The day proved to be a disaster for the Americans, but it would have been even worse if not for the action of William Smallwood’s regiment of 400 to 500 men from Maryland, temporarily commanded by a young and capable major named Mordecai Gist. Although inexperienced, they were among the best and bravest troops that day. While under fierce attack they made an orderly retreat to the Cortelyou house, a stone structure that commanded the Mill Dam Road and bridge, the only escape route across the Gowanus Salt Marsh.

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American General William Alexander (who claimed a Scottish title and called himself Lord Stirling) ordered Gist and 250 men to hold off the enemy while the other Americans withdrew across the Mill Dam Road. Not only did Gist’s men hold off the British, they made six counterattacks before being forced to scatter and make their individual ways back to the American lines. Watching from afar, General Washington turned to Israel Putnam. ‘Good God, what brave fellows I must this day lose,’ he said. Those few surviving Marylanders who could swim and who were lucky made it back. ‘There was in this action a regiment of Maryland troops (volunteers), all young gentlemen,’ recalled Joseph Plumb Martin, then 17 years old and a member of the nearby Connecticut Fifth. ‘When they came out of the water and mud to us, looking like water rats, it was a truly pitiful sight. Many of them were killed in the pond and many were drowned.’ The British had soon backed the Americans into a defensive position two miles across and about one mile deep on the shore of the East River. Fortunately for Washington, the winds had prevented Admiral Howe from sailing his fleet up the river and using his great firepower to wreak havoc with the patriots. The general knew only too well what would happen if the wind changed.

Despite the urging of subordinates who wanted to complete their victory, General Howe stopped his attack. Perhaps he feared a repeat of the costly and bloody ‘victory’ he had won at Bunker Hill. In a report to the British Parliament, Howe later said that the American army ‘could be had at a cheap price,’ meaning through a siege. Whatever Howe thought, his delay helped save Washington and the American cause.

Washington now called on Colonel John Glover of Massachusetts, who commanded one of the army’s crack regiments. Glover’s ‘Marvelous Men from Marblehead’ were well trained and wore smart blue-and-white uniforms. They were seamen and fishermen, so they were accustomed to shipboard discipline and were quick to carry out orders. As one Pennsylvania officer wrote, ‘[T]he only exception I recollect to have seen to the miserably constituted bands [Massachusetts regiments] was the regiment of Glover. There was an appearance of discipline in this corps.’ Washington had used Glover and his men before. The Hannah, the first ship to sail in the service of the new United States, was Colonel Glover’s own schooner, for which he found cannons and trained a crew and then successfully harassed British shipping and captured supplies for the Continental Army. In the wake of Hannah’s success, Washington asked Glover for two more ships to create what became known as ‘Washington’s Navy.’

John Glover is truly one of the forgotten men of American history. Born in 1732 a few houses away from the building where the accused Salem witches were imprisoned four decades earlier, he was apprenticed to a shoemaker and later moved to Marblehead, where he saved his money and bought a schooner. As a mariner he earned enough to purchase more ships. He joined the Marblehead militia in 1759 and soon worked his way up to the rank of captain of a ‘Military company of foot in the town of Marblehead.’ By 1776 he had become the regiment’s colonel. Washington knew that Glover was just the man to get his army out of its desperate situation. He also knew that there were spies in the ranks — one soldier had already been tried and hanged for his treachery and several others had been found guilty and put in prison — so he sent a misleading message to General William Heath on Manhattan: ‘We have many battalions from New Jersey which are coming over this evening to relieve those here. Order every flat-bottomed boat and other craft fit for transportation of troops down to New York as soon as possible.’ Then he ordered his quartermaster ‘to impress every kind of craft on either side of New York’ that had oars or sails, and to have them in the East River by dark. Anyone intercepting the messages would think that Washington was planning to bring reinforcements to Long Island; in reality he hoped to evacuate his entire army before the British realized what he was doing.

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