The Battle of Rhode Island Association has sponsored valuable research on the construction of Butts Hill Fort by Robert Selig and John K. Robertson. I am just now getting around to digesting the reports as I work on a timeline of what happened at the fort during the “Camp Butts Hill” period of 1780 to 1781. This is the first in a series of “Digging In” to the research. Today I am doing a close reading of Robert Selig’s article “Rochambeau’s Engineers at Butts Hill Fort July 1780 to June 1781.” The article appears in the Battle of Rhode Island website – battleofrhodeisland.org.
When the French arrived on Aquidneck Island, they found that work was being done on Butts Hill Fort. Selig writes about a diary entry of Ervoil d’Oyré. Describing the defensive works, he found upon arrival in Newport in July 1780:
“Finally, the works built by the Americans on the north of the island were re-established and repaired to assure communication with the continent.”
Selig writes about the French intentions on Aquidneck Island in their early days on the island.
“Prior to the arrival of Rochambeau’s forces in Rhode Island in mid-July 1780, Butts Hill Fort ‘was the only fort active on the north end of the island.’ As Rochambeau set up defenses against the anticipated and feared British attack, he sought to strengthen Butts Hill Fort to block any access from the north. Earthworks had been set up earlier in the war and repairs and additions were made by Massachusetts State troops, but French engineers almost immediately provided the expertise that the Americans lacked.”
Selig goes on to say that on the 9th of July, 21 British ships were seen near Newport Harbor. .
“The next morning Rochambeau accelerated the construction of defensive works, not only around Newport but at Butts Hill Fort as well. An entry in the journal of Major Marius de Palys’s Journal de Campagne, mentions the redoubts at Howlands Ferry and Butts Hill Fort.
” ‘Eight days had elapsed since the commencement of the work, and no thought had yet been given to fortifying the point of the island which should have 1st thought of. This is the point of Howlands Ferry, and Monsieur de La Fayette decided to occupy it better than it was at the time. There were two bad redoubts, which were connected and formed into a respectable fort, which had not been finished, the fort and another in the shape of a star, which protected the ferry together with a battery on the mainland assured communication with the mainland, which was essential for relief or retreat in case of misfortune.'”
Palys’s Journal continued: “Eight days had elapsed since the commencement of the work.”
That would place the date of the beginning of the work to around 28 or 29 July 1780. Selig tells us that La Fayette spent ten days in Newport from the evening of 24 July to late afternoon 3 August 1780. In a letter to General George Washington, dated “Newport july the 26th at seven o’clock P.M.,” he informed Washington that he “could not help advising him [i.e., Rochambeau] very Strongly and very often to erect works and keep a communication oppenn’d with the Continent By Howland’s Ferry or Bristol Point. That matter will I hope be attended to in the Course of the next day.”
When I started researching Butt Hill Fort, I found several orderly books from Massachusetts militias who were at the fort. I imagined a few French engineers supervising the American workers. Reading through Selig’s translation of a French orderly book gives me a different image. There was a constant French presence at the fort with a five day rotation of men from Soissonnois, Santonge, Royal Deux Ponts, and Bourbonnais. Every five days a new detachment would leave Newport at 7 AM. “This detachment will march with arms and baggage to Butts Hill Fort near Howland’s Ferry to work there as directed to them by the engineer who will be there. They will take with them cooking pots, mess tins, asks, and provisions for five days …The captain who will command the detachment order to work at Butts Hill Fort, a mile from Howland’s Ferry, will keep his soldiers in good order and discipline, he will order each day one corporal and four men as guards, and will not allow more than one cook to be employed per regiment in order to keep as few men as possible from the work.” (Order of 9 December 1780).
The orders of December 28, 1780 provide the duties of the French troops -“for the security of the post, the police of the guard, and the preservation of the fort’s works,” The detachment takes orders from Monseur de Palisse, Major of the Royal Corp of Engineers and from Monsieur Planchard.
The French Orderly book lists orders from December 23, 1780 to June 7, 1781. French forces left Aquidneck Island to travel south in June of 1781. The road to Yorktown began with Aquidneck IsIand. On their way to Bristol Ferry the French army would pass nearby the fort they had been working to build.
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