On August 19, 1780 the United States lost one of the most influential foreign officers that fought for the new nation during the American Revolution. Johann von Robais, Baron de Kalb migrated to the United States along with the Marquis de La Fayette in 1777. A Prussian born solider who fought in the Seven Years War, de Kalb quickly became a respected leader. In the summer of 1780, de Kalb was commanding the Maryland and Delaware Continental Line in Maj. Gen. Horatio Gates’ southern army. One of the best trained and disciplined units in the Continental Army, de Kalb commanded the left of Gates’ line at the Battle of Camden on August 16, 1780. The battle was more of a rout, as the British rolled up the Virginia and North Carolina militia on the field, leaving the Continentals in a desperate fight for survival. After being shot three times and bayoneted several times, de Kalb was taken from the battlefield to Camden. His wounds were mortal and he died three days later.
Baron de Kalb monument in Annapolis, MD
The reaction to his death was immediate and the respect everyone had for him was evident. Cornwallis and other British officers showed great respect for de Kalb and gave him a proper military burial. Washington, Gates and other Continental officers mourned the loss of the Prussian officer. Soon after the war a movement began to move de Kalb’s remains to another place in Camden with a larger monument. In 1825, Lafayette laid the cornerstone for a new monument above his new interment in front of the Bethesda Presbyterian Church. This memorial was designed by Robert Mills, a noted architect of the time.
De Kalb grave site in Camden, SC
Maryland especially took an interest in remembering de Kalb. His command of the Maryland Line and his bravery leading the men at Camden were important to Marylanders after the war. In 1780, Congress authorized a monument to be built in Annapolis to honor de Kalb, but it was not until 1886 that it was finally constructed on the grounds of the Maryland state house. In the early 20th century, the Daughters of the American Revolution placed a memorial stone on the Camden battlefield marking de Kalb’s death (supposedly marking the spot but this is still debated today). Recently in 2021, Camden unveiled a new statue to de Kalb at the new Revolutionary War Visitor Center.
The memory of de Kalb extended beyond memorials and monuments. In the late 18th century and early 19th century, states started to honor de Kalb naming counties and towns after him. A total of six counties in the United States are named after Baron de Kalb, located in Alabama, Georgia, Illinois, Indiana, Missouri and Tennessee. There are six towns/cities in the United States named for de Kalb located in Illinois, Mississippi, Missouri, New York, Ohio, Texas and West Virginia.
New statue to de Kalb at the Revolutionary War Visitor Center in Camden, SC
But one of the most recognizable memorials to de Kalb and his Maryland Continentals is one that most people don’t even know as a memorial. In southern Baltimore where the large railroad yards were located, many of the streets were named after battles and individuals in the Southern Campaign of the American Revolution. Streets such as Washington, Lee, Howard, Eutaw and Camden. The large rail yard in this area was known as Camden Yards. In 1992, the Baltimore Orioles opened their new baseball stadium in the area of the old railyards next to the old B and O Railroad warehouse. The name was hotly debated, but then Maryland Governor William Donald Schaefer wanted to keep “Camden Yards” in the stadium name and eventually won out. The stadium today is called Oriole Park at Camden Yards, but most people now refer to it as “Camden Yards.” Though de Kalb would not recognize the game being played, he would recognize the name of the stadium and the state that was the home of so many of the men that followed him into battle at Camden. So next time you watch a baseball game at Camden Yards, think of de Kalb and those men at the Battle of Camden.
I was recently reading the superb book by Patrick O’Donnell on Washington’s Immortals, which brought me back to a talk I did about the same Marylanders in the American Revolution a few years back. Below is an excerpt of that talk and highlights the second last stand for a regiment with a tradition of being steadfast when deadly duty called.
On March 15, 1781, approximately 20 men stood in the 1st Maryland Continental Regiment staring at the an eerie and familiar scene. It must have seemed that history was cruelly repeating itself once again. These men had survived the forlorn assault in New York in 1776, the ugly repulse at Camden in 1780, and now stood on third line of General Nathanael Greene’s defense at Guilford Court House.
Famous painting of the 1st Maryland at the Battle of Guilford Court House by H. CHarles McBarron, Jr.
Besides the 20 men who could be traced back to that fateful day in New York, the men that shouldered muskets in line with them were all veterans of indefinite periods of service as well.
The 1st Maryland and the men they confronted, 2nd Guards Battalion of Guards, were very similar, according to historian Lawrence Babits, who states that “the 1st Maryland was arguably one of the finest regiments produced by the Continental Army.
What ensued next was the defining moment of the battle and in essence the campaign. As the Guards officers gathered their men into a new line, the Marylanders came on at a rush. The Guards responded largely without specific commands…facing the oncoming Continentals, who fired several platoon volleys as they came. At a range of less than 12 yards, both lines fired again, so close that muzzle flashes overlapped into a wide sheet of flame and the heat from the volley could be felt.
Casualties mounted and at close range the musket balls shattered bone and even passed through the bodies of their targets.
Modern view from the location of Greene’s Third Line which the 1st Maryland held. Coming up the slight rise toward the photo was how the British approached.
The two sides then resorted to the bayonet and Williams recounted “the first Regiment embraced the opportunity…bayoneted and cut to pieces a great number of the British.”
Although the melee only lasted a few minutes, the Marylanders had checked the advance and with the dragoons of William Washington, allowed for Greene to begin to pull back and start the retreat. In another important position, Williams helped lead the rear-guard away from Guilford C.H. The Marylanders lost 15 killed, 42 wounded and 97 missing. Most of the missing could have came from the 2nd Maryland which broke in disorder on the left flank of the 1st Maryland.
Not only did the Marylanders suffer on that fateful March day in 1781, they did so with a lack of, well, everything. According to one inventory report, the entire regiment, numbering little over 300 men had not a single jacket, two-thirds were without proper footwear, and every man was destitute of a full complement of clothing. In addition, the men had served, fought courageously, and bled tremendously, without receiving one cent as pay.
A remarkable “band of brothers” that “held the line for independence.”
Which, in case you were wondering, was the name of the talk.
*Guilford Court House National Military Park is now preserved by the National Park Service, to plan your visit, click here.
*For information on Mr. O’Donnell’s book, click here.
For the next year and a half, until he was exchanged for a British officer captured in the Battle of Saratoga, Williams faced an ordeal that would continue to haunt him for the rest of his life. Initially treated as a gentleman because of his officer status, the first few months of his imprisonment passed in relative ease. The ease of the beginning months of his captivity was the norm for officers taken in civilized 18th century viewed warfare. Williams’ early imprisonment showed the gentleman status he had attained through his rise in the military ranks. During this time, an anecdote reinforces this point.
While in prison in New York, he became acquainted with a Major Ackland of the British military. The two became fast friends. Williams, under the auspices of his imprisonment, was able to move freely through the city of New York with this new friend.The friendship was confirmed when after dining with Major Ackland he was invited to attend an assembly. This was the term used to describe a fashionable ball of the period. When arriving at the ball, the reception that Major Williams received was so contemptuous and full of scorn that it attracted the attention of Major Ackland who replied: “Come, Williams, this society is to ill-bred for you and me; let us go home.” The account shows the personable demeanor and gentlemanly qualities that Williams espoused. This quote only tells half the story. The other half of the account transpired after Major Ackland returned to England that makes this story so worthy.
Upon Ackland’s return to England attended a mass dinner and one of the topics broached was the questionable courage of the American military. The major defended Americans so vehemently that he was issued a duel by a fellow British officer. This led to his demise, with a fatal gunshot wound to the head. To defend the abilities of Americans to such an extreme depicted the immense respect and valued friendship that blossomed between the two officers. Along with showing the respect and admiration that constituted the friendship was the fact that Williams reached a level where he could fraternize with gentlemen of pre-war higher social classes. In addition he was an amiable companion and a worthy military adversary in the views of British counterparts.
A sketch of one of the prison complexes used in New York City by the British to house American soldiers.
The imprisonment of Williams took a drastic turn to the worse when an accusation of espionage surfaced against him. According to the General Phillips, the commandant of New York, Major Williams was in the habit of communicating to General Washington all the information to be collected from the British camp by means of emissaries employed for that purpose. Williams was seized as soon as the accusation was leveled against him and was denied a chance to provide a defense or refutation of the charges. He was placed in the provost jail in New York, in a room about sixteen square feet. The prison cell had poor ventilation and was best described as “disgustingly filthy.”Here Williams languished for approximately eight months; the last of the fifteen months he was a prisoner of war. Although the spying was never verified and for all intents probably a false accusation, Williams’ “naturally fair constitution…was much impaired” by this ordeal.
After his exchange in January 1778, Williams took command of the 6th Maryland Regiment and Williams would see action at Monmouth Court House in the summer of that same year.
Williams headed south with the Maryland Continentals to aid the Southern Department and relieve the American garrison at Charleston, South Carolina. Unfortunately, the American reinforcements arrived too late to lift the siege.
The reinforcements did make it in time for another American military disaster; the Battle of Camden. Plucked as adjutant general for Horatio Gates, the American commander, Williams was powerless to stop the route of march that Gates chose to move the American army from North Carolina to South Carolina.
The condition of the troops, fatigued from the march along with other difficulties, mixed with very limited rations would prove fatal tomorrow to the American effort at Camden. What ensued the following day was the death of General Kalb, the lost of over 1,000 American soldiers, and the ruin of Gates military career as a field commander. The way the battle unfolded would haunt Williams for the rest of his life, which was recorded in a written component for the Papers of Nathanael Greene. He remembered how the “great majority of the militia fled without firing a shot.” This was a significant issue because the militia comprised two-thirds of the total force of Gates! Williams, along with the survivors were left to question the reasons behind the campaign, the strenuous marching, and the condition they were led into battle with.
Williams took part in the strategic move north across the Dan River in Southern Virginia, part of Nathanael Greene’s strategic maneuvering in the face of British Lord Charles Cornwallis’ British forces. Able to recuperate and refit his army across the watery boundary from the British, Greene planned the strategy that would lead Williams and the rest of the Americans back to North Carolina and to a place called Guilford Court House.
After serving a stint as a commander of light infantry, Williams played a pivotal role in the March 15, 1781 Battle of Guilford Court House. Serving in the last line, where other Marylanders of the 1st Maryland Continentals played a decisive role in saving Nathanael Greene’s American army, Williams helped lead the rear-guard away from Guilford Court House.
Williams would continue to serve admirable in future engagements at Hobkirk’s Hill and Eutaw Springs. In the later stages of 1781 Williams was given command of the 1st Maryland Regiment, the same unit that the famous painting below depicted at the Battle of Guilford Court House.
1st Maryland Continentals at Battle of Guilford Court House
In January 1783, Williams received notice that Congress had approved his promotion to brigadier general on account of his merit and service in the Southern Theater Campaigns.
Approimately halfway through that same month, on the 16th, Williams retired from the army.
After almost eight years of arduous service, Williams, like the nation he helped create by his service was a changed being. The changes were numerous, first being the obvious, that he had shown tremendous progress in climbing the officer ranks, from lieutenant in 1775 to brigadier general in 1783. Secondly, and possibly the most important he had endured through numerous campaigns and some of the bloodiest battles of the war, from Fort Washington in New York to Camden in South Carolina.
Williams return to civilian life saw him appointed as commissioner of the Port of Baltimore and he was active in the Society of Cincinnati, the society created to preserve the fellowship of former officers of the American army during the Revolution.
In 1786 Williams married Mary Smith and became a father to four sons, settling on the banks of the Potomac River where he tried his hand at farming.
Springfield Farm, home of Otho Holland Williams (courtesy of HMDB.org)
With his friendship to George Washington, Williams had his appointment as commissioner of the Port of Baltimore renewed and then in 1792 was approached by Henry Knox, Secretary of War in Washington’s administration (and at the behest of Washington) to see whether he would accept a commission as brigadier general in the regular army.
Although the position would have made Williams the second highest ranking officer in the military, he declined the position because he had no ambition for the position and also his health was poor.
Williams died on July 15, 1794. He was 45 years old. His health never recovered from the strains of imprisonment and the fatigues of war.
The town of Williamsport, Maryland, which would play a prominent role in the Gettysburg Campaign of 1863 was named after him and where he was laid to rest.
When I was completing my graduate degree in American history from George Mason University a few years back, I took on the challenge of trying to examine the motivations of American soldiers during the American Revolutionary War.
The basis was to examine, “why they fought” if I can borrow a line used frequently by Civil War scholars and historians.
Being a native Marylander, I narrowed my focus on soldiers from that colony/state.
Yet, I was struck by the continued emergence of one name in particular and this gentleman became a focal point of mine.
This gentleman became through the war and could not be ignored with any mention of Maryland and her patriotic citizenry’s service in the war. His name is Otho Holland Williams.
Otho Holland Williams
First a little background on Otho Holland Williams. Otho Williams’ early life mirrors that of many early American colonists. His parents, Joseph and Prudence Holland Williams were born and married in Wales before emigrating to the colonies and settling in Prince George’s County, Maryland.
Otho was born on March 1, 1749, one of eight children. The following year the family moved to western Maryland, settling near the mouth of Conococheauge Creek in Frederick County. Life on the frontiers of the British North American colonies could be rough and hard and before Otho reached adulthood, he lost his father. However, he showed enough promise and potential to be entrusted by a brother-in-law to a clerk position in Frederick County. Showing his ability to grasp a new skill, the young Williams rose to be given “final charge” of the clerk’s office before moving on to a clerk position in the larger town of Baltimore at age eighteen in 1757.
In Baltimore, Williams continued to enhance his reputation and business prospects. After seventeen years in the spiraling, busy port town situated on the Chesapeake Bay, Williams moved back to more familiar grounds in Frederick in 1774. With the move, he entered into the merchant trade, overseeing commercial enterprises in the growing town. Williams was building a respectable life and he would have been considered a gentleman.
However, nothing truly remarkable had happened to cause this ordinary British colonist in Maryland to be remembered by history. Events transpiring on both sides of the Atlantic Ocean soon reared an opportunity for Williams to change that.
Otho Holland Williams now 26 years of age, at the direction of the Committee of Observation of Frederick County, Md, on the 21st of June, 1775, would have heard of a letter from the Delegates of Maryland asking for the formation of two companies of “expert Riflemen to be raised” to join the army near Boston.
The gist of that correspondence is below:
“A letter from the Delegates of Maryland, and a resolve of the Congress enclosed therein, were read, requiring two companies of expert Riflemen to be furnished by this County, to join the army near Boston, to be there employed as Light-Infantry, under the command of the Chief officer of that Army
In the second company, Williams was elected one of three lieutenants and within the month was marching north to join the army, arriving in Cambridge in 22 days, marching over 550 miles, which needless to say gave a great first impression on the military officers and one that the future Commander-in-Chief George Washington would realize in New York.
George Washington was using this house as his headquarters when Williams and the Maryland riflemen arrived after a 550 mile trek to report for duty (courtesy of Mt. Vernon)
In January 1776, Capt. Price, of the rifle company, was promoted to major in Col. William Smallwood’s Maryland Regiment. The gentleman who replaced Price was Williams who succeeded him as captain. Williams’ star continued to rise and in June 1776 was appointed major in Colonel Hugh Stephenson’s newly organized rifle regiment. He was still a major in November when he saw action in New York.
While other Marylanders serving valiantly but unsuccessfully in the opening engagements of the battles around New York City, further the Hudson River stood Fort Washington and stationed there was the rifle company that Otho Williams was a member of.
Upriver from New York City the Americans had constructed two forts on either side of the Hudson River. On the island of Manhattan stood Fort Washington, named in honor of the commander-in-chief of the Continental Army. On the other bluff, stood Fort Lee named in honor of Charles Lee, a major general in the American army that had overseen the defense of New York City prior to the Continental Army’s arrival. Nathanael Greene, the very capable American general convinced General Washington that his namesake fort could be held and although of a different opinion initially, Washington relented to his subordinate. The decision would have dire consequences for Williams and the men in the rifle regiment.
Before discussing the role of Williams and his gallant band of riflemen in the defense of Fort Washington, one fact that cannot be looked over is the rapid rise that Williams had undertaken. The mere fact that a young boy, with no prior military experience, could rise to the rank of major was truly exceptional.
To rise to that similar rank in the British army would depend more on family prestige and the ability to pay the price for the commission. That this was not the case in the American army was a sign of the difference in ideals and make-up of the military. The American colonies were revolting against the aristocratic regime of Great Britain, so to imitate their promotion mechanisms would seem out of place with the republican ideals espoused by the aspiring new republic. Furthermore, the ability to navigate the command structure with the added benefit of superior’s being promoted or more morbid, die, allowed Williams to rise.
However, the previous mentioned attribute only tell a portion of the career so far of Williams. His commitment and perseverance to the cause had been duly noted and he would soon show the coolness and battlefield leadership that would cement his rise through the officer ranks.
Battle of Fort Washington, 1776
Williams commanded men of the rifle company occupied a portion of the outlying trenches that surrounded the fort because of a very grave insight the defenses in the environs of Fort Washington could not accommodate the number of American defenders. In their exposed position, the men from Maryland and Virginia would come into contact with their British and Hessian counterparts in the opening stages of the conflict on November 16, 1776. The action commenced in the morning and would be an all-day, drawn out conflict, the epitome of a “fight to the death” type battle. Part of the reason the affair turned out to be so relentless and bloody was the fact that the Americans had refused to surrender the fort initially and the ensuing action could quite possibly result in the British and their allies showing no quarter if the Americans suffered defeat.
History does not depict whether the men with Williams and under the command of Colonel Rawlings knew this fact, but what they did know was that they had been given an assignment to defend the fort and the men from Virginia and Maryland were prepared to do just that.
Map of Battle of Fort Washington (courtesy of Wiki)
Unfortunately, after facing overwhelming odds and the collapse of other sections of the American lines, Williams and his men were forced to fall back from their exposed positions. During the action Colonel Rawlings received a severe wound to the leg, resulting in a fracture of the bone. Serving as second in command, Williams assumed command of the rifle regiment, continuing to show his unwillingness to yield the field even after suffering a severe groin wound.
With the wound and the collapse of the American lines, he did not command for long. The survivors of the regiment, along with the rest of the fort’s garrison, surrendered to the British and German forces.
After the conflict, a Hessian survivor remarked about attacking the Maryland riflemen, in which Williams was most likely in command of; that “he had a hard time of it.” Another enemy soldier noted the inordinate number of wounded. Official casualty reports, listed 2,780 Americans, including Williams, as prisoners of war, and another 149 were killed and wounded. The British lost 458 killed, wounded, and missing during the day long fight.
Emerging Revolutionary War Era 