Henry Knox (12 page)

That same day, Knox wrote to Adams that he feared the inadequacies in the artillery corps could cause the loss of New York or even the war itself. He urged Congress to increase the pay of enlisted soldiers rather than placing hope in untrained and amateur state militias. To build an experienced army, Congress could not afford to economize on the soldiery. "When their homes
were invaded," Knox wrote Adams, "they fought for self-preservation. Now that they are moved away from these, they naturally consider that those who do not fight should pay.“
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On August 21, local inhabitants crossed the East River with reports that the British attack was imminent. According to intelligence they had gathered, about 20,000 regulars were gearing up and in motion for an assault the next day. Seven battleships were to surround New York and pin the American army in, as the British had been pinned in Boston earlier in the year. At 7
P.M.
that same day, Knox watched the most dreadful thunderstorm that many people could ever remember. He was jarred by terrific thunderclaps as the storm raged for three hours. Lightning struck a tent in the city, killing a captain and two lieutenants. The tips of the men's swords melted and twisted in the electric shock, along with silver dollars in their pockets. Another man was killed on Main Street, and ten others on Long Island died from lightning strikes. The sailors in the British fleet were tossed about in the ferment of the Atlantic.
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The storm abated by 10
P.M.
, at which time British and foreign troops boarded transports and began crossing the East River from Staten Island to Gravesend Bay at Utrecht on Long Island. By 10
A.M.
on Thursday, August 22, 15,000 troops had landed and established a foothold within three miles of the American lines. On Friday, the British advance guard pushed north as far as Flatbush under heavy American fire from the nearby woods. Knox remained at Fort George, where Washington and his advisors believed the main attack would be against Manhattan. His men stayed on alert for three days, hoping that a timely cannonade might discourage British ships from approaching the city's shoreline. On Monday, August 26, Howe feigned an attack on Flatbush and the adjoining Bedford Pass to draw the patriot army while the bulk of his force moved farther north up Staten Island along the Jamaica Pass during the night. At two o'clock Tuesday morning, a force of Hessian mercenaries attacked the Americans in the woods with British field artillery. Knox's gunners returned fire from just a couple hundred yards away. British guns fired into the trees, splintering trunks and branches and ripping through fortifications where the Americans hoped to make their stand. A gunfight and cannon duel dragged on for seven exhausting hours. Rain fell again, leaving the soldiers drenched. Ammunition became soaked and ruined. By 9
A.M.
on Wednesday, August 28, the patriots realized they had been outflanked. Surrounded by the British troops that had come up the Jamaica Pass,
they had to make their retreat through British lines, which were posted on roads leading to the fortifications at Brooklyn Heights. Washington ordered six regiments from Manhattan to cross the East River to reinforce the position. Knox also arrived at the scene. Two generals, Sullivan and Lord Stirling, were taken prisoner on Long Island. Sullivan was commanding only because Nathanael Greene was severely ill. Henry wrote Lucy that "I met with some loss in my regiment: they behaved like heroes and are gone to glory.“
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Several British ships attempted to sail up the East River and cut off the army on Long Island, but wind from the northeast prevented their progress.

Washington ordered an evacuation of Brooklyn Heights on Thursday, August 29. Knox, in charge of one of the two embarkation points, was mortified when one of his cannons accidentally fired. Fortunately for the Americans, the blast did not reveal the troops' secret departure across the East River to enemy picket guards. A heavy wind blowing from the east caused a churning high tide that prevented the American departure as the British marched in their direction. In what must have seemed like a hand from providence, the wind changed at 11:30
P.M.
and blew out to sea, and a heavy fog descended, providing cover for the 9,500 American troops attempting to cross the river. Knox was able to load almost all of the cannons onto barges, which were crewed by men from Massachusetts towns such as Beverly, Salem, Lynn, and Marblehead. Many of these soldiers had been fishermen and seamen before the war and were accustomed to the sea. They were led by a strict disciplinarian, Colonel John Glover, who had been a prosperous shipowner and a member of the close-knit "codfish aristocracy," which controlled the north shores of New England. Knox was able to tap the skills of the men from his home state to facilitate the crossing.
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Six heavy iron guns, however, were hoisted onto carriages, which immediately sank so deeply in the sodden ground that the spokes were buried up to the hubs and axles. The guns could not be moved and were abandoned. The troops rowed through the fog to safety in New York City. In the Battle of Long Island, 1,012 men of the Continental Army were killed, wounded, or taken prisoner. The loss of Brooklyn, overlooking Manhattan, meant the city could not be defended against British cannons.

The British moved up Long Island to Hell's Gate across from Kip's Bay and threatened to cut off Washington's land route out of New York. On Monday, September 2, a forty-gun battleship sailed up the Long Island Sound between Governor's and Long islands. Knox's artillerists opened fire from their batteries, but a strong wind allowed the vessel to reach Turtle Bay.
Knox quickly sent Major John Crane with two twelve-pound cannons and a howitzer to pound the ship, which took shelter behind an island. Several other British ships came into the sound and prepared to surround the Continental Army.

Knox, like Washington, was incensed that many of the state militia units suddenly found excuses to leave in the face of danger. "Apprehension and [despair]" characterized the army, Washington wrote to Congress.
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Knox wrote in disgust to Lucy on Thursday, September 5: "We want great men, who when fortune frowns will not be discouraged. God will I trust in time give us these men. The Congress will ruin everything by their stupid parsimony, and they begin to see it. It is, as I always said, misfortunes that must raise us to the character of a great people. One or two drubbings will be of service to us; and one severe defeat to the enemy, ruin. We must have a standing army. The militia get sick, or think themselves so, and run home; and wherever they go they spread panic.“
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Knox spent several days moving military supplies out of New York City and farther up Manhattan Island, hoping to put them out of reach if the British forced the Continental Army into a retreat. The redcoats and Hessian soldiers entrenched themselves along the shores of Long Island and prepared to launch their assault. Knox's men at Hell's Gate stood watch with cannons ready, realizing they were in easy reach of enemy guns aboard the British battleships in Long Island Sound. Rather than following up their victories with a fatal blow to the American army, however, the British commanders sent out peace feelers, believing that their stunned opponents realized the inevitability of their defeat and would avoid a senseless slaughter. On Wednesday, September 11, Lord Howe met with congressional leaders John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Edward Rutledge for three hours on Staten Island to discuss his offer of reconciliation with Britain. But the delegates expressed an unwavering commitment to independence and said they could not rescind the July 4 Declaration.

The British landed more troops on Montresor's Island at the mouth of the Harlem River, causing Washington to split his force. On September 12, a war council of his generals reversed their decision of just five days earlier to defend lower Manhattan. Their force was spread thin and divided, and the British threatened to surround them. So the order was given to evacuate New York City and move eight miles north to Harlem Heights. Knox believed that, without the help of a navy, an island such as Manhattan could not be defended
against an enemy blessed with a formidable fleet. He had been working to exhaustion for more than a month. In a letter to his brother, he wrote: "My constant fatigue and application to the business of my extensive department has been such that I have not had my clothes off once o'nights for more than forty days.“
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Peering through their spyglasses, the British saw that the Americans were packing up to leave lower Manhattan. They launched their assault on Sunday, September 15, crossing the East River at Hell's Gate or Hook's Horn and landing along Kip's Bay under the cover of a heavy cannonade from British battleships. At the same time, the frigate
Asia
and two other ships sailed into the Hudson to prevent the Americans from evacuating across the river to New Jersey. Knox's artillery unleashed heavy fire from Paulus Hook. The Americans retreated north on land along the Hudson. Knox, weighed down with the task of moving cannons, was among the last to leave the city when British troops began to arrive. Cut off from the road leading to Harlem, he was forced to abandon many of the heavy cannons and a large supply of munitions along with his luggage. With some of his men, Knox climbed into a boat, pushed from the shore, and sailed north with only minutes to spare.

As evening set in, Knox still had not arrived at Harlem Heights to join Washington, who heard reports that Henry had been captured. Washington himself had nearly been captured that day, when a fleeing American brigade left him standing alone within eighty yards of the enemy. He had remained on his horse for forty-eight hours during the evacuation. Eventually Henry came straggling into camp, his strength completely sapped, to the relief and manifest joy of his comrades.

He could not afford time to rest, however, and had to ready his artillery regiment to defend Harlem. A British advance party neared the American lines the next day, September 16, but was repulsed with heavy losses due to a determination not demonstrated by the Americans the previous day. The Continental regiments chased the British for two miles before Washington ordered a retreat as enemy reinforcements advanced. As Knox suspected and preached to his fellow soldiers, the British were not invincible. "The affair of last Monday [the Battle of Harlem Heights] has had some good consequences towards raising the people's spirits," Knox wrote to his brother William. "They find that if they stick to these mighty men, they will run as fast as other people."

In the same letter, Knox reflected on a lack of direction that pervaded the ranks and hoped that the ongoing congressional reorganization of the army
would include more officers and better pay and training for the troops. He wrote William again on Monday, September 23, commenting that Washington "is as worthy a man as breathes, but he cannot do everything nor be everywhere. He wants good assistants. There is a radical evil in our army—the lack of officers. We ought to have men of merit in the most extensive and unlimited sense of the word. Instead of which, the bulk of the officers of the army are a parcel of ignorant, stupid men, who might make tolerable soldiers, but [are] bad officers; and until Congress forms an establishment to induce men proper for the purpose to leave their usual employments and enter the service, it is ten to one they will be beat till they are heartily tired of it."

He admitted that he had been disgusted by much of what he had witnessed in the ranks. "As the army now stands, it is only a receptacle for ragamuffins." The remedy, he thought, was not only in attracting talent by better pay but in congressionally authorized military schools: "We ought to have academies, in which the whole theory of the art of war shall be taught, and every other encouragement possible given to draw persons into the army that may give a luster to our arms.“
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Two days later, Knox wrote the same sentiments to John Adams, who replied that he had proposed in Congress on October 1 the formation of a committee to consider establishing a military academy. Adams, who was on the committee, wrote Knox, "Write me your sentiments upon the subject" and that "I wish we had a military academy, and should be obliged to you for a plan of such an Institution. The expense would be a trifle, no object at all with me."