US History/US History (Bureau Development Inc.)(1991).ISO/dp/0014/00147.txt

Text File | 1990-12-23 | 28.9 KB | 448 lines

$Unique_ID{USH00147}
$Pretitle{11}
$Title{Our Country:  Volume 3
Chapter LXVII}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Lossing, Benson J., LL.D.}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{independence
congress
colonies
new
declaration
general
king
washington
britain
delegates}
$Volume{Vol. 3}
$Date{1905}
$Log{}
Book:        Our Country:  Volume 3
Author:      Lossing, Benson J., LL.D.
Volume:      Vol. 3
Date:        1905

Chapter LXVII

     British Vessels Driven from Boston Harbor - British Troops Sail for New
York - Washington in New York - Action of the Continental Congress - Schuyler
and the Indians - A Horrible Plot Defeated - Movements in Favor of
Independence - Paine and His "Common Sense" - Independence in Congress and
Elsewhere - Silas Deane Sent to France - Positive Action of the Colonies in
Favor of Independence - The Formation of State Governments Recommended -
Declaration of Independence.

     IMMEDIATELY after the evacuation of Boston, Washington hastened to New
York with a greater part of his army, for he suspected Howe of an intention to
attack that city.  British war vessels lingered in Boston harbor even so late
as June, and there was a prevailing fear in New England that Howe intended to
return to their shattered capital.  It was therefore determined by the
Massachusetts Assembly to drive the ships to the sea.  This was done at the
middle of June, by General Lincoln, at the head of militia and a few regulars,
who so annoyed the ships with cannon planted on the shores, that they departed
never to return.  Howe went to Halifax to prepare for attacking the Americans
at what he supposed to be a more vulnerable point.

     In June, 1776, General Howe sailed with his recruited army from Halifax
for New York, and arrived at Sandy Hook at near the close of that month.
There he was soon afterward joined by a large fleet commanded by his brother
Richard, Earl Howe.  The latter had been made joint commissioner with the
general, and authorized by the king to offer pardon to all rebels, in his
name, and to negotiate for peace or to prosecute the war as circumstances
might demand.  The admiral was the pleasant gentleman whom Dr. Franklin met at
the chess-playing with Mrs. Howe, in London, and had some diplomatic
correspondence with him.  He addressed a courteous letter to Franklin, on his
arrival, with copies of a proclamation of pardon, which the Congress permitted
the shrewd American diplomat to answer.  It was done in terms that made Howe
shrink from the task of replying to it.

     When Washington arrived in New York, he pushed forward the defenses of
the city, and in the Hudson Highlands, for already intimation had reached the
Americans that a grand scheme of the ministers for dividing the colonies, was
to effect a junction between troops going up the Hudson Valley, and others
coming down from the St. Lawrence, the latter being already at the foot of
Lake Champlain.  Fort Washington was built on the highest part of Manhattan
Island (now Washington Heights); and strong batteries were constructed near it
as well as in the more immediate vicinity of the little town whose northern
verge was on The Fields, now City Hall Park.

     The commander-in-chief went to Philadelphia to confer with the
Continental Congress on the topic of the general defence of the colonies, for
the theatre of war was evidently about to expand along the entire sea-board.
It was then known that the mercenaries of the British monarch were on their
way to America; and it was believed that the city of New York was destined to
receive the first stunning blow from the combined British and German armies.
Danger appeared imminent, and Congress authorized the enlistment of thirteen
thousand troops from New England, New York, and New Jersey also the
establishment of a Flying Camp under General Hugh Mercer, composed of men from
Pennsylvania, Delaware, and Maryland.  These were to rendezvous at Amboy, in
New Jersey, opposite Staten Island.  The Congress also authorized the forming
of a body of Indians, two thousand in number, for service in Canada, to oppose
the savages employed by Carleton.  General Schuyler, who was wiser concerning
the Indians than the senators at Philadelphia, asked the significant question
Where are the Indians to be found?"  He knew it would be impossible to gather
so large a number for such a purpose.  I think," he said, that if the Indians
can be kept from joining the enemy, it will be as much as we have a right to
expect."  Knowing their cruel disposition, he was averse to employing them in
war; he knew, also, that their maxim in alliances with the white people was to
adhere to the strongest, most liberal in giving rewards, and with whom there
was the least danger.  Schuyler labored successfully in effecting that
neutrality; he held the Six Nations in restraint from 1775 until 1783.

     Washington returned to New York early in June, and made his summer
headquarters at Richmond Hill (now the intersection of Charlton and Varick
streets), afterward the country seat of Aaron Burr.  Soon after his return a
foul conspiracy, hatched by the unscrupulous Governor Tryon on board the
Duchess of Gordon, was discovered.  The brothers Howe were hourly expected to
enter the harbor of New York with a powerful fleet and army, and a plan was
formed for causing the uprising of the Tories in New York and in the lower
valley of the Hudson at that moment to cut off all communication with the
mainland to fire the magazine to murder Washington, his staff and other
leading officers of the American army in the city or to seize them and send
them to England for trial on a charge of treason and, making prisoners of the
great body of the troops, carry out the separating design of the ministry just
mentioned.  The mayor of New York (Matthews) was Tryon's chief vehicle of
communication with the Tories.  A large number of persons were concerned in
the plot.  Their influence was felt even above the Hudson Highlands, by the
offer of large rewards for those who should join the king's troops when they
should land.  The up-river recruits were to spike the great guns on the
fortifications in the Highlands, and then hasten to join the Loyalists below.
Washington's Life Guards were tampered with, and two of them were seduced from
their fidelity.  To one of them, an Irishman named Hickey, was entrusted the
task of destroying Washington.  He resolved to poison his commander, and tried
to make the general's housekeeper, a faithful maiden, an accomplice in the
deed.  She pretended to favor his plans.  It was arranged for her to put
poison, that he should prepare, into green peas, a dish of which Washington
was very fond.  At the appointed time he saw the poison mixed with the peas
and watched the girl, at an open door, as she carried the fatal mess to the
general's table and placed it before him.  The maiden had revealed the plot to
Washington, and he made an excuse for sending the peas away.  He ordered the
arrest of Hickey, who was tried by a court-martial, and was condemned. He was
hanged on a tree in Colonel Rutger's field a little east of the Bowery, on the
28th of June, 1776, in the presence of twenty thousand people. Already Mayor
Matthews and more than twenty others had been arrested by order of the
Provincial Congress, but only Hickey suffered death.  It was the first
military execution in the Continental Army; and it is a notable fact that the
delinquent was from a body of men who were specially chosen for their
trustworthiness.  The horrible plot was traced directly to Governor Tryon, as
its author.  Ten days after the execution of the Life-Guardsman, General Howe
landed nine thousand troops on Staten Island, and there awaited the arrival of
his brother Lord Howe with a large fleet.

     At the moment when British armies and navies were hovering on the
American coasts charged with the unrighteous business of suppressing by force
of arms the uprising of a free people in defence of their liberties, that
people, by their representatives in Congress assembled, were laying broadly
the foundations of an independent nation.  In all their debates, petitions and
remonstrances, the colonists had steadily disclaimed a desire for political
independence of Great Britain.  As a body, they were sincere; and it was only
when dependence was made a synonym for slavery, that any great number of
Americans sincerely entertained a wish for independence.  That desire had been
cherished in the hearts of a few like Samuel Adams and Christopher Gadsden,
from the time when Writs of Assistance and the Stamp Act foreshadowed the
oppressive measures toward the Americans which the new king would be willing
to sanction but not until late in 1775, when the respectful petition of the
Congress had been treated by the sovereign and the legislature with scorn, and
it was known that there were negotiations on foot for the hire of foreign
troops to enslave the Americans, did any considerable number of thinking men,
in the colonies, openly expressed opinions favorable to independence.  When
Great Britain sent armies hither to coerce submission to her injustice to
plunder our seas, ravage our coasts, burn our towns, harass our people, and
eat out their substance when King, Lords, and Commons became totally "deaf to
the voice of justice and of consanguinity," the colonies were forced to
acquiesce in the necessity which compelled them to dissolve the political
bands which connected them with the parent state, and to assume among the
powers of the earth the separate and equal station to which the laws of
nature, and of nature's God, entitled them."

     At the beginning of 776 when the king had proclaimed the colonists to be
rebels, rejected their petitions with disdain, and was preparing to send a
crushing force hither, men in every station in life began to speak out boldly
in favor of independence.  Washington did not hesitate; and General Greene
wrote to a delegate in Congress from his colony: The king breathes revenge,
and threatens us with destruction America must raise an empire of permanent
duration, supported upon the grand pillars of truth, freedom, and religion."
And later Washington declared that when he took command of the army he
"abhorred the idea of independence;" but I am now fully convinced," he wrote,
that nothing else will save us." The flame of desire for absolute independence
glowed in almost every bosom.  It was fanned by the brave words of Thomas
Paine, the son of an English Friend who had lately come to America as a
literary adventurer and missionary of freedom.  He was full of aspirations for
liberty, and the opportunity to do good for mankind.  At the beginning of
1776, he put forth a powerful plea for independence, suggested by Dr. Rush of
Philadelphia.  In terse, sharp, incisive and vigorous sentences, glowing with
zeal and sincerity, he embodied the sentiments of reflecting men and women
throughout the colonies in telling words of common sense, like these:

     The nearer any government approaches to a republic, the less business
there is for a king; in England a king hath little more to do than to make war
and give away places.  Volumes have been written on the struggle between
England and America.  Arms must decide the contest the appeal was the choice
of the king, and the continent hath accepted the challenge.  The sun never
shone on a cause of greater worth.  'Tis not the affair of a city, a county, a
province, or a kingdom, but of a continent - of at least one-eighth part of
the habitable globe.  'Tis not the concern of a day, a year, or an age
posterity are virtually involved in it even to the end of time.

     It matters little now what the king of England either says or does.  He
hath wickedly broken through every moral and human obligation, trampled nature
and conscience beneath his feet, and by a steady and constitutional spirit of
insolence and cruelty, procured for himself a universal hatred. . . .
Independence is now the only bond that will keep us together.  We shall then
see one object, and our ears will be legally shut against the schemes of all
intriguing, as well as cruel, enemy.  We shall then, too, be on a proper
footing to treat with Great Britain for there is reason to conclude that the
pride of that court will be less hurt by treating with the American States for
terms of peace, than with those whom she denominates rebellious subjects' for
terms of accommodation.  It is our delaying it that encourages her to hope for
conquest, and our backwardness tends only to prolong the war - . . . Every
quiet method for peace hath been ineffectual our prayers have been rejected
with disdain reconciliation is now a fallacious dream.  Bring the doctrine of
reconciliation to the touchstone of nature; can you hereafter love, honor, and
faithfully serve the power that hath carried fire and sword into your land? Ye
that tell us of harmony, can ye restore to us the time that is past?  The
blood of the slain, the weeping voice of nature cries, 'Tis time to part.' The
last chord is now broken; the people of England are presenting addresses
against us A government of our own is our natural right.  Ye that love
mankind, that dare oppose not only tyranny but the tyrant, stand forth!  Every
spot of the old world is overrun with oppression; Freedom hath been hunted
round the globe; Asia and Africa hath long expelled her; Europe regards her
like a stranger; and England hath given her warning to depart: O!  receive the
fugitive, and prepare an asylum for mankind."

     So pleaded this earnest man, and he called his appeal by the significant
name of Common Sense.  The effect of the pamphlet was marvelous.  It carried
dismay into the camp of the enemy, and illustrated the truth of the assertion,
that the Pen is mightier than the Sword."  Its trumpet tones wakened the
continent, and made every patriot's heart thrill with joy.  It was read with
avidity everywhere and the public appetite for its solid food was not appeased
until a hundred thousand copies had fallen from the press. Satisfied of its
worth and salutary influence, the Legislature of Pennsylvania voted the author
two thousand five hundred dollars.  Washington wrote to Joseph Reed from
Cambridge: "A few more such flaming arguments as were exhibited at Falmouth
and Norfolk, added to the sound doctrine and unanswering reasoning contained
in the pamphlet Common Sense, will not leave members at a loss to decide upon
the propriety of a separation."  It probably did more to fix the idea of
independence firmly in the public mind than any other instrumentality.

     Legislative bodies soon began to move in the matter.  The Continental
Congress was firm at heart but timorous in action, for awhile.  In January
(1776), Franklin called up his plan for a confederation, and endeavored to
have a day set for its consideration, but was defeated by Dickinson, Hooper,
Jay and others, who were not ready for separation.  But in February, a
proposition from Wilson, for Congress to send forth an address to their
constituents in which they should disclaim the idea of renouncing their
allegiance, disgusted that body and the people.  The constituency everywhere
were ahead of their representatives in aspirations for independence.  The
proposition of Wilson brought out Harrison of Virginia, who said: "We have
hobbled on under a fatal attachment to Great Britain.  I felt that attachment
as much as any man, but I feel a stronger one to my country." The honest and
able George Wythe, from the same province, was also fired with righteous
indignation at the proposition, and exclaimed, after asserting the natural and
prescriptive rights of the Americans We may invite foreign powers to make
treaties of commerce with us but before the measure is adopted, it is to be
considered in what character we shall treat!  As subjects of Great Britain?
As rebels!  No we must declare ourselves a free people." These were the first
brave words on the floor of Congress in favor of independence.  They were
followed by a resolution offered by Mr. Wythe, "That the colonies have a right
to contract alliances." That means independence," said timid ones; but the
question whether the resolution should be considered was carried by the vote
of seven colonies against five.  In less than a month afterward, Silas Deane
was appointed by the Committee of Secret Correspondence, a political and
commercial agent to operate in France and also elsewhere, and to procure
necessary supplies of every kind for an army of twenty-five thousand men. He
was instructed to say to the French government, in substance, We first apply
to you, because if we should, as there is an appearance we shall, come to a
total separation with Great Britain, France would be the power whose
friendship it would be fittest for us to obtain and cultivate." Already an
emissary from France had been sent to America, with the consent of young King
Louis, who had doubtless given some of the members of the Congress to
understand that aid would be offered by France, if it could be done secretly,
for that country was not then in a condition to engage in war with Great
Britain.

     The subject of independence came up in other forms in Congress.  In their
instructions to the commissioners to go into Canada, reported by John Adams,
these words were used You are to declare, that it is our inclination that the
people of Canada may set up such a form of government as will be most likely,
in their judgment, to produce their happiness." To this Jay and others
objected, because it meant independence." But the sentence was adopted. Then,
after long debate, the Congress resolved, in April, to throw open the ports of
the colonies to the commerce of the world, not subject to the king of Great
Britain," and that no slaves be imported into any of the thirteen United
Colonies." This resolution abolished British custom-houses, and swept away the
colonial system here.  It was a most important step in the direction of
absolute independence.

     North Carolina was the first colony that took positive action on the
subject of independence.  On the 22nd of April, 1776, a provincial Convention
in that colony authorized its representatives in the Continental Congress to
concur with those in the other colonies in declaring independence.  The people
of Massachusetts did the same on the next day.  Those of Rhode Island and
Virginia instructed their representatives to propose independence.  Those of
Connecticut told their delegates to assent to independence.  The Provincial
Congress of New Hampshire issued similar instructions and the delegates from
New Jersey, just elected, were left to act in the matter as their judgment
might dictate.  Several months before, the subject had been hinted at in the
Pennsylvania Assembly, when the startled Conservatives procured the adoption
of instructions adverse to that idea These restrictions were removed, but the
delegates received no official instructions on the subject.  At the close of
May the Maryland Convention positively forbade their delegates voting for
independence, but at the close of June they were in accord with Virginia.
Georgia, South Carolina and Delaware, took no official action in the matter,
and their delegates were left free to vote as they pleased.  William Franklin
(son of Dr. Franklin), the royal governor of New Jersey and the last of the
crown-officers who held his seat, had been arrested by order of the General
Congress, and sent, a prisoner of State, to Connecticut.  So the sovereignty
of that body was asserted in this treatment of the direct representative of
the king.  It was the act of an independent nation.

     Meanwhile the desire for independence had become a living principle in
the Continental Congress, and that principle soon found courageous utterance.
On the 10th of May, that body, on motion of John Adams, resolved, That it be
recommended to the several assemblies and conventions of the United Colonies,
where no government sufficient to the exigencies of their affairs hath
hitherto been established, to adopt such a government as shall, in the opinion
of the representatives of the people, best conduce to the happiness and safety
of their constituents in particular, and America in general."  This was a bold
but cautious step.  It was not sufficiently comprehensive to form a basis of
energetic action in favor of independence.  There was need for some one
courageous enough to offer an instrument which should sever the cord that
bound the colonies to Great Britain.  That man would be marked as an
arch-traitor, and incur the undying resentment of the royal government.  He
appeared in the person of Richard Henry Lee, of Virginia, whose constituents
had instructed him to "propose" independence; and on the 7th of June, 1776, he
arose in his place in the hall of Congress - a spacious room in the State-
house at Philadelphia, and ever since known as Independence Hall - and with
his clear, musical voice read aloud this resolution:


"That these United Colonies are, and of right ought to be, free and
independent States; and that all political connection between us and the State
of Great Britain is, and ought to be, totally dissolved."


     John Adams instantly seconded the resolution.  To shield him, and Mr.
Lee, from the ministerial wrath, the Congress, whose sessions were always hid
with closed doors, directed their secretary to omit the names of the mover and
seconder of the resolution, in the Journal; and the entry simply declares that
certain resolutions respecting independence being moved and seconded, it was
resolved that the further consideration of them should be postponed until the
next day.  The postponement was afterward extended to the first of July; and
in order to avoid a loss of time, in case the resolution should be adopted, a
committee was "appointed to prepare a declaration to that effect."  The
committee was composed of Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, Benjamin Franklin,
Roger Sherman, and Robert R. Livingston.  Mr. Lee was not appointed on the
committee, because he had been compelled to leave Philadelphia for his home,
in consequence of the serious illness of his wife.

     The Declaration was fully discussed in committee, and when its topics
were settled, the task of putting the whole in proper form was committed to
Mr. Jefferson, because he was a colleague of Mr. Lee, and his acknowledged
superior in the art of literary composition.  At the end of two days he
submitted a draft which was adopted unanimously by the committee, after some
slight verbal alterations by Adams and Franklin.  Debates upon it in Congress
were long and animated, for there was not unanimity therein, on the subject.
Several amendments were made.  Among these was the striking out of a long
paragraph, in which the King of Great Britain, in the general indictment, was
held responsible for the African slave-trade carried on by the colonies, and
the perpetuation of slavery here.  The charge was not strictly correct, and a
sacred regard for truth caused the clause to be omitted in the indictment.

     It was evident from the beginning that a majority of the colonies would
vote for independence, but their unanimous consent was most desirable.  To
secure that result, the friends of the measure bent every effort.  The
Assemblies of Maryland and Pennsylvania, as we have seen, had refused to
sanction it, and Georgia, South Carolina, and New York remained silent.  The
delegates from Maryland were all in favor of it those from Pennsylvania were
divided. At length, on the 24th of June, the people of Pennsylvania, in a
convention held at Philadelphia, consented to concur in a vote of Congress,
declaring the United Colonies free and independent States;" and by the
unwearied exertions of Chase, Carroll, and other delegates from Maryland, the
Convention of that province, on the 28th of June, recalled their former
instructions and empowered their representatives to concur with the other
colonies in a Declaration of Independence.  So the most important obstacles in
the way of unanimity were removed; and when a vote was taken in the committee
of the whole House on Mr. Lee's resolution, on the 2nd of July, all the
colonies voted for it excepting Pennsylvania and Delaware, four of the seven
delegates from the former voting against it, and the two delegates from
Delaware, who were present, being divided Thomas McKean favoring it, and
George Read opposing it.

     The all important resolution being adopted, it remained for final action
in the Declaration of Independence.  It was warmly debated on the 2nd and 3rd
of July.  Meanwhile news of the arrival of General Howe, with a large British
army, at Sandy Hook, had been received by the Congress, and made a profound
impression on that body.  McKean, burning with a desire to have Delaware speak
in favor of Independence, sent an express after Caesar Rodney, the other
delegate from that colony, who, he knew, was in favor of the measure. Rodney
was eighty miles from Philadelphia.  He tarried only long enough to change his
linen.  Ten minutes after receiving McKean's letter, he was in the saddle, and
riding day and night, he reached Philadelphia on the 4th of July, a short time
before the final vote on the Declaration was taken.  So Delaware was secured -
Read had changed his mind and voted for the Declaration.  Robert Morris and
John Dickinson of Pennsylvania were absent.  The former was in favor, the
latter was opposed to the measure.  Of the other five Pennsylvania delegates
who were present, Dr. Franklin, James Wilson, and John Morton were in favor of
it, and Thomas Willing and Charles Humphreys were opposed to it; so the vote
of Pennsylvania was also secured.  When the question was taken on that bright,
cool day, the 4th of July, 1776, the Declaration of Independence was adopted
by the unanimous vote of the thirteen colonies, and Charles Thompson, the
Secretary of Congress, made the following modest record of the great event, in
their journal:

     "Agreeably to the order of the day, the Congress resolved itself into a
committee of the whole, to take into their further consideration the
Declaration and, after some time, the President resumed the chair, and Mr.
Harrison reported that the Committee have agreed to a Declaration, which they
desired him to report.  The Declaration being read, was agreed to."

     In that Declaration, after reciting their reasons for making it, in a
series of definite charges against 'the British monarch, the Congress said:


"We, therefore, the representatives of the United States, 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 connection
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 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 honor."


     Having, by this act, given birth to a nation, it was necessary to have,
for use, a token of national authority, and on the afternoon of the same day,
the Congress resolved: "That Dr. Franklin, Mr. J. Adams, and Mr. Jefferson be
a committee to prepare a proper device for a Seal for the United States of
America."

     The Declaration of Independence was signed on the same day by every
member present, who voted for it.  As the voting in the Congress was by
colonies, a majority of the members of that body could not bind a single
colony; it was therefore necessary for the members to sign it, to show that a
majority of the delegates of the several colonies represented were in favor of
it.  Their signature, only, could be received as a proper authentication of
the instrument.  These signatures were attached to a copy on paper, and the
instrument was ordered to be engrossed on parchment.  This was done, and the
copy on parchment was signed by fifty-four delegates on the 2nd of August. Two
others afterward signed, one in September and the other later in the autumn.

     Immediately after the adoption of the Declaration it was printed, and was
sent out in every direction, with the names of only John Hancock, the
President of Congress, and Charles Thompson, Secretary, appended to it' The
erroneous impression has prevailed that only these two officers signed it on
the Fourth of July.

     In January, 1777, it was printed on a broadside, with the names of all
the signers, and sent to the several assemblies, conventions and committees,
or Councils of Safety, and to the several commanding officers of the
Continental troops.