During August 1778, Tiverton was the fulcrum on which the American Revolution teetered. From all over New England militiamen marched along dusty roads to rendezvous at the fort on Tiverton Heights.
From Gloucester, Newburyport, and Marblehead came 265 fishermen to ferry American troops across the Sakonnet River.
From Boston came John Hancock, in command of the Massachusetts militia including Paul Revere, who wrote home, “It seems as if half of Boston was here.”
From New York came 1,000 Continental troops led by Rhode Islander Major-General Nathanael Greene, and another 1,000 led by the 19-year-old Marquis d’Lafayette.
Perhaps most importantly, from France came a fleet of twelve warships commanded by Comte D’Estaing, gun ports open, brass cannon glinting in the sun, the lead ship flying the French colors.
The French were not impressed by the American troops gathered at Tiverton. Lafayette’s aide wrote: “I have never seen a more laughable spectacle; all the tailors and apothecaries in the country must have been called out. They were mounted on bad nags, and looked like a flock of ducks in cross-belts.”
The target of this amassed force was Aquidneck Island, a short row across the Sakonnet. The British occupied the island with a garrison of 6,700 men. Their surrender might break England’s will, resulting in victory for the Americans.
D’Estaing knew that the British fleet expected reinforcements to arrive any day, which would mean certain destruction for the French ships. On the morning of August 10, D’Estaing decided to attack the enemy fleet anchored in Newport, but the British commander ordered his ships to flee. They receded toward the horizon with the French fleet after them, preparing to battle in the Atlantic.
American commander John Sullivan decided to press the land attack without French naval support. He ferried troops, cannon, horses, and supplies across the Sakonnet River, and the force of 10,000 marched toward Newport.
For days, both sides fired cannons at each other mostly without effect, while keeping an anxious eye on the sea, wondering what happened to the naval fleets that had slipped away from Newport to do battle. Whose sails would appear on the horizon?
Fog shrouded Newport on the morning of August 20, so thick it was difficult to see fifty yards. When skies cleared after noon, the sails of twelve large ships appeared. They drew nearer until a look through field glasses revealed the French tri-color flying from their masts.
But the French fleet had been crippled, not through battle with the British but by a storm at sea, and D’Estaing intended to sail into Boston for repairs.
Without support from the French fleet, many militia men wanted no part of British bullets and bayonets, and they began crossing the Sakonnet back to Tiverton in droves. The time had come to end the siege of Newport, but it would not be easy. Sullivan had to ferry nearly 5,000 men across the Sakonnet with an enemy force of 6,000 at his back.
The American retreat was defended by the Rhode Island First Regiment, a segregated unit of enslaved Rhode Islanders—African-Americans, Narragansetts, and men of mixed race—who were promised their freedom in exchange for enlisting. The solders of the 1st wore uniforms of cream-colored pants and jackets, with tall white hats emblazoned with blue anchors and topped with big blue feathers.
Twice the Hessians charged with their bayonets. Twice, in deadly hand-to-hand fighting, the 1st Rhode Island drove them back. The Hessians took on reinforcements and again attacked. With the help of reinforcements, the 1st “soon put the Enemy to rout,” Nathaneal Greene reported to General Washington, and the American forces escaped to Tiverton.
The Battle of Rhode Island resulted in a military draw. The Americans lost 30 dead and 137 wounded, while British losses were 38 dead, 210 wounded. The enemy temporarily kept their stranglehold on Rhode Island, but the underdog Americans stood toe-to-toe with the mighty British and had driven them back.
]]>In June of 1776, on the highest point of ground in Newport, the Americans erected a signal beacon and a small fortification. This high point is known as Tonomi Hill, a shortening of Miantonomi, the name of the sachem of the Narragansetts when Newport was settled in 1639. According to local tradition, the Narragansetts used the hill in much the same way as the European settlers, as a lookout and signaling location.
When the British occupied Newport in December of 1776, they made Tonomi Hill a focus of their efforts to defend the city, according to Frederick Mackenzie, a British soldier who kept a detailed diary of his time spent in America. For instance, on August 10, 1777, Mackenzie reported, “A Detachment of a Captain, 2 Subs. and 100 men of the 22d Regiment, marched this day and encamped near Tonomi-hill near Newport, where they are to be employed in carrying on some works.”
On May 2, 1778, Mackenzie wrote, “The troops are employed in construction of a Redoubt on Tonomi hill, which, from the nature of the situation, is capable of being made a place of great strength, and will cover the left of our position.” On May 5, he reported, “Three of the Redoubts near the town are finished, and that on Tonomi hill nearly so. When the works intended to be made from Green-end to the shore on the left of Tonomi are finished, the town will be rendered very secure, as it is by much the best position for the purpose.”
There were actually two earthwork fortifications at this location. The first and larger is on Tonomi Hill; the second earthwork (sometimes called a “fleche”) is located on an outcrop to the north called Sunset Hill or Little Tonomi, and was connected to the main earthwork by a high ridge. After the French sent their fleet into Narragansett Bay on July 29, 1778, Mackenzie noted, “The troops were informed last night, that on three Guns being fired from the North Battery in Newport, (which is the Signal that the Enemy is landing) they are immediately to get under arms. On this Signal, Ditfourth's Regiment is to throw 200 men into Tonomi hill; 30 into the Fleche on the left of it.”
In August of 1778, when the Americans began massing troops on the north end of Aquidneck Island in preparation for an attempt to retake Newport, the British created a new front line, with Tonomi as the westernmost position. During the American siege, Mackenzie noted the role Tonomi played in defending the British position: “About 6 this afternoon about 40 Rebels took post at Potter's chimnies on our left, but some shots being fired at them from Little Tonomi & Irish's they went off. We lost no men this day by the fire of the Enemy. Our troops at work on the Line, which is now extended within 200 yards of Great Tomini.”
After the Revolution, the earthworks at Tonomi Hill remained intact due to their difficult terrain and inaccessibility. Francisco de Miranda, a Venezuelan who traveled within the former thirteen colonies after the Revolution, described the “two hills close to each other and very dominating called Tonomi hills, where there is a sufficiently capable and well constructed...redoubt.” The property surrounding the fortifications soon reverted to farmland. On October 15, 1795, William Ellery (a signer of the Declaration of Independence) was paid $10 for “levelling the earth round the Citidel on Tonomi hill,” possibly to remove the remains of the barracks or an encampment.
On his 1848 visit to Newport, the American historian Benson Lossing provided a detailed description of Tonomi Hill: “About a mile and a half northward of Newport rises a bold, rocky eminence, called ‘Tonomi Hill’, celebrated as the seat of the Narragansett sachem of that name, and the commanding site of a small fort or redoubt during the war of the Revolution. …Tonomi Hill is said to be the highest land upon the island, except Quaker Hill, toward the northern end. On its southern slope is the mansion of Mr. Hazzard. …On the top of the hill Mr. Hazzard has erected an observatory, seventy feet high, over a cellar which was dug by the Indians, and in which is a living spring of water. The hill is two hundred and seventy feet above the bay and the top of the observatory commands one of the most beautiful panoramic views in the world.”
According to a 1921 description of the area, “A dense growth of cedars now covers these hills. In the center of Tonomi Hill fort there is an observation tower, which replaced an old one blown down many years ago, from which an extensive view of Newport and its harbor and surroundings could be enjoyed.” In 1922, Newport created a city park on Tonomi Hill, which included a 90-foot tall stone memorial, supposedly on the foundation of the Tonomi Hill powder magazine.
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