Gassaway Watkins (1752-1840)
MSA SC 3520-16779
Biography:
Born in 1752 to Nicholas and Ariana Watkins, Gassaway Watkins grew up alongside his five siblings: Elizabeth, John, Margaret, Nicholas, and Thomas. He likely lived in Anne Arundel County with the rest of his family. [1]
Gassaway Watkins enlisted in the First Maryland Regiment’s Second Company in January of 1776. Watkins enlisted as a corporal, but was later promoted to the rank of sergeant later that year. Watkins trained with the rest of his company until July of 1776. The First Regiment received orders to march to New York. George Washington feared an imminent British attack and desperately needed reinforcements. The Marylanders arrived later that month. [2]
On August 27, 1776, Watkins and the rest of the Second Company took part in the Battle of Brooklyn. British soldiers outflanked the Marylanders in a surprise attack. The Marylanders retreated, fighting their way toward the Gowanus Creek. Some companies, including the Second Company, successfully crossed the swampy creek and escaped. Although the Second Company lost fewer than ten soldiers, other companies lost up to 80 percent of their men, saving Washington’s army in the process. [3]
Watkins survived the Battle of Brooklyn, and participated in the Battle of White Plains on October 28, 1776. Following the Battle of White Plains, Watkins fell ill in November along with numerous other Marylanders. Watkins traveled to Morristown, New Jersey, where several hospitals had been set up, including hospitals treating soldiers for smallpox. Watkins placed all of his clothing inside of a “regimental wagon” while at Morristown, later discovering that “the driver carried all [of it] to the enemy.” Left without clothes or money, Watkins “traveled from Morristown to Annapolis,” arriving the following January. [4]
After laying “confined to [his] room until the last of April,” Watkins received an inoculation for smallpox. Despite the severity of his illness, Watkins survived and spent four months recovering in Maryland. During his sickness, Watkins had been transferred to the Seventh Regiment on April 17, 1777 and received a promotion to the rank of lieutenant. He “remained in Maryland as lieutenant on duty until September” of 1777. [5]
Watkins returned to Washington’s army “a few days before the Battle of Germantown” on October 4, 1777. Watkins yet again survived another disastrous American loss, in which many Americans found themselves lost in heavy fog and unfamiliar terrain. Watkins and other Marylanders spent the following winter at Wilmington, Delaware, protecting the state from a potential British invasion. [6]
Watkins spent most of 1778 attached to General Charles Scott’s light infantry unit. Light infantry forces carried little baggage, allowing them to travel and strike quickly. Scott’s soldiers harassed the British during late June, building up to the Battle of Monmouth on June 28, 1778. Poor communication between American leaders led Scott to hastily withdraw from the battle after encountering British soldiers. Watkins returned to the Seventh Regiment in September of 1778, and spent the winter in Bound Brook, New Jersey without much trouble. Although he remained with the army in 1779, Watkins saw little combat. [7]
Watkins placed his life in danger once more in 1780, however. Traveling south, Watkins joined Horatio Gates’s “Grand Army.” Eager to retake Charleston, South Carolina, Gates hoped to defeat British forces at Camden, South Carolina. The Battle of Camden on August 16, 1780 became one of the greatest disasters of the war, completely scrambling and annihilating Gates’s army. Although Watkins fought in the battle, he survived and avoided wandering the countryside like many of his fellow soldiers. The battle left such an impact on Watkins that he later named one of his daughters “Camsadel” in commemoration of the defeat. [8]
Following Gates’s failure, Washington appointed Nathanael Greene to be his successor. Greene arrived in the Carolinas in early December of 1780. At some point in the winter of 1780, Greene sent Watkins to a nearby house for information on British movements. Banastre Tarleton’s cavalry found and pursued Watkins during his mission, forcing Watkins to jump “a fence about eleven logs high.” Watkins spent the next “two nights and days without eating and without seeing anyone,” hiding and sleeping “in the woods.” When assured that Tarleton’s soldiers had left, Watkins returned to camp, encountering General William Smallwood in Elizabethtown, North Carolina. [9]
On January 17, 1781, Watkins commanded a company at the Battle of Cowpens. British forces under Tarleton had been pursuing Daniel Morgan’s army, forcing Morgan to stop at Cowpens, situated beside the Broad River. Tarleton attacked Morgan’s troops, who mostly remained calm in the heat of battle. The British panicked and began to retreat after suffering heavy casualties. The Marylanders then charged their left flank, helping to capture over five hundred British soldiers. [10]
Although Cowpens had been a rousing success for the Americans, the Battle of Cowan’s Ford, only a few weeks later on February 1, 1781, once again frustrated American plans. Greene gave orders to Watkins during the battle, and Watkins found himself “with the retreating militia, two miles from the battle ground.” In his memoir, Watkins described how
At twelve o’clock that night, [he] stopped at a house on the road, cold, wet and hungry, but got nothing to eat… [Watkins’s] dress was noticed by an old man of the country, who asked to speak in private with [him]. He told [Watkins] there were enemies as well as friends in the house and offered his services to [Watkins]... [They] rode all night and got to the foard [sic], about ten o’clock next morning… the old man said it was impossible to cross… [Watkins] immediately pulled off [his] coat and boots, put the despatches [sic] in the crown of [his] hat, tied it on my head, took leave of [his] friend, who, with tears in his eyes, wished [Watkins] well, and with difficulty crossed the river.
Watkins made it to camp that night, meeting with Greene and Morgan. [11]
Watkins spent the rest of 1781 participating in several major battles, including the battles of Guilford Court House, Hobkirk’s Hill, and the Siege of Ninety Six. Watkins participated in his last battle of the war on September 8, 1781 at Eutaw Springs. Although it was a tactical victory for the British, they failed to fully destroy Greene’s army and instead retreated to Charleston a few days after the battle. The Maryland Line suffered greatly during the battle, with several officers like Captain Edward Edgerly among the dead and wounded. Watkins survived, however, and went on to become a captain in the Third Regiment the following year. Watkins remained in the army until the official end of the war, serving until April 12, 1783, often recruiting new soldiers. [12]
Watkins returned to the southern part of Anne Arundel County, Maryland after the war, and soon married his first wife, Sarah Jones, on December 2, 1785. Although Sarah died within one year of their marriage, Watkins married Mary Dorsey on February 28, 1788, with whom he had seven children: Gassaway, Bonaparte, Thomas, Turenne, Ann Elizabeth, Charlotte, and Harriet. After the death of his second wife, Watkins married Eleanora Bowie Clagett on April 26, 1803. Gassaway and Eleanora Watkins had ten children together: William, John, Carolina, Camsadel, Eleanor, Amanda, Elizabeth, Priscilla Agnes, and Margaret. Gassaway Watkins’s many children put a financial strain on the Watkins family. Watkins applied for and received a state veteran’s pension in 1807 specifically because he had “a large family of children to provide for.” After receiving his pension, Watkins moved his family to an area in what is now Howard County, Maryland. After building a house near Richland Farm in the 1810s called “Walnut Grove,” Watkins expanded his farming operations to take care of his family. [13]
Watkins’s financial troubles were reflected by his slave-holdings. In 1783, Watkins owned 18 slaves, which steadily decreased to 8 slaves by 1800. Watkins’s pension and the expansion of his farming operations allowed Watkins to nearly quadruple the number of enslaved people in his possession, growing to 30 slaves in 1810. Although Watkins himself left no descriptions of his slaves behind, one unnamed slave fled from Watkins’s plantation in 1801. A slave trader had bought the man’s wife and children from Watkins two months prior, claiming to live in Virginia. Watkins, however, had “every reason to believe” that the slave trader lived in Georgia, where living conditions for enslaved people were even more horrific and deadly. Unwilling to let go of his family, the unnamed slave attempted “to get there after them” and fled from Watkins’s plantation; the man’s ultimate fate is unknown. Another slave, Oliver Cromwell Gilbert, recalled his enslavement on Watkins’s plantation in his youth. Gilbert worked in Watkins’s house in the 1830s, and recalled how Gassaway Watkins would “give his thrilling reminiscences of the daring and bloody conflicts he had in the Revolutionary struggle,” although Gilbert speculated that Watkins “thought [him] too ignorant to understand his talk.” [14]
Although Watkins prospered in his civilian life, he also returned to the military, serving in the militia. Watkins first served in the militia’s regimental staff as a major in June of 1794, likely appointed due to the ongoing Whiskey Rebellion. Although Watkins did not participate in ending the crisis, he remained active in the militia. On April 4, 1808, Watkins was promoted to the rank of lieutenant colonel in the Thirty-Second Regiment of Maryland Militia. [15]
His experience in the Revolutionary War and the militia provided Watkins with the opportunity to prove his military mettle once more in the War of 1812. Watkins led the defense of Annapolis from April 16 to July 31, 1813, during the height of fears regarding a British invasion of the city, and commanded several forts in the Annapolis area. Satterlee Clark, lieutenant in the Regiment of Light Artillery, accused Watkins of poorly disciplining his soldiers, some of whom “ferociously attacked” three artillery officers “with clubs.” Watkins, on the other hand, complained about regular soldiers operating out of forts and barracks within his jurisdiction, forcing his militia to camp outside. Luckily for Watkins, the British did not attack Annapolis, and Watkins likely did not face them in combat during the war. [16]
Returning to civilian life after the war, Watkins continued to focus on operating his plantation. Watkins reapplied for his pension in 1828 because he had not received any money for his Revolutionary War service since 1820. Watkins continued to pride himself on his exemplary service record, especially within Maryland’s Society of the Cincinnati, an organization founded by Maryland officers to preserve the war’s legacies. Watkins became the society’s vice president in 1831 and later became its president in 1839. [17]
Gassaway Watkins died on July 14, 1840. Maryland’s Society of the Cincinnati lamented “the death of their venerable President,” describing Watkins as “a distinguished Patriot and Soldier of the Revolutionary Army.” Watkins’s family buried him in a private cemetery about at “Walnut Grove,” where he remains interred today. [18]
Watkins had seventeen children throughout the course of his life, some of whom outlived him. His third wife, Eleanora, also outlived him, and petitioned both the state and federal government for pensions. Although Eleanora Watkins lacked a marriage certificate, one official explained that “Mrs. Watkins [had] perhaps more descendants living than any lady living in the state, and [was] perhaps better known.” She received a pension until her death in 1870. Gassaway Watkins’s 24 slaves were distributed throughout his family following his death. Oliver Gilbert eventually found himself in the ownership of Dr. William Watkins, and later recalled the physical and psychological abuse he endured as a slave owned by the Watkins family prior to his escape in 1848. One of Watkins’s descendants, Edwin Warfield, became Maryland’s governor from 1904 to 1908. [19]
-James Schmitt, Maryland Society Sons of the American Revolution Research Fellow, 2019
Notes:
[2] Muster Rolls and Other Records of Service of Maryland Troops in the American Revolution, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 18, p. 7; Francis B. Heitman, Historical Register of Officers of the Continental Army during the War of the Revolution, April 1775 to December 1783 (Washington, D.C.: Rare Book Shop Publishing Company, 1914), p. 575; Reiman Steuart, A History of the Maryland Line in the Revolutionary War (Towson, MD: Metropolitan Press, 1969), p. 145; Pension of Gassaway Watkins, National Archives and Records Administration, Revolutionary War Pension and Bounty-Land Warrant Application Files, NARA M804, W. 15857, from Fold3.com; Warfield, p. 413; Mark Andrew Tacyn, “‘To the End:’ The First Maryland Regiment and the American Revolution” (PhD diss., University of Maryland College Park, 1999), pp. 44-45.
[3] Warfield, p. 413; Tacyn, pp. 48-73; Return of the Maryland troops, 27 September 1776, from Fold3.com.
[4] Warfield, p. 413.
[5] Tacyn, pp. 94-98; Warfield, p. 413.
[6] Tacyn, pp. 143-146; Warfield, p. 413; Kim Burdick, “Rolling on the River: Delaware in the American Revolution,” 25 January 2017, Journal of the American Revolution.
[7] Warfield, p. 413; Compiled Service Record of Soldiers Who Served in the American Army During the Revolutionary War, National Archives, NARA M881, from Fold3.com; Patrick O'Donnell, Washington's Immortals: The Untold Story of an Elite Regiment Who Changed the Course of the Revolution (New York: Atlantic Monthly Press, 2016), pp. 192-193; Tacyn, pp. 197-199.
[8] Warfield, p. 413; Compiled Service Records, NARA M881, from Fold3.com; Tacyn, pp. 217-218, 220-225; Richard John Batt, “The Maryland Continentals, 1780-1781” (PhD diss., Tulane University, 1974), pp. 22-44.
[9] Batt, pp. 65-67; Warfield, p. 413.
[10] Steuart, p. 145; Tacyn, pp. 230-231; Warfield, p. 413; Batt, pp. 90-99.
[11] Batt, pp. 110-113; Warfield, p. 413-414.
[12] Batt, pp. 189-199; Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 18, p. 480; Steuart, p. 145; “Stations for Provisions—Recruiting Service,” 2 April 1782, Maryland State Papers, Brown Books, vol. 2, no. 66, MdHR 4609 [MSA S991-2, 1/6/5/3].
[13] General Assembly, House of Delegates, Assessment Record, 1783, Anne Arundel County, West River Hundred, p.3 [MSA S1161-2-2, 1/4/5/45]; Journal of the House of Delegates, 1807, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 555, p. 47; Maryland Inventory of Historic Properties, “Walnut Grove,” Howard County, HO-18; National Register of Historic Places, “Richland Farm,” Howard County, Maryland, NR-1462; Watkins Pension; Anne Arundel County Court, Marriage Licenses, 1777-1813, pp. 28, 35, MdHR 4752 [MSA C113-1, 1/1/11/27].
[14] Assessment Record, 1783; U.S. Federal Census, 1790, Anne Arundel County; U.S. Federal Census, 1800, Anne Arundel County; U.S. Federal Census, 1810, Anne Arundel County; U.S. Federal Census, 1820, Anne Arundel County; “Twenty Dollars Reward,” Times; and District of Columbia Daily Advertiser, 26 June 1801; Jody R. Fernald, “In Slavery and in Freedom: Oliver C. Gilbert and Edwin Warfield, Sr.,” Maryland Historical Magazine, vol. 106, no. 2 (Summer 2011), p. 149.
[15] Adjutant General, Militia Appointments, 1794-1816, no. 2, pp. 94, 99 [SM105-1].
[16] The Constitution and Register of Membership of the General Society of the War of 1812, to June 1, 1908 (Philadelphia: Society of the War of 1812, 1908), pp. 104, 115; Henry Whittemore, The Heroes of the American Revolution and their Descendants: Supplement to Section I: History of the Society Sons of the American Revolution (New York: The Heroes of the Revolution Publishing Company, 1898), p. 62; John C. Fredriksen, The War of 1812 U.S. War Department Correspondence, 1812-1815 (Jefferson, NC: McFarland and Company, inc., 2016), pp. 78, 412.
[18] Steuart, p. 145; Maryland Inventory of Historic Properties, “Walnut Grove”; Register of the Society of the Cincinnati of Maryland, pp. 55-56.
[19] Watkins Pension; General Assembly, Session Laws, 1852, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 615, p. 66; General Assembly, Session Laws, 1862, Archives of Maryland Online, vol. 532, p. 226; U.S. Federal Census, 1840, Anne Arundel County; Fernald, pp. 149-151.Return to Gassaway Watkins' Introductory Page
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