Читать книгу Aaron Burr: A Biography - Nathan Schachner - Страница 26

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The campaign now stagnated. Howe again delayed and temporized, when bold moves might have meant the rout of the opposing army. Washington sent 13,000 men to White Plains, where Howe inflicted another defeat on October 28th, yet failed to follow up his victory. Burr was at White Plains, writing to Sally on the eve of battle. “I was near you tho unwittingly ... Pray remind Seymour again of my Hat—I want it much. If I have any plain Metal Buttons on any of my old Cloathes I should be glad of them all. I have Cloath but cannot make it up for Want of some. If I have a Pr. of Leather Drawers send them & two Pr of the coarsest of my Winter Stockings.”^[90]

Then came disaster. Fort Washington and Fort Lee, the guardian sentinels of the Hudson, were taken; and Washington, who had joined the main body of his army at Hackensack, began his retreat through the Jerseys. Howe pursued with his accustomed leisureliness. Philadelphia seemed in danger of capture and Congress fled in alarm to Baltimore. General Putnam was ordered south to supervise the construction of lines of defense. Burr, still his aide-de-camp, and solidly entrenched in the bluff old man’s affections, assisted. Then came the startling news of Trenton and the victory at Princeton. From the latter place Major Burr wrote in some bitterness to an inquiry of his old friend, Ogden, now a Colonel: “As to ‘expectations of promotion,’ I have not the least, either in the line or the staff. You need not express any surprise at it, as I have never made any application, and, as you know me, you know I never shall. I should have been fond of a berth in a regiment, as we proposed when I last saw you. But, as I am at present happy in the esteem and entire confidence of my good old general, I shall be piqued at no neglect, unless particularly pointed, or where silence would be want of spirit. ’Tis true, indeed, my former equals, and even inferiors in rank, have left me. Assurances from those in power I have had unasked, and in abundance; but of these I shall never remind them. We are not to judge of our own merit, and I am content to contribute my mite in any station.”^[91]

Burr never, through life, possessed that capacity to push himself and plead his own cause that is characteristic of your typically successful man. His spirit was too proud, too reserved, even at the height of his own political career. But it rankled nevertheless. Rightly or wrongly, he attributed the oversight of his promotion to the Commanding General, George Washington. There was a crying lack of good officers in the Revolutionary Army. And the twenty-one-year-old Major had sufficiently proved himself possessed of military genius and capacity for leadership.

Yet he continued to perform his staff duties with diligence and dispatch. Already he was showing a decided aptitude for the Military Intelligence Service. He was quickwitted and observant as well as brave. He interviewed deserters from the British camp at Brunswick and prepared a careful account of “the Situation, Strength and Intentions of the Enemy ... taken at Princeton, Mar. 10, 1777,” for Staff use. At that time Putnam’s entire division for the defense of Princeton and its environs consisted of some 350 effectives.^[92]

Shortly after, Putnam was ordered to Peekskill to take command of the American lines across Westchester County. Once again, Burr was set to Intelligence work, a task at which he had proved himself most adept. On July 14, 1777, Putnam ordered him to proceed to the Sound and “transmit ... without delay the intelligence you shall from time to time receive of the movements of the enemy, or any of their fleets.”^[93]