Continental officer and claimant to the
title of Lord Stirling. William was the son of James Alexander (1691–1756), a
prominent New York lawyer, and Mary Sprat Provoost, a merchant. Growing up in
privileged circumstances, he received a good education from his father and
private tutors and became a proficient mathematician and astronomer. He was
associated with his mother in her mercantile business. In 1748, he married
Sarah Livingston, daughter of Philip Livingston, thus securing a close
connection with the wealthy and powerful Livingston family of New Jersey. At
the start of the Seven Years’ War, he joined the military staff of Governor
William Shirley of Massachusetts as his secretary. In addition, he and some
business partners were hired as army contractors during the Niagara campaign of
1755 and 1756. His connections with Shirley proved to be a liability when the
governor failed as a military leader, for Alexander and his partners were
accused of profiteering. In 1756 he accompanied Shirley to London, where he
defended his mentor’s reputation and fought successfully to clear his own name.
Alexander lived in Britain from 1757 to
1761, hobnobbing with land-owning gentlemen and spending money in pursuit of
the lapsed Scots earldom of Stirling. He got the Scots lords to accept his
claim to the title, but not their English counterparts. Undeterred by this
rebuff, he assumed the title, and his American contemporaries thereafter called
him lord Stirling. Upon his return to America, he gave up his previous
occupation of merchant. Building an elegant country house near Basking Ridge,
New Jersey, he lived there with his family in emulation of the English landed
gentry. He dabbled in science, invested in iron mining, speculated in land,
drank to excess, and squandered a fortune of more than £100,000. He served on
the councils of New York and New Jersey and the Board of Proprietors of East
Jersey. He also held the post of governor of King’s College (later Columbia
University). As tensions grew between America and Britain in the 1760s and
1770s, Alexander expressed pro-parliamentary views. On one occasion he even
urged the Board of Trade to tighten its enforcement of navigation and tax laws
in the colonies.
When the war with Britain began in 1775,
however, Lord Stirling quickly declared for America and never wavered
thereafter. The royal governors of New York (William Tryon) and New Jersey
(William Franklin) removed him from their councils. He was appointed a member
of the extralegal Council of Safety in New Jersey, and on 1 November 1775 was
commissioned as a colonel of the First New Jersey Regiment. He assisted in the
seizure of an armed British transport, the Blue Mountain Valley, on 25 January
1776, and was rewarded with promotion to brigadier general on 1 March. Assuming
command at New York City, he directed the construction of defensive works in
preparation for a threatened British invasion. In April he welcomed General
George Washington to the city, and soon developed a congenial association with
the commander in chief. He confronted his first big test as a military leader
on 27 August 1776, when Washington gave him command of the American right wing
in the battle of Long Island. Through no fault of his own, his brigade was
overwhelmed and he was captured.
Stirling was included in a prisoner
exchange on 6 October 1776. Rejoining Washington’s army on Manhattan, he was
given command of another brigade. He operated in a semi-independent command
over the next two weeks, retreating with the rest of the American army to White
Plains, New York. There, on 28 October, he participated in a pitched battle
before joining in a fighting withdrawal across New Jersey in November and
December. At Trenton on 26 December he played a major role in the defeat of a
Hessian garrison commanded by Colonel Johann Räll. On 19 February 1777 he was one of five American officers
promoted to major general. He took up his post with his division near Metuchen,
New Jersey, on 24 June. Two days later he was assaulted by a superior enemy
force commanded by Lord Charles Cornwallis and was given a severe mauling
before he extricated himself from his dangerously exposed position. Retaining
Washington’s confidence, he served in the Hudson Highlands for a short time
before rejoining the main army and marching into Pennsylvania. He commanded
well in the battle of Brandywine on 11 September, rushing his division to the
support of John Sullivan when Sullivan was attacked near the Birmingham Meeting
House. In the battle of Germantown on 4 October, Stirling’s division was in the
thick of the fight.
After spending the winter of 1777 and 1778
at Valley Forge, Stirling accompanied the American army in mid-June 1778 as it
followed the British forces withdrawing from Philadelphia across New Jersey. In
the battle of Monmouth on 28 June he played a key role in the American victory
by deploying cannon to good effect in the third and final line of defense. For
almost two hours, he cannonaded the enemy, with the British reciprocating in
kind. Breaking up a British infantry advance, he then ordered his own men to
assault the enemy’s right flank. As the redcoats broke into flight, he wisely
ordered his soldiers not to press the pursuit. From 4 July to 12 August he
presided over the court martial of Charles Lee, who was subsequently suspended
from the army for one year. In the summer of 1779 he assisted Major Henry Lee
in the latter’s brilliant assault on Paulus Hook, New Jersey. On January 14 and
15, 1780, he led a mismanaged, abortive raid on Staten Island during a period
of cruelly cold weather. Later that year he served on a board of general
officers that inquired into the activities of John Andre´.
Given an independent command at Albany in
1781, Stirling prepared to defend Fort Ticonderoga from a possible British attack.
No attack materialized, and his duties were easy. He died of a virulent and
painful attack of gout on 15 January 1783. Although not a brilliant soldier, he
was loyal, trustworthy, reliable, and brave. His loss was mourned by
Washington, his fellow officers, and his family.
BIBLIOGRAPHY Duer, William Alexander. The Life of William Alexander, Earl of
Stirling: Major General in the Army of the United States, during the
Revolution. New York: Wiley and Putnam, 1847. Nelson, Paul David. William
Alexander, Lord Stirling. University, Ala.: University of Alabama Press, 1987.
Schumacher, Ludwig. Major-General the Earl of Stirling: An Essay in Biography.
New York: New Amsterdam, 1897. Valentine, Alan. Lord Stirling. New York: Oxford
University Press, 1969.
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