Evening star., 1925-02-22

always been straight rum until then.
This new health measure at 1enE~A
became an established thing in the
British Navy, and some officers even
went so far as to dole out three-wa-
ter rum. The sailors, in their sailor
like way, extended the name of the
inventor to the invention. The daily
allowance of half-and- half henceforth
become "grog'-a name which has
stuck ever since, and which is re-
sponsible for a whole series of words
in our modern dictionaries from
groggery to grog- blossom.
Old Grog-beg pardon, Admiral Ed
ward Vernon-was one of your politi-
cal admirals. He got himself elected
to Parliament and made lCt s.
fiery speeches against the Spaniards,
urging war and declaring that he
could take Porto BeIlo, on the 18TH
mus of Darien, with six ships. What
is more, the heroic. rash Old Grog
made good his promise, with the loss
of only seven men, on November p,
1879. London went wild. Good Old
Grog became a great hero, the city
being Illuminated in his honor. His
56th birthday was celebrated all over
England in l740, and 130 medals were
struck in his honor.
Having given his nickname to a
new drink and made himself the idol
of nation by spanking the Span
iards, Old Grog now proceeded TO
give his proper name to a farm on
the Potomac River and TO lose his
reputation as a great commander a
the same time. At the close of 1740
he was given a magnificent fleet of
some 25 ships Of the line, so trans
ports, fireships and bomb ketches,
with Is, 600 sailors and marines and
10000 land troops to take the Spanish
city of Cartagena on the coast of the
province of Colombia, South America
The land force was assembled on the
Island of Jamaica, under the inme-
diate command of Gen. Wentworth.
Here is where the three Potomac
boys came into the adventure. The
British government decided that the
American colonies should furnish
'one regiment, with Scotch officers to
discipline it," Obedient to the kings
command, the Virginia council ar
ranged for the enlistment of 1000
men, some of whom came across the
Potomac River from Maryland, and
Gov. (Sir William) Gooch of Virginia
took command. That was in August,
1T40.
Lawrence Washington, eldest son
of Augustine Washington of Wake
field. on the Virginia side of the Poto-
mac, was given a captaincy In the
liam Hebb, from over the river in
Maryland got lesser commissions and
went along, too. With much speech
making and noise. the regiment left
in high spirits with every hope of "a
great victory.
IT took all that Autumn and Winter
to complete the plans Of Land Gen.
Wentworth and Sea Gen. Vernon
Dnh T..
will be exactly 1S4 years on March
of this year, when President Cool
idge is to be inaugurated, since that
grand fleet arrived before Cartagena.
The gorgeous pageant was enough
to have frightened every Spaniard in
the New World into submission.
But somehow - accounts conflict
heroic Old Grog of the sea and Land
Gen. Wentworth managed to turn the
whole affair into a grand fiasco-a
burlesque of battle, but a most hor-
rible and disastrous bu-lesque. The
range of the ships guns was too
short to reach the besieged city; seal
ing ladders for the troops were too
short to reach the battlements, or
were lacking entirely; everything
went wrong that could go wrong
Everybody fought well enough-too
well under the circumstances "a and
tropic diseases.
To make matters worse, rash Old
Grog quarreled with Wentworth on
land and withdrew his ships into the
offing. leaving the troops to win all
the glory by themselves. But there
was no glory in it, only awful defeat
and encouragement.
The troops, or what was left of
them. managed to get back to the
transports in the harbor, which be-
came horribly overcrowded, and dis
ease worked worse ravages there
The dead bodies of their comrades
floating in the waters around the yes
sells did not help to create an atmos-
phere of cheerfulness. Then, on top
of it all, Gen. Wentworth, who had
no good doctors, was so peeved at Old
Grog, who had plenty of good naval
surgeons, that he would not ask for
the loan Of any, and Admiral Vernon
was so stubborn that he would not
lend them without being asked
Tobias Smollett, famous old Eng
lish novelist, has left US a graphic
eyewitness account of the disastrous
attempt in his novel, ''Roderick Ran
dom" Says he:
The necessities of the poor peo-
pie were well known; the remedy was
easy and apparent; but the discord
between the chiefs was inf1amed to
such degree of diabolical rancor.
that the one chose rather to see his
men perish than ask help of the other
who disdained to offer his assistance
unasked, though it might have saved
the lives of his fellow-subjects
4 X
DURING all this affair the 1000
- militiamen ffom Virginia and
Maryland acted with consummated
hyl m
Washington Irving. But 500 of them
were killed or wounded, and the rem
nant had to fight the deadly fevers of
the tropic swamps. Illness brought
despondency to Col. Gooch, who re-
turned to Virginia, leaving Capt
Lawrence Washington, then only 23
years old, in command of the Ameri-
can colonials. Though weakened by
disease and hardships, young Wash
ington stuck it out until 1742, when
he brought the men left in his ill
fated regiment back to their pleasant
homes in Tidewater Virginia and
Maryland.
The experience was enough to MAXI
Lawrence Washington want to set.
tie down. He soon married Anna
Fairfax, daughter of Col. William
Fairfax, whose farm, Be!voir, was ad-
jacent to the Washington farm near
Dogue Greek, on the upper tidewater
Potomac, known as Epsewasson. In
those days this was considered high
up the Potomac" on the very edge of
civilization. Young Washington took
his wife to Epsewasson and renamed
it Mount Vernon out of feeling of
loyalty to his commander
George Washington, younger half
brother of Lawrence, frequently visited
at Mount Vernon, and doubtless listened
to the stories of Lawrence's West Indian
adventures. George eventually inherited