Chapter XVII. Sufferings of the Army at Morristown-Rigorous Winter-Derangement of the Currency-Confusion in the Commissariat-Impressment of Supplies-Patriotic Conduct of the People of New Jersey-The Bay of New York Frozen over-Lord Stirling's Expedition against Staten Island-Knyphausen's Incursion into the Jerseys-Caldwell's Church at Elizabethtown Burnt-Character of its Pastor-Foray into Westchester County-Burning of Young's House in the Valley of the Neperan. T HE dreary encampment at Valley Forge has become proverbial for its hardships; yet they were scarcely more severe than those suffered by Washington's army during the present winter, while hutted among the heights of Morristown. The winter set in early, and was uncommonly rigorous. The transportation of supplies was obstructed; the magazines were exhausted, and the commissaries had neither money nor credit to enable them to replenish them. For VOL. V.-19 weeks at a time the army was on half allowance; sometimes without meat, sometimes without bread, sometimes without both. There was a scarcity, too, of clothing and blankets, so that the poor soldiers were starving with cold as well as hunger. Washington wrote to President Reed of Pennsylvania, entreating aid and supplies from that State to keep his army from disbanding. "We have never," said he, "experienced a like extremity at any period of the war."* The year 1780 opened upon a famishing camp. "For a fortnight past," writes Washington, on the 8th of January, "the troops, both officers and men, have been almost perishing with want. Yet," adds he, feelingly, "they have borne their sufferings with a patience that merits the approbation, and ought to excite the sympathies of their countrymen." The severest trials of the Revolution, in fact, were not in the field, where there were shouts to excite and laurels to be won; but in the squalid wretchedness of ill-provided camps, where there was nothing to cheer and everything to be endured. To suffer was the lot of the revolutionary soldier. A rigorous winter had much to do with the actual distresses of the army, but the root of * Life of Reed, ii., 189. |