This article appeared in the Fall 2004 edition of “The Florida Patriot” Magazine

Winter at Valley Forge

by Compatriot “Bud” Casey

The ragged and hungry men of the American Army stumbled up the Gulph Road to winter quarters at Valley Forge. Some of them left bloody footprints in the snow. Not only were they cold and hungry, but they had lost their spirit. Time and time again they had been beaten by a well organized and well supplied enemy. And many of their countrymen supported the enemy. They arrived at Valley Forge on December 19, 1777 and, upon Washington’s orders, began building log huts for shelter. The winter cold had already set in and a light snow had fallen.

Four days after their arrival, Washington reported to Congress that of the 11,000 men, twenty-nine hundred of them were “…unfit for duty because they were bare foot and otherwise naked.” By February that number had increased to 4,000.

The Quartermaster General, Thomas Mifflin, had resigned in November. Then, the trickle of supplies stopped altogether. The inept Congress, hiding out at York, Pennsylvania, saw no need to replace him for three months.

Food became almost nonexistent. The soldiers lived on “hoe cake,” an unleavened mixture of flour and water baked over an open fire. Roving bands of hungry men foraged the nearby countryside looking for food; a few lucky ones who had shoes, boiled them and tried to eat the leather.

Five hundred horses starved to death at Valley Forge. Undoubtedly, gaunt horseflesh saved, or prolonged, the lives of starving soldiers. Several pet dogs also gave their lives in the cause of liberty.

Men died at the rate of four hundred a month. Hundreds of others deserted. They either went home or joined the well-fed British. Twenty-two miles south of Valley Forge in Philadelphia, “that Mass of Cowardice and “Toryism,” as John Adams called it, there were parades and pageants. Each day patient Pennsylvania farmers lined up their wagons to exchange their foodstuffs for solid English pounds sterling. They wanted no part of the desperately inflated continental money being offered at Valley Forge.

The evenings in the city were bright with gala parties and masquerade balls, as wealthy Tories entertained the British officers occupying the capital. Later at night, in bedrooms along Broad Street and Market and throughout the city, red uniforms hung in disarray. Plump and pretty American girls laughed and squealed with delight before they turned over and slept contentedly beside the enemy. It became a bitter joke that the young ladies suffered from “scarlet fever.”

However, in spite of the hardship, a new spirit was forged in the snows at Valley Forge. The weaker soldiers either died or went home. A comical officer from Prussia, Colonel Von Steuben¹ who spoke no English, took what was left and transformed farm boys into soldiers. In the spring the shad swam up the nearby Schuylkill River to spawn and the hungry soldiers waded out and caught great barrels-full with their hands. Then the King of France, elated by the news of Burgoyne’s defeat at Saratoga, announced that his country would enter the war on the American side. It was a proud new army that broke camp at Valley Forge in June of 1778. As British General Clinton evacuated Philadelphia and retreated across New Jersey to New York, they nipped at his heels. They would catch him on an especially hot June 28th, at a place called Monmouth Court House.

¹Baron Von Steuben wrote a book of military drills and assisted in the instruction of the men so that they were all trained in a similar fashion. He staged large-scale military exercises on the open field, so the army could practice coordinated movements. His leadership evinced a great transformation in the men amidst the cold , sickness and hardships of the encampment.