red to be loyal. It is certain indeed that the
struggle was, in America itself, much more of a civil war than the
Americans are now generally disposed to admit. In December, 1780, there
were 8,954 'Provincials' among the British forces in America, and on
March 7th, 1781, a letter from Lord George Germaine to Sir H. Clinton,
intercepted by the Americans, says: 'The American levies in the King's
service are more in number than the whole of the enlisted troops in the
service of the Congress.' As late as September 1st, 1781, there were
7,241. We hear of loyal 'associations' in Massachusetts, Maryland, and
Pennsylvania; of 'associated Loyalists' in New York; and everywhere of
'Tories,' whose arrest Washington is found suggesting to Governor
Trumbull, of Connecticut, as early as November 12th, 1775. But New York,
New Jersey, and Pennsylvania remained long full of Tories. By June 28th,
1776, the disaffected on Long Island had taken up arms, and after the
evacuation of New York by Washington a brigade of Loyalists was raised
on the island, and companies were formed in two neighbouring counties to
join the King's troops. During Washington's retreat through New Jersey,
'the inhabitants, either from fear or disaffection, almost to a man
refused to turn out.' In Pennsylvania, the militia, instead of giving
any assistance in repelling the British, exulted at their approach and
over the misfortunes of their countrymen. On the 20th of that month the
British were 'daily gathering strength from the disaffected.' In 1777,
the Tories who joined Burgoyne in his expedition from the North are said
to have doubled his force. In 1778, Tories joined the Indians in the
devastation of Wyoming and Cherry Valley; and although the
indiscriminate ravages of the British, or of the Germans in their pay,
seem to have aroused the three States above mentioned to self-defence,
yet, as late as May, 1780, Washington still speaks of sending a small
party of cavalry to escort La Fayette safely through the 'Tory
settlements' of New York. Virginia, as late as the spring of 1776, was
'alarmed at the idea of independence.' Washington admitted that his
countrymen (of that State), 'from their form of government, and steady
attachment heretofore to royalty,' would 'come reluctantly' to that
idea, but trusted to 'time and persecution.' In 1781, the ground for
transferring the seat of war to the Chesapeake was the number of
Loyalists in that quarter. In the Southern Stat