A History of the Valley of Virginia by Samuel Kercheval (1833; 3rd ed. 1902)

140

THE REVOLUTIONARY WAR.


CHAPTER XI.


WAR OF THE REVOLUTION.


It is not within the plan of this work, to go into a general detail of the War of the Revolution. The author will only give an account of it so far as it is connected with the immediate History of the Valley.

At the beginning of the war the late Daniel Morgan was appointed a captain, and very soon raised a company of brace and active young men, with whom he marched to join Gen. Washington at Boston. John Humphrey's was Morgan's first lieutenant. Morgan was soon promoted to the rank of major, and Humphrey's was made captain. It is believed this was one of the first regular companies raised in Virginia, which marched to the north. Morgan with his company was ordered to join Gen. Montgomery, and march to the attack on Quebec; in which attack Montgomery was killed, and Morgan, after performing prodigies of valor, compelled to surrender himself and his brave troops prisoners of war. Capt. Humphreys was killed in the assault. The Reverend Peter Muhlenburg {Muhlenberg}, a clergyman of the Lutheran* profession, in the County of Shenandoah, laid off his gown and took up the sword. He was appointed a colonel, and soon raised a regiment, called the eighth, consisting chiefly of young men of German extraction. Abraham Bowman was appointed to a majority {typo corrected} in it, as was also Peter Helphinstine, of Winchester. It was frequently called the German regiment. Muhlenburg was ordered to the south in 1776, and the unhealthiness of the climate proved fatal to many of his men.

James Wood, of Winchester, was also appointed a colonel. He soon raised another regiment, marched to the north, and joined Gen. Washington's main army.

Maj. Morgan, after several month's captivity, was exchanged together with his troops, promoted to the rank of colonel, and again joined his country's standard in the northern army. Muhlenburg returned from his southern campaign, and in 1777 also joined the northern army. He was promoted to the rank of brigadier-general and Abraham Bowman to the rank of colonel. Helphinstine contracted a lingering disease in the south, returned home on furlough, and died in Winchester in the autumn of 1776. Col. Morgan,with




* The author is mistaken; he was an Episcopalian.


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