Jean Jules Jusserand (1855–1932). With Americans of Past and Present Days. 1916.
III. Rochambeau and the French in America
From Unpublished DocumentsThe future marshal of France had been first destined to priesthood for no other reason than that he was a second son, and he was about to receive the tonsure when his elder brother died, and Bishop de Crussol, who had been supervising Donatien’s ecclesiastical studies, came one day to him and said: “You must forget all I have told you up to now; you have become the eldest of your family and you must now serve your country with as much zeal as you would have served God in the ecclesiastical state.”
Rochambeau did so. He was appointed an officer and served on his first campaign in Germany
On the opposite side of the same battle-fields were fighting many destined, like Rochambeau himself, to take part in the American war; it was like a preliminary rehearsal of the drama that was to be. At the second battle of Minden, in 1759, where the father of Lafayette was killed, Rochambeau covered the retreat, while in the English ranks Lord Cornwallis was learning his trade, as was too, but less brilliantly, Lord George Germain, the future colonial secretary of the Yorktown period. At Johannisberg, in the same war, Clinton, future commander-in-chief at New York, was wounded, while here and there in the
When still very young Rochambeau had contracted one of those marriages so numerous in the eighteenth, as in every other century, of which nothing is said in the memoirs and letters of the period, because they were what they should be, happy ones. Every right-minded and right-hearted man will find less pleasure in the sauciest anecdote told by Lauzun than in the simple and brief lines written in his old age by Rochambeau: “My good star gave me such a wife as I could desire; she has been for me a cause of constant happiness throughout life, and I hope, on my side, to have made her happy by the tenderest amity, which has never varied an instant during nearly sixty years.” The issue of that union, Viscount Rochambeau, from his youth the companion in arms of his father, an officer at fourteen, accompanied him to the States, and was, after a career of devotion to his country, to die a general at Leipzig, in the “Battle of Nations.”
Informed at Versailles of the task he would
To those intrusted with the care of loading the vessels he recommends that all articles of the same kind be not placed on the same ship, “so that in case of mishap to any ship the whole supply of any kind of provisions be not totally lost.”
As to the pay for himself and his officers, he
At Brest, where he now repaired, Rochambeau found that the ships were not so numerous as expected, so that only the first division of his army could embark under Admiral Chevalier de Ternay: a sad blow for the commander-in-chief. He prescribed that care be at least taken to select for the passage the most robust men, and, in order to save space, that all horses be left behind, himself giving the example. “I have,” Rochambeau writes to Prince de Montbarey, the minister of war, “to part company with two battle-horses that I can never replace. I do so with the greatest sorrow, but I do not want to have to reproach myself with their having taken up the room of twenty men who could have embarked in their stead.” Officers, soldiers, ammunition, artillery, spare clothing for the troops, and even the printing-press go on board at last. Men and things are close-packed, but end by shaking down into place; all will go well, Rochambeau writes to the minister, “without any overcrowding of the
When all were there, however, forming a total of 5,000 men, the maximum was so truly reached that a number of young men, some belonging to the best-known French families, who were arriving at Brest from day to day, in the hope of being added to the expedition, had to be sent back. The fleet was already on the high seas when a cutter brought the government’s last instructions to Rochambeau. On the boat were two brothers called Berthier, who besought to be allowed to volunteer. “They have joined us yesterday,” the general writes to the minister, “and have handed us your letters.… They were dressed in linen vests and breeches, asking to be admitted as mere sailors.” But there was really no place to put them. “Those poor young men are interesting and in despair.” They had, nevertheless, to be sent back, but managed to join the army later, and so it was that Alexander Berthier began in the Yorktown campaign a military career which he was to end as marshal of France, and Prince of Wagram and Neufchâtel.
The departure, which it was necessary to hasten while the English were not yet ready, was beset with difficulties. Tempests, contrary winds and other mishaps had caused vexatious delay; the
At sea now for a long voyage, two or three months, perhaps, with the prospect of calms, of storms, of untoward encounters, of scurvy for the troops. On board the big Duc de Bourgogne, of eighty guns, with Admiral de Ternay, Rochambeau adds now and then paragraphs to a long report which is a kind of journal, assuring the minister, after the first fortnight, that all is well on board: “We have no men sick other than those which the sea makes so, among whom the Marquis de Laval and my son play the most conspicuous part.” He prepares his general instructions to the troops.
On board the smaller craft life was harder and numerous unflattering descriptions have come down to us in the journals kept by so many
He confesses, but with no undue sentimentalism, that he was saddened at first to some extent at the prospect of an absence that might be a long one, particularly when thinking “of a charming young fiancée, full of wit and grace.… My profession, however, does not allow me to yield too much to sensibility; so I am now perfectly resigned.” He was assigned to the Comtesse de Noailles, of three hundred tons (the Ecureuil, that kept her company, was of only one hundred and eighty). Each officer had received fifty francs for extra purchases; they found it was little, but when they had made their purchases they found that it had been much, so great was the difficulty in stowing their possessions on the ship. At last, “after much trouble and many words—a few crowns here and there—each of us succeeded in squeezing himself and his belongings in those so-detested sabots.” Closen, for his part, had provisioned himself with “sugar, lemons, and syrups in quantity.”
The crew consisted of forty-five men, “half of them Bretons, half Provençals,” speaking their own dialect, “and who, little accustomed to the language used by their naval officers when giving
Every-day life now begins on the small craft;
Various incidents break the monotony of the journey. On the 18th of June the Surveillante
An occasion offers to open fight, with the advantage of numerical superiority, on six English vessels; some shots are exchanged, but with great wisdom, and, in spite of the grumblings of all his people, Ternay refuses to really engage them, and continues his voyage. “He had his convoy too much at heart,” says Closen, “and he knew too well the importance of our expedition, his positive orders being that he must make our army arrive as quickly as possible, for him not to set aside all the entreaties of the young naval officers who, I was told, were very outspoken on that score, as well as most of the land officers, who know nothing of naval matters.”
The event fully justified Ternay, for Graves, whose mission it had been to intercept him and his slow and heavy convoy, missed his opportunity by twenty-four hours only, reaching New York, where he joined forces with Arbuthnot
The more so since, when nearing the coast our fleet had fallen into fogs. “Nothing so sad and dangerous at sea as fogs,” Closen sententiously writes; “besides the difficulty of avoiding collisions in so numerous a fleet, each vessel, in order to shun them, tries to gain space; thus one may chance to get too far from the centre. The standing orders for our convoy were, in view of avoiding those inconveniences, to beat the drums every quarter of an hour or fire petards. The men-of-war fired their guns or sent rockets. The speed-limit was three knots during the fog, so that each vessel might, as far as possible, continue keeping company with its neighbor.” In spite of all which the Ile de France was lost, and there was great anxiety; she was not seen again during the rest of the journey, but she appeared later, quite safe, at Boston.
The landing orders of Rochambeau, making known now to all concerned the intentions of the government, were clear and peremptory. Drawn up by him on board the Duc de Bourgogne, he had caused copies to be carried to the chiefs of the several corps on board the other ships:
“The troops which his Majesty is sending to America are auxiliary to those of the United
The army, but not the fleet, had been placed under the orders of Washington. Ternay’s instructions specified, however, that while his squadron had no other commander than himself, it was expected that he would “proffer all assistance that might facilitate the operations of the United States,” and that he would allow the use of our ships “on every occasion when their help might be requested.” Good-will was obviously the leading sentiment, and the desire of all was to give as little trouble and bring as much useful help as possible.