Switching sides in the War of Independence

Joe Kernan
Posted 11/20/14

According to Rhode Island born historian Christian McBurney, New York and Pennsylvania may have witnessed more spy activity in the Revolutionary War, but Rhode Island was not that far behind…“no …

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Switching sides in the War of Independence

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According to Rhode Island born historian Christian McBurney, New York and Pennsylvania may have witnessed more spy activity in the Revolutionary War, but Rhode Island was not that far behind…“no theater of war produced such rich stories of spies and spying as Rhode Island.”

That’s a pretty big brag for a state as small as ours, but McBurney does make his case very well. The fact that Newport was a major North American port at the time had a lot to do with that, but there are a few towns around the edges that turned up some surprising tales of intrigue and treason.

For instance, most Americans are familiar with Benedict Arnold, the arch-traitor of the rebels’ cause. McBurney introduces us to another one who was from Rhode Island named Metcalf Bowler, who wasn’t unmasked in his lifetime.

“Rhode Island spies proved both notorious and daring. One was caught and hanged in Providence by American authorities. Another, whose betrayals nearly reached the level of Benedict Arnold’s toiled in the heart of Providence and met Continental army officers without ever being discovered.”

McBurney, who was born and raised in Kingston, has made a specialty of the Revolutionary War and has written a detailed and separate account of the abduction of General Richard Prescott, who was to be traded for General Charles Lee. He offers a briefer account of the exploit in Spies in Revolutionary Rhode Island. The raid was launched July 10, 1777 from Warwick Neck when 47 men crossed Narragansett Bay in whaleboats, sneaking past British navy ships along the way.

“After landing on Aquidneck Island, Barton carefully led his men along a path to the farmhouse in which Major General Richard Prescott, the commander of British troops on the island, spent his nights. The raiders forced open its doors and seized the sleepy British general in his bed. They then hurried to their boats and slipped back across the bay to Warwick Neck, their quarry in hand, avoiding a flurry of British artillery and rocket fire.”

That exploit mirrored a similar incident perpetrated by the British in New Jersey the year before when they captured Major General Charles Lee, the second-in-command to George Washington in a tavern near Basking Ridge. But there’s was a short, violent affair that had the British operatives returning to their territory through hostile American citizens back to New York. The exchange was made.

“Actually, both generals were really not that good,” said McBurney. “Prescott was kind of a jerk and Lee wasn’t much better.”

Lee wasn’t much of a general, in spite of his maneuvering to be the commander of all rebel forces. He proved particularly inept at the Battle of Monmouth, where he was almost routed out of the area before Washington himself rallied the troops and Rhode Island’s Nathanael Greene pounded the British with his well-organized artillery. Lee was court-martialed for his behavior at Monmouth, but he should have been court-martialed for being captured. Historians now say it was his visit to a tavern noted for its prostitutes that made him vulnerable to capture. In any event, Lee never did anything to justify the British assumption that the rebellion would dissolve with his capture.

In Kidnapping the Enemy: The Special Operations to Capture Generals Charles Lee and Richard Prescott, McBurney retells the each of the raids and subsequent exchange of the two generals.

Even though it has been over 90 years since he was revealed to be a spy for the British, the story of Metcalf Bowler will still raise some eyebrows.

Bowler was born in London in 1726 and came to America in the 1740s. His success in trade made him one of the Rhode Island colony's wealthiest men. He is credited with the introduction of the Rhode Island greening apple at his Portsmouth estate. He married Ann Fairchild, daughter of another prominent Newport merchant. A portrait of Bowler's wife by John Singleton Copley hangs in the national Gallery in Washington. He was chosen to represent the colony at the Stamp Act Congress in 1765 to speak against the Stamp Act. He sat as a judge on the panel that investigated the Gaspee Affair.

He was its speaker in the assembly from 1767 to 1776. When Rhode Island declared its independence, Bowler was among the signers. He remained active in state government, serving on its committee of secret correspondence. When the British occupied Newport Bowler fled to Providence. He died in Providence in 1789.

In the late 1920s the papers of British General Sir Henry Clinton, correspondence was found that revealed Bowler was a paid informer for the British at the same time that he was being hailed as an American Patriot. It was an attempt to prevent the plundering of his properties in and around Newport following the British occupation. No one knows if his treachery was of any real use to the British. McBurney considers Bowler an audacious fraud.

“He even had the gall to send a copy of a book about agriculture to George Washington,” McBurney said in a phone interview. The book was added to Washington’s library. “If Washington knew that Bowler was a traitor, he would have burned the book.”

There is some justice in the fact that his slippery alliance didn’t help him save his fortune. He died in a relatively impoverished condition.

“What I was impressed with was the spy network that Mary Almy set up in Newport,” said McBurney. “It was a very well-organized affair.”

The ring survived for most of the war and was only exposed in 1780 by counter-spies for the Americans. McBurney quotes a French officer’s report about the ring: “This house stands alone, is near the wharf, to which is an entrance by a garden door. There are in it many false secret entries. It belongs to a Mr. Chaloner. It is occupied by a widow who has three children…Another son, tall fellow, lean complexion stays at New York…comes regularly, once a week and arrives in an open boat and gets into the garden…There he finds sometimes ten. Sometimes fifteen persons who come in after night, and stay together til within an hour of daybreak…these meetings have been held since the arrival of the French troops at Newport…The man who came from New York never stays in town above two days…”

The widow was Mary Almy, a staunch Tory who kept a rooming house on Thames Street. Her husband left Newport to fight on the American side and she cursed him and his Whig friends and he was unable to see her or the kids after that. After 1780, according to McBurney, the Newport Loyalists became more coordinated in their spying, leaving Newport one at a time to deliver information about French and American military matters. McBurney suspects that another Tory, Dr. John Halliburton, was the ringleader of the group, “who also lived on Thames street, perhaps at Almy’s boarding house.”

Inevitably, the Tories lost and most of the Loyalists were either banished or suffered privations after the war. Most moved to Canada and started over, many of whom were rewarded for their service but many were not. It is possible to sympathize with them to a degree, but the manner in which spies were treated during the war is never pleasant reading.

Nathan Hale and Major Andre are the most notable casualties of the Revolutionary spy wars but others also died or suffered for their loyalties.

William Taggart of Middletown and his sons didn’t like the British or the Hessians who came to their town. Some of the family moved to Little Compton to avoid them, but William Taggart and two of his sons stayed, swallowed their distaste for the Tories and became spies for the rebels. His son, William Jr., told the rebels about his father’s willingness to give them information. Junior and three American soldiers crossed the Sakonnet back to Middletown and got information from William Sr. The younger Taggart started making the trip regularly to take information gleaned from a Hessian officer staying at Taggart’s farm and other sources back to the rebels in Tiverton.

When the British discovered the Taggarts, they ordered his cattle and stores confiscated and allowed Hessian troops to plunder his home. They tore the house down and burned his orchards and left him “nothing but dirt.” The Taggarts then went to Little Compton to rent a farm, but they were not safe from vengeful Brits and Tories. About 40 Loyalists cross the Sakonnet and raided their farm. One son was shot in the leg and subsequently bayoneted on the ground. William Taggart Jr. was captured along with some rebel soldiers and brought back to Newport and the county jail. Taggart faced being hanged as a spy and he and another rebel who had been captured at Swansea broke out of the jail and were hidden for a time by former neighbors of Taggart neighbors in Middletown. The two men improvised a sailboat from wooden rails and sailed to Prudence Island and subsequently to Bristol, where General Ezekiel Cornell noted that their feet were so swollen they couldn’t put shoes on. After the war, William Jr. became a judge and a member of the Middletown Town Council and the General Assembly, but he never recovered the good fortune of earlier years and died the year after he asked for and received a veterans pension in 1832.

The Taggarts rank among the many great Patriots that Rhode Island can boast about. We can be proud of Christian McBurney who is doing so much to get them the recognition they deserve.

McBurney will be at the Varnum Memorial Armory at 6 Main St. in East Greenwich Dec. 8 at 6 p.m. to lecture on spies and spying in the Revolution and to sign copies of his book. For other scheduled talks and signings visit www.christianmcburney.com.

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