MARTINI FAMILY------THOMAS WHITLOW AND GENERAL WASHINGTON'S ARMY

      When Thomas WHITLOW marched into the camp of the Continental Army at Valley Forge in May of 1778, he must have been discouraged by what he witnessed. George Washington had moved his 10,000 men Army into the area twenty miles northwest of the British Army in Philadelphia, only five months earlier, to remain there until Spring when the weather would permit both the British and Americans to resume the War. But the winter had been very harsh. For the first 3 months at Valley Forge, only a third of the Army had shoes...in mid-winter...clothing and food were scarce....so much so that 4,000 men were listed as "unfit for duty"...and that wasn't the worst.  In the Pennsylvania winter of 1777-1778, over 2,500 soldiers died from starvation, exposure, and disease.  Thomas must have asked himself, "What have I gotten myself into?"

Cabin replica at Valley Forge, PA

     Young Thomas WHITLOW was 20 years old when he arrived at Valley Forge, and it had been a long march from his parents' home in Mecklenburg County, Virginia.  Thomas had worked on the farm for his parents, Henry and Ann Mealer WHITLOW, during the first two years of the American Revolution, but the conflict had not been going well for General Washington and his Army. Washington made a request for more men to be drafted to fill the dwindling ranks before the Spring on 1778.....men lost by death, injury, desertion, and the winter at Valley Forge. Captain Henry Dudley, replacing his brother Ambrose Dudley as a Company Commander in the 2nd Virginia State Line, gladly swore the men into service.....not only as a Virginia militia unit...but as full-fledged Continental Army soldiers assigned to none other than the Commander-in Chief George Washington.....an honor Thomas may or may not have desired that winter. Thomas and the 2nd Regiment had stopped in Philadelphia to be issued the Continental uniforms they would wear while with the Main Army, and the off to Valley Forge.

Continental Army uniforms....when they had them

     Within a few weeks of his arrival at camp, Thomas WHITLOW marched off to War with everyone else, when word came that the British had left Philadelphia and were on the move.  Washington's Army first re-captured Philadelphia, and then headed north to chase the British who were now heading toward New York, and Thomas' Regiment was ordered to get rid of their knapsacks and blankets, allowing them to go faster in the chase. On the 28th of June, 1778,  General Washington and his Army met other American soldiers in full retreat at Monmouth, New Jersey, who had been fighting, and losing ground, to the British Army close behind them. The Continental Army dug in near the Old Tennant Church, and waited for the British Army to arrive, at which time Washington ordered the cannons to open fire on the entrenched Englishmen.  When the smoke cleared and dawn broke on the 29th, the British Army had quietly left Monmouth and abandoned the ground to the American Patriots.....a "win" for the Continental Army. Never before in the Revolutionary War had the Continental Army stood its ground against the main British Army, even though it did not stop the British from continuing to New York. Thomas WHITLOW had survived his first battle, and taken part in one of the major events in the fight for Independence...all in his first six months of duty.

 

Stony Point, New York

Old Tennant Church, Monmouth NJ, built 1751

      -Deciding not to face the Continental Army head-on again, the British Army had removed themselves to New York City, while the American Army settled in at White Plains, New York in August, 1778. There were no more major engagements for Thomas WHITLOW and the Continental Army that year......our Army watched their Army.  As winter neared, Thomas and his fellow soldiers set up camp near Middlesboro, New Jersey, where they remained from November 1778 until June 1779. Thomas' 2nd Virginia Regiment saw action again on July 16, 1779, under the leadership of General "Mad" Anthony Wayne at Stony Point, New York, a peninsula that stuck out into the Hudson River.  The Continentals routed the British by a midnight surprise raid on the fort the English were building, resulting in the surrender of all inside. This joyous moment was the last major engagement with the British in the northern colonies for the remainder of the War. Shortly afterward, Thomas and many other Virginia troops were released from their active duty with Washington's Army, and they returned home to spend the remainder of their service protecting their fellow Virginians. The remainder of the 2nd Virginia Regiment went on to Charleston, South Carolina, where the British captured the entire Regiment in May, 1780.  Thomas completed his two years in early Spring 1780, and started a new life as a 22 year old war veteran. His pay for the Patriot service was 59 pounds, 11 shillings, and 7 pence......whatever that's worth, it wasn't enough for a farm boy staring across the field at the British Army.

     When Thomas WHITLOW was 26, in 1784, he married Hannah GLIDEWELL, the 18 year old daughter of Nash GLIDEWELL, who had served in the Revolutionary War at the battle of Monmouth, although in a different Regiment than his future son-in-law....but he is another blog post.  Thomas and Hannah raised at least three children before his death in 1797 at age 39, and his young wife re-married in 1800 to William Irvin, or Irvine, and had more children with her second husband.  William Irvine died in 1833, and  in 1847, Hannah GLIDEWELL WHITLOW applied for a Revolutionary War Pension as Thomas' widow, and in 1850 at age 84 she appeared at the Halifax County, Virginia, Courthouse to take the Oath and receive her $80 per year plus back pay to 1836.   She lived with family in Halifax County, VA, until her death at age 88, in 1854.  Thomas and Hannah WHITLOW are the 6th great grandparents of Anthony P. MARTINI.