1776.1 THE DECLARATION. 867 He has endeavoured to prevent the population of these states; for that purpose obstructing the laws for naturalization of foreigners, refusing to pass others to encourage their migrations hither, and raising the conditions of new appropriations of lands. He has obstructed the administration of justice, by refusing his assent to laws for establishing judiciary powers. He has made judges dependent on his will alone for the tenure of their offices and the amount and payment of their salaries. He has erected a multitude of new offices, and sent hither swarms of new officers to harass our people and eat out their substance. He has kept among us in times of peace standing armies without the consent of our legislatures. He has affected to render the military independent of, and superior to, the civil power. He has combined with others to subject us to a jurisdiction foreign to our constitutions and unacknowledged by our laws, giving his assent to their acts of pretended legislation for quartering large bodies of armed troops among us; for protecting them by a mock trial from punishment for any murders which they should commit on the inhabitants of these states; for cutting off our trade with all parts of the world; for imposing taxes on us without our consent; for depriving us in many cases of the benefits of trial by jury; for transporting us beyond seas to be tried for pretended offences; for abolishing the free system of English laws in a neighbouring province, establishing therein an arbitrary government, and enlarging its boundaries, so as to render it at once an example and fit instrument for introducing the same absolute rule into these colonies; for taking away our charters, abolishing our most valuable laws, and altering fundamentally the forms of our governments; for suspending our own legislatures, and declaring themselves invested with power to legislate for us in all cases whatsoever. He has abdicated government here by declaring us out of his protection and waging war against us. He has plundered our seas, ravaged our coasts, burnt our towns, and destroyed the lives of our people. He is at this time transporting large armies of foreign mercenaries to complete the works of death, desolation, and tyranny already begun with circumstances of cruelty and perfidy scarcely paralleled in the most barbarous ages, and totally unworthy the head of a civilized nation. He has constrained our fellow citizens taken captive on the high seas to bear arms against their country, to become the executioners of their friends and brethren, or to fall themselves by their hands. He has excited domestic insurrections among us, and has endeavoured to bring on the inhabitants of our frontiers the merciless Indian savages, whose known rule of warfare is an undistinguished destruction of all ages, sexes, and conditions. In every stage of these oppressions we have petitioned for redress in the most humble terms: our repeated addresses have been answered only by repeated injuries. A prince whose character is thus marked by every act which may define a tyrant is unfit to be the ruler of a free people. Nor have we been wanting in attentions to our British brethren. We have warned them from time to time of attempts by their legislature to extend an unwarrantable jurisdiction over us. We have reminded them of the circumstances of our emigration and settlement here, we have appealed to their native 368 THE DECLARATION. [1776. justice and magnanimity, and we have conjured them by the ties of our common kindred to disavow these usurpations which would inevitably interrupt our connexion and correspondence. They too have been deaf to the voice of justice and of consanguinity. We must therefore acquiesce in the necessity which denounces our separation, and hold them as we hold the rest of mankind, enemies in war, in peace friends. We therefore the representatives of the United States of America in General Congress assembled, appealing to the supreme Judge of the world for the rectitude of our intentions, do in the name and by the authority of the good people of these colonies, solemnly publish and declare, that these united colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and independent states; that they are absolved from all allegiance to the British crown, and that all political connexion between them and the state of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved; and that as free and independent states, they have full power to levy war, conclude peace, contract alliances, establish commerce, and to do all other acts and things which independent states may of right do. And for the support of this declaration, with a firm reliance on the protection of divine Providence, we mutually pledge to each other our lives, our fortunes, and our sacred honour. Lord Howe, as the British Commissioner, addresses a letter to Washington-The letter refused -The British on Long Island-Battle of Brooklyn-Washington retreats-His exploit at Trenton-His success at Princetown-Franklin dispatched by the Congress to ParisUnderhand proceedings of France-John the Painter, the incendiary-Manning the navy -Defences of the country-Chatham appears again in Parliament-Steuben-La Fayette -Kosciusko-Battle of the Brandywine-The British in Philadelphia-Burgoyne's army enters the United States from Canada-The convention of Saratoga-Parliament meetsChatham's speech on the Address-On the employment of Indians-Washington in winterquarters at Valley Forge-Steuben re-organizes the army. THE first measures of lord Howe, upon his arrival off New York, were of a conciliatory nature. He arrived on the 12th of July. On the 14th, he sent a flag on shore with a letter, addressed "George Washington, Esquire." One of Washington's colonels told the officer who brought the letter, that there was no such person in the American army. The officer expressed great concern; and finally went back, receiving as his answer, that a proper direction would obviate all difficulties. Washington wrote to Congress, "I deemed it a duty to my country and my appointment to insist upon that respect which, in any other than a public view, I would willingly have waived." A letter of the 16th, from general Howe, similarly addressed, was similarly refused. The British adjutant-general, lieutenant-colonel Paterson, then came to Washington's quarters to explain the matter. He laid the letter on the table, and Washington refused to open it. The conversation on both sides was that of two high-minded gentlemen ; but Washington was firm in declining to accept the direction of "George Washington, Esquire, &c., &c., &c.," as a proper address to himself in his public station. Colonel Paterson wished his visit to be considered as the first advance towards that accommodation of the unhappy dispute which was the object of the appointment of Commissioners, who, he said, had great powers. Washington replied that he was not invested with any powers on this subject, from those from whom he derived his authority; but from what had transpired, it appeared that lord Howe and general Howe were only to grant pardons ;-those who had committed no fault wanted no pardon. Paterson departed, having VOL. VI. cc 370 THE BRITISH ON LONG ISLAND-BROOKLYN. [1776. declined Washington's invitation to a collation. He had expressed his apprehension that an adherence to forms was likely to obstruct business of great moment. Washington had signified to Congress his unwillingness to sacrifice essentials to punctilio; but it is clear that he thought the maintenance of his own dignity was an essential. No further attempt was made at negotiation with Washington. A large division of the British troops, on the 22nd of August, landed on Long Island. A portion of Washington's army was stationed near Brooklyn, a small town at the western angle of the island. Washington, with the greater number of his troops, remained in New York, an attack upon which city was not improbable. The Americans were under the command of general Putnam; the British, and their Hessian auxiliaries, were under sir William Howe. On the 27th, was fought the battle of Brooklyn, in which the Americans were defeated with great loss, and were driven back to their lines. But Howe did not follow up his advantage; and Washington, hurrying from New York, rallied his troops, and waited for two days an attack upon his position, which the British commander did not care to risk. Washington then determined to make no further attempt to hold Long Island; and with consummate prudence and ability, favoured by a dense fog, embarked his troops in boats, and landed them with the military stores and artillery in safety at New York. Lord Cornwallis, who had sailed from Cork in February, with seven regiments of infantry, was in the action of Brooklyn. Two of the American generals, Sullivan and Stirling, were taken prisoners. On the 15th of September, Washington evacuated New York. The reverses 1776.] WASHINGTON RETREATS-HIS EXPLOIT AT TRENTON. 371 in the field were not so dangerous to the cause of Independence as the want of discipline in the American troops. Their general was half-despairing, and exclaimed," Are these the men I am to defend America with?" When the British entered New York, they were received by a large number of the inhabitants as deliverers from the plunder and oppression of the troops of the Congress. From the heights of Haarlem, about nine miles from New York, where Washington was some time encamped, he moved further up the country to White Plains. There was a serious skirmish between the two armies on the 28th of October; but Howe was deterred from following up the retiring enemy by the apparent strength of their lines. Washington was astonished that the British general did not attempt something. His own army was so disorganized and weakened by desertions that a vigorous attack might have annihilated his remnant of effective men. Fort Washington and Fort Lee, each situated on the bank of the Hudson, were captured by the British in the middle of November. They followed up their success by overrunning Jersey. Washington continued to retreat before Cornwallis. Lee, the general who had been directed to join him, was taken prisoner, through his own imprudence in lodging out of his camp. The British generals now thought they had done enough for one campaign. They had an enemy to deal with who had the old English spirit of not knowing when he was beaten. There appeared no obstacle to the advance of the royal army to Philadelphia; and in that apprehension the Congress had dispersed to meet at Baltimore. But the passage of the Delaware had been rendered impracticable to the detachment under Cornwallis, for Washington had destroyed the boats on the river. Howe had directed that the men should go into winter cantonments, "the weather having become too severe to keep the field," as he wrote home on the 20th of December, expressing his confidence that, from the general submission of the country and the strength of the advanced posts, the troops would be in perfect security.* Washington had destroyed the boats by which the British might pass the Delaware; but the frost was setting in, and in a few days the British might pursue their way to Philadelphia over the frozen river. He had about five thousand men. On the evening of Christmas-day he embarked about half his forces on the Delaware; and continuing his passage through the night, impeded by floating ice, and struggling with snow-storms, he landed his men at Trenton at eight o'clock in the morning, surprised the outposts of the Hessians, and made the main body prisoners, with very slight loss on his own side. Washington went back to secure his prisoners; and again crossed the river, the outposts of the British being abandoned without a struggle by panic-stricken fugitives. Cornwallis, who had gone to New York, with the purpose of returning to England, hurried back with fresh troops, and collected those who had been posted on the Delaware. Washington, on the approach of Cornwallis, abandoned Trenton, and established himself in a strong position beyond the river Assanpink. It was not his purpose to hazard a general engagement. By a rapid and secret night march, whilst Cornwallis judged by the burning of the watchfires that the enemy was before him, Washington was far away in the rear of the British, and reached Princetown on his road to Brunswick. Here he • "Correspondence of Cornwallis," vol. i. p. 25. |