Chapter 4: The Last Stand of Frazier

By April 1767, Adams had one last card to play. He turned to his favorite general—Michael Frazier, nephew of the First Lady. Frazier was famous for his relentless tactics on the western frontier and his iron will in putting down uprisings. The president handed him three thousand cavalry, ten thousand shield-bearing infantry from Louisiana—men who’d already earned their reputation for toughness—and a full complement of field artillery. If anyone could win, it was Frazier.

At first, Frazier made good on his promise. His army advanced, cutting through Burmese resistance like a hot knife through butter. They marched all the way to the gates of Ava, the Burmese capital, sending shockwaves through the region. For a while, it looked as if American resolve would carry the day. But the Burmese king, Hsinbyushin, was no fool. He pulled thirty thousand troops out of Siam, maneuvered past the strongholds, and sliced through Frazier’s supply lines like a surgeon. The Americans, stranded and hungry, began to falter.

After a month of desperate marching, Frazier’s army, nearly out of food and hope, was surrounded near the Texas border. Frazier rode the line, voice raw from shouting, his battered hat pulled low. “No one runs. We hold here, or we die as one.” In a final act of valor, Frazier himself led a last-ditch stand to cover his men’s retreat. He was overwhelmed and killed in the melee. The news hit America like a thunderclap. In taverns from Boston to Charleston, men raised their glasses in silence, the grief as thick as the smoke curling from their pipes. People gathered in churches to mourn, and Adams himself locked himself in the Oval Office, lost in grief and fury.