Qualla: Battle of Bull's Ferry

Battle of Bull's Ferry: Introduction

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit George Engleheart, CC0. The poem came first. Before the battle at Bull's Ferry entered any history book, it entered English literature as comedy. British Major John Andre, the same officer who would be hanged three months later for conspiring with Benedict Arnold, penned a satirical ballad called The Cow Chace mocking the American commander Anthony Wayne as a "warrior-drover" whose real military objective had been stealing cattle. Andre was not entirely wrong. On July 20 and 21, 1780, Wayne led nearly 2,000 troops against a blockhouse defended by 70 Loyalists on the New Jersey side of the Hudson River. The blockhouse held. The cattle did not.

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Image: George Engleheart | CC0

Battle of Bull's Ferry: A War Running on Fumes

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit engraving by J. C. Buttre, after portrait by B. Otis, which was in turn based on a portrait by Robert Edge Pine, Public domain. By the summer of 1780, the northern theater of the American Revolution had been reduced to raids and minor skirmishes. The Battle of Monmouth in June 1778 was the last significant engagement in the region. George Washington's army had settled into a blockade around British-held N...

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Image: engraving by J. C. Buttre, after portrait by B. Otis, which was in turn based on a portrait by Robert Edge Pine | Public domain

Battle of Bull's Ferry: Wayne's Two Objectives

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit George Engleheart, CC0. Washington ordered Wayne to take the 1st and 2nd Pennsylvania Brigades, four artillery pieces, and Stephen Moylan's 4th Continental Light Dragoons to destroy the blockhouse. But the blockhouse was only half the mission. Wayne sent his cavalry under Major Henry Lee III to round up...

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Image: George Engleheart | CC0

Battle of Bull's Ferry: Seventy Men Behind a Stockade

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit George Engleheart, CC0. Early on July 21, Wayne opened fire with his four cannons. An hour of bombardment produced no discernible results against the log fortification. Meanwhile, the Loyalists inside poured accurate fire through their loopholes. Soldiers from the 1st and 2nd Pennsylvania Regiments, fru...

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Image: George Engleheart | CC0

Battle of Bull's Ferry: The Poet and the Drover

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit George Engleheart, CC0. While Wayne's infantry bled at the stockade, Lee's cavalry succeeded at the cattle drive. The seizure of British livestock was the operation's one concrete achievement, and it gave Andre his material. The Cow Chace opened with Wayne as a comic figure: "To drive the kine one summe...

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Image: George Engleheart | CC0