The Polish guy is Thaddeus Kościuszko a Polish/Lithuanian immigrant and a largely unsung hero of the American Revolution. The Bridge, connecting Albany and Saratoga Counties, commemorates a remarkable man who played a critical role, serving as an engineer, in the American victory at the Battle of Saratoga, the “turning point” of the Revolution.
He was an extraordinary man, a citizen of the world, who fought for the rights and liberty of all men and women against the tyranny of oppressive governments and institutions. (He found slavery of any kind, from African-Americans to feudal peasants in Europe, a particularly malignant evil.)
Act I – Early Life
Kosciuszko was born in 1746 in a small village, the youngest son of a poor noble family. He received training at the royal military academy and became an Army captain. Shortly thereafter a civil war arose in his country – his brother fought for insurgents; rather than take sides, Kosciuszko emigrated to France. He wanted to join the French Army, but couldn’t because he wasn’t French, so he enrolled in the Royal Academy of Fine Arts and Sculpture in Paris. In his spare time he studied in the libraries of the French military academies, learning economics, engineering, and military science. After 5 years he returned to home, but found there was no place in the Army for him. Ultimately he returned to Paris, where he learned about the nascent American Revolution.
Act 2 -The American Revolution
In 1776 Kosciuszko appeared one day at the print shop of Ben Franklin in Philadelphia (everyone, even the French, knew about Franklin). Franklin spent time with the young man, assessing his abilities and sent him off with a letter of introduction to the Continental Congress. Congress gave him an appointment as a colonel in the Continental Army and his work began – building fortifications around and near Philadelphia and along the Delaware River.
In summer 1777 he went north with General Horatio Gates, Commander of the Northern Department of the Continental Army, to Albany and then on to Fort Ticonderoga. Kosciuszko proposed placement of a battery on higher ground, on Sugar Loaf Mt. (now Mt. Defiance), overlooking the Fort; his recommendation was ignored. Subsequently the Fort was lost to General Burgoyne and the British army who laid siege, using the higher ground to their advantage. The Americans abandoned the Fort, slipping away using a flotilla of small boats and an ingenious floating log bridge of Kosciuszko’s design.
As the Americans fled, Albany’s own General Philip Schuyler adopted a “scorched earth” policy to cover the American escape and delay Burgoyne’s Army. Kosciuszko led the effort to destroy bridges and causeways, dam streams to cause flooding and fell trees. He was then ordered to survey the area north of Albany to find the best site to build defensible fortifications against the British. He selected Saratoga and began construction of defenses that proved impenetrable. Burgoyne was forced to surrender. General Gates, said after the battle “…the great tacticians of the campaign were hills and forests, which a young Polish engineer was skillful enough to select for my encampment.”
After Saratoga, Kosciuszko was dispatched to improve fortifications at West Point. (Benedict Arnold was going to pass Kosciuszko’s plans to Major Andre.) He remained at West Point until he requested a transfer to the Southern Army in 1780 where the battle for the country had moved. Again, Kosciuszko distinguished himself through his brilliant engineering skills and his bravery.
In 1783 he was appointed Brigadier General, granted American citizenship and given property. By now he was 37, a man of middle age at the time. But the remarkable life of Thaddeus Kosciuszko had only just begun. The next year he returned home to Poland.
Act 3 – Back to Poland and the Kościuszko Uprising
In the late 1780s he was appointed a Major General in the Army. Kosciuszko joined his country’s reform movement that produced the first Constitution in Europe. But the democratic ideals were viewed as a threat to the surrounding feudal countries. In 1792, the Russian army (with help from the Prussians) invaded. Kosciuszko proved a brilliant military strategist, winning several great battles against formidable Russians troops. But ultimately the king surrendered to the army of Catherine the Great and Kosciuszko and other members of the Resistance fled.
Biding his time, Kosciuszko planned how to free his country. Several years later Kosciuszko led troops determined to oust the Russians. After a number of great victories Kosciuszko was wounded, captured by the Russians and taken to St. Petersburg. (The uprising was soon over.) Ultimately he was pardoned by Tsar Paul, who also agreed to release 20,000 Polish freedom fighters (and gave him some money) if he took a loyalty oath and agreed never to return to Poland. (Later Kosciuszko tried to return the money when he renounced the oath; the Tsar refused to accept it.)
Act 4 – Back to America
After his release Kosciuszko returned to Philadelphia, catching up with old friends, collecting his back military pay and forming a lasting friendship with then Vice-President Thomas Jefferson*. It appears he meant to remain in America, but events on the other side of the Atlantic intervened. He learned his nephews and other Poles were fighting in France under Napoleon and the new French government of the Revolution was seeking his support in taking the fight to the Prussians occupying his beloved Poland. He was eager to go to Europe, but concerned he could be a target of the new Alien and Sedition Act (1798) which could be used strip him of his American citizenship and prevent his re-entry into the U.S. (This was an era of un-declared hostilities between America and France.) Jefferson secured Kosciuszko a false passport and he left for France as a secret envoy. He later wrote: “Jefferson considered that I would be the most effective intermediary in bringing an accord with France, so I accepted the mission even if without any official authorization.”
Act V -Return to Europe
By the time Kościuszko arrived in June 1798, plans had changed. While involved in Polish émigré circles in France, he refused command of Polish troops serving with the French. He had several testy meetings with Napoleon; there was mutual dislike. Kościuszko withdrew from political and military life to the French countryside, not being permitted to leave France.
Years later when Napoleon did reach Poland Kosciuszko mistrusted his intentions and refused an alliance. After Napoleon was deposed Tsar Alexander I approached him, trying to broker a political deal involving Russian control of part of Poland. Kosciusko demanded political and social reforms which the Tsar was not willing to grant. Kosciuszko finally went to live in free Switzerland where he remained until his death in 1817. (Just before his death he freed the serfs on his remaining Polish land; the Tsar undid the emancipation.)
A great life well-lived in the defense of ideals freedom and equality for all.
*Upon leaving America, Kosciuszko wrote a will leaving his American property to Jefferson in order to purchase the freedom of slaves and to educate them. After Kosciuszko’s death in 1817, Jefferson said he was unable to act as executor. The case of Kościuszko’s American estate went three times to the U.S. Supreme Court. The Court eventually ruled that the property belonged to Kosciuszko’s heirs in the 1850s.
“I Thaddeus Kosciuszko being just in my departure from America do hereby declare and direct that should I make no other testamentary disposition of my property in the United States I hereby authorise my friend Thomas Jefferson to employ the whole thereof in purchasing Negroes from among his own or any others and giving them liberty in my name, in giving them an education in trades or otherwise and in having them instructed for their new condition in the duties of morality which may make them good neighbours, good fathers or mothers, husbands or wives and in their duties as citizens teaching them to be defenders of their liberty and Country and of the good order of society and in whatsoever may make them happy and useful and I make the said Thomas Jefferson my executor of this. T. Kosciuszko 5th day of May 1798”
~ Last Will and Testament
Copyright 2021 Julie O’Connor
In summer 1777 British forces under Lt. Colonel Barry St. Leger were making their way east along the Mohawk Valley to join General Burgoyne coming down from the north – objective Albany. The British were making their way up the Hudson as well and there was no doubt Albany would be occupied by the British. It was only a matter of time. Albany was a strategic and tactical target. Albany, as the epicenter of the Northern Department of the Continental Army, was the site of military storehouses, warehouses, a powder house and armory. It was the staging area for all American troops in the Northern Department as well as the site of the military hospital (at Pine and Lodge). More importantly, occupation of the Hudson from Albany to New york City would give British control of New York State and separate New England (thought to be the heart of the resistance) from the other colonies – dividing the burgeoning Union.
But the British plans fell apart west of Albany at Fort Stanwix* and the Battle of Oriskany. Fort Stanwix (known then as Fort Schuyler) was first surrounded by the British, Indians (lead by Joseph Brant) and Tory and Hessian contingents on August 3, 1777, when the Fort refused to surrender. Inside the Fort were American troops under Colonel Peter Gansevoort**. His second in command was Marinus Willett.
And that is story of why we wanted to honor Col. Willett – his bravery was instrumental in saving Albany.
We have never been able to figure why a rock as a monument (rocks are cheap?). We know there was a multi-year search across upstate for just the right rock, but we’re not sure why this particular rock was selected. (It may have come from the Oriskany battlefield, but we’re not sure.)
On October 18, 1777 General Burgoyne (“Gentleman Johnny”), the British commander at the Battle of Saratoga, surrendered to the American General, Horatio Gates. Approximately 5,800 troops were taken prisoner, mostly British and Hessians. The Hessians were mercenaries- soldiers from the German State of Hesse-Cassel, furnished to the British for the American war under a financial agreement between with the Landgrave (sort of the Prince) of Hesse-Cassel) and the English government.
On the same day about 5,000 British and German troops set off for Boston where they were to be held as prisoners of war. They became known as the “Convention Army” – based on the conventions (terms) of the surrender. They marched south to Kinderhook, bypassing Albany, and then east to Massachusetts. There are many stories about British and Hessian soldiers falling out of line along the route of march and becoming part of the population of Columbia County (where there was a large Palatine German population) and along what is Route 20 in Massachusetts today. (America has a rich and diverse gene pool.)
After the surrender General Schuyler offered the hospitality of his Albany home to General Burgoyne and Baron von Riedesel (commander of the Hessian troops), as well as the Baroness and their 3 children who had accompanied him into the fight (The Baroness was quite astonished at such kindness, since British troops had burned Schuyler’s Saratoga home to the ground during the Battle). They left Saratoga on the 17th of October under a guard of 200 men led by Colonel Quackenbush and after 2 days reached Albany.
General Burgoyne (more than a bit of a bon vivant) enjoyed his stay at the Schuyler Mansion after his long trek though the wilderness from Canada and was impressed by General Schuyler’s wine cellar and the graciousness and geniality of the General and Mrs. Schuyler. Some even say that the charms of General Schuyler’s daughter Eliza, who would later marry Alexander Hamilton, caught the eye of the well-known playboy and sophisticate. Accounts vary on the length of his stay; it could have been as short as several days or as long as fortnight before he was on his way to Boston along with the Baron. The Baroness remained longer at the Mansion and departed with her children around the end of October.
Today, October 7, 1777 the Battle of Saratoga, which began on September 19th, ended. British General John Burgoyne made a last desperate attack on Bemis Heights. Disobeying a direct order from the commanding general, Horatio Gates, General Benedict Arnold flung himself into the fray, leading patriot troops against pockets of British attackers and exploiting weaknesses in British defenses. One soldier said “he was the very genius of war”.
During one of the last attacks, Arnold was shot in the leg and fell, pinned beneath his horse.
The hospital was constructed during the French and Indian War in the 1750s. It was located down the hill from Fort Frederick, overlooking the City at what is now the intersection of Lodge and Pine Streets. In 1776 it was refitted as one of 11 major military hospitals during the Revolution.
(Once upon a time there was an historical marker identifying the location; that has disappeared.)
It was a large building, constructed in an H configuration; with 2 stories, and 40 small wards (to enable quarantine from infectious disease) and able to accommodate 500 patients. After the Battle of Saratoga, the hospital was so crowded that provisions were made to locate patients in the Dutch Church at the intersection of State and Broadway. The Albany Committee for Safety also commandeered several private residences. About 60% of the patients were British and German; they were accompanied by their own physicians and surgeons.
Friends of Albany History 