USA > New York > The Empire State: a compendious history of the commonwealth of New York > Part 23
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RUINS OF FORT TICONDEROGA.
without specifically delegated legislative or executive powers ; yet the common-sense of the inhabitants of the colonies represented there at that perilous hour, regarded them as fully invested with supreme legislative and executive functions. The deference paid by the provincial authorities of Massachusetts and New York in asking the advice of Congress about public affairs was a tacit acknowledgment of the supremacy of the Con- tinental Congress, and action was taken accordingly. That body pro- ceeded to issue bills of credit, create an army and navy, establish a postal service, and to do all other acts of sovereignty.
* This is a view of the ruins of the famous old fort as it appeared in 1848, taken from the bank of the lake. The place of the covered way through which Allen and his followers entered the fort was at the left corner of the picture near the sheep in the fore- ground.
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Meanwhile the patriots of New England had gathered in large numbers around Boston, determined to confine the British troops that occupied the town within the bounds of the peninsula. The battle of Bunker (Breed's) Hill was fought on June 17th ; a Continental Army had just been organized, and George Washington, of Virginia, appointed its com- mander-in-chief ; and the Continental Congress made vigorous prepara- tions for the defence of liberty in America.
Rumors reached the Provincial Congress of New York that British troops were coming from Ireland to occupy the city. That body, now somewhat purged of its Toryism by intelligence from the East, invited General Wooster, who was in command of a body of militia at Green- wich, in Connecticut, for the defence of the shores of that colony, to come to the protection of New York. He encamped at Harlem for several weeks, and sent detachments to drive off marauders on Long Island, who were stealing cattle for the use of the British Army at Boston. Ilis presence so emboldened the patriots at New York that at midnight late in July they captured British stores on the eastern verge of Manhattan Island (foot of present Forty-seventh Street), and sent part of them to the American army before Boston and a part to the garrison at Ticonderoga. They also seized a tender belonging to the Asia, a British man-of-war lying in New York Harbor.
Governor Tryon had returned to New York in the Asia late in June, and was received with much respect ; but he soon offended the Repub- licans. The energetic action of the Committee of One Hundred soon taught him to be circumspect in public, but he was continually engaged in private intrigues in fostering the spirit of Toryism in the Provincial Congress.
Washington arrived at New York on his way to take command of the army at Cambridge on the same day when Tryon arrived at Sandy Hook (June 25th, 1775). This coincidence embarrassed the Provincial Con- gress and the municipal authorities. The public functions of the two men were seriously antagonistic, and their respective political friends were fiercely hostile. To avoid offence honors must be given to both. What was to be done ? Fortunately, these magnates did not reach the city simultaneously. Washington and his party, to avoid British vessels in the harbor, were landed at the seat of Colonel Lispenard, on the Hudson, about a mile above the town, in the afternoon, and were con- ducted into the city by nine companies of foot and a great multitude of citizens, where they were received by the civil authorities. The Presi- dent of the Congress (Philip Livingston) pronounced a cautious and con- servative address, to which the general replied. Governor Tryon arrived
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ELEMENTS OF WEAKNESS IN NEW YORK.
four hours later, and was conducted to the house of Hugh Wallace, Esq. The civic and military ceremonies were partially repeated in the evening, and all parties were satisfied. It was a memorable Sabbath day in New York.
The province of New York at this crisis presented thrce dangerous elements of weakness-namely, an exposed frontier, a wily and pow- erful internal foe (Indians and Tories), and a demoralizing loyalty. On its northern border was Canada with a population practically neu- tral on the great question at issue, and prone to be hostile to the patriots. The central and western regions of the province were swarm- ingwith the Six Nations of Iroquois, whose almost universal loyalty had now been secured by the influence of Sir William Johnson and his family, while nearer the seaboard PHILIP LIVINGSTON .* and in the metropolis, family com- paets and commercial interests were powerfully swayed by traditional and natural attachments to the crown. These neutralized, to a great extent,
* Philip Livingston was one of the most energetic, upright, public-spirited, and esteemed business men in the province of New York at the period immediately preceding the Revolution ; and he was one of the most trustworthy and efficient of the supporters of the cause of the American patriots. He was a grandson of Robert Livingston, the first " Lord of the Manor." He was born in Albany in 1716, the year when the manor was first accorded the privilege of a representative in the Colonial Assembly. He became a merchant, and a most energetic and thrifty one ; and he entered vigorously into the heated political discussions before the old war for independence began. His business was in New York City, where he was alderman nine years. He represented the manor in the Assembly during the French and Indian War, where he had great influence as a leader of the patriotic party in that body, with Colonel Schuyler, Pierre van Cortlandt, Charles De Witt, etc. ; and corresponded much with Edmund Burke. Mr. Livingston represented New York in the first Continental Congress, and was on the committee that prepared the remarkable " Address to the People of Great Britain," which drew forth warm encomiums from William Pitt (Lord Chatham). He was an active member of the New York Provincial Congress in 1775, and earnestly supported the proposition for inde- pendence, signing the great Declaration. Mr. Livingston was a member of the first Senate of the State of New York, and also a delegate in the General Congress. When the sessions of that body were held at Lancaster and York his health rapidly failed, and he died at York on June 11th, 1778. He was one of the founders of the New York Society Library, of King's (now Columbia) College, and of the Chamber of Commerce.
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the influence of the few sturdy patriots who, in the face of frowns and menaces and the fears of the timid, kept the fires of the Revolution burning with continually increasing brightness.
The whole province of New York constituted the " Northern Depart- ment" of the Continental Army. Washington placed it under the charge of Philip Schuyler, one of his four major-generals, whose sleep- less vigilance cansed him to be designated the "Great Eye" of the department. In his instructions to Schuyler, given at New York, Washington admonished him to " keep a watchful eye upon Governor Tryon," and to use every means in his power to frustrate his designs "inimical to the common cause."
Affairs on Lake Champlain demanded Schuyler's first and most earnest attention, for the possession of Canada by an alliance or by conquest was a consideration of the greatest consequence. As the inhabitants were French Roman Catholics, having no sympathy in religion or nationality with either party, they were objects of great solicitude to both. Friendly overtures were made to them by the colonies then in league, but imprudent language interfered. Had wise words and measures been adopted at the outset the Canadians might have been easily won to an alliance, for a traditional feud between the French and English had existed for a thousand years, and the recent conquest of Canada by the English was yet a cause for much irritation ; or had Congress acted promptly upon the suggestions of Colonels Allen and Arnold soon after the capture of Ticonderoga, Canada might have been easily won by conquest. The New York Provincial Congress thought it an " impertinent proposal coming from Allen, a man who had been outlawed by the authorities of New York."
The two heroes (Allen and Arnold) had already on their own respon- sibility taken preliminary steps toward such conquest. They went down the lake in a schooner and bateaux with armed men, and Arnold captured St. Johns, on the Sorel (the outlet of the lake), but could not hold the prize. Again, when Arnold heard that the Governor of Canada had sent an armed force to St. Johns for the purpose of attempting the recapture of the lake forts, he proceeded without authority to fit out, arm, and man with one hundred and fifty persons all the vessels he could lay his hands upon, and, as self-constituted commodore, he took post at Crown Point and awaited the coming of the foes. They did not come. This was the first Continental Navy. It was put afloat in New York waters before the middle of June, 1775.
Colonel Allen and his lieutenant, Seth Warner, appeared before the Continental Congress at Philadelphia, and on the floor of the House he
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EMPLOYMENT OF GREEN MOUNTAIN BOYS.
revealed to the members, in quaint phrases and with slow speech, the state of affairs on the northern frontier, and urged the importance of an immediate invasion of Canada before the small British force there should be increased. He asked for authority to raise a new regiment of Green Mountain Boys for that service. His words so deeply impressed the members that on June 17th they
"Resolved, That it be recommended to the Convention of New York that they, consulting with General Schuyler, employ in the army to be raised for the defence of America those called ' Green Mountain Boys,' under such officers as the said Green Mountain Boys shall choose."
Allen and Warner soon appeared in New York and craved an audience with the Provincial Congress. Their errand produced much embarrass- ment. How could members treat with men who had recently been pro- claimed outlaws ? Debates ran high, when Captain Sears moved that " Ethan Allen be admitted to the floor of the House." The motion was adopted by a large majority. The old feud was instantly healed, and the Congress decreed that a regiment of Green Mountain Boys, five hundred strong, should be raised.
Already Governor Trumbull, of Connecticut, had sent troops to Ticonderoga, under Colonel Hinman, who held the chief command there until superseded by General Schuyler. The military force then in the province did not exceed three thousand men fit for duty, and yet prepa- rations were made in New York for an invasion of Canada. The visit of Allen and Warner had quickened the perceptions of the Continental Congress of the necessity of such an invasion, and on June 27th that body ordered General Schuyler, if he should " find it practicable and not disagreeable to the Canadians, immediately to take possession of St. Johns and Montreal, and pursue such other measures in Canada as might have a tendency to promote the peace and security of these prov- inces"-in other words, to undertake an armed invasion of Canada.
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CHAPTER XVI.
GENERAL SCHUYLER had accompanied Washington from Philadelphia to New York. When he arrived at Albany early in July he found the aspect of affairs in Northern New York dark and unpromising to the Republican cause.
Sir William Johnson," who had taken sides with the crown in the political movements of the time, had died the previous autumn. His mantle of almost unbounded influ- ence over the Indians of the Mohawk Valley and beyond had fallen upon his energetic son-in-law, Colonel Guy Johnson, who succeeded him as Superintendent of Indian Affairs. Sir William's son Jolin inherited the title and estates of the baronet, and was at that time earnestly en- SIR WILLIAM JOHNSON. gaged in keeping Toryism actively alive in the Mohawk Valley. He had been appointed, in 1774, brigadier-general of the militia of Tryon County, which extended west of Albany County almost indefinitely.
These successors of Sir William, especially Guy, professed peaceable
* Sir William Johnson was a conspicuous character in the later period of the colonial history of New York. He was a native of Ireland, where he was born in 1715. Educated for a merchant, an unfortunate love affair changed the tenor of his life. He came to America to take charge of landed property in the region of the Mohawk Valley belonging to his uncle, Admiral Sir Peter Warren. His good treatment of the Indians made him a favorite with them. He built a fine mansion (yet standing), which he called " Johnson Hall," aud there the village of Johnstown, in Fulton County, now flourishes. IIe married a pretty German girl, by whom he had two children, a son (afterward Sir John Johnson) and a daughter. By his housekeeper, Mary Brant, the sister of Brant, the celebrated Mohawk chief, he had eight children. She lived with him until his death in 1774. When the French and Indian War broke out Johnson was appointed sole agent of Indian affairs in the province of New York, and managed the business most judi- ciously. The king granted him 100,000 acres of land in the Mohawk Valley. IIe lived on his domain in his fine mansion in rude baronial splendor.
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GUY JOHNSON AND THE INDIANS.
intentions, but the movements of the latter had been so suspicious for some time that the patriotic citizens of Tryon County were filled with apprehensions.
Guy Johnson was holding a council, in the spring of 1775, with the Indians at his house# (near the present village of Amsterdam), on the Mohawk, when news from Lexington and intimations that he was about to be arrested so alarmed him that he hastily adjourned the council, first to the German Flats SIGNATURE OF SIR WILLIAM JOHNSON. and then to Fort Stanwix, now Rome. He had taken his family with him. He soon pushed onward to the heart of the country of the fierce Cayugas and Senecas, and at Ontario (according to tradition) he called a great council of the Six
GUY JOHNSON'S HOUSE.
Nations. He was accompanied by Brant (whose sister had been the concubine-the wife, according to Indian customs-of Sir William) as
* This house, substantially built of stone, is yet standing on the north side of the Mohawk River, a mile from the village of Amsterdam, in Montgomery County. Sir William Johnson had an equally strong mansion, two stories in height, with a high peaked roof, wherein he resided twenty years before he built Johnson Hall. It is yet standing, about three miles west of Amsterdam. It was fortified and called "Fort Johnson."
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his secretary ; also by Colonel John Butler and his son Walter, who was afterward engaged in bloody forays upon the defenceless white inhab- itants of the Mohawk region.
The council at Ontario, at which about fourteen hundred barbarians were assembled, was satisfactory to Colonel Johnson. Thence he went to Oswego and invited representatives of the Six Nations to meet him in
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JOHNSON HALL.+ (From a sketch made in 1848.)
council there, to " feast on a Bostonian and to drink his blood "-in other words, to eat a roasted ox and to drink a pipe of wine .* The council was held ; and at the conclusion Johnson, with a large number of Iroquois chiefs and warriors, crossed Lake Ontario, went down the St. Lawrence to Montreal, and entered the British military service. They were chiefly Mohawks under Brant.
* Some doubt has been expressed by a late investigator (Mr. A. McF. Davis) as to two conferences in the summer of 1775, as Ontario and Oswego were names sometimes applied to the same place at the mouth of the Oswego River by writers at that day. There was a place in the Seneca country on the borders of Lake Ontario called " Ontario," where a conference may have been held, as stated in the text.
+ Johnson Hall, yet standing upon a gentle eminence about three fourths of a mile north of the court-house in the village of Johnstown, Fulton County, was built about the year 1760 by Sir William Johnson, and was, probably, the finest mansion in the province of New York at that time. The main building is of wood, clapboarded in a manner to represent blocks of stone. It is forty feet wide, sixty feet long, and two stories high. The detached wings, built for flanking block-houses, are of stone. The walls are very thick, and pierced near the eaves for musketry. One of these was recently removed.
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COMMISSIONERS OF INDIAN AFFAIRS.
While Guy Johnson was thus forming an active alliance of many of the tribes of the Six Nations (and especially the Mohawks) with the British in Canada, Sir John Johnson remained at Johnson Hall, the seat of Sir William, which he had fortified, exerting an equally powerful influence in a more quiet way in favor of the crown as a military leader and as a manorial proprietor over a large number of Scotch retainers, who were all Loyalists.
So was inaugurated the coalition with the British of Indians and Tories in New York, whose atrocious deeds in the Mohawk region gave it the name of " The Dark and Bloody Ground."
The Continental Congress now perceiving the necessity of securing the neutrality if not the alliance of the Indians, established a Board of Com- missioners of Indian Affairs in three departments. General Schuyler, Major Joseph Hawley, Turbutt Francis, Oliver Wolcott, and Volkert P. Douw were appointed commissioners for the Northern Department. Through this Board Congress addressed earnest and friendly " talks" to the Six Nations, entreating them not to engage in the contest. "This is a family quarrel between us and Old England," they said. "You Indians are not concerned in it. We do not wish you to take up the hatchet against the king's troops. We desire you to remain at home and not join on either side."
Had a like humane and discreet policy governed the councils of the British Ministry many a horrible deed the record of which stains the annals of the period might never have been committed.
Tionderoga, or Ticonderoga, was made the point of rendezvous for the troops designed for the invasion of Canada. Schuyler was there at the middle of July. Only a handful of meanly-clad and poorly-fed armed men were there, under the command of Colonel Hinman, among whom insubordination was the rule. Brigadier-General Richard Mont- gomery, Schuyler's second in command, had been left at Albany to receive and discipline troops that might arrive until the commissariat at Ticonderoga should be in an efficient condition.
It had been agreed that Connecticut should furnish men and New York supplies. Both were tardy in performance, and the summer was almost ended before there was a sufficient force fairly equipped at Ticonderoga to warrant Schuyler in ordering an advance toward Canada. Washington, in command of the Continental troops before Boston, gave all aid to the enterprise in his power, and when the movement began he sent Colonel Arnold with over a thousand men across the wilderness of Western Maine to co-operate in efforts to seize Quebec.
The Provincial Congress of New York was almost powerless to act.
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" You cannot conceive," wrote its president to General Schuyler in August, " the trouble we have with our troops for want of money. To this hour we have not received a shilling of the public money. Two of our members have been at Philadelphia almost a fortnight waiting for the cash. Our men insist on being paid before they march, not their subsistence only, but also their billeting money. Perhaps no men have been more embarrassed than we."
This inability was called indifference by some and disaffection by others, and drew forth ungenerous reflections. " That Congress," wrote Samuel Mott to Governor Trumbull from Ticonderoga, " are still unsound at heart. They make a great noise and send forward a few officers to command ; but as to soldiers in the service, I believe they are not more than one hundred and fifty strong at all the posts this side of Albany." And Major Brown, then on a mission in Canada, wrote to the same gentleman : "The New Yorkers have acted a droll part, and are determined to defeat us if they can."
Schuyler had sent Major Brown, an American and a resident on the Sorel, into Canada for information. At the middle of August he reported that there were seven hundred regular troops in Canada, of whom three hundred were at St. Johns ; that five hundred Tories and Indians under Sir John Johnson were near Montreal trying to persuade the Caughna- wagas to join them ; that the French Canadians, restive under British rule, were generally disposed to remain neutral, and that he believed the conquest of Canada, if undertaken at once, might easily be achieved.
Schuyler now resolved to push forward as speedily as possible. Troops and supplies were coming forward. The Provincial Congress of New York was using every effort to furnish its one thousand men. Four regiments were organized under the respective commands of Colonels McDongal, Van Schaick, Clinton, and Holmes, and Captain John Lamb was authorized to raise a company of artillery one hundred strong, to be attached to MeDougal's regiment. The Committee of Safety of New Hampshire sent to the gathering army on the lake three companies, under Colonel Bedel, who were accustomed to the woods and well acquainted with Canada. But the Green Mountain Boys were tardy in forming their regiment.
Toward the close of August the troops at Ticonderoga moved down the lake under the command of Generals Montgomery* and Wooster,
* Richard Montgomery was born in the north of Ireland in 1736 ; entered the British Army ; assisted in the capture of Quebec in 1759 ; was in the campaign against Havana with General Lyman, and, returning to New York, he made that city his residence. He went to England, sold his commission in 1772, came back, and bought a beautiful estate
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CAPTURE OF ST. JOHNS AND MONTREAL.
and took post at Isle aux Noix, on the Sorel, a few miles above St. Johns. There Schuyler joined them. He had been in attendance npon his duty as Commissioner of Indian Affairs in holding a conference with representatives of the Six Nations at Albany. The troops remained at Isle aux Noix until the middle of September, when Sehuyler, prostrated by illness, transferred the chief command to Montgomery and returned to Ticonderoga.
On the day of Schuyler's de- parture (September 25th) Mont- gomery advanced upon the fort at St. Johns with abont a thousand men withont artillery, and began a siege on the 1Sth. The garrison, commanded by Colonel Preston, maintained a vigorous resistance for more than a month. The fort was surrendered to Montgomery on November 3d, 1775.
1.
GENERAL RICHARD MONTGOMERY.
During the siege small detachments from Montgomery's foree went out upon daring enterprises. Colonel Ethan Allen had joined the little patriot army. At the head of eighty men, at the suggestion of Colonel John Brown, who was to co-operate with him, he pushed across the St. Lawrence to attack Montreal. Brown failed to co-operate. Allen was defeated, made prisoner, and was sent to England to be tried for treason, but was exchanged in May, 1778. Montgomery took Montreal.
General Montgomery wrote to the Continental Congress : " Until Quebee is taken Canada remains unconquered." Impressed with this idea, he lost no time in pressing toward Quebee in the face of terrible discouragements-inelement weather, the desertion of troops, hostility of the Canadians, and a lean commissariat. Frost was binding the waters, snow was mantling the whole country, and the rigors of a Canadian winter menaced him.
on the east bank of the Hudson, in Duchess County, and soon afterward married a daughter of Robert Livingston. He espoused the patriot cause ; was commissioned a brigadier-general, and joined General Schuyler in the expedition to conquer Canada in 1775. He was in chief command of the troops that captured St. Johns and Montreal, and laid siege to Quebec. In an attack upon that city he was killed. There is a fine memorial monument to his memory on the front of St. Paul's Church, New York City.
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Twenty miles above Quebec Montgomery met Arnold (December 11th) with a shattered remnant of his followers, tattered and torn, who had been driven from before the city, when woollen suits brought from Montreal were placed upon their shivering limbs. The united forces stood upon the Plains of Abraham, before Quebec, on December 1st, and demanded the surrender of the city. A scornful refusal was followed by a siege which lasted three weeks. It was carried on with a few light cannons and mortars mounted upon brittle ice redoubts, the men exposed to almost daily snow-storms in the open fields.
On the early morning of the last day of the year 1775 the little be- sieging army attempted to take Quebec by storm. The force was divided. One portion was led by Montgomery on the St. Lawrence side of the town ; the other portion was led by Arnold on the St. Charles side. They were to meet and attempt a forced entrance into the city through Prescott Gate at Mountain Street. Just before dawn, while he was pressing for- ward at the head of the New York troops in the face of a blinding snow storm, Montgomery was killed DAVID WOOSTER IN 1758. by a grape-shot from a masked bat- tery at the foot of Cape Diamond. Arnold had been wounded and sent to a hospital. After a further strng- gle the British made a sortie through Palace Gate and captured the whole of Arnold's division. Arnold, now in chief command, retreated a few miles up the St. Lawrence, and for a while blockaded the garrison at Quebec. He was soon succeeded in command by General Wooster," who came down from Montreal.
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