Caroline was still at the center of the behind-the-scenes negotiations. Dr. Franklin remained a constant guest during the holiday season. The upshot of his first two meetings with Richard in Grafton Street, on December 25 and 28, was a request by the admiral for a new set of conciliatory proposals. Within days, Franklin conveyed these to Caroline. In order to conceal Franklin’s handwriting and protect his anonymity, Caroline transcribed them herself before passing them on to her brother. She invited the American to visit her again on New Year’s Eve and assured him that Richard had received the proposals. Things now moved quickly. Richard did not think Franklin’s specific suggestions were very promising. But a week later, Caroline put into the American’s hands a letter from her brother, which he was instructed to read and return to her on the spot. It asked whether Franklin would engage to pay for the tea on behalf of the colony of Massachusetts as a preliminary to concessions from the British government. Franklin wrote back immediately that he was certain that Massachusetts would not pay for the tea unless the British government had first repealed the Coercive Acts. Massachusetts would not blink first. While he waited, Caroline transcribed his letter for her brother and returned the original.83
Although her role was nominally that of a go-between, Caroline was present at every meeting with Lord Howe. At the first of these, she made a gesture of “offering to withdraw” from what was clearly men’s business, but Franklin “begg’d she might stay, as I should have no Secret in a Business of this Nature that I could not freely confide to her Prudence.”84 After that, she made no further pretense; she must have been in on every subsequent development.
The chess matches continued, as Caroline and her Grafton Street drawing room remained at the heart of Franklin’s secret negotiations. In February, Richard divulged that he was being considered as peace commissioner; his hope was that Franklin would accompany him “as a Friend, an Assistant or Secretary.” Franklin discovered that the idea of sending a commissioner now also formed part of the thinking of his friends Dr. Fothergill and David Barclay, who continued their parallel negotiations with him. Again, though, the issue of the ruined tea cargo intruded. The two Quakers asked whether Franklin, along with the other colony agents in London, would engage to pay for the tea on behalf of Massachusetts, to pave the way for the government to appoint a commissioner. Franklin did not budge from his position that the Coercive Acts would have to be repealed if the tea were to be paid for. But he did think that the idea of sending a commissioner was a promising one, “as it might be a Means of suspending military Operations, and bring on a Treaty.”85
Lord Howe was a good choice as a peace commissioner. As a naval commander, he had been handed the role of negotiator before, in remote outposts of the empire and in preliminaries with the French at the end of the last war.86 His well-known ability to meet people at their own level had impressed Franklin, who “lik’d much his Manner, and found my self dispos’d to place great Confidence in him.”87 And, of course, the Howe dynasty was popular in America; George’s hero status was such that it would outlive even the War of Independence. The Howes could expect to be accepted as friends of the colonies, as they had fought for them. And, as independent members of the House of Commons, they were conveniently neutral—part of neither Lord North’s administration nor the opposition.
Richard and William took care to maintain their neutrality in what became the countdown to war. When the newly elected House of Commons held a significant debate on armed repression of America, on December 5, the two brothers quietly left the chamber. They made their way to their mother’s house in Albemarle Street, where they met Caroline, writing as usual to Lady Spencer. Commenting on the debate, she remarked briefly, “[M]y brothers stole from the House of Commons,” leaving her friend—obviously in the know about the Howe family’s secret project—to deduce the reason.88
By February, when the British public began to react to the prospect of war, the Howe brothers choreographed a double act in the Commons as they presented two conflicting petitions from William’s own constituency of Nottingham—one for coercion and one against it. Nottingham was divided over the subject of America, but it had a core of local leaders who opposed armed repression of the colonies. Each brother presented a petition, taking care between the two of them to appear evenhanded.89
Meanwhile, the growing tension in Massachusetts brought General John Burgoyne to Whitehall to sound out his chances of a posting in America. Best remembered as the man who surrendered a British army to the Americans at Saratoga in 1777, Burgoyne was a handsome, pleasure-loving individual who is often recalled today by his apt nickname—“Gentleman Johnny”—a sobriquet coined by George Bernard Shaw in his 1897 play, The Devil’s Disciple.90 Burgoyne wanted to be assigned to the regular garrison at New York because he had heard a rumor that it would involve a negotiation with the colonial leaders—a political role that the showy Burgoyne thought would lend glamour to his career. At Boston, he thought, his duties would be entirely routine. When he approached the ministers in hopes of the New York assignment, he discovered to his intense irritation that William Howe had gotten there ahead of him.
Although several members of the cabinet strongly preferred Burgoyne in the event of any negotiations, Lord Dartmouth and his undersecretary, John Pownall, adhered to Howe. They were vague about their reasons. Finally, Burgoyne appealed to Lord North, who admitted that a promise had already been made to General Howe regarding New York. Not wishing to go behind the back of a brother officer, Burgoyne approached William about the matter. William was friendly but evasive, saying only that he wished to avoid going to Boston if possible. “I knew the reason given publicly by all his friends for that wish was the obligation his family owed to the Bostonians, who had raised a monument to the late Lord Howe.” But “General Howe’s friends were, nevertheless, indefatigably at work,” Burgoyne noted drily. He believed that the real reason William wanted the New York posting was because he did not want to serve under the lackluster General Gage in Boston. “I knew that General Howe was using every engine of interest for the preference,” Burgoyne complained.91 But he did not know—as few did, even in the cabinet—that Richard Lord Howe himself was secretly working to be appointed a commissioner, and that any negotiations in New York would, within this scheme of things, be undertaken by him rather than by his less-experienced brother William. William, of course, would not tell Burgoyne this, and Dartmouth and his undersecretary were not to be budged from their inexplicable preference for General Howe.92
The Howes and their fellow peacemakers were swimming against the tide. As we have seen, even before Richard’s first meeting with Franklin at Christmas, the prospects for a peace commission were poor. When Lord Dartmouth pitched the idea to the cabinet in early December, it became obvious that he was out of step with most of the other members, and even the king himself. The idea of sending commissioners, the king confided to Lord North, “looks so like the Mother Country being more afraid of the continuance of the dispute than the Colonies and I cannot think it likely to make them reasonable, I do not want to drive them to despair but to submission which nothing but feeling the inconvenience of their situation can bring their pride to submit to.”93 The inconvenience mentioned by the king involved British stoppage of American trade, or, in the worst case, armed repression of a local uprising in New England.
Over the previous ten years, there had been a growing conviction in British political circles that colonial protests had been encouraged by concessions from the mother country, and that the government should put its foot down this time around. The most extreme Americans were making demands that Britain could never concede to, even had there been the will to do so. The petition from the Continental Congress directly challenged the position of the British government as the sovereign legislature within the empire.
From the point of view of the majority of British MPs and statesmen, Parliament, a pillar of British liberty and a counterweight to the monarchy, was under threat from the pre
tensions of colonial legislatures. In some circles, there was a sense of relief that complicated and perplexing theoretical questions of right could be resolved by a contest of strength (which, of course the colonies would lose). Now came the hour to confront a troublemaking colonial minority, enforce Britain’s authority over its empire, preserve the sovereignty of Parliament, and thus protect the nation’s liberties at home and its standing abroad as a major power.
The petition of the Continental Congress reached London just before Christmas in 1774; whatever Franklin thought, it was seen as an uncompromising list of American constitutional claims, and it was a great disappointment to Lord Dartmouth. Nevertheless, on Christmas Eve he informed all the colonial agents, including Franklin, that the petition had been received graciously by His Majesty and would be laid before the Houses of Parliament in January. This sent out a false signal to the colonies: Once in Parliament, the petition lay buried in a mass of papers.
Dartmouth was undoubtedly hoping that, despite the petition, something acceptable could be worked out with Franklin over the Christmas season. He and the Howes persisted with their behind-the-scenes maneuvers. Caroline and Lady Dartmouth met on Ladies’ Charitable Society business on December 21, the day Franklin and his fellow agents handed the petition to Lord Dartmouth; and, as we have seen, Richard met Franklin on December 25 and proceeded to explore the potential for a commissioner.94 Franklin would discover that both Richard Howe and Lord Hyde believed erroneously that he was empowered to make concessions that would water down congressional demands.
On February 20, 1775, Lord North laid before the House of Commons the sole proposal for conciliation to be offered by the British government during the final months before war. North proposed that when any colony assembly raised revenues to pay for its own civil government and defense, Parliament would desist from taxing it, but the sum raised would be subject to parliamentary approval. Franklin thought he detected the influence of his backstage negotiations, but the prime minister’s offer did not address most of the issues raised by the Continental Congress.95 Franklin dismissed North’s concession as British taxation by another route. Still worse, the meager olive branch was sandwiched between further warlike measures—Massachusetts would be declared in rebellion, and the trade and fisheries of New England were to be restrained. Everyone knew that more regiments were to be sent to Boston.96
North’s proposal was passed by Parliament, but government hardliners still thought it offered too much, while the opposition thought it offered too little. North had attempted to please both sides and met with the usual success. The tide continued in the direction of war.97
Meanwhile, Richard quietly continued to try to win support for a peace commission. On March 7, 1775, he and Caroline met Benjamin Franklin for the last time at Number 12 Grafton Street. Assuring the American that his intentions had been good, Richard regretted the failure to establish a commission. But, he concluded, things “might yet take a more favourable Turn; and as he understood I was going soon to America, if he should chance to be sent thither on that important Business, he hop’d he might still expect my Assistance.” And so, concluded Franklin, “ended the Negociation with Lord Howe.”98
William, however, was going to America, and he was going without his brother. By the middle of February, all of London knew that Generals Howe, Burgoyne, and Henry Clinton were to go to Boston with additional regiments to provide much-needed backbone for General Gage’s flagging command.99
In London, William’s appointment was popular. Lord George Germain, the hawkish MP who would soon replace the pacific Dartmouth as American secretary, was delighted. General Howe’s expertise in wilderness fighting would perfectly qualify him to lead a command in America. George III also was gratified. He had been impressed by a demonstration of William’s light infantry in Richmond in the summer of 1774.100
According to Horace Walpole, the king had turned to William in January as a sympathetic shoulder to cry on when news reached him about the high desertion rates of British soldiers posted in Boston.101 Walpole himself, while dismissing the abilities of Burgoyne and Clinton, opined that William “was one of those brave and silent brothers, and was reckoned sensible, though so silent that nobody knew whether he was or not.” In the House of Lords, the Duke of Richmond spoke up for his friend, complaining of “the cruelty of sending Howe to command against Boston,” a province that had raised a monument to his brother George Lord Howe.102 Even Arthur Lee, a Virginian who was about to become a secret agent for the American cause in London, spoke of General Howe as “an honorable man, respected in the Army, & trained in the late American war. He goes reluctantly.”103 William retained his popularity, at least for now.
On March 6, Richard rose to speak in the House of Commons during the debate on the New England Trade and Fisheries Act, which would block the seafaring industry of the New England colonies. The proposal sounded draconian, but at least it offered a means of coercing the colonies without resorting to bloodshed. Richard supported it as the only “moderate Means of bringing the disobedient Provinces to a Sense of their Duty, without involving the Empire in all the Horrors of a Civil War.” He spoke “so very low and indistinct, that it was extremely difficult to collect what he said.” One newspaper suspected that, with his brother going to Boston, he might appear to have a personal motive for wishing to avoid a fight.104
After fifteen years, William was returning to America, and his family knew from previous losses that he might never return. Caroline had seen her father die in Barbados, and her brother George had been slain in New York. She could not have been indifferent to the prospect of her “dear William” crossing the Atlantic yet again, especially knowing that there was likely to be fighting in America. “My heart aches for the Howe family,” wrote one member of the Ladies’ Charitable Society shortly after William’s departure.105
One Howe did not trouble to hide her emotion. Fanny had married William during peacetime and had no notion of what it meant to be a soldier’s wife. Timid by nature and at least a dozen years younger than her husband, Fanny’s distress was obvious to her friends. A few days after William’s appointment, one wrote, “I am very sorry for Mrs Howe, who I believe would most willingly have gone with her husband had it been possible.”106
After William departed on April 15, 1775, Fanny returned to her family home in Ireland, where her brother Tom and his wife, Lady Louisa Conolly, still lived. Lady Louisa tried to divert her favorite sister-in-law, whose “weak little frame and nerves” were not robust enough for stoicism. Horseback riding and picnics in the early summer verdure of Ireland were of little avail. Louisa wrote to her sister, the Duchess of Leinster, “Poor Mrs Howe is really one of the most moving objects I ever saw, for she suffers as much as it is possible for anyone to do; but so patiently, so meekly and with so little fuss, that her distress quite goes to one’s heart.” And the worst of it, confided Lady Louisa, writing on June 25, was that she had “but too just grounds for her fears.” Hostilities had begun in Massachusetts while William was crossing the Atlantic. And Fanny was not the only one who feared for the charming Savage: “I love General Howe so much,” Lady Louisa told her sister, “that if Mrs Howe was out of the question, I must be very anxious.”107
What Louisa did not know as she wrote her letter—what no one in Britain knew yet—was that seven days earlier, William had stood on Breed’s Hill, across the bay from Boston, facing some of the hottest fire he had ever experienced in a lifetime of soldiering. The Howes were plunged into their third war, and it would be their sternest test yet.
Eight
American Destiny
The Battle of Bunker Hill on June 17, 1775, was one of the bloodiest battles of the American War of Independence. Almost half of the British combatants were killed or wounded, including an appallingly high number of officers, deliberately picked off by rebel marksmen. More than one-eighth of the British officers to fall during the eight-year war died here.1 For the British, it was a technical vict
ory; the rebels were driven from their hastily erected fortifications overlooking Boston Harbor. But the battle was a game changer, and news of it sent shock waves through the British nation. Cabinet ministers suddenly realized they faced a prolonged struggle in the colonies, not an easy pushover, as predicted by some. In command of British troops on that fateful day was General William Howe.
The first shots of the war had famously been fired two months earlier at Lexington and Concord, on April 19, when British troops, on a mission to seize military stores in the Massachusetts countryside, had been chased back to Boston by American militia. But on that spring day, the Americans were pursuing a small enemy detachment in retreat. Bunker Hill, by contrast, was a major battle in which citizen-soldiers proved they had the courage to face and inflict grievous damage upon a large force of highly trained professional soldiers.
The story of Bunker Hill has been told and retold so often that it has assumed mythic proportions. Legend has it that arrogant redcoat officers led their men in a criminally incompetent frontal assault upon a well-fortified position, expecting the colonials to melt away in the face of a British charge. William Howe, of course, has a starring role in every account, and Bunker Hill is where the indictments of him as commander of the British war effort during the American Revolution always begin.2 “Light-Horse Harry” Lee, an American veteran of the War of Independence, was the first to suggest that William was so traumatized by his Bunker Hill experience that it sowed the seeds for British failure in the war. According to Light-Horse Harry, Howe ordered a mindless advance against the American entrenchments, and when he saw his men slaughtered around him, the horrific experience “sunk deep into the mind of Sir William Howe; and it seems to have had its influence, on all his subsequent operations, with decisive control.” For the rest of his service in America, William supposedly did not dare to attack the Americans head-on, fatally compromising his ability to defeat General Washington.3
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