Powder to Parchment

By October 8, 1775, the Revolution was no longer a hopeful experiment. It had become a test of endurance, and General George Washington knew it. The fires of Cambridge burned low that morning as the commander in chief gathered his generals for a council of war. Their task was not to fight the British but to decide what kind of army might survive the coming winter and what kind of nation it would represent.

The meeting was sober and practical. Officers debated how many regiments the Continental Army should maintain in 1776. Proposals ranged from a modest thirteen thousand to an ambitious eighteen thousand men. Washington listened quietly as his generals argued over numbers, enlistments, and supplies. He had learned in only a few months that enthusiasm could not hold a siege. The men who rushed to Lexington and Bunker Hill had gone home when their enlistments expired, leaving gaps in the lines and uncertainty in command. If this Revolution was to last, it needed permanence, not passion alone.

But that same council revealed the darker side of revolutionary logic. On that day, the Continental leadership decreed that African Americans, both free and enslaved, would no longer be permitted to enlist in the army. It was a decision made quietly but recorded firmly. The reason, they said, was to maintain order and unity among the troops. In truth, it was fear. Fear of offending southern colonies, fear of social upheaval, fear that liberty might extend further than intended.

Washington did not argue the point. Perhaps he felt bound by politics, perhaps uncertain himself. Yet in that single order, the cause of freedom narrowed its own definition. The Revolution, which claimed that all men are created equal, had already begun to draw lines around which men it truly meant.

That contradiction is the heartbeat of this week’s episode of Revolutionary Talk. Dave Diamond takes listeners into the candlelit room in Cambridge, where numbers were counted and ideals were compromised. Washington weighed powder, rations, and the souls of men. The army that emerged bore both the strength of his leadership and the stain of exclusion.

Meanwhile, across the lines in Boston, General William Howe was settling into his new command, replacing the disgraced Thomas Gage. Howe reviewed his troops and wrote grim letters home, warning that this war would not be easy. The British held Boston, but barely. Their supplies were thin, their morale thinner. While Washington’s council debated who could fight for freedom, Howe prepared to prove that the King’s army could still fight to crush it.

Here in Norwich, the ripples of that day could be felt even without cannon fire. Citizens worried over inflation and hoarded what goods they could. The Committee of Correspondence met again to root out Loyalist sympathizers. Church bells rang for Sabbath services, and sermons warned that betrayal could come even from within the camp. After Dr. Benjamin Church’s exposure as a British spy, trust had become as precious as powder.

In this episode, listeners will hear from the voices that shaped that uneasy day. A blacksmith who argues that liberty should be forged for all. A loyalist who mocks the Patriots’ hypocrisy. And a weary host who knows that ideals are easy to declare but hard to defend.

Washington’s council of war did more than plan a campaign. It revealed the fractures in the cause itself. The Revolution was not yet united. It was a collection of ambitions, fears, and contradictions tied together by one fragile thread of hope.

Tune in to Revolutionary Talk on WREV 760 AM. The year is 1775, the lines are drawn, and liberty is still learning who it belongs to.