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WASHINGTON, GEORGE. 



WASHINGTON, GEORGE. 



su 



complete military organisation of Virginia. And on the 1 5th of June 

 of that year he was elected couitaander-iu-chief of the Continental 

 army by Congress. 



The portion of Washington's life which we have hitherto been 

 passing in review may bo considered as his probationary period the 

 time during which he was training himself for the great business of 

 his life. His subsequent career naturally subdivides itself into two 

 periods that of his military command, and that of his presidency. 

 In the former we have Washington the soldier ; in the latter, Washing- 

 ton the statesman. His avocations from 1748 to 1775 were as good a 

 school as can well be conceived for acquiring the accomplishments of 

 either character. His early intimacy and connections with the Fairfax 

 family had taught him to look on society with the eyes of the class 

 which takes a part in government. His familiarity with applied mathe- 

 matics and his experience as a surveyor on the wild frontier lands had 

 made him master of that most important branch of knowledge for a 

 commander the structure of the country. His experience as a 

 parade officer, as a partisan on the frontier, and as the commander of 

 cDiir-iilerable bodies of disciplined troops, had taught him the prin- 

 ciples both of the war of detail and the war of large masses. On the 

 other hand, his punctual habits of business, bis familiarity with the 

 details both of agriculture and commerce, and the experience he had 

 acquired as trustee, arbitrator, and member of the House of Burgesses, 

 were so many preparatory studies for the duties of the statesman. He 

 commenced his great task of first liberating and then governing a 

 nation, with all the advantages of this varied experience, in his forty- 

 third year, an age at which the physical vigour is undiminished and 

 the intellect fully ripe. He persevered in it, with a brief interval of 

 repose, for upwards of twenty years, with almost uniform success, and 

 with an exemption from the faults of great leaders unparalleled in 

 history. ^ 



Washington was elected commander-in-chief on the 15th of June 

 1775 ; he resigned his commission into the hands of the president of 

 Congress on the 23rd of December, 1783. 



A few days after his appointment he left Philadelphia to join the 

 army at Cambridge, Massachusetts. The particulars of the battle of 

 Bunker's Hill reached him at New York, and increased his anxiety to 

 hasten forward. He arrived at Cambridge on the 2nd of July, and 

 assumed the command next day. The army, including sick and 

 wounded, amounted to about 17,000 men, collected on the spur of the 

 moment, occupying a range of posts disproportioned to their numbers, 

 and almost under the guns of the enemy. There were few stores, no 

 military chest, and no general organisation. And the new commander 

 discovered with astonishment that there was not powder enough in 

 the camp to supply nine cartridges for each man. There was much 

 discontent among the general officers on account of the manner in 

 which the appointments had been made by Congress, and the sub- 

 ordinate officers and privates formed themselves into parties. Referring 

 their complaints to Congress, Washington proceeded to mature his 

 plans. The army was formed into six brigades of six regiments each ; 

 the troops of the same colony were, whenever it was practicable, 

 brought together and placed under a commander from that colony. 

 All the officers were commissioned anew by Congress, and by degrees 

 a continental army was formed. He kept up an uninterrupted cor- 

 respondence with Congress, which, though tardily, adopted all his 

 important suggestions. He corresponded also with the heads of the 

 provincial governments, and subsequently with the] governors and 

 legislatures of the several states. He thus became not only the creator 

 of the American army, but the sole channel of communication between 

 it and the numerous and complicated depositories of power in- the 

 United States. 



The army was at first distributed into three grand divisions of two 

 brigades each : the division forming the left wing was stationed at 

 Winter Hill, under Major-General Lee ; the centre division at Cam- 

 bridge, under Major-General Putnam; the right wing at Roxburgh, 

 under Major-General Ward. The head-quarters of the commander-in- 

 chief were with the centre at Cambridge. These positions were 

 maintained with little alteration till far in January 1776. During that 

 interval the regular army, by the departure of many whose term of 

 enlistment had expired, and in consequence of the slow progress of the 

 recruiting, sunk to 9650 men, to whom were added 15,000 militia, who 

 were to remain only till the middle of January. " Search the volumes 

 of history through," Washington wrote at this time, " and I much 

 question whether a case similar to ours is to be found, namely, to 

 maintain a post against the flower of the British troops for six months 

 together without powder, and then to have our army disbanded and 

 another to be raised within the same distance of a reinforced enemy." 

 During this time he detached 1100 men, under Arnold (14th Septem- 

 ber), in the direction of Canada, and equipped and sent out armed 

 vessels from the New England ports. Occasional cannonades and 

 skirmishes took place at the advanced posts. But no decisive blow 

 could be hazarded ; and the patience and fortitude of the commander- 

 in-cbief were severely tried by the cabals of the officers, the undis- 

 ciplined habits of the men, and the pragmatical conduct of the civil 

 authorities. 



Towards the end of December 1775, General Howe, who had suc- 

 ceeded Gage in command of the British army, was fitting out part of 

 the fleet in Boston harbour for some secret enterprise. General Lee 



was despatched to place New York in a state of defence, but the 

 expedition proved to be destined against North Carolina. Washington 

 became impatient to attack Boston, but was twice overruled by a 

 council of war on the 16th of January and on the 10th of February 

 1776. At last, on the 4th of March, the Americans took possession of 

 Dorchester heights ; and on the 17th the British evacuated Boston. 

 As soon as the British fleet had put to sea, Washington set out for 

 New York, apprehensive that the enemy might attempt a landing 

 there. It was the 28th of June before the British forces appeared off 

 Sandy Hook ; but the deficient means at Washington's command, and 

 the strength of the royalist party in New York, had materially im- 

 peded his preparations for defence. The incompetency of some of 

 Washington's officers enabled the enemy to gain easy possession of 

 Long Island on the 27th of August ; and the weakness of his army 

 and fears of the soldiers obliged him in succession to evacuate New 

 York, cross the Hudson, and fall back behind the Delaware. Congress 

 at last saw the necessity of raising a regular army of men enlisted for a 

 longer period than a year, and of investing Washington with dicta- 

 torial powers. Thus strengthened he remodelled his troops, recrossed 

 the Delaware on the night of the 25th of December, and broke up and 

 drove back the whole of the enemy's line of cantonments on that 

 river. Having thus relieved New Jersey, he again fell back and esta- 

 blished his winter-quarters at Morristown in New Jersey. 



The campaign of 1777 did not open till the middle of June; and 

 the operations on both sides led for some time to nothing but a series 

 of skirmishes. Washington had received a supply of arms from 

 France, but ho was still uncertain of his new levies. He was also 

 kept in suspense as to the real designs of the British commander. It 

 was clearly an object with the English to maiotain the command of 

 the 'Hudson, keep up the communication, between New York and 

 Canada, and isolate the eastern from the western states. But there 

 was also danger in leaviug Philadelphia exposed. At last the British 

 landed at the Head of Elk. The Americans were defeated on the 

 Braudywine. Congress undismayed invested Washington with fresh 

 powers. The Americans were again beaten at Germantown in Penn- 

 sylvania, on the 4th of October, but a marked improvement was 

 visible in the fighting of part of their troops. The Britis-h took pos- 

 session of Philadelphia after the battle. On the 18th of December 

 Washington began to construct a fortified encampment at Valley Forge. 

 He was at this time harassed by cabals among the general officers. 

 Conway, Gates, and Mifflin, aided by a small party in Congress, con- 

 spired to have him removed from the command. The good sense of 

 the majority in Congress frustrated the plot, and the attachment of 

 the soldiers, heightened by the enthusiasm with which Lafayette and 

 Von Kalb threw their weight into Washington's scale, kept the army 

 in good temper. 



The winter was however a trying one for the troops. Owing to the 

 derangement of the commissariat, the men were inadequately sup- 

 plied with clothes and blankets, and at times even with food. With 

 the experience of three campaigns, Washington now set himself to 

 plan an entire remodelling of the army. He invited the general 

 officers to state their sentiments on the subject in writing. Congress 

 at the same time appointed a commission to visit the camp, which 

 remained there three months. With great difficulty the commander- 

 in-chief wrung from Congress the promise of half-pay for seven years 

 for the officers, and a gratuity of 80 dollars for each non-commissioned 

 officer and soldier who should continue in the service to the end of 

 the war. The ratification of the treaty with France was celebrated 

 in the camp with great solemnity on the 6th of May. The British in 

 Philadelphia, though only twenty miles distant from the American 

 camp, allowed the winter and spring to pass without making any 

 attempt to assault it. These concurring circumstances enabled 

 Washington to bring his troops into the field in 1778 in tolerable 

 spirits. A defensive campaign was however determined on by the 

 council of war. Howe evacuated Philadelphia on the 18th of June, 

 and Washington crossed the Delaware with his whole army. He 

 attacked the enemy at Monmouth on the 28th; night put an end to 

 the attack, and under its cover the British continued their retreat. 

 Washington advanced to the Hudson, and crossing it at King's Ferry, 

 encamped near White Plains. Count d'Estaing, with a French fleet 

 of twelve ships of the line and four frigates, arrived about the same 

 time off Sandy Hook. The American army was engaged for four 

 months in arrangements for the defence of New England, during 

 which interval the English laid New Jersey waste. Washington in 

 December retired into winter-quarters distributing his troops in a 

 line of cantonments around New York extending from Long Island 

 Sound to the Delaware. 



During the whole of 1779 Washington retained his position in tho 

 highlands of the Hudson, and remained on the defensive. An expedi- 

 tion fitted out to chastise the Indians was successful. The British 

 burned a number of towns on the coast, but Washington covered New 

 Jersey. Baron Steuben effected an improvement in the discipline and 

 evolutions of the American army. 



Lafayette returned from a visit to France before the end of April 

 1780, with the intelligence that tho French government had fitted out 

 an armament of land and naval forces which might soon be expected 

 in the United States. Rochambeau arrived at Newport, Rhode 

 Island, on the 1 Oth of July. A plan of combiued operations against 



