Blood of Tyrants: George Washington & the Forging of the Presidency (39 page)

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Authors: Logan Beirne

Tags: #American Revolution, #Founding Fathers, #George Washington, #18th Century

BOOK: Blood of Tyrants: George Washington & the Forging of the Presidency
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Under this plan, the states were expected to supply guns, shoes, pork, etc. on request. Like a starving man shouting into the wind, these requests fell on deaf ears—the states were usually unable (and often unwilling) to supply Washington’s army. The states were concerned about defending themselves and reluctant to divert their resources for the protection of their sister states. New York even went so far as to take clothing meant for the Continental Army and keep it for the state militia. With his troops “perishing for want of it,” Washington lambasted this appropriation of the clothing as “a most extraordinary piece of Conduct”
23
“People are starving,” Washington lamented; “the Cry of want of Provisions comes to me from every Quarter.”
24
His army had been fighting for years without adequate pay or supplies. During the winter months especially, his men perished for want of food and clothing. The supply shortage became particularly acute at Valley Forge during the bitter winter of 1778.
Upon the arrival of Washington’s troops, the farming community of Valley Forge quickly transformed into a military city of death. Like locusts, the 14,000 soldiers culled trees for miles in every direction to use for construction material and firewood. They worked furiously to erect thousands of crude wooden huts before the frigid winds could pierce their ragged clothing. They built defensive fortifications, and raced against the freezing ground to dig miles of trenches designed by Washington to repel attacks. But the smell of the trenches was probably repulsive enough—they also came to serve as the army’s latrines. Within a few days, the pastoral valley turned into a field of putrid misery.
One patriot reported, “It is certain that half the army are half naked, and almost the whole army go barefoot.”
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Washington’s officers recommended that to keep the army in good fighting condition, each soldier needed daily rations of a pound of beef, pork or salted fish, a pound of flour or hard bread, a half gill of rum or whiskey (liquid courage), and a half pint of rice.
26
But Congress could not keep up with this demand at a cost of three shillings and four pence per ration,
27
and the soldiers were lucky to receive just a fraction of that amount, or any at all.
Washington pleaded for more. “I am now convinced, beyond a doubt,” he wrote to Congress, “that unless some great and capital change suddenly takes place in that line, this Army must inevitably be reduced to one or other of these three things. Starve, dissolve, or disperse, in order to obtain subsistence.” Bemoaning the lack of food and clothing, one of his officers summarized, “All things seem to contribute to the ruin of our cause.”
28
A staggering 2,500 of Washington’s men were estimated to have perished that winter. His principled opposition to plunder was certainly put to the test; there must have been tremendous emotional and political pressure to allow his men to run carte blanche through the countryside seizing supplies for mere self-preservation. But Washington was determined to “crush in its earliest stage every attempt to plunder even those who are known to be Enemies to our Cause.”
29
It was his role to protect the Americans. Only the civil authorities, he believed, had a right to strip Americans of their property.
Washington was fighting to create a democratic republic, not a military dictatorship, after all. And while his powers over war tactics were sweeping, even dictatorial, these did not extend to the American citizens themselves. And so he declared:
The General prohibits both in Militia and Continental Troops, in the most positive terms, the infamous practice of plundering the Inhabitants, under the specious pretence of their being Tories—Let the persons who are known to be enemies to their Country, be seized and confin’d, and their Property disposed of, as the Law of the State directs—It is our business to give protection, and support, to the poor, distressed Inhabitants; not to multiply and increase their calamities. After the publication of this order, any officer, either Militia or Continental, found attempting to conceal the public Stores; plundering the Inhabitants under the notion of their being Tories, or venduing of Plunder taken from the Enemy, in any other manner than these Orders direct, may expect to be punished in the severest manner; and be obliged to account for every thing taken, or sold.
30
 
There was also a practical side to Washington’s principled stance, because he believed that “no plundering Army was ever a successful one.”
31
Cognizant of the fact that he was also fighting for the hearts and minds of the war-weary American people, he reasoned that plundering would “create dreadful Apprehensions in our Friends, and when it is once begun, none can tell where it will stop.”
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Confiscating property without authorization would “embitter the minds of the People, and excite perhaps hurtful jealousy against the Army.”
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Washington aimed to distinguish his army from the plundering British and Hessian forces that had terrorized the countryside. In this way, Washington was acting virtuously not just because he was a “good guy” but also because it was crucial to be seen as such.
Washington was so “resolved to put a stop to plundering, and converting either public, or private property” to military use that he reacted swiftly and severely when his troops violated his orders.
34
Any soldier found to have plundered American property was to be “immediately confined” and “most rigidly punished.”
35
Surprisingly, the prohibition on plunder by the army even extended, for the most part, to the property of civilian Loyalists—much to his ravenous troops’ dismay. While he detested the Loyalists as “abominable pests,” Washington was astonishingly protective of their rights.
36
Though he viewed them as traitorous Americans, the key was that he still generally considered them to be Americans. And he believed this afforded them protection from his military. Many of his starving soldiers, as well as many congressmen, saw his refusal to confiscate Loyalist property as outrageous.
When some troops inevitably disobeyed his strict rules, Washington was not surprised—to his unending frustration, the Continental Army was not the paragon of American virtue that he wished it to be. Exasperated, he explained to Congress, “I have with some others, used my utmost endeavours to stop this horrid practice, but under the present lust after plunder, and want of Laws to punish Offenders, I might almost as well attempt to remove Mount Atlas. I have ordered instant corporal Punishment upon every Man who passes our Lines, or is seen with Plunder . . . .”
37
The commander vigilantly strove to keep his unruly men in line.
On one occasion, a whole regiment was accused of “the infamous practice of Plundering.”
38
Along with a party of twenty men, the colonel of the regiment had purportedly robbed a house on the outskirts of the American encampment. A bemused Washington wrote that the young man was found with “large Pier looking Glasses, Women’s Cloaths, and other Articles which one would think, could be of no Earthly use to him.”
39
But this was no laughing matter. Washington promptly tried the soldier by court-martial, and when the court acquitted him and called for him merely to apologize, Washington rejected such leniency. He “ordered a Reconsideration of the matter, upon which, . . . they made Shift to Cashier him.”
40
Then Washington proceeded to have the regiment expelled along with the colonel. For a man who needed all the troops he could get, this was true conviction.
Washington even went so far as to execute a member of his personal guard for taking supplies from an obstinate Tory. He had entrusted this guard, John Herring, with obtaining supplies from the countryside. With a horse and a pass, Herring set out and arrived at the home of Mr. Prince Howland.
41
A known Loyalist living in Fishkill, New York, Howland owned a collection of fine garments, which Herring spotted during his visit.
42
Following Washington’s protocol, Herring asked to purchase the clothes, but Howland refused to sell them; he was not one to aid the patriot cause.
Herring was not willing to take no for an answer. He gathered other members of Washington’s guard and organized a heist. They knew the policy under Washington: the penalty for such thievery was hanging. Therefore, they donned disguises. While careful to blacken their faces with burnt cork, these not-so-stealthy burglars foolishly wore the round bearskin hats that clearly identified them as Washington’s guard. The bumbling burglars broke into Howland’s house and stole the fine clothing along with some silver spoons and cash.
43
Then they proceeded to loot his neighbor before returning to Washington’s camp. Howland promptly reported the theft, complete with a damning description of the burglars’ telltale hats.
Washington was livid. “Shocked at the frequent horrible Villainies of this nature committed by the troops of late,” he was “determined to make Examples which will deter the boldest and most harden’d offenders.”
44
He had Herring and his cat burglars tried by courts-martial. When they were found guilty and Herring condemned to death, Washington upheld this harsh punishment. He wrote in his general orders for the day, “Men who are called out by their Country to defend the Rights and Property of their fellow Citizens, who are abandoned enough to violate those Rights and plunder that Property deserve and shall receive no Mercy.”
45
The commander had made a strong statement in defense of a Tory’s property.
Realizing their inability to supply Washington’s army, Congress soon granted him license “to take, wherever he may be, all such provisions and other articles as may be necessary for the comfortable subsistence of the army under his command, paying or giving certificates for the same; to remove and secure for the benefit of the owners, all goods and effects, which may be serviceable to the enemy.”
46
Washington was reluctant to take advantage of this authorization, however. During the winter of 1778 he wrote, “I shall use every exertion . . . for subsisting the Army and keeping it together; But I must observe, that this never can be done by coercive means. Supplying of Provisions and Cloathing must be had in another way, or it cannot exist.”
47
He believed it was Congress’s place to confiscate supplies, not his. But with his men in such dire need, he eventually did seize American property—albeit in the least coercive way possible.
Washington acted as a tool of Congress, and a delicate one at that. He reasoned that he must proceed gently, since the military’s exercise of power was always viewed “with a jealous and suspicious eye.”
48
Thus, when he did order his men to confiscate supplies, he provided careful instructions.
In order to requisition supplies in the most democratic way possible, Washington set up a sort of confiscation checklist. His soldiers were required to: 1) have a compelling reason for the taking; 2) work with local authorities as closely as possible in carrying out the seizures; 3) take only small amounts so as not to harm the citizens; and 4) arrange for some type of repayment or, more likely, a promise thereof.
The first criterion was easy to fulfill. By the winter of 1780, Washington had shifted north from his previous quarters at Valley Forge to the area around the tiny village of Morristown, New Jersey. He and his 9,000 men settled into this little hollow nestled in a tranquil region of rolling farms and pasture in northern New Jersey. The land was dotted by picturesque cottages built in the so-called “ancient Dutch form,” with signature sloping dormitories that projected from a dramatically pitched wooden roof. Almost uniformly painted white, these houses varied in size but were typically encircled by “verdant lawns, shrubbery, and well-cultivated gardens.”
49
The Continental Army, however, did not find their stay so idyllic.
Far from a rural utopia, this was a warzone. Adjacent to New York City, the county had been scarred by gruesome battles and had witnessed Washington’s disastrous defeats following his loss of New York. By 1780, Washington had retaken New Jersey and was determined to remain in the mid-Atlantic in hopes of retaking New York. He set up camp at Morristown so that he might keep pressure on Clinton’s troops holed up in the city. The two commanders still assumed there would be a climactic battle between them after so many grueling years of bloodshed. But for now, Washington just worked to survive.
His contest with Clinton had devolved into a war of attrition. And he was losing. In fact, Parliament kept the British troops so well fed and clothed—albeit to the British taxpayers’ growing dismay—that Clinton began putting on a great deal of weight from all the dinner parties he enjoyed in New York. The Americans were unable to keep pace.
50
Washington, for his part, was living comfortably with Martha, five of his officers and eighteen servants in the white Georgian mansion that served as his headquarters. The grand house had been owned by a late patriot, and Washington respectfully paid rent to the widow.
51
But despite his comfort, he was not one to grow detached from the condition of his soldiers, who were shivering and hungry in the less genteel lodgings in the surrounding areas.
The Revolution had already robbed northern New Jersey of its tranquility, and now Washington wanted its food. At the same time, he was aware of the civilian population’s fears. The 250 residents of Morristown locked up their chickens and daughters as they watched the hungry-looking patriots warily.
52
With the coldest winter of the century hitting in 1780, the region was a powder keg of trouble. Before things turned ugly, Washington dispatched his troops to collect 200 head of cattle and 800 bushels of grain from the neighboring farms.
53
He demanded that his men act cautiously and respectfully in doing so, telling them:
I have reposed this trust in you from a perfect confidence in your prudence, zeal and respect for the rights of Citizens. While your measures are adapted to the emergency, and you consult what you owe to the service, I am persuaded you will not forget, that as we are compelled by necessity to take the property of Citizens for the support of the Army on whom their safety depends, we should be careful to manifest that we have a reverence for their rights, and wish not to do any thing which that necessity and even their own good do not absolutely require.
54
 

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