United States or Taiwan ? Vote for the TOP Country of the Week !
He answered with grave courtesy all remarks made to him, but immediately lapsed into a sombre abstraction, from which it seemed difficult to rouse him. At the end of the supper Lord Howe rose to his feet, made a dashing little speech to the company, full of fire and enthusiasm, and proposed the toast: "Success to the expedition against Ticonderoga!"
They do it yet; for although the flint-arm has gone out and the forts have tumbled down, the decree hasn't been repealed been overlooked and forgotten, you see and so the vacancies where old Ticonderoga and others used to stand, still get their six quarts of gun-flints a year just the same."
At this place the opposite shores of New York and Vermont are pushed out into the lake toward each other, thus forming two peninsulas, with the lake contracted to a width of half a mile, or point-blank cannon range, between them: one is Ticonderoga; the other, Mount Independence. Thus, together, they command the passage of the two lakes.
It was likewise affirmed that a familiar spirit or demon abode behind the blackness of the picture, and had shown himself at seasons of public calamity to more than one of the royal governors. Shirley, for instance, had beheld this ominous apparition on the eve of General Abercrombie's shameful and bloody defeat under the walls of Ticonderoga.
These suggestions were but the result of over-cautiousness on the part of some members of Congress. Happily their wishes were overborne and Ticonderoga remained an American fort until the cowardly St. Clair abandoned it before the advance of Burgoyne. At the moment, however, the satisfaction of Ethan Allen and his brave companions was unbounded.
He landed at Quebec and marched with eight thousand men, British, Germans and Indians, to Fort Ticonderoga. The garrison of thirty-five hundred men surrendered. Valuable stores were taken and the presence of this new army discouraged the Americans. But Washington only said, "We should never despair. If new difficulties arise, we must only put forth new exertions."
The French took possession of Ticonderoga, and fortified it. The expedition against Niagara and fort Frontignac, was also defeated by delays in making the preparations necessary for its prosecution. Shirley did not reach Oswego till late in August.
General Gates took command of the army at this critical time. Convinced that he could never hope to hold both Crown Point and Ticonderoga, and knowing Ticonderoga to be much the stronger, in a military view, he decided to remove the army to that place at once. This was promptly done.
Guert continued his questions, however, while dressing, and we all soon became convinced, by the words of the Indian, broken and abrupt as they were, that Abercrombie was on the point of embarking with his army on Lake George, and that we must needs be active, if we intended to be present at the contemplated operations in front of Ticonderoga.
For this campaign great preparations were making, both in Canada and England. Quiet, therefore, reigned at Ticonderoga throughout the winter of 1776 and 1777. General Burgoyne sailed for England in November, to lay before the king a plan for subduing the colonies in a single campaign. Burgoyne was a good soldier, popular with the army and government, brave to rashness, but vain and headstrong.
Word Of The Day