Frederick von Steuben Arrives at Valley Forge: February 23, 1778
Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben (1730-1794 arrives at Valley Forge, in the Pennsylvania Colony, and quickly begins to shape up the rag-tag American Revolutionary forces.
Unsubstantiated rumors of "having taken familiarities with young boys" were, according to Steuben's biographer John McAuley Palmer, "a final determining influence in sending Steuben to America." The mere existence of such "scandalous rumor," says Palmer, cut off Steuben's "last hope of employment or a refuge in Germany. Poor, in debt, no longer young, forsaken by all but a few of his bravest friends, he had nowhere to turn . . . . The American adventure was his only hope."[1]
At Valley Forge, Steuben, who did not know English, is accompanied by Peter Stephen Du Ponceau (1760-1844), a young French interpreter. Washington assigns Steuben the additional assistance of his youthful aides-de-camp, John Laurens and Alexander Hamilton, who Palmer calls "ardent admirers" of Steuben's.
Major General Nathaniel Green also assists Steuben and soon becomes his "devoted friend."
Later, in Philadelphia, says Palmer, Steuben becomes "especially intimate with Richard Peters," Peters's wife, and "devoted to their little boy." Steuben writes to De Ponceau to go to the Peters' home and "give three kisses to my little aide-de-camp and as many to his mother if Mr. Peters offers no objection."[2]
After a time, the twenty-four-year-old Captain William North and the twenty-six-year-old Ben Walker become Steuben's aides-de-camp, and, according to Palmer, "the principal members of his military family."[3]
Palmer writes:
There is a relation between an old general and an ideal aide-de-camp that is closer than the relation between father and son. The bond is a voluntary one and can endure only when there is perfect sympathy and understanding between the two parties. When this rare bond is once formed it is one of the closest and tenderest ties in all human relations. No son can know his father so intimately as such an aide knows his general. No father would dare to reveal himself so completely to his son as the old general reveals himself to a trusted aid. Walker and North retained this relationship to the Baron after the war and to the end of his life. And they were devoted friends to each other and the Baron adopted them as his children and his heirs.[4]
On September 18, 1788, on his fifty-eighth birthday, Steuben writes to William North (Steuben's spelling is retained):
Yesterday, my dear Bill, it was a year when you did cut your name & mine in a Big tree at Steuben [missing word or words]. it was a year that the Constitution was signed at Philadelphia, it was elleven year when Bourgoin capitulated at Sarratoga & it was [here, the manuscript is apparently missing]. I celebrated the Day in dining with Our friend [Ben] Walker where we wished health and happiness to our friend in the woods.[5]
Steuben adds that he is planning, together with General [?] Armstrong, to take winter quarters on Nassau Street in New York City, where Steuben will be near the church, the Bishop, and the mayor, along with the "Play-house, some B----- houses [brothel houses?], and black Sam" (African American, Samuel Fraunces' famous Fraunce's Tavern).[6]
Later, Steuben lives with John Mulligan as secretary and close companion, and Mulligan speaks of Steuben as his father. In 1794 Mulligan writes to Ben Walker after Steuben's death:
yesterday, at half past twelve o'clock, oh, my God, my parent died! o, Colonel Walker, our friend, my all. I can write no more. Come if you can. I am lonely. Oh, god God, what solitude is in my bosom. Oh, if you were here to mingle your tears with mine, there would be some consolation for the distressed.[7]
NOTES
Jonathan Ned Katz is deeply grateful to the late Richard Plant and the late James Foshee for help with this research. Katz would like to know of other historians' articles or books about Steuben, in English. Email: outhistory@gmail.com
Steuben's secretary and companion, John Mulligan, is one of the sources for the story of Steuben's role in the offer of an American kingship to Prince Henry of Prussia, born Friedrich Heinrich Ludwig in Berlin (1726-1802), the younger brother of Frederick the Great. Prince Henry was a distinguished soldier and statesman who in 1786 was backed by Alexander Hamilton, Baron von Steuben and other disgruntled American politicians as a cultured and liberal-minded candidate for “king” of the United States, when Americans were considering a constitutional monarchy as their form of government (George Washington had declined an offer to serve as "king"). See Warren Johansson essay on Steuben in Wayne R. Dynes, ed. Encyclopedia of Homosexuality (Garland Press, 1990).
John McAuley Palmer, General Von Steuben (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1937).
1 Palmer, pages 92-94.
2 Palmer, pages 206.
3 Palmer, pages 208-209.
4 Palmer, pages 208-09. Also see: 271-72.
5 Palmer, pages 362-363.
6 Palmer, pages 362-363.
7 Palmer, page 403.