Mount Vernon and its associations, historical, biographical and pictorial . utiously watched the British army in Boston, and waitedfor strength sufficient to attack it with success, while thepeople, and even the Congress, became impatient and clamoredfor battle. At length the proper time came, and with skilland energy he prepared to strike an annihilating blow. Tlieenemy saw their peril, fled to their ships, and escaped toHalifax, while the wdiole continent rang with the praises ofWashington. The Congress decreed a gold medal to thevictor. Duvivier, of Paris, cut the die; and to Mount Vernonth
Mount Vernon and its associations, historical, biographical and pictorial . utiously watched the British army in Boston, and waitedfor strength sufficient to attack it with success, while thepeople, and even the Congress, became impatient and clamoredfor battle. At length the proper time came, and with skilland energy he prepared to strike an annihilating blow. Tlieenemy saw their peril, fled to their ships, and escaped toHalifax, while the wdiole continent rang with the praises ofWashington. The Congress decreed a gold medal to thevictor. Duvivier, of Paris, cut the die; and to Mount Vernonthe glittering testimonial of a nations gratitude was afterwardborne, upon which was inscribed: The American CongressTO George Washington, commander-in-chief of its armies, THE ASSERTORS OF FrEEDOM I TlIE ENEMY FOR THE FIRST TIMI-:PUT TO FLIGHT BoSTON RECOVERED, 17tH MaRCH, 1776. Although excessively prudent, Washington w^as ever readyto strike a blow in the presence of greatest peril, when hisjudgment and incliiiati(»n coalesced in ri^commending the per- 102 MOUNT VERNOX. GOLD MEDAL AWARDED TO MASUINGTON FOR THE DELIVERANCE OF BOSTON. formance of the act. We see him with a handful of ill-dis-ciplined, ill-fed, ill-clad soldiers, after a prudent flight of threeweeks before a strong pursuing enemy, crossing a rapid riverin the midst of floating ice, and darkness, and driving storm,and smiting a hand of meicenary Germans at Trenton, whohad been hired out by their avaricious princes to aid theBritish soldiery in butchering their fellow subjects. Victoryfollowed the blow, and a few days afterward that victory wasrepeated at Princeton. Again the praises of Washington wereupon every lip. The great Frederick of Prussia declared thatthe acliievements of the American leader and his compatriots,between the twenty-fifth of December 1776, and the fourth ofJanuary, 1777—a space of ten days—were the most brilliantof any recorded in the annals of military action. A splendidflag, taken from
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Keywords: ., bookauthorlossingb, bookcentury1800, bookdecade1850, bookyear1859
