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Tench Coxe: Tory ^Merchant Tench Coxe: Tory ^Merchant HE outbreak of the American Revolution confronted Tench Coxe, then barely twenty years of age, with the most diffi- Tcult problem of his long life—whether to side with his countrymen or to remain loyal to the monarchy which in decades past had lavishly bestowed lands, including most of West Jersey and a vast western estate, on his forebears. At the outset of the imperial crisis, Coxe supported the American cause. Like Joseph Galloway, John Dickinson, Andrew Allen and a goodly number of his close relatives, Tench favored a policy of remonstrance and petition, protest up to but not including the use of force. His was the middle ground which, as he failed to realize, is so often unten- able in an era of revolutionary upheaval. This fact was brought home to him by the battle on Lexington Green, by the organization of a Continental Army, and, above all, by the Declaration of Independence. This he could not accept— home rule within the Empire, yes; separation from Great Britain, no. For a few months after the famous Declaration he held his tongue and continued in business. Then, a sudden intensification of patriot ardor in Philadelphia led to a witch hunt which forced many Tories, silent and avowed, to flee the city. On December 2, 1776, Coxe joined the exodus, driven away, he recalled years later, "by the violence and threats of a body of armed men to the British army."1 He went first to New Jersey and, after only a brief stay, to British- occupied New York City, where he spent the next eight or nine months at the house of Edward Goold, a long-time family friend and a member of the prominent merchant firm of Ludlow & Goold. During these months of involuntary leisure, Coxe eagerly awaited a victory of the Redcoats which would open the way for British occupation of his native city and his return home. He did not have long to wait. 1 Federal Gazette, Nov. 22, 1788. 48 1972 TENCH COXE: TORY MERCHANT 49 On the morning of September 26 some 3,000 British troops com- manded by Lord Cornwallis marched into Philadelphia accompa- nied by a number of the city's prominent Tory exiles, among them Joseph Galloway, Andrew Allen, William Allen and Tench Coxe.2 Whether or not (as later charged) "with a British officer locked in his arm/'3 Coxe entered a quiet and sparsely populated city, its stores left empty by departing Whig merchants, its population con- sisting largely of women, children, and Quaker pacifists. "Philadel- phia is rather a lovely city of considerable size . and . the public squares are beautiful... the City is very charmingly situated in level fertile country/' a Hessian commander wrote on the day of the occupation.4 To Coxe, happy to be "safely home after so many fatigues and perils/'5 it doubtless appeared even more beautiful than to its invaders, his return a symbolic vindication of the wisdom of his commitment to the English. The half-deserted city which the British occupied on September 26 was quickly transformed. Other Tory exiles returned, English and Scotch merchants arrived aboard British transports, business resumed, and Philadelphia became again the busy commercial hub and lively social center with which Coxe was familiar.6 The presence of British nobles and British officers dazzled the local Tories; the circulation of British gold appeased the neutrals; and the superior power of the British army silenced the secret patriots. The winter social season of 1777-1778 was one of the liveliest in memory, so convivial, indeed, that Benjamin Franklin was led to deny that Howe had taken Philadelphia by commenting that Philadelphia had taken Howe. More likely, the General and his staff beguiled the city's elite who recklessly abandoned themselves to a season of gaiety, attempting to blot from consciousness the dim realization that the glittering new social order might not last. For the moment, 2 "Diary of Robert Morton," The Pennsylvania Magazine of History and Biography CHUM), I (1877), 7- 3 Aurora^ Aug. 23, 1804. 4 Bernhard A. Uhlendorf and Edna Vosper, eds., "Letters of Major Baurmeister during the Philadelphia Campaign, 1777-1778," PMHB> LIX (1935), 413-414. 6 Colburn Barrell to Tench Coxe (TC), Nov. 8,1777, quoting TC to Barrell, Oct. aa, 1777. All manuscripts cited are in the Tench Coxe Papers at The Historical Society of Pennsylvania. 6 See Willard O. Mishoff, "Business in Philadelphia During the British Occupation 1777- 1778," PMHB, LXI (1937), 166-167. 5O JACOB E. COOKE January "Assemblies, Concerts, Comedies, Clubs and the like," made them, like the Hessian officer who so commented in January, 1778, "forget there is any war, save that it is a capital joke/'7 In short, weekly balls at the City Tavern, performances by British officers of farces, comedies, and tragedies at the Southwark Theater on South Street,8 official receptions, public spectacles, and private parties9 (many of which Coxe doubtless attended) overshadowed a war whose out- come was by no means certain. A week after Howe's triumphant conquest of Philadelphia, the Americans challenged him at Germantown, a few miles outside the city where most of the British troops were quartered. Washington's audacity was no match for British numerical superiority, and in the confused battle that ensued Washington lost a thousand men, twice as many as his adversary. Repulsed but undaunted, Washington continued to harass Howe's forces as they sought to clear the Dela- ware for the British fleet, commanded by Lord Howe the British general's brother who impatiently waited to. sail up the Bay and join forces with the army in Philadelphia. American resistance proved futile, however, and by December the British were in secure control of the Delaware forts. Cast down by the defeats of Brandy- wine and Germantown, Washington now went into winter quarters on a bleak plateau at Valley Forge, scarcely twenty miles from Philadelphia, where it was assignment enough merely to keep his wretched, starving, and freezing army intact. Howe, snug and se- cure in Philadelphia, did not even bother to attack. But to those Philadelphia Tories not blinded by self-interest, the seemingly im- pregnable British position in Philadelphia was offset by the most important American victory of the war—the stunning defeat in- flicted on the British at Saratoga, where, on October 17, 1777, Gen- eral Burgoyne, deprived of the support of an auxiliary force under Lieutenant Colonel Barry St. Leger and anticipated aid from New York City, surrendered his entire army, some 5,000 strong, to General Horatio Gates. That Coxe's own correspondence contains 7 "Extracts from the Letter-Book of Captain Johann Heinrichs of the Hessian Jager Corps, 1778-1780," PMHB, XXII (1898), 139. 8 Fred L. Pattee, "The British Theater in Philadelphia in 1778," American Literature, VI (1935), 381-383. 9 Ellis Paxson Oberholtzer, Philadelphia, A History of the City and its People (Philadelphia, n. d.), I, 268. 1972 TENCH COXE: TORY MERCHANT 51 only laconic comments on what must have been to him a disquieting development10 was owing to his agreement with the viewpoint ex- pressed in a letter from his friend Goold: "I shall make no reflections upon this melancholy affair/' the New Yorker said. "I expect our Turn will come next/'11 The dispatch with which Coxe and Goold took advantage of the opening of the Philadelphia market suggests how eager they were to store up profits during the British occupation. As Coxe put it: "If we must suffer misfortunes, we ought to drain all the good from them possible."12 During his months of idleness in New York he had discussed with Goold his plans to resume business in Philadelphia, and the two had agreed on an informal partnership, including "a recommendation of each other to our respective friends."13 In a gesture that revealed both his respect for the reputation Coxe & Furman (the now defunct merchant firm of Tench's father, William Coxe) still enjoyed in the Caribbean and his fondness for Tench, Goold persuaded his partner, Gerard Beekman, to recommend him- self and Coxe "mutually throughout all the islands," averring that "it was equally the same whether the cargoes were shipped to one or the other."14 Once his friend was safely back in Philadelphia, Goold seized the first opportunity to ship goods the two had pur- chased jointly the previous summer.15 "I hope you have got our things," he wrote on October 26. "If Philadelphia is to be head- quarters I think they will be safest there. Turn them into Cash as soon as possible and remit the nt proceeds in good Bills. ."16 Coxe, having already "embarked in Business" on his own ac- count,17 "it not being proper to use as heretofore the names of our 10 Rumors of Burgoyne's surrender reached Philadelphia on October 25. It was confirmed by general orders dated November 4. "Diary of Robert Morton," PMHB, I (1877), 24, 26. " Edward Goold to TC, Oct. 26, 1777. 12 TC to Goold, Mar. 1, 1778. 13 TC to Goold, Mar. 17, 1778. 14 Goold to TC, May 6, 1778. 16 The first ships from New York carrying supplies and provisions arrived in Philadelphia about four weeks after the British occupation. Mishoff, "Business in Philadelphia . ," PMHB, LXI (1937), 167. By Nov. 11, 1777, young Robert Morton reported that "2 brigs and 2 sloops came from the fleet with the provisions for the Army and went up Schuylkill." "Diary of Robert Morton," PMHB, I (1877), 27. 16 Goold to TC, Oct. 26, 1777. 17 The first letter in Coxe's revised business letter book was Oct.
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