On the Affairs of North America
In Which the Mistakes in the Abbe's Account of the Revolution
of Amreica [sic] are Corrected and Cleared Up
Thomas Paine
[A letter addressed to the Abbe Raynal, 1782]
INTRODUCTION A London translation of an original work in
French, by the Abbe Raynal, which treats of the Revolution of North
America, having been reprinted in Philadelphia and other parts of
the continent, and as the distance at which the Abbe is placed from
the American theatre of war and politics, has occasioned him to
mistake several facts, or misconceive the causes or principles by
which they were produced; the following tract, therefore, is
published with a view to rectify them, and prevent even accidental
errors intermixing with history, under the sanction of time and
silence.
The Editor of the London edition has entitled it, "The
Revolution of America, by the Abbe Raynal," and the American
printers have followed the example. But I have understood, and I
believe my information just, that the piece, which is more properly
reflections on the revolution, was unfairly purloined from the
printer which the Abbe employed, or from the manuscript copy, and is
only part of a larger work then in the press, or preparing for it.
The person who procured it appears to have been an Englishman; and
though, in an advertisement prefixt to the London edition, he has
endeavoured to gloss over the embezzlement with professions of
patriotism, and to soften it with high encomiums on the author, yet
the action, in any view in which it can be placed, is illiberal and
unpardonable.
"In the course of his travels," says he, "the
translator happily succeeded in obtaining a copy of this exquisite
little piece, which has not yet made its appearance from any press.
He publishes a French edition, in favour of those who will feel its
eloquent reasoning more forcibly in its native language, at the same
time with the following translation of it; in which he has been
desirous, perhaps in vain, that all the warmth, the grace, the
strength, the dignity of the original should not be lost. And he
flatters himself, that the indulgence of the illustrious historian
will not be wanting to a man, who, of his own motion, has taken the
liberty to give this composition to the public, only from a strong
persuasion, that this momentous argument will be useful, in a
critical conjecture, to that country which he loves with an ardour
that can be exceeded only by the nobler flame which burns in the
bosom of the philanthropic author, for the freedom and happiness of
all the countries upon earth."
This plausibility of setting off a dishonourable action, may pass
for patriotism and sound principles with those who do not enter into
its demerits, and whose interest is not injured, nor their happiness
affected thereby. But it is more than probable, notwithstanding the
declarations it contains, that the copy was obtained for the sake of
profiting by the sale of a new and popular work, and that the
professions are but a garb to the fraud.
It may with propriety be remarked, that in all countries where
literature is protected, and it never can flourish where it is not,
the works of an author are his legal property; and to treat letters
in any other light than this, is to banish them from the country, or
strangle them in the birth. - The embezzlement from the Abbe Raynal
was, it is true, committed by one country upon another, and
therefore shews no defect in the laws of either. But it is
nevertheless a breach of civil manners and literary justice; neither
can it be any apology, that because the countries are at war,
literature shall be entitled to depredation.[1]
But the forestalling the Abbe's publication by London editions,
both in French and English, and thereby not only defrauding him, and
throwing an expensive publication on his hands, by anticipating the
sale, are only the smaller injuries which such conduct may occasion.
A man's opinions, whether written or in thought, are his own until
he pleases to publish them himself; and it is adding cruelty to
injustice to make him the author of what future reflection or better
information might occasion him to suppress or amend. There are
declarations and sentiments in the Abbe's piece, which, for my own
part, I did not expect to find, and such as himself, on a revisal,
might have seen occasion to change, but the anticipated piracy
effectually prevented him the opportunity, and precipitated him into
difficulties, which, had it not been for such ungenerous fraud,
might not have happened.
This mode of making an author appear before his time, will appear
still more ungenerous, when we consider how exceedingly few men
there are in any country who can at once, and without the aid of
reflection and revisal, combine warm passions with a cool temper,
and the full expansion of imagination with the natural and necessary
gravity of judgment, so as to be rightly balanced within themselves,
and to make a reader feel, and understand justly at the same time.
To call three powers of the mind into action at once, in a manner
that neither shall interrupt, and that each shall aid and vigorate
the other, is a talent very rarely possessed.
It often happens, that the weight of an argument is lost by the wit
of setting it off, or the judgment disordered by an intemperate
irritation of the passions: yet a certain degree of animation must
be felt by the writer, and raised in the reader, in order to
interest the attention; and a sufficient scope given to the
imagination, to enable it to create in the mind a sight of the
persons, characters, and circumstances of the subject; for without
these, the judgment will feel little or no excitement to office, and
its determinations will be cold, sluggish, and imperfect. But if
either or both of the two former are raised too high, or heated too
much, the judgment will be jostled from his seat, and the whole
matter, however important in itself, will diminish into a pantomime
of the mind, in which we create images that promote no other purpose
than amusement.
The Abbe's writings bear evident marks of that extension and
rapidness of thinking and quickness of sensation which of all others
require revisal, and the more particularly so when applied to the
living characters of nations or individuals in a state of war. The
least misinformation or misconception leads to some wrong conclusion
and an error believed becomes the progenitor of others. And as the
Abbe has suffered some inconveniences in France, by mistating
certain circumstances of the war and the characters of the parties
therein, it becomes some apology for him, that those errors were
precipitated into the world by the avarice of an ungenerous enemy.
FOOTNOTE:
- The state of literature in America must one
day become a subject of legislative consideration. Hitherto it
hath been a disinterested volunteer in the service of the
revolution, and no man thought of profits: but when peace shall
give time and opportunity for study, the country will deprive
itself of the honour and service of letters and the improvement
of science, unless sufficient laws are made to prevent
depredations on literary property. It is well worth remarking
that Russia, who but a few years ago was scarcely known in
Europe, owes a large share of her present greatness to the close
attention she has paid, and the wise encouragement she has given
to science and learning, and we have almost the same instance in
France, in the reign of Lewis XIV.
******
To an author of such distinguished reputation as the Abbe Raynal,
it might very well become me to apologize for the present
undertaking; but as to be right is the first wish of philosophy, and
the first principle of history, he will, I presume, accept from me a
declaration of my motives, which are those of doing justice, in
preference to any complimental apology, I might otherwise make. The
Abbe, in the course of his work, has, in some instances extolled,
without a reason, and wounded without a cause. He has given fame
where it was not deserved, and withheld it where it was justly due;
and appears to be so frequently in and out of temper with his
subjects and parties, that few or none of them are decisively and
uniformly marked.
It is yet too soon to write the history of the revolution; and
whoever attempts it precipitately, will unavoidably mistake
characters and circumstances, and involve himself in error and
difficulty. Things like men are seldom understood rightly at first
sight. But the Abbe is wrong even in the foundation of his work;
that is, he has misconceived and misstated the causes which produced
the rupture between England and her then colonies, and which led on,
step by step, unstudied and uncontrived on the part of America, to a
revolution, which has engaged the attention, and affected the
interest of Europe.
To prove this, I shall bring forward a passage, which, though
placed towards the latter part of the Abbe's work, is more
intimately connected with the beginning: and in which, speaking of
the original cause of the dispute, he declares himself in the
following manner -
"None," says he, "of those energetic causes, which
have produced so many revolutions upon the globe, existed in
North-America. Neither religion nor laws had there been outraged.
The blood of martyrs or patriots had not there streamed from
scaffolds. Morals had not there been insulted. Manners, customs,
habits, no object dear to nations, had there been the sport of
ridicule. Arbitrary power had not there torn any inhabitant from the
arms of his family and friends, to drag him to a dreary dungeon.
Public order had not been there inverted. The principles of
administration had not been changed there; and the maxims of
government had there always remained the same. The whole question
was reduced to the knowing whether the mother country had, or, had
not a right to lay, directly or indirectly, a slight tax upon the
colonies."
On this extraordinary passage, it may not be improper, in general
terms, to remark, that none can feel like those who suffer; and that
for a man to be a competent judge of the provocative, or, as the
Abbe styles them, the energetic causes of the revolution, he must
have resided in America.
The Abbe, in saying that the several particulars he has enumerated
did not exist in America, and neglecting to point out the particular
period in which the means they did not exist, reduces thereby his
declaration to a nullity, by taking away all meaning from the
passage.
They did not exist in 1763, and they all existed before 1776;
consequently as there was a time when they did not, and another when
they did exist, the time when constitutes the essence of the fact;
and not to give it, is to withhold the only evidence which proves
the declaration right or wrong, and on which it must stand or fall.
But the declaration as it now appears, unaccompanied by time, has an
effect in holding out to the world, that there was no real cause for
the revolution, because it denied the existence of all those causes
which are supposed to be justifiable, and which the Abbe styles
energetic.
I confess myself exceedingly at a loss to find out the time to
which the Abbe alludes; because, in another part of the work, in
speaking of the stamp act, which was passed in 1764, he styles it "An
usurpation of the Americans' most precious and sacred rights."
Consequently he here admits the most energetic of all causes, that
is, an usurpation of their most precious and sacred rights, to have
existed in America twelve years before the declaration of
independence, and ten years before the breaking out of hostilities.
The time, therefore, in which the paragraph is true, must be
antecedent to the stamp act, but as at that time there was no
revolution, nor any idea of one, it consequently applies without a
meaning; and as it cannot, on the Abbe's own principle, be applied
to any time after the stamp act, it is therefore a wandering,
solitary paragraph connected with nothing, and at variance with
every thing.
The stamp act, it is true, was repealed two years after it was
passed; but it was immediately followed by one of infinitely more
mischievous magnitude, I mean the declaratory act, which asserted
the right, as it was styled, of the British Parliament, "to
bind America in all cases whatsoever."
If then, the stamp act was an usurpation of the Americans' most
precious and sacred rights, the declaratory Act left them no rights
at all; and contained the full grown seeds of the most despotic
government ever exercised in the world. It placed America not only
in the lowest, but in the basest state of vassalage; because it
demanded an unconditional submission in everything, or, as the act
expressed it, in all cases whatsoever: and what renders this act the
more offensive, is, that it appears to have been passed as an act of
mercy; truly then may it be said, that the tender mercies of the
wicked are cruel.
All the original charters from the Crown of England, under the
faith of which, the adventurers from the old world settled in the
new, were by this act displaced from their foundations; because,
contrary to the nature of them, which was that of a compact, they
were now made subject to repeal or alteration at the mere will of
one party only. The whole condition of America was thus put into the
hands of the Parliament or the Ministry, without leaving to her the
least right in any case whatsoever.
There is no despotism to which this iniquitous law did not extend;
and though it might have been convenient in the execution of it, to
have consulted manners and habits, the principle of the act made all
tyranny legal. It stopt no where. It went to everything. It took in
with it the whole life of a man, or, if I may so express it, an
eternity of circumstances. It is the nature of law to require
obedience, but this demanded servitude; and the condition of an
American, under the operation of it, was not that of a subject, but
a vassal. Tyranny has often been established without law, and
sometimes against it, but the history of mankind does not produce
another instance, in which it has been established by law. It is an
audacious outrage upon civil government, and cannot be too much
exposed, in order to be sufficiently detested.
Neither could it be said after this, that the legislature of that
country any longer made laws for this, but that it gave out
commands; for wherein differed an act of Parliament constructed on
this principle, and operating in this manner, over an unrepresented
people, from the orders of a military establishment?
The Parliament of England, with respect to America, was not
septennial but perpetual. It appeared to the latter a body always in
being. Its election or expiration were to her the same, as if its
members succeeded by inheritance, or went out by death, or lived for
ever, or were appointed to it as a matter of office. Therefore, for
the people of England to have any just conception of the mind of
America, respecting this extraordinary act, they must suppose all
election and expiration in that country to cease forever, and the
present Parliament, its heirs, &c., to be perpetual; in this
case, I ask, what would the most clamorous of them think, were an
act to be passed, declaring the right of such a Parliament to bind
them in all cases whatsoever? For this word whatsoever would go as
effectually to their Magna Charta, Bill of Rights, trial by Juries,
&c. as it went to the charters and forms of government in
America.
I am persuaded, that the Gentleman to whom I address these remarks
will not, after the passing of this act, say, "That the
principles of administration had not been changed in America, and
that the maxims of government had there been always the same."
For here is, in principle, a total overthrow of the whole; and not a
subversion only, but an annihilation of the foundation of liberty
and absolute dominion established in its stead.
The Abbe likewise states the case exceedingly wrong and
injuriously, when he says, "that that the whole question was
reduced to the knowing whether the mother country had, or had not, a
right to lay, directly or indirectly, a slight tax upon the
colonies." This was not the whole of the question; neither was
the quantity of the tax the object, either to the Ministry, or to
the Americans. It was the principle, of which the tax made but a
part, and the quantity still less, that formed the ground on which
America opposed.
The tax on tea, which is the tax here alluded to, was neither more
or less than an experiment to establish the practice of a
declaratory law upon; modelled into the more fashionable phrase of
the universal supremacy of Parliament. For until this time the
declaratory law had lain dormant, and the framers of it had
contented themselves with barely declaring an opinion.
Therefore the whole question with America, in the opening of the
dispute, was, Shall we be bound in all cases whatsoever by the
British Parliament, or shall we not? For submission to the tea or
tax act, implied an acknowledgment of the declaratory act, or, in
other words, of the universal supremacy of Parliament, which as they
never intended to do, it was necessary they should oppose it, in its
first stage of execution.
It is probable, the Abbe has been led into this mistake by perusing
detached pieces in some of the American newspapers; for, in a case
where all were interested, everyone had a right to give his opinion;
and there were many who, with the best intentions, did not chuse the
best, nor indeed the true ground, to defend their cause upon. They
felt themselves right by a general impulse, without being able to
separate, analyze, and arrange the parts.
I am somewhat unwilling to examine too minutely into the whole of
this extraordinary passage of the Abbe, lest I should appear to
treat it with severity; otherwise I could shew, that not a single
declaration is justly founded; for instance, the reviving an
obsolete act of the reign of Henry the Eighth, and fitting it to the
Americans, by authority of which they were to be seized and brought
from America to England, and there imprisoned and tried for any
supposed offenses, was, in the worse sense of the words, to tear
them by the arbitrary power of Parliament, from the arms of their
families and friends, and drag them not only to dreary but distant
dungeons. Yet this act was contrived some years before the breaking
out of hostilities. And again, though the blood of martyrs and
patriots had not streamed on the scaffolds, it streamed in the
streets, in the massacre of the inhabitants of Boston, by the
British soldiery in the year 1770.
Had the Abbe said that the causes which produced the revolution in
America were originally different from those which produced
revolutions in other parts of the globe, he had been right. Here the
value and quality of liberty, the nature of government, and the
dignity of man, were known and understood, and the attachment of the
Americans to these principles produced the revolution, as a natural
and almost unavoidable consequence. They had no particular family to
set up or pull down. Nothing of personality was incorporated with
their cause. They started even-handed with each other, and went no
faster into the several stages of it, than they were driven by the
unrelenting and imperious conduct of Britain. Nay, in the last act,
the declaration of independence, they had nearly been too late; for
had it not been declared at the exact time it was, I saw no period
in their affairs since, in which it could have been declared with
the same effect, and probably not at all.
But the object being formed before the reverse of fortune took
place, that is, before the operations of the gloomy campaign of
1776, their honour, their interest, their everything, called loudly
on them to maintain it; and that glow of thought and energy of
heart, which even distant prospect of independence inspires, gave
confidence to their hopes, and resolution to their conduct, which a
state of dependence could never have reached. They looked forward to
happier days and scenes of rest, and qualified the hardships of the
campaign by contemplating the establishment of their new-born
system.
If, on the other hand, we take a review of what part great Britain
has acted, we shall find every thing which ought to make a nation
blush. The most vulgar abuse, accompanied by that species of
haughtiness which distinguishes the hero of a mob from the character
of a gentleman; it was equally as much from her manners as from her
injustice that she lost the colonies. By the latter she provoked
their principles, by the former she wore out their temper; and it
ought to be held out as an example to the world, to shew how
necessary it is to conduct the business of government with civility.
In short, other revolutions may have originated in caprice, or
generated in ambition, but here, the most unoffending humility was
tortured into rage, and the infancy of existence made to weep.
A union so extensive, continued and determined, suffering with
patience, and never in despair, could not have been produced by
common causes. It must be something capable of reaching the whole
soul of man and arming it with perpetual energy. In vain it is to
look for precedents among the revolutions of former ages, to find
out, by comparison, the causes of this. The spring, the progress,
the object, the consequences, nay the men, their habits of thinking,
and all the circumstances of the country, are different. Those of
other nations are, in general, little more than the history of their
quarrels. They are marked by no important character in the annals of
events; mixt in the mass of general matters, they occupy but a
common page; and while the chief of the successful partizans stept
into power, the plundered multitude sat down and sorrowed. Few, very
few of them are accompanied with reformation, either in government
or manners; many of them with the most consummate
profligacy.-Triumph on the one side, and misery on the other, were
the only events. Pains, punishments, torture, and death, were made
the business of mankind, until compassion, the fairest associate of
the heart, was driven from its place; and the eye, accustomed to
continual cruelty, could behold it without offence.
But as the principles of the present resolution differed from those
which preceded it, so likewise has the conduct of America, both in
government and war. Neither the foul finger of disgrace, nor the
bloody hand of vengeance has hitherto put a blot upon her fame. Her
victories have received lustre from a greatness of lenity; and her
laws been permitted to slumber, where they might justly have
awakened to punish. War, so much the trade of the world, has here
been only the business of necessity; and when the necessity shall
cease, her very enemies must confess, that as she drew the sword in
her just defence, she used it without cruelty, and sheathed it
without revenge.
As it is not my design to extend these remarks to a history, I
shall now take my leave of this passage of the Abbe, with an
observation, which, until something unfolds itself to convince me
otherwise, I cannot avoid believing to be true; - which is, that it
was the fixt determination of the British Cabinet to quarrel with
America at all events.
They (the members who compose the cabinet) had no doubt of success,
if they could once bring it to the issue of a battle; and they
expected from a conquest, what they could neither propose with
decency, nor hope for by negociation. The charters and constitutions
of the colonies were become to them matters of offence, and their
rapid progress in property and population were disgustingly beheld
as the growing and natural means of independence. They saw no way to
retain them long but by reducing them time. A conquest would at once
have made them both lords and landlords, and put them in the
possession both of the revenue and the rental. The whole trouble of
government would have ceased in a victory, and a final end put to
remonstrance and debate. The experience of the stamp act had taught
them how to quarrel with the advantages of cover and convenience,
and they had nothing to do but to renew the scene, and put
contention into motion. They hoped for a rebellion, and they made
one. They expected a declaration of independence, and they were not
disappointed. But after this, they looked for victory, and obtained
a defeat.
If this be taken as the generating cause of the contest, then is
every part of the conduct of the British ministry consistent, from
the commencement of the dispute, until the signing the treaty of
Paris, after which, conquest becoming doubtful, they retreated to
negociation, and were again defeated.
Though the Abbe possesses and displays great powers of genius, and
is a master of style and language, he seems not to pay equal
attention to the office of an historian. His facts are coldly and
carelessly stated. They neither inform the reader, nor interest him.
Many of them are erroneous, and most of them defective and obscure.
It is undoubtedly both an ornament, and a useful addition to
history, to accompany it with maxims and reflections. They afford
likewise an agreeable change to the style, and a more diversified
manner of expression; but it is absolutely necessary that the root
from whence they spring, or the foundations on which they are
raised, should be well attended to, which in this work they are not.
The Abbe hastens through his narrations, as if he was glad to get
from them, that he may enter the more copious field of eloquence and
imagination.
The actions of Trenton and Princeton, in New Jersey, in December
1776, and January following, on which the fate of America stood for
a while trembling on the point of suspence, and from which the most
important consequences followed, are comprised within a single
paragraph, faintly conceived, and barren of character, circumstance
and description.
"On the 25th of December," says the Abbe, "they (the
Americans) crossed the Delaware, and fell accidentally upon Trenton,
which was occupied by fifteen hundred of the twelve thousand
Hessians, sold in so base a manner by their avaricious master, to
the King of Great Britain. This corps was massacred, taken, or
dispersed. Eight days after, three English regiments were in like
manner driven from Princeton; but after having better supported
their reputation than the foreign troops in their pay."
This is all the account which is given of these most interesting
events. The Abbe has preceded them by two or three pages, on the
military operations of both armies, from the time of General Howe
arriving before New York from Halifax, and the vast reinforcements
of British and foreign troops with Lord Howe from England. But in
these there is so much mistake, and so many omissions, that to set
them right, must be the business of history, and not of a letter.
The action of Long Island is but barely hinted at; and the
operations at the White Plains wholly omitted: as are likewise the
attack and loss of Fort Washington, with a garrison of about two
thousand five hundred men, and the precipitate evacuation of Fort
Lee, in consequence thereof; which losses were in a great measure
the cause of the retreat through the Jersies to the Delaware, a
distance of about ninety miles. Neither is the manner of the retreat
described, which, from the season of the year, the nature of the
country, the nearness of the two armies (sometimes within sight and
shot of each other for such a length of way), the rear of the one
employed in pulling down bridges, and the van of the other in
building them up, must necessarily be accompanied with many
interesting circumstances.
It was a period of distresses. A crisis rather of danger than of
hope, there is no description can do it justice; and even the actors
in it, looking back upon the scene, are surprised how they got
through; and at a loss to account for those powers of the mind and
springs of animation, by which they withstood the force of
accumulated misfortune.
It was expected, that the time for which the army was enlisted,
would carry the campaign so far into the winter, that the severity
of the season, and the consequent condition of the roads, would
prevent any material operation of the enemy, until the new army
could be raised for the next year. And I mention it, as a matter
worthy of attention by all future historians, that the movements of
the American army, until the attack upon the Hessian post at
Trenton, the 26th of December, are to be considered as operating to
effect no other principal purpose than delay, and to wear away the
campaign under all the disadvantages of an unequal force, with as
little misfortune as possible.
But the loss of the garrison at Fort Washington, on the 16th of
November, and the expiration of the time of a considerable part of
the army, so early as the 30th of the same month, and which were to
be followed by almost daily expirations afterwards, made retreat the
only final expedient. To these circumstances may be added the
forlorn and destitute condition of the few that remained; for the
garrison at Fort Lee, which composed almost the whole of the
retreat, had been obliged to abandon it so instantaneously, that
every article of stores and baggage was left behind, and in this
destitute condition, without tent or blanket, and without any other
utensils to dress their provision than what they procured by the
way, they performed a march of about ninety miles, and had the
address and management to prolong it to the space of nineteen days.
By this unexpected, or rather unthought of turn of affairs, the
country was in an instant surprised into confusion, and found an
enemy within its bowels, without any army to oppose him. There were
no succours to be had, but from the free-will offering of the
inhabitants. All was choice, and every man reasoned for himself.
It was in this situation of affairs, equally calculated to confound
or to inspire, that the gentleman, the merchant, the farmer, the
tradesman and the labourer, mutually turned out from all the
conveniencies of home, to perform the duties of private soldiers,
and undergo the severities of a winter campaign. The delay, so
judiciously contrived on the retreat, afforded time for the
volunteer reinforcements to join General Washington on the Delaware.
The Abbe is likewise wrong in saying, that the American army fell
accidentally on Trenton. It was the very object for which General
Washington crossed the Delaware in the dead of night, in the midst
of snow, storms, and ice: and which he immediately re-crossed with
his prisoners, as soon as he had accomplished his purpose. Neither
was the intended enterprise a secret to the enemy, imformation [sic]
having been sent of it by letter, from a British Officer at
Princeton, to Colonel Rolle, who commanded the Hessians at Trenton,
which letter was afterwards found by the Americans. Nevertheless the
post was completely surprised. A small circumstance, which had the
appearance of mistake on the part of the Americans, led to a more
capital and real mistake on the part of Rolle.
The case was this: A detachment of twenty or thirty Americans had
been sent across the river from a post a few miles above, by an
officer unacquainted with the intended attack; these were met by a
body of Hessians on the night, to which the information pointed,
which was Christmas night, and repulsed. Nothing further appearing,
and the Hessians mistaking this for the advanced party, supposed the
enterprize disconcerted, which at that time was not begun, and under
this idea returned to their quarters; so that, what might have
raised an alarm, and brought the Americans into an ambuscade, served
to take off the force of an information, and promote the success of
the enterprise. Soon after day-light General Washington entered the
town, and after a little opposition made himself master of it, with
upwards of nine hundred prisoners.
This combination of equivocal circumstances, falling within what
the Abbe styles, "the wide empire of chance," would have
afforded a fine field for thought; and I wish, for the sake of that
elegance of reflection he is so capable of using, that he had known
it.
But the action of Princeton was accompanied by a still greater
embarrassment of matters, and followed by more extraordinary
consequences. The Americans, by a happy stroke of generalship, in
this instance, not only deranged and defeated all the plans of the
British, in the intended moment of execution, but drew from their
posts the enemy they were not able to drive, and obliged them to
close the campaign. As the circumstance is a curiosity in war, and
not well understood in Europe, I shall, as concisely as I can,
relate the principal parts; they may serve to prevent future
historians from error, and recover from forgetfulness a scene of
magnificent fortitude.
Immediately after the surprise of the Hessians at Trenton, General
Washington re-crossed the Delaware, which at this place is about
three quarters of a mile over, and re-assumed his former post on the
Pennsylvania side. Trenton remained unoccupied, and the enemy were
posted at Princeton, twelve miles distant, on the road toward
New-York. The weather was now growing very severe, and as there were
very few houses near the shore where General Washington had taken
his station, the greatest part of his army remained out in the woods
and fields. These, with some other circumstances, induced the
re-crossing the Delaware and taking possession of Trenton. It was
undoubtedly a bold adventure, and carried with it the appearance of
defiance, especially when we consider the panic-struck condition of
the enemy on the loss of the Hessian post. But in order to give a
just idea of the affair, it is necessary that I should describe the
place.
Trenton is situated on a rising ground, about three quarters of a
mile distant from the Delaware, on the eastern or Jersey side; and
is cut into two divisions by a small creek or rivulet, sufficient to
turn a mill which is on it, after which it empties itself at nearly
right angles into the Delaware. The upper division, which is that to
the north-east, contains about seventy or eighty houses, and the
lower about forty of fifty. The ground on each side this creek, and
on which the houses are, is likewise rising, and the two divisions
present an agreeable prospect to each other, with the creek between,
on which there is a small stone bridge of one arch.
Scarcely had General Washington taken post here, and before the
several parties of militia, out on detachments, or on their way,
could be collected, than the British, leaving behind them a strong
garrison at Princeton, marched suddenly and entered Trenton at the
upper or north-east quarter. A party of the Americans skirmished
with the advanced party of the British, to afford time for removing
the stores and baggage, and withdrawing over the bridge.
In a little time the British had possession of one half of the
town, General Washington of the other; and the creek only separated
the two armies. Nothing could be a more critical situation than
this, and if ever the fate of America depended upon the event of a
day, it was now. The Delaware was filling fast with large sheets of
driving ice, and was impassable, so that no retreat into
Pennsylvania could be effected, neither is it possible, in the face
of an enemy, to pass a river of such extent. The roads were broken
and rugged with the frost, and the main road was occupied by the
enemy.
About four o'clock a party of the British approached the bridge,
with a design to gain it, but were repulsed. They made no more
attempts, though the creek itself is passable anywhere between the
bridge and the Delaware. It runs in a rugged, natural-made ditch,
over which a person may pass with little difficulty, the stream
being rapid and shallow. Evening was now coming on, and the British,
believing they had all the advantages they could wish for, and that
they could use them when they pleased, discontinued all further
operations, and held themselves prepared to make the attack next
morning.
But the next morning produced a scene as elegant as it was
unexpected. The British were under arms and ready to march to
action, when one of their light-horse from Princeton came furiously
down the street, with an account that General Washington had that
morning attacked and carried the British post at that place, and was
proceeding on to seize the magazine at Brunswick; on which the
British, who were then on the point of making an assault on the
evacuated camp of the Americans, wheeled about, and in a fit of
consternation marched for Princeton.
This retreat is one of those extraordinary circumstances, that in
future ages may probably pass for fable. For it will with difficulty
be believed that two armies, on which such important consequences
depended, should be crouded into so small a space as Trenton; and
that the one, on the eve of an engagement, when every ear is
supposed to be open, and every watchfulness employed, should move
completely from the ground, with all its stores, baggage and
artillery, unknown and even unsuspected by the other. And so
entirely were the British deceived, that when they heard the report
of the cannon and small arms at Princeton, they supposed it to be
thunder, though in the depth of winter.
General Washington, the better to cover and disguise his retreat
from Trenton, had ordered a line of fires to be lighted up in front
of his camp. These not only served to give an appearance of going to
rest, and continuing that deception, but they effectually concealed
from the British whatever was acting behind them, for flame can no
more be seen through than a wall, and in his situation, it may with
some propriety be said, they came a pillar of fire to the one army,
and a pillar of a cloud to the other: after this, by a circuitous
march of about eighteen miles, the Americans reached Princeton early
in the morning.
The number of prisoners taken were between two and three hundred,
with which General Washington immediately set off. The van of the
British army from Trenton, entered Princeton about an hour after the
Americans had left it, who, continuing their march for the remainder
of the day, arrived in the evening at a convenient situation, wide
of the main road to Brunswick, and about sixteen miles distant from
Princeton. But so wearied and exhausted were they, with the
continual and unabated service and fatigue of two days and a night,
from action to action, without shelter and almost without
refreshment, that the bare and frozen ground, with no other covering
than the sky, became to them a place of comfortable rest. By these
two events, and with but little comparitive force to accomplish
them, the Americans closed with advantages a campaign, which but a
few days before threatened the country with destruction. The
British army, apprehensive for the safety of their magazines at
Brunswick, eighteen miles distant, marched immediately for that
place, where they arrived late in the evening, and from which they
made no attempts to move for nearly five months.
Having thus stated the principal outlines of these two most
interesting actions, I shall now quit them, to put the Abbe right in
his misstated account of the debt and paper money of America,
wherein, speaking of these matters, he says,
"These ideal riches were rejected. The more the
multiplication of them was urged by want, the greater did their
appreciation grow. The Congress was indignant at the affronts
given to its money, and declared all those to be traitors to their
country, who should not receive it as they would have received
gold itself.
"Did not this body know, that possessions are no more to be
controuled than feelings are? Did it not perceive, that in the
present crisis, every rational man would be afraid of exposing his
fortune? Did it not see, that in the beginning of a Republic it
permitted to itself the exercise of such acts of despotism as are
unknown even in the countries which are moulded to, and become
familiar with servitude and oppression? Could it pretend that it
did not punish a want of confidence with the pains which would
have been scarcely merited by revolt and treason? Of all this was
the Congress well aware. But it had no choice of means. Its
despised and despicable scraps of paper were actually thirty times
below their original value, when more of them were ordered to be
made. On the 13th of September 1779, there was of this paper
money, amongst the public, to the amount of £.35,544,155. The
State owed moreover £.8,305,356, without reckoning the
particular debts of single Provinces."
In the above-recited passages, the Abbe speaks as if the United
States had contracted a debt of upwards of forty million pounds
sterling, besides the debts of individual States. After which,
speaking of foreign trade with America, he says, that "those
countries in Europe, which are truly commercial ones, knowing that
North America had been reduced to contract debts at the epoch even
of her greatest prosperity, wisely thought, that in her present
distress, she would be able to pay but very little, for what might
be carried to her."
I know it must be extremely difficult to make foreigners understand
the nature and circumstances of our paper money, because there are
natives who do not understand it themselves. But with us its fate is
now determined. Common consent has consigned it to rest with that
kind of regard which the long service of inanimate things insensibly
obtains from mankind. Every stone in the bridge, that has carried us
over, seems to have a claim upon our esteem. But this was a
corner-stone, and its usefulness cannot be forgotten. There is
something in a grateful mind, which extends itself even to things
that can neither be benefited by regard, nor suffer by neglect: But
so it is; and almost every man is sensible of the effect.
But to return. The paper money, though issued from Congress under
the name of dollars, did not come from that body always at that
value. Those which were issued the first year, were equal to gold
and silver. The second year less; the third still less; and so on,
for nearly the space of five years; at the end of which, I imagine,
that the whole value at which Congress might pay away the several
emissions, taking them together, was about ten or twelve millions
pounds sterling.
Now, as it would have taken ten or twelve millions sterling of
taxes, to carry on the war for five years, and, as while this money
was issuing and likewise depreciating down to nothing, there were
none, or very few valuable taxes paid; consequently the event to the
public was the same, whether they sunk ten or twelve millions of
expended money, by depreciation, or paid ten or twelve millions by
taxation; for as they did not do both, and chose to do one, the
matter, in a general view, was indifferent. And therefore, what the
Abbe supposes to be a debt, has now no existence; it having been
paid, by every body consenting to reduce it, at his own expence,
from the value of the bills continually passing among themselves, a
sum, equal to nearly what the expence of the war was for five years.
Again. - The paper money having now ceased, and the depreciation
with it, and gold and silver supplied its place, the war will now be
carried on by taxation, which will draw from the public a
considerable less sum than what the depreciation drew; but as, while
they pay the former, they do not suffer the latter, and as, when
they suffered the latter, they did not pay the former, the thing
will be nearly equal, with this moral advantage, that taxation
occasions frugality and thought, and depreciation produced
dissipation and carelessness.
And again. - If a man's portion of taxes comes to less than what he
lost by the depreciation, it proves the alteration is in his favour.
If it comes to more, and he is justly assessed, it shews that he did
not sustain his proper share of depreciation, because the one was as
operatively his tax as the other.
It is true, that it never was intended, neither was it foreseen,
that the debt contained in the paper currency should sink itself in
this manner; but as by the voluntary conduct of all and of everyone
it has arrived at this fate, the debt is paid by those who owed it.
Perhaps nothing was ever so much the act of a country as this.
Government had no hand in it. Every man depreciated his own money by
his own consent, for such was the effect which the raising of the
nominal value of goods produced. But as by such reduction he
sustained a loss equal to what he must have paid to sink it by
taxation; therefore the line of justice is to consider his loss by
the depreciation as his tax for that time, and not to tax him when
the war is over, to make that money good in any other person's
hands, which became nothing in his own.
Again.-The paper currency was issued for the express purpose of
carrying on the war. It has performed that service, without any
other material change to the public, while it lasted. But to
suppose, as some did, that at the end of the war, it was to grow
into gold and silver, or become equal thereto, was to suppose that
we were to get two hundred millions of dollars by going to war,
instead of paying the cost of carrying it on.
But if any thing in the situation of America, as to her currency or
her circumstances, yet remains not understood, then let it be
remembered, that this war is the public's war; the people's war; the
country's war. It is their independence that is to be supported;
their property that is to be secured; their country that is to be
saved. Here, government, the army, and the people, are mutually and
reciprocally one. In other wars, kings may lose their thrones and
their dominions; but here, the loss must fall on the majesty of the
multitude, and the property they are contending to save. Every man
being sensible of this, he goes to the field, or pays his portion of
the charge as the sovereign of his own possessions; and when he is
conquered, a monarch falls.
The remark which the Abbe, in the conclusion of the passage, has
made respecting America contracting debts in the time of her
prosperity (by which he means, before the breaking out of
hostilities), serves to shew, though he has not yet made the
application, the very great commercial difference between a
dependant and an independent country. In a state of dependence, and
with a fettered commerce, though with all the advantages of peace,
her trade could not balance herself, and she annually run into debt.
But now, in a state of independence, though involved in war, she
requires no credit; her stores are full of merchandise, and gold and
silver are become the currency of the country. How these things have
established themselves, it is difficult to account for: but they are
facts, and facts are more powerful than arguments.
As it is probable this letter will undergo a republication in
Europe, the remarks here thrown together will serve to show the
extreme folly of Britain, in resting her hopes of success on the
extinction of our paper currency. The expectation is at once so
childish and forlorn, that it places her in the laughable condition
of a famished lion watching for prey at a spider's web.
From this account of the currency, the Abbe proceeds to state the
condition of America in the winter of 1777, and the spring
following; and closes his observations with mentioning the treaty of
alliance, which was signed in France, and the propositions of the
British ministry, which were rejected in America. But in the manner
in which the Abbe has arranged his facts, there is a very material
error, that not only he, but other European historians, have fallen
into: none of them having assigned the true cause why the British
proposals were rejected, and all of them have assigned a wrong one.
In the winter of 1777, and spring following, Congress were
assembled at York-Town, in Pennsylvania, the British were in
possession of Philadelphia, and General Washington with the army
were encamped in huts at the Valley-Forge, twenty-five miles distant
therefrom. To all who can remember, it was a season of hardship, but
not of despair; and the Abbe, speaking of this period and its
inconveniences, says,
"A multitude of privations, added to so many other
misfortunes, might make the Americans regret their former
tranquillity, and incline them to an accommodation with England.
In vain had the people been bound to the new Government by the
sacredness of oaths, and the influence of religion. In vain had
endeavors been used to convince them, that it was impossible to
treat safely with a country in which one parliament might overturn
what should have been established by another. In vain had they
been threatened with the eternal resentment of an exasperated and
vindictive enemy. It was possible that these distant troubles
might not be balanced by the weight of present evils.
"So thought the British ministry when they sent to the New
World public agents authorized to offer every thing except
independence to these very Americans, from whom they had two years
before exacted an unconditional submission. It is not improbable,
but that by this plan of conciliation, a few months sooner, some
effect might have been produced. But at the period at which it was
proposed by the Court of London, it was rejected with disdain,
because this measure appeared but as an argument of fear and
weakness. The people were already re-assured. The Congress, the
Generals, the troops, the bold and skilful men in each colony, had
possessed themselves of the authority; every thing had recovered
its first spirit. This was the effect of a treaty of friendship
and commerce between the United States and the Court of
Versailles, signed the 8th of February, 1778."
On this passage of the Abbe's I cannot help remarking, that, to
unite time with circumstance, is a material nicety in history; the
want of which frequently throws it into endless confusion and
mistake, occasions a total separation between causes and
consequences, and connects them with others they are not
immediately, and sometimes not at all, related to.
The Abbe, in saying that the offers of the British ministry "were
rejected with disdain," is right as to the fact, but wrong as
to the time; and this error in the time, has occasioned him to be
mistaken in the cause.
The signing the treaty of Paris the 6th of February, 1778, could
have no effect on the mind or politics of America, until it was
known in America; and therefore, when the Abbe says, that the
rejection of the British offers was in consequence of the alliance,
he must mean, that it was in consequence of the alliance being known
in America; which was not the case: and by this mistake he not only
takes from her the reputation, which her unshaken fortitude in that
trying situation deserves, but is likewise led very injuriously to
suppose that had she not known of the treaty, the offers would
probably have been accepted; whereas she knew nothing of the treaty
at the time of the rejection, and consequently did not reject them
on that ground.
The propositions or offers above-mentioned, were contained in two
bills brought into the British Parliament by Lord North, on the 17th
of February, 1778. Those bills were hurried through both houses with
unusual haste; and before they had gone through all the customary
forms of Parliament, copies of them were sent over to Lord Howe and
General Howe, then in Philadelphia, who were likewise Commissioners.
General Howe ordered them to be printed in Philadelphia, and sent
copies of them by a flag to General Washington, to be forwarded to
Congress at York-Town, where they arrived the 21st of April, 1778.
Thus much for the arrival of the bills in America.
Congress, as is their usual mode, appointed a committee from their
own body, to examine them, and report thereon. The report was
brought in the next day (the twenty-second,) was read, and
unanimously agreed to, entered on their journals, and published for
the information of the country. Now this report must be the
rejection to which the Abbe alludes, because Congress gave no other
formal opinion on those bills and propositions: and on a subsequent
application from the British Commissioners, dated the 27th of May,
and received at York-Town the 6th of June, Congress immediately
referred them for an answer, to their printed resolves of the 22d of
April.-Thus much for the rejection of the offers.
On the 2d of May, that is, eleven days after the above rejection
was made, the treaty between the United States and France arrived at
York-Town; and until this moment Congress had not the least notice
or idea, that such a measure was in any train of execution. But lest
this declaration of mine should pass only for assertion, I shall
support it by proof, for it is material to the character and
principle of the revolution to shew, that no condition of America,
since the declaration of independence, however trying and severe,
ever operated to produce the most distant idea of yielding it up
either by force, distress, artifice, or persuasion. And this proof
is the more necessary, because it was the system of the British
ministry at this time, as well as before and since, to hold out to
the European powers that America was unfixt in her resolutions and
policy; hoping by this artifice to lessen her reputation in Europe,
and weaken the confidence which those powers, or any of them, might
be inclined to place in her.
At the time these matters were transacting, I was Secretary to the
Foreign Department of Congress. All the political letters from the
American Commissioners rested in my hands, and all that were
officially written went from my office; and so far from Congress
knowing anything of the signing the treaty, at the time they
rejected the British offers, they had not received a line of
information from their Commissioners at Paris on any subject
whatever for upwards of a twelvemonth. Probably the loss of the port
of Philadelphia, and the navigation of the Delaware, together with
the danger of the seas, covered at this time with British cruizers,
contributed to the disappointment.
One packet, it is true, arrived at York-Town in January preceding,
which was about three months before the arrival of the treaty; but,
strange as it may appear, every letter had been taken out, before it
was put on board the vessel which brought it from France, and blank
white paper put in their stead.
Having thus stated the time when the proposals from the British
Commissioners were first received, and likewise the time when the
treaty of alliance arrived, and shewn that the rejection of the
former was eleven days prior to the arrival of the latter, and
without the least knowledge of such circumstance having taken place,
or being about to take place; the rejection, therefore, must, and
ought to be attributed to the fixt, unvaried sentiments of America
respecting the enemy she is at war with, and her determination to
support her independence to the last possible effort, and not to any
new circumstance in her favour, which at that time she did not, and
could not, know of.
Besides, there is a vigor of determination and spirit of defiance
in the language of the rejection (which I here subjoin), which
derive their greatest glory by appearing before the treaty was
known; for that, which is bravery in distress, becomes insult in
prosperity: And the treaty placed America on such a strong
foundation, that had she then known it, the answer which she gave
would have appeared rather as an air of triumph, than as the glowing
serenity of fortitude.
Upon the whole, the Abbe appears to have entirely mistaken the
matter; for instead of attributing the rejection of the propositions
to our knowledge of the treaty of alliance; he should have
attributed the origin of them in the British cabinet, to their
knowledge of that event. And then the reason why they were hurried
over to America in the state of bills, that is, before they were
passed into acts, is easily accounted for, which is that they might
have the chance of reaching America before any knowledge of the
treaty should arrive, which they were lucky enough to do, and there
met the fate they so richly merited. That these bills were brought
into the British Parliament after the treaty with France was signed,
is proved from the dates: the treaty being on the 6th and the bills
the 17th of February. And that the signing the treaty was known in
Parliament, when the bills were brought in, is likewise proved by a
speech of Mr. Charles Fox, on the said 17th of February, who, in
reply to Lord North, informed the House of the treaty being signed,
and challenged the Minister's knowledge of the same fact.
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