The First American Army - Bruce Chadwick [96]
By the time the sun went down, the grass in the meadows of Freeman’s farm was covered in blood. British casualties were horrific. Overall, the enemy suffered a total of six hundred casualties that afternoon. Of the men battling the Americans back and forth at Freeman’s, 44 percent were killed, wounded, or captured. American casualties were far smaller, 319, with 57 killed.13
“Both armies seemed determined to conquer or die. [There was] one continual blaze without any intermission ’til dark,” wrote Massachusetts general John Glover at the scene. “The enemy . . . were bold, intrepid, and fought like heroes, and I do assure you, sirs, our men were equally bold and courageous and fought like men fighting for their all.”14 The Redcoats on the other side of that meadow agreed. “The heavy artillery, joining in concert like great peals of thunder, assisted by the echoes of the woods, almost deafened us with the noise,” wrote a British soldier. “This crash of cannon and musketry never ceased ’til darkness parted us.”15
Burgoyne then received a message from Sir Henry Clinton, telling him that he would try to reinforce him with about two thousand men in ten days. He trusted Clinton because the general had tried to convince Howe to send his entire army to meet Burgoyne in upstate New York instead of attacking Philadelphia.16 Gentleman Johnny then decided to dig in behind Freeman’s cabin and wait for Clinton’s army. It was a mistake. The delay not only gave Gates’s army time to rest and regroup, it gave militia commanders throughout New England needed days to raise thousands of men. That was easy because everyone seemed to believe that the defeat of the Redcoats could mean the end of the war. They also wanted to protect their homes against the British.
Dan Granger, a teenager who had finished one enlistment, joined up with dozens of other men and boys when a recruiter staged a rally with bands, singing, and patriotic speakers in his village. The speakers told the people that the British were cornered across the river and could be beaten if enough men joined the fight. Nearly all the able-bodied men in the village marched toward Saratoga, most without even going home to say goodbye to their families.17
In addition to the immediate crisis at hand, all of the residents of the Hudson Valley had learned through newspapers that weeks before several of Burgoyne’s Indians had murdered a white woman, Jane McCrea.18 They wanted revenge. By the time ten days had elapsed, Gates’s force of seven thousand at Saratoga had swelled to over eleven thousand armed and angry colonists.
The tension between Gates and Arnold had simmered throughout the day on September 19 and reached the boiling point in late afternoon, when Arnold’s leadership of the left flank resulted in halting the British advance. Arnold’s tough, bold leadership had once more won the admiration of his men. Gates waited three days and then reassigned Morgan’s riflemen, the heroes of the battle and among the most reliable troops in the army, away from Arnold’s command without even telling him. He had also sent a report to General Washington and Congress about the September 19 battle and took all the credit for pushing the British army back; he never mentioned Arnold’s bravery and never even wrote that he had joined in the fighting. The deliberate insults had the result that Gates knew they would—Arnold stormed into his headquarters, limping as always, and demanded his men back plus a formal apology.
What followed in the large marquee