Good God, What Brave Fellows

The Maryland soldiers knew what they were being asked to do. The British had flanked the American position at Brooklyn. The army was falling back toward the boats that might carry them to Manhattan. Someone had to cover the retreat.

Smallwood's regiment and Gist's volunteers — perhaps 400 men — turned to face the British advance. What followed was a series of charges: attacking, falling back, re-forming, attacking again. Each charge cost them men they could not replace. Each bought Washington minutes he could not buy any other way. Washington watched from the fortifications above. The words attributed to him — "Good God, what brave fellows I must this day lose" — come from a single later account, but what he saw is not in question.

Of the roughly 400, about 250 became casualties. The prisoners went to British prison ships where conditions were lethal. The killed were buried where they fell, in Brooklyn fields that have never been found. Their sacrifice bought Washington the hours he needed. The army reached the heights. The wind shifted. The boats crossed. The fog came down. The Revolution continued. Maryland remembers this. The state motto — "Fatti maschii, parole femine," manly deeds, womanly words — has these men in mind.