The Lost Gettysburg Address Read Free

withGeneral Nathanael Greene at the
ill-fatedBattle of Brandywine Creek in the fall of 1777. There,
Washington made a strategic error, leaving his right flank exposed
and nearly losing his entire army. Greene’s division held off British
generalWilliam Howe’s advance long enough for the Americans to
escape and fight another day. That day came three weeks later at
Germantown, Pennsylvania, when Washington tried in vain to dislodge
the British from their occupation of Philadelphia. Anderson
retired with his troops for a long, hard winter at Valley Forge,
content in the knowledge that the French, Poles, and other Europeans
were supporting their cause. The troops drilled and trained under
theMarquis de Lafayette andFriedrich William von Steuben, and
emerged from their winter quarters a much more effective fighting
force.
    Anderson was promoted to major of the First Virginia on February
10, 1778. He and his new regiment saw action at the Battle of
Monmouth, New Jersey, in late June. It was a standoff that proved
that the American army was disciplined enough to hold its own in a
protracted, large-scale engagement. As the war continued, Anderson’s
services were always in high demand. In the fall of 1779, an alliance
between more than five hundred white, free black, and slave soldiers
from Saint-Domingue under the command of French Admiral Comte
d’Estaing and American troops commanded byGeneral Benjamin
Lincoln devised a plan to recapture the port of Savannah from the
British. Lincoln wanted Anderson and the First Virginia to join the
expedition. On the morning of October 9, the attack began.
    The First Virginia was ordered to assault the British siege defenses
at the Spring Hill redoubt. The earthworks were soft and between
sixteen and eighteen feet high. Anderson admonished his troops to
refrain from firing until they reached the top of the embrasure. After
the bugle sounded, Anderson led his men in a scramble up the
mountain of soil. Very few made it. Major Anderson scaled the parapet
and was rewarded with a sword through the shoulder. The force
of the blow caused him to slide feet-first down the mound, striking
the ground so hard that he ruptured his abdomen. The attack was
abandoned. It was small consolation when Anderson’s body servant,
Spruce, shot and killed one of the defending grenadiers before
dragging his master from the ditch.
    On his retreat, Major Anderson encountered Polish-born brigadier
generalCasimir Pulaski, later called the “father of American
cavalry.” Pulaski was credited with saving the life ofGeneral
Washington as the result of his brave stand at Brandywine. The
Polish hero had been mortally wounded by grape shot as he tried
to defend retreating forces at Savannah. Anderson and Pulaski were
taken to the privateer Wasp , where Anderson stayed with him day
and night. Before he died, Pulaski gave his sword to Anderson in
gratitude for his friendship and service. The Savannah campaign was
a dismal failure. French and American forces blamed each other, and
the French admiral sailed away, leaving General Lincoln to his own
devices. The Americans retreated to Charleston to spend the winter,
while Anderson made another journey to the hospital. The major was
still recuperating when British generals Henry Clinton and Charles
Cornwallis and a force of fourteen thousand men and ninety ships
laid siege to Charleston on April 1, 1780.
    Lincoln finally surrendered the city and his five thousand troops
on May 12. It was the greatest defeat suffered by the Americans in
the war. The invalid Anderson was thrown into Fort Moultrie and
given only three spoons and a tin plate. British officers gave him a
permit to fish for his own food, but a British guard tore it up, saying
that the fish were “too damned good for any rebel against the king.”
Anderson was finally exchanged after nine months of captivity. He
joined General Daniel Morgan’s command and eventually reached
Richmond, where he received yet another