Coming Battle for New York

Coming Battle for New York

At 9 o'clock in the morning on the 29th of June, sentinels posted on the roof of the Kennedy House at No. 1 Broad Way suddenly noted warning signals fluttering on Staten Island. Major General Sir William Howe's invasion fleet, two weeks out of Halifax, had at last arrived in force at the entrance to New York's outer harbor.

For a time, as the fleet continued to gather near Sandy Hook, the city was calm. But on July 2, when British ships headed up the Narrows, New York was aroused. Soon, from St. Paul's Church at the city's northern edge to the Bowling Green, drummers began beating out the long ominous roll that calls soldiers to assembly. In the hazy heat, Continentals and militia, some in blue coats and buckskin breeches, some in brown hunting shirts, formed up, shouldered arms, then clattered over durable Dutch cobblestones to man sod redoubts recently thrown up at the foot of each major street leading to the harbor. At the Grand Battery, where Colonel Henry Knox, commander of Continental artillery, has set up a row of old and partly rusted cannon, sweating artillerymen stood to their pieces and peered southward across the waters. Alarm guns roared to alert northern batteries and fortifications in the woods along both east and west shores of the island. Major General Israel Putnam hastily ferried over from Manhattan to Long Island with 500 men to support Brigadier General Nathanael Greene's four regiments on fortified Brooklyn Heights. Here a line of redoubts and breastworks zigzags for some two miles between Gowanus Creek and Wallabout Bay.

It was soon clear, however, that after months of waiting, anxious New York citizens and soldiery faced more waiting still. As the British fleet came on, the lead ships, instead of continuing north for a quick assault on Manhattan, turned toward Staten Island. Clouds of canvas blossomed in the lower harbor --more frigates and transports (130 vessels carrying 9,300 troops) than anyone in the Colonies had ever before seen assembled. When at last the fleet was anchored and its sails were struck, the bare masts reminded one Continental soldier of a "wood of pine trees trimmed." Noted Private Daniel McCurtin of Maryland: "I thought all London was afloat."

New Yorkers watched helplessly from housetops and quays (spyglasses were in great demand) while General Howe took three leisurely and triumphant days to establish his armies on the green shores of Staten Island. Tents gradually dotted the countryside.

Loyalist crowds cheered General Howe when he came ashore, and his red-coated infantrymen soon found friends for themselves. A British officer commented cheerfully, "The fair nymphs of this isle are in wonderful tribulation ... A girl cannot step into the bushes to pluck a rose without running the most imminent risk of being ravished." Staten Island's 400 militiamen, who had been called up by Washington to defend the island, grounded their muskets and obligingly swore allegiance to the Crown. That oath was administered by New York's newly returned Royal Governor William Tryon, who had to spend recent months in the sanctuary of the British ship the Duchess of Gordon.

Discouraged by these events, hundreds of New Yorkers gathered up such belongings as were easily carried and left the city by cart and foot, creaking their way northward through the green fields that border Bowery Lane. One American officer recalls his wife's fear of being caught in battle: "You can scarcely conceive the distress and anxiety that she then had. The city is in an uproar and everything in the height of bustle. I scolded like a fury at her for not having gone before." The destination of the fleeing New Yorkers: the King's Bridge, the only way over the Harlem River to temporary safety in Westchester. Even the New York Provincial Congress moved to the safety of the courthouse at White Plains, 25 miles north of the city. Once there, they declared the Province of New York a state.

To rally his troops, Washington issued a resounding order of the day: "The time is now near at hand which must probably determine whether Americans are to be freemen or slaves."

Much is at stake in New York. And while it is a logical place for the British to attack, it is a less than ideal place for Washington to defend. One difficulty is the nature of the New Yorkers themselves. Colonel Knox, a Bostonian, has described them as "magnificent in their pride and conceit, which is inimitable; in the want of principle, which is prevalent; in their Toryism, which is insufferable, and for which they must repent in dust and ashes."

In fact, as long as the Colonies have almost no naval forces available, New York is virtually indefensible against strong sea and land attack. Worse, whether it is finally occupied or not, it can easily be destroyed by naval fire, as Falmouth in the Maine District was set ablaze last year and Norfolk, Virginia, was burned down in January. If New York citizens were less notably Loyalist (an estimated two-thirds of the city is owned by Tories), Howe's gunners could reduce the city to ruin.

The vulnerability of the city, its political importance and the desire of both Rebels and redcoats to keep from destroying it will certainly affect Howe's tactics once his attack is launched. These factors have already profoundly affected Washington's defense. Howe, sources in London confirm, needs the city whole, as a center of flourishing Tory trade and power in the Colonies. He also wants it for winter quarters and as a base from which his forces may push up Hudson's River. If in the process of taking the city, he can capture Washington's Army, it is possible even now that colonial resistance, shaky and divided as it still is, may collapse entirely.

Washington's basic plan was established last winter by his British-trained second in command, gaunt, hot-tempered Major General Charles Lee. Before going south to take command in Charles Town, South Carolina, Lee studied New York. His conclusions: since the two best military plans (burning the city or simply abandoning it to Howe) were both politically and morally objectionable, the only way open was a defense that would show the flag and yet make the British pay heavily for taking the city. He persuaded Washington to 1) keep most of his troops dispersed around New York and 2) concentrate on entrenched artillery along the rivers around Manhattan. Washington still hopes to keep British ships, especially troop transports, from moving freely up and down the rivers to outflank him. To this end he has also placed chevaux-de-frise (chains of sunken hulks studded with stakes just beneath the water line) between New Jersey and Fort Washington, just south of the King's Bridge. The extent to which such devices may hinder British naval action is doubtful. If Washington is also doubtful, he is not the kind of leader to share his fears with an already wavering public. Washington's aides would neither confirm nor deny the dramatic rumor that Sir William Howe has thus far delayed his attack only because he is expecting the imminent arrival (probably this week) of his brother Admiral Lord Howe with another vast fleet--about 150 vessels and some 10,000 men. Also expected are the Hessian mercenaries whom King George is known to have hired. As Washington has said, "We may expect a very bloody summer in New York."

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