Most people think of wartime propaganda as atrocity stories about the enemy. But commanders also disseminate false and true information in hopes of boosting their own soldiers’ morale and sapping the enemy’s. Even more persuasive than words are actions, and manipulating morale often dictates how commanders deploy their troops. Witness the American War of Independence.
Generals’ concerns about both sides’ morale often led them to scrap retrograde movements that made sense tactically. Only a week after arriving in Cambridge, Massachusetts, to take command of the Continental troops bottling up the British in Boston, George Washington acknowledged the tactical wisdom of disengaging from the enemy and shifting his entire army several miles to the west. But that would “dispirit our own People, and Incourage the Enemy,” so he stayed put. In August 1780, as Continental troops approached Camden, South Carolina, their commander, Horatio Gates, discovered the strength of the British force occupying the town and considered moving off to avoid a confrontation. But as a subordinate later reported, Gates worried that “to have fallen back . . . would have discouraged the good men of the Country, & have given confidence to the opposite party.” So he and his soldiers forged ahead—to the disastrous Battle of Camden.[1]
British commanders were just as averse to showing the enemy their backs. On July 5, 1777, Gen. John Burgoyne’s redcoats and German auxiliaries drove the Americans out of Fort Ticonderoga and pursued them southward. Days later, the British reached Fort Anne, just fifteen miles from their intermediate objective, the Upper Hudson River. But Burgoyne had originally planned to travel south up Lake George. Some of his subordinates proposed an about-face in order to resume that much easier water route. But Burgoyne feared the “impressions which a retrograde motion is apt to make upon the minds both of enemies and friends,” so he and his men marched on.[2]
In the South during the final years of the war, Gen. Charles Cornwallis showed similar concern for public opinion. After taking his army to Wilmington, North Carolina, in April 1781 to meet supply ships, Cornwallis considered returning to his base, Charleston, South Carolina. But that would be “disgraceful,” so instead he led his troops north—ultimately to Yorktown.[3]
As a natural corollary to their reluctance to retreat, commanders often tried to give the false impression that they had forced their opponents to do so. After leading 1,200 Continental light troops south to Virginia in April 1781, Gen. Lafayette spent the next few weeks running away from Lord Cornwallis’s redcoats and Germans. But when the British headed east, Lafayette “Made it a point to Give His Lordship the Disgrace of a Retreat” by following him and thereby seeming to chase him. One of Cornwallis’s officers acknowledged that Lafayette had thus “animated the drooping spirits of the Virginians.”[4]