These, with the so-called
"Flying Camp" of Pennsylvania, made the bulk of the soldiers taken
prisoners at Fort Washington on the fatal 16th of November. Washington
had already proved to his own satisfaction the value of such soldiers;
not only by his experience with them in the French and Indian wars,
but also during the siege of Boston in 1775-6.
These hardy young riflemen were at first called by the British
"regulars," "a rabble in calico petticoats," as a term of
contempt. Their uniform consisted of tow linen or homespun hunting
shirts, buckskin breeches, leggings and moccasins. They wore round
felt hats, looped on one side and ornamented with a buck tail. They
carried long rifles, shot pouches, tomahawks, and scalping knives.
They soon proved themselves of great value for their superior
marksmanship, and the British, who began by scoffing at them, ended by
fearing and hating them as they feared and hated no other troops. The
many accounts of the skill of these riflemen are interesting, and some
of them shall be given here.
One of the first companies that marched to the aid of Washington when
he was at Cambridge in 1775 was that of Captain Michael Cresap, which
was raised partly in Maryland and partly in the western part of
Virginia. This gallant young officer died in New York in the fall of
1775, a year before the surrender of Fort Washington, yet his company
may be taken as a fair sample of what the riflemen of the frontiers of
our country were, and of what they could do.
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