In my effort to highlight the important (and not-so-important) historical personalities in my fourth Yankee Doodle Spies novel, The North Spy, I must not neglect one who lived about an hour's drive from where I am living in Virginia.
This larger-than-life figure, whose contributions are the stuff of legend, is the only senior American leader who played significant positive contributions in all theaters from Canada to the Carolinas and led troops in The Northern and Southern Departments, as well as the main Continental Army. His role merits more than one blog post, so this edition will survey his background and actions leading up to and through the events in The North Spy. His further exploits will be the subject of a future post.
Daniel Morgan
Daniel Morgan was born around 1736. He came from a family of Welsh settlers in Pennsylvania, but young Dan Morgan was born in Hunterdon County, New Jersey, where his parents, James Morgan and Eleanor Lloyd, had resettled. He was five of seven siblings. When just a teenager, Morgan ran from his home in the Jerseys and settled in Virginia's Shenandoah Valley near Winchester, Virginia. Young Morgan spent these years cutting down trees, establishing a sawmill, and running wagons to haul goods. The latter proved quite lucrative. On the personal side, he soon garnered a reputation as a hard-drinking, quick-to-anger frontier brawler. Dan's six-foot, two-hundred-pound frame made him a powerful and muscular young man well-suited for the back-breaking work of life on the frontier. Due to his size and demeanor, Morgan seemed older than his years and was called "The Old Wagoner."
The way to Fort Duquesne was rough, but Morgan was more than up to guiding wagons pulled by horse teams through heavily wooded mountains, streams, and rivers of northwestern Virginia (today's West Virginia)), western Maryland, and Pennsylvania. Braddock's column was annihilated at The Battle of the Monongahela, where a smaller force of French and Indians cut the redcoats to ribbons in the dense forests around what is today's Pittsburgh.
"The Old Wagoner" hated the strict regimen of the British regulars, which he resisted and mocked. For their part, Morgan was the kind of rustic American colonial they loathed and put down at every opportunity.
In 1756, while Morgan was hauling supplies to Fort Chiswell, he had a run-in with a British lieutenant, who struck the "Old Wagoner" with the flat of his saber. Morgan exploded with a powerful blow to the subaltern's jaw, knocking him cold. A court-martial sentenced him to 500 lashes. He developed a hatred for the British Army. A properly used leather whip of the day could easily have a man near death or begging for it at ten well-placed stokes. He survived, and his joking about it only enhanced his tough-guy reputation, commenting that the British had miscounted and still owed him one more lash.
Morgan returned to Virginia and served as a rifleman in Virginia's militia assigned to protect the western settlements from the ravages of Indian raids. He led the relief column at Fort Edwards during its siege and took command of its defenses. In 1758, as Morgan was traveling home to Winchester from Fort Edward, a well-aimed ball from a musket-wielding brave near Hanging Rock passed through his cheek, shattering teeth, disfiguring his face, and contributing to an already fearsome demeanor.
Despite the wounds and struggles with the military hierarchy, Morgan was drawn to campaigning and, in 1753, fought as a ranger in Pontiac's Indian rebellion. And in 1774, Morgan picked up his musket to serve in Lord Dunmore's War between the Colony of Virginia and the Shawnee and Mingo American Indian nations.
The Revolutionary War commenced in April 1775, and the Continental Congress authorized the creation of a 10-company regiment of riflemen. Morgan was selected as a captain of a Virginia company. He led it to Boston and joined the main army gathered under General George Washington.
In September 1775, Morgan marched with Colonel Benedict Arnold on his punishing expedition to seize Canada from British control. He endured many grueling weeks in the rugged and barren Maine wilderness. On December 3, 1775, Morgan and Arnold joined an army led by General Richard Montgomery (See Blog, First to Fall) outside Quebec.
The Americans lacked artillery and supplies, so they launched a desperate attack on Governor Guy Carleton's (See Blog, The Governor General) garrison on December 31, 1775, during a blinding snowstorm. What could go wrong? Well, everything. Morgan took command of the surviving Americans after Arnold was wounded and Montgomery cut down in a torrent of grapeshot. The Americans were haggard, cold, tired, hungry, and unable to breach Carleton's defenses. Morgan surrendered.
Morgan was exchanged after eight months in captivity. He was soon appointed Colonel of the 11th Virginia Continental Infantry. But Washington, sensing the need for able light infantry sharpshooters, directed him to raise a battalion of riflemen. This new battalion would be made up of Virginians, Pennsylvanians, and Marylanders and be known as Morgan's Rifle Corps.
Although the Continental Army was busy watching General William Howe's forces in New York City, Congress pressured Washington to send part of his forces to reinforce the Northern Department near Albany, New York. Along with Henry Dearborn's Light Infantry and a few other regiments, Morgan joined General Horatio Gates's army and played a pivotal role in the Saratoga campaign against General John Burgoyne (See Blog, Gentleman Johnny).
Morgan's Riflemen were used to screen and patrol in the heaviest terrain, on the left flank of Gate's army, defending in farmland and rolling hills about thirty miles north of Albany. The sharpshooters of Morgan's Rifle Corps shot down droves of British officers at the pivotal battles of Freeman's Farm and Bemis Heights and pinned down the cream of Burgoyne's Army in the wooded hills.
On October 7, 1777, one rifleman, Timothy Murphy (See Blog, Patriot Sniper), fired three lead balls at General Simon Fraser (see Blog, Fighting Fraser)), with two striking and mortally wounding the best British leader on the field. Fraser's death demoralized the British, and Burgoyne later surrendered at Saratoga, New York, when Morgan's Rifles and American militia cut off his supply lines and threatened his line of retreat.
Usually reserving praise for himself and close confidants, Horatio Gates openly admired Morgan's qualities in his official report and gave him partial credit for Burgoyne's demise. Gates wanted Morgan's Rifle Corps to remain with his Department, but Morgan, who did not like the self-serving Gates, marched his Corps to join General Washington and the main Continental Army in New Jersey.
