Revolution 250 Podcast

Thomas Paine & Washington Crossing the Delaware

December 26, 2023 Robert Allison Season 4 Episode 52
Revolution 250 Podcast
Thomas Paine & Washington Crossing the Delaware
Show Notes Transcript

The rebellion nearly ended in December 1776, with Washington's army beaten in New York and chased across New Jersey, which the enemy then garrisoned with Hessian troops in Trenton to keep an eye on Washington's dwindling forces across the Delaware.  Washington now had fewer than 3000 men, and their enlistments would expire at the end of the year.  In this moment of crisis, Washington devised a plan.  "There is a natural firmness in some minds," Thomas Paine wrote, "which cannot be unlocked by trifles, but which, when unlocked, discovers a cabinet of fortitude."  We discuss what was in that cabinet of fortitude unlocked in December 1776.

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 Hello, everyone, and welcome to the Revolution 250 podcast.
 
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 I am Bob Allison.
 
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 I chair the Revolution 250 Advisory Group.
 
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 I also teach history at Suffolk University.
 
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 And this week, actually, we commemorate the Washington's Crossing, December 26th of 1776.
 
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 And 1776, we know as the year of American independence.
 
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 But as the year ended, things looked really gloomy for the American cause.
 
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 It seemed as though the rebellion was going to end.
 
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 In the fall of 1776, Washington and his army had been driven out of New York.
 
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 and then chased across New Jersey, across the Delaware River.
 
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 He actually manages to get all of the boats from the eastern shore of the Delaware over onto the western shore so that the British forces couldn't chase him.
 
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 But think about this.
 
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 When Washington left New York, when his forces were around New York, there may be 25, maybe 30,000 men in the Continental Army.
 
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 By the time they get to the Delaware River, he has about 3,000 troops.
 
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 Most of those men's enlistments will be up at the end of the year.
 
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 That is December 31st.
 
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 And they're going to go home.
 
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 Why are they going to stay?
 
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 And why is anyone going to come back?
 
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 So Washington might have had a sense that things were over.
 
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 Certainly the British had a sense that things were over.
 
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 Lord Cornwallis had come back to New York.
 
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 He left Hessian outposts in New Jersey.
 
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 There are about maybe a thousand or so Hessian troops in Trenton watching the other shore of the Delaware to make sure Washington doesn't come across.
 
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 And of course in the winter, what chance is there of that happening?
 
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 Cornwallis is going back to New York and he's actually on a boat, a ship ready to go back to England.
 
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 He thinks, as do others in the British command, that this rebellion is pretty much over.
 
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 Yeah, they declared independence.
 
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 They made a lot of noise.
 
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 But now with no more army, what chance is there that the Americans are actually going to be able to continue this fight in 1777?
 
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 One kind of positive thing that happens for the American side, but actually it's something that the British hold up as an evidence that things are going their way, was on the 12th of December, General Charles Lee, who was the second in command of Washington's forces of the Continental Army, had been taken prisoner.
 
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 Now, Lee was actually a British officer.
 
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 He had retired from the British Army.
 
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 He had a pension from the British Army.
 
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 However, when Congress was creating the Continental Army, they thought it would be good to have really an astounding general like Charles Lee as second in command.
 
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 Lee, of course, always imagined he really should be first in command.
 
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 And he and his forces had been further north along the Hudson River when New York fell.
 
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 And as Washington is being chased across New Jersey by the British Army, and in fact, the British Army was mocking Washington by playing fox hunting tunes.
 
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 Washington is sending missives to Lee to get his men down to join Washington's army at the Delaware.
 
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 Lee took his time.
 
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 And he also thought, well, if Washington gets knocked out, that's really not such a bad thing because then Congress will turn to a better general.
 
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 As you probably know, Washington was serving without a salary.
 
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 He didn't want a salary.
 
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 Congress didn't take long to negotiate that point, but it did take some time to negotiate Lee's salary because he was, after all, giving up a pension from the British Army and it would be ungentlemanly to accept a pension from the British Army while you're also leading forces against the British Army.
 
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 So Lee actually was getting a salary from the Congress for his service, and his service was relatively slow.
 
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 And in this point,
 
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 Lee and his army are in the area around Basking Ridge, New Jersey.
 
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 He is staying at the Widow Whites Tavern, the Widow Whites Inn in Basking Ridge.
 
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 His army was several miles away.
 
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 And on the morning of December 12th, Lee was, he had had breakfast and he was sitting at the table in his dressing gown and he was
 
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 telling the party assembled how badly things were going under Washington and what they really needed was a general who could actually win things, unlike what Washington had been able to do.
 
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 And in fact, Lee is sitting at the table writing a letter to Horatio Gates, another officer in the Continental Army, that very same message when one of Lee's men looks out the window and says, sir, there is a British patrol outside.
 
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 And in fact, there was a patrol.
 
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 Bannister Tarleton, then a lieutenant in the British Army with the 16th Light Dragoons, had found Lee.
 
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 I don't think they were necessarily looking for him, but took him prisoner.
 
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 And so Lee now is out of the picture, which might have been good news for Washington, although he didn't realize it at the time.
 
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 So things look very bleak for Washington and for the
 
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 American cause in December of 1776.
 
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 Now one of the
 
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 few people to enter the army at this moment was Thomas Paine.
 
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 You'll remember the Thomas Paine in January of 1776.
 
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 It set our hearts aflame with his pamphlet, Common Sense, calling for independence, calling for America to establish herself.
 
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 And common sense had really changed the political dynamic in America and is one of the precipitating causes of independence, as Paine put the argument so clearly.
 
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 And Common Sense sold something like 100,000 copies in those first months of 1776.
 
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 Then, as now, that would be a publishing phenomenon.
 
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 Now, things are going very badly at the end of the year.
 
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 And Paine, as the troops are at Fort Lee in New Jersey, trying to prevent the British from getting across the Hudson, Paine joins the forces.
 
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 And he is part of this force then that has to evacuate Fort Lee and then is driven across New Jersey.
 
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 And now we're encamped on the western bank of the Delaware waiting for spring or waiting for the army to dissipate.
 
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 And Paine at this point, you know, he wasn't very much as a soldier, nor was he very much as an excise man.
 
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 The other careers as he had had in the course of his eventful life, he was very good as a writer.
 
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 And so Paine, late at night, will sit by the fire and write what becomes probably his most important tract, which he calls The American Crisis.
 
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 And he takes it down to Philadelphia to be printed, where he then
 
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 It's read to American troops and then distributed throughout the colonies.
 
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 The idea isn't that this is meant to inspire the troops.
 
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 It's really meant to inspire the American public who might be flagging at this particular moment.
 
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 And it's such a striking thing.
 
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 that I thought I would share it with you to see the effect of the American crisis on the American psyche at the beginning of what are the ten crucial days that are going to save the revolution.
 
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 These are the times that try men's souls.
 
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 The summer soldier and the sunshine patriot will, in this crisis, shrink from the service of his country.
 
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 But he that stands it now deserves the love and thanks of man and woman.
 
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 Tyranny, like hell, is not easily conquered.
 
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 Yet we have this consolation with us that the harder the conflict, the more glorious the triumph.
 
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 What we obtain too cheap, we esteem too lightly.
 
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 It is dearness only that gives everything its value.
 
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 Heaven knows how to put a proper price upon its goods.
 
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 And it would be strange indeed if so celestial an article as freedom should not be highly rated.
 
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 Britain, with an army to enforce her tyranny, has declared that she has a right not only to tax but to bind us in all cases whatsoever.
 
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 And if being bound in that manner is not slavery,
 
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 then there is not such a thing as slavery upon earth.
 
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 Even the expression is impious for so unlimited a power can belong only to God.
 
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 Whether the independence of the continent was declared too soon or delayed too long, I will not now enter into as an argument.
 
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 My own simple opinion is that had it been eight months earlier, it would have been much better.
 
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 We did not make proper use of last winter
 
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 Neither could we while we were in a dependent state.
 
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 However, the fault, if it were one, was all our own.
 
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 We have none to blame but ourselves.
 
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 But no great deal is lost yet.
 
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 All that Howe has been doing for this month past is rather a ravage than a conquest, which the spirit of the jerseys a year ago would have quickly repulsed and which time and a little resolution will soon recover.
 
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 I have as little superstition in me as any man living, but my secret opinion has ever been and still is that God Almighty will not give up a people to military destruction or leave them unsupportedly to perish who have so earnestly and so repeatedly sought to avoid the calamities of war by every decent method which wisdom could invent.
 
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 Neither have I so much of the infidel in me as to suppose that he has relinquished the government of the world
 
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 and given us up to the care of devils.
 
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 And as I do not, I cannot see on what grounds the King of Great Britain can look up to heaven for help against us.
 
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 A common murderer, a highwayman, or a housebreaker has as good a pretense as he.
 
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 Tis surprising to see how quickly a panic will sometimes run through a country.
 
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 All nations and ages have been subject to them.
 
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 Britain has trembled like an ague at the report of a French fleet of flat-bottomed boats.
 
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 And in the 15th century, the whole English army, after ravaging the kingdom of France, was driven back like men petrified with fear.
 
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 This brave exploit was performed by a few broken forces collected and headed by a woman, Joan of Arc.
 
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 Would that heaven might inspire some Jersey maid to spirit up her countrymen and save her fair fellow sufferers from ravage and ravishment.
 
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 Yet panics in some cases have their uses.
 
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 They produce as much good as hurt.
 
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 Their duration is always short.
 
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 The mind soon grows through them and acquires a firmer habit than before.
 
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 But their peculiar advantage is that they are touchstones of sincerity and hypocrisy and bring things and men to light which might otherwise have lain forever undiscovered.
 
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 In fact, they have the same effect on secret traitors, which an imaginary apparition would have upon a private murderer.
 
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 They sift out the hidden thoughts of man and hold them up in public to the world.
 
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 Many a disguised Tory has lately shown his head that shall penitentially solemnize with curses the day on which Howe arrived upon the Delaware.
 
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 As I was with the troops at Fort Lee and marched with them to the edge of Pennsylvania, I am well acquainted with many circumstances which those who live at a distance know but little or nothing of.
 
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 Our situation there was exceedingly cramped.
 
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 the place being a narrow neck of land between the North River and the Hackensack.
 
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 Our force was inconsiderable, being not one-fourth so great as Howe could bring against us.
 
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 We had no army at hand to have relieved the garrison,
 
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 had we shut ourselves up and stood on our defense.
 
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 Our ammunition, light artillery, and the best part of our stewards had been removed on the apprehension that Howe would endeavor to penetrate the jerseys, in which case Fort Lee could be of no use to us.
 
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 For it must occur to every thinking man, whether in the army or not, that these kind of field forts are only for temporary purposes and last in use no longer than the enemy directs his force against the particular object which such forts are raised to defend.
 
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 Such was our situation and condition at Fort Lee on the morning of the 20th of November, when an officer arrived with information that the enemy with 200 boats had landed about seven miles above.
 
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 Major General Nathaniel Green, who commanded the garrison, immediately ordered them under arms and sent express to General Washington at the town of Hackensack, distant by the wave of ferry six miles.
 
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 Our first object was to secure the bridge over the Hackensack, which laid up the river between the enemy and us, about six miles from us, three from them.
 
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 General Washington arrived in about three quarters of an hour and marched at the head of the troops toward the bridge, which place I expected we should have a brush for.
 
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 However, they did not choose to dispute it with us.
 
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 The greatest part of our troops went over the bridge, the rest over the ferry, and made their way through some marshy grounds up to the town of Hackensack and there past the river.
 
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 We brought off as much baggage as the wagons could contain.
 
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 The rest was lost.
 
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 The simple object was to bring off the garrison and march them on until they could be strengthened by the Jersey or Pennsylvania militia, so as to be enabled to make a stand.
 
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 We stayed four days at Newark, collected our outposts with some of the Jersey militia, and marched out twice to meet the enemy on being informed they were advancing, though our numbers were greatly inferior to theirs.
 
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 Howe, in my little opinion, committed a great error in generalship in not throwing a body of forces off from Staten Island through Amboy, by which means he might have seized all our stores at Brunswick and intercepted our march into Pennsylvania.
 
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 But if we believe the power of hell to be limited, we must likewise believe that their agents are under some providential control.
 
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 I shall not now attempt to give all the particulars of our retreat to the Delaware.
 
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 Suffice it for the present to say that both officers and men, though greatly harassed and fatigued, frequently without rest, covering or provision, the inevitable consequences of a long retreat bore it with a manly and martial spirit.
 
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 All their wishes centered in one, which was that the country would turn out and help them drive the enemy back.
 
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 Voltaire has remarked that King William never appeared to full advantage, but in difficulties and inaction.
 
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 The same remark may be made of General Washington, for the character fits him.
 
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 There is a natural firmness in some minds which cannot be unlocked by trifles, but which, when unlocked, discovers a cabinet of fortitude,
 
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 which I reckon it among kinds of public blessings, which we do not immediately see, that God has blessed him with uninterrupted health and given him a mind that can even flourish upon care.
 
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 I shall conclude this paper with some miscellaneous remarks on the state of our affairs and shall begin with asking the following questions.
 
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 Why is it that the enemy has left the New England provinces and made these middle ones the seat of war?
 
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 The answer is easy.
 
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 New England is not infested with Tories, and we are.
 
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 I have been tender in raising the cry against these men and used numberless arguments to show them their danger, but it will not do to sacrifice a world either to their folly or their baseness.
 
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 The period has now arrived in which either they or we must change our sentiments or one or both must fall.
 
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 And what is a Tory?
 
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 Good God, what is he?
 
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 I should not be afraid to go with a hundred wigs against a thousand Tories were they to attempt to get into arms.
 
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 Every Tory is a coward.
 
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 A surfer, servile, slavish, self-centered fear is the foundation of Toryism.
 
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 And a man under such influence, though he may be cruel, can never be brave.
 
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 But before the line of irrevocable separation be drawn between us, let us reason the matter together.
 
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 Your conduct is an invitation to the enemy, yet not one in a thousand of you has heart enough to join him.
 
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 How is as much deceived by you as the American cause is injured by you?
 
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 He expects you will all take up arms and flock to his standard with muskets on your shoulders.
 
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 Your opinions are of no use to him unless you support him personally, for it is soldiers, not Tories, that he wants.
 
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 I once felt all that kind of anger which a man ought to feel against the mean principles which are held by the Tories,
 
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 a noted one who kept a tavern at Amboy, was standing at his door with as pretty a child in his hand about eight or nine years old as I ever saw.
 
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 And after speaking his mind as freely as he thought prudent, finished with this unfatherly expression, well, give me peace in my day.
 
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 Not a man lives on the continent, but fully believes that a separation must sometime or other finally take place.
 
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 And a generous parent should have said,
 
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 If there must be trouble, let it be in my day that my child may have peace.
 
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 This single reflection, well applied, is sufficient to awaken every man to duty.
 
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 Not a place upon earth might be so happy as America.
 
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 Her situation is remote from all the wrangling world, and she has nothing to do but to trade with them.
 
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 A man can distinguish himself between temper and principle, and I am as confident as I am that God governs the world.
 
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 that America will never be happy till she gets clear of foreign dominion.
 
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 Wars without ceasing will break out till that period arrives and the continent must in the end be the conqueror.
 
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 For though the flame of liberty may sometimes cease to shine, the coal can never expire.
 
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 America did not nor does not want force, but she wanted a proper application of that force.
 
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 Wisdom is not the purchase of a day.
 
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 It is no wonder that we should err at the first setting off.
 
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 From an excess of tenderness, we were unwilling to raise an army and trust their cause to the temporary defense of a well-meaning militia.
 
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 A summer's experience has now taught us better.
 
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 Yet with those troops, while they were collected, we were able to set bounds to the progress of the enemy.
 
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 And thank God they are again assembling.
 
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 I always considered militia as the best troops in the world for a sudden exertion, but they will not do for a long campaign.
 
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 How it is probable we'll make an attempt on this city, Philadelphia.
 
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 Should he fail on this side, the Delaware, he is ruined.
 
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 If he succeeds, our cause is not ruined.
 
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 He stakes all on his side against a part on ours.
 
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 Admitting he succeeds, the consequence will be that armies from both ends of the continent will march to assist their suffering friends in the middle states.
 
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 For he cannot go everywhere.
 
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 It is impossible.
 
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 I consider Howe as the greatest enemy the Tories have.
 
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 He is bringing war into their country
 
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 which had it not been for him and partly for themselves, they had been clear of.
 
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 Should he now be expelled, I wish with all the devotion of a Christian that the names of Whig and Tory may never more be mentioned.
 
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 But should the Tories give him encouragement to come or assistance if he come, I sincerely wish that our next year's arms may expel them from the continent.
 
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 and the Congress appropriate their possessions to the relief of those who have suffered in well-doing.
 
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 A single successful battle next year will settle the whole.
 
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 America could carry on a two years war by the confiscation of the property of disaffected persons and be made happy by their expulsion.
 
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 Say not that this is revenge.
 
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 I call it rather the soft resentment of a suffering people.
 
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 who having no object in view but the good of all, have staked their own all upon a seemingly doubtful event.
 
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 Yet it is folly to argue against determined hardness.
 
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 Eloquence may strike the ear, and the language of sorrow draw forth the tear of compassion, but nothing can reach the heart that is steeled with prejudice.
 
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 Quitting this class of men, I turn with the warm ardor of a friend
 
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 To those who have nobly stood and are yet determined to stand a matter out, I call not upon a few, but upon all.
 
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 Not on this state or that state, but on every state.
 
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 Up and help us.
 
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 Lay your shoulders to the wheel.
 
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 Better to have too much force than too little when so great an object is at stake.
 
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 Let it be told to the future world that in depth of winter, when nothing but hope and virtue could survive, that the city and the country, alarmed at one common danger, came forth to meet and to repulse it.
 
 22:24.559 --> 22:26.300
 Say not that the thousands are gone.
 
 22:26.760 --> 22:28.501
 Turn out your tens of thousands.
 
 22:29.042 --> 22:36.107
 Throw not the burden of the day upon providence, but show your faith by your works that God may bless you.
 
 22:36.747 --> 22:38.088
 It matters not where you live.
 
 22:38.653 --> 23:02.431
 what rank of life you hold the evil or the blessing will reach you all the far and the near the home countries in the back the rich and the poor will suffer and rejoice alike the heart that feels not now is dead the blood of his children will curse his cowardice who shrinks back at a time when a little might have saved the whole and made them happy
 
 23:03.473 --> 23:09.497
 I love the man that can smile in trouble, that can gather strength from distress and grow brave by reflection.
 
 23:10.018 --> 23:18.724
 Tis the business of little minds to shrink, but he whose heart is firm and whose conscience approves his conduct will pursue his principles unto death.
 
 23:19.625 --> 23:24.569
 My own line of reasoning is to myself as straight and clear as a ray of light.
 
 23:25.190 --> 23:32.376
 Not all the treasures of the world, as far as I believe, would have induced me to support an offensive war, for I think it murder.
 
 23:32.877 --> 23:46.869
 But if a thief breaks into my house, burns and destroys my property, and kills or threatens to kill me or those that are in it, and to bind me in all cases whatsoever to his absolute will, am I to suffer it?
 
 23:47.529 --> 23:59.757
 What signifies it to me, whether he who does it is a king or a common man, my countrymen or not my countrymen, whether done by an individual villain or an army of them?
 
 24:00.638 --> 24:04.120
 If we reason to the root of things, we shall find no difference.
 
 24:05.041 --> 24:11.405
 Neither can any just cause be assigned why we should punish in the one case and pardon in the other.
 
 24:12.106 --> 24:14.087
 Let them call me rebel and welcome.
 
 24:14.487 --> 24:15.768
 I feel no concern from it.
 
 24:16.425 --> 24:28.131
 but I should suffer the misery of devils were I to make a whore of my soul by swearing allegiance to one whose character is that of a sottish, stupid, stubborn, worthless, brutish man.
 
 24:28.911 --> 24:43.179
 I conceive likewise a horrid idea in receiving mercy from a being who at the last day shall be shrieking to the rocks and mountains to cover him and fleeing with terror from the orphan, the widow, and the slain of America.
 
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 There are cases which cannot be overdone by language, and this is one.
 
 24:49.443 --> 24:53.624
 There are persons, too, who see not the full extent of the evil which threatens them.
 
 24:53.944 --> 24:59.246
 They solace themselves with hopes that the enemy, if he succeed, will be merciful.
 
 24:59.946 --> 25:05.088
 It is the madness of folly to expect mercy from those who have refused to do justice.
 
 25:05.854 --> 25:10.143
 And even mercy, where conquest is the object, is only a trick of war.
 
 25:10.684 --> 25:17.117
 The cunning of the fox is as murderous as the violence of the wolf, and we ought to guard equally against both.
 
 25:18.171 --> 25:27.578
 Howe's first object is partly by threats and partly by promises to terrify or seduce the people to deliver up their arms and receive mercy.
 
 25:28.179 --> 25:43.871
 The ministry recommended the same plan to Gage, and this is what the Tories call making their peace, a peace which passeth all understanding indeed, a peace which would be the immediate forerunner of a worse ruin than any we have thought of.
 
 25:44.687 --> 25:48.169
 Ye men of Pennsylvania, do reason upon these things.
 
 25:48.630 --> 25:53.973
 Were the back countries to give up their arms, they would fall an easy prey to the Indians who are all armed.
 
 25:54.414 --> 25:57.536
 This is perhaps what some of the Tories would not be sorry for.
 
 25:58.236 --> 26:08.423
 Were the home counties to deliver up their arms, they would be exposed to the resentment of the back counties who would then have it in their power to chastise their defection at pleasure.
 
 26:09.284 --> 26:19.490
 And were any one state to give up its arms, that state must be garrisoned by all Howe's army of Britons and Hessians to preserve it from the anger of the rest.
 
 26:20.211 --> 26:27.135
 Mutual fear is the principal link in the chain of mutual love and woe be to that state that breaks the compact.
 
 26:27.875 --> 26:35.580
 Howe is mercifully inviting you to barbarous destruction and men must be either rogues or fools that will not see it.
 
 26:36.380 --> 26:38.982
 I dwell not upon the vapors of imagination,
 
 26:39.540 --> 26:47.263
 I bring reason to your ears and in language as plain as ABC, hold up truth to your eyes.
 
 26:48.624 --> 26:50.225
 I thank God that I fear not.
 
 26:50.785 --> 26:55.087
 I so see no real cause for fear.
 
 26:55.907 --> 26:59.188
 I know our situation well and can see the way out of it.
 
 26:59.809 --> 27:02.770
 While army was collected, how dared not risk a battle?
 
 27:03.186 --> 27:11.008
 And it is no credit to him that he decamped from the White Plains and waited a mean opportunity to ravage the defenseless Jerseys.
 
 27:11.809 --> 27:25.793
 But it is great credit to us that with a handful of men, we sustained an orderly retreat for near 100 miles, brought off our ammunition, all our field pieces, the greatest part of our stores, and had four rivers to pass.
 
 27:26.815 --> 27:35.397
 None can say that our retreat was precipitate for we were near three weeks in performing it that the country might have time to come in.
 
 27:36.077 --> 27:39.478
 Twice we marched back to meet the enemy and remained out till dark.
 
 27:39.978 --> 27:51.840
 The sign of fear was not seen in our camp and had not some of the cowardly and disaffected inhabitants spread false alarms through the country, the jerseys had never been ravaged.
 
 27:52.540 --> 27:55.341
 Once more again, we are collecting and collected.
 
 27:56.024 --> 28:07.150
 Our new army at both ends of the continent is recruiting fast, and we shall be able to open the next campaign with 60,000 men, well armed and clothed.
 
 28:07.731 --> 28:11.033
 This is our situation, and who will may know it.
 
 28:11.553 --> 28:15.635
 By perseverance and fortitude, we have the prospect of a glorious issue.
 
 28:16.075 --> 28:20.278
 By cowardice and submission, the sad choice of a variety of evils.
 
 28:20.825 --> 28:35.573
 a ravaged country, a depopulated city, habitations without safety, slavery without hope, our homes turned into barracks and bawdy houses for Hessians, and a future race to provide for, whose fathers we shall doubt of.
 
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 Look on this picture and weep over it, and if there yet remains one thoughtless wretch who believes it not, let him suffer it unlamented.
 
 28:47.870 --> 29:01.619
 So Paine had this printed on the 19th of December, and then it was read throughout Washington's army as Washington was preparing his stroke on Christmas night of 1776.
 
 29:02.920 --> 29:08.064
 And Washington initially planned a three-pronged assault across the Delaware River.
 
 29:08.604 --> 29:15.049
 A storm blew up, and only one of the three prongs, Washington's own, was able to make it across.
 
 29:15.799 --> 29:18.582
 Washington had 16 to 18 Durham boats.
 
 29:18.622 --> 29:23.966
 These are big boats made for hauling ore or other cargo along the Delaware.
 
 29:24.627 --> 29:32.154
 And John Glover's regiment of Marines from Gloucester were the ones who brought Washington and his men across, some 2,400 men.
 
 29:33.985 --> 29:41.993
 There were about 18 pieces of artillery along with a lot of horses that came across not in the Durham boats but on ferry boats.
 
 29:42.434 --> 29:54.206
 The overall operation was actually conducted by Henry Knox, the bookseller who had brought the artillery from Ticonderoga to lift the siege of Boston back in March.
 
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 If you see Thomas Sully's wonderful painting in the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston, you see Washington in the center on his white horse and Knox behind him on his horse directing the movement of the artillery down to the boats along the shore.
 
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 And by about 4 a.m.
 
 30:12.346 --> 30:19.071
 on December 26, Washington and his men had gotten across the Delaware and then made their way to Trenton.
 
 30:19.591 --> 30:30.099
 Again, snowy night, and they get there just at dawn, and one of the Hessian sentries suddenly sees these men coming out, coming along the road.
 
 30:30.159 --> 30:32.701
 He firstly thought it was a patrol coming back.
 
 30:32.761 --> 30:36.624
 Then he sees there are too many men, realizes they are under attack.
 
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 This is a well-known story reenacted every year on the Delaware River.
 
 30:43.751 --> 30:49.240
 Very well in David Hackett Fisher's book, Washington's Crossing, as well as in the Sully painting.
 
 30:49.844 --> 30:57.208
 And Lutz's painting, Washington Irving devoted a number of chapters to this episode because it is the crucial moment.
 
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 Benjamin Rush, the Philadelphia doctor, had visited Washington's camp and Washington was writing out on little slips of paper the words that would be the signals for the men so they would know which side they were on if they encounter one another.
 
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 And the code words were victory or death.
 
 31:16.018 --> 31:18.900
 Washington knew those were the only two options in this campaign.
 
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 Now, one of the myths that came up somewhat later is that Washington planned to attack the day after Christmas, knowing that the Hessian soldiers would have been celebrating Christmas and would probably be incapacitated the next day.
 
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 That's not true.
 
 31:35.345 --> 31:38.828
 These were very good professional soldiers that were here in Trenton.
 
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 And they did fight very well, but it was a surprise to them to be attacked at dawn on the day after Christmas just after a big snowstorm by this army they regarded as a group of, a rabble of peasants.
 
 31:53.883 --> 32:01.544
 And so Washington and his men do capture Trenton as well as some 900 German troops.
 
 32:01.904 --> 32:09.886
 There are about two dozen German casualties, including their commanding officer, Lieutenant Colonel Rall, who was mortally wounded in the attack.
 
 32:10.799 --> 32:14.682
 And then the other 900 men will be ferried across the Delaware.
 
 32:14.702 --> 32:25.711
 Washington knows he needs to get his men back across the Delaware and he does that along with the 900 captured Hessians who then are simply marched south to Philadelphia.
 
 32:26.151 --> 32:30.895
 And from Philadelphia, they are marched further south into Maryland and Virginia.
 
 32:31.564 --> 32:42.428
 where they will sit out the war and many of them, in fact, will remain in the country for the rest of their lives and will have children and descendants with us to this day.
 
 32:42.889 --> 32:53.853
 So the capture of Trenton and this force by an army that had been thought at the beginning of December to be defeated really does change the nature of the war.
 
 32:54.565 --> 33:09.219
 There will be other battles over the next 10 days, another Battle of Trenton, a battle at Princeton, and then it's Washington and his army who are leading the British across New Jersey before he'll take up winter encampment at Morristown.
 
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 This is really the big moment as Washington saves the Revolution.
 
 33:15.424 --> 33:20.309
 It's the reason why Washington's crossing becomes a celebrated moment.
 
 33:20.709 --> 33:21.872
 in American history.
 
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 Because with this bold attack across the river, Washington and his men
 
 33:28.638 --> 33:33.601
 Only two men died in this encounter and both of them died of exposure on the American side.
 
 33:35.042 --> 33:37.203
 Washington and his men saved the revolution.
 
 33:37.243 --> 33:39.925
 So that's Washington's Crossing of 1776.
 
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 Thank you all for joining us.
 
 33:42.567 --> 33:48.871
 I want to thank Jonathan Lane, our producer, and our many listeners around the world who tune in regularly.
 
 33:48.971 --> 33:56.015
 Friends in South, if you're in one of these places and would like some of our Revolution 250 gear, send an email to Jonathan Lane
 
 33:59.741 --> 34:02.604
 Jay Lane at Revolution250.org.
 
 34:02.884 --> 34:13.536
 By the way, I also want to take a moment to thank the many people from around the world who joined us last week to commemorate the 250th anniversary of the dumping of the tea in Boston Harbor.
 
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 It was an event that, just as the original event, this went far beyond our expectations.
 
 34:21.052 --> 34:22.933
 People from all over the world joined us.
 
 34:22.953 --> 34:32.680
 There were something like 15,000 to 17,000 people watching the destruction of the tea itself and many more all around Austin participating in these events.
 
 34:33.220 --> 34:39.084
 And it did set a very high bar for further reenactments and reminded us how important these stories are to people.
 
 34:39.699 --> 34:46.945
 not just to a handful of professional historians or living historians, but these are stories that do belong to all of us.
 
 34:47.485 --> 34:49.086
 So thank you all for joining us.
 
 34:49.186 --> 34:57.333
 And if you have an idea for an episode or something you want to learn more about, send Jonathan Lane an email, jlane at revolution250.org.
 
 34:57.913 --> 35:06.600
 Or if you're one of your listeners in these communities that I'm about to mention, send him an email and I'll send you some of our Revolution 250 commemorative items.
 
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 So
 
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 This week, friends in Southampton, England, and Chelsea, Massachusetts, Monroe, North Carolina, Georgetown, Kentucky, Ann Arbor, Michigan, Red Lion, Pennsylvania, and Wilkes-Barre, Pennsylvania, Norfolk, Virginia, Edison, New Jersey, Belo Horizonte in Brazil, Delhi in India, Pattaya in Thailand,
 
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 and all places beyond or between.
 
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 Thanks for joining us.
 
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 And now we will be piped out on the road to Boston.