“I have pleased myself with the thought of serving under you”

As discussed yesterday, sometime in the first week of May 1775 the Rhode Island legislature appointed Nathanael Greene to be the brigadier general of its army of observation.

In his biography of his grandfather, George Washington Greene wrote:

There is a tradition, but I will not vouch for it, that the first choice fell upon an Episcopalian, who declined; the second, on a Congregationalist, who also declined; and that, when the third vote was announced as having fallen on Greene, he rose in his place, and said: “Since the Episcopalian and Congregationalist won’t, I suppose the Quaker must.”

That’s about as tepid an endorsement for a “tradition” as a nineteenth-century biographer could provide. And the religious terms “Episcopalian” and “Congregationalist” weren’t standard in 1775, suggesting it wasn’t exact.

One recent biographer of Nathanael Greene has suggested that those first two candidates for command declined on religious grounds. I think that’s a misreading of the tradition. The first two faiths mentioned weren’t pacifist. That was the point of the anecdote—the irony of a (lapsed) Quaker leading an army instead of men from sects that didn’t object to military action. And the story might have some validity, though I doubt it happened in a legislative session.

The legislature’s first choice probably was Simeon Potter, already major general of the colony militia. At least, the body couldn’t ignore him. And Potter was an Anglican, even if he’d punched his minister in the face back in 1761. (Incidentally, the Rev. John Usher died on 30 Apr 1775, just as these discussions about the Rhode Island army were under way.)

Another candidate for command whom G. W. Greene and later biographers mentioned is James Mitchell Varnum (shown here), captain of the Kentish Guards. He’d grown up in Dracut, Massachusetts, as what people would later term a Congregationalist. That said, there were many others of that faith in Rhode Island as well, some probably quite senior to the twenty-six-year-old Varnum.

Varnum and Greene had worked together in the fall of 1774 to form the Guards, an independent militia company based in East Greenwich. Varnum, a rising young attorney, was chosen as the first captain. Encouraged by a cousin, Greene put his name forward to be a lieutenant, only to learn that some members thought his limp meant he didn’t look good marching in an elite company at all.

Sometime in October, it appears, Greene wrote to Varnum:

If I conceive right of the force of the objection of the gentlemen of the town, it was not as an officer, but as a soldier for that my halting was a blemish to the rest. I confess it is my misfortune to limp a little, but I did not conceive it to be so great; but we are not apt to discover our own defects. . . .

I have pleased myself with the thought of serving under you, but as it is the general opinion that I am unfit for such an undertaking, I shall desist. I feel not the less inclination to promote the good of the company, because I am not to be one of its members. I will do anything that's in my power to procure the charter.

Apparently Varnum had spoken of leaving the company himself if Greene was forced out because the letter continued:

Let me entreat you, Sir, if you have any regard for me, not to forsake the company at this critical season for I fear the consequences—if you mean to oblige me by it, I assure you it will not, I would not have the company break and disband for fifty Dollars

Varnum stayed with the company and apparently convinced Greene to do the same.

On 29 October, the legislature, with Greene as a delegate, issued a charter for the Kentish Guards. Its act listed the dozens of men who had petitioned for that charter, starting with Varnum and the other three designated as officers, including Christopher Greene. The fifth name on that list was Nathanael Greene. So officially he was a leading member.

It’s conceivable that some fallout from that affair influenced the choice of Greene as general in May 1775. If the legislature did approach Varnum, he may have thought it was Greene’s turn to lead. Or perhaps, with a real war looming, organizational skills seemed a lot more important than a slight limp.

TOMORROW: Hidden factors in the decision.

From Slaves to Soldiers at Rhode Island State House, 24 Jan.

On Tuesday, 24 January, the Rhode Island State House Library will host a book signing to celebrate the publication of From Slaves to Soldiers: The 1st Rhode Island Regiment in the American Revolution, by Robert A. Geake with Lorén M. Spears.

Here’s the publisher’s description of the book:

In December 1777, the Continental army was encamped at Valley Forge and faced weeks of cold and hunger, as well as the prospect of many troops leaving as their terms expired in the coming months. If the winter were especially cruel, large numbers of soldiers would face death or contemplate desertion. Plans were made to enlist more men, but as the states struggled to fill quotas for enlistment, Rhode Island general James Mitchell Varnum proposed the historic plan that a regiment of slaves might be recruited from his own state, the smallest in the union, but holding the largest population of slaves in New England.

The commander-in-chief’s approval of the plan would set in motion the forming of the 1st Rhode Island Regiment. The “black regiment,” as it came to be known, was composed of indentured servants, Narragansett Indians, and former slaves. This was not without controversy. While some in the Rhode Island Assembly and in other states railed that enlisting slaves would give the enemy the impression that not enough white men could be raised to fight the British, owners of large estates gladly offered their slaves and servants, both black and white, in lieu of a son or family member enlisting.

The regiment fought with distinction at the battle of Rhode Island, and once joined with the 2nd Rhode Island before the siege of Yorktown in 1781, it became the first integrated battalion in the nation’s history.

Robert A. Geake is the author of several books about Rhode Island history and proprietor of the rifootprints webpage. Loren M. Spears, M.Ed., is executive director of the Tomaquag Indian Memorial Museum; a veteran educator; and two-term tribal councilwoman of the Narragansett Tribe.

The Rhode Island Department of State will display items from its archives related to the Rhode Island Regiment, including the “original Regimental Book from 1781-83.”

The event will take place from 4:00 to 6:00 P.M. It is free and open to the public.

John Howland and the Lexington Alarm in Providence

Yesterday I quoted Elkanah Watson’s description of how Providence, Rhode Island, responded to the Battle of Lexington and Concord.

According to Watson, the news arrived on the afternoon of 19 Apr 1775, his militia unit spent the whole night equipping themselves, and they marched off on the morning of 20 April, defying the governor’s proclamation that they not cross the border into Massachusetts.

Watson’s contemporary John Howland, born in October 1757, left his own memoir of that day. He was from a lower class than Watson, apprenticed to a barber instead of a merchant and attached to an ordinary militia unit instead of the Cadets. But Howland grew up to be president of the Rhode Island Historical Society and seems to have been more accurate about important points:

On the afternoon of the 19th of April, 1775, news arrived here that a battle was then going on, as the regulars had marched from Boston into the country. There were four or five boys of us on Mr. Thompson’s wharf, where some hands were unloading a scow load of salt. Mr. Thompson came down and said, “war, war, boys, there is war. The regulars have marched out of Boston; a great many men killed; war, war, boys.” He turned quickly and went up to the street. We all followed, and saw the officers of the companies and many others on the parade before Gov. Bowen’s, seeking intelligence.

Jabez Bowen was never governor of Rhode Island; in 1778 he became deputy governor, and served for several years. But Bowen was a leader of the Providence militia, so it makes sense that people gathered near his house for news.

The drums of the four independent companies beat, and the men paraded as soon as possible. It was sundown, and the officers of the company repaired to Lieut. Gov. [Darius] Sessions, requesting him to give them orders to march towards Boston, as without his orders their authority would cease when they should have passed Pawtucket bridge. He declined doing any thing in the case, having no power out of the colony, or in it, as the Governor [Joseph Wanton] who lived in Newport was above him in authority.

It was then concluded to send an express towards Boston, to know whether the enemy had returned or were yet in the field, and to act or march on further intelligence, orders or no orders. Mr. Charles Dabney, a member of the Cadet company, offered to be the express. A horse was procured and he set off. It was toward noon the next day before he returned, but an express from near the scene of action arrived, stating that the regulars were safe cooped up in Boston.

Before this intelligence arrived here, early in the morning Col. [James] Varnum, with his Greenwich company arrived, but would not stay. They continued their march some miles beyond Pawtucket, when receiving the intelligence they returned here. I viewed the company as they marched up the street, and observed Nathaniel Greene with his musket on his shoulder, in the ranks as a private. I distinguished Mr. Greene, whom I had frequently seen, by the motion of his shoulders in the march, as one of his legs was shorter than the other.

According to Howland, therefore, Varnum’s Kentish Guards were the only Rhode Island company that marched across the colony line on 20 Apr 1775. Watson’s unit, the Independent Company of Cadets, waited for word from their member Dabney about what the situation was. Before noon, Providence received news “that the regulars were safe cooped up in Boston,” so those Cadets probably never marched. Elkanah Watson just wished they had.

Elkanah Watson and the Lexington Alarm in Providence

I previously quoted the part of Elkanah Watson’s Men and Times of the Revolution in which he described his military training as a schoolboy in Rhode Island.

Watson, born in 1758, was still a teenager when the Battle of Lexington and Concord occurred. He was a clerk working for John Brown in Providence. Here’s how Watson described the colony’s response to that news:

The intelligence of the march upon Lexington reached Providence in the afternoon of the 19th of April, 1775. Our five companies flew to arms. The whole population was convulsed by the most vehement excitement. We were unprovided with cartridges, and were compelled to defer our march till morning. I spent the most of that night with many of our company [Independent Company of Cadets under Col. Joseph Nightingale], in running bullets and preparing ammunition.

We mustered early the next morning, and marched for the scene of action. The royal governor, [Joseph] Wanton, issued a proclamation, which was little regarded, interdicting our passing the colony line, under the penalty of open rebellion. Capt. [Nathanael] Green, afterwards the celebrated Gen. Green, with his company of Warwick Greens, and Capt. [James] Varnam, afterwards a revolutionary general, with his Greenwich Volunteers, marched with us at the same time towards Lexington.

We had advanced six miles amid the cries and tears of women, every road we passed enveloped in a cloud of dust from the march of armed men, hastening onward, when an express met us, with the information that the regulars had been driven back into Boston.

Watson misremembered some facts. Greene wasn’t a captain in charge of a company but a private in the company Varnum commanded, the Kentish Guards. The “Warwick Greens” and “Greenwich Volunteers” may just have been bunches of guys in that independent militia company.

Gov. Wanton didn’t issue a proclamation forbidding Rhode Island troops from entering Massachusetts, though Rhode Islanders clearly believed they were taking a risk to do so.

Furthermore, there’s reason to doubt that Watson’s company marched into Massachusetts as he described.

TOMORROW: Another Rhode Islander’s recollections.

Capt. Bancroft’s “severe struggle to escape out of the fort”

I’ve been quoting the account of the Bunker Hill battle set down by a grandson of Capt. Ebenezer Bancroft reportedly around 1826. When we last left the captain and his Dunstable men, the British had made their third advance on the Breed’s Hill redoubt and had flanked it on the west side, overwhelming the provincial defenses.

Capt. Bancroft is quoted as saying:

As I was loading my gun the last time, and just withdrawing the ramrod, an officer sprang over the breastwork in front of me and presented his piece. I threw away the rammer which was in my hand, and instantly placed the muzzle of my gun against his right shoulder, a little below the collar-bone, and fired, and he fell into the trench. This was my twenty-second fire that day. The wound it gave was in the same place as that by which Pitcairn died, and as near as I can recollect the person I shot answered the description of that officer who was found mortally wounded in our trench.

Bancroft thus became yet another claimant for the honor of having killed Maj. John Pitcairn as he entered the redoubt. In an article published in the first Journal of the American Revolution collection, I argue that British sources show that Pitcairn was mortally wounded before he reached the redoubt, and none of those American stories is likely to be accurate. Bancroft may have killed another, less notable officer.

Whomever he shot at, Bancroft now had an unloaded gun with enemy soldiers swarming in from all sides.

I had then a severe struggle to escape out of the fort, the gateway of which was completely filled with British soldiers. I held my gun broadwise before my face and rushed upon them, and at first bore some of them down, but I soon lost my gun, a remarkably long one, which I had taken from the French at Chamblee, in the old French war.

I leaped upon the heads of the throng in the gateway and fortunately struck my breast upon the head of a soldier, who settled down under me so that I came with my feet to the ground. Directly as I came to the ground a blow was aimed at me, with the butt of a gun, which missed my head but gave me a severe contusion on the right shoulder.

Numbers were trying to seize me by the arms but I broke from them, and with my elbows and knees cleared the way so that at length I got through the fort. The last man I passed stood alone, and the thought struck me that he might kill me after I had passed him. As I ran by him I struck him a blow across the throat with the side of my hand. I saw his mouth open, and I have not seen him since.

A shower of shot was falling all around me as I ran down the hill. One struck my hat, several marked my clothes, one struck me in the left hand, and served off the forefinger. Our men were all in advance of me, and I was almost, if not entirely, alone, from the time I left the fort till I came to Charlestown Neck, on which there was not a man to be seen.

I thought it might be some protection from the fire of the floating batteries, to go behind the buildings, but on turning the corner I found Col. [Samuel] Gerrish with a body of men posted there. I said to him, “Colonel Gerrish, are you here? I hope to God you will be killed, but I will not stay to die with you,” and took the street again.

By this time I grew very faint with fatigue and loss of blood. There was a horse tied by the side of the common, and I made towards him. Colonel James Varnum saw me and came to me. He took me by the arm and led me to the horse. While he was with me, the ball of the last cannon I heard that day passed within a foot or two of me and struck the ground, at a short distance before me. We found the owner of the horse by him, and he cheerfully offered him to me to ride to Cambridge.

Many people criticized Col. Gerrish for his behavior on 17 June 1775, but he remained in the army until August, when he was court-martialed and cashiered for how he behaved in a lesser confrontation with the enemy.

Though Bancroft lived and died in Massachusetts, his grave (shown above, courtesy of Find a Grave) is located in New Hampshire. That’s because the sliver of Dunstable containing the cemetery where he was interred was later found to be across the state border.