USA > New York > New York City > Leslie's history of the greater New York, Volume I > Part 24
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Washington had saved the army from capture by Howe, but it was in a sadly demoralized coudition. It was dropping to pieces, too, for militiamen were returning to their native States and towus by com- panies and even whole regiments at a time. When there was a chance to look around at the remnants, it was found that General Putnam. with the brigades of Parsons. Scott, James Clinton, and two other brigadiers, occupied a position in the city and out as far as a line across the island about where Fifteenth Street is now. Six brigades. among them that of MeDougall, took post at different points along the East River, extending their line as far as Horn's Hook, opposite Hell Gate. Generals Heath, Mifflin, and George Clinton were sta- tioned at King's Bridge as before. None of the troops were in a very good frame of mind for fighting the enemy, while the latter were pre- paring to make an attack with both their naval and land forces at once. They possessed a fearful advantage. On September 3 the Rose frigate sailed up the East River and anchored in Wallabout Bay. She was tired on by our batteries, but without effect. On the 14th four more frigates, among them the Phoenix, sailed past the patriot batteries and joined the Rose in the Wallabout. All this was but in preparation for the effort contemplated for September 15. Early that morning the five frigates sailed up the river and anchored opposite Kip's Bay, at Thirty-fourth Street. The same favoring
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breeze took three men-of-war up the North River as far as Blooming- dale. No American forces conld get in the rear of the British in the East River, for there was a long line of posts ocenpied by the enemy. including Governor's Island at the south, and Montressor's (Ran- dall's) and Buchanan's (Ward's) islands at the northern extremity. Troops were stationed also on the hill at Astoria, commanding a view of the approaches of Hell Gate on both sides, and a line of posts ran down through Newtown to Wallabout and Gowanns, Thus masters of the situation in every particular, the British proceeded to accom- plish their design in a very elaborate and picturesque manner. Eighty-four boats were tilled with troops, standing up, muskets in hand, in the middle, while six or more sailors were at the oars in each. They were rowed leisurely in two lines toward the head of Kip's Bay. As they started the five frigates poured in a deadly fire from decks and tops upon the spot selected for landing, the smoke in the mean time hiding the boats. Whether the American forces were in a condition to withstand the enemy and prevent the landing may be a question: it was certain no one was there to dispute their progress. Two Connectient regiments had been stationed near Kip's Bay. When Washington rode to the scene of the firing he met them on the road that then ran across the island to Turtle Bay, about where Forty- third Street is now. On the site of the Grand Central Depot he stopped and sought to rally them, but it was too late. Riding toward the river he met still more of the fugitives, pursued by a party of sixty or seventy of the enemy. Washington in disgust threw down his hat and sat motionless, facing the pursuers; only after much urging conld the staff officers induce him to leave the spot, so that he was nearly captured or shot. There was nothing to prevent the British marching down the Boston post-road into the city, and Putnam's division was in imminent danger of being caught there. Stationing lookouts on Bay- ard's, or Bunker Hill. near Grand and Elizabeth streets, Putnam held his men ready for any emergency. At this critical moment a young officer of the name of Aaron Burr dashed up to the General and prom- ised to condnet him out of the trap, by the use of his familiar knowl- edge of the topography of the island. He led the division across coun- try to the road called Momment Lane. now Greenwich Avenue. Thence it was an easy march to the Bloomingdale Road, which was then followed with occasional retirement into the woods, to escape the view of the British ships in the North River. It is said that the opportunity would have come too late if General Howe had not been detained at the house of a Mrs. Murray, a Quakeress, on Murray Hill. As it was, by forced marching, hampered by superfluous baggage, ac- companied and obstructed by the territied multitudes of escaping citi- zens, under a fearful heat which claimed many a victim by the road- side. the last remnant of the American army was safely removed from the city it had vainly undertaken to defend. The Americans
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now camped on Harlem Heights, and Washington established his headquarters in the Roger Morris mansion (now called the Jumel mansion, and still preserved on One Hundred and Sixty-first Street near St. Nicholas Avenue), the property of his former reputed flame, Miss Mary Philipse, now the wife of Morris, and an escaped Tory.
The 16th of September was destined to cause a slight rift in the clouds of adversity that were settling over the patriot cause. Early that morning two battalions of light infantry and a few companies of the Forty-second Highlanders made a sally beyond their lines, which ran from Bloomingdale Heights to Horn's Hook on the East River. They crossed the deep depression through which Manhattan Avenne now runs, and drove in the pickets and some posts on the extreme line of the Americans above the Point of Rocks. They pursued the retir- ing Americans abont as far as One Hundred and Fifty-third Street, or where Audubon Park is now, and then returned, sounding in defi- ance a fox-hunter's peal npon their bugles. Washington was deter- mined to punish them. Sending out some troops to deploy in their front in the plain or valley north of Bloomingdale Heights (i.c., Man- hattan Avenue) to engage their attention, or to tempt them down from the hill, he sent a detachment of rangers under Colonel Knowlton and another of Virginian troops under Major Leitch, to get into their rear, by going around the heights on the land side (or Morningside Park) and the river side (or Riverside Park), respectively. By some blinder of an aide the ascent of the hill was made too soon, so that the Ameri- cans struck the enemy in the flank instead of in the rear. Neverthe- less, the British troops were driven back to their lines, and the Battle of Harlem Heights may be claimed as a victory for the patriots, the - first one achieved in a contest with the enemy in the open field. Hi cheered the army of Washington, restoring some of that confidence which the occurrences of the few previous weeks, and especially of the day before, had brought to a very low ebb. Yet it cost the lives of two valnable officers, the two leaders of the expedition, Colonel Knowlton and Major Leitch. They fell almost side by side, abont where One Hundred and Nineteenth Street runs now, and between Ninth and Tenth Avenues. Recently the spot has been marked by a memorial, although some time before a tablet was placed in One IInn- dred and Fifty-fifth Street, near where the slight preliminary affair of the morning took place, and which has been often mistaken by writ- ers for the real battle of Harlem Heights. Knowlton died almost immediately, Leitch lingered till nearly October. From the Point of Rocks, at One Hundred and Twenty-sixth Street and Ninth Avenue, Washington, attended by Putnam, Greene, and Clinton. watched the engagement. stimulating the men to do their best under the eyes of the Commander-in-Chief. A week later, on September 24, the Ameri- cans took advantage of a very dark night to deal the enemy a blow in another quarter. On Montressor (now Randall's) Island the British
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had located. as a place of security, a goodly quantity of ammunition and other stores. Major Henley, aide-de-camp to General Heath, commanding at King's Bridge and along the Westchester side of the Ilarlem, knew of this. Being familiar with the vicinity, he offered to guide a battalion of two hundred and fifty men under Colonel Jack- son to the island. The surprise would have been complete in the darkness had not a careless soldier discharged a gun too soon. The alarm having thus been given, the enemy quickly manned the earth- works, numbering at least five hundred men. The case of the patriots was now desperate, but they boldly attacked the superior force be- hind their breast works. They were, of course, repulsed. Major Hen- ley and twenty-two men were killed, but they retired in good order from the island, taking with them the Major's body, which was buried by the side of Colonel Knowlton's.
Lord Howe, with his accustomed deliberation, undertook no deci- sivemovementagainst Washington until October 12. His purpose was to get into the patriot army's rear. Accordingly, transports with troops were sent through Hell Gate, and on the 18th a large force was landed near New Rochelle. But Washington had been advised of the movement, and marched toward the Bronx River. The Brit- ish then proceeded northward, and Washington on the west side of the Bronx marched np in a line parallel to theirs. The result of these maneuvers was the engagement at White Plains, on October 28, 1776. a drawn battle, but with all the force and effect of a victory for the Americans. When Washington left Manhattan island he stationed a considerable force under Colonel Magaw in Fort Washington, over- looking the Hudson River. It was much against his own judgment. but he was overruled by the advice of his generals. Greene among them; his counsel being to abandon all posts on the island, or wher- over in the way of the enemy's overwhelming forces, as they could not be held by the nndisciplined troops, and a more effective warfare could be carried on, more adapted to the condition of the American army. Events justified Washington's idea. On November 15, 1776. the British troops under Perey Knyphausen, Cornwallis, and Rahl, the leading officers of their army, invested the fort on all sides. A powerful ship of the line took up a position opposite the fort in the river. The demand to surrender, on the alternative of being put to the sword, was refused with proper spirit, but when the attack was made it was but the work of a few hours to reduce the stronghold to the necessity of surrender. This was made on honorable terms, but over two thousand six hundred men were compelled to linger in the deadly prisons of the enemy, instead of serving their country, already too sadly lacking in the number of defenders. Greene acknowledged the mistake of not having abandoned the fort, and never again set his own judgment against Washington's. With an army that could do no conquering, and only an occasional spurt at fighting, brave indeed
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to temerity, but utterly without training for regular engagements. it was Washington's greatest glory that he had saved this army from capture during the campaign in the neighborhood of New York.
The whole island of Manhattan was now in the possession of the enemy. We may therefore return to the little city at the southern ex- tremity and see what was going on there under these new and start- ling circumstances. Governor Tryon could now again leave his float- ing castle and resume the reins of government on terra firma. On September 16, while the Harlem Heights battle was going on, Howe began to march his troops into the town. The Tories were, of course. in high feather, and were very zealous in marking the houses of their patriot neighbors, which were forthwith confiscated by the conquer- ors. With gratnitons wantonness the libraries in the City Hall and Columbia College were destroyed by the soldiery. Howe, after a while, made the Kennedy honse at 1 Broadway his headquarters. where Clinton also resided when he succeeded to the chief command. The Beekman house in Hanover Square was taken by Admiral Digby. and was the headquarters for the naval force on the station.
On Saturday, September 21, the city, now thoroughly English again, was visited by a tremendous calamity. Some drunken fellows in a tavern kept in a frame house on Whitehall Street, near the slip, got into a brawl and set fire to the building. A brisk wind was blow- ing from the southeast, and the fire spread with great rapidity to the neighboring houses. The fire engines were found to be ont of repair. and those skilled in handling them had left the city. There was not much water in the fire wells, and the soldiery made bnt an awkward attempt to do the work of firemen. Thus the fire raged practically unrestrained. It swept along the blocks between Whitehall and Broad streets as far as Beaver. There a shift in the wind carried it to the west side of Broadway, carrying down in the fiery flood the Luth- eran Church and the English School on Rector Street. Trinity suc- cumbed, its tower surmounted by a wooden steeple appearing like a pyramid of flame, and its blackened walls soon stood a roofless and windowless ruin. St. Paul's Church was saved with difficulty, but the fire sped to near the Columbia College buildings. Four hundred and ninety-three houses had been consumed. The blame was thrown upon the " rebels," and two hundred arrests were made, but nothing definite could be proved against these persons. It is said that during the progress of the fire many of the patriotic citizens remaining were cruelly thrust into the flames by the exasperated soldiers. In 1778 there was another fire, starting on Cruger's wharf at the foot of Coen- ties Slip, which destroyed about fifty honses. The soldiers made their inefficiency as firemen so disastronsly conspicnous at this time, that an order was issned from headquarters forbidding their interference again.
Far away from the scene of the fire. at the Beekman country-seat, at
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Fifty-first Street and Second Avenne, there was going on another memorable event of which the city has nowa fitting monument to keep it from forgetting. Everything about military affairs was so new and primitive that even in the matter of secret service there were none but crude provisions. Washington was in need of information about the movements and purposes of Howe after the battle of Long Island. and therefore asked commanders of regiments or companies to send him the names of persons willing to act as spies or scouts. Among
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STATUE OF CAPTAIN NATHAN HALE.
the names sent in was that of Nathan lale. a captain in
Knowlton's Ran- ger's. He was abont twenty-one years of age. tall. handsome. brave. intelligent, a grad- nate of Harvard, a native of Connecti- ent. He was asked whether he was willing to do the work of a spy. and risk its ignomi- nious punishment. Ile replied that no service for the good of his country could be dishonorable.
lle crossed over from Connectient to Long Island. as- suming the charac-
ter of a Yankee
schoolmaster, suc- ceeded in gather- ing valuable infor- mation. and was
on his way back with it to the Commander-in-Chief. having got as far as Huntington Bay, when he was met on the shore by a boat from a British man-of-war. A Tory relative had recognized him and given the que to the enemy. He did not deny his identity or his mission. and was therefore hurried into the presence of General Howe, whose headquarters just then were at the Beekman house aforesaid. There was no escape possible, of course, and after a drum-head court-mar- tial. Hale was condemned to be hanged on the next morning. which was Sunday, September 22. During the night he was confined in a
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greenhouse under guard of the Provost-Marshal, Cunningham, who added to his unhappy situation by needless and ungenerons ernelfies. He was not allowed to write to his mother, and when a compassionate lieutenant gave him materials for writing, the Provost tore up the letter. Both clergyman and Bible were denied him. He was hanged from a tree in the orchard, and his body thrust into an unmarked grave. All this was in painful and disgraceful contrast with the treatment accorded the spy Andre a few years later. Nevertheless. posterity has come to learn the noble manner of the young hero's death, and the glorious sentiment uttered by his dying lips: " I only regret that I have but one life to lose for my country." In City Hall Park, at its southwestern corner, near the General Post Office, and facing the busy throngs passing up and down Broadway all day, stands a bronze statue erected by the Sons of the Revolution, repre- senting Captain Hale, bonnd with ropes, ready for his martyrdom. It was cast in Paris, modeled by the American sculptor, MeMonnies, and in the Salon of 1891 received a gold medal. The muveiling took place on November 25-" Evacuation Day "-1893.
The echoes of events during the progress of the Revolution in other parts of the country occasionally penetrated to the ears of the citizens of New York. But their chief evidence of what was going on lay in the details of prisoners brought in occasionally after some defeat of the patriots. Sugar houses, churches, prison-ships, the jail on the Commons, all swarmed with prisoners, and their treatment was so horrible that it seems best to draw the veil over it. How England can endure the disgrace of some of her actions toward her open and fair-handed opponents, from William Wallace and Joan of Arc down to our Revolution, is more than we can understand. Besides the In- speakable miseries inflicted upon prisoners, whereby the civilized and Christian Britons easily ontdid the worst cruelties of the denizens of cannibal islands, they had other refinements of cruelty which needed civilization to think ont. Pains were actually taken by the British mit- itary anthorities in New York to communicate the smallpox through- ont the country. Again. when the prison fever had been carefully de- veloped so as to be certainly and fatally contagions, they endeavored also to infect American camps with that disease. Here was manly. English fair play for you. It is doubtful whether a more hellish scheme was ever concocted in the purliens of pandemonium. But it will not do to dwell on these particulars of the War of the Revolu- tion : it is too apt to put ns or keep ns in a frame of mind unfavorable to relations of amity and treaties of arbitration.
In March. 1778, Sir Henry Clinton. the son of Royal Governor George Clinton, superseded Howe as Commander-in-Chief. He oc- cupied as headquarters the house nsed as such by General Putnam. and afterward by Lord Howe. It was from this house that Major André went forth on his fatal mission, which brought the traitor
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Arnold into the city late in September, 1780. He first kept himself partially concealed in the Verplanck house on Wall Street. But later, after he had received his commission as Brigadier in the British army, he came forth more boldly and took quarters in the Watts honse, adjoining Clinton's. Sergeant-Major John Champe, a sup- posed deserter from the patriot army, on the strength of that deser- tion gained easy access to him there, and laid his plans for his cap- ture accordingly. Arnold was to be seized in the garden that ran down to the river's edge, and carried to a boat as a drunken soldier. But fortune again favored the traitor: just before the day fixed for the exploit Champe's regiment was ordered sonth, and Arnold changed his quarters to Burn's Coffee House, a few doors further up Broadway, disconcerting Champe's confederates.
Only once did the war drift within sight and sound of Manhattan Island after the patriots had abandoned it to the enemy. This was on the occasion of the bold attack made by Major Henry Lee, " Light- horse Harry," on the fort built by the British on the promontory called Paulus Hook. now a part of Jersey City. It was a strong posi- tion. A long low neck of land reached out far into the Hudson; a nar- row creek not fordable at high tide separated the promontory from the mainland. but a deep ditch had been dng besides to complete the insulation, and a drawbridge alone gave access to the fort beyond, as if it were a medieval castle. Light-horse Harry made a sudden dach at this bridge at the head of his troopers. Supposing them to be a foraging party returning, the bridge was lowered. Lee seenred 159 prisoners, with a loss of only two of his own men; and he hurried away from the spot with alarm guns from ships in the harbor and from the batteries in the city ringing in his ears. The date of this romantic exploit was August 18. 1779.
This was war; there were also occasional " rumors of war." The winter of 1779-1780 was a very severe one, so that we find in several authorities the almost incredible statement that ice formed eighteen feet thick on Bay and River. If Washington's army had been in a condition to move upon New York, all the advantages of the enemy. because of the deep waters of the surrounding rivers and their naval forces, would have served as nothing against attack. Strenuous efforts to oppose a possible attack were made therefore by the author- ities in the city. the ice affording a perfectly safe passage for trains of artillery and regiments of armed men. But at no time was the Com- mander-in-Chief of the British army more disturbed than when Wash- ington was preparing for his master-stroke against Cornwallis in Vir- ginia. Every appearance was industriously given to the supposition that New York was the intended object of attack by the combined armies of France and America. On August 19. 1781. the march was begin by crossing the Hudson. So carefully did Washington keep the secret that even the general officers imagined that they were
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making a detour through New Jersey in order to effect a landing on Staten Island from Perth Amboy. While the army was marching toward Philadelphia, Washington and the French officers made an ostentations display of inspecting New York, riding all along the length of Manhattan Island upon the Palisades and hills on the JJer- sey shore, and freely allowing such country people as were willing to carry the news to cross the river. Clinton was completely deceived and remained inactive until it was too late. Then soon came the news of the surrender at Yorktown, on October 19, 1781.
This was the beginning of the end of war, and also of the occu- pancy of New York by the enemy, atthongh it took more than two full years to bring to pass the latter event. The Yorktown episode caused Clinton to be superseded by Sir Guy Carleton, who now took up his residence in the city. On September 3, 1783, peace was signed at Paris, John Jay being one of the American Commissioners. On Oc- tober 18 the news was given out by Congress, and on November 2 it was formally announced to the army. On November 19, Carleton sent word to Washington that at noon of November 25 he would evacuate New York, and that the outposts in the vicinity would be vacated on the 21st. As the English Commander was preparing to withdraw, Washington was getting under way to enter and occupy the city. On November 19, the Commander-in-Chief, with Generals Knox and George Clinton, who was Governor of the State, arrived with their suites at Day's Tavern, at the corner of One In- dreth and Twenty-fifth Street and Eighth Avenue. An advance guard of the Americans had already taken post at McGowan's Pass in Central Park, waiting for orders to move further. A British officer came galloping up a little after noon on the 25th, reporting that the last of their rear-guard had taken their de. parture. The order to march was therefore given, and the war- worn veterans of the War of Independence once more marched through the city from which they had been driven seven years before. Washington, Clinton, and other prominent generals rode down into the city from Day's Tavern along the west side of the island, or the Bloomingdale and Greenwich roads, the two former taking up their quarters at Cape's Tavern on Broadway, afterward the City Hotel, on the corner of Cedar Street. The army marched down the Boston and Bowery roads, into Queen (Pearl) Street, to Wall, to Broadway, and then lined up along Broadway on both sides, from the vicinity of Washington's quarters to the fort. Riding with Clinton between the lines of the troops, Washington, followed by his main guard, rode down Broadway to Fort George, and took formal possession of the city in the name of the new nation so long defrauded of its possession, while the American flag was again flung to the breeze. It is told by some historians that the British in retiring had removed the halyards and had nailed the Royal Ensign to the top.
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