Notes On The Revolutionary War

Lucky Garvin
Lucky Garvin

I once read that while teenagers today are absorbed with Smart-phones and selfies, same-aged youngsters during WW 2 were besting Nazi Storm Troopers. It has been said that the Greatest Generation was that group of Americans who endured the privations of the Great Depression, then went on to play an instrumental role in the defeat of the Axis Powers in WW 2.

Without question, I certainly agree, but would add, on a par with that generation, were those colonists who fought in the Revolutionary as well as those who endured the Civil War. America has been, and hopefully shall remain, peopled by most remarkable individuals.

My awareness regarding the Revolutionary War was re-awakened by the TV Mini-series, Patriots’ Rising. The purpose of my brief commentary will be to shed light – and respect – on heroes I have never before heard about.

For example, Paul Revere’s ride to warn about the British coming is well known. Somewhat less known is that he rode with another patriot, a fellow names Dawes. Revere and Dawes, riding from Concord, and heading for Lexington, were detained by British patrols. But, before that detention, the two men had, by quirk of fate, met one Dr. Prescott, riding home from a date [some say a tryst] in Lexington. Prescott bridled his horse about, retraced has journey and warned the citizens of Lexington. In all, Revere’s trip was sixteen miles that night in 1775.

Here’s what I learned:

Two years later, sixteen-year-old Sybil Ludington – in order to notify her father’s militia members of an impending British attack, rode twice as far as Revere, et. al.; alone, in the darkness. Her circuit was just under forty miles.

I also learned of snipers. For the colonists, Tim Murphy, who used a rifled musket [a long rifle as opposed to a smooth-bore musket] to great effect. He shot Simon Fraser, a British officer, during the battle of Saratoga. The loss of their leader threw the redcoats into confusion, and a resultant retreat. That battle turned the slow moving tide in favor of the colonies.

On the British side was sniper Patrick Ferguson, marksman and Scot, whose most celebrated shot is the one he didn’t take. He once had General George Washington in his sights, but because Washington’s back was to him, and Ferguson’s chivalric code forbade such killing, he passed up a shot which might have crumbled the Americans’ revolutionary efforts summarily.

The famine at Valley Forge was, to a large degree, mitigated by Native American Indians who bought large amounts of food to the weakened colonists.

In a manner of speaking, there was no such thing as teenage years in Colonial America. First, you were a child; then you were an adult. Women became wives and mothers as young as fourteen, and many of the ‘soldiers’ who fought in the name of the colonies were not old enough to have driver’s licenses today. They grew up quickly; there was no choice.

Before I talk about the last subject, allow me to set it up in this way: Throughout the times of history, there have been men and women possessed of inordinate physical strength, the first narrative evidence of them probably starting with Samson.

Among many others, there was Louis Cyr [pronounced ‘Seer’], a French-Canadian trapper of the 1800’s. Louis could shoulder a four hundred pound keg of beer using just his knee and one hand, a feat which married brawn to balance.

In our own day, a Nordic fellow, competing in ‘The World’s Strongest Viking’ contest, had 50 men set a weight of 1433 pounds on his shoulder and he walked five steps breaking the previous record. [There was a man who had carried an equal weight, but walked only three steps before his back fractured under the load.]

Now, back to the Revolutionary War: There came to the Battle of Camden a man known as The Virginia Giant. His name was Peter Francisco, and his feats of physical strength and personal valor made him a legend in his own lifetime. He was a foundling; some say he was adopted by a Portuguese family, but much of his history is beclouded by time and a lack of reliable provenance.

Peter had grown to six foot six, two-hundred fifty pounds in his late teens, at a time in America when the average man stood five foot six. He continued to grow until he was six foot eight, at a weight of nearly three-hundred pounds. He joined the colonists’ rebellion age fifteen.

During the Battle of Camden, the colonists were being routed. Francisco noted a vital piece of ordnance which was about to be lost to the advancing British. It was an eleven-hundred pound cannon. Unbelievably, Francisco shouldered the cannon with no assistance, and walked it to safety. This deed is commemorated on an 18 cent US Postage stamp entitled, “Contributors to the Cause.”

Louis Cyr might have to move over.

– Lucky Garvin

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