BOOK 1780. SECTION II. So far as the realization of the hopes of the Irish patriots depended on the progress of the war, the events of the year 1780 were on the whole unfavourable to them. Though the Irish Channel was the hunting-ground of privateers, and bishops' daughters were captured and held to ransom between Waterford and Milford, England still presented an unbroken front to her many enemies. The Spaniards had blockaded Gibraltar in the belief that they could starve out the garrison. Sir George Rodney, with a relieving fleet, seized a convoy of Spanish provision-ships in the spring, and fed General Elliot and his troops out of the stores of the enemy. In July he encountered the Spanish Admiral Don Juan de Langara at Cape St. Vincent, destroyed seven out of eleven of his ships, and carried Don Juan himself a prisoner into the blockaded fortress. Nor had the alliance with France brought that immediate triumph to the American provinces which sanguine patriots anticipated. M. de Ternay arrived at Rhode Island in July with fifteen ships of the line, bringing with him the Count de Rocharabeau and six thousand men as the vanguard of a larger force which was to follow. France was preparing to put out her utmost strength, yet M. de Ternay let Admiral Arbuthnot blockade him with an inferior fleet, and the French contingent lay locked-up and useless. The capture of Charleston had been followed by II. 1780. the complete submission of the Carolinas. Sir Henry CHAP. Clinton held New York in strength, against which Washington could do nothing; and the unexpected protraction of the war, which had seemed as good as ended, brought despondency and mutiny into the American camp. General Arnold, who had headed the expedition into Canada, the most distinguished after Washington of the patriot commanders, believed the cause to be lost. He opened a correspondence with Clinton, proposed to betray West Point to him, and with West Point the controul of the Hudson. The plot was discovered. Arnold escaped into the English lines. Major André, Clinton's aide-de-camp, through whom the negociation was carried on, was taken and hanged. But the disappointment did not materially alter the prospects of the contending parties. Arnold published a defence of his desertion, in which he pretended that England by her concessions had removed the occasion of the quarrel, and that under no circumstances would he be a party to the French alliance or assist in betraying the mother country to her hereditary enemy. Having returned to his allegiance, he took active service under Clinton, and led an expeditionary force into Virginia, which at first carried all before it. In January, 178, the American army almost dissolved for want of pay, and but for the timely arrival of a subsidy from France, would have been unable to offer opposition in the field in any part of the Continent to the British divisions. The supply of money gave new spirit to the cause. Washington reequipped his troops. La Fayette went down to Virginia with part of the French army te oppose Arnold. De Ternay broke the blockade, and made 1781. BOOK VI. 1781. his way to the Chesapeake with the rest, intending to co-operate. Still the balance wavered. Arbuthnot pursued him and fought an action which, though indecisive, disabled him from proceeding. The French fleet returned to Rhode Island, General Phillips carried reinforcements to Arnold, and in March, 1781, Washington's own State, notwithstanding La Fayette, remained in possession of the British. The Dutch, too, were paying dear for having thrust themselves into a quarrel which was none of theirs. No sooner was war declared against them than Rodney seized St. Eustatius, the most important of their West India islands, where they had accumulated enormous stores for shipment to America. Ships, factories, warehouses, all were taken. Three millions' worth of property was captured or destroyed. From India, too, came cheering news. Sir Eyre Coote twice defeated Hyder Ali. Warren Hastings was triumphing in spite of France and Mysore, and passionate philanthropists at home. The French, finding the work less easy than they expected, began to hint at peace; and it was felt painfully by all parties that unless some combined and vigorous effort could be made, and made at once, Saratoga would be a barren triumph, and Bunker's Hill and Lexington would have been fought in vain. England, too, was strained to the utmost of her power. Lord George Germaine, her Minister at War, was incompetent beyond the average of Parliamentary administrators. The waste had been enormous. The national debt was piling up into a mountain, and the simultaneous requirements of India, Gibraltar, and the Navy, rendered it a hard task to keep Clinton properly reinforced. One more attempt should be made, at any rate. In the summer of 1780 the united French and Spanish fleets-thirty-six sail of the line in all-had sailed for the West Indies, with a view of taking Jamaica, and then of attacking Clinton at New York. Heat and overcrowding had brought disease. They returned, having done nothing. In 1781 the two fleets sailed again under Count de Grasse. Jamaica, as before, was to be their first object; but, whether successful at Jamaica or not, de Grasse was to assist Washington and De Rochambeau in a grand attack by sea and land upon New York. If the attack was successful, it would conclude the war. If it failed, France would probably decline to pursue the adventure further, and fortune this time was more favourable than the most sanguine hopes could have anticipated. Lord Cornwallis, who had served in America from the beginning of the war, still commanded in the Carolinas, which he was endeavouring to bring to formal submission. The Americans, unable since the defeat at Camden to meet the British in the field, were able to harass their marches, surprise isolated detachments, and maintain a spirited if irregular resistance. Cornwallis found himself unable, with all his exertions, to restore a regular government, or unite the loyal part of the inhabitants of those states. The defeat of General Tarleton at Cow Pens was none the less a serious blow that it was due to carelessness and over confidence. The small number of troops engaged on both sides were lost in the enormous territory for which they were contending, and the soldiers wasted away in profitless marches and malaria. Finding it necessary to attempt something more effective, the English General determined, CHAP. II. 1781. BOOK VI. 1781. though with no very definite object, on a bold adventure. He proposed to establish a communication with Arnold in Virginia, and place a line of military posts between Charleston and Petersburgh. He took the field at the beginning of March, 1781, with some misgiving, but on the whole sanguine. He inflicted a severe defeat on General Greene on the 15th at Guildford, and leaving Lord Rawdon1 to keep order in South Carolina, he moved on himself to Wilmington. American armies recovered quickly from their losses. Greene doubled back in his rear, and though again defeated on the 19th of April, forced Rawdon afterwards into Charleston, and picked up the detachments which Cornwallis had left to keep open his communications. As Burgoyne had been cut off from Lake Champlain, so Cornwallis was now separated from his base of supplies in South Carolina, and was forced to push forward with his best speed into Virginia. He reached Petersburgh on the 20th of May, where he found Arnold. Clinton had sent him 1,500 men from New York, which raised his entire numbers to 7,000. He was more than a match in the field for any power which La Fayette could then bring against him; and as long as the sea was open and the English were masters of it, he was in no danger of a want of supplies. But he confessed himself totally in the dark' as to what he was generally to do; he was weary of marching about the country in quest of adventure,' 2 and was anxious for orders from New York. Orders' were what Clinton was just then unable to give; he had just heard that de Grasse had sailed, and that he was himself in dan เ 1 Earl of Moira afterwards. |