The Philadelphia Campaign, Volume II: Germantown and the Roads to Valley Forge (review)

The Battle of Brandywine left Washington's army bowed but not beaten. With his flank turned, Washington and his subordinates fought a successful delaying action that allowed the army to escape destruction. Nonetheless, it had been a close thing. A more aggressive general than General William Howe might well have smashed the Continental army and forced an end to the two-year-old rebellion, but what might have been was not what was, and the American army lived to fight another day.

Thomas J. McGuire addresses the campaign that followed Brandywine in the second volume of The Philadelphia Campaign. The focus is on Washington's attempt to reverse the decision at Brandywine with an audacious night attack on British positions in and around Germantown. The author then ably describes the move toward winter quarters at Valley Forge. In the spirit of the first volume, the second features lively prose and varied perspectives ranging from generals to privates as well as the civilians caught up in the maelstrom of war. It is a work more focused on key leaders than the first volume. Despite his intellect and insight, General William Howe's tragic flaw was that he was willing to hesitate at just the right moment to allow his opponent opportunity. Washington appears to be a man growing in his job, able to find the advantage when offered to ensure that there would be a tomorrow for the army he led. The war eventually proved that Washington's ability to sustain an army in being for years eventually exhausted the British government and its people.

The days following the American defeats at Brandywine and Paoli could have been psychologically devastating for the American cause. Philadelphians watched powerless as British troops marched along the streets of William Penn's city. Fort Mifflin, along with the small Pennsylvania Navy, kept the Delaware River closed to British warships, but it seemed clear that this was but a temporary stay. Washington sought a solution to the disintegrating civil-military solution by attempting something he had not yet done, an attack on the main British army. In the past, he had limited himself to the defensive, allowing his foe to come to him. The victories at Trenton and Princeton had been against an exposed garrison or a rear guard action, not main force engagements. Washington understood that his army was not the equal of its foes, thus he sought to leverage circumstances to compensate for the inexperience of his soldiers.

Washington's solution was to have his army carry out a night attack employing four different avenues of approach to the British encampment at Germantown. On the wings of his army he placed militia, while Continental regulars under John Sullivan and Nathanael Greene held the center. If all went according to plan, the Continental army would fall upon its foe in the early morning light of 4 October 1777 in a double envelopment. Unfortunately, Washington's plan exceeded the capabilities of his army. Night marches and limited visibility attacks are some of the most difficult operations for highly skilled soldiers using modern communications equipment, let alone an eighteenth-century army of relative novices. The frictions of war overcame Washington's best intentions.

Washington's men had to cover roughly sixteen miles between their assembly area and the British/Hessian encampment on a moonless night. Continental cavalry had not clearly marked the routes causing moments of confusion and delay. The right wing, consisting of militia, arrived first, fired a few shots at Hessian units and then without orders, withdrew. Sullivan's column moved down the Germantown Road encountering resistance from British forces barricaded in the house of John Chew, a substantial stone construction. Sullivan, at the insistence of Henry Knox, elected to reduce the house rather than bypass it. Fog delayed Greene although most of his men did arrive to drive British forces...