USA > New York > Saratoga County > History of Saratoga County, New York, with illustrations and biographical sketches of some of its prominent men and pioneers. > Part 10
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# Sce Journal of Provincial Congress, vol. i. p. 12.
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IHISTORY OF SARATOGA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
up the Hudson, and join, at Albany or at any other point deemed practicable, the force from Canada under Burgoyne. By this means it was hoped that, while a free communica- tion would thus be opened between New York and Canada, all communication would be eut off between the northern and southern colonies, and that each of them, being left to its own means of defense, without the possibility of co-oper- ation, and attacked by superior numbers, would be reduced to submission. In order to make this desired junction more easy, and for the purpose of distracting the attention of the Americans, Lieut .- Col. St. Leger, with about two hundred British, a regiment of New York loyalists, raised and commanded by Sir John Johnson, and a large body of Indians, was to ascend the St. Lawrence to Lake Ontario, and from that quarter was to penetrate towards Albany, by the way of the Mohawk river.
The campaign thus planned had been determined upon after long-considered and mature deliberation, and the ulti- mate failure of the campaign so carefully designed was more significant of the power of the Americans and the weakness of the British than any event that had preceded it. The battle summer of 1777 has ever since been regarded as the season during which the destiny of the United States as a jurisdiction independent of Great Britain was definitely settled,-as the season when the power of England in this country received the shock from which recovery was im- possible .*
V .- BURGOYNE'S ARMY.
It has been seen that, at the close of the year 1775, the star of the colonists was in the ascendant, and that the ex- pectations of the people rode high on the glittering erest of hope's wave. " The next change was, of course, a plunge towards the trough of the billow. This trough of the bil- low, this slough of despond, was reached by the people of the colonies when the war-cloud swept down the northern valley, in the early summer of 1777, carrying everything before it. On the 27th day of March, Burgoyne sailed for America, and arrived at Quebec in the beginning of May, 1777. On the 20th of May he took command of the northern army of invasion, and set ont on his ill-fated ex- pedition with the flower of the British army and some of the best blood of England in his train. Up the river Richelieu, up Like Champlain, his army swept in gorgeous pageantry, like the armies of the old French war of the long colonial period. It was the trail followed by the Marquis de Traey and Governor Courcelle on their way to the Mo- hawk towns in the antumn of 1666. It was the pathway of Dieskau to his defeat at Lake George in 1755, and of Montealm to his victory over Abercrombie at Fort Carillon (now Ticonderoga) of the year 1757. And like those of armies of the French and Indian wars, there was a mixed multitude in this army of Burgoyne. There were in it the bronzed veterans of many an European battle-field, joined with the undisciplined provincial and the savage warrior from the Canadian forests. Burgoyne's army, which thus took the field in July, 1777, consisted of seven battalions of British infantry, viz., the Ninth, Twentieth, Twenty-first, Twenty-fourth, Forty-seventh, Fifty-third, and Sixty-second
Regiments. Of these the flank companies were detailed to form a corps of grenadiers, under Major Aekland, and of light infantry, under Major the Earl of Balearras. The Germans were Hessian Rifles, dismounted dragoons, and a mixed foree of Brunswickers.
The artillery was composed of five hundred and eleven rank and file, including one hundred Germans. There were a large number of guns, the most of which were left on the lake.
The whole original train furnished by Sir Guy Carle- ton consisted of sixteen heavy twenty-four-pounders ; ten heavy twelve-pounders; eight medium twelve-pounders ; two light twenty-four-pounders; one light twelve-pounder ; twenty-six light six-pounders ; seventeen light three-pound- ers ; six eight-inch howitzers ; six five-and-a-half-inch howitzers; two thirteen-inch mortars; two ten-inch mor- tars; six eight-inch mortars; twelve five-and-a-half-inch mortars; and twenty-four four-and-two-fifth-inch mortars. Of these, two heavy twenty-four-pounders were sent on board a ship for the defense of Lake Champlain, and the other fourteen were sent back to St. John's. Of the heavy twelve-pounders six were left at Ticonderoga, and four in the " Royal George ;" four medium twelve-pounders at Fort George ; one light twelve-pounder at Ticonderoga; two light six-pounders at Fort George; four light six-pounders at St. John's; four light three-pounders at Ticonderoga ; five light three-pounders at St. John's; two eight-inch howitzers at Fort George, and two at St. John's; two five-and-a-half-inch howitzers at Fort George ; two thirteen- inch mortars, two ten-inch mortars, and four eight-inch mortars in the " Royal George;" four five-and-a-half-inch mortars at Ticonderoga ; four royal mortars in the " Royal George ;" twelve cohorns at Ticonderoga ; and eight cohorns in the " Royal George."
The field-train, therefore, that proceeded with the army, consisted of four medium twelve-pounders, two light twenty- four pounders, eighteen light six-pounders, six light three- pounders, two eight-inch howitzers, four five-and-a-half-inch howitzers, two eight-inch mortars, and four royals.
The army was divided into three brigades under Major. Gen. Phillips and Brig .- Gens. Fraser and Hamilton. Col. Kingston and Capt. Money acted as adjutant and quarter- master-generals. Sir James Clarke and Lord Petersham were aides-de-camp to Gen. Burgoyne. The total foree was : Rank and file, British, 4135; Germans, 3116; Canadians, 148; Indians, 503; total, 7902. It was an army composed of thoroughly disciplined troops under able and trustworthy officers. John Burgoyne, the general, statesman, dramatist, and poet, was the pet soldier of the British aristocraey. Maj .- Gen. Phillips was a distinguished artillery officer of exceptional strategical skill. Maj .- Gen. Riedesel, who commanded the ITessians, had been especially selected for his military experience, acquired during a long service under Prince Ferdinand in the Seven Years' war. Brigadiers Fraser and Hamilton had been appointed solely on the ground of rare professional merit. Col. Kingston had served honorably in Portugal, and Majors Lord Bal- carras and Ackland " were each in his own way considered officers of high attainments and brilliant courage." Thus officered, equipped, and manned, this army in its flotilla
# See B. It. Hall's account of the battle of Bennington.
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HISTORY OF SARATOGA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
swept gracefully across the waters of the beautiful Lake Champlain, long before made historie by such hostile pageantry, until every bristling crag and rocky promontory breathed forth " the stern poetry of war."
VI .- THE TERM "HESSIAN."
But fully to understand the import of the events of this battle of the summer of 1777, an examination of the an- tecedent circumstances which had aided in bringing to- gether a certain portion of the army of Great Britain in America must not be omitted. For the last century the word " llessian" has been used in this country : first, to signify a mean-spirited man, who, for money, hires himself to do the dirty work of another, and generally as an epithet of opprobrium. The word with these meanings was never recognized until after the defeat of Burgoyne at Saratoga ; and the peculiar infamy which since then has attached to it is derived from the supposed voluntary employment of the Hessian soldiery by Great Britain against the Ameri- eans. That there was no such voluntary employment is historically true, and the reproach which has so long been connected with the word Hessian in this country is as un- deserved as it is unfounded. The Hessian sokliery had no more option in their employment to fight against Americans than had the negrocs of the South, who were brought in slave-ships to this country, in working as slaves for their masters in the cotton-fields of South Carolina. As men the Hessians were honest, industrious, and peculiarly do- mestie in their tastes and lives, and many, if not all, of them would gladly have given half they were worth or years of labor could they have been permitted to remain in their fatherland and follow their humble avocations in ob- senrity, or serve their country in their own armies .*
ENGLISH TREATIES FOR HESSIAN SUBJECTS.
To England belongs the disgrace and infamy of enticing the rulers of these men by large subsidies to compel their subjects to fight the wars of Great Britain. That this statement is correct, an examination of the facts will make apparent. On the 16th day of February, 1776, Lord Weymouth laid before the House of Lords, first, a treaty with the hereditary prince of Hesse-Darmstadt, dated Jan. 5, 1776; sceond, a treaty between his majesty George III. of England and the Duke of Brunswick, dated Jan. 9, 1776; and third, a treaty with the Landgrave of Hesse- Cassel, dated Jan. 15, 1776, for the hire of troops for the American service to the number of seventeen thousand three hundred men. The same treaties were laid before the House of Commons on the 29th of February of the same year. Lord North moved to refer them to the com- mittec of supply. The motion instantly led to a most vehement debate. The chief arguments used by ministers to excuse or justify this hiring of foreign mercenaries were, that there was no possibility of raising in time a sufficient number of men at home; that, even if native forees could have been raised, it was not to be expected that raw and undisciplined troops could answer the purpose so well as tried, experienced veterans ; that it would be a terrible loss
to withdraw so many hands from the manufactures and hus- bandry of the country ; that the expense with native troops would not end with the war, but would leave the nation saddled with the lasting incumbrance of half-pay for nearly thirty battalions; that foreign troops would cost muuch less for their maintenance than English troops ; and that there was no novelty in such hiring, as the king had at all times been under the necessity of employing foreigners in the wars of the realm.
VI .- ENGLISIE OPPOSITION TO THE TREATIES.
To these statements the opposition replied that England was degrading herself by applying to the petty prinees of Germany for suecor against her own subjects, and repro- bated in the strongest terms the practice of letting out to hire men who had nothing to do with the quarrel in ques- tion. Lord Irnham, in opposing the measures, quoted " Don Quixote" with some humor and effect, and ended with a compliment to the American people. " I shall say little," observed his lordship, " as to the feelings of these prinees who can sell their subjeets for such purposes. We have read of the humorist Sancho's wish that, if he were a prince, all his subjects should be blaekamoors, as he could, by the sale of them, easily turn them into ready money ; but that wish, however it may appear ridiculous and un- becoming a sovereign, is much more innocent than a prince's availing himself of his vassals for the purpose of sacrificing them in such destructive war, where he has the additional crime of making them destroy much better and nobler beings than themselves."
It was also urged by the opposition that these German soldiers, as soon as they should find themselves in a land of liberty, would join the banner of independence and fight against England, and that they would be specially inelined to such a course from the fact that already more than one hundred and fifty thousand of their countrymen had emi- grated to the New World, and were making common cause with the Anglo-Americans. It was maintained that these German veterans, " who considered the camp their home and country," would be less inclined to desert than raw English levies. Lord North, who reverenced too highly German taetics and discipline, declared that a numerous body of the very best soldiery in Europe, inspired only with military maxims and ideas, too well disciplined to be disorderly and cruel, and too martial to be kept back by any false limits, could not fail of bringing matters to a speedy conclusion. Others, more sanguine even than he, were of opinion that these Brunswickers and Ilessians would have little more to do than to show themselves on the American continent when instantly the rebellion would ecase and quiet be restored to the land, as Virgil tells us the tempest ceased to beat and the storms subsided when Neptune, rising from the waves, bade the winds retire to their recesses. In closing the debate, Ald. Bull, who sub- sequently became conspicuous as the friend of Lord George Gordon, in the " No l'opery" riots, spoke as follows : " The war you are now waging is an unjust one; it is founded in oppression, and its end will be distress and disgrace. Let not the historian be obliged to say that the Russian and the German slave were hired to subdue the sons of English-
# B. H. Hfall, on the battle of Bennington.
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IIISTORY OF SARATOGA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
men and of freedom ; and that in the reign of a prince of the house of Brunswick every infamous attempt was made to extinguish that spirit which brought his ancestors to the throne, and, in spite of treachery and rebellion, scated them firmly upon it." In this debate not much stress was laid upon that " laudable national feeling" which in former times and since led Englishmen to " prize British valor above that of other nations," and to exalt the deeds of British infantry in all ages. The treaties were, by a large majority, referred to the committee of supply, who, on the 4th of March following, reported favorably upon them.
Discussion then arose afresh, and in the House of Lords the whole strength of the opposition was arrayed against the treaties and against the principle of hiring mercenaries to fight the battles of the realm. The Duke of Richmond moved an address to countermand the march of the foreign troops and to suspend hostilities altogether. In a speech, in which he criticised with the utmost severity every para- graph of the treaties, he stated that ever since the year 1702 the German princes had been rising in their demands, until now the present bargain far outstripped all other bar- gains, and would cost the nation not less than a million and a half of pounds sterling a year for the services of these seventeen thonsand three hundred mercenaries. As to the influence, whether for good or for evil, that pervaded the councils of the realm in respect to these treaties, he de- clared that it proceeded from the determined character of the king himself.
VIEWS OF THE EARL OF COVENTRY.
But of all the opposition,-among whom were Chatham and Burke, earnest advocates of the most conciliatory mea- sures,-one noble lord, the Earl of Coventry, alone took the right philosophical view of the whole question, in maintaining that " an immediate recognition of the inde- pendence of the United Provinces was preferable to war." In advocating this theorem, his sagacious language was as follows: " Look on the map of the globe, view Great Brit- ain and North America, compare their extent, consider the soil, riches, climate, and increasing population of the latter. Nothing but the most obstinate blindness and partiality can engender a serious opinion that such a country will long continue under subjection to this. The question is not, therefore, how shall we be able to realize a vain delu- sive scheme of dominion, but how we shall make it the in- terest of the Americans to continue faithful allies and warm friends. Surely that can never be effected by fleets and armies. Instead of meditating conquest, and exhausting our own strength in an ineffectual struggle, we should- wisely abandoning wild schemes of coercion-avail ourselves of this only substantial benefit we can ever expect,-the profits of an extensive commerce and the strong support of a firm and friendly alliance and compact for mutual defense and assistance."
But in vain were philosophy, eloquence, national pride, an appeal to kingly honor, mercy, or peace. The report of the committee on the treaties was approved (as were all measures whose object was to coerce the Americans), by what Burke called " that vast and invincible majority ;" and Great Britain was compelled by necessity to accept the very
terms which the German princes had themselves prescribed in drafting these treaties, the only change produced being embodied in an address to his majesty made by Col. Barre, desiring him to use his interest that the German troops in British pay, then and thereafter, might be clothed with the manufactures of Great Britain. By the conditions of the treaties, nearly £7 10s. levy money was paid for every man, and the princes who hired out the limbs, blood, and lives of their subjects, in a fonler manner than men farmu out their slaves, and with none of the humanity that charac- terizes the dealings of those who keep beasts of draught or of burden for hire, took especial care, while driving a very hard bargain with Great Britain, to reap the greater part of the profits thereof in their own subsidies. To the Duke of Brunswick, who supplied four thousand and eighty-four men, was seenred an annual subsidy of £15,519 so long as the troops continued to serve, and double that sum, or £31,038, for each of the two years following their dismissal. To the Landgrave of Hesse-Cassel, who furnished twelve thousand men, was secured £10,281 per annum, during the service of the soldiers, which payment was also to be con- tinued until the end of a twelve months' notice of the dis- continuance of such payment, which notice was not to be served until after his troops should all be returned to his dominions. To the hereditary prince of Hesse-Darmstadt, who furnished six hundred and eighty-eight men, was secured an annual subsidy of £6000, and besides all this the king of England guaranteed the dominions of these princes against foreign attack. A little later the Prince of Waldeck, who agreed to furnish six hundred and seventy men, made a bargain for himself equally as good as the bargains made by any of the other princes already named.
VIEWS OF EDMUND BURKE, THIE FRIEND OF AMERICA.
The effect of this employment of foreign troops continued to be felt not only in parliament during the continuance of the war, but exerted an influence on both sides of the Atlantic. In a letter to the sheriff's of Bristol on the affairs of America, published in April, 1777, Edmund Burke, referring to those who were in the habit of petitioning the king to prosecute the war against America with vigor, made use of this lan- guage : " There are many circumstances in the zeal shown for civil war, which seem to discover but little of real magna- nimity. The addressers offer their own persons, and they are satisfied with hiring Germans. They promise their private fortunes, and they mortgage their country. They have all the merit of volunteers, without risk of person or charge of contribution ; and when the unfeeling arm of a foreign soldiery pours out their kindred blood like water they exult and triumph, as if they themselves had performed some notable exploit." In the same letter he also observed as follows: " It is not instantly that I can be brought to rejoice, when I hear of the slaughter and captivity of long lists of those names which have been familiar to my ears from my infancy, and to rejoice that they have fallen under the sword of strangers, whose barbarous appellations I scarcely know how to pronounce. The glory acquired at the White Plains by Col. Rahl has no charms for me, and I fairly acknowledge that I have not yet learned to delight in finding Kniphausen in the heart of the British dominions."
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HISTORY OF SARATOGA COUNTY, NEW YORK.
VIEWS OF THE ELDER PITT AS THE FRIEND OF AMERICA.
On the 30th of May, 1777, Lord Chatham entered the Ilouse of Lords wrapped in flannel, and bearing a crutch in each hand. Sitting in his place, with his head covered, he delivered a powerful speech in support of his motion for an address to his majesty requesting him to put an end to hostilities in America. In the course of his remarks he said : " What has been the system pursued by administra- tion, and what have been the means taken for carrying it into execution ? Your system has been a government erected on the ruins of the constitution and founded in conquest, and you have swept all Germany of its refuse as its means. There is not a petty, insignificant prince whom you have not solicited for aid. You are become the suitors at every German court, and you have your ministers en- rolled in the German chancery, as the contracting parties, in behalf of this once great and glorious country. The laurels of Britain are faded, her arms are disgraced, her negotiations are spurned at, and her councils fallen into contempt. My lords, you have vainly tried to conquer America by the aid of German mercenaries, by the arms of twenty thousand undisciplined German boors, gleaned and collected from every obscure corner of that country. You have subsidized their masters. You have lavished the public treasures on them. And what have you effected ? Nothing, my lords, but forcing the colonies to declare themselves independent states."
REFERENCE TO THE HESSIANS IN THE DECLARATION.
Among the charges brought against George III. in the Declaration of Independence was the following : " He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the work of death, desolation, and tyranny already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy searcely paralled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation."
VIII .- BURGOYNE'S SPEECH TO THE IROQUOIS.
On the 17th of June, Burgoyne encamped at the mouth of the Bouquet river, where for several days his army foraged on the deserted fields of Gilliland's manor of Wills- boro'. On the twenty-first he made his speech to the In- dians, couched in their own flowery style, as follows :
" CHIEFS AND WARRIORS .- The great king, our com- mon father, and the patron of all who seek and deserve his protection, has considered with satisfaction the general con- duet of the Indian tribes from the beginning of the trou- bles in America. Too sagacious and too faithful to be deluded or corrupted, they have observed the violated rights of the parental power they love, and burned to vindicate them. A few individuals alone, the refuse of a small tribe, at the first were led astray ; and the misrepresentations, the precious allurements, the insidious promises and diversified plots in which the rebels are exercised, and all of which they employed for that effect, have served only in the end to enhance the honor of the tribes in general, by demon- strating to the world how few and how contemptible are the apostates. It is a truth known to you all that, these piti- ful examples excepted (and they probably have before this day hid their faces in shame), the collective voices and
hands of the Indian tribes over this vast continent are on the side of justice, of law, and of the king.
" The restraint you have put upon your resentment in waiting the king, your father's, call to arms,-the hardest proof, I am persuaded, to which your affection could have been put,-is another manifest and affecting mark of your adherence to that principle of connection to which you were always fond to allude, and which it is mutually the joy and the duty of the parent to cherish.
" The clemency of your father has been abused, the offers of his merey have been despised, and his further patience would, in his eyes, become culpable, inasmuch as it would withhold redress from the most grievous oppres- sious in the province that ever disgraced the history of mankind. It therefore remains for me, the general of one of His Majesty's armies, and in this council his represen- tative, to release you from those bonds which your obedi- ence imposed. Warriors, you are free ! Go forth in might of your valor and your cause ! Strike at the common ene- mies of Great Britain and America,-disturbers of public order, peace, and happiness ; destroyers of commerce ; par- ricides of the state.
" The circle round you, the chiefs of His Majesty's European forces, and of the prince, his allies, esteem you as brothers in the war. Emulous in glory and in friendship, we will endeavor reciprocally to give and to receive exant- ples. We know how to value, and we will strive to imitate, your perseverance in enterprise and your constancy to resist hunger, weariness, and pain. Be it our task, from the die- tates of our religion, the laws of our welfare, and the prin- cipal and interest of our policy, to regulate your passions when they overbear, to point out where it is nobler to spare than to revenge, to discriminate degrees of guilt, to suspend the uplifted stroke, to chastise and not to destroy.
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