THE DECISIVE PERIOD OF THE WAR. SURRENDER OF BURGOYNE AND CAPTURE OF
PHILADELPHIA BY HOWE. THE NAVAL PART IN EACH OPERATION
1777
The leading purpose of the British government in the campaign of 1777
was the same as that with which it had begun in 1776,--the control
of the line of the Hudson and Lake Champlain, to be mastered by two
expeditions, one starting from each end, and both working towards a
common centre at Albany, near the head of navigation of the River.
Preliminary difficulties had been cleared away in the previous year,
by the destruction of the American flotilla on the Lake, and by the
reduction of New York. To both these objects the Navy had contributed
conspicuously. It remained to complete the work by resuming the
advance from the two bases of operations secured. In 1777 the
fortifications on the Hudson were inadequate to stop the progress of a
combined naval and military expedition, as was shown in the course of
the campaign.
The northern enterprise was intrusted to General Burgoyne. The
impossibility of creating a new naval force, able to contend with
that put afloat by Carleton, had prevented the Americans from further
building. Burgoyne therefore moved by the Lake without opposition to
Ticonderoga, before which he appeared on the 2d of July. A position
commanding the works was discovered, which the Americans had neglected
to occupy. It being seized, and a battery established, the fort had to
be evacuated. The retreat being made by water, the British Lake Navy,
under Captain Skeffington Lutwidge, with whom Nelson had served a
few years before in the Arctic seas, had a conspicuous part in the
pursuit; severing the boom blockading the narrow upper lake and
joining impetuously in an attack upon the floating material, the
flat-boat transports, and the few relics of Arnold's flotilla which
had escaped the destruction of the previous year. This affair took
place on the 6th of July. From that time forward the progress of the
army was mainly by land. The Navy, however, found occupation upon Lake
George, where Burgoyne established a dépôt of supplies, although he
did not utilise its waterway for the march of the army. A party
of seamen under Edward Pellew, still a midshipman, accompanied the
advance, and shared the misfortunes of the expedition. It is told that
Burgoyne used afterwards to chaff the young naval officer with being
the cause of their disaster, because he and his men, by rebuilding a
bridge at a critical moment, had made it possible to cross the upper
Hudson. Impeded in its progress by immense difficulties, both natural
and imposed by the enemy, the army took twenty days to make twenty
miles. On the 30th of July it reached Fort Edward, forty miles from
Albany, and there was compelled to stay till the middle of September.
Owing to neglect at the War Office, the peremptory orders to Sir
William Howe, to move up the Hudson and make a junction with
Burgoyne, were not sent forward. Consequently, Howe, acting upon
the discretionary powers which he possessed already, and swayed by
political reasons into which it is not necessary to enter, determined
to renew his attempt upon Philadelphia. A tentative advance into New
Jersey, and the consequent manoeuvres of Washington, satisfied him
that the enterprise by this route was too hazardous. He therefore
embarked fourteen thousand men, leaving eight thousand with Sir Henry
Clinton to hold New York and make diversions in favor of Burgoyne;
and on the 23d of July sailed from Sandy Hook, escorted by five 64-gun
ships, a 50, and ten smaller vessels, under Lord Howe's immediate
command. The entire expedition numbered about 280 sail. Elaborate
pains were taken to deceive Washington as to the destination of the
armament; but little craft was needed to prevent a competent opponent
from imagining a design so contrary to sound military principle,
having regard to Burgoyne's movements and to the well-understood
general purpose of the British ministry. Accordingly Washington wrote,
"Howe's in a manner abandoning Burgoyne is so unaccountable a matter,
that till I am fully assured of it, I cannot help casting my eyes
continually behind me." He suspected an intention to return upon New
York.
On the 31st of July, just as Burgoyne reached Fort Edward, where he
stuck fast for six weeks, Howe's armament was off the Capes of
the Delaware. The prevailing summer wind on the American coast is
south-south-west, fair for ascending the river; but information was
received that the enemy had obstructed the channel, which lends itself
to such defences for some distance below Philadelphia. Therefore,
although after occupying the city the free navigation of the river to
the sea would be essential to maintaining the position,--for trial had
shown that the whole army could not assure communications by land
with New York, the other sea base,--Howe decided to prosecute his
enterprise by way of the Chesapeake, the ascent of which, under all
the conditions, could not be seriously impeded. A fortnight more was
consumed in contending against the south-west winds and calms, before
the fleet anchored on the 15th of August within the Capes of the
Chesapeake; and yet another week passed before the head of the Bay was
reached. On the 25th the troops landed. Washington, though so long
in doubt, was on hand to dispute the road, but in inferior force;
and Howe had no great difficulty in fighting his way to Philadelphia,
which was occupied on the 26th of September. A week earlier Burgoyne
had reached Stillwater, on the west bank of the Hudson, the utmost
point of his progress, where he was still twenty miles from Albany.
Three weeks later, confronted by overwhelming numbers, he was forced
to capitulate at Saratoga, whither he had retreated.
Lord Howe held on at the head of the Chesapeake until satisfied that
his brother no longer needed him. On the 14th of September he started
down the Bay with the squadron and convoy, sending ahead to the
Delaware a small division, to aid the army, if necessary. The winds
holding southerly, ten days were required to get to sea; and outside
further delay was caused by very heavy weather. The Admiral there
quitted the convoy and hastened up river. On the 6th of October he was
off Chester, ten miles below Philadelphia. The navy had already been
at work for a week, clearing away obstructions, of which there were
two lines; both commanded by batteries on the farther, or Jersey,
shore of the Delaware. The lower battery had been carried by troops;
and when Howe arrived, the ships, though meeting lively opposition
from the American galleys and fire-rafts, had freed the channel for
large vessels to approach the upper obstructions. These were defended
not only by a work at Red Bank on the Jersey shore, but also, on
the other side of the stream, by a fort called Fort Mifflin, on Mud
Island.[18] As the channel at this point, for a distance of half a
mile, was only two hundred yards wide, and troops could not reach the
island, the position was very strong, and it detained the British for
six weeks. Fort Mifflin was supported by two floating batteries and
a number of galleys. The latter not only fought, offensively and
defensively, but maintained the supplies and ammunition of the
garrison.
On the 22d of October, a concerted attack, by the army on the works at
Red Bank, and by the Navy on Fort Mifflin, resulted disastrously. The
former was repulsed with considerable loss, the officer commanding
being killed. The squadron, consisting of a 64, three frigates, and
a sloop, went into action with Mud Island at the same time; but,
the channel having shifted, owing possibly to the obstructions, the
sixty-four and the sloop grounded, and could not be floated that day.
On the 23d the Americans concentrated their batteries, galleys, and
fire-rafts upon the two; and the larger ship took fire and blew up in
the midst of the preparations for lightening her. The sloop was then
set on fire and abandoned.
So long as this obstacle remained, all supplies for the British
army in Philadelphia had to be carried by boats to the shore, and
transported considerable distances by land. As direct attacks had
proved unavailing, more deliberate measures were adopted. The army
built batteries, and the navy sent ashore guns to mount in them; but
the decisive blow to Mud Island was given by a small armed ship, the
_Vigilant_, 20, which was successfully piloted through a channel on
the west side of the river, and reached the rear of the work, towing
with her a floating battery with three 24-pounders. This was on the
15th of November. That night the Americans abandoned Fort Mifflin.
Their loss, Beatson says, amounted to near 400 killed and wounded;
that of the British to 43. If this be correct, it should have
established the invincibility of men who under such prodigious
disparity of suffering could maintain their position so tenaciously.
After the loss of Mud Island, Red Bank could not be held to advantage,
and it was evacuated on the 21st, when an attack was imminent. The
American vessels retreated up the river; but they were cornered,
and of course ultimately were destroyed. The obstructions being now
removed, the British water communications by the line of the Delaware
were established,--eight weeks after the occupation of the city, which
was to be evacuated necessarily six months later.
While these things were passing, Howe's triumph was marred by the news
of Burgoyne's surrender on the 17th of October. For this he could
not but feel that the home government must consider him largely
responsible; for in the Chesapeake, too late to retrieve his false
step, he had received a letter from the minister of war saying that,
whatever else he undertook, support to Burgoyne was the great object
to be kept in view.
During the operations round Philadelphia, Sir Henry Clinton in New
York had done enough to show what strong probabilities of success
would have attended an advance up the Hudson, by the twenty thousand
men whom Howe could have taken with him. Starting on the 3d of October
with three thousand troops, accompanied by a small naval division of
frigates, Clinton in a week had reached West Point, fifty miles up
the river. The American fortifications along the way were captured,
defences levelled, stores and shipping burned; while an insignificant
detachment, with the light vessels, went fifty miles further up,
and there destroyed more military stores without encountering any
resistance worth mentioning. Certainly, had Howe taken the same line
of operations, he would have had to reckon with Washington's ten
thousand men which confronted him on the march from the Chesapeake to
Philadelphia; but his flank would have been covered, up to Albany, by
a navigable stream on either side of which he could operate by that
flying bridge which the presence and control of the navy continually
constituted. Save the fortifications, which Clinton easily carried,
there was no threat to his communications or to his flank, such as the
hill country of New Jersey had offered and Washington had skilfully
utilised.
The campaign of 1777 thus ended for the British with a conspicuous
disaster, and with an apparent success which was as disastrous as a
failure. At its close they held Narragansett Bay, the city and harbour
of New York, and the city of Philadelphia. The first was an admirable
naval base, especially for sailing ships, for the reasons given by
Rodney. The second was then, as it is now, the greatest military
position on the Atlantic coast of the United States; and although
the two could not communicate by land, they did support each other
as naval stations in a war essentially dependent upon maritime power.
Philadelphia served no purpose but to divide and distract British
enterprise. Absolutely dependent for maintenance upon the sea, the
forces in it and in New York could not coöperate; they could not even
unite except by sea. When Clinton relieved Howe as commander-in-chief,
though less than a hundred miles away by land, he had to take a voyage
of over two hundred miles, from New York to Philadelphia, half of
it up a difficult river, to reach his station; and troops were
transferred by the same tedious process. In consequence of these
conditions, the place had to be abandoned the instant that war with
France made control of the sea even doubtful. The British held it for
less than nine months in all.
During 1777 a number of raids were made by British combined land and
sea forces, for the purpose of destroying American dépôts and other
resources. Taken together, such operations are subsidiary to, and aid,
the great object of interrupting or harassing the communications of
an enemy. In so far, they have a standing place among the major
operations of war; but taken singly they cannot be so reckoned, and
the fact, therefore, is simply noted, without going into details.
It may be remarked, however, that in them, although the scale was
smaller, the Navy played the same part that it now does in the many
expeditions and small wars undertaken by Great Britain in various
parts of the world; the same that it did in Wellington's campaigns
in the Spanish peninsula, 1808-1812. The land force depended upon the
water, and the water was controlled by the Navy.
[Footnote 18: This was just below the mouth of the Schuylkill, a short
distance below the present League Island navy yard.]