First Salute (45 page)

The inability of all three British commanders, Hood, Graves and Clinton, to envisage the envelopment of Cornwallis by a combination of the rebel army and the French fleet on the Virginia coast was simple obtuseness, the more so as the destination of Washington’s march had been revealed by deserters and, so it is said, by an American girl, mistress of Rochambeau’s son—inadvertently, one hopes. As usual with clandestine information, Clinton and his staff did not believe it, and, as always, underrated their opponent. They could not believe that Washington would undertake so Herculean a task as a march to Virginia, or
would leave the Hudson forts denuded of his main army. If there was to be a junction with de Grasse, it seemed obvious to Clinton it was planned for Staten Island, for attack on New York.

In truth, a month of paralysis took hold of the British command in America when the French fleet entered the situation, as if each of the three—Clinton, the Commander-in-Chief; Graves, the Naval Chief; Cornwallis, General of the Army on the spot—had been administered a sedative. It began when a dispatch from Rodney reached Clinton on September 2 reporting that de Grasse’s destination was the Chesapeake, as he had learned from the pilots who came to meet de Grasse at Cap-Frančais. Though the news threatened Cornwallis and not directly himself, Clinton realized that a fateful moment was at hand. “Things appear to be coming fast to a crisis,” he wrote to Germain. “We are therefore no longer to compare forces with the enemy, but to endeavour to act in the best manner we can against them. With what I have, inadequate as it is, I will exert myself to the utmost to save Lord Cornwallis.” In short, he recognized at this point that Cornwallis had to be “saved.” On this day, too, he learned from Philadelphia, where the marching army he had thought on its way to Staten Island had arrived to a rapturous public greeting, that the land forces of Washington and Rochambeau were headed for a union with de Grasse at the Chesapeake. Clinton now had in his possession the full outline of the enemy’s scheme, and although he was by nature the most hesitant of the three commanders, he did act at once to order Graves to take on board 5,000 reinforcements to relieve Cornwallis, for departure on October 5, with the qualification, “
as soon as the way is clear”—as if expecting that de Grasse, if indeed he had come, would obligingly move out of the way. De Grasse had, in fact, arrived. After crossing the Atlantic without interception by Rodney or Hood, and after escaping Hood’s notice by the maneuver through the Bahama Channel, he entered Chesapeake Bay on August 30, while Graves and Hood were still considering the matter at New York. Graves was anchored in the harbor inside the bar and Hood outside. For three days they remained in place. It was not until August 31 that they hoisted sail for the Chesapeake, and no sense of urgency impelled them because they expected to retain numerical superiority in any event—provided they could block de Barras from adding his strength to the French fleet. But de Barras had already left Newport, on his way to the Bay on August 25, well before Hood and Graves left New York.

Anxious to be on time for the rendezvous with de Grasse at the Chesapeake, Washington had ordered the Allied armies, as soon as they disembarked on the Jersey shore, to supply themselves with three days’ rations and be ready to move at four o’clock in the morning, with the New York First Regiment leading, followed by the artillery and the Rhode Island Regiment and the French First Division. The march to Virginia had begun. The journal of Rochambeau’s aide, Baron von Closen, is an invaluable record of the journey.

Von Closen was a native of the Palatinate, the Rhineland district lying between France and Germany. He had adopted France as his country, and entered military service at fourteen as a “pleasing, industrious, extremely intelligent, especially well informed” young officer. Rapidly promoted, he obtained a commission with the Royal Deux-Ponts regiment, who came to America in 1780 with Rochambeau. The Deux-Ponts wore sky-blue uniforms with lemon-yellow collars and facings. Closen was among the foreign diarists of the expedition who, unlike the Duc de Lauzun, were interested observers of the scenes and persons of American life and studiously recorded their observations in journals which, after 200 years, give us glimpses of what America looked like where they passed, often with unexpected views and comments.

Because of the limited and primitive roads of the period, and to ease the pressure of foraging on the countryside and to add to Clinton’s uncertainty about the objective, the Allied army, in two groups, took separate routes along two parallel lines. Foot soldiers covered fifteen miles the first day, a distance that over the next two weeks remained about the daily average. Officers rode, including the French who had brought their own horses. Washington’s army marched in three columns, arriving at scheduled destinations at different times. On the way, Washington, further to implicate Staten Island, ordered the construction of hardtack ovens at Chatham, New Jersey, to suggest the establishment of a permanent camp and, in addition, the collection of thirty flat-bottomed boats on wheels, both for use on rivers going south as well as to imply a crossing to Staten Island.

Von Closen’s route passed through the well-cultivated lands of long-settled New Jersey, where imperturbable cows under old gnarled apple trees lazily lifted their heads to stare at the riders. He finds pasture fences arranged like fence rails in France, “five of them, one on top of the other.” Describing a “very beautiful small valley” along the river road between Chatham and Elizabethtown, he thought it “a land of
milk and honey, with game, fish, vegetables, poultry,” where the inhabitants—of Dutch origin, he thinks—“have kept it neat” in contrast to New York state “where misery is written on the brows of the inhabitants”—one of von Closen’s odd remarks of now buried import. The riders continue on a “beautiful route” to Pompton, passing several large residences and fine cattle. At a “grandiose residence” in Whippany they are served a “sumptuous dinner,” not repeated next day when at Bullion’s Tavern at Basking Ridge they eat a “rather mediocre supper,” balanced for von Closen by happiness in learning he is to have a bed, although he has to share it with Colonel Smith, an aide to Washington. They come next to Princeton, described in Blanchard’s
Journal
as “a pretty village where the inns are handsome and very clean. A very handsome college is also to be seen there, [having] 50 scholars, [with] room for 200.” So much for Princeton. After a “very good American breakfast” they push on to Trenton, having covered 45 miles that day. They dine with Washington and hear his account of past battles. Half a mile from the Delaware, Trenton is a “charming site in spite of the ravages of the Hessians (who made themselves hated).” The district is still rich in large villages reminding von Closen of his native Palatinate, though it has no good Rhine wine. Instead the people drink a delicious “Pery,” or pear cider.

During the army’s march through Jersey, a courier brought news on August 29 causing profound anxiety. An observer at Sandy Hook—a general of the New Jersey militia known to be trustworthy—reported the
appearance of a fleet of eighteen ships, identified by their flags as British. Later the count was modified to fourteen, but either way the combination of the newcomers, which were thought to be Rodney’s ships from the West Indies, with Graves’s fleet would, they feared, give the enemy the most dreaded weapon, naval superiority over any number that de Grasse was expected to bring. The ships were not of course Rodney’s but Hood’s, now part of Graves’s fleet, which was not animated by any great offensive energy in its Admiral.

Crossing the Delaware on September 1, the marchers arrived in Philadelphia the next day, having covered so far 133 miles. At Philadelphia the generals, who had entered the city three days in advance of the army, were met by the cheers of spectators and an ovation when they stopped at the City Tavern. Ecstatic applause greeted the dazzling spectacle of the French as they passed in review in their bright white uniforms and white plumes. Wearing colored lapels and collars of pink,
green, violet or blue identifying their regiments, they were the most brilliantly appointed soldiers in Europe. The gold and silver thread in the facings and hats of their orderlies and the gold-headed canes the orderlies carried made them all look like generals. The artillery wore gray with red velvet lapels. Extravagant sartorial display had a purpose: it created an impression of wealth and power on the opponent and pride in the wearer, which has been lost sight of in our nervously egalitarian times. It seems a puzzle how the white uniforms could have been kept clean and pristine after one or two days’ march along dusty or muddy roads. No women were on hand for laundering, for Washington had expressly forbidden camp followers to accompany the march, giving orders that wagons must not give them space nor food rations be issued. Cleaning, as far as it went, would be accomplished by covering stains with talc or white powder of one kind or another used to whiten wigs. Major Gaspard Gallatin, a staff officer of the Royal Deux-Ponts Regiment who kept a journal of the New York campaign, tells us that on reaching Philadelphia, the French Army, “having halted to burnish its arms and dust its white uniforms,” and in the case of some units to change into dress uniform, “made a most impressive entrance in the City.” In contrast, the American troops, grim-faced because they had not been paid, were in no very agreeable mood and were thought by some to be on the edge of mutiny, leaving some doubt whether they would continue to march. Nevertheless, they duly saluted as they filed past the flag, and past Washington, Rochambeau, Luzerne and the members of Congress assembled on the balcony of the State House. As the soldiers marched by, the congressmen doffed their thirteen hats in response. The brass instruments that accompanied French regiments excited the utmost enthusiasm of the crowd, who were accustomed only to fife and drum. The perfect marching in step to the music and the colorful regimental flags augmented the delight of the spectators who, von Closen thought pridefully, “could never have imagined that the French troops could be so handsome.” The ladies watching the review from Minister Luzerne’s residence are “enchanted to see such handsome men and hear such good music.” Rochambeau and his staff are housed “like Princes” by Luzerne. With Washington and his generals they enjoy an “excellent repast” at the home of Robert Morris, with “all the foreign wines possible with which to drink endless toasts” to the United States, to the Kings of France and Spain, to the Allies and to the Count de Grasse. Afterward, the city was illuminated in Washington’s honor.

The Allies spent the next day sightseeing in the “huge” city, which, with its large harbor and convenient piers for loading and unloading ships that come up the river, is “as commercial as Boston,” having shops filled with fine merchandise. Merchants of the city, von Closen notes, “profited greatly” by the occasion because everyone “stocked up.” The city had 72 straight, wide and well-built streets and sidewalks. The Congress meeting hall has the “finest view imaginable,” and there is a “very famous College with the title of
University
” (the present University of Pennsylvania). At the home of Joseph Reed, “President of the State [sic] of Pennsylvania,” the visitors are entertained at a ceremonial dinner of which the main feature was an immense ninety-pound turtle with soup served in its shell.

Toasts and ovations and honors did not compensate for lack of transport ships expected at Philadelphia. Morris, more familiar with obtaining money than boats, had been able to supply only a few. These were enough to carry the heavy field guns, but hope of water transport for the troops had to be abandoned.

From Philadelphia, the army moved on toward Chester, in Pennsylvania, on the way to its destination at Head of the Elk, at the top of the northernmost inlet of Chesapeake Bay. The anxiety that now rode with Washington like a physical pain can be judged in a letter he wrote on September 2 to Lafayette. “
I am distressed beyond expression to know what is become of the Count de Grasse, and for fear the English fleet, by occupying the Chesapeake … should frustrate all our flattering prospects in that quarter.” He added that he was anxious, too, about de Barras, who was supposed to be coming down to the Chesapeake with the guns and beef for the army. If Lafayette learned anything “new from any quarter,” he was to send it “
on the spur of speed
for I am almost all impatience and anxiety.” These words from General Washington, for so long a rock against an ordinary man’s anxieties, reveal his agony on the march to Virginia. Would all the planning and the alliance and the hope come to nothing? Was he leading his army to futility at the end?

On September 5, as he rode into Chester, the agony was banished in a heart-stopping moment when a
courier from de Grasse’s fleet came riding up to tell him that the Admiral had actually arrived in the Bay with no less than 28 ships and 3,000 troops, and that they were already being disembarked in contact with Lafayette. The Cornwallis trap was laid! After announcing the stunning news to his troops, Washington
turned his horse northward to inform Rochambeau, who was coming down by barge. As Rochambeau’s boat neared the dock at Chester, he and his staff saw the astonishing sight of a tall man acting as if he had taken leave of his senses. He was jumping up and down and waving his arms in sweeping circles, with a hat in one hand and a white handkerchief in the other. On nearing the shore they could see that the eccentric figure was undoubtedly General Washington, ordinarily so grave and self-contained. Rochambeau jumped from the barge to be embraced as the wonderful news was conveyed. No one had ever seen the General so unrestrained and joyful and almost childlike in his happiness. A single worry remained. What about de Barras? Had he been intercepted in the Bay, and the food and guns he carried possibly lost to the Allies at the very brink of the ultimate encounter?

On the day that Washington heard the report about de Grasse, the same news was delivered in Philadelphia when a courier entered the hall where Minister Luzerne was entertaining Comissary Blanchard and eighty guests. All the guests fell silent as the messenger’s document was taken to Luzerne, who, after hasty scanning, and in excitement almost equal to Washington’s, read aloud the announcement that Admiral de Grasse with a reported 36 ships (an exaggerated count) was in the Bay, with 3,000 troops being disembarked to join Lafayette. The company was transported, and the courier overwhelmed as the guests crowded around him. In the city when the news was made public by Luzerne, the population raised cries of “Long live Louis Sixteenth!” and mounted scaffolds and platforms to deliver funeral orations for Cornwallis and lamentations for the Tories.