On Reading About The Battle of Bunker Hill

So far I have about four or five small plastic containers that once used to hold chicken stir fry or kiwi fruit, crammed with cards containing notes about the Battle of Bunker Hill and these are mostly though not entirely from secondary sources - e.g. :
Elting's The Battle of Bunker's Hill : very, very good, but too hard on General Gage, who was a bit slack but not that slack - there were factors beyond his control like wind, currents and tide, which frequently stuffed up generals' plans in eighteenth century wars; not hard enough on Admiral Graves, who really was as corrupt and inefficient as the majority of historians paint him - he was in charge of the British fleet in Boston Harbor on 17 June, 1775 - though he did write a wonderful primary source, shorthanded as Graves's Conduct, written to justify his abysmal dereliction of duty while in Boston.)
Thomas J. Fleming's Now we Are Enemies : very well written. Among other things it is especially good on the American artillery and on General William Howe's grand strategy. I found his argument that it was Howe's intention to take Bunker/Breed's Hill swiftly and then move on to take the rebel headquarters and stores at Cambridge, only a couple of miles from the Charlestown Peninsula, quite convincing. As well, it more or less puts paid to the idea that Howe's only strategy was a brutal frontal attack on Breed's Hill. Annoyingly it has no footnotes.
Richard M. Ketchum, Decisive Day. The Battle for Bunker Hill: Also very well written, also without footnotes, and, I think, the last writer to suggest the American rebels used their very inefficient cannon to blast holes in the redoubt walls so they could shoot at the advancing British. Even though it's written after Fleming, who, to my mind, successfully debunks many of the Bunker Hill myths, Ketchum makes no use of him, reiterating all the hoary old stories. (But what else would you expect of an American, (ie Ketchum) who, during the Cold War wrote a book titled What is Communism? I can't bring myself to think of reading it, let alone ordering it via the Net.) His Bunker Hill book needs to be used with considerable care.
So far I've checked through a few general histories for some details, like Ward's The War of the Revolution and MiddleKauff's The Glorious Cause but I've got a few more to go. Then there is the gloriously old History of the Siege of Boston And Of The Battles Of Lexington, Concord And Bunker Hill by Richard Frothingham, published in 1872. He is invaluable for the primary sources in his appendices and footnotes. His telling of the Bunker Hill battle is confused, but really, it doesn't matter; newer secondary sources make the necessary corrections and he just didn't have available to him some of the primary sources we have today.
Some primary sources I've managed to trawl through, like Percy's letters and Drake's edition of British letters from Bunker Hill, Force's American Archives, and a few minor documents I've found on-line. I've ordered Charles Coffin's History of the Bsattle of Breed's Hill By Major Generals Heath, Wilkinson and Dearborn, but its taking Amazon ages to send it to me; and I've been through the relevant parts of Sir Henry Clinton's The American Rebellion. Today I just got in the post Political And Military Episodes In The Latter Half Of The Eighteenth Century Derived From The Life And Correspondence Of John Burgoyne, General, Statesman, Dramatist, (1876). There's quite a few I've yet to get: Heath's Memoirs, the Massachusetts Historical Society's collection of documents on Bunker Hill, (which I trust are more than the few I've downloaded from them on the Net) and various others.
So, you can see, I've been having fun.

Reflections on an Ancient Book.

I'd alway thought the first book that I'd read on the American Revolution was some book by Henry Steele Commager, the title of which I have forgotten. I was a kid, ten or eleven and had somehow managed to get a copy out of the Adults' Library Section at Earlwood, NSW, near where I grew up. Except that was not the book I remember. The same book that I got out of Earlwood library so long ago, arrived at my place from the USA yesterday. It was Christopher Ward's The War of the Revolution, a 2 Volume boxed set, published by MacMillan in New York in 1952. I recognised it the moment I saw it.
I don't know what it was started me off reading history at such an early age, though I'm sure my father had something to do with it. He brought home a poster of the pictures of the kings and queens of England one day, and I pored over that poster for months, maybe even years, examining every picture in minute detail, wondering about each particular king and queen. I quickly learnt from my father that Henry VIII was a bad king, but somehow, despite the fact that she was Protestant, Elizabeth II was a good queen. The medieval kings were endlessly fascinating especially Richard Coeur de Lion and King John, because they had something to do with Robin Hood, (as played by Cornel Wilde, who I think also played John Paul Jones.) When I was thirteeen or younger I wanted to go and see a movie about Martin Luther (not the one based on the play by John Osborne) but I was forbidden it, quite vociferously. So, secretly, I became intrigued by this dreadful thing called the Reformation.
The other very early memory of history I have, apart from Robert Taylor in Ivanhoe and The Knights of the Round Table, and some engraved pictures in a wonderful edition of Walter Scott's Kenilworth, (which I never got around to reading until I was an adult) was the presence on the family bookshelf of Scott's red-covered A History of Australia, the title printed one the spine in black, font unknown. I remember determinedly ploughing through it at quite a young age, and getting bogged down with the NSW Robertson Land Acts of the 1870s. Up to that point I had been enthralled. So, I learnt early, that not all history is necessarily "interesting."
Amazing what the sight and smell of an old dark blue book with its blue spine and faded gold title in a red diamond square can evoke, a book which I have to thank for my perennial fascination with the War of American Independence, which, after all these years, I finally have on my bookshelf.

Ensign Francis Grose and the Battle of Lexington Concord

This is the conclusion from the third chapter of my book on the First/Second Fleeters and their association with the American Revolution. Enjoy.

At this distance in time it is difficult to assess the adverse psychological impact that the experience of the Lexington-Concord conflict had on the young Francis Grose. Alan J. Guy has argued convincingly that traumatic stress had a major impact on the eighteenth century British soldiery.⁴⁷ Grose must have been affected adversely in some way by the devastating slaughter at 'The Bloody Angle' in particular, and the militia's harried pursuit of the Concord espedition from Concord to Lexington. He was almost certainly involved in the bloody hand-to-hand and house-to-house combat at Menotomy. It is very likely that he may have killed his first man at Menotomy. He would certainly have been traumatised both by the sight of the apparently scalped British private near Concord's North bridge, and by the normal onset of fear soldiers experience in battle - '... I never had such a tremor come over me before -' Those experiences may have been heightened for him because he went into battle with very little training compared to many of his fellow officers.

Nevertheless, Grose's experiences on this police action turned murderous were nowhere near as severe as many of his comrades. To state the obvious, he was neither killed nor wounded. He was not at the first fight in Lexington. He missed the battle at the North bridge in Concord. At Barrett's Farm, though he was in a situation that engendered tension, he was one of the officers treated with a strained courtesy and dined on bread and fresh milk. At Mrs. Brown's Tavern he had a further opportunity to quench his thirst after a long, hot march, an opportunity not given to many of his peers. Basically, he missed the actual beginning of the War of American Independence.

One series of events do seem to have had an impact on his impressionable mind: the impunity with which the rank and file, along with some officers, were allowed to loot the houses of possibly innocent colonists. It is probably drawing a long bow to argue from this that his witnessing of the looting and its lack of punishment alone planted the seeds for his later attitudes of leniency toward the New South Wales Corps seventeen years later in Sydney. A long-formed regimental loyalty and the tradition that soldiers were entitled to land to settle on in the colonies in which they served undoubtedly also informed his attitudes in that instance.⁴⁸

47 Alan Guy, 'The Army of the Georges, 1714-1783' in The Oxford History of the British Army,p. 107; Samuel Blacheley Webb to Joseph Webb, Cambridge, June 19, 1775, in John Rhodehamel, (ed.) The American Revoluition. Writings from the War of Independence,New York, 2001, p. 37, for an 18C. Expression of fear in first battle.

48 Manning Clark, A New History of Australia, Sydney, 1963, p. 29; Alan Atkinson, The Europeans in Australia, Vol. I, p. 183.

As this post has been transposed directly from the original manuscript, the original numbering of footnotes has been retained.

Burnsey's TV Dinners et al.

Yesterday (ie last Wednesday) on Larvatus Prodeo on the condemn thread, there was a discussion on food, partly prompted by me admitting I cook up shop bought chili con carne. Whereupon I was asked to expatiate here on my experiences with TV Dinners. Obviously, as some-one who lives half or all of the fortnight on pre-prepared meals I ain't no food critic. Nevertheless, here goes.
Best to start with the real TV dinners; the stuff in cardboard boxes you put in the microwave oven and cook for 30 seconds to one minute more than they say on the packet.
McCain's Roast Turkey Dinner. Slices of turkey covered with a combination of gravy and cranberry sauce. With vegetables, namely, thinly sliced carrots, peas, and roast potato. Eaten with bread thickly margarined on a plate beside the black plastic plate ready to mop up what's left of the gravy after I've eaten everything else. Appeals to my sweet tooth (sweet teeth why I haven't got any teeth; tho genetics played a part as well - an inherited calcium deficiency - though it might have something to do with the fact I don't drink milk, except for the powdered stuff you get in instant Mocha coffee.) much recommended because of it varying taste sensations.
McCain's Veal Cordon Bleu. I kid you not. Veal wrapped in ham and crumbed. Carrots as above. Beans - I think they're string beans. Some sort of cheese sauce, I think. Sometimes the ham the veal is wrapped in comes away from the ham. Crunchy. I'm not big on cheese sauce, but it does for variety.
McCain's Roast Chicken. Vegetables as above. Roast potato pieces and beans, I think. Don't have a packet in the fridge to check at the moment. Lots of gravy. Size of the chicken breast varies. Sometimes its big, sometimes, well, not so big. On those latter days I get annoyed. Gravy mopped up with bread and margarine. Usually recommended but if you don't put it in the microwave long enough the chicken isn't heated through.
Mccain's Steak Diane. This one's a bit more expensive so I don't get it very often. I don't like beef much so anything I say about this particular dinner can't be trusted.
McCain's Roast Lamb. Peas, carrots, chunks of roast potatoes. Gravy and mint sauce. Up there with the turkey and roast chicken, for the same reasons.
Mccain's Chicken Parmagiana. A TV Dinner gourmet's delight. Peas, carrots, pieces of baked potato. And that sauce! What can I say? Don't have to go out to Italian restaurants. Besides, I don't know where the one in Armidale is.
McCain's Lamb Cutlet With Gravy. Peas, carrots, instant mashed potato. Have to keep it in the microwave a minute longer to cook through the cutlets.
McCain's black plastic plates Sometimes they crack round the edges when they're stacked on the supermarket shelves. Its a bugger getting the plastic cover of the plate then and you have to pick out little bits of sharp black plastic from the meal before you eat. I could return them, I suppose but I live two miles from Bi-Lo and I don't have a car. Can't drive in fact. So, I pick out the sharp bits of black plastic.

Bird's Eye Create-a-Meals. All you can get at the moment at Bi-Lo's in Armidale are Honey Soy, Black Bean, Teryaki and some Green Ginger gunk. They're named after the rather large sauce packets in them which you melt over the cooked chicken with a tablespoon of water. Sometimes I sprinkle a very little bit of sugar on them.They used to have Chili Con Carne and Sweet'n'Sour. But they don't any more. Capsicum, water, chestnuts, beans, carrots etc, etc. all very good for you. Cook up with fried stir fry chicken in a frying pan - my wok is rusty - and serve on steamed long grained white rice. Lasts two days. Good stuff. Except you have to cook it on the stove. I suppose I could microwave it but sometimes I get a bit traditional, if you know what I mean.

Lean Cuisine Meals. Like Meatball Arrabiatta, Satay Beef, beef and Mushroom. I'm sure you know them. Heat and shake the sauce packets, add vegetable packets, mostly rice or pasta and some few vegetables. Cook in four minutes. All wonderful, but very spicy. Go for it.

Tuscan Style Baby Potatoes. I have them in the microwave right now. Potatoes in some kind of Italian herbs. Cooking for 9 minutes, it says 7, but what the hell. And I did sort of bust the plastic on top when I tried to pierce them with a fork. Never tried it before. Was looking for strawberries and chocolate dip, and there they were. We'll see.

Post-script. Reporting on Tuscan Style Baby Potatoes. A bit bland. I ended up eating most of them cold. Tasted better that way and I could use my fingers instead of struggling with a fork. I mean ... well ... nobody was watching.

Researching Barrett's Farm and Widow Brown's Tavern.

Maybe it's jejeune to remark on the amazement one sometimes experiences when undertaking historical research, but I guess I'm not world-weary enough, world-weary as I am, not to get some excitement out of the things I find.
Presently, as I remarked in an earlier post, I'm in the process of writing about the experiences of Ensign Francis Grose in the battles of Lexington/Concord on 19 April, 1775. In the process of this battle the British soldiery battered on several house and tavern doors in their search for weapons, and later, out of anger and a desire for revenge, because one of their own had apparently been scalped, and had his ears and nose cut off after the skirmish at the North Bridge near Concord. ( He hadn't been scalped, whatever the British thought, nor had his ears been cut off, but he had been cleaved with a tomahawk by a young teen while he lay dying of his wounds on the Concord road.) Grose, who was fortunate enough to miss the battle at Lexington and the deadly clash on the North Bridge, through no fault of his own, had been sent to search the Barrett's Farm some miles out of Concord for weapons and ammunition. James Barrett was head of the Concord militia and Loyalist spies had reported his farm was one of the main storage depots for weapons in Concord.
There was much tantalising material about Barrett's Farm in the secondary sources, but I still didn't really have a good idea of what actually went on there until I came across a little gem of a book which had all the American first hand accounts of events at the farm and a good deal of Concord local tradition. (There is a British narrative by Ensign John De Berniere, but it didn't have much in it for this part of the Concord expedition; and its reliability is suspect in any case.) That little gem was Ellen Chase's The Beginnings of the American Revolution based on contemporary letters, diaries and other documents, compiled in the nineteenth century. It can be found at http://www.archive.org/details/beginningofam03chas The same work gave me quite a bit of information about how Grose's detachment behaved on their way back from Barett's Farm when they stopped at Widow Brown's Tavern a mile away from the North Bridge. Basically, with the encouragement of three of their officers they sat under a tree tippling. Because of young Francis Grose's propensity for the grog I like to think he was one of the officers who encouraged this moment of quiet relaxation. A thirteen year old boy who was in the tavern at the time, years later made a deposition about the soldiers' behaviour, and that is in Chase's little pamphlet in its entirety. The boy heard the musket fire at the North Bridge, but it seems none of the British did. Or if they did, they ignored it.
There are no pictures of Widow Brown's Tavern. From what I can work out it did not survive the ravages of time. However, there are a plethora of images of Barrett's Farm and you can get an idea of what the place looked like inside and and out here:
http://www.hmdb.org/marker.asp?marker=18064
Apparently his bedroom walls were painted a "Red Indian red."
The Barrett family had hid musket balls in barrels of feathers in their attic, ploughed kegs of powder, muskets and cannon into the fields near their house, hidden food meant for rebel soldiers on an ox-driven wagon in the swamp etc., if the local tradition is correct. And there is no reason to suppose it isn't in this instance. All that were found were some gun carriages in the barn. When the soldiers proceeded to set fire to them in the middle of the barn, Mrs. Barrett insisted they burn them out in the middle of the road, as they had promised they would preserve private property. [at this point the writer is tempted to be a socialist smart-alec about the radicalism of the American Revolution, but he refrains.] She fed the soldiers bread and milk after they had finished their searching, because "we are commanded to feed our enemy if he hunger", refused to dole out any spirits she may have had hidden away in a cupboard and told them they were giving her blood money when an officer tried to pay for the food. At 58, which was old for those days, she was quite a spirited ancient.
I reckon the whole story of Barrett's farm and the drinking session afterwards under the trees at Widow Brown's Tavern will be one of the many good stories in my chapter on Grose and the battles of Lexington/Concord.

History Minutiae: Lexington and Concord

Presently I'm deep in the throes of writing chapter 3 of my book on the Australian connection with the American Revolution and the War of American Independence. The chapter is about 20 year old Ensign Francis Grose (Commander of the New South Wales Corps in 1792 and Lieut. Governor of New South Wales from 1792). And in the process I've got bogged down (briefly) in some historical minutiae which by itself is vaguely purposeless, but for purposes of historical accuracy one sort of has to get right.

The first of these was the vexed question of how many officers and rank and file went on the Concord expedition. We know it was somewhere between 700 to 800 troops overall but I got this bug trying to work out exactly how many troops were in the detachment of the 52nd. Light Infantry (Grose's company) that went to Concord. Helpfully, David Hackett Fischer provided some records in the appendices of his excellent Paul Revere's Ride. According to one list which was partly drawn from pay rosters there were 2 officers and 35 other ranks in the 52nd. Light Infantry. But another list provided in Fischer's appendices which showed the Returns of of Strength of the British Army in Boston which did not include commissioned officers, sergeants or musicians showed that in April 1775 there were 299 soldiers fit to march, 30 unfit, and that the company was down 61 effectives. Finally, looking at British casualty figures a captain and 2 lieutenants were killed along the Battle Road, which, one might note is more than the total complement of officers supposed to be attached to the 52nd. according to the pay rosters. At this point, I just threw my hands up in the air, and gave up. (I hate numbers anyway, even if I do have to deal with them sometimes.)

The second piece of minutiae I became temporarily obsessed with was why was there such a negative and angry reaction from the Americans in the powder scares in late 1774, (which partly arose out of the fact that one of the things the British were out to destroy at Concord was gunpowder.) when the British confiscated American powder in Massachusetts. The answer to that one was easy enough to find. It was in one of the books I have here, Robert Harvey's A Few Bloody Noses. The main ingredient to gunpowder was saltpetre, mined in Bengal and exported to Europe. The Americans had to import all their gunpowder as they didn't have all the ingredients to make it. (And, from early December, 1774, importation of gunpowder into the thirteen rebellious colonies, but especially Massachusetts was prohibited.

The final piece of minutiae I got caught up with was - exactly where in Boston was the 52nd. Light Infantry stationed? This was actually of some significance for the paragraph I was currently working on as I wanted to know the time it took Grose's 52nd. Light Infantry to march from their quarters to Back Bay where the Concord expedition began. It could have been from near Back Bay, from the Long Wharf or from various other places. It turns out they were encamped on Beacon Hill only ten minutes march from their embarkation point, but they were probably one of the last regiments to reach the beach, because Lt. Frederick Mackenzie of the Royal Welch Fusiliers does not note their arrival at the beach.

And if you wondering what's happening to the chapter on Bunker Hill, discussed in an earlier post, I'll be starting on it after I've completed the research and have finished chapter 3.

Book Review: Nicholson Baker's Human Smoke. The Beginnings of World War II, the End of Civilization

This book review is published in Green Left Weekly.

Here is the link:

http://www.greenleft.org.au/2009/807/41520

(You can comment here, if you like.)

Cheers,
PB.