REVOLUTIONARY WAR.] WAYNE, Anthony. Autograph letter, unsigned, to Joseph Reed Totoway, 26 July 1780. 4 pages, 4to, separations and losses at folds (some repaired with tape), tape remnants, small loss on second leaf catching a few words of text .
REVOLUTIONARY WAR.] WAYNE, Anthony. Autograph letter, unsigned, to Joseph Reed Totoway, 26 July 1780. 4 pages, 4to, separations and losses at folds (some repaired with tape), tape remnants, small loss on second leaf catching a few words of text . WAYNE JUSTIFIES THE FAILED ATTACK ON BULL'S FERRY AS "DESIGNED TO DIVERT" THE BRITISH' "FROM A MEDITATED ATTEMPT UPON RHODE ISLAND" Wayne tries to give a post-facto justification to a bad American defeat. On 20 July 1780, Washington ordered Wayne to attack the Loyalist held blockhouse at Bull's Ferry, New Jersey. "You have undoubtedly heard of our tour of Bergen," Wayne writes. "...The grand object was to draw the army which Sir Henry Clinton brought from Charles town into an action in the Defiles of the Mountain in the Vicinity of Fort Lee, where we expected them to Land in order to Succour the refugee post, or to endeavor to cut off our retreat to the Liberty pole & New Bridge...three thousand men consisting of the flower of the British army were embarked from Philip's and stood down the river hovering off the Landing near Fort Lee--where the 6th and 7th Pennsylvania Regiments lay concealed with directions to let them land unmolested...& then to meet them...with the point of bayonet to dispute the pass at every expense of blood until the arrival of the first & Second Pennsylvania Brigades--when we should put them between such three fires as no human fortitude would withstand...and I may now...mention that it was also designed to divert their attentions from a meditated attack upon Rhode Island..." Washington's objectives, however, were not so grand. He wanted to capture a large number of cattle and horses "on Bergen Neck, within reach of the enemy" and to destroy a stockaded blockhouse at Bull's Ferry manned by "a Body of Refugees [Loyalists]...who committed depredations upon the well affected inhabitants for many miles around" (quoted in Fitzpatick 19:260-261). Wayne may have needed to provide a grander objective in the face of the appalling American losses. An hour of heavy shelling failed to put a dent in the thickly built blockhouse, and raking fire rained down on his men from the stockade. In an act of what Washington later called "intemperate valor," the enraged Patriots charged the stockade--deaf to the commands of their officers--and tried to force their way in. They could not. They retired with 15 comrades dead on the ground and some 50 wounded, including three officers, one of whom later died of his wounds. Only 5 Loyalists died. The Americans did, however, secure the livestock.
REVOLUTIONARY WAR.] WAYNE, Anthony. Autograph letter, unsigned, to Joseph Reed Totoway, 26 July 1780. 4 pages, 4to, separations and losses at folds (some repaired with tape), tape remnants, small loss on second leaf catching a few words of text .
REVOLUTIONARY WAR.] WAYNE, Anthony. Autograph letter, unsigned, to Joseph Reed Totoway, 26 July 1780. 4 pages, 4to, separations and losses at folds (some repaired with tape), tape remnants, small loss on second leaf catching a few words of text . WAYNE JUSTIFIES THE FAILED ATTACK ON BULL'S FERRY AS "DESIGNED TO DIVERT" THE BRITISH' "FROM A MEDITATED ATTEMPT UPON RHODE ISLAND" Wayne tries to give a post-facto justification to a bad American defeat. On 20 July 1780, Washington ordered Wayne to attack the Loyalist held blockhouse at Bull's Ferry, New Jersey. "You have undoubtedly heard of our tour of Bergen," Wayne writes. "...The grand object was to draw the army which Sir Henry Clinton brought from Charles town into an action in the Defiles of the Mountain in the Vicinity of Fort Lee, where we expected them to Land in order to Succour the refugee post, or to endeavor to cut off our retreat to the Liberty pole & New Bridge...three thousand men consisting of the flower of the British army were embarked from Philip's and stood down the river hovering off the Landing near Fort Lee--where the 6th and 7th Pennsylvania Regiments lay concealed with directions to let them land unmolested...& then to meet them...with the point of bayonet to dispute the pass at every expense of blood until the arrival of the first & Second Pennsylvania Brigades--when we should put them between such three fires as no human fortitude would withstand...and I may now...mention that it was also designed to divert their attentions from a meditated attack upon Rhode Island..." Washington's objectives, however, were not so grand. He wanted to capture a large number of cattle and horses "on Bergen Neck, within reach of the enemy" and to destroy a stockaded blockhouse at Bull's Ferry manned by "a Body of Refugees [Loyalists]...who committed depredations upon the well affected inhabitants for many miles around" (quoted in Fitzpatick 19:260-261). Wayne may have needed to provide a grander objective in the face of the appalling American losses. An hour of heavy shelling failed to put a dent in the thickly built blockhouse, and raking fire rained down on his men from the stockade. In an act of what Washington later called "intemperate valor," the enraged Patriots charged the stockade--deaf to the commands of their officers--and tried to force their way in. They could not. They retired with 15 comrades dead on the ground and some 50 wounded, including three officers, one of whom later died of his wounds. Only 5 Loyalists died. The Americans did, however, secure the livestock.
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