John Erwin, Revolutionary War Hero and British Prisoner of War Lieutenant John Erwin, was born in 1756 in Ireland. When he was 12 years old, he sailed with his family to Pennsylvania and arrived in Philadelphia on Aug. 18, 1768 on the ship, Newry Assistance. Shortly thereafter his family settled in Upper Bucks County in what would become Tinicum Township.
Erwin Family of Patriots
When the call came to fight the British in 1776, The Erwin Family sided with the patriots. John's father, Arthur, was Commissioned that year as as a Colonel of the Fourth Battalion of the Bucks County Militia and a year later, at the age of 51, as a Colonel of the Second Battalion of the militia.
Even his John's younger brother, William signed up as Wagon Master of a brigade of wagons in 1778 when he was 18 and at the age of 21, he was commissioned as a captain of the First Company, Third Battalion of the Bucks County Militia on May 14, 1781.
German engraving of the Battle of Saratoga, 1777 from the Library of Congress
July 1776
On July 9, 1776,When John Erwin was 20 years old, he enlisted as a Second Lieutenant in the "Flying Camp," within Joseph Hart's Bucks County Battalion, Lt. Col. William Baxter commanding.
A 1764 illustration of the Pennsylvania Associators assembling in Philadelphia, Print by Henry Dawkins, The Paxton Expedition, published in 1764
The Flying Camp
THE FLYING CAMP WAS A MOBILE MILITARY FORCE DESIGNED BY GENERAL GEORGE WASHINGTON TO CREATE TROOPS ALWAYS IN MOTION TO COVER ALL THE GARRISONS AND TO KEEP THE ENEMY IN CONTINUAL ALARM. HIS PROPOSAL WAS APPROVED BY CONGRESS AND RECRUITMENT TO MEET THE 10,000 SOLDIERS WAS DRAWN FROM THE MILITIAS OF DELAWARE, PENNSYLVANIA AND MARYLAND. PENNSYLVANIA WAS SLATED TO PROVIDE 6,000 MEN, 400 OF WHOM WERE DRAWN FROM THE BUCKS COUNTY ASSOCIATORS.
Portrait of Standing George Washington by Gilbert Stuart
General Hugh Mercer was appointed to command the Flying Camp. Mercer soon clarified his mission as being the defense of Pennsylvania and New Jersey, while assisting operations around New York.
August 20, 1776
Washington fortified an encampment for the Flying Camp at Perth Amboy, NJ. By August 20, six full-strength Pennsylvania battalions with a total of 2600 Pennsylvania Troops, had reported to Mercer, and were stationed north of the main camp at Perth Amboy including Col. Joseph Hart's Bucks County Battalion.
Promises of provisions fell through. Meat was in short supply. The soldiers were not provided arms and so were weaponed with what they had brought from home; fowling guns, rifles and muskets--almost none of the weapons were equipped with bayonettes.
The soldiers were not provided the promised uniforms. Instead, General Washington recommended "the adoption of hunting shirts and breeches". His intention was to masquerade the troops as marksmen "...which might have its terrors for the enemy."
August 22-29, 1776- Battle of Long Island
A substantial British fleet had entered New York Bay on June 29. Additional British ships from the Mediterranean, the West Indies and the Florida coast soon joined them, and by August 21, the New York Bay contained a fleet of thirty-five warships and 400 transports, carrying about 35,000 well-trained men.
ON THE EVE OF THE BATTLE OF AUGUST 21, A THREE HOUR LONG, ELECTRICAL STORM “AS VICIOUS AS ANY IN LIVING MEMORY, AND FOR THOSE WHO SAW OMENS IN SUCH UNLEASHED FURY FROM THE ELEMENTS … A NIGHT SO VIOLENT SEEMED FILLED WITH PORTENT... LIGHTNING FELL IN MASSES AND SHEETS OF FIRE TO THE EARTH, AND SEEMED TO STRIKE INCESSANTLY AND ON EVERY SIDE.”
During the Battle of Long Island, Continental Soldiers like John Erwin fought forces possibly four times their number. Afterwards many Patriot soldiers lay dead, some slain in cold blood, some pinned by bayonets to trees. Over 1000 Americans were taken prisoner.
A collection of papers from the Lancaster Battalion of the Flying Camp sheds some light on the encampments and troop movements from August through the end of October of 1776.
According to the diary dates below, John Erwin and his battalion were constantly on the move, marching as much as 60-70 miles a day, some 300 miles in a week.
- August 31 Reding [Reading] in cam.
- September 1 Lakgrove in cam.
- September 2 Drab in cam.
- September 3 Cruced billed in cam.
- September 4 New Toun [Newton] in cam.
- September 5 Drentoun [Trenton?] in cam.
- September 8 Prinstown [Princeton] in cam.
- September 9 Lounshvig [Brunswick?] in cam
- October 9 Crost the North [Hudson] River agin
- October 16th the Regulars land at Frog's Point [Throg's Neck]. We had the battell at Westchester.
- October 18th, the battell at East Chester
- 28th of Oct 1776 the battell at the West [White] Plains.
Colonel Baxter was impressed with John Erwin.
On November 4, 1776, Baxter recommended John Erwin "as a person worthy of a first Lieutenants Commission." He describes that erwin 'has acted the part of a good officer in his station."
November 14, 1776
On November 14, more than 1,500 men Were Ferried Across the Hudson to strengthen Fort Washington. Of these, about half were troops of the Pennsylvania Flying Camp.
John Erwin received his promotion. ON NOVEMBER 16, he is listed (second name one the list below) on the Roll for Colonel Hart's Battalion as a First Lieutenant.
That same day, The entire garrison of Fort Washington came under fire with 2837 men being captured before mid-afternoon on November 16, 1776.
INCLUDING FIRST LIEUTENANT JOHN ERWIN
The defeat at Fort Washington has been called the heaviest suffered by the American army during the entire war.
Colonel William Baxter was killed in the battle. His death was reported by William Crawford, a Captain in the Pennsylvania Line who, like John Erwin, was captured.
CRAWFORD TESTIFIED THAT HE WAS TOLD BY TWO BRITISH OFFICERS THAT THEY "HAD BURIED A MAN OF THE NAME BAXTER WHO HAD A COLONELS COMMISSION IN HIS POCKET, AND THE NAME WILLIAM BAXTER ENGRAVED ON THE HILT OF HIS SWORD.
A monument was erected in the Honor of Colonel William Baxter and the patriot Volunteers of the Pennsylvania Flying Camp by the Daughters of the American Revolution in 1923
Col. Baxter's Monument is located in Fort George in Manhattan at the intersection of Audubon Avenue and 192nd street
According to William Darlington, a private in Captain Wallace's company of the Pennsylvania Flying Camp, the prisoners were "roughly used on their way from Fort Washington to New York; that 800 of them were stowed into a house called New Bridewell...
Old Bridewell, New York, America. Coloured lithograph by H.R. Robinson. Iconographic Collections Keywords: H.R. Robinson
THEIR RATIONS FOR THREE DAYS, EACH INDIVIDUAL, WERE ONE HALF POUND OF BISCUIT, HALF A POUND OF PORK, A HALF PINT OF PEAS, HALF A GILL OF RICE, AND HALF AN OUNCE OF BUTTER...THAT THEY HAD NO STRAW OR HAY TO LIE ON; AND NO FUEL, BUT ONE CART-LOAD, PER WEEK, FOR THE EIGHT HUNDRED MEN...THAT THEY BEGAN TO DIE LIKE ROTTEN SHEEP, WITH COLD, HUNGER, AND DIRT...THAT THE ENEMY SEEMED TO TAKE A KIND OF INFERNAL PLEASURE IN THEIR SUFFERINGS."
British Prison Ships
A number of decommissioned British warships were moored in Wallabout Bay, just off Brooklyn, New York, where they served as floating prisons for captives taken at sea by the Royal Navy.
Lieutenant John Erwin was liked imprisoned on the Whitby initially. It was the first prison ship to be anchored in Wallabout, being moored near Remsen's mill in October 1776. According to General Jeremiah Johnson the Whitby was , "the most sickly of all the prison ships. Bad provisions, bad water, and scanted rations...no medical men attended the sick, disease reigned unrelieved, and hundreds died from pestilence or were starved."
"I saw the sand-beach, between the ravine in the hill and Mr. Ramsen's dock, become filled with graves in the course of two months."
Map noting the location of a few British prison ships in Wallabout Bay, and three spots where mass graves were purportedly found (Mary French, New York City Cemetery Project). Anywhere from 11,500 to 18,000 were buried along the shore. Remsen's Mill is noted at the red arrow all the way to the right
In May of 1777, the prisoners were transferred from the Whitby to two other ships in the harbor. but both caught fire the first in October and the other the following February. The Surviving prisoners were passed from one ship to the next (Scorpion, Prince of Wales, Falmouth, Hunter, Stromboli and John) until the H.M.S Jersey Arrive in April of 1780.
The HMS Jersey, Nicknamed “The Hell Afloat,” was a gigantic sixty gun warship built in 1736 that had been converted into a hospital ship in 1771. being repurposed from a warship to a prison, the Jersey had been stripped of almost all sails, spars and rigging. The Jersey’s portholes had all been sealed shut. Iron-barred breathing holes were drilled the length of the ship about ten feet apart.
The Jersey“contained pestilence sufficient to desolate a world; disease and death were wrought into her very timbers.”--prisoner Thomas Andros 1781.
HMS Jersey drawing is from Recollections of Life on the Prison Ship Jersey. APS.
The hold's of the prison ships like the jersey held rampant disease, rotten food, contaminated water, infestations of lice, and suffocating heat or frigid cold. All the most deadly diseases were present including: dysentery, small-pox, and yellow fever, killing a dozen soldiers daily. At any given time, The "Jersey" had on board anywhere from 400 to 1200 prisoners.
Prisoner Exchange
Between 1775-1776, state assemblies and local committees of safety managed military prisoners with little guidance from the Continental Congress. however, Starting in 1777, Congress began centralizing prisoner management efforts. DESPITE THE ILL TREATMENT OF AMERICAN PRISONERS ABOARD BRITISH PRISON SHIPS, THE ACT OF PRISONER EXCHANGE WAS MIRED IN NEGOTIATIONS FROM 1777-1781.
The Continental Congress wanted Loyalists tried as traitors, and the British claimed they were honor-bound to protect them. Furthermore the British Generals would only negotiate on their own behalf, and the Continental Congress feared their actions would not bind the English Government.
The Balance of Power, London : Published as ye Act directs [by R. Wilkinson, at No 58 in Cornhill], 1781 Jany. 17.
For Four long years prisoner exchange was at an impasse leaving Soldiers like John Erwin wasting away in the bowels of the prison ships.
A Letter from George Washington on Prisoner Exchange
"I have the best evidence that an event of this kind [a general exchange] is the general wish of the country. I know it to be the wish of the army, and no one can doubt that it is the ardent wish of the sufferers themselves...that we designedly avoided an exchange, it would be a cause of dissatisfaction and disgust to the country and the army, of resentment and desperation to our captive officers and soldiers...The ill consequences would be immense...by dejecting the courage of the soldiery from an apprehension of the horrors of captivity; and finally, by reducing those whose lot it is to drink the bitter cup, to a despair which can only and relief by renouncing their attachments, and engaging with their captors."
1781 the Commanders in The Field Take the Reigns
From this time frequent exchanges of prisoners took place at different points, under arrangements between the commanders in the field.
ONE SUCH MEETING TOOK PLACE AT ELIZABETHTOWN, N.J. and on February 18, 1781, John Erwin was Paroled.
Elias Boudinot was the Commissary General for Prisoners, later replaced by John Beatty and John Pintard served as Deputy Commissary of Prisoners at New York.
THEIR DUTIES WERE TO EXAMINE AND RELIEVE THE WANTS OF THE PRISONERS AND WORK TO NEGOTIATE PRISONER EXCHANGES.
An account of Capt. Thomas Dring, on being released from the Jersey; “Our hearts beat hard with joy, fear, and apprehensions at the same time . . . My name was soon called, and I cheerily answered “here.” The commissary pointed to the boat. I believe I never stepped quicker. It certainly was to me the most happy moment I had ever experienced in all my life."
At war's end, there were only 1,400 survivors among the inmates of the entire prison ship fleet, and at least 11,000 men and boys died aboard the ships from 1776 to 1783 - more than lost to combat (6,800) during the entirety of the war.
December 10, 1781
When John Erwin Returned home his skin hung from his body. He had suffered from dysentery, disease, starvation and torture. Too weak to work, John applied for pension from orphans court.
February 17, 1782
One year, almost to the day, of his release, John Erwin was laid to rest, never having recovered his strength. He was buried in the family burial ground.