A Yankee Doodle Memorial

This is Memorial Day weekend.  For most Americans, just another reason to have a party, go to ball games or watch the Indianapolis 500 or Preakness.

But for some, especially those who have a military connection, Memorial Day is truly something special because it is the one day that commemorates those who have fallen in the service of their country. Memorial Day was promulgated on 5 May 1868 by General John Logan, the Commander of the Grand Army of the Republic, a Civil War veterans group made up of northern vets -sort of the American Legion/VFW of its day. To honor Civil War fallen, flowers were placed on the graves of Union and Confederate dead on 30 May although most southern sympathizers clung to separate holidays to commemorate their fallen. This changed after World War 1 when veterans of both regions who had served side by side began to be honored as well.

General John A. Logan

The trauma of the Civil War, followed by that of the Great War brought industrial age carnage to new heights and the need for some sense of spiritual closure for those fallen in massed attacks such as those at Gettysburg, Cold Harbor, or the Marne and the Meuse-Argonne offensives.  To honor them, huge cemeteries and memorials span the nation and the battlefields of Europe and Asia honoring the hundreds of thousands of fallen. By "modern" standards casualties during the War for Independence were laughable and most soldiers died from sickness and starvation while in service to their nation.



But our First Patriots cherished and honored their fallen no less. And after the war, the need to honor those who gave all for an idea sanctified both the idea and those whose sacrifice enabled it.  Here are just a few examples:

General Montgomery Memorial
at St. Paul's

The first commemoration was ordered by the Continental Congress in 1776 to honor General Richard Montgomery, who fell during the American assault on Quebec, Canada. Our first fallen general's monument was designed and built under the supervision of Benjamin Franklin by one of France's best artists, King Louis XVI's personal sculptor, Jean Jacques Caffieri. Shipped to America upon completion, it rested in Edenton, NC.  Although Congress originally intended to place it in Philadelphia, it ultimately ended up in
New York City, where, in 1788, it was installed under the direction of France's Pierre Charles L'Enfant (who later designed Washington, DC)  beneath the portico of St. Paul's Chapel, which served as George Washington's church during his time in New York as the United States' first president in 1789, and where it remains to this day. Montgomery's body, which was originally interred on the site of his death in Quebec, was moved to St. Paul's in 1818.



Those who read my earlier blogs also know that I began the Yankee Doodle Spies idea, and particularly The Patriot Spy because as a boy I was inspired by the Maryland Monument in Brooklyn's Prospect Park (scroll down to read of it). But an important and little known monument was erected at the site of the Brooklyn Navy Yard.  Why? Because there the remains of perhaps as many as 15,000 First Patriots were interred there.  These were prisoners of war, the victims of the notorious British prison ships anchored as "hulks," that is de-masted sailing ships, docked in an area called Wallabout Bay.  These First Patriots later became known as the "Prison Ship Martyrs."

Unveiling Prison Ship Memorial at Ft Greene Park 1908

For years after the war, the bones of Martyrs would wash up on shore and finally  a monument was erected near the site of the hulks at the famed Brooklyn Navy Yard at a place called Vinegar Hill.  In the mid 19th century a stone crypt was erected at nearby Fort Greene Park and the bones were interred there. Fort Greene was one of several forts erected by Washington to defend Brooklyn from the British in 1776 (you can read about that in The Patriot Spy). In the late 19th century the martyrs' remains were once again moved to a new Fort Greene monument  - a tall (148 foot) obelisk that looked down on Brooklyn. When President Taft dedicated it in 1908, it was one of the finest structures in the nation and a fitting final resting place for the Prison Ship Martyrs.

General Wooster Monument

One of my recent blogs was on Connecticut's General David Wooster who was killed in the fighting that followed the British/Loyalist raid on the arsenal at Danbury, CT. On June 17, 1777, Congress voted that a
suitable monument should be erected in his memory, but measures were never inaugurated to execute the resolution. His grave was not identified until 1854 when the Connecticut legislature laid the cornerstone of a monument. Today, a monument 30 feet high marks his final resting place at Mount Moriah in Danbury. Coincidentally, Wooster fought at Quebec as Montgomery's second in command and took much unjust blame for the campaign and its result.





Many argue that Philadelphia, our nation's first capital, marks the spiritual, political, and geographic center of the American War for Independence and in 1954 an impressive monument was built to commemorate those who fell in the war. The Tomb of the Unknown Revolutionary War Soldier is  located in
Philadelphia's Washington Square. It honors the thousands of soldiers who died during the American Revolutionary War, but especially those who were buried in mass graves in that park.
The actual  plaque upon the tomb of the Unknown Soldier reads: "Beneath this stone rests a soldier of Washington's army who died to give you liberty."

Tomb of the Unknown Revolutionary War Soldier
Philadelphia

Bunker Hill Monument
Boston

If Philadelphia was the heart of the new nation, Boston was the heart and soul of the rebellion that forged the nation. The entire area is a virtual monument to the American Revolution but I'll single out one for this piece - the Bunker Hill Monument. The battle of Bunker Hill (which took place on Breed's Hill) is legendary, and for years General Washington (vainly) sought to replicate the scenario of entrenched Americans mowing down disciplined British troops who calmly marched into a hale of rebel lead. The first monument on the site was an 18-foot wooden pillar with a gilt urn erected in 1794 by King Solomon's Lodge of Masons to honor fallen patriot and mason, Dr. Joseph Warren. In 1823, a group of prominent citizens formed the Bunker Hill Monument Association to construct a more permanent and significant monument to commemorate the famous battle. The existing monument was finally completed in 1842 and dedicated on June 17, 1843, in a major national ceremony. The exhibit lodge was built in the late nineteenth century to house a statue of Dr. Warren.

So this weekend and throughout the year, we should remember all Americans who died in their nation's service. But we should especially recollect those who died to establish the nation and the idea of a free and independent people. Wherever and however you decide to celebrate the occasion, take a moment to think of those who had no Arlington - the fallen at Saratoga, Brandywine, Brooklyn, Harlem, Paoli, Bennington, Germantown, Charleston, King's Mountain, Guilford Court House, Valley Forge, Yorktown, and hundreds of battlefields fields so small only the local patriots know of them. Give them a roaring "Huzzah" for duty well done.

Arlington

Yankee Doodle Angels of Mercy

I wanted to devote more time to this particular blog, but the computer gods hosed my operating system, which imploded, causing me to spend about fifteen hours on three different days to sort of get things back in order.  Thus my time has been consumed in less creative ways that I'd like. On the positive side, I also have some very good friends now in India...

Continental Nurse Corps?

One important way women served in the Continental Army was through nursing. Female nurses were preferred over males because every woman nursing meant one more man freed to fight. Women who would care for the sick were in constant demand and short supply throughout the war. A woman serving as a nurse received regular pay (which meant irregular or not at all), but the job brought many risks such as exposure to deadly diseases like smallpox, as well as other viruses and infections. Nursing was one of the dirtiest jobs connected to the medical profession, so many women around the camps were bribed and threatened into it. The promise of full rations and an allowance for volunteer nurses or threats to withhold rations from women who refused to volunteer often worked.

Shortly after the establishment of the Continental Army on June 14, 1775, Maj. Gen. Horatio Gates reported to Commander-in-Chief George Washington that “the sick suffered much for want of good female Nurses.” Gen. Washington then asked Congress for “a matron to supervise the nurses, bedding, etc.,” and for nurses “to attend the sick and obey the matron’s orders.”

General Horatio Gates recognized
 the need for nurses early in the war

In July 1775, a plan was submitted to the Second Continental Congress that provided one nurse for every ten patients and provided “that a matron be allotted to every hundred sick or wounded.”

Second Continental Congress

Big Bucks

Congress allowed two dollars per month as a salary for these nurses, though matrons (women who supervised nurses and acted as liaisons to surgeons) were allotted four dollars per month. In 1776, Congress raised nurses’ pay to four dollars per month, and in 1777, to eight dollars per month, possibly in an attempt to entice more women into nursing or to retain nurses dissatisfied with their jobs. Despite Congressional efforts to increase the number of female nurses for the army, there remained a shortage throughout the war. Regiments constantly sought women to nurse their sick and wounded. Contemporary newspapers in Massachusetts and Virginia advertised requests for nurses to serve in the Continental Army. In July of 1776, Nathanael Greene wrote: "The sick Being Numerous in the Hospital And But few Women Nurses to be Had, the Regimental Surgeon must Report the Number Necessary for the sick of the Regt and the colonels are Requested to supply accordingly."

Nurse or Spy?

The demand for nurses was so great that commanders often overlooked suspicious circumstances in order to obtain women for nursing. In April of 1777, General Israel Putnam questioned a woman named Elisabeth Brewer after she left British-occupied New Brunswick, New Jersey. Putnam wrote to Governor William Livingston that Brewer...
" . . . has an Inclination of entering the Hospital as a Nurse; in which employment she has been before
employ'd at this place, and the Surgeon giving her a good Character, I have that purpose to detain her here for that purpose—If you have any Objections and will let me know, I will send her Immediately to you."

 Brewer was permitted to take up nursing duties with Putnam's units. The fact that she had arrived from a British-held town did not cast enough suspicion on her to prevent a desperate army from using her skills.  Putnam should have inquired more carefully into Brewer’s background though because she was found guilty of espionage in June 1777.

First Patriots

But for the most part, true patriot nurses answered the call. In July of 1776, orders for the Pennsylvania battalions at Ticonderoga stated that one woman is chosen from each company to go to the hospital at Fort George to nurse the sick. Returns for the hospital at Albany in July 1777 record nine female nurses. In 1778, Washington ordered his regimental commanders to employ as many nurses as possible to aid regimental surgeons.


 In March 1780, an Albany hospital provided provisions for female nurses and their children, as well as for female and child patients. Nurses Rachel Clement (with two children) and Mary DeCamp (with one child) received two rations each, while Mrs. Perkins (with three children) and Sarah Lancaster (with one child) received one ration each. Nurses working there who were without children received one ration each.

Continental Nurse treating at the front line

Unlike the skilled and highly educated professionals of today, Continental nurses' duties were generally related to keeping the hospital and its patients clean. The "Rules and Directions for the better regulation of the military Hospital of the United States" described nurses' duties. They must stay clean and sober, empty chamber pots as soon as possible after use, wash new patients, wash the hands and faces of old patients, comb patients' hair daily, change linen, sweep out the hospital, sprinkle the wards with vinegar (as a disinfectant) three to four times a day, and deliver dead patients' belongings to the ward master. Nurses were forbidden to be absent without the permission of their supervising physicians, surgeons, or matrons.

These devoted women served tirelessly and without glory, status, or bountiful compensation.  As with nurses today...they served their patients with quiet and selfless dignity. These First Patriot nurses should be accorded all the accolades accorded their male patients. So this week...and every week...we should honor them above all...