovery that the other

attacks meant nothing, sent out a force, which so hemmed Morgan in,

that, having already learned of Montgomery's failure, he found it

prudent to surrender with the few hundred men still clinging to him.

The Americans elsewhere in the field hastily withdrew to their camp,

and Carleton was too suspicious of the townspeople to dare to take any

further advantage of his success.

The command of the Americans now devolved on Lieutenant-Colonel Donald

Campbell, who sent an express to Wooster at Montreal, urging him to

come and take the control. That general thought it more prudent to

hold Montreal as a base,[487] and remained where he was, while he

forwarded the dismal news to his superior, Schuyler, at Albany, who had

quite enough on his hands to overawe Sir John Johnson and the Tories

up the Mohawk. The succession of Wooster to the command in Canada

boded no good to the New York general, and led to such crimination and

recrimination between the two that Congress, towards spring (1776),

took steps to relieve Schuyler of the general charge of the campaign.

Thomas, who had rendered himself conspicuous in driving the British

from Boston, was made a major-general (March 6), and was ordered to

take the active command in Canada. A New England general for troops in

the main from those colonies seemed desirable, and Thomas was certainly

the best of those furnished by Massachusetts during the early days of

the war.

Meanwhile Arnold, amid the snows, was audaciously seeming to keep up

the siege of Quebec in his little camp, three miles from the town.

Small-pox was beginning to make inroads on his little army, scarce at

some periods exceeding five hundred effective men. Wooster finally

came from Montreal on the first of April, and assumed command. For the

influence intended to soothe and gain the Canadians to pass from the

courtly Montgomery to the rigid and puritanical Wooster was a great

loss, and it soon became manifest in the growing hostility of the

people of the neighboring country. It was by such a pitiful force that

Carleton allowed himself to be shut up in Quebec for five months.

This was the condition of affairs when a commission, consisting of

Benjamin Franklin, Samuel Chase, and Charles Carroll, was sent by

Congress, with delegated powers, to act with prompter decision on

the spot.[488] They reached Albany early in April, and found Thomas,

from Boston, already there. So the two generals, Schuyler and Thomas,

pushed on ahead of the commissioners, and, with the reinforcements now

setting towards Canada, before and behind them, it seemed as if a new

vigor might be exerted upon the so far disastrous Northern campaign.

Thomas directed his course to Quebec, while the commissioners went to

Montreal, where they found the most gloomy apprehensions existing, and

were soon convinced that, without hard money and troops, Canada must be

relinquished. Franklin returned to Philadelphia to impress this upon

Congress, while Schuyler was at his wits' ends to find men, provisions,

and money to send forward, till Congress should act.

Washington, by this time in New York with the troops which had

forced the evacuation of Boston, yielded to the orders of Congress,

and sent Sullivan of New Hampshire with a brigade, carrying money

and provisions, to reinforce the wretched army in Canada, thereby

diminishing, with great risk, his own force to less than 5,000 men.

Thomas had at this time reached Quebec (May 1), where he found, out

of the 1,900 men constituting the beleaguering army, only about a

thousand not in hospital, and scarcely five hundred of these were

effective troops. It was necessary to do something at once, for the

breaking ice told the American general that a passage was preparing

for a British fleet, which was known to be below. Plans for an assault

on the town miscarried, and while Thomas was beginning to remove his

sick preparatory to a retreat, three British men-of-war appeared in the

basin. They landed troops, and gave Carleton an opportunity to hang

upon the rear of the retreating invaders, and pick up prisoners and

cannon. He did not pursue them far.[489]

Near the same time a force of British and Tories, coming down the river

from Ontario, had fallen upon Arnold's outpost at Cedar Rapids, above

Montreal, and had captured its garrison. Thus disaster struck both

ends of the American line of occupation. The force under Thomas was

withdrawing to the Sorel, when Burgoyne, with large reinforcements,

landed at Quebec. Up the Sorel the Americans retreated, joined now

by the troops under Thompson, which Washington had earlier sent from

New York. Thomas[490] soon died (June 2) of small-pox at Chamblée;

and Wooster being recalled, Sullivan, who now met the army, took the

command, and pushing forward to the mouth of the Sorel, prepared to

make a stand. He soon sent a force under Thompson towards Three Rivers,

to oppose the approaching British, now reaching 13,000 in number,

either at Quebec or advancing from it,—a number to confront, of which

apparently Sullivan had no conception. This general himself possessed

hardly more than 2,500 men, for Arnold, instead of reinforcing him,

as directed, had left Montreal for Chamblée. The action at Three

Rivers, of which the cannonading had been heard at the Sorel, proved

a disastrous defeat. It was followed by the British vessels pushing

up the river, and as soon as they came in sight Sullivan broke camp

and also retreated to Chamblée, followed languidly by Burgoyne. Here

Sullivan joined Arnold, and the united fugitives, of whom a large

part were weakened by inoculation, continued the retreat to the

Isle-aux-Noix, thence on to Crown Point, where early in July the poor

fragmentary army found a little rest,—five thousand in all, and of

these at least one half were in hospital.[491]

[Illustration: DUNMORE'S SEAL.

From a plate in Valentine's _N. Y. City Manual_, 1851.]

* * * * *

We may glance now at the progress of events to the southward. In

Virginia, Dunmore, the royal governor, hearing of Gage's proclamation

proscribing Hancock and Adams, feared that he might be seized as a

hostage, and took safety on board a man-of-war in Yorktown harbor.

Events soon moved rapidly in that quarter.[492] Patrick Henry, perhaps

a little unadvisedly, was made commander of their militia.[493] In

due time, from his floating capitol, Dunmore issued his proclamation

granting freedom to slaves of rebels,[494] and had directed a motley

crew of his adherents to destroy the colonial stores at Suffolk,

and this led to a brisk engagement at the Great Bridge (December 9,

1775), not far from Norfolk, in which the royalists were totally

defeated.[495] The destruction of that town, now under the guns of the

royal vessels, soon followed, on the first of January, 1776.[496]

On the 27th of February, 1776, the Scotch settlers of North Carolina,

instigated by Martin, the royal governor, and under the lead of their

chief, Macdonald,[497] endeavored to scatter a force of militia at

Moore's Creek Bridge, but were brought to bay, and compelled to

surrender about half of a force which had numbered fifteen or sixteen

hundred.[498]

Early in 1776 the task was assigned to Clinton, who had in January

departed from Boston, as we have seen, to force and hold the Southern

colonies to their allegiance, and Cornwallis, with troops, was sent

over under convoy of Sir Peter Parker's fleet, to give Clinton the

army he needed. The fleet did not reach North Carolina till May. In

March, Lee, while in New York, had wished to be ordered to the command

in Canada, as "he was the only general officer on the continent who

could speak and think in French." He was disappointed, and ordered

farther south.[499] By May he was in Virginia, ridding the country of

Tories, and trying to find out where Parker intended to land.[500] It

was expected that Clinton would return north to New York in season

to operate with Howe, when he opened the campaign there in the

early summer, as that general expected to do, and the interval for

a diversion farther south was not long. Lee had now gone as far as

Charleston (S. C.), and taken command in that neighborhood, while in

charge of the little fort at the entrance of the harbor was William

Moultrie, upon whom Lee was inculcating the necessity of a slow and

sure fire,[501] in case it should prove that Parker's destination, as

it might well be, was to get a foothold in the Southern provinces, and

break up the commerce which fed the rebellion through that harbor.

[Illustration: FORT MOULTRIE, 1776.

Reduced from the plan in Johnson's _Traditions and Reminiscences of the

Amer. Revolution in the South_ (Charleston, S. C., 1851). It shows that

the rear portion of the fort had not been finished when the attack took

place. The same plate has an enlarged plan of the fort only. See the

maps in Drayton's _Memoirs of the Amer. Rev. in the South_ (Charleston,

1821, two vols.), ii. 290, which is similar to Johnson's Ramsay's _Rev.

in S. Carolina_, i. 144, which is of less area; and that in Gordon's

_Amer. Revolution_, iii. 358. These are the maps of American origin.

Lossing (ii. 754) follows Johnson.]