New York and New Jersey campaign

The New York and New Jersey campaign in 1776 and the winter months of 1777 was a series of American Revolutionary War battles for control of the Port of New York and the state of New Jersey, fought between British forces under General Sir William Howe and the Continental Army under General George Washington. Howe was successful in driving Washington out of New York, but overextended his reach into New Jersey, and ended the active campaign season in January 1777 with only a few outposts near the city. The British held New York Harbor for the rest of the war, using it as a base for expeditions against other targets.

Landing unopposed on Staten Island on July 3, 1776, Howe had assembled an army composed of elements that had been withdrawn from Boston in March following their failure to hold that city, combined with additional British troops, as well as Hessian troops hired from several German principalities. Washington had New England soldiers as well as regiments from states as far south as Virginia. Landing on Long Island in August, Howe defeated Washington in the largest battle of the war in North America, but the Continental Army was able to make an orderly retreat to Manhattan under cover of darkness and fog. Washington suffered a series of further defeats in Manhattan, with the exception of the skirmish at Harlem Heights, and eventually withdrew to White Plains, New York. At that point Howe returned to Manhattan to capture forces Washington had left in the north of the island.

Washington and much of his army then crossed the Hudson River into New Jersey, and retreated all the way across the Delaware River into Pennsylvania, shrinking due to ending enlistment periods, desertions, and poor morale. Howe ordered his troops into winter quarters in December, establishing a chain of outposts from New York City to Burlington, New Jersey. Washington, in a tremendous boost to American morale, launched a successful strike against the Trenton garrison after crossing the icy Delaware River, prompting Howe to withdraw his chain of outposts back to New Brunswick and the coast near New York, while Washington established his winter camp at Morristown. During the following winter months and on to the rest of the war, both sides skirmished frequently around New York City and New Jersey as the British sought forage and provisions.

Britain maintained control of New York City and some of the surrounding territory until the war ended in 1783, using it as a base for operations elsewhere in North America. In 1777, General Howe launched a campaign to capture Philadelphia, leaving General Sir Henry Clinton in command of the New York area, while General John Burgoyne led an attempt to gain control of the Hudson River valley, moving south from Quebec and failed at Saratoga.

Background

When the American Revolutionary War broke out in April 1775, British troops were under siege in Boston. They defeated Patriot forces in the Battle of Bunker Hill, suffering very high casualties. When news of this expensive British victory reached London, General William Howe and Lord George Germain, the British official responsible, determined that a "decisive action" should be taken against New York City using forces recruited from throughout the British Empire as well as troops hired from small German states.

General George Washington, recently named by the Second Continental Congress as the commander-in-chief of the Continental Army, echoed the sentiments of others that New York was "a post of infinite importance", and began the task of organizing military companies in the New York area when he stopped there on his way from Philadelphia to take command of the siege of Boston. In January 1776, Washington ordered Charles Lee to raise troops and take command of New York's defenses. Lee had made some progress on the city's defenses when word arrived in late March that the British army had left Boston after Washington threatened them from heights south of the city. Concerned that General Howe was sailing directly to New York, Washington hurried regiments from Boston, including General Israel Putnam, who commanded the troops until Washington himself arrived in mid-April. At the end of April, Washington dispatched General John Sullivan with six regiments to the north to bolster the faltering Quebec campaign.

General Howe, rather than moving against New York, withdrew his army to Halifax, Nova Scotia, and regrouped while transports full of British troops, shipped from bases around Europe and intended for New York, began gathering at Halifax. In June, he set sail for New York with the 9,000 men assembled there, before all of the transports arrived.Lengel, p. 135 German troops, primarily from Hesse-Kassel, as well as British troops from Henry Clinton's ultimately unsuccessful expedition to the Carolinas, were to meet with Howe's fleet when it reached New York. General Howe's brother, Admiral Lord Howe, arrived at Halifax with further transports after the general sailed, and immediately followed.

When General Howe arrived in the outer harbor of New York, the ships began sailing up the undefended Narrows between Staten Island and Long Island on July 2, and started landing troops on the undefended shores of Staten Island that day. Washington learned from prisoners taken that Howe had landed 10,000 men, but was awaiting the arrival of another 15,000. General Washington, with a smaller army of about 19,000 effective troops, lacked significant military intelligence on the British force and plans, and was uncertain exactly where in the New York area the Howes intended to strike. He consequently split the Continental Army between fortified positions on Long Island, Manhattan and mainland locations, and also established a " Flying Camp" in northern New Jersey. This was intended as a reserve force that could support operations anywhere along the New Jersey side of the Hudson.

Capture of New York City

The Howe brothers had been granted authority as peace commissioners by Parliament, with limited powers to pursue a peaceful resolution to the conflict. King George III was not optimistic about the possibility of a peace, "yet I think it right to be attempted, whilst every act of vigour is unremittingly carried on".Ketchum (1973), p. 94 Their powers were limited to granting of "general and special pardons" and to "confer with any of his Majesty's subjects". On July 14, pursuant to these powers, Admiral Howe sent a messenger with a letter addressed to "George Washington, Esq." across the harbor. Washington's adjutant, Joseph Reed, politely informed the messenger that no person with that title was in their army. Admiral Howe's aide wrote that "the Punctilio of an Address" should not have prevented the letter's delivery, and Howe was said to be visibly annoyed by the rejection.Ketchum (1973), p. 104 A second request, addressed to "George Washington, Esq., etc." was similarly rejected, although the messenger was told that Washington would receive one of Howe's adjutants. In that fruitless meeting, held July 20, Washington pointed out that the limited powers the Howe brothers had been given were not of much use, as the rebels had done no wrong requiring an amnesty.

In late August, the British transported about 22,000 men (including 9,000 Hessians) from Staten Island to Long Island. In the Battle of Long Island on August 27, the British outflanked the American positions, driving the Americans back to their Brooklyn Heights fortifications. General Howe then began to lay siege to the works, but Washington skillfully managed a nighttime retreat through his unguarded rear across the East River to Manhattan Island. Howe then paused to consolidate his position and consider his next move.

During the battle, the British had captured General John Sullivan. Admiral Howe convinced him to deliver a message to Congress in Philadelphia, and released him on parole. Washington also gave his permission, and on September 2 Sullivan told the Congress that the Howes wanted to negotiate, and had been given much broader powers to treat than those they actually held. This created a diplomatic problem for Congress, which did not want to be seen as aggressive, which is how some representatives felt a direct rejection of the appeal would appear.Ketchum, p. 116 Consequently, Congress agreed to send a committee to meet with the Howes in a move they did not think would bear any fruit. On September 11, the Howe brothers met with John Adams, Benjamin Franklin, and Edward Rutledge in the Staten Island Peace Conference. The positions expressed by the two groups in the three-hour meeting were irreconcilable.

During this time, Washington, who had previously been ordered by Congress to hold New York City, was concerned that he might have escaped one trap for another, since the army was still vulnerable to being surrounded on Manhattan. To keep his escape routes open to the north, he placed 5,000 troops in the city (which then only occupied the lower portion of Manhattan), and took the rest of the army to Harlem Heights. In the first recorded use of a submarine in warfare, he also attempted a novel attack on the Royal Navy, launching ''Turtle'' in a failed attempt to sink , Admiral Howe's flagship.

On September 15, General Howe landed about 12,000 men on lower Manhattan, quickly taking control of New York City. The Americans withdrew to Harlem, where they skirmished the next day, but held their ground. Rather than attempting to dislodge Washington from his strong position a second time, Howe again opted for a flanking maneuver. Landing troops with some opposition in October in Westchester County across the Harlem River and north of Manhattan, he sought once again to encircle Washington. To defend against this move, Washington withdrew most of his army to White Plains, where after a short battle on October 28 he retreated further north. The retreat of Washington's forces was aided by a dense fog which concealed their movement to the British troops. This isolated the remaining Continental Army troops in upper Manhattan, so Howe returned to Manhattan and captured Fort Washington in mid-November, taking almost 3,000 prisoners.

Four days later, November 20, Fort Lee, across the Hudson River from Fort Washington, was also taken. Washington brought much of his army across the Hudson into New Jersey, but was immediately forced to retreat by the aggressive British advance.

General Howe, after consolidating British positions around New York harbor, detached 6,000 men under the command of two of his more difficult subordinates, Henry Clinton, and Hugh, Earl Percy to take Newport, Rhode Island and its strategic port east across Long Island Sound (which they did without opposition on December 8), while he sent General Lord Cornwallis to chase Washington's army through New Jersey. The Americans withdrew across the Delaware River into Pennsylvania in early December.

Reactions

The outlook of the Continental Army—and thus the revolution itself—was bleak. "These are the times that try men's souls", wrote Thomas Paine in ''The American Crisis''. Washington's army had dwindled to fewer than 5,000 men fit for duty and would be significantly reduced further after enlistments expired at the end of the year. Spirits were low, popular support was wavering, and Congress had abandoned Philadelphia, fearing a British attack. Washington ordered some of the troops that returned from the failed invasion of Quebec to join him, and also ordered General Lee's troops, which he had left north of New York City, to join him. Lee, whose relationship with Washington was at times difficult, made excuses and only traveled as far as Morristown, New Jersey

HOME


Content is Copyleft
Website design, code, and AI is Copyrighted (c) 2014-2017 by Stephen Payne


Consider donating to Wikimedia



As an Amazon Associate I earn from qualifying purchases