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On this day in 1777, months before Valley Forge became the sacred name we all know, the frozen crucible where Washington's army suffered and was reborn, it was just a supply depot, and the British burned it. And the two American officers who barely escaped that raid were a pair of 20-somethings named Alexander Hamilton and Henry "Light-Horse Harry" Lee. The context was grim. A week earlier the British had beaten Washington at Brandywine, and now General Howe's army was loose in Pennsylvania, driving on Philadelphia, the American capital. The Continental Congress had to pack up and flee the city ahead of the enemy. And the Americans had a small but valuable supply magazine at a place called Valley Forge, on the Schuylkill River, stocked with flour, grain, tools, and iron goods from the local forge. Washington sent men to save those supplies before the British could grab them. The officers given that dangerous job were two of the most talented young men in the army. One was Alexander Hamilton, Washington's brilliant 22-year-old aide, the future architect of American finance. The other was Henry Lee, a dashing young cavalry officer who would become one of the war's great partisan leaders and, decades later, the father of Robert E. Lee. On September 18, they were down at Valley Forge scrambling to load supplies onto boats and haul them to safety when the enemy came. It was the Hessians, German troops in British service under General von Knyphausen, and they arrived faster than expected. Suddenly Hamilton and Lee were nearly trapped. In the scramble to escape, Hamilton and a few men leaped into a flat-bottomed boat on the river to get away, while Lee and others made a run for it on horseback. The enemy opened fire. Bullets tore into the boat, killing and wounding men right beside Hamilton and holing the craft. It was a genuinely close call, one of several times in the war that the young man who would shape the nation's future nearly did not survive its present. Both officers got out, but only barely. The supplies were not so lucky. The Hessians seized the magazine and burned it, carrying off or destroying everything the Americans had failed to evacuate. It was one more loss in a stretch of the war that was nearly all losses. Within days the British would occupy Philadelphia itself, and Congress would be governing a country from exile in a small Pennsylvania town. And here is the strange, poignant thread that makes September 18 worth remembering. This grim little raid on an obscure supply depot is our first real introduction to Valley Forge, and it is a scene of American failure and narrow escape. Just three months later, Washington would march his beaten, freezing army to that very same ground to make winter camp, and the name Valley Forge would be transformed forever, from the place where the British burned the magazine into the place where the Continental Army, against all odds, endured, drilled, and emerged in the spring as a real fighting force. The war has a way of returning to the same ground with the meaning completely changed.

1/ The executive director of @GWBooks, @lmchervinsky, shares how John Quincy Adams’ years as a diplomat shaped his influence on future presidents’ approach to foreign policy in this short by @RetroReport, based on @InPursuitUSA, for @PBS. In Pursuit: Lessons of American Leadership is a new documentary special produced by @RetroReport, based on @InPursuitUSA by More Perfect. It brings the leadership lessons of American presidents and first ladies to life for America’s 250th anniversary. Tune in Oct. 27 at 10/9c (check local listings) on @PBS to learn more: retroreport.org/articles/in-…