All Episodes
Previous Next
Nov. 11, 1994 - Bill Cooper
58:08
1776 Revolutionary VETS
| Copy link to current segment

Time Text
*Write Power* This is hour of the tide.
Light hour for the broken.
I am so sorry.
I'm William Cooper.
Ladies and gentlemen, today is Veterans Day, and I want to wish all my fellow veterans a very happy Veterans Day, a very happy and prosperous future, although it looks that those of us who have fought for this nation in the past may have to soon fight for it again.
This makes me especially sad and reflective today, for when I fought in Vietnam, upon leaving that war, I vowed to myself that I would never take the life of another living thing during the rest of my life.
And I find myself preparing to do exactly that, if the need And indeed, ladies and gentlemen, it might.
So while everybody is reminiscing about the Vietnam War and the Korean War and World War II, and there may even be a few of us veterans who can reminisce about World War I, the last Civil War veteran
died several years ago, and so we know that there is no one left alive who can remember that war, and of course there is indeed no one alive who can remember the Revolutionary War which brought this nation into being.
So tonight, ladies and gentlemen, I'm going to bring you eyewitness accounts of the Revolutionary
that through the sacrifice of less than probably three percent of the entire population of the colonies brought us out of the servitude of the king and made us free men and women.
We have them to thank.
And I don't think we thank them enough.
Thank you.
On the 19th of April, in the year 1775, English rule over Americans snapped.
And Probably the most influential day in American history, and certainly a vital one in the history of the world, it signalized a new direction in the energies of the transatlantic settlers and marked the climax of one hundred and sixty-eight years of English plantation.
Where the first great challenge to New World colonists had come from the wilderness, from a novel climate and marauding savages, the second came from their own kinsmen, from the might of established empire.
They had conquered harsh winters and forbidding forests, and now They must deal with the armies and navies of the foremost power of the world.
The shots fired at Lexington and Concord by militia farmers on British regulars represented an open act of rebellion.
Now, this was no mob lawlessness or fringe defiance as in the Boston Massacre five years before, but a concerted fully calculated action proceeding from the substantial farmers who composed the main stock of the Bay Colony.
Their training companies were drilling regularly against just such a crisis.
The arch-patriot Sam Adams had organized committees of correspondents to keep the towns informed of British moves.
And in the atmosphere of tension that had existed since the Home Government quartered the King's troops in Boston and cracked down on Massachusetts with a series of stringent regulatory acts in 1774, any jarring incident—any incident at all—could lead to war.
Behind the exchange of shots on Lexington Common lay twelve years of mounting tension.
The sweeping of the French from North America by the combined efforts of English and American troops in 1763 had removed their common enemy and opened the way for imperialist legislation that drove colony and mother country ever further apart.
Parliamentary taxes to defray the cost of the Seven Years' War met with mass meetings of outrage.
colonial boycotts on English goods and thunderous pamphlets on the rights of self-governing colonists.
The issue sharpened with each successive attempt at taxation, from the Stamp Act of 1765 to the Tea Act of 1773, until Lord North and his Tory party felt the very base of parliamentary authority attacked.
When Massachusetts men, dressed as Indians, dumped the offensive tea into Boston Harbor, and never again would Americans indulge in the English passion for tea, Parliament closed the port of Boston to commercial shipping and sent General Thomas Gage with six regiments to govern Massachusetts.
And these troops lived and moved in the midst of hostility.
The intellectual capital of the colonies was being singled out for special punishment, because Boston, you see, was politically the most subversive American city.
Her rabble had broken into and wrecked the mansion of Governor Hutchinson in the Stamp Act riot of 1765.
They had provoked the king's troops beyond endurance in the so-called Boston Massacre of 1770, an action in which John Adams and Josiah Quincy had successfully defended the accused captain and his soldiers.
They alone, among all the seaport cities, had done violence to the cargoes of T-ships over in 1773.
When Gage arrived, patriots drilled openly on the commons.
openly on the commons.
They organized a provincial congress, harangued in town meeting, coerced the magistrates, threatened the loyalists, insulted the king's men, and gathered military supplies.
The new military governor bore all this patiently for a while, in hopes of conciliating the irate colonists.
We used between the pressure of the Home Government and the defiance of the Patriots, he faced an impossible task.
Lord Dartmouth wrote to Gage in January 1775 that a small force acting now against the rude rabble who had collected arms would prove more effective than a larger force needing a more determined resistance later.
In March, Franklin sailed home from London giving up his diplomatic battle for peace after the Commons had voted funds for six thousand more troops for Boston.
In April, Gage decided, or agreed, that the time had come for a show of force to restore the dignity of Crown and Parliament.
His spies reported a concentration of stores of arms in Concord.
The night of the eighteenth The boatloads of Redcoats slipped secretly across the Charles River and began their early morning march eighteen miles inland.
The efficient Patriot Intelligence Service spied their movements and forewarned the Minutemen along the route.
When Colonel Smith and Major Pitcairn reached Lexington with their seven hundred troops, some seventy militiamen stood on the Seventy militiamen, warned by the intelligence service, faced seven hundred of Britain's best.
Someone fired a shot, and a stormy debate would ensue as to which side fired first and committed the overt act of war, and a general exchange followed.
Through the rest of that shattering day, Yankee farmers fired at the King's soldiers.
Both sides rushed their version of the affair to London.
The American ship outraced the English and won a propaganda victory with a document of atrocity tales more lurid than General Gage's sober account of insurrection.
Participants and historians have since greatly swollen the testimony, but among the available accounts, that set down by Jonas Clark, Minister of Lexington, on the first anniversary of that fateful day.
best reveals the intensity of patriot emotion.
Jonas Clark, born in 1730, died in 1805, was born in Newton, Massachusetts, of old Puritan stock.
He graduated from Harvard College in 1752, and from 1755 until his death, half a century later, occupied the First Parish Church of Lexington.
Puritanism in the late seventeenth century had crystallized into orthodoxy and lost much of its theological vigor, and Jonas Clarke preached more as a sturdy farmer and staunch patriot than as a Calvinist reformer.
The titles of his published sermons reveal his thinking, the importance of military skill, measures for defense in a martial spirit in a time of peace The fate of blood, the thirsty oppressors, and God's tender care of His distressed people, and to this latter, was attended the factual narrative that I am going to relate to you tonight, during the hour of the time.
It describes the events of the first day of war.
Clark possessed a commanding voice, an energetic presence, and in moments of excitement his resounding tones startled the cows in nearby pastures.
He reached his full heights of rhetoric in the 1776 sermon denouncing the British invader, and I quote from that sermon, "...more like murderers and cutthroats than the troops of a Christian king, without provocation, without warning."
When no war was proclaimed, they draw the sword of violence upon the inhabitants of this town, and with a cruelty and barbarity which would have made the most innocent savage blush, they shed innocent blood.
But oh, my God, how shall I speak, or how describe the distress?
Yea, the horror of that awful morn, that gloomy day, yonder, yonder field can witness the innocent blood of our brethren slain, and from thence does their blood cry unto God for vengeance from the ground."
8th of Clark's parishioners had died on the commons to which he pointed.
Oddly enough, the husky farmer and Puritan parson paid considerable attention to dress and appeared in the pulpit in gown, Catholic in bands crowned by a great white wig.
Clark enjoyed important connections.
John Hancock and Sam Adams were close friends and stayed with him on the eve of battle.
One son-in-law became president of Columbia College and another, the Hollis Professor of Divinity at Harvard.
The latter, William Ware, wrote a useful sketch of Clark in W. B. Sprague's Annals of the American Pulpit, published in New York in 1857.
This story comes from the original edition, and it's a sermon
Ladies and gentlemen, preached at Lexington, April 19, 1776, entitled To Commemorate the Murder, Bloodshed, and Commencement of Hostilities between Great Britain and America, in that town by a brigade of troops of George III, under command of Lieutenant Colonel Smith, on the 19th of April, 1775, to which is added a brief narrative of the principal transactions of that day by Jonas
AM, Pastor of the Church in Lexington, Massachusetts State, Boston, printed by Powers & Willis in 1776, and contained in our library.
The narrative is page 1-7, following the sermon on pages 1-32.
It was reprinted separately with four plates from the contemporary engravings of Amos Doolittle in a very large folio edition Austin, James R. Osgood, and Company, in 1875, under the title, Opening of the War of the Revolution, 19th of April, 1775.
And I begin Jonas Clark's narrative.
On the evening of the 18th of April, 1775, we received two messages, the first verbal, the other by express, in writing, from the Committee of Safety, who were then sitting in the westerly part of Cambridge, directed to the Honorable who were then sitting in the westerly part of Cambridge, directed to the Honorable John Hancock Esquire, who, with the Honorable Samuel Adams Esquire, was then providentially with us, informing that eight or nine officers of the King's troops were seen, just
informing that eight or nine officers of the king's troops were seen just before night passing the road towards Lexington in a musing contemplative posture, and it was suspected they were out upon some evil design.
Both these gentlemen had been frequently and even publicly threatened by the enemies of this people, both in England and America, with the vengeance of the British administration.
Thank you.
And as Mr. Hancock in particular had been more than once personally insulted by some officers of the troops in Boston, it was not without some just grounds supposed that under cover of the darkness, sudden arrest, if not assassination, might be attempted by these instruments of tyranny.
To prevent anything of this kind, ten or twelve men were immediately collected in arms to guard my house through the night.
In the meantime, said officers passed through this town on the road towards Concord.
It was therefore thought expedient to watch their motions and, if possible, make some discovery of their intentions.
Accordingly, about ten o'clock in the evening, three men on horses were dispatched for this purpose.
As they were peaceably passing the road towards Concord and the borders of Lincoln, They were suddenly stopped by said officers, who rode up to them and, putting pistols to their breasts and seizing their horses' bridles, swore if they stirred another step they should be all dead men.
The officers detained them several hours as prisoners, examined, searched, abused, and insulted them, and in their hasty return, supposing themselves discovered, they left them in Lexington.
Said officers also took into custody, abused, and threatened with their lives several other persons, some of whom they met peaceably passing on the road, others even at the doors of their dwellings, without the least provocation on the part of the inhabitants, are so much as a question asked by them.
Between the hours of twelve and one in the morning of the nineteenth of April, we received intelligence by express.
From the intelligence service, the Honorable Joseph Warren Esquire at Boston, that a large body of the King's troops, supposed to be a brigade of about twelve or fifteen hundred, were embarked in boats from Boston and gone over to land on Lechmere's Point, so-called, in Cambridge.
It was shrewdly suspected that they were ordered to seize and destroy the stores of arms belonging to the Colony, then deposited at Concord in consequence of General Gage's unjustifiable seizure of the Provincial Magazine of Powder at Medford and other Colony stores in several other places.
Upon this timely intelligence, the militia of this town were alarmed and ordered to meet on the usual place of parade.
This was not with any design of commencing hostilities upon the King's troops, but to consult what might be done for our own and the people's safety, and also to be ready for whatever service Providence might call us out to upon this alarming occasion.
Just in case overt acts of violence or open hostilities should be committed by this mercenary band of armed and bloodthirsty oppressors.
About the same time, two persons were sent express to Cambridge, if possible to gain intelligence of the motions of the troops and what route they took.
The militia met, according to order, and waited the return of the messengers.
that they might order their measures as occasion should require.
Between three and four o'clock, one of the expressers returned, informing that there was no appearance of the troops on the roads, either from Cambridge or Charleston, and that it was supposed that the movements in the army the evening before were only a feint to alarm the people.
Upon this, therefore, the militia company were dismissed for the present But with orders to be within call of the drum, waiting the return of the other messenger who was expected in about an hour, or sooner, if any discovery should be made of the motions of the troops.
But he was prevented by their silent and sudden arrival at the place where he was waiting for intelligence, so that, after all this precaution, We had no notice of their approach till the brigade was actually in the town and upon a quick march within about a mile and a quarter of the meeting house in place of parade.
However, the commanding officer thought best to call the company together, not with any design of opposing so superior a force, much less of commencing hostility, but only with a view to determine what to do.
And where?
to meet and to dismiss and disperse.
Accordingly, about half an hour after four o'clock, alarm guns were fired, and the drums beat to arms, and the militia were collecting together.
Some, to the number of about fifty or sixty, or possibly more, were on the parade.
Others were coming towards it.
The troops, having thus stolen a march upon us, to prevent any intelligence of their approach, seized and held prisoners, several persons whom they met unarmed, upon the road.
They seemed to come determined for murder and bloodshed, and that, whether provoked to it or not, when within about half a quarter of a mile of the meeting-house they halted and the command was given to turn and load.
Which being done, they marched on till they came up to the east end of said meeting house, in sight of our militia, collecting us aforesaid, who were about twelve or thirteen rods distant.
Immediately upon their appearing, so suddenly and so nigh, Captain Parker, who commanded the militia company, ordered the men to disperse and take care of themselves and not to fire.
Upon this our men dispersed, but many of them not so speedily as they might have done, not having the most distant idea of such brutal barbarity and more than savage cruelty from the troops of a British king as they immediately experienced.
For no sooner did they come in sight of our company, but one of them, supposed to be an officer of rank, was heard to say to the troops, Damn them!
We will have them!
Upon which the troops shouted aloud and huzzahed and rushed furiously toward our men.
About the same time, three officers, supposed to be Colonel Smith, Major Pitcairn, And another officer advanced on horseback to the front of the body, and coming within five or six rods of the militia, one of them cried out, Ye villains, ye rebels, disperse, damn you, disperse!
Or words to this effect.
One of them, whether the same or not is not easily determined, said, Lay down your arms Damn you!
Why don't you lay down your arms?" The second of these officers about this time fired a pistol towards the militia as they were dispersing.
The foremost, who was within a few yards of our men, brandishing his sword and then pointing towards them with a loud voice, said to the troops, Fire!
By God, fire!
Which was instantly followed by discharge of arms from the said troops, succeeded by a very heavy and close fire upon our dispersing party, so long as any of them were within reach.
Eight were left dead upon the ground.
Ten were wounded.
The rest of the company, through divine goodness, were, to a miracle preserved, unhurt in this murderous action.
Having thus vanquished the party in Lexington, the troops marched on for Concord, to execute their orders in destroying the stores belonging to the colony deposited there.
They met with no interruption in their march to Concord, but by some means or other the people of Concord had notice of their approach and designs and were alarmed about break of day, and collecting as soon and as many as possible improved the time they had before the troops came upon them to the best advantage, both for concealing and securing as many of the public stores as they could, and in preparing for defense.
By the stop of the troops at Lexington, many thousands were saved to the colony, and they were, in a great measure, frustrated in their design.
When the troops made their approach to the easterly part of the town, the provincials of Concord and some neighboring towns were collected and collecting in an advantageous post on a hill, just a little distance from the meeting house north of the road, to the number of about one hundred and fifty or maybe two hundred.
But finding the troops to be more than three times as many They very wisely retreated, first to a hill about eighty rods further north, and then over the North Bridge, so-called, about a mile from the town.
And there they waited the coming of the militia of the towns adjacent to their assistance.
Thank you.
They fired the British in the distance.
Thank you.
The End
The End The British detachment marched into the center of the town.
A party of about two hundred was ordered to take possession of said Other parties were dispatched to various parts of the town in search of public stores, while the remainder were employed in seizing and destroying whatever they could find in the townhouse and other places where stores had been lodged.
But before they had accomplished their design, they were interrupted by a discharge of arms at said bridge.
The Provincials, who were in sight of the bridge, observing the troops attempting to take up the planks of said bridge, thought it necessary to dislodge them.
They accordingly marched, but with express orders not to fire unless first fired upon by the King's troops upon their approach towards the bridge.
Captain Lorry's party fired upon them, killed Captain Davis and another man dead upon the spot, and wounded several others.
Upon this, our militia rushed on, with a spirit becoming free-born Americans, returned the fire upon the enemy, killed two, wounded several, and drove them from the bridge, and pursued them towards the town till they were covered by a reinforcement from the main body.
The Provincials then took post on a hill at some distance north of the town, and as their numbers were continually increasing, they were preparing to give the troops a proper discharge on their departure from the town.
In the meantime, the King's troops collected, and having dressed their wounded, destroyed what stores they could find, and insulted and plundered a number of the inhabitants prepared for a retreat.
The troops began a hasty retreat about the middle of the day, and were no sooner out of the town that they began to meet the effects of the just resentments of this injured people.
The Provincials fired upon them from various quarters and pursued them, though without any military order, with a firmness and intrepidity beyond what could have been expected on the first onset, and in such a day of confusion and distress.
The fire was returned for a time to a great fury by the troops as they retreated, though through divine goodness, but with little execution.
This scene continued with but little intermission till they returned to Lexington, when it was evident that, having lost numbers in killed, wounded, and prisoners that fell into our hands, they began to be not only fatigued, but greatly disheartened.
And it is supposed that they must have soon surrendered at discretion, had they not been But Lord Percy's arrival, with another brigade of about a thousand men and two field pieces about half a mile from Lexington Meeting House towards Cambridge, gave them a seasonable respite.
The coming of this reinforcement with the cannon, which our people were not so well acquainted with then as they have been since, brought the Provincials also to a pause for a time, but no sooner with the king's troops in motion, but our men renewed the pursuit with equal and even greater ardor and intrepidity than before.
The firing on both sides continued with but little intermission to the close of the day, when the troops entered Charleston, where the Provincials could not follow them without exposing the worthy inhabitants of that truly patriotic town to their rage and revenge.
That night and the next day, they were conveyed in boats over Charles River to Boston Glad to secure themselves under the cover of the shipping, and by strengthening and perfecting the fortifications at every part against the further attacks of the justly incensed people who, upon intelligence of the murderous transactions of this fatal day, were collecting in arms around the town, in great numbers and from every quarter.
In the retreat of the King's troops from Concord to Lexington, They ravaged and plundered as they had opportunity, more or less, in most of the houses that were upon the road.
But after they were joined by Percy's Brigade in Lexington, it seemed as if all the little remains of humanity had left them, and rage, rage and revenge had taken the reins and knew no bounds.
Clothing, furniture, provisions, goods, plundered, broken, carried off or destroyed.
Buildings, especially dwelling houses, abused, defaced, battered, shattered, and indeed almost ruined.
And as if this had not been enough, numbers of them fumed to the flames.
Three dwelling houses, two shops, and a barn were laid in ashes.
in Lexington.
Many others were set on fire in this town, in Cambridge, etc., and must have shared the same fate had not the close pursuit of the provincials prevented and the flames been seasonably quenched.
Add to all this the unarmed, the aged and infirm, who were unable to flee, are inhumanely stabbed and murdered in their habitations.
Yes, even women in childbed with their helpless babes in their arms do not escape the hard alternative of either being cruelly murdered in their beds, burnt, and their even women in childbed with their helpless babes in their arms do not escape the hard alternative of either being cruelly murdered in
But I forbear, for words are too insignificant to express the horrid barbarities of that distressing day.
Amen.
Our loss, and several actions of that day, was forty-nine killed, thirty-four wounded, and five missing who were taken prisoners, and have since been exchanged.
The enemies lost according to the best accounts and killed, wounded and missing.
About 300.
And so ends the narrative of Jonas Clark.
Yes.
Minister of Lexington on the first anniversary of that fateful day, the day that began the War of Independence and established for their posterity the greatest nation the day that began the War of Independence and established for their posterity the greatest nation that has ever been reared
Thank you.
This is just a portion of his narrative.
until October 1st, 1779.
This is just a portion of his narrative.
Valley Forge, December 11th, 1777.
I am prodigious sick and cannot get anything comfortable with.
What in the name of Providence am I to do with a fit of sickness in this place where nothing appears pleasing to the sick and die and nauseating stomach?
But I doubt not Providence will find out a way for my relief.
But I cannot eat beef if I starve, for my stomach positively refuses to entertain such company.
And how can I help that?
December 12, 1777 A bridge of wagons made across the Shulkill last night, consisting of thirty-six wagons with a bridge of rails between each, some skirmishing over the river.
Militia and dragoons brought into camp several prisoners.
Sunset.
We were ordered to march over the river.
It snows.
I'm sick.
Eat nothing.
No whiskey.
No forage.
Lord, Lord, Lord, Lord.
The army were till sunrise crossing the river, some at the wagon bridge and some at the raft bridge below.
Cold.
Cold and uncomfortable.
December 13th.
The Army marched three miles from the west side of the river and encamped near a place called the Gulf, and not an improper name, either, for this Gulf seems well adapted by its situation to keep us from the pleasures and enjoyments of this world or being conversant with anybody in it.
It is an excellent place to raise the ideas of a philosopher beyond the glutted thoughts and reflections of an Epicurean, as reflections It will be as different from the common reflections of mankind as if we were unconnected with the world and only conversant with immaterial beings.
It cannot be that our superiors are about to hold consultations with spirits infinitely beneath their order by bringing us into these utmost regions of the Now, it is upon consideration for many good purposes since we are to winter here.
Winter.
First, there is plenty of wood and water.
Secondly, there are but few families for the soldiers to steal from, though far be it from a soldier to steal.
Fourthly, there are warm sides of hills to erect huts on, carefully, they will be heavenly-minded like Jonah when in the belly of a great fish.
Sixthly, they will not become homesick, as is sometimes the case when men live in the open world, since the reflections which will naturally arise from their present habitation will lead them To the more noble thoughts of employing their leisure hours and filling their napsacks with such materials as may be necessary on the journey to another home.
December 14th.
Prisoners and deserters are continually coming in.
which has been surprisingly healthy hitherto, now begins to grow sickly from the continued fatigues they have suffered this campaign.
Yet they still show a spirit of alacrity and contentment not to be expected from so young troops.
I am sick, discontented, and out of humor.
Poor food, hard lodging, Fatigue.
Nasty clothes.
Nasty cookery.
Ugh.
Vomit.
Half my time smoked out of my senses.
The devil's in it.
I can't endure it.
Why are we sent here to starve and to freeze?
What sweet felicities have I left at home?
A charming, charming wife.
Pretty children.
Oh, good beds.
Good food.
Oh, good.
Good cookery.
All agreeable.
All harmonious.
But here?
All confusion.
Smoke and cold.
Hunger and filthiness.
A pox on my bad luck.
There comes a bowl of beef soup full of burnt leaves and dirt.
Enough such to make a hectare spew.
Away with it, boys.
I'll live like the chameleon upon the air.
Purr.
Purr, cries patience within me.
You talk like a fool.
You're being sick.
Cover your mind with a melancholic gloom which makes everything about you appear gloomy.
See the poor soldier.
When in health, with what cheerfulness he meets his foes and encounters every hardship.
If barefoot, he labors through mud and cold with a song in his mouth extolling war in Washington.
Washington.
Should his food be bad, he eats it.
Notwithstanding, with singing content, blesses God for a good stomach and whistles it into digestion.
But he patients a moment.
There comes the soldier, his bare feet seen through his worn-out shoes, his legs nearly naked from the tattered remains of an only pair of stockings, his breeches Not sufficient to cover his nakedness, his shirt hanging in strings, his hair disheveled, his face meager, his whole appearance pictures a person forsaken and discouraged.
He comes and cries with an air of wretchedness and despair, I am sick, my feet lame, my legs are sore, my body covered with this tormenting itch.
My clothes are worn out, my constitution is broken, my former activity is exhausted by fatigue, hunger, and cold.
Oh, it's cold.
I fail fast.
I shall soon be no more, and all the reward I shall get will be.
Poor Will is dead.
People who live at home in luxury and ease, quietly possessing their habitations, enjoying their wives and families in peace, have but a very faint idea of the unpleasing sensations and continual anxiety of a man in years who is in a camp and is the husband and parent of an agreeable family.
These same people are willing.
We should suffer everything for their benefit and advantage, and yet are the first to condemn us for not doing more.
December the 18th.
Rank and precedence make a good deal of disturbance and confusion in the American Army.
The Army are poorly supplied with provisions occasioned, it is said, by the neglect of the commissary of purchases.
Much talk among officers about discharges.
Money has become of too little consequence.
The Congress have not made their commissions valuable enough Heaven avert the bad consequences of these things.
Our brethren who are unfortunately prisoners in Philadelphia meet with the most savage and inhumane treatments that barbarians are capable of inflicting.
Our enemies do not knock them in the head, or burn them with torches to death, or slay them alive, or gradually dismember them till they die, which is customary among savages and barbarians.
No!
No, they are worse by far.
They suffer them to start, to linger out their lives in extreme hunger.
One of these poor, unhappy men, driven to the last extreme by the rage of hunger, ate his own fingers up to the first joint from the hand before he died.
Others ate the clay, the lime, the stones, the very stones of the prison walls.
Several who died in the yard had pieces of bark, wood, clay, and stones in their mouths, which the ravings of hunger had caused them to take in for food in the last, last agonies of life.
These are thy mercies, December the 21st, Valley Forge.
Preparations made for huts.
Provisions scarce.
Mr. Ellis went homeward.
Sent a letter to my wife.
Horrorfully wish myself at home.
My skin and eyes are almost spoiled with continual smoke.
A general cry through the camp this evening among the soldiers.
No meat!
No meat!
The distant veils echoed back the melancholy sound.
No meat!
Imitating the noise of crows and owls also made a part of the confused music.
Thank you.
Thank you.
What have you for your dinners, boys?
Nothing but fire, cakes, and water, sir.
At night.
Gentlemen, the supper is ready.
What is your supper, lads?
Fire, cake, and water, sir.
Very poor beef has been drawn in our camp the greater part of this season.
A butcher, bringing a quarter of this kind of beef into camp one day, who had to wipe buttons on the knees of his breeches, a soldier, cries out, There, Tom, is some more of your fat beef.
By my soul I can see the butcher's breeches buttoned through it.
December the 22nd.
Lay excessive cold and uncomfortable last night.
My eyes have started out from their orbits like rabbit's eyes occasioned by a great cold and smoke.
What have you got for breakfast, lads?
Firecakes and water, sir.
The Lord send that our commissaries of purchases may live on firecake and water till their glutted guts are turned to pasteboard.
Our division are under marching orders this morning.
I'm ashamed to say it, but I am tempted to steal fowls if I could find them, or even a whole hog.
For I feel as if I could eat one.
Oh yes, but the impoverished country about us affords but little matter to employ a thief, or to keep a clever fellow in good humor.
But why do I talk of hunger and hard usage when so many in the world have not even fire, cake, and water to eat?
December the 24th.
Cuts go on slowly.
Cold and smoke make us fret, but mankind are always fretting, even if they have more than their proportion of the blessings of life.
We're never easy, always repining at the providence of an all-wise and benevolent being, blaming our country or faulting our friends.
But I don't know of anything that vectors the man's soul more than hot smoke continually blowing into his eyes, and when he attempts to avoid it, being met by a cold, cold and piercing wind.
December 25th.
Christmas, Valley Forge.
We are still in tents, and we ought to be in huts.
The poor, poor sick, suffer much in tents this cold weather, but we now treat them differently from what they used to be at home, under the inspection of old women, and Dr. Bolus linked us.
We give them mutton and grog, and in capital medicine, once in a while, to start the disease from its foundations at once.
We avoid piddling pills, powders, boluses, linctuses, cordials, and all such insignificant matters whose powders are only rendered important by causing the patient to vomit up his money instead of his disease.
But very few, very few of the sick men die.
Ah, there stands General Washington in the cold wind blowing about him his cloak, the snow up to his knees, and he stares off and he stares off at his frozen, suffering army.
And I, I eat my fire cakes and water.
Don't ever forget the men and women who brought this nation into being.
And don't ever forget for one moment that we may have to do this again.
Good night, and God bless you all.
.
Thank you.
Thank you.
▲
Export Selection