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Vol XLI No.4 the Journal of the Brigade of the American Revolution Winter 2011 The Brigade Dispatch Journal of The Brigade of the American Revolution Vol. XLI No.4 Winter 2011 THE BRIGADE OF HfE AMERICAN REVOLUTION IN THIS ISSUE NATIONAL BOARD OF DIRECTORS PRESIDENT PAST PRESIDENT Mark Hurwitz Jack Rogers VICE PRESIDENT SECRETARY "This Very Respectable Corps of His Bob Winowitch Robert Traver INSPECTOR GENERAL TREASURER Majesty's Troops": Henry Cooke Tom Castrovinci BOARD MEMBERS AT LARGE The Royal Welch Fusiliers m New John Cronin Cathleen Crown Barbara DeAngelis Sean Dermond York, 1773-74 Ken Siegel Gregory J. W.Urwin ........... ......... 2 NORTHWEST DEPARTMENT BOARD OF DIRECTORS "Young Gentlemen of Mathematical PRESIDENT PAST PRESIDENT Robert Cairns Jack Rogers Genius" VICE PRESIDENT SECRETARY David Miller Robert Kashary W. Scott Breckinridge Smith ..... ... 11 TREASURER INSPECTOR William_Dibbern Howard McDaniel BOARD MEMBERS AT LARGE Kurt Ayers John Conklin Features Mary Jo Lucas Joe Forte SOUTHERN DEPARTMENT BOARD OF DIRECTORS Reviews ... .... ...... ... ... ... ...... ..... 22 PRESIDENT PAST PRESIDENT Gregory Ehrmann Todd Post VICE PRESIDENT SECRETARY © 2011 Tlte Brigade of the American Revolution TREASURER INSPECTOR Press, Tlt e Brigade of tire American Revolution. Walter A. Vanderbeek Jay Callaham BOARD MEMBERS AT LARGE All rights reserved including the right to reproduce this Journal in Todd Dickinson any form whatsoever. FAR WESTERN REGION COORDINATOR PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA. David Weidner ISSN 1534-1690 MARITIMES REGION COORDINATOR Address all editorial correspondence and materials for publication to Owen Hamlin the Editor, Norman Desmarais 467 River Rd. , Lincoln, Rl 02865 (Email: [email protected]) Address all general correspondence and inquiries about subscription and distribution to the Adjutant, Brigade of the American Revolution, 41 Collamer Drive, Ballston Spa, NY 12020-4348 Phone: 888-GO REV WAR The Brigade of the American Revolution on the World Wide Web: http://www. brigade.org "This Very Respectable Corps of His Majesty's Troops": The Royal Welch Fusiliers in New York, 1773-74 I . Gregory J. W. Urwin Corporal, Colonel's Company, Royal Welch Fusiliers in America The 23rd Regiment of Foot (Royal by then a major, was serving as a deputy Welch Fusiliers) fought through the American adjutant general at the British Army's main War of Independence from the beginning to the American base at New York.) Additional end at Yorktown. It is particularly remembered information on the 23rd Foot's Boston sojourn for the conspicuous part it played in the events can be found in the journal of Lieutenant that triggered the conflict in and around Boston, Richard Williams, who joined the regiment at Massachusetts. The regiment's grenadier and the Massachusetts port on June 12, 1775, but light infantry companies joined the flank left for Nova Scotia on August 22? companies from the other British regiments in What is often forgotten is that the Royal the Boston garrison to form the 800-man Welch Fusiliers served in the thirteen colonies expedition that Lieutenant Colonel Francis for nearly two years before the outbreak of the Smith led on April 18-19, 1775, in a bungled American War. Aside from a letter that the attempt to seize Whig war supplies at Concord. ubiquitous Lieutenant Mackenzie wrote his The 23rd Foot's eight battalion companies father describing the regiment's voyage across belonged to the brigade under Brigadier the Atlantic to New York, little is known about General Hugh, Lord Percy, which succeeded in this period in the regiment's history. A review relieving Smith's beleaguered grenadiers and of colonial newspapers, however, reveals light infantrymen during their homeward march several mentions of the 23rd Foot during the on April 19. 1 thirteen months it spent in New York City. The This dramatic period in the 23rd Foot's regiment also appeared regularly in the history is a major reason that its incarnation in surviving orders issued by British Army the Brigade of the American Revolution, the headquarters in New York in 1773 and 1774. Royal Welch Fusiliers in America, normally Though brief and somewhat fragmentary, these dresses as if it belonged to the Boston garrison sources reveal something of the regiment's in 1775. This phase in the regiment's history character, duties, and the esteem in which it also enjoys substantial documentation. A was held by its American friends and future reliable and detailed source on the 23rd Foot's enemies.3 activities exists in the diary kept from January 5 The 23rd Regiment of Foot sailed from to April 30, 1775, by the regimental adjutant, Plymouth Sound on April 25, 1773, as part of a Lieutenant Frederick Mackenzie. (Mackenzie seven-ship convoy led by the ungainly HMS reportedly kept a diary throughout his active Fox, an old East Indiaman. (This was probably military career from 1756 to 1791 , but only the eight-gun ketch launched at the Bombay eight volumes survive. Four of these cover dockyards in 1766 and not the 28-gun sixth­ events on Long Island and Rhode Island from rater of the same name captured by the September 4, 1776, through July 12, 1778. He Americans in 1777.) The fusiliers found berths filled three more with entries written between on four of the six transports that followed the January and December 1781 , when Mackenzie, Fox. The Brigade Dispatch 2 XLI No.4 Winter 2011 dispatched to Cornwall and south Devon to suppress unemployed tin miners driven to desperation by poverty and hunger. According to a report to the War Office, these unhappy people had grown "very Riotous and Outrageous in plundering the Maltsters, Millers and Farmers" and "committed many Robberies on the High Roads." After the 23rd Foot received orders for New York, it was relieved by the 33rd Foot.5 These two regiments would meet again and serve closely together in the American War, especially in the South in 1780 and 1781. On Monday, June 14, 1773, the New­ York Gazette; and the Weekly Mercury announced the arrival of the Friendship, the first of the Royal Welch Fusiliers' transports to complete the crossing: Captain Rescot, m 6 Weeks from Plymouth, arrived Fig. 1. Thirty-eight-year-old William Blakeney here last Wednesday, with Part came to New York in the spring of 1773 as a of the Royal Welch Fuzileers; captain in the 23rd Regiment of Foot, Royal having parted from the other Welch Fusiliers. He later led the regiment's Transports with the Remainder grenadier company at Lexington, Concord, of the Regiment on board the and Bunker Hill in 1775, falling wounded at 23d of May in Lat. 40, 53, and the latter engagement. Promoted to major on left the Transports for Quebec, November 24, 1775, Blakeney sat for this ten Days before. portrait miniature by Thomas Hill while on Capt. Rescot spoke with leave in England in 1778. Battalion company the following Vessels, viz. The and field officers in ordinary British infantry 51 21 of May, Lat. 40, 51, Lon. regiments wore a single epaulette on the right 4 7, with the Ship Watson, Capt. shoulder, but their counterparts in fusilier Philips, from Jamaica for regiments wore two epaulettes. Note also that Bristol; the 3d Instant, with a the buttons on Blakeney's lapels are set in Whaler from Rhode Island, in pairs. (The Colonial Williamsburg Foundation Lat 38, the th following, Lat., #2010-90) 39, 40, with a Schooner from Philadelphia, for Newfoundland. A trans-Atlantic voyage on a troop ship was usually an unpleasant experience in the eighteenth century. Bad weather could make Lieutenant Mackenzie, one of the Friendship's the trip even more uncomfortable and passengers, noted that the transport tied up to transform it into a terrifying ordeal.4 a wharf in New York harbor by 11 :00 P.M. Nevertheless, some of the 23rd Foot's on June 9. 6 personnel may have welcomed a change in British Army headquarters at New station. Early in 1773, the regiment had been York heralded the Friendship's appearance the The Brigade Dispatch 3 XLI No.4 Winter 2011 following day with these orders: "Captain Master will attend to rece1ve the barrack [Edward] Evans with the part of the 23 rd , or utensils from them on the upper barracks, and Royal Welch Fusileers under his Command, deliver their utensils in their new quarters." will disembark this Afternoon at 5 o'Clock. The 23rd,s additional companies went ashore Sergeant Dixon attending the Quarter Master two days later at 9:00 A.M., and Barrack General will be in waiting to conduct them to Master Bancker supervised the men's room the upper barracks." For some reason, assignments and furnished their "barrack ... 8 ' headquarters postponed the disembarkation of utensils. " Evans' detachment until the following With more personnel on hand, the 23rd morning. The fusiliers received little time to Foot's responsibilities increased exponentially. recover their land legs before they were put to On June 14, Lieutenant Colonel Bernard work. On June 11, Evans received these received instructions to provide guards for orders: "The Royal Welch Fusileers to mount three installations. One subaltern, one [guard with] 1 Serjeant, 2 Corporals, and 10 sergeant, one corporal, and twenty fusiliers Private Men at the Fort Guard to Morrow."7 took post at the Upper Barracks. One sergeant, The Pallas and the Henry, two of the two corporals, and ten fusiliers stood guard at 23rd,s three remaining transports, reached New the fort overlooking New York's waterfront. York on June 12, as Rivington 's New-York Finally, one corporal and six fusiliers occupied Gazetteer reported on Thursday, June 17 : the guard room and sentry boxes at the Lower Barracks. "The other Guards will report to the On Saturday last two Officer of the upper barrack Guard," more of the transport squadron headquarters specified, "and he will report to arrived here from Plymouth, the General.

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