Tag: Sir William Howe

British Leadership – Bunker Hill

On By Daniel DavisIn 1775, America 250, Armies, Battlefields & Historic Places, Battles, British Leadership, Campaigns, Emerging Revolutionary War, Memory, National Park Service, Northern Theater, Personalities, Revolutionary War1 Comment

After years of political unrest between Great Britain and her North American colonies, tension finally boiled over into armed conflict on April 19, 1775, at Lexington and Concord. The British expedition to capture arms and munitions held by the colonists at Concord disintegrated into a panic-ridden retreat to Boston as local militias struck the column as it moved through the Massachusetts countryside. As often happens in war, seeds planted during a battle often sow the next.

Rather than enter march through Boston Neck British officers diverted to Cambridge and proceeded to the Charlestown Peninsula. Bordered by the Charles and Mystic Rivers, the peninsula jutted out into Boston Harbor northeast of the city. As darkness settled in, exhausted British soldiers made their way onto 110-foot high Bunker Hill. This eminence, commanded Charlestown Neck, a narrow sliver of land connecting to the mainland, along with the surrounding landscape.

That night, Lt. Gen. Thomas Gage, the British Commander-in-Chief met with Vice Admiral Samuel Graves, head of the North Atlantic Squadron. Among other suggestions, Graves urged Gage to burn Charlestown and occupy Bunker Hill. Graves likely knew that his ships in the harbor could not elevate their artillery to reach the high ground. Additionally, Bunker Hill was out of range of the Copp’s Hill Battery located in the city’s North End.

Thomas Gage

Gage recognized the long-simmering pot would eventually boil over with the colonists. “If you think ten thousand men sufficient, send twenty; if one million thought enough, give two; you save both blood and treasure in the end,” he wrote the previous fall to his superiors in London. Now, seemingly distant from the tactical situation on the ground, the survivor of the Monogahela rejected Graves’ proposal, claiming “the weakness of the army.” One must wonder if this was a decision Gage came to privately regret.

The arrival of reinforcements at the end of May, along with Maj. Gens. John Burgoyne, Henry Clinton, and William Howe may have buoyed Gage’s spirits. He soon began making plans to break out of Boston. In consultation with his subordinates, Gage formulated a plan to strike first across Boston Neck to capture Dorchester Heights, which commanded the southern end of the city. A second attack would capture Charlestown then move the three miles to Cambridge to hopefully destroy the Massachusetts army. The offensive was slated to take place on June 18.

Read more: British Leadership – Bunker Hill

Unfortunately, Boston leaked like a sieve and Gage failed to maintain what is known today as operational security. His plans were soon known in Cambridge where the Massachusetts Committee of Safety authorized their own effort to occupy Bunker Hill ahead of the British. On the night of June 16, colonial units led by Col. William Prescott marched out of Cambridge toward Charlestown. Rather than follow his orders, Prescott moved to the 60 foot high Breed’s Hill, located slightly to the southeast of Bunker Hill. Prescott’s decision remains one of the great mysteries surrounding the battle. His men began construction of a redoubt.

Another question surrounding the engagement rests with Henry Clinton. Sometime on the evening of June 16, Clinton wrote he conducted a reconnaissance and claimed he witnessed Provincial activity. He did not, however, explain where he went nor reported the type of actions he saw. Additionally, visibility would be difficult in the growing dusk. Clinton further stated he reported his findings to Gage and Howe but Gage elected to wait for daylight.

Sunrise revealed Prescott’s men atop Breed’s Hill, hard at work on the redoubt, which threatened the northern end of the city. Gage and his officers quickly convened at his headquarters at the Province House. Howe, the senior officer, would be in command. Some thought was given to sail up the Mystic to land on Charlestown Neck well in the rear of the redoubt. This plan was quickly nixed for fear the force could be isolated and cut off by reinforcements from Cambridge and militia on Breed’s Hill. It was eventually decided Howe would land below and out of range of the redoubt. Orders soon went out for the mustering of the “ten oldest companies” the flank and grenadiers, each – along with several regiments to prepare for the operation.

Each British regiment consisted of ten companies, eight line, with two flank and grenadier companies. The flank companies consisted of men who were often the shortest and fastest, who could operate in open order tactics, moving quickly to engage and skirmish with the enemy. The grenadiers, identified by their bear skin hats, were often the tallest men in the regiment and were used as the shock troops during an attack. By the time of the American Revolution, they were no longer carrying hand grenades but the name remained. Oftentimes these companies were separated from their regiments and placed in their own battalions.

Howe disembarked from Long Wharf, going over himself in the second wave, that afternoon. The British landed at Moulton’s Hill, near the modern Navy Yard. Stepping ashore, Howe observed his objective. “On first view it was clearly seen that the rebels were in forced and strongly entrenched upon their right in the Redoubt that had been seen from the town at daybreak,” he reported. “Their left and center were covered by a breastwork which reached from the Redoubt to the Mystick, the space from the Redoubt to that river being about 380 yards, and the whole extent they occupied about 600 yards”. The extent of the defenses compelled Howe to call for reinforcements.

Toward the middle of the day, the British launched their assault. Although Howe’s second in command, Brig. Gen. Robert Pigot was present and directed the left of the line, Howe also decided to take a stronger role and led the center himself on foot. Howe directed his light infantry to advance along the beach of the Mystic, likely with the hope in mind of getting behind the redoubt. This attack was met and repulsed by New Hampshire militia under Col. John Stark. So too were Howe’s and Pigot’s attacks. Watching his men come stumbling back after the failed attempt prompted Howe to later write “it was a moment I had not felt before.”

In the second assault, Howe attempted to further squeeze off the redoubt, pulling the light infantry from the beach to augment his center. At the same time, Pigot sent the 1st Marine Battalion and the 47th Regiment of Foot to get between Charlestown and the redoubt. During the assault, which also failed, the light infantry fired into the rear of the grenadiers, inflicting casualties.

Once again, the British lurched forward, determined to overwhelm the redoubt by a sheer force of numbers. This time, luck was with them as the militia were running out of ammunition. Francis, Lord Rawdon, an officer in the 5th Regiment of Foot who would go on to distinguish himself in the Southern Campaigns recalled “our men grew impatient, and all crying Push on, Push on, advanced with infinite spirit to attack the work with their small arms. As soon as the rebels perceived this, they rose up and poured in so heavy a fire upon us that the oldest officers say they never saw a sharper action. They kept up this fire until we were within ten yards of them…there are few instances of regular troops defending a redoubt till the enemy were in the very ditch of it.”

The British infantry swarmed into Prescott’s redoubt. Somewhere in the maelstrom was British lieutenant and adjutant of the 1st Marines, John Waller. “Nothing could be more shocking than the carnage that followed the storming of this work,” he wrote “We tumbled over the dead to get at the living who were crowding out of the gorge of the redoubt…’twas streaming with blood and strewed with the dead and dying men, the soldiers stabbing some and dashing out the brains of the others.” The colonials managed to retreat across Charlestown Neck, the British too exhausted to give chase.

Bunker Hill became the first of many pyrrhic victories for the British over the course of the American Revolution. Still, there were a number of shortcomings. Howe, rather than oversee the attacks from Moulton’s Hill, led the assaults himself. Perhaps he needed to inspire his men or he recognized the importance of the situation but he reverted to being a battalion commander. One must wonder whether the initial attacks could have been more effective had he delegated authority and used more of a guiding hand. Howe’s experience that day may have influenced him for the remainder of the war. Rather than rely on frontal assaults, he utilized flanking maneuvers such as those at Long Island and Brandywine. The friendly fire casualties can be attributed to inexperience amongst the ranks. Gage, along with his subordinates also share, the blame for not maintaining operational security and letting their plans slip out of Boston. Additionally, Gage failed to heed the advice of Graves and secure Charlestown Peninsula in April when he had the opportunity. The result nearly two months to the day resulted in over 1,000 British soldiers killed and wounded, a high cost of blood and treasure, in a war that would lead to the independence of the United States.

Conquering a Continent: The Battle of Quebec, September 13, 1759

On By erwpostIn Battles, Campaigns, French and Indian War1 Comment

This article by ERW’s William Griffith first appeared on the American Battlefield Trust’s website on January 4, 2021. The original link can be found here.

The French and Indian War was in its fifth full year, and the tables had turned in Britain’s favor. As the larger conflict, the Seven Years’ War, raged throughout the globe, in North America, the British were one swift strike away from conquering the continent. The French in the Ohio River Valley, Great Lakes region, and Upstate New York had been thrown back on their heels and sent scurrying north into Canada leaving the road open for a British thrust against Montreal and Quebec. For the summer of 1759, the latter city, the capital of New France, would be placed in the crosshairs by an army commanded by Major General James Wolfe. If Quebec, situated along the most important water highway in Canada, the Saint Lawrence River, should fall, the French in North America would be squeezed into the region around Montreal. Pending any catastrophic failures by Britain’s army and navy and their allies elsewhere in the world, it would only be a matter of time than before New France was conquered.

James Wolfe and His Army

Thirty-two year old James Wolfe had served in the British Army for almost eighteen years when he was given command of the roughly 9,000-man force that was tasked with defeating the French in and around Quebec City in 1759. He was hard-nosed and did not always get along with his subordinate generals, Robert Monckton, George Townshend, and James Murray. The previous year he had been a brigadier general under Jeffry Amherst during the successful siege and capture of the fortress city of Louisbourg in Nova Scotia, and afterward led a campaign of destruction against the fishing villages of the Gulf of Saint Lawrence. He then returned to England and secured a major generalship and command of the Quebec expedition. He arrived in Halifax in April 1759 and began training his force and preparing plans for his campaign.

Wolfe’s army was composed predominantly of professional British soldiers. Several hundred North American ranger units also complimented his force, which he described as, “… the worst soldiers in the universe.” He did not have much respect for colonial troops. On June 26, Wolfe’s men began landing at Ile d’Orleans in the middle of the Saint Lawrence River just to the east of Quebec City. Across the river, the French commander, the Marquis de Montcalm, prepared to oppose them.

The Marquis de Montcalm and Quebec’s Defenders

Louis-Joseph, Marquis de Montcalm, had been in command of France’s regular troops in North America since 1756. During that time he had put together an impressive string of victories at places like Fort Oswego, Fort William Henry, and Fort Carillon. As the attack on Quebec loomed, he was given command of all military forces on the continent, including the Canadian militia and marines. The previous harvest had not been good in Canada, and his army and the civilians in the city were on short rations, but relief came during the spring of 1759 when ships arrived carrying food and supplies. With this, Montcalm was determined to hold onto the city at all costs. He dug trenches outside the city and along the Saint Lawrence’s northern shoreline extending for nearly ten miles, welcoming a frontal assault from Wolfe. His army, consisting of over 3,500 French regular troops, included thousands more Native American allies and Canadian militiamen who were not accustomed to fighting in open fields against professional enemy soldiers. This important disadvantage would play a large part in Montcalm’s ultimate defeat.

An engraving of Montmorency
An engraving of General James Wolfe’s failed attack on the Montmorency River, July 31, 1859. Library of Congress

The Campaign

When General Wolfe’s army began landing at Ile d’Orleans and subsequently Point Levis (directly across the river from the city) to the east of Quebec, he had initially hoped to force a landing on the northern shore just a few miles downstream at Beauport. However, he quickly discovered that Montcalm had heavily fortified the landing site, throwing a monkey wrench into his plans. This did not deter Wolfe, however, and by July 12, he had placed ten mortars and cannon at Point Levis and began bombarding the city itself. More guns were brought up and the bombardment continued for weeks in an effort to demoralize those within Quebec City.

The best chance to defeat Montcalm was to force him out of his defenses and into an open field battle. Wolfe understood that his vigorously trained and superior disciplined regular troops would have the upper hand against lesser-numbered French regulars and their militia. His first attempt to accomplish this occurred on July 31, when he landed a force of grenadiers, light infantry, and rangers near Montmorency Falls further downstream from Beauport hoping to ford the Montmorency River and reach a position in the rear of the French lines. It failed miserably. Montcalm guessed correctly that an attack was coming from that direction and rushed men there to meet the enemy. The river’s tide prevented Wolfe from getting all of his troops in position on time and frontal assaults launched from the beach were beaten back with heavy losses. The British retreated, leaving behind 443 men killed and wounded. The first attempt to force a landing on the Quebec side of the river had failed, but it would not be the last. Wolfe turned his attention further upriver, where he hoped his prospects for victory would be more fruitful.

The Plains of Abraham

As the weeks passed following the debacle at Montmorency, the British probed the northern shore west of Quebec for a secure landing spot. During this time, Wolfe grew sick with a severe fever and kidney stones and believed his days were numbered. He recovered enough, however, to begin moving his army upriver about eight miles from the city not far across from Cap Rouge. It was decided that the landing would be made at Anse au Foulon, where a narrow gap and trail led to the top of the cliffs just two miles west of the city.

At four in the morning, September 13, Lieutenant Colonel William Howe (who would serve as the commander of the British Army in America during the Revolutionary War) came ashore with the light infantry and surprised and overwhelmed the enemy outpost above the landing site. The conditions for rowing the army into position that early morning had been perfect for Wolfe. Montcalm was caught off guard.

After securing the landing zone, Wolfe began moving his attack force of roughly 4,400 regulars onto the Plains of Abraham, an open field about a mile wide and a half a mile long in front of the city’s western defenses. Responding to the threat as quickly as could be done, Montcalm rushed some 1,900 French regulars and 1,500 militiamen and Native Americans to meet the British line. This was the open field fight that Wolfe had been yearning for ever since the campaign began.

A painting of the death of General Wolfe
Benjamin West’s depiction of the death of British General James Wolfe during the Battle of Quebec, painted in 1770. Wikimedia Commons

As the French commander formed his men up in a line of battle, the British waited patiently across the field to receive their attack. Montcalm ordered his troops forward, and almost immediately his militiamen’s lack of experience and training in open combat became apparent as their formations wavered and some failed to advance close enough to the enemy line to fire effectively. One British participant described what happened next:

The French Line began … advancing briskly and for some little time in good order, [but] a part of their Line began to fire too soon, which immediately catched throughout the whole, then they began to waver but kept advancing with a scattering Fire.—When they had got within about a hundred yards of us our Line moved up regularly with a steady Fire, and when within twenty or thrity yards of closing gave a general [fire]; upon which a total [rout] of the Enemy immediately ensued.

The battle was over in just fifteen minutes as the British swept forward, claiming the field and capturing hundreds of prisoners. Both sides each lost over 600 men killed and wounded, including both respective commanders. Wolfe was mortally wounded and died a hero on the field. Montcalm, too, was hit by grapeshot in the abdomen and died the next morning. Five days later, Quebec surrendered. The French retreated further downstream to Montreal, attacked and failed to retake Quebec the next spring, and surrendered in whole on September 8, 1760, effectively ending all major military operations in North America during the French and Indian War. The battle for the continent between Britain and France was over.

“If General Howe attempts…”

On By Phill GreenwaltIn 2022 Bus Tour, Battlefields & Historic Places, British Leadership, Emerging Revolutionary War, Northern Theater, Revolutionary War1 Comment

On December 19, 1777 a bedraggled, underfed, undersupplied, and hemorrhaging manpower, the Continental army trudged into their permanent winter encampment at Valley Forge. Located approximately 20 miles from Philadelphia, General George Washington’s army would recuperate, revitalize, re-train, and march out six months later a different military force.

Meanwhile, the British army, victors of Brandywine and survivors of Germantown ensconced themselves in the colonial capital of the rebellious colonies after its peaceful fall on September 26, 1777. Commanded by Sir General William Howe the British were better fed, better equipped, and in theory better suited to continue conducting military operations to quell the rebellion.

Which begs the question, why did Howe not attack Valley Forge?

Sir William Howe

Although historians have grappled with this, there are a number of reasons why Howe did not press the issue during the winter months, some range from personal to logistical to how warfare was conducted in the 18th century.

Was Howe frustrated at Washington for not taking the bait at White Marsh in early December 1777 to fight outside defensive works and envisioned the same reticence would be shown by the Virginian if the British attempted an offensive action toward Valley Forge?

Or was Howe simply a man of his time and war was not practiced in winter when there were so many variables one could not control, chiefly the unpredictability of Mother Nature?

Was Howe already worried about his reception and defense when he arrived back in England? Only willing to take a low risk-high reward gambit, which he attempted in May 1778 at Barren Hill?

One of his own soldiers, Captain Richard Fitzpatrick in a letter to Charles Fox penned the following;

               “If General Howe attempts anything but securing his army for the winter I shall
consider him, after what has happened in the north, a very rash man. But if he
lets himself be governed by General Grant I shall not be surprised if we get
into some cursed scrape.”[1]

Or does this one paragraph explain the main reason behind no winter campaigning, “what has happened in the north.” A clear implication to the disaster of the other field army operating in the northern American colonies, Burgoyne’s that capitulated at Saratoga in October 1777.

Although we will never know for certain, this is a question that has come up in conversations, at book talks, and around the national park at Valley Forge. This is a question Emerging Revolutionary War will grapple with on our second annual bus tour, which will include Valley Forge, this November. Check the link “Bus Tour 2022” on the black banner above to secure your ticket and partake in the ongoing debate on why Howe did not attack. Limited tickets remain.

[1] Urban, Mark. “Fusiliers: The Saga of a British Redcoat Regiment in the American Revolution (Walker & Company: Manhattan, 2007).