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American Revolution 250

@RevWar250

Tweets from 1776! The American Revolution and War of Independence and the world in which they happened, 250 years ago.

 The Thirteen Colonies
Joined January 2023
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11 OCTOBER 1776, VALCOUR ISLAND, LAKE CHAMPLAIN: “At half-past twelve, the engagement became general, and very warm”: The British and American lake fleets begin exchanging general broadsides.
The Battle of Valcour Island

ALT The Battle of Valcour Island

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9 NOVEMBER 1776, ELIZABETH, NEW JERSEY: “Certain it is that the greatest politician on Record, I mean the Devil, apply’d himself to a female Agent to involve mankind in Sin and ruin”: the Governor of New Jersey asks Washington to stop allowing women to pass through the lines.
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Just yesterday the Board of War wrote to Washington about the importance of not preventing women moving between American- and British-held territory, of avoiding “any Thing whuch looks like severity, or indeed to lay any Restraint upon the fair Sex.”
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9 NOVEMBER 1776, FORT LEE, NEW JERSEY: “Upon the whole I cannot help thinking the Garrison is of advantage”: Nathanael Greene writes to George Washington with the reasons he’s not following Washington’s recommendation to abandon Fort Washington, across the Hudson in Manhattan:
Image from American Revolution 250 (@RevWar250)
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So long as the Continental Army has an outpost on Manhattan, Greene points out, the British have to keep troops not just outside Fort Washington but also at Kingsbridge (the only crossing point between Manhattan and the mainland)—troops they thereby can’t use elsewhere.
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8 NOVEMBER 1776, NORTH CASTLE, NEW YORK: With Fort Washington clearly unable to stop British warships sailing up the Hudson, Washington suggests to Nathanael Greene that the time has come to evacuate the fort—but crucially, doesn’t order it, leaving the choice up to Greene.
Nathanael Greene

ALT Nathanael Greene

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Fort Washington is the last American outpost on British-held Manhattan. It faces Fort Lee on the New Jersey side, just below the modern George Washington Bridge; the purpose of the two forts is to prevent British ships moving up and down the Hudson River from New York Harbor.
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8 NOVEMBER 1776, NORTH CASTLE, NEW YORK: “I … must take the liberty of referring you to my former Letters upon the subject of providing for the French Gentlemen who shall incline to enter the service of the States,” Washington writes tiredly to the Board of War.
George Washington, painted in 1776 by Charles Willson Peale

ALT George Washington, painted in 1776 by Charles Willson Peale

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In the past several months, a number of French aristocrats have arrived, seeking commissions in the Continental Army, & Washington doesn’t know it yet, but there’ll only be more in the coming year, as the comte de Saint-Germain’s reforms put many French army officers out of work.
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8 NOVEMBER 1776, NORTH CASTLE, NEW YORK: Washington’s aide Tench Tilghman writes to Robert R. Livingston that, though the people of Westchester County are making their Toryism very visible, that isn’t protecting them from British and Hessian troops:
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“[Royal] Governor Tryon summoned the inhabitants of this county to come to the White Plains and make their submissions. We are informed that four or five hundred went in and took the oaths, but this did not exempt them from plunder when their new friends came across them.
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7 NOVEMBER 1776, WILLIAMSBURG: Thomas Jefferson submits a bill to the Virginia state legislature to raise the value of Virginia’s copper halfpenny coins to being worth one full penny of Virginia paper currency.
Thomas Jefferson, painted by Charles Willson Peale in 1776

ALT Thomas Jefferson, painted by Charles Willson Peale in 1776

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For the most part, colonial (and now state) governments issue only paper money, as does the Continental Congress; hard currency is limited to English or Spanish coins that have circulated into the Thirteen Colonies during the course of commerce.
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7 NOVEMBER 1776, PHILADELPHIA: With Benjamin Franklin departed on his diplomatic to France, the Second Continental Congress replaces him as postmaster general with his son-in-law, Richard Bache.
Richard Bache, painted by John Hoppner

ALT Richard Bache, painted by John Hoppner

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7 NOVEMBER 1776, DOBBS FERRY, NEW YORK: “8 or 10 of our People taken Marauding,” says the American redcoat Stephen Kemble.
Stephen Kemble

ALT Stephen Kemble

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“Scandalous behavior for British Troops; and the Hessians Outrageously Licentious, and Cruel to such a degree as to threaten with death all such as dare obstruct them in their depredations. Violence to Officers frequently used, and every Degree of Insolence offered.”
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7 NOVEMBER 1776, NEW YORK: Ambrose Serle “Took a delightful Ride on Horseback to see the Scylla and Charybdis of America, or the curious Phoenomenon of Hell-Gate between Long Island & the Islands in the East Sound,” in the East River.
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“The Navigation fully appears to be, what it really is, both difficult & dangerous. The Stream is very rapid, and the Vortex, or what is vulgarly called the Pot, at about half-Tide is very alarming to those who are hardy enough to pass at that Time.
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6 NOVEMBER 1776, WHITE PLAINS, NEW YORK: “The situation of our Affairs is critical and truly alarming; The dissolution of our Army is fast approaching and but little, if any prospect of levying a New one in a reasonable time,” Washington writes to the Massachusetts General Court.
George Washington, painted in 1776 by Charles Willson Peale

ALT George Washington, painted in 1776 by Charles Willson Peale

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On September 17, the general court called up a brigade of militia to serve under Washington until November 17. He’s writing now to ask that they call up another four thousand militia to replace those men when they leave, engaged to serve until 1 March 1777.
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6 NOVEMBER 1776, WHITE PLAINS, NEW YORK: Washington holds a council of war to decide how to react to the British army’s decision to withdraw southwest. Do they mean to attack New Jersey? Besiege Fort Washington in Manhattan? Or just lure the army out from their defenses?
George Washington, painted in 1776 by Charles Willson Peale

ALT George Washington, painted in 1776 by Charles Willson Peale

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Washington is certain William Howe means to make some sort of attack & cannot simply be withdrawing into winter quarters: “I cannot indulge an Idea, that General Howe, supposing he is going to New York, means to close the Campaign & to sit down without attempting something more.
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6 NOVEMBER 1776, DOBBS FERRY, NEW YORK: The British army arrive at Dobbs Ferry, a Hudson River crossing from which they can equally well strike at New Jersey or Fort Washington (the Continental Army’s last outpost on Manhattan).
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The American redcoat Stephen Kemble tells us that “the March of our Baggage [was] marked by the Licentiousness of the Troops, who committed every species of Rapine and Plunder.” He finds Dobbs Ferry “fine ground for an Encampment.”
Stephen Kemble

ALT Stephen Kemble

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6 NOVEMBER 1776, EXETER, DEVON: Massachusetts Loyalist Samuel Curwen is unimpressed with the pomp surrounding a by-election for one of Exeter’s seats in the House of Commons: “The important day is at length arrived, the election of a member to represent this City in Parliament.”
Samuel Curwen

ALT Samuel Curwen

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“The whole City is alive, except my self who am dead to all curiosity; interest, and the hopes of victory have inspired all here with an extream ardor. ’Tis amusing to me to see how warmly their passions are engaged;
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5 NOVEMBER 1776, WHITE PLAINS, NEW YORK: Around midnight, “a party of the Americans wantonly set fire to the court-house, Dr. Graham’s house, and several other private houses, which stood between the two armies. This gave great disgust to the whole American army.”
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The “base and cowardly Wretches” (as Washington will call them) are led by Continental officer Jonathan Williams Austin. “There Came a party of men into [a Mrs. Adams’s] house on White plains and Immediately set the house on fire. …
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5 NOVEMBER 1776, NEW YORK: The packet of Washington’s dispatches to the Continental Congress that went missing a week ago is delivered to British leaders “by a person who said he saw them lying on a table in a house at Trenton,
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“and who, taking advantage of the absence and carelessness of the person entrusted with them, put it in his pocket, and got off undiscovered.
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5 NOVEMBER 1776, KINGS FERRY, NEW YORK: Nathanael Greene writes to George Washington with the alarming news that some of the New York militia guarding the Hudson River “refuses to do duty—they say General How has promised them Peace Liberty and safety and that is all they want.”
Nathanael Greene

ALT Nathanael Greene

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The militia regiments in question are the men from Haverstraw, charged with guarding the Haverstraw Bay portion of the Hudson River shoreline. Their colonel, Ann Hawkes Hay, has been notifying the New York Convention for weeks that his men refuse to serve when called.
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5 NOVEMBER 1776, WHITE PLAINS, NEW YORK: Rather than make a further attack on the Continental Army’s new defensive position, the British army withdraws, moving southwest toward the Hudson River and Manhattan.
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“The Enemy made a sudden and unexpected movement from the Several posts they had taken in our Front. they broke up their whole Encampments the preceding night, and have advanced towards King’s bridge and the North river.
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5 NOVEMBER 1776, DUBLIN: Adelaide O’Keeffe is born to the actress Mary Heaphy and the playwright John O’Keeffe. Her parents’ marriage will end when she’s six, when her father discovers her mother is having an affair with the Scottish actor George Graham.
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John O’Keeffe will take Adelaide and move permanently to London. Mary Heaphy, left behind in Dublin, will marry George Graham, feeling that, as a Protestant, her marriage to the Catholic John is “not sufficiently binding to prevent a subsequent marriage.”
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4 NOVEMBER 1776, NORTH CASTLE, NEW YORK: A court martial acquits Continental Colonel Morris Graham of cowardice at the Battle of White Plains. Joseph Reed, Washington’s adjutant-general, accused Graham of ordering multiple retreats without ever firing at the enemy.
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Graham had been in command of Chatterton’s Hill, the high ground whose capture by British and Hessian troops was the focal action at the Battle of White Plains on October 28.
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