IN CONGRESS AND IN CAMP
On Thursday, the 18th of May, Patrick Henry took his seat in the
second Continental Congress; and he appears thenceforward to have
continued in attendance until the very end of the session, which
occurred on the 1st of August. From the official journal of this
Congress, it is impossible to ascertain the full extent of any
member's participation in its work. Its proceedings were transacted in
secret; and only such results were announced to the public as, in the
opinion of Congress, it was desirable that the public should know.
Then, too, from the private correspondence and the diaries of its
members but little help can be got. As affecting Patrick Henry, almost
the only non-official testimony that has been found is that of
Jefferson, who, however, did not enter this Congress until its session
was half gone, and who, forty years afterward, wrote what he probably
supposed to be his recollections concerning his old friend's
deportment and influence in that body:--
"I found Mr. Henry to be a silent and almost unmeddling
member in Congress. On the original opening of that body,
while general grievances were the topic, he was in his
element, and captivated all by his bold and splendid
eloquence. But as soon as they came to specific matters, to
sober reasoning and solid argumentation, he had the good
sense to perceive that his declamation, however excellent in
its proper place, had no weight at all in such an assembly
as that, of cool-headed, reflecting, judicious men. He
ceased, therefore, in a great measure, to take any part in
the business. He seemed, indeed, very tired of the place,
and wonderfully relieved when, by appointment of the
Virginia convention to be colonel of their first regiment,
he was permitted to leave Congress about the last of
July."[195]
Perhaps the principal value of this testimony is to serve as an
illustration of the extreme fragility of any man's memory respecting
events long passed, even in his own experience. Thus, Jefferson here
remembers how "wonderfully relieved" Patrick Henry was at being
"permitted to leave Congress" on account of his appointment by the
Virginia convention "to be colonel of their first regiment." But, from
the official records of the time, it can now be shown that neither of
the things which Jefferson thus remembers, ever had any existence in
fact. In the first place, the journal of the Virginia convention[196]
indicates that Patrick Henry's appointment as colonel could not have
been the occasion of any such relief from congressional duties as
Jefferson speaks of; for that appointment was not made until five
days after Congress itself had adjourned, when, of course, Patrick
Henry and his fellow delegates, including Jefferson, were already far
advanced on their journey back to Virginia. In the second place, the
journal of Congress[197] indicates that Patrick Henry had no such
relief from congressional duties, on any account, but was bearing his
full share in its business, even in the plainest and most practical
details, down to the very end of the session.
Any one who now recalls the tremendous events that were taking place
in the land while the second Continental Congress was in session, and
the immense questions of policy and of administration with which it
had to deal, will find it hard to believe that its deliberations were
out of the range of Patrick Henry's sympathies or capacities, or that
he could have been the listless, speechless, and ineffective member
depicted by the later pen of Jefferson. When that Congress first came
together, the blood was as yet hardly dry on the grass in Lexington
Common; on the very morning on which its session opened, the colonial
troops burst into the stronghold at Ticonderoga; and when the session
had lasted but six weeks, its members were conferring together over
the ghastly news from Bunker Hill. The organization of some kind of
national government for thirteen colonies precipitated into a state of
war; the creation of a national army; the selection of a
commander-in-chief, and of the officers to serve under him; the
hurried fortification of coasts, harbors, cities; the supply of the
troops with clothes, tents, weapons, ammunition, food, medicine;
protection against the Indian tribes along the frontier of nearly
every colony; the goodwill of the people of Canada, and of Jamaica; a
solemn, final appeal to the king and to the people of England; an
appeal to the people of Ireland; finally, a grave statement to all
mankind of "the causes and necessity of their taking up arms,"--these
were among the weighty and soul-stirring matters which the second
Continental Congress had to consider and to decide upon. For any man
to say, forty years afterward, even though he say it with all the
authority of the renown of Thomas Jefferson, that, in the presence of
such questions, the spirit of Patrick Henry was dull or unconcerned,
and that, in a Congress which had to deal with such questions, he was
"a silent and almost unmeddling member," is to put a strain upon human
confidence which it is unable to bear.
The formula by which the daily labors of this Congress are frequently
described in its own journal is, that "Congress met according to
adjournment, and, agreeable to the order of the day, again resolved
itself into a committee of the whole to take into consideration the
state of America; and after some time spent therein, the president
resumed the chair, and Mr. Ward, from the committee, reported that
they had proceeded in the business, but, not having completed it,
desired him to move for leave to sit again."[198] And although, from
the beginning to the end of the session, no mention is made of any
word spoken in debate by any member, we can yet glean, even from that
meagre record, enough to prove that upon Patrick Henry was laid about
as much labor in the form of committee-work as upon any other member
of the House,--a fair test, it is believed, of any man's zeal,
industry, and influence in any legislative body.
Further, it will be noted that the committee-work to which he was thus
assigned was often of the homeliest and most prosaic kind, calling not
for declamatory gifts, but for common sense, discrimination,
experience, and knowledge of men and things. He seems, also, to have
had special interest and authority in the several anxious phases of
the Indian question as presented by the exigencies of that awful
crisis, and to have been placed on every committee that was appointed
to deal with any branch of the subject. Thus, on the 16th of June, he
was placed with General Schuyler, James Duane, James Wilson, and
Philip Livingston, on a committee "to take into consideration the
papers transmitted from the convention of New York, relative to Indian
affairs, and report what steps, in their opinion, are necessary to be
taken for securing and preserving the friendship of the Indian
nations."[199] On the 19th of June, he served with John Adams and
Thomas Lynch on a committee to inform Charles Lee of his appointment
as second major-general; and when Lee's answer imported that his
situation and circumstances as a British officer required some further
and very careful negotiations with Congress, Patrick Henry was placed
upon the special committee to which this delicate business was
intrusted.[200] On the 21st of June, the very day on which, according
to the journal, "Mr. Thomas Jefferson appeared as a delegate for the
colony of Virginia, and produced his credentials," his colleague,
Patrick Henry, rose in his place and stated that Washington "had put
into his hand sundry queries, to which he desired the Congress would
give an answer." These queries necessarily involved subjects of
serious concern to the cause for which they were about to plunge into
war, and would certainly require for their consideration "cool-headed,
reflecting, and judicious men." The committee appointed for the
purpose consisted of Silas Deane, Patrick Henry, John Rutledge, Samuel
Adams, and Richard Henry Lee.[201] On the 10th of July, "Mr. Alsop
informed the Congress that he had an invoice of Indian goods, which a
gentleman in this town had delivered to him, and which the said
gentleman was willing to dispose of to the Congress." The committee
"to examine the said invoice and report to the Congress" was composed
of Philip Livingston, Patrick Henry, and John Alsop.[202] On the 12th
of July, it was resolved to organize three departments for the
management of Indian affairs, the commissioners to "have power to
treat with the Indians in their respective departments, in the name
and on behalf of the United Colonies, in order to preserve peace and
friendship with the said Indians, and to prevent their taking any part
in the present commotions." On the following day the commissioners for
the middle department were elected, namely, Franklin, Patrick Henry,
and James Wilson.[203] On the 17th of July, a committee was appointed
to negotiate with the Indian missionary, the Rev. Samuel Kirkland,
respecting his past and future services among the Six Nations, "in
order to secure their friendship, and to continue them in a state of
neutrality with respect to the present controversy between Great
Britain and these colonies." This committee consisted of Thomas
Cushing, Patrick Henry, and Silas Deane.[204] Finally, on the 31st of
July, next to the last day of the session, a committee consisting of
one member for each colony was appointed to serve in the recess of
Congress, for the very practical and urgent purpose of inquiring "in
all the colonies after virgin lead and leaden ore, and the best
methods of collecting, smelting, and refining it;" also, after "the
cheapest and easiest methods of making salt in these colonies." This
was not a committee on which any man could be useful who had only
"declamation" to contribute to its work; and the several colonies
were represented upon it by their most sagacious and their weightiest
men,--as New Hampshire by Langdon, Massachusetts by John Adams, Rhode
Island by Stephen Hopkins, Pennsylvania by Franklin, Delaware by
Rodney, South Carolina by Gadsden, Virginia by Patrick Henry.[205]
On the day on which this committee was appointed, Patrick Henry wrote
to Washington, then at the headquarters of the army near Boston, a
letter which denoted on the part of the writer a perception, unusual
at that time, of the gravity and duration of the struggle on which the
colonies were just entering:--
PHILADELPHIA, July 31st, 1775.
SIR,--Give me leave to recommend the bearer, Mr. Frazer,
to your notice and regard. He means to enter the American
camp, and there to gain that experience, of which the
general cause may be avail'd. It is my earnest wish that
many Virginians might see service. It is not unlikely that
in the fluctuation of things our country may have occasion
for great military exertions. For this reason I have taken
the liberty to trouble you with this and a few others of the
same tendency. The public good which you, sir, have so
eminently promoted, is my only motive. That you may enjoy
the protection of Heaven and live long and happy is the
ardent wish of,
Sir,
Yr. mo. obt. hbl. serv.,
P. HENRY, JR.[206]
His Excellency, GENL. WASHINGTON.
On the following day Congress adjourned. As soon as possible after its
adjournment, the Virginia delegates seem to have departed for home, to
take their places in the convention then in session at Richmond; for
the journal of that convention mentions that on Wednesday, August the
9th, "Patrick Henry, Edmund Pendleton, Benjamin Harrison, and Thomas
Jefferson, Esquires, appeared in convention, and took their
seats."[207] On the next day an incident occurred in the convention
implying that Patrick Henry, during his absence in Congress, had been
able to serve his colony by other gifts as well as by those of "bold
and splendid eloquence:" it was resolved that "the powder purchased by
Patrick Henry, Esquire, for the use of this colony, be immediately
sent for."[208] On the day following that, the convention resolved
unanimously that "the thanks of this convention are justly due to his
excellency, George Washington, Esquire, Patrick Henry, and Edmund
Pendleton, Esquires, three of the worthy delegates who represented
this colony in the late Continental Congress, for their faithful
discharge of that important trust; and this body are only induced to
dispense with their future services of the like kind, by the
appointment of the two former to other offices in the public service,
incompatible with their attendance on this, and the infirm state of
health of the latter."[209]
Of course, the two appointments here referred to are of Washington as
commander-in-chief of the forces of the United Colonies, and of
Patrick Henry as commander-in-chief of the forces of Virginia,--the
latter appointment having been made by the Virginia convention on the
5th of August. The commission, which passed the convention on the 28th
of that month, constituted Patrick Henry "colonel of the first
regiment of regulars, and commander-in-chief of all the forces to be
raised for the protection and defence of this colony;" and while it
required "all officers and soldiers, and every person whatsoever, in
any way concerned, to be obedient" to him, "in all things touching the
due execution of this commission," it also required him to be obedient
to "all orders and instructions which, from time to time," he might
"receive from the convention or Committee of Safety."[210]
Accordingly, Patrick Henry's control of military proceedings in
Virginia was, as it proved, nothing more than nominal: it was a
supreme command on paper, tempered in actual experience by the
incessant and distrustful interference of an ever-present body of
civilians, who had all power over him.
A newspaper of Williamsburg for the 23d of September announces the
arrival there, two days before, of "Patrick Henry, Esquire,
commander-in-chief of the Virginia forces. He was met and escorted to
town by the whole body of volunteers, who paid him every mark of
respect and distinction in their power."[211] Thereupon he inspected
the grounds about the city; and as a place suitable for the
encampment, he fixed upon a site in the rear of the College of William
and Mary. Soon troops began to arrive in considerable numbers, and to
prepare themselves for whatever service might be required of
them.[212] There was, however, a sad lack of arms and ammunition. On
the 15th of October, Pendleton, who was at the head of the Committee
of Safety, gave this account of the situation in a letter to Richard
Henry Lee, then in Congress at Philadelphia:--
"Had we arms and ammunition, it would give vigor to our
measures.... Nine companies of regulars are here, and seem
very clever men; others, we hear, are ready, and only wait
to collect arms. Lord Dunmore's forces are only one hundred
and sixty as yet, intrenched at Gosport, and supported by
the ships drawn up before that and Norfolk."[213]
On the 30th of November, Lord Dunmore, who had been compelled by the
smallness of his land force to take refuge upon his armed vessels off
the coast, thus described the situation, in a letter to General Sir
William Howe, then in command at Boston:--
"I must inform you that with our little corps, I think we
have done wonders. We have taken and destroyed above four
score pieces of ordnance, and, by landing in different parts
of the country, we keep them in continual hot water....
Having heard that a thousand chosen men belonging to the
rebels, great part of whom were riflemen, were on their
march to attack us here, or to cut off our provisions, I
determined to take possession of the pass at the Great
Bridge, which secures us the greatest part of two counties
to supply us with provisions. I accordingly ordered a
stockade fort to be erected there, which was done in a few
days; and I put an officer and twenty-five men to garrison
it, with some volunteers and negroes, who have defended it
against all the efforts of the rebels for these eight days.
We have killed several of their men; and I make no doubt we
shall now be able to maintain our ground there; but should
we be obliged to abandon it, we have thrown up an
intrenchment on the land side of Norfolk, which I hope they
will never be able to force. Here we are, with only the
small part of a regiment contending against the extensive
colony of Virginia."[214]
But who were these "thousand chosen men belonging to the rebels," who,
on their march to attack Lord Dunmore at Norfolk, had thus been held
in check by his little fort at the Great Bridge? We are told by
Dunmore himself that they were Virginia troops. But why was not
Patrick Henry in immediate command of them? Why was Patrick Henry held
back from this service,--the only active service then to be had in the
field? And why was the direction of this important enterprise given to
his subordinate, Colonel William Woodford, of the second regiment?
There is abundant evidence that Patrick Henry had eagerly desired to
conduct this expedition; that he had even solicited the Committee of
Safety to permit him to do so; but that they, distrusting his military
capacity, overruled his wishes, and gave this fine opportunity for
military distinction to the officer next below him in command.
Moreover, no sooner had Colonel Woodford departed upon the service,
than he began to ignore altogether the commander-in-chief, and to make
his communications directly to the Committee of Safety,--a course in
which he was virtually sustained by that body, on appeal being made to
them. Furthermore, on the 9th of December, Colonel Woodford won a
brilliant victory over the enemy at the Great Bridge,[215] thus
apparently justifying to the public the wisdom of the committee in
assigning the work to him, and also throwing still more into the
background the commander-in-chief, who was then chafing in camp over
his enforced retirement from this duty. But this was not the only cup
of humiliation which was pressed to his lips. Not long afterward,
there arrived at the seat of war a few hundred North Carolina troops,
under command of Colonel Robert Howe; and the latter, with the full
consent of Woodford, at once took command of their united forces, and
thenceforward addressed his official letters solely to the convention
of Virginia, or to the Committee of Safety, paying not the slightest
attention to the commander-in-chief.[216] Finally, on the 28th of
December, Congress decided to raise in Virginia six battalions to be
taken into continental pay;[217] and, by a subsequent vote, it
likewise resolved to include within these six battalions the first and
the second Virginia regiments already raised.[218] A commission was
accordingly sent to Patrick Henry as colonel of the first Virginia
battalion,[219]--an official intimation that the expected commission
of a brigadier-general for Virginia was to be given to some one else.
On receiving this last affront, Patrick Henry determined to lay down
his military appointments, which he did on the 28th of February, 1776,
and at once prepared to leave the camp. As soon as this news got
abroad among the troops, they all, according to a contemporary
account,[220] "went into mourning, and, under arms, waited on him at
his lodgings," when his officers presented to him an affectionate
address:--
TO PATRICK HENRY, JUNIOR, ESQUIRE:
Deeply impressed with a grateful sense of the obligations we
lie under to you for the polite, humane, and tender
treatment manifested to us throughout the whole of your
conduct, while we have had the honor of being under your
command, permit us to offer to you our sincere thanks, as
the only tribute we have in our power to pay to your real
merits. Notwithstanding your withdrawing yourself from
service fills us with the most poignant sorrow, as it at
once deprives us of our father and general, yet, as
gentlemen, we are compelled to applaud your spirited
resentment to the most glaring indignity. May your merit
shine as conspicuous to the world in general as it hath done
to us, and may Heaven shower its choicest blessings upon
you.
WILLIAMSBURG, February 29, 1776.
His reply to this warm-hearted message was in the following words:--
GENTLEMEN,--I am extremely obliged to you for your
approbation of my conduct. Your address does me the highest
honor. This kind testimony of your regard to me would have
been an ample reward for services much greater than I have
had the power to perform. I return you, and each of you,
gentlemen, my best acknowledgments for the spirit, alacrity,
and zeal you have constantly shown in your several stations.
I am unhappy to part with you. I leave the service, but I
leave my heart with you. May God bless you, and give you
success and safety, and make you the glorious instruments of
saving our country.[221]
The grief and indignation thus exhibited by the officers who had
served under Patrick Henry soon showed itself in a somewhat violent
manner among the men. The "Virginia Gazette" for that time states
that, "after the officers had received Colonel Henry's kind answer to
their address, they insisted upon his dining with them at the Raleigh
Tavern, before his departure; and after the dinner, a number of them
proposed escorting him out of town, but were prevented by some
uneasiness getting among the soldiery, who assembled in a tumultuous
manner and demanded their discharge, and declared their unwillingness
to serve under any other commander. Upon which Colonel Henry found it
necessary to stay a night longer in town, which he spent in visiting
the several barracks; and used every argument in his power with the
soldiery to lay aside their imprudent resolution, and to continue in
the service, which he had quitted from motives in which his honor
alone was concerned."[222] Moreover, several days after he had left
the camp altogether and had returned to his home, he was followed by
an address signed by ninety officers belonging not only to his own
regiment, but to that of Colonel Woodford,--a document which has no
little value as presenting strongly one side of contemporary military
opinion respecting Patrick Henry's career as a soldier, and the
treatment to which he had been subjected.
SIR,--Deeply concerned for the good of our country, we
sincerely lament the unhappy necessity of your resignation,
and with all the warmth of affection assure you that,
whatever may have given rise to the indignity lately offered
to you, we join with the general voice of the people, and
think it our duty to make this public declaration of our
high respect for your distinguished merit. To your vigilance
and judgment, as a senator, this United Continent bears
ample testimony, while she prosecutes her steady opposition
to those destructive ministerial measures which your
eloquence first pointed out and taught to resent, and your
resolution led forward to resist. To your extensive
popularity the service, also, is greatly indebted for the
expedition with which the troops were raised; and while they
were continued under your command, the firmness, candor, and
politeness, which formed the complexion of your conduct
towards them, obtained the signal approbation of the wise
and virtuous, and will leave upon our minds the most
grateful impression.
Although retired from the immediate concerns of war, we
solicit the continuance of your kindly attention. We know
your attachment to the best of causes; we have the fullest
confidence in your abilities, and in the rectitude of your
views; and, however willing the envious may be to undermine
an established reputation, we trust the day will come when
justice shall prevail, and thereby secure you an honorable
and happy return to the glorious employment of conducting
our councils and hazarding your life in the defence of your
country.[223]
The public agitation over the alleged wrong which had thus been done
to Patrick Henry during his brief military career, and which had
brought that career to its abrupt and painful close, seems to have
continued for a considerable time. Throughout the colony the blame was
openly and bluntly laid upon the Committee of Safety, who, on account
of envy, it was said, had tried "to bury in obscurity his martial
talents."[224] On the other hand, the course pursued by that
committee was ably defended by many, on the ground that Patrick Henry,
with all his great gifts for civil life, really had no fitness for a
leading military position. One writer asserted that even in the
convention which had elected Patrick Henry as commander-in-chief, it
was objected that "his studies had been directed to civil and not to
military pursuits; that he was totally unacquainted with the art of
war, and had no knowledge of military discipline; and that such a
person was very unfit to be at the head of troops who were likely to
be engaged with a well-disciplined army, commanded by experienced and
able generals."[225] In the very middle of the period of his nominal
military service, this opinion of his unfitness was still more
strongly urged by the chairman of the Committee of Safety, who, on the
24th of December, 1775, said in a letter to Colonel Woodford:--
"Believe me, sir, the unlucky step of calling that gentleman
from our councils, where he was useful, into the field, in
an important station, the duties of which he must, in the
nature of things, be an entire stranger to, has given me
many an anxious and uneasy moment. In consequence of this
mistaken step, which can't now be retracted or
remedied,--for he has done nothing worthy of degradation,
and must keep his rank,--we must be deprived of the service
of some able officers, whose honor and former ranks will not
suffer them to act under him in this juncture, when we so
much need their services."[226]
This seems to have been, in substance, the impression concerning
Patrick Henry held at that time by at least two friendly and most
competent observers, who were then looking on from a distance, and
who, of course, were beyond the range of any personal or partisan
prejudice upon the subject. Writing from Cambridge, on the 7th of
March, 1776, before he had received the news of Henry's resignation,
Washington said to Joseph Reed, then at Philadelphia: "I think my
countrymen made a capital mistake when they took Henry out of the
senate to place him in the field; and pity it is that he does not see
this, and remove every difficulty by a voluntary resignation."[227] On
the 15th of that month, Reed, in reply, gave to Washington this bit of
news: "We have some accounts from Virginia that Colonel Henry has
resigned in disgust at not being made a general officer; but it rather
gives satisfaction than otherwise, as his abilities seem better
calculated for the senate than the field."[228]
Nevertheless, in all these contemporary judgments upon the alleged
military defects of Patrick Henry, no reader can now fail to note an
embarrassing lack of definiteness, and a tendency to infer that,
because that great man was so great in civil life, as a matter of
course, he could not be great, also, in military life,--a proposition
that could be overthrown by numberless historical examples to the
contrary. It would greatly aid us if we could know precisely what, in
actual experience, were the defects found in Patrick Henry as a
military man, and precisely how these defects were exhibited by him in
the camp at Williamsburg. In the writings of that period, no
satisfaction upon this point seems thus far to have been obtained.
There is, however, a piece of later testimony, derived by authentic
tradition from a prominent member of the Virginia Committee of Safety,
which really helps one to understand what may have been the exact
difficulty with the military character of Patrick Henry, and just why,
also, it could not be more plainly stated at the time. Clement
Carrington, a son of Paul Carrington, told Hugh Blair Grigsby that the
real ground of the action of the Committee of Safety "was the want of
discipline in the regiment under the command of Colonel Henry. None
doubted his courage, or his alacrity to hasten to the field; but it
was plain that he did not seem to be conscious of the importance of
strict discipline in the army, but regarded his soldiers as so many
gentlemen who had met to defend their country, and exacted from them
little more than the courtesy that was proper among equals. To have
marched to the sea-board at that time with a regiment of such men,
would have been to insure their destruction; and it was a thorough
conviction of this truth that prompted the decision of the
committee."[229]
Yet, even with this explanation, the truth remains that Patrick
Henry, as commander-in-chief of the Virginia forces, never was
permitted to take command, or to see any real service in the field, or
to look upon the face of an armed enemy, or to show, in the only way
in which it could be shown, whether or not he had the gifts of a
military leader in action. As an accomplished and noble-minded
Virginian of our own time has said:--
"It may be doubted whether he possessed those qualities
which make a wary partisan, and which are so often possessed
in an eminent degree by uneducated men. Regular fighting
there was none in the colony, until near the close of the
war.... The most skilful partisan in the Virginia of that
day, covered as it was with forests, cut up by streams, and
beset by predatory bands, would have been the Indian
warrior; and as a soldier approached that model, would he
have possessed the proper tactics for the time. That Henry
would not have made a better Indian fighter than Jay, or
Livingston, or the Adamses, that he might not have made as
dashing a partisan as Tarleton or Simcoe, his friends might
readily afford to concede; but that he evinced, what neither
Jay, nor Livingston, nor the Adamses did evince, a
determined resolution to stake his reputation and his life
on the issue of arms, and that he resigned his commission
when the post of imminent danger was refused him, exhibit a
lucid proof that, whatever may have been his ultimate
fortune, he was not deficient in two grand elements of
military success,--personal enterprise, and unquestioned
courage."[230]
FOOTNOTES:
[195] _Hist. Mag._ for Aug. 1867, 92.
[196] 4 _Am. Arch._ iii. 375.
[197] 4 _Am. Arch._ ii. 1902.
[198] 4 _Am. Arch._ ii. 1834.
[199] 4 _Am. Arch._ ii. 1849.
[200] 4 _Am. Arch._ ii. 1850, 1851.
[201] _Ibid._ ii. 1852.
[202] _Ibid._ ii. 1878.
[203] 4 _Am. Arch._ ii. 1879, 1883.
[204] _Ibid._ ii. 1884, 1885.
[205] 4 _Am. Arch._ ii. 1902.
[206] MS.
[207] 4 _Am. Arch._ iii. 377.
[208] _Ibid._ iii. 377, 378.
[209] _Ibid._ iii. 378.
[210] 4 _Am. Arch._ iii. 393. See, also, his oath of office, _ibid._
iii. 411.
[211] 4 _Am. Arch._ iii. 776.
[212] Wirt, 159.
[213] 4 _Am. Arch._ iii. 1067.
[214] 4 _Am. Arch._ iii. 1713-1715.
[215] Graphic contemporary accounts of this battle may be found in 4
_Am. Arch._ iv. 224, 228, 229.
[216] Wirt, 178.
[217] 4 _Am. Arch._ iii. 1962.
[218] _Ibid._ iv. 1669.
[219] _Ibid._ iv. 1517.
[220] _Ibid._ iv. 1515, 1516.
[221] 4 _Am. Arch._ iv. 1516; also, Wirt, 180, 181.
[222] 4 _Am. Arch._ iv. 1516.
[223] 4 _Am. Arch._ iv. 1516, 1517.
[224] _Ibid._ iv. 1518.
[225] 4 _Am. Arch._ iv. 1519.
[226] Wirt, 175.
[227] _Writings of Washington_, iii. 309.
[228] W. B. Reed, _Life of Joseph Reed_, i. 173.
[229] Grigsby, _Va. Conv. of 1776_, 52, 53, note.
[230] Grigsby, _Va. Conv. of 1776_, 151, 152.