The
Battle of Stony Point was a battle of the
American Revolutionary
War fought on the night of July 15-16, 1779.
A select force of
Continental Army infantry made a coordinated surprise night attack
and stormed a fortified position of the British Army on the Hudson River near West Point, New
York
. The position was taken in 25 minutes with
the loss to the British of nearly an entire regiment of
infantry.
Although the position, commanding a key ferry crossing point of the
Hudson, was abandoned three days after its capture, British
commanders later in the year concluded that it was defensibly
untenable and evacuated it permanently. The crossing was used by
the Continental Army in its march to
Yorktown, Virginia, two years later.
Background
British dispositions
In late May, 1779, British Lieutenant General Sir Henry Clinton
sent a force of about 8,000 men up the North (or Hudson) River with
the intention of drawing General
George Washington’s
Continental Army out of their mouintain
garrisons and into open battle.
By June 1 British forces had seized and begun
fortifying Stony Point
on the west side of the river and Verplanck’s
Point
on the east bank. This move effectively
closed King’s Ferry, a major river crossing at that narrow point in
the river, about 10 miles (16 km) south of
West Point and 35
miles (56 km) north of New York City.
Stony Point was garrisoned with elements of the
17th Regiment of Foot under the
command of Lt. Col. Henry Johnson. The 17th was reinforced there by
a grenadier company belonging to one of the two battalions of
the
71st
Regiment, a company-strength detachment of the
Loyal American Regiment, and a
detachment of the
Royal Artillery
manned fifteen field pieces that included five iron and two brass
cannon, four mortars and four small howitzers. A
Royal Navy gunboat was assigned to protect the
river approaches to the fortifications, and the armed sloop
Vulture was also anchored in that part of the river.
Washington observed construction of the fortifications through a
telescope from atop nearby
Buckberg
Mountain. Historians also believe he used intelligence gathered
from local merchants to get a better idea of the strength of the
garrison, the types of watchwords in use, and the placement of
sentries – especially on the south side of the point, which could
not be seen from Buckberg.
During this time he formulated a plan of
attack and selected a commander to lead it – Major General Anthony Wayne of Pennsylvania
.
The British position at Stony Point was a fortified one, but it was
never intended to be a true fort in the 18th Century European sense
of the word. No stone was used and no walls were constructed. The
defenses consisted of earthen fleches (cannon positions) and wooden
abatis (felled trees sharpened to a point and
placed in earthen embankments). The defenses were situated a rocky
elevation approachable only from the west, protected in the front
by a watery defile and on both flanks by extensive swampy
areas.
American forces and tactics
To storm the position, the
Corps of Light
Infantry was formed on July 11, 1779, under Brigadier General
Anthony Wayne, commander of the Pennsylvania Line. A seasonal
combat organization drafted each year between 1777 and 1781, the
Corps of Light Infantry consisted of the light infantry companies
of each regiment of the Continental Line's Main Army. Brigaded into
four regiments, each composed of two battalions of four companies,
theCorps' order of battle was:
The attack plan called for a night attack on the fortifications to
be carried out by the 1,350 men of the corps. According to 18th
Century military doctrine, this was not enough men to take a
well-prepared defensive position, but in addition to the element of
surprise, Washington’s plan exploited a fatal flaw in the
fortifications. The wooden abatis along the southern shore of the
point was not extended into the deep water of the Hudson and could
be outflanked by attackers along a narrow beach at low tide. The
main attack would be along this approach, but Washington advised
that if practicable, secondary and diversionary attacks could also
be made along the north shore of the point and across the causeway
to the center.
Washington gave Wayne his instructions, along with permission to
modify the plan as necessary. This was an unusual act for
Washington, and indicates the high opinion he had of Wayne’s
tactical abilities. The assault would be difficult: It would be
carried out in the dead of night, it called for the men to scale
the steep, rocky sides of Stony Point, and it required absolute
surprise. To accomplish this last aim Washington ordered that the
men attack with bayonets only in order to prevent a
musket blast from alerting British sentries. Despite
the difficulty of the plan, Wayne ordered the two companies of
North Carolina light infantry to detach themselves from the
northern column, cross the causeway, and stage a demonstration
attack at the center of the British defenses, where the British
expected an attack to come. This battalion, commanded by Maj.
Hardy Murfree, was instructed to lay
down a "gauling fire" with their weapons as a diversionary
tactic.
Wayne selected Butler's 2nd Regiment of approximately 300 men to
conduct an assault along the northern shore of the point, while
Wayne himself would lead the main column ion the south, consisting
of the 1st and 3rd Regiments, and Hull's detachment of
Massachusetts light infantry. The columns deployed an advance force
of 100 and 150 men respectively wielding axes to clear obstacles,
and 20 men of each advance force preceded them as the
forlorn hopes, to protect the others during
clearing work, and to be the first to enter the works.
Battle
After a
morning muster, on July 15, 1779, the Corps of Light Infantry
marched from Sandy Beach north of Fort
Montgomery
beginning at noon. Any civilians met along
the route of march were to be taken into custody to prevent them
from warning the British. The column, often forced to march single
file over rough terrain and roads hardly more than paths, took a
circuitous route west through Queensboro to the west and over
Dunderberg Mountain to avoid detection by the British. The Corps
began arriving at 8 p.m. at the Springsteel farm, a mile and a half
west of the fortifications, and by 10 p.m. had been formed in the
attack columns. The men were given a
rum ration
and their orders. They were also given pieces of white paper to pin
to their hats in order to help them tell each other from the
British in the darkness. The columns then moved out at 11:30 p.m.
to their jump-off points, diverging immediately, to begin the
assault at midnight.
Bad weather that night aided the Continentals.
Cloud cover cut off
moonlight and high winds forced the British ships in Haverstraw Bay
to leave their posts off Stony Point and move
downriver. At midnight, just as scheduled, the attack began
with the columns crossing the swampy flanks of the point. The
southern column unexpectedly found its approach inundated in two to
four feet of water and required thirty minutes to wade to the first
line of abatis, during which it and Murfree’s demonstration force
were spotted by British sentries and fired upon. Under fire Wayne’s
column succeeded in getting inside the British first line of
defenses. Wayne himself was struck in the head by a spent musket
ball and fell to the ground, leaving Col. Febiger to take over
command of Wayne’s column. Meanwhile, Butler’s column had succeeded
in cutting its way through the abatis, although it sustained the
only loss of life on the American side while doing so. The two
columns penetrated the British line almost simultaneously and
seized the summit when six companies of the 17th Regiment of Foot
took positions opposite the diversionary attack and were cut
off.
The first man into the British upper works was Lt. Col.
Francois de Fleury, an aristocrat French
engineer commanding a battalion of
the 1st Regiment. He was followed by Lt.
Henry Knox, Sgt.
William
Baker and
George Dunlop – all of
whom earned cash prizes for their accomplishment. As the men
entered the British works they called out, “The fort’s our own!” –
the prearranged
watchword to distinguish
friend from foe. The action lasted 25 minutes and was over by 1
a.m., and proved to be the major engagement of 1779, one of the
last major battles of the War in the Northern Theater.
Wayne's losses were 15 killed and 83 wounded. 546 prisoners were
taken, 74 of whom were wounded . Some Patriot sources stated that
there were 63 British dead but military historian Mark M. Boatner
accepts the official British report of 20 killed . However, the
report (from Lt-Col. Johnson to Sir Henry Clinton on July 24, 1779)
also lists 58 missing separate from killed, wounded, and captured,
many of whom may have drowned in the Hudson.
Aftermath
Before dawn, Wayne sent a brief dispatch telling Washington “The
fort and garrison, with Col. Johnson, are ours. The men behaved
like men determined to be free.” The next day Washington rode into
the works to inspect the battlefield and congratulate the troops.
For his exploits, Wayne was awarded a medal by Congress, one of the
few issued during the Revolution.
The Continentals, not having enough men to defend the site from
being cut off to the west, chose to abandon it on July 18, but not
until after carrying off the cannon and supplies captured there.
The British briefly reoccupied the site only to abandon it shortly
after as untenable when Clinton redeployed troops to the southern
states in anticipation of a French invasion.
Some
officer prisoners were exchanged immediately after the battle, but
the more than 400 other ranks were marched off to a prison camp at
Easton,
Pennsylvania
. An unsuccessful attempt by a small number
of prisoners on July 17 to overpower their captors resulted in one
British sergeant killed and about 20 other ranks wounded.
Contemporary Patriot accounts note that Wayne had given quarter to
the garrison of Stony Point despite the alleged treatment of his
own men at the "
Paoli Massacre" in
1777. (One asserted that
King George
III fought back tears when he heard of the “mercy” that had
been shown to his troops). British reports also remarked that
unanticipated clemency was immediately shown the garrison.
State Historic Site
The Stony Point State Historic Site is located at the former
battlefield and has interpretive materials, tours, and
demonstrations, primarily during the summer season. A museum on the
site features artifacts from the battle, including a howitzer and
two mortars.
References
See also
External links
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