THE AFFAIR OF DORCHESTER HEIGHTS—AMERICAN AND ENGLISH LETTERS RESPECTING
IT—A LABORIOUS NIGHT—REVELATIONS AT DAYBREAK—HOWE IN A PERPLEXITY—A
NIGHT ATTACK MEDITATED—STORMY WEATHER—THE TOWN TO BE
EVACUATED—NEGOTIATIONS AND ARRANGEMENTS—PREPARATIONS TO EMBARK—EXCESSES
OF THE TROOPS—BOSTON EVACUATED—SPEECH OF THE DUKE OF MANCHESTER ON THE
SUBJECT—A MEDAL VOTED BY CONGRESS.
The evening of Monday, the 4th of March, was fixed upon for the
occupation of Dorchester Heights. The ground was frozen too hard to be
easily intrenched; fascines, therefore, and gabions, and bundles of
screwed hay, were collected during the two preceding nights, with which
to form breastworks and redoubts. During these two busy nights the
enemy’s batteries were cannonaded and bombarded from opposite points, to
occupy their attention, and prevent their noticing these preparations.
They replied with spirit, and the incessant roar of artillery thus kept
up, covered completely the rumbling of waggons and ordnance.
How little the enemy were aware of what was impending, we may gather
from the following extract of a letter from an officer of distinction in
the British army in Boston to his friend in London, dated on the 3d of
March:
“For these last six weeks or near two months, we have been better amused
than could possibly be expected in our situation. We had a theatre, we
had balls, and there is actually a subscription on foot for a
masquerade. England seems to have forgot us, and we have endeavored to
forget ourselves. But we were roused to a sense of our situation last
night, in a manner unpleasant enough. The rebels have been for some time
past erecting a bomb battery, and last night began to play upon us. Two
shells fell not far from me. One fell upon Colonel Monckton’s house, but
luckily did not burst until it had crossed the street. Many houses were
damaged, but no lives lost. The rebel army,” adds he, “is not brave, I
believe, but it is agreed on all hands that their artillery officers are
at least equal to ours.”[52]
The wife of John Adams, who resided in the vicinity of the American
camp, and knew that a general action was meditated, expresses in a
letter to her husband the feelings of a patriot woman during the
suspense of these nights.
“I have been in a constant state of anxiety, since you left me,” writes
she on Saturday. “It has been said to-morrow, and to-morrow for this
month, and when the dreadful to-morrow will be, I know not. But hark!
The house this instant shakes with the roar of cannon. I have been to
the door, and find it is a cannonade from our army. Orders, I find, are
come, for all the remaining militia to repair to the lines Monday night,
by twelve o’clock. No sleep for me to-night.”
On Sunday the letter is resumed. “I went to bed after twelve, but got no
rest; the cannon continued firing, and my heart kept pace with them all
night. We have had a pretty quiet day, but what to-morrow will bring
forth, God only knows.”
On Monday, the appointed evening, she continues: ’I have just returned
from Penn’s Hill, where I have been sitting to hear the amazing roar of
cannon, and from whence I could see every shell which was thrown. The
sound, I think, is one of the grandest in nature, and is of the true
species of the sublime. ’Tis now an incessant roar; but oh, the fatal
ideas which are connected with the sound! How many of our dear
countrymen must fall!
“I went to bed about twelve, and rose again a little after one. I could
no more sleep than if I had been in the engagement; the rattling of the
windows, the jar of the house, the continual roar of twenty-four
pounders, and the bursting of shells, give us such ideas, and realize a
scene to us of which we could scarcely form any conception. I hope to
give you joy of Boston, even if it is in ruins, before I send this
away.”
On the Monday evening thus graphically described, as soon as the firing
commenced, the detachment under General Thomas set out on its cautious
and secret march from the lines of Roxbury and Dorchester. Every thing
was conducted as regularly and quietly as possible. A covering party of
eight hundred men preceded the carts with the intrenching tools; then
came General Thomas with the working party, twelve hundred strong,
followed by a train of three hundred waggons, laden with fascines,
gabions, and hay screwed into bundles of seven or eight hundred weight.
A great number of such bundles were ranged in a line along Dorchester
Neck on the side next the enemy, to protect the troops, while passing,
from being raked by the fire of the enemy. Fortunately, although the
moon, as Washington writes, was shining in its full lustre, the flash
and roar of cannonry from opposite points, and the bursting of
bombshells high in the air, so engaged and diverted the attention of the
enemy, that the detachment reached the heights about eight o’clock,
without being heard or perceived. The covering party then divided; one
half proceeded to the point nearest Boston, the other to the one nearest
to Castle Williams. The working party commenced to fortify, under the
directions of Gridley, the veteran engineer, who had planned the works
on Bunker’s Hill. It was severe labor, for the earth was frozen eighteen
inches deep; but the men worked with more than their usual spirit; for
the eye of the commander-in-chief was upon them. Though not called there
by his duties, Washington could not be absent from this eventful
operation. An eloquent orator has imagined his situation—“All around him
intense movement; while nothing was to be heard excepting the tread of
busy feet, and the dull sound of the mattock upon the frozen soil.
Beneath him the slumbering batteries of the castle; the roadsteads and
harbor filled with the vessels of the royal fleet, motionless, except as
they swung round at their moorings at the turn of the midnight tide; the
beleaguered city occupied with a powerful army, and a considerable
non-combatant population, startled into unnatural vigilance by the
incessant and destructive cannonade, yet unobservant of the great
operations in progress so near them; the surrounding country, dotted
with a hundred rural settlements, roused from the deep sleep of a New
England village, by the unwonted glare and tumult.”[53]
The same plastic fancy suggests the crowd of visions, phantoms of the
past, which may have passed through Washington’s mind, on this night of
feverish excitement. “His early training in the wilderness; his escape
from drowning, and the deadly rifle of the savage in the perilous
mission to Venango; the shower of iron hail through which he rode
unharmed on Braddock’s field; the early stages of the great conflict now
brought to its crisis, and still more solemnly, the possibilities of the
future for himself and for America—the ruin of the patriot cause if he
failed at the outset; the triumphant consolidation of the Revolution if
he prevailed.”
The labors of the night were carried on by the Americans with their
usual activity and address. When a relief party arrived at four o’clock
in the morning, two forts were in sufficient forwardness to furnish
protection against small arms and grape-shot; and such use was made of
the fascines and bundles of screwed hay, that, at dawn, a
formidable-looking fortress frowned along the height. We have the
testimony of a British officer already quoted, for the fact. “This
morning at daybreak we discovered two redoubts on Dorchester Point, and
two smaller ones on their flanks. They were all raised during the last
night, with an expedition equal to that of the genii belonging to
Aladdin’s wonderful lamp. From these hills they command the whole town,
so that we must drive them from their post, or desert the place.”
Howe gazed at the mushroom fortress with astonishment, as it loomed
indistinctly, but grandly, through a morning fog. “The rebels,”
exclaimed he, “have done more work in one night, than my whole army
would have done in one month.”
Washington had watched, with intense anxiety, the effect of the
revelation at daybreak. “When the enemy first discovered our works in
the morning,” writes he, “they seemed to be in great confusion, and from
their movements, to intend an attack.”
An American, who was on Dorchester Heights, gives a picture of the
scene. A tremendous cannonade was commenced from the forts in Boston,
and the shipping in the harbor. “Cannon shot,” writes he, “are
continually rolling and rebounding over the hill, and it is astonishing
to observe how little our soldiers are terrified by them. The royal
troops are perceived to be in motion, as if embarking to pass the harbor
and land on Dorchester shore, to attack our works. The hills and
elevations in this vicinity are covered with spectators, to witness
deeds of horror in the expected conflict. His excellency, General
Washington, is present, animating and encouraging the soldiers, and they
in return manifest their joy; and express a warm desire for the approach
of the enemy; each man knows his own place. Our breastworks are
strengthened, and among the means of defence are a great number of
barrels, filled with stones and sand, and arranged in front of our
works, which are to be put in motion, and made to roll down the hill, to
break the legs of the assailants as they advance.”
General Thomas was reinforced with two thousand men. Old Putnam stood
ready to make a descent upon the north side of the town, with his four
thousand picked men, as soon as the heights on the south should be
assailed: “All the forenoon,” says the American above cited, “we were in
momentary expectation of witnessing an awful scene; nothing less than
the carnage of Breed’s Hill battle was expected.”
As Washington rode about the heights, he reminded the troops that it was
the 5th of March, the anniversary of the Boston massacre, and called on
them to revenge the slaughter of their brethren. They answered him with
shouts. “Our officers and men,” writes he, “appeared impatient for the
appeal. The event I think, must have been fortunate; nothing less than
success and victory on our side.”
Howe, in the mean time, was perplexed between his pride and the hazards
of his position. In his letters to the ministry, he had scouted the idea
of “being in danger from the rebels.” He had “hoped they would attack
him.” Apparently, they were about to fulfil his hopes, and with
formidable advantages of position. He must dislodge them from Dorchester
Heights, or evacuate Boston. The latter was an alternative too
mortifying to be readily adopted. He resolved on an attack, but it was
to be a night one.
“A body of light infantry, under the command of Major Mulgrave, and a
body of grenadiers, are to embark to-night at seven,” writes the gay
British officer already quoted. “I think it likely to be a general
affair. Adieu balls, masquerades, &c., for this may be looked upon as
the opening of the campaign.”
In the evening the British began to move. Lord Percy was to lead the
attack. Twenty-five hundred men were embarked in transports, which were
to convey them to the rendezvous at Castle William. A violent storm set
in from the east. The transports could not reach their place of
destination. The men-of-war could not cover and support them. A furious
surf beat on the shore where the boats would have to land. The attack
was consequently postponed until the following day.
That day was equally unpropitious. The storm continued, with torrents of
rain. The attack was again postponed. In the mean time, the Americans
went on strengthening their works; by the time the storm subsided,
General Howe deemed them too strong to be easily carried; the attempt,
therefore, was relinquished altogether.
What was to be done? The shells thrown from the heights into the town,
proved that it was no longer tenable. The fleet was equally exposed.
Admiral Shuldham, the successor to Graves, assured Howe that if the
Americans maintained possession of the heights, his ships could not
remain in the harbor. It was determined, therefore, in a council of war,
to evacuate the place as soon as possible. But now came on a humiliating
perplexity. The troops, in embarking, would be exposed to a destructive
fire. How was this to be prevented? General Howe’s pride would not
suffer him to make capitulations; he endeavored to work on the fears of
the Bostonians, by hinting that if his troops were molested while
embarking, he might be obliged to cover their retreat, by setting fire
to the town.
The hint had its effect. Several of the principal inhabitants
communicated with him through the medium of General Robertson. The
result of the negotiation was, that a paper was concocted and signed by
several of the “select men” of Boston, stating the fears they had
entertained of the destruction of the place, but that those fears had
been quieted by General Howe’s declaration that it should remain
uninjured, provided his troops were unmolested while embarking; the
select men, therefore, begged “some assurance that so dreadful a
calamity might not be brought on, by any measures from without.”
This paper was sent out from Boston, on the evening of the 8th, with a
flag of truce, which bore it to the American lines at Roxbury. There it
was received by Colonel Learned, and carried by him to head-quarters.
Washington consulted with such of the general officers as he could
immediately assemble. The paper was not addressed to him, nor to any one
else. It was not authenticated by the signature of General Howe; nor was
there any other act obliging that commander to fulfil the promise,
asserted to have been made by him. It was deemed proper, therefore, that
Washington should give no answer to the paper; but that Colonel Learned
should signify in a letter, his having laid it before the
commander-in-chief, and the reasons assigned for not answering it.
With this uncompromising letter, the flag returned to Boston. The
Americans suspended their fire, but continued to fortify their
positions. On the night of the 9th, a detachment was sent to plant a
battery on Nook’s Hill, an eminence at Dorchester, which lies nearest to
Boston Neck. A fire kindled behind the hill, revealed the project. It
provoked a cannonade from the British, which was returned with interest
from Cobble Hill, Lechmere Point, Cambridge, and Roxbury. The roar of
cannonry and bursting of bombshells prevailed from half after eight at
night, until six in the morning. It was another night of terror to the
people of Boston; but the Americans had to desist, for the present, from
the attempt to fortify Nook’s Hill. Among the accidents of the
bombardment, was the bursting of Putnam’s vaunted mortar, “the
Congress.”
Daily preparations were now made by the enemy for departure. By
proclamation, the inhabitants were ordered to deliver up all linen and
woollen goods, and all other goods, that, in possession of the rebels,
would aid them in carrying on the war. Crean Bush, a New York tory, was
authorized to take possession of such goods, and put them on board of
two of the transports. Under cover of his commission, he and his
myrmidons broke open stores, and stripped them of their contents.
Marauding gangs from the fleet and army followed their example, and
extended their depredations to private houses. On the 14th, Howe, in a
general order, declared that the first soldier caught plundering should
be hanged on the spot. Still on the 16th houses were broken open, goods
destroyed, and furniture defaced by the troops. Some of the furniture,
it is true, belonged to the officers, and was destroyed because they
could neither sell it nor carry it away.
The letter of a British officer gives a lively picture of the hurried
preparations for retreat. “Our not being burdened with provisions,
permitted us to save some stores and ammunition, the light field-pieces,
and such things as were most convenient of carriage. The rest, I am
sorry to say, we were obliged to leave behind; such of the guns as by
dismounting we could throw into the sea was so done. The carriages were
disabled, and every precaution taken that our circumstances would
permit; for our retreat was by agreement. The people of the town who
were friends to government, took care of nothing but their merchandise,
and found means to employ the men belonging to the transports in
embarking their goods, so that several of the vessels were entirely
filled with private property, instead of the king’s stores. By some
unavoidable accident, the medicines, surgeons’ chests, instruments, and
necessaries, were left in the hospital. The confusion unavoidable to
such a disaster, will make you conceive how much must be forgot, where
every man had a private concern. The necessary care and distress of the
women, children, sick, and wounded, required every assistance that could
be given. It was not like breaking up a camp, where every man knows his
duty; it was like departing your country with your wives, your servants,
your household furniture, and all your incumbrances. The officers, who
felt the disgrace of their retreat, did their utmost to keep up
appearances. The men, who thought they were changing for the better,
strove to take advantage of the present times, and were kept from
plunder and drink with difficulty.”[54]
For some days the embarkation of the troops was delayed by adverse
winds. Washington, who was imperfectly informed of affairs in Boston,
feared that the movements there might be a feint. Determined to bring
things to a crisis, he detached a force to Nook’s Hill on Saturday, the
16th, which threw up a breastwork in the night regardless of the
cannonading of the enemy. This commanded Boston Neck, and the south part
of the town, and a deserter brought a false report to the British that a
general assault was intended.
The embarkation, so long delayed, began with hurry and confusion at four
o’clock in the morning. The harbor of Boston soon presented a striking
and tumultuous scene. There were seventy-eight ships and transports
casting loose for sea, and eleven or twelve thousand men, soldiers,
sailors, and refugees, hurrying to embark; many, especially of the
latter, with their families and personal effects. The refugees, in fact,
labored under greater disadvantages than the king’s troops, being
obliged to man their own vessels, as sufficient seamen could not be
spared from the king’s transports. Speaking of those “who had taken upon
themselves the style and title of government men” in Boston, and acted
an unfriendly part in this great contest, Washington observes: “By all
accounts there never existed a more miserable set of beings than these
wretched creatures now are. Taught to believe that the power of Great
Britain was superior to all opposition, and that foreign aid, if not,
was at hand, they were even higher and more insulting in their
opposition than the Regulars. When the order issued, therefore, for
embarking the troops in Boston, no electric shock—no sudden clap of
thunder,—in a word, the last trump could not have struck them with
greater consternation. They were at their wits’ end, and conscious of
their black ingratitude, chose to commit themselves, in the manner I
have above described, to the mercy of the waves at a tempestuous season,
rather than meet their offended countrymen.”[55]
While this tumultuous embarkation was going on, the Americans looked on
in silence from their batteries on Dorchester Heights, without firing a
shot. “It was lucky for the inhabitants now left in Boston, that they
did not,” writes a British officer; “for I am informed every thing was
prepared to set the town in a blaze, had they fired one cannon.”[56]
At an early hour of the morning, the troops stationed at Cambridge and
Roxbury had paraded, and several regiments under Putnam had embarked in
boats, and dropped down Charles River, to Sewall’s Point, to watch the
movements of the enemy by land and water. About nine o’clock a large
body of troops was seen marching down Bunker’s Hill, while boats full of
soldiers were putting off for the shipping. Two scouts were sent from
the camp to reconnoitre. The works appeared still to be occupied, for
sentries were posted about them with shouldered muskets. Observing them
to be motionless, the scouts made nearer scrutiny, and discovered them
to be mere effigies, set up to delay the advance of the Americans.
Pushing on, they found the works deserted, and gave signal of the fact;
whereupon, a detachment was sent from the camp to take possession.
Part of Putnam’s troops were now sent back to Cambridge; a part were
ordered forward to occupy Boston. General Ward, too, with five hundred
men, made his way from Roxbury, across the neck, about which the enemy
had scattered caltrops or crow’s feet,[57] to impede invasion. The gates
were unbarred and thrown open, and the Americans entered in triumph,
with drums beating and colors flying.
By ten o’clock the enemy were all embarked and under way: Putnam had
taken command of the city, and occupied the important points, and the
flag of thirteen stripes, the standard of the Union, floated above all
the forts.
On the following day, Washington himself entered the town, where he was
joyfully welcomed. He beheld around him sad traces of the devastation
caused by the bombardment, though not to the extent that he had
apprehended. There were evidences, also, of the haste with which the
British had retreated—five pieces of ordnance with their trunnions
knocked off; others hastily spiked; others thrown off the wharf.
“General Howe’s retreat,” writes Washington, “was precipitate beyond
anything I could have conceived. The destruction of the stores at
Dunbar’s camp, after Braddock’s defeat, was but a faint image of what
may be seen at Boston; artillery carts cut to pieces in one place, gun
carriages in another; shells broke here, shots buried there, and every
thing carrying with it the face of disorder and confusion, as also of
distress.”[58]
To add to the mortification of General Howe, he received, we are told,
while sailing out of the harbor, despatches from the ministry, approving
the resolution he had so strenuously expressed, of maintaining his post
until he should receive reinforcements.
As the smallpox prevailed in some parts of the town, precautions were
taken by Washington for its purification; and the main body of the army
did not march in until the 20th. “The joy manifested in the countenances
of the inhabitants,” says an observer, “was overcast by the melancholy
gloom caused by ten tedious months of siege;” but when, on the 22d, the
people from the country crowded into the town, “it was truly
interesting,” writes the same observer, “to witness the tender
interviews and fond embraces of those who had been long separated under
circumstances so peculiarly distressing.”[59]
Notwithstanding the haste with which the British army was embarked, the
fleet lingered for some days in Nantucket Road. Apprehensive that the
enemy, now that their forces were collected in one body, might attempt
by some blow to retrieve their late disgrace, Washington hastily threw
up works on Fort Hill, which commanded the harbor, and demolished those
which protected the town from the neighboring country. The fleet at
length disappeared entirely from the coast, and the deliverance of
Boston was assured.
The eminent services of Washington throughout this arduous siege, his
admirable management, by which, “in the course of a few months, _an
undisciplined band of husbandmen_ became soldiers, and were enabled to
invest, for nearly a year, and finally to expel a brave army of
veterans, commanded by the most experienced generals,” drew forth the
enthusiastic applause of the nation. No higher illustration of this
great achievement need be given, than the summary of it contained in the
speech of a British statesman, the Duke of Manchester, in the House of
Lords. “The army of Britain,” said he, “equipped with every possible
essential of war; a chosen army, with chosen officers, backed by the
power of a mighty fleet, sent to correct revolted subjects; sent to
chastise a resisting city; sent to assert Britain’s authority;—has, for
many tedious months, been imprisoned within that town by the Provincial
army; who, their watchful guards, permitted them no inlet to the
country; who braved all their efforts, and defied all their skill and
ability in war could ever attempt. One way, indeed, of escape was left;
the fleet is yet respected; to the fleet the army has recourse; and
British generals, whose name never met with a blot of dishonor, are
forced to quit that town which was the first object of the war, the
immediate cause of hostilities, the place of arms, which has cost this
nation more than a million to defend.”
We close this eventful chapter of Washington’s history, with the honor
decreed to him by the highest authority of his country. On motion of
John Adams, who had first moved his nomination as commander-in-chief, a
unanimous vote of thanks to him was passed in Congress; and it was
ordered that a gold medal be struck, commemorating the evacuation of
Boston, bearing the effigy of Washington as its deliverer.