Page:American History Told by Contemporaries, v2.djvu/539

No. 181] Genl Robertson very ready to agree to every Measure for alleviating the Miseries of War and very candidly acknowledging many Faults committed by the inferior Officers, and even the Mistakes of the General himself, by hearkening to the Representations of those around him —. ..

 181. A Loyalist Corps (1777) BY LIEUTENANT-COLONEL JOHN GRAVES SIMCOE (1787)

N the 15th of October, 1777, Sir William Howe was pleased to appoint Captain Simcoe of the Grenadiers, with the Provincial rank of Major, to the command of the Queen's Rangers ; the next day he joined that regiment, which was encamped with the army in the vicinity of German-Town. On the 19th the army marched to Philadelphia, the Queen's Rangers formed the rear guard of the left column, and, in the encampment, their post was on the right of the line, in front of the village of Kensington ; the army extending from the Delaware to the Schuylkill.

On the 20th the regiment was augmented with nearly an hundred men, who had been enlisted by Captain Smyth during the various marches from the landing of the army in the Chesapeak to this period.

This was a very seasonable recruit to the regiment ; it had suffered materially in the action at Brandywine, and was too much reduced in numbers to be of any efficient service ; but if the loss of a great number of gallant officers and soldiers had been severely felt, the impression which that action had left upon their minds was of the highest advantage to the regiment ; officers and soldiers became known to each other, they had been engaged in a more serious manner, and with greater disadvantages than they were likely again to meet with in the common chance of war ; and having extricated themselves most gallantly from such a situation, they felt themselves invincible. This spirit vibrated among them at the time Major Simcoe joined them ; and it was obvious, that he had nothing to do but to cherish and preserve it. Sir William Howe, in