His Excellency: George Washington (48 page)

46. Van Schreeven and Scribner, eds.,
Revolutionary Virginia
2:347–86;
PWC
10:308–9.

47. 
Diaries
3:320–25; Longmore,
Invention of Washington,
154–56, for Mason’s proposal about officer rotation.

48. 
JCC
2:13–45; Washington to George William Fairfax, 31 May 1775,
PWC
10:367–68. For the purchases, see 369–70.

49. Lyman Butterfield, ed.,
The Diary and Autobiography of John Adams,
4 vols. (Cambridge, 1961), 3:322–23. Flexner 1:336–40, tends to accept the Adams version. Knollenberg,
Washington: The Virginia Period,
113–16, and Longmore,
Invention of Washington,
162–67, do not.

50. Benjamin Rush to Thomas Ruston, 29 October 1775, in Lyman Butterfield, ed.,
The Letters of Benjamin Rush,
2 vols. (Princeton, 1951), 1:92. Cunliffe,
Man and Monument,
74, also suggests that his silence and reserve in the Continental Congress impressed his talkative colleagues.

51. 
JCC
2:49–66. The Adams quotation is in Butterfield, ed.,
Diary and Autobiography
2:117.

52. Address to the Continental Congress, 16 June 1775,
PWC
1:1–3;
Diaries
3:336–37;
JCC
2:91–94.

53. Washington to Martha Washington, 18 June 1775, Washington to John Augustine Washington, 20 June 1775, Washington to Burwell Bassett, 19 June 1775,
PWR
1:3–4, 12–14, 19–20.

54. I am making an argument here about the improbability of the American Revolution succeeding that I make more fully in
Founding Brothers: The Revolutionary Generation
(New York, 2000), 3–19.

55. The thoughts about a retreat to the western wilderness is based on Washington’s later reminiscence about his distressed state of mind at that moment. See Flexner 1:336. He actually arrived at Cambridge on July 2, but officially assumed command the following day. See
PWR
1:49–50.

CHAPTER THREE

 1. The story of Lund Washington’s effort to appease the British naval officer and Washington’s hostile reaction to the effort is nicely told in Dalzell and Dalzell,
Mount Vernon,
xv–xvi. The most succinct overview of Washington’s military career during the Revolution is Glenn A. Phelps, “The Republican General,”
GWR,
165–97.

 2. Washington to Joseph Reed, 10 February 1776,
PWR
3:288; Washington to John Augustine Washington, 31 May–4 June 1776,
PWR
4:412–13. See also Washington to Philip Schuyler, 4 October 1775,
PWR
2:95–96.

 3. On the Bunker Hill casualties and lessons, see the letters in
PWR
1:71, 134–36, 183–84, 289–90. The standard history of the battle itself is Richard Ketchum,
The Battle for Bunker Hill
(Garden City, 1962).

 4. For a typical expression of the belief that one decisive blow at Boston could end the war, see Richard Henry Lee to Washington, 29 August 1775,
PWR
1:209–10. For the belief that volunteers would defeat mercenaries, see General Orders, 3 January 1776,
PWR
3:14.

 5. Washington to John Hancock, 9 February 1776,
PWR
3:274–75. See also Washington to Joseph Reed, 28 November 1775,
PWR
2:448–51, for the inadequacy of militia.

 6. Address from the New York Provincial Congress, 26 June 1775, Address from the Massachusetts Provincial Congress, 3 July 1775,
PWR
1:40, 52–53. Longmore,
Invention of Washington,
184–201, is especially good on the quasi-king theme.

 7. Phillis Wheatley to Washington, 26 October 1775,
PWR
2:252–54; Washington to Phillis Wheatley, 28 February 1776,
PWR
3:387. Fritz Hirschfeld,
George Washington and Slavery: A Documentary Portrayal
(Columbia, MO, 1997), 93–94. Washington to Thomas Gage, 19 August 1775,
PWR
1:326–28.

 8. Washington to Lund Washington, 20 August 1775,
PWR
1:335–36; Washington to Joseph Reed, 15 December 1775,
PWR
2:552; Washington to Joseph Reed, 14 January 1776 and 10 February 1776,
PWR
3:87–92, 286–91.

 9. Washington to Charles Lee, 10 February 1776,
PWR
3:282–84; Washington to Joseph Reed, 20 November 1775,
PWR
2:407–9; General Orders, 27 February 1776,
PWR
3:379–81; Washington to Joseph Reed, 23 January 1776, ibid., 172–75. For the role of Billy Lee, see Hirschfeld,
Washington and Slavery,
96–111.

10. Hugh Rankin, “Washington’s Lieutenants and the American Victory,” in John Ferling, ed.,
The World Turned Upside Down: The American Victory in the War for Independence
(Westport, 1988), 71–90; John Shy,
A People Numerous and Armed: Reflections on the Military Struggle for American Independence
(New York, 1976), 133–62; George Billias, ed.,
George Washington’s Generals and Opponents
(New York, 1994).

11. The case for Washington as a fundamentally insecure leader, nervous about the superior credentials of Lee and Gates, is made best by John Ferling,
The First of Men: A Life of George Washington
(Knoxville, 1988). A more succinct version is available in Ferling, ed.,
The World Turned Upside Down,
53–70.

12. For typical examples of Washington’s deference to John Hancock as president of the Continental Congress, see his letters in
PWR
2:444–47, 483–87, 533–35.

13. General Orders, 20 August 1775,
PWR
1:329–30, for “United Colonies”; Washington to Joseph Reed, 4 January 1776,
PWR
3:23–27, for the “union flag”; Minutes of the Conference, 18–24 October 1775,
PWR
2:190–95, for the meeting with the delegation of the Continental Congress.

14. Washington to John Hancock, 4 January 1776,
PWR
3:18–21. See also, General Orders, 1 January 1776, ibid., 1–5, especially the editorial note, for the transition problem as troops came and went.

15. Council of War, 8 October 1775,
PWR
2:123–38; General Orders, 12 November 1775, ibid., 353–55; Washington to John Hancock, 31 December 1775, ibid., 623.

16. Circular to the General Officers, 8 September 1775,
PWR
1:432–34; Council of War, 16 January 1776,
PWR
3:103–4; Council of War, 16 February 1776, ibid., 319–24; Washington to Joseph Reed, 26 February–9 March 1776, ibid., 369–79.

17. For the correspondence on the Quebec mission, see
PWR
1:331–33, 431–32, 455–56, 461–62;
PWR
2:155–56, 160–62, 300–01;
PWR
3:78–80. The comment to Arnold is in Washington to Benedict Arnold, 27 January 1776, ibid., 197–98.

18. Kenneth Roberts,
March to Quebec
(New York, 1942), 201–6.

19. Elizabeth A. Fenn,
Pox Americana: The Great Smallpox Epidemic of 1775–82
(New York, 2001).

20. John Hancock to Washington, 2 April 1776,
PWR
4:16–17.

21. For Washington’s trip to and arrival at New York, see
PWR
4:40–43, 58–60. For the size of the British expeditionary force, see Mary B. Wickwire, “Naval Warfare and the American Victory,” in Ferling, ed.,
The World Turned Upside Down,
193–96.

22. This entire section represents my own digestion and interpretation of the rather massive scholarly literature on the military history of the War of Independence. The following books and articles have exercised the greatest influence on my thinking: on the Continental army and its essential if threatening role, Charles Royster,
A Revolutionary People at War: The Continental Army and American Character
(Chapel Hill, 1979), and Robert K. Wright,
The Continental Army
(Washington, D.C., 1983); on the decline of popular support for the war and the Continental army, Ray Raphael,
A People’s History of the American Revolution: How Common People Shaped the Fight for Independence
(New York, 2001), and Joseph Plumb Martin,
Private Yankee Doodle: Some of the Adventures, Dangers, and Sufferings of Joseph Plumb Martin
(New York, 2001); on the role of the Continental Congress, Jack N. Rakove,
The Beginnings of National Politics: An Interpretive History of the Continental Congress
(New York, 1979); on the role of the militia, John Shy,
A People Numerous and Armed,
and John Shy, “The American Revolution Considered as a Revolutionary War,” in Stephen Kurtz and James Huston, eds.,
Essays on the American Revolution
(Chapel Hill, 1973), 121–56; on the British perspective, Ira D. Gruber,
The Howe Brothers and the American Revolution
(New York, 1972), and Paul H. Smith,
Loyalists and Redcoats: A Study in the British Revolutionary Policy
(Chapel Hill, 1964); on the American perspective, Don Higginbotham,
The War of American Independence
(New York, 1971), Robert Middlekauf,
The Glorious Cause: The American Revolution
(New York, 1982), and Dave R. Palmer,
The Way of the Fox: American Strategy in the War for America
(Westport, 1975). Excellent collections of essays that shed light on multiple dimensions of the conflict are: Ferling, ed.,
The World Turned Upside Down;
Jack P. Greene, ed.,
The American Revolution: Its Character and Limits
(New York, 1987); Don Higginbotham, ed.,
Reconsiderations on the Revolutionary War: Selected Essays
(Westport, 1978); and Ronald Hoffmann and Peter J. Albert, eds.,
Arms and Independence: The Military Character of the American Revolution
(Charlottesville, 1984).

23. John Keegan,
Fields of Battle: The War for North America
(New York, 1996), 152–54, which includes the quotation from Lord Camden.

24. For the modern parallel, see Don Higginbotham, “Reflections on the War for Independence, Modern Guerrilla Warfare, and the War in Vietnam,” in Hoffman and Albert, eds.,
Arms and Independence,
1–24.

25. The best brief review of this huge subject is Piers Mackesy, “What the British Army Learned,” ibid., 191–215.

26. See Russell Weigley, “American Strategy: A Call for a Critical Strategic History,” in Higginbotham,
Reconsiderations on the Revolutionary War,
32–53. See also Don Higginbotham,
George Washington and the American Military Tradition
(Athens, 1985).

27. Washington to the New York Provincial Congress, 9 June 1776,
PWR
4:473, for the first statement of his intentions to defend New York at all costs.

28. For the visit to Philadelphia, see the correspondence in
PWR
4:346–53, 363–68;
JCC
4:389–91, for the conference with the Continental Congress;
PWR
4:526, for the creation of the Board of War and Ordnance; Washington to John Hancock, 10 July 1776,
PWR
5:260; General Orders, 23 August 1776,
PWR
6:109–10; Washington to John Hancock, ibid., 627.

29. Lord Richard Howe to Washington, 13 July 1776,
PWR
5:296–97; Memorandum of an Interview with Lieutenant Colonel James Patterson, 20 July 1776, ibid., 398–403, which includes invaluable editorial notes on the details of the meeting.

30. General Orders, 13 August 1776,
PWR
6:1; Washington to Charles Lee, 12 August 1776,
PWR
5:686–87; John Adams to Abigail Adams, 30 August 1776,
AFC
2:89.

31. John Adams to Abigail Adams, 8 October 1776,
AFC
2:140; Nathanael Greene to Washington, 5 September 1776,
PWR
6:222–24; Abigail Adams to John Adams, 20 September 1776,
AFC
2:129.

32. Council of War, 12 September 1776,
PWR
6:288–89; Washington to John Hancock, 8 September 1776, ibid., 248–54. One of the best, certainly most readable accounts of the maneuverings on Manhattan, is Bruce Bliven Jr.,
Battle for Manhattan
(New York, 1956).

33. Keegan,
Fields of Battle,
162–65, for a convenient summary of scholarly judgments; Washington to Lund Washington, 30 September 1776,
PWR
6:440–43; Washington to John Hancock, 16 November 1776,
PWR
7:162–69, for the account of the Fort Washington disaster. See also Washington to John Augustine Washington, 6–19 November 1776, ibid., 102–6, for his sense of desperation and mortification at the capture of Fort Washington.