Veterans Become Patriots
Many former British officers later settled in America and served in the Continental Army. Some of them were controversial. A previous Yankee Doodle Spies post on Major General Charles Lee is arguably the best example.
You can read of him in, A General Disaster:
https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2019/07/this-edition-of-yankee-doodle-spies.html.
There were others – such as my recent post on Arthur St. Clair.
You can read of him in Frustrated Founder:
https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2021/10/frustrated-founder.html
What, Ho, Horatio!
This post profiles an Englishman whose life became no less ambiguous than the fictional Horatio in Shakespeare’s Hamlet. Horatio Gates came from humble beginnings, the son of a housekeeper to the Duke of Leeds. She was said to be his favorite, and why not? On 26 July 1727, she gave birth to a boy in Maldon, Essex, England, who was rumored to be the Duke’s illegitimate son. For some reason, the Duke favored the young boy from an early age. He received an education far beyond what ordinary servants could afford a child. And curiously, his servant parents managed to come up with the pounds sterling needed to purchase a commission as an Ensign in the 21st Regiment of Foot in 1745! Methinks a Sugar Daddy Duke played no small role in securing this post. If so, the investment paid off.
Following the Drum
Over the next 25 years, Gates served competently in Britain’s many wars, gaining experience in the European War of the Austrian Succession, the Micmac War in North America, and the French and Indian War. Young Horatio developed and excelled in staff skills, the type of work most young and ambitious British officers would avoid at every opportunity. He served under many accomplished governors and field commanders like Edward Cornwallis, John Stanwix, and Robert Monckton. The now Major Gates returned to England after the French and Indian War, seconded to the 45th Regiment of Foot.
Love and War
As with many young officers who served in the new world, Gates found love during his service. In June 1749, he was sent to Halifax, Nova Scotia, to serve as aide-de-camp to Colonel Edward Cornwallis (uncle of Lord Charles Cornwallis of Yorktown fame). During this time, he met young Elizabeth Phillips. The young officer was smitten and determined to marry her.
In January 1754, Horatio returned to London, hoping to improve his situation. But when that did not pan out, he returned to the New World, Maryland specifically, where he was able to purchase a captain’s commission. The captaincy gave him the income and status he needed, so in October 1754, he returned to Nova Scotia and wed Elizabeth, who bore him a son.
During the French and Indian War, young Captain Gates joined his new company in Maryland in March 1755, as it was preparing to join General Edward Braddock’s ill-fated expedition against the French and Indians.
You can read of Braddock in, Road of Destruction:
https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2017/07/things-road-of-destruction.html
Along for the march into the mountains and forests of the western frontier were such future notables as George Washington, Charles Lee, Thomas Gage, and Daniel Morgan. During Braddock’s defeat at the Monongahela River in July 1755, Horatio was severely wounded – he took a musket ball in the chest. His wound took a long time to heal. When he did return to active service, it was to garrison duty along the New York’s Mohawk River. Elizabeth lived in New York City during this time.
By 1761, Gates was a major who had become an expert in military administration and an experienced leader of men in battle. Yet without a war to speed things along, advancement in the British Army required money and influence. The maid’s son quickly realized his social status would preclude further promotion. So, he sold his commission in 1769 and sailed back to America.
With a Little Help from My Friends
The French and Indian War had been good to Horatio. It exposed him to the new world and new ways of thinking where people with humble beginnings could prosper. Of course, it never hurts to have friends and connections, and now Horatio was connected to one of the largest land purveyors (and surveyors) in America: Colonel George Washington. Washington helped his fellow French and Indian War veteran purchase a 659-acre farm in Virginia’s Berkley County. Gates turned the land into a plantation, which he named Traveler’s Rest. He settled there with Elizabeth and their son, Robert, in 1773. They built a prosperous plantation and enjoyed the blessings of marital bliss until political discord and growing insurrection exploded into open warfare against the crown.
War Clouds on the Horizon
News of Lexington and Concord reached Traveler’s rest in May 1775. Horatio wasted no time. He leaped onto one of his chargers and galloped to Mount Vernon, where he offered his services to his fellow veteran and friend, George Washington. At Washington’s recommendation, Horatio Gates received a commission as a brigadier general from the Continental Congress and was named Adjutant General of the Continental Army.
Horatio’s administrative experience in British service was critical to a new army. He developed the army’s record system processes for orders and standardized the structure of the regiments from a half-dozen or so states. Horatio was with Washington at the siege of Boston. It never hurts to be around the right people at the right time. Impressed with his performance, Washington commended Horatio’s performance. In 1776, Congress promoted him to major general.
At his request, Gates received a field command – the Canadian Department. But the American invasion of Canada and the army’s dissolution relegated him an assistant to Major General Philip Schuyler in the Northern Department.
A General Nuisance
Gates rejoined the main Continental Army under George Washington later in 1776. But Gates’s growing sense of his military superiority brought him into conflict with his mentor. Gates believed in the superiority of defense over the offense and recommended Washington retreat rather than launch a bold and reckless attack on Trenton in the middle of winter.
You can read of the attack on Trenton in. Gambling through Defeat and Victory: https://yankeedoodlespies.blogspot.com/2013/12/gambling-through-defeat-and-victory_21.html
Washington did not take his advice, so Gates contrived some sort of ailment so he would not have to join the night crossing. He let his command go into battle without its leader. Not a good look.
Danger in the North
Gates bided his time. When the debacles in Canada and northern New York fell on Major General Phillip Schuyler (himself no stranger to politics), Gates was sent north to assist and ultimately replace him as commander of the Northern Department. He assumed full command in August 1777.
His organizational skills were critical because the British columns that seized Fort Ticonderoga and poured through the forests to the north were about to descend on Albany and split New England away from the rest of the rebellious states.
Fortunately as well, the army would soon discover it had no shortage of officers who could lead men on the battlefield. John Stark‘s defeat of a sizable British raiding force at the Battle of Bennington gave the British a taste of what well-led Americans could do.
The American victories and British surrender at Saratoga shocked the world and drove the French from silent support to open alliance with the new American states. The battles of Freeman’s Farm and Bemis Heights in September and October of 1777 led to the collapse of an army of British and German professionals.
Horatio Gates received credit for command in both battles, and as the campaign architect. Yet it is besmirched by his lack of active management on the battlefield. The American strikes and counterstrikes that proved such a gut punch to General John Burgoyne’s army were only reluctantly approved by Gates. He seemed content to remain in camp while Benedict Arnold, Dan Morgan, Enoch Poor, Charles Dearborn, and other officers led the men in harm’s way.
A Political General?
Still, the commander is responsible for all his men do and do not do. If the campaign had gone the other way, Gates would have taken the blame at a court-martial and possibly would have been drummed out of the service. Gate’s political instincts told him the first report was the one that counted. So he immediately sent his Adjutant, James Wilkinson, galloping south to bring the news to Congress – not stopping along the way to inform his commander-in-chief!
Following Saratoga, Gates was named President of the Board of War, the military oversight arm of Congress, and kept his field command. Friends in Congress looked the other way at the blatant conflict of interest. And why not? They were also in favor of removing General Washington as Commander-in-Chief and replacing him with Gates.
The so-called Conway cabal was a network of officers who favored Horatio Gates’s ascension to the highest command. General Thomas Conway was an Irish-French officer and supporter of Gates’s cause. But the alleged plot was exposed. Washington did nothing directly, allowing his surrogates to attack Conway and others. And not just with words – on 4 July, Brigadier General John Cadwalader shot Conway in a duel. Ironically, it was Gates’s duplicitous aide Wilkinson who exposed Conway’s machinations.
After a round of attacks, recriminations, and apologies, the affair flamed out. Washington’s position was stronger than ever – while Gates was humiliated. In October 1778, Gates was made commander of the Eastern Department in Boston – now a military backwater. He resigned in 1779 and retired to his Virginia plantation. It has never been proven that the circle of officers and politicians favoring Gates were an actual "cabal." But if there was an actual conspiracy, it soon collapsed and Gates had egg on his face. How involved he was is a matter of controversy as well. But not to worry. More controversy lay ahead.
Song of the South
The post-Saratoga “Southern Strategy” was now paying off for the British, who took Charleston in May 1780. Thousands of Southern Department men and their commander, Benjamin Lincoln, marched off to captivity. Congress and the nation were stunned. The politicians were anxious to put a proven officer in command and chose Horatio Gates to command the Southern Department. Anxious to get back in the mix, Gates rode south and, on 25 July 1780, took command of the demoralized remnants of the army near the Deep River in North Carolina.
More trouble was brewing as the British, now under the command of Major General Lord Charles Cornwallis, were consolidating their grip on the Carolinas. Post after post fell, and suddenly the Loyalists were in the ascendant. Gates was under pressure to show results, and quickly. In August 1780, he assembled what forces were at hand, half untrained militia. Gates planned to strike southward. But now Cornwallis’s forces were gathering to face the new threat to the north.
Camden and Chaos
They clashed on 16 August near Camden, South Carolina. Cornwallis seized the initiative in the early morning. Gates favored defensive action, but his continentals were tired and under-equipped. His militiamen were raw. All were undernourished. Many were sick from raw corn. Even without these problems, his army was unready for what it faced – the bayonets of determined regulars. They quickly broke and ran in wild confusion. French-American General Baron De Kalb fell in the battle.
Muskets fire was still rattling, and men were still dying when Gates left the field of battle. He galloped 70 miles north, not stopping until his lather foaming mount reached Charlotte, North Carolina that evening. Gates’s claim of seeking a place to rally the army did not ring true to most – 70 miles was way beyond a typical distance for rallying troops. He was distraught by the loss at Camden, but in October, his mood was further darkened by the news of his son Robert’s death in combat at twenty-two.
Board of Inquiry
Gates was relieved and replaced by Nathanael Greene on 3 December 1780. The distraught general went back to his plantation to grieve his career and son. Congress demanded a board of inquiry look into his actions at Camden. Gates resisted this and drew on his political supporters for help. In 1782 Congress canceled the board of inquiry. But a future command was out of the question. Back in the saddle, Gates rode north and joined Washington’s staff at Newburgh, New York. Perhaps this was the ultimate humiliation.
Peace and Prosperity
Although the war was winding down in 1783, Horatio’s troubles were not over. His wife, Elizabeth, died that summer. The last British troops left New York City in late November, and Horatio Gates retired to his Virginia estate. He lived the life of a gentleman planter. He also served as the Virginia Society of the Cincinnati president – a controversial association of former Continental Army officers. The widowed Gates proposed marriage to Janet Livingston Montgomery, the widow of another former British officer and among the nation’s first heroes, General Richard Montgomery. But she refused.
Still, in those days, a prosperous gentleman could not remain unwed. In 1786 he married Mary Valens, a wealthy widow. He decided to move north and live on her estate, Rose Hill Farm, on the Island of New York (today’s Manhattan). Its proximity to the northern outskirts of the nation's fastest-growing city was ideal. When he sold Traveler’s Rest in 1790, Horatio conditionally (after five years) freed his slaves on the recommendation of his friend John Adams.
A New Life of Politics, Society & Service
With his new wife Mary at his side, Horatio threw himself into New York City society and its politics. But he only served one term in the New York State legislature in 1800. As New York had become an anti-Federalist and later Republican stronghold, Gates gravitated towards up-and-coming Thomas Jefferson as a presidential candidate. This shift in allegiance destroyed his friendship with John Adams.
Unlike nearly all of his Revolutionary War peers, Gates spent most of his wealth caring for less fortunate Revolutionary War veterans. The nations’ streets teemed with these broken and needy men who gave their lives and futures for a country slow to recompense them.
Gates approached his “evening parade” with a growing sense of happiness at throwing his lot in with the new nation and the role, controversial as it was, in fighting for its independence and founding.
Although his career had some "sketchy" moments, Gates, after all, had commanded the forces that turned the war's tide. And he did an admirable job in helping organize the Continental Army.
Sitting out Trenton was a mistake - the mistake of false pride. His actions at Camden were a disgrace on several levels and although he faced no board of inquiry, the fact was - none was needed. His actions spoke for themself.
And while having every reason to remain home at Traveler's Rest, he swallowed his pride and joined Washington at Newburgh in a less than luminary role. To me, that makes him a patriot - if not a military genius. As do his efforts on behalf of the beleaguered post-war veterans. He died at his farm on 10 April 1806, at seventy-nine, and was buried in Trinity Churchyard on Wall Street.
