Prelude to Glory, Vol. 2

by Ron Carter

  British regulars on Staten Island and American soldiers on Manhattan and Long Islands snatched their muskets and rifles and knapsacks and sought low ground, to crouch behind anything that would break the whistling wind while they clung to their hats and weapons, deafened by the roar of the wind, eyes clenched shut as the black world flashed white in the unending lightning, and thunderclaps shook them and the ground.

  On the west shore of Long Island, just above the Narrows, Eli wedged himself in a crack between two great boulders and sat down. He leaned forward and jammed his hands over his ears, his long rifle locked between his knees, over his shoulder, muzzle plugged with a chunk of peeled maple branch. The wind tore at his hair and his shirt, and he clenched his eyes shut against the stinging, flying grit scoured from the beach. He dropped one hand to press the side of his shirt to be certain the pad and pencil and the telescope were still there, and then he clamped the hand over his ear once more.

  In a world filled with blackness broken by brilliant light and with roaring wind and thunder that made the ground tremble, time blurred. It was after one o’clock when a great, crooked finger of lightning reached a thousand feet down to shatter a pitching maple tree eighty feet inland from Eli and leave it a shattered, smoking stump, and Eli felt the tingle in his feet and legs as the terrible power went to ground and spread. It was close to two o’clock when a second arcing lightning bolt flashed and struck a tall rock less than forty feet south and blew it into a million fragments, some small and molten hot, and they came pelting on the wind, and Eli hunched lower.

  At half past two Eli felt a slackening in the wind, and at three o’clock it had softened to a gale. The overcast moved inland to the north, and the lightning dwindled to spasmodic flashes that grumbled on the far northern horizon, and then it was gone. At half past four, the wind was a breeze. A quarter moon was dropping towards the New Jersey coastline, and endless stars sprinkled the black velvet dome overhead.

  Eli stood in the darkness and stretched cramped muscles, listening for a moment to the strangeness of near silence. He brushed the grit from his leather shirt and breeches, shook it from his hair, pulled the plug from the muzzle of his rifle, and walked to where the water lapped against the shore. Across the Narrows, on Staten Island, he watched as tiny points of light began to appear, randomly at first, then soon forming lines and then squares as the British army shook off the storm and lighted the fires they needed to start camp repairs. A little past five o’clock, with the pre-dawn gray at his back, Eli could make out the forest of masts of the British armada before him, sails furled and lashed against the storm, riding calmly at anchor.

  With the first arc of the rising sun setting their sails afire, Eli watched five men-of-war hoist their anchors dripping from the water and slowly move south towards Gravesend Bay, to his left. He drew the telescope from inside his shirt, extended it, and concentrated to read the names on their bows. Then he reached for the pad and pencil and carefully printed, Greyhound, Phoenix, Rose, Thunder, and Carcass. The last two ships were smaller, and there was something different about their cannon ports. He made notes and a sketch.

  While they were yet half a mile distant he retreated into the battered scrub oak and bushes, to higher ground where the Narrows were before him and the entire panorama of Gravesend Bay lay east, to his left. He settled into a stand of trees and rocks on a small knoll, where he could see everything and still remain invis-ible. He silently tracked the big men-of-war as they took up positions around the bay, opposite De Nyse’s ferry, opened their cannon ports, and rolled the black muzzles of their guns forward into the brilliant sun.

  His forehead wrinkled in question. What are they doing? Those guns can’t reach Gravesend or Flatbush. Suddenly he realized, and his breath came short. Those ships are for cover. They’re going to bring the army over!

  The sun was an hour high when Eli rested the telescope over a rock and studied the beach on the near side of Staten Island. He watched tiny red dots assemble and then move down to waiting boats where they systematically boarded. The blades of the long oars were lowered into the water and then began their rhythmic stroking, and the boats swung around and took a heading directly across the Narrows, under the protection of the guns of the warships. Eli did not move as he watched them move towards Gravesend Bay, with the oar blades dripping water that sparkled in the bright morning sunlight. For a time it seemed the Narrows were covered with small, bobbing craft, filled with red-coated soldiers, and then they were at the bay, and slowly the detail of both the troops and the boats defined itself. Once again Eli drew out the pencil and pad and quickly made crude drawings, and began the crucial count of men, boats, and artillery.

  The first of the boats were strung out nearly one mile when they reached the beach, and sailors dropped overboard into the knee-deep surf to throw their backs against ropes and drag the vessels scraping onto the sandy, rocky soil. The troops inside jumped onto the land and formed into regiments, with their officers barking orders and pointing directions.

  Eli’s eyes narrowed as he saw six men not wearing military uniforms draw off to themselves, and quickly he brought them into focus with the telescope.

  Mohawks.

  He watched them talking, gesturing among themselves for a few seconds, then walk to an officer and again talk, and then they turned east and fell into single file, trotting up the beach.

  The thought flashed in Eli’s mind, Jamaica Pass!

  He remained where he was, hidden, methodically counting, making marks on his pad. With the boats empty, the sailors shoved them back into the water, scrambled on board, and once again began the stroking of oars to turn them and line out for Staten Island for the next wave of assault troops. It was approaching noon when Eli watched the flotilla disgorge their last loads and turn back to Staten Island, finished.

  He stared in awe at what lay before him. Gravesend beach was a mass of red-coated soldiers, baggage, food in barrels and crates, cannon, arms, ammunition, medicine, all segregated, in great orderly stacks. While Eli watched and made rough sketches on his pad, the British spread north and east with their arms and supplies and cannon, establishing themselves on the great, broad plains sloping up from the water’s edge of Gravesend Bay, six miles east to west, and five miles northward towards the first of the two long ridges on which the Americans had entrenched themselves. Their movements were organized, steady.

  Four thousand of those first arrived had long since fallen into marching formation under the command of an officer and moved inland with six cannon, marching towards the village of Flatbush.

  From the corner of his eye Eli caught movement to his left and brought his telescope to bear, and froze, startled. Scattered through the tangle of oak and maple he caught flashes of sunlight on homespun and buckskin and realized an American force of unknown size or origin was moving south, on a collision course with the four thousand British troops moving north towards Flatbush. The Americans stopped, then reversed themselves and began moving north, staying ahead of the British, just out of musket range, avoiding a fight as they continued north, testing the British intent. Within minutes, north of the Americans, dark smoke rose from the woods and spread against the blue sky as twenty men under orders of the American leader ran ahead of the main force, burning wheat fields and crops and outbuildings storing food supplies, and slaughtering animals belonging to the farmers of Flatbush, to keep them from falling into British hands.

  The British ignored the Americans and continued north, to warily approach the outskirts of the small village, not knowing what to expect. They were welcomed with open arms by the Tories who had remained, while panic-stricken Patriots swiftly loaded their most precious belongings into wagons and disappeared northward on trails and paths through the thick brush and trees. Eli heard but one single cracking musket shot in the far distance before the village of Flatbush was occupied by the British.

  He glanced upward. The sun was past its zenith, and he judged the time at about two o’clock in the
afternoon. He brought his telescope to bear on the beach south and west of him and watched carefully to be certain no British forces were circling his position from the west. Satisfied, he continued to study the British movements, careful to keep mental track of movements into the dense trees and brush northward that could make an entire regiment of men invisible.

  A little past three o’clock he jerked forward and adjusted the telescope, and they were there. The six Mohawk Indians came trotting single file along the shoreline and did not stop until they reached a British officer with much gold on his shoulder epaulets, sparkling in the sun. The Mohawk leader spoke for half a minute, pointing back towards the east, and the British officer stood with his hands clasped behind his back, listening intently. The officer said something, the Mohawk answered, they spoke for two or three minutes, and the British officer nodded, said something, and the Mohawk led his small command west to their tiny pile of belongings, laid down their muskets, and dug out their canteens.

  By four o’clock half the British forces had their tents erected in orderly rows and squares on the slopes of Gravesend, segregated according to regiment. Their command tent was near the center, of modest size, not the great one requiring a center pole and sixty tie-downs. Before it the Union Jack fluttered proudly on a fifty-foot pole. Eli made a crude sketch of the command tent and once again went over the entire campsite with the telescope. Men were digging latrines and garbage pits and gathering rocks to build fire pits.

  With the sun settling towards the New Jersey coast, Eli kept low as he backed off the low knoll, turned, and angled to the northwest towards the east shore of New York Harbor. He avoided the skyline, and paused every hundred yards to hold his breath and listen, but there were only the dwindling, distant sounds of a military camp and occasionally the scurry of something small and furry dodging through the tangle of brush and brambles.

  Once close to New York Harbor he followed the shoreline north, then angled back east past the great Gowanus marsh, with the stench of stagnant waters and dying things, to the fortifications and breastworks of the Continental army that now reached nearly three miles inland, eastward. At dusk he stopped before the quarters of Colonel Israel Thompson and waited while the picket announced him, and one minute later was standing across the table from the colonel, notepad in hand.

  Thompson was seated. “I was worried we’d lost you. Was the storm bad?”

  “As bad as I’ve ever seen.” Eli laid the notepad and then the telescope and pencil on the table.

  “Any rain down there?”

  “No. Wind. Lightning, thunder.”

  Thompson shook his head. “Killed four men here. Three were officers.” He brought his eyes to Eli’s, and Eli had never seen him so intensely focused. “What’s going on down there?”

  “I made some notes.” He pointed to the pad, but Thompson did not immediately look at it. He wasted no time.

  “How many troops?”

  “About fifteen thousand.”

  Thompson rounded his mouth and blew air. “Where?”

  “On the plains north of Gravesend Bay.”

  “Over how big an area?”

  “Maybe six miles east to west, and over five to the north.”

  “Anyone move inland?” Thompson held his breath.

  “About four thousand men. They took Flatbush without a fight. I heard only one musket shot and I think it was by accident.”

  Thompson exhaled and his shoulders dropped. “Any of their troops dressed in dark blue?”

  Eli stopped for a moment, searching his memory. “No. All red coats.”

  Thompson’s face clouded as he muttered to himself, “What’s Howe doing with his Hessians? Holding them back for what? Are these troops on Long Island just a decoy while Howe attacks New York with the rest of his troops and Hessians?”

  He spoke to Eli. “Did the British set up a camp?”

  “Yes. Including a command tent and flagpole.”

  “Tell me about the command tent.”

  “Not big. There’s a sketch in the notepad.” Eli pointed to his pad.

  “Sounds like a field tent, not a permanent one. Did they prepare to stay for a while? dig latrines? garbage pits?”

  “Yes. And fire pits.”

  “How many boats to move their troops?”

  “Eighty-eight.”

  “All the same kind?”

  “No. Seventy-five flatboats, eleven squared off at both ends like I’ve never seen before, and two long ones with a dozen oars on each side.”

  “Flatboats, bateaux, and galleys,” Thompson said quietly. “How many cannon?”

  “The little boats didn’t have any. There were five men-of-war and it looked like they—”

  “I mean cannon with the ground troops. How many did they bring ashore?”

  “Forty. The bunch that took Flatbush had six with them.”

  “How much time to move all that across the Narrows?”

  “Three hours, maybe a little more.”

  Thompson’s eyes widened in disbelief. “Three hours!” he exclaimed. “With all their supplies and luggage?”

  Eli nodded but said nothing.

  “Anyone move east?”

  Eli leaned forward on stiff arms, palms flat on the table. “Six Mohawk. Gone for half a day and returned to report. I’m betting they scouted the Jamaica Pass. Do we have men there?”

  Thompson shrugged, eyebrows arched, concern etched on his face. “I don’t know. I presume we do.”

  Eli straightened. “Someone better find out. Those Mohawk were the first to leave and the first to report back. That wasn’t by accident.”

  “I’ll see to it General Washington hears. Is there anything else? Anything I missed?”

  Eli shook his head. “Those notes might help.”

  Thompson stood. “You need to know about some things that happened while you were gone. General Greene was taken across to New York, out of his head with fever. General Sullivan’s been given command here.”

  “He know this island?”

  “No. Not very well.”

  “Somebody better tell him what’s east of here. Jamaica Pass and those other roads.”

  “I’ll give him your report.” Thompson picked up the notepad. “When did you eat last?”

  “Yesterday.”

  “Go eat and get some rest.”

  “One thing. How’s Mary Flint?”

  “Doing better. Her fever broke about noon. She’s weak, but she’s mending.”

  “Your surgeon still in charge?”

  “She’s in his quarters.”

  Eli nodded approval and turned to go.

  Thompson called after him. “Would you like to see her?”

  Eli paused for a moment in thought. “Does she know what happened? how she got to your surgeon’s tent?”

  “I told her.”

  “Maybe I’ll go see her.”

  “Tell the doctor I sent you.”

  Eli ducked out the tent entrance into the darkness. Campfires flickered everywhere, and he shook his head at the havoc still showing from the storm. Wreckage from trees was still scattered, mixed with torn blankets and articles of clothing and knapsacks that had not yet been claimed. Weary men moved about, hunting.

  Eli worked his way thirty yards south to the surgeon’s tent. Inside, a single lantern glowed. He walked to the picket, who raised his musket.

  “No admission here. This is the surgeon’s tent.”

  “I know. Colonel Thompson sent me here to see Mary Flint.”

  The picket hesitated. “You know her?”

  Eli nodded. “I brought her here.”

  “You got written orders from the colonel?”

  “No. Is the doctor here?”

  “Not right now.” He dropped his eyes for a moment. “Only a minute?”

  Eli nodded and handed the picket his rifle, and the picket drew back the flap and Eli ducked to enter.

  She lay curled on her side beneath a blanket, her back to the can
vas tent wall, and Eli went to one knee beside the cot. The dark eyes were closed, and small curls of dark hair were on her forehead, damp from light perspiration. Her face was peaceful, sallow in the yellow lantern light, and her breathing was slow and deep. For long moments Eli studied her quiet face and the hand that lay limp on the pillow, and he let his thoughts take him back to the night they had ferried the Boston regiment across the East River with a dead man on the top of her wagon, and he had told her of how he had lost his family, and she had wept.

  I hope you find peace. I hope you find a good man who can give you children and make you forget all the pain. I hope so.

  He rose soundlessly and had nearly reached the entrance when her quiet voice came from behind. “Eli? Is that you?”

  He turned and retraced his steps and knelt again beside her cot. “I didn’t mean to wake you.”

  “I’m glad you did. Colonel Thompson told me what happened. Thank you.”

  “It was Billy.”

  “Billy helped. You’re the one who brought me here.”

  Eli dropped his eyes for a moment. “Go back to sleep. You need rest. The doctor said you’ll be all right.”

  She smiled and her eyes lighted. “Thank you. Tell Billy.”

  Eli rose and smiled down at her and silently walked out the entrance of the tent into the night.

  Sixty-two miles to the east, past the border of the colonies of Connecticut and New York, Cullen rose from the campfire and glanced around at the weary, exhausted faces of the others, lined by the dancing flames. He gestured towards the four wagons, standing beneath a quarter moon and the stars, twenty yards north on the edge of the small flat where they had stopped at dusk to make camp. The horses were hobbled just beyond, eyes glowing red in the firelight.

  “I’m thinkin’ I’ll make a round of the livestock and wagons,” he said quietly. No one moved or commented as he walked away to disappear in the darkness, as he had done every night since they left Boston.

  Brigitte drew and released a great breath, then rose and gestured to Caleb. Together they walked to where their blankets were spread on two heavy tarps in the wild grass, five feet apart. They slumped down and pulled off their shoes and tucked them beneath the tarp to protect them from the heavy dews of morning, and watched as others, one and two at a time, rose to move to their blankets.