They “… fought bravely, but were unfortunate:”

By the end of March 1778, enough slaves had been recruited to begin the process of military training. On March 27, 1778, Sergeant Greenman recorded in his diary at Providence, “this morn [morning] we peraded [paraded] our Slaves for to march to Grinage [East Greenwich].” East Greenwich, Rhode Island on the western shore of Narragansett Bay was near the Warwick home of Colonel Christopher Greene, the commander of the new “Black Regiment.” With its proximity to the bay and to the main land route to the west through Connecticut, East Greenwich offered a good location to train the new recruits and respond to any raiding activity by British and Tory naval and privateer forces operating out of Newport. On March 28, 1778, Colonel Greene posted an order in the Providence Gazette for all officers and sergeants of the First and Second Rhode Island Regiments to meet the following week at Major William Arnold’s house in East Greenwich in order to produce returns of their respective recruits and to account for the money they received for the recruiting service. In early April 1778, the recruits of the “Black Regiment” were already conducting organized guard patrols to the Narragansett Bay shore. Sergeant Jeremiah Greenman helped lead a guard patrol of black soldiers on April 14, 1778: “Continuing in Grinage exersis[ing] our Recrutes, thick Clowdy Wether, in ye after part of the day turn’d out our black [troops], rec’d sum orders picked out a guard of 20 men and a sub. [subaltern officer] then march down to Quidneset ware we made a guard house [out] of a dweling house half a mild from ye Shore ware we set 5 Sentinals, at day Light took off our Sentinals, march[t] up to Grinag.” While the recruits of the “Black Regiment” were being trained at East Greenwich, Rhode Island, the surviving veteran soldiers of Colonel Angell’s Rhode Island Continental Line were receiving instruction of a different sort at Valley Forge. Baron Frederick von Steuben arrived at Valley Forge on February 23, 1778. The Baron had served as a Prussian officer in the army of Frederick the Great, including company-level field and staff officer positions. Von Steuben had combat experience with the Prussian Army, fighting at the Battles of Prague, Rossbach, and Kunersdorf in the Seven Years War. He was wounded at the Battles of Prague and Kunersdorf. Later in the Seven Years War, Baron von Steuben became an aide-de-camp on Frederick the Great’s personal staff doing duty in the Quartermaster General’s office; he also served as temporary commander of an infantry regiment. With all of his field and staff officer experience in the Prussian Army, Von Steuben had become an expert at military organization, discipline, and logistics. After the close of the Seven Years War, the Baron quit the service of the Prussian Army and served in various royal courts in Germany as a staff officer and military advisor. At the start of the American Revolution, a great number of european officers petitioned American representatives in France to serve in the American Revolution. While a significant percentage of these officers would return to Europe after only a year or two of war in America, some of the european officers served in important positions in the American Army through the end of the war, making critical contributions to the American war effort. The most notable example of a successful european officer serving in the American Army was the Marquis de Lafayette. Baron von Steuben eventually sailed to America after meeting covertly with French Foreign Ministry and military officials, including the Count de Vergennes, the French Minister of Foreign Affairs, and the American envoys to the French Court, including Benjamin Franklin. Baron von Steuben was given the title of Temporary Inspector to the Grand American Army by General Washington, and in early March 1778 he set about bringing serious organization and discipline to the American Army. Loosely based on the structure and regulations of the British Army, the American Army under General Washington in early 1778 was a disaster in terms of its military organization, discipline, drilling, logistics, and finance. Each Continental regiment of infantry in Washington’s Grand Army at Valley Forge had drastically different numbers of men, various methods of drill and discipline, and dissimilar guard rules. Muster rolls of actual company strength often had many errors and military equipment, including muskets and bayonets, were frequently rusty and in poor condition. Von Steuben remembered: I found here [Valley Forge] neither rules, nor regulations, nor system, nor minister at war, nor pardon, nor reward. The inspector general in Prussia and France has nothing whatever to do with the money department; here it was necessary that he or some one [sic, someone] else should take charge of it. This mysterious department was a mere farce. The war commissary in France examines the books and accounts of the different regiments and companies; here, there were no books and no accounts, and consequently no one to examine them.