Commander in the Crucible

The first edition of the Yankee Doodle Spies Blog continues to highlight historical characters featured in the series. In this case, we begin looking at the characters in my upcoming novel, The South Spy, book six in the series. We'll start with the man who was there at the start, but was given overall command of British forces in North America midstream.

New World Origin

Henry Clinton, born April 16, 1730, in Newfoundland, was the son of Admiral George Clinton, a Royal Navy officer and colonial governor of New York (1741–1751). This early exposure to America shaped his career, though he chose the army over the navy. 

Admiral George Clinton

Gone to Soldier

At age 15, he joined the New York militia as a lieutenant in 1745, gaining initial experience before returning to England in 1749. In 1751, he was commissioned in the Coldstream Guards, advancing through merit and patronage to become aide-de-camp to Sir John Ligonier in 1756. 

During the Seven Years' War (1756–1763), he rose to lieutenant colonel in the 1st Foot Guards by 1758. He served in Germany from 1760, fighting at Villinghausen (1761), Wilhelmsthal (1762), and Nauheim (1762), where a severe wound as an aide-de-camp to Prince Ferdinand ended his active campaigning. These experiences sharpened his tactical skills and forged ties with future Revolutionary figures such as Charles Lee, Lord Stirling, and Charles Cornwallis. 

Battle of Villinghausen

Marital Interlude Disrupted

After the war, Clinton married Harriet Carter in 1767; they had five children, but her death in 1772 from childbirth complications plunged him into prolonged grief. Promoted to major general in 1772, he entered Parliament (Boroughbridge 1772–1774, Newark-on-Trent 1774 onward) through the Duke of Newcastle's influence and briefly toured Russian forces in 1774 during the Russo-Turkish War. The American crisis called him back to service. 

Joining the Dream Team

In February 1775, Clinton sailed to Boston as third-in-command under Thomas Gage (along with William Howe and John Burgoyne, a sort of DreamTeam of military leaders), arriving on May 25. As second-in-command under Howe after Gage's recall, he urged aggressive action. At Bunker Hill (June 17, 1775), he rallied reserves amid heavy losses and later deemed it a "dear-bought victory." 

Bunker Hill

The Boston siege ended with an evacuation to Halifax in March 1776. In 1776, Clinton led a southern expedition to the Carolinas but failed at Sullivan's Island (June 28) against strong defenses. Rejoining Howe, he supported a flanking plan that secured victory at Long Island (August 27), though Howe's caution prevented annihilation. Clinton conducted landings on Manhattan and in Westchester, but growing friction with Howe over tactics soured their relationship. He occupied Rhode Island in December 1776 with ease. 

Frustration and Knighthood

Frustrated, Clinton sought resignation in early 1777 and returned to England briefly. Knighted (Knight of the Bath, April 1777) to retain him, he resumed as Howe's deputy in New York that July. Denied the northern command (which was given to Burgoyne), he criticized isolating Burgoyne and warned of disaster. In October, his diversionary Hudson River attack captured Forts Clinton and Montgomery but came too late to relieve Burgoyne at Saratoga. 

Sir Henry Clinton

Commander in Chief

Appointed Commander-in-Chief in America (February 1778, assumed in May after General William Howe's resignation), Clinton faced France's alliance with America, prompting troop transfers to the Caribbean and a defensive posture in the north. He withdrew from Philadelphia to New York (June 1778), clashing indecisively at Monmouth. Repelling a French threat at Newport (August), he shifted to a Southern Strategy to exploit Loyalist support, disrupt rebel economies, and rally sympathizers in Georgia and the Carolinas. 

Monmouth: First Battle as Commander in Chief

By spring 1778, the American War for Independence had entered its final phase—a global war that would make the Caribbean and its valuable spice islands a major theater. This was precipitated by France’s formal entry into the war and its open alliance with America in 1778, and was further complicated by Spain’s declaration of war against Britain in June 1779.  

Southern Strategy

Lord George Germain and the British commander-in-chief, Sir Henry Clinton, devised the so-called Southern Strategy amid mounting frustration. Stymied by inconclusive northern campaigns and the transfer of several crack British regiments to the islands after the French alliance in 1778, Clinton advocated shifting the focus to Georgia and the Carolinas to rejuvenate British fortunes and form a secure flank for the valuable British possessions in the West Indies.

George Germain

Clinton hoped to capitalize on perceived Loyalist sympathy, seize coastal strongholds to rally supporters, disrupt rebel economies, and threaten the Continental Army. A sound strategy, but one fraught with logistical nightmares, including overextended supply lines and unreliable intelligence on Loyalist numbers.

Savannah Success

In late 1778, Clinton dispatched Archibald Campbell with 3,000 troops; Savannah fell swiftly (December 29) with minimal losses, restoring royal control in Georgia. A Franco-American siege of Savannah (September–October 1779) under d'Estaing and Benjamin Lincoln failed disastrously on October 9, with allied losses exceeding 800, while the British suffered fewer than 150. Clinton hailed it as the war's greatest event, though subordinates such as Augustine Prévost acted semi-independently. 

Success at Savannah

Clinton in Charge

Clinton personally led the decisive Charleston campaign, departing New York in December 1779 with 8,500 troops and Admiral Marriot Arbuthnot's fleet. Storms delayed the arrival until February 1780; Clinton suffered from seasickness and fretted over losses. Landing south of Charleston, he methodically encircled the city, crossing the Ashley River by late March and digging siege lines against Lincoln's 5,000 defenders. 

Charleston

Cavalry raids, including Banastre Tarleton's at Monck's Corner (April 14), seized supplies. Arbuthnot's delays in blockading the harbor intensified Clinton's impatience. Artillery bombardment, including heated shot, devastated Charleston. Clinton rejected Lincoln's "honors of war" plea and demanded unconditional surrender on May 8. 

Charleston Victory

On May 12, Lincoln capitulated, surrendering over 5,000 prisoners—the war's largest American surrender—and vast munitions. This triumph vindicated Clinton's southern pivot. After occupying South Carolina, Clinton initially paroled militia members who pledged neutrality to win support. But in June 1780, he revoked the paroles, requiring active loyalty or imprisonment—a decision driven by fears of resurgence that alienated civilians and ignited guerrilla resistance. 

The Fall of Charleston

War on Remote

Leaving 8,000 troops under Cornwallis, Clinton sailed north in June, intending to oversee operations from New York. Cornwallis advanced inland, winning at Camden (August 1780), but defeats at King's Mountain (October) and Cowpens (January 1781) eroded those gains. Clinton's micromanagement, via delayed dispatches, rigid policies toward the Carolinians, poor relations with Admiral Arbuthnot and the theater commander, Lord Cornwallis, and underestimating partisan tenacity undermined the strategy. 

Lord Cornwallis

Legacy of Failure

This confusion led to Cornwallis’s surrender at Yorktown, effectively ending major combat and prompting serious negotiations. Clinton was replaced as commander-in-chief in early 1782, and General Guy Carleton (Governor General of Canada) took his place in May. Clinton returned to England, serving in Parliament and rising to the rank of full general. His post-war years were marked by ongoing controversy over his conduct of the war rather than by further major commands.

The Irascible Spy

 

This final Yankee Doodle Spies blog post of 2025 is the last profile of the historical characters in my novel, The Reluctant Spy, now available through Amazon and other fine purveyors of books: https://www.amazon.com/Reluctant-Spy-Yankee-Doodle-Spies/dp/B0FF23NMN1

In the shadowy world of 18th-century Europe, Arthur Lee emerged as a pivotal yet contentious figure in America's fight for independence. Born in 1740 into Virginia's influential Lee family, Arthur pursued medicine at the University of Edinburgh and law in London, arriving in the British capital in 1770. There, amid the bustling streets and political salons, he honed his skills as an advocate against British tyranny, penning fiery essays against the Stamp Act and advocating for colonial rights. As tensions escalated, Lee evolved from a mere expatriate into America's unofficial eyes and ears in the heart of the enemy.

 London Asset

The Continental Congress recognized Lee's unique position. Through the secretive Committee of Secret Correspondence, they dispatched him to London as a spy to gather intelligence on British military plans, public sentiment, and potential European allies. See my post, Committee of Secrets at https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2020/12/committee-of-secrets.html

Lee's London

Officially, Lee served as a practicing attorney and colonial agent for the colonies. He navigated a treacherous web of informants and double agents. He cultivated contacts within London's intellectual circles, discreetly probing for weaknesses in British resolve. One of his most daring ventures involved clandestine meetings with Pierre-Augustin Caron de Beaumarchais, the French playwright turned arms dealer and covert operative. These unsanctioned discussions sowed the seeds for French aid, convincing Beaumarchais to lobby Versailles for support disguised as private commerce. See my blog post, The Clockmaker’s Gambit. https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2025/08/the-watchmakers-gambit.html 

 

Beaumarchais

 

Lee's reports back to Philadelphia showed that Britain was overextended, its navy in disarray after years of war, and that European powers like France and Spain were eager to humble their rival. Lee was on a razor’s edge, surrounded by loyalists, British spies, and possible exposure at every turn, yet his efforts provided crucial insights that shaped early American strategy.

Spies lurked everywhere in Paris

As the war shifted from resistance to open rebellion, Lee's role evolved from solitary spy to roving diplomat. In late 1776, he crossed the Channel to Paris, the glittering epicenter of intrigue, where he joined Silas Deane as an American commissioner tasked with securing foreign alliances. See my blog post, Deane of Spies. https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2025/06/deane-of-spies.html

 Diplomat in Paris

Paris’s glamorous salons and complex politics became the backdrop for Lee's most intense contributions and disputes. Lee discovered Deane already deeply involved in secret negotiations for arms and munitions through Beaumarchais's front company, Roderigue Hortalez et Cie. France, guided by Foreign Minister Comte de Vergennes, was offering two million livres in aid, matched by Spain, but required secrecy to prevent provoking Britain into war too early. 

For more details about these intricate maneuvers, see my earlier blog posts: Roderigue Hortalez et Cie. https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2017/02/things-rodrigue-hortalez-cie.html and The French Fox:  https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2025/05/the-french-fox.html 

  

Paris was a center of espionage

Eager to push things along, Lee began advocating for more substantial commitments. His diplomatic ventures extended beyond France; in 1777, he traveled to Berlin as an envoy to Prussia, seeking Frederick the Great's recognition, but the wily Der Alter Fritz (Old Fritz) offered only vague promises.

 

Der Alter Fritz

 

In Spain, he more successfully navigated restrictions by meeting secretly with the Marquis de Grimaldi and the merchant Diego de Gardoqui in Vitoria, where he secured commitments for 24,000 muskets, 30,000 blankets, and uniform fabric—crucial supplies that were covertly shipped to the Continental Army. Lee skillfully combined diplomacy with espionage to gather intelligence on Spanish and French strategies against Britain. However, as the war continued, Paris evolved into a hub of betrayal and rivalry, further complicated by the involvement of the era's most renowned figure.

Dark Suspicions, Bold Accusations

In 1777, Benjamin Franklin joined the commission, forming a triumvirate plagued by discord. Lee, suspicious and uncompromising, clashed with his colleagues. He accused Deane of financial improprieties, including embezzlement and prioritizing personal gain over the cause. See last month's blog post on Franklin, The Polymath Spy: https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2025/11/the-polymath-spy.html 

 

Franklin was the key commissioner

Intrigue erupted into conflict when Lee uncovered evidence that Edward Bancroft, the commission's trusted secretary and a close associate of Franklin and Deane, was a British spy. Bancroft, paid handsomely by London, relayed sensitive details—treaty negotiations, supply routes, and even American correspondence—via invisible ink in faux love letters dropped in the Tuileries Gardens for a courier to retrieve for the British Ambassador Lord Stormont. See more on this in my blog post, A Peer in Paris: https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2025/09/a-peer-in-paris.html

 

Lord Stormont

 

Lee's accusations, supported by evidence of Bancroft's London meetings, were rejected by Franklin, who viewed Lee as paranoid and obstructive. Ironically, Lee's own aides were later revealed to be British agents, underscoring the pervasive espionage that infiltrated the American legation.

 

 Diplomatic Triumph

Despite the infighting, the commissioners achieved a landmark. The February 1778 Treaty of Alliance with France, which Lee co-negotiated, secured open military support after Saratoga's victory. This alliance shifted the war's tide, with French troops and fleets aiding Yorktown's triumph. John Adams joined the commission in April of that year, adding another prickly personality to the mix.

John Adams

Lee's spying extended to monitoring European courts, reporting on troop movements and diplomatic shifts that informed Congress. Lee’s clashes continued. By 1779, the feuds culminated in Lee's recall, and he was replaced by John Jay, who was serving as envoy in Spain. 

Uneventful Return and Understated Legacy

Returning to America in 1780, Lee kept a relatively low profile. He served in Congress before retiring to Virginia, where he died in December 1792, unmarried and childless, at his estate, Lansdowne, in Urbanna, Middlesex County.

  

Arthur Lee

  Often criticized as jealous and abrasive—John Adams described him as "acrimonious" but "faithful"—Arthur Lee's legacy remains as one of America's first spies and diplomats.

 

Lansdowne

 

His efforts in London and Paris, where he combined espionage with bold diplomacy, secured crucial intelligence and alliances vital to America’s independence. Arthur Lee serves as a reminder that success in espionage and diplomacy frequently depends on the actions of even the most disfavored and experienced diplomats.

 

The Polymath Spy

 Winter Journey
 

In the chill December of 1776, as ice floes were forming on the Delaware River, the USS Reprisal docked at Auray, a port town shrouded in Atlantic mist. Benjamin Franklin, a key historical figure in my novel, The Reluctant Spy, stepped onto what would prove to be a decisive, if not kinetic, field of battle.

Sailing to France

Doctor in the House?

At the then very ripe age of seventy, the polymath from Philadelphia—printer, inventor, philosopher—arrived not as a conqueror but as a supplicant spy, his fur cap and spectacles deliberately signaling rustic American virtue. Dispatched by Congress, Franklin's mission was to persuade the French King Louis XVI to join the war against Britain and secure more loans, arms, and ships to shift the balance in America's favor. To achieve this, he would walk a tightrope among the most skilled practitioners of the dark arts in history.

King Louis XVI

Diplomat as Rock Star

Paris, the glittering center of Enlightenment salons and Bourbon intrigue, would be his battleground, where diplomacy swayed with deception, and every whispered promise concealed a shadowed meaning.

 Franklin's Home Away from Home: Hotel Le Valentinois

Franklin energized the city like he was an 18th-century Rock Star! His international reputation—from lightning rods to Poor Richard's almanacs—preceded him like a comet. He settled into Passy, a leafy suburban villa lent by a generous patron, turning it into a hub of intrigue. Here, amid cherry orchards, he crafted a web of alliances that mixed charm with calculation.

The Comte

Chief among his patrons and adversaries was Charles Gravier, Comte de Vergennes, the foreign minister whose gaze fixed on Britain's North American jewel. Vergennes, a calculating aristocrat scarred by the Seven Years' War's humiliations, saw the rebels as a tool for French revenge.

Charles Gravier, comte de Vergennes

Franklin knew as much and outwitted him masterfully, hosting salons where philosophes like Raynal and d'Alembert debated liberty over claret, subtly steering discourse toward Franco-American solidarity. "We must make them believe the cause is theirs," Franklin confided to Deane, his early ally—a Connecticut merchant whose prior secret shipments of powder had already greased the wheels.

Working the “Street”

 Yet alliances were fragile blooms in a thorned garden. Franklin's network extended into the underworld — a tangled web of booksellers, couriers, and informants who smuggled secrets amid salons and at French ports, where informants tracked British naval dispatches. He even enlisted the Marquis de Lafayette's circle, funneling funds to the young nobleman's expeditionary force.

Charles-Joseph Panckoucke

 A key ally was Charles-Joseph Panckoucke, the powerhouse Parisian bookseller and publisher whose Palais-Royal shop was a revolutionary printing hub. He openly collaborated with Franklin, churning out pro-American pamphlets such as the Affaires de l'Angleterre et de l'Amérique series in 1776–1777 to sway French public opinion and elites toward an alliance. 

 By 1777, more French gunpowder and muskets flowed covertly to Washington's ragged Continentals, sustaining Valley Forge's winter quarters.

Sultan of Sophistication

 Franklin's espionage was no cloak-and-dagger affair so much as a symphony of subtlety. He cultivated British expatriates in Paris, posing as a harmless savant while extracting tidbits on troop movements from loose-lipped officers at the iconic theater and social venue, Comédie-Française.

Comédie-Française

One such ploy netted details of Burgoyne's Saratoga campaign, intelligence relayed in invisible ink to Congress. The stunning American victory at Saratoga that October sealed the deal: bolstering American morale and tipping Vergennes toward an open alliance. In February 1778, France formalized the Treaty of Amity and Commerce and the Treaty of Alliance in a blaze of mutual pledges—commerce, defense, and the dream of a transatlantic republic. A formal declaration of war came the following month.

Signing the Treaties

Spies Among Us

Adversaries lurked in every corner of the city. The British embassy, a hive of spies under Paul Wentworth and Edward Bancroft—a turncoat American chemist in Franklin's own employ—plotted ceaseless sabotage. Bancroft, double-dipping for London while transcribing Franklin's dispatches in lemon juice, fed Whitehall a stream of half-truths, nearly unraveling the mission when forged letters in 1778 accused Deane of profiteering.

Edward Bancroft

Then there was Arthur Lee, Franklin's fellow commissioner, a Virginia lawyer whose paranoia festered into outright enmity. Lee, sidelined by his own prickly demeanor, accused Franklin of embezzlement and senility, caballing with British agents to discredit him. "Lee is a wretch," Franklin later quipped, but the barbs stung, fracturing the American delegation and inviting French skepticism.

Beyond, George III's envoys like William Eden prowled the salons, dangling peace overtures to peel France away. At the same time, Prussian and Spanish diplomats—wary of Bourbon overreach—whispered doubts in Vergennes's ear.

Obstacles

Challenges mounted. Secrecy was paramount. A single leak could summon British frigates to Brest. Franklin countered using a cipher system blending Polybius squares and homophonic substitutions, smuggling letters in wine bottles or hollowed canes.

Crafting Secret Letters

Financial straits gnawed deeper—Congress's credit evaporated amid war's voracity, forcing Franklin to beg loans from French bankers like the Neufvilles, who demanded ruinous interest. "I am become the diplomatic beggar of Europe," he lamented in a dispatch.

Chick Magnet

Yet he responded with unflagging bonhomie, charming Versailles courtiers with bifocal demonstrations and anti-slavery tracts that aligned American ideals with French humanism. Franklin used his avuncular image to woo the French noblewomen.  A trait that his other commissioners found off-putting, but yielded no small conquests.

Twists and Barbs

When British spies torched American supply ships in the summer of 1779, crippling reinforcements bound for the Carolinas, Franklin retaliated not with rage but with a mock obituary for the "late" General Howe (who returned to Britain in disgrace in 1778), circulated in private letters, humiliated London, and eroded morale. To the French, he spun the arson as proof of British desperation, urging Vergennes to dispatch Admiral d'Estaing's fleet anew, even as d'Estaing's stalled Savannah siege that autumn tested the alliance's mettle.

The "Late" General Howe

Meanwhile, Bancroft's betrayals went unnoticed, but Lee's slanders echoed through Congress, and Britain's steadfast resolve suggested a tough struggle ahead. Franklin, always the optimistic strategist amid chaos, wrote to Washington: "Persevere, and the sun will break through."

Deception’s Twilight

By the close of 1778, Franklin sat by Passy's hearth, spectacles fogged by pipe smoke, studying a chessboard tilted in delicate advantage. The alliance thrived—French ships filled with cannon slicing through Atlantic waves, Vergennes's coffers opening for yet another loan, and soon French soldiers would fight side by side with the hard-pressed Americans.

The French Army - Crucial to Victory

The old scholar had woven a web of cleverness and charm, outsmarting empires with a smile and a secret. His first year in Paris marked a tour de force of realpolitik amid the rising storm. He would need to keep playing his game, as the stakes would be higher as the long-warring nations struggled to reach peace.

 

 

 

 

Spirits of Seventy-Six

Ever since I posted my vintage Yankee Doodle Spies Blog titled, “George Washington, Vampire Slayer,” I have wanted to share more Revolutionary War stories from beyond the grave. Below are more ghostly figures who continue to march (or drift) to a haunting version of the Yankee Doodle tune. Recent reports by paranormal investigators include Electronic Voice Phenomena (EVPs), which are sounds or voices recorded on electronic devices.  EVP recordings often happen in environments with background noise and are interpreted as messages from the deceased. Some believe these are communications from spirits.  

All these sightings are lore, passed down over the years by visitors and caretakers who hardly believe what they see, but are still spooked all the same.

 

The Anguished Angel

Built in 1716, Concord's Colonial Inn served as a temporary hospital during the Revolutionary War, treating wounded soldiers after the Battles of Lexington and Concord. Legend connects it to a nurse named Rosemary, a middle-aged caregiver who tended to the injured amid the chaos of 1775. Reports describe her apparition as a spectral woman in old-fashioned nursing attire. The anguished angel of mercy drifts silently through dimly lit hallways, her footsteps silent but her presence chills the air. Guests in Room 24, a corner chamber with creaking floorboards and antique furnishings, often wake to grayish figures huddled in pain—wounded soldiers with bandaged limbs and vacant stares, vanishing like mist when approached. Cold spots appear unexpectedly, doors latch shut on their own, and faint medicinal scents linger.

The Concord Inn

One account from 2018 details a family hearing labored breaths and seeing a translucent figure checking an empty bed before fading away. Paranormal investigators capture EVPs of whispers like "hold on" and orbs in photos. These sightings continue, echoing the inn's bloody past.

 

A Smuggler’s Spirit

Copp’s Hill Burying Ground, established in 1659, overlooks the site of the 1775 Battle of Bunker Hill, where British artillery targeted the North End, riddling gravestones with cannon fire. Captain Daniel Malcolm, a Sons of Liberty smuggler who evaded duties on 60 casks of wine, lies beneath one of the most scarred markers—a winged skull epitaph declaring him a "True Son of Liberty." His spirit, restless from the desecration, reportedly stirs paranormal activity: strange lights flicker like musket flashes among the crooked slate stones at dusk, casting elongated shadows that twist unnaturally. Muffled cries echo as if from wounded ranks, groans rise like wind through pines, and translucent figures in tricorn hats pace the paths, halting abruptly. Visitors feel an icy grip on their shoulders or hear gravel crunch under invisible boots.

Captain Daniel Malcolm's Gravestone

A 2023 account describes a group photographing the pockmarked stone when orbs swirled, accompanied by a guttural "liberty" whisper on recordings. The hauntings peak on foggy nights, blending colonial fury with eternal vigilance.

Sentinel Spooks

On September 6, 1781, during the Battle of Groton Heights, 160 American defenders held Fort Griswold against 800 British raiders led by Benedict Arnold. Despite inflicting heavy losses, the garrison faced a massacre after surrender. Lieutenant-Colonel William Ledyard was bayoneted, and many were slain or wounded inside the redoubt. Today, the site is a state park with the Groton Monument overlooking the Thames River, and it’s filled with stories of restless spirits. Wounded defenders sometimes appear beside modern picnickers on the grassy slopes—gaunt figures in bloodied linen shirts, leaning on muskets with vacant eyes fixed on the horizon. Sudden chills sweep through groups mid-meal, accompanied by ragged breaths and the sound of phantom footsteps on the earthworks.

Fort Griswold

A 2025 report describes a family seeing translucent soldiers resting against the ramparts, their groans synchronized with the wind before vanishing. EVPs capture pleas like "mercy" near the death hole where bodies were piled. The hauntings grow stronger at dawn, recalling the betrayal and brutality that marked this forgotten outpost.

A Southern Spirit

This legend is strikingly similar to the famed “Headless Horseman.” In 1781, during a Patriot raid on Wedgefield Plantation near Georgetown, South Carolina, British dragoons guarded the property and some prisoners amid the chaos of the Southern Campaign—specifically, some of the famed “Swamp Fox” Francis Marion’s men. A clash ensued when a rescue party arrived. One sentry, beheaded by a swift sword stroke in the skirmish, became the lore's centerpiece: "The Headless Sentry." Apologies to Ichabod Crane!

At twilight, the sentry’s apparition staggers across the yard—a headless torso in a tattered red coat and riding boots, his large flintlock pistol gripped in a gloved hand, groping blindly for his lost head. Hoofbeats thunder or chains rattle from nowhere, building to a frenzy as he lurches toward witnesses, the ragged neck stump oozing ethereal blood. Approachers hear guttural gurgles, feel a rush of fetid breath, before he dissolves into mist.

Headless Dragoon Haunts sthe Bunkers

The estate is now a golf course residential community, but that has not driven away the ghost—a 2020 video from golfers captured distorted audio of clopping hooves and a form flickering near the clubhouse. The ghost writhers on grounds where the raid unfolded, pistol raised in futile defense, vanishing at full dark. This tale warns of war's dismembering toll and its effect on your handicap!

Warrior Whispers 

From 1776 to 1783, British prison hulks in Wallabout Bay held over 11,500 American captives in squalor; disease, starvation, and abuse claimed most, their bones dumped into unmarked graves now beneath Fort Greene Park's Prison Ship Martyrs' Monument—a 149-foot Doric column dedicated in 1908. Lore clings to the waterfront: faint whispers of martyred Patriots drift on breezes by the East River, spectral murmurs of "freedom" or chained coughs blending with lapping waves. At dusk, visitors near the monument hear ragged breaths from the crypt below, where remains were reinterred, or glimpse emaciated shadows shuffling in fetters along the shore. Cold fog rolls in unbidden, carrying briny rot and distant clanks of irons.

Martyrs Monument

A 2017 historical tour reported EVPs of overlapping pleas amid the hum of traffic, tying back to the "ghost ship" Jersey's horrors. These echoes mark the unseen graveyard, a silent rebuke to forgotten suffering.

The Phantom Encampment

Valley Forge National Historical Park in Pennsylvania marks the grueling winter encampment of the Continental Army from 1777-1778, where around 2,500 soldiers died from typhus, pneumonia, and starvation in the freezing cold, their shelters just simple log huts amid frozen fields. Archaeological evidence shows most bodies were taken to distant hospitals for burial, leaving the site eerily free of graves, yet the sense of tragedy remains. Victorian-era romanticism created the legend, adding whispers of unrest. Phantom soldiers in threadbare blue coats trudge across snowless paths at sunset, bayonets shining under moonlit oaks, their empty footsteps matching phantom drum rolls that unset modern nerves. Distant musket cracks break the silence, as if volleys echo from unseen lines. On stormy nights, ghostly campfires glow across barren hillsides—orange flickers drawing eyes to shadows huddled for warmth, faces gaunt and frostbitten, vanishing with thunderclaps.

Since reports began in 1895, witnesses have glimpsed a solitary sentry saluting, his tricorn hat cast in shadow. South of Route 23, near Varnum's quarters, an "JW" headstone commemorates Lieutenant John Waterman, who died on April 23, 1778. A 1901 obelisk, relocated in 1939, sparks tales of wraiths clawing from the soil, although no haunt linked to him has been proven—only legends of his vigilant shade patrolling the monument with eyes fixed on intruders.

The Haunted Obelisk

 

A Peer in Paris

The Peer's Challenge

As Paris buzzed with intrigue during the American Revolution, Lord David Murray, the seventh Viscount Stormont, the British ambassador to Louis XVI's court and chief of intelligence, was at the center of this complex web of intrigue. Appointed in 1772, Stormont was a Scottish peer related to Lord Mansfield, the chief justice who had ruled against colonial protests during the Stamp Act crisis of 1765. His diplomatic cover cloaked espionage aimed at blocking French support for the rebelling colonies.

Lord Stormont

Covert Aid

The 1776 Declaration of Independence upped the stakes. George Washington's Continental Army faced severe shortages of weapons, powder, and funds. Franklin's arrival in Paris in December was a game-changer: the Philadelphian captivated French intellectuals and aristocrats alike. He lobbied Foreign Minister Charles Gravier, the Comte de Vergennes, for more covert aid. Vergennes, estimating the strategic blow to Britain, authorized secret shipments through intermediaries, such as the front company Rodrigue, Hortelez & Cie.

Comte de Vergennes

Unleashing a Master Spy

From his Rue du Faubourg Saint-Honoré estate, Stormont took this as a dire threat. His network, funded by Whitehall subsidies and coordinated with Loyalist exiles, became Britain’s eyes and ears in a city full of conspiracy. At the core of Stormont's operation was Dr. Edward Bancroft, a Massachusetts-born physician and chemist whose scientific credentials masked his duplicity. Recruited in March 1776 by British secret service agent Paul Wentworth, a wealthy Loyalist tobacco merchant acting as Stormont's intermediary, Bancroft had infiltrated the American mission.

Edward Bancroft

Placement and Access

Serving as Silas Deane's secretary—the Connecticut merchant tasked with buying munitions—Bancroft gained access to Franklin's villa in Passy, a hub of covert diplomacy. From there, he documented every detail: Vergennes' promises of gunpowder, arms shipments disguised as commercial cargo; the negotiations over loans to fund the American cause. Bancroft’s use of spycraft was brilliant. He used stain (invisible ink), hidden papers, and pseudonyms.

Silas Deane

Sophisticated Spycraft

He made weekly visits to a “dead drop" in a crevice at the base of a tree on the south terrace of the Jardin des Tuileries. Stormont dispatched his private secretary, Thomas Jeans, who retrieved these drops under the cover of darkness. Stormont’s instructions and new requests for intelligence were also left by Jeans, often accompanied by payments of up to £500 annually.

Jardin des Tuileries 

Exquisite Intelligence

By April 1777, as negotiations between France and America intensified, Bancroft's leaks included verbatim transcripts of commissioners' minutes and drafts of the 1778 Treaty of Alliance. One dispatch, smuggling the final version of the treaty, reached King George III within 48 hours of its signing in Paris, allowing Britain to prepare naval responses.

King George III

Démarcheing the Bourbons

Stormont used this intelligence in heated meetings with Vergennes, citing specifics to accuse France of violating the 1776 Treaty of Commerce and demanding inspections—his démarches spawned hesitation and bought Britain months of breathing space. 

Signing the Treaty

An Army of Agents

His influence reached the Atlantic ports of Lorient, Brest, and Nantes, which were crucial points for American supplies. Here, a network of embedded agents—dockyard foremen, corrupt customs officials (douaniers), and bribed ship chandlers—monitored rebel privateers such as the USS Reprisal, commanded by the daring American Captain Lambert Wickes.

USS Reprisal

Stormont’s informants tracked illegal exchanges: American tobacco and indigo were traded for Charleville muskets and gunpowder, which was routed through Roderigue Hortalez et Cie.

Actionable Intelligence

In July 1777, Lambert Wickes' squadron escorted a Dutch convoy loaded with arms past Ushant. Stormont's informers provided intelligence that led the Royal Navy to intercept the convoy, seizing prizes worth £100,000. As the British ambassador, he issued a strong démarche to Versailles. This pressured Vergennes to issue mild protests against "illegal" sailing.  Although enforcement was pro forma, Stromont’s protests delayed France’s full naval involvement until 1778.

Illegal Sailing

French Mole

Meanwhile, spymaster Stormont developed a mole within the Foreign Ministry's Archives Section—a junior archivist, possibly bribed with 500 louis d'or—who stole dispatches from locked cabinets.

Lord North

Breaking into the Quai d'Orsay's bureaucracy was a master stroke against the French.  These stolen dispatches revealed Franco-American subsidies, as well as overtures to Spain's Charles III for a Mediterranean diversion against Gibraltar. Stormont forwarded copies to London via secure couriers, helping Prime Minister Lord North lobby neutral European nations, such as the Dutch, against Bourbon plans.

Unplugging the Electrician

But no target infuriated Stormont more than Franklin, the "electrician of sedition,” whose charm threatened French neutrality. Intercepts exposed Franklin's secret letters to William Petty, the second Earl of Shelburne, a Whig opposition leader who called the war "madness" in Parliament and secretly provided £10,000 to American agents such as Arthur Lee.

Benjamin Franklin

In a slick psychological operation, Stormont leaked "correspondence" accusing Franklin of treasonous dealings—leaking rebel plans to Lord Shelburne for personal gain. These accusations were circulated in London newspapers and Paris coffeehouses, sparking a scandal. 

Lord Shelburne

Angered at the false reports, Shelburne fought a duel with his purported accuser, Colonel William Fullarton, in Hyde Park, but both survived unscathed. This episode damaged trust within the American delegation, with Deane suspecting Lee of leaks and making French courtiers wary of deeper involvement. It also provided the predicate for my fifth novel in the Yankee Doodle Spies series, The Reluctant Spy.

Success and Failure

Lord Stormont’s web of espionage delayed French arms shipments, kept London apprised of secret negotiations, and sowed discord among both French and American diplomats. However, Stormont's efforts in Paris could not stop the momentum of support for America by France, Spain, and the Netherlands.

Admiral d'Estaing

After the treaty of alliance was signed in 1778, French fleets under Admiral d'Estaing sailed for Savannah, shifting the war. Stormont, whose protests were ignored, was recalled that June — bringing a great sigh of relief to Vegennes and Franklin. Although his network dissolved, its efforts had sustained the British struggle for two more years—a testament to the power of espionage in the forging of revolution.

The Peer's Postscript

In a final note, Edward Bancroft's treason to America was not revealed in 1889 — from Stormont's secret papers—highlighting how Britain’s intelligence secrets were sustained over many decades.