Friedrich Wilhelm von Steuben
Baron von Steuben was a Prussian military officer who attained the rank of captain while serving in the army of Frederick the Great. During his service in the Seven Years War he was twice wounded, taken prisoner by the Russians, exchanged and eventually became a member of the King’s staff. While serving Frederick as an aide-de-camp he was part of a class of young officers who received direct instruction in discipline and tactics from the King.
In 1777 von Steuben fled rumors of his homosexuality – then illegal in Prussia – to Paris where he met with Benjamin Franklin. Franklin immediately realized the value of an officer familiar with Prussian military discipline to the American cause and sent him to Washington bearing a letter of introduction which exaggerated the Prussian’s military rank and experience. Franklin ignored the rumors about von Steuben which were rampant in Paris.
Baron von Steuben rapidly proved to be a godsend to the fledging American army encamped for the winter at Valley Forge. The general presented numerous flamboyant idiosyncrasies which endeared him to the American troops, including the wearing of enormous pistols in his uniform sash, cursing in a multitude of foreign languages, all the while being constantly followed by an enormous Italian Greyhound named Azor.
The Baron is remembered for having taught the American army military discipline at Valley Forge, but he did far more than that. Von Steuben established health and sanitary regulations which contributed greatly to the army’s well-being. He rewrote the British manual of arms which had been the basis of the American’s drill, eliminating what he believed to be redundant steps, and under his tutelage the American infantry learned to fire, reload, and fire again faster than their British opponents. When French bayonets began to arrive in the camp he taught the Americans how to use that fearsome weapon in combat.
Baron Von Steuben served in the Virginia campaign and was present at Yorktown, but his services in the field paled compared to his role in the creation of an American Army. He created professional soldiers out of the formerly reticent troops, to the degree that only a short time later the American troops captured a British emplacement at Stony Point using bayonets alone, a clear demonstration that they were the equal of the British and Hessian troops they were fighting. After the troops he had trained fought the British to a standstill in a pitched battle at Monmouth, the northern British army retired to New York, declining battle for the rest of the war. After the war von Steuben remained in America until his death at his home in upstate New York in 1794. His estate was absorbed into the town of Steuben, named in his honor.