Tomorrow we leave for Zenkaikon, and I'm running around in circles trying to get everything done that I need to have done. That of course includes this blog post.
It's been a while since we looked at anything in York, so I thought it would be good to head back there. In the process of setting up this post, I learned that the individual named on the marker actually has a couple of markers about him. So I won't be talking a whole lot about the gentleman himself - we'll leave that for when I've collected those markers. I will, however, go into the details about his time in York.
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| The marker stands in front of the building near the intersection of West Market and South Beaver Streets |
Anthony Wayne was the grandson and namesake of Captain Anthony Wayne, an Englishman who distinguished himself during the Battle of the Boyne. (This was part of the contention for the British crown after James II was deposed and replaced by his daughter Mary II and her husband William III. It's a long story that I find interesting, but has no further bearing on today's quest.) Several years after that battle, in 1722, the captain relocated to William Penn's experiment and settled in Chester County, and it was there that Anthony the second was born in 1745.
Like I said, I'll leave the bulk of his biography for when I get to the markers that are about the man; but after a relatively unremarkable youth he spent a year in the Pennsylvania Legislature. Around the time that his term ended in 1775, the American Revolution got underway and Anthony decided to participate. He pulled together a regiment to fight in the war and was named its commanding officer with the rank of colonel.
As the war continued, so did Anthony's trajectory. He proved to be very skilled in leading his troops in battle, and George Washington gave him some important appointments as a result. By 1779, he was commander of the Corps of Light Infantry, with which he pulled off some successful maneuvers in New York; his victories were a boost to the army's morale, and his casualties were few. He himself was wounded in the effort to take the British fortifications at Stony Point on the Hudson River, and in fact was shot in the head. But his plan worked all the same, earning him a medal from the Continental Congress, and he recovered from his injury, which I think might honestly be the more impressive accomplishment.
In January of 1781, about a year and a half after this victory, Washington made Anthony the commanding officer of the Pennsylvania Line. This was not exactly a reward, however, but more like a cry for help. The Pennsylvania Line Mutiny was one of the most serious mutinies in the entire war, and an officer of Anthony's reputation and loyalty was needed to quell the dissent. The mutineers weren't wrong about their grievances, though, as Anthony himself admitted; they weren't adequately paid, and conditions were terrible. They also weren't thrilled about being paid in continental dollars, which weren't exactly the most valuable form of currency. Along with Joseph Reed, the president of the Supreme Executive Council of the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (how's that for a mouthful?), Anthony worked to get the soldiers to concede peacefully. For a while, though, the most he could get from them was a promise that they wouldn't defect to the British. To their credit, this was a promise they kept even when an opportunity arose that would have enabled such a defection with ease.
The major issue, as was ultimately revealed, was that soldiers were underpaid and that some officers had used coercion and even physical punishments to force soldiers to remain or reenlist when their time was up. Many of them had enlisted in 1776 or 1777 for three years, in exchange for a bounty of $20. Their request, which Anthony and Reed agreed to grant, was that they be discharged and then, if they wanted, they could reenlist for a new bounty. This resulted in roughly half of the Pennsylvania Line being discharged.
Anthony was supposed to relocate to Virginia at this point, to assist our old friend Lafayette with defeating the British forces there. But with the Pennsylvania Line such a mess after so many men were discharged, he stayed to rectify the matter. From his headquarters in Yorktown (as York was called then), he spent the next few months reorganizing and rebuilding the Pennsylvania Line. He lived and worked in a building known as the Indian Queen Inn, which stood at the intersection of modern-day Beaver and Market Streets; it was owned by George Stake, one of the original trustees of what is today Franklin & Marshall College in Lancaster. By May of 1781, when he finally departed to join the good Marquis, Anthony had restored the Line to its full strength.
Sources and Further Reading:
Except where indicated, all writing and photography on this blog is the intellectual property of Laura Klotz. This blog is written with permission of the Pennsylvania Historical and Museum Commission. I am not employed by the PHMC. All rights reserved.
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