King George

by Steve Sheinkin

Thomas Paine, it’s time for you to enter the story.

  After spending his first thirty-seven years in Britain, Tom Paine sailed away from his homeland in 1774. He left behind several failed careers, two failed marriages, and a reputation as a clever but fairly annoying fellow. He was the kind of guy who would come over to your house and then stay for weeks, lazily lying around your living room and eating your food.

  But when he felt like working, Paine had an amazing ability to write powerful and convincing arguments. He showed writing talent early in life, as you can see from this poem eight-year-old Tom wrote for his dead pet bird:

  Here lies the body of John Crow,

  Who once was high but now is low;

  Ye brother Crows take warning all,

  For as you rise, so must you fall.

  When his boat arrived in Philadelphia, Paine was so sick from the journey that he had to be carried ashore on a stretcher. Not a good start. He recovered quickly, though, and soon found work writing for a few newspapers.

  By early 1776, Paine was ready to write something big. Really big. He was sure the colonies should declare independence, and he wanted to convince Americans that they could make it on their own. So he published a pamphlet called Common Sense, which was filled with punchy lines like:

  Thomas Paine

  Common Sense was a wild success. “I believe the number of copies printed and sold in America was not short of 150,000,” reported Paine with pride. George Washington soon noticed that Paine’s writing was winning many Americans over to the side of independence. “I find Common Sense is working a powerful change in the minds of many men,” he said.

  After years of failure, Paine finally could have made some money. Instead, he donated his Common Sense profits to the Continental army. He asked that the money be used to buy mittens for the soldiers. “I did this to do honor to the cause,” Paine said.

  Abigail’s Advice

  Now it was March 1776, and Abigail Adams was still waiting for a declaration of independence. She and the Adamses’ five children were living at the family house near Boston. Abigail wrote frequently to John in Philadelphia, keeping him up to date on their family and friends. “The little folks are very sick and puke every morning,” she wrote in one letter. “But after that they are comfortable.”

  John wrote back with all the latest news from Congress. But his letters were always too short for Abigail—she wanted more information. “You justly complain of my short letters,” John admitted. He said he was too busy to write more.

  Abigail must have accepted this excuse, because she kept writing long letters to John. She knew that when the colonies declared independence, the new country would need a new government. And in a letter that later became famous, Abigail offered John some advice on what this government should be like:

  “And by the way in the new code of laws which I suppose it will be necessary for you to make I desire you would remember the ladies, and be more generous and favorable to them than your ancestors.”

  Why should John “remember the ladies”? You probably know that women had few rights in those days. They couldn’t vote, run for elected office, or attend college. And married women had to give up control of all their property to their husbands. Suppose a woman owned a farm, for example. Once she was married, her husband could sell the farm without her permission!

  Abigail was ready for some changes. She even warned John that women might start a revolution of their own:

  Abigail Adams

  “If particular care and attention is not paid to the ladies, we are determined to foment3 a rebellion, and will not hold ourselves bound by any laws in which we have no voice, or representation.”

  Abigail was joking with John, but she was also expressing a serious idea. Too bad John wasn’t quite ready. for

  Abigail’s ideas. “As to your extraordinary code of laws, I cannot but laugh,” he wrote to her.

  King George Update

  We haven’t checked in on King George in a while. Do you miss him?

  As you might expect, the king was not waiting around to hear any declarations of independence. In a speech to Parliament, George declared the American colonies to be in an official state of rebellion. The king called Patriot leaders “wicked and desperate persons” and vowed to “bring the traitors to justice.”

  To help get this done quickly, Britain needed more soldiers. So King George rented some from Germany. You can do that when you’re a king. It worked like this: George paid German princes a lot of money, and the princes sent German soldiers to fight for Britain. And the princes actually got extra cash for every German soldier that was killed. You can do that when you’re a prince.

  In the spring of 1776 Americans started reading the shocking news: boats full of German soldiers were on their way west across the Atlantic Ocean! How could King George do this? colonists wondered. How could he send foreign troops here to kill us?

  King George had been hoping to stop a revolution. Instead, he actually made more Americans think it was time to declare independence.

  Congress Heats Up

  And Congress needed the shove. Let’s let a member of Congress named Joseph Hewes sum up the mood in Philadelphia: “Some among us urge strongly for independence … others wish to wait a little longer.”

  These were tense times in Congress. Members spent twelve hours a day (often without snack breaks) meeting in the hot, stuffy Pennsylvania State House. Then, at night, they continued working and arguing in taverns and inns.

  These guys were not only debating independence—they were trying to help run a war too. Like his cousin John, Samuel Adams hardly had time to keep in touch with his family. “I can scarcely find time to send you a love letter,” Adams wrote to his wife.

  By the middle of June, a majority of the members of Congress were finally ready to declare independence … almost. You can’t just wake up one day and say, “Okay, now we’re independent.” You really need some kind of official declaration. You know, a written document that explains your reasons for becoming independent. What you need is a Declaration of Independence.

  The members of Congress elected a five-man committee to write the Declaration: Roger Sherman, Robert Livingston, Benjamin Franklin, John Adams, and a young lawyer from Virginia named Thomas Jefferson. Jefferson was fairly new in Congress, and he hadn’t spoken much so far. John Adams said of Jefferson: “The whole time I sat with him in Congress, I never heard him utter three sentences together.”

  No, Jefferson wasn’t much of a public speaker. He could write, though. And he was about to do some pretty good writing.

  Thomas Jefferson

  Who Gets the Job?

  Who should write the Declaration of Independence? That was the committee’s first decision. Franklin was sick in bed, so he was out. John Adams thought Thomas Jefferson was the man for the job. Jefferson wasn’t so sure. According to Adams, he and Jefferson had a discussion that went like this:

  Jefferson: You should do it.

  Adams: Oh! No.

  Jefferson: Why will you not? You ought to do it.

  Adams: I will not.

  Jefferson: Why?

  Adams: Reasons enough.

  Jefferson: What can be your reasons?

  Adams: Reason first—you are a Virginian, and a Virginian ought to appear at the head of this business. Reason second—I am obnoxious, suspected, and unpopular. You are very much otherwise. Reason third—you can write ten times better than I can. Jefferson: Well, if you are decided, I will do as well as I can. Adams: Very well. When you have drawn it up, we will have a meeting.

  John Adams

  Writing at night in his room (after spending long days in Congress), Jefferson worked on the document for the next two weeks. When he had a draft he liked, he made a copy and sent it to Franklin, who was still stuck in bed. Franklin made a few quick suggestions. Then the document was given to Congress. “We were all in haste,” John Adams explained. “Congress was impatient.”

  Just a Fe
w Changes

  Don’t you hate it when you hand in a report and your teacher gives it back all marked up with corrections in red ink? Now you know how Jefferson felt on July 3, 1776. Jefferson sat in Congress, a look of pain on his face, as he watched the other members change his work. He was sure they were ruining some of the best parts.

  Ben Franklin (who was finally feeling better) sympathized with the sensitive Jefferson. He sat down next to Tom and tried to distract him by telling him funny stories.

  As Adams said, Congress was in a hurry. So by the next day, the members were ready to vote on Jefferson’s document. Congress approved the Declaration of Independence on July 4, 1776.

  Today, we think of this as the most important day in our country’s history. To Jefferson, July 4 was just another day. He made only two entries in his diary that day. First, he wrote that the temperature in Philadelphia rose from sixty-eight degrees to seventy-six degrees. Second, he noted that he had bought seven pairs of women’s gloves to take back to Virginia.

  What Does it Say?

  Let’s get right to the point. The Declaration of Independence basically says three things, in this order:

  1. People are born with certain rights.

  2. King George has taken those rights from us.

  3. So we’re forming our own country.

  Of course, Jefferson’s words are a little better. Okay, a lot better. This is how he introduced the idea of rights that belong to all people:

  “We hold these truths to be selfevident, that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their creator with certain un-alienable rights, that among these are life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”

  Not bad. Then Jefferson went on to say some nasty things about King George: “The history of the present King of Great Britain is a history of repeated injuries … . all having in direct object the establishment of an absolute tyranny over these states.”

  Thomas Jefferson

  Jefferson listed all the ways King George had violated the colonists’ rights. It was a very long list—we don’t have room for it here.

  Then he came to the part everyone was waiting for: “We, therefore, the representatives of the United States of America … declare that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be free and independent states.”

  And that’s how you declare independence in style.

  Sign Here-If You Dare

  The Declaration of Independence was read in the streets and printed in newspapers. Pretty soon the whole country (we can call it a country now) was talking about it. Abigail Adams wrote to John, saying she looked forward to “the future happiness and glory of our country.” She said she was very proud that her husband had been such a big part of founding a new nation.

  John Adams was proud also. But he told Abigail that some of the other members of Congress were not too eager to sign their names to the Declaration of Independence. That’s because anyone who signed it would be considered a traitor to Britain. And the punishment for traitors was well known: death by hanging.

  This frightening fact was on everyone’s mind when members gathered to sign the Declaration. John Hancock signed first, then had this exchange with Ben Franklin:

  John Hancock: There must be no pulling different ways. We must all hang together.

  Ben Franklin: “Yes, we must indeed all hang together, or most assuredly we shall all hang separately.”

  With this very real danger in mind, a tall, heavy member of Congress named Benjamin Harrison turned to a skinny member named Elbridge Gerry and said: “When the hanging scene comes to be exhibited, I shall have the advantage over you on account of my size. All will be over with me in a moment, but you will be kicking in the air half an hour after I am gone.” -

  That was kind of a sick joke, but it captured the nervous mood in Congress. There was no turning back now.

  Bad Reviews in Britain

  Copies of the Declaration of Independence were sent across the ocean to Britain. As far as we know, King George pretended it didn’t exist. But lots of other British people did read the Declaration. Some were not very impressed. Their major complaint was this: many members of Congress were slave owners. How could slave owners declare that “all men are created equal”? How could people who own slaves say that all men have the right to “life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness”?

  Or, as a famous English writer named Samuel Johnson put it: “How is it that the loudest yelps for liberty come from the drivers of slaves?”

  You’ve got a good point, Johnson. If you visited the homes of George Washington, Thomas Jefferson, Patrick Henry, and many other Patriot leaders, you would have seen enslaved African Americans. Did these guys believe in freedom, or didn’t they? Patrick Henry wrestled with this question in a letter to a friend, saying:

  “Would anyone believe I am the master of slaves of my own purchase? I will not, I cannot justify it.”

  Washington and Jefferson also wrote against slavery in their personal letters. But they simply did not see the American Revolution as a fight for the freedom of all Americans, black and white.

  Patrick Henry

  As you have figured out by now, the story of our country is not a fairy tale. No one is perfect and not everyone lives happily ever after. Hey, at least it’s not boring.

  Remember That Statue?

  By July 1776, George Washington and the Continental army had moved from Boston to New York City. On July 9, Washington had the Declaration of Independence read to his soldiers. They gave three loud cheers.

  Then some of the guys went to the park in town where a King George statue was standing. This was the statue that NewYorkers had put up after the king agreed to repeal the Stamp Act. Now American soldiers helped a group of New York Patriots tie ropes around the top of the statue and yank it down to the ground. They even had an idea of how to reuse the statue’s four thousand pounds of metal. “The lead we hear is to be run up into musket balls for the use of the Yankees,” said a soldier named Isaac Bangs.

  But General Washington knew he would need a lot more than a fancy declaration and bullets from a statue. The British army was about to begin a massive attack in New York. And Washington had no idea how he was going to stop it. He warned his men, “The eyes of all our countrymen are now upon us. The fate of unborn millions will now depend, under God, on the courage and conduct of this army … we have therefore to resolve to conquer or die.”

  No pressure, guys. Just save your country—or die trying.

  Losing and Retreating in ’76

  Sixteen-year-old Joseph Plumb Martin still hadn’t made up his mind. Was today the day he would enlist in the Continental army? “I thought I was as warm a Patriot as the best of them,” Martin said. On the other hand, he wasn’t exactly sure he was ready to risk getting shot. “I felt myself to be a real coward,”he admitted.

  Expect a Bloody Summer

  Joseph Plumb Martin walked up to the table where a Continental army officer was seated. A bunch of Martin’s friends were standing around the table, trying to get their courage up.

  “Come—if you will enlist, I will,” said one friend to another.

  “You have long been talking about it.” was the reply. “Come, now is the time.”

  Martin sat down at the table. The officer handed him enlistment papers and a pen. Martin dipped the pen in ink. He continued going back and forth in his mind … and then he signed his name.

  Martin left his home in Connecticut and sailed to New York City to join George Washington’s army. He began exercising and training. And he began eating army food. The flour-and-water biscuits were especially bad. “They were hard enough to break the teeth of a rat,” Martin remembered.

  Meanwhile, George Washington had troubles of his own. Washington had about 19,000 soldiers in New York. Most of them were like young Joseph—willing to fight, but totally inexperienced in battle. The British, on the other hand, had 32,000 well-trained troops. That included about 8,000 of those rented Ge
rmans, who were famously fierce fighters.

  Washington knew he was in trouble. “We expect a very bloody summer at New York,” he wrote to his brother. The general strapped two pistols to his belt and warned his men to stay ready. “I will not ask any man to go further than I do,” he told them. “I will fight so long as I have a leg or an arm.”

  The soldiers slept in their uniforms, guns by their sides.

  The British Are Coming!

  The British attack came on August 22, a beautiful summer day in New York. Thousands of British and German soldiers poured off their boats and started marching toward the American forts on Long Island.

  On their way to battle, British soldiers passed rows of apple trees, the branches bending with ripe, red fruit. This was too tempting a sight for guys who had been stuck aboard ships for months, eating salty, rotting ship food—so they stopped to pick and eat apples. Then they got right back to the attack.

  Soon the soldiers approached the small village of Flatbush. And, as you might expect, the people of Flatbush began to panic. “Women and children were running hither and thither,” said a sixteen-year-old girl named Femmetia. “Men on horseback were riding about in all directions.” Femmetia looked down the street and saw the doors of the red schoolhouse fly open. “The boys rushed out with a shout,” she said. No more school today!