CHAPTER VIII
Thenow unopposed command of the sea by the British navy and the consequent invasion and overrunning of the South brought darkest gloom and despondency to the American cause.
It was well that Providence had given America Washington who, when all things seemed to fail, held firm and carried us to victory. Without him the nation could not have survived the throes of birth. Calm and undismayed, he made up for the inefficiency of Congress, the lethargy of the states, the discontent of all. Whatever our national shortcomings—past, present, or future—America can ever be proud of having produced this king of men, the greatest character in history. He was, in fact, the Revolution personified. The war was fought without even the semblance of a government, for even the “Articles of Confederation and Perpetual Union” reported on July 12, 1776, by a committee appointed on June 10th (thesame day as that on which the committee was appointed to draft the Declaration of Independence), were not agreed to by Congress until November 17, 1777, and a sufficient number of states under the conditions of these articles did not ratify the action of Congress until March 1, 1781. Thus nearly six years of war passed before we had anything approaching a confederacy, and even then, as Washington well said, it was “but a shade without a substance.” “The organized and carefully barricaded impotence of this scheme of government,” says an able authority, “is probably unequalled in history, with any nation surviving.” Congress could only “request” of the several states, and but too often these requests bore no fruit whatever. Attendance in Congress lagged, interest dwindled, and by 1780 but for Washington, so far as mortal can judge, the Revolution would have come to a dismal end.
But Washington’s time of cheer was at hand. From February, 1779, to March, 1780, Lafayette was in France and unceasing in his efforts in support of the American cause. It was chiefly due to his efforts that on May 2, 1780, seven line-of-battle ships and three frigates left Brest under the Chevalier de Ternay, convoyingthirty-six transports carrying 5,027 troops, officers and men, under Lieutenant-General Count de Rochambeau. The enemy had, on October 25, 1779, withdrawn from Narragansett Bay to New York fearing an attack by d’Estaing’s great fleet after its operations against Savannah. The French fleet anchored at Newport on July 11th.
The death of de Ternay in December, due, in Lafayette’s judgment, to despondency caused by his hopeless view of things; the treason of Arnold which came to light in September; the blockade for most of the coming winter of the French squadron by, now, a superior British force; the arrival in the West Indies at the end of April, 1781, of the Count de Grasse with a powerful addition to the French fleet; the information that he expected to come on to the American coast; the pressing messages to him from Washington and Rochambeau to hasten his departure; the reply received on August 14th that he would sail on August 13th for the Chesapeake with 3,300 troops, artillery, and siege guns, and 1,200,000 livres (francs) in money, determined the move of the small allied armies to Virginia, where Cornwallis, now some months in that state, was finally to take up an entrenchedposition at Yorktown, his move from Portsmouth being completed on August 22d.
The American and French armies, after a whole year’s inaction, joined on July 6, 1781, taking position on a line from Dobbs’ Ferry to the Bronx. The Fates were surely with America. Everything conspired for the allies’ success; the position taken had convinced Clinton that New York was to be attacked; he pressed Cornwallis to send him every man he could spare, but Cornwallis could spare none. Rodney in the West Indies, misinformed as to De Grasse’s intentions, and thinking he was to take but half his fleet instead of the whole, detached but fourteen of his own command to go north under Sir Samuel Hood to reinforce Admiral Graves at New York. Rodney himself left for England on leave of absence, carrying four ships with him. The two vessels dispatched to Graves with information of British intentions never reached him. He was east with his squadron when one, arriving at New York, was sent on to him but was driven ashore on Long Island by a superior force and destroyed; the other and more important one, giving word of Hood’s departure, was captured. For this reason, though Graves returned to New York on August16th, he still remained in the dark as to Hood’s movements. The whole was a marvel of good fortune for the Americans, while every move of De Grasse’s fleet and of the allied armies were to fit with the perfection of mechanism.
Hood left the West Indies on August 10th. On the 25th he looked into the Chesapeake and, finding nothing, went on to Sandy Hook, where he arrived August 28th. That same evening word was received that De Barras (who had arrived from France as the successor of De Ternay) had sailed from Newport with his whole division of eight of the line, four frigates, and eighteen transports. It was now known to the British general that the allied armies were on their way south and that De Grasse was bound for the Chesapeake. Graves, with five of the line and a 50-gun ship, all that could be got ready in the time, joined Hood off Sandy Hook on August 31st and started south. He had nineteen ships-of-the-line to De Grasse’s twenty-eight. But De Grasse was already inside the capes, which he had reached on August 30th, and was at anchor in Lynnhaven Bay, just within Cape Henry. He had at once landed his troops and had stationed cruisers in James River to prevent Cornwallis attempting to escapeto North Carolina. His dispositions reduced his available ships to twenty-four of the line. At this moment Washington “was crossing the Delaware on his way south, with 6,000 regular troops, 2,000 American and 4,000 French, to join Lafayette,” who now, with the 3,300 French from the fleet, had 8,000 regulars and militia.
On September 5th Admiral Graves’s fleet was sighted by the French in the northeast. It was at first thought to be that of De Barras, but, on discovering the mistake, De Grasse took a course which risked all by getting under way and going outside the capes to fight a battle. To get twenty-four heavy sailing ships under way and attempt to get them in any formation in a reasonable time, even with the ebb tide which was running, was, with the wind north-northeast, a difficult operation. Several had to tack in order to clear Cape Henry, and by the time they reached the open sea the French ships must have been in very straggling condition. Graves failed to take advantage of such an opportunity. Instead of crowding sail, with a wind as fair as he could wish, and pressing down for the French, whom he might have attacked in detail, he formed a line heading out to sea, to fight abattle, partially under the old rule of parallel columns with each ship engaging her opposite, and partially under new ideas of tactics which Graves, just from England, had imbibed but which most of his captains had scarcely heard of.
The action began about four o’clock, signals were not understood, and, taken all in all, the handling of the British fleet was badly botched. Furthermore, Sir Samuel Hood, who commanded the rear division and was an officer of highest reputation, showed no initiative such as, in the circumstances, might have been expected, his division getting scarcely into gunshot. Thus at sunset, when the battle ceased, the British were in decidedly the worse plight, with a loss of 90 killed and 246 wounded, against about 200 killed and wounded of the French, and with several ships very severely injured, one, theTerrible, 74, so much so that she was in sinking condition, and five days later was burned. Though the two fleets were yet in sight of each other for four days, neither showed a wish to renew the action. On September 10th, when morning broke, the French were out of sight. Next day they reëntered the Chesapeake, capturing near the entrance two frigates sent byGraves to reconnoitre, one of which was theIriswhich had been the AmericanHancock. They found at anchor within the capes the division of Barras which the day before had arrived from Newport with the siege artillery intended for use at Yorktown. On the 13th the British fleet stood in for the capes and sighted the French at anchor. There was nothing to do but to return north. On the 19th it was again at Sandy Hook, and American independence was won.
Washington had not heard until September 5th of De Grasse’s arrival. “Standing on the river bank at Chester, he waved his hat in the air as the Comte de Rochambeau approached, and with many demonstrations of uncontrollable happiness he announced to him the good news.” Had he known that at that moment De Grasse was under way to go to sea and fight a battle, he would have been less joyous. For it was only the want of initiative on the part of the British admiral that saved the situation. For had the latter at any time in the six days which the French spent at sea himself entered the Chesapeake, he could have held the position, and De Grasse’s venture would have gone for nought. It is highly improbable that in suchcircumstances de Grasse would have shown such initiative as to attack New York. It is clear that neither admiral had a clear sense of the strategy involved, for De Grasse himself but a little later was again desirous of leaving the Chesapeake to seek the British fleet, and was only held by the most earnest remonstrances of Washington. As it was, the army was transported by September 26th to Williamsburg, and on October 19th Lord Cornwallis surrendered, thus, virtually, closing the war. De Grasse sailed November 4th to the West Indies and to ruin; for on April 12, 1782, he was signally defeated by Rodney and became a prisoner.
The French army was an aid to our success; the French navy was a necessity. The result completely filled the dictum of Washington, who foresaw by a hundred years that which is to-day an axiom and one particularly applicable to our own country: “In any operation and under all circumstances, a decisive naval superiority is to be considered a fundamental principle and the basis upon which every hope of success must ultimately depend.”[10]He would have made a great admiral, a career he narrowly escapedwhen it was proposed that he should go as midshipman under Admiral Vernon. The Fates fortunately decreed otherwise.
The operations of the Continental navy were now confined to very few ships. TheAlliance, under Captain Barry, had left Boston February 11, 1781, carrying Colonel John Laurens and Thomas Paine. The former bore a letter which, addressed by Washington to Laurens, was to be shown Vergennes, putting strongly the necessity of money and ships, and giving the whole logic of the situation in the sentence: “Indeed, it is not to be conceived how [the British] could subsist a large force in this country if we had the command of the seas to interrupt the regular transmission of supplies from Europe.”
TheAlliancewas unhappy in the character of her crew, which illustrated the exigencies to which we were now driven. A large number were British prisoners. These on the return voyage formed a conspiracy to carry the ship to Ireland, in the suppression of which Barry exhibited courage and qualities for command of a high order. On the way he captured two British cruisers, of 16 and 14 guns, the smaller of which was made a cartel to carry his prisoners, now about 250, into Halifax. The larger wasretaken by a squadron near Cape Cod. TheMarquis de Lafayette, a French privateer which had left France at the same time as theAlliance, with a valuable cargo of military stores, suffered the same fate.
TheDeane,Confederacy, andSaratogacruised this year in the West Indies, with small fortune, which was turned into very bad, by the capture of theConfederacyby a British squadron on April 15th. TheTrumbull, at sea on her first cruise, with a mixed crew of wretched quality, was dismasted in a gale and was taken on August 8th by theIrisand theGeneral Monk, both of which were captured American ships taken into the British service, one, as just said, being theHancock, and the latter a privateer, theGeneral Washington. TheIris, as but just mentioned above, was taken by the French only a month later and theGeneral Monkon April 7th of the next year by theHyder Ally, under Captain Joshua Barney, in one of the notable actions of the war.
Up to the peace signed September 3, 1783, privateering had continued active, 383 letters of marque being granted by Congress in 1782, but the Continental navy had practically disappeared. There were but five ships remaining:the frigatesAlliance,Hague, andBourbon(the last not yet launched), and the shipsGeneral WashingtonandDuc de Lauzun. Only the first two were in commission. Our only line-of-battle ship, the newly launchedAmerica, had been given to France to replace theMagnifique, wrecked coming into Boston harbor. The few ships mentioned gradually disappeared: theDuc de Lauzunwas sent to France as a transport and sold; theBourbon, launched at Middletown, Connecticut, July 31, 1783, was advertised for sale two months later, as was theHaguein August; theGeneral Washingtonwas sold the next year. Sentiment preserved theAllianceuntil August, 1785, when, with her sale, the Continental navy passed into history.
To recapitulate some data of the first chapter:
The British navy had at the beginning of the war 270 ships, of which 131 were of the line (from 100 to 60 guns), and but 18,000 seamen. At the end, January 20, 1783, there were 468 ships, of which 174 were of the line, and 110,000 seamen. They had lost (taken, destroyed, burned, foundered, or wrecked) 202 ships carrying 5,130 guns. The Continental and state navies had lost (taken, destroyed, burned,foundered, or wrecked) 39 ships, carrying 876 guns. The French had lost (in all the ways just mentioned) 72 ships, with 2,636 guns; the Spanish 24, with 960 guns; the Dutch 9, with 364 guns.
The British during the war lost 3,087 merchant vessels, taken by Americans, French, Dutch, and Spanish; 879 of these were retaken or ransomed. They lost 89 privateers, of which 14 were retaken or ransomed. They captured 1,135 merchantmen, of which only 27 were retaken or ransomed, and 216 privateers, of which only one was retaken.[11]The net result was heavily against them.
The navy of the Revolution, however insufficient and ineffective as an instrument of real war, served a good purpose. It kept up our communication with Europe; made many captures of material in ordnance, ammunition, and stores of utmost importance to our forces, and fought many gallant actions. But actions between small cruisers and captures of merchantmen are not the means which bring control of the sea. The action of greatest moment was that of the little flotilla on Lake Champlain in 1776, and this, even though defeated, was a main instrumentin gaining the French alliance and thus our independence. It is the battleship, in that day known as the ship-of-the-line, which decides the question of command of the world’s highway and thus decides the outcome of war between powers separated by the ocean. The services of the small Continental navy thus from the very nature of things could effect comparatively little so long as the ship-of-the-line could go and come as it pleased. It was the French battleship in larger numbers than the English that completely changed the melancholy outlook of 1780 and 1781. In July of the latter year Rochambeau, in a letter to De Grasse urging him to come north, could use the words: “General Washington has but a handful of men.... This country has been driven to bay and all its resources are giving out at once.” He told but the painful fact. The presence of a dominating fleet gave us victory and independence; without it the Revolution would have failed. It took us a hundred years to realize the truth of the principle here stated, and we have yet to frame a policy in accord with its meaning.
With the passing of the ships passed all semblance of naval organization. The Board of Admiraltyhad really consisted of Robert Morris only, and the Congress of the loosely bound Confederation was itself almost moribund. The United States found itself free, but it was the freedom of disorganization, an atrophy of government. The Revolution had been fought until March, 1781, without an established government. This is a remarkable fact. We had yet to wait four years from the peace for a real instrument of government, the Constitution of 1787. The adoption of this on September 13, 1787, was the true birthday of the Republic rather than the 4th of July, 1776. The Revolution of 1787 was quite as momentous as that of the war just ended.