USA > New York > Washington County > Washington county, New York; its history to the close of the nineteenth century > Part 19
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The garrison of Ticonderoga 1 was estimated at from four to five
that it is not to be wondered at that contemporaries named him the "hero" and the "thunderbolt of war." Indeed, in those qualities which illustrate Hancock in our late Civil War and made Washburn style him " the living impersonation of war" Arnold was resplendent. He was a mar- vellous soldier and was very badly treated by Congress. "Strange to say," remarks General J. Watts de Peyster, in one of his historical essays, " the scene of the British naval victories in 1776, was not far distant (only six miles) from the place of their defeat in 1814."
Crown Point was called Kruyn or Kroon punt (or Scalp point) by the Dutch, and by the French Point a la Cheveleuse. The size and extent of these works, which, (1900) are still standing, render their exploration by the tourist very satisfactory and instructive. The promontory which juts out from the further shore directly opposite Crown Point and on which General Riedesel was encamped for a day or two, is called Chimney Point. When Fort Frederick was built in 1731, a French settlement of considerable size was begun at this place. During the old French war, however, it was destroyed by a party of Mohawk Indians, (which left Fort Edward for this pur- pose) who burned the wood-work of the houses, leaving the stone chimneys standing. For many years afterward these stood, like solitary and grim sentinels, watching over the ruins. Hence the name of Chimney Point.
1 Ticonderoga, the various French and Indian names of which have been given in a preced- ing note, is situated fifteen miles south of Crown Point and thirty north of Whitehall. It is formed by a sharp angle in the narrow waters of the lake, and an arm of that lake stretching to the westward which receives the waters of Lake George at the foot of a precipitous fall of some twenty feet.
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thousand men and consisted of twelve regiments divided into four brigades commanded by General St. Clair. Its position was covered on the right flank by Fort Independence, a star-fort built on a consid- erable eminence on the east shore of Lake Champlain and fortified by three successive lines of fortifications. It was separated by water from Ticonderoga, which lay on the opposite side, and consisted chiefly of the old French works. In the lake, between the two forts, lay four armed vessels, and both were connected by a bridge not yet thor- oughly completed. In front of this bridge there was a strong iron chain hanging across the water, which was intended to break the first assault of the British. To the left of Ticonderoga there was another fortification upon a hill covering the enemy's left toward the saw-mills on the portage between Lake Champlain and Lake George. Ticon- deroga was garrisoned by one-half of the American force, or two bri- gades; the third brigade was at Fort Independence and the fourth was distributed in the entrenchments outside of the fort. This was the position of the Americans when General Burgoyne arrived before Ticonderoga.
Meanwhile, the people of Washington County, though confidently relying on the army garrisoning Ticonderoga to form a wall against which the forces of the invading army would dash in vain, were not idle, being actuated by a stern desire to do their part in the general defense. The "Charlotte (Washington) County Rangers," at this time under the command of Captain Joshua Conkey and Lieutenants Isaac Moss and Gideon Squiers, were patrolling the northern roads and forests, watching for British scouts or lurking Indians, and the efforts made to get out the militia met with great success. On the ed of July, General St. Clair wrote to Colonel Williams saying he " was happy to hear that the people turn out so well. The ene- my," said the general, "have been looking at us for a day or two, and we expect them to try what they can do perhaps to-night." He then urged Colonel Williams and Colonel Seth Warner, the leader of the Green Mountain Boys, if "they can bring but six hundred men, or even less, to do so." He directed them to march through the grants, on the east side of Lake Champlain, "first on the old road," and then "on the new road, to make the enemy think there is a larger force." If attacked, the militia were to make directly for Mount Independence and St. Clair promised to send a force to support them. That general, in closing, remarked in a very flattering and politic manner: "If I
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INEFFECTUAL OPPOSITION TO BURGOYNE.
had only your people here, I would laugh at all the enemy could do." Letters, also, to the same purport, were sent to Colonels Robinson and Warner. 1 The Charlotte (Washington) County regiment accord- ingly set forth under Colonel Williams immediately upon the recep- tion of this letter. "We know, from records still extant," writes Johnson, " that there were at least five or six companies, and doubt- less they all turned out on this expedition ; but the only ones of which there are any account are the one from New Perth (Salem) consisting of fifty-two men under Captain Charles Hutchison-the Highland corporal whom Ethan Allen had mobbed in 1771; that of Captain Thomas Armstrong, numbering thirty men, and that of Captain John Hamilton, numbering thirty-two men. The battalion marched under Colonel Williams' command to Skenesborough, and thence to Castle- ton, whence a portion of them were selected by the Colonel to pro- ceed to Ticonderoga." This point they never reached.
At noon of the 2nd of July-the very day that St. Clair had sent his letter just quoted to Colonel Williams-Fraser moved forward and taking possession of some high ground which commanded the Ameri- can line and cut off their communications with Lake George, named it Mount Hope in anticipation of victory. On the approach of Fraser to occupy Mount Hope, the Americans, most unaccountably, imme- diately abandoned all their works in the direction of Lake George, setting fire to the block houses and saw-mills, and without sally or other interruption, permitted the enemy under Major-General Phillips to take possession of this very advantageous post which, besides com- manding their lines in a dangerous degree, totally cut off, as has been said, all their communications. The only excuse for such an early abandonment of such an important point, was found (as was devel- oped afterwards at St. Clair's court martial) in the fact that the general in command had not force enough to man all the defences.2
At the same time that Fraser made his successful attack on Mount Hope 3 Phillips moved more to the right and occupied the saw-mills.
1 Johnson.
2 In the beginning of this skirmish of Fraser, Lord Balcarras (of whom we shall hear further) who commanded the light infantry, had his coat and trousers pierced with thirty balls, while, at the same time Lieutenant Haggit received a mortal wound in both eyes by a ball and Lieutenant Douglass of the 29th while being carried from the field wounded was shot through the head by a sharpshooter.
3 The ridge on the highest part of which Mount Hope is situated, extends westwardly about half a mile to the saw-mills or the perpendicular fall at the outlet of Lake George. On the south
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WASHINGTON COUNTY: ITS HISTORY.
Riedesel, likewise, advanced with Breymann's corps and took up a position in front of Fort Independence behind Stream Petie Marie- now called East Creek. Meanwhile, unfortunately for the Americans, their engineers had overlooked, or rather neglected, the high peak or mountain called Sugar-loaf hill (Mount Defiance), situated south on the point of land at the confluence of the waters of Lakes George and Champlain. Originally it had been supposed and taken for granted, that the crest of Sugar-loaf hill was not only inaccessible, but too dis- tant to be of any avail in covering the main fortress. This opinion was, however, a great error, for it was really the key to the situation, whichever army might occupy it. In fact, as early as July, 1758, Captain Stark had brought the fact of its commanding attitude to the notice of Lord Howe, 1 who, on that occasion, had been taken by Stark to its summit-some 800 feet in height-overlooking the works of Ticonderoga. Howe even perceived at that time the advantage which a few pieces of cannon, placed there in battery, would afford a besieg- ing army over the garrison; but General Abercromby, supposing his force of sufficient strength, brought, as we have seen, no artillery with his army. Colonel John Trumbull, also, the preceding year, 1776, had called the attention of the officers of the garrison to it. Colonel Trumbull was then Adjutant-General for the Northern De- partment but when he made the suggestion he was laughed at by the mess. He, however, soon proved the accuracy of his own vision by throwing a cannon-shot to the summit and, subsequently, by clam- bering up to the top, accompanied by Colonels Stevens, Wayne and Arnold, dragging a cannon after them. 2 General Schuyler, also, had seen the necessity of occupying it and had frequently requested reinforcements for that purpose. 3 In whatever light it is viewed, it was a criminal neglect on the part of St. Clair, the commander-in-chief of the fortress, that the oversight was not at once corrected by the construction of a work upon the summit of Mount Defiance which
it presents a bold declinity washed by the strait, and on the north it declines until it sinks into a plain which is extended about one hundred rods to the shore of the lake where the bank is ten or twelve feet high. It was precisely at this point that Abercromby suffered such a disastrous repulse.
1 Memoir of Caleb Stark, pg. 24.
2 Conversations of the author's father with Colonel John Trumbull, and also his unpublished memoirs, to which the author had access.
3 This being an undoubted fact, the detractors of Schuyler, who throw on him the errors of the evacuation, have nothing on which to base their slanderous assaults.
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BRITISH THREATEN TICONDEROGA.
would have commanded the whole post. It was a neglect, however, that was soon to cost them dear. While the maneuvers of Fraser and Phillips, above described, were executing, Lieutenant Twiss, one of the most experienced engineers of the British army, made a thorough personal examination of Sugar-loaf hill and reported that the "hill" [it is really quite a mountain ] " completely commanded the works and buildings both at Ticonderoga and Fort Independence; that it was distant about 1400 yards from the former, and 1500 from the latter; that the ground might be levelled so as to receive cannon, and that a road to convey them, though extremely difficult, might be built in twenty-four hours." Accordingly, as soon as darkness had set in, a winding road was cut to its summit, a battery commenced and cannon to serve it transported thither. ' In fact, so expeditiously was the work carried forward under Phillips, " that the garrison of Ticonderoga, on awakening the next morning, found to their amazement and dismay that from the' crags, seven hundred feet above, the British were coolly looking down upon them, watching their every movement and only waiting for the completion of their batteries to open fire.
As soon as General St. Clair perceived that the British had gotten up guns upon Sugar-loaf hill, and that it was ablaze with the crimson and gold of their uniforms, he knew that all the efforts of the Colonies to provide for the defense of this place had been rendered useless and that all the enormous amounts expended upon it had been mere waste of money. He ought, it is true, to have comprehended this at the outset, but prominent military men, as well as engineers-as we have seen-are often blind on such subjects. In commenting upon this error of St. Clair, General de Peyster justly says: "Halleck, esteemed a scientific soldier and life-long engineer, in our Civil war made even a worse mistake in regard to Harper's Ferry; and the Sardinian gov- ernment, after squeezing a million of dollars out of their savings to fortify Ventimiglia, only awoke to the fact that it was commanded by two elevations, when an American officer, in 1851, demonstrated to
: The holes drilled into the rocks on the summit of Mount Defiance for the carriages of the cannon may still be seen by the curious tourist who takes the trouble to climb to its top at least they were to be seen some ten years since, when the author visited the spot.
" " General Phillips has as expeditiously conveved cannon to the summit of this hill (Mount Defiance), as he brought it up in that memorable battle at Minden, where, it is said, such was his anxiousness in expediting the artillery, that he split no less than fifteen canes in beating the horses." Auburey's Letters.
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WASHINGTON COUNTY: ITS HISTORY.
them the enormous range which had been recently attained by Bom- ford's Columbiads-the heaviest then, of American artillery."
In this critical situation, St. Clair at once called a council of war, which immediately decided on an immediate evacuation. He after- wards justified himself by claiming "Although I have lost a fort I have saved a province, " or " I have eventually saved a state." In- deed, the only man, except Colonel Trumbull, as I have noted, who from the first saw and said that "Old" Ticonderoga was untenable was Schuyler. But, in his case as in a thousand of others, ignorant public opinion overruled experienced private judgment. This obsti- nate stupidity cost the infant nation over a million of dollars, implace- able material, more than a thousand men when most needed, and for nearly two months demoralized the frontier population of Washington County.
At this council of war, held by St. Clair and his officers, it was also determined that the baggage of the army, together with such artillery, stores and provisions as the necessity of the occasion would admit, should be embarked with a strong detachment on board of two hun- dred batteaux and despatched under the convoy of five armed galleys up the lake to Skenesborough (Whitehall) and that the main body of the army should proceed by land, taking its route on the road to Castleton in what is now Vermont, which was about thirty miles south- east of Ticonderoga, and join the boats and galleys at Skenesborough. Absolute secrecy was also enjoined. Accordingly, early in the even- ing, Colonel Long, with five armed galleys and six hundred men, set out with the sick and wounded for Skenesborough, and a few hours later, about two o'clock in the morning of July 6th, St. Clair with the main body of the troops passed over the floating bridge in safety and in all probability would have effected his retreat wholly undiscovered, had not the headquarters of General Roche de Fermoy, who com- manded Fort Independence, either through accident or treachery been set on fire. We are, however, inclined to the latter opinion. The Chevalier Mathias Alexis Roche de Fermoy was one of those foreign- ers who cost the Colonies so much before they learned to estimate sufficiently, how the high estimate put upon these strangers by them- selves and the stupid masses was all sham. He is credited in history with ordering his dwelling to be fired, and the lurid light of the flames revealed to Fraser (and of course to Burgoyne) what the Americans were doing. It may not have been absolute intention like the treason
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EVACUATION OF TICONDEROGA.
of Demont which lost us Fort Washington, but the effects were even more prejudicial to our arms. No one without absolute proof has a right to claim treachery, but weighing the facts and results, the critic is certainly justified in saying that the consequences were equivalent to it. It lost to the Colonies what, at that time, was equal to an army at a crisis and occasioned the bloody engagement at Hubbardtown, which cost the Americans the life of Colonel Francis, one of their best officers, and hundreds of their very best troops-not to speak of incalculable consequent demoralization. " It is a somewhat singular fact," says that able military critic, General J. Watts de Peyster, " that, generally, wherever the Americans were unsuccessful a foreigner was mixed up in it." A little thought on the part of the reader (see, for example, at the Battle of Monmouth) will confirm the truth of this observation. 1 But whether Fermoy's act was the result of treason or not, this unfortunate occurrence, besides informing the British of the retreat, threw the Americans into great disorder. At carly daylight Riedesel embarked his men and took possession of Fort Indepen- dence, at the same time that Fraser occupied Ticonderoga. Eighty large cannon, five thousand tons of flour, a great quantity of meat and provisions, fifteen stand of arms, a large amount of ammunition and two hundred oxen, besides baggage and tents, were found in the deserted forts.
There would seem to have been no necessity for this stampede. The camps of the Americans were not surrounded-on the contrary, the road to Vermont was still open-and the batteries of the assail- ants were not yet in position. Indeed, it is very questionable, if the garrison had fallen back in time and fought the British in a well selected position, as bravely as Francis and Warner did a few days later at Hubbardtown, that the Americans would not have made it a second Bunker Hill-that is, a barren victory, achieved at such a cost of British life as must have brought the Burgoyne capitulation much nearer to Lake Champlain, both as to scene and to date. " There are
1 Roche de Fermoy for Fermoi was a colonel of the French army and received the appoint- ment of Brigadier-General from Congress. "One of the worst of the aventurers was this very General Fermoy, who brought disaster upon the rear of St. Clair's army after the successful retreat from Ticonderoga." Smith's St. Clair 1.65. Gates dismissed Fermoy with a letter to Hancock, September 4th, 1777, containing this shrewd diplomatie praise: " I have much respect for long service and rank of General Fermoi and wish circumstances had made it convenient to have retained him here." Gates MS. Papers, in New York Historical Society. Upon his return to France after in vain attempting to be placed again in active service-he returned, it is be- lieved, to France and thence to the West Indies where he disappears from view.
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a great many successes in war," says General de Peyster, "which like the fall of Fort Sumter and the issue of the first Battle of Bull Run in our late civil war, are more fatal in the end to the winners than to the losers. Ticonderoga was one of these." However this may be, " great fright and consternation" says General Riedesel in his "Mili- tary Journal," " must have prevailed in the enemy's camp, otherwise they would have taken time to destroy the stores and save some- thing." And yet St. Clair's retreat was by no means so disorderly as some historians have represented it. Lamb (whom I shall have occasion again to quote) and who was evidently a conscientious and shrewd observer, speaking of this event in his Journal, says: "After the enemy retreated we marched down to the works and were obliged to halt at the bridge of communication which had been broken down. In passing the bridge and possessing ourselves of the works, we found four men lying intoxicated with drinking, who had been left to fire the guns of a large battery on our approach. Had the men obeyed the commands they received, we must have suffered great injury, but they were allured by the opportunity of a cask of Madeira to forget their instructions and drown their cares in wine. It appeared evident they were left for the purpose alluded to, as matches were found lighted; the ground was strewed with powder, and the heads of some powder-casks were knocked off in order, no doubt, to injure the men on their gaining the works. An Indian had like to have done some mischief from his curiosity-holding a match near one of the guns, it exploded, but, bing elevated, it discharged without harm."
The news of the fall of Ticonderoga was received in England with every demonstration of joy. The King rushed into the Queen's apartment, erying, "I have beat them; I have beat all the Ameri- cans!" and Lord George Germaine announced the event in Parliament as if it had been decisive of the campaign and of the Colonies.
The unresisted occupation of a fortress so highly esteemed as Ticonderoga, and upon which the Americans had so confidently counted as capable of resisting Burgoyne, the apparently ignominious flight of its garrison and the even more insignificant impediments and resistance of the American preparations and flotilla, elated the British general in the highest degree. They lifted him up as much as they depressed the Colonists. Yet, this over-weening confidence with which it inspired the English commander was, in the end, as we shall see, the cause of innumerable misfortunes. It was much more
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difficult to abase the high thoughts of the British than to elevate the temporary depression of the Americans. "Common danger and com- mon sense," it has been said, "are stronger allies than the influence of a bloodless triumph." And so it proved in this instance. Schuyler was the embodiment of common sense, and if he needed any encour- agement he found it in the judgment of Washington. " Time and will against any other two" has long passed into a proverb. In the game that ensued Schuyler wrung Time from Burgoyne and he him- self furnished the Will. Making the most Time and exerting Will in the highest degree, Schuyler, on the one hand so obstructed Bur- goyne, that on the other hand, he was able to gather together suffi- cient forces to crush him.
But how was this defeat received by the Colonies at large ? John Adams, when he heard of St. Clair's abandonment of Ticonderoga, 1 said, "We shall never be able to defend a post until we shoot a gen- eral." This seemed a very patriotic speech, and, as such, was duly applauded. He had much better have said, "His people would never succeed until they hung the majority of the politicians, who inter- fered with such men as Washington and Schuyler and fostered the vile cabals against them," (the same as it was in our last war against Spain). St. Clair's remark, quoted on a preceding page, was much more just-that "he had lost a fort and saved a province." Never- theless, they were both wrong. "St. Clair was a poor commander and both the Adamses were politicians of greatly circumscribed ideas. Not one of the Adams family ever had enlarged views. Several speeches of these Bostonians abundantly prove this, especially, their remarks from time to time in regard to Washington. Still, as time passes, every day more and more clearly reveals the fact, that he was a consummate leader of men, although not destitute of the proclivities and failings of energetic humanity-faults or blemishes without which mortality cannot have force."
But, if the news of the fall of Ticonderoga, on which so many hopes had been based, caused general consternation throughout the Colon- ies, especially did it fall with crushing weight upon New York State and more particularly on the County of Charlotte (Washington). " The people felt as they did in that Massachusetts valley, a few years
1 St. Clair was afterwards tried by court martial for this retreat from Ticonderoga but was honorably acquitted. The ridiculous charge also made at the time, that Burgoyne had shot silver bullets into St. Clair's camp by way of a bribe may be dismissed as too absurd for consid- eration.
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ago, when they heard that the dam had broken away and the waters were rolling down upon their defenceless homes. Many, especially in the northern part of the settlements, made immediate preparations for flight with their families from the dreaded British, the more dreaded Hessians and the Indians, the most terrible of all. Others hastened to join the army, now more than ever in need of men: while still others (and not a few) of Tory proclivities, furbished up their arms and consulted together how they might best serve the cause of the King." 1
But to resume the thread of my narrative of the events following the capture by the British of Ticonderoga. In the retreat from that fort Colonel Francis succeeded in bringing off the rear guard in a regular manner. When the troops arrived at Hubbardtown in Ver- mont they were halted for nearly two hours, and the rear guard was increased by many who did not at first belong to it, but were picked up on the road, having been unable to keep up with their regiments. The army under St. Clair then proceeded to Castleton, six miles fur- ther-Colonel Warner with the rear guard and the stragglers, remain- ing at Hubbardtown.
No sooner had the Frenchman, (Brigadier-General de Fermoy's) quarters burst into flames than the vigilant Fraser discovered by their glare and the partial moonlight that the Americans were evacu- ating Ticonderoga and making off. With an alacrity unusual in Eng- lish officers he instantly began an eager pursuit with his brigade, Major-General Riedesel being ordered to follow with his Brunswick- ers. But it does not enter into the province of this work to describe in detail the battle which took place at Hubbardtown. It is sufficient to say, that on the 7th of July, Fraser came up with Colonel Warner who had about one thousand men. A severe battle was thereupon fought resulting in the death of the brave Colonel Francis, who fell at the head of his regiment while fighting with great gallantry, and in the complete defeat of the Americans. This victory, however, had not been easily won. General Fraser acknowledged that he would have been in great danger of defeat had it not been for General Ried- esel's timely aid, since, if reinforcements had not arrived at the very moment they did, his whole corps would have been surrounded and cut off to a man.
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