Carries Surrender Papers To Yorktown
The Siege of Yorktown in October 1781 marked the start of the Patriot’s victory and an honor for Tench who Washington picked to carry the surrender papers to Philadelphia. Two poets have written about the ride, Dr. Oliver Huchel and Howard Pyle which both make Tilghman into a hero. A Ballad titled "The Ride of Tench Tilghman" also speaks of the ride and the surrounding areas as well.
In a letter to Tilghman the following year, Washington’s humor and admiration is apparent. Washington’s letter to Tench on July 9, 1782 from Newburgh, New York:
- “Till your letter of the 28th arrived which is the first from you and the only direct account of you since we departed at Philadelphia, we have various conjectures about you. Some thought you were dead—others that you were married—and all that you have forgot us. Your letter is not a more evident contradiction of the first and last of these suppositions than it is a tacit conformation of the second and as more can wish you greater success in the prosecution of the plan you are upon than I do...you have no friend who wishes more to see you than I do.”
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Famous quotes containing the words carries, surrender and/or papers:
“The children are all crying in their pens
and the surf carries their cries away.
They are old men who have seen too much,
their mouths are full of dirty clothes,
the tongues poverty, tears like pus.”
—Anne Sexton (1928–1974)
“It is easy at any moment to surrender a large fortune; to build one up is a difficult and an arduous task.”
—Titus Livius (Livy)
“To a historian libraries are food, shelter, and even muse. They are of two kinds: the library of published material, books, pamphlets, periodicals, and the archive of unpublished papers and documents.”
—Barbara Tuchman (1912–1989)