Susan reports: Any group of males can soon get into mischief when under-occupied, whether it's a Little League baseball team or a military army.
General George Washington discovered this (doubtless not for the first time, either) in the summer of 1775. While some of his soldiers were usefully engaged in attacking British shipping sailing in and out of Boston Harbor, other Continental soldiers had found a more entertaining way to amuse themselves during the hot August days. While the soldiers were permitted to use the Charles River for bathing, washing, fishing, and general recreation, matters appear to have gone a bit further, as this quote from General Washington's orders for the day reflect:
The General does not mean to discourage the practice of bathing whilst the weather is warm enough to continue it, but he expressly forbids any person's doing it at or near the bridge in Cambridge, where it has been observed and complained of that many men, lost to all sense of decency and common modesty, are running about naked upon the bridge, while passengers, and even ladies of the first fashion of the neighborhood, are passing over it, as if [these men] meant to glory in their shame. The guard and sentries at the bridge are to put a stop to this practice, for the future.
The 1811 print Portsmouth Point, above, by Thomas Rowlandson shows the general shenanigans of English sailors on shore leave. A different continent and a different century, but the spirit seems much the same.
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