Conceived in Liberty (212 page)

The colonists might choose either alternative or various admixtures of both. On the one hand, they could fight the war in European fashion, gathering together a standard European army, organizing it according to European-style totalitarian discipline, conscripting men and vast supplies to feed and equip the army, and then meeting the British in formal open combat. On the other hand, they could run a new style of war, a radical people’s war of national liberation, a guerrilla war resting on individual responsibility, mobility, and surprise. A guerrilla war would be enormously less expensive than an orthodox one. For one thing, the guerrillas would not be full-time soldiers, torn away from productive labor to require parasitic feeding from an already harassed and burdened population. They would not be hauled from place to place, region to region. Instead they would be part-time soldiers, remaining in production, not requiring taxes or inflation to impose burdens on the people as a whole; they would remain close to home, fighting with high morale for their own area and homes, and feeding off their own continuing production rather than off the rest of society. Moreover, whereas orthodox warfare would require taxation, conscription, hierarchy, discipline, and the creation of a vast unproductive and expensive state bureaucracy to direct and supply the armies while draining the production of society, a guerrilla war could be run individualistically, relying on the zeal of the individual guerrilla, and would entail virtually no central bureaucracy or centralized confiscation of property to finance the war.

In brief, a guerrilla war would be the libertarian way to fight a war fully consistent with the American revolutionary ideals of liberty and equality of rights, and, therefore, the only way to achieve the libertarian goals of the Revolution. A European-style, orthodox war would be heavily statist, and would inevitably lead to the resumption of the very statism—the taxes, the restrictions, the bureaucracy—which the colonists were waging the revolution to escape.

What is more, guerrilla war would be enormously more effective; for that is the way any subjugated people—not only libertarians—can best fight against a better-armed, but hated foe. The efficiency of guerrilla fighting as against European warfare had not only been demonstrated in the unbroken victories of Ethan Allen and the Green Mountain Boys in the Vermont revolution, but also in the victory at Concord, a guerrilla engagement so individualistic as to be almost completely leaderless. In
contrast stood the slaughter at Lexington, where the Americans had fought in fixed ranks in the open.

Both moral principle and utility therefore required the choice of a guerrilla war; but various factors, certainly including the novelty of the dilemma, dictated a different choice.

Massachusetts, a few days after Concord, had little time to ponder its choices. Twenty thousand individualists were keeping the British penned in Boston; but the 20,000, seeing little or nothing for them to do, began to drift home. In truth, the taking of major cities is the final stage of a guerrilla war; if the Americans were not yet strong enough to crush the British force of 4,000 within Boston, there was little point in maintaining the huge besieging force. Besides, Boston’s geography as a peninsula with a very narrow neck and General Gage’s panicky evacuation of the Charles-town Peninsula immediately after Concord insured the immobility of the British army. Here Joseph Warren took a large step away from liberty by pressing for a formal army organization to replace the individual militiaman and by insisting on terms of enlistment to last until the end of the year, and so destroying the freedom of action of the individual soldier. Massachusetts radicalism was beginning to be tempered by conservatism, and Liberty diluted by Power.

On April 23, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress voted to raise over 13,000 men for the siege, and the other New England colonies offered to supply a quota of several thousand each. Although these quotas were never filled, in little over a month 15,000 men of an organized army surrounded Boston. Occupying the center at Cambridge with 9,000 men was Gen. Artemas Ward, in command of the Massachusetts army and acknowledged as commander by the forces of the other New England colonies. On the right, at Roxbury, in front of Boston, was Gen. John Thomas of Massachusetts, commanding 5,000 men; on the extreme left, at Chelsea and Charlestown Neck, were over a thousand New Hampshire
men, headed by Cols. John Stark and James Reed. The Americans had settled down to an expensive and unrewarding—and standard—“Sitzkrieg,” and collecting goods to continue to feed and supply this inert and continuing army soon began to prove difficult. Meanwhile, British reinforcements swelled Gage’s force to over 6,000 men, giving him a greater potential for mischief.

While the New England and British troops were thus stalemated, bolder souls began to dream of American irregulars taking the offensive and striking a vital blow against England. In particular, Ethan Allen had, at least as early as February, been stressing the importance of the American seizure of Fort Ticonderoga should hostilities break out with England. Ticonderoga, on the northern frontier of New York, and at the border of the New Hampshire Grant country, was the vital gateway to Canada —whether for offense or defense against any possible British attempt to march from Canada down the Hudson Valley, splitting the colonies in two. Furthermore, Ticonderoga was known to have by far the largest store of cannon and other heavy artillery in the colonies; if the Americans could possibly manage to transport the big guns to the heights around Boston, they could compel the British to evacuate.

Shortly after Lexington and Concord, Ethan Allen proposed to seize Fort Ticonderoga. The bulk of his force was to consist of his Green Mountain Boys, to which were to be added one troop from Connecticut and one from Pittsfield, Massachusetts. All in all, approximately sixty-five men from Connecticut and western Massachusetts joined a hundred Green Mountain Boys at Bennington (now in Vermont) on May 9, and the leaders unanimously chose Allen as their commander, with Seth Warner and James Easton as his lieutenants.

The same idea had also occurred to the outspoken and wealthy merchant of New Haven, Capt. Benedict Arnold; on hearing of the outbreak of fighting, Arnold, within a day, marched his militia company to Cambridge. On the way, Arnold met and convinced Connecticut’s Col. Samuel Parsons of the importance of capturing Ticonderoga. Parsons promptly set about organizing the expedition. At Cambridge, Arnold successfully threatened to seize the needed ammunition by force when the town authorities tried to block him from taking any. He also persuaded the Massachusetts Committee of Safety to grant him a colonelcy and authorize him to raise men and take Fort Ticonderoga. Hearing of the Allen-Easton expedition, he rushed to the Green Mountain country, and, with characteristic gall, brandished his Massachusetts commission and insisted on taking absolute command of the rebel force. Allen, of course, was not one to bow before any official commission, and neither were his soldiers. Finally, Arnold was allowed to march alongside Allen at the head of the expedition, but there was no doubt in anyone’s mind—except perhaps
Arnold’s—that Ethan Allen was the undisputed leader.

On the morning of May 10, Allen and his intrepid band sailed across Lake Champlain to Ticonderoga. Before launching the surprise assault on the fort, Allen, true both to his libertarian beliefs and to the individualistic framework of guerrilla war, reminded his troops that no one, even at this late date, would be forced against his will to embark on the attack.

The blow was swift and sure; the surprise was complete. Mighty Fort Ticonderoga fell without a shot being fired. Here was eloquent testimony to the effectiveness of the guerrilla tactic, with its advantages of great mobility, superior knowledge, and high morale. The next day, the small British force at neighboring Crown Point fell to a detachment under Lt. Col. Seth Warner, also without a shot.

On the day of Ticonderoga’s capture, the Second Continental Congress opened a monumentally important meeting at Philadelphia. The great task of the Massachusetts and New England radicals was to line up firm military support for and unity with the Massachusetts cause, a difficult task in the face of stubborn conservatism and middle-of-the-road confusion among their colleagues. The New England rebels found they were forced to temper their radicalism and individualism in order to appeal to the far more oligarchic leaders in the other colonies.

One of the early orders of business of the Congress was how to handle the news of Ticonderoga, and the dubious temper of the Congress was revealed in its reaction to the happy news. After Ticonderoga, on May 16, Arnold, reinforced by men from western Massachusetts, had raided and occupied Fort St. John’s in Canada, north of Lake Champlain, and he was preparing to occupy Ticonderoga permanently. Moreover, both Arnold and Allen were proposing to help keep up the momentum by pressing onward to capture Montreal and even all of Canada from the British. Allen asserted that all they would need was more men, but instead of rejoicing at the news, let alone encouraging further victories, Congress was horrified at the entire exploit. In contrast to Lexington and Concord or even to the siege of Boston, here was a frankly
offensive
action against the British armed forces. To welcome Ticonderoga would be to acknowledge that America was fully in the throes of revolution, and Congress, beset by timidity and conservatism, was unwilling to do this. Accordingly, on hearing the news on May 18, Congress promptly ordered Arnold and Allen to abandon Fort Ticonderoga and retreat to the south end of Lake George. Congress’ only slight acknowledgement of the victory was to concede that the Americans might take the guns and amunition back with them; but an accurate account must be kept of them, “in order that they may be safely returned when the restoration of the former harmony between Great Britain and these colonies... shall render it prudent.”

Arnold protested bitterly to the provincial congresses of New York and Massachusetts as well as to the Continental Congress. Allen, too, was willing to swallow his old hatred of New York and appeal to that colony for aid in keeping the forts and pressing onward to Canada. The New England colonies kept up a drumfire of protest and finally persuaded Congress to change its mind and keep the captured forts. Neither Allen nor Arnold were to gain congressional support for a conquest of Canada, however, despite the enthusiastic approval of Sam Adams. Instead, Ticonderoga and Crown Point were granted to Connecticut, and both Allen and Arnold were humiliated by being deprived of command in favor of Col. Benjamin Hinman of Connecticut, who was to occupy the forts with nearly 1,500 more troops from Connecticut. Understandably, Arnold was so disgusted that he resigned and went home. A scintillating guerilla conquest had lost its momentum and deteriorated into an orthodox, idle, and squabbling army of occupation at Ticonderoga.

The most important business before the Congress, however, was not Ticonderoga, but the problem of Boston and the army that Massachusetts and New England had hastily put up around it. What Congress decided to do about that army would determine what it would do about the entire Revolution. As soon as Congress opened, Dr. Warren of the Massachusetts Provincial Congress urged the Continental Congress to take responsibility for the army around Boston by appointing a commander-in-chief—thus committing the other colonies irrevocably to the Revolution. The Congress showed its temper by not even deigning to answer. Instead, as the Massachusetts radicals watched with dismay, it frittered away its time in evading responsibility for adopting the Revolution, merely sending elaborate proofs to London that the British troops had fired first at Lexington. It was clear that a considerable majority of the delegates, led by the now archconservative John Dickinson of Philadelphia, looked forward to reconciliation with Britain rather than to waging the Revolution with zest and vigor toward eventual independence. (Joseph Galloway and Isaac Low, heads of the ultraright in the first Congress, had by then, as outright Tories, moved outside the American dialogue as well as the Continental Congress, and were soon to slip behind British lines.) Seething inwardly, John Adams wrote to Joseph Warren from Philadelphia: “We find a great many bundles of weak nerves.... We are obliged to be as delicate and soft and modest and humble as possible.”

Not receiving any reply to its letter, the Massachusetts Provincial Congress developed a careful petition shrewdly designed to prod the Continental Congress into action by urging Congress to allow Massachusetts to
set up a permanent civil government. Such official authorization of the provincial congress and the network of town committees would push the Continental Congress closer to endorsing an open political break with England. Above all, Massachusetts petitioned Congress to appoint a commander-in-chief of the army at Cambridge. The Massachusetts petition was sent down via the informer Church as personal courier, and was presented to the Congress on June 2. Cautiously, Congress appointed a committee to mull over and report on this vital and controversial petition.

The first part of the Massachusetts petition was relatively easy. On June 7, Congress sanctioned Massachusetts’ new civil government and approved the right of the people to set up their own government in the current circumstances, declaring, however, that this civil government would be only temporary, until reconciliation with Britain could restore the operation of the old, disrupted Massachusetts charter.

Meanwhile, the right-wing had been winning point after point in the Congress. An attempt to shift the site of the Congress northward to Connecticut, near the New England battlefront, had been quashed by the Dickinson group. So underdeveloped was the revolutionary timbre of this Congress that when New York asked what it should do if British troops were to land in New York City, Congress had generously urged the citizens not to resist and to give the soldiers proper quarters! Finally, while the hypocritical plan of British Prime Minister Lord North for conciliation was summarily rejected by the Congress, Dickinson and James Duane of New York infuriated the radicals by moving, at the end of May, to send “An Humble and Dutiful Petition” to the king, pleading for immediate negotiation and mutual accomodation. Infuriated, John Adams blasted such futile and humble petitioning. He argued that Congress should be making haste to defend the continent from the British, to take charge of the army at Cambridge, and even to warn that it was ready to make European alliances to aid its resistance. Adams was quickly backed by John Sullivan of New Hampshire, but Dickinson bitterly warned them that if New England didn’t agree to “our pacific system, I, and a number of us, will break off from you in New England!”