History of Morris County, New Jersey, Part 30

Author: Halsey, Edmund Drake, 1840-1896; Aikman, Robert; Axtell, Samuel Beach, 1809-1891; Brewster, James F; Green, R. S. (Rufus Smith), 1848-1925; Howell, Monroe; Kanouse, John L; Megie, Burtis C; Neighbour, James H; Stoddard, E. W. (Elijah Woodward), 1820-1913
Publication date: 1882
Publisher: New York : W.W. Munsell & co.
Number of Pages: 540

USA > New Jersey > Morris County > History of Morris County, New Jersey > Part 30

Note: The text from this book was generated using artificial intelligence so there may be some errors. The full pages can be found on Archive.org (link on the Part 1 page).

So far as possible let us now relate the facts which show the sufferings and heroism of our soldiers on Kim- ball Hill the winter of 1779-80. On the 9th of December General Greene wrote: Our hutting goes on rapidly, and the troops will be under cover in a few days. The officers will remain in the open field until the boards [from Trenton] arrive, and as their sufferings are great they will be proportionably clamorous." The New Eng- land troops on the 9th of that month were at Pompton; and Doctor Thatcher, in his Military Journal, says: "On the 14th we reached this wilderness, about three miles from Morristown, where we are to build huts for winter quarters." The severity of the winter may be inferred from Doctor Thatcher's description: "The snow on the ground is about two feet deep and the weather extremely cold; the soldiers are destitute of both tents and blankets, and some of them are actually barefooted and almost naked. Our only defense against the inclemency of the weather consists of brushwood thrown together. Our lodging the last night was on the frozen ground. Those officers who have the privilege of a horse can always have a blanket at hand. Having removed the snow we wrapped ourselves in great coats, spread our blankets on the ground and lay down by the side of each other, five or six together, with large fires at our feet, leaving orders with the waiters to keep it well supplied with fuel during the night. We could procure neither shelter nor forage for our horses; and the poor animals were tied to the trees in the woods for twenty-four hours, without food except the bark which they peeled from the trees." " The whole army in this department are to be engaged in building log huts for winter quarters. The ground is marked, and the soldiers have commenced cutting down the timber of oak and walnut, of which we have great abundance. Our baggage has at length arrived; the men find it very difficult to pitch their tents in the frozen ground; and, notwithstanding large fires, we can scarcely keep from freezing. In addition to other sufferings the whole army has been seven or eight days entirely desti- tute of the staff of life; our only food is miserable fresh beef, without bread, salt or vegetables."

The general fact that that winter was one of terrible severity is well known; but we may obtain more vivid ideas of this fact by a few details. In the New Jersey Gazette of February 9th 1780, published at Trenton, the editor says: "The weather has been so extremely cold for nearly two months past that sleighs and other car- riages now pass from this place to Philadelphia on the Delaware, a circumstance not remembered by the oldest person among us." As early as the 18th of December

124

HISTORY OF MORRIS COUNTY.

1779 an officer who visited some of the smaller encamp- ments along the hills in the vicinity writes: "I found the weather excessively cold." On the 14th of January Lord Stirling led a detachment against the enemy on Staten Island; and on the morning of the 15th he crossed on the ice from Elizabethtown Point. The Hudson was so bridged with ice as to permit foot passengers to cross from New York to Hoboken and Paulus Hook.

But the unparalleled depth of snow added to the intense sufferings of the soldiers. On the 14th of December, as Thatcher says, the " snow was two feet deep." On the 28th of December an officer says in the New Jersey Gazette, " While I am writing the storm is raging without." But the great storm of the winter began on the 3d of January, when the greater part of the army were not protected by the huts, which were not yet ready for oc- cupation. Doctor Thatcher thus deseribes the storm : "On the 3d inst. we experienced one of the most tre- mendous snow storms ever remembered; no man could endure its violence many minutes without danger to his life. Several marquees were torn asunder and blown down over the officers' heads in the night, and some of the soldiers were actually covered while in their tents and buried, like sheep, under the snow. My comrades and myself were roused from sleep by the calls of some officers for assistance; their marquee had blown down, and they were almost smothered in the storm before they could reach our marquee, only a few yards, and their blankets and baggage were nearly buried in the snow. We (the officers) are greatly favored in having a supply of straw for bedding; over this we spread all our blankets, and with our clothes, and large fires at our feet, while four or five are crowded together, preserve ourselves from freezing. But the sufferings of the poor soldiers can scarcely be described; while on duty they are un- avoidably exposed to all the inclemency of the storm and severe cold; at night they now have a bed of straw on the ground and a single blanket to each man; they are badly clad and some are destitute of shoes. We have contrived a kind of stone chimney outside, and an open- ing at one end of our tents gives us the benefit of the fire within. The snow is now from four to six feet deep, which so obstructs the roads as to prevent our receiving a supply of provisions. For the last ten days we received but two pounds of meat a man, and we are frequently for six or eight days entirely destitute of meat and then as long without bread. The consequence is the soldiers are so enfeebled from hunger and cold as to be almost un- able to perform military duty or labor in constructing their huts. It is well known that General Washington experiences the greatest solicitude for the sufferings of his army and is sensible that they in general conduct with heroic patience and fortitude."

ing the soldiers ; and, to the honor of the soldiery, they received what they got with thankfulness, and did little or no damage."

The manuscript letters of Joseph Lewis, quartermaster at Morristown, prove this description to be truthful. On the 8th of January he wrote : "We are now as distressed as want of provision and cash can make us. The soldiers have been reduced to the necessity of robbing the in- habitants, to save their own lives." On the next day he wrote : "We are still in distress for want of provisions. Our magistrates, as well as small detachments from the army, are busy collecting to relieve our distresses, and I am told that the troops already experience the good effects of their industry. We are wishing for more plen- - tiful supplies." And, in real distress, he writes under the same date: "The sixty million dollars lately collected by tax must be put into the hands of the superintendent for the new purchases. You will therefore have but little chance of getting cash until more is MADE. If none comes sooner than by striking new emissions I must run away from Morris and live with you at Trenton, or some other place more remote from this, to secure me from the al- ready enraged multitudes."

On the 8th of January General Washington wrote from the Ford mansion, the comforts of which must have made the sufferings of his soldiers seem the more awful : " The present state of the army, with respect to provis- ions, is the most distressing of any we have experienced since the beginning of the war. For a fortnight past the troops, both officers and men, have been almost perishing for want. They have been alternately without bread or meat the whole time, with a very scanty allowance_of either, and frequently destitute of both. They have borne their sufferings with a patience that merits the ap- probation and ought to excite the sympathy of their countryman. But they are now reduced to an extremity no longer to be supported." This letter, which was ad- dressed to "the magistrates of New Jersey," is one of the noblest productions of his pen; and right nobly did those thus feelingly addressed respond to the appeal. And in this none were superior to the people of Morris county, on whom of necesssity fell the burden of affording imme- diate relief, and whose efforts did not cease when this was effected. On the 20th of January Washington wrote to Doctor John Witherspoon that " all the counties of this State that I have heard from have attended to my requsition for provisions with the most cheerful and com- mendable zeal; " and to "Elbridge Gerry, in Congress," he wrote: "The exertions of the magistrates and inhabi- tants of this State were great and cheerful for our relief." In his Military Journal (page 182) Doctor Thatcher speaks with enthusiasm of " the ample supply " of food furnished by "the magistrates and people of Jersey ; " and Isaac Collins, editor of the New Jersey Gazette, on the 19th of

This storm continued for several days, accompanied with violent winds, which drifted the snow so that the January says : "With pleasure we inform our readers roads were impassable. So deep was the snow that in that our army, which, from the unexpected inclemency of the season and the roads becoming almost impassable, had suffered a few days for want of provisions, are, from the spirited exertions now making, likely to be well sup- plied." many places it covered the tops of the fences, and teams could be driven over them. Under date of January 22nd 1780 an officer on Kimball Hill wrote the following lively description of the condition of the army in consequence of this storm : "We had a fast lately in camp, by general constraint, of the whole army; in which we fasted more sincerely and truly for three days than we ever did from all the resolutions of Congress put together. This was occasioned by the severity of the weather and drifting of the snow, whereby the roads were rendered impassable and all supplies of provision cut off, until the officers were obliged to release the soldiers from command and permit them to go in great numbers together to get pro- visions where they could find them. The inhabitants of this part of the country discovered a noble spirit in feed-

Provisions came with a right hearty good will from the farmers in Mendham, Chatham, Hanover, Morris, and Pequannock ; and not only provisions, but stockings and shoes, coats and blankets. "Mrs. Parson Johnes " and " Mrs. Counsellor Condict," with all the noble women in the town, made the sewing and knitting needles fly on their mission of mercy. The memory of the Morris county women of that day is yet as delightful as the " smell of a field which the Lord hath blessed !" and this tribute to their worth is not woven up of fictions, but of facts, gathered from living lips; and therefore never may

125

FESTIVITIES AT THE "HEADQUARTERS."

those women perish from the memory of their admiring try!" "I do declare," said one of them afterward, "I and grateful descendants.

The generosity of which we have spoken is much en- hanced by the fact that the people supposed themselves to be giving, and not selling their provisions. According to the prices-continental currency-affixed to various articles by the magistrates of Morris county in January 1780, they gave away thousands of dollars to soldiers at their tables ; and as for provisions, nominally sold, they were paid for either in continental bills or certificates, both of which they considered as nearly worthless. Their opinion of the bills was not wrong, since after the war hundreds of thousands of dollars were left on their hands, which were never redeemed; but many of them made a serious mistake in their estimate of the certificates, which were redeemed with interest. Yet many of these men threw these certificates away as worthless, and esteemed themselves as doing an unpaid duty to their country.

It is interesting to ascertain the prices of various arti- cles used in the camp that winter. On the 27th of Jan- uary Quartermaster Lewis wrote: "The justices, at their meeting, established the following prices to be given for hay and grain throughout the county [of Mor- ris], from the Ist of December 1779 to the Ist of Febru- ary next, or until the regulating act take place. For hay, Ist quality, f100 per ton; 2nd, £80; 3d, £50; for one horse, 24 hours, $6; for one horse, per night, $4; wheat, per bushel, $50; rye, $35; corn, $30; buckwheat and oats, $20. This certainly is rather a startling "price current;" but it was only in keeping with such signficant advertisements as frequently appeared in the papers of that day: "one thousand dollars " for the recovery of "my negro man Toney;" or "thirty Spanish milled dollars for the recovery of my runaway Mu- latto fellow Jack." "Forty paper dollars were worth only one in specie;" and the fact in- creases our wonder alike at the patriotism of the people and soldiers, which was sufficient to keep the army from open mutiny or being entirely disbanded.

To leave this gloomy side of the picture a little while, it is well to record the fact that on the 28th of December 1779, while the snow "storm was raging," Martha Wash- ington passed through Trenton, on her way to Morris- town; and that a troop of gallant Virginians stationed there were paraded to do her honor, being very proud to own her as a Virginian, and her husband also. She spent New Year's day in Morristown; and now, in the Ford mansion, you may see the very mirror in which her dignified form has often been reflected. The wife of the American commander-in-chief received her company, did the honors of her family, and even appeared occa- sionally at the "assembly balls " that winter dressed in American stuffs. It is a pleasing anecdote which was once told me by the late Mrs. Abby Vail, daughter of Uzal and Anna Kitchel. Some of the ladies in Han- over, and among them "the stately Madame Budd," mother of Dr. Bern Budd, dressed in their best, made a call on Lady Washington, and, as one of them afterward said, " we were dressed in our most elegant silks and ruffles, and so were introduced to her ladyship. And dont you think, we found her with a speckled homespun apron on, and engaged in knitting a stocking! She re- ceived us very handsomely, and then resumed her knit- ting. In the course of her conversation she said very kindly to us, while she made her needle fly, that Ameri- can ladies should be patterns of industry to their coun- trywomen; * * *

* " we must become independent of England by doing without those articles which we can make ourselves. Whilst our husbands and brothers are examples of patriotism, we must be examples of indus-

never felt so ashamed and rebuked in my life!"

From documents not very important in themselves we sometimes derive impressive lessons. The original of the following subscription for assembly balls in Morris- town that winter is still in possession of the Biddle family, on the Delaware: "The subscribers agree to pay the sums annexed to their respective names and an equal quota of any further expense which may be incurred in the promotion and support of a dancing assembly to be held in Morristown the present winter of 1780. Sub- scription moneys to be paid into the hands of a treasurer hereafter to be appointed." The sum paid in each case was "400 doll's," and the contributors were as follows: Nath. Greene, H. Knox, John Lawrence, J. Wilkinson, Clement Biddle, Robt. H. Harrison, R. K. Meade, Alex. Hamilton, Tench Tighlman, C. Gibbs, Jno. Pierce, The Baron de Kalb, Jno. Moylan, Le Ch. Dulingsley, Geo. Washington, R. Clairborne, Lord Stirling, Col. Hazen, Asa Worthington, Benj. Brown, Major Stagg, James Thompson, H. Jackson, Col. Thomas Proctor, J. B. Cutting, Edward Hand, William Little, Thos. Wool- ford, Geo. Olney, Jas. Abeel, Robert Erskine, Jno. Cochran, George Draper, J. Burnet.

The amounts thus paid constitute the somewhat im- posing sum of $13,600 " for the support of a dancing assembly the present winter of 1780." Now I frankly confess that this paper produced an uncomfortable sensa- tion in my mind, by the somewhat harsh contrast between the dancing of the well-housed officers, at O'Hara's tavern and the " hungry ruin" at Kimball Hill. The assembly was not so well set off with gas-lights and fashionable splendor as many a ball in our day. No doubt it was rather a plain affair of its kind; and yet it reminds one that, while these distinguished men were tripping " the light fantas- tic toe " in well-warmed rooms, there were at that very time, as Captain William Tuttle often told it, a great many tents in which there were soldiers without coats and barefoot, shivering and perishing in the fearful storms and colds of that same "present winter of 1780;" and that there were paths about the camps on Kimball Hill that were marked with real blood expressed from the cracked and frozen feet of soldiers who had no shoes!

However, I do not allude to this contrast as peculiar to that place and those men, for feasting and starvation, plenty crowned with wreaths of yellow wheat and gaunt famine wreathed in rags and barefoot, dancing and dying, are facts put in contrast in other places beside O'Hara's and Kimball Hill, and at other times than "the present winter of 1780."

The principal object of introducing the subscription paper here is to show the kind of currency on which our Revolution was compelled to rely. Here we find the leading men in Morristown paying a sum for the dancing master and landlord, the ministers of a little amusement, which nominally is large enough for the high figures of Fifth avenue millionaires; but a closer inspection shows that the sum $13,000 was not worth as much as three hun- dred silver dollars. Doctor Thatcher says significantly: "I have just seen in the newspaper an advertisement offering for an article forty dollars. This is the trash which is tend- ed to requite us for our sacrifices, sufferings, and priva- tions while in the service of our country. It is but a sordid pittance, even for our common purposes while in- camp; but those who have families dependent on them at home are reduced to a deplorable condition." The officers of the Jersey troops, in their memorial to the Legislature of New Jersey, declare that " four months' pay of a soldier would not procure for his family a bush- el of wheat; that the pay of a colonel would not purchase [oats for his horse; that a common laborer or express .

126

HISTORY OF MORRIS COUNTY.

rider received four times as much as an American offi- cer."

If such were their circumstances let us rather admire than condemn these brave men at Morristown, who were striving to invest the stern severities of that winter with something of the grayer and more frivolous courtesies of fashionable life.

As for fighting, there was but little, the principal expe- dition being the descent of a detachment on Staten Island, under Lord Stirling. The expectations raised by this expedition are quite flatteringly told in an unpublished letter of Joseph Lewis, quartermaster. He writes, un- der date of "January 15th 1780," that he had orders from General Greene to procure three hundred sleds to parade Friday morning at this post and at Mr. Kim- ble's. * * *

** I did not fail to exert myself on the occasion, and the magistrates gained deserved applause. About five hundred sleds or sleighs were collected, the majority of which were loaded with troops, artillery, &c. These sleds and as many more are to return loaded with stores from the British magazines on Staten Island, ex- cept some few that are to be loaded with wounded Brit- ish prisoners. About 3,000 troops are gone, under the command of Lord Stirling, with a determination to re- move all Staten Island, bag and baggage, to Morris- town!"

This expedition failed of realizing its object, because the enemy, by some means,had been put on his guard. Still, Collins of the New Jersey Gazette was sure it would "show the British mercenaries with what zeal and alacrity the Americans will embrace every opportunity, even in a very inclement season, to promote the interest of the country by harassing the enemies to their freedom and independence." And on the 22nd of that Jannary Quarter- master Lewis wrote in quite a subdued tone: "I sup- pose you have heard of the success of our late expedi- tion to Staten Island. It was expensive but answered no valuable purpose. It showed the inclination of our in- habitants to plunder." This expedition was at a time when " the cold was intense;" about 500 of the soldiers had their feet frozen.

The enemy, by the way of retaliation, on the 25th of January crossed to Elizabethtown and burned the town- house and Presbyterian church. They also "plundered the house of Jecaniah Smith." The same night another party "made an excursion to Newark, surprised the guard there, took Mr. Justice Hedden out of his bed; and would not suffer him to dress; they also took Mr. Robert Niel, burnt the academy, and went off with pre- cipitation." Rivington's Royal Gazette speaks of this Justice Hedden as " a rebel magistrate remarkable for his persecuting spirit."

It was marvelous that Hedden survived that march, in such weather, from Newark to New York; but the tough man was nerved thereto by his brutal captors.

But have the troops enough to eat? General Greene's letter to "the colonel of the Morristown malitia " gives us a most sorrowful answer. " The army," writes Greene in January, "is upon the point of disbanding for want of provisions, the poor soldiers having been for several days without any, and there not being more than a suffi- ficiency to serve one regiment in the magazine. Pro- visions are scarce at best, but the late terrible storm, the depth of the snow, and the drifts in the roads prevent the little stock from coming forward which is in readiness at the distant magazines. This is, therefore, to request you to call upon the militia officers and men of your bat- talion to turn out their teams and break the roads from between this and Hackettstown, there being a small quan- tity of provisions there that cannot come until that is done. The roads must be kept open by the inhabitants,

or the army cannot be subsisted; and unless the good people immediately lend their assistance to forward sup- plies the army must disband. The direful consequences of such an event I will not torture your feelings with a description of; but remember the surrounding inhab- itants will experience the first melancholy effects of such a raging evil."

On the 11th of January Greene wrote: "Such weather as we have had never did I feel," and the snow was so deep and drifted "that we drive over the tops of the fences." He then describes the sufferings of the soldiers, and adds: " They have displayed a degree of magnanimity under their sufferings which does them the highest honor." On the roth of March Joseph Lewis tells his superior officer: " I should be happy to receive about fifty thousand dollars to persuade the wagoners to stay in camp until May, which will prevent the troops from suf- fering." And on the 28th of the same month he again writes: " I am no longer able to procure a single team to relieve the distresses of our army, to bring in a supply of wood, or forward the stores which are absolutely neces- sary. * *

* I wish I could inhabit some kind retreat from those dreadful complaints, unless I had a house filled with money and a magazine of forage to guard and protect me. Good God! where are our resources fled? We are truly in a most pitiable situation and almost dis- tracted with calls that it is not in our power to answer."

But there is another fact which adds a deeper shade to this picture of suffering, since from Thatcher's Military Journal we have this sentence, in which, with no little ex- ultation, he says: "Having to this late season-February 14th - in our tents experienced the greatest incon- venience, we have now the satisfaction of taking posses- sion of the log huts just completed by our soldiers, where we shall have more comfortable accommodations," and yet in March he says: "Our soldiers are in a wretched condition for want of clothes, blankets and shoes, and these calamitous circumstances are accompanied by a want of provisions."

From these letters, written by actual witnesses, we are able to gather enough of facts to aid us in appreciating the condition of the army.

I may appropriately close this historical monograph with an original letter of Washington, which has never yet been published, and which is a very striking com- mentary on the difficulties of his position the last winter he was in Morristown. It was found among some old papers in the possession of Stephen Thompson, Esq., of Mendham, a son of Captain David Thompson, who is re- ferred to in this article. It will be remembered that the great snow storm which caused such distress in camp began on the 3d of January 1780. The famine which threatened the army caused Washington to write a letter "to the magistrates of New Jersey," which is published in Sparks's edition of the Writings of Washington. A copy of that letter was inclosed in the letter which is now published for the first time. It is a valuable letter, as showing that Washington's "integrity was most pure, his justice most inflexible."

HEADQUARTERS, MORRISTOWN, January 8th 1780. "SIR,-The present distresses of the army, with which you are well acquainted, have determined me to call upon the respective counties of the State for a proportion of grain and cattle, according to the abilities of each.

Need help finding more records? Try our genealogical records directory which has more than 1 million sources to help you more easily locate the available records.