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Title: The magazine of history with notes and queries, Vol. II, No. 6, December 1905
Author: Various
Language: English
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*** Start of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The magazine of history with notes and queries, Vol. II, No. 6, December 1905" ***
NOTES AND QUERIES, VOL. II, NO. 6, DECEMBER 1905 ***
VOL. II NO. 6
THE
MAGAZINE OF HISTORY
WITH
NOTES AND QUERIES
DECEMBER, 1905
WILLIAM ABBATT
281 FOURTH AVENUE, NEW YORK
Published Monthly $5.00 a Year 50 Cents a Number
THE MAGAZINE OF HISTORY
WITH NOTES AND QUERIES
VOL. II. DECEMBER, 1905. NO. 6
CONTENTS
SULLIVAN’S GREAT MARCH INTO THE INDIAN COUNTRY
(_Second Paper_)
REV. W. E. GRIFFIS, L.H.D. 365
THE LIBERTY OF THE PRESS (_Conclusion_)
REV. LIVINGSTON ROWE SCHUYLER 379
RELICS OF COM. JOHN BARRY IN PHILADELPHIA 386
BUSHNELL’S “TURTLE”
B. J. HENDRICK 389
ANTHONY WALTON WHITE (_Concluded from January Number_)
A. S. GRAHAM 394
WHERE ARE EVANGELINE AND GABRIEL BURIED?
MARTIN I. J. GRIFFIN 403
CAPTAIN JAMES DUNCAN’S DIARY OF THE SIEGE OF YORKTOWN
_Communicated by_ W. F. BOOGHER 407
A PORT OF THE LAST CENTURY
N. R. BENEDICT 417
INDIANA COUNTY NAMES 420
INDIAN LEGENDS: _IV._ THE DANCING GHOSTS
(The Late) CHARLES LANMAN 424
ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS
Letter of Washington to Dr. Stuart 427
Letter of Joseph Trumbull to Christopher Varick 429
Letter of Washington to Benjamin Harrison 429
MINOR TOPICS
A Ward Election in New York in 1739 431
A Liquor License in New York in 1739 432
THE NEW JERSEY HISTORICAL SOCIETY 432
BOOK NOTICES 432
* * * * *
Entered as second-class matter, March 1, 1905, at the Post Office at
New York, N. Y., under the Act of Congress of March 3, 1879.
_Copyright, 1905, by William Abbatt_
THE MAGAZINE OF HISTORY
WITH NOTES AND QUERIES
VOL. II DECEMBER, 1905 NO. 6
SULLIVAN’S GREAT MARCH INTO THE INDIAN COUNTRY
_II._
CHAPTER IV--_Concluded_.
Sullivan having heard nothing from either Brodhead or Clinton, became
especially anxious about the latter, fearing that he might be waylaid
by a union of the Tories under Butler and McDonald with Brant’s forces.
On the 16th of August, he sent forward a picked force of nine hundred
men, under Generals Poor and Hand, with the Coehorn mortar and eight
days’ rations, to advance and meet the right wing. Marching to Owego,
then an Indian village, and to Choconut, containing fifty long houses,
they heard at sunset of the 18th, Clinton’s evening gun. This they
answered with their Coehorn. Between the present city of Binghamton
and Owego the two forces met and the forest resounded with sounds of
mutual acclaim and welcome to brothers in arms. The place of their
junction, as we see on the map, is named Union, now a flourishing
village. Then the host, the flotilla in boats and the men along the
flats and heights, moved down the Susquehanna in fine array. As the
united forces of men from three states thus drew near the camp at Tioga
Point, Sullivan ordered out the whole army to give them welcome. The
fifers and drummers furnished lively music and a _feu de joie_, by the
infantry drawn up in single line, completed the ceremonies. This was at
noon on Sunday, 21st, and on the site of the present village of Athens.
Previous to the arrival of Clinton’s brigade, Sullivan (August 11) had
sent westward up the river valley, a party of eight of his bravest
officers and men, to reconnoiter the Indian town of Chemung. This
collection of bark houses was built on the first great river flat above
the village in Chemung county, at present called by that name. Keeping
away from the trail they reached the hill top and looked down upon the
town, finding everything in confusion. The Indians fearing an immediate
attack in force, were getting ready to move westward. When this
scouting party returned to the main camp at three o’clock the next day,
Sullivan ordered his whole force to be ready to march at a moment’s
notice. At 8 P. M., August 12, he started with most of his force on
a night march and pushed on through swamps and forests. At morning
finding themselves in a fog, they also discovered that the enemy had
fled.
General Hand asked that he be allowed to take Colonel Hubley’s regiment
and the Wyoming companies to pursue the foe. This request was granted
and our men pushed eagerly on. In spite of all wariness, Captain Bush’s
company of the Eleventh Pennsylvania got into an Indian ambush, and six
of the Continentals were killed and nine wounded. Our men rallied and
drove the Indians off the ground with a loss equal to their own. Then
they began destroying sixty acres of standing corn, then in the milk,
by cutting down the stalks. While at this work they were again fired on
by the Indians in hiding, and one man was killed and five were wounded.
Forty acres of maize were left untouched for the future use of the
army, and then the whole force returned, greatly wearied with fatigue
and the extreme heat. The bodies of the dead were brought back to camp
for decent burial.
It was a sad occasion, when in the forest, the seven slain were buried
in one grave, which, as was usual, had all outward marks obliterated,
so that the savages could not exhume and mutilate the corpses. Then
their comrades fired memorial vollies. Thus perished by the bullets
of the enemy the first of the men in Sullivan’s main expedition. Two
days afterwards, a corporal and four men, who were guarding cattle on
Queen Esther’s plains, were fired on by sneaking Indians. One was shot
dead and one wounded. In the rude hospital, quickly built out of green
wood, within the lines of the diamond-shaped Fort Sullivan, the fifteen
wounded men found shelter and care. In 1897, in digging foundations for
the edifice of the Tioga Point Historical Society, at Athens, Pa., the
bones of the buried Continentals were exhumed, and with other relics of
1779 are now under glass in the cases of the Spalding Museum.
Having his whole effective force under his direct command, Sullivan
reorganized the army, and announced both the order of march and the
order of battle. The light troops under General Hand were to form the
advance, the riflemen acting as scouts. Poor’s brigade was to guard
the right and Maxwell’s brigade the left of the army, Clinton’s brigade
forming the rear guard. The park of nine pieces of artillery was placed
in the center, with three columns of pack horses on either side. A
morning and evening gun was to be fired daily and on account of the
length and narrowness of the moving line through the woods, a horn,
instead of drums, was to announce the orders to march or halt. The
corps of engineers and surveyors were to measure each rod of ground
traversed, and maps of the region traversed were to be made.
In the fort, Colonel Shreve was left with a garrison of two hundred and
fifty men of the New Jersey regiment. It was ordered that when further
supplies should come up from Wyoming, Captain Reed should proceed up
the Chemung Valley, build a fort where Newtown Creek joins the river
(at Elmira), and there await the return of the army from the Genesee
valley.
The army was now eager to move into the unknown wilderness. The route
was up the Chemung river, into the Seneca country, and through the Land
of Lakes. There was no hope of reinforcements or relief, and, in case
of defeat, of any quarter from the foe. Over paths never trodden by any
white man, save the lone trader, trapper, or captive, they must now
find much of their food and rely wholly on their own valor. How brave
must these men have been, and how equally worthy of fame and honor, was
this expedition in comparison with Sherman’s march through Georgia to
the sea in 1864.
(It is to be noted that in the Centennial celebration of 1879, General
William Tecumseh Sherman, was present in the Chemung valley, with words
of memorial and congratulations to the thousands present, as well
as with praise of the men of 1779 who had given him so inspiring a
precedent of success.)
CHAPTER V
THE GREAT BATTLE NEAR ELMIRA
One of the first obstacles to the army, was a very high hill at the
edge of the river. To avoid this, all but the infantry crossed the
river twice, being supported and guarded against hostile attack by
Maxwell’s New Jersey regiments. The other brigades marched over the
hill, and camp was made on the site of the Indian town of Chemung
which the advanced detachments had destroyed two weeks before.
Our fathers thought few articles of food more delicious than green corn
roasted in the ear. So the maize in the fields near by helped to make a
good supper. In addition, the army enjoyed a feast of potatoes, beans,
cucumbers, watermelons, squashes and other vegetables which were here
in great plenty. It was the season of ripeness.
Towards the end of July, there had gathered together, whites and reds,
Indians, Tories, Royal Greens and British regulars, numbering over
a thousand men, at Newtown, the Indian town near Baldwin’s Creek,
opposite to the present village of Wellsburg on the Erie, and at
Lohmansville on the Lackawanna railroad. Here they were for weeks hard
at work. Tearing down the Indian houses, they built, with the old and
fresh-cut logs, a fortification that extended up the slope of the hill
to the north and along the western ridge nearer the Chemung river.
But where was the enemy? It was known that the raid of Brant, down the
Walkill valley to the Delaware, had failed to draw Sullivan from his
main purpose. The other parties of Tories and Indians had been equally
impotent. What then should be done to drive back the avenging army and
save their villages and crops?
Evidently the only safety was to join all forces. At a great council
of Tories and Iroquois, held where Geneva now stands, it was decided
to send wampum belts again to every and all tribes and bands of the
Iroquois, and bid them assemble to oppose the invaders in the Chemung
valley. Some of the parties that started in response to this call
arrived too late. The notorious John Butler, who had led the expedition
against Wyoming, was in command of the mixed forces of King George,
red, black, and white, and the strategy and tactics employed by him
showed the combination of the crafts of both savage and civilized man.
On Saturday evening, August 28, Sullivan’s advance pickets heard the
sound of axes and saw many fires brightly burning along the hills just
beyond Baldwin’s Creek. A scout sent out a day or two before, reported
that the enemy were fortified just beyond the creek and west of the
Indian village of Newtown. The march must now be made with a constant
reference to ambuscade and with the greatest wariness. “Above all, no
Braddocking.”
On Sunday, August 29, the day broke with every indication of very hot
weather. The air was close and heavy. The army moved at nine o’clock,
the riflemen being well scattered in front of Hand’s light corps, so as
to act as scouts and skirmishers, while every man in the brigade moved
with the greatest caution. Hardly had they gone a mile, before they
discovered several Indians in front. One of these fired and then all
fled. Going forward still further a mile, the riflemen found the ground
low, marshy and well fitted for the shelter of hiding Indians. Moving
slowly and alertly, they discovered another party of Indians, who as
before, fired and retreated. Evidently their purpose was to lure the
Americans into ambush.
Major Parr, commander of the rifle corps, now determined to advance no
further without reconnoitering every foot of the ground. Ordering his
men to halt, he sent one of them to climb the highest tree and survey
the whole situation. The scout was unable at first to discover anything
peculiar, but peering intently ahead, he made out a line of brushwood
artfully concealed with green boughs and trees. Starting from near the
Chemung river on the left, it ran up the slope of a high hill to the
right, for possibly half a mile. Here had been the Indian village of
Newtown, consisting of twenty-five or thirty bark houses, but most of
the houses had given way to timber entrenchments and to the camp inside
of them, though two or three were left so as to form, as it were,
bastions for the newly-built fort.
Here the enemy had gathered to make their determined stand. Their
force, numbering about nine hundred warriors from five tribes, had
been reinforced by between two and three hundred white men, Tories and
Canadians, drilled and aided by fifteen regular soldiers of the British
army, and commanded by Butler, McDonald, and Brant, while two or three
hundred more warriors were soon expected.
Such a position was a formidable obstacle to the advance even of an
army provided with artillery. The right flank of the British rested
on the river, their left on the side of a hill, while immediately in
front of them and for a space of about one hundred yards was a clear
field which their fire could sweep easily. Between this field and the
Continental lines was a stream, since called Baldwin’s Creek, and then
very difficult to cross. On the American right lay a valley so low and
marshy that an attack in flank would seem nearly impossible. Thus the
place was evidently well chosen.
Nearly the whole story of Indian craft in war is told in the one word,
concealment. To hide their breastworks with the hope that the invaders
might come very near to them without their being discovered, the Tories
and Indians had laid boughs and greenery over the front and top. They
had even planted out in front, here and there, fresh young trees, so
as to give the appearance of primitive and untouched forests. They had
stuck these young trees in the ground outside the breastworks and had
thoroughly cleaned up the ground, so that no chips or evidence of human
industry were left lying about. They hoped also that Sullivan’s troops
would rush for plunder into the few Indian houses left standing outside
the lines and would thus be entrapped.
Evidently, also it was their design that the Continentals, moving in a
narrow defile and strung out in a line several miles long, should be
caught between the river and the entrenchments, while the Indians in
ambuscade could pour in their fire. They hoped to “Braddock” Sullivan’s
force by stampeding the pack horses and cattle. On the high hill across
the river, and on the summit to the northward, watching parties were
stationed by Brant so that at the right moment they could quickly
descend. Then by frightening the animals, sending them flying in every
direction, they could complete the destruction of the army thus huddled
together. With so many chances in their favor, the Tories and Indians
hoped to give the Continental army such a check as to compel its return.
All these plans were frustrated by the great caution of Sullivan and
the alertness of his lieutenants. When Major Parr, about noon, reported
to his superior the situation of the enemy, Hand sent forward the
riflemen to occupy the banks of the creek, within one hundred yards of
the breastworks and under cover. The light brigade then moved to within
three hundred yards and deployed in line of battle. Sullivan coming
forward with the main army, sent Ogden’s flanking division along the
river to the left of Hand’s light brigade and further to the west. He
ordered Maxwell to remain in the rear in reserve. For a flank attack,
he detached two brigades, Poor’s New Hampshire and Clinton’s New York,
to move to the right and north. They were to make their way up the
swampy valley, and gain, if possible, the enemy’s left and rear. In
order to divert attention from this flank attack, Hand’s light corps
opened in the center, while Proctor’s nine guns were run forward and
posted on a hillock, directly in front of the angle of the breastworks
and about two hundred yards distance from them. As everything had to be
done in a rough country in the woods, on a fearfully hot day, it took
several hours to get the batteries and the brigades into position.
Then opened a lively fusilade, of small arms, which held the attention
of the enemy. It was proposed to allow until three o’clock for Poor and
Clinton to reach the top of the hill (now called Sullivan’s Hill, on
which the lofty monument stands), whence they were to turn and charge
down upon the enemy. Yet Sullivan listened long in vain for the sound
of musketry upon the distant right wing, notwithstanding that it was
Poor’s intention to advance with unloaded guns and charge with the
bayonet, for Wayne’s handsome work at Stony Point on July 16, only
six weeks before, had stirred the army with an ambition to achieve a
similar victory with cold steel. Colonel Cilley, who commanded a New
Hampshire regiment, had been with Wayne on the Hudson and was now with
Poor.
At three o’clock, Sullivan thinking it not wise to wait longer, gave
order to Proctor to open fire with all his guns. The two howitzers,
the little Coehorn and the six cannon opened with a terrific roar,
while the light corps were ordered to be in readiness for a charge, as
soon as the firing of the flanking column was heard. It was intended
that the cannonade should be the prelude to a general advance on front
and flank. The guns grew hot with firing, however, before anything
was heard from the New Hampshire men, who had been obliged to face
unexpected difficulties and especially to flounder through swamps, far
deeper than anyone had supposed.
Proctor’s round shot, grape and bombs not only cut and tore the forest
trees to the terror of the savages, but did terrible execution. In
many places within the enemy’s line the bloody proofs of the terrific
and destructive power of the shell fire were afterwards amply evident.
Brant, their mighty leader, found it was all he could do to hold his
painted warriors together. Suddenly, rather to their relief, than
otherwise, runners from the hilltop came to inform their chief that the
enemy had made an attack in force on their left flank, driven in the
party of watchers, and were moving forward on the main body. Glad to
escape the terrific missiles of the artillery, and to give his braves
congenial occupation and one more suitable to Indian warfare, Brant led
off a large party, possibly the majority of his warriors, to repel this
new danger.
Turning now to the hilltop on the right and to the flanking operations,
we behold the most startling episode of the battle, when for a moment
it looked as if a cloud of red men was about to overwhelm this one
isolated body of their foes. The second New Hampshire regiment under
Colonel Reid, separated from the others in the brigade, suddenly found
themselves partly surrounded by a semi-circle of rifles and hatchets.
Their thin scattered line of riflemen, sent out to scour the woods as
skirmishers, and at this time only a few yards in front of them, was
quickly driven back before a whirlwind of fire. With unloaded muskets,
the destruction of Reid’s regiment seemed certain. Nevertheless the
salvation of the Americans was in the Indians firing too high. They
were too certain of victory to keep cool and take sure aim.
This was the situation--Dearborn’s Third New Hampshire, Alden’s Sixth
Massachusetts, Cilley’s First New Hampshire, and Du Bois’s two hundred
and fifty picked New Yorkers, on the extreme right flank, and far to
the northwest of the main body, made up, with the Second New Hampshire,
the brigade. These regiments moving in the woods, in a country which
no white man had ever penetrated, had become quite separated from each
other. Poor, the commander, hoping to completely outflank the enemy,
was far ahead on the right, too distant to be heard from. Clinton’s
brigade, consisting of the Third New York under Gansevoort, the Fifth
New York commanded by Du Bois, the Fourth New York led by Livingston,
and the Second New York on the right under Van Cortlandt, formed the
reserve, but they were still far below in the rear. The regiments
were all small, numbering each about three hundred men. The great and
imminent danger was that Brant’s seven hundred warriors might wholly
overwhelm the men of one regiment before help could reach them from
their comrades.
Such disaster seemed now to threaten. Starting his men on the run,
Brant had reached the hill top, just as the men of Reid’s Second New
Hampshire, nearly out of breath, and toiling amid the terrific heat,
were only half way up the rough face of the rather steep eastern
slope. At the extreme left of their brigade and nearest the British
breastworks, which were a few hundred rods to the westward, Reid’s
men found themselves far away and out of sight from their comrades in
the other regiments, which were further to the right--east and north.
Their guns were unloaded while their ears were deafened with the yell
of hundreds of exultant savages who felt sure of scalps. In a moment
more they were face to face with the foe. With their empty muskets,
defeat and massacre seemed certain. They realized that their brigadier,
Poor, was far away to the right, pressing his troops on to the attack,
hoping to close in upon the enemy and prevent their retreat.
There was but one thing to do. It was to fix bayonets and charge. Reid
shouted the order. His men, jaded as they were, pushed further up the
hill, driving the enemy for a moment before them and getting a bare
chance, in the momentary lull, to load their guns. Then began the usual
fusilade among the trees. Yet it was still a desperate uncertainty and
the enemy outnumbered them.
Not far away, Dearborn, with the Third New Hampshire, hearing the
firing, realized at once the peril in which Reid was. Without waiting
a moment, he took the responsibility, without orders, to right about
face. He did so, supporting Reid and striking the enemy on the flank,
while Clinton, equally alert, pushed forward two of his regiments. His
object was to support the New Hampshires and if possible gain Brant’s
rear.
Then ensued a severe fight in the woods, which from the nature of the
situation could not last very long. Brant seeing his plans upset,
ordered his men to retreat and save themselves.
At the same time, further down on the flats, Sullivan having heard the
report of the guns on the hill, at once ordered an advance along the
whole line. With cheers our men rushed over the entrenchments, and then
a running fight of several miles, indeed all the way into the limits of
the modern city of Elmira, ensued. Nevertheless the enemy were able to
escape, being much more familiar with the country. They carried away
their wounded in canoes up the river, and made off with, or concealed
some of the bodies of their dead.
The battlefield was fully occupied by our trains and camp, and about
six o’clock in the afternoon, when the pursuit stopped, three cheers
told the story of another American victory. The known loss of the enemy
was thirteen whites and many Indians. Twenty-six corpses of red men
were found upon the field. Two prisoners, one a negro and one a Tory
with his face painted black, were taken. General Sullivan reported
three killed and twenty-nine wounded, five of whom afterwards died. All
the patriot dead and most of the wounded were New Hampshire men, and
all the casualties except four were in Poor’s brigade, Reid’s regiment
suffering the worst.
In reality this was one of the great decisive battles of the
Revolution, for it broke forever the power of the Iroquois. Throughout
the war, except in small parties, neither Tories nor savages were
able to gather for raids. As a military factor the warriors of the
Six Nations never again appeared in or with an army. Sullivan and
his soldiers had ended the flank attacks on the army, and opened the
way for civilization into western New York and Pennsylvania. Indeed,
for over half a century, or until the railways dictated the lines of
travel, “Sullivan’s Road” was the main highway into New York from
Pennsylvania.
CHAPTER VI
IN THE WONDERFUL LAKE REGION
It began to rain on Sunday shortly after the battle firing was over,
and the next day, Monday, August 30, was a day of rest.
It was also necessary, in consequence of the very poor and insufficient
provisions, as well as the want of enough pack horses, to cut down
to one-half the rations of flour, salt and meat. However, as the
country through which they were to march was rich in vegetable food,
Sullivan issued orders, stating the facts, and asking that “the troops
will please to consider the matter and give their opinion as soon as
possible.” So late that afternoon the whole army was drawn up in the
separate brigades and regiments. Then the question was put whether they
would advance, taking the risk of hunger.
“Without a dissenting voice, the whole army cheerfully agreed to the
request of the General, which was signified by unanimously holding up
their hands and giving three cheers.” Neither the remembered horrors
of Valley Forge, nor the risk of possible starvation could discourage
the army. With many a laugh and joke, the men moved forward to their
“Succotash Campaign.” They were happy to know that the heavier
artillery, the two howitzers and brace of six pounders were to be sent
back. The labor of drawing ammunition wagons and heavy cannon up and
down hills would be much reduced. Nevertheless, the four three pounders
and caissons, taken along with the Coehorn, meant much chopping in the
woods to make a path.
On Tuesday, the line of march was taken up through the broken, swampy,
and mountainous country. For their night’s camp the men were happy
to find a level plain, but the next day they had to go through Bear
Swamp, which was then a horrible dark quagmire six miles long. Having
a clay bottom, the black mire held the water which flowed tortuously
through the spongy soil, in which the vegetation of centuries had
made a peaty mass, which the recent rains had made as unstable as a
jelly and slippery as soap. Here was the divide of waters between the
Susquehanna and the Saint Lawrence rivers, flowing into the Atlantic
at Labrador or Hatteras. The Indian trail through this soggy country
passed through defiles, over mounds and through ravine after ravine,
rough and scrubby, while through all meandered a stream of dark water.
Only with the most tremendous toil were the Continentals able to get
through, and the rear guard did not reach hard ground until long after
noon next day. The cannon were pulled through only by the toil of
hundreds of men at the drag ropes, or by laying on the worst places
corduroy, or a rough road of trees and brushwood. Many horses were
mired and abandoned, and scores of packs with precious bags of flour
and ammunition were lost. Altogether it was a most terrible experience,
much worse than in the Pennsylvania swamp, called “The Shades of
Death,” which they had traversed.
For years afterwards, that horrible night formed the blackest memory
and gave the most disturbing element to the dreams of the old soldiers.
In our time, as we travel through this drained and dry valley between
the green walls of the hills on either side, we wonder as we look over
the celery gardens where Bear Swamp was. Within half a century after
Sullivan’s march and return, the forests were cleared and the Chemung
canal, bearing millions of cubic feet of timber to the great cities,
and especially to build the Maryland privateers for the War of 1812,
traversed and drained the swamp. To-day smiling farms and vegetable
gardens on either side of the well laid beds of the steam railway and
electric trolley line fill the sunny and beautiful valley.
Just beyond this horrible swamp of 1779 lay the village of Sheaquaga,
or “French Catherine’s town,” three miles from Seneca Lake, on the site
of the present town of Havana, or Montour Falls. It was the capital
of the Indian Queen Catherine Montour, and contained her “palace.” It
consisted of about forty “long,” or apartment, houses of timber and
bark, with splendid cornfields, orchards, and fenced enclosures, in
which were horses, cows, calves and hogs. It looked as though the army
would have, for a little while at least, meat rations. Here had been
the home of Catherine, sister of Queen Esther and granddaughter of
Adam Montour, who was the offspring of Count Frontenac. A Dutch family
had also lived here among the Indians. It seemed strange to our men to
find feather beds and other evidences of civilization so far in the
wilderness. Some of it was the plunder from Cherry Valley and Wyoming.
The town was deserted, but our troops had to wait all day Thursday for
the pack horses and cattle that emerged one by one, or in parties,
from the darkness of the dreadful swamp. They found an old squaw, whom
they compelled to give information about the Indians. Then they built
for her a hut and left her some provisions. Moving northward along the
eastern shores of Seneca Lake, through open woods and level country,
they found corn roasting in the fire, their supper left untasted and
all the evidences of the hasty movement of a large body of Indians.
The next day they moved as far as North Hector, to a village consisting
of one very large apartment house with several rooms and fires. To this
day the new timber, grown up in the place of the old forest cut through
for the artillery, can be easily discerned. Resuming their march, they
came on Sunday, September 5, to Kendaia, or Apple Town. This was an
Indian village of the first class, over twenty large, long apartment
houses built of timber and bark, some of them well painted. There
were apple and peach orchards, with many hundreds of trees ripening
their fruit, and a cemetery, in which there were tombs erected to
the chiefs and made of hewn and painted planks. Here they met with a
white captive, Luke Sweetland, whom the Indians had kept employed in
making salt. All this lake region is underlaid with beds of the purest
chloride of sodium, and in times of peace the Senecas and Onondagas
drove a thriving trade with the other tribes in this necessity of life.
They made their salt by boiling the brine from salt springs. To-day at
Ithaca and Ludlowville the white crystals fill daily a freight train.
On the sixth of September the evening gun sounded at Indian Hollow.
On the seventh day they reached the great Seneca town of Kanadesaga,
lying on both sides of Castle Creek near what is now Geneva, N. Y.
Here had dwelt Old Smoke, the Indian King, and his son who married a
daughter of Catherine Montour. In 1756, during the Old French War, Sir
William Johnson had built a fort, or stockade, in this town, which was
regularly laid out with the open square, in which the fort stood, in
the center. Orchards and gardens were plentiful, especially on the
north and northeast. Although Sullivan had expected to fight a battle
here, and had deployed his regiments for assault, yet the town was
found to be entirely deserted, except that a little white boy three
years old, captured from one of the settlements, was found playing,
though nearly starved. The circular mound, on which the councils of
the chiefs and orators were held, still stands, a monument of a nearly
vanished race. Gleefully the troops marched in and through the town,
with pumpkins and squashes skewered on their bayonets.
The Continentals were now in that renowned lake region of New York
famous among the Indians not only for its salt springs, but for its
abundance of fish and fruit, and the general fertility of the soil.
The forest was still dense all around them, except the more frequent
openings, but the Indian villages were numerous and with luxuriant
vegetable gardens. In these, onions, peas, beans, squashes, potatoes,
turnips, cabbages, cucumbers, watermelons, carrots and parsnips were
plentiful, while great cornfields stretched farther off into the
clearings and to the very edge of the forest, and orchards of apple,
peach and mulberry trees were within easy reach.
It was this great store of vegetable food found everywhere ready that
decided Sullivan and his brigade commanders, after a council of war,
to push on further westward, despite the very scanty supplies of meat
and flour rations. So the horses and the men unable to proceed further
by reason of sickness or lameness, were sent back to the fort at Tioga
Point, Captain Reed of Massachusetts with fifty men forming the escort.
Thence he was to return again, as we have seen, to Kanawaholla, near
the present city of Elmira, with supplies for the army on its return.
The main army, facing the setting sun, camped at Flint Creek September
9, and on the next day at noon reached Canandaigua, so named because
here the trading Indians on the trail, or red commercial travellers
on the road, “took off their pack” to rest. It was an Indian town of
twenty-three large houses, with standing crops, all of which, as at the
other places, were given to the torch. It is said that the women and
pappooses hid themselves on Squaw Island, in the lake near the town.
On Saturday, September 11, the Stars and Stripes were unfurled at the
foot of Honeoye Lake, where stood the Indian village of twenty long
houses. All these except one, selected for a fortified storehouse,
were set on fire. The walls of this strongest dwelling were still
further strengthened with kegs and bags of flour, and a ditch dug and
_abatis_ made. Then two three pounders were mounted and their black
noses poked out of the port holes cut through the walls. Here the sick
and disabled, amounting to nearly three hundred, were left, in camp.
The weakest found quarters in the rooms and bunks of the Indian house.
Then the whole army, now able to move as a light armed corps, pressed
forward to the goal, which was the big Indian town in the Genesee river
valley, near what is now Cuylerville, below Geneseo, N. Y. Delayed
by storm and rain next day, only eleven miles were made to Adjuton,
a village of eighteen houses, near Conesus Lake, where had lived two
celebrities, Captain Sunfish, a negro, and Big Tree, a Seneca chief.
The fresh evidences of savages near at hand, were very manifest on the
Indian path leading to the Genesee town.
It may be wondered what had become of the motley British force after
their defeat at Newtown. As a matter of fact, two hundred fresh Indian
warriors had joined Brant just after the battle. They were clamorous
to advance at once against the Americans, but those who had a taste of
grape shot and bursting bombs were unwilling to make a stand. So the
whole force of red and white allies of King George had retreated to the
north and west, making camp near Avon, in Livingston County. Keeping
out their scouts on the hilltops, they were well informed of Sullivan’s
movements.
Now, knowing that he had left Conesus, evidently to attack the big
town of the Senecas, Brant and Butler chose a strong position. It was
remarkably like that of Braddock’s field, in Pennsylvania, wherein the
pride of England’s infantry were changed, from red-coated soldiers,
in the glory of lusty life, to heaps of bleaching bones. On a bluff,
parallel with the western side of Conesus Lake, well forested, but
full of deep ravines, Butler posted his men in ambush. He hoped that
Sullivan would advance with his men up the well known trail between two
ravines. He had broken down the old, rude bridge over the stream, but
he knew that the Continental pioneers would be likely to build another
out of the oak and hickory which abounded here. Here he expected to
post his men and watch for the opportunity when the scouts should
announce the nearness of Sullivan, who was without artillery. With his
fresh reinforcements Butler was confident of victory.
WILLIAM ELLIOT GRIFFIS.
ITHACA, N. Y.
(_To be continued._)
THE LIBERTY OF THE PRESS
IN THE AMERICAN COLONIES BEFORE THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR, WITH PARTICULAR
REFERENCE TO CONDITIONS IN THE ROYAL COLONY OF NEW YORK.
CHAPTER VI--_Concluded_
It is also important to remember that the press appealed to a very
much smaller percentage of the population in colonial times than it
does to-day. “In Boston with a population of 8000, Campbell succeeded
in selling but 3000 copies of his News Letters when it was the only
newspaper printed in America.”[1] Later the circulation of all the
papers increased, but it was still but a small proportion of the
colonists who received first hand the opinions of the editor. And
this body of subscribers was for the most part of the professional
class or the wealthier part of those in trade, persons naturally of a
conservative temper and apt to look with disfavor on any strong attack
on or disregard of legalized and established authority.
In New York, owing to the peculiar way in which the press was
introduced, it for the first forty years of its existence did nothing
to put itself in antagonism to the government; in Massachusetts it at
first was given a subvention by the General Court; in South Carolina
a comparatively large sum was offered to any printer who would
brave the dangers of the climate and establish a press. With these
exceptions its early days were passed under governments which viewed
with dislike or suspicion any attempts on the part of the printers to
take an intelligent part in the questions that were interesting the
people. For this reason the press in all the colonies early assumed a
position of antagonism to the constituted authority and in return the
government took every opportunity to hurt it by means of prosecutions
in the courts or inquisitorial proceedings before the Governor and his
Council. It is interesting to note however that these proceedings lost
almost all their terrors as the period of the Revolution approached,
for the press received more and more the support of the people, who had
learned to appreciate the wide circulation which the newspapers gave
to the new doctrines; thus we constantly find the grand juries refusing
to find true bills against the printers, in this way reducing the
Governor to the use of Informations which were looked on with suspicion
by the people and seldom resulted in a verdict of Guilty.
But the greatest influence of the press was exerted through the
flood of hand-bills and pamphlets which ever increased in volume as
the period of the Revolution drew near. Printed in large numbers
and circulating everywhere, we find Governors reporting to the home
government that it was impossible to stop them, and that they were
doing incalculable harm.
If now we attempt in a very brief way to review the whole matter of the
struggle for the liberty of the press we shall find:
First: That the system in vogue in America, as in England, up to the
close of the seventeenth century, was a system of administrative
control by the Crown through appointed officers called Censors, to whom
all writings had to be submitted before publication and who either gave
or refused permission to print. That this Censorship was shared by
Church and State in some instances only complicated the situation.
Second: With the failure to pass the Licensing Bill in 1695 the press
became in all parts of the English dominion freed from this censorship;
but a system of judicial control took its place, for all publications
were now subject to the law of libel, and an attack on the dominant
party was held by the courts to be a libel, and a censure of the
Governor to be a personal reflection on the King. In Franklin’s case
in England in 1731,[2] it was laid down by Lord Raymond that the court
alone was to judge of the criminality of a libel, to the jury was given
only the right to decide as to the fact of publication.
In England that doctrine continued in force until the passage of Mr.
Fox’s Libel Bill in 1792. But fifty-eight years earlier the Zenger case
(in 1734) had established in principle the freedom of the press in the
colonies, by settling the right of juries to find a general verdict in
libel cases. We have said “in principle,” for this right, which the
colonists soon grew to consider as a part of their common law, was yet
in practice more or less nullified in the different colonies according
as the Governor was able to impose his will on the courts or was
opposed by an intelligent public opinion.
In other words, liberty of the press did not and could not exist in
the colonial period, but the people accepted the principle and when
they obtained the opportunity incorporated it in Bills of Rights and
State Constitutions. The Continental Congress in issuing, on Oct. 21st,
1774, an “Address to the people of Canada” proceeded to detail and
enlarge upon the rights to which English subjects were entitled, and
among them placed the freedom of the press.[3]
We see the same point made by State after State.
Maryland, 1776: “That the liberty of the press ought to be inviolably
preserved.”
Virginia, 1776: “That the freedom of the press is one of the great
bulwarks of liberty, and can never be restrained but by despotic
governments.”
Pennsylvania, 1776: “That the people have a right to freedom of speech,
and of writing, and of publishing their sentiments; therefore the
freedom of the press ought not to be restrained.”
Georgia, 1777: “Freedom of the press and trial by jury to remain
inviolable forever.”
Vermont, 1777: “That the public have the right to freedom of speech and
of writing and publishing their sentiments; therefore the freedom of
the press ought not to be restrained.”
South Carolina, 1778: “That the liberty of the press be inviolably
preserved.”
Massachusetts, 1780: “The liberty of the press is essential to the
security of freedom in a state; and ought not, therefore, to be
restrained in this commonwealth.”
New Hampshire, 1784: “The liberty of the press is essential to the
security of freedom in a state; and it ought, therefore, to be
inviolably preserved.”
Pinckney’s Plan of 1787: “The Legislature of the United States shall
pass no law touching or abridging the liberty of the press.”
Delaware, 1792: “The press shall be free to every citizen who
undertakes to examine the official conduct of men acting in a public
capacity, and any citizen may print on any subject, being responsible
for the abuse of that liberty. In prosecutions for publications
investigating the proceedings of officers, or where the matter
published is proper for public information, the truth thereof may be
given in evidence; and in all indictments for libels, the jury may
determine the facts and the law, as in other cases.”
After the Federal Convention came together in 1787 it was proposed
to insert in the Constitution, “the liberty of the press shall be
inviolably preserved.” This was defeated by six states against five.[4]
But when the different States afterwards sent to the first Congress the
proposals from which the first ten Amendments were selected we find in
nearly all some reference to the liberty of the press. The article on
the subject from Massachusetts was selected and now appears as a part
of the First Amendment to the Constitution, “Congress shall make no
law ... abridging the freedom of speech or of the press.”[5] And since
that time nearly every Constitution drawn up by the different States
has contained an admission of the principle so long contended for by
supporters of the rights of the press, that, as David Hume says, “its
liberties, and the liberties of the people must stand or fall together.”
BIBLIOGRAPHY
Andrews, Alexander--History of British Journalism; 2 vols. London,
1859.
Anson, Sir Wm. R.--Law and Custom of the Constitution; 2 vols. Oxford,
1886.
Barry, John Stetson--The History of Massachusetts; 3 vols. Boston,
1855.
Booth, Mary L.--The History of the City of New York. New York, 1880.
Bradford, Wm.--New England’s Spirit of Persecution Transmitted to
Pennsylvania. New York, 1693.
Brodhead, John Romeyn--History of the State of New York; 2 vols. New
York, v.d.
Brown, David Paul--The Forum; 2 vols. Philadelphia, 1856.
Brown, Henry B.--The Liberty of the Press; Am. Law Review, 34, 321.
Buckingham, Joseph T.--Specimens of Newspaper Literature, with
Personal Memoirs, Anecdotes, and Reminiscences; 2 vols. Boston, 1852.
Burk, John D.--The History of Virginia from its first Settlement to
the Present Day; 4 vols. Petersburg, Va., 1805.
Burn, John Southerden--The Star Chamber. London, 1870.
Chalmers, George--Political Annals of the Present United Colonies from
the Settlement to the Peace of 1763. London, 1780.
Collier, Edward--Essay on the Law of Patents and the General History
of Monopolies. London, 1803.
Cucheval-Clarigny, M.--Histoire de la Presse en Angleterre et aux
Etats Unis. Paris, 1857.
De Peyster, Frederic--Early Political History of New York. New York,
1865.
Duane, Wm.--Canada and the Continental Congress, An Address delivered
before the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Philadelphia, 1850.
Dunlap, Wm.--History of New York; 2 vols. New York, 1839.
Eastman, F. S.--History of New York. New York, 1831.
Fisher & Strahan--Law of the Press. London, 1895.
Force, Peter--American Archives; 9 vols. Washington, v.d.
Ford, Paul Leicester--Journal of Hugh Gaine. New York, 1901.
Fowle, Daniel--Total Eclipse of Liberty. Boston, 1755.
Franklin, Benjamin--Autobiography. New York, 1849.
Fraser, Hugh--Privileges of the Press in relation to Libel; Law
Quarterly Review, 7, 158.
Gentz, F. von--Reflections on the Liberty of the Press in Great
Britain, London, 1820 (trans.)
Gordon, Wm. D. D.--The History of the Rise, Progress and Establishment
of the Independence of the United States of America; 4 vols. London,
1788.
Grant, James--History of the Newspaper Press. London, 1840.
Hall, Robert--An Apology for the Freedom of the Press and for General
Liberty. London, 1793.
Harrison, W. L. S.--Proceedings at the Printers Banquet held at the
N. Y. Typographical Society, on the Occasion of Franklin’s Birthday,
1850. New York, 1850.
Hening, Wm. Waller--Statutes at Large of Virginia; 16 vols. New York,
1823.
Howell, T. B.--State Trials; 30 vols. London, v.d.
Hildeburn, Charles--Sketches of Printers and Printing in Colonial New
York. New York, 1895.
Hudson, Frederick--A History of Journalism. New York, 1873.
Hunt, F. Knight--The Fourth Estate; Contributions Towards a History of
Newspapers and of the Liberty of the Press; 2 vols. London, 1850.
Hutchinson, Thomas--History of Massachusetts; 2 vols. Salem, 1795.
Jefferson, Thomas--Notes on the State of Virginia. London, 1787.
Jones, Horatio Gates--Andrew Bradford, Founder of the Newspaper Press
in the Middle States of America; An Address delivered at the Annual
Meeting of the Historical Society of Pennsylvania. Philadelphia, 1869.
Lechford, Thomas--Note-Book. Am. Antiquarian Society; Vol. VII, 1885.
Leake, Isaac Q.--Memoirs of the Life and Times of General John Lamb.
Albany, 1850.
Lincoln, Wm.--History of Worcester, Mass. Worcester, 1862.
Massachusetts--MS. Records of the Colony.
McAdam, David--History of the Bench and Bar of New York; 2 vols. New
York, 1897.
McMaster, John Bach--A Free Press in the Middle Colonies. Princeton
Review; Vol. I (N. S.)
Munsell, Joel--Annals of Albany; 10 vols. Albany, v.d.
New York--The Colonial Laws of; 5 vols. Albany, 1894.
New York--Votes and Proceedings of the General Assembly of the Colony
of. 1691-1765; 2 vols. New York, 1765.
New York--Votes and Proceedings of the General Assembly of the Colony
of. 1766-1776. Albany, 1820 (reprint).
New York--Votes and Proceedings of the Legislative Council, Albany.
New York, 1861.
North, S. N. D.--Constitutional Development of the Colony of New York.
Mag. Am. Hist. III, 161.
O’Callaghan, E. B.--Documents relative to the Colonial History of the
State of New York; 11 vols. Albany, v.d.
Odgers, W. Blake--The Law of Libel. Philadelphia, 1887.
Pennsylvania--Minutes of the Provincial Council of; 3 vols.
Philadelphia, 1852.
Proud, Robert--History of Pennsylvania; 2 vols. Philadelphia, 1798.
Ross, Peter--A History of Long Island. New York, 1903.
Rutherfurd, Livingston--John Peter Zenger. His Press, His Trial, and
a Bibliography of his Imprints and those issued by his Wife and Son.
Also a reprint of the Trial. New York, 1904.
Satterlee, Herbert L.--Political History of the Province of New York.
New York, 1885.
Taylor, Hannis--The Freedom of the Press. Argument ex parte John L.
Rapier, before Supreme Court of U. S., n.p., n.d.
Taylor, Henry Osborn--Development of Constitutional Government in the
American Colonies. Mag. Am. Hist. II, 705.
Thomas, Benjamin Franklin, Memoir of Isaiah Thomas. Boston, 1874.
Thomas, Isaiah--History of Printing; 2 vols. Albany, 1874.
The Tryal of John Peter Zenger. London, 1738.
Wallace, John William--Address on Wm. Bradford. Albany, 1863.
Wallace, John William--Col. Wm. Bradford. Philadelphia, 1884.
LIVINGSTON ROWE SCHUYLER.
NEW YORK CITY.
[Illustration]
FOOTNOTES:
[1] Hudson, History of Journalism, p. 57.
[2] Howell’s State Trials XVII, 1243.
[3] Wm. Duane, “Canada and the Continental Congress,” p. 20.
[4] Journal of Convention, p. 217.
[5] Elliot’s Debates, Vol. I, p. 183.
RELICS OF COMMODORE JOHN BARRY IN PHILADELPHIA
Apropos of the proposed erection here of a monument to the memory of
Commodore John Barry, it is interesting to know that in addition to his
tomb in St. Mary’s Churchyard, on Fourth street below Locust, where he
was buried, there are many other relics of the great naval commander in
this city, which was his home and where he maintained both a town and
country residence. In Fairmount Park, too, is a monument not known to
many people, where one of the five figures of the fountain erected by
the Catholic Total Abstinence Society is a statue of Barry. It is of
heroic size and the inscription, besides reciting some of his principal
exploits on the sea, describes him as the first commodore of the United
States navy.
Nearly all the other relics are in the possession of Mrs. W. Horace
Hepburn of this city, who is a great-grandniece of Barry, and also
a granddaughter of Commodore Bainbridge, and to whom they have been
handed down. They are of many kinds and, taken altogether, would form
quite a museum. Some of them are particularly valuable as records
of history, among these being the logs of the _Alliance_ and other
warships which Barry commanded. Another documentary relic is the
commission as captain and commander of the frigate _United States_
issued to Barry to “take rank from the fourth day of June, 1804.” It
is dated February 22, 1797, however, and is signed by Washington. On
the margin it is numbered “one,” showing it to have been the first
captain’s commission issued in the navy of the new constitutional
government.
Of nearly equal importance as a record is the certificate of Barry’s
membership in the Society of the Cincinnati. With this Mrs. Hepburn
has also the handsome jewelled badge of the order presented to him by
Lafayette. It is in the regular form of the organization’s emblem, but
is very ornate. It was manufactured in France. Also in Mrs. Hepburn’s
possession is Stuart’s original portrait, a copy of which, by Colin
Campbell Cooper, was presented to the city by the Hibernian Society
in 1895, and now hangs in Independence Hall. The Stuart portrait was
painted in this city.
Among the relics is a set of china, much of which was used on the
frigate _Alliance_. Among these is a punch bowl and pitcher in white
china, with a good picture of the frigate under full sail on each.
This china was probably made in France, but that point has not as
yet been definitely determined. What were also probably used on the
ship are a number of glass goblets and other glassware, which are not
particularly fine as to design and manufacture, but are none the less
cherished as relics. There is also a considerable quantity of French
china, with the monogram S. B., for Sarah Barry, on it, and a number of
dinner plates, which were probably used in his house. Pertaining more
closely to the commander’s seafaring career are one of his swords, a
gun, and a full-dress uniform, the latter consisting of yellow nankeen
knee breeches and vest, with a blue frock coat with immense brass
buttons. The size of these garments emphasizes the well-known fact
that the commodore was a very large man. Originally among the relics
were a pair of silver knee buckles, which, before the collection came
into the hands of its present owner, were melted down and made into
teaspoons. How big they were may be inferred from the fact that they
made six spoons. Mrs. Hepburn has these spoons, but says she would much
prefer to have the silver in its original form of buckles. Commodore
Barry’s watch is also in the collection, as is a large solid silver ale
tankard, which was probably used on land.
Barry’s tomb in St. Mary’s churchyard is one of the most impressive
mementos of him because of the inscription which it bears. The original
tomb was erected by the commodore’s widow, but this became dilapidated
through the ravages of time and the inscription, written by Dr.
Benjamin Rush, a copy of which has been preserved in the Ridgeway
branch of the Philadelphia Library, was barely decipherable as early
as 1865. In 1876 the tomb was repaired, and now bears the following
inscription:
“Sacred to the memory of Commodore John Barry, father of the American
navy. Let the Christian patriot and soldier who visits these mansions
of the dead view this monument with respect and veneration. Beneath
it rest the remains of John Barry, who was born in County Wexford,
Ireland, in the year 1745. America was the object of his patriotism,
and the aim of his usefulness and ambition. At the beginning of the
Revolutionary War he held the commission of captain in the then limited
navy of the colonies. His achievements in battle and his renowned naval
tactics merited for him the position of commodore, and to be justly
regarded as the father of the American navy. He fought often and bled
in the cause of freedom, but his deeds of valor did not diminish in him
the virtues which adorned his private life. He was eminently gentle,
kind, just, and charitable, and no less beloved by his family and
friends than by his grateful country. Firm in the faith and practices
of the Roman Catholic Church, he departed this life on the 13th day
of September, 1803, in the fifty-ninth year of his age. In grateful
remembrance, a few of his countrymen, members of St. Mary’s Church and
others, have contributed towards this second monument, erected July 1,
1876. _Requiescat in Pace._”
Commodore Barry’s deeds as a naval officer, the fact that he commanded
the _Lexington_, the first armed cruiser; that he captured and brought
to Philadelphia the first prize; that he fought the last naval battle,
and many other such points in his brilliant record, are all embalmed
in the nation’s history. In private life he was a loyal friend and a
good citizen, social in his tastes, hearty in his manner, and genial to
all. He was a sailor before joining our navy, having been placed in the
merchant marine service by his father when a mere boy. He came to this
country when probably about twenty-one years old, reaching Philadelphia
from the island of Barbados, in command of the schooner _Barbados_.
This was ten years before the Revolution, and from that time until
the opening of the war he followed his career in these waters, and
in command of vessels sailing between here and England. He was twice
married, and both wives were buried in the same grave in St. Mary’s
churchyard. His second wife, Sarah Austin, and her sister, Mary, are
said to have made and presented to John Paul Jones the flag of the _Bon
Homme Richard_. Commodore Barry died in 1803, at his country residence,
“Strawberry Hill.” This was not the Strawberry Hill in Fairmount Park,
but was located on Frankford Road, at Gunner’s Run. The body was
brought to his city residence, on the south side of Chestnut Street,
between Ninth and Tenth Streets, on a site about opposite the _Record_
building, where the funeral took place.--_Philadelphia Record._
BUSHNELL’S “TURTLE”
The successful use in the Russian-Japanese war (as is supposed, for no
official statement has come from the Japanese officials) of submarine
boats has obscured the historic fact that one hundred and thirty years
ago the first attempt of the kind was made in the harbor of New York.
It is a fact that is not generally known, but which is of official
record--that the first serious attempt in this line was the work of a
Yale undergraduate. It was while a freshman at Yale, in the year 1771,
that David Bushnell, an ingenious Connecticut boy, conceived the idea
of a submarine vessel as a desirable means of defensive warfare. He
kept at the problem throughout the four years of his college course,
and by the time of his graduation, in 1775, had made several successful
trial trips with his _American Turtle_, as his peculiar contrivance
was called. The plans of this vessel were carefully examined a few
years ago by Commander F. W. Barber, U. S. N., whose conclusion was
that “it seems to have been the most perfect thing of its kind that has
ever been constructed, either before or since the time of Bushnell.”
Bushnell invented not only the first submarine boat of which there is
any intelligent record, but the first torpedo as well. He discovered
the principle of modern torpedo-mining--that is, the utilization of the
pressure of the water to develop the desirable intensity of action in
an explosion near the vessel to be destroyed. Furthermore, he was the
first man to give the torpedo its modern name. All these triumphs he
accomplished while an undergraduate student at Yale.
He gathered an assemblage of what he called “the first personages in
Connecticut” to prove to them that this strange thing could be done. He
first exploded two ounces of powder four feet under water, and later
blew up a hogshead filled with stones, a wooden bottle, and a two-inch
oak plank, greatly to the astonishment of his learned associates. After
this preliminary display of what he could do, young Bushnell’s theories
were held in greater respect throughout the rest of his college course.
He had one great idea, however, and this was the possibility of
constructing a boat that could sail under the enemy’s ship, attach to
it a magazine with a sufficient charge of powder to destroy the vessel
and all its men--the operator, meanwhile, getting safely away. He kept
hard at work throughout his four undergraduate years, and by the time
he was graduated had constructed such a machine and experimented with
the most encouraging success.
He finished his vessel at an opportune time. He had its complicated
mechanism complete and in fine running order when the Declaration
of Independence was signed, and the war between England and America
was under full way. He naturally had some difficulty in gaining a
respectful hearing from the leading men on the colonial side. Although
afterwards he was praised by Washington as “a man of great mechanical
powers, fertile in inventions, and a master of execution,” his first
real encouragement came from another Connecticut man, Israel Putnam.
Bushnell explained his contrivance to Putnam, who after carefully
examining the vessel, was much struck with its ingenuity and its
possibilities of success. He gave the young inventor full permission
to go ahead, and declared his intention of being present at the first
trial.
The occasion for this preliminary experiment was soon at hand. The
movements of General Washington about Long Island had been accompanied
by the arrival of a large British fleet from Halifax under Admiral Lord
Howe, brother of the commander of the British army. Putnam had been
left with 4000 men in New York, and sent for Bushnell, inviting him
to test his submarine boat against one of the enemy’s ships. Bushnell
was himself physically incapacitated from managing his machine, for it
required considerable strength. He had, however, taught his brother
its fine points, and the latter in many trials had demonstrated
his skill. At the critical time, however, the latter fell ill of a
fever and a substitute had to be found. Ezra Lee of Lyme, Conn., was
finally decided upon as the fittest man for the place. Lee had already
volunteered to go in a fire-ship, and his bravery was unquestioned.
Bushnell spent several days teaching Lee the management of the
boat--altogether too short a time, as subsequent events showed. The
British fleet lay a little above Staten Island, the flagship, against
which it was determined to operate being the _Eagle_.
It was a queer craft, the like of which no man had ever seen, in
which Ezra Lee embarked one dark night in August, 1776, with the firm
intention of destroying the pick of the British fleet. Its shape
suggested a turtle or rather two upper turtle shells, securely fastened
together. A brass crown, resembling a hat, represented the head of the
turtle; it was provided with glass windows, which supplied light while
the boat was on the surface, and with several round doors, which were
opened before submersion for the admission of air. The turtle rested
in the water with its tail downwards, being held in position by a
permanent lead ballast in the hold of 500 pounds. This was supplemented
by 200 pounds of the same metal, which could be released at the will
of the navigator, enabling him to rise suddenly to the surface. The
turtle was made of oak, put together in the strongest manner; it was
seven and one-half feet long and six feet high. It admitted only one
person, who had room enough either to stand up or sit down. There were
two air-tubes, one for letting the fresh air in and another for letting
the foul air out. These were ingeniously arranged so that they operated
whenever the boat was brought to the surface and closed immediately
after it was submerged. There were no means of generating or supplying
air while the contrivance was under water. Sufficient atmosphere to
last the operator thirty minutes was supplied before the trial began,
after the exhaustion of which he was obliged to rise to the surface.
The question of light presented a still greater difficulty. A candle
exhausting the air too rapidly, Bushnell was obliged to find some less
embarrassing substitute. He finally noted the points of the compass by
two pieces of fox-fire wood--that is, wood that emitted a phosphoric
light. The same method was used to determine the depth of the water.
For this Bushnell constructed a peculiar contrivance, the secret of
which is unknown, consisting of a glass tube, filled with water, in
which a cork floated up and down. This cork was also covered with
fox-fire, and by its rise and fall the operator could determine the
depth to which his vessel was submerged. The boat was propelled back
and forth by a paddle in front, shaped like the arm of a windmill. The
operator turned this with a crank, and could go either forwards or
backwards, as he desired. It was precisely the same principle as the
modern screw, with the exception that it was placed in the bow instead
of the stern of the boat. Another “oar,” identically the same, was
arranged at right angles with the first, by means of which the vessel
could be guided up or down. The progress of the boat was necessarily
slow, but it is said that a strong man, with a favoring tide and
current, could propel it three knots an hour. The rudder, also turned
by a crank, could be used for sculling when desired. In the bottom of
the vessel were two large water tanks, into which the water was let by
a spring. It was by this means that the boat made its descent. There
were two pumps, which the operator worked with his feet, for the
expulsion of the water when he desired to rise. In case these failed to
work, the two hundred pounds of lead on the bottom could be released,
after which the rise was very sudden. The operator sat upright, with
his head in the crown of the vessel, and by a dexterous use of his
hands and feet, had little difficulty in completely mastering his boat.
It required considerable practice, however, and unusual strength.
This was Bushnell’s submarine boat, but it was only one feature of his
invention. His other discovery, the torpedo, was ingeniously combined
with his vessel. On the stern of the boat, just above the rudder, on
the outside, was a large cask, made of two pieces of oak, carefully
caulked and tarred, and bound together with iron. The interior was dug
out and contained a charge of powder. Within was a gun-lock, which was
arranged to strike fire whenever a clock-work attachment ran down. The
magazine was fastened to the boat by a screw, which could be unscrewed
from within. It was contrived so that when the magazine should be
disengaged from the vessel the clock-work should be set agoing. The
clock-work ran down in about thirty minutes, when the gun-lock went
off and ignited the charge. A short cable attached the magazine to
another screw in the top of the vessel. From within the operator could
fasten this screw into the bottom of a vessel and fill his own boat
at the same time. He could, therefore, sail safely away, leaving the
magazine attached to the bottom of the enemy’s man-of-war, and await
developments.
There was no evident reason why the attempt upon the _Eagle_ should
not have a satisfactory issue. Sergeant Lee was obliged to wait
several nights for a favorable opportunity. Finally, at eleven o’clock
one night in August, he embarked on his dangerous voyage. General
Putnam was on the wharf when he pushed off, and kept a constant watch
throughout the next few hours. Lee was towed by whale-boats as near the
ships as the oarsmen dared to go, and was then cast off. He discovered
that it was too early to make the attempt. The tide was running strong,
and, in spite of all that he could do, it carried him far beyond the
ships. He rowed aimlessly around until the tide slowed up, when he
made directly for the man-of-war. He drew so near under the stern of
the ships that he could see the British sailors and hear their voices.
At a favorable moment he let the water into the reservoirs and sank.
Everything up to this point worked splendidly. He had no difficulty in
managing his boat under the water, and took up a favorable position
directly under the keel of the man-of-war, near the stern. He at once
proceeded to attach the screw to the bottom of the vessel, when he
struck a formidable opposition. He had not figured on the copper
with which the bottom of the ship was covered, and which resisted
all his attempts to fasten the screw. At every attempt the boat
rebounded from the vessel’s bottom. Lee finally moved to another part
of the ship, and in so doing lost his hold completely, and rose with
tremendous velocity to the surface. He came within two or three feet
of the man-of-war, upon whose destruction he had been bent--a rather
uncomfortable circumstance, especially as it was nearly daylight. He
at once, therefore, filled the reservoirs and sank again. As it would
soon be morning, however, and as he had four miles to row, he decided
to abandon his attempt to blow up the man-of-war, and instead to look
out for his own safety. Bushnell never blamed Lee for his failure
to execute the plan, owing to the fact that he had had such slight
preparation for the task.
There was naturally much disappointment over this initial failure,
and especially when a British frigate came up and anchored off
Bloomingdale, and Lee made another equally unsuccessful attempt. His
intention this time was to go up to the stern of the vessel and,
without sinking, screw in his magazine close to the edge. Discovered
by the watch, he dove under the frigate, but went too deep and came up
on the other side. In the year 1777, however, Bushnell sent one of his
machines against the _Cerberus_, a British frigate, lying at anchor
between New London and the mouth of the Connecticut River. The machine
instead fell in with a schooner, anchored astern of the frigate, which
had escaped Bushnell’s observation. It blew up the schooner, completely
demolishing it, and killed three men. Bushnell was very much cast down
by the failure of his contrivance, which he believed had never had a
fair show. At the end of the war he went to France, and was present
during the stirring scenes of the Revolution. His relatives lost all
track of him, and supposed that he had died in a French prison or upon
the guillotine, until, in 1826, they received information of his death
in Georgia.
B. J. HENDRICK.
ANTHONY WALTON WHITE
[_Concluded from January Number._]
At the end of the “Western Insurrection,” in 1794, General White issued
the following address to the troops:
BEDFORD (PA.), _December 5, 1794_.
The dismission and sudden departure of the Cavalry, by Troops, from
Pittsburgh to their respective states and counties, prevented the
General of Cavalry from conveying in Orders, at that place and period,
the thanks and good wishes of the Commander-in-Chief, so handsomely
and friendly expressed in the following extract from his Excellency’s
last Orders, viz.: “To the Officers of every description he presents
his warmest thanks, for the faithful and able support which he has
derived from their exertion, in every stage of the execution of the
objects intrusted to his direction; and he intrusts them to convey
to his fellow-soldiers, in the most lively terms, his respectful
attachment, and his best wishes for their safe return, and happy
meeting with their friends.”
This praise, though flattering and justly due, cannot equal the
self-approbation every good citizen must experience, who has taken
so decided a part to check rebellion, restore order, and establish
the best of Constitutions. The nature of Cavalry service directed
the propriety of ordering a separation of the Brigade, after
passing the mountains, and now affords the General an opportunity
of congratulating those officers, who were favoured with separate
commands, on the success attending the design of the separation; as it
must be acknowledged, that the Brigade of Cavalry, with those three
very respectable Troops from the city of Philadelphia, commanded by
Captains Dunlap, Singer, and M’Connel, capturing in one day, and
almost at the same hour, every Insurgent of the western counties of
Pennsylvania, who had not previously fled from Justice, or signed
a submission to the laws to which they had so basely encouraged an
opposition. The complete execution of this enterprise expresses, in
lively colours, the great address of the Cavalry Officers, and the
military prowess of their respective Commands.
Deign, fellow-citizens and brother-soldiers, who have acted under the
General’s Orders, to accept of his warmest thanks for the cheerfulness
and promptitude you have shown in obeying and executing his Orders.
The satisfaction he experienced in commanding you can never be erased
from his mind. This became sometimes painful, by observing old
military rank, gray hairs, wealth, and character, placed, by choice,
in a subordinate situation, which unpleasant circumstance could only
be removed by beholding, at the same time, such honourable evidence of
this fact, that a true American will never embrace considerations of
this kind, to shield him from dangers and hardships, when called to
support the laws of his country, should they ever again be insulted or
opposed by any men or set of men, wickedly combined for that purpose.
Dictates of Justice direct the General of Cavalry to request Doctor
Charles Smith, Brigade Surgeon; Major Carle, Inspector of the Brigade;
Major Samuel Clarkson, Brigade-Quarter-Master, and Major John Striker,
Brigade-Forage-Master, to accept his thanks, for the attention they
have paid to their respective departments. Acknowledgements are also
due from the General to Le Chevalier D’Auterroches, his Aid-de-Camp,
and to Brigade-Major Dunham and Coejeman, for their faithful services.
Colonels Hubley and Gibbons, who honoured the General with acting
under his Orders as volunteer Brigade-Majors, will likewise please to
accept his unfeigned thanks for the aid he received from them. Major
James Dunham, who has the honour to bring up the rear of the Army, and
is intrusted with the deposite of their victories, has fully merited
that honour, by the great attention and humanity shown, by him, to
those unfortunate prisoners under his immediate charge; which has been
often noticed by the General, with the greatest satisfaction, during
the march to this place; and speaks in strong language, the goodness
of the Major’s heart. A continuation of the same attention, with every
precaution for the safety of those unhappy instruments of designing
men, is warmly recommended, till they shall be delivered up to the
Marshal of the state of Pennsylvania. To every individual of the
Cavalry, whom the General has had the honour to command, he now bids
an affectionate farewell; and sincerely wishes them every domestic
happiness.
ANTHONY W. WHITE,
_Brig. Gen. commanding the Cavalry
ordered on the western Expedition_.
(FROM CONTEMPORARY PRINTS)
NEW BRUNSWICK, _Feb. 3, 1795_.
On Monday, the 26th, seventy-five officers of the New Jersey cavalry,
met in this city and dined together at the White Hall Tavern, His
Excellency the Governor and suite honored them with their company at
dinner, after which fifteen toasts were drank. The next day all the
officers waited on General White, delivered the following address to
him, and partook of a cold collation at his house.
SIR.
With unfeigned satisfaction, we embrace this occasion, the earliest
we have been able to command, to make our warmest acknowledgements to
you for the very polite and friendly sentiment conveyed to us in your
last cavalry orders. This public testimony of your partiality to us
and interest in our happiness, has been fully evinced in many trying
circumstances. Raw and undisciplined as we were, to have met the
approbation of one, so complete in military science, cannot but vastly
enhance the pleasing sensations we derive, from having lent a willing
aid in support of our happy constitution. If we have acted with a
degree of reputation to ourselves; if we have rendered service to our
country, to you sir, are we much indebted for both these advantages.
Your activity, combined with an extensive knowledge of your important
duties, have at all times been eminently conspicuous; your zeal
for the public good, and an affectionate regard for the honor and
happiness of the New Jersey cavalry, have been too well noticed and
too sincerely approved, ever to be effaced from our remembrance. To
see the man, who has spent years in a continued struggle for freedom,
and bled in asserting our dearest rights, again at the call of his
country, step forward with that ardent enthusiasm which true liberty
ever inspires, did not fail to command our grateful admiration and
render us emulous of such virtue. May that sacred flame of liberty
which you have been so instrumental in lighting up and supporting,
long burn bright in this new world and extend its genial influence
from continent to continent, until tyranny shall disappear and the
whole world would be emancipated.
Accept sir, our warmest approbation of your conduct and our sincere
prayer that your life may be long continued, as useful to your
country, an honor to the New Jersey Cavalry, and full of every comfort
to yourself.
In behalf of the officers of the New Jersey Cavalry on the late
expedition.
BENJ. WILLIAMSON, _Maj._
Com. 1st. Reg. Jersey Cavalry.
January 27, 1795.
To which the General replied: That the polite and affectionate
address of his fellow citizens and brother soldiers, expressing their
approbation of his conduct added to the heart felt satisfaction he had
already experienced from his late honourable commands, claimed our
warmest acknowledgements, and sincerely wish that they might enjoy
every happiness and a tender of his friendship and services.
The officers spent several days together in that harmony and true
friendship, to be expected only from men warmly interested in the good
of their country, and the happiness of each other.
Judge Paterson, Major General Dayton and several gentlemen and
officers of character and distinction, visited the social board of
this patriotic band of citizen soldiers. We are told that they have
appointed Major Williamson of Essex, Major Meeker of Bergen, Major
Laddle of Morris, Major Baily of Sussex, Major Carle of Hunterdon,
Major Quay of Monmouth, Major Dunham of Middlesex, Captain Vanderveer
of Somerset, and Captains Wollcot and Shute of the Western counties, a
committee to wait on the Legislature with a memorial, praying redress
of certain grievances which the cavalry are subject to, from the
present militia law, and that the same may be formed into regiments,
we also hear that they have agreed to meet annually, at such time and
place as their General may please to fix.
On Thursday last, Anthony Walton White, Esq., Adjutant-General of
the Militia of New Jersey, accompanied by Generals Frelinghuysen and
Bloomfield, and politely attended by the members of Congress from this
State, waited upon the President of the United States, and, in behalf
of the officers of the New Jersey Militia, presented the following
address:
SIR.
The Commander-in-Chief, the General Officers, the General Staff and
Field Officers of the Militia of the State of New Jersey, feel in
common with their numerous fellow citizens who have addressed you in
the present critical situation of our nation, and most cordially join
them in expressing to you their high approbation of your conduct in
the management of its foreign concerns, and their indignation for the
insult offered to the honor and independence of the American people.
We come not, Sir, to dictate--whether peace can be preserved with the
safety of our national dignity, or whether an appeal is to be made to
arms, are questions intrusted to those in whose patriotism we confide,
and according to their decision we shall always be prepared to act.
But, Sir, at this eventful period, we deem it our duty, and feel it a
pleasure, respectfully to approach our Commander-in-Chief, and to make
him a solemn proffer of our lives and fortunes in the service of our
country. It is not, Sir, for soldiers to boast; but we know the troops
whom we have the honor to command; we have been eye witnesses to their
zeal in the cause of freedom; we have been their companions in many
toils and many sufferings, and if our beloved country calls, we shall
again cast the eye of confidence along their embattled ranks.
Let our enemies flatter themselves that we are a divided people.
In New Jersey, Sir, with the exception of a few degraded and a few
deluded characters, to whose persons and to whose services the
invading foe shall be welcome the moment of their arrival, and whom we
engage to convey in safety to their lines--in New Jersey, Sir, there
is but ONE VOICE, and that is the voice of confidence in the federal
government: the voice of perfect satisfaction with your administration
of it; and the voice of firmness and determination to support the laws
and constitution, the honor and dignity of the United States; and,
Sir, for the defence of these, we do this day, in the presence of the
God of armies, and in firm reliance in his protection, solemnly pledge
to you our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honor.
COMMANDER IN CHIEF AND GENERAL STAFF OFFICERS
Richard Howell, _Commander-in-Chief_.
Anthony W. White, _Adjutant-General_.
D. Woodruff, _Sec’ry to Commander-in-Chief_.
R. Boggs, _Judge Advocate_.
Aaron Ogden, }
J. Rhea, }
Mark Thompson, } _Aids to Commander-in-Chief_.
Aaron Dunham, }
B. Loyd, }
John Lacey, }
Wm. Wykoff, }
James F. Armstrong, }
John Croes, } _Chaplains to Commander-in-Chief_.
John Neilson, _Paymaster General_.
James Schureman, _Quarter-Master Gen._
Thomas Lowry, _Commissary General_.
N. Belleville, _Physician General_.
Moses Scott, _Surgeon General_.
Charles Smith, _Surgeon of Cavalry_.
MAJOR GENERALS
Elias Dayton,
Wm. Helmes,
F. Frelinghuysen,
Joseph Bloomfield.
BRIGADIER GENERALS
John N. Cumming,
Richard Dey,
John Doughty,
James Giles,
Elisha Lawrence,
John F. Morris,
Clarkson Edgar,
John Hilt,
Joseph Brearly,
Franklin Davenport,
John Heard,
A. V. Middlesworth,
Wm. Todd,
Clement Wood,
John Hardenburgh,
Wm. M’Kussack,
John Frelinghuysen,
Gershom Dunn,
Samuel Morford,
John Baird,
J. Veghte,
Andrew Lyle.
LIEUT. COLONELS
James Heddin,
Wm. Crane,
Jedediah Swan,
C. Ford,
Jacob Arnold,
Wm. W. Bell,
Thomas Blanch,
Nehemiah Wade,
Prudden Alling,
Samuel Quay,
Wessel T. Stout,
Barnes Smock,
James Green,
Elias Conover,
P. J. Stryker,
Henry Vanderveer,
James Henry,
E. Beatty,
Robert Ross,
Wm. M’Cullough,
Chs. Pemberton,
David Bishop,
David Schamp,
John Vancleve,
Jona. Black,
P. Hunt,
Thomas Heston,
Joshua L. Howell,
Daniel Benszett,
Dayton Newcomb,
Aula M’Calta,
Eli Elmer,
Joshua Sihnn,
I. Beekman,
Andrew Sinnickson,
Phinehas Carman,
Joseph Marsh,
Andrew M’Dowell,
C. Shipmons,
Thomas Paul,
Wm. Kolberdieu,
Wm. Gasill,
John M’Peck,
Richard Edsall,
Elias Ogden,
Solomon Broderick,
John Stevens,
John Stevenson,
Charles Reading,
Jona. Smith,
Jona. Porter,
Wm. Dumont,
Samuel Becks,
Robert Lucas,
Joseph M’Ilvaine,
Wm. Pearson,
John Lawrence,
Samuel I. Keer,
Wm. Dick,
John Forman,
Albemarle Collins,
Joel Gibbs,
Thomas Wilkins,
Samuel Flaninggam,
E. L. Whitclock,
Nathaniel Beach,
Matt Williamson, Jun.
Wm. Dayton,
Wm. Shute,
David Clark,
Nathan Ford.
MAJOR COMMANDANTS
Peter Keenon,
Ralph P. Lott,
James Dunham.
MAJORS
Cornelius Hoagland,
Benjamin Jackson,
James Craig,
Thomas Little,
Isaac Kip,
Jon. Vanbueren,
Samuel Reading,
Hiram Smith,
E. Vangelden,
James Conover,
James Cox,
Samuel P. Forman,
Gared Stillwell,
John Stillwell,
John Budd,
Wm. Colfax,
Abraham Pust,
Marmaduke Stokes,
John Tice,
James Williams,
Enoch Leeds,
Ephraim Buck,
Almerain Brooks,
Morris Beasley,
Jacob Hussy,
Robert G. Johnson,
Richard Fisher,
Wm. Gordon Forman,
J. H. Imlay.
To which the President returned the following:
ANSWER:
_To the Commander-in-Chief, the General Officers, the General Staff
and Field Officers of the State of New Jersey._
GENTLEMEN:
Among all the numerous addresses which have been presented to me, in
the present critical situation of our nation, there has been none
which has done me more honor, none animated with a more glowing
love of our country, or expressive of sentiments more determined
and magnanimous. The submission you avow to the civil authority,
an indispensable principle in the character of warriors in a free
government, at the same moment when you make a solemn proffer of
your Lives and Fortunes in the service of your country, is highly
honorable to your dispositions as Citizens and Soldiers, and proves
you perfectly qualified for the duties of both characters. Officers
and Soldiers of New Jersey have as little occasion as they have
disposition to boast. Their country has long boasted of their ardent
zeal in the cause of freedom and their invincible intrepidity in the
day of battle.
Your voice of confidence and satisfaction, of firmness and
determination to support the laws and Constitution of the United
States, has a charm in it irresistible to the feelings of every
American bosom; but, when in the presence of the God of armies, and
in firm reliance on his protection, you solemnly pledge your lives
and fortunes and sacred honor, you have recorded words which ought to
be indelibly imprinted in the memory of every American youth.--With
these sentiments in the hearts, and this language in the mouths of
Americans in general, the greatest nation may menace at its pleasure,
and the degraded and deluded characters may tremble lest they should
be condemned to the severest punishment an American can suffer--that
of being conveyed in safety within the lines of an invading enemy.
JOHN ADAMS.
Philadelphia, May 31st, 1798.
A. S. GRAHAM.
NEW BRUNSWICK, N. J.
[Illustration]
WHERE ARE EVANGELINE AND GABRIEL BURIED?
The priests and sextons of old St. Joseph’s, St. Mary’s and Holy
Trinity Churches, of Philadelphia, are often called upon by visitors to
the city, to point out the grave of Evangeline and her lover, Gabriel,
the delightful creatures of Longfellow’s fancy, in relating the
expulsion of the Acadians from their happy homes and their dispersion
along the coast of the British provinces.
Of course, Gabriel and Evangeline are buried nowhere, as they never
existed, save in the imagination of the poet. The poem he calls “A
Tale of Acadie,” a “mournful tradition still sung by the pines of the
forest.” Still, it is astonishing that so many who have read the poem
have believed in the actuality of the tradition in its relation of
chief characters, in its Evangeline and her lover, and have sought
their graves at these three Catholic graveyards. St. Joseph’s now has
no burial ground attached to the church. It had originally, but after
1759 the dead of the congregation were interred in the ground across
the street, and, after 1763, called St. Mary’s Street.
Longfellow’s poem represents the time of the meeting, death and burial,
as occurring during a pestilence. This was the yellow fever of 1793,
as no general epidemic had occurred in the city from the time of the
coming of the Acadians in November, 1755, until that awful pestilence
of 1793 ravaged the city.
But St. Joseph’s, in that year, had no burial ground at the church. The
latest interment I know of was that of Father Farmer, August, 1786.
Perhaps a few persons holding lots might have been permitted to inter
in that graveyard after the opening of St. Mary’s ground in 1759, but
most unlikely that Gabriel, an inmate of the city almshouse, would have
been brought there for burial, and later Evangeline laid in a grave
“side by side” by his.
So, though Old St. Joseph’s--mainly because it is called Old, and
because of the nearness of the Quakers’ Almshouse (torn down in 1874),
which many have supposed to have been the almshouse Longfellow had
in mind--is the most probable place of the burial of the lovers,
in the belief of many, including usually well informed “Penn,” of
the _Evening Bulletin_, who, on October 12, 1898, declared that as
Evangeline had long been a Sister, who knew the city and its seamy
side, she, like a good Catholic, could have saved his body from being
buried in the potter’s field, and would have carried it to the ground
of Old St. Joseph’s.
(It is to be remarked that Philadelphia had no Sisters of Mercy then,
nor Sisters of any Order until 1814, when the Sisters of Charity came
from Mrs. Seton’s to take charge of St. Joseph’s Orphan Asylum, on
Sixth Street.)
St. Mary’s, on Fourth Street, almost directly opposite to St. Joseph’s,
is not so often called at nor so frequently assigned as the supposed
place of interment.
To the opinions of those, who have supposed that either of these
“churchyards” was the one Longfellow had in mind when writing the poem,
I, years ago suggested that Holy Trinity Churchyard, on Sixth Street,
was the most likely place--the place most probable--the one which
Longfellow saw and years after had in mind.
The City Almshouse, at the time of the fever in 1793, was on Spruce
Street, south side, from Tenth to Eleventh Streets.
It was there when, in 1824, Longfellow visited the city.
On the same street from Eighth to Ninth, was then, and is now,
the Pennsylvania Hospital. Longfellow doubtless saw both, and the
recollection of either came to him when writing the poem, as the
place where Gabriel, dying, was attended to by Evangeline, in the
city poorhouse. Though there has been discussion as to which of these
institutions Longfellow had in mind, it could not be settled, because
the poet, in writing to Charles H. A. Esling, Esq., of Philadelphia,
now a resident of Germany, could not himself tell what building he had
in mind.
But the point with us is as to where the lovers were buried. They have
so impressed countless thousands, that one may almost consider them as
actual personages, who lived and moved and died, and were buried in our
city--but where?
When it is remembered that the Pennsylvania Hospital and the City
Almshouse were both on Spruce Street, and that either of these could
have been the scene of the meeting of Evangeline and Gabriel, what is
more probable, that, as Longfellow walked Spruce Street, in 1824, he
could, at the western entrance of Holy Trinity church have glanced at
the passageway to the entrance of the church and seen as you can to-day
see, the little churchyard attached to it? Then passing eastward, to
Sixth Street, and turning northward, he had to pass the church, when
again he saw “the little Catholic churchyard”--the only such in the
city in 1824, and the smallest even to-day.
Remember, Longfellow, in describing the burial place of the lovers,
wrote:
“Side by side, in their nameless graves, the lovers are sleeping,
Under the humble walls of the little Catholic churchyard.
In the heart of the city, they lie, unknown and unnoticed;
Daily the tides of life go ebbing and flowing beside them.”
Mind, he says, “the little Catholic churchyard.” Many, I fear, have
thought of Old St. Joseph’s, “the little Catholic church,” and so,
have assigned to it the burial place, but it is “the little Catholic
churchyard,” which Longfellow speaks of, and the smallest such which
Philadelphia had in 1824, or could have had in 1793, the time of the
pestilence, was Holy Trinity, which dates from 1789. It best fills the
probabilities in the case: the almshouse at Tenth Street; the hospital
at Eighth; the little Catholic churchyard at Sixth Street.
The word “yard,” too, is important. He does not say Catholic
_graveyard_--but _churchyard_. Holy Trinity best fills the idea of a
small space attached to a building--a church--and having the commonly
called “yard,” a small enclosed place--in this case, at the side of the
church, right “under the humble walls.” No other Catholic churchyard
in 1793, could have been “under the walls” of any church but this. St.
Joseph’s had ceased to be a place of interment; St. Mary’s was, and yet
is, a large graveyard. It is not a “little churchyard,” and interments
cannot be said, even in imagination of poetry, to have been “under the
walls” of the church, as big in 1793 as to-day, save by about twenty
feet.
While, of course, there was no real Evangeline or Gabriel in
Philadelphia, and no real burial anywhere, the sole discussion is
confined to the churchyard Longfellow saw, in 1824, and in 1847,
had in mind as the burial place of the two. No place so well fills
the possibilities, even the probability, as Holy Trinity’s “little
churchyard,” at Sixth and Spruce.
How Longfellow came to write Evangeline has been narrated; how Lowell
thought the “tradition” a fit one for a story, but that Longfellow
desired he be allowed to use it for a poem.
In “The Neutral French or the Exiles of Nova Scotia,” by Mrs. Williams,
issued in 1841, will be found the same story, but with New York as
the scene of action. That doubtless was the source of suggestion to
Longfellow.
MARTIN I. J. GRIFFIN.
PHILADELPHIA.
[Illustration]
CAPTAIN JAMES DUNCAN’S DIARY OF THE SIEGE OF YORKTOWN
Colonel Hazen’s regiment was the second regiment of the kind and was
known as “Congress’s Own,” because under authority of a resolution of
Congress of January 20, 1776, permission was granted to enlist one
thousand Canadians or more for one year, as was done in a previous case
under Colonel James Livingston. This regiment was not chargeable to any
State, and hence its name, “Congress’s Own.” The troops were sometimes
called “Canadian forces.”
Colonel Moses Hazen was appointed Colonel and Edward Antill Lieutenant
Colonel, by Congress. In the early part of 1776 about 500 Canadians
were secured for the regiment; but the evacuation of Canada reduced the
number to less than 100 by the time it reached Albany. Colonels Hazen
and Antill then went to Philadelphia to lay the matter before Congress.
As a result they received authority to recruit anywhere within the
United States. Hazen went to New York and the New England States;
Antill to Pennsylvania and the Middle States. The latter was the more
successful in securing recruits.
In the early part of 1781 the regiment moved from West Point down the
Hudson and joined the army en route for Yorktown, when it participated
in the siege. After the surrender of Cornwallis it was ordered to
Lancaster, Pa., where for ten months it guarded English prisoners. Then
it moved to New York, and was finally disbanded at White Plains in
November, 1783.
In this regiment served James Duncan, first as a Lieutenant, commission
dated November 3, 1776, and next as Captain, commission dated March 25,
1778.
James Duncan was a native of Philadelphia, where he was born in 1756.
He graduated at Princeton College and was studying for the ministry
when the war broke out. As related by himself afterward, “The beating
of the d-- drums past my window made such a noise that I could not
study;” so he concluded to enter the army. He became a member of
Colonel Hazen’s regiment, and continued with it till the close of
the war. For his services he received from Pennsylvania 500 acres
of land. This tract was situated in the Shenango valley, in what is
now Mercer County. When Adams County, Pa., was formed, Captain Duncan
was appointed first Prothonotary, and held the position until 1822.
During the twenty-one years he filled this office, he was never beyond
the sight of his Court House; and during that time he never opened
his office at night nor allowed a candle or lantern to be used in his
office, so carefully did he regard his duty to preserve the public
records.
Captain Duncan removed to Mercer County, Pa., in 1822, and lived there
to the time of his death, which occurred June 24, 1844, in his 89th
year.
The diary which is here presented was kept by Captain Duncan with great
care. As a scholarly man and a good military officer, he was thoroughly
competent to make careful and reliable observations. These memoranda
were in his own handwriting. From this record the author of this paper
made an exact copy in 1899, and it is an important contribution to the
history of the Siege of Yorktown.
THE DIARY PROPER
CAMP BEFORE YORK, Oct. 2, 1781.--It may not be amiss to take notice
of a few remarkable occurrences prior to the commencement of this
journal. The army were never so universally deceived in regard to the
operations of the campaign as at this time. New York was thought to
be the object, and no maneuver left untried to confirm this opinion,
when all on a sudden, the army decamped from W. Plains, crossed the
North river, and proceeded by a circuitous route to Springfield, in
New Jersey, where, after a halt of a few days (in order the better to
deceive the enemy), they took their route for Trenton, at which place
the artillery stores with our regiment and some other troops embarked.
We were now no longer at a loss to know our place of destination. We
arrived at Christiana Bridge and thence marched by land to the head
of Elk, where the French troops with the rest of our army joined us
in a very short time. Here we were delayed for 6 or 7 days, being
busily employed in embarking ordnance stores of all kinds on board the
vessels. In the meantime the French troops with some other corps of
our army proceeded by land for Baltimore. The bay not being able to
furnish a sufficient number of vessels, the Rhode Island regiment with
ours was obliged to embark on board a number of flat-bottomed boats,
which had been constructed at Albany and brought to this place. We set
out on this arduous and very hazardous undertaking about Sept. 15 and
arrived at Williamsburg the 26th. On our passage, we hugged close the
Western shore, but the many bays and mouths of rivers we were obliged
to cross rendered it exceedingly dangerous. I think the rivers in
their order were as follows, viz: Elk, Susquehannah, Petapsco, Severn,
Patuxent, Potomac, Rappahannock, Pequankitank, York and James. The
bays were numerous. Among the largest is Mock Jack,[6] better than 20
miles across.
The weather in general was very favorable excepting at the time of
our crossing the mouth of Rappahannock, when on a sudden, a furious
wind arose, which occasioned a very rough sea. A number of boats were
dismasted, sails torn to pieces, and the whole in the utmost distress.
We, however, all made round the point into a safe harbor, excepting
Colonel Antill[7] who, missing the point, was obliged to stretch for
Given’s island. After repairing our rigging it was determined to
proceed a safer course than that which Colonel Antill took, by sailing
across Pequankitank bay into the mouth of a river which forms Given’s
island. In this attempt I shipped water several times and had all my
sail torn to pieces. Some of the boats were more prudent and did not
cross that day. However, we all arrived safe, and were detained there
two days by the storm. Three vessels sailing in the bay were the same
day foundered. A miraculous escape! I cannot but mention the very
polite treatment we received from the inhabitants of Given’s island.
I have said we arrived at Williamsburg the 26th; the 27th and 28th
were detained at this place in making preparations for the siege,
and on the 29th the allied army moved down toward York (distant from
Williamsburg about 12 miles), and made a short halt about two miles
distant from the enemy’s outworks when a few shots were fired from the
French pieces at some of Tarleton’s horse, who immediately dispersed.
In the course of the night three deserters came in with little or no
intelligence that could be depended on. On the morning of the 30th
we had orders to approach the enemy’s works. After marching a short
distance we were ordered to load, and proceed within half a mile of
the enemy’s works on the left. One brigade of infantry was halted,
while the First brigade, commanded by Gen. Muhlenburg, crossed a small
morass and paraded in order of battle, marched a small distance in
front; but the enemy not firing, they wheeled to the right and took
their post in the line; a picket was now turned out (the better to
favor reconnoitering parties) which advanced in front nearly half
way to the enemy, until they were obliged to retreat by the fire of
a field piece from the enemy’s works. (It was said his excellency,
the commander-in-chief, was in front of this picket the whole time
reconnoitering.) The sentries were, however, continued at their posts
and regularly relieved the whole day. One of the sentries was so
unfortunate as to receive a wound on his foot from a cannon ball,
which obliged the surgeons to make an immediate amputation of his
leg. We sustained no other harm from their firing, although they
frequently overshot us. The remainder of the day was employed in
reconnoitering the enemy; and toward evening the whole army encamped
nearly on the ground they had before occupied. Before we proceed it
may be proper now to take some notice of the different corps and
the arrangement of the army. The Marquis de Lafayette’s division of
L. infantry, composed of Muhlenburg’s and Hazen’s brigades on the
right of the front line, and nearest the enemy; the Baron Steuben’s
division, composed of the Marylanders, Pennsylvanians and Virginians
on the left of the front line. The Jersey troops in the rear of the
infantry, & the York in rear of Steuben’s division, with the park of
artillery and sappers and miners in the center, forming the second
line; the militia forms the corps de reserve, and the French troops,
commanded by Count Rochambeau, on the left of the whole. We passed
this night with little or no disturbance from the enemy, but guess our
agreeable surprise when on the morning of the ensuing day (Oct. 1) we
found the enemy had evacuated all their front works, and retreated
about half a mile. We knew of no other way to account for this than
that their works being too extensive and weak, they were afraid of a
storm.
This morning Col. Scammel[8] was unfortunately wounded and taken by
the enemy, as he was too closely reconnoitering, and sent on parole
to Williamsburg. No sooner were the enemy’s works evacuated than
they were taken possession of by our pickets, supported by the whole
army, who marched up for that purpose, and continued on the lines a
great part of the day, although the enemy at certain times fired very
briskly from their pieces. About 8 o’clock this morning the French
grenadiers attacked and carried a small battery, with the loss of
four killed and six wounded. Ten companies were ordered out early
this morning for fatigue, of which I had the honor to command one.
Until 11 A. M. we were employed in cutting and stripping branches for
gabions. On being furnished with shovels, spades, pickaxes, etc., we
were ordered up to the lines, where we continued inactive until about
an hour before sunset. In the meantime, the engineers were employed in
reconnoitering the enemy’s works, and fixing on proper places to break
the first ground. Let me here observe that the enemy by evacuating
their works had given us an amazing advantage, as the ground they left
commanded the whole town, and nothing but the reasons before alleged
could have justified them in so doing, as by contrary conduct they
must have very much retarded the operations of the siege.
The engineers having fixed on and chained off the ground in two
different places to erect their works within point blank shot of the
enemy, the parties were called on. Five companies were ordered to an
eminence on the right and five to another on the left. It happened to
be my fate to be stationed on the left, a place the most dangerous
of the two, as it was nearest to the enemy, and more exposed to the
fire from the enemy’s batteries [enemies batteries--copy]. We were now
conducted to a small hollow near the ground. Five men were ordered by
the engineer to assist him in clearing away the rubbish, staking out
and drawing the lines of the work. This was in the face of open day,
and the men went with some reluctance; a little before this we had a
shot from the enemy which increased their fears. At dusk of evening
we all marched up, and never did I see men exert themselves half so
much or work with more eagerness. Indeed, it was their interest, for
they could expect nothing else but an incessant roar of cannon the
whole night. I must confess I too had my fears, but fortunately for us
they did not fire a shot that whole night. I am at a loss to account
for it, for the moon shone bright, and by the help of their night
glasses they must certainly have discovered us. We were relieved about
daybreak, and scarcely had we left the trenches when the enemy began
their fire on both works from three pieces.
_Oct. 2._--The works were so far finished in the course of the
preceding night that the men worked in them this day with very little
danger, although the enemy kept up an almost incessant fire from two
pieces of artillery. A drummer, rather too curious in his observation,
was this day killed with a cannon ball.
_Oct. 3._--Last night four men of our regiment, detached with the
first brigade, were unfortunately killed (on covering party) by one
cannon ball; one of the men belonged to my own company (Smith), a loss
I shall ever regret as he was, without exception, one of the finest
men in the army. A militia man this day, possessed of more bravery
than prudence, stood constantly on the parapet and d-- his soul if he
would dodge for the balls. He had escaped longer than could have been
expected, and, growing foolhardy, brandished his spade at every ball
that was fired till, unfortunately, a ball came that put an end to his
capers. This evening our brigade was ordered for an evening party, and
in the course of the night a deserter went to the enemy, informing
them of our situation, in consequence of which they directed a few
shots our way, but did no harm.
_Oct. 4._--This morning, on leaving the ground, the enemy were
complaisant enough to favor us with a shot, but did no execution.
Fatigues were continued in the works as usual, and suffered little or
no harm. This day’s orders give us an account of Tarleton’s defeat on
the Gloucester side on the 3d. He was attacked by Duke Leziome’s[9]
legion and the militia grenadiers, commanded by Mercer. Tarleton lost
50 men, killed and wounded, the officer who commanded his infantry
killed, and himself badly wounded, with very little loss on our side.
_Oct. 5._--We had more firing from the enemy last night than any night
since the commencement of the siege, but don’t learn that they did
any other harm than delay the operation of the works. This day the
regiment was employed in cutting and making fasseines, and a regiment
from every brigade in the army ordered out for some extra fatigue duty
this evening.
_Oct. 6._--The parties did not go out, and nothing extraordinary
happened this day.
_Oct. 7._--The regiments ordered for the extra duty were last night
employed in drawing the line of circumvallation. This line extends
itself to the river on each side the town, and at all places nearly
equally distant and better than 200 yards in front of the former
works. The enemy discovered us, although the night was pretty
favorable, but the chief of their fire was directed against the
French. They were, no doubt, much astonished in the morning to find
themselves so completely hemmed in on all sides, and trenches so deep
that we could sustain little or no harm from their fire. The trenches
were this day to be enlivened with drums beating and colors flying,
and this honor was conferred on our division of light infantry. And
now I must confess, although I was fond of the honor, I had some fear,
as I had no notion of a covered way, and more especially as I was
posted in the center with the colors. We, however, did not lose a man
in relieving, although the enemy fired much. The covered way was of
infinite service. Immediately upon our arrival the colors were planted
on the parapet with this motto: _Manus Haec inimica tyrannis_. Our
next maneuver was rather extraordinary. We were ordered to mount the
bank, front the enemy, and there by word of command go through all the
ceremony of soldiery, ordering and grounding our arms; and although
the enemy had been firing a little before, they did not now give us
a single shot. I suppose their astonishment at our conduct must have
prevented them, for I can assign no other reason. Col. Hamilton gave
these orders, and although I esteem him one of the first officers
in the American army, must beg leave in this instance to think he
wantonly exposed the lives of his men. Our orders were this night that
if the enemy made a sortie and attempted to storm the trenches we were
to give them one fire from the barquet, rush over the parapet and meet
them with the bayonet.
_Oct. 8._--Some time before daylight this morning we were very much
surprized at the conduct of a picket that had been posted some little
distance in front of our works. They were fired upon by the enemy,
never returned a single shot and retreated into our works in the
utmost disorder. Captain Weed, who commanded the picket, was again
ordered out, but the enemy had retired. How he will be answerable for
his conduct time will discover as I dare say he will soon be obliged
to give an account. One man of our picket was killed, though some
think it was by our men, as there had been other parties ordered out.
The fire of the enemy was this day chiefly directed against the
parties employed in erecting batteries. We were relieved about 12
o’clock and sustained no harm during our tour excepting two men badly
wounded; but we had scarcely left the trenches when a man working
on the parapet had his arm shot off. As soon as we arrived in camp
we changed our ground further to the right. Nothing extraordinary
happened the remainder of the day.
_Oct. 9._--Last night the troops in the trenches, as well as a great
part of this day, were busily employed in finishing the batteries,
and about 4 o’clock this afternoon an American battery was opened,
consisting of three 24-pounders, three 12’s and four 10-inch mortars.
The enemy’s fire was chiefly directed against this battery, and the
others that were nearly finished.
_Oct. 10._--Last night the men were busily employed in finishing the
batteries, and early this morning four more were opened against the
enemy, viz.: One American battery on our left, consisting of four
18-pounders; the grand French battery, consisting of 11 24-pounders,
two 13-inch mortars, two howitzers, and six 10-inch mortars; and
another French battery of four 18-pounders and two howitzers. The
fourth is on the left of the French, but am not able as yet to
ascertain the number of guns. About 12 o’clock this day our division
relieved the trenches, and from that time the enemy fired but very
little until the evening. This afternoon our American bomb battery was
opened of four 10-inch mortars. A flag came out with Secretary Nelson.
He informs us our fire did great execution last night; that we had
killed 11 or 12 of their officers, that his black servant was killed
by his bedside, and that the first gun fired killed two commissarys as
they were sitting at their wine.
_Oct. 11._--Last night commenced a very heavy cannonade, and the
enemy returned the fire with no less spirit. Being apprehensive of a
storm, they often fired in every direction. The largest of the enemy’s
vessels was set on fire by the bursting of a shell or a red hot ball
from some of our batteries, and communicated it to another, both of
which were burnt down. They must have lost a considerable quantity
of powder in the last, as there was an explosion which made a heavy
report. The whole night was nothing but one continual roar of cannon,
mixed with the bursting of shells and rumbling of houses torn to
pieces. As soon as the day approached the enemy withdrew their pieces
from their embrazures and retired under cover of their works, and
now commenced a still more dreadful cannonade from all our batteries
without scarcely any intermission for the whole day. We were relieved
about noon this day, and went home very much fatigued.
_Oct. 12._--Last night we began the second parallel and extended it
better than half round the enemy. This parallel is better than three
hundred yards in front of the other, and close upon the enemy’s
right works. No sooner had the morning made its appearance and the
enemy discovered our very near approach, than they commenced a very
heavy fire from the batteries and in the course of the day no little
surprised us by opening five royals, as we were in hopes they had no
shells, by their not giving them on the first parallel.
_Oct. 13._--Last night we were employed in strengthening the line, and
began a French battery and a redoubt. We lost several men this night,
as the enemy by practice were enabled to throw their shells with great
certainty. About noon this day our division relieved the trenches, and
about 2 o’clock advanced to the second parallel. Capt. White and one
private of Col. Wee’s regiment were this day killed by a horizontal
shell. The militia suffered much this afternoon.
_Oct. 14._--The enemy last night kept up a continual blaze from
several pieces of cannon of nine royals and some howitzers. Early in
the night the fire was chiefly directed against the French, who were
just on our left, but about 10 o’clock our people [began] to erect a
battery. They soon discovered us, and changed the direction of their
fire. It happened to be our lot to lie in the trenches just in the
rear of the battery exposed to all their fire; and now were I to
recount all the narrow escapes I made that night it would almost be
incredible. I cannot, however, but take notice of a remarkable and
miraculous one indeed. About midnight the sentry called “A shell!” I
jumped up immediately to watch the direction, but had no suspicion of
its coming so near until it fell in the center of the trench, within
less than two feet of me. I immediately flung myself on the banques
among some arms, and although the explosion was very sudden and the
trench as full of men as it could possibly contain, yet not a single
man was killed and only two of my own company slightly wounded.
I should not forget here that Capt. Hughes and Dr. Anderson, two
intimate friends and very worthy officers, were sitting close by me at
this time. We all counted it a most miraculous escape. Fatigue parties
were still continued at work in the open face of day at the battery,
although they suffered much. Ten men of Col. Barber’s regiment were
killed and wounded in a very few minutes, five of whom belonged to
Capt. Pry’s camp. Our division was relieved about 12 o’clock, and on
our march home two of our men were wounded by the bursting of a shell.
About 5 o’clock this day we were again ordered for the trenches.
_Oct. 15._--I have just said we were ordered yesterday to the
trenches. The French grenadiers were ordered out the same time, and
all for the purpose of storming two redoubts on the enemy’s left. Our
division arrived at the deposite of the [copy defective.--J.] a little
before dark where every man was ordered to disencumber himself of his
pack. The evening was pretty dark and favored the attack. The column
advanced, Col. Guinot’s[10] regiment in front and ours in the rear. We
had not got far before we were discovered, and now the enemy opened
a fire of cannon, grape shot, shell and musketry upon us, but all to
no effect. The column moved on undisturbed and took the redoubt by
the bayonet without firing a single gun. The enemy made an obstinate
defense (but what cannot brave men do when determined?). We had 7 men
killed and 30 wounded. Among the latter were Col. Guinot, Maj. Barber
and Capt. Olney. Fifteen men of the enemy were killed and wounded
in the work, 20 were taken prisoners besides Maj. Campbell, who
commanded, a captain and one ensign. The chief of the garrison made
their escape during the storm by a covered way.
Captain Duncan’s diary, it will be observed, closes with the record
of October 15. The failure to complete it for the remaining days of
the siege is to be accounted for by the fact that he and his command
were so actively employed in military operations that neither time nor
opportunity to write was afforded him.
Fortunately, we are enabled to complete the record by referring
to the “Military Journal of the Revolution,” written by Dr. James
Thacher (born in Barnstable, Mass., Feb. 14, 1754, died in Plymouth,
Mass., May 24, 1844), who as Surgeon’s Mate and Surgeon served in
the Revolutionary War. As Surgeon of a Massachusetts regiment he
was present at the siege of Yorktown. His diary very appropriately
supplements Captain Duncan’s record. What follows is a condensation:
_Oct. 16._--Early in the morning, Col. Abercrombie with about four
hundred men, made an attack on two unfinished French redoubts, and
succeeded in spiking seven or eight pieces of cannon. The French
advanced and recaptured the redoubts.
_Oct. 17._--From the American line of works at least a hundred pieces
of heavy ordnance were playing upon the British lines, and doing
great destruction. The whole peninsula trembled under the incessant
thunderings of the immense field pieces. Great destruction was the
result. The great havoc upon Cornwallis’s position was apparent to his
besiegers, compelling him to ask for suspension of hostilities with a
view to capitulation.
_Oct. 18._--It was ascertained that Cornwallis attempted, on the night
of the 16th, to escape by crossing to Gloucester Point with a portion
of his command. A heavy storm prevented his execution of the plot,
and with difficulty his men returned to their positions. On this day
Washington communicated the terms of capitulation, and allowed two
hours for their acceptance.
_Oct. 19._--The surrender actually occurs. Gen. O’Hara, as the
representative of Cornwallis, who seems to have recoiled from
the humiliation of surrender, apologized to Washington for the
non-appearance of his chief, and conducted the further operations of
the capitulation. General Lincoln on the American side accepted the
tokens of surrender.
_Oct. 20._--In general orders Washington thanks officers and men, both
French and American, for their services in the campaign.
_Oct. 21._--This being Sunday, some of the troops participated in
divine service. Mr. Evans preaching an appropriate discourse, which
was listened to by Generals Lincoln and Clinton.
Yorktown was the site of the closing battle of the American Revolution.
The surrender included 7,247 regular troops, 840 sailors, and 225 guns.
The British loss in killed, wounded, and missing was 550; that of the
Americans and French some 300.
W. F. BOOGHER.
WASHINGTON, D. C.
[Illustration]
FOOTNOTES:
[6] (Now Mobjack).
[7] Edward Antill, who was with Arnold at Quebec. This is the
first mention of him in active service that I have seen after that
time.--(ED.)
[8] Alexander Scammell was born in Mendon (now Milford), Mass., in
1746; died in Williamsburg, Va., Oct. 6, 1781. Having graduated at
Harvard in 1769, he taught for a year or two. In 1772 he was employed
at Portsmouth, N. H., in surveying and exploring operations. Having
studied law with General Sullivan, he assisted him in his legal
business for a time.
Dec. 10, 1776, he became Colonel of 3rd N. H. regiment, but was soon
transferred to the 1st regiment. Was wounded at Saratoga, Jan. 5, 1778,
while serving under General Gates. In 1780 he was appointed Adjutant
General of the army, and became a member of Washington’s staff.
Preferring active field work, he was assigned again to the command of
his regiment. As officer of the day, Sept. 30th, he was employed in
reconnoitering the enemy’s position at Yorktown. He was captured by
Hessian dragoons and was treacherously and mortally wounded by them
after his surrender. He was the highest American officer killed during
the siege. His loss was universally felt and expressed.
[9] Duc de Lauzun.
[10] Gimat, aid to La Fayette.
A PORT OF THE LAST CENTURY
When white frosts and keen, starry nights have turned the foliage of
the Niagara gorge into a riotous color scheme is the best time to
visit Queenston Heights, and walk the grass-grown thoroughfares of the
forgotten hamlet at their base.
It is the best time, because the picnic and tourist season is over, and
one’s contemplation of the beautiful view which every point affords is
not disturbed; and as for the cluster of roof-trees lying below, it is
more picturesque in its autumnal nakedness.
Three-score years ago this village was the second town of importance
in the province of Upper Canada. Named for Queen Charlotte, Queenston
began life auspiciously in 1787 with a dock, a distillery, and a
tavern; and so rapidly did it grow that the opening century found the
dock transformed into a wharf flanked with store-houses, the population
doubled, and those infallible signs of prosperity in a new country--a
grist- and a saw-mill--running on full time.
Situated at the head of the St. Lawrence route, and at the foot of
the Chippewa portage, Queenston had every advantage at the start. It
was the natural _dépôt_ and point of departure for the western trade,
now growing rapidly with the opening of new territory. Across its
narrow wharf, and up the Chippewa road, flowed for over a quarter of a
century, a continuous tide of traffic, which eddying here, débouched on
the near shore of the upper lakes, or spent itself in the wilderness of
the far west.
Hither swarmed the motley crowd that follows the hunter’s trail and the
pioneer’s axe--fur-traders, settlers, speculators, Indians, emigrants,
and adventurers.
Government land in Canada was very cheap as compared with the price of
land in the “States,” and this fact alone accounts for the great influx
into Canada of Americans, immediately after the close of the War.
This land boom, so wisely fostered, was too soon paralyzed by the War
of 1812, and nowhere did the hardships of that war fall more heavily
than upon the new port of the lower Niagara. When the hastily-planned
and ill-executed assault upon Queenston Heights was made, it was only
defended by a small battery upon which a solitary field-piece was
mounted. Those extensive earthworks west of the monument were an
afterthought. They were not built until 1814.
General Brock was killed below this redan; and the heaviest fighting
must have been along the foot of the ledge. A small cenotaph marks the
spot where Brock fell. This little monument is more interesting from
the fact that King Edward himself, as Prince of Wales, placed the block
in position in 1860.
But for situation, no monument in the country can compare with that
which marks the place of General Brock’s sepulchre. Standing on the
very crown of the Heights, this shaft dominates a wonderful picture.
The monument itself is of the usual British type, and the figure
surmounting it might be Nelson, so very like is it to that hero’s
attitude in stone.
The house into which General Brock was carried dying stands, a
grey-stone ruin by the untraveled way. Other wounded soldiers besides
Brock were carried into that low-roofed house to die. Diagonally across
from this place is the house in which Laura Secord was living when she
saved the British stores at De Cew’s.
It is not generally known that this famous Canadian heroine was born
and lived in Massachusetts, until her twentieth year. In 1795 her
father, Thomas Ingersoll, a Revolutionary soldier, came to Canada
to buy land; and shortly after the family arrived at Niagara, Laura
married James Secord of Queenston.
During the second year of the War of 1812, the Niagara frontier of
Canada was in possession of the American forces, and American soldiers
were billeted upon every family on the border.
Hearing some officers, whom she was thus forced to entertain,
discussing a plan for seizing the stores at the De Cew house, some
eighteen miles away, she determined to inform the officer in command
at that place. It meant a long, dangerous journey on foot, over hill
and bog land and through a densely wooded country swarming with hideous
savages from the Grand River, the allies of the British. But Laura
Secord was equal to the occasion. Though she had started from home
before daylight, night overtook her on the journey. Her courage and
promptness saved the stores, and the officer in command sent her home
under the protection of a guard.
When the Prince of Wales visited Canada he sent her one hundred
dollars, the first recognition made of her services to her adopted
country.
As we stroll farther along the King’s highway we come to the Wadsworth
cottage, a rough-cast dwelling with sills much below the level of the
street. This was a tavern at the time of the battle, and in the front
room to the left, General Scott was detained as a prisoner. It was
here, while waiting for his captors to complete arrangements for his
removal to Fort George, that an Indian in the barroom deliberately took
aim at the General through the open door, and would have shot him but
for the presence of mind of Captain Thaddeus Davis, a British officer,
who promptly knocked the gun from the Indian’s hands.
Screened by a clump of maples and rank shrubbery that speaks of an
old-time garden, is a ruined stone house, rather more pretentious than
those that date back to the period of the War. It is spoken of by the
townspeople as the “blue-stone house.” In this house in 1824 William
Lyon Mackenzie printed the first numbers of the _Colonial Advocate_,
the first paper printed in Upper Canada.
“We are not in want, neither are we rich,” he says candidly in his
prospectus. O, golden age! Our strenuous present admits of no such
happy medium! Mackenzie is remembered no more as an agitator. The
measures of justice for which he contended in the bitterness of poverty
and exile, have long since been granted and enjoyed.
If plenty of relics of historic Queenston abound, no trace of its
one-time prosperity remains. Gone the shipping and trade along with the
store-houses bursting with pelts, and rum, and merchandise. Gone that
horse railway to Chippewa, built to relieve congested traffic. Gone the
bank, with its funds, and the unlucky thirteen taverns that tradition
says lined the principal street. Gone, too, that first bridge that
spanned the river, built in 1851, just too late to divert from newer
channels the ebbing current of commerce.
The great cataract being more accessible by the Queenston route, all
the distinguished visitors to our shores in former years came to this
port. Chateaubriand was here as early as 1790. Lafayette, Thomas Moore,
the Bourbon princes, and Louis Napoleon saw the town enjoying the
top-most wave of prosperity. It is said that Moore’s poem beginning,
“I knew by the smoke that so gracefully curled,” was inspired by the
breakfast fire of one of Queenston’s houselets.
But if these later annals are more brilliant, they seem to belong less
to the Queenston of to-day than that earlier history which gives the
delightful old place a notable part in the making of a Great Dominion.
N. R. BENEDICT.
BUFFALO, N. Y.
INDIANA COUNTY NAMES
The influence of the strong men of any time upon their time and
community is strikingly illustrated by a study of the origin of the
names of the counties of Indiana, which has just been completed by an
old resident of the State after the work of collecting the scattered
material in odd moments during the last twenty years. The result as
completed shows that seventy-eight of the ninety-two counties were
named after men prominent nationally or locally, in war and in peace;
men of foreign birth and foreign training, of foreign birth and
native training, and native birth and native training. And the strong
influence of men whose personality so dominated small communities, men
whose names have not been handed down as taking part in the affairs of
the nation, is shown by the fact that of the seventy-eight men whose
names have been given to counties of the State, forty-one were men
whose life and work, influential as it must have been in the particular
communities wherein they lived, were not of sufficient prominence to
save them from almost utter oblivion in State or National history.
Of the thirty-eight counties that have been named from what might be
called well-known men, men of more than local prominence, seven were
named for Presidents of the United States: Madison, Monroe, Washington,
Jefferson, Jackson, Harrison (William Henry Harrison), and Adams
(John Quincy Adams); sixteen were named for men prominent in military
history--Clark, for George Rogers Clark; Decatur, for the commodore;
De Kalb, for the famous German of Revolutionary days; Fayette, for La
Fayette; Marion, for General Francis Marion; Morgan, for General Daniel
Morgan; Perry and Porter, for Commodores Perry and Porter; Pulaski,
for the Polish soldier; Putnam, for General Israel Putnam; Steuben,
for Baron Steuben; Wayne, for “Mad Anthony”; Kosciusko, for the Polish
soldier; Knox, for General Knox, one of the first secretaries of war;
Greene, for General Nathaniel Greene; Warren, for General Joseph
Warren, who fell at Bunker Hill, and Stark, for Captain John Stark,
victor at the battle of Bennington.
Six signers of the Declaration of Independence were honored in the
naming of counties--Huntington, Carroll, Franklin, Hamilton, Hancock,
and Jay. De Witt Clinton is honored in the naming of Clinton County.
The eight other counties named for men of more than local prominence
are Benton, after Thomas H. Benton; Boone, after the frontiersman;
Clay, after Henry Clay; Fulton, after the inventor of the steamboat;
Marshall, after the great Chief Justice; Henry, after Patrick Henry;
Jennings, after Jonathan Jennings, Indiana’s first governor, and Posey,
another governor, appointed to succeed Harrison.
Howard County is the only Indiana county that has changed its name. Its
first name was Francisville, the name of a famous Indian chief, but
on account of the universal esteem in which Colonel T. A. Howard, a
prominent citizen of the community, was held, the name was changed.
Grant County was named for two Grant brothers, Samuel and Moses, early
settlers in this region. Parke, for Benjamin Parke, one of the earliest
of the educators in the State. He founded the State Law Library, was
the first president of the Indiana Historical Society, and coöperated
in the founding of the Vincennes Library and University.
Vigo County was named for Colonel Francis Vigo, a Sardinian, whose
services were invaluable to General Clark in the capture of Vincennes.
The bell now hanging in the court house at Terre Haute was bought with
the $500 set apart in his will to show his appreciation of the people
giving his name to the county.
Four counties--Delaware, Miami, Tippecanoe, and Wabash--received Indian
names. St. Joseph County was named after the river running through it,
named by the early French settlers. Switzerland was so named because
most of the early settlers were Swiss, coming to grow grapes on the
plan followed in the old country. The scheme failed. Ohio County was
named for the river; Lake, for Lake Michigan; Elkhart, for a small
island in the river that flows through the county. Laporte was named
by the French. Three counties--Orange, Vermilion, and Randolph--were
named after counties in other States--Vermilion for an Illinois county
directly over the line, Orange and Randolph for North Carolina counties.
Of the remaining counties three were named after men of only local
prominence: Allen, for Colonel John Allen, a Kentuckian who fell at the
battle of River Raisin; Bartholomew, for General Joseph Bartholomew,
State Senator, and identified with the early Indian wars; Blackford,
for a judge of that name; Brown, for General Jacob Brown, one of the
heroes of the War of 1812; Cass, for General Lewis Cass.
Crawford County was named for Colonel William Crawford, Washington’s
land agent in the West, who was finally taken prisoner by the Indians
and burned at the stake; Daviess, for Joseph H. Daviess, distinguished
lawyer; Dearborn, for General Henry Dearborn, once secretary of war.
Toussaint Dubois, a Frenchman who had charge of the spies under General
William Henry Harrison, has the name of Dubois County as a memorial.
Floyd County was named after Colonel John Floyd, an old Indian fighter;
Fountain, for Major Fountaine of Boone County, Kentucky, who was killed
in the battle of Maumee, October 22, 1790.
General John Gibson, after whom the county of that name was called, was
secretary of war, who repeatedly acted as territorial governor of the
State in the absence of General Harrison. He was taken captive by the
Indians, made himself one of them for a long time, finally going blind.
Hendricks County was named after William Hendricks, the State’s first
representative in Congress, and governor from 1822 to 1824.
Jasper County was named after Sergeant Jasper, the Revolutionary hero;
Johnson, for John Johnson, one of the early judges of the Supreme
Court; Lawrence, for Captain James Lawrence, an esteemed citizen of
the community; Martin, after Major Martin, a citizen of Newport, Ky.;
Montgomery, for General Richard Montgomery.
There is some question as to the origin of the name of Newton County.
Some investigators contend that it was named after a sergeant in the
Revolutionary war, while others give the more poetic explanation that
at the time of the organization of the county one of the commissioners,
who was somewhat of an astronomer, was an ardent admirer of Sir Isaac
Newton, and saw that the county was named after him.
Noble County was named after Governor Noble; Owen, after Colonel Owen
of Kentucky, who was killed in the battle of Tippecanoe; Pike, after
Zebulon M. Pike, killed at the capture of York; Ripley, for General E.
W. Ripley, an officer of 1812; Rush, for Dr. Benjamin Rush, a prominent
citizen; Scott, for General Charles Scott, the Revolutionary soldier
and later governor of Kentucky; Spencer, for Captain Spier Spencer,
who fell at the battle of Tippecanoe; Sullivan, for Daniel Sullivan,
who was killed by the Indians on the road from Vincennes to Louisville
while carrying public papers; Tipton, for General John Tipton, who
served in Congress; Vanderburg, for Henry Vanderburg, captain in the
Revolution, member of the Legislative Council of the Northwest, and
presiding judge of the first court organized in the Territory; Warrick,
for Colonel Jacob Warrick, who fell at Tippecanoe; Wells, for Captain
W. H. Wells, killed by the Indians while carrying papers from Fort
Wayne to Fort Dearborn, now Chicago; White, for Captain Isaac White,
killed at Tippecanoe; and Whitley, for Colonel William Whitley, who was
killed in the battle of the Thames.--_Indianapolis News._
[Illustration]
INDIAN LEGENDS
_IV._
THE DANCING GHOSTS
That beautiful phenomenon known to the white man as the Aurora
Borealis, or Northern Lights, is called by the Chippewa Indians
_Je-bi-ne-me-id-de-wand_, or the Dancing Ghosts. The legends accounting
for it are numerous, and the following, which was related to the
translator by a Chippewa hunter, named _Kehes-Chock_, or Precipice
Leaper, is quite as fantastic as the phenomenon itself. That it is a
very ancient tradition is evident from the fact that the sacrifice to
which it alludes has not been practiced by the Chippewas for at least a
century (1850).
There was a time when all the inhabitants of the far North were
afflicted by a famine. It was in the depth of winter, and the weather
had for a long time been so cold that even the white bear was afraid
to leave his hiding place. The prairies were so deeply covered with
snow that the deer and the buffalo were compelled to wander to a warmer
climate, and the lakes and rivers were so closely packed with ice that
it was only once in a while that even a fish could be obtained. Such
sorrow as reigned throughout the land had never before been known. The
magicians and wise men kept themselves hidden in their cabins. The
warriors and hunters, instead of boasting of their exploits, crowded
around their camp-fires, and in silence meditated upon their unhappy
doom. Mothers abandoned their children to seek for berries in the
desolate forests, and the fingers of the young women had become stiff
from idleness, for they had not any skins out of which to make the
comfortable moccasin. From one end of the Chippewa country to the other
was heard the cry of hunger and distress. That the Great Spirit was
angry with his people was universally believed, but for what reason
none of the magicians could tell. The chief of the Chippewas was
the oldest man in the nation, and he was consulted in regard to the
impending calamity. He could give no reason for the famine, but stated
that he had been informed in a dream that the anger of the Great Spirit
could be appeased by a human sacrifice. How this should come to pass,
however, he could not tell, and therefore concluded to summon to his
lodge all the medicine-men who lived within a day’s journey, for the
purpose of consulting with them. He did so, and when the council was
ended it was proclaimed that three Chippewas should be immediately
bound to the stake and consumed. They were to be selected by lot from
among the warriors of the tribe; and, when this sad intelligence was
promulgated, a national assembly was ordered to convene.
The appointed time arrived, and, in the presence of a large multitude,
the fatal lots were cast, and three of the bravest men of the tribe
were thus appointed to the sacrifice. They submitted to their fate
without a murmur. Whilst their friends gathered around them with wild
lamentations, and decked them with the costliest robes and ornaments
to be found in all the tribe, the youthful warriors uttered not a word
about their untimely departure, but only spoke in the most poetical
language of the happy hunting grounds upon which they were about
to enter. The spot selected for the sacrifice was the summit of a
neighboring hill which was covered with woods. Upon this spot had three
stakes been closely erected, around which there had been collected a
large pile of dry branches and other combustible materials. To the
stakes, at the hour of midnight, and by the hands of the magicians,
unattended by spectators, were the three warriors securely fastened.
They performed their cruel duty in silence, and the only sounds that
broke the stillness of that winter night were the songs and the
shoutings of the multitude assembled in the neighboring village. The
incantations of the priests being ended, they applied a torch to the
faggots, and, returning to their village, spent the remainder of the
night in performing a variety of strange and heart-sickening ceremonies.
Morning dawned, and upon the hill of sacrifice was to be seen only a
pile of smouldering ashes. On that day the weather moderated, and an
unusual number of hunters went forth in pursuit of game. They were all
more successful than they had been for many seasons, and there was an
abundance of sweet game, such as the buffalo, the bear, and the deer in
every wigwam. A council was called, and the patriarch chief proclaimed
the glad tidings that the Great Spirit had accepted their sacrifice,
and that it was now the duty of his children to express their gratitude
by a feast--the fast of _bitter roots_.
The appointed night arrived, and the bitterest roots which could be
found in the lodges of the magicians were collected together and made
into soup. The company assembled to partake of this feast, was the
largest that had ever been known, and, as they were to conclude their
ceremony of thankfulness by dancing, they had cleared the snow from the
center of their village, and on this spot were they duly congregated.
It was a cold and remarkably clear night, and their watchfires burnt
with uncommon brilliancy. It was now the hour of midnight, and the
bitter soup was all gone. The flutes and the drums had just been
brought out, and the dancers, decked in their most uncouth dresses,
were about to enter the charmed ring, when a series of loud shoutings
were heard, and the eyes of the entire multitude were intently fixed
upon the northern sky, which was illuminated by a most brilliant and
unearthly light. It was a light of many colors, and as changeable as
the reflections upon a summer sea at the sunset hour. Across this light
were constantly dancing three huge figures of a crimson hue, and these
did the magicians proclaim to be the ghosts of the three warriors who
had given up their bodies for the benefit of their people, and who had
thus become great chiefs in the spirit-land. The fire by which their
bodies had been consumed had also consumed every feeling of revenge;
and ever since that remote period it has been their greatest pleasure
to illume by their appearance on winter nights the pathway of the
hunters over the snowy plains of the north.
CHARLES LANMAN.
[Illustration]
ORIGINAL DOCUMENTS
LETTER OF WASHINGTON TO DR. STUART
(An important autograph letter of Washington, addressed to Dr. David
Stuart, of Fairfax, Va., who was the husband of Mrs. Washington’s
niece. He gives his views on Government salaries, and mentions
Jefferson, and others).
PHILADELPHIA, _March_ 3rd., 1793.
Dear Sir;
The official letter from the Commissioners to me--dated the 8th of last
month--promising their sentiments on the subject of compensation, so
soon as a meeting was had with Mr Johnson, prevented my acknowledging
the receipt of your private letter of the same date and on the same
subject, until now; nor shall I do more than slightly touch on it until
I receive the further sentiments of the board thereupon. It may not
be amiss, however, in this friendly & confidential manner, previously
to regret that the expectations of the Commissioners and the opinions
of those who were consulted on the compensation proper to be made
them for past and future services, should accord so little. It is to
observed (as was mentioned in my last) that the law authorizing the
appointment contemplates no pay. Justice however, requires it--and
therefore such as it was conceived would meet the concurrence of the
public was allotted. In similar cases it rarely happens that high,
if any salleries are allowed. Instance the Directors of the Potomac
Company--of the Canal Navigation of this State--the Banks, &c &c--I do
not quote these cases, however, to prove that Salleries ought not to be
allowed in the case of the Commissioners of the federal district for
the past, and compensation for their future services; but only to shew
the necessity of their being as low as could comport with Justice--With
respect to your ideas of a future allowance I am bold in assuring you
as my opinion that, no fixed Sallery in the United States (however
they have been reprobated for their extravagance), from the Chief
Magistrate to the door-keeper of the House of Representatives, is equal
to one thousand Dollars clear of expences. The reasons are too obvious
to stand in need of enumeration--and I must candidly declare that I
see little use for a Superintendant if more will be required of the
Commissioners than either to form or to adopt plans;--give the great
outlines thereof in Instruction;--and leave the details and execution
to the Superintendant, who ought, as I have declared in a letter to you
dated the 30th of November last, to be always on the Spot--(unless the
duties of the trust should take him away, to facilitate the objects of
it)--Under this idea, could it suit any person better than yourself to
visit the federal City once every three or four months--suppose every
two months--when you have an Estate opposite to it that has a claim to
a share of your attention,--as to the suspicion which may arise--if
you serve for daily pay--that your sessions will be prolonged by it,
they are not worth regarding--The malevolence of man is not to be
avoided.--But instead of _touching_ the subject only, in the manner I
proposed, I find I am enlarging upon it, and therefore will change it.
Mr Jefferson is at a loss to discover what could have proceeded from
him to Mr Ellicott that should have occasioned any discontent in the
mind of the latter with the Commissioners;--and having shewn me the
_only_ letter which (he says) he has written to him for many months I
see nothing there on which to found the conjecture contained in the
latter part of your letter of the 8th of February.
As I do not take the George Town paper, and have seen no extracts
from it in any others, I do not know to what it is you allude--in
your letter of the 8 & 18 inst which came to hand a few days ago.--Mr
Ellicot has never come near me since his return to the City:--no
explanation therefore on this--the case of Mr Young, or any other
subject has taken place between us. With respect to Mr Young’s renewed
application for a change towards the point, &c. I scarcely know what
answer to make at this time.--A change in one instance will, I am
certain, open a wide door which could not easily be shut. Therefore
before I could consent even to take the matter into consideration it
would be necessary to have an accurate plan of the parts, delineated
upon paper, with the alterations he proposes; and to have the
Commissioners’ opinion of the consequences result’g from the adoption
of it, in writing; for unless there are some powerful reasons for
discrimination, it would be bad policy to comply with the request of
one of the Proprietors, and reject the application of another. It is
possible, & not improbable that I may be at George Town on my way
to Mount Vernon, about the first of April; when, if every thing was
prepared for it, I might on the spot be better able to give an opinion.
But, as Mr Young is in the occupancy of the whole, I see no cause for
hasty decision which may create (if an alteration should take place)
discontents in other quarters.--No letter to me, has been received from
him yet.
With very great esteem & regard
I am, Dear Sir
Your most obed’t & affec’t Serv’t
Gᵒ WASHINGTON.
LETTER OF JOSEPH TRUMBULL (SON OF “BROTHER JONATHAN”) TO CHRISTOPHER
VARICK, DEPUTY MUSTER-MASTER GEN’L FOR NORTHERN DEP’T., AT ALBANY, N. Y.
(Joseph Trumbull, 1737-1778, was Commissary General, 1775-1777, when
he resigned and died in the following year, worn out by his labors in
the public service).
TY (TICONDEROGA) 3rd _November_, 1776
Dear Sir,
I Received your polite favour of the middle of last month, amid such
a hurry of business & Expectation that I omitted answering it--this
Day I am Honor’d with your’s of the 29th by Major Stewart. Nothing
mentional has happen’d till this Day we are informed that the Enemy
have abandoned Crown Point, Chimney Point, &c., entirely, Determined
on Winter Quarters in Canada. Its a prudent Choice I fancy, as we
should not have parted with ours to them at a low Price & a high one
they could not afford. I wish to have it confirm’d--Delay to us is
Victory--& Victory procured without loss of Blood is more Glorious than
any other. You must excuse my being so concise, my Best Compliments
attend the Ladies & Poor Wilkinson, Jr.
I am Dr Sir
Your very Sincere & most obedient
Servant
J. TRUMBULL
PART OF A LETTER OF WASHINGTON TO BENJAMIN HARRISON, SIGNER OF THE
DECLARATION AND MEMBER OF THE BOARD OF WAR
_Dated at_ MIDDLEBROOK, N. J., _May 5, 1779_.
(As the letter covers ten folio pages, we give only the salient points
of it. It was sold in the Bishop Hurst collection, last Spring, for
$1065, the largest price ever paid for a Washington letter).
The letter commences by referring to some statements in a previous
letter recommending certain measures, and reiterates their necessity,
and that if longer delayed “_I shall not scruple to add that our
affairs are irretrievably lost_.” He also predicts that the result will
be “_the fate of our paper money and with it a general crash of all
things_.” Washington then proceeds:
“The measures of Ministry are taken, and the whole strength and
resources of the Kingdom will be exerted against it in this campaign;
while we have been slumbering and sleeping, or disputing upon
trifles, contenting ourselves with laughing at the impotence of Great
Britain.... Accts. from London to the 9th. of March, have fixed me in
the opinion that G. Britain will strain every nerve to distress us
this campaign, but where or in what manner her principal forces will
be employed I cannot determine.... My own opinion of the matter is
that, they will keep a respectable force at (New York), and push their
operations vigorously to the Southward, where we are most vulnerable,
and least able to afford succour.... She may, cercumstanced as we
are, give a very unfavourable turn to that pleasing slumber, we have
been in for the last eight months.... From present appearances I have
not the smallest doubt but that we shall be hard pushed in every
quarter. This campaign will be the grand, and if unsuccessful, more
than probable the last struggle of Great Britain.... They are raising
all the Indians from North to South which their arts and money can
procure, and a powerful diversion they will make in this quarter with
the aid they expect from Canada.”
Washington then criticises the method of calling out the Militia,
condemning it, and proposes another scheme. He also writes about the
treatment of the British prisoners, and then returns again to the
operations and conduct of the war.
“I view General Philips in the light of a dangerous man--in his march
to Charlotteville he was guilty of a very grave breach of military
judgment and of a procedure highly criminal; for instead of pursuing
the route pointed out to him he went”--(Washington then describes the
route).
The General then gives warning that deserters or prisoners must not
be trusted, giving some interesting facts, and proceeds to relate the
latest news of the operations against the Indians on the frontier.
The letter is signed G. Washington in full, and a postscript is added
giving some news of the sailing of a British expedition, presumably to
Georgia, and stating what he has ordered in consequence, signed G. W.
MINOR TOPICS
A WARD ELECTION IN NEW YORK IN 1739
[_Contributed by Mr. William Nelson, Paterson, N. J._]
[In view of the recent election in New York city, this record of the
simple methods of the forefathers will possess an obvious interest for
the modern Knickerbocker. The license fee would interest the modern
saloonkeeper--but he does not read the MAGAZINE.--ED.]
NORTH WARD
CITY OF NEW YORK. } _ss._:
I Christopher Bancker Esqʳ Alderman of the North Ward of the City of
New York Do hereby Certifie (Pursuant to a Warrant unto me Directed by
the Mayor of the said City) that this Day between the Hours of Nine and
Twelve in the fforenoon the ffreemen of the said Ward being Inhabitants
and the ffreeholders of the said Ward Did assemble and meet together
within the said Ward at the time & place by me appointed, and then and
there by the plurality of Voices or Votes Did Elect and Choose the
persons hereafter mentioned (being ffreemen or ffreeholders Inhabiting
within the said Ward) to serve in the Respective Offices hereafter
mentioned for the said Ward for the Year Ensuing or untill other fit
persons are Elected and Sworn in their Rooms or places, as by his
Majesty’s Royall Charter Granted to the Mayor Aldermen and Commonalty
of the City of New York is appointed Directed & Required (vizt)
Christopher Bancker Alderman
Wᵐ Vreedenburgh Assistant
Isaac Stoutenburgh }
Jan Van Arenham } Assessors
Stephen Bourdet Collector
Peter Hendrickse } Constables
Arent Van Hoek }
Witness my hand in New York the twenty ninth day of September in the
thirteenth year of his Majestys Reign Anno Dom 1739
CHRIS: BANCKER.
A N. Y. LIQUOR LICENSE IN 1739
[Printed form; the names and words in italics are inserted with pen and
ink.]
CITY OF NEW YORK. } _ss._: _West Ward Nᵒ_ _Murry Street_
I Certify that _Mary Clarck_ hath agreed for the Excise as a
Tavern-Keeper; and hath paid for Excise, £. 2. 6ˢ.0 And for License,
0 16 0
---------
[Given under my Hand, the 1ᵗʰ Day of _March_--1785.]
_Abᵐ. P. Lotts_
[Endorsed:] _Mary Clark_ £3. 2..
4/..
----------
NEW JERSEY HISTORICAL SOCIETY
The annual meeting of The New Jersey Historical Society was held
in the beautiful and spacious building of the Society on West Park
Street, Newark, on October 25, 1905. A business meeting was held at
noon, at which the annual reports of officers were read, showing the
very prosperous condition of the Society. The Corresponding Secretary,
William Nelson, in his report alluded to the fact that the present
completed his twenty-fifth year of continuous service as an officer of
the Society, and so was a sort of silver jubilee of his. He was elected
Recording Secretary in 1880, holding that office for ten years, when
he was elected Corresponding Secretary, which office he has held for
fifteen years. The correspondence during the year had embraced between
400 and 500 letters of all sorts and covering a great variety of
topics.
Francis M. Tichenor, Librarian, reported that during the year there had
been 2400 visitors at the Library.
Ernest E. Coe, for the Committee on Membership, reported that the
Society now had 784 members.
A very important adjunct of the Society for several years past has been
the Woman’s Branch, presided over by Miss M. Antoinette Quinby, who
read the report of the work of that body. The women have been devoting
themselves specially during the past year to the compilation of
tombstone inscriptions throughout the State, and Miss Quinby presented
to the Society two large, handsome volumes of such inscriptions.
Dr. J. Ackerman Coles, Judge Amzi Dodd, Robert F. Ballantine, Wallace
M. Scudder and George R. Howe were elected Trustees for the term of
three years, and Jonathan W. Roberts for the term of one year to fill
a vacancy.
The address of the day was delivered by the Rev. William Y. Chapman,
pastor of the Roseville (Newark) Presbyterian Church, his subject
being “Acadia.” He was himself a native of Nova Scotia, and from his
earliest boyhood had been familiar with the scenes so beautifully
and pathetically described by Longfellow in his exquisite poem
“Evangeline.” In the interest of truth, however, he was constrained
to say that the cold facts of history differed very widely from
the narrative of the romantic poem, and he described clearly and
graphically the events which constrained the English commander to
deport the recalcitrant French settlers.
At a subsequent meeting of the Board of Trustees of the Society, the
following officers were elected for the ensuing year:
President, Jonathan W. Roberts; Vice-Presidents, Wallace M. Scudder,
Francis M. Tichenor and George R. Howe; Corresponding Secretary,
William Nelson; Recording Secretary, Joseph F. Folsom; Treasurer,
William C. Morton; Librarian, Francis M. Tichenor; Trustees to fill
vacancies, Dr. W. S. Disbrow, of Newark, and W. Elwood Speakman, of
Woodbury.
BOOK NOTICES
The Records of the Town of Hanover, New Hampshire, 1761-1818. The
records of the town meetings, and of the selectmen, comprising all of
the first volume of records and being Volume I of the printed records
of the town. Printed by vote of the town under the direction of Herbert
Darling Foster, George Mendal Bridgman, Sidney Bradshaw Fay. Hanover,
New Hampshire, 1905. Octavo, pp. VI+336.
The committee of learned men appointed by the selectmen of Hanover
to print the early records of that town apparently have endeavored
to reproduce faithfully the original spelling, capitalization and
punctuation. Both copy and proofs have been compared with the records
word for word, and when necessary letter by letter. The moderate sum
of money used in preserving and making easily accessible to students
these early annals has been well spent. The committee having this
volume in charge suggests that the proprietors’ records (covering the
years 1761 to 1807 inclusive) and the first volume of vital statistics
(covering the years 1762 to 1846) ought also to be printed. All persons
interested in the history of Hanover ought to use their influence
towards carrying out this wise suggestion at once and having it done
under the direction of the same committee.
The contents of the book and the space of time covered are accurately
indicated by the title, but one very important feature of the work, not
there mentioned, is the town clerk’s affidavit that the printed book is
a true and correct copy of the original. The original paging is marked
in brackets. The book is well indexed and substantially bound.
INDEX VOL. II.
JULY-DECEMBER, 1905
PAGE
American History, Footlights of, 199
American History, Miscellanea of, 346
American Independence, Ode to, 30
Andre Country, In the, 75
Andre Prison (Illustration), 151
Army of the Potomac--A Page of History Corrected, 127, 171, 249
Arpe, R. N., articles by, 127, 171, 249
Baltimore’s Old Stepping-Stones, 282
Barry, Commodore John, Relics of, 386
Benedict, N. R., article by, 417
Bolton, Reginald Pelham, article by, 223, 311
Boogher, W. F., article by, 407
Book Notices, 222, 433
Bridgham, Eliza W., journal of, 14, 90
British Navy in the Revolution, 223, 311
Buffalo, Lone, 356
Burr and Hamilton, 70
Bushnell’s _Turtle_, 389
Calhoun, J. B., article by, 326
Catlin, Louise E., article by, 346
Civil War Sketches, 34
Dakota Militia (poem), 116
De Costa, Rev. B. F., article by, 265
Diamond Island, The Fight at, 265
Diary of a Poet’s Mother, 206
Duncan, Capt. James, Diary of, at Yorktown, 407
Duryee, Rev. J. R., article by, 330
Early Days in Luzerne County, Pa., 239
Editor, articles by, 75, 352
Errata, 281
Evangeline and Gabriel, Where Buried, 403
Fancies at Navesink (poem), 264
Fate of the Pigeons, 353
First United States Flag, 291
First Dutch Church, Schenectady, 173
First Woman in the Post-Office Department, 276
Fleming, W. L., article by, 34
Folsom, A. A., communication from, 285
Froeligh, Reverend Solomon, and His Great Schism, 330
Fulton, Robert, Reminiscences of, 326
GENEALOGICAL:
Adams, 71
Allen, 292
Bartlett, 70
Burt, 221
Chamberlain, 71, 151, 292
Cushman, 220
Elliot, 151
Emmons, 71
Estabrook, 71, 72
French, 151, 220
Gridley, 71, 293
Hale, 152
Hardin, 152
Hasey, 151
Horne, 71
How, 71
Howard, 292
Huggins, 71
Ingalls, 151
Lamb, 220
McNey, 151
Parker, J., 71
Parrott, 72, 293
Pease, 71
Perkins, 71, 151
Perry, 292
Poole, 220
Pottle, 151
Rand, 151
Roberts, 151
Snow, 292
Thayer, 220
Turner, 71
Webb, 152
Wood, 70
Wright, 292
Gloucester, Linzee’s Attack on, 85
Griffis, Rev. W. E., articles by, 295, 365
Guernsey, R. S., article by, 44
Graham, Alex. S., article by, 394
Grave of Leather Stocking, 283
Great Dismal Swamp, A Day in the, 339
Green, Samuel A., article by, 185
Greenwood, Isaac J., article by, 181
Groton, The Old Town of, 185
Hall, Edward H., article by, 202
Hammond, Otis G., article by, 48
Hand-Loom Weaving Revived, 271
Hanson, Joseph M., poem by, 116
HISTORICAL SOCIETIES:
Montgomery Co., N. Y., 221
New Jersey, 432
New York, 221
N. Y. State Hist Ass’n., 69
Hogg, Ebenezer, _vs._ John Paul Jones, 48
ILLUSTRATIONS:
André Prison, Tappan, August
Gen. Clinton’s Dam, Cooperstown, November
Landais, Capt. Pierre, portrait of, September
Odell, Rev. Jonathan, portrait of, July
INDIAN LEGENDS:
The Dancing Ghosts, 424
The Lone Buffalo, 356
The Shooting Meteors, 210
Indiana County Names, 420
Jones, John Paul, 48, 285
Journey through New England and New York in 1818, 14, 90
Landais, Captain Pierre, 181
Lanman, Charles, articles by, 210, 273, 356, 424
Last Century, A Port of the, 417
Leather Stocking, Grave of, 283
Liberty of the Press, 55, 118, 160, 228, 315, 379
Lincoln, Abraham, speech of, 362
Luzerne County, Pa., Early Days in, 239
LETTERS:
British Officer, 144
John Dickinson, 290
Capt. Jas. Duncan, 67
William Lloyd Garrison, 150
Col. Henry Glen, 287
Capt. John Gooch, 216
Andrew Jackson, 68
Major James McHenry, 362
Edmund Munro, 360
Gen. John Pope, 217
John Sellon, 359
Jonathan Trumbull, Jr., 429
Washington, 66, 146, 215, 289, 364, 427, 429
Martha Washington, 364
Maine, Henry C., article by, 206
Martin, I. J., article by, 403
Matthews, Amanda, article by, 206
McHenry, James, letter of, 362
McPike, Eugene F., article by, 346
Memorial Trees, 281
Miscellanea of American History, 346
MISCELLANEOUS TOPICS:
André Prison, efforts to preserve, 151
Burr and Hamilton, 70
Fate of the Pigeons, 353
First Dutch Church, Schenectady, 173
N. Y. Liquor License, 1739, 432
Thomaston Ter-Centenary, 150
Ward Election in New York, 1739, 431
Mississippi River, Progress of Discovery of, 1
Munro, Edmund, letters of, 359, 360
Navesink, Fancies at (poem), 264
New England, Journey through, in 1818, 14, 90
Northern Neck of Virginia, 259
NOTES AND QUERIES:
Replies, Revolutionary Flags, 219
Odell, Rev. Jonathan, 28
Portrait of, July
Old Town of Groton, The, 185
Origin of Name of Washington, 202
Original Documents, 66, 67, 68, 144, 146, 150, 215, 216, 217, 287,
289, 290, 359, 360, 362, 364, 427, 429
Parker, Mrs. Jane Marsh, article by, 153
Pigeons, Fate of the, 363
POEMS:
Dakota Militia, 116
Fancies at Navesink, 264
Ode to American Independence, 30
Poet’s Mother, Diary of a, 417
Port of the Last Century, 417
Post Office Department, First Woman in the, 276
Potomac, Army of the, 127, 171, 249
Press, Liberty of the, 55, 118, 160, 228, 315
Ryman, Wm. P., article by, 239
Saratoga, Battle of, 284
Schuyler, Rev. L. R., articles by, 55, 118, 160, 228, 379
Sellon, John, 359
Siege of Yorktown, Capt. Duncan’s Diary of the, 407
Somes, John J., article by, 85
Sullivan’s Great March in the Indian Country, 295, 365
Stepping-Stones, Baltimore’s Old, 282
Stone, William L., article by, 284
Thomaston, Me., Ter-Centenary of, 150
Turtle, Bushnell’s, 389
Unknown Exile, was he Charles X?, 96
“Unknown Exile,” not Charles X., 153
Upham, Warren, article by, 1
Vancil, Frank M., article by, 199
Vallandigham, E. N., article by, 259
Washington Name, Origin of the, 202
Washington, Letters of--_See_ Original Documents
Weaving, Handloom, Revived, 278
Wendover and the Flag, 44
White, Anthony Walton, 394
Whitman, Walt., poem by, 264
Yorktown, Capt. Duncan’s Diary at Siege of, 407
Transcriber’s Notes
Punctuation errors have been silently corrected.
Page 372: “Second New Hampsire” changed to “Second New Hampshire”
Page 376: “They next day” changed to “The next day”
Page 379: “3000 capies” changed to “3000 copies”
Page 394: “Cavalary Officers” changed to “Cavalry Officers”
Page 397: “polite and afecttionate” changed to “polite and affectionate”
Page 404: “has been dsicussion” changed to “has been discussion”
Page 415: “upon Corwallis’s” changed to “upon Cornwallis’s”
Page 429: “as as we should” changed to “as we should”
Page 433: “Truestees of the Society” changed to “Trustees of the
Society” “fill vacanies” changed to “fill vacancies”
The index has been corrected to fix items that were out of alphabetical
order.
*** End of this LibraryBlog Digital Book "The magazine of history with notes and queries, Vol. II, No. 6, December 1905" ***
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