Valley Forge became a hotbed of intrigue and treachery

While at Valley Forge, Washington was in danger of being deposed and replaced as commander in Chief of the Continental Army. This was the reason for all the intrigue and treachery that happened at the time. This also put Washington in a position where he had to fight two wars at once: one against the British in Valley Forge, and one against his own Continental Congress.

Following the Horatio Gate’s astounding defeat of a large British expeditionary force at the Battle of Saratoga in early October 1777, there was a concerted and vicious back-channel effort among a bevy of statesmen led by the Massachusetts congressmen John Adams to demote Washington and install Gates at the head of the army. Gates and his supporters within both Congress and the military were not averse to what the Washington loyalist Alexander Hamilton labeled the “execrable coup d’état.”

To that end, while Washington worked tirelessly to keep his army from either dissolving or perishing at Valley Forge, Gates assiduously worked behind the scenes to undermine him in the field. Only Washington’s superior political instincts, heretofore vastly underrated, allowed him to maintain his position as he deftly outmaneuvered the Gates cabal with a series of actions that rallied an influential faction of statesmen and military officers to his side.