CHAP. Director of all events; the rebels who need pardon VI. from the king of Britain are not yet discovered." 1776. Sept. 11. 12. By this time the army of General Howe extended along the high ground that overlooks the East river and the sound, from Brooklyn to Flushing, and occupied the two islands which we call Ward's and Randall's; a battery erected at Astoria replied to the American works on the point just north of Hellgate ferry. Night after night, boats came in and anchored just above Bushwick. On the twelfth, Washington, supported by the written request of Greene and six brigadiers, reconvened his council of war at the quarters of Macdougall; and this time it was decided to abandon the lower part of the island, none dissenting but Spencer from sheer ignorance and dulness, Heath from dishonesty, and George Clinton from stubborn zeal. The council was hardly over, when Washington was once more in the lines; and at evening the Americans under his eye doubled their posts along the East river. He was seen by the Hessians, and Krug, a captain of the Hessian artillery, twice in succession pointed cannon at him and his staff, and was aiming a third shot, as he rode on. 13. The thirteenth, the anniversary of the victory on the Plains of Abraham, in which Howe bore an honorable part, was selected for the landing of the British in New York; the watchword was Quebec, the countersign Wolfe; but the ships of war that were to cover the landing caused delay. In the afternoon, four of them, keeping up an incessant fire, and supported by the cannon on Governor's VI. 1776. Sept. 14. island, sailed past the American batteries into the CHAP. East river, and anchored opposite the present Thirteenth street. Washington kept a close watch on their movements, and one of their shot struck within six feet of him. During the fourteenth he did all that his very scanty means of transportation would allow, to save his stores and artillery About sunset, six more British armed ships went up the East river. In one more day, the city would have been evacuated. On the fifteenth, three ships of war ascended the Hudson as far as Bloomingdale, which put a stop to the removal of army stores by water. At eleven, the ships of war which were anchored in the stream below Blackwell's island began a heavy cannonade, to scour the grounds; at the same time, eighty-four boats laden with troops, under the direction of Admiral Hotham, came out of Newtown creek, and with a southerly wind sailed up the East river in four columns; till, on a signal, they formed in line, and, aided by oars and the sweeping tide, came to the shore between Turtle bay and the city, in array for battle. At the sound of the first cannon, Washington, who had supposed the principal landing would be made at Harlem or Morrisania, rode "with all possible despatch" towards Kip's bay, near Thirty-fourth street; as he drew near, he found the men who had been posted in the lines running away, and the brigades of Fellows of Massachusetts and Parsons of Connecticut, that were to have supported them, flying in every direction, heedless of the exertions of their generals. Putnam's division of about four thousand 15. CHAP. troops was still in the lower city, sure to be cut VI. off, unless the British could be delayed. When all 1776. else fails, the commander-in-chief must in person 15. give the example of daring: Washington presented Sept. himself to lead any body of men, however small, who would make an effort to hold the advancing forces in check. He used every means to rally the fugitives, get them into some order, and reanimate their courage; but on the appearance of a party of not more than sixty or seventy, they ran away in the greatest confusion without firing a single shot, panic-stricken from fear of having their retreat cut off, leaving him on the ground within eighty yards of the enemy. "Are these the men by whom I am expected to defend the liberties of America?" he asked of himself; and he seemed to seek death rather than life. Being reminded by the officers nearest him that it was in vain to withstand the British alone, he turned to give the wisest orders for the safety of Harlem heights, and for guarding against ill consequences from the morning's disaster. As the Hessians took immediate possession of the breastworks which guarded the Boston road, near the present Lexington avenue, the fugitive brigades fled, not without loss, across woody fields to Bloomingdale. At ten minutes past three in the afternoon, the American colors were struck on the old Fort George, and the English flag was raised by Lord Dunmore. Most of Putnam's division escaped by a road very near the Hudson; its commander, heedless of the intense heat of the day, rode from post to post to call off the pickets and guards. VI. 1776. Sept. 15. Silliman's brigade threw itself in despair CHAP. into the redoubt of Bunker hill, where Knox, at the head of the artillery, thought only of a gallant defence; but Burr, who was one of Putnam's aids, rode up to show them that a retreat was prac ticable, and guided them by way of the old Monument lane to the west side of the island, where they marched along the winding road now superseded by the Eighth avenue, and regained the Bloomingdale road near the present Sixtieth street. The respite which saved Putnam's division was due to Mary Lindley, the wife of Robert Murray. When the British army drew near her house on Incleberg, as Murray hill was then called, Howe and his officers, ordering a halt, accepted her invitation to a lunch; and by the excellence of her viands and old Madeira wine, and by the good-humor with which she parried Tryon's jests at her sympathy with the rebels, she whiled away two hours or more of their time, till every American regiment had escaped. Washington was the last to retire, riding from Bloomingdale but a few moments before it was occupied by the British infantry. The Americans left behind a few heavy cannon, and much of their baggage and stores; fifteen of them were killed; one hundred and fiftynine were missing, chiefly men who had wilfully loitered behind. The British gained the island as far as the eighth mile-stone, with but two Hessians killed and about twenty British and Hessians wounded. At night, their bivouac extended from the East river near Hellgate to the Hudson at Bloomingdale. On Harlem heights the American VI. 1776. CHAP. fugitives, weary from having passed fifteen hours under arms, disheartened by the loss of their tents and blankets, and wet by a cold driving rain that closed the sultry day, lay on their arms with only the sky above them. Sept. 15. NOTE. The account I have given of Washington's conduct in his attempt to rally the fugitives at Kip's bay agrees substantially with that of Marshall, (Marshall's Washington, i. 101, ed. 1843,) and with the matured judgment of Sparks, (Life of Washington, 199). Washington was justly vexed at the cowardice of the men whom he had stationed at Kip's bay; he reported it in unsparing terms to congress, and censured it in general orders. All agree that he attempted, but in vain, to rally the men; no one disputes that, with the good judgment of perfect self-possession, he gave immediately the wisest orders for the safety of the army, nor that his conduct on the occasion struck the army with such awe that he could count on its courage by the dawn of another day. The makers of gossip have gradually embroidered upon the incident of his serious and well-founded displeasure a variety of inconsistent details. Of strictly contemporary accounts, that is, of accounts written within a few days of the events, I find three of importance: Washington to Congress, September 16, 1776, in his Official Letters, i. 246, and in Sparks, iv. 94; Greene to Governor Cooke of Rhode Island, September 17, 1776, in Force, fifth series, ii. 370; and Cæsar Rodney at Philadelphia to Messrs. Read and Mackean, September 18, 1776. The account of Rodney is a report carefully prepared from various sources which he does not specify. I give an extract from it: "From all I can collect, this was the situation of affairs on Sunday morning, when the ships before mentioned began a very heavy firing at Turtle bay, to scour the country previous to their landing the troops, but hurt nobody, that I can hear of. When the firing ceased, their troops began to land, and ours to run as if the devil was in them. In spite of all the general could do, they never fired one gun. General Washington, having discovered the enemy's intention to land at that place, ordered a reënforcement, and set out there himself. However, before he got to the place, he met our people running in every direction. He endeavored by persuasion and threats to get them back, but all to no purpose; in short, they ran till they left the general to shift for himself." This letter shows clearly the opinion prevailing among men of sense in Philadelphia at the time. Greene's words are: "Fellows's and Parsons's whole brigade ran away from about fifty |