It is January 10th. Welcome to Episode 10 of History in a Year. Today, we witness a miracle of logistics. A 25-year-old bookseller named Henry Knox convinces George Washington to let him drag 60 tons of heavy artillery over 300 miles of frozen mountains. We follow the “Noble Train of Artillery” from Ticonderoga to Boston, stand on Dorchester Heights as the British wake up to a nasty surprise, and celebrate “Evacuation Day”—the first great American victory of the war.
STEPHEN: Welcome to History in a Year: America’s First 250 Years.
LEAH: Join us every single day as we journey from the Revolution of 1776 to the 250th anniversary of the United States.
STEPHEN: You can find every episode and join the discussion at PointedWords.com. I’m Stephen.
LEAH: And I’m Leah.
STEPHEN: It is January 10th. Welcome to Episode 10. Yesterday, we looked at Thomas Paine and the intellectual war. But while Paine was writing pamphlets in Philadelphia, George Washington was staring at a stalemate in Boston.
LEAH: The situation in the winter of 1775-1776 was grim. Washington had the British trapped in the city, but he couldn’t touch them. The British were warm and comfortable in the houses of Boston, while Washington’s army was freezing in huts in Cambridge.
STEPHEN: Washington was desperate. He knew that if he didn’t do something soon, his army would dissolve. Enlistments were expiring. Morale was low. He needed to drive the British out. But he couldn’t do it without heavy cannons to bombard the city and the ships.
LEAH: We mentioned in Episode 8 that Benedict Arnold and Ethan Allen had captured Fort Ticonderoga way back in May. That fort was packed with cannons. But it was 300 miles away, in the wilderness of New York.
STEPHEN: Between Ticonderoga and Boston lay the Berkshire Mountains. There were no paved roads. Just forests, frozen lakes, and steep ridges covered in snow. Most people said moving heavy artillery that distance was impossible.
LEAH: Enter Henry Knox.
STEPHEN: Knox is one of the best characters in the Revolution. He was only 25 years old. He wasn’t a soldier; he was a bookseller from Boston. He was a large man—jovial, loud, and confident. He had lost two fingers on his left hand in a hunting accident, so he always wrapped it in a handkerchief.
LEAH: Knox had learned the art of war entirely by reading books in his own shop. He had read every manual on engineering and artillery he could find. He walked into Washington’s headquarters and basically said, “General, I can get those guns for you.”
STEPHEN: Washington, who was usually very reserved and skeptical, liked Knox immediately. He saw a spark in him. He gave the young bookseller a Colonel’s commission and $1,000 in cash, and told him, “Go get the guns.”
LEAH: Knox arrived at Ticonderoga in December 1775. He selected 59 pieces of artillery—cannons, mortars, and howitzers. The total weight was about 120,000 pounds. Sixty tons of iron and brass.
STEPHEN: His plan relied on the weather. He needed snow. He couldn’t move these things on wagons; the wheels would sink in the mud. He needed sleds. He hoped to drag them over the snow and ice.
LEAH: He hired local farmers and oxen. He built 42 massive wooden sleds. And he waited for the freeze.
STEPHEN: But the weather didn’t cooperate at first. It was too warm. The ice on Lake George wasn’t thick enough. But finally, around Christmas, it froze. The “Noble Train of Artillery,” as Knox called it, began to move.
LEAH: It was a nightmare journey. On the first day, a cannon broke through the ice and sank. Knox didn’t give up. He just organized a team to fish it out of the freezing water and kept going.
STEPHEN: They crossed the Hudson River four times. At one point, the locals told him the ice was too thin. Knox insisted. He laid out a path of straw and poured water over it to create a thicker layer of ice. Then he used long ropes to keep the oxen far away from the heavy sleds to distribute the weight. It worked.
LEAH: Once they hit the Berkshire Mountains, it got even harder. They were climbing steep, snowy trails. The sleds would slide backward. Knox had to use block-and-tackle pulleys to winch the cannons up the slopes, and then use drag chains to keep them from rocketing down the other side and killing the oxen.
STEPHEN: Knox wrote in his diary about the exhaustion. His men were freezing. But his enthusiasm kept them going. He was riding up and down the line, shouting encouragement.
LEAH: By late January 1776, the Noble Train arrived in Framingham, Massachusetts. Knox rode ahead to Cambridge to tell Washington: “The guns are here.”
STEPHEN: It was a miracle. Washington finally had his teeth. But now he had to figure out how to use them.
LEAH: The key to Boston was the high ground. Specifically, Dorchester Heights. These were two steep hills south of the city that looked right down into the harbor. If you could put cannons on those hills, you could sink every British ship at anchor.
STEPHEN: The British knew this. But they assumed—arrogantly—that the Americans couldn’t take the hills because the ground was frozen solid. You couldn’t dig trenches. If you tried to march up there, the British would just blast you off the hill before you could build protection.
LEAH: But Washington had a plan. Or rather, his engineer, Rufus Putnam, had a plan. Since they couldn’t dig into the frozen ground, they would build the fort above the ground.
STEPHEN: They spent days building “chandeliers”—essentially heavy wooden frames—and filling barrels with dirt and rocks. They prepared everything behind the lines, like a pre-fabricated house.
LEAH: On the night of March 4, 1776, Washington made his move. It was the anniversary of the Boston Massacre, so the men were motivated.
STEPHEN: To distract the British, Washington ordered the American artillery to bombard Boston from the other side of the city. For hours, the sky was filled with exploding shells. The British fired back. The noise was deafening.
LEAH: Under the cover of that noise, 2,000 American soldiers and 400 ox-carts moved silently up Dorchester Heights.
STEPHEN: They laid down straw on the roads to muffle the sound of the wheels. They hauled the chandeliers and the barrels up the steep slopes. They worked like demons. By 3:00 AM, they had built two complete forts that were cannon-proof.
LEAH: They also hauled up Knox’s cannons. And they lined up hundreds of barrels filled with rocks at the top of the hill. The plan was that if the British tried to charge up the hill, they would roll the barrels down like bowling balls to break the British lines.
STEPHEN: When the sun rose on March 5th, the British General, William Howe, looked out his window and gasped. He famously said, “The rebels have done more in one night than my whole army would have done in a month.”
LEAH: His admiral told him, “If they keep those guns there, I cannot keep my ships in the harbor.”
STEPHEN: Howe had a choice. He could evacuate, or he could attack. And remember, Howe was the guy who led the attack at Bunker Hill. He wasn’t afraid of a fight. He ordered an assault.
LEAH: He loaded 2,400 men onto transport boats. They were preparing for an amphibious landing at the base of the cliffs. It was going to be Bunker Hill all over again, but on a massive scale. Washington was ready for them.
STEPHEN: But then, something happened that the Americans called “Divine Providence.”
LEAH: A storm. A massive gale blew in from the south. It was a “Hurry-cane.” The wind was so violent that the British boats couldn’t move. The surf was pounding the shore. The attack had to be called off.
STEPHEN: By the time the storm cleared two days later, the Americans had strengthened the forts even more. Howe realized it was over. He couldn’t take the hill, and he couldn’t stay in the city.
LEAH: He sent word to Washington—unofficially—that if the Americans let him leave peacefully, he wouldn’t burn the city of Boston to the ground.
STEPHEN: Washington agreed. For the next week, the British army packed up. And it wasn’t just the soldiers. Over 1,000 Loyalists—American citizens who had sided with the King—decided to flee with them.
LEAH: It was a tragic scene. Wealthy families abandoned their homes, their furniture, and their lives, cramming onto ships to sail for Nova Scotia. They knew they could never come back.
STEPHEN: On March 17, 1776, the British fleet set sail. 120 ships loaded with 9,000 soldiers and refugees.
LEAH: As they sailed away, the Americans marched into Boston. It was a liberation. People came out of their houses, cheering and weeping. They had survived the blockade, the starvation, and the occupation.
STEPHEN: March 17th is still a holiday in Boston today. Officially it’s “Evacuation Day,” though it conveniently falls on St. Patrick’s Day, which helps the celebration.
LEAH: Washington went to the Old South Meeting House. He attended church. It was his first great victory. He had taken a ragtag army and driven the British Empire out of America.
STEPHEN: But as Washington watched those white sails disappear over the horizon, he wasn’t celebrating. He knew something the cheering crowds didn’t.
LEAH: General Howe wasn’t going home. He was going to Halifax to regroup. He was going to wait for reinforcements.
STEPHEN: Washington turned to his officers and said, “They will be back.” And he knew exactly where they would go next. The most important strategic point in America: New York City.
LEAH: Join us tomorrow for Episode 11. The Empire strikes back. A fleet of 400 ships—the largest armada ever seen in American waters—descends on New York. Washington is outnumbered, outflanked, and about to face his darkest hour.
STEPHEN: You can find every episode at PointedWords.com. I’m Stephen.
LEAH: And I’m Leah.
STEPHEN: And this… is our story.