Larry Mendte Curtis Sliwa America 250th June 16

Larry and Curtis speak about Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben, who controlled the British Army. The Continental Army was a big part of Valley Forge in 1977. 

See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.

Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:01):
Curtis and Larry celebrate two fifty stories that made America
on seventen wors. Amidst the Rolling Hills, cannons and monuments,
in Valley Forge, Pennsylvania, you will find a statue of
the great Persian military mind, Baron Frederick von Steuben. He

(00:24):
is single handedly responsible for the Continental Army surviving the
bitter winner of nineteen seventy seven and training the men
so they were no longer a citizen's militia but a
world class military fighting machine. The British Army had taken
control of Philadelphia and Washington chose Valley Forge, with its

(00:48):
high ground and open fields, to set up camp and
prepare for a major continental assault to take back the
birthplace of the Revolution of seventeen seventy seven. Was especially brutal.
Men were freezing, men were dying, men were deserting. Conditions

(01:09):
at the camp were horrendous. There wasn't enough food, no discipline,
unsanitary conditions. The Continental Army had the bulk of its
troops twelve thousand men at Valley Forge. Two thousand of
them would die of influenza, typhus, dysentery, all exacerbated by malnutrition.

(01:33):
Exposure and unsanitary conditions. The British army at Valley Forge
was no longer fighting the British. They were fighting Mother Nature,
and she was winning. They needed a miracle. The miracle
showed up on February twenty third, seventeen seventy eight. Dressed
in crisp Prussian general attire, General Baron von Steuben immediately

(01:59):
impressed Washinghington with his military knowledge and plans on how
to properly train the troops and bring sanitary conditions to
the camp. Von Steuben came highly recommended by Benjamin Franklin,
who met with von Steuben during Franklin's stay in Paris.
Even though the general had just helped Prussia win the

(02:19):
Seven Year War against France and Austria, he had to
flee his homeland with rumors that he was a homosexual,
which is a crime punishable by death. General Washington had
heard the rumors, he just didn't care. He desperately needed
von Steuben's military experience and expertise. So even though the

(02:41):
Persian general came to Valley Forge with his seventeen year
old male personal secretary, linguist and lover, Washington didn't care.
He needed him within a few weeks, von Steuben had
the encampment on a regular schedule. He improved sanitation to

(03:02):
stem the spread of disease, and taught the men military
strategy and maneuvers. Washington was so impressed he made von
Steuben his chief of staff, commissioned him as inspector general,
and gave him the rank of major general. Washington also

(03:22):
assigned men with similar sexual procliftivities to serve under von Steuben.
In the meantime, the British and Philadelphia, through their spies,
learned of von Steuben's military drills and knew well of
his victories in the Seven Year War. So on June nineteenth,
seventeen seventy eight, when George Washington's men marched into Philadelphia,

(03:46):
the British had fled not only because of von Steuben,
but because the French were now involved in the war
on the American side and troops were arriving in Philadelphia
to meet Washington. Also, rumors had spread that Benjaman Franklin
had created a new weapon using lightning. He didn't, but
rumors were powerful. In seventeen seventy eight, the Americans had

(04:08):
forced the British out of Philadelphia without firing a single bullet.
Von Steuben would fight many major battles with General Washington,
who considered Von Steuben his top military mind. Von Steuben
would later play a lead role in the Siege of
Yorktown that led to the British surrender an end of
the Revolutionary War, but first would come the Battle of

(04:29):
Monmouth in New Jersey. We'll talk about that on Thursday,
but it's important to underscore that General Frederick von Steuben
lives on as an icon in the LGBTQ community in America,
and all because George Washington judged men on their abilities
and not their character, and certainly not on who they loved.

Speaker 2 (04:50):
Thank god he did. And then he became an American citizen,
went up to Steuben, New York, where he was given
vast track of land as he ward for his loyalty
to the rebels against the Crown. And he had two
little dandy gents who lived with him there who eventually

(05:12):
he aired the property too. You see, back then, you
couldn't say you were gay. You couldn't say you were
having a relationship with a man. As you pointed out,
you could be killed. You said you adopted the young
men who were without home or without family, and everybody
gave you a pass.

Speaker 1 (05:28):
How about the fact that Washington knew he just didn't care.

Speaker 3 (05:31):
Oh, he needed desperate help. And then eventually from Pulaskian
because Juice go from Poland Lafayette from France. Without France,
they went bankrupt for supporting us in this war, we
could not have prevailed. Lookers here, Jimmy, Oh, Jimmy failure.

Speaker 1 (05:48):
Holy heck, I'm sweating because I had just lit a
school bus on fire.

Speaker 3 (05:52):
And we'll talk about doll we get back at eight o'clock.
But first the news