It is a good eighteen-mile ride to Valley Forge over the crooked
Perkiomen road, which, was none the better for the breaking up of the
frost. I rode along with a light heart, but I was watchful, being so
used to disastrous adventures. Happily, I met with no difficulties.
A few miles from the bridge General Washington had built, I fell in with
a party of horse. The officer in command seemed at first suspicious, but
at last sent me on with two troopers. On the last Sunday of the month
Friends were persistently in the habit of flocking into the city to
General Meeting. They were not unwelcome, for they were apt to carry
news of us, and neither we nor the enemy regarded them as neutrals. Our
Commander-in-chief, in an order of this day, declared “that the plans
settled at these meetings are of the most pernicious tendency,” and on
this account directed General Lacy “that the parties of light horse be
so disposed as to fall in with these people.”
It was one of these parties of horse I had encountered. The officer sent
me on with a guard, and thus, in the company of two troopers, I rode
through a fairly wooded country to the much-worn road leading down to
the river. Here my guards left me with the picket at the bridge. It
was a half-hour before the officer here stationed was satisfied, and
meanwhile I stared across the Schuylkill at the precipitous bluffs, and
wondered where lay the army which had passed the winter back of them.
A few men along the far shore, and on the hill beyond a little redoubt,
were all the signs of life or of war and its precautions. The bridge,
over which presently I rode, was of army waggons weighted with stone,
and on top rails with rude scantling. On the high posts driven into the
river-bed for stay of the bridge were burned the names of the favourite
generals. Once over, I walked Lucy up a cleft in the shore cliff, and
came out on the huts of General Varnum’s brigade. The little world of an
army came in view. I was on the first rise from the stream, a mile and
a half to the south of the Valley Creek. To westward the land fell a
little, and then rose to the higher slope of Mount Joy. To north the
land again dropped, and rose beyond to the deep gulch of the Valley
Creek. On its farther side the fires of a picket on Mount Misery were
seen. Everywhere were regular rows of log huts, and on the first decline
of every hill slope intrenchments, ditches, redoubts, and artillery. Far
beyond, this group of hills fell gradually to the rolling plain. A mile
away were the long outlying lines of Wayne, and the good fellows with
whom I had charged at Germantown.
Everywhere the forests were gone. Innumerable camp-fires and a city of
log huts told for what uses they had fallen. On the uplands about me
ragged men were drilling; far away I heard the cavalry bugles. A certain
sense of elation and gaiety came over me. It lasted no long time, as
I rode Lucy over the limestone hillocks and down to the lesser valley,
which far away fell into the greater vale of Chester.
The worst of the winter’s trials were over, and yet I was horror-struck
at the misery and rags of these poor fellows. No wonder men deserted,
and officers were resigning in scores, desperate under the appeals of
helpless wife and family in far-away homes. It was no better on the
upland beyond. Everywhere were rude huts in rows, woeful-looking men
at drill, dejected sentries, gaunt, hungry, ill clothed, with here and
there a better-dressed officer to make the rest look all the worse.
I thought of the grenadier British troops, fat and strong, in the city
I had fled from, and marvelled to think of what kept them from sweeping
this squalid mob away, as a housewife switches out the summer flies.
Full of thought, I rode a mile through the melting drifts of snow, and
came on Wayne’s brigade, which held the lines looking in this direction.
I was long about it; but at last a man pointed out a hut, and I went in.
“Holloa, Jack!” I cried.
“Hugh! Hugh! Where on earth are you from?” And he flushed as he used
to do, and gave me a great bear-hug, saying, “And you are not dead! not
dead! Thank God! thank God!”
Thus again we met, to my unspeakable joy. He was about as lean as I had
been, but on the whole, thanks to his florid skin, looked well or better
than the best of that half-fed army. How we talked, how we poured out
our news that cold March afternoon, I shall not take space to tell; nor
his great wonder at seeing me after all had believed me dead.
After supper came a half-dozen officers, and I heard all the camp
gossip, and was made heartily welcome. Everything was on the mend, they
said. Steuben was drilling the men; Greene was the new and efficient
quartermaster-general. Supplies were pouring in. Mrs. Washington and
Lady Stirling had come. The French were sure to make a treaty with us.
As they talked of their privations I learned, for the first time, of the
full horrors of the winter camp at the forge in the valley. There was
still enough wretchedness to show how far worse must have been the
pitiable condition of the army during that winter of ‘77-’78. I passed
the next day at rest with Jack. I had had enough of the volunteer
business, and determined, to Jack’s regret, to take service with the
horse. I was still unfit to march, and it seemed to me wise for this
reason to stick to Lucy’s good legs, at least until my own were in
better order.
I think Jack felt that he was under some necessity to take care of me,
or from that affection he has ever shown desired to keep me near him. He
only hoped I would not incline to join McLane’s troop, and when I asked
why, declaring that to be my utmost desire, he said it was a service of
needless peril.
Upon this I laughed so that the hut shook, and poor Jack became quite
disconcerted, and fell to making a variety of excuses. It is of this he
says:
“Hugh is come from death, and there is more to live for. For me, that am
often unready and weak, here is again his ever just helpfulness. He
is but a shadow of himself, and I cannot wonder that he is so bitter
against the enemy, or that he desires, less on account of his bodily
feebleness than from a wish to revenge his cruel treatment, to serve
with the horse. They are never more quiet than gadflies. It is dangerous
duty, and should it cost this dear life, how shall I ever face Mistress
Wynne?”
I myself had but one thought in my own mind this Sunday in March, as I
rode through the east wind. It is my way, and always was, to have but a
single idea in mind, and to go straight to my object the nearest way. He
was right in his belief that it was my burning wish to pay the debts of
my poor abused body. I knew not when we should move, and the dislike
of tiresome drills under Steuben, with a restless, perhaps a wholesome,
instinct to lead a more active life, conspired to make my hatred seem
reasonable.
I could see, as I rode along through the cantonment and the long lines
of huts, how well chosen was the valley camp. The Schuylkill flowing
from the Blue Hills turned here to eastward, the current was deep,
the banks were high and precipitous. To the west, in a deep gorge, the
Valley Creek protected the camp. Bunning down from Mount Joy, a broad
spur turned northward to the Schuylkill. Between this ridge and the
river lay an angular table-land, falling to the valley beyond. Along
this ridge, and high on Mount Joy, were the intrenchments laid out by
Du Portail, and within them were the camps of rare tents and the rows of
wooden huts.
Riding north amid the stumps and the lessening drifts of snow, past the
dark huts, and the files of ragged men in line for morning service, I
came down to the angle between the Valley Creek and the Schuylkill. The
river was full, and ran a gray-brown flood. Where the trampled slope
rose from the creek I came upon a small but solid house, built of gray
and ruddy sandstones, a quaint, shell-curved penthouse above the open
doorway. Here were horses held by orderlies, the blue and white of
French uniforms, buff-and-blue officers, and the guard of fifty light
horse on a side road in the saddle, facing the house. I knew I had found
the headquarters. Looking about, I saw, to my joy, Mr. Hamilton talking
with some of our allies. I rode up, and as they turned, I said, “I am
Mr. Hugh Wynne, Colonel Hamilton.”
“Good heavens, sir! You are not dead then, after all!”
“No,” I said, laughing; “I am alive, thank you. I have been in prison
for months, and I am come now to ask for that commission in the light
horse about which I must beg you to remind his Excellency.”
“No wonder,” said he, “I did not recognise you. We are now going to
morning service. I will see to it at once. We thought you dead. Indeed,
his Excellency wrote to Mistress Wynne of you. The general has full
powers at last, and you are sure of your commission. Now I must leave
you.”
A few more needed words were said, and I drew aside to see the staff
ride away. In a few minutes the young aide came back.
“You may join McLane at once. You will have an acting commission until a
more formal one reaches you. I suppose you have no news?”
“None,” I said, “except of how a British jail looks.”
“His Excellency desires your company at dinner to-day at six.”