Page:History of the United States of America, Spencer, v1.djvu/497

] could not read them, and would not understand them; and the British soldiers thought they had as good a right to a share of the booty as the Hessians. The loyalists were plundered even at New York. General De Heister was considered the arch-plunderer. He offered the house he lived in at New York to public sale; though the property of a very loyal subject, who had voluntarily and hospitably accommodated him with it. The goods of others, suffering restraint or imprisonment among the Americans, were sold by auction. The carriages of gentlemen of the first rank were seized, their arms defaced, and the plunderer's arms blazoned in their place; and this, too, by British officers. Discontents and murmurs increased every hour at the licentious ravages of the soldiery, both British and foreigners, who were shamefully permitted, with unrelenting hand, to pillage friend and foe in the Jerseys. Neither age nor sex was spared. Indiscriminate ruin attended every person they met with. Infants, children, old men and women, were left in their shirts, without a blanket to cover them, under the inclemency of winter. Every kind of furniture was destroyed and burnt; windows and doors were broken to pieces: in short, the houses were left uninhabitable, and the people without provisions; for every horse, cow, ox, and fowl;, was carried off. Horrid depredations and abuses were committed by that part of the army, which was stationed at or near Pennytown. Sixteen young women fled to the woods, to avoid the brutality of the soldiers; and were there seized and carried off.

Bitter complaints arose from all parts of America; and they were echoed throughout Europe, to the heavy reproach of England. Among those who exclaimed the loudest, were the French, who were naturally humane, and also enemies to the English, and partisans of the Americans. The cry was raised everywhere, that the English government had revived in the new world the fury of the Goths, and the barbarity of the northern hordes. But so much savage fury returned upon its source, and became more fatal to its authors than to their victims. The few remaining friends that England had, became enemies, and her enemies were filled with new hatred, and a more vehement desire of vengeance.

Citizens of all classes flew to arms, with a sort of rage, to expel from their territory, as they said, these infamous robbers. Thus, the excesses of the royal army were probably more injurious to the cause of the British, than even the efforts of Washington, and the resolves of Congress. Had General Howe, and those under his command, pursued the course which Carleton adopted in Canada, a course of kindness and gentleness towards the prisoners and the people, in general, there is every reason to believe that a large portion of those who were driven, in self-defence, to join the army of Washington, would have remained neutral, at least, and perhaps would have been persuaded to take up arms for the side of the king and the invading force. Justice, however, requires that it be stated here, that excess and outrage were not confined altogether to the