This day in American History, 250 years ago.
We have two events taking place on this day. First, Rhode Island allows the death penalty for certain activities at sea.
Next, word goes out that the Continental Army is in need of supplies…lots of supplies. It’s looking like General Washington isn’t seeing an end to the Siege of Boston anytime soon.
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Lots of prominent early Americans weren’t Americans to begin with. For instance, the first President of the United States who was actually born in the United States would be Martin Van Buren, our eight president.
But while most of these folks were born on the North American continent, the subject of today’s episode was not. He was born in Bermuda. So while George Tucker was still a British citizen by birth, he didn’t come to America until he was twenty years old, making him an honest-to-goodness immigrant.
But let’s not hold that against him. As you’ll learn today, Tucker had a long and varied career as a politician, an educator and an author.
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In 1681, John Dryden said in his poem “Absalom and Achitophel”:
Beware the fury of the patient man.
I hear ya, Dryden, because that’s how I operate.
And apparently George Washington operated the same way, because he initially took the high road, assuming that rumors about how American prisoners were being treated were just that, and giving General Gage the benefit of the doubt.
But when the rumors began that Washington was mistreating his prisoners…oh, that didn’t sit well with the General at all.
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James Elliot was born in 1839 (like the stone says over there), in Massachusetts. Later on he became a legislator for the state of Vermont, which was neither a state nor even a colony when he was born; it was still disputed territory between New York and New Hampshire.
Although Elliot was too young to participate in the American Revolution, his political fortunes waxed and waned…but mostly waxed.
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Philip Schuyler served as a delegate from New York to the Continental Congress until June 1775 when he was appointed a major general to the Continental Army. We’ll hear more about him as we start to delve into the Invasion of Quebec later this year.
Schuyler was on his way to Saratoga, NY when he got word that the tribes of the Six Nations—the Mohawks, Oneidas, Tusscaroras, Onondagas, Cayugas, and the Senekas (spelled that way then)—had taken Congress up on its offer of a summit and were on their way to Albany. What’s more, he was needed for the summit.
What happened next came as a surprise to…well, nobody, really. But at least everyone knew where everyone else stood. And if that was the locals’ attitude, it wasn’t their fault; the Speech to the Six Nations laid out their argument for them.
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Just a couple of days ago we told you about the efforts on the part of the Continental Congress to get around its own rules in order to provide Washington’s army with the materials they needed to maintain the Siege of Boston.
This time around, John Adams takes steps to do what he needs to do without running afoul of the Intolerable Acts.
It’s like the legal equivalent of the obnoxious game your siblings played with you: “I’m not touching you…I’m not touching you…”
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We do seem to be spending a lot of time with George Washington this week.
It stands to reason, though: Washington was a very busy guy at this time, what with getting his army organized. That meant finding the men who were smart and reliable, to get the ones who weren’t into fighting shape. It also meant figuring out what resources he had and what he needed.
What we’re learning is that the men that he did promote would eventually go on to prosper, whether in the military or in politics or just their personal lives after the war. There were only a few who did not, and oftentimes there was a reason. Not all of them didn’t prosper out of incompetence; some of them simply had to deal with things like illness or lingering effects of injuries inflicted during the conflict.
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There’s an episode of The West Wing in which Leo McGarry explains how, several years earlier, the President wanted to meet the Dalai Lama. The problem was that China was strongly opposed to such a meeting, so they arranged for an “accidental” meeting between the two:
Set up a low-level meeting with someone else and leave the door open. The President wanders by, “Hey, how ya doing, Dalai Lama?”
The point is, diplomacy can be weird. And when the Continental Army, needed gunpowder from Bermuda, it was arranged to have the gunpowder be “stolen” from their armory and somehow make its way into American hands.
Who knew!
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As you may recall, several months ago some members of the Continental Congress thought it was important to make one last effort to reconcile with Britain before things got worse. So they composed the Olive Branch Petition and sent it off to England.
Transit times being what they were then, the petition took several weeks to get to its destination. In the meantime, things got worse.
So when the Olive Branch Petition arrived, nobody really cared. But there were two other documents that made matters worse. Plus, you know, all the shooting that went on in April. And in June.
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One thing that you can’t say about George Washington is that he was a slacker. He was constantly communicating with people, whether it was the orders of the day, making plans to organize his army, or writing letters. And Washington was absolutely prolific at writing letters.
In this case, he’s writing to a Rhode Island merchant, thanking him for the advance notice of an incoming shipment, and reassuring him that the shipment will reach its destination safely, at least to the extent that he had any control over the matter.
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