8

War at Last

On the March

White Plains, New York, to Yorktown, Virginia

September 1781

The 1st and 2nd New York Regiments, along with a pair of patchwork Connecticut divisions, set off for Yorktown, Virginia, on September 7, under the command of Lieutenant Colonel Alexander Hamilton. The three-week march was grueling, even for the mounted officers. Ten-hour days in scorching heat, the sun beating down on their tricorne hats and turning them into little furnaces atop the soldiers’ heads, dense wool coats draped around shoulders and arms growing heavier and heavier with each step. The occasional cloudburst brought rain and brief respite from the heat, but any relief was offset by the burden of marching in sodden clothing through muddy roads churned to slurry by hundreds of booted feet.

Some of the men tried to ease their load, doffing their caps or removing their coats and tying them to their packs, but Alex ordered them to don them again. As a self-made man, he knew the importance of appearances. He kept the brass buttons of his coat secured from waist to neck and his hat firmly screwed in place. If you looked the part, most people would assume you were the part, and he wanted any news of advancing Continental troops to be tinged with awe rather than derision. Whether the stories reached the ear of either General Washington or General Cornwallis was immaterial, the accounts had to be glowing. He wasn’t just marching to battle, after all. He was marching into history, into glory.

I am so proud of you, Eliza had written in her latest missive, when she heard the news of his command. His brave Betsey, whose only resentment was that he had kept his ambition from her instead of allowing her to share in his dreams for glory. I will come back to you, my love. I promise, he had written in return.

Alex was mounted on his brilliant new chestnut stallion, christened Mepkin in homage to the friend who had gifted it. While as an officer he didn’t have to carry a pack, ten hours in the saddle, even with breaks for water or food, can leave the legs feeling like jelly, and he was developing tender spots in parts of his body that he didn’t like to think about. But when the army made camp each evening, he eschewed whatever cabin or house had been requisitioned for the night, giving his place to one of the many soldiers who had developed fever or some other ailment during the day’s march. Instead, he slept under the open sky like the enlisted men.

In the morning, he washed himself with a bucket of frigid well water, shaved with a dry razor, and donned his uniform, smoothing the wrinkles as much as possible. He made the rounds of his men as they ate their breakfast, inquiring after their blisters and sunburns and passing along whatever news he might have received overnight about the soldier’s hometown. He himself ate only a few pieces of jerked beef or venison with hardtack, and only on horseback, after the march was underway.

No one had told him to do this, and certainly it was not the kind of thing he had ever seen General Washington do. Washington inspired by his regality, his air of unapproachable greatness. He was well over six feet tall and nearly fifty years of age, and a wealthy country squire to boot: He could get away with such a performance. Alex was just in his twenties, and a nameless orphan from the West Indies. If he was going to win his men’s respect and loyalty, he was going to have to do it by caring about them as individuals as well as soldiers. That he would not give any order that might put them in harm’s way without first considering the very real lives that would be affected by his decision.

Seventeen days into the march, one of his men, a Private Baxter, caught his foot in a wagon rut and turned his ankle quite severely. It was impossible to tell if it was broken or simply badly sprained, but in either case Baxter was unable to walk. After more than two weeks on the road, it would have been onerous for Alex to demand his exhausted men carry Baxter in a stretcher. It was not yet noon, and there were still six hours of hard marching ahead. Without hesitating, Alex ordered that Baxter be put on Mepkin, and he marched the rest of the day on foot with his enlisted men.

Alex remained at the head of the column, and though he replied jocularly to the occasional familiar comment from one of his soldiers, he also maintained military jargon, reminding them that he was still their commander. It was exactly the right balance. If his men had been guardedly respectful in their regard to him before, open affection was in their eyes when he made his usual rounds. When they addressed him as “Sir” or “Colonel,” it wasn’t begrudgingly, but with genuine respect.

Two days later, exhausted but feeling more prepared for the coming battle than he had at the start, Alex and his men reached Williamsburg, where Washington and Rochambeau would make the final preparations for the siege at Yorktown. Alex saw his soldiers to their temporary barracks, then cleaned himself up and reported to headquarters.

It was early in the afternoon, and he’d only marched two hours that day, so he felt comparatively fresh. Still, he was extremely grateful to accept his first cup of coffee in three weeks, as well as several thick slices of bread that didn’t taste of ash or mold. He had just finished a second slice when he was summoned into Washington’s office.

General Washington sat at his desk with two other men. Alex recognized the first as the Count de Rochambeau, a distinguished man in his middle fifties in the dark wool jacket of the French army. The third man was similarly attired, but it wasn’t until he turned his head toward the door that Alex realized it was his old friend, the Marquis de Lafayette.

“My dear Colonel Hamilton,” Lafayette said genially but respectfully. Though the two had spent many an evening making their way through a bottle or three of fine French wine, Lafayette was greeting him in the presence of Washington and Rochambeau with the deference due his rank. Still, his handshake was warm, and the look in his eye promised a more rousing welcome at some more convenient moment. Alex greeted General Rochambeau next, and then General Washington, who once again bid him to take a seat. Only then did he notice a large map spread out on a low table placed between the chairs.

I could get used to this, Alex thought. But I probably shouldn’t.

There was some brief talk about Alex’s march and Washington’s opinions on Admiral Grasses’s Ville de Paris, a 120-gun French warship. Then without preamble, Washington said, “We have been discussing final plans for the assault of Yorktown.”

Alex sat up straighter. It was unseemly to be excited by the prospect of battle, yet he couldn’t help it. He felt his heart beat as if someone had just dealt him a hand of poker, and a peek discovered he held a brace of aces.

“General Cornwallis sought to evacuate his troops by sea, but the French have managed to thwart the attempt. Some seven thousand British troops are for all intents trapped behind their battlements.”

Alex wanted to yell in triumph, “We have them!” but he contented himself with turning to General Rochambeau and saying, “The American people will learn of the great contributions the French made to their liberation.”

Rochambeau made a funny face at this rather formal pronouncement. “Any enemy of the British navy is a friend of the French,” he said drily.

Alex allowed himself to crack a smile at the count’s witticism.

“We have concluded,” Washington continued, “that the only way to complete a second trench that will allow us a cannon within range of the British position is to take redoubts numbers nine and ten, which protect the main body of their troops in Yorktown.” He indicated the forts’ positions on the map. “The British have fortified them with earthen walls and a timber palisade. Our engineers tell me we could blast through the walls fairly easily, but moving the cannon into position would alert Cornwallis to our intentions. We must prevent his troops from falling back into Yorktown proper, protracting the siege. Therefore, we have concluded that the redoubts will have to be stormed on foot, and the palisades toppled with axes. The forts are not heavily manned. We will suffer casualties, undoubtedly, but we should be able to take them with minimum loss of life. Once the positions have been secured, we will dig our second parallel here, place our cannon within range of Yorktown—”

“And then we will blast the British to hell,” Rochambeau interjected. “Forgive me for interrupting, General,” he said to Washington. “The thought of a British defeat gets my pulse racing.”

Mine too, Alex thought, though that wasn’t quite correct. He had no great animus against the British. He just didn’t think they had any business ruling a country three thousand miles away from their own, a group of colonies that was, moreover, ten times larger than the mother country. It was the thought of battle itself that excited him.

“It has been decided,” Lafayette said now, “that the assault on redoubt nine will be a French column under the able command of our German ally, Lieutenant Colonel Wilhelm von Zweibrücken. The assault on redoubt ten will be by the First and Second New York infantry units, and the Fifteenth Connecticut.”

Alex kept his face neutral. “My men have arrived in fine form, General. They are ready for the challenge.”

“Ah yes,” Lafayette said, squirming slightly in his chair. “About that.”

Alex peered at his old friend. “Yes, General?” he said in as formal a voice as he could muster.

“It has been decided that in order to foster a greater spirit of camaraderie between the French and American forces, the First and Second New York and the Fifteenth Connecticut will be commanded by my aide, Major Jean-Joseph Sourbader de Gimat.”

Alex stared at his friend, unable to believe this turn of events. Lafayette knew how important the opportunity to command a battlefield assault was to him. Alex also knew that Lafayette had not awarded command of the assault to Major Gimat in an effort to build “camaraderie” between American and French forces. He had done it for the same reason that Washington had given the command to Alex: because his longtime aide had insisted that he, too, be given a chance for glory before the war was over. On one level, Alex appreciated the loyalty Lafayette was showing to his officer. But as a friend, he felt utterly betrayed.

“I was under the impression,” Alex said tightly to Washington, fighting to keep his voice calm, “that when you asked me to lead the First and Second New York and the Fifteenth Connecticut, it was not just on a march from New York to Virginia.”

Washington’s face showed no reaction to the bitterness in Alex’s words. “General Lafayette makes the case that even after we take the redoubt, the ensuing siege could last some weeks. During that time, American and French forces will be quartering together and often skirmishing with the enemy. It is important that every single soldier fighting for the American cause feels that he is a member of one army and not two, as it were. That there be no unnecessary divisions between people fighting for the cause of freedom and mercenaries fighting merely for a salary.”

“There is not a single American soldier,” Alex said, turning back to Lafayette, “who is unaware that the French grievance against the British is many generations older than our own, and compounded by the two countries being separated by the few miles of the English Channel rather than by the vastness of the Atlantic Ocean. We welcome the French here with unqualified affection and, as you so aptly put it, ‘camaraderie.’”

“That may be,” Lafayette said. “But whether the war is won or lost, after it is over the Americans know that our French troops will go back to the far side of the Atlantic, while they will stay here. We need to erase that thought from their minds.”

“And you think that putting four hundred patriotic Americans under the command of an officer whom they have never met and whose motives and, dare I say, abilities are unknown to them is the best way of doing that?” he asked, his voice rising.

“I assure you,” Lafayette said, an edge coming into his voice for the first time, “that Major Gimat is entirely qualified to lead this assault, else I would not have entrusted the command to him.”

Alex checked himself. He knew he had come close to going too far. Whatever Lafayette’s reasoning behind promoting Gimat, Alex knew his friend would not risk one of his officer’s lives merely for the sake of giving him a shot at glory, let alone the lives of hundreds of soldiers and the chance to end the war.

“I apologize if I seemed to suggest otherwise,” he said in a tense voice. “Nevertheless, you must know that it is what my men will be thinking.” He summoned a deep breath and spoke before Lafayette or one of the other two generals could answer. “I have spent the past three weeks on the road with these soldiers,” he said passionately, turning to General Washington. “I have marched with them, eaten with them, bunked with them. I have gotten to know their wives’ and children’s names, their brothers and sisters and mothers and fathers. They have learned how this country took me in and gave me the chance to better my lot in life in spite of the fact that I had neither name nor fortune.

“These men know that I go to battle because I believe in the United States of America. In what it offers both to its natural-born citizens and to the downtrodden across the globe, who see the New World as a place where they can make a fresh start and improve themselves, regardless of rank. And that, Generals, is why these men fight. Not just for their freedom, but for their country, and for what it offers them and their children and their children’s children. They will not share that bond with a French interloper, let alone one they have never met, but they share it with me. And that sense of kinship may well be what makes the difference on the day of the assault.”

General Washington listened to Alex’s impassioned speech with his usual stony, unreadable face. There was a long moment of silence. Then, “I have heard each of your arguments and see merit in both of them,” he said. “I will consider them overnight and give you an answer in the morning.”

Alex knew that Washington was merely stalling. He was not a rash man, but there was no real considering to be done. He had only to choose if he was going to reward a fellow patrician in Lafayette, or a faithful subordinate in himself.

“With all due respect, General, I need an answer now,” Alex pressed, as courteously as he could.

Washington blinked. From such a reserved man, it was the equivalent of a gasp. Then Alex could have sworn he saw a bit of a smile flicker over the man’s lips. “Well then, Colonel. You may lead the assault.”

Alex was stunned to silence. Though he believed every word he just said, he hadn’t thought they would have any effect. Washington was a man of his class, and his generosity rarely extended itself to the plebeians. He recognized talent and ability, but only to the degree that their possessor was useful to him. All other things being equal—and Alex had no doubt that Gimat had studied as faithfully at Lafayette’s side as Alex had studied at Washington’s—he would always side with gentry against the common people.

“You have earned this, Colonel Hamilton,” Washington said now. “With me, and with your men. I trust that you will lead them, and the Continental army, to victory.” He paused and continued with a hint of a smile. “That you are capable of eliciting this kind of quick, resolute decision-making from me helped you win your case.”

“Thank you, Your Excellency,” Alex said, when he found his voice. He turned to Lafayette. “My condolences to Major Gimat.”

Lafayette shrugged, an amused twinkle in his eye. “Ah well. There will always be another war.”