. Washington, the man of action . gton had not been long at thefront before he learned that therewas scarcely enough ammunition onhand for a sharp skirmish, and hadGage (his former comrade in theMonongahela campaign), who thencommanded the British in Boston,known of this he could have raisedthe siege of the town with almostridiculous ease. But aghast as the new Comman-der-in-Chief was at this alarmingsituation, he instantly met it by 108 WASHINGTON maneuvering his men so that hisopponent would conclude that hewas preparing for an assault. Thisbold ruse was highly successfuland while certain of
. Washington, the man of action . gton had not been long at thefront before he learned that therewas scarcely enough ammunition onhand for a sharp skirmish, and hadGage (his former comrade in theMonongahela campaign), who thencommanded the British in Boston,known of this he could have raisedthe siege of the town with almostridiculous ease. But aghast as the new Comman-der-in-Chief was at this alarmingsituation, he instantly met it by 108 WASHINGTON maneuvering his men so that hisopponent would conclude that hewas preparing for an assault. Thisbold ruse was highly successfuland while certain officers and menwere dispatched to Ticonderoga toprocure the siege guns recentlycaptured at that post, others wereordered to scour the country forpowder and ball, with the resultthat before long a reasonable amountof ammunition was secured and allimmediate danger of ignominiouscapture was averted. But other dangers rapidly ap-peared, for the troops, enlisted only 104 Reading the Declaration of Independence tothe Army (July 9, 1776). WASHINGTON for three months, began to returnto their homes, and what littletraining and discipline they hadreceived went with them. Thus,under the very eyes of the enemy,the harassed commander was obligedto disband one army and recruit an-other—a task which would probablyhave been an impossibility for anyother military leader. But Washington was not only asoldier; he was a man who, by closeapplication, had trained himself tomeet emergencies and to devise waysand means of overcoming difficul-ties. For two years after Braddocks 109 WASHINGTON defeat he had kept a makeshift armyin the field and for six years he hadmolded a large body of workmeninto the most effective businessorganization in Virginia. All thistraining was now utilized to createan army out of raw material, and sotirelessly did he supervise every de-tail of the work that a second force,far more formidable than the first,both in numbers and discipline, wasconfronting Boston when the long-l
Size: 1340px × 1866px
Photo credit: © Reading Room 2020 / Alamy / Afripics
License: Licensed
Model Released: No
Keywords: ., bookauthorhillfredericktrevor18, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910
