The enthusiasm of the visits began to wilt as the days blazed on. After a week of no further news of the British fleet, Howe “may now be in the Moon for aught we know,” Congressman Henry Laurens speculated, “but he is probably gone to New England & will Strive to join General Burgoine.”152 John Adams quipped in sporting fashion, “The Hounds are all still at a Fault. Where the game is gone, is the Question. The Scent is quite lost.”153
Washington decided to move the army from Germantown back toward Coryell's Ferry. On August 8, the troops were ordered to pass in review before moving out; here, Lafayette saw the main Continental Army parade for the first time. “About eleven thousand men, poorly armed and even more poorly clothed, offered a singular spectacle,” he recalled. “The best garments were hunting shirts, large jackets of gray linen commonly worn in Carolina.” As for maneuvers, they were clumsy at best. For parade or for battle, “they were always formed in two ranks, with the small men in front”; unlike European armies with grenadiers, “no other distinction as to height was ever observed.” Nonetheless, “they were fine soldiers, led by zealous officers, and each day added to their experience and their discipline.”154
“The army was reviewed, and in the afternoon marched about nine or ten miles back from Germantown,” Col. Timothy Pickering wrote in his journal on August 8. “But it was a hot day; the troops fatigued by being under arms from six o'clock in the morning till one or two in the afternoon; and the march afterwards hurt many of them, especially as some did not arrive at their ground till late in the evening.”
Part of the army had marched to Whitemarsh, about eight miles north, and encamped along Sandy Run. “But the General did not intend they should have moved so far by four or five miles,” Pickering noted. It was a mistake, a needless blunder so common in army operations as to fuel timeless jokes about “military intelligence.” “The Deputy Quartermaster-General miscalculated the distance; and, besides, did not take the route which led most directly to Coryell's Ferry, so that the army marched…five or six miles for nothing.”155
Washington had remained near Germantown and departed on the tenth for Coryell's Ferry. “The soldiers went away about 5 this morning” from Stenton and “left it in a dreadful dirty condition, but have done no very material damage to us,” a relieved Sarah Logan Fisher wrote in her diary. “Engaged two women to come & assist in cleaning the house & yard tomorrow.” The tenant lost his apples, however, and his meadow was ruined by the army horses. Sarah also noted, “The weather is extremely hot.”156
No sooner had Washington left Germantown than word arrived in Philadelphia that the British fleet had been spotted off southern Maryland near the Virginia border three days earlier. “We have found Howe again,” Congressman Lovell crowed sarcastically. “I thought he was lost in the Gulph stream.”157
“Where the Scourge of God, and the Plague of Mankind is gone, no one can guess,” his irascible colleague John Adams told Abigail. “An Express from Sinnepuxtent, a Place between the Capes of Delaware and the Capes of Chesapeak, informs that a fleet of 100 sail was seen off that Place last Thursday.” John, though, had his doubts; “whether this is Fishermens News like that of Cape Ann, I know not.”158
John Hancock forwarded the report to Washington, who had just arrived at camp that evening at “the Crossroads” near Neshaminy Creek in Bucks County, about twenty-five miles northeast of the city. Concerned about the effect that all the marching and countermarching in the heat was having on the health of the troops, Washington decided to stay put until more firm intelligence could be obtained.
Eleven days of sailing from the Delaware Bay had brought the fleet less than 100 miles closer to the capes of the Chesapeake, and strong tides delayed entry for a few more days. “I am now entering my fifth week at sea in a passage of only fourscore leagues,” Sir George Osborn told his brother on August 10. Vacillating between his own optimism and the frustration of a drawn-out voyage, Sir George tried to rationalize his feelings: “I am philosopher enough in great operations of the nature of that I am now engaged in to think that providence or chance directs us better than our own wisdoms and foresight can suggest.” Ever optimistic, Osborn tried to look for a bright spot in the strategy: “The delay therefore of five weeks in a voyage, which in the common course of calculation might be laid at ten days, in the one light may be thought a calamity, but if we consider that we should have arrived just in the heat of the Dog Days in a climate under the latitude of 37, the length of our voyage may prove beneficial to our future operations.”
But even Sir George could not help but face reality. “Indeed I dread the next six weeks for our troops,” he admitted. “We shall probably land in three or four days and with the excessive heats of this month and the rains of September we must expect many agues and fevers.” Still, he managed to find a bright spot, adding, “At present the army is pretty healthy. I have three hundred on board this ship and not one sick man: I never have my own health better than at sea.”159
The unexpected length of the voyage was taking a serious toll on the food supplies and the army's horses. Captain Hamond of the Roebuck had noted at the end of July that even though Howe's decision to go to the Chesapeake was predetermined, it was “not untill the Quarter Master General was consulted as to the State of the Forage who reported, that sufficient remained for 14 days.”160 The estimate was somewhat optimistic; as early as August 7, Captain von Münchhausen commented, “Since it was not foreseen that we would be aboard ship so long, the horses were given very little space; this is the reason they are beginning to die.”161 From the Alert, Captain Montrésor wrote the same day, “Master of the horse Sloop came on board to signifie the distress for want of forage. Gave him a note to the Commissary General.” Three days later, he reported, “The Horse Vessels in general lying too for Food from the forage vessel, they being much distressed.”162
Fresh food ran out, so the troops and many of the officers were put on salt rations. “Three weeks we were told to lay in for,” grumbled Lt. Loftus Cliffe. “Use brought us to relish our Salt Pork.” He blamed the situation on the long wait “from my taking Shipping at Staten Island the 9th July or rather from the 23d July that we sailed, for that interval was taken up only in consuming our fresh Stock, very scantily laid in indeed.”163
“The Officers were upon Salt Provisions for some Weeks before they came ashore, some of our Generals observed the same Regimen,” General Grant commented imperiously from the comfort of the Isis, commanded by Capt. William Cornwallis. “Lord Cornwallis & I lived well on Board the Isis with his Brother, who neither eats or drinks himself—but takes good care of his Friends.”164
“Col. [Henry] Monckton and Major Gardiner (the Genl's Aid de Camp, now acting as Major to our Battalion) and a set of pleasing officers, made us bare the horrors of a ship with resignation,” Lt. William Hale told his parents. “Our fresh provisions were indeed exhausted for more than three weeks before our landing.” As far as beverages were concerned, he wrote, “We drank claret [red Bordeaux wine] all the way, every officer contributing so many days’ pay made the expense very easy to the subalterns, and Col. Monckton supplied us with his own claret when ours was out.”165
The drinking water turned foul, adding to the overall misery. Montrésor observed on August 11, “The officers put to great shifts for want of fresh provisions, rowing about from ship to ship for relief…. Our fresh water on board became very offensive.”166 On board the Martha, Lieutenant von Feilitzsch bemoaned his situation in early August: “Anyone who has a desire to experience misery and misfortune should go aboard ship….1) There is no bread except zwieback [hard biscuits] which is spoiled or full of worms. 2) Stinking water with all possible impurities mixed in….3) The meat is miserable and frightfully salted so that it can hardly be eaten, and then one nearly dies of thirst. 4) The entire ship is full of lice; and when it storms, no one can think of anything else.”167
Despite the lack of fresh food, Osborn and his companions, Fitzpatrick and Wrottes
ley, lived well on the Aolus, what with a French cook and a foppish touch of decadent opulence in the form of a German musician providing background music on a harp. “I have an Harper on board, one of the Musick of the Regiment de Ditforth,” Sir George informed his brother John. “We have a Frenchman, one of the best campaign cooks I ever met with and at times we live tres honnetement [“very properly”], at present indeed malheureusemen nous n'avons querre de provisions [“unfortunately, we cannot fetch fresh provisions”].”
Still, even with these perks, Osborn yearned for some home cooking from Mrs. Blackford, the cook at the family estate in Bedfordshire, Chicksands Priory. He told his brother, “If Mrs. Blackford [only] knew how acceptable some of her good poultry and kitchen garden productions would be. You may tell her I am confident she would run out and gather them herself and be happy to send them to me.” Sir George knew her temperament well: He should be home looking after the estate, not gallivanting around America with his friends, listening to harp music! “She would say probably that if she were me, she would eat them at Chicksands,” he gibed, tongue-in-cheek. On a more serious note, he remarked to John, “You may likewise tell her that her Master is really and truly of a very different opinion; he feels himself one stake, though but a small one, in one of the most important struggles his or any other country was ever engaged in, and the period he trusts not very far off when he shall be eyewitness whether the finest Empire upon the globe shall be attached or wrested from Great Britain.”168
The voyage had its share of hair-raising episodes, involving collisions, near misses, and spectacular electrical storms. Most frightening and fascinating of all were the lightning strikes. Fueled by the intense heat, the thunderstorms, memorable for their violence, left a vivid impression on these northern Europeans. Captain von Münchhausen described the effect of a lightning bolt hitting the Brittania on August 6: “Our foremast was shattered down to the keel, damaging the decks and knocking down the sails and yards. The whole forepart of the ship, which was set afire, was sunk into the sea by the force of the blow. Thus, the fire was extinguished and we were saved.” But the danger was far from over: “We worked pumps hard and constantly to keep our ship from sinking…. There was no ship in the vicinity, because during the storm, ships always spread out to avoid collision…. Soon after we had been hit, the storm ended. A complete calm followed…. The Admiral ordered the nearest ships of the line to send their carpenters to us, who at once began to repair our damage by putting up a new mast etc…. With the exception of a sailor, who is not expected to recover, no one was injured.”169
John Adams expressed little sympathy for the “Scourge of God” and “Plague of Mankind.” “I wish this Wiseacre may continue to coast about until an equinoctial Storm shall overtake him,” he wrote spitefully. “Such a Thing would make fine Sport for his Fleet.”170
The voyage continued in the same desultory manner, and several more days passed before the fleet was able to clear the Chesapeake capes. To make matters worse, the dog days were in their full fury, and the mid-Atlantic region was in the grips of the hottest stretch in memory. “The winds were so contrary in this part of the voyage, that the middle of August was turned before they entered Chesapeak Bay,” The Annual Register reported, commenting with elegant understatement, “a circumstance highly inconvenient and irksome in that hot season of the year, with so great a number of men and horses crowded and cooped up in the vessels.”171
Up in the Pennsylvania countryside, “the heat is almost unbearable. Here and there people suddenly collapse and die when they are not careful in drinking cold water,” Rev. Henry Muhlenberg entered in his diary on August 11. “Several officers stopped in and refreshed themselves with milk and water, which is the only drink that really slakes thirst.”172
Out in the Atlantic on August 12, Captain Montrésor commented, “The heat of the Sun here feels more like an artificial than a genial heat, and the heat of this night Insupportable. The wind this night from S. W. to W. S. West,” the classic regional summer “heat pump,” which bore out Grant's earlier comments about the climate being the same all over the East Coast in summer.173
From his home west of Baltimore, Congressman Charles Carroll of Carrollton wrote to Benjamin Franklin in Paris that same day and told him, “The 1st [of August] the weather set in very hot, and has continued so ever since; yesterday was the hottest day I ever felt; this is almost as bad—I have not a thermometer or I would let you know the exact degree of heat.”174
“We have been sweltering here, for a great Number of days together, under the scalding wrath of the Dog Star,” a wilting John Adams wrote from Philadelphia on August 13. “So severe a Spell of Heat has scarcely been known these twenty Years. The Air of the City has been like the fierce Breath of an hot Oven.” In a timeless summer ritual, “Every Body has been running to the Pumps all day long.” John told Abigail that it made him feeble and irritable, so much so that “the Fatigue of even holding a Pen to write a Letter, is distressing.”175 The following day, August 14, he wrote, “The Day before Yesterday, Dr. Ewing…told me, the Spirit in his Glass [thermometer fluid], was at 91 in his Cool Room…. Yesterday, it was at 94, abroad in the Shade…against a Post which had been heated by the Sun, and the Spirit arose to 100.”
Adams's thoughts turned again to the British expedition, whose whereabouts were any landsman's guess: “If Howes Army is at Sea, his Men between Decks will suffer, beyond Expression. Persons, here, who have been at Sea, upon this Coast, at this Season of the Year, say, the Heat is more intolerable, on Shipboard than on Land. There is no Comfort to be had any where, and the Reflection of the Suns Rays from the Deck, are insufferable.”176 Congressman Richard Henry Lee of Virginia commented, “Our accounts from France say that [King] George depends much on the ‘desperate efforts that Howe & Cornwallis must make to redeem their bankrupt honor.’ His present Manoeuvre seems the effort of a despairing Bankrupt. For what good can result from having multitudes of Men & Horses confined on board Ships at this season of the year, exposed to the torrid hell that beams upon their heads?”177
Earlier, after discovering that they were actually heading for the Chesapeake, Ambrose Serle had written, “May GOD defend us from the Fatality of the worst Climate in America at this worst Season of the Year to experience it!” Now, on August 14, he recorded, “The Thermometer in the Shade and at Sea stood frequently at 84° and 86°. What must it have been upon Shore?”178 On the Alert, after a restless night with “the intense heat and closeness horrid,” Captain Montrésor gasped that they were “obliged now to lay on deck. The heat of this day (if possible) more insupportable than yesterday, the pitch melting off the seams of the vessel.”179 His assistant, Capt. Archibald Robertson, noted, “Thermometer at 88°”180
That same day, August 14, the British fleet entered the Chesapeake Bay. Seeing the Virginia shoreline, not far from where his home had been in Norfolk, Loyalist James Parker wrote, “The View of the fleet in this place I make no doubt will incline the patriots to try the speed of their blooded Colts.”181
Despite the heat, the change of scenery inspired much spontaneous commentary from the British officers. “The sailing up Chesapeak Bay was the Grandest Sight, sure that cou'd be seen,” Lt. William Dansey wrote home to Ireland.182 Lt. Loftus Cliffe told his brother, “We were ten Days sailing up the most beautifull Bay perhaps in the World.”183
“It is the boldest Bay in the whole world,” exclaimed Sir George Osborn, “twenty miles broad in many places.” Barely containing his enthusiasm, he told brother John, “Nothing can be more beautiful than our sailing up the Bay of Chesapeak, the Rhine which I sailed through in the year ’75 is really a plaything to it. The boldness of a coast of near 200 miles, which I shall have passed when I arrive at the Elk River (the place of our destination) coasting the length of Virginia and the two shores of Maryland are scenes which I probably may never see again and which falls to the lot of few to behold.”184
The British public's first glimpse of this
voyage came through the eyes of an anonymous British officer by way of a letter published in The London Chronicle a few months later. “After we got into Chesapeak, we came to anchor every night, and I assure you, this part of our voyage was very agreeable; the country on each side of us delightful; the well cultivated fields wore a beautiful aspect and afforded the finest rural prospect. In our way we passed Annapolis which I thought a handsome place, and pleasantly situated.”185 Ambrose Serle proclaimed, “Nothing could be more beautiful than the View of this immense Fleet passing round some of the Headlands. The Bay, the higher it is ascended, becomes more beautiful.”186
The Chesapeake's natural bounty was not only a feast for the eyes. “It's remarkable in this Bay the multitude of crabs that swim nearly to the surface of the water,” Captain Montrésor noticed just below Annapolis, “The Fleet caught thousands.” A delightful change of diet, to be sure, from day after wretched day of boiled salt pork.
But the dog days blazed on. August 16 was a particularly oppressive day, sultry and still. “No wearing coats or waistcoats with any satisfaction,” Montrésor stated. “This if possible the hottest day.”187 That evening, the fleet dropped anchor at dusk as a storm rose, and von Münchhausen reported that “by midnight we experienced the heaviest rain and thunderstorm I have ever seen.” Lt. Heinrich von Feilitzsch confirmed that “during the night there was a thunderstorm such as has never been seen in Europe.”188 Sgt. Thomas Sullivan of the 49th wrote, “A Woman's shift being burnt upon her body, lying in a Birth [berth] on a Transport, and she aSleep, by a Flash of Lightning, without the least damage to her skin or Flesh, Also a Man's Coat and Shirt was burnt likewise on his Back, without his knowing of it till next morning: And the Arms of three Companies of men were japanned [blackened] on Board the same ship by the same Flash.” The same storm “killed seven horses in a horse ship.”189
The Philadelphia Campaign Page 14
