True Stories From History and Biography (20 page)

"When the crowd reached the wharf," said Grandfather, "they saw that a set
of wild-looking figures were already on board of the ships. You would have
imagined that the Indian warriors, of old times, had come back again; for
they wore the Indian dress, and had their faces covered with red and black
paint, like the Indians, when they go to war. These grim figures hoisted
the tea chests on the decks of the vessels, broke them open, and threw all
the contents into the harbor."

"Grandfather," said little Alice, "I suppose Indians don't love tea; else
they would never waste it so."

"They were not real Indians, my child," answered Grandfather. "They were
white men, in disguise; because a heavy punishment would have been
inflicted on them, if the king's officers had found who they were. But it
was never known. From that day to this, though the matter has been talked
of by all the world, nobody can tell the names of those Indian figures.
Some people say that there were very famous men among them, who afterwards
became governors and generals. Whether this be true, I cannot tell."

When tidings of this bold deed were carried to England, King George was
greatly enraged. Parliament immediately passed an act, by which all
vessels were forbidden to take in or discharge their cargoes at the port
of Boston. In this way, they expected to ruin all the merchants, and
starve the poor people, by depriving them of employment. At the same time,
another act was passed, taking away many rights and privileges which had
been granted in the charter of Massachusetts.

Governor Hutchinson, soon afterward, was summoned to England, in order
that he might give his advice about the management of American affairs.
General Gage, an officer of the Old French War, and since
commander-in-chief of the British forces in America, was appointed
governor in his stead. One of his first acts, was to make Salem, instead
of Boston, the metropolis of Massachusetts, by summoning the General Court
to meet there.

According to Grandfather's description, this was the most gloomy time that
Massachusetts had ever seen. The people groaned under as heavy a tyranny
as in the days of Sir Edmund Andros. Boston looked as if it were afflicted
with some dreadful pestilence,—so sad were the inhabitants, and so
desolate the streets. There was no cheerful hum of business. The merchants
shut up their warehouses, and the laboring men stood idle about the
wharves. But all America felt interested in the good town of Boston; and
contributions were raised, in many places, for the relief of the poor
inhabitants.

"Our dear old chair!" exclaimed Clara. "How dismal it must have been now!"

"Oh," replied Grandfather, "a gay throng of officers had now come back to
the British Coffee House; so that the old chair had no lack of mirthful
company. Soon after General Gage became governor, a great many troops had
arrived, and were encamped upon the Common. Boston was now a garrisoned
and fortified town; for the general had built a battery across the neck,
on the road to Roxbury, and placed guards for its defence. Every thing
looked as if a civil war were close at hand."

"Did the people make ready to fight?" asked Charley.

"A continental Congress assembled at Philadelphia," said Grandfather, "and
proposed such measures as they thought most conducive to the public good.
A provincial Congress was likewise chosen in Massachusetts. They exhorted
the people to arm and discipline themselves. A great number of minute men
were enrolled. The Americans called them minute men, because they engaged
to be ready to fight at a minute's warning. The English officers laughed,
and said that the name was a very proper one, because the minute men would
run away the the minute they saw the enemy. Whether they would fight or
run, was soon to be proved."

Grandfather told the children, that the first open resistance offered to
the British troops, in the province of Massachusetts was at Salem. Colonel
Timothy Pickering, with thirty or forty militia men, prevented the English
colonel, Leslie, with four times as many regular soldiers, from taking
possession of some military stores. No blood was shed on this occasion;
but, soon afterward, it began to flow.

General Gage sent eight hundred soldiers to Concord, about eighteen miles
from Boston, to destroy some ammunition and provisions which the colonists
had collected there. They set out on their march in the evening of the
18th of April, 1775. The next morning, the General sent Lord Percy, with
nine hundred men, to strengthen the troops which had gone before. All that
day, the inhabitants of Boston heard various rumors. Some said, that the
British were making great slaughter among our countrymen. Others affirmed
that every man had turned out with his musket, and that not a single
soldier would ever get back to Boston.

"It was after sunset," continued Grandfather, "when the troops, who had
marched forth so proudly, were seen entering Charlestown. They were
covered with dust, and so hot and weary that their tongues hung out of
their mouths. Many of them were faint with wounds. They had not all
returned. Nearly three hundred were strewn, dead or dying, along the road
from Concord. The yeomanry had risen upon the invaders, and driven them
back."

"Was this the battle of Lexington?" asked Charley.

"Yes," replied Grandfather; "it was so called, because the British,
without provocation, had fired upon a party of minute men, near Lexington
meeting-house, and killed eight of them. That fatal volley, which was
fired by order of Major Pitcairn, began the war of the Revolution."

About this time, if Grandfather had been correctly informed, our chair
disappeared from the British Coffee House. The manner of its departure
cannot be satisfactorily ascertained. Perhaps the keeper of the Coffee
House turned it out of doors, on account of its old-fashioned aspect.
Perhaps he sold it as a curiosity. Perhaps it was taken, without leave, by
some person who regarded it as public property, because it had once
figured under Liberty Tree. Or, perhaps, the old chair, being of a
peaceable disposition, had made use of its four oaken legs, and run away
from the seat of war.

"It would have made a terrible clattering over the pavement," said
Charley, laughing.

"Meanwhile," continued Grandfather, "during the mysterious non-appearance
of our chair, an army of twenty thousand men had started up, and come to
the siege of Boston. General Gage and his troops were cooped up within the
narrow precincts of the peninsula. On the 17th of June, 1775, the famous
battle of Bunker Hill was fought. Here General Warren fell. The British
got the victory, indeed, but with the loss of more than a thousand
officers and men."

"O, Grandfather," cried Charley, "you must tell us about that famous
battle."

"No, Charley," said Grandfather, "I am not like other historians. Battles
shall not hold a prominent place in the history of our quiet and
comfortable old chair. But, to-morrow evening, Laurence, Clara, and
yourself, and dear little Alice too, shall visit the Diorama of Bunker
Hill. There you shall see the whole business, the burning of Charlestown
and all, with your own eyes, and hear the cannon and musketry with your
own ears."

The next evening but one, when the children had given Grandfather a full
account of the Diorama of Bunker Hill, they entreated him not to keep them
any longer in suspense about the fate of his chair. The reader will
recollect, that at the last accounts, it had trotted away upon its poor
old legs, nobody knew whither. But, before gratifying their curiosity,
Grandfather found it necessary to say something about public events.

The continental Congress, which was assembled at Philadelphia, was
composed of delegates from all the colonies. They had now appointed George
Washington, of Virginia, to be commander-in-chief of all the American
armies. He was, at that time, a member of Congress, but immediately left
Philadelphia, and began his journey to Massachusetts. On the 3d of July,
1775, he arrived at Cambridge, and took command of the troops which were
besieging General Gage.

"O, Grandfather," exclaimed Laurence, "it makes my heart throb to think
what is coming now. We are to see General Washington himself."

The children crowded around Grandfather, and looked earnestly into his
face. Even little Alice opened her sweet blue eyes, with her lips apart,
and almost held her breath to listen; so instinctive is the reverence of
childhood for the father of his country. Grandfather paused a moment; for
he felt as if it might be irreverent to introduce the hallowed shade of
Washington into a history, where an ancient elbow chair occupied the most
prominent place. However, he determined to proceed with his narrative, and
speak of the hero when it was needful, but with an unambitious simplicity.

So Grandfather told his auditors, that, on General Washington's arrival at
Cambridge, his first care was, to reconnoitre the British troops with his
spy-glass, and to examine the condition of his own army. He found that the
American troops amounted to about fourteen thousand men. They were
extended all round the peninsula of Boston, a space of twelve miles, from
the high grounds of Roxbury on the right, to Mystic river on the left.
Some were living in tents of sail-cloth, some in shanties, rudely
constructed of boards, some in huts of stone or turf, with curious windows
and doors of basket-work.

In order to be near the centre, and oversee the whole of this
wide-stretched army, the commander-in-chief made his head-quarters at
Cambridge, about half a mile from the colleges. A mansion-house, which
perhaps had been the country-seat of some tory gentleman, was provided for
his residence.

"When General Washington first entered this mansion," said Grandfather,
"he was ushered up the stair-case, and shown into a handsome apartment. He
sat down in a large chair, which was the most conspicuous object in the
room. The noble figure of Washington would have done honor to a throne. As
he sat there, with his hand resting on the hilt of his sheathed sword,
which was placed between his knees, his whole aspect well befitted the
chosen man on whom his country leaned for the defence of her dearest
rights. America seemed safe, under his protection. His face was grander
than any sculptor had ever wrought in marble; none could behold him
without awe and reverence. Never before had the lion's head, at the summit
of the chair, looked down upon such a face and form as Washington's!"

"Why! Grandfather," cried Clara, clasping her hands in amazement, "was it
really so? Did General Washington sit in our great chair?"

"I knew how it would be," said Laurence; "I foresaw it, the moment
Grandfather began to speak."

Grandfather smiled. But, turning from the personal and domestic life of
the illustrious leader, he spoke of the methods which Washington adopted
to win back the metropolis of New England from the British.

The army, when he took command of it, was without any discipline or order.
The privates considered themselves as good as their officers, and seldom
thought it necessary to obey their commands, unless they understood the
why and wherefore. Moreover, they were enlisted for so short a period,
that, as soon as they began to be respectable soldiers, it was time to
discharge them. Then came new recruits, who had to be taught their duty,
before they could be of any service. Such was the army, with which
Washington had to contend against more than twenty veteran British
regiments.

Some of the men had no muskets, and almost all were without bayonets.
Heavy cannon, for battering the British fortifications, were much wanted.
There was but a small quantity of powder and ball, few tools to build
entrenchments with, and a great deficiency of provisions and clothes for
the soldiers. Yet, in spite of these perplexing difficulties, the eyes of
the whole people were fixed on General Washington, expecting him to
undertake some great enterprise against the hostile army.

The first thing that he found necessary, was to bring his own men into
better order and discipline. It is wonderful how soon he transformed this
rough mob of country people into the semblance of a regular army. One of
Washington's most invaluable characteristics, was the faculty of bringing
order out of confusion. All business, with which he had any concern,
seemed to regulate itself, as if by magic. The influence of his mind was
like light, gleaming through an unshaped world. It was this faculty, more
than any other, that made him so fit to ride upon the storm of the
Revolution, when every thing was unfixed, and drifting about in a troubled
sea.

"Washington had not been long at the head of the army," proceeded
Grandfather, "before his soldiers thought as highly of him, as if he had
led them to a hundred victories. They knew that he was the very man whom
the country needed, and the only one who could bring them safely through
the great contest against the might of England. They put entire confidence
in his courage, wisdom, and integrity."

"And were not they eager to follow him against the British?" asked
Charley.

"Doubtless they would have gone whithersoever his sword pointed the way,"
answered Grandfather; "and Washington was anxious to make a decisive
assault upon the enemy. But as the enterprise was very hazardous, he
called a council of all the generals in the army. Accordingly, they came
from their different posts, and were ushered into the reception room. The
commander-in-chief arose from our great chair to greet them."

"What were their names?" asked Charley.

"There was General Artemas Ward," replied Grandfather, a "lawyer by
profession. He had commanded the troops before Washington's arrival.
Another was General Charles Lee, who had been a colonel in the English
army, and was thought to possess vast military science. He came to the
council, followed by two or three dogs, who were always at his heels.
There was General Putnam, too, who was known all over New England by the
name of Old Put."