George Washington in The American Revolution - British Southern Strategy, and Treason

British Southern Strategy, and Treason

The winter of 1779–80 was one of the coldest in recorded colonial history. New York Harbor froze over, and the winter camps of the Continental Army were deluged with snow, resulting in hardships exceeding those experienced at Valley Forge. The war was declining in popularity, and the inflationary issuance of paper currency by Congress and the states alike harmed the economy, and the ability to provision the army. The paper currency also hit the army's morale, since it was how the troops were paid. Congress fixed the rate between paper and gold dollars at 40-to-1 in March 1780, but many merchants refused to accept the Continental currency at the official exchange rate. One Loyalist wrote, "Mock-money and mock-states shall melt away // And the mock troops disband for want of pay."

The British in late 1779 embarked on a new strategy based on the assumption that most Southerners were Loyalists at heart. General Clinton withdrew the British garrison from Newport, and marshalled a force of more than 10,000 men that in the first half of 1780 successfully besieged Charleston, South Carolina. In June 1780 he captured over 5,000 Continental soldiers and militia in the single worst defeat of the war for the Americans. Washington had at the end of March pessimistically dispatched several regiments troops southward from his army, hoping they might have some effect in what he saw as a looming disaster. He also ordered troops stationed in Virginia and North Carolina south, but these were either captured at Charleston, or scattered later at Waxhaws and Camden. Camden saw the ignominious defeat of General Gates, who had been appointed to the southern command by Congress without Washington's advice or knowledge beforehand. Gates famously abandoned his army and retreated 180 miles (290 km) by horse after his battle lines were broken. The debacle ended Gates' career as a field officer, but he eluded formal inquiries into his behavior because of his political connections.

Washington's army suffered from numerous problems in 1780: it was undermanned, underfunded, and underequipped. Because of these shortcomings Washington resisted calls for major expeditions, preferring to remain focused on the principal British presence in New York. Knowledge of discontent within the ranks in New Jersey prompted the British in New York to make two attempts to reach the principal army base at Morristown. These attempts were defeated, with significant militia support, in battles at Connecticut Farms and Springfield.

September 1780 brought a new shock to Washington. British Major John André had been arrested outside New York, and papers he carried exposed a conspiracy between the British and General Benedict Arnold. Washington respected Arnold for his military skills, and had, after Arnold's severe injuries in the Battles of Saratoga in October 1777, given him the military command of Philadelphia. During his administration there, Arnold had made many political enemies, and in 1779 he began secret negotiations with General Clinton (mediated in part by André) that culminated in a plot to surrender West Point, a command Arnold requested and Washington gave him in July 1780. Arnold was alerted to André's arrest and fled to the British lines shortly before Washington's arrival at West Point for a meeting. In negotiations with Clinton, Washington offered to exchange André for Arnold, but Clinton refused. André was hanged as a spy, and Arnold became a brigadier general in the British Army. Washington organized an attempt to kidnap Arnold from New York City; it was frustrated when Arnold was sent on a raiding expedition to Virginia.