The Army Of Two

America has produced some tough folks, people like Wyatt Earp, John Henry, Mike Tyson, Chuck Norris, LT, Sasha Banks, Batman... 

However, none of them turned back 200 of the world's best Marines. I'm not sure if Sergeant York can claim those kind of stripes, or even Captain America. In even his silliest movie, Arnold Schwarzenegger didn't try to sell himself as being capable of taking on 200 elite Marines.

So, naturally, this feat was performed by two young girls from Scituate. They were unarmed, of course. They had no backup, and may have been raped or even hung as spies if they lost. As is generally the case when two girls decide to make a stand against 200 Marines, they used Fear as their weapon.

The War of 1812 was very unpopular in New England, and we discussed seceding from the US over it long before the Confederacy made it fashionable. This meant little to the British, other than an opportunity to perhaps drive New England out of the war if they made life hard enough for them.

Understand that Massachusetts was the first colony to send the Brits packing in the Revolution. We had already attacked British soil in Canada. The British had been chased with their tails between their legs from Marshfield, one town to the south, in the previous squabble almost 40 years earlier. There was no love lost, and the British Navy wasn't going to use the kid gloves when they decided to send a raiding party ashore in Scituate, Massachusetts.

Her Royal Navy spent quite some time smashing up Massachusetts ports. We were known as a haven for pirates/privateers, Falmouth, New Bedford and Wareham were torn to shreds by the British Navy in this war, and they had already whipped up on Scituate a few times. Scituate had ships stolen and burned. The British had shown up off of her shores in the summer of 1814, demanding provisions under the threat of more ill treatment.

The local militia assembled, and the British never came ashore. They never went away either, but the militia did. The Brits heard about this (Marshfield was heavily Loyalist when the Revolution started, and some holdovers may have been giving information to the Limey sailors) and prepared to pay Scituate back for not providing the provisions.

Keep in mind, the scholarship of this story is limited, and really good superhero stories tend to grow with time. This is especially true in areas with lots of fishermen. We're just going to give you the basic legend, and leave all of that further-study stuff to the reader.

In September of 1814, the British Navy made their move on Scituate. A ship, La Hogue, dropped anchor about a mile off of Scituate Harbor. They loaded the barges with Marines and started rowing towards the town. They had raided Scituate three times before, but had never come ashore, limiting themselves to burning/stealing ships. This time, they were coming to burn the town.

They chose a stealth approach, rowing towards isolated Old Scituate Light. Their luck was better than they could have hoped, as the lighthouse keeper (Simeon Bates) was away with most of his family. Only his wife and two daughters stayed at the station, and they were the first to see this less-musical British Invasion coming.

Rebecca and Abigail Bates were no weak sisters, however. They knew that the militia had dispersed, and that there was no way to get them assembled before Scituate was set aflame. Their home, a very valuable lighthouse that treacherous local shipping was dependent on, was probably the first thing that would be set aflame when John Bull got the matches out. They would also be the first young girls that 200 marauding sailors would get their hands on after a long time at sea.

There then commenced what I would say may have been the coolest teen-girl chattering that ever happened in America (I'm thinking hard on this, and can't get past 90210), and the two sisters decided that the British raid would be getting no further than them.

They chose an Audio defense. Grabbing a fife and drum, they hid behind a dune and started making a racket. History disagrees on who was playing what instrument, but they played loudly as they walked back and forth behind the dunes. Maybe they snuck a peek over the dunes now and then, or maybe they just put their heads down and had faith in the plan.

We do know that they played "Yankee Doodle" over and over.

As the Brits got closer to shore, there were five sounds they could hear. One was the ocean, one was the rowing, one was their officers' exhortations... and the other two were a fife and drum. Fifes and drums meant "Militia."

Two hundred British marines (I am making that number up based on a force that they used for a similar attack on Wareham) are nothing to trifle with, but even they couldn't stand up to what could be 1000-1500 men, all familiar with the territory, all crack shots who have to shoot their own supper a lot and who have had months to prepare for just such a siege. The British turned around and ran like scalded dogs. OK, they were in a boat, so they didn't technically run, but I don't have a metaphor for Rowing. "They had to Row like Versus Wade".... OK, I have nothing.

Exact records for the Battle of Scituate are hard to find. The girls both lived to old age, and would tell their story for anyone who'd pay a dime to hear it. Stories may get embellished that way. It's tough for a skeptic to debate a living, breathing Primary Source.

Likewise, the British have no record of the encounter. Very few men who wanted to advance in Her Majesty's Navy (I don't know if they had a Queen at the time, I just like saying "Her Majesty's Navy") reported back to the crown that "Well, your Majesty, we were going to burn Scituate, but my 200 toughest Marines got scared off by a couple of teenyboppers pretending to be Jethro Tull." Career suicide.

(Editor: References to the aborted raid on Scituate exist in the journals of some British officers)

American soldiers have been in some tough spots. Little Round Top was defended by a bayonet charge against an enemy who had guns. The Battle of the Bulge had Americans surrounded in a snowstorm by Hitler's best troops. The Minutemen gathered on a town square and stood toe-to-toe with the world's best light infantry..

The Bates Sisters have them all beat. Two unarmed girls went to war against a veritable boatload of British Marines. I wouldn't touch those odds with a six and a half foot Pole, and neither would Rob Gronkowski. It matters not... the girls ended the day in possession of the battlefield.

The Bates sisters and their victory were not lost on military historians. General John Magruder used similar deceptions in Virginia during the Civil War. It even came full circle, with the Chinese using whistles to intimidate when attacking Americans in the Korean War. Some even say that the Vietcong used a similar strategy at Khe Sanh.

The Bates sisters did it better, though... and they have a sign to prove it.

Music hath charms...