who accompanied us, were some of them shoemakers,”
writes Frau von Riedesel, “and on the days we halted
made boots for our officers, or even mended the shoes
of our soldiers. They set a great value on coined
money, which was very scarce among them. The
boots of one of our officers were badly torn. He saw
that an American general had on a good pair, and said
to him, for a joke: ‘I would give you a guinea for
them.’ The general immediately got off his horse,
gave up his boots, took the guinea, and mounted again
in the officer's torn pair.”[1] General von Riedesel's
temper was at this time imbittered by ill-health and
misfortune. It is to this that we must attribute the
judgment he passes on the Americans. Indeed, he is
quoted as saying that he had met but one American
officer in Cambridge whom he respected. Of the
members of the General Court of Massachusetts he
gives an extraordinary description. “One can see in
these men exactly the national character of the natives
of New England. Especially are they distinguished
by the fashion of their clothing. They all present the
appearance of respectable magistrates, with their very
thick, round, yellowish wigs. Their clothes are of the
very old English fashion, and they wear, winter and
summer, a blue cloak with sleeves, which they fasten
round their bodies with a leathern strap. You seldom
see one without a whip. They are mostly thick-set
- ↑ Baroness Riedesel, p. 198. We get a side light on this story from the writer in Schlözer's “Briefwechsel” above quoted. He mentions one Tielemann whom he calls marschcommissaire (commissary general?), a native of Mannheim, innkeeper at Albany, shoemaker by trade, and major in the militia.
