06 - The Last Day of Magic

March 1776

February was spent making preparations to conduct an attack on Boston.  Washington had gotten word from his spies that General Howe, the Commanding General of the British Army, was making preparations to leave Boston and sail north to New York as soon as the weather was favorable.  The British had grown tired of occupying Boston and the city held no advantage to them anymore.  New York would be a fresh base of operation for the British, with a mostly loyalist population, where the British could regroup after 11 months of stalemate in Boston.

Washington's window of opportunity to force a decisive battle with the British was slipping away.  If the British were allowed to evacuate Boston without conflict he would lose all hope of support from both the Continental Congress back in Philadelphia and the Continental Army.  On the other hand, if Washington could take the British by surprise it was possible that he could trap the British completely and force a surrender - effectively ending the war.  The Continentals needed to make sure the British couldn't leave.

Henry Knox and Brigadier General John Thomas were given orders by Washington to take some 4,000 men out of Cambridge to fortify the town of Roxbury, southeast of Boston Neck.  Fisher and Rose went with them.  Knox split the men into two forces once they arrived in Roxbury.  Knox's forces organized work teams to cut trees and build portable gun emplacements called chandeliers to haul along with the artillery up to Dorchester Heights.  The chandeliers would allow the Continentals to instantly create gun batteries along the heights without having to dig into the frozen and rocky ground up on the heights.  Thomas' men dug in around Roxbury and created redoubts to hold back any British counterattack.

From atop Dorchester Heights Knox would have a commanding position. The entirety of Boston and its harbor lay within the range of his 18 and 24 pound guns.  Yet Dorchester Heights was equally dangerous as it was rewarding to occupy.  General Howe's army outnumbered the Continentals and the British had a full Navy to compliment its ground forces. If Howe chose to march out of Boston and engage the Continentals the men along the heights would be cut off and trapped.  It was therefore Thomas' duty to prevent that from happening.

The Continentals worked for almost two weeks to prepare for the battle.  During that time Fisher and Rose worked from Dorchester Heights to keep the winds calm.  Crowe operated four miles north out of the ruins of Charlestown towards the same goal.  Collectively they maintained a low profile and kept the British ships from sailing for New York.

Nicholas Fisher and Charlotte Rose had pledged to work with Crowe to calm the weather and stop the British from leaving even though the two magicians hadn't actually joined the Continental Army.  They wanted to help with the siege but they found it easier to go about their work without the regulations of the military structure.  Knox and Washington didn't mind, they would take all the help they could get.

On March 4th the Continentals completed their work.  Word was sent to Washington and his response was to prepare for battle immediately.  There was no time to lose, everyday that went by there was a chance the British would set sail.  However, there was another reason Washington wanted to press the attack as well.  March 5th was the 6th anniversary of Boston Massacre and Washington was counting on the significance of that anniversary to rally his men.  That evening, March 4th, Knox mobilized a force of 2,000 men to drag the artillery and chandeliers up to Dorchester Heights.

Early morning, March 5th, the British in Boston were shaken from their slumbers by the pounding of cannon fire.  The Continentals fired upon the British from Cambridge as well as Dorchester Heights.  The British fleet was pinned down and the army couldn't evacuate under heavy fire so they mounted a quick counterattack. They sent men in small transports across the harbor to silence the guns in Cambridge while the bulk of their forces marched out and across Boston Neck where General Thomas was waiting with just 2,000 men.

Fisher and Rose did their best to curtail the British advance but ultimately two magicians could not prevent the passage of an entire army.  The British pushed out of Boston and threatened to press combat with the awaiting Continentals.  Thomas tried to rally his men but they were severely outnumbered, completely exhausted from days of endless labor, and lacked bayonet or cannon to resist a charge from the superior British force.

All day long a storm had been building along the coast.  After nearly two weeks of bottling up the weather the magicians had unknowingly created a meteorological powder keg that was primed to explode.  As the British marched on the fortifications outside of Roxbury a large and roiling storm was churning off of the coast  and pushing inland fast. Thomas' men began to break upon seeing the storm coupled with the British advance.  Fisher and Rose retreated from Dorchester and arrived just in time to witness the collapse of Thomas' men.  Fisher made to stand against the British and rally Thomas' broken army but alas he was unsuccessful.  The magician could turn neither men nor storm.

Before long the storm swallowed everything.  The British gave chase to Thomas' men through the storm until the snow was so thick they couldn't see more than a few feet ahead of themselves.  Fisher and Rose retreated with Thomas' men, all the while hearing the beating drums of the British in tow. It was the storm that finally saved them.  The storm was a true force of nature, an unintended consequence of magical intervention, and it conquered both armies that day.  The British finally gave up, the sound of their drums faded as they pulled back to Boston.  The Continentals fell back too.  They made their way back to their camps to wait out the storm that had just saved their lives.