I shrugged, held my hands wide.
“But it was not to be. Congress called upon me to lead the Continental Army. I asked for twenty-eight thousand men; I was given nineteen thousand. We bested our enemies at Boston but I knew that the issue would be determined here in New York. Hence, I brought my raggle-taggle army south. My plan was to stalemate the English long enough for the winter to freeze the battle lines.”
Detective Inspector Danson guffawed softly.
“And then what were you going to do, George?”
“I planned to lead my foes a merry chase. My men had no chance in open battle but our land is great and every man the British lost through sickness or in battle would take six months to a year to be replaced from Europe. I planned to let the predations of campaigning, sickness and war-weariness take its toll on my enemies. I’m not sure if that amounts to ‘a plan’ but on that last Tuesday evening in August 1776 it all seemed somewhat academic. As darkness fell it was likely that but for a miracle our rebellion was doomed less than two months after our Declaration of Independence had been promulgated at the Pennsylvania State House in Philadelphia. If our army was lost and New York fell our enemy would surely hollow out the rebellion from within; without the Continental Army the British might strike north up the Hudson Valley or south towards Trenton and Philadelphia. It would only be a matter of time before the colonies were split in half, subdued in detail, or seized by the loyalist rump who sought to undermine their fellows at every turn…”
“Loyalists?” Lieutenant Adams objected, speaking for the first time in several minutes.
“Loyalists to the crown. The war had set brother upon brother and friend against friend up and down the East Coast. I can tell you that dire thoughts rifled my mind that afternoon as I gazed out across the forest of masts of the hundreds of merchantmen, great ships of the line and the low, lean frigates of the Royal Navy waiting ready to unfurl their sails and force an entry to the Hudson and the East Rivers. I felt helpless, knowing full well that if the wind shifted, even a few points to the south of east or west, there was nothing in the World that would stop Vice Admiral Richard ‘Black Dick’ Howe’s men-of-war trapping my ten thousand men on Long Island. With the Royal Navy at my back and General William Howe’s – the British liked to keep these things in the family in those days, William was the younger brother of the admiral – twenty thousand mercenaries and professional Redcoats at his front, I would be trapped. Moreover, if the day’s fighting had taught me anything it was that I relied on my own generals at my peril.”
The woman vented a long, irritated sigh.
For the first time Danson gave his fellow cop a look that was very nearly but not quite, schoolmasterish. She shrugged, waved for me to continue.
“There comes a point in every campaign, rebellion, battle or whatever,” I explained, “when everything is up for grabs and Washington was general enough to know that time was coming, if that was, it was not already upon him.”
I slipped out of character.
“You see by then the war with the old country had been rumbling on for the best part of two years, Washington had driven the British garrison and the Royal Navy out of Boston that spring; but that was then and this was now, and the British had finally got their act together big time. The Howe brothers had succeeded in bringing over-whelming fighting power on land and at sea to bear on the so-called Continental Army of the fledgling, and barely united colonies of the East Coast. The Continentals were exhausted and Washington’s guns were running short of powder. Out in the Upper Bay the guns of Fort Defiance on Red Hook, Governor’s Island and at Fort George might hold off the English for a while but there were too many ships already in the Upper Bay and the moment Washington pulled men back from his defence works General Cornwallis’s Hessian mercenaries – thousands of them – would pour through the gaps. Washington knew he had lost the battle and that whatever happened the British would be in Manhattan in days. So, he did what any good general would do. He took a deep breath and threw the dice one last time.”
I resumed my seat at the table.
“Washington gambled, or at least we think he gambled; what seems to have happened was that he sent an order across the East River to Manhattan ordering every boat – effectively the local fishing fleet – to cross to the Brooklyn shore that night. He meant to mount a diversion and save as many of his men as he could before the enemy realised what was going on. It was his only hope. If he could keep his army ‘in being’ the rebellion might still have legs. It was a desperate move but not ill-considered. The previous night there had been a fog on the East River and the British clearly disliked fighting at night as much as his men; so, he might have got lucky. If all went well the evacuation would begin at four o’clock on the next morning, Wednesday 28th August. It can’t have been much fun waiting for the first boats to arrive. Periodically, English guns lobbed balls into the redoubts along Brooklyn Heights – Fort Putnam, Fort Box and Fort Greene – as Washington strode through the darkness, seeking out his generals.”
I always thought of the George Washington fable as one long, convoluted shaggy dog story; the sort of thing one could drag out all night or conclude at a moment’s notice. Most of the people one told the story to already knew the punchline so it was all about the twists and turns on the way, the journey not the destination.
“George’s luck ran out around midnight. First the wind veered away from the north. First by a point to the east, then the south. For about an hour a fine rain began to fall, afterwards the clouds scudded inland to uncover the panoply of the heavens as the summer squall blew inland. Even by starlight the men on the shore could see the sails billowing from the top gallants of the ships of the line anchored off Staten Island. It must have been like watching one’s death walking, very slowly towards you knowing that there was absolutely nothing you could do about it. Legend has it that a collective moan rose from the throats of the Continentals manning the redoubts as the English dowsed their cook fires and formed up to renew the assault at dawn’s first gleaming, knowing now that their quarry was without hope.”
The Battle of Long Island was a cautionary tale that ought to be ingrained into the heads of all young officer candidates.
“The Continentals had no control over the wind but by rights more seasonal westerlies would have blown Admiral Howe’s fleet into the Upper Bay long since. But there’s always the human element in the best tragedies; and that was supplied by Thomas Mifflin, one of Washington’s commanders. Supposedly, he misunderstood his orders – many of my colleagues in the history game think he was either a fool or just one of those men who misunderstand orders because they always think they know better – and pulled his regiment out of the line around the time the first boats from Manhattan were landing at Brooklyn Pier.”
I sat back and studied my interrogators.
“Why the Hell am I telling you this stuff?”
It was as if Lieutenant Adams had been waiting for exactly this cue; she leant down, grabbed her attaché case and pulled out a battered book which she proceeded to place equidistantly between me and her on the table.
Oh…double shit!
This just gets worse!
The woman nudged the book towards me.
“Open it at the title page please, Professor.”
I did as I was instructed.