Fall came, and Elizabeth reported that the men who had enlisted in haste in spring were ill-prepared for service in winter, and Mrs. Thomas and I worked feverishly to card and spin wool from the Thomases’ herd and then weave two dozen blankets. I became so fast on the loom, the town commissioned me to produce the cloth for a hundred more, and I set up my operation in a room at Sproat’s Tavern, accepting donations of carded wool for the soldiers. I spun and wove for long hours into the night and rode the old mare back home in the dark so I could fulfill my duties at home.
The days passed in a blur, the clap and the clack of the loom and the whir of the spinning wheel accompanied me into the winter and propelled me toward spring, waiting for news that never came.
Then, on March 17, 1776, General William Howe, commander of the British forces occupying Boston, boarded a ship and evacuated the city, ending the siege that had lasted almost a year. Washington and his army had managed, in the dead of night, with a storm rolling in, to mount cannons in Dorchester Heights, the highest point in the harbor, and train them on the British warships anchored below. It was a stunning victory, and Reverend Conant brought us word of the triumph with a bottle of wine and utter conviction that the trial would soon be over.
“They had to get the cannons onto the heights, but the ground was frozen, so digging trenches was out of the question. Old Put—that’s what General Putnam’s men call him—came up with a plan to build the fortifications in sections. Then they hauled the sections up the hills, quiet as church mice. They even put hay bales between the path and the harbor to keep the sound from carrying. Building parapets and hauling cannons isn’t quiet. Neither are twenty-five hundred troops. Still, by 4:00 a.m., they’d done it. General Howe said the rebels had done more in one night than his whole army could have done in a month.”
Deacon Thomas slapped the table in triumph, and Mrs. Thomas began to cry tears of pride and joy, but Sylvanus wasn’t finished.
“The general also agreed not to burn the city if his men were able to leave unmolested.” He threw up his hands, triumphant. “They’re gone.”
“Are they going back to England?” I asked. “Is it over?”
“Not quite. The British forces that were in Boston have taken temporary cover in Nova Scotia, but they’ve lost control of the ports in New England. General Washington is heading to New York. Some think the British will strike there next.”
Phineas said he wasn’t coming home until every redcoat had been booted from Boston, and that had just been accomplished.
But Phineas did not come home.
Nat, Benjamin, and Jacob did not come home either.
We expected them in June; they’d signed a one-year enlistment after Bunker Hill. Instead, buoyed by the end of the siege in Boston, they reenlisted, and Elijah and Edward joined them, whittling the number of brothers still at home to four. The deacon’s shoulders began to droop, and Mrs. Thomas grew quiet and gray. Gone were six of their sons, seduced by a revolution that had grown significantly more trying and considerably less exciting.
I continued to labor and wait, though for what I did not know.
5
OF THE EARTH
In the early months of 1776, a pamphlet was widely distributed throughout the colonies, one I read and reread with paper and quill at the ready. Written by an anonymous author, it was titled Common Sense, and it called not just for redress from England but independence.
The pamphlet was too long for the papers to print, and too lengthy to nail to a tree, but Sylvanus Conant read sections aloud from the pulpit, though some hissed when he said “independence” and a few stood and left.
“Independence” was not a word that had been bandied about, and it was a step too far for many. Yet the word became a battle cry.
Not everyone agreed with the war. In truth, the yeas were but a slim majority, even in and around Middleborough, where a hundred sons from the area had marched to join George Washington in the last year and more were constantly going.
Treason became a common attack, and those who wanted to remain under England’s flag had begun to call themselves loyalists, as if those who disagreed were guilty of a deeper offense, even a flaw in their characters.
“Who are they loyal to? A king and a flag? I think it a greater thing to be loyal to one’s own countrymen,” Deacon Thomas muttered.
I wrote to Elizabeth, full of questions and commentary, and she wrote back with her usual aplomb, promising that she would share my thoughts with John in her next letter to him and ask him for his insights.