Travels through the interior parts of America by Thomas Anburey

Author:Thomas Anburey [Anburey, Thomas]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: Geschichte
Publisher: Jazzybee Verlag
Published: 2017-11-08T23:00:00+00:00

LETTER XLVII

Cambridge, in New England, Nov. 30th 1777

My dear friend,

THE last town we left, before our arrival at this place, was Westown, where we found the most convenient inn of any on the road, it is equal to most in England, the rooms commodious, provisions good, and servants attentive; above all, the landlord is a friend to our Government, and like all of that description, has been much persecuted. He was not without his apprehensions of being sent to prison for attentions shewn to the officers who stopped at his house, which was nothing more than the common civility he shewed to all his guests: in short, he was deemed by the Americans a rank Tory.

The spirit of Whig and Tory is as predominant in America, as it was in England some years back; perhaps you may not have troubled yourself as to the unde derivatur of these two words, you will therefore pardon my explaining them:

Tory, originally, was a name given to the wild Irish robbers, who favored the massacre of the Irish Protestants, in 1641; it was afterwards applied to all enormous high-fliers of the Church.

Whig was a ludicrous name, first allotted to the country-field devotion-meeting, whose ordinary drink was whig, or whey of coagulated sour milk: it was afterwards applied to those who were against the Court interest, in the reigns of Charles II. and James II. and for the Court, in the reigns of King William and King George; the Americans apply them quite the reverse.

Our march from Westown to this place was the most unpleasant of any, as it rained incessantly, and we reached the barracks on Prospect Hill very late in the evening, which were unfortunately in the worst condition imaginable for the reception of troops, being so much out of repair, that we suffered severely from the inclemency of the weather; the barracks were, in fact, bare of every thing; no wood, and a prodigious scarcity of fuel, insomuch, that we were obliged to cut down the rafters of our room to dry ourselves.

The method of quartering was dreadfully inconvenient, six officers in a room not twelve feet square, permission was denied us to accommodate ourselves with rooms in this town, till General Burgoyne arrived, and represented our situation to the Council at Boston, when it was reluctantly granted. We laboured under many distresses and difficulties; every species of provisions was very dear, and to add to our misfortune, could hardly be procured for money. You do not, I believe, in England, rank milk in the catalogue of luxuries, yet we were obliged, ourselves, to traverse a deep snow for a full mile, to get a small quantity for our breakfasts, as our servants were not permitted to pass the centinels. It was understood at the convention, that the troops were to be stationed on Prospect and Winter Hills, and the officers were to be quartered in Boston, and the neighbouring towns. On this supposition some of the officers had pushed forward and got into Boston, but were immediately ordered out.

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