XIV
The Count Raises the Siege
AFTER the battle the wounded d’Estaing had ridden on horseback to the French hospital at the waterside settlement called Thunderbolt. There is a story that he shut himself up for three days, refusing to speak to anyone and that the only answer the surgeon could get from him was, “I have a deep wound which is not in your power to cure.”1 Some say that the General pointed to his heart. The wound there was deep indeed and these undoubtedly were moments of bitterness for the Count, bitterness which letters of sympathy from his officers did not assuage. They would have been even more galling had he known what Bougainville was saying about him. The wound in his leg, that sharp-tongued officer was writing, was “rendered dangerous by the state of his blood, and, I think, that of his soul!”2
But the story that d’Estaing shut himself up for three days is not supported by the evidence. Captain Séguier de Terson, who was admitted to his presence on the 11th, reported that the Count seemed appreciative of the inquiries about his health. As senior colonel Dillon was ostensibly in command but d’Estaing remained in actual control, making all policy decisions. He himself sent word to General Lincoln on the 9th that the Siege was being immediately raised by the French.
During the remainder of his stay in Georgia the wounded d’Estaing was harassed by requests and demands of all sorts. Besides the details of retreat and embarkation and the complicated problem of the destination of his ships, numerous lesser troubles beset him. The British were demanding the return of two carriages they had lent the French to convey their wounded to Thunderbolt. There were demands from the Americans that they stay on. Dillon and Noailles were nagging him about retreating to Charlestown. There were requests from army officers asking permission to go back to France instead of to the Isles. There were petitions from naval officers for duty on other ships. In short, there was an eternal refrain of Mon Général this and Mon Général that.
Then there was Mrs. Jourdina Cunningham Baillie. On top of all his other worries this Tory female was now insisting that the Count return “the Chair horse & Saddle & bridle I handed your Excellency the morning after your Arrival at the Orphan House.”3 Horses! It was all these Americans seemed to think about. General Lincoln had even officially complained to him at one point about the French taking horses from the American camp. The Count had had to fall back on the explanation that the blame rested with American civilians.4 Not only was he being dunned by Mrs. Baillie for the horse but even for a bed borrowed for his personal use after he was wounded. She had also billed him for the cattle, hogs, and poultry the French troops had taken from Bethesda. Sacrénom! They belonged to Lady Huntingdon in the first place. Besides the Americans had stripped the plantations around Savannah of everything they needed. The only difference was a trifling one—Lincoln had given receipts for what the Americans appropriated.
What a fine contrast between Mrs. Baillie who had tried to fool him by hanging the portrait of “Liberty” in a conspicuous place at Bethesda and the owner of Greenwich! Jane Bowen had “endeavored,” she assured the Count, “to furnish everything in my power for the use of the Troops under your Excellency’s command.” She had provided “Beds & Blankets, fodder for the Cavalry, and Boats and Negroes for obtaining provisions for the Hospital.” She had housed naval officers. She had also contributed, she wrote, “all my Horses for the Dragoons.”5 The only thing she asked in return was that her home not be turned into a hospital like the place next door. Despite Mrs. Mulryne’s presence the French had pillaged Bonaventure in a way that “would shock you to hear her relate,” declared Anthony Stokes.
Such was to be expected in the case of the property of a dyed-in-the-wool Tory like Colonel Mulryne, who had hied himself off to Savannah as soon as the French arrived. But the necessities of war sometimes recognized no distinction between the treatment of foes and friends. General d’Estaing was forced to deny the widow Bowen’s request. Her house was badly needed. After all, 12 French officers and 200 men were already hospitalized at Thunderbolt with fever while 377 wounded men had to be accommodated after the attack.
Ironically enough, Monsieur d’Estaing now found himself a patient at Mrs. Bowen’s home. He suffered greatly from his wounds and looked “extraordinarily thin,” reported a French officer. As he convalesced at “Half Moon Bluff” on the marsh-fringed creek, d’Estaing could reflect bitterly upon the events of the past eighteen months. There was plenty of time for reflection during these long days for we are informed that he slept very little [“il dort très peu”].6 When he left Toulon in April, 1778, a popular song was ringing in his ears:
“Combattons, vive France, Antoinette et Bourbon.
Vive d’Estaing. Vive tout bon luron.
F . . . de la vieille Angleterre
Et de son pavillon.”
There had been those first great moments of expectation when the French fleet arrived in American waters. “I love you tenderly, Monsieur le Comte; you are the man I wish to see at the head of this squadron, and the man who pleases my heart,” his kinsman and fellow-Auvergnat, Marquis de Lafayette, had gushed in welcoming him to America.
But some demon of ill-fortune seemed to dog d’Estaing’s tracks on this side of the Atlantic. Everywhere he had gone he had been just too late. Nearly everything he attempted seemed to go wrong. In his words, he had encountered an “incredible series of untoward circumstances.” “Fortune,” he reported to M. de Sartine, had “dealt some hard knocks” and if occasionally she “chucked us under the chin, her caresses were brief and had been sold a little dearly.” And now instead of atoning for everything by a brilliant triumph at Savannah he was bringing back, to use the expression of the historian Doniol, the reputation of “une vaine forfanterie.”
The margin between glory and failure had been so close! How was a general to accomplish anything when he had to contend, said d’Estaing’s apologists, “not only against the vagaries of the sea and unforeseen obstacles, but also against disobedience and treachery which dared all because of the uncertainty of punishment”?7 Ces Américains! Their traitors had exposed his plans. They had allowed Maitland to slip into Savannah through the inland waterways. They had misrepresented everything from the state of Savannah’s defenses to the size and quality of their army.
But Meyronnet de Saint-Marc tells us that d’Estaing also blamed a fellow-countryman in the American service. It had been largely upon the proposals of M. de Brétigny that the French came to Georgia. The embittered Count turned on this “old musketeer of the King” during a conference and “accused him of being the cause of the misfortunes that had befallen us.” Colonel Brétigny did not take the charge meekly. He “never imagined,” he replied warmly, “that he would excite us to come to this country with such large sea forces; besides he had always said that the capture of Savannah could only be by a coup de main and if we had attacked the city immediately after landing it would have been taken.” The basic error, he had always maintained, was in bringing the American army to Savannah—“It would have been much wiser to persuade General Lincoln to attack Port Royal.” The Count cooled off after M. de Brétigny had spoken his mind. “It was better to forget everything,” said d’Estaing—“common misfortunes should unite them.”
But d’Estaing would find solace of a kind. His very wounds were to be a source of satisfaction. “I even find myself happy in my situation,” he wrote Governor Rutledge before he sailed, “since my blood serves to refute bad intentions.” The appearance of his fleet on the American coast had resulted in the British evacuation of Rhode Island. The prizes taken off Savannah brought a net $737,-955. Furthermore, prior to leaving Georgia he received a communication from John Wereat, President of the Supreme Executive Council of the State, expressing the hope that the French general would “confer on us the happiness of accepting a grant of twenty thousand Acres of Land and the right of Citizenship.”8 The Count later had to remind Georgia of this offer. He received the grant in 1784 at which time the privileges of citizenship were also conferred by the State. The gift of land “gratified him much” and d’Estaing told his friend, Thomas Jefferson, that the title of American citizen was “dear to my heart.” It was no more than was his due. After all, was he not, as he later boasted to George Washington, “ye only French general officer who has shed his blood for America”? But we have gotten ahead of the story.
Oblivious to Count d’Estaing’s repeated statement that the French could remain only eight days on their coast, the Americans begged him to stay on. “The Repulse seems not to dispirit our men, as they are convinced it was only owing to a mistake of the ground,” wrote Charles C. Pinckney to his mother on the day of the assault. “I have not the least doubt but that we shall soon be in possession of Savannah,” added Pinckney. In Charlestown the newspapers tried to cushion disappointment over the result of the attack. “The reduction of Savannah is not doubtful,” one editor assured his readers, “but suspended only, because not worth so many lives as might be sacrificed by a more rapid progress.”9
But the French had had enough. The Siege was raised immediately. “No argument could dissuade” d’Estaing, reported General Lincoln, who informed the Continental Congress that he had endeavored to “divert him from his purpose—representing to him, in the strongest terms in my power, the evils, which would attend the measure.” “Could he have remained,” the American commander told a friend, “I see nothing which could have prevented our success.”10 “What a pity it is,” said Charles C. Pinckney, “that Count D’Estaing could not be prevailed on to stay longer, the Enemy I believe are in want both of provisions & ammunition & it is impossible for them to hold out long even if we were only to blockade them.”11
To the argument that it was a matter of personal honor for him to stay d’Estaing is quoted as replying, “Gentlemen, if my honor is to be lost by not taking the city, it is lost already; but I deem my honor to consist in the honor of my country, and that honor is my country’s interest.”12 Upon learning of the Count’s decision Governor Rutledge of South Carolina wrote him in “Astonishment & Concern which I have not Words to express.” “Do not then Sir,” he entreated, “blast all our Hopes, by withdrawing, in the very Moment of Victory.”13 Rutledge even sent a delegation to see the French General. As an alternative the Count was urged to retreat through South Carolina and to embark his troops from Charlestown. Such a plan was favored by a majority of a Council of War convened by Colonel Dillon.
“Oh, mon Dieu!” exploded the impatient Bougainville when he learned such a project was being considered, “Fais pour nous en miracle” [“Work some miracle for us”]. For once the great navigator could agree with his Vice-Admiral. D’Estaing’s mind was closed on the subject. The embarkation was to be made by way of Thunderbolt and not South Carolina. At his direction Colonel Dillon drew up the plan of retreat though personally opposing it. He argued that if contrary winds should delay the embarkation the whole French army might be destroyed. When he announced the plan, the older officers protested, Dillon reported, “So, at an age at which a man scarcely has his own liberty at his disposal he has the right of exposing troops to the shameful extremity of surrendering without a blow, or reducing them to die of hunger.”
Dillon and Noailles took it upon themselves to deliver a strongly worded protest to d’Estaing in which they pressed upon him the advantages of Charlestown as the base of retreat.14 The matter ended abruptly. “Not moved by so eloquent a document,” said Captain de Tarragon, the General sent word that “he wished the retreat to be made by way of the place he had decided upon” and if the two young colonels persisted in their opposition, he intended to “send down M. de Bougainville to command the army.” It had been a compliment to them that he had not done so in the first place, explained d’Estaing in his Notes. Not only did Bougainville’s grade entitle him to the command but “he was an excellent officer on both elements.”
The Count subsequently relented in his views to the extent of permitting part of the embarkation to be made from Causton’s Bluff, a short distance north, but at a more protected place on the same river on which Thunderbolt was located. He had his reasons for resisting what he described in his Notes as “the epidemic of retreat via Charlestown.” One of them was that his troops would desert “by the hundreds in order to establish themselves in this country.” The Irish were particularly susceptible. “American recruiting officers would have had an abundant harvest in the Dillon Regiment,” said the Count. Discipline and desertion had been bad enough as it was since their defeat. “You are aware,” Colonel Dillon reminded the French General somewhat curtly, “that personal authority (moi-même) is no longer known by your troops.” Colonel de Rouvray was complaining during this same period about the “spirit of insubordination” in the Negro corps he commanded.15 Sentinels had to be placed around the French camp to prevent desertions.
After entering into a formal convention concerning the retreat, the Allies went their separate ways, the Americans leaving twenty-four hours before d’Estaing’s troops commenced to retire. The French were unmolested by the British, who seemed content enough with the fact that they were leaving. In Count d’Estaing’s words, “the troops returned aboard the vessels not only without leaving anything behind but more than that, without having been attacked, annoyed or even followed.” Indeed, there were those who suspected collusion between the French and English. The latter actually proposed, said Dillon, that if they did not accompany Lincoln to Charlestown, their withdrawal would not be impeded. The Americans saw d’Estaing’s young officers visit the town daily, a fact that was bound to generate suspicion. In Savannah itself there were puzzled faces. “Very extraordinary,” thought one Britisher, that “our Troops never attempted to harass them in their Retreat.”16
With the raising of the Siege and departure of d’Estaing’s troops the Royalist propaganda machine went into full operation. “Mutual Animosities and Revilings have arisen to such a height betwixt the French and Rebels since they were repulsed by us, that they were almost ready to cut one another’s Throats,” claimed a British sympathizer. “The inhabitants of Carolina declare they never will draw a sword again in the presence of a Frenchman, unless to plunge it into his bosom,” reported a New York newspaper which asserted that the Allies had parted company, “mutually execrating each other as unfortunate poltroons.”17
But on the surface at least cordial relations were preserved. The Gazette de France could say that “The greatest union has subsisted between the combined forces.” General Lincoln, whose tact had much to do with this show of harmony, informed Congress that d’Estaing “has undoubtedly the interest of America much at heart.” “His want of success,” added this benign American, “will not lessen our ideas of his merit.” Not a word of criticism about the French ever came from Lincoln. “The causes of failure,” he said in his Journal, “were such as attend the uncertain events of War and are rather to be lamented than at present investigated.” The Journals of the Continental Congress reflect a similar philosophy at Philadelphia. Their defeat was “to be attributed to those incidents which in the hand of Omnipotence determine all human events,” President Samuel Huntington told the new French envoy. “Our disappointment is compensated,” he added, “by reflecting on the perfect harmony that subsisted between the generals and the troops of the two nations.”
Publicly the Americans had nothing but praise for d’Estaing. Every effort was made in the press to smooth things over. A contributor to a Philadelphia newspaper declared that “The wounds which he has received, the blood which he has shed in our service, will be remembered by us. He has displayed a most heroic valour, tempered with prudence, and the troops under his command have acted with the greatest courage.” “On all occasions,” attested a South Carolinian, “the Count d’Estaing shewed himself a brave man, and acted in every respect consistent with the dignity of his character, as a Nobleman of a distinguished family, and as a gentleman whose best wishes were most ardent for the good and protection of the United States.”18
In the wake of American criticism of Admiral d’Estaing following the Newport affair John Laurens had deplored the absurd anti-French prejudices “inherited from the British Nation.” Association with the Count at Savannah failed to change Colonel Laurens’ sentiments. To his father he wrote shortly after the Siege that “We are as much indebted as if his efforts had been attended with the most complete success.”19
America indeed owed Charles-Henri d’Estaing a great deal. He had responded to her calls at a critical time. Without orders from France he had brought an army to Georgia to co-operate in a campaign which might have turned the whole course of the Revolution. His own blood had been shed in the common cause. He had sacrificed the lives of many brave Frenchmen in the attempt to take Savannah. Mistakes had been made. But the blame for the failure of the expedition should by no means be placed solely at his door. And one should always remember that if M. d’Estaing had been a shade luckier his name would be as familiar in America today as Lafayette’s.