“His most Christian Majesty guarantees on his part to the United States their liberty, sovereignty and independence, absolute and unlimited.” Those ringing words, which opened the third act of the American war, appeared in the treaty of alliance between France and the United States, signed in Paris on 6 February 1778. Americans had been seeking such a treaty for some two years or more. The subject had first come up well before the signing of the Declaration of Independence. Proponents of proclaiming independence had in fact used the general desire for foreign assistance to bolster their arguments, saying that without a formal declaration no third nation would ever enter into an alliance with the rebels. There were other important reasons: merchants had yearned for a pact to protect trade; Congress had wanted one to open a door for economic assistance; military men had wished for armed assistance and naval support. And now it was a reality!
When news of the astounding patriot victory at Saratoga and reports of the encouraging performance of American arms outside Philadelphia reached Paris, the effect was electrifying. For years, France had been seeking revenge for the humiliating drubbing Britain had administered in the Seven Years War. Her military arm had been refurbished in anticipation of the day of revanche, and diplomats had eagerly read every sign to discern the right moment to strike. Agents had traveled through America looking for indications of rebellion as many as seven years before the outbreak of fighting in 1775. When a confrontation appeared imminent, the foreign minister, Comte de Vergennes, rushed an emissary to London to sample the air. He reported back that the colonies were very likely to break free. France, with somewhat more hesitant assistance from Spain, then began surreptitiously to support the American rebels. Money and weapons from England’s two old adversaries did much to keep General Washington’s ragged legions in the field through the war’s first three years. Now, with the colonials stronger than ever and England shocked by her unexpected reverses, Vergennes concluded that the time for open intervention was at hand. This looked like the long-awaited opportunity. London had never appeared more vulnerable. Louis XVI, whose own head would one day roll in the bottom of a rebel basket, overcame his scruples against revolutionaries and decided to form an alliance with the upstart American republic. The war abruptly entered a new and ultimately decisive phase, which could be labeled “coalition victory.”
Just as the second phase had presented Washington a set of conditions wholly different from those in the first, the third phase was completely unlike the previous two. France’s entry into the war added international legitimacy to the revolutionary cause, assured a continuing source of supply, and held forth the promise of reinforcement by a French expeditionary army. But more important still was the introduction of the French navy. Henceforth, there would be a fleet to challenge British supremacy in North American waters. France had been energetically regenerating its naval arm ever since the last war, while Britain had allowed its own to atrophy. In weight of guns and number of warships, the French were stronger. Britannia would not rule the waves uncontested. No longer would British generals have the privilege of freely shifting units along the Atlantic seaboard; no longer would they enjoy the unopposed strategic advantage of interior lines. The only edge in mobility they had ever held over the Americans was thus endangered—if not lost altogether.
Washington had been limited to acting on the strategic defensive so long as Great Britain had absolute superiority at sea. The arrival of a French fleet—or even the threat of its arrival—now permitted him to resume the offensive. Military victory became possible. The invaders could be driven from American soil. Patriots could accept greater risks, for the loss now of a major portion of the Continental army would not necessarily be fatal; the Revolution had taken too firm a hold in the country to be rooted out by a Britain at war also with France. This is not to say that Americans could become foolhardy, but they could operate with less constraint, more daring. Seizing the initiative was Washington’s new imperative, defeating the British army his overriding goal. Although it is overlooked surprisingly often, the Americans’ predominant motivation during the four years between Saratoga and Yorktown was their burning desire to smite the foe. In Washington’s words, American actions were shaped by the need to make “one great vigorous effort at all hazards” to win the war.1
When Washington went into the miserable winter camp at Valley Forge, he could not foresee how drastically the war would change. Nevertheless, certain alterations were already in evidence. Foreign aid had lately been a great boon to the cause, and a gaggle of foreign officers had imparted a cosmopolitan flavor to the Continental army. Lafayette, Kosciuszko, DeKalb, Pulaski, Duportail, and Steuben were some of the more illustrious of Washington’s new lieutenants. The Americans expected more help of that kind. But an outright alliance was to be hoped for, not counted on. In the dead of winter, struggling to survive until spring, the patriots looked for warm weather to bring a campaign in 1778 like that of the previous year. Throughout January, in fact, Washington continued to speak emphatically of waging “a defensive war.”
But, under whatever strategic cloak it fought, the American army had to be improved. One clear lesson Washington had learned was that his ragtag regiments required better training and organization if they were ever to have a decent chance of beating British and German formations. The amorphous mass with which he had previously fended off British parries had been neither responsive nor dependable. Germantown had taught him that the Continental army was too dull a weapon to permit him to carry the war to the enemy with much expectation of success. Americans today look back on the Valley Forge winter as an epic of suffering and survival. It was, in truth, a terrible time for the underfed, ill-clothed, poorly paid Continentals, but it was not the worst winter they would endure, nor was mere survival their greatest accomplishment. Helped immeasurably by longer enlistments, which had provided a solid nucleus of veterans, and the influx of foreign officers, which had provided a professional base of knowledge, the Continental army came of age that winter. When it marched forth in the spring from its training camp at Valley Forge, it bore the stamp of Steuben, the Prussian drillmaster who had taught it to form line from column, to maneuver crisply on the battlefield, to wield the fearsome bayonet. For the first time, George Washington led an army not only rich in experience but well trained and brimming with confidence, equal or superior to its foe in many respects. Battles henceforth would be between British regulars and American regulars.
The British recognized that the war had entered a new phase much earlier than the Americans did. London was stunned by the news of Saratoga. Germain could discuss nothing else for days. Lord North contemplated resigning. Opposition leaders in Parliament grew more vocal. The desire to press the war reached a low point. After but a little reflection, Germain concluded that there was no longer any prospect of overrunning the colonies, and he reverted to a strategy of naval blockade. Although a declaration of war on Britain did not immediately accompany France’s alliance with the United States, the ministry in London knew that warfare between the two ancient enemies was inevitable and imminent. George III could also expect Spain to side with France. As a modern British scholar has noted, “England faced what she had always dreaded and averted: a coalition of maritime enemies undistracted by war in Europe.” Orders leaving London that winter made abundantly clear that king and cabinet realized a new phase in the fight was upon them.2
Henry Clinton was told to abandon Philadelphia in order to free forces for employment elsewhere. He was even, if need be, to give up New York and make Halifax the main British base in North America. With France in the conflict, London fully expected the Caribbean to become the new focus of fighting. Both France and Britain had bases there. And, though it may seem preposterous today, not a few Englishmen considered the sugar islands to be quite more valuable than the thirteen colonies. Once he had consolidated his scattered elements, Clinton was to detach five thousand men to the West Indies to attack the French island of St. Lucia. The new plans also directed him to send another three thousand troops to Florida, where they would be in position to defend Jamaica or attack New Orleans, as the situation might dictate. In North America, except for naval actions in coastal waters, Great Britain’s generals were told to adopt a strictly passive stance, thus forfeiting the initiative to the rebels.
Evacuating Philadelphia was not a simple matter, Clinton soon discovered. The year before, upon hearing that General Howe had taken the city, Benjamin Franklin, who knew his town well, had quipped, “No, Philadelphia has taken Howe.” The sage was right. Loyalists abounded in the area, and, believing the king’s colors were there to stay, they had stepped forward in numbers to proclaim allegiance to the monarch. For the most part, they had been unwilling to take up arms against the patriots, but they had accepted the king’s protection. The British stay in the city had been most pleasant, their idle hours filled with entertainment, the passage of winter weeks hastened by enjoyable companionship. Indeed, in some ways the natives might have been overly warm, for it seems the occupying army suffered more than was usual from intimate encounters. Apothecaries did a brisk business in such medicines as Dr. Yeldall’s Anti-venereal Essence, which both prevented and cured; Hannay’s Preventive, a London product; and Keyser’s Pills, advertised as effective for “a certain disease.” But the health of his command was not Clinton’s primary problem as he prepared to depart. It was the Tories themselves. They could not be left to the predictable fury of the patriots; on the other hand, he had insufficient shipping to transport both the army and the horde of loyalists. After some soul-searching, the British commander finally decided to send noncombatants by sea while marching his army across New Jersey to the friendly lines around New York.
Not until 30 April did Washington learn of the treaty with France. A French frigate, La Sensible, had left Brest on 8 March, not reaching the United States until 13 April. From its landfall in Falmouth, a courier rode to York, Pennsylvania, to give word to Congress. Delegates hurried the message on to camp. The grand news found the general and many of his associates already in an aggressive mood. He promptly called a council of war to choose one of three courses of action. Should the Americans attack New York, strike at Philadelphia, or await developments? Nathanael Greene wanted to hold the enemy in Philadelphia while striking their New York sanctuary. Henry Knox, too, preferred to aim at the port on the Hudson, but he was more cautious than Greene. Anthony Wayne, as always, wanted to go immediately on the offensive, any offensive! Most of the others wanted to take some positive action to hit the British, but they could not see how or where. The army was not yet large enough and there was a shortage of heavy artillery needed to batter down fortifications. In the end, the council decided to wait a while longer to see what would develop.3
That new bellicosity had actually been growing for some time. Americans of that era were by nature activists, none more so than those involved in the rebellion. Patriots who thought about such matters could appreciate that General Washington’s protracted war may have been necessary, but that did not make it palatable. By the middle of 1777, an obvious backlash had set in. All across the land, nearly everyone began more or less independently looking for some way to hit back at the royal invaders. On the very eve of its flight from Philadelphia, Congress had worked up a plan for an assault against Pensacola. Many eyes also turned westward in 1777. Congress established a western department that year and sent Brigadier General Edward Hand out to command it. Washington’s daring counterattack at Germantown had itself fit with the nation’s new pugnacity. The year 1778 opened with some inventive patriots attempting to damage British vessels anchored at Philadelphia by floating mines down the Delaware—the so-called Battle of the Kegs—while Congress enthusiastically plotted a new invasion of Canada. Washington, meanwhile, worked at organizing a mounted service, which would permit him to raid enemy outposts. Such enterprising efforts did not cease when Continentals took the field at winter’s end. Virginia sent George Rogers Clark west in 1778. John Paul Jones conducted his first raid on the English homeland that same year, spiking the guns at two forts in the harbor of Whitehaven and setting several fires. Captain James Willing, with a courageous band of backwoodsmen, sailed down the Mississippi in an armed boat named Rattlesnake, raising havoc along the way. Major General Robert Howe led a venturesome, if unsuccessful, attempt to seize East Florida. And Congress planned yet another offensive to capture Canada. There was no mistaking Americans’ eagerness for the war’s new phase. They were tired of defending, and they would have tried to snatch the initiative even if the British had not already decided to give it away.
Conclusive evidence of Clinton’s pending departure from Philadelphia reached Valley Forge in late May. Washington made plans to hinder a march through New Jersey if the British should choose to go that way. “The game,” he wrote, “seems now to be verging fast to a favorable issue and cannot, I think, be lost unless we throw it away by too much supineness on the one hand or impetuousity on the other.” When the British started their trek from Philadelphia into New Jersey on 18 June, the Virginian eagerly set out in pursuit.4
At first patriots only harassed Clinton’s long file of troops and wagons. Washington followed to the north and rear with the main body of the army, while Daniel Morgan, with six hundred riflemen, hung on the southern flank. But Clinton moved more slowly than either he or Washington had expected. Rebels in New Jersey had burned bridges and otherwise impeded the route of the march. Encumbered with an excessive number of baggage wagons, the British in seven days covered only forty miles. Washington was tempted by the opportunity. There was the enemy, struggling just to move and strung out in a long, vulnerable column. Americans stood poised on their flank with a slightly superior force, twelve thousand to the British ten thousand. The general convened a council of war on 24 June. Should the Continentals “hazard a general action?” If so, should it be a major assault, a partial one, or should they maneuver in such a way as to make the British attack?
Steuben, Lafayette, Wayne, Greene, and Duportail wanted to attack. But Charles Lee, who had recently been exchanged, argued against doing anything. Avoid all action and wait for the French to enter and win the war, he counseled. Lee was articulate and persuasive, and the aura of European professionalism still hung about him. The vote was close, but he carried the debate. Young Alexander Hamilton, who was taking notes, disgustedly labeled the timid council a “society of midwives.” Anthony Wayne stalked out, refusing to put his name on the report. That night, Wayne, Lafayette, and Greene each wrote a note to Washington urging him to overrule the council and attack anyway. Realizing what a chance was slipping through his fingers—one that might never again be repeated—the general decided to take the bolder course. He gave Lafayette command of the advance detachment and set his entire army in motion on the road to Monmouth Court House.5
The battle of Monmouth was fought on 28 June 1778, three years to the month after the man from Mount Vernon had been appointed commander in chief. It was a landmark in the war, for Continentals that day performed in open battle as well as or better than the Europeans.
Lee, who had insisted that he, by virtue of seniority, should command the advance, replaced Lafayette. Upon reaching Monmouth, he found Clinton facing him with a small but vigorous covering force. Lee, the general who had not wanted to fight in the first place and who, despite his reputation, had never commanded men in battle, promptly lost control. A confused retreat of about three miles resulted. Washington, galloping to the sound of the guns, rode headlong into the midst of the reeling Continentals, at once assumed command, rallied the shaken troops, and stopped the British short. After reinforcing his stalled units, Clinton launched several attacks, only to be repulsed each time by disciplined and steady Americans. Washington then organized a counterattack, but the day was done. Nightfall ended the battle. Leaving his dead and wounded on the field, Clinton got away in the darkness, reaching the safety of the ocean at Sandy Hook. Counting desertions, he had lost some two thousand men. American casualties were put at 230 dead and wounded. The Continental army had fought splendidly and, after Washington relieved Lee, it had been superbly led. Monmouth could not properly be called a victory for either side. Washington had carried the day, but Clinton had escaped—not without being humbled and badly frightened, though. The Englishman had learned a jolting lesson—the American ragamuffins could no longer be pushed about at will.
“It is not a little pleasing, nor less wonderful to contemplate, that after two years of maneuvering and undergoing the strangest vicissitudes that perhaps ever attended any one contest since creation, both armies are brought back to the very point they set out from.” So wrote an elated George Washington from his new headquarters east of the Hudson and above New York City, where he had marched after Monmouth. The opponents occupied roughly the same ground they had held in 1776 before Howe had crossed the Hudson to invade New Jersey—the British owning Manhattan and the patriots entrenched south of the Hudson Highlands. But in 1778 there was one all-important difference: the roles of attacker and defender had been reversed. This time around, the Americans were on the offensive and the king’s troops were hunkering behind barricades, wondering when and where the next blow would fall.
Chasing Clinton back to his lair was not the only event elevating patriot spirits. France and the United Kingdom had broken off diplomatic relations in March and had begun a shooting war in June. America had an active ally! Comte d’Estaing, a general appointed to serve as an admiral in the French navy, left Toulon in mid-April with a powerful fleet. His destination: the United States. Unfortunately, he loitered in crossing, taking nearly three months, thereby missing a grand coup at the Chesapeake by mere days. Admiral Richard Howe had left Philadelphia with his load of loyalists in the nick of time. He scurried safely into New York just ahead of the French. D’Estaing promptly bottled the British up in the harbor. Howe had only nine ships of the line, his largest ones carrying but sixty-four guns. D’Estaing overwhelmingly outnumbered and outgunned the English, having six seventy-four-gun men-of-war, one behemoth of eighty guns, and another of ninety. General Washington learned of the French arrival on 13 July. Windows suddenly opened on new vistas of strategy. The means to annihilate the British garrisons were at hand. Washington sent his brilliant, French-speaking aide Alexander Hamilton to coordinate with d’Estaing, meanwhile maneuvering the American army to a position from which it could attack Clinton’s stronghold in New York.
But the story of d’Estaing in America would be one of dashed hopes. The general-turned-admiral looked at the treacherous bar he would have to cross to get into the harbor, glumly considered the restricted nature of the proposed battle site, and uneasily noted Admiral Howe’s readiness to fight. The Frenchman did not have the heart to try it. He claimed his deep-draft ships could not negotiate the channel. Without showing his great disappointment, Washington, ever the opportunist, quickly shifted sights to Rhode Island. D’Estaing agreed to support an attack there.
The isolated base at Newport was defended by only six thousand men, mostly Hessians. About four thousand marines were on board d’Estaing’s ships, while John Sullivan, the American commander in Rhode Island, had another nine thousand, including last-minute reinforcements sent from the main army. The odds heavily favored an allied victory; Washington confidently reckoned the chances of winning stood at a hundred to one or better. To help smooth relations, he sent two of his more trusted generals—Nathanael Greene, a native of Rhode Island, and Lafayette, who was expected to coordinate actions with the French. At first all went well. Squeezed between d’Estaing’s fleet and a combined French and American land force, the British garrison appeared doomed. Then English boldness, with an assist from Lady Luck, turned near victory into near disaster.6
Admiral Howe, though leading a much inferior fleet, sailed bravely from New York to the aid of his beleaguered compatriots in Newport. D’Estaing immediately picked up his marines and sailed out to meet Howe on 10 August, leaving the surprised Americans stranded in a rather awkward position. As the two admirals maneuvered for battle, a violent storm blew up, scattering and severely damaging their warships. Howe limped back to New York, and d’Estaing returned to Newport, but only to make temporary repairs. He had no stomach for further operations there. Oblivious to the entreaties of his allies, he sailed for Boston to refit. While there, he also dropped his plans for amphibious raids against Halifax and Newfoundland. The season was late. He headed for the West Indies instead. Sullivan, meanwhile, had barely extricated his exposed forces in time to avert a crushing defeat. What had once looked like a certain victory had turned into a frustrating loss. The new alliance was getting off to a rocky start.
Indians struck that year in the Wyoming Valley, the first of a series of deadly raids into the frontier settlements of Pennsylvania and New York. General Hand, with few resources, had done little in the west in 1777. In what came to be known as the “Squaw Campaign,” he could report nothing more decisive than killing four Indian women and one boy. General Lachlan McIntosh replaced Hand as commander of the western department. Given two Continental regiments in 1778, McIntosh pushed into the Ohio country, erecting Forts McIntosh and Laurens and planning to attack Detroit. But the Indian raids, hitting settlements much farther to the east, behind McIntosh’s area of operations, effectively halted patriot expansion for the time being. The Indian terror had to be dealt with first. Arms and men bolstered the threatened sectors, and Washington began plans for a decisive campaign in 1779. “The only certain way of preventing Indian ravages,” he said, “is to carry the war vigorously into their own country.”7
Still, the commander in chief’s primary concern was with British units occupying American territory. So long as British forces remained behind their fortifications and the French fleet remained timid, the Americans could not get at them. But what if the British commanders tried some new scheme to regain the initiative? What if Clinton opened a front in a different area? Where could redcoats go? What could they do? Those and similar questions arose at patriot headquarters in the autumn of 1778. As intelligence accumulated indicating a forthcoming British move of some sort, divining the correct answers became more important. Washington’s analysis of what his opponent could and should do affords us a glimpse into the commander in chief’s well-developed strategic grasp.
Recognizing that he had no inside information to tell him what Clinton was up to, Washington reasoned that the Englishman could choose from only three decisive objectives: the annihilation of the Continental army, the destruction of the French fleet, or the capture of fortress West Point. Without an army or a navy, the allies could not operate offensively; without the bastion at West Point, they would be hard pressed to thwart an enemy offensive. Washington, therefore, could hardly credit reports that Clinton was readying an expedition for the southern colonies, away from West Point and the Continental army. Surely the enemy must have learned by now, he said, “that the possession of our towns, while we have an army in the field, will avail them little. It involves us in difficulty, but does not, by any means, insure them conquest.” To gain a victory, “it is our arms, not defenseless towns, they have to subdue.” Then, quoting from Shakespeare, the Virginian stated that all British schemes would fade “like the baseless fabric of a vision” as long as an American army remained intact. Moreover, he continued, heading south was not only illogical, it would be dangerous for the British. Before the entry of France into the war, a southern strategy would have been feasible, “but to attempt now to detach 10,000 men (which is, I suppose, half their army) and to divide their naval strength for the protection of it, would, in my judgment, be an act of insanity, and expose one part or the other of both land and sea force to inevitable ruin.” The American leader was quite correct, of course—perhaps even prescient.8
Despite logic, though, Clinton had a southern campaign in mind. Savannah was his initial objective. It fell to an amphibious strike on 29 December 1778, ending a year in which almost all the luck had been with the British.
Uncharacteristically, right at year’s end George Washington fought with all his might to prevent the launching of an offensive campaign. In October, the Continental Congress had proposed a grandiose French and American invasion of Canada. The delegates instructed Benjamin Franklin to offer France a part of the Newfoundland fishing grounds in return for sending a naval squadron and five thousand troops up the St. Lawrence River to link up with an invading American army of twelve thousand men to be led by Lafayette. They thought Lafayette’s name would tempt the French to agree and might attract support from the thousands of French-speaking Canadians. Lafayette, naturally, was all for the scheme. But Washington, with one eye on the national goal of territorial expansion, was thoroughly shaken by the thought of the French flag flying once again over Quebec. He argued against the plan, publicly explaining that it was beyond patriot capabilities to launch such an invasion but privately expressing his fears of a French resurgence in the coveted lands. As an alternative, he suggested an American blow against Detroit and Niagara. The fact of the matter was that French officials had not the slightest interest in becoming involved again as a colonial power in North America, but the Americans did not know that. If they opposed a British force in Canada after the war, they regarded the reestablishment of French influence there as unthinkable. It would have been an embarrassing situation indeed had their allies claimed the very territory that the colonists desired so ardently. The mere thought, Washington wrote, “alarms all my feelings for the true and permanent interests of my country.” He was looking into the future. With Frenchmen in Canada, Spaniards in New Orleans, and Indians along the western frontier, France would “have it in her power to give law to these states.” Unsure of persuading by letter, the general went to Philadelphia in December to argue personally, an effort that testifies to the seriousness with which he viewed the possibility of losing future claims to Canada. In the end, he prevailed. The invasion was canceled. Americans turned their interests and hopes for 1779 back to the Atlantic coast. Lafayette returned to France for a visit.9
Another issue kept Washington in Philadelphia, away from his army, until well into February: the vexing problem of planning a campaign for the forthcoming season. The difficulties confronting him at that point in the war were as much political and economic as they were military. Decisions, therefore, could not be made in isolation at winter headquarters. And, for once, the Continental army was not on the verge of dissolving. It did not need General Washington’s firm presence. The weather was mild and the men were tough. Most by now were immune to the diseases of camp life. Widely scattered cantonments in New York and New Jersey simplified the burden of transporting supplies, so the troops were relatively well fed. They were also warmer than was their usual winter lot—many sported shoes and blankets and uniforms made in France. No, the real threat of dissolution was not in the army, it was in the civilian sector. Hence, that is where Washington worked.
America’s economic and political situation was in sharp decline. Inflation was runaway, with money sometimes dipping 5 percent a day. Manipulators were growing rich while the country was sliding into financial ruin. Political factions were developing. Congress was practically impotent, for the “ablest and best men” had long since left it to serve elsewhere. Damning those seeking wealth from the woes of war, a bitter George Washington exclaimed, “Speculation, peculation, and an insatiable thirst for riches seem to have got the better of every other consideration and almost of every order of men.” He railed against those “speculators, various tribes of money makers, and stock jobbers of all denominations” who were waging their own war for private profit. As for the Continental Congress, the general noted sadly how “party disputes and personal quarrels are the great business of the day, whilst the momentous concerns of an empire ... are but secondary considerations.” Washington can be forgiven for overstating the case somewhat, for he was utterly dumbfounded by the contrast of “luxury and profusion” in Philadelphia with “want and misery” in camp. With much reason, he deeply feared for the future of the cause.10
Strategic discussions reflected that fear. “The question does not turn upon military principals only,” the commander in chief stated. American poverty and European politics shaped military planning. The country’s wracked economic condition would be the primary limit on any strategy, while international developments would perhaps be the second most important consideration. Spain’s open entry into the war, which all sides expected, would change the equation, as would the course adopted by other nations in Europe. Should Great Britain react to European events by evacuating its bases in the United States, Washington thought patriots ought to be in a posture to grab the opportunity to expand. As he phrased it, his army “should be ready to strike an important blow for the effectual security of our frontiers and for opening a door for a further progress into Canada.” On the other hand, he continued, if the British stayed, the Continental army must be prepared to join with a French fleet in efforts to strike one of the enemy bases at Newport, New York, or Savannah. Yet either of those eventualities—attacking westward or tackling a British enclave—required a large and expensive military establishment. The destitute nation, Washington felt, simply could not afford so heavy a burden just then. The standing army had no recourse but to stay small. If a French naval force arrived, the general would be obliged to depend on mobilizing militia units to swell his ranks to a size permitting offensive actions.11
In his analytical way, Washington next listed three options open to the Americans if the British kept their bases and a French fleet did not appear. First, and most desirable, was to attack in Rhode Island or New York, but the flattened state of finances would not support such an effort. Second was to conduct an offensive against Niagara. This, too, would be expensive because those forces containing the British in their coastal redoubts could be thinned out only at great risk, and Americans would be compelled to raise additional regiments. The last option was to remain on the defensive. “It is to be regretted,” the general summarized, “that our prospect of any capital offensive operation is so slender that we seem in a manner to be driven to the necessity of adopting the third plan, that is, remaining entirely on the defensive.” Economically, that was the best course, but it had dangerous psychological implications, he warned. Doing nothing might “serve to dispirit the people and give confidence to the disaffected.” The dilemma was that the country had insufficient funds to act, but lacked the spirit to sustain inaction. Washington pointed out that without the hope of a speedy end to the war, which had been provided earlier by France’s entry, he would now command but “the shadow of an army.” In a very real sense, regardless of its fiscal straits, the nation could not afford to do nothing. The sad fever of idleness could be fatal. That sobering consideration, he concluded, might require “one great vigorous effort at all hazards.”12
In the end, Congress and commander in chief decided to send a strong force into Iroquois country to punish the Indians, while standing on the defensive elsewhere—unless, that is, a French squadron should put in an appearance. Then they would of necessity rely upon a surge of spirit to summon the needed manpower. We might call this bargain-basement war, but the old cliché that beggars can’t be choosers was certainly true of the impoverished rebels as they entered their fifth campaigning season.
The military tale of 1779 is quickly told. D’Estaing returned to American waters in September, but he wanted nothing to do with New York or Newport. Memories of the previous year’s fiasco were too fresh. Instead, he sailed to Savannah where he joined Americans under Benjamin Lincoln in besieging the British. The English garrison was cut off from support when French warships took station, and should have been easy prey. D’Estaing, however, was too impatient, insisting upon a premature attack, which the defenders handily turned back. That single bloody repulse was all the combat the admiral wanted that year. He sailed away once more, leaving a fuming Lincoln to fend for himself. The name of d’Estaing is not a respected one in patriot chronicles of the war.
Elsewhere, results were better. Against the hostile tribes, John Sullivan and James Clinton led a highly successful punitive expedition, which was the beginning of the end of the power of eastern Indians. Colonel Daniel Brodhead, the new commander of the western department, also led a victorious march against Indians near the Allegheny River headwaters. Washington was “in hopes these severe blows will effectually intimidate the Indians and secure the future peace of our frontier.” Henry Clinton devised an involved scheme to grab West Point, which miscarried, giving Washington an opportunity to attack an exposed post at Stony Point. Anthony Wayne stormed it in darkness at bayonet point, gaining a splendid little victory and boosting patriot morale. In a similar stroke, “Light-Horse Harry” Lee, the father of Robert E. Lee, knocked off a key outpost at Paulus Hook, opposite New York City. Clinton, finding the Americans all too eager to fight and his own forces much too dispersed, was thoroughly frightened when he heard d’Estaing was operating along the coast. He shortened his lines around New York and withdrew completely from Rhode Island. John Paul Jones made his second raid on the British Isles, capturing the Serapis in September. George Rogers Clark completed his conquest of the Old Northwest, and the people of Boston, on their own, sent an ambitious if unsuccessful expedition off in forty vessels to capture Penobscot. Americans and Frenchmen were not doing all the fighting, however. After Spain entered the war, Bernardo de Galvez, governor of Louisiana, promptly seized British posts along the Mississippi. All in all, it was not a happy year for George III.
Americans had failed to dislodge the British from Georgia, but an indirect result of d’Estaing’s short stay there had been the bloodless recovery of Newport. Nor had patriots been able to make a “great vigorous effort” anywhere, but the sum of all the minor victories was nearly as beneficial—maybe more so, because the cost could hardly have been lower. With Congress bankrupt, that was an important point. Once again, it could be said that George Washington had employed American arms in perfect accord with American capabilities and needs.
Action on the diplomatic front heated up in 1779. Spain’s entry required Congress to decide upon its minimum war aims, sparking a debate lasting several months. Pointedly, the French ambassador told the president of Congress that his country would not support United States claims to lands outside the thirteen states unless Americans were in possession of them at the beginning of peace talks. For that matter, he cautioned, it might not be possible to prevent Britain from retaining any territory its army might occupy—including parts of the United States. That stance served as a sharp spur to invigorate the Americans, as well as a warning that, while France would back the patriot goal of independence, it would not be bound to support the aim of territorial aggrandizement.13
Already the maneuvering for postwar position had begun, although, since neither side was yet willing to terminate hostilities, fighting remained paramount. A nation at war normally seeks peace only when it has gained all it can expect to achieve, when it foresees greater losses by continuing, or when it has absorbed its limit of punishment. The American war was obviously not near its end for any of those reasons, but all participants would from that point give more weight to the political repercussions of military actions than they had done before. Americans were unsure of the political aspects of the war. In international politics, the patriots were, in John Adams’s colorful phrase, “militia diplomats.” When playing the tricky game of state with practiced European statesmen, they would surely have to hold the strongest hand possible, which was a solid military position.14
For Americans, the low point of the war came in 1780, appropriately known ever since as the “Black Year.” The year opened forebodingly enough with the worst blizzard in memory and a mutiny in the Massachusetts line stationed at West Point. There soon came word of staggering patriot setbacks in the south—including the costliest loss of the war (Charleston) and the bloodiest defeat (at Camden). Continental dollars became so inflated that they were practically worthless, giving rise to the phrase “not worth a Continental.” British and German units swiftly overran Georgia, South Carolina, much of North Carolina, and threatened Virginia. Benedict Arnold, the most renowned combat leader in patriot ranks during the war’s early years, shocked his countrymen by turning traitor, only narrowly failing to sell West Point to the British. French agents made secret overtures to London, suggesting that George III might keep the American south. Spain obstinately refused to sign an alliance with the rebels. At year’s end, a British force opened a new front in Virginia. It was a black year indeed for the United States.
Buried in all that adversity, however, were the seeds of victory that would sprout in full glory just a year later. George Washington strove mightily to get an offensive operation off the ground in 1780. He failed, but his prodigious efforts set the stage for a decisive campaign in 1781.
As they had done in the previous year, internal problems in the United States severely limited Washington’s strategic choices in 1780. From the start, conditions were bad. Survival itself was no small feat, as the army found itself caught in the icy grip of a terrible winter made worse by a paralyzed economy. The general could hardly contemplate a summer campaign when he was unsure if he would have even the skeleton of any army when spring came. Desertions outstripped enlistments. “I assure you,” Washington told the president of Congress, “every idea you can form of our distresses will fall short of reality.” There could be seen “in every line of the army the most serious features of mutiny and sedition.” Winter’s end brought warmth to the frozen wretches in Continental rags, but not an end to misery. An army surgeon wrote, “Our poor soldiers are reduced to the very verge of famine; their patience is exhausted by complicated suffering, and their spirits are almost broken.” Mutiny struck again in May, this time in the Connecticut line. Pennsylvanians, who themselves would revolt a few months later, suppressed the uprising. George III gloated over the appallingly low state of patriot morale. If no great disaster befell Britain, the monarch opined, the United States would sue for peace that summer. For once, he was not far wrong in guessing the mood of his erstwhile subjects.15
Washington’s efforts to inspirit his countrymen in that gloomy spring of 1780 were utterly unavailing. The nation was sunk in torpor. After five years of war, it seemed unable to rouse itself for a sixth. Alexander Hamilton caught the mood of despair in one terse paragraph:
... Our countrymen have all the folly of the ass and all the passiveness of the sheep in their compositions. They are determined not to be free and they can neither be frightened, discouraged nor persuaded to change their resolution. If we are to be saved France and Spain must save us. I have the most Pigmy-feeling at the idea, and I almost wish to hide my disgrace in universal ruin.16
The first good news of the year came in May. Lafayette returned to America carrying word of a French expeditionary force which, at that very moment, he said, should be in passage across the Atlantic. Louis XVI was sending not only a naval squadron but a land component as well. The Comte de Rochambeau, leading an army of several thousand French regulars, had orders to place himself under Washington’s command. Those foreign troops would fill the gap Americans no longer seemed willing or able to fill—the gap in numbers of fighting men between Washington’s army and one large enough to beat the British. That news galvanized the general to action. Never mind that his army was weak, that his country was lethargic, that his supply system was in a shambles—here was the way to win the war, the means of inflicting a decisive defeat on the British! With the cause standing so dangerously close to the edge of the abyss and with what amounted almost to a miracle about to arrive in the form of French regulars, patriots had no choice but to gird themselves for that one great, vigorous effort.
Meeting with a committee from Congress at his headquarters in late May, Washington bluntly told the lawmakers what must be done. He tried to rekindle in the delegates some of the fire and spirit of 1775 and 1776. Americans would march with the French, he stated unequivocally: “Offensive operations, on our part, are doubtless expected ... we have not, nor ought we to wish, an alternative.” America must exert itself to the utmost to permit the army to make “a decisive effort,” even if that required drafting men to fill Continental units. “Our arrangements should be made on the principle of the greatest enterprise we can undertake,” which meant fielding a total of forty thousand men, he added. The delegates rode back to Philadelphia, awed by the new opportunity, dubious of their ability to raise the necessary forces, but convinced that the commander in chief fully intended to fight regardless of what happened.17
Indeed he did. He had begun making his plans before the congressional committee reached camp. Immediately upon hearing of Rochambeau’s approach, the general had urged Lafayette to try to get word to him to steer directly for New York. Henry Clinton, with a large part of his army, was away just then, tied up in the siege of Charleston. New York was vulnerable. Knowing how difficult it would be to intercept a convoy at sea and unsure of Rochambeau’s precise plans, Washington also alerted his lieutenants elsewhere, exhorting them to be ready to take advantage of the French force wherever it made land. He told Heath in New England to examine the methods of attacking Halifax. To Lincoln at Charleston he sent word of the possibility of French succor. But New York was his dream. Gather equipment for a strike at Manhattan, he directed Greene, but while doing so, spread rumors of a pending raid along the Canadian coast. Lafayette, as part of the deception plan, prepared a proclamation to the Canadians, inviting them to cooperate with a French fleet sailing up the St. Lawrence to join an American corps invading from northern New York. “It will get out,” Washington said confidently.18 France also had a powerful fleet in the Caribbean commanded by the Comte de Guichen. Could Lafayette relay word to him of New York’s inviting vulnerability? The eager American was overlooking no bets in attempting to mass a superior allied force for a supreme effort.19
Charleston fell on 12 May, a loss opening South Carolina to the enemy. The end of the siege also freed Clinton to rush reinforcements back to New York. Washington learned of the grievous setback on 31 May, but not even that news dimmed his determination. He even found some good in it: “The enemy, by attempting to hold conquests so remote, must dissipate their force, and of course afford opportunities of striking one or the other extremity.” On 6 June he assembled a council of war at Morristown. Best intelligence estimates set British strength at about thirty thousand men, but they were scattered beyond the reach of mutual support. Some eight thousand troops, bolstered by four thousand or more Tories, held New York. Perhaps nine thousand were in Charleston, twenty-five hundred were in Halifax, five hundred manned the works at St. Augustine, and four hundred garrisoned Penobscot. Patriots, Washington reported, could count on maybe eight thousand around New York (twenty-four thousand if a second miracle should fill all requisitions) and twenty-five hundred in the south. When Rochambeau arrived, with seven thousand to ten thousand men, the allies would clearly be stronger at any point where they chose to mass. The general did not ask his council whether there should be an offensive. He directed the members only to select an objective for an attack, specifically mentioning New York City, Halifax, Canada, and St. Augustine. The council chose New York with little argument. That was what Washington wanted. For the next five weeks, he worked on plans for the assault, worried about the sluggish response of the states to his appeals for men, and scanned the horizon for French sail. Unhappily, the first vessels to appear off Sandy Hook were those of Admiral Marriot Arbuthnot, bringing Sir Henry Clinton and several thousand men back from their victory at Charleston. New York was no longer open to a swift coup. Taking the city would require heavy fighting.20
Rochambeau, escorted by the Chevalier de Ternay with twelve ships of the line, made land in Rhode Island on 10 July 1780. He put more than five thousand men ashore.
As soon as he learned of the French landfall, Washington sent Lafayette galloping to Newport with his plans for action. Pointedly, he first explained the prerequisite of attaining naval superiority before a land campaign could be launched. “In any operation, and under all circumstances, a decisive naval superiority is to be considered as a fundamental principle, and the basis upon which every hope of success must ultimately depend.” Next, he carefully described the strategic importance of the port of New York and explained the urgency of launching an allied attempt quickly. Any delay in seizing the city, he said, “may defeat all our projects and render the campaign inactive and inglorious.” To begin with, Washington’s outline stated, French vessels would be required to take the harbor and open the Hudson. “To render our operations nervous and rapid, it is essential for us to be masters of the navigation of the Hudson River and of the sound.” Once that was accomplished, the combined French and American armies would attack Manhattan from Morrisania, near Kingsbridge. Washington set 5 August as the tentative rendezvous date. Finally, remembering d’Estaing’s abrupt departures from battles at Newport in 1778 and Savannah in 1779, the general tactfully but forcefully informed Rochambeau that the French would have to agree beforehand not to abandon the operation suddenly.21
Washington’s soaring aspirations were dealt a severe blow when Admiral Thomas Graves brought six more British ships of the line into New York harbor, giving the British clear naval superiority. Nevertheless, Washington refused to abandon his plans for an offensive. Maybe not in New York, but somewhere, anywhere. One had to consider the possibility of help from the French and Spanish fleets cruising in the West Indies, he reported wistfully. Furthermore, having seen American citizen-soldiers rally before to swell Continental ranks in a time of need, Washington hoped they might do so again. Rochambeau’s arrival ought “to excite in us a determination to be prepared at all events,” he told Congress. But he was grasping at straws. The time had passed when Americans would spontaneously spring to arms in the numbers needed. The war had been long, casualties had exacted a heavy toll on the spirited, and enthusiasm had waned among the others. There would never again be a massive uprising. Whatever was accomplished would be with the under-strength Continental army and a sprinkling of staunch militia units. Nevertheless, Washington stubbornly told Greene to continue preparations for the assault on New York. To facilitate those plans, the commander in chief sent three harbor pilots familiar with approaches to New York to serve Admiral Ternay, ordering them to stick with the Frenchman no matter what. The plan of attack would not be abandoned for lack of drive at the top.22
Late in July, Henry Clinton decided to test his new French opponent. British warships sealed the harbor at Newport, and Clinton began transporting a large land force toward Rhode Island. Although he could assemble on such short notice barely three thousand men fit for duty, General Washington boldly maneuvered them toward New York. Clinton, believing Washington led at least twelve thousand troops, scampered back to protect his base.
For his part, Rochambeau had no intention of leaving his haven in Newport until he had a stronger naval arm to support him. He had expected to be joined in Rhode Island by another increment of the navy, but that was not to be. British warships had bottled the reinforcing squadron in Cadiz, on the wrong side of the Atlantic. Being deprived of the better part of his fleet was enough in itself to make the Frenchman cautious—and he found the patriot spirit less than reassuring. Americans had not flocked enthusiastically to arms upon his arrival. He was not impressed with the Continental army. “Do not depend upon these people, nor upon their means,” he bluntly told his government. A chagrined Washington finally brought himself to admit the unlikelihood of masses of aroused recruits swarming to his army. “We may expect soon to be reduced to the humiliating condition of seeing the cause of America, in America, upheld by foreign arms,” he lamented. Then he learned of the blockade of the French ships in Cadiz, an indication that foreigners were unlikely to uphold the cause either. A successful offensive depended upon a French fleet and American militiamen—the fleet could not come and the citizen-soldiers would not. “The flattering prospect which seemed to be opening to our view in the month of May,” he wrote, “is vanishing like the morning dew.”23
Washington and Rochambeau met for the first time in September. The Frenchman, steeped in European ways of warring, thought establishing a base at Newport was achievement enough for one campaign. He planned to winter where he was. The American came away from the conference understanding that Rochambeau’s loudly proclaimed subordination to him was so much window dressing, that it would apply only when French ends were served. He noted wryly, “My command of the French troops stands upon a very limited scale.” The two commanders could agree only to concert their efforts for a conclusive campaign in 1781.24
A less determined commander might have accepted what appeared to be the inevitable and have taken steps to shelter his men for the winter. Yet Washington, study as he might, kept coming to one conclusion: “The affairs of this country absolutely require activity on whatever side they are viewed.” Thwarted in the north, Washington began glancing hopefully southward. Following the fiasco at Camden, a subdued Congress meekly withdrew its finger from the strategic pie and turned all authority in the south over to the commander in chief. Washington lost no time in appointing a general who thought and fought like himself: Nathanael Greene. He also sought naval support, appealing in September directly to Guichen, the commander of the French West Indies fleet. Having expected aid from France in 1780, Washington pointedly told the admiral that “great exertions have been made on our part for offensive operations.” It was too late to strike New York, but might not a campaign farther south be productive? There was no response. On 31 October, after hearing the heartening news from North Carolina of the unexpected victory at King’s Mountain, Washington called a council of war. He ordered the group of officers to respond to three questions: Should more reinforcements be sent south? Where should the Continental army spend the winter? When should it go into winter quarters? The council advised the general to send no more men to Greene, to take a winter position that would protect West Point, and to settle down immediately. On that third point, Washington overrode the council’s judgment. The tenacious commander intended to end the year with an attempt on New York—without the French.25
Everything Washington needed for an assault was at hand. Greene had collected it all for the proposed August attack. Initially, the general set the night of 5 December as the target date, but later apparently moved the time forward about ten days into late November. After a feint at Staten Island, he planned to storm the defenses at Kingsbridge under cover of darkness. As at Trenton four years before, surprise and boldness would be his allies. Moving as inconspicuously as possible, the army shifted into position during the cold, wet November days. Then, at the very last moment, with all in readiness, word passed down from echelon to echelon suspending the operation. The attack would not take place. Purely by coincidence some British warships had come to anchor in a position that would have interfered with the American crossing. Fearing the loss of surprise, which had been his only trump card, Washington canceled the affair. Later he wrote:
An earnest desire ... of closing the campaign with some degree of éclat led me to investigate the means most thoroughly of doing it; and my wishes had so far got the better of my judgment that I had actually made some pretty considerable advances in the prosecution of a plan for this purpose when, alas! I found the means inadequate to the end.
Finally, even Washington recognized that history would record no great offensive that year in the north. Perhaps the depth of his disappointment is told by a gap in his voluminous correspondence, a break stretching from 30 November to 7 December. He put his army into quarters in an arc around West Point, deeply concerned lest weather as harsh as that of the preceding winter should destroy the spirit and health of his remaining veterans. “It would be well for the troops if, like chameleons, they could live upon air, or, like the bear, suck their paws for sustenance during the rigour of the approaching season.”26
Still he was not ready to quit trying to get something started somewhere. Might not the winter provide a chance to bring pressure to bear on the foe in the south? Hearing that the Spanish were planning an expedition against Florida, Washington eagerly suggested to Rochambeau that American and French troops could join the Spaniards and recover Georgia and South Carolina as well as Florida. More and more, disappointed with the stalemate in the north, he was looking southward. Under escort of a Spanish fleet, Washington told Rochambeau, the allies could embark safely from Newport and Philadelphia. The Frenchman said no. Well then, if Washington could not end the year on a grand high note, he would end it on a small high one. In the last days of December, he slipped special agents into New York in an attempt to kidnap Henry Clinton. Like all his other plans that year, this final one failed.27
Little changed as the year 1780 came to an end. Benedict Arnold, wearing the bright red coat of a British brigadier, rode at the head of an invasion of Virginia in December, just three months after his treason had been discovered. Washington was furious when he learned what was happening—the detested traitor ravaging the Old Dominion, perhaps even burning Mount Vernon! He sent Lafayette and twelve hundred troops pounding overland to Virginia while he himself galloped to Newport to plead with Rochambeau to send warships to support Lafayette’s operations against Arnold. A winter gale had scattered the British fleet blockading Newport, giving the French a temporary edge. They had sailed, Washington learned to his great joy, but soon lost heart en route and turned back. After some confusion, they headed out to sea again, but Admiral Arbuthnot, having regained his station, beat them back into Newport. The attempt to trap Arnold failed, but the snare was thereby baited for even larger game. The British had established a base in Virginia, which, like all their enclaves on the coast, could be isolated at any time by a French fleet. Unlike their bases farther south, however, this one was close enough to be reached by a swift move of the Continental army.
Arnold, after establishing a stronghold at Portsmouth, raided as far as Richmond, nearly capturing Governor Thomas Jefferson and paralyzing the state. Jefferson and remnants of his government fled to Charlottesville, where Arnold’s hard-riding detachments pursued and scattered them again. Jefferson escaped over the mountains, but his term expired and there was no government left to elect a new governor. Virginia lay prostrate and leaderless in the enemy’s grip.
Reinforcing Lafayette, Washington sent more men under Steuben and another contingent led by “Mad” Anthony Wayne. The Continental build-up in Virginia had begun.28
Meanwhile, unrelated events in Europe and the Carolinas were setting the stage for George Washington’s long-sought, but long-elusive, grand effort.
Congress had sent Colonel John Laurens as a special emissary to Versailles to press the American argument for the need of a superior fleet to operate against the British in North American waters. Benjamin Franklin introduced Laurens at court, where he forthrightly presented his case. As it happened, the French were interested in increasing their exertions anyway. The time was right. Holland was now a belligerent against Britain, the League of Armed Neutrality was hurting London, and the British seemed to be tiring of the war. The moment for a major effort had never been more propitious. Separate messages had also reached Versailles from Rochambeau and Lafayette. Both of them urged sending the fleet that Laurens was requesting. Louis XVI agreed to do it. In March, Admiral François Joseph Paul Comte de Grasse set out from Brest with twenty ships of the line, three frigates, and 150 other vessels. His orders were to sail for the Caribbean, where he was to cooperate with Rochambeau and Washington. De Grasse was no d’Estaing. He would fight if he had the chance. The king also opened his purse, sending six million livres to permit the Continental army to take the field, the first of some sixteen million livres France would provide the United States that year.
Nathanael Greene, meanwhile, in a superb campaign which is itself a strategic classic, was shrewdly pushing Cornwallis out of the south. “Few generals,” Greene reported, “[have] run oftener or more lustily than I have done. But I have taken care not to run too far, and commonly have run as fast forward as backward to convince our enemy that we were like a crab that could run either way.” The Rhode Islander had been among the original proponents of a protracted war, and he had closely observed Washington’s astute manipulation of the reins in 1776 and 1777. Now, with some modifications to adapt that strategy to conditions peculiar to the south, he demonstrated that he had learned well from watching the Virginian. Unlike most strategic operations of the Revolutionary War, Greene’s southern campaign has been thoroughly documented and studied—and deservedly so. It was magnificently done. Curiously, he never won a battle, but his defeats always cost the British more than they could afford to pay. Superior strategy led ultimately to victory despite tactical setbacks. Like Washington, Greene accepted battle willingly enough but, also like his mentor, never in situations where he could not withdraw from the fray. British officers who had fought in New York and New Jersey four years earlier might well have experienced an eerie sensation of having lived through all of this before. Perhaps they recognized in the exasperating Nathanael Greene a younger version of the “Old Fox”—especially as they watched the bleeding ulcer of attrition ruin their once strong and vigorous army. For a change, it was the British who were naked and starving as Cornwallis limped out of the Carolinas in April to join forces with Arnold in Virginia. Greene let him go and turned his attention to clearing South Carolina and Georgia, where partisan fighters were already making life miserable for British posts and patrols.
Cornwallis, receiving conflicting and confusing orders from Henry Clinton in New York and Lord Germain in London, achieved very little in a series of clashes with Lafayette. The English general had no strategy for operations in Virginia or even a good reason for being there. By August, he had withdrawn to a fortified base at Yorktown. When Henry Clinton had sailed from Charleston for New York in 1780, he had been optimistic but not unaware of a serious risk he was running: “I leave Lord Cornwallis here in sufficient force to keep [the south] against the world, without a superior fleet shews itself, in which case I despair of ever seeing peace restored to this miserable country.” Cornwallis had squandered much of his “sufficient force” by August 1781, and “a superior fleet” was about to show itself.29
In the spring, of course, Washington could not know that a powerful French fleet would arrive or that Cornwallis would get himself bottled up in Virginia. The commander in chief warned Lafayette in April, as a matter of fact, that chances of his coming from New York to operate in the Virginia area were quite remote. In May, the general rode to Wethersfield, Connecticut, for a strategy session with Rochambeau, believing that New York would become the allied objective.
Rochambeau, in memoirs published after his death, recalled how Washington was so obsessed with New York that he could see no other objective. Washington, also trying to recollect events years later, said that was not so. He remembered that he and Rochambeau had agreed to attack wherever success beckoned—be it New York or Virginia or Charleston. He did not plan to attack New York without a certainty of success, he claimed, but he was going to attack somewhere. A victory, “whether upon a larger or smaller scale,” was absolutely necessary. The evidence tends to support the American.30
At Wethersfield, Rochambeau did not tell Washington about de Grasse. Their talks, then, were in the context of possible naval support, not probable assistance. Washington, disappointed so often, refused to count on a fleet that might never show up. He and the French commander agreed on an offensive, with the target being either New York City or enemy forces in the south. At the end of May, a message from Laurens informed Washington of the departure of de Grasse. From then on, with some assurance of cooperation from a fleet, the commander in chief looked with more favor on a strike southward. He ordered supplies held in Virginia in preparation for possible operations there. Nevertheless, he continued to keep both options open, preparing also for the storming of New York.
Trying to follow the progression of Washington’s thoughts that summer is like walking a maze. There is no doubt that he wanted to attack New York if an attack were feasible, but keeping that goal a secret was neither possible nor necessary. So he did not try. His intention of marching, in the alternative, to Virginia is also clear, but an operation of that sort would require strict secrecy lest the prey be frightened away. So he concealed all mention of the subject. He went to surprising lengths to convince everyone concerned of his single-minded determination to assault Manhattan, believing the British certainly would not fall for this deception unless the Americans themselves were convinced of it. Obviously, the French had to be convinced too. Unfortunately, historians have no certain method for distinguishing spurious messages from genuine or real plans and cover plans. About all that can be said, without much fear of contradiction, is that the American leader fully intended to attack somewhere in 1781.
Washington urged Rochambeau to shift his army secretly from Newport to New York for a surprise attempt to make a lodgment on Manhattan. While Continentals executed a feint from the west, French soldiers could grab a beachhead on the east of the island, the general reckoned. Rochambeau was slow in marching and the British were not surprised, so the scheme had to be abandoned after the armies were in motion. But the maneuver had left the allied forces in a position to attack New York—or, alternatively, to race to Virginia. It might be that both Washington and Rochambeau were playing the same game, that each had his eyes set more on Virginia than New York but dared not level with the other.
Washington’s flexible intentions are perhaps best revealed in his messages to Lafayette. He wrote to the commander in Virginia on 13 July, telling him to gather as large a body of troops as possible, especially cavalry, and prepare for operations in either Virginia or South Carolina. Cornwallis, according to Washington’s calculations, might occupy a strong position on the coast and send regiments to reinforce either New York or Charleston. Lafayette was also to establish a secure route of express communications between Virginia and Philadelphia. In a private letter sent on 30 July, Washington mentioned a complete change in previous plans should Cornwallis ship troops to New York. If New York should become too strongly defended, he wanted “to expel [the British] totally” from the south. Lafayette was to gather his forces wherever the British set up a base and to harass them if they tried to march to the Carolinas. On 14 August, Washington heard from de Grasse. The admiral announced his intention of being at the Chesapeake on 3 September and of remaining until mid-October. That settled matters. The south would be the scene of the great vigorous effort. Immediately, Washington sent a courier to de Grasse to let him know the Americans intended to fight. Should they find the British still in Virginia when they arrived, Washington wrote purposefully, the allies “ought, without loss of time, to attack the enemy with our united force.” At the same time, he ordered Lafayette to prevent Cornwallis from leaving Yorktown in an attempt to escape to South Carolina. The Englishman was not to be permitted to slip out of the trap. Washington wanted a victory—a big victory.31
The very speed with which the combined armies moved suggests something less than a blind fixation on New York. The maneuver was not simple. Half the American forces would have to remain on the Hudson to keep pressure on Clinton in New York and to protect West Point, while the other half and all of the French would have to shift nearly four hundred miles south to link up with other Continentals in Virginia for a rendezvous with a French fleet, which was then somewhere at sea. The coordination was inordinately complex. Within a week, the allied regiments were in motion. A well-executed feint at Staten Island kept Clinton in the dark until Washington and Rochambeau reached Philadelphia. By then it was too late.
Because the troops had not been paid for some time, Washington did not know how they would behave around Congress. He rushed them through Philadelphia. Rochambeau, though, paused to march his men in a parade past the state house. Unsure just how an executiveless body fit into protocol arrangements, he instructed his officers “to salute Congress as a crowned head and the President as a first prince of the blood.”32
No incident marred the involved move to the Chesapeake. De Grasse arrived right on schedule, bringing still more soldiers to add to those already with Washington and Rochambeau. Cornwallis was doomed. Benjamin Franklin later expressed the general astonishment that allied forces “should with such perfect concord be assembled from different places by land and water, form their junction punctually without the least regard for cross accidents of wind or weather or interruption from the enemy; and that the army which was their object should in the meantime have had the goodness to quit a situation from whence it might have escaped, and place itself in another from whence an escape was impossible.”33
Yorktown was won at sea. French Admiral de Barras dashed from Newport with the necessary siege artillery and equipment stowed in his ships. The British set out in pursuit from New York. De Grasse, on learning of the approach of the British fleet, eagerly sailed to meet it. Although he ordinarily stood six feet two inches tall, it is said that de Grasse grew to six feet six inches at the prospect of a slugfest. While the two fleets were inconclusively pounding one another in the Battle of the Capes, from 5 to 10 September, de Barras slipped into Chesapeake Bay, sealing Cornwallis’s fate. British warships returned helplessly to New York.
Nevertheless, Washington had no intention of leaving himself at the mercy of the whims or fears of the admiral of the French fleet. He carefully wrote out a series of questions for the commander of the foreign armada. He first asked de Grasse to specify the precise date he would be obliged to depart. And would he consider continuing the campaign to include the capture of Wilmington and Charleston? On 17 September, when Washington and Rochambeau met de Grasse for the first time, the American leader politely but pointedly handed over his list. The Frenchman promptly answered each query in writing. He committed himself to stay until the end of October, but he said further operations after Yorktown were probably out of the question. Satisfied that he would not be deserted, Washington initiated the investment of Yorktown, opening formal siege approaches on 6 October.34
Washington’s prudence was rewarded, and only one problem threatened to disrupt the otherwise splendid campaign. De Grasse, hoping for another crack at the opposing fleet and growing restless as preparations for the siege were in progress, suggested on 23 September that he might do more good off New York than as “an idle spectator” at Yorktown. Washington had a horrible vision of being left in the lurch again. He received the French recommendation with “painful anxiety.” Yorktown was a sure thing only so long as the fleet maintained the blockade, Washington cried. De Grasse simply must stay in order “to secure an important general good.” The admiral acquiesced.35
The siege works inexorably squeezed the British defenses. On 17 October, on the fourth anniversary of Burgoyne’s surrender at Saratoga, American and French batteries delivered the heaviest cannonade yet. That night the British asked for terms. Cornwallis had been “Burgoyne’d.” Allied casualties were in the neighborhood of three hundred, Britain’s nearly ten thousand.
Yorktown is one of history’s most decisive campaigns. It ended Britain’s attempts to subdue her thirteen rebellious colonies, assuring the independence of the United States of America. For four successive years, ever since marching out of Valley Forge, George Washington had labored doggedly to put together one great vigorous effort to win the war. At long last he had done it. The result was as decisive as he had predicted all along.
