CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY ONE: THE FEW, THE BRAVE, THE FORT MIFFLIN REBELS

CHAPTER ONE HUNDRED AND THIRTY ONE: THE FEW, THE BRAVE, THE FORT MIFFLIN REBELS

Okay, I promised a tour of a Revolutionary War fort – Fort Mifflin in Philadelphia – and here it is: It was a dark and stormy night, and Washington was trying to cross the Delaware without getting killed by Brits. How did he manage this? The brave soldiers holding down Fort Mifflin against a formidable Redcoat force made it all possible. At least that’s my story and I’m sticking to it. And there is more than a kernel of truth to this. Up until November 15, 1977, the Brits had been kicking Revolutionary ass up and down the Atlantic Seacoast. They were coming in for the kill with a fleet of warships headed up the Delaware River chasing after Washington’s tattered troops. But the few, the brave, the proud soldiers defending Fort Mifflin held them off long enough to let Washington and his troops escape and make it to Valley Forge for the winter. (Yes, that Valley Forge and yes, that horrible winter). This is the way the story is told by the historians at Fort Mifflin:

“In the early years of the American Revolution, Fort Mifflin was an ill supplied, poorly constructed fortification on an island 500 yards from the Pennsylvania shore. Despite its shortcomings, the fort on Mud Island was destined to play an important role in foiling the British campaign to defeat Washington’s Continental Army.

“In July of 1777 the British Army, commanded by General Sir William Howe, engaged in a series of battles with General George Washington that would last until winter. Howe planned his strategy at the British headquarters in New York, loaded the occupying troops onto approximately 240 British naval vessels and sailed out of Sandy Hook to pursue Washington and his men.”

Interjection: Who has 240 naval vessels? In 1777? The British Empire, that’s who. See what I mean about being outmanned, outgunned, outshipped? Back to the narrative:

“After sailing into the Atlantic, the British fleet moved quickly out of sight, misleading Washington and his army of their whereabouts. The fleet was first spotted at the mouth of the Delaware Bay, and then reappeared off Cape Charles, VA.”

Second interjection: Where can you hide 240 naval vessels? I guess it was pretty easy in 1777, not so much now with radar, AIS, sonar, drones, and the omnipresent NSA. Back we go:

“The British troops disembarked at the Head of Elk (Elkton, MD) and took a few days to recover from their journey before setting out towards Philadelphia. After skirmishes with the rebels at Cooch’s bridge on Delaware’s Christiana River and at the Kennett Meeting House, the armies finally met head on at Brandywine Creek.

“During the remainder of September and into early October, the Continental Army failed to overcome the British at the battles of Brandywine, Paoli, and Germantown. They also suffered humiliation when the British Army triumphantly marched into Philadelphia. Once there, Howe prepared to definitively defeat the American rebellion.”

“A fleet of British ships sailed up the Delaware River with munitions, clothing, food, and much needed supplies. For the British Army and Navy, it became a race against time. Should the fleet be able to resupply the troops in the occupied city before winter, the British could descend upon the beleaguered and exhausted American forces, defeating them in the War for Independence.”

Third interjection: See what I mean? If our brave soldiers could just delay the British ships long enough – not even get an outright victory – Lord knows, they were not equipped to do that – they could keep the hopes of independence alive. And more importantly, they could keep Washington’s men alive to fight another day – in the spring. Back to the climactic finish:

“Between the British ships on the Delaware and their troops in Philadelphia sat a humble fort built of wood and stone, defended by some of the most determined men of the American Revolution. Fort Mifflin would not allow the British Navy to go easily into Philadelphia. For seven weeks, fighting against cold, hunger and despair, with only scarce supplies, the soldiers on Mud Island fought to hold on to Fort Mifflin.”

And you probably thought I was laying it on too thick. These guys were on a mission to save the New World for democracy, no matter what the personal sacrifice – and against all odds. To put salt in their wounds, a British guy, Captain John Montresor of the Royal Engineers, had designed Fort Mifflin in 1771-1772, and so, at General Howe’s request in 1977, he shared with the Brits his knowledge of the “weak” spots in the fort’s defenses, so they could focus on them and pummel the rebels into submission. Under the heading “Design and Destruction”, the Fort Mifflin historians wrote: “Having designed the Fort as a river defense, Montresor knew he needed to draw around the back channel to the west, and bombard the fort’s weakest point: the wood and earthen walls.” And that’s exactly what the Brits did.

Now for a real treat. The last days of the Battle for Fort Mifflin are vividly and oh so articulately described by a 17 year old American rebel. Here is boy wonder, Private Joseph Plumb Martin, in his own words:

"Well, the island, as it is called, is nothing more than a mud flat in the Delaware lying upon the west side of the channel….Our batteries were nothing more than old spars and timber laid up in parallel lines and filled between with mud and dirt. The British batteries in the course of the day would nearly level our works, and we were, like the beaver, obliged to repair our dams in the night. During the whole night at intervals of a quarter or half an hour, the enemy would let off all their pieces, and although we had sentinels to watch them and at every flash of their guns to cry, “a shot”, upon hearing which everyone endeavored to take care of himself, yet they would ever and anon, in spite of all our precautions, cut up some of us. The engineer in the Fort was a French officer the name of Fleury, the same who struck the British flag at the storming of Stony Point. He was a very austere man and kept us constantly employed day and night; there was no chance of escaping from his vigilance….What little provisions we had was cooked by the invalids in our camp and brought to the island in old flour barrels: it was mostly corned beef and hard bread, but it was not much trouble to cook or fetch what we had.

“We continued here, suffering cold, hunger and other miseries, till the fourteenth  day of November. On that day, at the dawn, we discovered six ships of the line, all 64s [?], a frigate of 36 guns, and a galley in a line just below the chevaux-de-frise: a 24 gun ship…her guns said to be all brass 24 pounders, and a sloop of six guns in company with her, both within a pistol shot of the Fort, on the western side. We immediately opened our batteries upon them but they appeared to take very little notice of us. We heated some shot, but by mistake 24 pound shot were heated instead of 18, which was the caliber of the guns in that part of the Fort. The enemy soon began their firing upon us and there was music indeed.

“The cannonade continued without interruption on the side of the British throughout the day. Nearly every gun in the Fort was silenced by midday. Our men were cut up like corn stalks…. As soon as it was dark we began to make preparations for evacuating the Fort and endeavoring to escape to the Jersey shore. When the firing had in some measure subsided and I could look about me, I found the Fort exhibited a picture of desolation. The whole area of the Fort was as completely ploughed as a field. The buildings of every kind [were] hanging in broken fragments, and the guns were all dismounted, and how many of the garrison sent to the world of the spirits, I knew not. If ever destruction was complete, it was here. The surviving part of the garrison were now drawn off and such of the stores as could conveniently be taken away were carried to the Jersey shore.

“I returned directly back into the Fort to my party and proceeded to set fire to everything that would burn, and then repaired immediately to the wharf where three bateaux [boats] were waiting to convey us across the river…

“Here ends the account of as hard and fatiguing a job, for the time it lasted, as occurred during the Revolutionary War. Thomas Paine, in one of his political essays, speaking of the siege and defense of this post, says, “They had nothing but their bravery and good conduct to cover them.” He spoke the truth.”

I know that the average life span of men and women in the 1770’s was probably not more than 40 years, but still – after just 17 years on this earth, Private Martin was being bombarded by the guns on British frigates and had to burn down his own fort before escaping to “the Jersey shore”. Yes, before the Jersey Shore was a horrible reality show, it meant salvation for a small band of rebels who, plagued by hunger and cold, staved off the British to allow Washington and troops to get to a place of safety for the winter. Even as the last group of about 40 rebels burned down the fort, they cagily and proudly flew the flag of independence over the fort, so as to lead the British to believe they were still inside defending the fort, when in fact they were rowing away to Jersey with their muffled oars in the middle of the night. Hats off to Private Martin and the Fort Mifflin survivors.

A word about the reference to the chevaux-de-frise: This was an underwater construct/device that was placed in the Delaware River to destroy the British ships, as they moved toward Fort Mifflin and up river. In 1775 the Pennsylvania General Assembly appointed 25 men to the Committee of Safety, which was headed by Benjamin Franklin. Their job was to protect Philadelphia against all enemies. In order to do this, they asked shipwrights and architects to submit designs for a defense system for the Delaware River. The design that was chosen was the “chevaux-de-frise”, an open box with heavy timbers at the bottom and plank sides. Long logs with pointed iron spikes were stuck up at an angle from these boxes to impale ships. The boxes were filled with 20 to 40 tons of stones and sunk in the river to create blockades at strategic points in the Delaware River. These defenses worked to an extent, but they did not impale all the British ships by any means and were not able to prevent the bombardment of Fort Mifflin.  In fact, the British succeeded in raising two of the chevaux-de-frises out of the water, to allow their warships to pass unharmed.

Lest you think that the history of Fort Mifflin ended when Private Martin and the remaining rebels burned it down and headed for Jersey, here is a brief summary of some post-Revolutionary War activities at the Fort:

The British captured the fort in November, 1777, what was left of it, when the American troops evacuated on the 15^th of November. For number freaks, there were 400 American soldiers trying to hold off more than 2000 British troops and 250 ships. It was on November 10 that the Brits began their fiercest assault with nonstop cannonading the Fort from their ships. Of the 400 rebels, 250 were killed or wounded.

The U.S. Army started to rebuild Fort Mifflin in 1794 and kept building on that site for the much of the 19^th century. Pierre L’Enfant, the designer of Washington, D.C., also designed the post-revolutionary Fort Mifflin. The new assemblage of buildings – barracks and casemates, a citadel, a blacksmith shop – was officially named Fort Mifflin in 1795, in honor of Major General Thomas Mifflin of the Continental Army.

Fort Mifflin housed prisoners from 1863 to 1865 during the Civil War – Confederate soldiers, Union soldiers, and political prisoners – not nearly to the same extent as Fort Delaware – but one hanging occurred during that period that was notorious. The Union Army accused William H. Howe, a Union soldier, of desertion, and somehow found him guilty of the crime of murder. He was housed at Fort Mifflin in January, 1864. He led a group of 200 prisoners in trying to escape in February 1864, but failed. Then he was placed in solitary confinement. He wrote twice to President Lincoln asking for clemency. But later in 1864 Howe was executed by hanging on the gallows built right next to the guardhouse where he was kept prisoner in his last days. Tickets were sold to the public – SRO, no doubt.

The Army Corps of Engineers set up shop at Fort Mifflin in 1866, and they repaired and “modernized” the fort. They actually built a torpedo casement in 1874/75, for the purpose of lowering torpedoes into a pool of water and then propelling them under the moat water into the Schuylkill River. I don’t know who they were preparing to torpedo, but had an enemy ship come up the Schuylkill after 1876, it would have had to deal with more than a few chevaux-de-frises trying to impale it. The torpedo casement still exists – you can see it with your own eyes if you don’t believe me. It’s called East Magazine and it is located right next to Casement # 11, the entrance to which was sealed off when the torpedo casement was built. Be careful, though, as there is a lot of reported ghost activity around Casement #11.

During World War Two, the Army placed anti-aircraft guns at the fort to defend the Fort Mifflin Naval Ammunition Storage Depot and the U.S. Naval Shipyard in Philadelphia. In 1942 the Army stationed Battery “H” of the 76^th Coast Artillery Regiment, the first African American Coast Artillery Unit in the history of the United States, at Fort Mifflin. The military branches stopped using Fort Mifflin in 1954 and in 1962 the fort was deeded to the City of Philadelphia by the federal government. Somehow, even with the decommissioning and sale of the fort, the Army Corps of Engineers has maintained a presence at Fort Mifflin. That is why it is called the oldest active military base in the U.S. and the only fort that goes back to pre-Revolutionary War days. Per Wikipedia, “Fort Mifflin is the only military base in use that is older than the nation itself.”

Okay, that does it for your tour of Fort Mifflin. Tips are appreciated.