Notes on Nathanael Greene

We continue our series of posts observing the 250th anniversary of the American Revolution with this acknowledgment of the natal day of General Nathanael Greene (1742-1786).

Greene was reputedly second only to Washington in ability and stature as a General during the Revolutionary War, and was Washington’s preferred successor in the event of his early demise. The neighborhood of Fort Greene, Brooklyn (and Fort Greene Park) are named after him, as are the cities of Greensboro, North Carolina; Greensboro, Georgia; Greensburg, Pennsylvania; Greenville, North Carolina; Greenville, South Carolina; Greeneville, Tennessee; and Greensboro, Pennsylvania.

Monument at Ft. Greene Park

I have no intention of writing about EVERY Revolutionary War officer, only those which have some logical connection to existing areas of this blog, and in this case (as in many others) the existing connection is me. Greene was from my home state of Rhode Island, and we are mutually descended from early Quaker settler John Greene (1597-1659). Nathanael was raised in the Quaker faith, and was known as The Fighting Quaker, though he was essentially ejected from that pacificist sect in 1773. The son of a prosperous merchant, Greene studied with private tutors in his youth. He built a private library that included military works, and thus, like Henry Knox, and other early American military men, he was self taught.

In 1770, Greene and his brothers inherited their father’s business interests. Two years later a cargo ship owned by Greene and his brothers, the Fortune, was seized by the British for customs duties. In response, a group of Rhode Islanders captured H.M.S. Gaspee and burned it to the water line. This was one of the precipitating events leading to the Revolutionary War. It took place over a year prior to the Boston Tea Party. “Gaspee Days” are still celebrated annually in Rhode Island.

In 1774, Greene formed his own state militia unit. When war broke out in spring 1775, he was appointed to lead Rhode Island’s “army”, and this led to his being named one of Washington’s generals when the Continental army was formed soon after. Greene served in most of the early actions in Boston, New York, New Jersey, and Philadelphia (and a minor one in Rhode Island, for obvious reasons). In 1780 he was appointed to lead the forces in the Southern theatre of the war, fighting campaigns in the Carolinas and Georgia, which is why so many cities and counties are named after him there. It was in the South that the British were eventually defeated. Greene didn’t win every battle, but he helped wear the British down.

Like many Revolutionary leaders, Greene went into debt during the war, using his own resources to feed, clothe, transport, and house the men under his command. As partial repayment for his service, after the British surrender in 1783 he was given a Southern plantation called Mulberry Grove near Savannah, Georgia. This is where he spent his last years, as owner of this large rice plantation, worked by slave labor. At this time, most of the northern states allowed slavery as well, although most would soon abolish it. Greene’s willingness to participate in the system may justly be reckoned a blight on his character. (In a notable related tidbit, Eli Whitney was employed on Greene’s plantation as a tutor to his children. Whitney invented the cotton gin while working there, and it was the cotton gin that resulted in the explosion in scale of chattel slavery in the 19th century as agriculture industrialized).

In any case, Greene’s time as a “Southern Gentleman” in the Washington vein was to be short-lived. He died of sunstroke in 1786 at the age of 43. Though he had earlier turned down the position of Secretary of War, it’s likely that had he lived, Greene would have gone on to other positions of national leadership.

For much more on the American Revolution, go here.