VII

Maitland Finds a Way

MAITLAND’S little fleet meanwhile had inched its way southward along the inland waterways of Carolina—across Port Royal Sound on whose shores (“one of the goodlyest, best and fruitfullest cunteres that ever was sene”) Jean Ribaut’s dreams of French empire had long since become ashes of roses—past islands wild with beauty and big with romance—past Spanish Wells where centuries before, the tide of Castile had rolled and receded—on through the wide sea marshes and into the waters of Callibogue where the imaginative might still espy the dugouts of the vanished Yamassee caciques silhouetted against the headlands of Dawfuskie.

Why had not this way been closed? A man-of-war posted at the mouth of Skull Creek where Prevost’s first express had been intercepted would have sealed it. The Americans knew that Maitland would try to reach Savannah through these waters. A newspaper in Charlestown reported that the Beaufort garrison had embarked “rather hastily, on board the Vigilante, the gallies, and some other small craft, with an intent to push through Skull Creek, and join General Prevost at Savannah, but it is doubted whether he has been able to effect that junction; it is rather believed that his vessels are blocked up in Skull Creek.”¹ Apparently d’Estaing and Lincoln were less accurately informed of the enemy movements than the Charlestown press.

There was to be acrimonious controversy over the failure to cut off the Beaufort troops. Lincoln for his part maintained that the French had agreed in the Council of War at Charlestown that they would “block up the enemy in Port Royal.” He had warned d’Estaing as early as September 5th that “it will be necessary that the mouth of the Savannah, Broad River, Ogeechee and the inlet to Sunbury be soon effectually guarded.”² The Americans contended that M. de Fontanges had promised to send a fifty gun vessel up the Beaufort River. Though the Viscount warmly denied having made any such commitment the French Archives contain a copy of an order which d’Estaing sent on September 7th to d’Albert de Rions in which that officer was directed to “block Port Royal and anchor at the entrance of the Broad River” in order to keep any ship from “entering or leaving there.” He was charged with preventing the nine hundred troops of the Beaufort garrison from availing themselves of that route.

The Vice-Admiral explained to his Ministry that the order sent to d’Albert de Rions was given independently of any promise to the Americans to send a vessel to Port Royal. In any event, its prompt execution would have driven an impenetrable wedge between Beaufort and Savannah. No officer in the fleet, said d’Estaing, was “more bold, more anxious to get things done or a better sailor than M. D’Albert.”³ But the captain of the Sagittaire found himself unable to carry out his instructions. The Charlestown pilot refused to carry the ship over the bar. Captain d’Albert pleaded with him in vain.

Not without irony was it that through a channel never less than four fathoms at high water a more venturous French navigator named Ribaut had entered these same waters in 1562 to pronounce the Sound “one of the greatest and fayrest havens of the worlde . . . where without daunger all the shippes in the worlde myght be harbored.” Two hundred and seventeen years later it would “admit Ships of a Considerable Draught,” according to General Prevost who on September 6th informed Clinton that if the French were “so minded, we had no Naval force to prevent their Entering Port Royal River. . . . and cutting between the division of our little Army.”

For his part, the French commander insisted that the Americans were to blame. Colonel Brétigny told him, he said, that at the Council in Charlestown Lincoln was personally charged with preventing the junction of the Beaufort detachment. Though he at first blamed, d’Estaing later exonerated Vicomte de Fontanges. “It is beyond comprehension,” he informed M. de Sartine, “that a high ranking officer, as experienced and as informed as he is intelligent, could have forgotten the principal object of a mission as important as the one I confided to M. de fontanges.” On September 18th Fontanges would write to M. Plombard, the French consul, to obtain his version of what had taken place at the meeting at Charlestown. Plombard informed him that Lincoln and Rutledge were both convinced that if the French made themselves masters of the several sea passes, any junction would be impossible. If the Americans were ignorant of the existence of an interior route, it was no fault of his, he consoled.⁴

Everybody’s business had become nobody’s. Too much had been taken for granted. It should have been realized that an officer as resourceful as Maitland would stop at nothing in attempting to reach Savannah. The blockade of Beaufort was the key to everything, demanding as General Henry Lee said, “primary attention.” D’Estaing fully realized it. “To prevent any sort of junction,” he wrote, “was the basis of the plan.” The failure to cut off that garrison, declared Thomas Pinckney, was the “first great error” of the Allies. If the troops from Beaufort had been “prevented from getting into the Town (& wh’ch was practicable) they would have Capitulated without firing a Gun,” claimed Colonel Joseph Clay.⁵ With that statement there was general agreement.

But Maitland’s men were still far from their goal. By this time they had been transferred to small craft, the Vigilant and the other vessels being left in a fortified anchorage off Buck Island on the southwestern side of Hilton Head, where the convalescents were disembarked. The critical point in the operation had now been reached. The British were nearing the Savannah. To enter it they had to cross Tybee Roads, but far across Callibogue Sound the top-gallants of French frigates could be seen in the Savannah. That channel was barred. If the lower South—if America itself was to be saved to the King—Maitland somehow had to get his troops through twenty miles of marsh and swamp that lay between them and beleaguered Savannah. Unless the French were dawdling more than one dared hope it was too late, even could they find a way.

At this crucial moment fortune threw some Negro fishermen in the path of Maitland. In their strange Gullah version of the English language they told the British about an obscure waterway behind Dawfuskie Island. In serpentining through the marshes a creek looped within a short distance of another. A shallow cut had been dug to connect the two. This passage, which was called Wall’s Cut, could be used only at high tide. But once in the creek to which it led, the English with luck and hard work might get into the Savannah above the point to which the French vessels had advanced. Lieutenant Goldesbrough, who was in charge of the boats, was prompt to take advantage of the opportunity.

Poems would be written about this exploit. “With rapid wing, but not before untried, From BEAUFORT’S banks the gallant MAITLAND flew.”⁶ So went a line in one of them. Fever and all, the Colonel would have managed a smile had he read that. Closer to the truth was the version of an incredulous Charlestownian who supposed that the British “must have plunged through swamps, bogs and creeks which had never before been attempted but by bears, wolves, and run-away Negroes.”⁷

A long stretch of shoal creek lay between Wall’s Cut and the Savannah. The men struggled through mud and marsh up to their waists. The boats were dragged through the narrow creek by main force. But suddenly the British were looking out upon the waters of a great river. Along the marsh-bordered banks of the Savannah one could see “multitudes of alligators lying in the mud like old Logs.” That was all, for no enemy vessels were that far up the stream. American pilots (“pilots more in word than in deed,” d’Estaing described them) had informed the French that by becoming masters of Tybee Island they would effectually block the route from Beaufort. On September 11th the French Admiral had ordered Chevalier Trolong Durumain to proceed with three vessels (already in Tybee Roads) up the Savannah and as close to the city as possible. The purpose was not to intercept Maitland, but to pursue and destroy the English ships and, in the end, establish a communication with the French land forces.⁸ But numerous difficulties had been encountered. Cannon had to be taken on. The channel was narrow. There were several mud banks, and the Comte de Chastenet de Puysegur, who commanded the Truite, had to take soundings nearly every foot of the way upstream.

The only men-of-war Maitland encountered in the Savannah were the Keppel brig and the Comet galley which had been sent down the river from Five Fathom Hole to cover his approach. Before long there was a glimpse of a church steeple. It was September 16th, around noon. The summons to surrender had been received only a short time before.

The English are sometimes accounted an undemonstrative lot, but this was drama to warm the hearts of even the most reserved, the sight of these long-awaited reinforcements—veterans of Brandywine, Fort Montgomery, Brier Creek, and Stono Ferry—filing up the bluff and marching off to their posts in the lines. Even rough British tars were so moved that they gave three cheers. “Brave Fellows,” applauded an elated English naval officer—“Savannah in the highest Spirits.” The arrival of Maitland brought “inexpressible joy,” said Sir James Wright. After reviewing the troops in the lines that day General Prevost described them as “all in high spirits, and the most pleasing confidence expressed in every face.”⁹

In ponderous phrases an English historian of the time described the occasion. “The safe arrival of so considerable a reinforcement,” wrote Charles Stedman, “and that too of chosen troops, but above all, the presence of the officer who commanded them, in whose zeal, ability and military experience so much confidence was deservedly placed by the army, inspired the garrison of Savannah with new animation.”¹⁰

Half the Beaufort troops were still on the way up the river. But time enough for that! Shortly before midnight on the 16th a flag had come in from d’Estaing. “I consent to the Truce you ask,” said the Count magnanimously, announcing that the sounding of retreat the next evening would signalize the “Recommencement of Hostilities.”

Possibly General d’Estaing had not yet received the message Fontanges had sent that night from Brewton Hill advising him of the arrival of the Beaufort troops. Perhaps he had heard that ominous news and knowing that he was in no position to carry out his threat of an assault was merely trying to save face. Whatever were d’Estaing’s motives, the English had reason to be pleased. By the evening of the 17th, Maitland’s troops, to the last effective man, would be in Savannah.

Boats had been observed on the way up the river on the 16th. Fontanges learned of the fact when the French established a post at Brewton Hill that day. At nine o’clock on that evening he scribbled a hasty note conveying the bad tidings to d’Estaing. “The Americans have assured me,” he reported, “that they saw pass today 14 boats, each filled with at least 25 men who ascended the river and reached Savannah.”¹¹

The following morning d’Estaing personally investigated. On a murky day he and Lincoln watched from Brewton Hill the last of Maitland’s soldiers enter Savannah. “I have had the mortification,” the chagrined Frenchman said, “of seeing the troops of the Beaufort garrison pass under my eyes.” What was almost as bad, the “indifferent” Lincoln, after witnessing this “doleful sight,” promptly “fell asleep in a chair.”¹² The Count was being a bit unfair in branding as indifference what was actually the American General’s remarkable habit of “somnolency,” which was such that he would even nap between sentences while dictating dispatches.

The arrival of the reinforcements was “au grand contentement des Anglais” reported Séguier de Terson who sadly added, “et à nos grands regrets.” Through the scattered pines they could see, just across the British lines, the big barracks—“un très bon corps de caserne,” as he described it. Yesterday the building seemed so close the French could almost reach over and touch it. Now it was as though it were a thousand miles away. The steady rain which set in on the 16th did not improve Allied tempers.

Nor were spirits helped by the northeaster that blew the ships from their anchorage, depriving d’Estaing of all communication with them for several anxious days. The landing of his troops ceased for the time.

There was one comic touch that helped relieve the gloom in the French camp. While the negotiations were being conducted, the Vicomte de Cambis, an aide-de-camp to d’Estaing, took the wrong road on his way back to Beaulieu. He encountered a British outpost. The young officer jumped from his horse and tried to escape by running into the woods. He was taken prisoner but was given his freedom the next day on parole after a pleasant meal with General Prevost at Savannah. Fearful of the wrath of his querulous commander, the French officer went around repeating over and over, in the tone of Géronte, a famous line from one of Molière’s plays: “Mais que diable allait-il faire dans cette galère?” [“But what the devil was he doing on that galley?”]¹³