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Chapter VII
The Revolutionary Struggle to the Battle of Brandywine | |||
forth his indignation, but his wrath was mollified when, on Feb. 21, 1777, Congress promoted Col. Anthony Wayne to the rank of brigadier-general, and he (Johnston) was made the colonel of the Fifth Pennsylvania Regiment, Persifor Frazer its lieutenant-colonel, and Thomas Robinson its major. The term of the Fourth Pennsylvania Battalion had expired on Jan. 5, 1777, but it remained over until January 24th to allow other troops to be enlisted and forwarded to take its place. It is, however, not to be inferred from the foregoing remark that the Fourth Battalion marched away from the field in a body, for the fact is that the greater number of Wayne's men, being of Irish birth or descent, re-enlisted, under their old officers, in the Fifth Regiment of the Pennsylvania line.1 Those who did not re-enter the service were ordered to Chester, where the battalion was mustered out Feb. 25, 1777. On the same day John Evans, of Chester County, was notified that he had been elected a member of the Council of Safety, the duties of which office he assumed shortly afterwards. Although early in the year the storm of war, owing to Washington having assumed the offensive, had rolled away from Philadelphia, the Council did not lessen its efforts to place the Continental army in as efficient condition as possible, and to that end, on Jan. 13, 1777, it required the commissioners in the several counties in the State to furnish thirty-eight thousand bushels of horse feed, and of that total, four thousand bushels were required for Chester County. At this time the prevalent idea was that Gen. Howe proposed to make an attempt to capture Philadelphia by water, and this impression was confirmed when, on March 25th, James Molesworth, who bore a lieutenant's commission from Gen. Howe, was arrested in Philadelphia, charged with attempting to obtain a chevaux-de-frise and two bay pilots, to bring the British fleet up the Delaware. Not only did he attempt to corrupt pilots to that end, but he strove to have accomplices, whose duties it should be to spike the guns at Fort Island (Fort Mifflin), and to destroy the posts and ropes at the ferries. Molesworth was tried by court-martial, on the charge of being a spy, was found guilty, and hung March 31, 1777.2 Previous to his execution he made a confession, and accused a number of persons as being implicated in the design to restore the royal authority in Philadelphia. Council hastened its preparation to meet the threatened invasion, and on April 3d a hundred wagons drawn by four horses was called for by the Board of War, to remove public stores from Philadelphia to the west side of the Schuylkill. Col. Caleb Davis, Maj. Evans, Col. William Dewees, and Isaac Webb were designated to hire such wagons in Chester County. On April 21st Council instructed the committees of the counties of Bucks, Philadelphia, and Chester "to take an Inventory of all the Flour, Wheat, Rye, and Indian Corn, Oats, Beef, Pork, Horses, Neat Cattle, Sheep, Hogs, &c., also Wagons, Carts, &c.," in each county, and make return as quickly as possible, so that in the event of sudden alarm the provender and live stock might be removed to a place of safety. This was the ostensible reason for this order, but in all probability the purpose was to ascertain how much and where located were the articles enumerated, so that, if necessary, they might be impressed for the use of the American army. |
1 In Gen. Henry Lee's "Memoirs of the War in the Southern Department," vol. ii. p. 203, the personnel of the Pennsylvania Line is thus described: "Wayne had a constitutional attachment to the decision of the sword, and this cast of character had acquired strength from indulgence, as well as from the native temper of the troops he commanded. They were known by the designation of the Line of Pennsylvania, whereas they might hve been with more propriety called the Line of Ireland. Bold and daring, they were impatient and refractory, and would always prefer an appeal to the bayonet to a toilsome march. Restless under the want of food and whiskey: adverse to absence from their baggage, and attached to the pleasures of the table. Wayne and his brigade were more encumbered with wagons than any equal portion of the army. The general and his soldiers were singularly fitted for close and stubborn action, hand to hand, in the centre of the army. Cornwallis, therefore, did not miscalculate when he presumed that the junction of Wayne would increase rather than diminish his chances of bringing his antagonist, Lafayette, to action."
2 Penna. Archives, 1st series, vol. v. p. 282; Colonial Records, vol. xi. p. 197. | ||
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Robert Smith had been appointed lieutenant of Chester County on March 12, 1777, which office gave him the rank of colonel, and devolved on him the duties of raising, arming, and provisioning the military contingent in his district, and preparing the troops when called into service. They remained under his command until ordered to take the field. On April 12th, Col. Smith reported that Chester County then contained five thousand men capable of bearing arms, and he promised to use his utmost exertions to get his contingent in the greatest possible state of forwardness.3 On April 24th, Congress requested that three thousand of the militia of Pennsylvania, exclusive of the militia of the city of Philadelphia, should be called, one-half of the "troops to rendezvous at Chester, on the Delaware." The following day Council ordered the lieutenants in the several counties to furnish men, although the number from Chester County was not designated. Each man was to be provided with a blanket, which was to be purchased; if that could not be done blankets were to be impressed, but in a way that should give the least offense to the public. The troops from the | 3 Penna. Mag. of Hist., vol. iv. p. 84; "The onerous duties of his office were discharged in an active, untiring, self-sacrificing spirit, and much of his property melted away during the war, partly from direct gifts to the army and to the needy families of the soldiers, and partly because his public duties gave him no time to attend to his private business. On one occasion when foragers were sent into Uwchlan to procure supplies for the famishing army at Valley Forge, Col. Smith assisting to load corn from his own stores into the wagon, was urged by his wife to keep enough to subsist his own family through the winter. He replied, saying that the soldiers' needs were greater than their own, and continued his work till the wagons were filled and his granary was almost empty. He spoke with feeling in his latter life of taking, on another occasion, unthreshed wheat to Valley Forge, and being met on his arrival at the edge of the encampment by numbers of hungry men, who seized the sheaves and mitigated the pangs of hunger by eating the grains, which they rubbed out with their hands." Ib., p. 85. | ||
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