Chapter III: The War of American Independence (2)

Of Montgomery, Horace Walpole wrote that he ‘was not so fortunate as Wolfe to die a conqueror, though very near being so’.[91] He was so far fortunate in his death, that his name has passed into American history as that of a martyr to the cause of liberty. He was known to Burke, Fox, and the leaders of the Opposition in England; and he seems to have been an attractive man in private life as well as a capable soldier. We read in the _Annual Register_ for 1776 that ‘The excellency of his qualities and disposition had procured him an uncommon share of private affection, as his abilities had of public esteem; and there was probably no man engaged on the same side, and few on either, whose loss would have been so much regretted both in England and America’.[92] In America addresses and monuments commemorated his name, Tryon county of New York was renamed Montgomery county in honour to his memory, and in 1818 his remains were exhumed and taken to New York for public burial. In England leading politicians bore tribute to his merits, and as late as the year 1791, in the House of Commons, Fox called to Burke’s remembrance how the two friends had ‘sympathized almost in tears for the fall of a Montgomery.’[93] He died fighting for what proved to be the winning cause, and men spoke well of him. But there is another side to the picture which should not be overlooked. Montgomery was not, like Arnold, born and bred on New England soil. He was ‘a gentleman of good family in the kingdom of Ireland’,[94] and educated at Trinity College, Dublin. He had worn the King’s uniform from 1756 to 1772; he had served as a subaltern at the capture of Louisbourg, under Amherst again on Lake Champlain, and with Haviland’s division in the final British advance on Montreal, by the line by which in 1775 he led the American troops into Canada. After the British conquest of Canada he had seen active service in the West Indies. His connexion with the North American colonies consisted in having bought an estate in New York, having married a lady of the well-known Livingston family in that state, and having made his home there after retirement from the army. That retirement took place in 1772. In 1775 he was a brigadier-general in the American army, not concerned to defend house and home against unprovoked attack, but to lead an army of invasion into a neighbouring British province, endeavouring to wrest from Great Britain what he himself had fought to give her, and identifying oppression with one whose worth he must well have known, with a fellow British soldier of Carleton’s high character and name. Montgomery was an Irishman. In his case, as in that of Arnold, the wife’s influence probably counted for much; and the time was one when what were called generous instincts were at a premium and principles were at a discount. But the terms[95] in which he summoned Carleton to surrender suggest unfavourable contrast between his own words and actions on the one hand, and on the other the stern old-fashioned views of loyalty and military honour which Carleton held, and which forbade him to pay to Montgomery in his lifetime the respect which was ensured by a soldier’s death.

Montgomery had charged Carleton with inhumanity. Carleton was a soldier who did not play with war and rebellion, but he was also a humane man, and the charge, if it needed any contradiction, is belied by a proclamation which he issued on the 10th of May, four days after the relief of Quebec. In it search was directed to be made for sick and wounded Americans, reported to be ‘dispersed in the adjacent woods and parishes, and in great danger of perishing for want of proper assistance’. They were to be given relief and brought in to the General Hospital at Quebec, a promise being added that, as soon as their health was restored, they should be at liberty to return to their homes.[96]

[Sidenote: The affair of the Cedars.]

Quebec was relieved on the 6th of May. Some ships were sent up the river, but Carleton waited for the reinforcements which were fast coming in from England before making a decided move, and it was not until the beginning of June that Three Rivers was re-occupied by the Royal troops. Meanwhile, the American head quarters at Montreal had been alarmed by a diversion from another quarter. The invading forces had broken into Canada at two points only. Montgomery’s advance had been direct to Montreal: Arnold had marched straight on Quebec. The British outposts above Montreal and in the west had been left undisturbed. One of them, very small in numbers, was stationed at Ogdensburg, then known as Oswegatchie, a few years previously the scene of the Abbé Piquet’s mission of La Présentation. The commander was Captain Forster of the 8th Regiment of the line, the same regiment which in the later war of 1812 played so conspicuous a part in the defence of Canada. Towards the end of the second week in May, Forster, with about 50 regulars and volunteers and some 200 Indians,[97] started down the St. Lawrence, his objective being the Cedars, a place on the northern bank of the St. Lawrence below Lake St. Francis in that river, and a few miles above Lake St. Louis and the island of Montreal. Here an American force was stationed, numbering nearly 400 men. On the 18th and 19th of May Forster attacked the post, which surrendered on the second day; and on the 20th another small party of Americans, rather under 100 in number, which was advancing from Vaudreuil, seven miles to the north of the Cedars, surrendered to a mixed body of Canadians and Indians. By these two successes Forster secured between 400 and 500 prisoners, and crossing over to the island of Montreal, he advanced against Lachine, where a considerable force of Americans was encamped. These men were under the command of Arnold who, on recovering from the wound which he had received at Quebec, had been placed in charge of the Congress troops at Montreal. Forster found the position and the numbers defending it too strong to attack, although he had been reinforced by a large party of Canadians. Accordingly, he retired to the mainland. Arnold then attempted to cross and make a counter attack, but was in turn obliged to recross to the island. There then followed negotiations for the release of the prisoners, who were handed over to Arnold on condition that British prisoners should be subsequently released in exchange, and at the end of the month Forster returned to Oswegatchie.

His exploit had been a notable one. With a very insignificant following he had defeated superior numbers and had threatened Montreal. History repeated itself; and, as in the days of New France, the Canadians and Indians showed themselves formidable in sudden raids, supplementing the regular plan of campaign. The affair of the Cedars proved that, as long as Quebec and the mouth of the St. Lawrence were in British keeping, the American army of occupation would be troubled on the western side by home-bred combatants, stiffened by British outposts which could only be dislodged as the result of a general conquest of Canada. Canada was in fact far from conquered, and in a very short time the country was cleared of its foes.

[Sidenote: Dispute with Congress as to the exchange of prisoners.]

But Forster’s enterprise obtained notoriety for another and a different reason. The Congress of the revolting states refused to ratify the agreement to which Arnold had consented. The American prisoners, with the exception of a few hostages, were sent back, but the promised exchanges were not made, and the reason given for not fulfilling the engagement was that some of Forster’s prisoners had been murdered and others maltreated and plundered. Congress therefore resolved not to give back the requisite number of British prisoners, until the authors and abettors of the alleged crimes had been handed over and compensation made for the plunder. The allegations seem in the main not to have been substantiated, as is shown by a letter from one of the American hostages themselves.[98] That the Indians looted some of the prisoners’ property was undeniable, but Forster appears to have used every effort to secure the safety and good treatment of those who were in his hands, and the charges of murder were not made good. Carleton wrote strongly on the subject,[99] attributing the action of the American Congress to a desire to embitter their people against the English and to prolong the war; but at this distance of time it is unnecessary to revive the controversy. What is worth noting is the feeling aroused when coloured men are enlisted, or even alleged to be enlisted, on either side in white men’s quarrels, the exaggerated reports which are spread abroad, and the credence which is given to them. The record of Indian warfare in North America was a terrible one, and it is no matter for surprise if, when Indians were found fighting on the British side, the barbarities of the past were reported to have been reproduced at a later date.

[Sidenote: American delegates sent to Montreal.]

[Sidenote: Retreat of the American army.]

[Sidenote: Montreal re-occupied by the English, and preparations made for an advance up Lake Champlain.]

Before Quebec had been relieved, the weakness of the American hold on Canada, and the condition of the army of occupation, had given anxiety to Congress, who sent special commissioners to Montreal. The commissioners were three in number. One was Benjamin Franklin, and another was Carroll, a Roman Catholic, who was accompanied by his brother, a Jesuit priest. The object was to ascertain the actual position of matters military and political, and to conciliate Canadian feeling. What was ascertained was depressing enough, and the efforts at conciliation came to nothing. While the commissioners were at Montreal, they received news of the relief of Quebec, and events soon swept away recommendations. The American army fell back from Quebec to the Richelieu; and, as the troops came in from England, including some German regiments under Baron Riedesel, Carleton sent them up the St. Lawrence by land and water, Burgoyne being in command. In the first days of June Three Rivers was garrisoned; and within a week, on the 8th of June, an American general, Thompson, who made an attempt to regain the position, crossing over by night from the southern shore, was cut off and taken prisoner with over 200 of his men. This completed the discomfiture of the Americans: small-pox and other diseases were rife in their ranks: their posts on the line of the Richelieu were hastily abandoned; Arnold barely had time to evacuate Montreal; and, before the last week of June began, Montreal, Chambly, and St. John’s were all again in British possession, and the invasion of Canada was at an end.

The Americans, however, still retained their hold on Lake Champlain. It was impossible to dislodge them without organizing transport by water as well as by land, and building armed vessels to overpower the ships with which they commanded the lake. For when they overran Canada as far as Quebec, they secured all the sailing craft and bateaux on the Upper St. Lawrence. ‘The task was indeed arduous,’ says a contemporary writer, ‘a fleet of above thirty fighting vessels, of different kinds and sizes, all furnished with cannon, was to be little less than recreated.’[100] Three months, therefore, were taken up in boat-building, the material being in large measure sent out from England, in making roads, constructing entrenchments, drilling the troops, and collecting supplies. The troops, over 10,000 in number, were stationed at La Prairie on the St. Lawrence, immediately opposite Montreal, at Chambly, St. John’s, and the Isle aux Noix, with detachments lower down the Richelieu river than Chambly in order to keep all the communications open; and in September, when the preparations were nearly completed, advanced parties were moved forward to the opening of Lake Champlain.

[Sidenote: Fighting on Lake Champlain.]

[Sidenote: Destruction of the American flotilla.]

[Sidenote: Crown Point abandoned by the Americans.]

[Sidenote: Close of the campaign.]

In October the newly-constructed gunboats ascended the Richelieu river from St. John’s, and entered the lake. On the 11th they came into touch with the American vessels, which were then stationed, under Arnold’s command, between Valcour Island and the western shore of the lake. The place was about five miles south of Plattsburg, about twenty-five miles south of what is now the boundary line of Canada, and a little less than fifty miles to the north of Crown Point. The strait between the island and the mainland is about a mile wide, and across it was the American line of battle. The English had the superiority in numbers and, as the result of the first day’s fighting, being carried to the south of the enemy’s ships, were at the close of the day drawn up in line to intercept their retreat. At night, however, Arnold, bold and skilful as ever, found a passage through and sailed off to the south, hotly pursued by Carleton’s squadron. On the 13th fighting began again, and ended with the capture or destruction of twelve American vessels, out of a total of fifteen, over 100 prisoners being taken including the second in command to Arnold. Crown Point was set on fire and abandoned by the Americans, and on the 14th Carleton wrote from his ship off that place reporting his success. In his dispatch he expressed doubts whether anything further could be done at that late season of the year, and he subsequently came to the conclusion that an attack on Ticonderoga, which was held by a strong force under Gates, must be postponed till the following spring. Nor did he think it prudent to occupy Crown Point, which was in a dismantled and ruined condition, through the winter, and by the middle of November, he had withdrawn all his forces to the Isle aux Noix and St. John’s, whence he had started.

[Sidenote: Carleton censured by Germain.]

It was a good summer’s work. Quebec had been relieved, the whole of Canada had been recovered, and on the main line of invasion, Lake Champlain, the English had obtained the upper hand by the destruction of Arnold’s vessels. This last part of the campaign stands out in bright contrast to the abortive Plattsburg expedition in the later war of 1812. If there had been any delay, it was largely due to the fact that Carleton had not received from England all the boats and materials for boat-building for which he had requisitioned; and, to judge from Horace Walpole, intelligent observers in England were not disappointed with the outcome of the autumn fighting. ‘You will see the particulars of the naval victory in the _Gazette_,’ he wrote to Sir Horace Mann on the 26th of November, 1776, ‘It is not much valued here, as it is thought Carleton must return to Quebec for the winter.’ Nevertheless, the British Government, as represented by Lord George Germain, professed to be dissatisfied that more had not been achieved, and that, having reached Crown Point, the general had not made a further advance against Ticonderoga, or at least held his ground where he was through the winter. Germain, who in January, 1776, had succeeded Dartmouth in charge of colonial matters, had begun by finding fault with Carleton, complaining that the latter had left the Home Government in the dark as to his plan of operations after the relief of Quebec, and as to the position in Canada. The result was, Germain wrote, that it was impossible at the time to send Carleton any further instructions.[101] It would have been well if the impossibility had continued. He found new ground for criticism in Carleton’s temporary retreat from Lake Champlain, but the criticism was wholly without justification. Carleton was a cautious leader; he had shown caution in the defence of Quebec, where events had justified his attitude; but the whole record of the 1776 campaign had proved him to be at the same time a man of energy, firmness, and resource, unwearied in organizing, prompt in action. Wolfe, it might be said, would at all hazards have attacked Ticonderoga, but it must be remembered that Wolfe in America, where he always preached and practised forward aggressive movement, was fighting Frenchmen and Indians, not soldiers of the same race as his own. If we compare Amherst, on the other hand, with Carleton, we find that Amherst in 1759, having taken Ticonderoga and Crown Point by the beginning of August, made no further move till the middle of October, and then, after an abortive start down Lake Champlain, gave up active operations for the winter. There is no valid reason to suppose that Carleton’s judgement was otherwise than sound. At any rate, to quote his own words to Germain in a letter written on the 20th of May, 1777, ‘Any officer entrusted with the supreme command ought, upon the spot, to see what was most expedient to be done, better than a great general at 3,000 miles distance.’[102]

[Sidenote: The English generals in America.]

Less capable than Carleton were the other British officers in America, and far less satisfactory were the results of their efforts. In the early days of 1775, before fighting actually began, Amherst, the former Commander-in-Chief in North America, was invited by the King to resume his command, but declined the invitation, and General Gage was accordingly retained in that position. To support him, three generals were sent out from England, Howe, Burgoyne, and Clinton. They arrived towards the end of May, 1775, after the fight at Lexington had taken place, and before the battle of Bunker’s Hill. Early in 1776 Lord Cornwallis also appeared upon the scene. After the battle of Bunker’s Hill, Gage was recalled to England, and Howe was placed in command of the troops on the Atlantic seaboard, while Carleton was given independent command in Canada. Gage left in October, 1775, and Howe, his successor, remained in America till May, 1778, having sent in his resignation a few months previously. Clinton succeeded Howe, and held the command until the surrender of Cornwallis at Yorktown in October, 1781, turned out the ministry and practically finished the war. Then, when it was too late, Carleton was named as commander-in-chief, and arrived at New York in May, 1782, by which time the fighting was practically over.

[Sidenote: Howe.]

[Sidenote: Clinton.]

[Sidenote: Burgoyne.]

[Sidenote: Cornwallis.]

These men, who commanded the armies of England in America during a disastrous war, were by no means hopelessly incompetent. Howe had been one of the best of Wolfe’s officers. He had led the advanced party which stormed the Heights of Abraham on the memorable morning of the 13th of September, 1759. In the revolutionary war, though found wanting in some of the qualities which make a great general, he none the less showed firmness, courage, and skill in various actions from Bunker’s Hill onwards, and he achieved several notable successes. Clinton proved himself to be at least an average commander. Burgoyne, in a subordinate position, was apparently a good soldier; and the subsequent career of Lord Cornwallis showed that he was a man of capacity. Comparing them with the predecessors of Wolfe and Amherst in the late French war, with Loudoun, Webb, and Abercromby, and bearing in mind that they had a far more difficult task, they stand in no unfavourable light. But they were not leaders of men themselves, and there was no man in power in England, such as Chatham had been, who was a leader of men, strong enough to break down political intrigue and court influence, to find the best men and send them out, superseding the second best, encouraging and supporting his soldiers and sailors, but not worrying them with ill-timed and ignorant interference.

[Sidenote: The English admirals.]

On the sea England was even less fortunate in the men who served her than on land, whereas, as events proved, the possibility of success in the war depended entirely on keeping command of the sea. In the time of the Seven Years’ War, the English admirals were at their best. Hawke, in his brilliant fight at Quiberon, did hardly better service than the less known Admiral Saunders, who co-operated heart and soul with Wolfe at Quebec. Widely different was the naval record of the War of American Independence. The French navy, it is true, was stronger than in former years, but the naval commanders on the English side were also less adequate. The competent men were superseded by, or had to serve under, senior and less competent officers. Sir George Collier, who showed energy and ability, was succeeded by an inferior man, Marriot Arbuthnot; and, at the most critical point of the campaign, when the French admiral, de Grasse, combined with Washington to procure the surrender of Cornwallis, Sir Samuel Hood, one of the best, had to take his orders from Admiral Graves, one of the least competent of British naval officers. Even Rodney, who had not yet won the great victory in the West Indies, by which he is best remembered, seems to have been remiss in regard to North America; and, if Hood be excepted, Lord Howe alone among the famous seamen of England, during a short period of the war, showed something of the skill and energy which, at other times, and in other than American waters, characterized the leaders of the British navy.

[Sidenote: Military science was not conspicuous in the American War of Independence.]

Apart altogether from its causes and its results, and dealing only with the actual operations, the War of American Independence was a most unsatisfactory, and for the English, a most inglorious war. It might well have resulted in a far more crushing defeat for England, and yet have left a much better impression on English minds. Though the war lasted for fully seven years, on neither side, with one exception, were very great military reputations made. The American Civil War of later days was marked by notable military achievements, and extraordinarily stubborn fighting. It was a terrible but a heart-whole struggle, fought hard to the bitter end under men, among winners and losers alike, whose names will live to all time in military history. In the American War of Independence, on the other hand, though good soldiers were engaged on either side and some, such as the American general, Nathaniel Greene, deservedly attained high reputation, yet the only name which lives for the world at large because of the war itself, is that of Washington; and it lives not so much because of brilliant feats of generalship, as because he led a murmuring people through the wilderness with statesmanship, rare nobility of character, and unconquerable patience. ‘Few of the great pages of history,’ writes Mr. Lecky, ‘are less marked by the stamp of heroism than the American Revolution.’[103] The Americans muddled through, because the English made more mistakes, and because, though the American people were divided among themselves, their leaders, at any rate, knew their own minds, and were not half-hearted like the majority of leading men at the time in the United Kingdom.

[Sidenote: Wavering attitude of the English Government]

For neither the English nation nor the English Government were wholehearted in the war. It was of the nature of a civil war, with little to appeal to on the English side. It is true that it was for a time popular in England, that the intervention of France prolonged its popularity, and that the outrageous extravagances of Fox and other extreme Whigs also tended to provoke honest patriotism in favour of the Government and their policy; but it was not truly a nation’s war, guided by the nation’s chosen leaders. Not only was there strong opposition to it in England, for reasons which have already been given, strong especially in the personality of men like Chatham and Burke who opposed it, but the ministry themselves showed that their heart was not in their work. Twice in the middle of the struggle they tried to make peace. In 1776, the brothers Howe at New York, Whigs themselves, were commissioned to open negotiations with the colonists: but their powers in granting concessions were far too limited to satisfy opponents, who had already, on the 4th of July in that year, declared for independence. Again in 1778, under an Act of Parliament, specially passed for the purpose, commissioners were appointed to negotiate for peace. They were five in number, two being, as before, the brothers Howe,[104] and the other three being delegates specially sent out from home. This time ample powers were given to make concessions, but the situation was wholly changed. Burgoyne had surrendered in the preceding autumn, the French had joined hands with the colonists, and Philadelphia was being evacuated by the British troops. Had the commissioners been sent out after some striking success on the side of England, offering generous terms from a strong and resolute nation, they might have gained a hearing, and the proffered concessions might have been accepted. Under the circumstances the mission was interpreted as a sign of weakness, and the messages which were brought were treated with contempt.

[Sidenote: and of the generals.]

As it was with the Government, so it was also with the military men. Amherst would not serve because of his old friendly relations with the Americans. General Howe, for similar reasons, was at first loth to serve, and his delays and shortcomings in prosecuting the war may perhaps be in part attributed to the same cause. Howe, Burgoyne, and Clinton all came out in 1775 from the House of Commons, politicians as well as soldiers.[105] Burgoyne was brought home towards the end of 1775. He went out again to Canada in the spring of 1776, again went home in the autumn of that year, and again went out in 1777 for his last disastrous campaign. Cornwallis went to England twice in the course of the war. It was probably a mere coincidence, but the fact remains that the two commanders who suffered the greatest disasters, were the two who went back and fore between England and America, and presumably came most under the influence of the mischievous ministry at home. It is true that Wolfe had gone home in 1758 after the taking of Louisburg, discontented with the tardiness of Amherst’s movements, and that he went out again in 1759 to his crowning victory and death; but Wolfe went home to Chatham, Burgoyne and Cornwallis to Lord George Germain.

[Sidenote: Want of continuity in the military operations on the English side.]

Take again the spasmodic operations of the war. Boston, held when war broke out, and for the retention of which Bunker’s Hill was fought, was subsequently abandoned. Philadelphia was occupied and again evacuated. The southern colonies were over-run but not held. At point after point the Loyalists were first encouraged and then left to their fate. Everything was attempted in turn but nothing done, or what was done was again undone. The vacillation and infirmity of purpose, which has so often marred the public action of England, was never more manifest than in the actual campaigns of the War of American Independence. The great difficulty to contend with was the large area covered by the revolting colonies; and the one hope of subduing them lay in blockading the coasts and concentrating instead of dispersing the British land forces. Lord Howe and Lord Amherst are credited with the view that the only chance of success for England lay in a purely naval war; and it is said to have been on Amherst’s advice that Philadelphia was abandoned and the troops concentrated at New York. The true policy was, as Captain Mahan has pointed out,[106] and as Carleton had seen before the war came,[107] to cut the colonies in two by holding the line of the Hudson and Lake Champlain; and the object of sending Burgoyne down from Canada by way of Lake Champlain in 1777 was that he might join hands with the British forces on the Atlantic coast, as they moved up the Hudson from New York. But, while Burgoyne was marching south, Howe carried off the bulk of the troops from New York to attack Philadelphia; and there followed, as a direct consequence, the ruin of Burgoyne’s force and its surrender at Saratoga. No positive instructions had reached Howe as to co-operating with Burgoyne, and the well-known story goes[108] that this oversight was due to Lord George Germain, who had fathered the enterprise, going out of town at the moment when the dispatches should have been signed and sent. At any rate, it is clear that, even when the British Government had formed a right conception of the course to be followed, they failed to take ordinary precautions for ensuring that it was carried into effect. In Canada alone did the English rise to the occasion. Here, and here only, was a man among them in the early stages of the war who moved on a higher plane altogether than his contemporaries in action, a statesman-general of dignity, foresight and prudence. Here alone too the English were repelling invasion, and keeping for the nation what the nation had won. In this wrong-headed struggle the one and only ray of brightness for England shone out from Canada.

[Sidenote: Operations on the Atlantic seaboard.]

After the battle of Bunker’s Hill, in June, 1775, the British army of occupation at Boston spent the year in a state of siege. Gage was recalled to England in October, the command of the troops being handed over to Howe. Burgoyne too went home, returning to Canada in the following spring. The autumn and the winter went by, Carleton being beleaguered in Quebec, and Howe cooped up in Boston, while British ships bombarded one or two of the small seaport towns on the American coast, causing misery and exasperation, without effecting any useful result. Early in 1776, Clinton and Cornwallis were sent to carry war into the southern states, and towards the end of June made an unsuccessful attack on Charleston Harbour.

[Sidenote: Howe evacuates Boston and occupies New York.]

In March Howe evacuated Boston, and brought off his troops to Halifax. In June he set sail for New York, which was held by Washington; established himself on Staten Island, where he was joined by his brother, the admiral, with strong reinforcements; and, having now ample troops under his command, he took action in the middle of August. Crossing over to Long Island, he inflicted a heavy blow on Washington’s army on the 27th of August, but did not follow up his success, with the result that Washington two days later carried over his troops to New York. In the middle of September New York was evacuated by the Americans and occupied by the English, and through October and November, Washington was driven back with loss, until by the beginning of the second week in December, he had retreated over the Delaware to Philadelphia, and the whole of the country between that river and the Hudson, which forms the State of New Jersey, was in British hands. The American cause was further depressed by the temporary loss of General Charles Lee, who had been surprised and taken prisoner. He was one of the few American leaders who was a practised soldier, having been before the war a half-pay officer of the British army; at the time of his capture he stood second only to Washington.

[Sidenote: Howe’s delays.]

Howe had been almost uniformly successful, but at each step he had been slow to follow up his successes. In all wars in which trained soldiers are pitted against untrained men, it must be of the utmost importance to give as little breathing space as possible to the latter, for delay gives time for learning discipline, regaining confidence, and realizing that defeat may be repaired. Easy to check and to keep on the run in the initial stages of such a war, the untried levies gradually harden into seasoned soldiers, taking repulses not as irreparable disasters, but as incidents in a campaign. For those who set out to subdue a stubborn race it is a fatal mistake to give their enemies time to learn the trade of war. Especially is it a mistake when, as in the case of the Americans, the causes of the war and the ultimate objects are at the outset not yet clearly defined, when there are misgivings and hesitations as to the rights and wrongs, the necessities of the case, the most desirable issue: most of all when one side represents a loose confederation of jealous states, and not one single-minded nation. Howe seems to have lost sight of these considerations, and not to have wished to press matters too far. While engaged in taking New York, he was also busy with his brother in trying vainly to negotiate terms of peace; and subsequently, while mastering New Jersey, instead of completing his success by sending ships and troops round to the Delaware to attack Washington in Philadelphia, he dispatched Clinton to the north to occupy Newport in Rhode Island, a point of vantage for the naval warfare, but held at the cost of dispersing instead of concentrating the British forces.

[Sidenote: Washington’s victory at Trenton.]

[Sidenote: Howe retreats from the Jerseys, and occupies Philadelphia.]

Yet, as the year 1776 drew towards its close, all seemed going well for the English in America. Carleton from Canada, Howe from New York, had uninterrupted progress to report. With Christmas night there came another tale. In fancied security after the late campaign, Howe’s troops in New Jersey were quartered at different points, the commander-in-chief remaining at New York, and Cornwallis, who had commanded in New Jersey, being on the point of leaving for England. The village of Trenton on the Delaware, through which passed the road from New York to Philadelphia, was held by a strong detachment of Hessians under General Rahl, whose whole force, including a few British cavalry, numbered about 1,400 men. No entrenchments had been constructed, few precautions had been taken against attack, and Christmas time and Christmas weather made for want of vigilance. Crossing the Delaware with 2,500 men, Washington broke in upon the position in the early morning of December 26th, amid snow and rain, and the surprise was complete: General Rahl was mortally wounded; between 900 and 1,000 of his men were killed, wounded, or taken prisoners; and not many more than 400 made good their escape. Returning with his prisoners to Philadelphia, Washington again re-crossed the Delaware, and during the rest of the winter and the first six months of the year 1777 continually harassed the English in New Jersey, avoiding a general engagement, which Howe vainly endeavoured to bring on. At length, towards the end of July, Howe evacuated the territory, and, leaving Clinton with over 8,000 men at New York, shipped the rest of his army for Chesapeake Bay, resolved to attack the enemy from the opposite direction and to take Philadelphia. Washington gave him battle on the Brandywine river early in September and was defeated. On the 26th of September Howe entered Philadelphia: and on the 4th of October at Germantown, five miles distant from the city, he successfully repelled a sudden attack by which Washington attempted to repeat the success of Trenton. At Brandywine, Washington lost some 1,300 men, at Germantown over 1,000; but, while Germantown was being fought, Burgoyne’s army on the upper reaches of the Hudson was nearing its final disaster.

[Sidenote: Far-reaching consequences of the fight at Trenton.]

The War of American Independence, to quote the words of the _Annual Register_ for 1777,[109] was ‘a war of posts, surprises, and skirmishes, instead of a war of battles’. The disaster to the Hessians at Trenton was what would have been called in the late South African war a regrettable incident, but it had far-reaching consequences. The German troops employed by the British Government were not unnaturally regarded by the American colonists with special dislike and apprehension. They were foreigners and professional soldiers, alien in sympathies and in speech, partisans in a quarrel with which they had no concern, fighting for profit not for principle. The citizen general, at the darkest time of the national cause, came back to Philadelphia, bringing a number of them prisoners, and broke at once the spell of ill success. There followed, as a direct consequence, the abandonment of the Jerseys by the English, the rising again of colonial feeling throughout the region, and corresponding depression of the Loyalists. But almost more important was the effect on the side of Canada; for the Trenton episode led to the supersession of Carleton and to his eventual resignation.

[Sidenote: The Secretary of State for the American Department.]

In the year 1768 the office of Secretary of State for the American Department was created in England, to deal especially with colonial matters. The Council of Trade and Plantations, which in one form or another had hitherto taken charge of the colonies, was not superseded, but to the new Secretary of State it fell to handle questions of war and peace with the American colonies. The appointment was not long lived, being abolished, together with the Council of Trade and Plantations, by Burke’s Act in 1782. The first Secretary of State for the American Department was Lord Hillsborough; the second, appointed in 1772, was Lord Dartmouth, in character and sympathy, a pleasing exception to the type of politicians who at the time had power in Great Britain; the third, appointed at the beginning of 1776, was Lord George Germain who, when he took office, was about sixty years of age.

[Sidenote: Lord George Germain.]

No name in English political history during the last 150 years is less loved than that of Lord George Sackville, or, as he was known in later years, Lord George Germain. He was born in 1716, a younger son of the first Duke of Dorset. Lady Betty Germain, who died in 1769, left him the Drayton estate[110] in Northamptonshire, and he took her name. Ten years before, he had been cashiered for disobedience to an order to charge at the battle of Minden in 1759, laying himself open by his conduct in that battle to what was no doubt an unfounded charge of cowardice. He took to political life, and has been commonly regarded as in a special manner the evil genius of the British ministry during the war with America. Yet he was not a man without parts. In his early life he had some reputation as a soldier, being highly spoken of by Wolfe. After he was dismissed from the army, he pertinaciously demanded a court-martial, though warned that more serious results even than dismissal might follow from re-opening the case. The inquiry was held, and the dismissal confirmed; but, helped no doubt by his family connexions, he held up his head in public life, and became, in Horace Walpole’s opinion, one of the five best speakers in the House of Commons.[111] Walpole, and probably others also, disbelieved the charge of cowardice;[112] and certainly in politics, whatever may have been the case on the battlefield, Germain cannot be denied the merits of courage and tenacity, though he may well have been embittered by his past, and hardened into fighting narrowly for his own hand. He became a follower of Lord North, and under him was appointed a Lord Commissioner of Trade and Plantations and Secretary of State for the American Department. He was an unbending opponent of the colonists and their claims. ‘I don’t want you to come and breathe fire and sword against the Bostonians like that second Duke of Alva, the inflexible Lord George Germain,’ wrote Horace Walpole in January, 1775,[113] before Germain had taken office. To use Germain’s own words, he would be satisfied with nothing less from the Americans than ‘unlimited submission’.[114]

Germain seems to have been deeply imbued with the great political vice of the time, that of dealing with national questions from a personal and partisan point of view. It was a vice inculcated by George the Third. The King was a narrow man: his school bred narrow men: and one of the narrowest was Lord George Germain. Such men are fearful of power passing from their hands, and are consequently prone to be constantly interfering with their officers. Hence it was that the evil of ministers trying to order the operations of generals, and of men in one continent purporting to regulate movements in another, was more pronounced at this time than at almost any other period in English history. Moreover, Lord George Germain having been a soldier, though a discredited one, no doubt thought that he could control armies; and, mixing military knowledge with political intrigue, he communed with the generals who came home, and formulated plans with slight regard to the views of the responsible men in America. The result was disastrous, in spite of the fact that he seems to have formed a true conception of the campaign, viz., that the one army in Canada and the other at New York should co-operate and cut in two the revolting colonies. The immediate outcome of his arrogant meddling was the loss of Carleton’s services.

[Sidenote: His correspondence with Carleton.]

[Sidenote: Carleton censured and superseded in command of the army on the side of Canada.]

On the 22nd of August, 1776, while Carleton was busy making preparations to drive the Americans back up Lake Champlain, Germain wrote to him, commending what had been done, expressing a hope that the frontiers of Canada would soon be cleared of the rebel forces, and giving instructions that, when this task had been accomplished, Carleton should return to Quebec, to attend to civil duties and the restoration of law and order, while detaching Burgoyne with any troops that could be spared to co-operate with Howe’s army acting from New York. Written when it was, the letter could hardly have been received in any case before the year’s campaign was drawing to its close, and before events had already determined what could or could not be done. It might have been received, wrote Carleton in a dignified and reasoned reply, at the beginning of November,[115] and coming to hand then could only have caused embarrassment. As a matter of fact, the ship which carried Germain’s letter, was driven back three times, and Carleton only received a duplicate in May, 1777, under cover of a second letter from Germain which was dated the 26th of March in that year. This second letter attributed the disaster to the Hessians at Trenton, which had happened in the meantime, in part to the fact that by retreating from before Ticonderoga in the preceding autumn Carleton had relaxed the pressure on the American army in front of him, which had thereby been enabled to reinforce Washington; and it announced that two expeditions were in the coming campaign to be sent from Canada, one under Colonel St. Leger, the other under Burgoyne, while Carleton himself was to remain behind in Canada and devote his energies to the defence of the province, and to furnishing supplies and equipment for the two expeditions in question. It will be remembered that Burgoyne had in the meantime returned to England, reaching Portsmouth about the 9th of December, 1776, and had brought with him Carleton’s plans for the operations of 1777, which were therefore well known to Germain when he wrote in March.

[Sidenote: Personal relations of Germain and Carleton.]

It is difficult to imagine how a responsible minister could have been at once so ignorant and so unfair as Germain showed himself to be in this communication. To suppose that the movement or want of movement on Lake Champlain could have had any real connexion with the cutting off of a detachment on the Delaware river, which was within easy reach of the rest of Howe’s forces, overpowering in numbers as compared with Washington’s, was at best wilful blindness to facts. To supersede Carleton in the supreme command of the troops on the Canadian side was an act of unwisdom and injustice. It is true that, already in the previous August, while Carleton was still on the full tide of success, it had been determined to confine his authority to Canada, and apparently, in order that his commission might not clash with that of Howe, to place under a subordinate officer the troops which were intended to effect a junction with Howe’s army. But in any case it is not easy to resist the conclusion that Germain had some personal grudge against the governor.[116] From a letter written by the King to Lord North in February, 1777, it would seem that, had Germain been given his way, Carleton would have been recalled, and, writing to Germain on the 22nd of May, Carleton did not hesitate to refer to the reports which were set abroad when Germain took office, to the effect that he intended to remove Carleton from his appointment, and in the meantime to undermine his authority. In his answer, dated the 25th of July, 1777, Germain gave the lie to these allegations, assuring Carleton that ‘whatever reports you may have heard of my having any personal dislike to you are without the least foundation. I have at no time received any disobligation from you’; he stated categorically that the action which had been taken for giving Burgoyne an independent command was by ‘the King’s particular directions’, and he added that the hope that Carleton would in his advance in the previous autumn penetrate as far as Albany was based upon the opinions of officers who had served in the country, and was confirmed by intelligence since received to the effect that the Americans had intended to abandon Ticonderoga, if Carleton had attacked it.[117] But, whatever may have been the facts as to the personal relations of Carleton and Germain, it seems clear that the small-minded minister in England was bent on ridding himself of the best man who served England in America.[118]

[Sidenote: The case of Chief Justice Livius.]

As Germain superseded Carleton in his military command, so he set aside his advice, and over-rode his appointments in civil matters. Reference has already been made to the evil effects produced by appointing unfit men to legal and judicial offices in Canada. The climax was reached when Germain in August, 1776, appointed to the Chief Justiceship of Canada a man named Livius, whose case attained considerable notoriety in the annals of the time. Peter Livius seems to have been a foreigner by extraction. Before the war broke out, he had been a judge in New Hampshire; and, his appointment having been abolished, he came back to England with a grievance against the governor and council, with whom he had been on bad terms while still holding his judgeship. A provision in the Quebec Act had annulled all the commissions given to the judges and other officers in Canada under the Royal Proclamation of 1763, which that Act superseded: and the English ministry seems to have taken advantage of this provision to displace men who had done their work well, and whose services Carleton desired to retain, substituting for them unfit nominees from England.

[Sidenote: Carleton’s description of Livius.]

One of the men thus substituted was Livius, for whom they saw an opportunity of providing in Canada. Lord Dartmouth wrote to Carleton in May, 1775, notifying the appointment of Livius as a judge of Common Pleas for the district of Montreal; and in August of the following year he was promoted by Germain to be Chief Justice of Canada. Livius succeeded Chief Justice Hey, who had held the office since 1766, and had in August, 1775, requested to be allowed to retire after ‘ten years honest, however imperfect, endeavours to serve the Crown in an unpleasant and something critical situation’.[119] Hey was a man of high standing and character, and had been much consulted by the Government in passing the Quebec Act. Livius was a man of a wholly different class. Carleton’s unflattering description of him in a letter written on the 25th of June, 1778,[120] was that he was ‘greedy of power and more greedy of gain, imperious and impetuous in his temper, but learned in the ways and eloquence of the New England provinces, valuing himself in his knowledge how to manage governors, well schooled, it seems, in business of this sort’. ‘’Tis unfortunate,’ he wrote in another and earlier letter, referring apparently to Livius, ‘that your Lordship should find it necessary for the King’s service to send over a person to administer justice to this people, when he understands neither their laws, manners, customs, nor their language.’[121]

[Sidenote: He dismisses him from office.]

Livius’ appointment as Chief Justice apparently did not take effect till 1777, and he lost no time in making difficulties. Though paid better than his predecessor, he protested as to his emoluments and position; he claimed the powers which had been enjoyed by the Intendant under the old French régime, and both in his judicial capacity and as a member of the council, constituted himself an active opponent of the government. As Chief Justice, he espoused the cause of a Canadian who had been arrested and sent to prison for disloyalty by the Lieutenant-Governor Cramahé, and in the council, in April, 1778, he brought forward motions directed against what he held to be illegal and irregular proceedings on the part of the governor. The result of his attitude was that on the 1st of May, 1778, Carleton, before he left Canada, summarily, and without giving any reason, dismissed him from office.

[Sidenote: Livius appeals to the King.]

[Sidenote: Merits of the case.]

Both Livius and Carleton went back to England, and in September Livius appealed to the King. His appeal was referred to the Lords Commissioners of Trade and Plantations, whose report on the case was in turn referred to the Lords of the Committee of Council for Plantation Affairs, and with their recommendation was brought before the King in Privy Council, Livius having in the course of the inquiry stated his case fully both in person and in writing, while Carleton declined to appear, and contented himself with referring to his dispatches and to the minutes of council. On technical grounds Livius had a strong case. Appointed by the King, he had been dismissed by the governor without any reason being assigned in the letter of dismissal. His conduct in a judicial capacity had not been specifically impugned, and the two motions directed against Carleton, which he had brought forward in the Legislative Council immediately prior to his dismissal, had, at any rate, some show of reason. The first was to the effect that the governor should communicate to the council the Royal Instructions which had been given him with respect to legislation, and which by those instructions he was to communicate so far as it was convenient for the King’s service. The second referred to a committee of five members of the council, which Carleton had constituted in August, 1776, a kind of Privy Council for the transaction of executive, as opposed to legislative business, in which Livius was not included. Livius contended, and his contention was upheld, that the instruction under which the governor had appointed this board or committee, did not contemplate the formation of a standing committee of particular members of council, but only authorized the transaction of executive business by any five councillors, if more were not available at the time.

[Sidenote: The appeal upheld and Livius restored to office. His subsequent career.]

The result of the inquiry was that the Chief Justice was restored to his office, but he never returned to Canada. In July, 1779, a mandamus for his re-appointment as Chief Justice was sent to Governor Haldimand, Carleton’s successor, and in the same month he was ordered to go back at once to Quebec. But he remained on in England on one pretext or another. In March, 1780, he was still in London asking for further extension of leave, to see his brother who was coming home from India. Two years later, in April, 1782, he had not gone, though he alleged that he had attempted to cross the Atlantic and had been driven back by stress of weather; and he pleaded with rare audacity that it was advisable that he should still prolong his absence from Canada, as otherwise it would be his duty to oppose the high-handed proceedings, as he deemed them to be, of General Haldimand. So matters went on until Carleton, now Lord Dorchester, returned to govern Canada in the autumn of 1786, when a new Chief Justice was at once appointed, and Livius finally disappeared from history.[122]

[Sidenote: Moral of the case.]