1 7 8 2 seizure of necessary supplies so irritated the people that they were almost ready to fight with those who had been fighting for them. The situation demanded great tact and some severity on the part of the commanding general. The End August 27 The British had evacuated Wilmington in January, 1782, and, on the eleventh of July, they took their leave of Savannah carrying not fewer than five thousand negroes with them. On the seventh of August, General Leslie announced that the evacuation of Charleston had been determined on. Greene declined Leslie's proposition for a cessation of hostilities and his offer to pay for provisions that might be brought into Charleston. Then Leslie tried to seize what he was not permitted to buy. One of his foraging parties, led by Lieutenant-colonel Benjamin Thompson (a native of Woburn, Massachusetts, and later well known in the scientific world as Count Rumford), surprised and dispersed Marion's brigade while that partisan chief was in attendance at the John Laurens Appreciation of Greene Autograph of John Laurens legislature. The younger Laurens who had winged" General Charles Lee in a duel was killed in a skirmish with one of these foraging parties at Combahee Ferry. In the guerrilla warfare that was kept up in some parts of the South, the irate Whigs exacted a fearful vengeance of the Tories. On the fourteenth of December, Charleston was evacuated and Greene marched into the city at the head of his army. Three days later, the last British ship passed the bar. The whole South was now free from British domination. To the victors of King's Mountain and the Cowpens, to the strategical genius and untiring labors of Greene, and to Marion, Sumter, Pickens, and other partisan leaders and their followers belongs the credit for the redemption of the South. It is impossible to say what General Greene might have done with more ample resources, but his campaigns have been pronounced comparable with the best work of Turenne or Wellington, and Alexander Hamilton said 1 7 8 2 that his qualifications for statesmanship were not less 17 8 3 remarkable than his military ability. Congress marked its appreciation of his brilliant conduct by a gold medal and a vote of thanks, South Carolina voted him ten thousand guineas, Georgia gave him the confiscated plantation of Lieutenant-governor John Graham, and North Carolina made a grant of wild lands. In the summer of 1783, when his army had been disbanded, he journeyed homeward and was greeted at Philadelphia by congress and everywhere by an enthusiastic people. His estate had been seriously impaired by the war and he was burdened with pecuniary responsibilities incurred through the dishonesty of an army contractor for whom he had become security. In 1785, he removed to his Georgia plantation at Mulberry Grove, a few miles from Savannah, where his death was soon caused by a sunstroke. On the following day, the body was taken to Savannah and placed in one of several similar vaults in the old cemetery. Later, there were stories of removal, and, for a century, the exact resting-place of the remains was a matter of much mystery. In 1900, the Rhode Island society of the Cincinnati appropriated money to cover the expenses and appointed Colonel Asa Bird Gardiner a committee to direct a search that proved successful. coffin-plate, being subjected to careful scientific and photographic treatment, gave up the following inscription: NATHANAEL GREENE Obit June 19 1786 Æ 44 years Greene's Monument at The corroded Continental Bills of Credit CHAPTER X V THE TH SI NEWS OF WAR HE colonies had little surplus capital and the continental congress had no coercive power. It could apportion loans and taxes, resolve, and implore, promise-little more. As the war went on, congress sought the necessary financial support in four different ways: bills of credit, requisitions upon the states, loans, and taxation. was comparatively cheap and printers were reasonably 1 7 7 5 plentiful. An issue of six million dollars was authorized 1 7 8 0 in 1775; nineteen millions in 1776; thirteen millions in 1777; sixty-three millions in 1778; and one hundred and forty millions in 1779. The volume of paper currency afloat was increased by state issues of more than two hun- $209,524,dred million dollars, of which 776 more than half was authorized THEUNITED STATES by Virginia. Furthermore, the notes were counterfeited on a large scale, not only by undesirable citizens of American birth but also by the British who deliberately engaged in the work. Depreciation was inevitable; congressional resolutions and state legislation were tried in vain; every additional note lessened the current value of each of its predecessors. By January, 1779, it required eight dollars in bills to buy one dollar in specie; by December, the ratio was forty. Washington scarcely exaggerated when he Genuine and Counterfeit Continental Bill (From Harper's Magazine) wrote to John Jay "that a wagon-load of money will scarcely purchase a wagon-load of provisions." 1780 1 7 8 1 New Tenor Notes Congress was slow to admit that its money had depre- THEUNITEDSTATES, Not Worth a Meanwhile, the old tenor bills depreciated more rapidly than ever. In October, 1780, Indian corn at Boston cost one hundred and fifty dollars a bushel; and a barrel of flour, fifteen hundred and seventy-five dollars; even the impecunious Samuel Adams paid two thousand dollars for a suit of clothes and a hat. By January, 1781, it was difficult to pass the bills at any discount; by May, they had practically ceased to circulate, though for a time they were bought and sold as a speculation at prices as low as a thousand to one or even lower. Barbers' shops were papered with the bills, sailors turned loss into frolic by parading the streets in clothes made of the printed paper, and a Philadelphia wag smeared his Continental Currency of 1778 |