The First American Army - Bruce Chadwick [8]
Greenwood’s uncle moved into one of the largest homes in Falmouth, a three-story wooden house on the south side of Middle Street, shortly after his nephew arrived. His uncle, who had grown to despise the Crown, became the lieutenant of a local Cape Cod militia company and brought his nephew along as the troupe’s fifer. The boy joked that he was selected as the fifer because he was brave, healthy, and imbued with the military spirit. He added slyly that he was the only man or boy in Falmouth who knew how to play the fife.
Two years later, the men in the company, and everyone else on Cape Cod, learned of the battles at Lexington and Concord. Greenwood had not been home to Boston to see his family in two years. He wanted to return because he feared a war and was worried about the safety of his parents. “I was afraid [my parents] would all be killed by the British, for nothing was talked of but murder and war,” he wrote in his journal.
His uncle was opposed to the idea, but Greenwood sneaked away early on a Sunday morning, his sword dangling from his belt. Greenwood walked one hundred miles from Falmouth to Boston, a journey of five days. Signs of war were everywhere. He followed the main highway, a narrow dirt road, that led from Falmouth northwest to Boston. It took him through small villages and past the fields of large farms toward the port city, occupied by approximately five thousand British troops. He recalled, “As I traveled through the different towns, the people were preparing to march toward Boston to fight.”
Passersby marveled that such a young boy was walking all the way to the port where the Americans had the British trapped. One night on the road, he found himself in a crowded roadside tavern, playing tunes on his fife for the patrons. They sang along and toasted him with tankards of grog following numerous cheers for the men in the militia units that had surrounded the British. Waitresses moved quickly between the thick wooden benches where some sat to the square wooden tables with their brightly lit candles, the men banging their tankards on the tabletops as they belted out their time-honored choruses. Seamen sang songs of their voyages and others sang about men and their women. The crowd finally got around to inquiring about the young fifer who was serenading them with whatever type of music they requested. The room was becoming more and more heated as the men loudly lambasted the king and the Redcoats holed up on the Boston peninsula. And so was young Greenwood, who had explained earlier that he was headed to Boston to visit his parents.
“Why are you really going to Boston?” shouted one man. Greenwood, as aroused for war as the rest of them by that time late in the evening, put down his fife and yelled back, “To fight for my country.”
All in the tavern roared their approval.
When he reached Boston, a bustling city of seventeen thousand residents, he discovered that his former hometown had become an armed camp. British soldiers occupied the city itself and the rebel army surrounded them, with headquarters in Cambridge. He was told he could not visit his parents, still living in Boston. Greenwood had landed in the middle of a nightmarish scene. General Gage had given approval for people to flee Boston, but there was no organization to the flight of the refugees. Some left by land, to the south, with their belongings packed in bags slung over their shoulders or stacked up in wooden carts. Others took the ferry to Charlestown that glided silently through the harbor.
The ferries were jammed with people and their possessions; the boats constantly threatened to tip over from the excess weight. Refugees included individual men and women, couples and families, some with animals, all carrying large trunks or tightly cinched canvas bags. There were so many people fleeing the port city—nearly half the population— that the overloaded ferries had to make runs all night, with their crowds of