THE EMPIRE TO CRUSH THE REPUBLIC. 299 write a history of the Revolution, much less to describe its battles. All we can do will be to keep our eyes steadily enough fixed on the national ensign as it waved or drooped, to follow the fortunes of the war; while we must trace with special care the causes of our chief successes and failures in the great business of emancipating ourselves from the political, as well as the military thraldom of the Old World, and in the consolidation of thirteen separate and independent Colonies, into a higher and better form of free government than had yet been established among men. I am endeavoring to write a work of instruction, as well as of popular interest. I am more anxious to explain facts of deep significance, than to captivate the reader by stirring narration. I hoped to escape, in some measure, the charge which an ingenious writer not long ago brought against the historians of our country, for his criticism seemed to be at least partly just:There has not been a single writer who has attempted to distinguish between the History of the United States, and the Political Literature of the country; that is, in giving an account of the facts, of a public or a private nature, that controlled the events of any era or epoch, almost all have altogether failed to look to the inner influence, so to speak, of the writings, the proceedings of public bodies, the State papers, that in each case preceded, and moulded, and accompanied every important occurrence of the different phases of our national existence. They have confined their attention too much to the effect of the development of both the political and social progress of our earlier existence, and have paid too little heed to the causes of the gradual expansion of political opinions, and the origin of our steady and suc. cessful advance to independence and constitutional government.' ' The Force of the Empire invoked to crush the Republic.-Astounded and enraged at the hardihood and audacity of the rebel Congress, the king his ministers and his Parliament determined to strike one blow that would end the Rebellion. Accordingly Gen. Howe, and the Admiral of the same name— the one commanding the naval, and the other the land forces-were ordered to New York; and, a few days after the Declaration of Independence-July 12th, '76-these experienced commanders had posted themselves on, and around Staten Island, with more than thirty thousand fighting men. The commanders were also empowered to act as commissioners to proclaim pardon to all who would lay down their arms, and resume their allegiance. General Howe seems to have been a man of humane disposition, and he believed that the presence of so overwhelming a force would crush the Rebellion, and save the effusion of blood. Every effort was made to impair the confidence of the people in the acts of the Provincial Congress; but when these attempts failed, Howe wrote a letter directed to Mr. Washington. It was returned to the writer unopened, with the intimation that he could receive no communication that was not addressed to him as Commander-in-Chief of the Ameri can forces; as a private man, he could hold no intercourse with the enemies The Penn Monthly, for August, 1871, vol ii., p. 379. 300 THE BATTLE OF LONG ISLAND. of his country. Further attempts were made by addressing him as 'George Washington, Esq.,' etc. The same result followed. It was then determined to take New York, and annihilate the main body of the American army. They could then easily succeed in cutting off all communication between New York and the Southern colonies; and Sir Guy Carleton was prepared, with thirteen thousand men, to descend from Canada to meet Lord Howe in his advance up the Hudson to Lake Champlain. By reinforcements of the provincial militia, Washington had now under his command, nominally, twenty-seven thousand men. But, owing to sickness, and a short provision of arms, scarcely one-half of this number could be called into requisition; and even they were without order or discipline. But poorly provided as he was with the materials of war, he resolved not to abandon the important post of New York, until after a hard struggle. The Battle of Long Island.—That struggle was at hand. On the 25th of August, the British had landed twenty thousand effective men,' and forty cannon on the western end of Long Island, between New Utrecht-now Fort Hamilton-and Gravesend, and they posted themselves in a line stretching as far as the Flatlands, only four miles from the fortified camp of General Sullivan on Brooklyn Heights. 'It was,' says Bancroft, the most perfect army of that day in the world, for experience, discipline, equipments, and artillery; and was supported by more than four hundred ships and transports in the bay; by ten ships of the line, and twenty frigates, besides bomb-ketches, galiots, and other small vessels. Against this vast armament the Americans on the Island, after repeated reinforcements, were no more than eight thousand men, most of whom were volunteers or militia; and they had not the aid of a single platoon of cavalry, nor one ship of war.' A large detachment was at once despatched by Washington under General Putnam, who was to take the chief command of the little army-all Washington could spare to resist the assault of a vastly superior number. The sudden illness of General Greene, who alone, from his complete knowledge of the ground and superior generalship, was equal to such a work, was regarded at the time, as it has ever since been, an unmixed misfortune. Supposing that an attack would be simultaneously made by the fleet on New York,-as Howe had intended, and which nothing but a sudden change in the wind prevented,-Washington could not leave the city in time to help the army across the river, and as he landed, later in the day, and rode through our broken lines, he saw that it was a hopeless defeat. 1 There had been so much misconception about the numbers of British troops engaged in the Battle of Long Island, that the time had fully come to get at the facts. Bancroft has set the matter at rest on un questionable authority. In his ninth volume, p. 85, is found the following statement: "Howe, in the Observations annexed to his Narrative, p 45, wrote thus: I landed upon Long Island with bet reen 15,000 and 16,000 rank and file, having left the remainder of the army for the defence of Staten Island; my whole force at that time consisted of 20, 121 rank and file, of which 1,677 were sick.' It is charitable to suppose that his memory was for the moment confused; on August 27, 1776, his rank and file amounted to 24,247, apart from the royalist force under Briga dier De Lancey. MSS. in my possession from the British State-paper Office. Sir George Collier writes that the army with Howe on Long Island amounted now to upwards of 20,000, besides those who remained on Staten Island.' Detail of Services by Sir Georgs Collier in Naval Chronicle, xxxii. 271. Sir Georg Collier was employed at the time to cover the land. ing of the troops." WASHINGTON'S ADDRESS TO THE ARMY. 301 Washington's Address to the Army before the Battle of Long Island.-'The time is now near at hand, which must probably determine whether Americans are to be freemen or slaves; whether they are to have any property they can call their own; whether their houses and farms are to be pillaged and destroyed, and themselves consigned to a state of wretchedness, from which no human efforts will deliver them. The fate of unborn millions will now depend, under God, on the courage and conduct of this army. Our cruel and unrelenting enemy leaves us only the choice of a brave resistance, or the most abject submission. We have, therefore, to resolve to conquer or to die. 'Our own, our country's honor, calls upon us for a vigorous and manly exertion; and if we now shamefully fail, we shall become infamous to the whole world. Let us then rely on the goodness of our cause, and the aid of the Supreme Being, in whose hand victory is, to animate and encourage us to great and noble actions. The eyes of all our countrymen are now upon us, and we shall have their blessings and praises, if happily we are the instruments of saving them from the tyranny meditated against them. Let us therefore animate and encourage each other, and show the whole world, that a freeman contending for liberty on his own ground, is superior to any slavish mercenary on earth. 'Liberty, property, life, and honor are all at stake; upon your courage and conduct rest the hopes of our bleeding and insulted country; our wives, children, and parents expect safety from us only; and they have every reason to believe that Heaven will crown with success so just a cause. 'The enemy will endeavor to intimidate by show and appearance; but remember that they have been repulsed on various occasions by a few brave Americans. Their cause is bad-their men are conscious of it, and, if opposed with firmness and coolness on their first onset, with our advantage of works, and knowledge of the ground, the victory is most assuredly ours. Every good soldier will be silent and attentive-wait for orders and reserve his fire until he is sure of doing execution.' Before day-break on the morning of the 27th, the British commanders brought on the action. Clinton from the old Jamaica road on the east, swept down on Sullivan while he was desperately struggling with De Heister. Grant, from the Bay of New York on the west, engaged Stirling among the hills where Greenwood,—the silent city of the dead,—now stands, and whose soil was from that day consecrated by the most generous blood. He had also to contend with Cornwallis, and surrendered only after a hard-fought but hopeless battle, many of his fugitive troops being swallowed up by the tide rushing into Gowanus Creek. After a hand-to-hand fight with the foe in front and rear, Sullivan was also taken prisoner with a large part of his division, and the day was lost.' 'At this moment '-the signal for a general 1 In an ORATION on the Life, Character, and Public services of GENERAL NATHANIEL WOODHULL, by LUTHER R. MARSH, ESQ., some years ago, the distinguished lawyer and scholar, after tracing the career of the Statesman and Soldier who had fallen into the hands of the enemy on the bloody Long Island day, thus he speaks of his death and cl aracter: 'But General Woodhull, cut off in the position he was ordered to maintain, from the soldiers of Congress, unaided, alone, fell into British power. Upon being commanded to say "God save the King," he firmly refused, but replied with the nobler sentiment, save us all." His refusal to comply, brought upon him the savage violence of his captors. But, though "Goa 302 THE RETREAT FROM LONG ISLAND. attack-continues Bancroft, the whole force of the Americans on Long Island was but about eight thousand, less rather than more; of these only about four thousand, including all who came out with Stirling and Sullivan, were on the wooded passes in advance of the Brooklyn lines. They were environed by the largest British army which appeared in the field during the war. Could the American parties have acted together, the disproportion would yet have been more than five to one; but as they were disconnected, and were attacked one by one, and were routed in a succession of skirmishes, the disproportion was too great to be calculated.' The Memorable Retreat.-During the six hours the battle was raging, Wash ington had watched it from New York with intense anguish, but to have left his position or sent further reinforcements might have proved fatal. The loss was afterwards shown by Washington to have been somewhat less than one thousand, of whom three-fourths were prisoners; and although they had been so well drawn off that they succeeded in gaining their entrenchments, yet the victorious enemy felt sure of their capture, which should end the war. On the morning after the battle, Washington learned that the British would delay a further attack until Howe's fleet could move up the East River to co-operate, which would give him a day for planning the escape of his army. During the morning General Mifflin had brought over a reinforcement of a thousand men, whose arrival was greeted with cheers. This raised the number of Americans to nine thousand, and served effectually to conceal the resolution which Washington had already formed, to retreat with the whole body. In Mifflin's loyalty and discretion he could place absolute trust. Through him he sent early in the morning-August 29-in writing, a peremptory command to Heath at King's Bridge, a distance of fifteen miles, 'to order every flat-bottomed boat and other craft at his post, fit for transporting troops, down to New York as soon as possible-without any delay. Trumbull, the Commissary-General, was despatched to New York 'to impress every kind of water-craft, on either side of the river, that could be kept afloat, and had either oars or sails, or could be furnished with them, and to have them all in the East river by dark.' Washington had now been fortyhours in the saddle, in a cold drenching rain; but caring little for rest at any time, and least of all at a time like this, he was riding night and day from defenceless, assaulted with the sword, severely wounded in the head, and with an arm mangled and bleeding, "God save us all," was the only benediction that could be hacked from his lips. While he would ac knowledge no kingly monopoly of the blessing of God, he would recognize no kingly exclusion, even of an enemy-" God save us all," king and subject, friend and foe, the victor and the vanquished, the prisoner and the free, the living and the dead. "God save us all." Here was a breadth of philanthropy which knew no exception. Here was the teaching of our Saviour carried into practice. Here was the mingling of courage, patriotism and religion. While he invoked the Divine blessing upon all, he would admit neither exclusion nor exclusive right-a sublime spectacle! He would not yield the sentiment; he would sooner yield his life. At the risk of death he clung to his faith, and gave up his life for a deathless inciple. Mortally wounded-thrown with eighty of his countrymen into "God HOW THE RETREAT WAS CONDUCTED. 303 station to station, encouraging his worn, half-clothed, and half-famished men with inspiring words, while his whole bearing betokened the unshaken confidence of an undaunted soul. Later in the day he called a council of war at the house of Philip Livingston on Brooklyn Heights, and opened his whole plan. Some fiery spirits declared against it. But Macdougall, the sailor, showed that they were liable every moment on a change of wind, to have their communication with New York cut off by the British frigates.' An eastern storm of two days had injured their arms and spoiled most of their ammunition; the soldiery, of whom many were without cover at night, were worn out by incessant duties and watching. The resolution to retreat was therefore unanimous; yet in ignorance of what orders Washington had issued, and how well they had been obeyed, an opinion was entertained in the council that success was not to be hoped for.' Some time after dark the officers of every regiment were ordered to hold their entire commands ready for a night attack, and in the utmost silence the preparations were made along all the lines. Every man of the nine thousand seemed to feel that the fate of the next few hours hung upon his own prudence and valor. Meanwhile the tiny fleet of homely craft was carefully manoeuvring in the darkness and storm and raging tide of the East river, waiting for the concerted signals. The preparations were conducted with such profound secresy that no suspicion of his purpose was excited. Not one of his own aids was in his confidence. All the preparations being complete, at nine o'clock, with the greatest silence, the American troops began to move down to the shore. But a violent northeast wind and angry tide rendered all attempts to cross worse than futile. The elements, however, became auspicious; for while the anxious host could see no deliverance but in the miraculous interposition of Heaven, the wind suddenly veered to the southwest, the water became so smooth that the row-boats could be laden nearly to the gunwales. The British were so nigh that they were heard with their pickaxes and shovels; yet neither Agnew, their general officer for the night, nor any of them, took notice of the deep murmur in the camp, or the plash of oars on the river, or the ripple under the sail-boats. All night long, Washington was riding through the camp, insuring the regularity of every movement. Some time before dawn on Friday morning, Mifflin, through a mistake of orders, began to march the covering party to the ferry: it was Washington who discovered them in time to check their premature withdrawing. The order to resume their posts was a trying test of young soldiers; the regiments wheeled about with precision, and recovered their former station before the enemy perceived that it had been relinquished. As day approached, the sea-fog came rolling in thickly from the ocean; welcomed as a heavenly messenger, it shrouded the British camp, completely hid all Brooklyn, and hung over the East river, without enveloping New York. When after three hours or more of further waiting, and after every other regiment was safely cared for, the covering party came down to the water-side, Washington remained standing on the ferry-stair, and would not be persuaded to |