The Evacuation of Boston

John Bowater (1741–1813)
From The American Revolution: Writings from the War of Independence 1775–1783

Interesting Links

“The Siege of Boston” (Historic Ipswich)

“Dragging Cannon from Fort Ticonderoga to Boston, 1775: A Spotlight on a Primary Source by Henry Knox” (Gilder Lehrman Institute)

Previous Story of the Week selections
• “The Battle of Long Island,” Philip Vickers Fithian
• “Concerning the Treatment of Himself & Wife by Sundry Persons,” Peter McNelly
• “It is impossible we should think of Submission,” Benjamin Franklin
• “The Declaration of Independence,” Abigail Adams

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“Lord Howe Evacuating Boston,” c. 1861. Hand-colored print by British printmaker John Godfrey (1817–1889) after a watercolor (now lost) by British artist Michael Angelo Wageman (c.1820–1898). Image courtesy of American Revolution Institute.

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“No one doubts the least of our finishing this Business before Christmas,” Captain John Bowater of the Royal Marines wrote confidently in June 1776 to his patron, Basil Feilding, 6th Earl of Denbigh, when he arrived in New York to continue the fight against the American rebels. Bowater’s close friend, Lieutenant William Feilding, who also owed his military commission to Lord Denigh (a distant relation), was just as bold in his prediction: “It is the Opinion of many that this summer, and next winter will totally destroy their Army, and the Misled deluded people will at last be convinced that they have been drawn into Ruin, by a set of mock patriots.”

Instead, within months both men were woefully embittered by their overseas adventure, and they extended their disgust to the entire population. In November, temporarily stationed in Rhode Island, Bowalter wrote:

The Natives are such a Levelling, underbred, Artfull, Race of people that we Cannot Associate with them. Void of principal, their whole Conversation is turn’d on their Interest, and as to gratitude they have no such word in their dictionary & either cant or wont understand what it means. (For instance as to levelling.) I met a man of very good property a few days ago who had a Complaint to make and I refer’d him to Lord Percy. I heard him enquire at his Lordships door for Mr. Percy. Thinking him Ignorant I stept up & told him again Lord Percy. He replied to me he knew no Lord but the Lord Jehovah. Thus it is throughout America and a sad set of Presbyterian Rascals they are. . . . Their dress is so formal and their words come up so Slow, that I frequently long to Shove a Soup ladle down their throat, and it is not want of Conception that these people are so Slow in Delivery, but from a certain determind duplicity that Governs all their Actions. . . .

His opinion had hardly changed by the end of the following year, when he wrote to Denbigh, “I every day curse Columbus and all the discoverers of this Diabolical Country, which no Earthly Compensation can put me in Charity with.”

In April 1775, before either Feilding or Bowater had arrived from England and after the Battle of Lexington and Concord, the Massachusetts militia began the siege of Boston. General Thomas Gage, who was both the governor of the Province of Massachusetts Bay and commander-in-chief of North America, strengthened fortifications around the city and awaited reinforcements. By the time Lieutenant Feilding arrived in Boston early that summer, British forces had increased from 4,000 troops to 6,500. On the night of June 16 rebel troops moved onto the Charlestown peninsula opposite Boston and began fortifying Breed’s Hill and Bunker Hill. Upon realizing the militia’s actions, the British landed 2,200 men on the peninsula and succeeded in capturing the American positions on June 17—but more than 1,000 men were killed or wounded. The extent of the casualties convinced British commanders not to conduct further attacks outside Boston.

On July 3, 1775, George Washington arrived at Cambridge to take command of the rebel forces and, dismayed by the lack of discipline among the New England troops and the inability of their elected officers to exercise authority, worked rapidly to equip, train, and reorganize the army. On the British side, General Gage was recalled to England and replaced by General William Howe, who became Commander-in-Chief, America, while General Guy Carleton assumed the role of commander-in-chief, Quebec.

John Bowater arrived in Boston at the end of January 1776, after “the longest and most disagreable” trip across the Atlantic, and he immediately met up with Feilding, who described the rebel commander as a “Yankee General . . . who can’t read but can speachifie and tell his soldiers they are to obey the Voice of the people in the streets.” The siege had been a virtual stalemate since the Battle of Bunker Hill. The cold winter weather, the waves of scurvy and smallpox, and the lack of gunpowder, weapons, supplies, and food slowly strangled both sides. But three months earlier Washington had ordered that fifty-nine heavy cannons captured from the British at Fort Ticonderoga be brought three hundred miles overland through the dead of winter to Dorchester Heights. After a trip of fifty-six days, the artillery arrived at the end of January; when the gunpowder supply was finally replenished, the cannons were set into place by March 4. Overlooking Boston Harbor, the position effectively cut off the British army’s only remaining supply line.

On March 19, Washington wrote to John Hancock:

It is with the greatest pleasure I inform you that on Sunday last, the 17th Instant, about 9 O’Clock in the forenoon, The Ministerial Army evacuated the Town of Boston, and that the Forces of the United Colonies are now in actual possession thereof. I beg leave to congratulate you Sir, & the honorable Congress—on this happy Event, and particularly as it was effected without endangering the lives & property of the remaining unhappy Inhabitants.

I have great reason to imagine their flight was precipitated by the appearance of a Work which I had Order’d to be thrown up last Saturday Night, on an Eminence at Dorchester which lay nearest to Boston Neck, call’d Newks Hill. The Town, although it has suffer’d greatly is not in so bad a state as I expected to find it, and I have a particular pleasure in being able to inform you Sir, that your house has receiv’d no damage worth mentioning.

One hundred twenty ships transported nearly 9,000 British troops, as well as more than 1,000 civilians, many of them women and children, to Halifax, Nova Scotia. Among them were both Feilding and Bowater, the latter of whom wrote the letter to Denbigh reprinted below. Two weeks later, in a subsequent letter, he added, “I don’t Know what the people of England will think of our Evacuating Boston, but it was Rediculous keeping a place that was [so] much Edg’d in that it wou’d Require a very large Army to force their lines and a much greater to Keep it after it was done, now we can Act where we please & they do not Know where to guard against us.”

For the next five weeks, Bowater would be assigned to a ship that cruised outside of Boston Harbor to divert cargo transports from Europe bearing provisions for the British forces. On July 1, he would arrive in Staten Island, where he would encounter Washington’s Continental Army as an “Eye Witness to the Compleatest Victory over the Rebels, that has happen’d in America”: the Battle of Long Island.

The above excerpts from Bowater’s and Feilding’s letters are from Marion Balderston and David Syrett, eds., The Lost War: Letters from British Officers during the American Revolution (1975). Much of the information about the events of the war is adapted from the Chronology in American Revolution: Writings from the War of Independence.

Notes: Denbigh had sponsored three of the five Bowater brothers for officer commissions—John, who turned 35 in 1776, Edward, 24, and William, 21—and all three would serve in the colonies.

Bowater dispatched his letter while on the HMS Centurion a week after the evacuation of Boston. He claims that “seventy sail” failed to reach Boston during the winter of 1775–76; more accurately, although thirty-five ships were sent from England with provisions, most were either captured by rebel ships or diverted by storms to the West Indies, and only eight made it to Boston. Major Hon. Charles Stuart (spelled Stewart by Bowater) was the son of former Prime Minister John Stuart, 3rd Earl of Bute.

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This week’s selection appears in its entirety below.
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The Evacuation of Boston
John Bowater to the Earl of Denbigh

Centurion: King’s Road, Boston March 25th. 1776

My Lord

I wrote to your Lordship by the Preston, Admiral Graves, which was the only Ship that has Saild from hence since my Arrival in America. Neither has Any ship Arrived here since she saild nor have I Received a line from any one since I left England. The Violence of the Winds at this Season of the Year with the extream Coldness of the Weather has prevented any ship Approaching the Coast. By a Sloop that came in Yesterday from Antigua we have an account of three men of War & Seventy sail of Transports Victualers & store Ships being drove in there & was Refitting in order to join us as soon as possable. And we are now all looking with the utmost anxiety for Vessels to Appear in sight as no one here is free from the dreadfull Thought of famine as I am inform’d we have not a months provisions Remaining for either Army or Navy. Tho we have been for this week past put upon two thirds of Allowance, and I believe this was the principal Reason for our Evacuating Boston, tho many others are Assign’d. The Rebels taking Possession of Dorchester Heights, & at last made their Approaches within a Thousand Yards of the Town, it was said to be no longer Tenable. Indeed at last they Amused us with both shot and shells in every part of the Town, but did no damage to the Shiping. An other Reason Assign’d was, that by our being Embarked must puzzle the Enemy exceedingly as they wou’d not Know where to guard most — And we might go to any place that wou’d Joyn us heartily. The present orders says Halifax but that Cannot be for any time as we have exausted that Country during the Winter. Meat was rose to 10d. per pound all over the province two months ago. We have three & twenty Battalions embarkt with us yet we have not seven Thousand fighting men. But with Women & Children civil Officers, followers of the Army, and many of the principal Inhabitants of Boston, (who if they did not accompany us would be either hung or sent to the mines) we are above twenty Thousand people to Receive Victuals & drink. The Transports are very much Crowded & a great many Children was Sufficated the first night and if the Weather turns Warm I am afraid the Troops will be sickly. It wou’d be a pitty to loose any of them, as I never saw a more spirited sett of fellows — and they have the greatest Confidence in their Generalls, if they Lament any thing it is that they can die but once in the service of their Country. The Cruelty Committed daily by the Rebels makes them keen for Revenge.

Mr. Feilding writes to your Lordship by this Opportunity and will give you an Exact Account of all the millitary motions previous to the Retreat — as Every precaution was taken the same as if the Enemy meant to anoy us. But they chose to save the Town as the principal seat of their Rebellion, and we wou’d not destroy it as the principal part of it belongs to the Friends of Government, also it might be Nessisary for us to retake it again for the next Winter Quarters. Tho I now think we shall go either to New York or Virginia, we have still a Regiment of light Horse with us which takes up as much Room as six Regiments of Foot and they never could be of the least service in any one of the Colonies, this with a Thousand other Absurdities which the wise heads at home have transmitted to us has laid us under the most dreadful misfortunes. Coals Porter & Potatoes have been brought out to us in great Plenty and in large Ships with twenty Guns & a hundred men. Brass Cannon, Mortars, Shells, Balls, flints, Powder &c. &c., have been sent out in small Briggs, with two & four Guns & ten or twelve men. And they have been taken by the Enemy who have beat us Very severely with our own Weapons. (The Board of Ordinance is in great disrepute with us at present.) If we are Expected to do any thing considerable we must have very great Reinforcements as the Rebels are so Numerous, they have above five & twenty Thousand Round us now & they take the utmost pains in Disciplining them, & they have got a great many Foreigners amongst them Runegadoes & partisans from all Countrys which are Very great Rascals but are generally Very Clever fellows. We have not had any late Accounts of Genl. Carleton but we are in hopes he will be Able to hold out at Quebec untill we can send him a Reinforcement he has perform’d Wonders already.

My best Respects attends Lady Denbigh & family. The packett going in haste obliges me to Conclude. Major Charles Stewart is well we often Converse and he desires to be Remember’d to your Lordship.

You must not Expect to hear from me often as we are so often sent out of the way when any thing is going home & it is at least a Thousand to one you do not Receive this.

Originally published in The Lost War: Letters from British Officers during the American Revolution (1975).