Henry Knox's Noble Train by William Hazelgrove

Author:William Hazelgrove
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: Prometheus
Published: 2020-02-28T00:00:00+00:00

General Schuyler’s suspicion that Palmer was taking advantage of the young bookseller seems warranted here. “That the rate was totally unacceptable is well established by the fact that men with sleds and teams have responded at a price even less than the best Schuyler would offer Palmer.”17 Palmer was finally out of the picture. The reality is that Schuyler saved Knox from being taken advantage of financially by Palmer. More importantly, Palmer probably could not have produced the sleds and oxen needed (he seemed to be more intent on getting paid), which would have stopped the Noble Train on the shores of Lake George, unable to proceed. Knox was lucky to have Schuyler step in when he did.

As snow continued to fall, making the roads impassable, Schuyler swung into action. It was now up to Schuyler and teamster John Becker to round up the necessary oxen and sleds. Feeling that the young Colonel Knox needed all the help and guidance he could give, Schuyler might have wanted to control as much of Knox’s expedition as he could. In all probability, Schuyler had already put out word himself and did not want to disappoint his contractors, either. Knox’s harrowing journey into the snowy wilderness ultimately proved to be essential to straightening out the confusion regarding procurement of the oxen and sleds. Communications were poor, one-sided, and took days if not weeks or months to reach correspondents. There was no time to lose, and on December 29, Knox wrote:

General Schuyler sent out his wagon master and other people to all parts of the county to immediately send up their sleighs with horses suitable he allowing them 12/p [pounds per day] for each pair of horses or 7 p ton for 62 miles. . . . The 31st December the wagon master returned the names of [those] who [had] gone up to the lake with their horses in the whole amounting to 124 pairs with sleighs which I’m afraid are not strong enough for the heavy cannon if I can judge from the sample shown me by General Schuyler.18

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