The Student's Life of Washington; Condensed from the Larger Work of Washington Irving Part 14

[Arnold, meanwhile, was advancing with severe toil and difficulty. His troops and effects were transported across the carrying-point between the Kennebec and Dead Rivers. On the latter river they landed their boats, and navigated its sluggish waters to the foot of snow crowned mountains. Here they experienced heavy rains; some of their boats were overturned by torrents from the mountains, and many of their provisions lost. The sick list increased, and the spirits of the army gave way. But the energy of Arnold was unabated. He pushed on, and at Lake Megantic, the source of the Chaudiere, he met an emissary whom he had sent forward to sound the feelings of the French yeomanry. His report being favorable, Arnold divided his provisions among his troops, and with a light foraging party pushed rapidly ahead to procure and send back supplies. Chaudiere is little better than a mountain torrent, full of rocks and rapids. Arnold embarked upon it with his little party in five bateaux and a birch canoe. Three of the boats were dashed to pieces, the cargoes lost, and the crews saved with difficulty.] At length they reached Sertigan, the first French settlement, where they were cordially received. Here Arnold bought provisions, which he sent back by the Canadians and Indians to his troops. The latter were in a state of starvation.

Arnold halted for a short time in the hospitable valley of Chaudiere to give his troops repose, and distributed among the inhabitants the printed manifesto with which he had been furnished by Was.h.i.+ngton. Here he was joined by about forty Norridgewock Indians. On the 9th of November, the little army emerged from the woods at Point Levi, on the St. Lawrence, opposite to Quebec.

Leaving Arnold in full sight of Quebec, we turn to narrate the events of the upper expedition into Canada. Montgomery appeared before Montreal on the 12th of November. General Carleton had embarked with his little garrison and several of the civil officers of the place, on board of a flotilla of ten or eleven small vessels, and made sail in the night. The town capitulated, of course; and Montgomery took quiet possession. His urbanity and kindness soon won the good will of the inhabitants, both English and French, and made the Canadians sensible that he really came to secure their rights, not to molest them.

Intercepted letters acquainted him with Arnold's arrival in the neighborhood of Quebec.

His great immediate object was the capture of Carleton; which would form a triumphal close to the enterprise, and might decide the fate of Canada. The flotilla in which the general was embarked had made repeated attempts to escape down the St. Lawrence; but had as often been driven back by the batteries thrown up by the Americans at the mouth of the Sorel. It now lay anch.o.r.ed about fifteen miles above the river; and Montgomery prepared to attack it with bateaux and light artillery, so as to force it down upon the batteries. Carleton saw his imminent peril. Disguising himself as a Canadian voyager, he set off on a dark night accompanied by six peasants, in a boat with m.u.f.fled oars, which he a.s.sisted to pull; slipped quietly and silently past all the batteries and guard-boats, and effected his escape to Three Rivers, where he embarked in a vessel for Quebec. After his departure the flotilla surrendered.

Montgomery now placed garrisons in Montreal, St. Johns and Chamblee, and made final preparations for descending the St. Lawrence, and co-operating with Arnold against Quebec. To his disappointment and deep chagrin, he found but a handful of his troops disposed to accompany him. Some pleaded ill health; the term of enlistment of many had expired, and they were bent on returning home; and others, who had no such excuses to make became exceedingly turbulent, and mutinous.

Nothing but a sense of public duty and grat.i.tude to Congress for an unsought commission, had induced Montgomery to engage in the service; wearied by the continual vexations which beset it, he avowed, in a letter to Schuyler, his determination to retire as soon as the intended expedition against Quebec was finished.

[General Montgomery had been thwarted continually in his efforts by the want of subordination and discipline among his troops, "who," said he, "carry the spirit of freedom into the camp and think for themselves." Accustomed as he had been, in his former military experience, to the implicit obedience of European troops, the insubordination of these yeoman soldiery was intolerable to him.]

The tidings of the capture of Montreal gave Was.h.i.+ngton the liveliest satisfaction. He now looked forward to equal success in the expedition against Quebec. Certain pa.s.sages of Schuyler's letters, however, gave him deep concern, wherein that general complained of the embarra.s.sments and annoyances he had experienced from the insubordination of the army. "Habituated to order," said he, "I cannot without pain see that disregard of discipline, confusion and inattention which reign so generally in this quarter, and I am determined to retire. Of this resolution I have advised Congress."

He had indeed done so. In communicating to the President of Congress the complaints of General Montgomery, and his intention to retire, "my sentiments," said he, "exactly coincide with his. I shall, with him, do everything in my power to put a finis.h.i.+ng stroke to the campaign, and make the best arrangement in my power, in order to insure success to the next. This done, I must beg leave to retire." Congress, however, was too well aware of his value, readily to dispense with his services. His letter produced a prompt resolution expressive of their high sense of his attention and perseverance, "which merited the thanks of the United Colonies."

What, however, produced a greater effect upon Schuyler than any encomium or entreaty on the part of Congress, were the expostulations of Was.h.i.+ngton, inspired by strong friends.h.i.+p and kindred sympathies.

"I am exceedingly sorry," writes the latter, "that you and General Montgomery incline to quit the service. Let me ask you, sir, when is the time for brave men to exert themselves in the cause of liberty and their country, if this is not? Should any difficulties that they may have to encounter at this important crisis deter them? G.o.d knows there is not a difficulty that you both very justly complain of, that I have not in an eminent degree experienced, that I am not every day experiencing; but we must bear up against them, and make the best of mankind, as they are, since we cannot have them as we wish. Let me therefore conjure you, and Mr. Montgomery, to lay aside such thoughts--as thoughts injurious to yourselves and extremely so to your country, which calls aloud for gentlemen of your ability."

This n.o.ble appeal went straight to the heart of Schuyler, and brought out a magnanimous reply. "I do not hesitate," writes he, "to answer my dear general's question in the affirmative, by declaring that now or never is the time for every virtuous American to exert himself in the cause of liberty and his country; and that it is become a duty cheerfully to sacrifice the sweets of domestic felicity to attain the honest and glorious end America has in view."

[The true cause of Schuyler's wish to retire from official station was the annoyance he had suffered through the campaign from sectional prejudices. The eastern troops persistently declared that the general commanding in that quarter ought to be of the colony whence the majority of the troops came. His liberal treatment of British and Canadian prisoners was also a cause of offence, and rendered him unpopular.]

CHAPTER XXIV.

INCIDENTS OF THE CAMP.--ARNOLD BEFORE QUEBEC.

The forming even of the skeleton of an army under the new regulations, had been a work of infinite difficulty; to fill it up was still more difficult. The first burst of revolutionary zeal had pa.s.sed away; enthusiasm had been chilled by the inaction and monotony of a long encampment; an encampment, moreover, dest.i.tute of those comforts which, in experienced warfare, are provided by a well-regulated commissariat. The troops had suffered privations of every kind, want of fuel, clothing, provisions. They looked forward with dismay to the rigors of winter, and longed for their rustic homes and their family firesides.

[The Connecticut troops, whose time was expiring, were urged to remain until December 10th, when their place would be supplied by new levies.

They refused, and withdrew on the 1st, thereby greatly weakening the lines. This conduct excited great indignation, and the homeward-bound warriors met with a reception on their arrival at home which prompted many to return again to camp.]

On the very day after the departure homeward of these troops, and while it was feared their example would be contagious, a long, lumbering train of wagons, laden with ordnance and military stores, and decorated with flags, came wheeling into the camp escorted by continental troops and country militia. They were part of the cargo of a large brigantine laden with munitions of war, captured and sent in to Cape Ann by the schooner Lee, Captain Manly, one of the cruisers sent out by Was.h.i.+ngton. Beside the ordnance captured, there were two thousand stand of arms, one hundred thousand flints, thirty thousand round shot, and thirty-two tons of musket b.a.l.l.s.

It was a cheering incident, and was eagerly turned to account. Among the ordnance was a huge bra.s.s mortar of a new construction, weighing near three thousand pounds. It was considered a glorious trophy, and there was a resolve to christen it. Mifflin, Was.h.i.+ngton's secretary, suggested the name. The mortar was fixed in a bed; old Putnam mounted it, dashed on it a bottle of rum, and gave it the name of "Congress."

With Was.h.i.+ngton, this transient gleam of nautical success was soon overshadowed by the conduct of the cruisers he had sent to the St.

Lawrence. Failing to intercept the brigantines, the objects of their cruise, they landed on the Island of St. Johns, plundered the house of the governor and several private dwellings, and brought off three of the princ.i.p.al inhabitants prisoners; one of whom, Mr. Callbeck, was president of the council, and acted as governor. These gentlemen made a memorial to Was.h.i.+ngton of this scandalous maraud. He instantly ordered the restoration of the effects which had been pillaged.

Shortly after the foregoing occurrence, information was received of the indignities which had been heaped upon Colonel Ethan Allen, [who was loaded with chains and thrown into prison,] when captured at Montreal by General Prescott, who himself was now a prisoner in the hands of the Americans. It touched Was.h.i.+ngton on a point on which he was most sensitive and tenacious, the treatment of American officers when captured.

[A correspondence ensued between Was.h.i.+ngton and General Howe, in which the former threatened as retaliation to inflict upon General Prescott the same treatment and fate which Colonel Allen should experience. In reply, Howe a.s.serted that his command did not extend to Canada and that he had no knowledge of Allen or his fate. General Carleton, he a.s.sumed, would not in this case forfeit his past pretensions to decency and humanity. The measure of retaliation threatened by Was.h.i.+ngton was actually meted out by Congress on the arrival of General Prescott in Philadelphia. He was ordered into close confinement in jail, though not put in irons; but subsequently, on account of his health, he was released.]

At the time of this correspondence with Howe, Was.h.i.+ngton was earnestly occupied preparing works for the bombardment of Boston, should that measure be resolved upon by Congress. General Putnam, in the preceding month, had taken possession in the night of Cobble Hill without molestation from the enemy, though a commanding eminence; and in two days had constructed a work, which, from its strength, was named Putnam's impregnable fortress. He was now engaged on another work on Lechmere Point, to be connected with the works at Cobble Hill by a bridge thrown across Willis's Creek, and a covered way. Lechmere Point is immediately opposite the north part of Boston; and the Scarborough s.h.i.+p-of-war was anch.o.r.ed near it. Putnam availed himself of a dark and foggy day (Dec. 17), to commence operations, and broke ground with four hundred men, at ten o'clock in the morning, on a hill at the Point. "The mist," says a contemporary account, "was so great as to prevent the enemy from discovering what he was about until near twelve o'clock, when it cleared up, and opened to their view our whole party at the Point, and another at the causeway throwing a bridge over the creek. The Scarborough, anch.o.r.ed off the Point, poured in a broadside.

The enemy from Boston threw sh.e.l.ls. The garrison at Cobble Hill returned fire. Our men were obliged to decamp from the Point, but the work was resumed by the brave old general at night."

On the next morning, General Heath was detached with a party of men to carry on the work which Putnam had commenced. It was to consist of two redoubts, on one of which was to be a mortar battery. There was, as yet, a deficiency of ordnance; but the prize mortar was to be mounted which Putnam had recently christened, "The Congress." For several days the labor at the works was continued; the redoubts were thrown up, and a covered way was constructed leading down to the bridge. All this was done notwithstanding the continual fire of the enemy. Putnam antic.i.p.ated great effects from this work, and especially from his grand mortar. Sh.e.l.ls there were in abundance for a bombardment; the only thing wanting was a supply of powder.

Amid the various concerns of the war, and the multiplied perplexities of the camp, the thoughts of Was.h.i.+ngton continually reverted to his home on the banks of the Potomac. A constant correspondence was kept up between him and his agent, Mr. Lund Was.h.i.+ngton, who had charge of his various estates. The general gave clear and minute directions as to their management, and the agent rendered as clear and minute returns of everything that had been done in consequence. According to recent accounts, Mount Vernon had been considered in danger. Lord Dunmore was exercising martial law in the Ancient Dominion, and it was feared that the favorite abode of the "rebel commander-in-chief" would be marked out for hostility, and that the enemy might land from their s.h.i.+ps in the Potomac and lay it waste. Was.h.i.+ngton's brother, John Augustine, had entreated Mrs. Was.h.i.+ngton to leave it. The people of Loudoun had advised her to seek refuge beyond the Blue Ridge, and had offered to send a guard to escort her. She had declined the offer, not considering herself in danger. Lund Was.h.i.+ngton was equally free from apprehensions on the subject. Though alive to everything concerning Mount Vernon, Was.h.i.+ngton agreed with them in deeming it in no present danger of molestation by the enemy. Still he felt for the loneliness of Mrs. Was.h.i.+ngton's situation, heightened as it must be by anxiety on his own account. He wrote to her, therefore, by express, in November, inviting her to join him at the camp. He at the same time wrote to Lund Was.h.i.+ngton, engaging his continued services as an agent. This person, though bearing the same name, and probably of the same stock, does not appear to have been in any near degree of relations.h.i.+p.

Mrs. Was.h.i.+ngton came on with her own carriage and horses, accompanied by her son, Mr. Custis, and his wife. Escorts and guards of honor attended her from place to place, and she was detained some time at Philadelphia by the devoted attention of the inhabitants. Her arrival at Cambridge was a glad event in the army.

[Mrs. Was.h.i.+ngton presided at head-quarters with dignity and affability. Some questions of ceremony had arisen, and jealousies had been excited in reference to invitations to head-quarters. The presence of Mrs. Was.h.i.+ngton relieved the general from numerous perplexities of this character. After her arrival the camp a.s.sumed a more convivial tone than before, and parties became common.]

While giving these familiar scenes and occurrences we are tempted to subjoin one furnished from the ma.n.u.script memoir of an eye witness. A large party of Virginia riflemen, who had recently arrived in camp, were strolling about Cambridge, and viewing the collegiate buildings, now turned into barracks. Their half-Indian equipments, and fringed and ruffled hunting garbs, provoked the merriment of some troops from Marblehead, chiefly fishermen and sailors, who thought nothing equal to the round jacket and trowsers. A bantering ensued between them.

There was snow upon the ground, and s...o...b..a.l.l.s began to fly when jokes were wanting. The parties waxed warm with the contest. They closed, and came to blows; both sides were reinforced, and in a little while at least a thousand were at fisticuffs, and there was a tumult in the camp worthy of the days of Homer. "At this juncture," writes our informant, "Was.h.i.+ngton made his appearance, whether by accident or design, I never knew. I saw none of his aides with him; his black servant was just behind him mounted. He threw the bridle of his own horse into his servant's hands, sprang from his seat, rushed into the thickest of the melee, seized two tall brawny riflemen by the throat, keeping them at arm's-length, talking to and shaking them."

As they were from his own province, he may have felt peculiarly responsible for their good conduct; they were engaged, too, in one of those sectional brawls which were his especial abhorrence; his reprimand must, therefore, have been a vehement one. He was commanding in his serenest moments, but irresistible in his bursts of indignation. On the present occasion, we are told, his appearance and strong-handed rebuke put an instant end to the tumult. The combatants dispersed in all directions, and in less than three minutes none remained on the ground but the two he had collared.

The invasion of Canada still shared the anxious thoughts of Was.h.i.+ngton. His last accounts of the movements of Arnold, left him at Point Levi, opposite to Quebec. It was his intention to cross the river immediately. At Point Levi, however, he was brought to a stand; not a boat was to be found there. Letters to Generals Schuyler and Montgomery had been carried by his faithless messengers, to Caramhe, the lieutenant-governor, who, had caused all the boats of Point Levi to be either removed or destroyed.

Arnold was not a man to be disheartened by difficulties. With great exertions he procured about forty birch canoes, but stormy winds arose, and for some days the river was too boisterous for such frail craft. In the meantime the garrison at Quebec was gaining strength.

The veteran Maclean arrived down the river with his corps of Royal Highland Emigrants, and threw himself into the place. The Lizard frigate, the Hornet sloop-of-war, and two armed schooners were stationed in the river, and guard-boats patrolled at night.

On the 13th of November, Arnold received intelligence that Montgomery had captured St. Johns. He was instantly roused to emulation. His men, too, were inspirited by the news. The wind had abated: he determined to cross the river that very night. At a late hour in the evening he embarked with the first division. By four o'clock in the morning a large part of his force had crossed without being perceived, and landed about a mile and a half above Cape Diamond, at Wolfe's Cove, so called from being the landing-place of that gallant commander. Just then a guard-boat, belonging to the Lizard, came slowly along sh.o.r.e and discovered them. They hailed it, and ordered it to land. Not complying, it was fired into and three men were killed. The boat instantly pulled for the frigate, giving vociferous alarm.

Without waiting the arrival of the residue of his men, for whom the canoes had been despatched, Arnold led those who had landed to the foot of the cragged defile, once scaled by the intrepid Wolfe, and scrambled up it in all haste. By daylight he had planted his daring flag on the far-famed Heights of Abraham. Here the main difficulty stared him in the face. A strong line of walls and bastions traversed the promontory from one of its precipitous sides to the other; enclosing the upper and lower towns. On the right, the great bastion of Cape Diamond crowned the rocky height of that name. On the left was the bastion of La Pota.s.se, close by the gate of St. Johns, opening upon the barracks.

A council of war was now held. Arnold, who had some knowledge of the place, was for das.h.i.+ng forward at once and storming the gate of St.

Johns. Had they done so, they might have been successful. The gate was open and unguarded. Through some blunder and delay, a message from the commander of the Lizard to the lieutenant-governor had not yet been delivered, and no alarm had reached the fortress. The formidable aspect of the place, however, awed Arnold's a.s.sociates. Cautious counsel is often fatal to a daring enterprise. While the counsel of war deliberated, the favorable moment pa.s.sed away. The lieutenant-governor received the tardy message. He hastily a.s.sembled the merchants, officers of militia, and captains of merchant vessels.

All promised to stand by him, and the walls looking upon the heights were soon manned by the military. Arnold paraded his men within a hundred yards of the walls, and caused them to give three hearty cheers; hoping to excite a revolt in the place, or to provoke the scanty garrison to a sally. There was some firing on the part of the Americans, but merely as an additional taunt; they were too far off for their musketry to have effect. A large cannon on the ramparts was brought to bear on them, and a few shots obliged the Americans to retire and encamp.

In the evening Arnold sent a flag, demanding in the name of the United Colonies the surrender of the place. Some of the disaffected and the faint-hearted were inclined to open the gates, but were held in check by the mastiff loyalty of Maclean. The inhabitants gradually recovered from their alarm, and armed themselves to defend their property. The sailors and marines proved a valuable addition to the garrison, which now really meditated a sortie. Arnold received information of all this from friends within the walls; he heard about the same time of the capture of Montreal, and that General Carleton, having escaped from that place, was on his way down to Quebec. He thought at present, therefore, to draw off on the 19th to _Point aux Trembles_ (Aspen-tree Point), twenty miles above Quebec, there to await the arrival of General Montgomery with troops and artillery. As his little army wended its way along the high bank of the river towards its destined encampment, a vessel pa.s.sed below, which had just touched at Point aux Trembles. On board of it was General Carleton, hurrying on to Quebec.

CHAPTER XXV.

WAs.h.i.+NGTON'S PERPLEXITIES.--NEW YORK IN DANGER.

In the month of December a vessel had been captured, bearing supplies from Lord Dunmore to the army at Boston. A letter on board, from his lords.h.i.+p to General Howe, invited him to transfer the war to the southern colonies; or, at all events, to send reinforcements thither; intimating at the same time his plan of proclaiming liberty to indentured servants, negroes, and others appertaining to rebels, and inviting them to join his majesty's troops. In a word, to inflict upon Virginia the horrors of a servile war. "If this man is not crushed before spring," writes Was.h.i.+ngton, "he will become the most formidable enemy America has. His strength will increase as a s...o...b..ll."

General Lee took the occasion to set forth his own system of policy.

"Had my opinion been thought worthy of attention," would he say, "Lord Dunmore would have been disarmed of his teeth and claws." He would seize Tryon too, "and every governor, government man, placeman, tory and enemy to liberty on the continent, and confiscate their estates, or at least lay them under heavy contributions for the public. Their persons should be secured, in some of the interior towns, as hostages for the treatment of those of our party whom the fortune of war shall throw into their hands; they should be allowed a reasonable pension out of their fortunes for their maintenance."

Such was the policy advocated by Lee in his letters and conversation, and he soon had an opportunity of carrying it partly into operation.

[Newport being threatened by a naval armament from Boston, General Lee was despatched, at the request of the governor, to put the island in a state of defence. Lee set out with alacrity. Having laid out works, and given directions for fortifications, he summoned before him a number of persons who had been in the habit of supplying the enemy, and compelled them all to take an oath of fidelity to the continental claim. Those who refused were put under guard and sent to Providence.

Congress was disposed to consider these measures too highhanded, but Was.h.i.+ngton approved of them.]

December had been throughout a month of severe trial to Was.h.i.+ngton; during which he saw his army dropping away piece-meal before his eyes.

Homeward every face was turned as soon as the term of enlistment was at an end. Scarce could the disbanding troops be kept a few days in camp until militia could be procured to supply their place. Was.h.i.+ngton made repeated and animated appeals to their patriotism; they were almost unheeded. He caused popular and patriotic songs to be sung about the camp. They pa.s.sed by like the idle wind. Home! home! home!

throbbed in every heart. "The desire of retiring into a chimney-corner," says Was.h.i.+ngton reproachfully, "seized the troops as soon as their terms expired."

Greene, throughout this trying month, was continually by Was.h.i.+ngton's side. His letters expressing the same cares and apprehensions, and occasionally in the same language with those of the commander-in-chief, show how completely he was in his councils. The 31st of December arrived, the crisis of the army; for with that month expired the last of the old terms of enlistment. "We never have been so weak," writes Greene, "as we shall be to-morrow, when we dismiss the old troops." On this day Was.h.i.+ngton received cheering intelligence from Canada. A junction had taken place, a month previously, between Arnold and Montgomery at Point aux Trembles. They were about two thousand strong, and were making every preparation for attacking Quebec.