![]() wrote: “More than savages men who under the guise of patriotism prowl through the community with a thirst for plunder that is unsalable and a love of cruelty that mocks the ingenuity of the Indian-fellows whose mouths are filled with liberty and equality, and whose hearts are overflowing with cupidity and gall- gentlemen they are yclept the Skinners.” Could one quote buried in a single journal spiral to put a twist on historical accuracy? The answer lies in an author’s desire to gain profits overshadowing historical content. Surgeon’s mate William Lawton of the 5 th Mass. So, how did skinners become associated with patriots? As mentioned, there is only one primary source referral to skinners as purely patriotic plunderers. Scheer for publication in 1964 under the new title Private Yankee Doodle, he added a footnote claiming that rebel sympathizers called themselves skinners.Īuthor James Fenimore Cooper – Source of misconception of labeling skinners as patriot plunderers. ![]() Plumb Martin, a private in Douglas’ State Militia wrote in 1776 that a local militia officer had gathered some goods, but part of the enemy “dominated “Cowboys” destroyed his stores.” However, when Martin’s book was edited by George F. They, like cowboys (another term loosely applied to British Tory groups or partisan marauders who stole or confiscated cattle and drove them to British markets and army camps) foraged and pilfered the county and it was from the residents and rebel troops that the term was applied. Under his Tory leadership, his skinners saw partisan service for King George III in and around New York City from 1778 – 1783. Skinners were simply the three battalions of British refugee or partisan volunteers raised by the fifty-year-old attorney general of New Jersey, Brigadier General Cortland Skinner. The origin of the term Skinner did not come from any patriot guerrilla group ‘skinning’ Hudson Valley farmers of their food or household goods. The referral to patriots did not begin until some decades after the war ended, a gross twist on historical accuracy by one author, and from there snowballed over the years by countless others until our scholarly texts joined the bandwagon.īrigadier General Cortlandt Skinner, New Jersey Attorny General and active Tory led the three brigades of “Skinner” Loyal partisan groups. The term skinners was bandied around frequently and often recorded among Westchester County residents and American troops, but only in the context of describing Tory or partisan bands of plunderers. The Merriam-Webster’s Unabridged Dictionary, attempting to walk the middle road, defined skinners as a “band of guerrillas and irregular cavalry claiming attachment to either British or American troops operating in Westchester County in New York during the American Revolution.” However, there is but one mention of skinners as patriot pillagers in any portion of the vast collection of Revolutionary daybooks and dispatches. Historically, skinners have been identified as strictly American patriots. Yet the patriotic men who caught Major Andre (Benedict Arnold’s co-conspirator spy at West Point, NY) have since been referred to as skinners. Colonel DeLancy Tory Partisan Corps Cowboy painting by Charles M Lefferts.Īt the time of the American Revolution, s kinners was a term applied to British partisan units who pilfered the citizens of the Westchester County region – not patriot partisan groups. ![]() Labeled cowboys and skinners, they professed their actions as sanctioned by passions of patriotism or loyalty to the crown. But most horrific to those who tried to continue their lives in the war-torn region were the constant threat of ‘barbarous behavior’ by bands of thugs and highwaymen who claimed loyalty to both England and America. Those who remained witnessed frequent clash of arms between British and American troops stationed in and around the borders of the county dragoon horsemen and light infantry who left their posts to forage and gather information on their enemy’s movements. Most of the county’s residents eventually fled the carnage. ![]() Farms were abandoned and entire communities became ghost towns. ![]() By war’s end, most of the county, especially a twenty-mile-wide region labeled the neutral ground, would be totally devastated. Idyllic Countryside of Westchester CountyĪt the start of the American Revolution, the county of Westchester, just north of New York City, was among the richest and most populous of the rural counties in the colonies. ![]()
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