Miracles and Massacres (6 page)

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William Shepard's prized possession on this late January afternoon was not either of his cannons—“government puppies,” his men called them—but a piece of paper hidden within his red-trimmed blue greatcoat. It was the letter commandeered the day before from a drunken messenger at Parsons' Tavern, a critical communication from Luke Day to Daniel Shays.

Day had been attempting to respond to Shays to inform him that he would
not
be available to assault General Shepard and the arsenal at 4:00
P.M
. on January 25—this very hour—but that they would instead cordially arrive precisely twenty-four hours later.

And, so, Shepard knew—though he took the precaution of posting some men on Main Street in case Day changed his mind—that he would have to defend only
two sides
of the arsenal, not three.

Just as important, Daniel Shays did
not
know that.

“Major Stephens!” roared Shepard, “Fire o'er the rascals' heads!”

Two fuses burned, and Shepard prayed that such a warning might bring his opponents to their senses. Not merely for their sake, but for his as well. He had no way of really knowing how his own men might react to drawing the blood of their neighbors and fellow countrymen. His own army, he fretted, might dissolve at the first shot.

BOOM! . . . BOOM!

A great, deafening roar rose from the arsenal as two cannonballs sailed safely over the heads of Shays' advancing hordes.

Or
had
they sailed safely? Most of Shays' army lay prone, facefirst, on the snowy ground, as if they were a field of harvested wheat.

One by one, Shays' army arose and dusted themselves off. “March on! March on!” Shays barked.

“Major Stephens,” Shepard ordered, his words catching in his throat as he uttered them, “Another volley—this time
waist height
.”

BOOM! . . . BOOM! The cannons crashed again.

Stephens' cannon shot found its target, ripping through Shays' ranks, tearing through blood, sinew, and bone like a sword through a sack of flour.

Three men—Ezekiel Root and Ariel Webster, both of Gill, and Jabez Spicer of nearby Leyden—crumpled to the ground dead. A fourth, Shelburne's John Hunter, was gravely injured. The vast remainder of Shays' troops, save for a scattered handful frozen in fear, again fell prostrate to the snow-packed ground.

“Again!” cried Shepard, and more metal rocketed through the leaden sky. But above that roar, the men manning the arsenal's guns heard a scream that shocked them to their very marrow. Artillery Sergeant John Chaloner had moved away too slowly from his cannon's mouth. Its fearsome blast ripped both of his arms from their sockets and its searing flash blinded him instantly.

The sound of Chaloner's screams echoed along with the distant rumble from the cannon. The air was thick with gunpowder, and the snow where the ill-fated group of now-dead rebels once stood was red with blood.

Militiamen watched as the Regulators retreated. After they had fallen back to a safe distance, the militiamen inched down to where the army had stood facing them just a few short minutes earlier. They retrieved the mortally wounded John Hunter and what was left of Root, Webster, and Spicer, and moved them to a nearby stable, where the bodies quickly froze solid.

About an hour later, a party of Regulators advanced again, but this time under a white flag.

“Sir, we respectfully request that we may remove the bodies of our five comrades for decent Christian burial.”

“Five?” snorted Shepard. “I'm afraid I've only four, but if you care to repeat your march on the arsenal, I'll be only too glad to accommodate you with a fifth!”

They were not about to take him up on that. The thought of fighting their friends and neighbors was one thing; watching them actually die was another thing entirely.

The battle was over.

Regulator Encampment

Chicopee, Massachusetts

January 26, 1787

Daniel Shays' men had run from the armory grounds and they kept on running hard for five miles until finally reaching Japhet Chapin's Tavern at Cabotville to Springfield's east. At daybreak they fled farther—to Chicopee—where they rejoined Eli Parsons' Berkshire County men. Along the way, two hundred Regulators had deserted the cause.

A roaring fire had once threatened to engulf the entire commonwealth, and, with it, perhaps the entire Confederation.

But now that fire seemed to be nothing but dying embers.

Continental Arsenal

Springfield, Massachusetts

January 27, 1787

“They're back!”

A militia sentry watched a column of men steadily advancing toward him.

Men sprang to their posts. If Shays and his mobbers were foolish enough to attempt another attack on Springfield's arsenal, they would ensure that an even bloodier price was paid.

“Hold your fire!” came another shout. “It's not Shays! It's General Lincoln and reinforcements!” Glorious in their strength and number—three companies apiece of infantry and artillery, plus a company of cavalry—Lincoln marched them steadily along.

A great cheer went up, but General Shepard cut them short. He mounted the steps of the arsenal's wooden barracks and barked out: “Make your huzzahs short, men! Prepare your kits and your mounts. We leave within the hour—north bound, on the trail of the mobbers!”

Connecticut Valley

Western Massachusetts

January 30, 1787

General Benjamin Lincoln's men crossed the Connecticut River, marching northward along its west bank. His cavalry, under Colonel Gideon Barr, advanced gingerly upon its ice-hardened surface. General Shepard's militia trudged up the Connecticut's eastern shore.

Lincoln and Shepard moved fast, but the dispirited Regulator force moved faster, bolting out of Chicopee. Those who remained plundered several houses in South Hadley and looted two barrels of rum at Amherst. More men deserted along the way. It seemed now as though only a couple hundred remained. Shays himself retreated to his ramshackle Pelham homestead. Ensconced among his fellow hardscrabble Scotch-Irish neighbors, Shays bided his time. Unsure of his next move, and burdened with an “army” more inclined to shouting than shooting, his options had grown ever more limited.

This was not at all what he had planned.

Luke Day remained in West Springfield. He'd taken the precaution of posting a guard at the ferry house, but when Lincoln's army approached, the guard, along with the bulk of his panic-stricken men, had fled, abandoning their supplies and muskets so they might run that much faster. They fled through Southampton, and then Northampton, as quickly as they could, hoping they might find refuge in the Independent Republic of Vermont before Lincoln found them.

Major General Lincoln's Headquarters

Hadley, Massachusetts

January 30, 1787

Benjamin Lincoln was encamped at Hadley, barely ten miles to Shays' west. Lincoln could have advanced on him at Pelham, but chose not to. The township was too rugged and too heavily defended—swarming with the greatest concentration of “Shaysites” known to Christendom.

Benjamin Lincoln would not attack Pelham. At least, not yet.

Instead, he sat down to compose a letter.
Perhaps,
he thought,
blessed
reason might finally work to end this unfortunate episode and an offer of mercy might go further than a twelve-pound cannon shot.

And so, in a fine hand, he wrote to Captain Shays.

Whether you are convinced or not of your error in flying to arms, I am fully persuaded that you now realize that you are not able to execute your original purposes. Your resources are few, your force inconsiderable, and hourly decreasing from the dissatisfaction of your men. You are in a post where you have neither cover nor supplies, and in a situation in which you cannot hesitate for a moment to disband your deluded followers.

If you do not disband, I must approach and apprehend your most influential men. Should you attempt to fire upon the troops of Government, the consequences must be fatal to many of your men, the least guilty. To prevent bloodshed, you will communicate to your privates, that, if they will instantly lay down their arms, surrender themselves to Government, and take and subscribe the oath of allegiance to this Commonwealth, they shall be recommended to the General Court for mercy.

If you should either withhold this information from them, or suffer your people to fire upon our approach, you must be answerable for all the ills which may exist in consequence thereof.

Well
, Lincoln sighed,
let's pray that that works
.

Regulators' Headquarters

William Conkey's Tavern

Pelham, Massachusetts

January 30, 1787

Daniel Shays figured that if he had to hide out from General Lincoln's army, old William Conkey's Tavern, remote even by Pelham standards, was as good a place as any.

Particularly when the fugitive was also its most distinguished patron: Daniel Shays.

Gone were the days when Shays exhorted his “troops” with vain or glorious boasts. “My boys,” he had lectured them not long before, “you are going to fight for liberty. If you wish to know what liberty is,
I will tell you: It is for every man to do what he pleases, to make other folks do as you please to have them, and to keep folks from serving the devil.”

If that was the definition of liberty, then these men were experiencing the opposite. Few at Pelham were now doing what pleased them—instead they hunkered down to defend their very homes.

Shays pondered Lincoln's offer. He didn't particularly like his opponent's tone or his threats, but an offer of pardon had its charms. Except, and here Shays read very, very carefully, the offer clearly extended only to noncommissioned recruits. That didn't do much for him or for his fellow officers like Adam Wheeler. A “general pardon” would be necessary. Until then, it was best to stall for time.

Pelham, Jan. 30th, 1787

To Gen. Lincoln, commanding the Government troops at Hadley,

Sir: However unjustifiable the measures we have adopted in taking up arms against the government, we have been forced to do so. The people are willing to lay down their arms, on the condition of a general pardon, and return to their respective homes. They are unwilling to stain the land, which we, in the late war, purchased at so dear a rate, with the blood of our brethren and neighbors.

Therefore, we pray that hostilities may cease on your part, until our united prayers may be presented to the General Court, and we receive an answer. If this request may be complied with, the government shall meet with no resistance from the people, but let each army occupy the post where they are now.

Daniel Shays, Captain.

Well
, Shays sighed,
let's pray that that works
.

It didn't.

Major General Lincoln's Headquarters

Hadley, Massachusetts

February 3, 1787

General Benjamin Lincoln was not about to let Daniel Shays off so easily. He didn't trust Shays to not go back on his word and attack his army. Nor did he trust that Shays would not fade away into the hills to fight a guerilla war against the government.

But, above all, Lincoln didn't trust his own army's ability to play a waiting game against these blasted Regulators.

My army is falling apart!
Lincoln thought to himself as he finished reading a dispatch from Major General John Paterson, his commander in the Berkshires. The antigovernment “frenzy,” Paterson reported, infested the regions bordering New York and made him fear for his safety. He was demanding reinforcements.

“General,” Lincoln's cavalry commander, Colonel Burt, interrupted, “I must have a word with you. I was unable to send out patrols again tonight . . . the rate of desertions is simply too high.” The normally mild-mannered Lincoln flung Patterson's letter to the floor. “Desertions! Those madmen in the Berkshires!” he screamed. “And discipline is breaking down. Looting even here in Hadley—by my own men! Damn it, this has to end!”

Both armies—the government's and the Regulators'—were quickly collapsing. Lincoln's militia enlistments would expire in late February. Victory now seemed to be a question of which side would dissolve first.

How
, thought Lincoln,
am I going to explain this to Governor Bowdoin? Or to General Washington?

“General Lincoln?” a snow-covered lieutenant interrupted.

“What do
you
want?” Lincoln snapped.

“Uh . . . we've . . . we've learned that Shays has evacuated his Pelham stronghold and has reached Petersham for the night.”

“Petersham? Where in tarnation is that?”

“It's about thirty miles northeast of here, toward Gardner.”

“Yes, yes, of course,” said Lincoln suddenly, very softly and calmly. A plan welled inside him. “Gentlemen, alert the troops, we are headed for Petersham . . . tonight . . . now!”

“Now?” stammered Colonel Burt. “It's nearly eight o'clock. We'd have to travel through the night—and in the most hostile territory.”

“All the better to march by night, then,” answered Lincoln. “Our enemies will slumber peacefully and wake to some very unwelcome company.”

En Route to Petersham

New Salem, Massachusetts

February 3, 1787

General Lincoln and his troops had set off late but in fair weather. At 2:00
A.M
., however, and about halfway to Petersham, that changed quickly: Veritable blizzard descended upon them. Temperatures dropped, sheets of snow drifted, and the wind blew so violently that it blinded his caravan. Soon frostbite struck.

Lincoln's men wondered what sort of madman had delivered them into such disaster, but they kept marching. They had no real choice.