27. WASHINGTON
VALLEY FORGE, PENNSYLVANIA, JANUARY 1778
For days, the rhythmic sound of axes rolled over the plateau, the forests below teeming with men who knew only one duty now. They had begun their winter camps by sleeping in the ragged canvas tents, but Washington knew that canvas would shield no one from winter. If the army was to subsist and survive in a winter quarter, they would have to build solid structures. The ground had been chosen with the vast stretches of woods in mind, and no one complained when the tools were handed out. Already the snow had covered the plateau where the cabins would be built, and already sick men were filling the nearby farmhouses, the health of the army decaying. Each day, fewer men were able to answer the call to duty, fewer men made the difficult trek down into the trees, fewer men had the strength to haul the stout logs up to the heights of the camp.
He had begged the congress to secure horses and wagons, and neither had appeared. Washington watched as the men formed their own teams, wrapping themselves in leather harnesses, straining with hard groans as they pulled the cut timbers up the hill. On the plateau itself, men with some training in carpentry guided the others, notching the logs, each cabin rising slowly as the timbers were set upon each other. Stiff red hands worked frozen mud and clay, filling the gaps in the logs, sealing out the cold. As the walls grew higher, the men worked from the inside out, seeking protection from the sharp wind. Washington had hoped they would find some ingenious method of building a roof, something more weatherproof than thatched sticks and muddy grass. But once the doors were built, slabs of split oak, a dozen men could finally huddle inside, protected against the hard freezing wind. The grassy, porous roofs would have to do.
Each cabin had a chimney to vent the choking smoke from a variety of crude hearths. The men who had some experience with brick making or masonry, or some skill with molding clay, could construct an efficient escape for the smoke from their blessed fires. Others relied on wooden chimneys and fireboxes caked thick with mud to make them fireproof.
Inside, the snow and grass beneath their feet was trampled down to wet bare dirt that would become the floor of each cabin. As the cabins filled with men, the wetness of the bare earthen floors rose up to swallow them in a soft cauldron of sickness. Though the fires in the crude hearths would eventually dry the ground, the cold still seeped in, and the troops scoured the countryside for straw, for any kind of ground cover. But the barns had been stripped clean of hay, the feed so desperately needed for livestock. What straw could be found was soon matted and worn, but it could not be replaced, and so even when soiled, it could not be discarded. Soon, mold and filth was all that remained, and many of the men found that their only protection against the earth beneath them was the clothing on their backs.
They were still soldiers, and the camp was still the vulnerable home of an army whose enemy was barely twenty miles away, and so the official duties would continue. Provosts and lookouts and pickets were still posted, guarding against a sudden assault by the enemy, or keeping watch on those who might attempt to desert. Washington could not stop the desertions, of course, knew that any man who feels a festering passion for going home will somehow find the means of escaping the army. They would leave mostly at night, some slipping away from the outposts, some from the cabins themselves. Many would not go far before the cold and snow and their own wretched weakness would drag them down, some freezing to death in the roadways, found by patrols the next day. Others would never be found, would stumble into gullies deep with soft snow, swallowed up by the frozen misery they were so desperate to escape.
Despite the loss of numbers, Washington had begun to detect some new form of camaraderie. Each cabin was its own small community, and when one man did not return from his night watch, the others would make good use of the small bit of vacant space while cursing the man’s weakness. It was rarely infectious, a man’s desperate escape regarded more as a tragedy. It was better to learn a man’s character now, in the camp, than on the line when you might have desperate need for his musket. The men who kept to their duty understood that a deserter was less likely to find his way home than to suffer a lonely death. There was simply nowhere to go, no place close enough to offer sanctuary where a man could find any better protection against the weather than the cabins at Valley Forge.
Few had coats, and the shoes that were still serviceable could not stand up to the constant freezing and thawing that came with the daily routine. Most of the men had worn through their pants and shirts, many could only wrap themselves in what remained of blankets. In each cabin, the man whose lot it was to make the march to the frozen outpost would be dressed by the men around him, each man contributing some small bit of protection, anything that might help their comrade survive the watch.
Despite the hard winter, despite the blasts of wind that swirled the snow, in a few short weeks, what had once been a bare grassy plateau cut by a few ravines, was now a town. Washington’s army had constructed more than a thousand wooden structures, great long rows of cabins spread out over a camp that was nearly two miles long.
Washington made a daily inspection, rode along the trampled snow-packed lanes, through great clouds of black smoke from the low chimneys. The men had built cabins for more than just their own quarters, and beyond the rows of barracks were other structures, a blacksmith shop, supply sheds. There were larger cabins as well, what had quickly become vastly overflowing hospitals.
More than a year ago he had ordered the army to construct a central hospital facility in the small Moravian town of Bethlehem, a means of bringing together as many doctors and other volunteers whose sole duty was the care of the sick and wounded. But Bethlehem was fifty miles from Valley Forge, and unless a man was suffering from smallpox, or some other ailment that might endanger the entire camp, it was impractical to risk such lengthy transport. The tragic alternative was the structures they had built at Valley Forge, and very soon the hospital cabins were places to be avoided, the source of nightmarish stories of fever and dysentery, of men dying in their own filth. But avoiding the hospitals did not always erase the horror, and the awful sounds would echo across the snowy fields, the screams of men who suffered the amputation of frostbitten or infected limbs.
The numbers of sick were still growing, nearly a third of his army was suffering some serious illness, and another third were huddled in their cabins with the ailments that stripped them of any ability to fight. The men who were excused from duty found that the shelters could cause problems of their own. Sealed up in their cabins, their eyes and lungs would suffer from the stifling dry heat of the wood fires, eyes and lungs burnt with smoke. But to escape the cabins meant exposure, hands and fingers split, feet swollen into lameness. As he heard and endured the suffering of his men, Washington was grateful that Howe was so fond of quiet winters, would make no attempt to interrupt the comfort of the British troops. Eleven thousand men had moved into Valley Forge, but Washington knew that on any given day, fewer than three thousand could have put up any kind of fight.
While so many of his men had worked on the cabins, others had been busy with the shovel, digging entrenchments and redoubts, earthworks along the roads that gave access to the camp. There were inner lines as well as outer, the crucial necessity of having some good defensive line to fall back to. More often, he would ride out along the outer lines, heavy earthworks facing south and east, the roads that led to Philadelphia. Out past the works, the ground fell away, a long hill easily protected by artillery. As he rode along the far left flank, he could see the Schuylkill, and the new bridge just built by his men. It was constructed for the purpose of foraging, the most convenient means of sending wagons out to the north and west. But Washington knew that it was something else as well. Despite the strength of the ground, the stout defenses, if Howe did launch an attack, he might very well overwhelm any meager force Washington could summon. The bridge would be the army’s one avenue of escape.
The outposts and picket posts were few and scatte
red along the river itself, and served little purpose than to watch the far side, some sign of a British patrol perhaps. The plateau fell away to the river’s edge in a steep drop along much of the northern flank, and he stayed up on the flat roadway, would not risk the horse’s legs on a sharp slope of icy ground. The staff would be grateful; they were not the skilled rider that he was. He glanced behind him, saw Tilghman huddled in the saddle, his arms pulling tightly to his coat. Around his shoulders was draped a blanket, the man’s face barely visible. Washington stopped the horse, waited for the aides to come up, said, “We’re nearly done, gentlemen. I do not enjoy this duty any more than you, but as long as the men are suffering in our protection, we will pay our respects by observing them with the same decorum we would exhibit at headquarters.”
Tilghman emerged from his covering, removed the blanket, had received his subtle message. Washington spurred the horse, moved out again, could see the final picket post in front of them, saw the men coming together, muskets upright. Beyond the post, the ground fell away to the west, and he could see a lone column of smoke, rising from the chimney of his headquarters. He rode close to the pickets, stopped, could see one of the men bareheaded, thought, Not wise, then he saw the man’s feet, dark and red, and beneath them, the man’s hat, crushed flat, the only protection the man had against the icy ground. The site horrified him, and he said, “Have you no cover for your feet, soldier?”
The man began to speak, but the words were held back by a sudden wave of shivering. Beside him, a man said, “Have you, sir?”
There was no emotion in the man’s voice, no expectation of a reply. Washington avoided the sight of the man’s bare feet, scanned their muskets, saw no gloves, cracked and cut hands wrapped tightly around the dull wooden stocks of their weapons. He wanted to respond, we are trying, we are making every effort . . . but the words would not come, held away by the tightness in his throat. There could be no good answer after all, no anger toward the man, who only spoke what they all were feeling. He could not help but stare at the clothing, some of it barely there, one man’s legs naked from the knee down to the rags that wrapped his feet. There were remnants of blankets around some of them, large holes revealing the torn strips of a shirt, patches of filthy color, scraps of cloth that were never meant for clothing. Each man was looking at him, hollow black eyes, and he fought for the words, some response, something to comfort them.
“Your country is proud of you. Your sacrifice will be rewarded, so help me God.”
He moved the horse, was past them, heard no cheers, no grateful salutes to his concern. Is it a lie, after all? If our country is proud of what we do, why have they not provided? How can they allow their soldiers to suffer the nakedness, to go without the basic comforts, or worse, the basic necessities of survival. He could see the headquarters now, the house nestled down near the junction of the river and the Valley Creek. For a long while he had kept to his tent, would not move into the house until the cabins had been built, would not allow his men to suffer in their tents while their commander lived in comfort. The gesture had been appreciated by the troops, but down in York, the congress could only criticize, letters condemning him for putting his men into camp at all. He had read the protests with a hard grip on his temper, fat men in wool suits, tobacco and brandy, soft leather chairs, insisting that his army should attack, and attack again. It was the consequence of the success of Horatio Gates, the simpleminded assumptions that one man’s victory can so easily be achieved on every front. If Washington’s army failed to win, it was only because they failed to attack, the mindless strategy of men whose only knowledge of war is the inconvenience of hearing about it.
He eased the horse down the slippery roadway, saw a man emerging from the house, then another, Hamilton, pointing up toward him now. The first man was quickly up on his horse, and Washington thought, I will be there in a moment. What could be so urgent that you cannot wait?
The man rode unsteadily up toward him, the horse struggling in the deeper snow, and Washington did not stop, was feeling the chill himself that had so plagued Tilghman. He recognized the man now, Major Deere, the quartermaster department, one of Mifflin’s people, rarely seen in the field. The man turned the horse, moved beside him, and Washington simply looked at him, said nothing.
“Sir! I have some unfortunate news!”
Washington said nothing, thought, Certainly. Why else be in such haste?
“The wagons have arrived with the latest victuals. There is a problem, however. It seems that in an effort to, um, lighten their load, the drivers drained the brine from the barrels of pork. I am sorry to report, sir, that the meat has . . . spoiled, sir.”
Washington sagged in the saddle, said, “How much meat?”
“I regret . . . all of it, sir.”
He closed his eyes, his head down, could not feel anger. His mind was a sea of fog, no words at all, just one vision, the bare feet of the shivering soldier. For all the shortages, food had not yet been a problem, the one item that the quartermaster had seemed to secure. At least the men had been fed, and if it was not always what they hoped for, no one had yet gone hungry. Washington rode the horse into the yard of the headquarters, an aide emerging to take the reins. He climbed down, his boots sinking into soft snow. He moved slowly toward the door of the house, climbed the short steps. He passed the flag, the dark blue square dotted by white stars, held up in a soft flutter by the light breeze. The door was open now, Hamilton standing to one side, waiting for him. The smoky warmth rolled toward him, and he moved into the hall, turned into his office, was surprised, pleased to see Lafayette, the young man rising out of his chair. He expected the usual smile from the Frenchman, but Lafayette looked at him with a somber frown.
“Yes, Mr. Lafayette, I just received the news. Countless barrels of pork, now useless. We shall have to find some other means . . .” He stopped, saw a look of confusion on the young man’s face. “What is it, Mr. Lafayette?”
“Forgive me, sir, I did not know about the pork. That is most tragic, sir. I brought you . . . this. The message arrived a short time ago. It was not sealed, and I persuaded Mr. Hamilton that I should examine it in your absence. Forgive the indiscretion, sir.”
Washington saw a paper in the young man’s hand, reached out, the automatic response, held the paper in his hand for a long moment.
“Is this . . . bad news, Mr. Lafayette?”
“It is unfortunate, sir.”
He unfolded the paper, was surprised to see the name of Patrick Henry. He tried to focus his eyes on the man’s writing, saw it was merely an introduction, Henry forwarding some other letter to Washington’s hand. He read for a moment, said, “It seems my friend Mr. Henry has been the recipient of another of these anonymous essays which are circulating around the congress. He has enclosed it . . . oh, well, I misspoke. This one is not so anonymous after all. There is no signature, but I recognize the handwriting. This is from the hand of my friend, Dr. Rush.” He held the letter up, caught the light from the window, began to read, felt the words knotting up deep inside of him, a chill rising in his chest.
“Dr. Rush clearly believes that the cause of our country’s woes can be placed firmly at my feet.”
Lafayette said, “It is outrageous, sir! He does not even sign his name! What manner of cowardice is this?”
Washington continued to read, and he made a small sound, the words cutting into him,
But is our case desperate? By no means. We have wisdom, virtue and strength enough to save us if they should be called into action. The northern army has shown us what Americans are capable of doing with a GENERAL at their head. The spirit of the southern army is no ways inferior to the spirit of the northern. A Gates, a Lee, or a Conway would in a few weeks render them an irresistible body of men . . .
He lowered the paper.
“Dr. Rush has joined that ever-growing cabal who champion those men who believe themselves more capable of commanding this army. This is disappointing, Mr. Lafayette. B
ut not so much as to incite your anger.”
“I must disagree, sir! Conway? This is surely a product of his indiscreet blathering to congress. The man has inspired nothing short of an insurrection against your command, and, of course, he has found a willing partner in the ambitions of General Gates!”
Thomas Conway was an Irishman who had come to the army from France, another in the long line of puffed-up martinets, generally despised by everyone at headquarters. But Conway had gone a step further than so many of those who simply displayed their medals. He had taken his campaign to congress with unceasing energy, had been open and aggressive about his own qualifications for command. Congress had tried to appease the man by granting him a major general’s rank, with the position of “inspector general.” As such, he would not answer to Washington, but directly to the congressional Board of War. It was an absurd arrangement, and could not disguise the growing dissatisfaction with Washington’s power. When Conway had presented himself at headquarters, Washington had essentially ignored him, but Conway would not go away quietly. The man’s words came back to him now, Conway’s own letter, an astounding comment to Gates that had come to Washington’s hand:
Heaven has been determined to save your country; or a weak general and bad counselors would have ruined it . . .
Washington folded Henry’s letter, slipped it into his coat.
“Thank you, Mr. Lafayette.”
He moved to his chair, put a hand on the back of his tall desk, stood quietly for a moment. Lafayette said, “Sir, how will you respond to this? This is outrageous! These men are clearly advancing their efforts to undermine your command!”
Washington stared toward the window, his mind a soft blur, his thoughts as bleak as the white ground that spread out beyond the house.