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1. Lord Richard Howe, the British naval commander and brother of Sir William Howe. 2. mow runs through a number of recent military encounters of the war. Parker (1721– 1811), commander of a British naval squadron, had been sent as reinforcement for loyalists attacking the southern colonies but was repulsed by an American land force at Fort Moultrie, South Carolina, in June 1776. John Murray, 4th Earl of Dunmore (1730–1809), onetime royal governor of New York and later (1771–76) royal governor of Virginia, had departed that latter colony by ship on January 1, 1776, burning Norfolk in his wake. General Sir Guy Carlton (1724–1808) was commandant at Quebec City, where General Richard Montgomery was defeated at the end of 1775. British control of Lake Champlain had been contested by Benedict Arnold and a small, ragtag fleet of American gunboats. General John Burgoyne moved north as part of the campaign to destroy the American army in a pincers movement from Canada and New York—a strategy that backfired in October 1777 with the British defeat at Saratoga. 3. Note in Letterbook draft reads, “While shut up in Boston the preceding winter Burgoyne entertained the town with a farce of his own composing entitled the [?] Blockade of Boston for the entertainment of the ladies of the city.” This refers to the staging of a play, written by General Burgoyne, by the British military in occupied Boston, home of the antitheatrical Puritans. During the performance of the play, the Americans began to fire on the city as part of their siege, word of which, when announced on stage by one of the costumed performers, the audience at first thought to be part of the show. 4. The text is somewhat confusing because the last words of the paragraph appear to be incorporated into mow’s note; this is probably a transcription error by jw2. 5. Edward Rutledge (1749–1800) was governor of South Carolina. 6. See headnote to l 32 regarding General Charles Lee’s capture at Basking Ridge. 35 to catharine sawbridge macaulay Plymouth February 15th 17771 My Dear Madam, I have mentioned in a preceding letter that Sir William Howe had returned to New York, and that the year had opened with better prospects to the Colonies. A spirited measure of General Washington has had a very happy effect. With the remnants of his army, consisting of about two thousand men, he on the evening of the twenty fifth of December, crossed the Delaware, 92  to catharine macaulay, february 1777 surprized a regiment of Hessians stationed at Trenton, took twelve hundred prisoners, and recrossed the river the same night, with little or no loss. Within a few days after he gained some signal advantages at Princeton, at Elizabeth Town, and several other places on the Jersey side of the river, where the British army, elated by success, and anticipating conquests, lay carelessly cantoned in small divisions. The Americans animated by the late fortunate stroke, gathered strength as they moved, and in their turn, pursued the King’s troops with as much rapidity as they had fled before them: while those veterans, as if seized with a general panic, made but a feeble resistance. They have collected their strength at Brunswick, and it is supposed they will soon retire to New York there to wait, until the humane [??] of Britain obtains foreign mercenaries sufficient to aid his own subjects in the butchery of their American brethren. Congress are taking measures for the establishment of a permanent army: they have ordered eighty battalions and two legions of cavalry to be raised and kept in full pay to the conclusion of the war. The approaching Spring appears big with the fate of empires, and the wheels of revolution move in swift progression: they may smite the diadem from the brow and shake some tyrant from his throne before he is aware. The flatterers of majesty may be more attended to than the prophetic voice that augurs evil: yet when the Mene Tekel2 is inscribed on the walls of the palace, it cannot be blotted out by the hand of the prince who humbles not himself though he sees the work that has been done in the days of his fathers. We have been precipitated into a conflict that will probably light half Europe in flames; and we must ascribe it to him; who sits at the helm of the universe, that America has not fallen at the threshold...

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