Feeding Washington's Army: Surviving the Valley Forge Winter of 1778 by Ricardo A. Herrera

Abstract

Reviewed by: Feeding Washington's Army: Surviving the Valley Forge Winter of 1778 by Ricardo A. Herrera Ann M. Becker (bio) George Washington, American Revolution, Valley Forge, Continental Army, Grand Forage Feeding Washington's Army: Surviving the Valley Forge Winter of 1778. By Ricardo A. Herrera. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2022. Pp. 256. Cloth, $28.00.) [End Page 176] The privations endured by the Continental Army during the Valley Forge winter encampment have been well documented by historians, yet efforts by General George Washington and his staff to alleviate the lack of provisions, supplies, and clothing have rarely been the focus of the numerous books that address Valley Forge. For example, while Bob Drury and Tom Clavin's book Valley Forge (New York, 2018) describes the transformation of the Continental Army during this winter encampment, highlighting Baron von Steuben's training of the troops, Alexander Hamilton's supporting Washington in the face of attacks by political rivals, and the Marquis de Lafayette's lobbying France for assistance, it does not address the crucial need for forage to keep the soldiers alive and the army viable for a spring campaign. Professor Ricardo Herrera, on the other hand, provides a comprehensive view of those efforts in his book, Feeding Washington's Army: Surviving the Valley Forge Winter of 1778. Painting a realistic picture of the shocking state of the army, which had held together despite the many battlefield losses and desperate need for food and shelter, Herrera credits Washington and his officers and staff with actively being engaged in finding ways to survive and persevere. The first section of the book describes the "Grand Forage," a series of foraging expeditions over six weeks beginning in February of 1778, as a proactive attempt to both reduce the suffering of the American soldiers and to prevent the British Army, quartered nearby in Philadelphia, from procuring the limited supplies of food, fodder, wagons, and livestock available across the Pennsylvania countryside and beyond. Detailing the challenges of the Continental Army, which included the presence of disease, incidences of desertion, and the possibility of mutiny, in addition to the lack of food and shelter, the author argues that taking action to support and feed the troops was crucial to its survival and the ultimate survival of the Revolution itself. Longstanding problems within the quartermaster general's department and with the commissariat charged with supplying and feeding the army had roots in the Congressional fear of central authority and corruption, leading to a distrust of military power. Inability to provide sustenance for the Continental Army led to the Grand Forage, which Herrera frames as illustrating Washington's "burgeoning acumen as a planner and commander, and his long-standing willingness to accept risk" (5). The amount of food needed to sustain the troops was staggering, with the average monthly consumption of bread nearly 454 tons, and meat consumption about 397 tons. The daily ration per soldier was one pound of meat and [End Page 177] bread, a pint of milk, a quart of beer, one ounce of rice, six ounces of peas or beans and a small amount of butter. On average, the army needed about 1.7 million pounds of food per month to provide adequately for its soldiers. One of the most problematic aspects of supplying these vast quantities was the lack of horses and wagons to transport any food and supplies foraged. Needing over 113 wagons per day, the army had only 8, with few horses to pull them. The challenges also included unwilling sellers, with the local population hoarding supplies for their own use or to sell to the British who paid with hard specie rather than the nearly worthless Continental script offered by the Americans. Ultimately Washington placed his trust in Nathanael Greene, Anthony Wayne, and Henry Lee, Jr. as he planned his grand foraging expedition. By mid-February 1778 the soldiers at Valley Forge had been short of meat for four days. Regardless of the danger of allowing the British to know how dire the situation was, and the irony of denying local residents their liberty and property in the name of political and economic freedom from Britain, Washington had...