USA > Massachusetts > Suffolk County > Boston > Celebration of the centennial anniversary of the evacuation of Boston by the British Army, March 17th, 1776 > Part 11
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felonious North." As his eye would have to fall on this epithet, Bur- goyne apologizes by writing that he had intended to have sent orly ex- tracts, "leaving out those virulent apostrophes which stand like oaths at Billingsgate, for expletives when reason fails" - but as the whole corre- spondence has been printed, his caution would not avail. He writes very differently about Lee, from the tone and style in which he had written to him. His chief object had been to have obtained an interview with Lee, in which he would " have cut him short in that paltry jargon of invec- tive" against ministers, and pressed him with the fallacy and frenzy of his notions. Burgoyne proceeds : "I would then have endeavored to touch his pride, his interest, and his ambition. I know the ruling pas- sion of Lee's mind to be avarice ; the foundation of his apostasy I be- lieve to be resentment." Working from that interpretation and estimate of Lee's character, Burgoyne goes on to explain to the minister the method by which he was fully confident he could have won over the American general to his previous service under the king. He thought it probable that " though Lee would have started at a direct bribe, he might have caught at an overture of changing his party to gratify his interest, provided any salvo were suggested for his integrity, - a point in which many a man fancies he possesses more than he really does. It is not impossible that the example of General Monk might have pre- sented itself to his imagination," etc., etc. If Lee could be thus " secretly bought over, the services he might do are great ; and very great, I con- fess, they ought to be to atone for his offences." Burgoyne offers this precious plea to the minister to palliate his having used mild and friendly terms in writing to a traitor whose life was forfeited. It seems, too, that Lee had written still another letter to Burgoyne, of which extracts were enclosed to Lord North, though neither the original nor these are forthcoming. From the comments npon it, it appears that Lee had in it expressed his alarm that the British intended to employ Indian allies, and also his positive knowledge " that France and Spain were ready to accept the colonies."
Burgoyne did not restrict his estimate of venality to Lee. For in an- other confidential letter he writes, " There is hardly a leading man among the rebels, in council or in the field, but at a proper time, and by proper management, might have been bonght." He makes an exception, how-
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ever, for either John or Sam. Adams, whom he confuses together, though what he writes was equally true of both of them. " I believe Ad- ams to be as great a conspirator as ever subverted a State. Be assured, my lord, this man soars too high to be allured by any offer Great Brit- ain can make to himself or to his country. America, if his counsels continue in force, must be subdued or relinquished. She will not be reconciled."
A 'PRELIMINARY TO THE DECLARATION OF INDEPENDENCE.
One year before the Continental Congress took the long-delayed and decisive step of declaring Independence, it preceded the measure by what it regarded under the circumstances as equally decisive, though to us it seems merely temporizing, the issuing, on July 6, 1775, a declaration of the reasons for taking up arms. The declaration represented this as the alternative of " mmconditional submission to irritated ministers." They review the wrongs they have suffered, and the outrages which have been inflicted upon the colonies ; refuse to make terms separately ; insist upon being treated as a united body ; resolve to die free. men rather than slaves ; and yet they still disavow a " design of separating from Great Britain, and establishing independent States."
A solemn occasion was made in the camp for publishing this paper. The Declaration was read on Cambridge Common on July 15th, by President Langdon, in presence of the General, his officers, and a mass of people, and was received with enthusiastic responses. It was also read to the soldiers under Putnam, on Prospect Hill, on the 18th ; and, after a solemn address and prayer by the Chaplain, Mr. Leonard, at Putnam's word the soldiers cheered and shouted their approval. A cannon was discharged, and Putnam displayed a Connecticut flag, with its motto, Qui Transtulit Sustinet; "The Philistines on Bunker's Hill," being dismayed by this outburst of " the Israelites."
A stir was made in the camp on Sept. 13th, by the fitting out of an expedition, under Arnold, for Quebec.
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ARRIVAL AND CONFERENCE OF A COMMITTEE FROM CONGRESS.
The Commander was cheered by the arrival at the camp, on October 15th, of a committee specially appointed for the purpose by the body at Philadelphia, with which his only previous channel of intercourse had been by letters. Dr. Franklin, Lynch, of Carolina, and Harrison of Virginia, came as a committee on a reconstruction of the army. Official representatives from this and the other N. E. provinces were present. Amicable and earnest discussion resulted in measures which were highly encouraging to the Commander, and which rallied his hopefulness. Still, with the winter approaching, he was anxious to take some effective action against the besieged enemy. He retained the delegates till the 24th, and wished their advice on a measure which he had proposed to a Council of War as to an assault on Boston by bombardment. Ilis officers in council, admitting that such an attempt was desirable, thought it impracticable. The Committee from Congress advised that the project be referred to the decision of that body. It was not till two months afterwards that Congress gave Washington authority to destroy the capital. While he was on this visit to the camp Franklin made over to a Committee of the Massachusetts Assembly the sum of £100, which had been sent to him by sympathizers in England, to relieve the wounded, widows and children, sufferers by the battle at Lexington. After the formal convention at the camp was closed, the committee re- mained for friendly discussion on many important matters. They revised the articles of war, made suggestions to the Congress, pro- posed regulations about prizes and provisions captured at sea, the ex- change of prisoners, and the employment of Indians, and so defining and conforming the authority of the Commander as greatly to strengthen and encourage him. Congress confirmed all their action.
In October, intelligence of a most irritating and alarming character was received in the camp, of the burning, by Lient. Mowatt, on the 18th, of 500 houses, and 14 vessels, at Falmouth, now Portland, Me. Wash- ington was earnestly entreated, by the people of the sea-board towns, who were constantly in dread of similar ontrages from the British fleet, to send detachments from the army for their protection. He replied
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with strong expressions of sympathy, but he could not by compliance reduce his own insufficient forces.
DR. BENJAMIN CHURCH CHARGED WITH TREACHERY.
This gentleman, who was a graduate of Harvard, a poet, a prominent patriot with pen and tongue, a member of the Provincial Congress, and who, when sent on a mission to the Continental Congress, had obtained the appointment of Surgeon-General of the Army, and Military Director of Hospitals, came under suspicion from being detected, about the first of October, in correspondence with a brother-in-law in Boston, who was a tory. His medium was a woman, and a letter of his was intercepted, written in cipher, and with some difficulty interpreted. The letter is certainly ambiguous in its contents, but the circumstances justified his arrest and confinement. He was allowed a full hearing at his examina- tion before the General Court, at Watertown, on the charge of com- municating information to the enemy. Ilis ingenious but evasive plea in his defence was not satisfactory, and he was expelled from the House. Washington laid the case before the Continental Congress, which sen- tenced him to be confined in a jail in Connecticut, without pen, ink, or paper, or privilege of private intercourse. On the score of failing health he obtained relaxation in the terms, and a change of the place of his duress, and finally permission to sail for the West Indies. The vessel in which he took passage was never heard of.
A VISITOR TO THE CAMP.
We have an interesting account of a visit to the camp in the Life of Jeremy Belknap, a minister in Dover, N. H., afterwards of Boston, the historian of New Hampshire, and a principal founder of the Mass. His- torical Society. He was a native of Boston, and the tidings of the affair at Lexington reaching him soon after its occurrence, he hurried hither, leaving his parish to excuse his absence from his pulpit on Sunday, while he took filial care for his parents in the town. He remained at Cambridge more than a week, in April, before he could bring about an interview with them and their removal. In the interval
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he wrote to his wife, " Don't let my gun and ammunition get out of the house, if you can help it." The state of his health compelled him to decline the appointment as chaplain of the camp to the New Hampshire troops, but, agreeing to take his turn in preaching there to the soldiers, he visited the camp for that purpose in October. In the discharge of his clerical offices there he was given to understand " that it was offensive to pray for the king," though the Congress had not yet renounced allegiance to him as "our rightful sovereign." Under Oct. 20th, he writes : -
" I prayed with Gen. Thomas' regiment, quartered at Roxbury, and after- wards visited the lines in company with an officer of the picquet guard. Nothing struck me with more horror than the present condition of Roxbury; that once busy, crowded street is now occupied only by a picquet guard, The houses are deserted, the windows are taken out, and many shot-holes are visible ; some have been burnt, and others pulled down to make room for the fortifications. A wall of earth is carried across the street to Williams' old house, where there is a formidable fort mounted with cannon. The lower line is just below where the George Tavern stood; a row of trees, root and branch, lies across the road there, and the breastwork extends to Lamb's Dan, which form a part thereof. I went round the whole, and was so near the enemy as to see them (though it was foggy and rainy) relieve their sentries, which they do every hour. Their outmost sentries are posted at the chimneys of Brown's house." [The rebels had burned this house.]
" After dining with General Ward, I returned to Cambridge; in the evening visited and conversed with General Putnam. Ward appears to be a calm, cool, thoughtful man ; Putnam, a rough, fiery genius.
"Oct. 21st. - Detained at Cambridge all day by the rain. Met General Sullivan, who told me he was ordered to Portsmouth on the report of the destruction of Falmouth. Dined, by invitation, with Mr. Mifflin, Quarter- master-General. The company present were Dr. Franklin, Mr. Lynch and Colonel Harrison (a committee from the Congress), General Lee, ete. General Lee is a perfect original, a good scholar, and an odd genius, full of fire and passion, and but little good manners ; a great sloven, wretchedly profane, and a great admirer of dogs, of which he had two at dinner with him, ete. Gen- eral Washington was to have been at this dinner, but the weather prevented. Hle is said to be a very amiable gentleman, cool, sensible and placid, and a resolute soldier.
"Oct. 22d. -- Preached all day in the meeting-house. After meeting I was
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again told by the chaplain that it was disagreeable to the generals to pray for the king. I answered that the same authority which appointed the generals had ordered the king to be prayed for at the late Continental Fast; and, till that was revoked, I should think it my duty to do it. Dr. Appleton [the minister of the church in Cambridge] prayed in the afternoon, and mentioned the king with much affection. It is too assuming in the generals to find fault with it.
" Oct. 23d. - Mr. Miflin assured me there was no design to make an assault upon Boston very soon, and that it would not be done unless it was found that nothing else could be done. Flat-bottomed boats are preparing which will carry sixty or seventy men at once. Barracks are also building for the army's winter quarters. The army is healthy, and well supplied. I visited the works at Prospect Hill. The weather being hazy I had not so good a view as I should wish ; but I could see the enemy's lines and buildings at Bunker Hill, and the desolation at Charlestown. Visited also the works at Ploughed Hill and Winter Hill, and set out on my return, etc.
" Oct. 24th. - Got home [to Dover] and found the town full of Portsmouth people, who have been moving with their effects, ever since the destruction of Falmouth, apprehending the same fate."
A CHARACTERISTIC ORDER IN THE CAMP BY WASHINGTON.
The history and traditions of colonial and provincial life in Boston give us many illustrations of the zeal and animosity of the people exhibited against everything peculiarly identified with the claims and observances of the Roman Catholic Church. The anniversary associated with the famous Gunpowder Plot was an occasion of manifestation, parade and satirical shows in Boston which, by frequent recurrence, had made the day one of almost obligatory recognition. Important issues were now suspended upon the hopes and plans connected with movements designed to bring Canada into sympathy with the revolting colonies. The British Ministry, by the famous Quebee Bill, had adroitly schemed to secure the allegiance of Roman Catholic Canada, and it was not for us to alienate it by any insult to its faith. The following order was issued in the Provincial Camp for Nov. 5th : -
" As the Commander-in-Chief has been apprised of a design formed for the observance of that ridiculous and childish custom of burning the efligy of the Pope, he cannot help expressing his surprise that there should be officers and 20
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soldiers in this army so void of common sense as not to see the impropriety of such a step at this juncture ; at a time when we are soliciting, and have really obtained, the friendship and alliance of the people of Canada, whom we ought to consider as brethren embarked in the same cause, the defence of the general liberty of America. At such a juncture and in such circumstances to be insulting their religion is so monstrous as not to be suffered or excused; indeed, instead of offering the most remote insult, it is our duty to address public thanks to these our brethren, as to them we are so much indebted for every late happy success over the common enemy in Canada."
WINTER IN THE CAMP.
The unwearied forethought and oversight of the Commander, setting before him all the details and conditions of his arduous task, were engaged in about equal measurements in trying to avert the necessity of keeping his forces inactive through the winter, and in preparing for that season if compelled to remain on the ground. The Provincial and the Continental Congresses gave him the help of their most earnest wishes and intents, though not always resulting in prompt efficiency.
Ile had reason to believe that even if the enemy made no offensive demonstrations, beyond an occasional cannonade, through the winter, strong reinforcements would join them in the spring, and therefore he decided that the sooner he could strike a strong blow the better. Be- sides, the close of the year would terminate the period of enlistment of the larger portion of the men whom, by incessant and rigid discipline, he had been preparing for soldierly work, and turn in upon the camp, when it was most weakened, a body of raw recruits. The militia of the neighboring towns, summoned for a few days to meet special emergen- cies, was his only resource. In councils with his officers he urged his own views as to the necessity of an assault on the enemy before rein- forcements should arrive, and he freely avowed his assurance that, though any such enterprise would be extremely hazardous, yet, if his men would face the risk courageously, it had a fair chance of success. The autumn and early part of the winter were comparatively mild, and his hopes of seeing the bay tightly locked in ice - that the temptation to use it as a bridge to Boston might induce his officers to approve his plan - were disappointed. But the uncertainty of his schemes in this
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direction could not offset the certainty that he must be prepared to keep his men on the ground through a New England winter, in whatever shape it might come. The men were of a sort and training and habit of life that disposed and fitted them to do the best possible for themselves in this matter. They were content with plain fare, and there was no lack of it. They showed their ingenuity in the construction of huts and shanties of every conceivable pattern. After experiencing some dif- ficulty in providing a sufficient quantity of firewood the Provincial Congress made a levy on the towns to a considerable distance from the camp, and it was furnished in abundance. The time-honored Thanks- giving festival was heartily enjoyed on November 23d. Orders had been issued to Gen. Sullivan, on the seventh of the month, to go to the protection of Portsmouth against the fate which had been visited upon Falmouth. On Nov. 9th, about four hundred of the enemy, in boats from Boston, made a landing at high water on Lechmere's Point, which was thus made an island, to plunder the stock there. They were pro- tected by a frigate, and by floating batteries. The alarm drew a detach- ment of the provincials, who could reach the scene only by fording, and the result was a skirmish with a loss of two men on each side. The enemy carried off some cows. The Point was, as stated above, strongly fortified by the Provincials on the next month.
On the opening of the new year Washington received the desired allowance of the Continental Congress to destroy Boston, if he found it advisable to do so, and President Hancock, in transmitting the message, endorsed it with his full approbation, though he would have been, per- haps, the largest sufferer. The monthly expenses of Washington's army were estimated by him, at the end of the year, at $275,000.
The union flag had been flung to the breeze with hearty cheering, on the new year. Admiral Schuldam, who had just come into the harbor to displace Graves, brought with him an edition of the king's last speech in opening Parliament, full of the spirit of defiance and resolution to crush a "rebellious war, manifestly carried on for the purpose of estab- lishing an independent empire." The reading of it in the camp was received with shouts and jeers. A bold stroke was made on the even- ing of Jan. 8th, by a party under Major Knowlton, to burn some houses then left on Charlestown Neck. It was, in a degree, successful, and caused a panic in Boston.
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TREATMENT OF PRISONERS.
As in all cases of alienation, strife and resistance on the part of any considerable portion of subjects or citizens in their relations with an established government, when what begins as sedition and rebellion waits the issue of events to decide whether it shall be crushed, or result in successful and accomplished revolution ; so in the struggle which is here rehearsed, one of the most critical questions opened in its earliest stage was the treatment and disposition to be made of those persons who became obnoxious to, or were first seized in actual armed hostility to authority. There was no unusual course adopted, no peculiar severity exercised by the British commander here in treating the rebels who first fell into his hands as such, unless we recognize as of that character the arrogance and supercilious disdain, the assumption, contempt and con- ceit of an easy triumph over a despicable enemy, which marked the whole official conduct of the royalists in their dealings with the pro- vincials. Of course, the military titles borne by the rebel officers could not be, even in courtesy, allowed in intercourse with them, and it was assumed that no distinction would be made between them and the soldiers. As in all such cases, too, consideration, tolerance, and all the measures that gradually recognized the pending of an issue to which there was conceivably more than one result, were won by the rebels, and yielded on the royal side, only as the former proved that they were in earnest, and were not to be trifled with. The security of the revolting party in every such case is to possess themselves, as soon as possible, of the means and materials for retaliation. It came to be a matter of regret with Gage, and his lieutenants, that the most able and obnoxious leaders of the rebels had not been seized according to the purposes of the ministry, and sent to England for trial as traitors. They would probably even then have escaped with their lives, and merely been held as pledges of the orderly conduct of their fellow-subjects, as when Henry Laurens, bearing despatches from the rebel Congress to Holland, was intercepted on the high seas, and confined in the Tower of London. By Gage's proclamation of June 12th, which it now appears was written for him by the pen of Burgoyne, Hancock and Samuel Adams were exempted from the pardon offered to all who would then avail them-
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selves of it by submitting to the royal governor. Not to be outdone in the matter of grace, though their list of the proscribed was a longer one, the Provincial Congress, on June 16th, by proclamation, offered a full and free pardon to soldiers, tories, and all sorts "of public offenders against the rights and liberties of this country, excepting only from the benefit of such pardon," the General, the Admiral, all the Mandamus Counsellors who had not resigned, and all not belonging to the royal army or navy, who had aided in the recent "robberies and murders." The Continental Congress had given attention to the matter of retalia- tion in the seizure of any of the patriot party, and the Committee of Safety had advised the Provincial Congress, on July 6th, " to recom- mend to the grand American Congress that every crown officer within the united colonies be immediately seized and held in safe custody until our friends, who have been seized by Gen. Gage, are set at liberty, and fully recompensed for their loss and imprisonment."
These " friends seized by Gage" were some prominent offenders in Boston, whom he had committed to the jail. James Lovell and John Leach were here confined, with rough treatment, sixty-five days each, on the charge of being spies ; Peter Edes and William Starr, seventy-five days each, for concealing fire-arms, and John Gill, as a printer of seditious matter. Besides these were the prisoners, about a score, taken at Bunker Hill. It was alleged that the wounded among these were neglected or brutally treated. In a confidential letter of Burgoyne to Lord Rochfort, before quoted, he wrote, " My advice to General Gage has been to treat the prisoners taken in the late action, most of whom are wounded, with all possible kindness, and to dismiss them without terms. 'You have been deluded ; return to your homes in peace ; it is your duty to God and your country to undeceive your neighbors.' I have had opportunities to sound the minds of these people. Most of them are men of good understanding, but of much prejudice, and still more credulity ; they are yet ignorant of their fate, and some of them expect, when they recover, to be hanged." It was indeed to that fate, as culprits and rioters, that Gen. Gage tried to attract the fears of such as fell into his hands. Washington, on Aug. 11, addressed a letter to the General, remonstrating against his thus treating prisoners of war as felons, and threatening full retaliation to
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obnoxious persons in his hands who had till then been forbearingly dealt .by. In this letter Gage is described as acting under "ministers." Gage again used the pen of Burgoyne for a reply, addressed to " George Washington, Esq." Burgoyne gives us the letter as he wrote it, and it appears that Gage, in copying it, added to it the following sentence : " Till I read your insinuations in regard to ministers, I conceived that I had acted under the king," etc. True to his threat, Washington gave orders that some obnoxious persons and prisoners in his hands should be confined in common jails ; but for some reason the severity was relaxed. He had occasion to write again to Gage on the same subject, Aug. 20th, and also on Dec. 18th to Gen. Howe, on the brutal treatment of Ethan Allen. This officer was put in irons, carried to England, then shifted between New York and Halifax, at which last place Mr. Lovell was carried ; and their treatment was the subject of much correspond- ence. But cartels and exchanges soon disposed of the whole matter.
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